“You didn’t deny it, either,” Ian said flatly, and something about the bleakness in his voice shook Trisha almost as much as the thought of what she had done.
“No,” she replied. “I know that. I can take my medicine like a big girl and admit that I didn’t object, but…but…”
Words failed her in trying to pin down why exactly this was so wrong.
“Have you ever been attracted to anyone like this?” Ger asked quietly.
A rainstorm of thoughts came down in her head. She was a psychologist for Christ’s sake! It shouldn’t be hard to diagnose the root of the problem here. And yet, she had to work with one of these brothers. And then, she felt her heart tugged by the tenderness of the other. And then, she felt the heat and exhilarating rush of sparring with Ian. And then, she felt the melty femininity Ger made her feel. Was she starved for sex? Companionship? Where did this come from? Why was it surfacing now?
She became aware of them waiting for her response, and that sparked a whole new controversy in her head about how to respond. Blow them off? Threaten them with charges? Say nothing and give in for a few days of mind-blowing sex? Be honest?
“I…I don’t think I’ve ever reacted so strongly so quickly before,” she finally admitted, opting for honesty or at least a measure of it.
“Trisha,” Ger said, moving to stand before her and wrap his arms around her waist. “The same goes for us.”
She glanced over at Ian, who was now leaning against the dresser, arms crossed and one foot crossed over the other. His expression was grim and closed off. She doubted he felt the same way as Ger. She turned back to Ger, feeling the sweet emotional tug as she lost herself in his eyes. His arms tightened around her, and his muscles shot awareness into her system of just how much of a man he was. A real man. A man who worked with his hands, saw truth with his eyes, and had no fear of a hotheaded woman. This was a guy who could make a woman feel sexy and beloved at the same time.
He smiled down at her, and her heart flipped like a pancake.
“Take a chance, Trisha Blacke,” he said with a grin, lowering his head to skim his nose along her jaw, as if to take in her scent. “You won’t regret it.”
Unbelievably, another wave of lust shuddered through her body. Her head fell to the side, and she caught sight of the gruesome spread on her bed. She stiffened, all desire falling to ash.
She backed out of Ger’s arms and shook her head.
“Ger, I’d…I can’t…I have a job to do here.” God, her words sounded so lame, just like romance novel heroines turning down the hero for the best reasons that turned out to be stupid in the end. But, this wasn’t a romance novel. This was real. This was life. There were consequences to actions.
“I have to catch this guy,” she said, straightening up. “I can’t do anything or think of anything else before I find him. This isn’t a game I can decide to skip a turn in. This is all or nothing.”
Ger’s face grew deeply serious, and he nodded.
“You do what you need to do, Trisha,” he said. “We can wait.”
She glanced over at Ian, who looked as cold and closed-off as before, giving no indication how much of the “we” he was.
“Good night, love,” Ger said, kissing her forehead and caressing her hair. “Get some sleep.”
“Good night,” she replied, looking from Ger to Ian, who simply nodded at her and followed his brother out the door.
She sat down on the edge of the bed, blinked, and wondered just what the hell had happened?
Chapter 6
“Morning, Trisha,” Ian said calmly as Trisha walked into the conference room that was her temporary office. He watched her anxiously, though he worked hard to keep a neutral expression on his face.
“Hey, McDade,” she replied coolly, barely glancing at him.
His heart fell at her dismissive demeanor. He had been afraid of this. It didn’t take a profiler to know that prickly, emotionally closed-off Trisha Blacke wasn’t going to just roll with the punches and embrace what had happened between them last night. Hell, he wasn’t sure how he felt about last night except that his body was on fire for her now. He didn’t have Ger’s certainty about this woman, but he could acknowledge that he’d never felt as intensely turned on by anyone in his life.
She shook off her coat and started to set up her laptop, pulling out file folders and arranging them in distinct and organized piles. Only the barest hint of tension in the line of her shoulders and the corners of her mouth let him know that she was not as unaffected by his presence as she wanted him to believe.
“I’d like to go look at the last dump site today,” she said, finally glancing up and looking him straight in the eye. “I also want to go into Blue Moon and take a look around.”
“You still stuck on the Blue Moon idea?” Ian pretended to scoff, personal disappointment mixing with professional dread and making a tight knot of stress in his gut.
“Yes, I am, and frankly, I’m rather intrigued as to why you’re not?”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“You’re so dead set against even considering Blue Moon as a triangulation point for the killer’s home base. Why is that? What’s in Blue Moon that you’re so damned eager to protect? Or maybe, I should be asking who is in Blue Moon that you’re protecting?”
Ian stared at her, feeling his eyes narrow as her words hit every nerve he had. Yes, he was protecting Blue Moon. He was protecting every damn person in that town. Why was she acting like this? If she had been personally angry at him for last night, that was one thing, but to still be professionally confrontational? That was just infuriating! He wanted to slam her against a wall and fuck her senseless, or at least fuck some sense into her for her own good.
Whoa. He had to get control of this raging, red-hot need he felt every time he looked at her before it got in the way of everything. The odd thing was that he wasn’t even sure fucking her would get rid of the feeling that was under his skin.
“Fine,” he snapped. “I’ll take you for breakfast in Blue Moon.”
“Wow, you must get all the girls with that,” Trisha snapped back, then stopped, looking frozen and embarrassed as the implications of her words sank in.
Ian grinned lasciviously at her, relishing her unease.
“Why, Agent Blacke,” he replied innocently, grinning all the while. “I have no idea what you mean.”
She turned to the desk but glared back at him over her shoulder, and he felt his mouth go dry at the fierce loveliness of her blue eyes and porcelain skin, the fiery waves of her hair tamed into a low ponytail that spilled down her back.
His gaze hungrily devoured the slender slope of her shoulder and back, the slight curve and weight of a breast, the tiny waist and round hips with legs that wouldn’t quit, even encased in jeans and hiking boots.
He was lost in the thought of burying his aching cock in her sweet, soft pussy and feeling her fire as she scratched her nails down his back as she came calling his name over and over. He saw himself rocking her underneath him with his body, sucking her breasts and biting her lips, fighting her to orgasm after orgasm.
He looked up to see her looking back at him, her eyes dark and dazed. He watched spellbound as she licked her lips with the tip of her pink tongue. He wanted to sweep her into his arms and suck on that tongue until her knees buckled.
“Ready, Blacke?” he asked, his voice raw from desire.
Trisha nodded dazedly, and he found himself wishing he knew just what she was ready for.
* * * *
It was exactly thirty-two minutes into Blue Moon once they hit State Road 73.
Trisha alternately watched the clock on the cruiser’s console and gazed out at the seemingly endless lines of dense, snow-laden pines. Ugly brown slush piled along the sides of the road, but every now and then, the woods opened up to give a glimpse of steel-gray ocean and unforgiving icy rocks.
As far as Trisha was concerned, watching clocks and trees was the best option
. Conversation with Ian was not a good idea, not when her brain automatically went to images of him ripping off her shirt and grabbing handfuls of her hair as he smashed kisses against her throat. Yeah, that was the sort of thing that had gotten her in trouble last night.
Oh God, last night. No. No, she wouldn’t think about it or the way it felt to have two men kissing and touching her.
Nope, not thinking about it.
She watched keenly as Ian pulled up to a corner that was landmarked by a red general store, a white clapboard church, a cafe, and a library. The buildings all looked old and weathered. Several beat-up pickup trucks were parked in front of the general store. Great banks of snow formed formidable walls around the building.
“Here we are,” Ian announced, pulling into a parking spot at the general store. “Blue Moon, Maine.”
“I see,” Trisha replied softly, allowing herself to slip into the place in her head where she could tap into a wider awareness of everything.
She followed Ian into the general store, listening to the crunching of the hard, crusty snow under their boots. The store itself was an old wooden building painted in a faded red. Everything seemed a little dilapidated about it, from the rickety springs of the screen door to the old-fashioned gas pumps without credit card swipes.
Inside, the linoleum floor was wet with the muddy melted snow tracked in from the outside.
“No ‘caution floor wet’ sign?” she muttered to herself, but it seemed that Ian had heard her.
“People around here aren’t stupid,” he replied back over his shoulder with a crooked grin. “We know that if a floor is wet, it’s slippery. A sign isn’t going to change that.”
Trisha’s lips twitched in an almost-smile, and she fought back the desire to throw him up against one of the shelves lined with canned soup, biscuit mix, and potato chips, kiss him until he couldn’t breathe, and have him lift her up and impale her on his cock. She could see it, the shushing sound of blue jeans against each other, the rattling of the cans, the bite of the cheap metal shelves in her back as he turned her around so that she was braced by the boxes of Minute Rice. His cock would be big, hard, with veins and a ridge around the crown that would scrape the inside of her pussy, firing nerves that made her nipples shiver and churned the hunger in the pit of her belly for him.
“Earth to Agent Blacke?”
Trisha started out of her reverie, and for one agonizing moment, she realized her cheeks were burning hot, her eyes had been glazed over, and her lips were hanging open ever so slightly. With a deep, shaky breath, she pulled herself together and turned to Ian, pulling a frown onto her face to hide the fact she now realized her panties were sodden with her desire.
“Right,” she said crisply. “So, where’s breakfast?”
“Here,” Ian replied, waving his hand at a small case of homemade donuts and other breakfast breads. “Hey, Al, how about some coffee for your local law enforcement?”
Trisha looked over as a tall bear of a man came out from the back to behind the counter. The man—Al, she supposed—wore a black-and-red flannel shirt. He looked as if he must have been at least six four, and she got the impression of a Santa Claus who was a mix between a body builder and a cowboy. Al was older, with white hair, but he was still all man.
“Even the police have to obey the law around here, McDade,” Al said with the suspicion of a chuckle in his voice. “You want coffee, you buy it. I run a business, not a charity.”
“Oh, now don’t listen to him,” said a woman coming to join him behind the counter. “Big Al’s always complaining no one pays for their coffee, and he’s the one handing it out right, left, and center!”
“Woman!” Al exclaimed. “I don’t do nuthin’ of the sort.”
“He’s just trying to impress the pretty FBI agent,” the woman said, winking at Ian. She then turned to Trisha. “I’m Cookie Boyer. My husband owns this store, but don’t take that too seriously, eh?”
The woman’s ease of manner coaxed a smile out of Trisha finally. Cookie was taller than she, but not by much. She wore an old cream knit sweater and a parka vest, and her choice of work footwear was a battered pair of L.L. Bean boots. Her skin had the permanent tan of someone who had lived in sun and wind, and her hair was bleached an unbelievable shade of golden yellow. Still, there was something undeniably attractive about her.
Al harrumphed and handed two paper cups of coffee to Ian. He smiled at Trisha, but she noticed that he was watching her intensely, as if trying to profile her in his own way.
“So,” Al said finally. “You’re here about the Butcher of Bangor.”
It wasn’t a question. It was a statement.
“News travels fast,” Trisha replied with a statement of her own, raising one eyebrow. Two could play at the blank brinksmanship of who would give up the first piece of information.
“Small town,” he said, his smile widening a fraction.
“Small towns,” she corrected. Why was she acting like this? This whole trip felt like a hostile interrogation to her, and she had been on her guard from the first. Or was it her? Maybe she was picking up and reflecting back a hostility that was already there.
“Elkville, too, eh?”
“Basic triangulation,” Trisha answered with a shrug.
“Al, you’re not gonna get anything out of her,” Ian said. “She’s not the giving type.”
Ouch. Another pinprick. Well, maybe she had started it or kept it escalated or whatever, but something was setting her back up now.
“You boys are terrible,” Cookie intruded, putting a couple of donuts in tissue paper and a paper bag. “We need her to get this beast!”
What was that? Trisha’s instincts went on high alert at the unconscious, involuntary way both men suddenly jerked infinitesimally. Someone else not trained in observing body language would have missed it, but there was the stiffening, and…wait for it…yes, there was Big Al’s lightning quick glance down and to the left before he looked back up and laughed. Down and to the left. Lying or something to hide.
“You think you can do it?” he asked Trisha.
“I know I can,” she replied with a cool confidence that was real and bone deep to her. “He’s making mistakes now. It’s just a matter of time.”
Crash!
She jumped, her heart in her throat and the painful spikes of adrenaline pumping into her nerves. She spun around to find a short, mousy man in the aisle behind her, cans of tuna fish and cat food littered at his feet, and the flash of an agonized expression on his face.
“Hey, Perk,” Ian said, the first of them to recover. “You gave us all a scare there.”
Trisha watched in fascination as the man, already small and somewhat weedy despite a growing paunch, seemed to shrink back into himself. He looked down and gave a nervous, sheepish smile.
“Sorry, Ian,” he replied in a nondescript voice that Trisha found odd to listen to because it was so bland, it would be hard to remember. “Guess I’m just upset and nervous like everyone else around here about that killer.”
“I don’t think you have to worry, sir,” Trisha said, picking her words carefully and studying him behind a mask of bland, condescending amusement. “My killer only targets small women. I think you’re safe.”
“Small women like you?” Perk whispered with a strange, ferret-like glance at her.
“Exactly,” Trisha laughed heartily, though inside, her brain was racing madly. “I got assigned this case because I fit the victimology precisely.”
The man stared at her as if she was speaking gibberish, and she realized that she was using her fancy vocabulary again.
“Well,” Ian said drily, interrupting her. “If he ever gets close enough to catch you, I’m pretty sure you’ll cut him down to size before he knows what’s happening.”
Trisha was hardly listening. Her whole focus was fixed on the small man, this Perk, in front of her. Her brain was feverishly computing his appearance, his clothing, his height and weight, his mannerism
s, words, behavior, and responses. He was tittering nervously at Ian’s joke, then seemed to realize all the cans were still at his feet. He bent over to pick them up, and a pen and grimy scrap of paper fell out of his shirt pocket from where his coat was unzipped.
In a quick movement, Trisha had picked them up and was handing them back to Perk. She was shocked to see his face had turned bright red and his watery eyes were boiling hot with rage.
“Here you go,” she said sweetly, unleashing a smile on him. “Didn’t want your paper to get wet on the floor and smudge.”
“Thanks,” the man mumbled and fumbled past her to put his cans on the counter. “Just gotta get a few more things,” he said to Big Al, who nodded absently.
“Well, I guess that’s—” Ian started to say, but Trisha cut him off.
“Actually,” she said, turning to Cookie. “We’re going to be out in the woods today. Do you sell any of those hand warmer packs that skiers use?”
“The woods?” Cookie exclaimed.
“I need to go to the latest dump site.”
“Blacke?” Ian murmured confusedly. Trisha wasn’t about to tell him why she was advertising to the whole store exactly where she was going, but her instincts were buzzing like mosquitoes at a summer picnic.
“That’s going to be a hike, dear,” Cookie replied, her eyes flicking back and forth between Ian and Trisha. “Let’s get you some things. At least some sandwiches and granola bars and such to carry with you. Ian, what do you want for your sandwich?”
Trisha couldn’t say for sure, but she was willing to bet good money that Cookie had somehow picked up on the fact that she wanted Ian distracted so she could wander about and observe Perk. She turned to walk down the aisle he was in when the door to the store opened and a gust of icy air blew in, clean and fresh.
She looked up and saw Ger, all tall and handsome, cold and golden. She felt a frisson of dread when she realized he hadn’t noticed her because he was looking straight at Perk.
Blacke and Blue Page 5
