Livy watched him with the child.
For the whole nine months, she worried he wouldn’t love her. She stressed that Gabe wouldn’t be able to connect with the child on some emotional level.
“I’m going to spoil you rotten. Whatever you want, you and your mommy are going to have. In fact, I want more kids. I want you never to be alone. I want you to have so many siblings you go crazy.”
He gave her gentle kisses on her tiny tipped up nose. “You are so beautiful like your mother.”
Livy began sobbing.
Gabe asked the nurses to leave.
As soon as they were gone, it was time to have a heart to heart with his wife.
It was a long time coming.
“We have this, Olivia. She’s my child. You don’t have to worry about it. When I look at her, I don’t see him. She looks like you, honey. She’s our daughter.”
“Oh God! I dreaded this day. Now I feel horrible that I didn’t enjoy the process.”
He was aware.
The nursery was done, but barely.
Livy had PTSD, and he knew it. She was damaged from the rape, and finally, she was seeing it.
“When we get home, I want you to enjoy these moments. She’s ours, Olivia. She’s not his. She came from my wife, born with my name. He may have donated the sperm, but I’m going to raise her. That makes me her father—not him.”
He wrapped his arm around her as he cuddled their child. Gabe let Livy cry it out.
Sometimes, it was the best medicine.
When she was done, she wiped her eyes.
“Can I hold Amelia?” she asked.
He smiled. “Yeah, you can.”
Gently, he gave her the baby. She began fussing in her arms. Livy looked panicked. “She doesn’t like me.”
He smiled at her. “She is my child. She’s looking for breasts.”
She stared at him. “What?”
“She wants to comfort herself. I read all about it. Her first instinct is to suckle. Put her to your breast, and watch the miracle of natural instinct.”
Olivia was surprised. She didn’t know he had been doing research. He hadn’t said a word. Then again, she wasn’t exactly approachable.
She’d shut herself off from him, the child growing in her, and Elizabeth.
“I read everything available.”
It was true.
In his office, at the Hoover building, he’d read about breastfeeding and everything else he could get his hands on the last nine months.
Gabe helped her put their child to her breast.
She latched right on, and the baby settled down.
Livy ran her fingers over Amelia’s soft skin. “She’s pretty, isn’t she?”
He laughed. “She’s gorgeous. Now I have to keep the males away from both my girls. I hope we have some boys next. They’ll help me defend the damsels in the castle.”
She grinned. “Okay. I’m up for more babies.”
He dropped a kiss onto the crown of her head.
Yeah, so was he.
A house full of them.
* * * E l i z a b e t h L a R u e * * *
He hated watching the news.
Their deaths were all over it. In fact, it was going national, and that pissed him off. What he wanted was to lay low. He didn’t want the media talking about what he was doing, and he certainly didn’t want anyone getting notoriety from this case.
And she was.
In fact, it there was so much coverage, that they were calling him DC’s Jack the Ripper.
They were calling him crazy.
He wasn’t.
He was simply doing his job, and that was all that mattered. They were all vile, disgusting, and perverse, and he was going to make sure they paid for it.
He was cleaning up the streets.
Well, luckily for them, he was diligent.
He took another one.
Yes, he switched it up. Why let them get complacent. Only this time, they wouldn’t find her for a while. Maybe he needed to start hiding them in secret places.
Maybe that would work.
Yeah, it would.
The FBI was out of their league on this one. He was smarter, he was hidden, and he was going to win because the hookers needed to die.
This was far from over.
Sunday would be perfect.
After all, it was the Lord’s Day. He’d give him an offering no one would forget.
He’d be victorious yet.
* * * E l i z a b e t h L a R u e * * *
Chris’s Brownstone
Sunday Seven AM
She hated mornings when she was up late.
They sucked.
Weekends were supposed to be about recharging, reading the paper, and lumping it. When you worked fifteen-hour days, you needed time off.
Yeah, except in her world.
Granted, it made it so much better when you didn’t have to wake up alone. In fact, she didn’t have to eat alone either. She had company, and that was nice.
When she walked home, grabbing her things, Chris was shocked when she showed back up at his place. It was clear he wasn’t expecting it.
That was why she did it.
She was taking this experimental couple-hood for a spin.
So, back at her place, she kissed her father, grabbed her go bag out of the Denali, and drove Chris’s car back to his house. They’d leave it in the lot at work, just to be safe. No one in their right mind would jack it out of there.
Then again, the woman who robbed Chris wasn’t exactly sane. She’d held up a Fed. That screamed all kinds of crazy.
Oh, and Elizabeth was going to find her.
It was a matter of time, and then the woman who preyed on her best friend was going to get her ass handed to her.
Payback was a bitch.
No one messed with Christopher. He was hers to protect, and protect she would.
Now that she was back at his place, she was going to eat breakfast, and officially start her day.
So far, everything was normal.
This was their routine. She could see by his face he was still waiting for something to change.
Well, it wouldn’t.
“Cereal?” he offered.
“Yes, please. Do you have anything with marshmallows and colorful balls of fun?” she asked, heading into his kitchen. “Life is too short to eat bran. I’d rather chew on a cardboard box.”
“Yeah, I do. I know it’s your favorite. I don’t eat this because it’s fun. I eat it because I know what the inside of a body looks like, and I’d like to live a long time.”
He pulled down the box.
“Well, that’s awesome breakfast chitchat.”
He shook his head.
“What are you doing today?” he asked. “You said you had interviews.”
She poured milk over her cereal and took it to Chris’s table. He followed, after doing the same thing. Together, they sat in his breakfast nook.
“I have two Johns to interview. I was running them last night before you called. Then I need to head to the local mission. It seems one of the flock was trying to corral the hookers to Jesus. Maybe he wanted to play wanton Mary and horny Joseph first.”
Chris started choking on his cereal.
She patted him on the back.
“Uh, you okay?” she asked.
He stared laughing once the choking stopped. “I pictured it in my head. You paint a creative picture.”
“Well, I do try. That’s my day. How about yours?” she asked.
“I have a meeting with the Director of the FBI. I got the email while you were gone.”
She stopped eating. “Already?”
“Yeah, he wants to see me. It seems the report of last night reached his desk.”
They both knew that was bad.
“I’m sorry,” she offered. “Do you want me to ride shotgun on this one? I can run interference for you. I’m his favorite screw up. I spend a shitload of time in his office getting
my ass torn a new one. If I’m in there, he won’t even notice you.”
He wished she could, but he needed to do this one on his own. “I have it. You can’t fight my battles for me.”
“Okay.”
He glanced over. “That’s it?”
Elizabeth laughed. “You said no. Does no mean yes?” she asked. “Don’t be a girl, Christopher. Be clear. Remember what happened yesterday when you beat around the bush.”
“Yeah, I got to beat around your bush. That’s not a deterrent.”
She stared at him. “You’re not right, Christopher Leonard. Here’s your proof.”
“And yet here you are…”
He had a very valid point.
He took a spoonful of her cereal. “I don’t want you going with me. I just figured you’d try to handle it. That’s usually your thing.”
“Nope. I’m not your mommy or your wife. I’m your best friend. We have boundaries.”
He ate more of her cereal.
“Except with my food.”
He grinned. “Technically, that’s my food. When I’m at your place I don’t steal your food.”
“You steal my food all the time,” she stated. “You poach my bacon, and every time I make toast, it’s suspiciously missing a bite here and there.”
“My bad.”
Chris made her laugh.
“I made a mistake, so I’m going to own it. What’s the worst he can do?”
“I don’t know. I’ve never lost my badge, let alone my gun. I’m sure you’ll get an ass chewing.”
Great.
“This is going to suck,” he muttered, drinking his coffee.
“Well, the cops think you were robbed. Go with that. It’s not your fault that the place was broken into while you weren’t home.”
That had his attention.
“What? I told them about the woman. Why won’t the director know about it?”
She chewed on some cereal. It was time to tell him what she did.
“Yeah, well, about that. I knew the one cop. The report says the place was jacked. You weren’t home at the time. We were having dinner at my place and working on the case.”
He stared at her.
“Are you going to bitch?” she asked. “I was just trying to help you out. You looked as if you were on the verge of a breakdown last night. I didn’t think you could handle much more before you needed institutionalization.”
Instead, he kissed her on the lips. “You’re the best. You get a pretty birthday gift.”
“Hell no, Orion! No gifts.”
“Not the middle name,” he said.
“If you buy me shit, I’m dropping that little tidbit every time people are around,” she warned. “Same rules apply as before.”
“Yeah, and I told you I was going to before too.”
She snorted. “You’re a pain in my ass.”
“How about birthday and Christmas presents only, and we celebrate them together?”
She weighed her options. It was a good deal.
“We get sushi on Christmas, and birthdays are that person’s choice.”
“Cake?”
“Hell yes!”
“Deal.”
She smiled and gave him a kiss on the cheek.
“Will you be safe today?” he asked.
“Are you worried about me?”
“Uh, yeah. I was worried about you before we slept together, so it has nothing to do with the sex. It may have everything to do with the fact that you’re all over the newspaper and television.”
“What are they saying? No, don’t tell me. It’ll just piss me off.”
He shoved cereal into his mouth and chewed.
She stared at him.
“Well?”
“You said not to tell you.”
“Like I thought you’d listen. You never listen.”
Chris laughed. “They’re betting you screw up. There were some anonymous sources inside the FBI who said you’re sleeping your way to the top and that’s the only reason you didn’t get fired.”
She offered him a fist bump. “I’d like that office with the setting sun view, please.”
“Maybe for your birthday.”
She snorted.
“I love when people bet against the house. It’s shit like this that makes me want to light the world on fire.”
“They have no clue what you’re like,” Chris stated. “You’re tenacious. You’ll have this solved by mid-week. I’ll bet on it.”
So would she.
Elizabeth had no choice.
“Back to you being safe…”
“I have Detective Williams with me today. He’s working this in cooperation with the Metro PD—or that’s what we’re telling everyone.”
“Is this the handsome guy you were fawning over?” he asked, trying not to think about it.
“I don’t know if he’s really handsome. He’s exotic and sexy.”
“Yeah, that didn’t help,” he stated. “Now I want to remove his spleen through his chest.”
She snorted.
“Did you really date him?”
“It wasn’t a date. We had a beer, we got loaded, and we rolled around. It was right after a bad case. It involved babies and a killer. I was trying to forget, and so was he.”
Chris got it. In their world, you did a few things to forget. You drank, you medicated, or you fornicated.
Now, he preferred option C. He liked his liver intact. He was using it.
“Was he good in bed?”
“Ehhh. We didn’t have chemistry. He definitely wasn’t the one. He’s too self-absorbed. You know that shit bugs me. It was a one-time deal.”
“So, he wasn’t a friend with benefits?”
She punched him. “Whoever taught you that should be hurt.”
“Shit! I forgot that makes you cranky. It was Tony. I swear.”
“I’ll handle him later. He’s screwed with the perfectly fine ME model, and I need to hurt him. You were great before he started suggesting shit like online dating.”
He was glad she thought so.
“Are you comparing yourself to Kaleb?” she asked.
“A little. It’s hard not to.”
“What we have is completely different. I didn’t love him. That was just some bed hopping. With you, we’re best friends, and you’re like my brother. There’s a bond.”
“Is this an odd conversation?” Chris asked.
“Nope. You and I always talk like this. I’ll let you know if you cross a line.”
“Will you?”
“No, that doesn’t sound like me at all.”
He grinned. “I’m in a good mood.”
“Are you?” she asked, getting what he was saying.
So was she.
“How good of a mood?”
“I would probably say yes to anything you asked,” he said, wiggling his eyebrows.
“Really?”
“Uh huh.”
“Can I drive your car?”
He stared at her. “That wasn’t what I was alluding to,” he offered, “and you know it.”
“Yeah, I know. You were thinking shower sex.”
“I was. You read my mind.”
She put her bowl in his dishwasher and then held out her hand for his. They did the same thing all the time.
“You don’t have condoms,” she stated.
“Crap.”
“While I’m safe, and on birth control, that’s a bad habit to get into. We don’t need a little Lyzee or Christopher running around.”
He was aware. In fact, that thought horrified him. He wasn’t going to have kids. There was no way he was equipped to raise one.
“So, a cold shower it is,” he stated.
She started laughing. When she dug into her go bag, she pulled out a half-used box and tossed it to him. “Here you go, Christopher. Keep track of them. I don’t plan to buy the next box. That’s your job.”
He caught them. “Wait, are you saying…?”
She didn’t answer. Instead, she headed out of the room whistling.
“Elizabeth!”
She didn’t reply. Chris didn’t need to know that she’d divided the box in half, leaving some at her place—just in case.
“Elizabeth!”
Chris had a few choices. He could stand there and ponder who she’d used the rest of them with or he could follow her and use one himself.
It was a no brainer.
He was going to have sex with his best friend, and then head into the office to play in the dead.
“You’re lucky I’m addicted.”
She simply laughed.
And that said it all.
* * * E l i z a b e t h L a R u e * * *
FBI
Hoover Building
Chris dropped her off and went to park his ride. She had to get to the lab, and fast. She had a mission, and she didn’t want him to know about it.
Upstairs, she found one of the techs. He was sitting at his station, and she needed his help.
“I need these dusted.”
“Uh, okay,” he said, pulling out the black powder and the brush. “What am I looking for, Elizabeth?”
“New fingerprints. You’re going to find mine and Doctor Leonard’s. I don’t care about those. I want the other ones. There should be a set belonging to a woman.”
“Oh, that’s easy.”
“When will you have them?”
“An hour or so.”
“I need this off the record. DO NOT say anything to Doctor Leonard.”
He stared at her. “Uh, okay.”
Elizabeth knew what he was thinking. Already, everyone they worked with thought they had some torrid affair going on after hours.
She didn’t care.
Let them talk.
“Yes, we used them during a kinky threesome. I need to get the woman’s name.”
He stared at her.
Stalked by the Past: An FBI Flashback Novel. (An FBI Romance Thriller Book 17) Page 31
