Obsession

by Traci Hunter Abramson

  “No, I don’t have a girlfriend.” A look of vulnerability flashed in his eyes but quickly vanished. He busied himself at the stove for a minute, and then his eyes met hers once more. “That was actually my sister. She’s trying to plan a big anniversary party for my parents next year.”

  “Really?” Kendra felt her cheeks heating, and she told herself she didn’t have any reason to be embarrassed. After all, it was a normal curiosity for her to wonder if he was involved with someone. “Do you have any other siblings? You mentioned a brother earlier.”

  “No, just an older brother and younger sister.” Charlie stirred the chicken again and then turned off the stove. “What about you? Do you have brothers and sisters?”

  “Just my younger sister.” Kendra’s lips curved up. “You might have heard of her. Sienna Blake.”

  “Right, the actress.” Charlie nodded. “You have quite a talented family.”

  “Sounds like I could say the same thing about you.”

  Charlie simply shrugged and then picked up a hot pad. He carried the food to the table and looked up at her. “Dinner is served.”

  “It smells wonderful,” Kendra said when he lifted the lid, not quite able to hide the surprise in her voice. “You know, I didn’t peg you for a guy who likes to cook.”

  “It’s my sister-in-law’s doing,” Charlie admitted. “I spent a few weeks living with them in Florida to help out when she was pregnant with her second kid. She was determined that at least one Whitmore learn their way around the kitchen—besides my mom, that is.”

  “Your brother and sister don’t cook?”

  “Not unless you count burnt toast.”

  Kendra laughed as she took her seat. Charlie retrieved a tossed salad from the refrigerator and sat beside her.

  “Do you mind if I offer a blessing on the food?”

  Surprise showed on her face, but she shook her head. She folded her arms, bowed her head, and listened to Charlie’s simple prayer. When he was done, she looked up at him, astonished.

  “You’re Mormon?”

  “Yeah,” Charlie said, clearly surprised by her question. “How did you know that?”

  “The way you blessed the food.” Kendra shook her head as this new development played through her mind. “I’m Mormon too.”

  “Seriously?” Charlie asked with the same tone of bewilderment that she had used moments before. “I didn’t know that.”

  Kendra’s shoulder’s lifted. “I think that may be the only area of my life the press hasn’t exploited.”

  “Have you always been a member?”

  “More or less. My grandparents used to take me and my sister to church when we visited them, which was a lot when we were growing up,” Kendra told him. “Then when I got older, I realized I didn’t really like my parents’ lifestyle, and I finally got their permission to get baptized.”

  “How old were you?”

  “Fifteen.”

  “You must face a lot of challenges being LDS in the music world,” Charlie commented as he passed a serving spoon to Kendra.

  When Kendra simply shrugged, he changed the subject. “I was kind of surprised when your grandfather called to tell me that you were coming up here. I thought you were on another one of your concert tours.”

  Kendra’s hand briefly tightened on the spoon. She scooped some of the chicken and rice mixture onto her plate before lifting her eyes to meet his. “Actually, I just finished my tour and needed a break.” She motioned toward the window. “Of course, I may end up with a longer break than I had planned for.”

  “I know what you mean.” Charlie nodded. “I didn’t expect to find this much snow here in Arizona.”

  “You sure came a long way for a few weeks off,” Kendra said. “Didn’t you say that you live in DC?”

  “Not anymore. I live in Phoenix now.”

  “Really?”

  Charlie nodded. He hesitated, as though trying to decide how much to tell her. “I love my family, but I needed to get out of their shadows for a while.”

  Kendra’s eyes lifted to meet his. Slowly, a smile bloomed on her face. “I guess we have more in common than I thought.”

  Chapter 11

  Charlie looked over the police report from the bombing at Kendra’s concert and shook his head. He had hoped to find some obvious clues as to who had set off the explosive, but clues were apparently scarce in this case. The backstage security had been tight, surprisingly so. The band members, caterers, and concert staff had all worked Kendra’s concerts before. None of the fans with backstage passes had been given access to the area near the stage, which meant they could eliminate that group of people.

  The interview with Kendra’s personal security guard had revealed little, except that he had been hit from behind during one of Kendra’s songs. Other than that, no one had seen or heard anything out of the ordinary.

  A little frustrated that the police hadn’t uncovered more information, he set Kendra’s file aside and began reading through the case files of the Malibu Stalker. His gut churned as his mind absorbed the gruesome details. Charlie had chosen this career because he’d wanted to make a difference, but trying to get into the mind of a serial killer was one part of the job he wished he could avoid.

  As Elias had said, each victim fit the same physical description. And each woman had been killed with a single bullet through the heart.

  The crime scenes had also been eerily similar. Each woman had been wearing a blue dress when she was killed, and each body had been found next to a backyard swimming pool, a red rose lying on the ground beside her.

  He grabbed a notepad out of his laptop case and began jotting down the basic information about each victim. The first had only been twenty-one years old when she was killed three years earlier. The oldest and most recent victim, supermodel Joslyn Korden, had been twenty-four.

  All six women had been staying in Malibu at the times of their deaths, and no fingerprints had been found at any of the crime scenes. Nor had there been any sign of forced entry. He thought about this for a moment, considering the implications. Had all of these women known their killer, or had they all been careless in letting a stranger get too close to them?

  Charlie glanced through the victims’ photos, each face reinforcing what he’d already learned. They were all young, blonde, and beautiful. He thought of Kendra’s conversation with Mrs. Burgess and her mention of her house in Malibu. His teeth clenched together as he realized that Kendra also fit the profile of the women being murdered. Every one of these women looked a lot like her.

  He took a deep breath and blew it out as he tried to focus once more on the words in front of him. The psychological profile described the Malibu Stalker as intelligent, familiar with security systems, possibly with a former police or military background. His victims were chosen for their physical appearance, presumably because they reminded him of someone he was obsessed with. He went to great lengths to set the scene, each crime scene nearly identical to the others. His obsessive tendencies wouldn’t be readily apparent, and it was possible that the killer was functional, even appearing normal, in everyday activities.

  Beyond that, most of the information described common demographics of known serial killers: white male, lower to middle class, probably between twenty-five and thirty-five years old. Following that description was the classic disclaimer stating that the demographics were based on past cases and that a certain amount of deviation was possible. In other words, it could be just about anyone.

  Charlie shut down his computer and crossed to the front windows. He stared out into the darkness, the only visible light coming from the cabin across the street. The snow had stopped for the moment, but according to the latest weather reports, another storm was expected to hit them within the next few hours.

  His concerns heightened after reading the case files, Charlie retrieved his weapon from the nightstand where he had left it and pulled on his jacket. He stepped outside, listening to the stillness. His breath plumed
out in front of him, and he could taste the snow in the air. According to his watch it was only ten o’clock, but in the quiet of the mountains, it felt much later.

  He stared at Kendra’s place, wondering if the light in the front window meant she was still up or if she had left it on to give her a sense of security. He hated the fact that she would probably be safer if it appeared that no one was home. It could be worse, he supposed. Right now, apart from the single light, only the smoke coming from the chimney and the variety of tracks in front of the cabin indicated that anyone was there. If her car had been parked out front, there would be no question as to her presence.

  She hadn’t seemed terribly concerned about her safety over dinner, causing Charlie to believe that she trusted her grandfather’s assurances that no one would be able to find her here. He heard the first notes of a song ringing out in the quiet. He didn’t recognize the tune, but he found himself approving of the catchy melody. Charlie leaned on the railing and thought back to his evening with Kendra.

  He still couldn’t quite believe that she was Mormon, and he wondered at the odds of her being assigned someone to protect her who shared her religious beliefs. Not that she knew he was here to protect her, of course. Other than her religious beliefs, she really hadn’t revealed much about herself other than basic information he could have uncovered simply by typing her name into Google.

  Now, he found himself wondering what made her tick. Was she playing the guitar late at night because it helped her relax, or did she think of it as work? Were the songs she wrote born from her own experiences or from her dreams? And why had she turned to her grandfather for help instead of her own parents? He knew they didn’t share the same religious beliefs, but was she close to them?

  As much as Charlie had needed to step outside of his father’s shadow for a while, he knew that if he ever ran into a problem he couldn’t handle alone, his parents would be the first people he would turn to for help. Even though he preferred to shelter his parents, especially his mother, from the dangers of his job, they had been the ones he’d relied on for support after his former partner had gotten shot.

  Charlie closed his eyes as he thought of the way Brian had pushed him aside, had essentially taken the bullet that had been meant for him. He hated knowing that Brian was still cooped up in a rehab center trying to regain use of his legs, knowing that he might not ever succeed.

  With a sigh, Charlie moved back inside and tried to realign his thoughts. He needed to leave the past where it belonged and concentrate on what was important in his future, like finding out exactly who Kendra Blake really was so he could make sure she stayed safe.

  * * *

  She had disappeared, both physically and electronically.

  Kendra’s phone was turned off, and he hadn’t been able to detect any activity on her computer. He typed in a search for recent internet articles on Kendra, only to find that the incident at her concert was still dominating cyberspace.

  His plan had worked, perhaps a little too well. Kendra had understood his message. She understood now that she wasn’t safe in front of all those people. But why hadn’t she gone somewhere that he could find her? He knew her hiding places. He knew where she would feel safe.

  His jaw clenched as he considered what could have caused her to disappear so completely. Someone was helping her. She had turned to someone else, someone besides him.

  He pushed away from his computer desk and stared up at the wall in front of him. Photographs of Kendra covered every inch of space on the wall, some clipped from magazines and others taken from his own camera. He focused on a picture of her smiling down at him, humor in her eyes.

  She was laughing at him. She thought she could hide.

  Fury bubbled up inside him, and he slammed his open hand against the wall. She would be his. She didn’t have a choice.

  This was her destiny. And his.

  * * *

  Kendra stared out at the blanket of white that seemed to go on forever. Tree branches hung low under the weight of the snow, their green only visible in patches. Snow was no longer falling, but clouds still loomed overhead.

  She looked down at her watch, amazed, and a little embarrassed, that she had slept through the entire morning. Of course, her body was still on concert schedule, late to bed, late to rise. She stretched her hands over her head, not surprised by the stiffness in her back and her shoulders. She could hardly expect to spend hours hunched over her guitar without her body protesting a little.

  She was still amazed by the way the music had flowed the night before, playing in her head in a way it hadn’t in a long time. She knew her emotions fed into that. Her need to put the past few days into perspective had given her creative energy a boost.

  She had expected the anxiety to surface first, to demand an outlet, but surprisingly, it was her sense of freedom that had dominated her thoughts when she’d sat down with her guitar the night before. She couldn’t ever remember feeling so in control of her own life, so liberated.

  The day before had started out so badly, and yet, somehow, everything had taken a turn for the better. Charlie had played a part in it, treating her like a person who had the right to make her own choices, even expecting her to exercise that right. She wondered if he had any idea what that meant to her.

  She thought back to the way he had insisted on walking her home the night before. Why was it that she hadn’t resented the gesture from him? Had it been someone on her security team, she would have felt stifled, trapped. But Charlie had walked her home, the paragon of a perfect gentleman as he’d made sure she was safely inside before leaving her alone.

  Perhaps that was it. The fact that he had left her alone, that he had trusted that she would be okay without hovering over her the way all of the other men in her life had. Of course, the only men who had truly been in her life were her father and the various security men he had assigned to her. The few people she had dated during high school and those first couple of years after graduation had never lasted beyond a week or two. The only exception had been Steve, and that certainly hadn’t turned out well. She supposed Steve had been right about one thing. Most guys didn’t have any interest in going out with someone who already had half a dozen men following her around, watching her every move.

  No one is watching me now, Kendra reminded herself as she dressed and headed downstairs in search of some breakfast. She looked down at her guitar that was leaning against the loveseat and at the scattered sheet music she’d left there the night before. She was oddly pleased, both by the signs of a successful evening and by the fact that no one had come along to shuffle the clutter out of sight.

  She rubbed her arms against the chill in the room, noticing for the first time that the fire had gone out in the fireplace and that the heater was less than adequate in this big cabin. Putting breakfast on hold for the moment, Kendra picked up some newspaper and twisted it before setting it on the grate. Realizing that the stack of newspaper was going to have to last her, she used only two sections before she lifted a log and put it in the fireplace.

  She struck a match, holding it under the newspaper until the flame grew. The flames licked at the side of the log until the wood finally caught fire. When Kendra was satisfied that it wouldn’t go out, she put the screen back into place. Looking down at the last two logs next to the fireplace, she was faced with the reality that she was going to have to get some firewood before the day was out, or she was going to freeze.

  After tidying up her mess from the night before, she grabbed an apple from the kitchen and wondered if her grandparents kept a stack of wood anywhere outside. She took a bite of the apple and crossed to a hall closet in search of some of her grandfather’s work gloves.

  She smiled when she not only found a pair of gloves she could use but also a knit hat and scarf her grandmother had undoubtedly made. She put them all on, along with her winter coat. Then she slipped her boots on and headed out the back door. Icy wetness seeped through her jeans and into the top
of her boots as she trudged through nearly two feet of snow.

  She thought she remembered a woodpile off the back porch, but with the deep snow, she couldn’t identify where it was. Holding tightly to the railing, she walked down the steps and began searching along the back of the cabin. Her grandparents must have put the wood somewhere near the door, right?

  When she didn’t find anything but snow along the back wall, she circled toward the front door. She made it all the way to the front porch before her foot struck something buried beneath the blanket of white.

  “Ow,” she muttered to herself.

  Leaning down, she began pushing the snow aside. Her hands were nearly to the ground when they finally hit something solid. Sure enough, she had found the wood stack. Brushing more snow aside, she could only shake her head in frustration. The wood stack consisted of five pieces of wood. Five. That wouldn’t even last her through tomorrow.

  With a sigh, she picked up the first two pieces and hauled them up onto the front porch and into the cabin. She considered her limited options as she deposited them by the fireplace. She might be able to gather some stray branches outside for firewood, but with the depth of the snow, she would likely end up with frostbite before she found enough to make it worth the effort.

  She could try to go without a fire in the fireplace, but she already knew from last night that the heater in the cabin wasn’t quite able to ward off the chill. The cabin had been built as a summer vacation home, not a snowbound hideaway. Even the fireplace was more for aesthetics than warmth, unlike the wood-burning stove in Charlie’s cabin, which could heat most of the cabin without the aid of an electric heater.

  Maybe if she was lucky, Charlie would have some wood at his cabin he’d be willing to part with, at least until they could get back into town for more supplies. She went back outside to get the rest of the wood and heard someone calling her name. She turned around, instantly smiling when she saw Charlie heading toward her.