Beneath This Mask

by Victoria Sue

  “Other boys?” Gael asked.

  “Why don’t you start at the beginning and I’ll make coffee?” Mateo suggested, standing.

  Amy smiled and took a breath. “I’m a youth group coordinator at Blessed Be on Hillsborough and 59th. We have a popular food-drive program, and we take the older teenagers, with parents’ permission, to distribute.”

  “And they’re not afraid of some of the areas they go in. Nebraska Ave, Old Port Tampa, etcetera,” Mateo said and went to the kitchen.

  Jake looked at Gael for clarification. “Nebraska?”

  “Some areas of it are popular with working girls,” Gael explained.

  “And boys,” Amy added. “The photograph you showed me was old—very old, which is why I didn’t recognize him at first. I’m guessing he’s about seventeen, eighteen now.”

  Jake didn’t correct her use of the present tense.

  “And you met Skin on Nebraska?”

  Amy shook her head. “No, this was on Kissimmee Ave, Old Port Tampa. There was a bar down there that the prostitutes would go to. I think it’s been demolished recently for new housing.”

  “Did Adero know him?” Gael asked.

  “I don’t think so. Adero wasn’t a member of my church.”

  “Do you know why he was called Skin?” Jake thought it odd for a name for a prostitute.

  Amy nodded, her eyes growing a little misty. “He had a reputation for being hard-core. You know a lot of them won’t allow marks of any sort? Apart from the hurt, other clients like the ones with the smooth skin, baby faces.”

  Jake sighed. He had come across that a lot when he was a beat cop. Johns often liked the younger-looking ones.

  “You know he was enhanced?” she asked.

  “Yes,” Gael replied, but they hadn’t, not really. “Do you know what abilities he had?”

  “It was common knowledge. Skin would let his clients do anything to him—cut, bruise, bite, you name it—so long as he could walk away and they paid him a ton of money, he was good.”

  Gael frowned. “So… he didn’t feel pain?”

  “Oh, yes, he felt pain,” Amy insisted, and Mateo came back with the coffees. He sat next to Amy and put an arm around her. “The thing was, whatever they did to him, so long as he ate, his skin would be completely healed in around three hours.”

  “What?” Jake was incredulous. He looked at Gael. “Have you ever heard anything like that?”

  But Gael wasn’t looking at him. All his focus was on Amy.

  “What do you mean, so long as he ate?”

  “He had to eat to repair his skin. I have never seen someone so slim with such an appetite. Seriously, I bet diet companies would have paid him a ton of money to be able to research what made him like that.”

  Oh, shit. Jake had been slow, but Gael had picked up on it straightaway.

  “And if he didn’t eat, what would happen?” Gael clarified.

  “He’d be in a lot of pain for a much longer time,” Amy said bluntly. “His injuries would heal at the same rate as everyone else.”

  And the man in the storeroom had been starved.

  Jake felt almost sick. This wasn’t an accident. This wasn’t someone being forgotten, or his tormentor prevented from coming back. This was deliberate, and Jake would bet with everything in him that his killer knew about his ability and had used it to torture him.

  Jake stood, unable to keep still.

  Adero Huras. He had died because he hadn’t been able to get in the water to use his ability, and he had drowned while he was in bed.

  Jake stared in shock at Gael, and Gael stared back with sick understanding in his eyes. Gael had worked it out as well. Whoever was doing this wasn’t just targeting enhanced. He was using their own abilities to torture and, eventually, murder them.

  Chapter Thirteen

  “I’M CALLING Talon. I think we need to bring Cortes and Ryker in on this as well,” Gael said as they walked back to the truck.

  Jake put his hand on Gael’s shoulder, and Gael turned sad eyes to his. “This is what I’m thinking it is, right?”

  “That some sicko isn’t just targeting enhanced, but he’s using their ability to kill them,” Gael said, his voice dry, brittle, and it wasn’t a question; it was a confirmation.

  “That is sick, I agree,” Jake said, getting in the car, “but it’s also very, very clever.” This wasn’t some random hate crime. This had taken a lot of thought.

  They drove to the office mostly in silence. Jake called Talon, who listened quietly, didn’t offer an opinion, just said he would call the others and see them both soon. Then he called Detective Ryker. She was intrigued and promised to meet them as soon as she could get there.

  They both walked into the office, and Drew came out of the locker room. “I was here already and just got Talon’s call.”

  Didn’t this guy have a life? But then to be fair, if Drew was hoping to join the BAU, he had to be single-minded about his career.

  Jake and Gael got coffee ready for everyone as the guys started arriving. Jake watched quietly as the team interacted. They were close. It was interesting how they all treated Finn like he was their little brother. In fact, most of them called him “kid,” and at twenty-four, that must have been annoying, but he just took it happily. Sawyer came in, and Jake was surprised to see Eli with him. Jake hadn’t had much to do with him. Eli’s stature was interesting. All the enhanced Jake had seen were tall and quite bulky, but Eli was slim and not much different in height from Finn. The only similarity was his obvious scar.

  Jake stood deliberately, and Sawyer turned defensively, obviously remembering his last words yesterday.

  Jake put a hand out to Eli. “We haven’t really met, but I’m Jake.” He’d seen Eli when he reported on the child he was helping, but between that and the different training they’d all been on, they had barely been in the same room twice.

  Eli’s eyes widened as he stared at Jake’s face, and then his gaze dropped to Jake’s outstretched hand. Jake didn’t say anything else, just waited. After a few seconds, Eli shook his hand so briefly if he’d blinked, he would have missed it. He didn’t say a word, but Jake counted it as a win.

  Cortes arrived a minute later, followed by Ryker.

  “Gregory is in Orlando and can’t make it, but I will keep him up to date,” Talon started. He looked at Gael. “Want to explain why we’re here?”

  Gael quickly explained what Amy Nealson had told them.

  “Are you saying that the vics were deliberately targeted?” Cortes asked as soon as Gael paused.

  “Not necessarily,” Jake answered while Gael took a slurp of his coffee. “The opportunity may have had to present itself, but whoever is doing this has to have an understanding of enhanced.”

  “Individually or collectively?” Ryker asked.

  “Both,” Vance said. “Collectively, because he can’t be scared. I mean, most people see an enhanced walking down the street, they cross it.”

  “And individually because they would need to know how to kill them,” Cortes answered his own question.

  “It could still be a coincidence,” Gael carried on. “Adero in particular.”

  “No toxicology, yet?” Ryker asked.

  Cortes shook his head.

  “Why not Skin? A coincidence, that is,” Sawyer asked.

  “Because his ability was well-known. Everyone knew the only way he could recover quickly was by eating.”

  “That’s some scary metabolism,” Ryker mused.

  “Let’s start at the beginning,” Talon said.

  “We think the murders were all connected because of the photographs,” Vance said.

  “Then we have to discount Maria Kelly,” Drew pointed out. “She was neither enhanced, nor was there a photograph left.”

  “Unless—” Crap, Jake was so damn slow. “Unless Maria was killed first. The killer did it to get to Derrick, used electricity because of his ability, but he was at a traffic light. He quite possibly ran
out of time.”

  Ryker narrowed her eyes. “That’s a lot of ifs, Agent.”

  “The tablet,” Gael said slowly. He glanced at Eli. “You’re able to help Bo because you can channel another ability linked to your own. You create fire, but Bo couldn’t burn you.” He looked around, excitement on his face. “What if the murderer did try to electrocute Derrick, but it didn’t work? All he succeeded in doing was destroying the computer because Derrick was holding it at the time, so the energy went through him unharmed but wrecked his tablet?”

  Everyone was silent, various degrees of comprehension and surprise showing on their faces.

  Cortes opened his file. “Maybe we should go right back to the beginning. What information do we have on Dale Smith?”

  “He was one of the foster children from the home who disappeared originally. We thought he was taken by Nolan Dakota, but he has always denied all knowledge. I understand from the decomposition of the body, he was dead before Alan Swann started taking the enhanced,” Talon said.

  “So, the murderer started doing this before all this with the foster kids had even started?” Sawyer asked. “And the two things might not be connected at all?”

  “What’s next, then?” Gael asked.

  “You need to go see Derrick,” Talon replied.

  A flash of irritation passed over Ryker’s face. “We haven’t gotten permission to do so yet.”

  “Gael is the only one who has managed to get him to communicate at all,” Jake pointed out defensively.

  “Which could lead to the assumption that Agent Peterson is by no means unbiased in this,” she said flatly, and Gael squeezed Jake’s leg in warning to keep quiet. She sighed. “I’m not wanting to be difficult, but any prosecutor worth his salt could make an argument for that.”

  Cortes stood and extended his hand to Gael, then nodded to Jake. “Thank you for keeping us in the loop.”

  Everyone stood and the meeting broke up. The detectives left.

  “There’s something else,” Finn said, and all the team turned to look at him.

  “Something you didn’t want to say with those two here?” Jake asked, but he pretty much guessed it when Finn went slightly pink in the cheeks.

  “When Swann held me—” He hesitated. “—he’d just captured you and Sawyer.” Finn nodded at Talon. “I put it in my report, but we never found out how he knew about Talon’s increased abilities. I got the distinct impression someone was feeding him information, confidential information. There were a lot of people there when you disintegrated Manning’s earrings, so we guessed someone there could have told her.”

  “Like ENu,” Sawyer said pointedly.

  Jake tried not to roll his eyes.

  “I just think it’s something we need to remember,” Finn said. “It’s someone comfortable with enhanced.”

  “The badge,” Jake reminded everyone. “We still think it’s likely it was a cop, or someone dressed as a cop, that got Maria to lower her window.”

  “We need to go through the addresses that Amy Nealson sent us,” Gael reminded Talon.

  “I don’t mind doing that,” Drew volunteered. “I feel like I haven’t exactly been pulling my weight around here, and I was going to hang around and do some research anyway.”

  “Okay, we’ll meet back tomorrow. I’ll call Gregory and bring him up to speed.” Talon turned and eyed Jake. “Go home.” He looked at Gael. “Chain him to the bed to keep him there if you have to.”

  Jake tried really, really hard not to look happy about it.

  GAEL LOOKED across at Jake again when they paused at the light. His color was shit, and he didn’t mean the black-and-blue bruising; he meant the rest of his face. “How do you feel?”

  Jake rolled his head to look at him. “I need a nap,” he said with a little self-depreciating humor thrown in.

  “Headache, nausea, blurred vision?”

  “No, Mom,” Jake drawled and closed his eyes. “Well, headache, yeah,” he admitted. “I just want to sleep, and then I’m wondering if you could get that amazing cook who’s just moved into my place to make some dinner.”

  Gael smiled and turned the corner as steadily as he could so as not to jostle him.

  “You know,” Jake continued with his eyes still closed, “I don’t suppose any of Vance’s brothers work vice, do they?”

  “No.” Gael shook his head. “Why?”

  “Because it would be good to get another insight into Skin’s ability. Name, etcetera. I know Cortes is looking, but we know sometimes talking to someone they’re comfortable with helps. I haven’t been here long enough to develop any connections yet.”

  “Connections? You mean, cops?” Gael was interested. He tended to forget Jake had been a cop before he had started with SWAT.

  Jake smiled lazily but kept his eyes closed. “Yeah, but only to get introductions.”

  Gael frowned even though Jake couldn’t see him. “You lost me.”

  Jake turned his head again and opened both eyes. “I mean, the cops who work in those areas should all have contacts among the girls. If we’re real lucky, they would have them among the boys as well. Asking his peers what he’s like is going to get you more info a lot faster. I would imagine that’s what Cortes is doing, only he’s not enhanced so he might not be asking the right questions.”

  Gael turned onto 9th and suddenly had a flash of green eyes and blue hair. His smile was wide.

  “What?”

  He turned, not realizing he was being watched. Jake was listening and had noticed the smile. “I know a rent boy.”

  Jake didn’t move. His eyebrows didn’t rise, nor did his breathing alter, but Gael knew he had every drop of the man’s attention.

  “I don’t mean that,” Gael replied to the unspoken question, and he pulled up by the pink house. He got out and came around to Jake’s side, even though Jake had already gotten out and was shielding his eyes from the sun. Shit, Jake should have worn sunglasses. “And I don’t have any you could borrow.”

  Jake blinked. “Huh?” He stepped up to unlock the door.

  “I don’t wear sunglasses,” Gael said quietly, shyly.

  Jake pushed the door open and toed off his sneakers. “Don’t like them?”

  “No, I mean, I don’t need them. Ever since my skin changed, if the sun’s too bright, my eyes seem to shade themselves.” It sounded ridiculous, and to be honest, he hadn’t really questioned it. Along with everything else, it seemed minor. In fact, come to think about it, the doc had asked him if he ever had any vision changes and he’d said no because everything still looked the same, just not as glaring.

  Jake stopped and stared, and Gael nearly broke out in a sweat, looking at his dumbfounded expression. What if it was one weird thing too many?

  “That is unbelievably cool,” Jake said in an awed voice. “Do you know how much money I literally throw away by dropping mine and scratching them, or throwing them on the seat when I get out of the truck and squashing them ’cause I’m too dumb to look when I get back in?”

  Gael grinned. Jake was funny, and somehow he still seemed to like Gael, weirdness and all. Jake turned around and trudged up the stairs. Gael went to the fridge and pulled out a bottle of water, then followed him.

  In barely a few seconds, Jake was already down to his briefs and pulling back the sheet. He groaned loudly as he lay down. Gael picked up the bottle of pills and shook two out. Jake whined in protest.

  “On a scale of one to ten, how much is your face hurting?”

  “Five,” Jake muttered.

  Gael arched an eyebrow.

  “Okay, maybe seven,” Jake grumbled. He obediently swallowed the pills and took a long drag of the water. Gael watched the swallow trail the length of Jake’s throat and cleared his throat. Why should that of all things be unbelievably hot? Jake eased himself down and his eyes fluttered shut. “So tell me about rent boys,” he cajoled.

  Gael sat on the edge of the bed and absently smoothed the sheet over Jake’s side. “Yo
u’ve seen me. You know what I look like, and you know how frightened people are.”

  Jake reached out and caught Gael’s hand, which was tucking the sheet over his arms. He opened his eyes. “I know, and that doesn’t have anything to do with me, with us. I kind of slept my way across the country coming here. That’s why I wanted you to know I was clean, and there hasn’t been anyone since my last test, but we should take another first, just to be safe. I’ve never gone bareback, ever.” He took a breath. “I’ve never wanted to before.”

  Gael’s heart missed a beat. Before? Before him? “Yes… I mean, me too. I mean, no, not ever, but maybe yes now.” He wanted to die. Since when did he—of every fucking guy on the planet—lose the ability to communicate with any semblance of coherency?

  Jake’s smile was wicked but not mocking. He locked eyes with Gael and slowly brought Gael’s hand up, turned it over, and kissed his palm.

  Gael decided that his immediate problem wasn’t speaking—it was pulling air into his lungs.

  “Now that we’ve established which rent boys I don’t mean, how about we talk about the ones I do?”

  He was going to look pathetic. No. He sighed. He was going to look even more pathetic. “I finally got up the courage to go for a drink in Ybor. I normally hate packed bars like the Westgate, but I thought it might be quiet early on.”

  Jake scowled. “Yeah, Bernie’s cool, but some of the customers are douches.”

  “Oh,” Gael said. “You like it?”

  “I like the pool table and the quiet during the day,” Jake replied.

  Gael focused on Jake’s fingers. He hadn’t let go of his hand, and his thumb was drawing steady circles on it. “Well, Mac and Carter came in. I was just leaving anyway.” He wasn’t going to admit to being chased out, but Jake’s hand tightened a little on his. “I went outside and ran right into a huge group of partygoers.” He waved at his face, knowing that would save him an explanation. “I ducked into the alley that runs alongside it and got propositioned.” Gael smiled at the memory but realized Jake’s fingers had stopped and looked at his face. Jake’s eyes had narrowed, glittering, and Gael immediately wanted to soothe him. “What I mean is, before I told him I wasn’t interested, he was kind of mouthy, not a bit scared. He asked me if I was a cop.”