Beautifully Damaged (Contemporary Romantic Suspense)

by Faye, Amy

  "I can keep you informed, but only as a civilian."

  "Not good enough."

  Roy's face darkened, and he looked around as if he expected someone to be hiding behind the desk he had sat his ass up on. Her desk, or it should have been.

  "Look, Erin. I can't do any better for you, and you know as well as I do that I can't stop you from doing whatever you're going to do. But don't fuck this up. We need to still have the evidence at the end of the day to nail this son of a bitch."

  She let out a deep breath. "Yeah, I know."

  "You know? Good. Now get your shit straight. Go on." He pointed her out the door with a nod of his head.

  "Fuck off, Roy. You don't know what the fuck you're talking about."

  "I'll call you later."

  "I'm going to be busy later today."

  "Then tomorrow."

  "I'm going to be busy tomorrow, too. Pretty much all this month. It's pretty busy being suspended."

  "Yeah, I hear," he said, sarcastic and angry.

  "Good luck with the investigation, though. I'm sure that you Feds can take care of it just fine."

  "Erin, we can. But this isn't over, and you know it."

  "Yeah, I know."

  "I know you're upset. Don't do anything to get yourself hurt."

  "I'm not going to get hurt."

  She could tell Roy didn't like that answer. He didn't get to tell her what to do. But she already had a plan forming in her head, and with some luck she'd be able to make it work.

  With nothing more to say, she started towards the door. Roy stopped her a moment. "Wait, one last thing."

  "What's that?"

  "Whatever you find, I want you to come back in here and tell me. Every day."

  "Maybe I will, when I feel like it."

  "Erin—"

  "I'm not your damn sex-bunny, Roy. You don't get to boss me around just because you're in charge now. You don't own me."

  She about slapped him, but managed to stop herself.

  "I know. But I know you're about to go do exactly the opposite of what I want you to do, which is nothing. When you do it, either you win or you lose, and I want to make sure that if you don't catch the son of a bitch, we don't have to let him go free and clear. Whatever you find, you tell someone before you go off on it. Is that understood?"

  She turned and gave a mock salute.

  "Then you're dismissed. Good luck, Detective Russo."

  "Good luck yourself, Special Agent Schafer."

  She stormed out, furious with him for taking the case from her. But she was more furious with herself for letting it hurt as much as it did.

  Eleven

  The little woman on her screen telling her how excellent her online dating experience was going to be made it all that much more real. Maybe this wasn't such a good idea after all. Maybe she should have reconsidered. The temptation would be great, but what was it going to help if she ended up dead in a ditch somewhere?

  It wouldn't help anyone, but they weren't going to catch the guy on their own. They weren't approaching the case with the right kind of serious concern, and it was going to bite them in the ass until they realized it.

  She wasn't willing to wait that long. She was going to find this guy, and she was going to catch him. If she could only get him, then that would be one thing. But she wouldn't just stop there. She was going to go as deep down the rabbit hole first, before she pulled out and got the sons of bitches who did this cold.

  Erin closed her eyes and tried to calm down. This was no time to be losing her cool. Not so early on. She needed to keep her head on her shoulders as long as possible. She was going into the lion's den here.

  She had the account already. A few years ago she'd heard about online dating, and opened an account. It had lasted all of several minutes before she realized that it wasn't ever going to happen for her, and for that matter she didn't want it to happen that way if it was going to happen.

  Pulling in a breath, Erin clicked the button to reactivate her account. It was a good thing that she had it already. If she had a one-day old account, it would make it difficult for him to trust when she emailed him out of the blue. As if someone had put up a fake account with a picture of his latest murder victim. He'd absolutely know the jig was up.

  But now she had an account with two or three tasteful four-year-old pictures that were still just about good enough, she hoped. Then she got to messaging.

  Craig Hutchinson might not respond. It might make him nervous, especially if he thought that she knew who he was, or who he had been, to her sister. But if he were a serial killer, or involved in serial killings, then he wouldn't be able to resist the chance at a repeat performance, even if he had misgivings. That was what the whole plan was built on.

  She closed her laptop and went to watch daytime television, just like the Captain told her to. See, Erin thought to herself. I can do as I'm told. Besides, it might be hours before she got an answer from the guy, and it was a long shot in either case. She sat down on the couch, fished for the remote between her knees, and clicked the T.V. on. Some news story, but it wasn't about her sister. They probably weren't going to run anything about her on the T.V. at all.

  Erin wasn't sure how she felt about it. If they let out all the details—that the FBI were involved, that they suspected the work of a serial killer, then there would be way too many unanswered questions and way too much trouble. They'd never be able to live it down. But if they left out details, then what was the point of doing any story at all?

  So they didn't run one. That was typical. Exactly the reason that she couldn't stand letting someone else do the work to track down her sister's killer. One thing gets a little hard, and suddenly they're not so committed to the truth any more. If she wanted someone willing to do something hard, then she had to rely on herself. Nobody was going to do it for her.

  She flipped the channel until she found a bunch of women talking amongst themselves. They had another woman at the table and proceeded to make ground beef out of her. It was like watching someone caught in a pack of hyenas. Everything she said was a chance to pick and criticize and fight.

  Oh, it was all very friendly on the surface, but Erin knew all about how the game was played, and it was about as friendly as a gunfight.

  She flipped the channel again. A T.V. judge was shouting at the defendant in a case. From what Erin could see, the girl deserved it, sort of. These shows held no real appeal for her, either. Everyone on them was scum. It wasn't a case of one person being injured and the other being a bastard. Everyone should have been put in the corner until they learned to get the hell along with other people.

  Then again, that wasn't so different from real life. The judges were all a bit too keen to throw temper tantrums. Usually sitting judges manage not to do that, but it might have something to do with being able to threaten people with jail time if they don't shut the hell up. That probably made a pretty big difference in terms of frustration levels, Erin figured.

  Her phone buzzed. An email had arrived. It was from the dating service. She'd gotten a message!, it read. Exclamation mark and all. Her face twisted into a taut smile. Already, the seed she had planted was starting to grow.

  She opened the laptop again, refreshed her messages, clicked it open. Instead of Craig Hutchinson, she was treated to the profile picture of the man who had written her a very… excited message. A very explicit message, and attached was a very explicit photograph of a cock as thick as her wrist.

  She closed it as fast as her fingers could click the buttons and she blinked. God damn it. That's exactly what she had hoped wasn't going to happen. Maybe this was a mistake. Her phone buzzed again. Another message.

  She took in a deep breath and prepared to be disturbed. Then she clicked it open. A biker-looking type, built like he was still in the Army, smiled out at her. He still had all his teeth, which meant he was either just putting on airs with the motorcycle club vibe, or he was better in a fight than most.

  Tha
t, or he had a very good dentist, but that was unusual by itself for that sort of guy in her experience.

  He would love to meet. In public, of course. He suggested a coffee house on the south side of town. Too isolated for her, and it wouldn't play into her hand the way she'd hoped. What about the beach? She was right out by the boardwalk. It was crowded, so no danger for either of them. That would work better for her.

  A message came back a minute later, asking how he'd know her. She took a deep breath. She had to play this to the hilt, that was the only way to do it. She'd be wearing a light blue swimsuit with a large flower-print. She didn't know how to describe the flowers, except they were dark-colored. Then she went off to find the bikini she hadn't worn in years.

  Now her skinny figure would come in handy. She hadn't gained a pound in almost ten years, so the swimsuit should still fit, she hoped. But the problem was where it would be.

  Well, that and how to carry her backup gun when most of her body was on display.

  Twelve

  The sun was beating down. What a poor excuse for a January. Too hot, especially after all the fun in the snow only a few days ago. She laid back against a plastic chair someone else had set out a long time ago, watching with her eyes while trying to look still and resting. Her big, dark glasses helped with that a bit, since hopefully nobody would see the minute motions of her eyes.

  She heard someone approaching, but kept a watch out anyways, not bothering to look. Whoever was doing these murders was ballsy, but not this ballsy. There must have been two hundred people in plain view. He'd have been caught by the time he made it to the end of the sand.

  "Erin Russo?"

  His voice made her turn even as she had planned on pretending she hadn't heard him. He sounded like honey tasted, sweet and dark and everything in between.

  "Craig Hutchinson?"

  He hadn't dressed for the beach, but that just put her at an advantage. She was putting herself on display for him. Taunting him with her body, to an extent, and if he thought they were there for a swim the effect wouldn't be as distinct.

  "Yeah, that's me. You want to get something to eat?"

  "Where were you thinking?"

  "I don't know this part of town," he confessed. "You got any recommendations?"

  That was a surprise. A guy like this, he wasn't killing because he was losing his goddamn mind. That was why they hadn't caught him yet. The guys who thought it all through, they made plans. If you tried to mess with their plan, they would make a new one before they followed through.

  Yet, this guy had come here with no particular plan except wearing a heavily-padded motorcycle jacket and looking like he could train with any of the guys down the beach, and could probably outrun all of them. She filed that knowledge away for later.

  "Oh, sure. There's a Coney Island right at the edge of the beach. It's pretty good."

  She rolled out of the chair and picked up her purse. It was heavy with the weight of her gun, but she didn't show that she felt the extra weight. She'd put it in the middle to try to get rid of as much blocking as she could. If she was lucky, he wouldn't even know it was there until the moment she pulled it on him.

  "This way." She started to walk, and he walked beside her, his boots leaving deep impressions in the soft sand.

  "You come around here often?"

  "Not often enough," she said. Play a role. She wasn't Erin Russo, workaholic police detective, but that didn't mean she wanted to be Erin Russo, beach rat, either. "It's only a few miles from my apartment, but I'm usually working too much."

  "I hear you on that," he said. His voice sounded gregarious, but his face didn't show anything besides squinting at the supposed-to-be-winter sun.

  "But I'm between contracts right now, so—the beach it is, I guess."

  "That's cool. What do you do for work?"

  She'd spent a long time thinking about the answer to that question. She wasn't going to hope for another Roy-type where they didn't bother to ask, and unlike that time, there was a very good reason not to mention her real job.

  "I'm a photographer," she said. She'd bought a camera once, paid almost six hundred dollars for a pretty nice one. It was still sitting in the padded case she'd bought with it. It had three photos of handsome dogs she had seen walking past the apartment building on the memory card, a few photos of her sofa, and nothing else. "I mostly do magazine shoots."

  "Oh yeah? What magazines?"

  "Bridal magazines, mostly. Just easy stuff."

  "Cool," he said, but Erin could tell that he wasn't really interested. That was exactly what she'd hoped. That he wouldn't want to hear too much about her job when she dropped that little tidbit. So his disinterest fit perfectly.

  "I'm sorry, how rude of me. What do you do, Craig?"

  He looked tired. Bored, even. "I work on bikes, mostly. Sometimes I do a little car repair on the side, but it's not often."

  "Oh yeah?"

  "Yeah." He didn't elaborate, just tapped his thumbs on the table where they'd been seated and looked around for a waitress. "What's takin' her so long, you think?"

  They hadn't seen anyone, so there was no reason to assume that it was a her, and they'd only been seated a little less than a minute, so it hadn't been that long. Jumpy or entitled, pick one. She wasn't sure which it was, but it was one of those.

  Erin frowned. She was liking this guy less and less by the minute, but she wasn't there to like him. She was there to get close to him and figure out what he had to do with her sister's murder. It was hard to imagine that her sister had seen anything in him at all. Then again, maybe he was on-edge. She could think of a few reasons.

  If she was generous, he might be upset that he couldn't reach her sister. Might be trying to find a way to broach the subject with her without sounding insensitive. That would make about anyone edgy. 'Hey, have you seen that person who looks identical to you lately?' Yeah, right.

  If she wasn't generous, maybe he was filled with nervous energy because she was exactly that. Identical to the woman he'd just killed. It wasn't often you got to have your cake and eat it, too. He would eat his cake twice, if he got the chance, but that was a special treat for anyone. For serial killers, from what she'd been told, it was a hundred times worse. It was all about repetition. About chasing that first high, and each one was less than the last.

  But a repeat, she'd be irresistible. The one that might actually be able to compete.

  He pinched his lips together. "You want to get out of here?"

  She shrugged. It had been a couple minutes. Longer than it should have been, anyway. "Sure."

  She followed him out. She had taken her car, but she didn't raise a fuss when he took her over to a motorcycle. He stepped over it and it hummed to life as he handed her back a helmet that fit snugly enough to hurt her ears.

  "Get on!" She could tell he was shouting, but it was only about loud enough to hear clearly.

  "Where are we going?"

  "Where do you want to go?"

  "I've got an apartment a quarter-mile away. I could mix us something to drink." She didn't realize how loud she was shouting until her chest started to hurt a little with the effort.

  "Sounds great. Give me directions while we're moving."

  Erin had to jump a little to get herself properly situated on the back of the thing, and her bare feet pressed against the textured rubber of the pegs felt odd. She took extra care to keep her knees spread a little too wide, to avoid the hot pipes on her thighs. It pressed her lower onto the bike, and opened up her mound to grinding hard against the seat, the low vibrations of the bike sending spikes of pleasure through her that she would have rather done without. She needed a clear head to get this guy. She wrapped her arms around his waist, surprisingly thin compared to his relative bulk, and squeezed tight.

  "You ready?"

  She had better be, because she was already in way too deep.

  Thirteen

  "What's your poison?"

  It was cooler in the
apartment. Cool enough that Erin could feel her nipples tightening up and rubbing uncomfortably against the fabric of her bikini with every little movement, until it hurt. She wanted to change into something else, or at least put on a robe or a jacket. But she didn't.

  This was all about a show for Hutchinson, and if she was going to give him a show then she was going to go as far as she could.

  "Whatever you've got is fine."

  She pulled down a half-drank bottle of Irish Whiskey and poured two fingers for each of them, then carried both glasses in along with the bottle and set them down in front of him.

  "Did you want to get something to eat? I could fix something, or we could get Chinese delivered, or—"

  He drank the whiskey as if he wasn't particularly listening, and she wasn't sure that she cared if he was or wasn't. It wasn't important that he respected her, only that he believed that she was who she said she was. If he believed it enough to open up and expose himself.

  "Whatever you want, babe. I'm not too worried about it."

  "Pizza, then."

  He smiled. "You read my mind."

  She made the call, stepping into the other room. She wasn't going to leave him enough that he could get into any trouble with her stuff, but she couldn't let him think that she didn't trust him, either. That would have ruined the show. The illusion that she was some vapid sexpot who wouldn't even think about him having murdered her little sister.

  An hour's difference didn't make a lot in terms of human growth. A one-hour old wasn't so different from someone just born, and a twenty-one-and-thirty-minutes woman was even less different than thirty-minutes-short-of-twenty-one. But officially the days were different, so officially Becca was the baby.

  And man, for years that had been her way, too. Erin couldn't stand it, until she was older and could look at it with hindsight. Besides that, Becca had sure grown up a hell of a lot by the time she went off with Dad. Neither of them had any illusions about what that was. He was trouble, and she was going to walk into it with him, because he needed her to.