Profiling a Killer

by Nichole Severn

  She pulled the scalpel from her wrist.

  Blood gushed from the wound and soaked the grain of the wooden chair and her slacks. The blade fell from her hand, the tang of metal against concrete barely registering as she grasped the clamp. She didn’t have time to ensure it’d been sterilized. If she lived through this—if she and Nicholas made it out of here—the hospital could take care of any infection. Aubrey struggled to keep her eyes open as she inserted the clamp into the wound. The pain was gone now. There was only survival. She compressed the clamp’s teeth where she believed Caldwell had lacerated her artery, and an instant exhaustion flooded through her. The bleeding slowed, but the longer the clamp obstructed blood flow to her hand, the higher chance she’d never be able to use it again.

  Reality came into focus with measured breaths, and she caught sight of Nicholas. Her partner struggled to free himself from the pinning grip of Dr. Caldwell’s hands around his throat. If the pathologist pressed down with too much force, he’d crush the profiler’s larynx and the man she loved would suffocate in a matter of minutes.

  The man she loved.

  Aubrey slid from the chair, wrapping her hand around the scalpel she’d pulled from her wrist. The fractures in her shoulder had taken a considerable amount of strength from her grip, but she wouldn’t need much. The best medical examiners made the best killers.

  Caldwell had turned his back toward her. Nicholas’s feet pressed into the floor to unbalance his attacker, but it wasn’t enough. Those green-blue eyes she’d come to rely on widened as she arced the scalpel down and stabbed the blade through the occipital nerves at the base of Dr. Caldwell’s skull.

  The pathologist’s body went rigid, and his hands fell from around Nicholas’s neck. Faster than her blood-deprived brain registered, Nicholas rolled his attacker to the floor. His gaze dipped to her wrist, to the clamp hanging from the wound, then raised to her. “Aubrey, are you—”

  The strength in her legs failed.

  He caught her as she collapsed. Staring down at her, Nicholas swept her hair out of her face as he positioned her across his lap. Shouts echoed down the corridors and tunnels, but he never left her. “In here! Call an ambulance!” He hauled her closer, setting his forehead against hers. “I’ve got you, Doc. I’ve got you.”

  She closed her eyes, reveling in the warmth his body injected as the cold crept in. She tried to thread her hands through his hair, but her extremities wouldn’t respond. “Have I ever told you...your hair...is as pretty as a periwinkle...flower on a pony?”

  “Aubrey, come on,” he said. “Stay with me.”

  She wanted to, but the blackness pulled her under.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Archer Caldwell was dead.

  The damage Aubrey had done to the occipital nerves at the back of his neck had instantly killed him, but the damage the son of a bitch had caused over the past few days would last for years.

  Nicholas refreshed the glass of water on the side table beside the hospital bed and took a seat. Remote in hand, he turned on the TV and switched the channels until he found Aubrey’s favorite show. The one with the toy doctor who could bring her stuffed animals to life. Monitors punctuated each beat of her heart as she slept.

  The surgeons had been able to suture the severed artery in her wrist, but the amount of trauma she’d been through in the slaughterhouse, combined with the damage to her wrist two days ago, had forced her doctor to sedate Aubrey in order to speed her recovery.

  “All right, the little girl with a magical stethoscope is having a hard time after making a big mistake at her clinic. She’s wondering if her patients would be better off if she hadn’t been there at all, but I think we both know how this one is going to end,” he said. “Hell, you’ve probably watched it half a dozen times yourself, but I’ve got to tell you, I feel kind of bad for her.”

  Three quick knocks punctured the bubble he’d created inside the small room since she’d been released from surgery. The door swung open, and Dashiell West nodded. “How’s she doing today?”

  Nicholas turned off the television and set the remote on the side table near Aubrey’s glass of water. “Her doctors came in about an hour ago to take her off the sedation meds. Her vitals are steady, but it’s taking a while for her to wake up. They tell me it’s nothing to worry about for now. If everything goes well, she’ll be awake soon.” He sat higher in the chair. “What’s up?”

  “Figured you’d want an update on the Caldwell investigation.” West closed the door behind him softly and took the chair closest to the door. “Caitlyn has been keeping the families in the loop. The new medical examiner finished his reexamination of Kara Flood’s and Paige Cress’s remains and has released both victims to their families for final arrangements.”

  “That’s good. You were there while he did the examination?” Nicholas studied Aubrey’s sleeping form, her dark brown hair framing her face. The fractured shoulder blade, two broken ribs and the scalpel in her wrist hadn’t stopped her from saving his life down in those tunnels. He’d see this through to the end. For her.

  “Yeah. Seemed Caldwell went out of his way to make sure the evidence he recovered from both victims wouldn’t tie back to him, but from what the new ME said, it’s pretty clear who attacked Kara Flood and Paige Cress. The cast the pathologist made of Paige’s teeth matches the wound on Caldwell’s forearm, and the lab recovered epithelial cells from the dog’s leash used to strangle Kara. He wore gloves, but the doc’s sister must’ve struggled enough to scrape one edge of the leash against her attacker’s neck. There are faint scratches under Caldwell’s jaw.”

  West motioned toward Aubrey. “On top of that, the blood Aubrey swallowed after she bit Caldwell came back as a DNA match for the tissue the ME’s assistant pulled from between Paige Cress’s teeth. He tried to contaminate the sample, but the solution he’d used breaks down DNA over time. We caught it before there was too much damage. Forensics wasn’t able to pull prints from the map he taped to Dr. Flood’s door or from the Polaroid Caldwell left with the dog, but the shoe print outside Kara Flood’s apartment is a perfect match and size to a pair of boots from Caldwell’s apartment. Soil samples confirm he was there, and CSU found three bottles of perfume with both victims’ fingerprints and Dr. Flood’s on the glass from his bathroom. Looks like the bastard was collecting trophies from his kills. You’ll also be happy to know Dyson found a regular from AfterDark who was willing to sit down with one of our composite artists. She described all four book club members to a tee.”

  “You should’ve seen her.” Nicholas couldn’t keep the admiration out of his voice. Even in the face of death, Aubrey had stood up against her attacker and killed him before the bastard could kill Nicholas. No matter how many times he found himself in awe of her determination and self-sacrifice, she surprised him. “Anything else?”

  “I decrypted Dr. Caldwell’s personal laptop drive. I found these.” West handed over the file in his hand, and Nicholas forced himself to tear his gaze from Aubrey to take it. “Surveillance photos. Caldwell might’ve tampered with the evidence tying him to Kara Flood’s and Paige Cress’s murders, but he didn’t get rid of all of it. Seems I can break a serial killer’s encryption, but proving my sister’s innocence is beyond my capabilities.”

  West’s sister. Arrested for embezzling funds from the investment bank where she worked as a hedge fund manager. Nicholas understood the obsession to protect the people he cared about and to use the very justice system he believed in to do it, but sometimes the law was out of their hands. He flipped through dozens of photos obviously taken with a telephoto lens. Kara Flood walking her dog, Koko, down the same section of sidewalk where she’d been found dead. Paige Cress outside her employer’s office. Aubrey in one of Harborview Medical’s hospital wings. He hesitated, his thumb tracing over the curve of her jaw in the photo, and lifted his gaze to the warm, real-life woman in the hospital bed.

&
nbsp; He’d been wrong about her after Simon Curry’s interrogation. He’d accused her of using the trauma she’d been through to cling to the next person who’d shown her any kind of attention, but the truth was, it’d probably taken everything she had to trust him with her safety and welfare. Aubrey had spent nearly her entire life putting others first, always ignoring her own needs in the hope the love she showed would be returned, and he’d thrown it in her face. He’d accused her of weakness when, in fact, she was the strongest woman he’d ever met in his life. Once again, if it hadn’t been for her, Nicholas wouldn’t have made it out of the underground.

  He closed the file and handed it back to West. “We have proof that ties Caldwell to each of the victims. It’ll be enough to close the case and give the families the closure they deserve. Great work, West. We got him.”

  “Thought you’d be a little more enthusiastic about it.” West pushed to his feet, his gaze shifting to Aubrey. “But I imagine you’ve got other things on your mind.” The cybercrimes expert half saluted toward the hospital bed with the file folder. “Looks like she’s coming around. I’ll give you two some time.”

  The monitor on the other side of the bed ticked up in rhythm, and Nicholas shoved to his feet. The hospital room door clicked closed behind him as West exited. Sliding his hand beneath hers, he studied the subtle changes in Aubrey’s expression as she battled to open her eyes. “Hey, Doc.”

  “Hey.” She focused on him, and the world righted itself in an instant. Her tongue darted across her bottom lip as she scanned the room, took in the machines tracking her vitals, then came back to him. Her gaze dipped to the cast around her left hand, and his heart jerked in his chest. Aubrey Flood was—had been—one of the best pathologists in the country, and the tears welling in her eyes told him she knew exactly what the extensive damage to her wrist meant. “I can’t feel my fingers. Nerve damage?”

  Nicholas massaged his thumb into her forearm above the cast, but no amount of physical or verbal comfort would change what’d happened. “Yeah, Doc. Your surgeon did everything he could, but the damage Caldwell caused... They said there’s still a chance of making a full recovery with physical therapy and time, but—”

  “But I won’t be able to hold a scalpel again. I won’t be able to keep my job or help the people who’ve lost their loved ones find answers.” Her voice deadpanned, her expression as neutral as her words. She pulled her hand away from his and set her forearm across her eyes. “Even dead, Dr. Caldwell got exactly what he wanted.”

  “I’m fairly certain he wanted to walk out of those tunnels alive. You made sure that didn’t happen. You made sure he couldn’t hurt anyone ever again.” Nicholas brought his chair closer and took a seat. Tugging her hand back into his, he swept the tear that’d escaped from one eye away with his thumb. He had to be sure. He had to be sure this wasn’t a dream, that she was alive, that she was really here, but hell, even if it wasn’t real, he’d do whatever it took not to wake up.

  “You saved my life. And my team’s lives, Aubrey. You made sure we all got out of there alive. You might not be able to hold a scalpel again, but there are plenty of ways you can still help the people who need you. You’re stronger than you think. No matter how many times you get knocked down, you stand back up. That’s what I love about you.”

  Her gaze cut to his, confusion swirling through the honey depths. “What do you mean, that’s what you love about me?”

  “I mean I was an idiot.” He shook his head, a humorless laugh filling the tension between them as their last conversation replayed in his head for the hundredth—or was it the thousandth?—time. “After Simon Curry’s interrogation, I discounted your instincts about his innocence and blamed your attachment to me on the trauma you’d been through in the slaughterhouse. We had a perfectly viable suspect on the other side of that glass, but I was wrong, and I was wrong to invalidate your feelings. I didn’t give you enough credit. I should’ve known after what you’d been through you were stronger than that, but the truth is, I was scared.”

  “It’s hard to believe anything scares you,” she said.

  “Cole Presley made me believe he was a good man. Hell, he helped raise me and my sister. He took care of my mom when she didn’t have anyone else to rely on, and he manipulated me into thinking he cared about us. But after the truth came out, I swore I wouldn’t ever let someone manipulate me like that again.”

  Nicholas studied the fine lines of the sling on her right arm, heat rising up his throat. “Then you came along, and when you told me you’d finally found someone you didn’t have to hide your true self with, I convinced myself you were manipulating me as he had. I convinced myself that you were wearing a mask to get what you needed from me before you left.”

  * * *

  SHE DIDN’T KNOW what to say, what to think.

  Nicholas had been through one of the worst betrayals a person could experience when Cole Presley had revealed who he was behind that friendly neighbor/father-figure mask, and her chest hurt witnessing the pain in his voice now, but she needed to know. She needed to know how they could move on from this. Because even though he’d crushed her heart in that observation room, a part of her still stood by what she’d said. She didn’t have to hide pieces of herself from him. She didn’t have to convince him she was a pediatrician or explain her need to autopsy human beings to give comfort to their loved ones. She didn’t have to hide the fact she’d rather watch a silly children’s show instead of the news or a true crime documentary or listen to a podcast all her colleagues and friends had become obsessed with.

  “Do you blame me for being the one to prove Cole Presley was the X Marks the Spot Killer?” Aubrey willed her fingers to curl around his, but the signals from her brain had died the moment Dr. Caldwell had stabbed that scalpel through her wrist. The hollowness of facing the fact she’d never hold a surgical instrument steadily again had cut through her, but worse, the fear Nicholas would never be able to trust her hooked into her and pulled tight. “Do you resent me because you think I made a mistake on that case?”

  The three distinct lines between his eyebrows deepened in confusion. He shifted to the edge of his seat and locked both hands around her cast. The dark circles under his eyes evidenced his lack of sleep, and it was only then she realized he’d slept in the clothes he was wearing. He’d stayed here. With her. “What? No. You did your job, Doc, and you’re damn good at it. The evidence proved he killed all those women. You proved it. You’re the one who showed the world who he really was, and I could never blame you for that.”

  “But you won’t ever trust me.” The pain of that statement sliced deeper than the fractures to her ribs and scapula. She’d trusted him. She’d trusted him to find her when Caldwell had abducted her from the pier, and afterward when he’d promised he wouldn’t let anything else happen to her. She’d trusted him with pieces of her and Kara’s childhood and to find the man responsible for murdering her sister. She’d trusted him with her heart, even at the risk of not being wanted in return. Tightness swelled in her throat.

  “All I’ve done is trust you during this investigation, Nicholas. You made me feel wanted and worthy when you watched my favorite show with me and made doughnuts for me. When you held me and let me cry in your arms, I felt...loved. You showed me I was burning out by putting others first, but when I finally made myself a priority by telling you I didn’t want to hide any part of myself from you, you reduced my feelings to an effect from trauma. It might not seem like much, but it took everything I had to convince myself what I felt was real—that I deserved to be happy—and it meant nothing to you. I am not Cole Presley, Agent James. That man manipulated and lied to you for thirty years, but there isn’t an ounce of blood in my body that could do that to someone I love.”

  Seconds slipped by, a minute.

  “You don’t exactly know whose blood you have in your body now, but you’re right, Doc. About all of it.” Nicholas
sat back as though she’d thrown a physical blow. He released her hand, and she swore the dead nerves in her fingertips went cold. Standing, he cast his gaze to the floor. “What I did had nothing to do with you and everything to do with fear of trusting someone who could hurt me again, and I’m sorry. I was falling in love with you, and losing control of myself like that scared the hell out of me. You’re nothing like Cole Presley. I know the person I’ve spent the past week with on this investigation is who you really are, and I stupidly took it for granted. You’re generous and sincere—a bit macabre, considering you used to make Kara play dead as a kid—but it took nearly losing you for me to realize you are everything I’ve been afraid of and everything I’ve needed in my life.”

  He pushed unkempt hair off his forehead and hauled a duffel bag she hadn’t noticed until now from the floor over his shoulder. The stitches in the right side of his face shifted as one side of his mouth curled into a half smile. “I wouldn’t blame you if you never wanted to see me after I leave this room, but you deserved an explanation.”

  Nicholas headed for the door.

  Her heart rate ticked higher on the monitors as she struggled to sit straight in the bed. “You were falling in love with me?”

  He hesitated, his hand on the door handle, every ounce the BAU agent she’d fallen in love with. Intense, focused, protective. Craning his head toward her, he tightened his grip around the bag’s strap until the whites of his knuckles materialized through bruised and lacerated skin. “I started falling in love with you the first time I met you, Doc. I just didn’t realize it until I almost lost you to Caldwell in that slaughterhouse.”