I can’t wait to open you up, to see you’r beautiful heart beating just for me. Can’t wait to put my hand on it while it pumps, to know that the last thing you’ll see in this world will be my face.
She started to tremble, but when Shawn tried to take the note from her, she wrenched it from his grasp. She would finish reading it, she had to, because after this, she never wanted to touch the thing again.
So, have you found the clue I left you? I confess to being just a tad bit anxious—I’ve waited so long to make you mine that I am terribly excited at the thought that if you are smart enough—good enough—you will understand. And then you will come to me.
Be smart, Genevieve. And swift—the fate of the next one rests in your beautiful hands.
For a moment she really thought she was going to puke. Clapping a hand over her mouth, she thrust the letter at Shawn before hightailing it into the hall. She heard Luc call her name, heard Shawn curse as he must have begun reading the letter.
For the second time in an hour, she braced her hands on her knees and concentrated on her breathing. In through the nose; out through the mouth.
In, out.
In, out.
She kept up the rhythm for long minutes, worked to keep her mind clear of everything but the need to breathe.
The nausea finally receded, along with her need to flee. What the hell was this guy doing? Why had he fixated on her? And why was he going through this ridiculous game of cat and mouse, when it would be easier—and more expedient—to just snatch her somewhere?
God knew she would prefer it to this endless charade. But then, that was probably why he was doing this. If he knew as much about her as he claimed, the bastard would know that she’d much prefer a direct confrontation. He would know that the idea of women being tortured and raped would hit her hard, especially when he implied that they were stand-ins for her.
Just the idea made her ill—that these women were dying because some psychopath wanted her attention. Well, mission accomplished. He had her attention—and she wasn’t backing off until she’d nailed his ass to the f**king wall.
Steadier now that she’d had a chance to think things through, Genevieve headed back into the hotel room. And ran smack-dab into Torres.
“This was in the box,” he said grimly, holding up a beaded and fringed scarf in shades of hot pink and purple.
She reached for it reflexively, gasping as her hands touched the gossamer thin silk. “Oh, shit,” she said as she held it up to the light and saw the magnificent swirls sweeping out from the center.
“What now?” Luc demanded from the doorway, blatant fury in every line of his body.
“I wanted this scarf.” She looked blankly at the two men, watched them tense as they waited for her to explain. “I saw it in the French Market last week, spent a long time debating whether I wanted to spend the money on it. Finally, I decided it was too expensive and I left it there. But I’ve been thinking of it off and on all week, wondering if I should go back and get it.”
Silence greeted her revelation, a silence broken only by Shawn’s voice, cursing low and viciously.
Chapter Sixteen
“Delacroix, get in here.” Chastian’s voice boomed across the bull pen, grabbing Genevieve’s attention—and that of every other cop in the room.
She cursed, mentally, even as she slid back her chair and started to cross the room that had suddenly begun to feel like a gauntlet. It had been three days since they had found Maria Varden’s body at the Monteleone. Three days with very little sleep and even less progress, as they tried to run this bastard to ground.
Three days since she’d seen Cole. She’d spoken with him briefly this morning, and had been reassured by his quiet assertions that he was getting along just fine without her. Some men didn’t understand what it was like to be in the middle of a murder investigation of this magnitude; she’d lost more than one lover through the years because they felt she didn’t have enough time for them.
Of course Cole would understand, she told herself as she headed for her lieutenant’s office. He’d lived through this from the other side—had dealt with his sister’s brutal murder and the ensuing investigation.
Still, she wanted to see him. Her body was aching for him. To have him hold her—just for a minute—and tell her everything was going to be all right. Because with the way she was feeling now—as she hit dead end after dead end in her search for this bastard—she felt like nothing was ever going to be okay again.
She put Cole—and her need for him—out of her mind as she stopped in front of Chastian, knowing she’d need every ounce of concentration she had left, after working almost seventy-two hours straight, to deal with the man.
On some level, she was conscious of Shawn walking behind her, but as she entered Chastian’s office, he barked, “Not you, Webster. Go do whatever it is you do.” Then slammed the door in her partner’s face.
Her heart picked up its rhythm, and a line of sweat—cold and uncomfortable—rolled from her shoulder blades to the small of her back. She’d never seen Chastian look so smug or so grim. Whatever he had to talk to her about wasn’t going to be good. That he wanted to do it without Shawn sent her radar on red alert.
Silence stretched between them, long, awkward moments where they did nothing but stare at each other. Genevieve knew he was testing her, waiting for her to speak first. It was just one of the many power games he liked to play, and today she just wasn’t in the mood to humor him.
When he finally realized he wasn’t going to get a response from her, he reached into the top drawer of his desk and pulled out a large manila envelope, then tossed it on the desk and nodded for her to take it.
She eyed the thing for a minute, somehow knowing that the contents wouldn’t be pleasant. But they both knew she didn’t have a choice but to look, so she reached over and picked the thing up, careful not to show her reluctance.
Screw him, she thought as she undid the tabs that held the envelope closed. If he wanted to pull these games with her, he had a long wait coming before he would get a reaction—
Shit.
For at least a minute, the world went black. There was a buzzing sound in her ears, and she swayed alarmingly. But she locked her knees in place, refusing to let them buckle, no matter how weak they had become. She stared down at the pictures in her hands and nearly gagged. Chastian would like nothing more than to watch her fall, to call out for help while the damning photos lay spread out around her on the floor for the entire squad room to see.
Photos of her and Cole—photos of her nak*d, in his kitchen, him poised over her—tequila flowing freely over her stomach. Photos of him licking it off her br**sts.
She flipped through the stack, paused as she saw a series taken with her blindfolded and strapped to a bed. The lines down the middle of the picture made it abundantly clear that it had been taken from outside the half-open shutters that had decorated Cole’s bedroom windows. Shutters neither of them had thought to close as the room faced his high-fenced backyard.
She felt violated in a way she had never before experienced. That someone had watched her during the most intimate sexual moments of her life was horrible enough; that he had taken pictures and sent them to her boss was unthinkable.
She wanted to cry, wanted to run away and never come back. But Chastian was counting on that feeling, was exploiting it for all he was worth, and she would be damned if she gave him the satisfaction.
Making sure her voice was as tough as his skin, she demanded, “Was there a note?”
His eyes widened, and she realized that wasn’t the question he’d been expecting her to ask. Maybe Where did you get these? would have been a more appropriate first question, but she already knew the answer. He had taken these pictures. He had sent them to her boss.
He was taunting her, humiliating her, paying her back for sleeping with someone else when he’d wanted her for himself. And now that she’d been blindsided by the photos, she realized she shouldn’t have been. Of course he’d been watching her, following her, learning her every move. His knowledge of the plays she liked gave proof that he’d already been inside her house, had looked at her bookshelves.
She’d spent the last three days alternating between horror and fury that he’d had the nerve to enter her house, to go through her things. Even though she’d changed the locks, she didn’t feel safe in her own home. She stared down at the photos, couldn’t repress the shudder that rocked through her. But that—that was nothing compared to what he’d done here.
“Why do you ask?” Chastian’s eyes swept over her, and though she assured herself that there was nothing sexual in the look, she’d never felt more nak*d. How was she supposed to look her boss in the eye and explain how those pictures had been taken? How could she not?
“You know he sent these, right?” She was proud of how hard her voice sounded, how completely invulnerable.
“Is that what you think?”
“It’s what I know. The killer’s sick mental fingerprints are all over them.” She started flipping through the remaining pictures, knowing that if she didn’t get through them now, she never would.
Each one was a little more explicit than the one before it, each one a new humiliation for her to endure. The thought of them being logged into evidence, of Shawn and Luc and Roberto seeing them, was more than she could bear.
When she got to the last photo, it was all she could do not to gasp, not to drop the thing and give Chastian exactly the reaction he was looking for. But she was made of sterner stuff, she reminded herself, as she stared at the altered picture of herself. Whoever had developed it had let the developing fluid sit too long on it. Around her body stretched on the bed, there were huge, dark puddles that looked like blood.
Her eyes had been gouged out, her body mutilated almost beyond recognition. She glanced up, saw Chastian watching her with hungry, glazed eyes—as if he was dying for her to fall apart.
Refusing to give him that satisfaction, she said again in her best hard-ass voice, “Where’s the note?”
He raised an eyebrow, but reached back in the envelope and pulled out yet another letter printed on pale blue paper. She grabbed it, read the two words with a sinking heart. My turn.
She didn’t know what to do, what to say. Could barely look Chastian in the eyes as she contemplated how to handle this latest viciousness. If he was a different kind of lieutenant, she might have asked him for help. Might have listened to his suggestions. Might have counted on him to protect her.
But Chastian hated her and always had, and this was the excuse he’d been waiting for to knock her down a peg—or five.
So she simply watched him, waited. He’d already made up his mind on how to handle this before he’d ever called her in—and he would sure as hell tell her what he wanted to do. Better to wait than to humiliate herself all over again.
But when he spoke, his voice was gentler than she’d expected. “This guy’s fixated on you, Delacroix.”
It was all she could do to keep from laughing. Hysterically. “Yes, sir. That seems pretty obvious at this point.”
“What are we going to do about that fact?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know. But I figure if you’re bringing the topic up, you have a solution.”
He sat down hard on his desk chair, drummed his fingers on the desk as he watched her. “I do. I think you should take a leave of absence.”
Genevieve felt her mouth drop open. Worked hard to close it so she wouldn’t look like a total idiot. But of all the things she’d expected him to say to her, that didn’t even register in the top fifty. “A leave of absence? In the middle of a serial homicide case?” She knew her tone implied that she thought he was several cards short of a full deck, but she couldn’t help it. Had Chastian gone completely insane?
He held up a hand. “It’s dangerous for you to be a part of this case, and I think—”
“It’s dangerous for any of us to be a part of this case!” she exploded. “It’s ridiculous to say that I’m any more at risk than Shawn or Luc or Torres.”
“Don’t throw that feminist crap at me, Delacroix.” Chastian stood up, got in her face. “This guy kills women, not men. And you are definitely a woman.” He waved the photos around. “On top of that, he’s obsessed enough with you that he’s sneaking around a stranger’s backyard to get nak*d pictures of you. I don’t see any of Torres in this pile, do you?”
She gritted her teeth to keep from saying something she’d regret, especially since for once Chastian was actually making sense. “I still don’t think a leave of absence is the way to solve that problem.”
“Yes, well, that’s not actually your call to make.”
“Since when? I’m the one who has to put in for the time off.”
“Genevieve.” Alarm coursed through her as Chastian used her first name for the first time in three years. “You have a choice. Put in for time off or I’ll suspend you.”