TO DIE FOR (Eva Rae Thomas Mystery Book 8)

by Willow Rose

  “What kind of trouble?”

  “Maybe I should take Angel upstairs,” Matt said and got up. “She’s asleep.”

  I looked down at my gorgeous child, then sighed. He was right. She needed to be somewhere quiet. I was just disappointed since I had been looking forward to holding her again. I handed her to Matt, who smiled at the sight of his daughter. He looked so sexy with our baby on his arm.

  “I’ll get her to bed.”

  I exhaled and sat down, yet felt strangely at unease as Matt left me alone with Scott.

  Scott’s green eyes lingered on me, and I saw almost despair in them. They were begging me, as he said, “The kind of trouble only a former FBI-profiler can help me out of.”

  Chapter 8

  “You’re telling me you’re on the run from the police right now?”

  I stared at Scott, and he grimaced.

  “It’s bad, isn’t it?”

  “Yeah, it’s bad. It’s awful. Did you tell Matt? You know he’s CBPD, right?”

  He nodded. “I know. I know. I just didn’t know where else to go. Then I remembered that I read recently that you moved back and that you solved that Nancy Henry case, and I was so impressed since it was really complicated. I was on I95 and had decided to run when I saw the exit sign to Cocoa Beach and thought of you. Only you can help me. I am innocent, Eva Rae. I haven’t hurt her.”

  I stared at him, then sipped the coffee I had poured myself while Scott told me everything.

  “And you say she just disappeared? Any signs of forced entry?”

  He shook his head. “All I found was an empty picture frame on the living room floor. Nothing else.”

  I gave him a look. I saw the desperation in his eyes. It was hard to miss.

  “Well, I have known you for years, Scott, and even though you acted like a prick back in the day, I don’t believe you would harm anyone.”

  “Thank you,” he said, relieved. “You’re the first to say so. All my friends, even my parents, don’t want to have anything to do with me. They think I did it, that I did something to her. Can you believe them?”

  I sipped my coffee pensively. “Could she have left you? Is there a reason why no one thinks that’s a possibility?”

  “I think she’d at least say goodbye,” he said. “Or leave a note.”

  “When was the last time you heard from her? Was it when you said goodbye in the morning, or did you talk during the day?”

  “She texted me because she had received flowers, and she thought they were from me. But I told her that I hadn’t sent any. When I came home, they were in the trash bin outside.”

  That made me frown.

  “Flowers?”

  “Yes, lilies. They were her favorites, and so she immediately thought they were from me.”

  “But you didn’t send any. Could it have been someone else she knows? Her parents?”

  “She didn’t speak to her parents. I never met them, and she didn’t like to talk about them.”

  “Hm, why not?”

  He shrugged. “She never told me.”

  “Did you ask?”

  He smiled. “I know you think I’m a cold bastard, but people change, Eva Rae. Yes, of course, I asked. She didn’t want to tell me. She had moved far away from them because she didn’t want to see them. She came down here from Ohio and wanted to start over.”

  “Was she generally very secretive about her past? Like did she have friends from before she moved down here? Did anyone visit with you?”

  He shook his head. “None. She never spoke of anyone from her past.”

  I paused, then thought of my baby upstairs. “I don’t know, Scott…”

  His eyes were begging. He put a hand on top of mine, and I froze. His touch brought me back to years ago. My heart was pounding at the memory.

  Careful, Eva Rae.

  “Please. Eva Rae. I have nowhere else to turn.”

  I exhaled. “I just had a baby, Scott. Things are kind of tight and messy around here right now. I wouldn’t even know where to begin. For all I know, Sarah just left you, and maybe she went back to some guy she hadn’t told you about. Besides, if the police can’t prove you hurt her, then they can’t charge you with anything. I suggest you get a good lawyer instead. I can help you with that.”

  “I don’t think that is what happened,” Scott said. “She didn’t just leave. Or I wouldn’t be here.”

  I rubbed my eyes. Exhaustion was beginning to set in. This was so not what I needed right now.

  “I’m sorry, Scott… I can’t…”

  He grabbed my arm and forced me to look at him. The deep desperation in his eyes got to me.

  “I’m telling you—something happened to her. I know it did.”

  “And how do you know?”

  He sighed. “Because she told me two months ago that if she ever went missing, I should look for her.”

  Chapter 9

  THEN:

  “How have you been? You seem a little…quiet today?”

  Lynn sent Jeffrey a compassionate smile. He looked great, as usual, impeccably dressed in his pinstriped suit and white shirt underneath. His expensive watch dangled from his wrist, but there was something different about him—a sadness she hadn’t seen in him before. He had arrived a few minutes late for their appointment and had barely looked at her.

  “Is something wrong?” she added after a few seconds of silence.

  She couldn’t help smiling when she looked at him. She couldn’t tell him, but she had been looking forward to their session all weekend. She had thought about him a lot, maybe even more than she should have. She couldn’t help it. There was something about him that made her care for him. She had wondered if it was a maternal instinct that had awoken in her. Did she care for him the way a mother would a child?

  “Jeffrey?”

  He looked up. Were those tears in his eyes?

  “It’s just… well, I miss her so much.”

  Lynn exhaled. “You mean Joanna?”

  He nodded. “She was the one for me, you know?”

  “Okay. Let’s talk about that.”

  Lynn straightened in her chair.

  “I don’t know,” he said. “What’s there to talk about?”

  “I have a feeling there’s more than you think. Have you seen her recently?”

  “I see her…from time to time.”

  Lynn looked at him from above her reading glasses. “You see her? Where?”

  He shrugged and looked away. His eyes hit the bookshelves to his right. There was something he wasn’t telling her.

  “Just…around.”

  Lynn tilted her head slightly. “Okay, just so I understand better, you see her around, you say, but could you tell me where you see her? At the supermarket?”

  “Among other places…yes.”

  “At her house?”

  “Maybe.”

  Lynn swallowed, then took off her glasses and looked at him. “Have you been following her?”

  His eyes hit the floor. He shrugged. “Maybe…a little.”

  She sighed and closed her eyes briefly. She wasn’t supposed to pass judgment, so she’d have to be careful how she said the next thing.

  “Does that sound like a good idea?”

  He shrugged again. “I don’t know. It’s not something I plan to do. It just happens. I drive past her house and see her come out the door, and then I follow her. I just feel…it’s hard to live without her. You must know this. You know with your sister and all.”

  Lynn swallowed again, then wrinkled her forehead.

  “My sister?”

  “Yes, how she fell in love with a guy and then killed herself because he dumped her.”

  Lynn’s heart stopped. “That’s not exactly what happened, but that’s not important. How do you know this?”

  He lifted his gaze, and his eyes met hers. “From Facebook. You wrote a post about it on the fifth anniversary of it happening. It was really sad to read.”

  Lynn put the
pen down. A strange sensation rushed through her body, which she pushed away as fast as possible.

  “You’ve been checking my Facebook account?”

  He blushed. “No, no…I mean, yes…I did…but just once.”

  “That is not a very good idea, Jeffrey,” she said. “And I think you know it. You and I have a different kind of relationship. We’re not friends. I am your therapist.”

  He looked sheepishly at her. “O-of course. I didn’t mean anything by it. I just…I was curious. I won’t do it again. I promise.”

  His gaze made her smile. She couldn’t help herself; she felt flattered. He wasn’t the first patient to have checked her social media profiles or Google her name. One had even run a background check on her, getting her address and phone number. It wasn’t unusual to be curious like Jeffrey said. Most patients were. But she knew it was essential to stop that sort of behavior right away. Patients were supposed to become attached to their therapists, but there had to be clear boundaries from the beginning. Once one of them overstepped those boundaries, the relationship would shift, and it would become something other than a patient-therapist relationship.

  And that was where the danger lay.

  Chapter 10

  Matt stood with his arms crossed while I finished my breakfast. Angel was napping in her crib upstairs, and I was hurrying to be done with my food so I could get dressed. All the kids had left for school—except Amy and Owen, of course—and the house had finally gone calm.

  “You actually told him you’d help him?” he asked, giving me one of his angry and disapproving looks. “You want to help that prick?”

  I looked up at him. “That’s not very nice.”

  “But that’s what he was back then. We hated him, remember?”

  “That was twenty years ago, Matt. He is in trouble now. Something happened to his girlfriend. I can’t just not help him because we didn’t like him back in high school.”

  He lifted his eyebrows. “I just don’t get it. What is it with you two, anyway? I didn’t even know you knew one another. You barely spoke back then.”

  I sipped my coffee and closed my eyes briefly. I really didn’t want to get into it now. I wasn’t sure I ever wanted to. It had stirred up some strong emotions from back then that I didn’t really want to resurface. But I just couldn’t get that sentence out of my mind again. His girlfriend had known something might happen to her. She had warned him.

  “We don’t know one another very well,” I said. “I just want to help him, okay? It’s not so much for his sake as it is for his girlfriend’s. If she told him that he should look for her if she ever disappeared, then she must have feared that something would happen to her. I can’t stop thinking about her.”

  “And what about Angel?” he asked. “Who’s gonna take care of her? I have to go to work.”

  “I’ll bring her with me,” I said with a shrug. “As soon as she wakes up and I’ve changed her and fed her, I’ll go.”

  He tilted his head. “And you’re sure that’s a good idea?”

  I scoffed. “It’s not like I’m going somewhere dangerous. I’m just going to talk to the detective on the case. He’s an old colleague of mine, and he owes me a favor.”

  Matt smiled and shook his head. “You’re incredible; do you know that?”

  “I hope that is meant as a compliment,” I said and sipped more coffee. I was going to need it to stay focused today. Angel had kept me awake from two until four o’clock, refusing to fall asleep. I had ended up sleeping with her while sitting in my chair, the baby lying on my chest. That was how we woke up this morning.

  Matt grabbed a bowl and poured in some cereal, then started to eat. “I don’t understand why you can’t stay home and enjoy this time with Angel?”

  I sighed. “Just let me have this, okay? I’m going a little stir-crazy home alone all day. Helping Scott and maybe Sarah out will give me something to do. A purpose.”

  “And taking care of our baby isn’t purpose enough?” he asked, crunching his cereal loudly.

  I finished my cup and put it down. “Let it go, will you?”

  I rose to my feet, then leaned over and kissed his milky lips before Angel’s crying stopped us.

  “I just wish you’d tell me why you two seem to know each other so well,” he said as I ran up the stairs to attend to her. “You’re being weird about it.”

  I stopped briefly at the top of the stairs, biting my lip, thinking back on Scott and what had happened back then, then sighed. Angel’s insistent cries pulled me back to reality, and I rushed into her nursery and smiled as I saw her beautiful face staring back at me from inside the crib. It was amazing how one small smile from such a little creature could make all my problems and bad thoughts disappear in a heartbeat. I grabbed her in my arms, then heard the front door slam shut as Matt left for work.

  Chapter 11

  “Eva Rae Thomas!”

  I opened the door to Detective Jake Perez’s office at Rockledge Police Department. He was part of the Criminal Investigations Division, and he was the lead investigator on the case of the missing Sarah Abbey. I had worked another case with him ten years ago, back when he was in Tallahassee, and I had saved his life in a shootout with a serial killer who strangled his victims as part of a sexual ritual.

  Jake looked at Angel, who was strapped to my chest in her sling.

  “Cute kid. I can’t believe you’re still having more?”

  I sat down in a chair across from him, ignoring his comment that obviously revealed that he thought I was a little old for having a baby.

  “What can I do for you?” he asked. “You said on the phone that it was about the Sarah Abbey case? What’s your interest in that?”

  “It’s a long story,” I said, looking down briefly at the baby as she started to complain. I found the pacifier and tried to get her to take it, but she hadn’t really accepted it yet and spat it out as soon as I tried.

  “I have a lot of time,” Jake said.

  “I just want to ask you for some details, if I may,” I said.

  He leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms. “I’m not really allowed to since you’re technically not working. You quit, right?”

  “Yeah, well, that didn’t really work. Work has sort of kept following me since I stopped. But technically, no, I’m not FBI anymore.”

  He bit the inside of his cheek, then shook his head. “I don’t think I can help you, Eva Rae; I’m sorry.”

  Angel fussed, and I tried the pacifier once more. It stuck for about a second before she spat it right out again. I couldn’t figure out why she wouldn’t take it. All my other children had loved their pacifiers from the first moment I introduced them.

  “Come on, Jake. I just need to take a look.”

  He gave me a glare across the room, then tilted his head while rubbing his stubble. “Oh, I have a feeling I’m going to regret this big time.”

  I smiled. “You’re the best, Jake.”

  He pointed at me. “But that means we’re even.”

  I gaped. “What? I saved your life. No way does that make us even.”

  He rolled his office chair to the file cabinet, then flipped through the dividers and pulled one out. He threw it on the desk in front of me.

  “I’m going for coffee. You have ten minutes.”

  “That’s all I need,” I said.

  He walked out while I opened the file, trying to calm Angel, but she was getting annoyed now and wouldn’t keep quiet. I flipped through the pages, reading the details when I came to something that made me pause and reread it just to be sure. I stared at the page for a few seconds, pondering the information, then continued. By the time Jake came back, I was done and rose to my feet.

  “You leaving so soon?” he said, holding two cups of coffee in his hands. I smiled at his sweet gesture. Angel was not just fussing now but starting to cry. “As much as I would love to stay and catch up on old times, I have to get this one home and feed her before she gets really upset
,” I said and rushed out the door, feeling satisfied that I had gotten what I came for, and then some.

  Chapter 12

  He was sitting in the corner of Juice ‘N Java, a local coffee shop in Cocoa Beach. Lily Mitchell spotted him from behind the counter and smiled as she took the customer's credit card and swiped it. It had been like this all morning. He would sit there, stare at her, and their eyes would meet. She smiled back, showing him what her boyfriend referred to as her charming overbite.

  The customer got his coffee and bagel, then left. Lily remained at the cash register for a few seconds, fixing the receipts, then lifted her gaze again and met his. He smiled, and she smiled back, then lowered her eyes shyly.

  She wasn’t sure why he was watching her so intently. He was handsome yet significantly older than her. Did he think she would be interested in someone like him?

  The guy sipped more coffee when the door opened, and two local police officers stepped in. Lily studied the guy as his eyes grew wide, and he turned away.

  The officers walked up to Lily and ordered their usual sandwiches. Lily noticed how the panic was painted all over the guy’s face as they looked around them, waiting for their coffee. He grabbed a magazine that was just lying there and looked through it, lowering his head as much as possible.

  What’s he doing?

  The officers received their coffee and breakfast in a bag, then thanked Lily, and one of them put a tip in the jar with a wink. They turned around and started to head for the door. The guy in the corner lowered his eyes and looked into the magazine. He was sweating heavily, and his torso was shaking. It seemed very suspicious, and for a second, Lily wondered if she should tell the officers. This guy had been acting strangely ever since he got here and ordered coffee from her, unable to take his eyes off of her. And now this? The officers walked toward the door when one of them stopped and turned to look.

  He’s looking straight at him.

  Lily held her breath while the officer stared at him. Neither of them moved a muscle.