by Cynthia Eden
Joel swore. “A month? A whole fucking month? Why?”
“I don’t want to hurt you.”
“Too fucking late for that.” His voice was raw. Savage.
She flinched.
“Why? Why me, Chloe? Why the hell did you pull me into your web?”
“I originally wanted to see your file because I was doing research on people in the area…” Tell him. “Who might fit the profile of the killer.”
“The Bad Deeds Killer.”
She nodded. “I saw you the day I learned of Gregory Guidry’s murder. You were running down the street. I was at the crime scene, and you just—you ran right past me.”
“I don’t remember that.”
“You run a lot, Joel. You never remember where you go. You’re too busy trying to escape. But I saw you and—”
“And you notice everything, don’t you? Every fucking thing. You saw me, probably recognized my face, and you decided to rip my life apart.”
She couldn’t let him see how much his words hurt her. She’d learned to never let anyone see when she hurt. Some people liked pain far too much. “You were at the crime scene. When I saw you, I remembered what had happened to you.”
“Sure, you did. What with that great eidetic memory and all.”
She would not flinch. “I use the victims to help me find the killers. I work backwards. I was building an idea in my head based on Gregory of what the perp might be like. And all of a sudden, you were there, running right past me, and after what you’d done to the man who you believed hurt you—”
“Believed? I damn well know what that bastard did to me! You weren’t there! You don’t know! You don’t know how he laughed when I bled. How he smiled when he cut deeper and deeper. How he told me no one would ever come. No one would find me, no one would—” Joel stopped. Exhaled.
She reached up to touch him because she hated his pain. She wanted to take it away and make it better for him—
“Don’t.” He jerked away.
She was the one to suck in a deep breath. Pain knifed through her and Chloe had to hurriedly lower her lashes so that he wouldn’t notice the tears that filled her eyes.
“You set me up from the beginning, didn’t you?” His voice was angry, but cold. Very cold. “All some giant test. A game you were playing.”
“I don’t play games.” Her voice was rough. Too ragged. “People always say that, but I don’t.”
“Look at me.”
Her head snapped up. A tear slid down her cheek.
He swallowed. His hand lifted toward her, but it stopped. Fisted. Fell back to his side. “It wasn’t coincidence that we met in that bank, was it?”
Slowly, she shook her head.
“How the fuck did you arrange that?”
“I…I knew Harry’s pattern. The trick was getting you in the bank on the right day. I made sure a check was sent to you from your lawyer’s Dallas office and I—”
“God, you are a piece of work.”
Chloe pressed her lips together.
“You manipulated me from day one. Nothing was real, was it?” Both of his hands locked around the handlebars. Tightened fiercely. “I’m just someone else for you to mind fuck—”
“No!” The snarl tore from her and everything—
The walls came crashing down.
Her heartbeat seemed too fast. Her breathing too fast. Her body too hot. Everything was too much. “I’m not mind fucking you. I’ve been trying to help you! Yes, I set up the meeting in the bank. All I had to go by on you were Gordon’s notes. I don’t trust the assessment of other people. I needed to interact with you myself! And within five minutes of meeting you, I knew how wrong he was. But you didn’t. You were living in a grave that he’d created for you. Believing the lies he’d told you, and I had to help you to break free. So I gave you opportunities. Choices. You made those decisions. You chose to move here. You chose to be my partner. You chose to be my lover.” She didn’t swipe away the tears on her cheeks. She didn’t care about them.
I care about him. Why couldn’t he see that?
“I knew you weren’t the killer, Joel. You weren’t the man I was after. But you were the man I needed. I wanted you to stay with me. I still want you to stay with me.” She’d never been this open with anyone in her life.
Maybe because no one had ever mattered this much?
“You don’t let me in, Chloe.” His voice seemed as ragged as her own. Not as cold any longer. Rough and gruff. “I don’t know any of your secrets, yet you know everything that makes me bleed. How the hell is that fair?”
It wasn’t. “Joel…” She almost reached for him again.
But he had the motorcycle roaring to life. “I can’t watch you cry,” he rasped. “I can’t fucking do it.”
She couldn’t stop crying. She hadn’t cried in so long, but the tears were coming now because he was hurt. She’d done this. “The more time I spent with you, the more I wanted to help.”
“I’m not a freaking fixer-upper project! I’m a person, I’m—”
“I think I love you, Joel.”
He stared at her. The motorcycle growled.
A tremble shook her body.
“I can’t tell,” he said.
“What?” She didn’t understand.
“I can’t tell when you are lying or when you’re telling me the truth.”
A chill swept over her body. “I see.”
“What do you want me to do?”
Chloe choked down the lump in her throat. Put the walls back up. Get your control back, Chloe. “I want you to figure out if I’m lying or telling the truth. When you do, come back to me.” She turned away. Made herself put one foot in front of the other. She’d get inside. Shut the door. Get herself together.
“Chloe!”
She didn’t stop walking. “You haven’t figured out anything yet, Joel. Come back to me when you do.” Because…as she’d told him before…
It had always been his choice. His decision. Every step of the way.
The motorcycle roared down the road.
When she opened the door of the house, Marie was waiting for her near the foot of the stairs. A brown envelope was gripped in her hands. “Did he really need to rev the bike that way?” Marie asked with a wince. “Loud as hell. Annoying.”
“I think he really needed to rev the bike that way,” Chloe replied woodenly.
Marie advanced on her. Narrowed her eyes. “Why the hell do you have tear tracks on your cheeks?”
“Because I hurt him.”
“No, no, bullshit. You have tear tracks on your cheeks because he hurt you.” She shoved the envelope into Chloe’s hands and pulled out one of her knives in the next moment. Marie always had a knife hidden somewhere. “I’m going after him,” she fumed. “I will make him sorry, don’t you worry about that for a second, I will—”
“Where did this envelope come from?”
“It was on the doorstep. Had your name on it. Figured it was for one of your weird cases.”
She flipped over the envelope. Saw her name. Recognized the familiar scrawl. A fist squeezed her heart as she ripped open the envelope. The tarot card spilled into her hand. Yellow background. A man with his hand in the air, standing near a powerful altar. A man who was…
The Magician.
Her head whipped right back up. “Go after Joel.”
“Oh, I’m going after him. I will make him so sorry, I will—”
“Protect him. Please. He doesn’t want to be around me now, and I need you to go. Stay with him. Make sure he’s safe.”
Marie hesitated. Worry flashed in her eyes. “Someone is after Joel?”
“I trust you, Marie. You’re the best, most skilled—”
“Assassin you know?” Marie finished darkly. She looked down at the knife in her hand. “Just like my father.” Grim. Sad.
“No. No.”
Marie peered up at her.
“You’re nothing like him. You’re the best, most skil
led hunter I know. You can find anyone, and we both know it. Yes, your father trained you how to track prey just like he did…” To track and then to kill. “But you didn’t cross the line. You never have. You never will. You can find anyone, at any time. I know you can find Joel. I need you to find him. Then make sure he stays safe. Please,” Chloe pleaded again. She could hear the desperation in her own voice.
Marie held her gaze. “We both know the only reason I didn’t cross the line was because you stopped me when I was in the middle of my first kill.”
“Me being there wasn’t the reason you didn’t finish the job. If you’d really wanted to do it, you would have just taken your knife and shoved it in my throat. Then done the job and gotten paid.”
Marie licked her lower lip. “I…didn’t want to kill you.”
“You didn’t want to kill anyone,” Chloe corrected.
“You know how many people my dad killed. You know what he—”
“I know you’re not your dad. I’m not my father, either. We’re our own people. We make our choices. That’s what matters.”
“You always say that.” She squared her shoulders.
“Because it’s always true.”
“Say it enough and one day, I might believe you.” Marie yanked open the door. “I’ll find your lost partner, don’t worry. I might hurt him a little, but I’ll be sure he stays alive—”
“You already do believe me. That’s why you’re going after Joel. And thank you.”
Marie disappeared into the night.
Chloe looked back down at the card. Then at the envelope. That familiar scrawl. She’d feared it was him. Had known, deep down, all along, that it had to be.
The stairs creaked. The fifth stair, to be exact. She raised her eyes. Found Reese staring at her.
“What’s happening?” he asked. Like Marie, he had worry in his eyes.
“A dead man is in town.” Her hold tightened on the card and envelope. “And I think he’s about to be a problem.”
Chapter Twenty-Five
Joel lifted the shot glass to his lips. Drained it fast. Didn’t even feel the burn as the whiskey slid down his throat. He immediately motioned for another.
He was in the loudest, roughest bar he could find. And everywhere he looked, Joel saw…her. Chloe. With tears on her cheeks. Tears he’d made her shed.
I am such a bastard.
When he’d seen her tears, all he’d wanted to do was wipe them away. Kiss them way. Pull her into his arms. Tell her everything was okay.
I think I love you, Joel.
The whole world had stopped when she’d said those words. And he’d wanted—so very badly—to believe her. But Chloe had been playing him from the beginning. What if she was still playing him? What if I want her so much that it doesn’t even matter?
Was he that desperate? That far gone? That in love with Chloe Hastings?
“Oh, wow, I’ve seen that look before.” A guy slid onto the barstool next to him. “Woman trouble, am I right?”
“You have no idea.” Joel slanted him a quick glance.
“You’d be surprised.” The man smiled at him. His gray eyes swept over Joel. “I’ve had my heart broken before. Shattered beneath the heel of a sexy high-heeled shoe.” He motioned to the bartender. “I’ll take what he’s got.”
Wonderful. A stranger trying to be chummy. “Look, buddy, I am not in the mood to commiserate. And trust me, you’ve got no idea what my life is like.”
“Oh, I’m not here to commiserate. Just to get drunk off my ass.” He took the shot glass that had been placed in front of him. Lifted it toward Joel in a salute. “Cheers.” He drained it in one gulp. “Another!” he called.
Joel studied the refilled shot glass in front of him. The amber liquid. He remembered the last time he’d had whiskey. With Reese. And the guy’s accent had vanished. “Can’t believe anything with them.” He reached for the glass. Held it too tightly because…
I want to believe her. I want to believe she loves me.
He’d been staring into her eyes. Those tears…
He let go of the glass. Rubbed his chest. It ached.
“Nope. You can’t believe a word some women tell you. They’re just trying to get in your head. Trying to mess you up. That’s what my fiancée did to me.” The chatty stranger drained the second glass. “But I have plans. I’m not out yet.”
Joel found himself peering at the fellow once more. Dark hair. Wide shoulders. T-shirt. Jeans.
The man caught his glance. Flashed another smile.
Oh, fuck. Joel knew that smile. The man’s eyes were a different color. The hair was a different cut and color, too. But the smile was the same. The exact same.
“You all right?” He slapped Joel on the shoulder. “Because it looks like you’ve just seen a ghost.”
He had. Joel was staring at a ghost. “Get your hand off me.”
“Okay.” He removed the hand. “Settle down. Obviously, you’re not the kind of man who makes friends easily.” The man tossed some cash on the bar. “See you around.” He pushed off the stool. Slipped into the crowd.
Hell, no. Hell. No. Joel yanked out his wallet and threw money down as he surged after the guy.
“Hey!” The bartender’s shout followed him. “You didn’t even touch your second drink!”
Joel ignored the call and rushed out of the bar. He looked to the left. Not there. Turned his head to the right. There. The man was ducking into an alley. “Stop!” Joel shouted.
He didn’t.
“Morgan, stop!” He used the name deliberately. The name of the man who’d planned to marry Chloe. Morgan Fletcher.
For just a moment, the man stopped. Then he darted into the alley.
Joel raced into that alley right after him. His feet flew over the cracked pavement as he turned the corner and hurried inside and—
A hard hand grabbed him and slammed him into the alley’s brick wall. “Don’t you know better,” the man who had to be Morgan Fletcher asked, “than to go running into dark alleys? Has Chloe taught you nothing?”
Morgan’s elbow was jammed against Joel’s throat. Was he supposed to be impressed by that shit? He wasn’t. Joel drove his knee into the fellow’s dick, as hard as he could. Morgan gasped and eased his grip. Joel used that opportunity to yank down Morgan’s hand, to head butt the bastard, and to drive a fist straight into Morgan’s stomach.
Morgan groaned as he doubled over. “Je…sus…” he panted. “Just…messing with you.”
Joel kept his hands loose at his sides. “I’m not in the mood to be messed with.”
Morgan put his hands on his knees. Sucked in a couple of deep breaths. “Dirty move. My dick may never be the same.”
“I don’t think the world will mind.”
Morgan tilted up his head. “But will Chloe?” A taunting smile curled his lips. “I think she—”
“I don’t think Chloe gives a damn what happens to you or your dick. She’s with me now.” Even as he said those words, even as he heard the possessive growl in his own voice, Joel realized…
I mean it. Chloe is mine. I’m hers. Because they were partners. Good. Bad. All the stuff in between—they were partners.
“Is she?” Morgan taunted. His hands were still braced on his knees. “Then how come I don’t see her with you? How come I found you all alone, drinking ever so sadly in a rundown bar?”
He shrugged. “Because I like drinking in rundown bars?”
Morgan continued to hunch over and that bothered Joel. He tensed because he expected—
Morgan surged up, and when his arms rose, he clutched a gun in his right hand. Damn. He’d dragged that out of thin air. Or maybe…he’d probably had it hidden under his shirt. Morgan brought the gun up and at Joel, but—too late. Joel had sensed the attack. He kicked at Morgan’s wrist and hand. Some bones snapped, and the gun went flying.
Morgan didn’t cry out in pain. Just hissed out a breath. “I can see why you appealed to her. Chloe likes a bit of
danger. Turns her on.”
“And I can see why she told me that she’d once had sex with a psycho.”
Morgan threw back his head and laughed.
“I wasn’t making a joke.” The gun waited a few feet away. “You faked your own death, didn’t you? Why the hell would you do that?”
“Chloe hasn’t told you?” Morgan flexed the gloved fingers of his right hand. Winced. “Oh, that’s right. Chloe doesn’t tell anyone her secrets.” As if imparting a very special piece of knowledge, he lowered his voice and revealed, “That’s how you can tell that she doesn’t love you. Not truly. Because if she did, she’d tell you everything.”
“She didn’t tell you jack shit about herself,” Joel threw back at the bastard. “Is that how you knew she didn’t love you?”
Morgan wasn’t laughing now. The faint light from a nearby window trickled into the alley. “She told me plenty.”
“I don’t think so. Turns out, I can play poker pretty well. I know a bluff when I see one.”
“Not when Chloe is the one bluffing. No one can tell when Chloe bluffs. Lies or truth, you never know with her.”
Fuck me. Hadn’t Joel told her…I can’t tell when you are lying or when you’re telling me the truth? He’d just told her that, and this prick seemed to know those exact words. “Have you been watching us?”
Another flex of his fingers. “You don’t overly concern me.”
“I’ll take that as a yes.”
“Chloe is quite something, isn’t she? Know how I’d describe her?”
“I don’t particularly give a shit how you would—”
“Death and moonlight.” Whispered. Said almost tenderly. “That’s what she is. Chloe will always be drawn to death. To the darkness that waits in the world. She can’t help herself. It’s almost an addiction. And she’s moonlight. You think you can catch her. You want to catch her because she’s so beautiful, but like moonlight, she just slips through your fingers.” He peered at his fingers. “I think you broke two of them. Maybe fractured my wrist. That wasn’t very nice.”
“Coming at me with a gun wasn’t nice, either.”
“I wasn’t going to shoot you. Just testing your skills.”