by Cynthia Eden
Hell, so maybe the serial killer had attracted some people to the island. He’d seen crap like that before. Almost like serial killer groupies. He would never understand that shit.
“Another one,” Eve snapped to the bartender.
He immediately set her up with another rum and Coke. She drained it in an instant.
“I want to go now, Johnny,” the brunette said. “ ’Cause I heard you can hear the ghost of those women screaming right after sunset, and I want to hear—”
“Oh, yeah, baby,” Johnny said eagerly. “Let’s go. I’ll get you in that sand, I’ll show you—”
A tremble ran through Eve’s body.
“Johnny, stop being a fucking dick,” Gabe snapped.
Johnny whirled around and his gaze shot toward him. The guy was in his early twenties, with a weak-looking chin and bleary eyes that said he’d already had plenty of booze.
“That’s a crime scene, and you aren’t getting your ass near it.” The guy wanted to take his girl out there and screw her where women had died? Hell, no, that wasn’t going down.
Where Eve could have died? The guy wanted to have a fuckfest out there?
“It’s none of your business, asshole,” Johnny fired back, his cheeks flushing. “You need to step away!” Then he made a mistake. Well, another one. He shoved at Gabe’s chest.
Gabe shoved back, only he hit much harder, and Johnny wound up sailing over the bar.
“And there goes the night,” Dean muttered as he came to stand at Gabe’s side. Some of the folks around them were cheering. “Kid, word of advice?”
Johnny had heaved himself up and appeared to be prepping for another attack. He didn’t seem overly interested in Dean’s advice. Pity. The dumbass should listen to his elders.
“You don’t want to tangle with an ex-SEAL,” Dean told him, apparently deciding to give his advice whether Johnny wanted to hear it or not. “You’ll just wind up kissing the floor.”
Johnny snarled and leapt at Gabe.
And the kid wound up kissing the floor. Or, rather, the sand.
Johnny groaned as he tried to push himself off the sand and back to his feet.
Gabe crouched next to him. “Those women had families. Friends. They aren’t some sideshow for you to use just so you can get laid.” He grabbed Johnny’s head and tipped it back so the guy had to look into his eyes. “Try having some respect for the dead.”
“Gabe?” Eve’s voice was soft, worried. Shit, he hadn’t meant to scare her. But seeing violence up close like that would scare most people. He rose, keeping his hands loose at his sides. If Johnny boy came at him again, he would take him out.
“Hell . . .” That sharp voice wasn’t Eve’s. And it didn’t belong to the advice-giving Dean. “Am I gonna have to arrest you the first night you’re on my island?”
Gabe glanced over and saw Trey Wallace making his way through the crowd. Trey glared at him. Then the police chief focused his glare on Johnny—who was almost back on his feet.
Before Gabe could respond, Eve stepped in front of him. “That man—” She pointed to Johnny. “He attacked first. Gabe was just defending himself.”
Now she was defending him. Well, damn.
Dean coughed a bit. “Uh, yes, that’s exactly what happened.” He moved to Eve’s side. “The little prick was spouting off about sneaking up to the crime scene and showing his girl a good time there.” He jerked his thumb toward the girl. The brunette was even younger than Johnny, she looked barely eighteen, and her blue eyes had gone huge.
She gasped even as her face flamed. “I was not going there with him!”
Gabe rolled his eyes. What the hell-ever. And it was nice that Eve and Dean had his back, but he had this covered.
“That true, Johnny?” Trey asked as he craned his neck and glanced around Dean. “You throw the first punch again?”
Again? So the kid made a habit of bar fights. Big surprise.
Johnny just glared.
“I told you before,” Trey said, voice hard, “you’re gonna tangle with the wrong person one night.”
Johnny growled at him.
“Seriously? Stop that shit,” Trey fired, “or you’ll be sleeping in a cell tonight.” He looked at Johnny’s girl. “Drive him home, Gia. Now. Take him back to his uncle Clay’s place.”
Gia grabbed Johnny’s arm and dragged the guy away.
Trey glanced around. The crowd was still watching. He shook his head. “Show’s over, people! Get that music going. It’s supposed to be a party, right?”
The band started playing again. Couples danced. The drinks flowed.
The tension drained away from Eve’s shoulders. She stared back at Gabe, and she looked tired. Drained.
Trey eased onto one of the bar stools. His fingers reached for Eve’s glass. “Rum and Coke, huh? Always your drink of choice, especially when you’re stressed.”
The jealousy was there again, sliding its way into Gabe’s gut. The man seemed to know everything about Eve.
And that should have been a good thing. They needed to know her past.
But the intimacy between them pisses me off.
“Do you feel the stares, Jessica?” Trey asked as he picked up her empty glass and stared into it. “I mean, folks are acting like they aren’t looking this way, but they’re glancing at you from the corner of their eyes. You still feel the look, right?”
“Yes.”
Gabe could feel those stares, too.
“Some folks here recognize you. Sure, we’ve got a lot of out-of-towners, but . . . Sam over there—the guy playing the guitar? He knows you. That’s why he keeps missing the beat every few moments. ’Cause he thinks he’s seeing a ghost. And Clara? The redheaded waitress? She dropped a whole tray of drinks when she got a look at your face. ’Course, that was when your lover boy was beating up on the kid, so you probably missed that part, too.”
Gabe’s eyes narrowed on the cop.
“Even Johnny knows you, though he was probably too shit-faced to make the connection tonight. You and his uncle Clay Thompson were friends . . . we all were, back in the day.” His smile was sad. “There are lots of folks here who know you, Jessica.”
The cop was deliberately calling her Jessica, Gabe knew that. He wants her to be the woman she was before. Because that woman had been his?
“When you want to talk to them, they’ll be there. But until then, until you’re ready, I told them to stay back. Well, everybody but Johnny, I didn’t get a chance to tell his fool self anything about you. I’ll go see him and Clay later.” He looked over at her. “I know you only go for the rum and Coke when you’re at your limit. When you’re scared or when you’re about to break.”
“She’s not about to break,” Gabe said. Maybe you don’t know her that well.
Trey’s gaze was on hers. “Have you painted?”
Eve shook her hand. She flexed her fingers. “I don’t remember how to paint.”
“Try picking up the brush,” Trey said softly, the words sounding almost like a dare. “You might be surprised at what comes back to you.”
Eve looked down at the sand beneath her feet. “My fingers were broken. That was . . . that was one of the injuries I had.”
“I read the medical report on you.”
Her head snapped up.
Trey flashed a wry smile. Gabe hated that smile. “What? A ghost from my past walks right in front of me, and you think I won’t do everything in my power to find out what happened to her?” He stood, moving away from the bar stool and toward Eve. His hand reached out.
Gabe stiffened.
Trey’s fingers brushed over her neck. Over the scar there. “I know he cut you here.” His hand fell to her side. “And here.”
“Move the fucking hand,” Gabe warned, voice low and lethal.
“Here we go,” Dean muttered a second later.
The handsy-cop wisely took a step away from her. “You had a concussion, but the docs don’t think that is what caused the memory loss.
You’re blocking it all because you’re scared. You don’t have to be scared with me.”
Eve stared into his eyes.
“I’ve always protected you,” Trey told her. Emotions were heavy in those words. “And I always will.”
“A word.” Gabe managed to push it out as he locked his hand around the cop’s shoulder. “Alone.”
Trey gave a nod, but he didn’t take his eyes off Eve. “I’ll be waiting. When you remember, I’m here.”
Gabe pulled the cop away from the crowd. As they left, he turned back and saw Victoria striding to join Eve and Dean. And . . . just as Trey had said, there were stares on Eve. Watchful gazes. People who looked as if they were seeing a ghost.
“You’re going to lose her,” Trey said as soon as he and Gabe were away from the crowd. “Go ahead and get used to that fact, Spencer.”
The hell he would. “My job is to keep her safe. To help Eve find out what happened to her.”
Trey laughed, but the sound held no humor. “We both know what happened. The killer took her, but she got away from him. Now she’s fighting her way back to the life she had before.”
Back to me.
Trey didn’t say those words, but they hung in the air between them.
“A killer is hunting on your island.” The cop needed to be tracking him. “Why the hell don’t you seem more concerned about catching the guy?”
Trey’s eyelids flickered. “You think I’m not trying?” He stood toe-to-toe with Gabe on the beach now as the waves crashed near them. “You think I’m not up nearly every night, trying to put the puzzle pieces together? Trying to figure out who it could be? The FBI gave me a profile—a white male, late twenties, early thirties, attractive, confident, able to move in wealthy circles . . . do you know how many men fit that profile? Every day, people come in and out of this place. And I’m watching them all. I’m trying to watch them every moment.” His breath heaved out. “So don’t tell me that I’m not doing my job. I’m doing the best I can. I have four full-time officers who work for me. Just four. We are doing everything we can to keep this island safe.”
“And I’m trying to keep her safe.” The whole island wasn’t his priority. Eve was.
“Are you? Or are you just interested in keeping her?” Trey tossed back. “I get it, hell, if anyone can understand, it’s me. Once you have Jessica, you—”
“Stop.”
Trey lifted a brow. “I’m not some drunk twenty-one-year-old kid that you can toss over a bar.”
“Don’t talk about Eve.”
“Jessica. Her name is Jessica. Eve doesn’t exist!”
She was standing not far away, watching them with a nervous stare. “She does to me,” Gabe said.
Trey didn’t reply to that.
The cop turned, and a redhead nearly slammed into him. “Officer?” She grabbed for his arms. “I can’t find my friend . . . she—she was supposed to be here.”
Trey focused on the woman. “Have you tried calling your friend, ma’am?” His voice was calm, courteous, but the cop’s body was still tense.
Gabe took a few steps back toward Eve.
“Alexa isn’t answering. She’s not at the condo . . . she’s not here. I—I’m worried about her.”
Gabe stopped short, next to the redhead. “What does your friend look like?” The question came because of the sudden knot in his gut.
The woman gave a nervous laugh and she pointed toward Eve. “A lot like her. I—I thought that was Alexa when I first got here, but it’s not.” She grabbed onto Trey’s arm. Her blue eyes were filled with worry. “This isn’t like her. We’ve been friends for years. She wouldn’t just leave me. Alexa doesn’t ditch her friends without a reason.”
“Maybe she met someone,” Trey said, but there was a new, harder intensity in his voice.
Maybe she met the wrong someone.
The redhead bit her lip. “There . . . there was a guy she was talking with earlier . . . when we were outside of the condo . . .”
“Just which condo are you staying at?” Gabe asked, the suspicion he felt getting stronger.
The redhead glanced at him, her hands fluttering nervously in the air. “Are you a cop, too?”
“Something like that,” Trey muttered.
“We’re at the Dauphin View.” She gave a weak smile. “We’re on the fifth floor, with a real killer view of the water.”
That was Eve’s condo tower, the Dauphin View. “Tell me about the man your friend met.”
“I—I didn’t see much of him.” She glanced between Gabe and Trey. “He was big, muscled, like you two. He had on a ball cap and sunglasses. He turned away before I could say hello.”
“You saw him talking to your friend Alexa, at that condo tower?” Trey pressed.
“Yes . . . earlier today.” She shook her head. “But Alexa wouldn’t just leave with the guy. I mean—she broke up with her boyfriend about two months ago, but she is so still stuck on Mark. There is no way she would hook up with a stranger and not at least text me so I wouldn’t worry about her.”
Trey looked at Gabe. The cop’s gaze was deadly serious. Gabe nodded, understanding exactly what the guy feared. “We’ll help you find her,” he promised the woman.
After all, that was exactly what he did.
SOMETHING WAS WRONG. Eve kept her eyes on Gabe as he and Trey closed in around a pretty redhead. The woman was talking quickly, and nervously waving her hands in the air.
“What’s going on over there?” Victoria asked as she peered toward Gabe.
Eve shook her head. “I don’t know.” But she was worried. Especially when Trey reached for his radio.
Wait, was the redhead crying?
Gabe glanced over at her. His face was hard, tight, and then he stalked quickly toward her and Victoria.
“Is she all right?” Eve asked, craning to see the redhead.
Instead of answering her, Gabe said to Victoria, “I want you to take Eve back to the condo. Stay with her until I get there.”
He was sending her away? “What’s happening?”
His jaw locked. “It could be nothing, could be just a woman who decided to hook up with a new lover and ditch her friend—”
She grabbed his arm and her fingers curled around his wrist. “What’s happening?”
“A blond woman named Alexa Chambers is missing. She was supposed to meet her friend here, but Sydney is worried because she can’t find her anywhere. Alexa isn’t answering her texts or her calls and—”
“Do you think he has her?” Eve asked, breaking through his words.
Gabe’s head inclined toward her. “It’s far too soon to say anything like that. Trey and I . . . we’re just going to see if we can find this woman’s missing friend.”
But he wanted her away from the scene, that much was obvious to Eve. Because he was afraid the Lady Killer was hunting? “If it’s him, why would he go after someone else?” And not me?
The faint lines near his eyes deepened. “We’re just looking for Alexa. That’s all right now. With the island’s history, Trey doesn’t want to take any chances, and neither do I.”
Victoria hopped off her bar stool. “I’m not much for the party scene anyway. Come on, Eve, let’s get out of here.”
Dean was already heading toward Trey and the redhead. “I want to help,” Eve said. She wasn’t as eager to leave as Victoria seemed to be.
Gabe shook his head. “Not until we know more—”
“But—”
His hands closed around her shoulders and he lowered his head. His lips brushed across the shell of her ear when he said, “Maybe Alexa is just making out with some new lover someplace, or maybe . . . maybe something else has happened. I need you to stay safe until we find out more. I can’t risk you.”
Yet it was her life to risk, and she couldn’t stand the thought of another woman out there, suffering.
Being buried alive in the sand.
“He could even be trying to lure you out.” Gabe’s lips fea
thered over her ear once more, and Eve shivered. “I need you to be safe. Go back with Victoria. Stay at the condo until I get there.”
Fine. She nodded. Mostly because . . .
I could walk right up to the killer and not even know him. So just how much help could she really be in the hunt?
Gabe slid away from her.
Then he turned and headed back toward the redhead—Sydney. Eve glanced at Victoria. The other woman was watching her with wide eyes.
“Are you okay?” Victoria asked her with a nervous hitch in her voice.
No, she wasn’t, but that was nothing new. She hadn’t been okay in a very long time.
“I hope they find her,” Eve said. Because that was all there was to say.
I hope the Lady Killer doesn’t have a new victim.
ALEXA’S LITTLE FRIEND was screwing things up for him. Spencer and his agent were walking around the West End of the island, asking after Alexa, if anyone had seen her. And of course that little redheaded bitch had a picture of Alexa on her phone, so everyone could get a fast and up-close view of her.
Gabe was asking if anyone remembered seeing her, if she’d been talking to anyone . . .
Yes, she was talking to me.
He backed into the shadows. He wanted to get back to Alexa. Wanted to rush and take that boat out and vanish with her. But he had to be careful.
If he drew the wrong attention, things could go badly for him. He had to play the game just right.
It was a good thing that he’d been playing this game for so long.
For over ten years . . .
And they haven’t caught me yet.
They never would.
AS SOON AS Victoria and Eve pulled into the parking lot at the Dauphin View, Eve saw the man waiting there for her. He was standing in front of a big beast of a motorcycle, his arms crossed over his chest. Their headlights hit him, revealing Wade Monroe’s tense face. He had his helmet perched on the back of the bike, and, with those stark lights hitting him, the guy looked more than just dangerous.
He looked deadly.
“I guess Gabe sent in reinforcements,” Victoria said as she parked the Jeep. “Figured Wade would show up sooner or later.”
Eve opened her door. As Wade headed toward her, she saw the weapon at his side. A gun. For an instant, fear had her heart racing.