A Caress of Bones: a serial killer thriller (Wren Delacroix Book 9)

by V. J. Chambers

  “Don’t want to what?” She went after him. “Hook up with you?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I didn’t say I didn’t want to, I just… you can’t… you’re way too young—”

  “So, you do want to?” He glanced at her over his shoulder.

  “I hate you right now,” she decided. “What do you want?”

  “I wouldn’t have brought it up if I didn’t want to,” he said. “But now everything’s really uncomfortable, and I don’t like that, so… I wish I hadn’t said it at all.”

  She licked her lips, and then she let out an artificial laugh. “Well, then you didn’t say it.”

  “Okay.”

  She shrugged. “I don’t even know what we’re talking about right now. Let’s get tacos.”

  He surveyed her for a minute, and then he grinned. He offered her his arm. “Let’s.”

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  “I want coffee,” Wren announced.

  Reilly glanced at her. They were in the airport at baggage claim, and he had been looking for their luggage. “Seriously? You said the taste of coffee made you vomit.”

  “Well, I don’t know,” she said. “I just know I want some. Now. It feels urgent.”

  He raised his eyebrows.

  “It’s okay,” she said. “I’m in the second trimester, and they’ve done studies, and two cups of coffee a day is totally safe in the second trimester.”

  “Really?” he said. “I think that has changed since the last time I got a woman pregnant.”

  “Why didn’t you do research?” she said.

  “I thought you hated coffee,” he said. “It was lonely here, but I had adjusted. Um…” He gestured. “We just left behind all the stores in the airport.”

  “When do we have to be at the local police station?”

  He checked his phone. “Um, twenty to thirty minutes.”

  “Well, they won’t mind if we’re late,” she said. “Find us a coffee shop on our way to the station.”

  “Okay,” he said, shrugging. “You know that it’s late, right?”

  “Yes,” she said.

  “It’s after 4:30 p.m. and you usually go to sleep around 9:00?”

  “Yes,” she said, and then she scooted off because there were their suitcases.

  “Hey, Wren, I got that,” he said, pushing past her.

  “I can lift suitcases for God’s sake, Cai,” she said, but she let him grab them. “I don’t think the coffee’s going to keep me awake. Nothing keeps me awake anymore. I sleep like the dead.”

  “You do,” he said.

  “Oh, I didn’t tell you about the dream I had last night. It was so vivid. There was this bright blue bunny.”

  “Sounds horrifying.” He smirked at her. “So, this coffee you want? Can it be any coffee, or are you wanting something fancy?”

  “McCafe,” she said decisively.

  “McDonald’s coffee,” he said. “You want McDonald’s coffee.” He was floored by this. He would never have expected her to say such a thing.

  “I want McDonald’s in general,” she said. “I think I’m also hungry. That should be easy to find on our way, though, right?”

  He spoke to her stomach. “What are you doing to your mother that she wants to drink McDonald’s coffee?”

  She shoved him. “McDonald’s coffee is good. Shut up. We’re not coffee snobs. We always say that.”

  “Not being a snob and seeking such things out are different things,” he said, grinning at her.

  “You will get me my McCafe, Caius Reilly.”

  “Yes, I will,” he said, kissing her cheek. “I will get you whatever you want, whenever you want it.”

  She turned and captured his lips with her own. “I love you.”

  “I love you, too.”

  “And I also love McDonald’s coffee, so help me out here, please. For the sake of your unborn child and all that is holy.”

  Later, they arrived at the local police station, and Wren had a drink covered in whip cream and full of various flavored shots. She had eaten a mess of French fries in the car, which she had also dipped into the whipped cream, and protested was “really, really good, so shut up about it.”

  She was not wearing her typical holey jeans, but this was only because they didn’t fit her anymore, and so she had gone out and bought a bunch of maternity clothing, even though Reilly still didn’t think she looked pregnant. Her body was different, but that wouldn’t be obvious to anyone who wasn’t as familiar with it as he was.

  There was something affecting about the changes in her, though. It was a powerful feeling, and he couldn’t say it was entirely positive or entirely negative. It just made him feel a really intense bundle of things. He still wasn’t sleeping a lot. He was still anxious.

  But he was happier to be traveling, to be working a case. Maybe it would help.

  They were greeted by a detective named Andrew Beau who had a drawl and even called Wren cher once or twice, something that Reilly had thought was just one of those stereotypical things that only Gambit from the X-Men did, not really real.

  “Oh, we never saw hide nor hair of that one again,” said Beau. “She skipped town real quick after she took that knife to her husband.”

  “Did you ever meet her?” Wren asked.

  “Nope, not once,” said Beau. “I wouldn’t have had any reason to have talked to her until she started getting knife happy, if you know what I mean? So, I don’t know a lot about her, I’m afraid.”

  “What about PLL?” said Reilly.

  “Ah, yes, those weirdos,” said Beau, chuckling. “Well, they mostly kept to themselves, didn’t cause a lot of trouble, but we weren’t real sorry to see them all pack up and leave, I gotta say. There are still people out on that land, I think. There’s a little trailer park down Greens Road, and there are remnants, but that’s all.”

  “We appreciate your talking to us,” said Wren.

  “Oh, we are very cooperative with the FBI,” said Beau with a wink. “You say, ‘Jump,’ we say, ‘How high.’ So, if there’s any jumping you need done, be sure to ask, and we’ll be here for you. Where are you two staying when you’re in town?”

  “Uh, just a Holiday Inn in town here,” said Reilly.

  “Oh, no, no, you don’t want to stay there,” said Beau.

  “We don’t?” said Wren.

  “No, cher.” Beau shook his head. “We’re up in that hotel every two days dealing with gang violence. You take your precious cargo and stay here instead.” He opened a desk drawer and slid across a business card. “That’s my friend’s little place. It’s a motel out along the old Route 19, and you’ll be very comfortable there.”

  Wren took the business card. “Drumming up business for your friend?”

  Beau smirked. “Just looking out for you.”

  Wren handed the card to Reilly. “What do you think? I like motels. Local color. Like that one we stayed at in Romney.”

  Yeah, that reminded me of the hotel in Psycho, he thought, but he nodded. “Sure. We’ll probably like it better there.”

  Wren turned back to Beau. “How’d you tell I was pregnant? Everyone tells me I’m not showing, even though I think I am. Are they lying to me?”

  “I’m a detective, cher,” said Beau, grinning. “You don’t get anything by me.”

  She took a drink of her coffee and licked whipped cream off of her upper lip. “I touch my belly too much.”

  Beau only chuckled. “I hope you two find what you’re looking for here.”

  MALIAH got a text around 8:00 p.m. I’m at Billy’s, and you’re not here. It was from Trevon.

  She had been planning on staying in that night, but she considered, fingers hovering over the keypad on her phone’s screen.

  Another text came in. I was thinking about going into Shepherdstown and checking out the bars there. For the case.

  He wanted to do detective work? Really? Both the vics were approached at parties.

  We could get ourselves
invited to a college party.

  She snorted. Maybe you could. I’m definitely too old.

  Whatever. You are not old.

  She wasn’t going to have this discussion via text.

  You want to come with me?

  She sighed. I don’t know. I was thinking about staying home tonight.

  Okay, he texted back.

  Considering that done with, she went into the kitchen and opened the refrigerator. She’d eat a bunch of fattening snack food and then she wouldn’t be tempted to change her mind and go out to the bar.

  Her phone beeped again.

  She went back to look at it.

  Staying home because you want to be alone? he had texted.

  She bit down on her lip.

  Or do you want company? I could bring hard cider.

  Um… Sure, that sounds good. Oh, fuck, what had she just done? She’d invited Trevon over to her house to drink alcohol after they’d had that weird conversation about hooking up, and now he was going to show up here and… She looked down at herself.

  She needed to change her clothes.

  Okay, be there soon, he texted back.

  Fuck.

  She had only changed her clothes three times by the time he showed up, two six packs of cider in tow, one in each hand.

  “I got too much,” he said. “I’m not trying to get you wasted and take advantage of you or something. I just thought it was better to have too much than too little. Where’s your fridge?”

  She directed them to the kitchen and got them both ciders and then they went into her living room where they sat down on opposite sides of the couch, very far apart.

  “Were you really going to go try to investigate the case?” said Maliah.

  “I don’t know,” he said. “I feel like Delacroix and Reilly are really stressed about it, and if there was a way I could help, I would.”

  She nodded. “I get that. But we’re not detectives, and that’s not our job.”

  He picked at the label on his bottle of cider. “Uh, what if I changed my mind about wanting to pretend I hadn’t said that thing earlier?”

  She swallowed. “Trevon, just because I invited you over here—”

  “I kind of invited myself,” he said, looking up at her. “And, like I told you before, I’m not good at this stuff, the mushy pair-bondy stuff, and I’m not saying, like, I want us to… I mean, I like you, is all? I think about you a lot?”

  Despite herself, her pulse was starting to pick up speed. “I think about you too, but this is crazy. Everything about it is crazy. And if it goes really badly, think of the fallout. Who am I going to eat lunch with if you hate me?”

  “Why would I hate you?”

  “That’s what happens when people do the mushy pair-bondy stuff,” she said. “It ends ugly.”

  “Not always,” he said. “Delacroix and Reilly, for instance, they seem…”

  “Freakishly happy,” she said. “How do they work together, and live together, and see each other constantly and not hate each other?”

  “I don’t know,” said Trevon, “but we see each other a lot too.”

  She took a long swig of her cider.

  “Okay,” he said, sitting up straight, “do you want me to shut up about it? Because if you do, I will.”

  “I…” She didn’t. But she didn’t know if she could say that.

  “I think if you did, you would say it,” he said. “You’d feel that pretty strongly. So, the hesitation means you’re not sure about it, so I’m going to keep talking. Here’s what I think we should do. I think we should kiss.”

  She let out a disbelieving laugh.

  “Just once,” he said, spreading his hands. “To see.”

  “To see what?” She couldn’t stop the way she was smiling.

  “You know…” He gestured with his hands. “How it feels.”

  She swallowed.

  His voice lowered. “And no matter what, that’s all we do, is kiss. And then we wake up in the morning and see each other at work, and we just… see how it feels.”

  It was quiet.

  She set down her cider. “Okay.”

  “Okay?” he said.

  She nodded.

  He set down his cider too, and he got up from his side of the couch. He fixed her with a penetrating stare and he advanced on her.

  Her breath caught in her throat, because there was something dark and pleasant in the way he looked at her, the way he moved, something that made her pulse pound even more quickly.

  He sat down next to her on the couch, looking her over.

  Her breath hitched.

  He lifted his hand. “I’m going to… touch your face, Maliah,” he said in a rough voice. “If you don’t like it, you can stop me.”

  She did like this. How was he so different now, suddenly? Maybe he wasn’t different. Trevon was always very straightforward and he wasn’t much for subtlety. It was only that she hadn’t expected it to be smoldering like this.

  His fingers grazed her cheekbone, and then fluttered down to her jaw.

  Her eyes flitted closed.

  She felt his breath on her skin, and then the soft brush of his lips on hers.

  She pressed closer, moving her mouth on his, parting her lips.

  His tongue touched hers, and that was a sweet shock, like fireworks, and she was somehow in his arms, molded against him, but had she pressed herself into him or had he pulled her close? She couldn’t be sure, but it was good here. They fit together nicely.

  He deepened the kiss, and she made a little noise in the back of her throat. He stroked one hand over her hair.

  Then he pulled away.

  She opened her eyes slowly, letting out a shuddering breath.

  He was just gazing at her, gazing at her in a way he’d never seemed to look at her before. “I know I said, you know, just once, but I, um, I would like to keep doing that.”

  She let out a laugh that was dangerously close to a giggle. “Yes.”

  “Yes?” One side of his mouth quirked up.

  “Yes.”

  “Good,” he said, but now there was a rumble in his throat, that smolder again.

  She surrendered to it, offering her mouth to him again.

  They kissed for a very, very long time.

  But they only kissed. They held each other, and there might have been some roaming hands, but at one point, Trevon accidentally got his hand under her shirt and touched the bare skin of her waist, and he pulled back, saying, “Not yet,” and somehow that didn’t make her feel frustrated or annoyed, just pleased, because there was more to explore, later, and because she liked the kissing, and she hadn’t made out like this since she was a teenager.

  She wasn’t quite ready for it to be anything else yet.

  So, when he left, late that night, his hair mussed and his lips swollen, she only felt giddy about it all, anticipatory not deprived, and she went to sleep with a smile on her face.

  CHAPTER NINE

  “INDIGO told me that she was nineteen years old when I met her,” said Travis Mullany. He was sitting on the porch of his house, talking to Wren and Reilly. He had not offered to let them come inside, but seemed willing enough to talk to them out there and had offered them rocking chairs to sit on. “I believed her, but I was young and stupid. That was six years ago. I didn’t know shit about anything. One second she would be like this trembling baby rabbit that I felt like I needed to protect, and then the next she’d be… I don’t know, a hellcat. I never anyone like her, and I was a sucker from the beginning.”

  “So, she wasn’t nineteen?” said Wren.

  “Fifteen,” said Travis. “I was twenty-three. I didn’t know. I swear to God. I know that’s a thing that men say when they’re with younger women, and I know that she’d probably lie and say shit about me. She’d say anything. If you ever caught her, she’d say she was defending herself or some shit. She’d probably say that I beat her or something, but I never put my hands on her.” He shook his head. “Neve
r once. I was raised that you don’t do that. That it doesn’t matter what a woman does, you never raise a hand, and I would never have…” He shook his head again.

  Wren thought he was protesting an awful lot about something he hadn’t even been accused of. She filed that away.

  “So, when did you find out she was fifteen?” said Reilly.

  “Uh, I don’t know,” he said.

  “This isn’t something that you discovered when the two of you got married?” said Wren.

  “No,” said Travis. “She did all the paperwork stuff herself, and my job was just to show up. Oh, and to write all the checks. Because she always wanted money, and money was always going missing, too. Like, I’d have money in my wallet, and it would be gone, and she would just distract me or get me drunk or like try to have sex with me, and I wouldn’t ever get a straight answer from her. But I think she was giving it to her friend. I was their mark. I was their patsy. Hell, I don’t even know. Maybe they planned the whole thing out.”

  “What friend?” said Wren.

  “She and this girl Clover had left PLL together. They were both about the same age, and they were trying to survive but they didn’t have anything, so Indigo came after me. So, she was like getting the money from me, and giving it to her friend, I think.”

  “Well, when Indigo left, after she, um, attempted to murder you, did this Clover go with her?” said Wren.

  “No, no,” said Travis. “No, she’s still out in a trailer on PLL land. Nah, Indigo left her too. Indigo leaves everyone. And I don’t know, there was a time when I was more angry about that than the fact that she stabbed me. Because… I don’t know… she obviously had shit going on in her head.” He shrugged. “Like, she was screwed up, you know, and I think she just needed love, and I guess I thought…” He sighed. “Never mind. You don’t need to hear that shit from me. What do you want to know? You want to know about the stabbing?”

  “Whatever you’re comfortable with,” said Wren.

  He snorted. “I mean, I’m not really comfortable with any of this. I’d rather not talk about her at all. I’d rather not think about her. But I’m doing it because you’re the FBI or whatever, and I guess I should cooperate.” He sighed.