by Cynthia Eden
So quiet. No emotion there.
“Romeo wanted his girls to love him. He wanted them to need him.”
Them, not me. “What did he want from you?”
Silence.
Shouldn’t have pushed. Why did I—
“The first thing he did, the thing he always did…” Her hand tugged free of his and rubbed behind her right shoulder. “He marked us. He shoved the iron against my skin—”
My now, not them. Because she wasn’t talking as Agent Davenport anymore. She was talking as the girl she’d been.
Mary Jane. He’d learned that name in his search.
“He said, ‘You’re mine.’ That’s all he said, and I could smell my flesh burning. But I didn’t scream, and I didn’t cry. Not then.” A swallow that he could hear in the darkness. “And I saw that he liked that. In his eyes, he-he was excited.”
Because he’d found someone strong enough to play his games.
“If you broke too soon, he killed you. I learned that, fast. He liked to hurt his girls. He said he was testing us. That we had to be worthy of him. Able to stand the pain.”
Luke kept his fingers light as they skimmed down her bare arm. Light, when he wanted to grab her and hold tight. But if he held too tight…
“I’d always been pretty good at reading people,” she told him. “Just one of those things. I’d pick up on body language, voice—don’t know how or why really—I just always did. And I-I started reading him.”
More than that. She’d gotten into his head.
“The first night I was there, he cut away my clothes. Branded me.” She took a ragged breath. “Then he beat me. Not with his fists—he didn’t like to touch us, not directly anyway. He had a pipe he liked to use.” Silence. “He broke my right arm with his first hit. After that…” A shudder. “Doesn’t really matter.”
Oh, shit, he shouldn’t ask, he shouldn’t, but he had to know. “Did he rape you?” Romeo had raped the other girls. But Mary Jane—that part hadn’t been in the file he’d accessed.
Her breath caught. “He strapped me to his table. An operating table. Pulled my legs apart—”
Christ, no, he didn’t want to hear this. Why had he asked? Why?
“He tied rope around my wrists and ankles so tight I bled.” His fingers dug into her arms. Kill him.
“But then he found out I was a virgin.” She exhaled and he felt the soft shudder of air against his throat. “And he liked that. Said it made me more his.” A humorless laugh.
“You’re not his.” Never were. Never would be. That bastard should have gotten the death penalty for this twisted shit, and Louisiana usually wasn’t a state to hesitate. But Romeo had a way of working women, even women on juries.
“He didn’t break my hymen.” Said clinically, coldly, as if she were distancing herself again. “When he realized—he pulled back and he smiled at me. He told me I was his good girl. His sweetheart.”
Luke always knew what to say to the victims. Knew how to comfort them, how to help them step away from the darkness, but he didn’t know what to say to her. And he sure didn’t know how to channel the rage boiling his blood. Helpless. Not her, him.
“After that night, he didn’t try to rape me again. He kept me locked in a freaking two-by-three-foot room, like I was some kind of dog. No windows, no light. He took me out to screw with my head, to show me what he’d done to the others so he could watch my reaction. Then he’d put me back.” The words came fast, tumbling out. “Every time he put me in there, I felt like he was burying me.”
Luke swallowed the lump that rose in his throat.
“I survived. I played his game, and he kept me alive.”
“And the others?” Had he made her watch as they died? Watched as he carved up their bodies?
“When he brought them down, I-I heard them. He kept them chained in his playroom.” Her head moved in a slow shake. “I told them not to scream when he hurt them. I pounded on the door and I told them.”
Christ.
“I told them not to show fear because that was what he wanted.” She trembled a bit in his arms. “I told them but they couldn’t stop screaming. He’d slice them, and I could hear their screams for hours, and I couldn’t get out to help them. I couldn’t get out, not unless Romeo came for me.”
He kissed her. Kissed her with the tenderness he should have shown her before. Her breath slipped into his mouth, and he stole it, giving her back his own with a sigh. His lips lingered on hers. Tasted the salt of tears.
Slowly, his head lifted. Silence then, thick and heavy in the air. He didn’t think she’d say anymore, didn’t think—
“After a while, he started letting me out of the closet. When no one else was there, he’d let me out and allow me to stay in his playroom. That’s what he called it.”
Her voice came stronger now, with anger boiling beneath the words. “There was a metal door at the top of the stairs. I tried to break that door down so many times. I couldn’t. He’d leave me down there for days, and I couldn’t get out. I was trapped there, and I knew I’d die there, just like the others.”
No. “You got out.”
“He left a knife behind.” Her hair was drying. The light lavender scent deepening. “I think it was a test. He’d been getting angrier and angrier with me. Telling me he knew what was inside of me. ‘Time for it to come out.’ I found that knife, I kept it, and I knew that the next time he turned his back on me, I’d kill him.” A brittle laugh. “Maybe that was the test. I think it was what he really wanted. To show that I was just like him.”
“You’re nothing like him.”
“I tried to kill him. I would have killed him, if Hyde hadn’t stopped me.”
Yeah, and maybe Hyde should have been a little slower on that pullback. Because if anyone deserved a chance for payback, it was Monica. “The bastard deserved to die.”
“He wanted me to be a killer. Just like him. He was pushing me, always pushing me, because he wanted me to cross that edge and be like him.” Her hand pressed against his chest. “And I became one.”
“No! You were a kid! Tortured by a sick freak—”
“I stopped being a kid the minute the door of his Corvette closed behind me. And when I left those woods, I was a killer. Even Hyde knew it.”
Aw, fuck. Her skin seemed so cold now. He pressed a kiss to her shoulder and dragged her closer, trying to warm her with his own flesh.
“Everyone but Hyde wanted to throw me in a psych ward and toss away the key.”
Luke squeezed his eyes shut.
“He wouldn’t let them.”
So he owed Hyde. Big time.
“Because he looked at me, and he knew what I was. And he knew he could use me.” Her voice held a brittle edge.
Luke hesitated. “You sure about that?” Maybe there’d been more to the story. Hyde seemed to really care about her, as much as he could care about anyone.
“He only asked me one question in the ambulance. Everyone else was shouting constantly at me, but he just wanted to know one thing.”
Luke waited. She’d tell him, just like she’d told him everything else.
“ ‘How did you get him to keep you alive?’ ” she murmured.
It would have been the million-dollar question. “And what did you say?”
“ ‘I got in his head. I became what he wanted, and I lived’.”
The profiler who knew the killers. The whispers that had always followed her were so dead on.
“The state put me into a group home, but Hyde—he wouldn’t let me go. He made sure I saw a shrink he’d picked out for me. Hyde had me in therapy for a couple of years. He visited me almost every day, and then he gave me a reason to keep living.”
Because she’d needed one.
“Hyde gave me a new name. He told me if I could pass the classes, pass all the tests, I could hunt monsters. I needed that. I needed to take control. To stop the killers and not let them screw with my head. This time, I’d be screwing with their
minds.”
Get into a monster’s mind like no other.
“I thought the psych tests would be harder,” she said. “But by then, I knew all the answers. Knew exactly what to say. I wasn’t different anymore. I’d trained myself to fit in and to be whatever I needed to be.”
And she’d become cold. Untrusting. She’d locked herself away from the world because she was afraid someone would look past her perfect surface and see the monster inside.
But she didn’t understand—there wasn’t a monster inside.
He kissed her again. Deep this time. Harder, letting her feel his hunger and need because, yeah, he still craved her.
He wanted her just as badly as before, needed her just as much. Because Monica had a core of steel that had been forged from hellfire.
Monster? Not damn likely.
“Who knows?” he asked against her mouth.
“Hyde. You. A handful of higher-ups at the Bureau.”
But no one close to her. No friends. No lovers. A heavy burden for her to carry. “This why you cut tail and left me before?”
“It’s why I was going to leave you again.”
Damn.
“I’m not an easy person to be with, Luke. I—”
“Keep your gun under your pillow because you’re afraid of an attack. Keep the bathroom light on because you don’t want the darkness. Keep control with men because you don’t want to be weak with anyone ever again.” All the signs of a victim had been there. He’d seen them, but had never guessed just how terrible the crimes against her had been.
A little hum from her, then, “Yeah, that about covers it.”
A question nagged at his mind. “What was the first thing you did when you got clear of Hyde and those shrinks?”
“I got laid.”
He couldn’t have been more surprised if she’d slammed her fist into his jaw.
“Romeo wanted his good girl to kill, but he didn’t want her to fuck. So I fucked. I found a man who wanted me, and I had sex because I wasn’t his.” Her fingers were still on Luke’s chest, curling over his heart. And he didn’t want to hear about her lovers, didn’t want to hear her say—
“I did that for a while, until I realized I was still cold inside. The sex didn’t matter. The men didn’t.”
Had he been one of those men? A shadow in the night?
“Then I met you.”
She had to feel the sudden hard racing of his heart.
“And you tempted me to want more. I went with you when I’d always kept my work and sex separate. I went with you because I wanted you, and I wasn’t going to let anything stop me from having you.”
The same way he felt.
“Even though you scared the hell out of me.”
Been there.
“Still do.” Her voice was husky.
Done that.
Luke cleared his throat. “Some things you should know.”
He felt her stiffen. His back teeth clenched. Did the woman really think he was about to turn away? Did he look like a fool?
“You don’t have to—” Oh, yeah, that was her already withdrawing.
“I hate what he did to you—and I’d love to tear the bastard apart.” Let’s see you scream, asshole. “But knowing about your past doesn’t change the way I feel about you, baby.”
“And… how do you feel?” Did he imagine it or did her breath seem to catch?
Confession time. If she could bare her soul and reveal her past, then, it was way past time for him to show some trust, too. “You’re it for me, Monica. I’ve known it from the first time I kissed you.” His fucking world.
“Luke…”
He had to get this out. “I know you don’t love me,” he said gruffly. Bluntly. Better for him to say it than her. Hell, after what she’d been through, she might never be able to trust or love anyone completely—and that pissed him off. She should have had more. They should have. Damn Romeo to hell. “But give me a chance. That’s all I’m asking. When this case is over, even if I have to leave SSD for us to be together, just give me a chance.” He brushed back her hair. Smoothed his hand down her cheek. His cock was up, she was near—what was new? But he choked back the lust. This was the time for something else. “Give me a chance to show you what we can have.”
She pushed up, and he knew she was trying to see his eyes in the darkness. “And what can we have? Luke, you don’t know what I’m—”
“I know you. I want you. Always have, always will.” Felt good to say it. Maybe he should have said it years ago. Wonder what difference it would have made? “Knowing about your past doesn’t change a damn thing about the way I feel.”
A part of him wanted to hold her close, keep her safe, but Monica wasn’t the type to stand back and let others protect her. Not her.
They’d both kept secrets, but no more.
This time, he’d get things right with her.
“What if I hurt you?” she whispered.
She already had. He’d survived. “You said I tempted you then… do I tempt you now?” She tempted him. Eve couldn’t have tempted him more.
“Yes….”
“Don’t worry about the pain.” He kissed the soft column of her neck. “Let me tempt you, and we’ll worry about the darkness later.” Because with her, he knew there would always be darkness. It was in her soul, and she was in his.
And he’d fight like hell to keep her by his side, even if he had to fight the nightmares from her past.
And the killer waiting at the door.
CHAPTER Fifteen
A pounding at the door woke Monica hours later. She shoved her hand under the pillow automatically as her heart raced in her chest.
“Not there, baby,” Luke’s gruff voice, coming from the dark beside her. Because there was no bathroom light on—
Her memory came flooding back.
No shame. No horror.
Just relief. He knows… and he still wants me.
A fist thudded against the door. “Monica! Open up! Or tell Dante to drag his sorry ass out of your bed and open the door!” Kenton’s thundering voice.
But he should have been at the hospital. They couldn’t leave Sam alone!
She flew out of the bed. Raced to the door. Her eye pressed against the peephole. Had to be sure, someone could be forcing him—
No, just Kenton, looking pissed as he stood there with narrowed eyes and faint lines bracketing his mouth.
She yanked open the door.
His gaze raked her, and his eyes widened. “Wow, didn’t expect to see you—”
“What? In a shirt?” Her hand caught the front of his shirt, and she pulled him inside. “Why aren’t you at the hospital? What’s—”
“I’d advise you to keep those eyes up, partner,” Luke ordered as he walked toward them.
So she didn’t have on shorts or pants. The shirt was long. She had on panties and now really wasn’t the time for modesty.
But then, she hadn’t cared about modesty in years. Not really. She’d stopped caring after Romeo.
“Hyde’s working this shift. He sent me after you.” Kenton kept his eyes on Monica’s face. “He saw the surveillance footage from the airport. Got one of the techs at SSD to monitor every second of that video. He saw Sam.”
Monica rocked forward. “Did he see the killer? Did he—”
“Oh, yeah.” His lips pursed. “And get this shit. The bastard was wearing a deputy’s uniform. Hyde thinks he knew where the cameras were located, and he had his hat on, pulled low so we couldn’t see his face.”
A deputy’s uniform. She shoved back her hair. “He could have stolen that uniform. He took a doctor’s scrubs when he went after Laura.” They thought he had. Maybe…“This guy is good at blending in.” The cell phone had been at the sheriff’s station, right there in the midst of all those deputies.
And who was working every crime scene? Deputies.
Davis worked hard at keeping his men and Melinda apprised of every development in the case.
There wasn’t a move they’d taken that the deputies didn’t know about.
“Something else you should know.” Kenton’s eyes bored into her. “Kyle West is a dead man.”
Monica shook her head. “No, we talked to his aunt, she—”
“Jon called from the SSD. According to the records he’s found, Kyle West was killed in a one-car accident six months ago.”
“His aunt didn’t know, and the sheriff didn’t say anything about his death when we asked about Kyle.” Didn’t make sense.
A shrug. “What can I tell you? The man is dead.”
Then that put her back with her growing suspicion that the killer was very close indeed.
“Hyde said you’d know what to do. Seems to me we either got us a bastard dressing up like a cop—”
Not a cop. A deputy. “Or…” Monica said quietly, “one of Jasper’s finest is killing and making us all look like fools.”
A killer who’d been right there with them, for every step of the hunt. Watching…
Watchman.
Monica shoved open the glass door at the sheriff’s station. Four a.m. Who’d be there?
“Agent Davenport?” The sheriff came out of his office, rubbing his eyes, looking dead on his feet, with a red mark on his cheek and a long, thin wrinkle on his forehead. “What are you doin’ here?”
She glanced over at the fax machine. A pile of papers lay scattered on the floor near them.
Luke crossed the room and started gathering up the papers.
“Oh, shit, he hasn’t taken another one, has he? Not another—”
Luke whistled. “Damn. It says here that May Walker was institutionalized twice in the past ten years.” His eyes met hers. “She was schizophrenic.”
That would explain her medications. And the woman’s affect had been off, her responses too slow, and her anger had stirred too suddenly.
He rose, reading the pages. “May was told about Kyle’s death a week after it happened.” He shook his head. “She told the officer to keep the body and, ‘bury it wherever the hell you want. Just don’t make me see it.’ ”
And she’d forgotten to tell them? Or just hadn’t remembered the guy’s death? With a diagnosis of schizophrenia, there was no telling. If May had been having hallucinations, well, maybe she actually believed that Kyle was still alive.