Twisted

by Cynthia Eden

  She didn’t just hurt. Emma felt as if a knife had been shoved straight into her heart. “Yes, it was hard.” Her voice was wooden. She could only hope that the agent hadn’t been fully briefed on Lisa—or rather, on her funeral arrangements. Because Lisa wasn’t being buried there at all. The arrangements for Lisa were still being put in place.

  “Pull up to the curb,” Kevin directed the driver. “We’re making a pit stop.”

  Emma drew in a shuddering breath. “Thank you.” Once in the not-too-distant past, she’d done a stint as a tour guide at this particular cemetery. She knew all the twists and turns inside those walls.

  She knew the perfect places to hide. Vanishing there wouldn’t be hard at all.

  Emma hurried from the car. The sun was glaring down on them, and she lifted her hand to shield her eyes. “Thank you,” she told him again. “I’ll only be a moment—”

  He caught her wrist. “You don’t think I’m letting you go alone?”

  She’d hoped he would.

  Kevin shook his head, the sun glinting off his blond hair. “We go together, Ms. Castille. That’s the point of having FBI protection.”

  He was going to be a problem.

  He bent near the driver’s side window. “Keep an eye out, okay? I’ll go in with her, and we’ll be back in a bit.”

  That just wasn’t going to work for her. Emma hunched her shoulders and headed through the old gates. As usual, there were plenty of people milling around in the cemetery, especially near the entrance, and that was good news for her. Maybe Cormack thought those folks weren’t just tourists, maybe he’d believe they were there for the funeral service.

  The funeral service that wasn’t happening.

  Emma hurried inside. With every step she took, Emma moved a bit faster, faster. She headed toward Marie Laveau’s tomb. Once she got there, vanishing would be a snap.

  But his hold on her wrist was unbreakable.

  Too tenacious. She’d give the guy credit for that. But he hadn’t counted on a woman like her.

  People were up ahead, and the path narrowed. Excellent.

  “Emma, where’s your friend’s tomb?”

  Lisa doesn’t have a tomb here.

  “We’re almost there,” she lied without hesitation. “Her family’s area is to the left.” Bullshit, bullshit, bullshit. They were almost to the group of people on the path. Emma jerked hard to the left. There wasn’t room for the agent over there with her, and if he kept holding her wrist, he’d block the others from passing by. She was hoping the guy’s good manners would win the day.

  Drop your hold. Let them pass. Drop your hold—

  He did.

  And Emma lunged between the crypts.

  “Emma!” He roared her name, and she knew he was giving chase. Too bad for him. Too terribly bad because she knew this place better than she knew the back of her hand. She snaked to the left. To the right.

  Rushed by another tour group, then—

  There. The crypt that the tour guides had nicknamed the Vampire Den. It was an ancient place, with rusty chains in front of the door, a sad attempt to keep folks out. But with the height of vampire love a few years back, couples had started going in that place like crazy. If you just slipped under the chains . . .

  Like I just did.

  And grabbed the door, then pulled it up and to the left . . .

  The door creaked as it opened, and Emma leapt inside.

  The tour guides had grown used to pulling vamp-crazy teens and college kids out of that crypt. Nothing was in there any longer, not even a casket. Just cobwebs. Dust.

  She pulled the crypt’s door shut again, narrowing the small bit of light that spilled through. Emma didn’t shut the door completely, though, because she didn’t want to get sealed inside.

  “Emma!” Agent Cormack’s voice blasted from a few feet away. Emma tensed and barely dared to breathe. He was far too close. Right outside the crypt. Had he heard the creaking of the door?

  “Emma, I was trying to help you!”

  By taking her away from the life she knew?

  “Emma!” But his voice didn’t sound as close now. He was moving away. She finally took a deep breath for her oxygen-starved lungs.

  Emma stared at that small crack of light. The idea of rushing back outside—oh, it was tempting. But he’d still be out there. She had to wait. Bide her time.

  Slowly, carefully, she crouched until her knees touched the old, stone floor. When she inhaled, she could smell the dusty scent of the place and the faintest hint of . . . decay?

  Emma sat down on that floor, her head falling forward. Her heart was racing far too fast in her chest, galloping like mad, and the burst of adrenaline in her body had her fingers shaking. She’d done it, though. She’d gotten away from the FBI. Now she just had to take a few minutes and figure out what the hell to do next . . .

  Other than, of course, hide in a tomb all day long.

  SONOFABITCH. KEVIN CORMACK whirled around. People were everywhere in the damn cemetery—slipping back and forth through the tombs. So many people, but where was she?

  Because he couldn’t lose Emma Castille. Elroy would have his head if Kevin didn’t bring that woman back. Securing her had been priority one for him.

  He ran ahead. Looked to the left. The right. Shit. This was bad. So bad. After the mess-up in Quantico, Kevin had been kicked back to a field office in Louisiana. This was his first chance at the big leagues again because Elroy had sent specifically for him. If he screwed up, there would be no second chances.

  As quickly as he could, Kevin made his way back to the front of the cemetery. When he burst out of the place, he immediately saw the two uniformed cops. One was standing near the front fender of the patrol car, one was slumped inside. “Did you see her?” Kevin barked.

  They jerked to attention.

  “Emma Castille,” he barked. “Did you see her come out?”

  The two looked blankly at each other. “Uh, isn’t she supposed to be with you?” the younger cop asked.

  Such an asshole response. “If she were with me,” he snarled back, “you’d freaking see her.” He stabbed his finger toward them. “Don’t let her pass, got it? She’s in that cemetery. If she tries to come out, you stop her.”

  “Yes, sir!”

  He nearly snarled again. Those two bozos weren’t paying attention to anything. Emma could have already gotten out, and they wouldn’t have known.

  Kevin whirled around and rushed back into the cemetery. Hell, he’d made a rookie mistake, too. Just like them. He’d bought into the act that Emma fed him. She’d blinked those big, tear-filled eyes at him, and he’d done exactly what the woman wanted.

  Gritting his teeth, Kevin yanked out his phone. Dialed Elroy. When the boss answered, Kevin told him, “We’ve got a problem.”

  EMMA INCHED TOWARD the faint beam of light. It was time. She needed to make a break for it and get the hell out of that cemetery before the agent wised up and started searching the tombs. Because if she didn’t move soon, that place wouldn’t just be a hiding spot for her.

  It would be her prison.

  As silently as possible, Emma rose. She’d already mentally plotted out her escape from the cemetery. She wouldn’t make the mistake of going out the front gate, not with those cops there. But she knew of a crypt near the far right wall, one that had an angel statue near its base. She’d climb up that crypt and be able to jump over to the wall. Then she could climb down, piece of cake. She just had to get there first, undetected by Agent Cormack.

  Step one . . . be prepared for your exit.

  Agent Cormack would remember what she’d had on before. Lucky for Emma, she was wearing a light camisole under her shirt. She ditched the outer shirt and suddenly—new outfit. If someone was just scanning over her, for a fast instant, the change of clothes might fool the onlooker. Then she ripped her discarded shirt. Got just enough fabric for a tight, little strip, and used it as a makeshift ponytail holder. Again, it was just a small chan
ge. But a small change could fool a person . . . for a few moments, anyway.

  Emma squared her shoulders. This was it. She’d have to walk fast. And luck would definitely need to be on her side.

  Step two . . . get out of the crypt.

  Her fingers curled around the door. She pushed it away from her, opening it a few more precious inches. Emma winced, sure that creaking sound was far too loud, but there was nothing she could do about it. Then she shimmied her body through that narrow opening. The sunlight hit her full force, and Emma had to blink quickly so her eyes could adjust.

  Then she looked over to the right—

  A boy was there. Maybe ten, eleven years old. He was staring at her, his mouth open in apparent shock. Oh, right . . . a woman just walked out of a locked-up tomb. No one else appeared to have noticed her. Just the boy. Emma put her index finger over her mouth in the universal sign for silence.

  The boy’s mouth snapped closed, and he hurriedly backed up. He bumped into his mother, and she glanced down at him. “Sweetie, what is it?”

  Emma didn’t wait around to hear the boy’s explanation. She rushed through the maze of crypts, moving fast toward her destination.

  Step three . . . don’t get caught.

  So far, she seemed to be home free. There was no sign of Agent Cormack. He wasn’t—

  There.

  Emma jumped back and immediately flattened her body against the side of the nearest tomb. She counted to ten, and then, slowly, she peeked around the corner. He was gone. Yes!

  So she shot away from the wall. A few more twists and turns, and she was in front of the little angel statue that she remembered so well.

  Step four . . . use the statue to climb to the top of the crypt. Then get the hell out.

  She put her foot on the statue. Grabbed for its head with her hand. Sorry, angel! Then she heaved herself up.

  Hard hands locked around her stomach. “I don’t think so . . .” The voice was low, grating.

  Terrifying.

  Emma tried to jerk away from that hold, but it was too strong. He yanked her back down, and she would have fallen straight to the ground if it hadn’t been for his steely grip. Jeez. Agent Cormack was being too rough. So she’d tricked him, so she’d—

  “Our fun is just about to begin,” her captor rasped in her ears. “Told you . . . you’re next.”

  She started fighting then, frantically struggling to turn around so that she could see the man who held her, but he now had his hand fisted in her hair. He lunged forward quickly, that one still hand in her hair while the other locked around her stomach, and he rammed her head into the stone wall of the crypt.

  Emma didn’t even have a chance to cry out.

  The sickening thud of her head hitting that crypt was the last sound she heard.

  CHAPTER TEN

  WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU MEAN . . .” DEAN DEMANDED, his voice low and lethal as fury surged inside of him, “you . . . lost her?”

  Kevin’s jaw was tightly clenched. “I mean just what I said, okay? I lost her.”

  They were at a New Orleans police station, in a room the FBI had taken over with its “task force.” Elroy was sitting at the conference table, like a king at his throne, and Dean was about two seconds away from lunging over and beating the hell out of Kevin. “You were supposed to keep her safe!” This couldn’t be happening.

  “If she’d cooperated, she would be safe.” Kevin started pacing. “She tricked me. Got me to stop at the St. Louis Cemetery—”

  “Which damn one?” Dean cut in.

  Kevin stopped. Frowned. “What?”

  Sarah cleared her throat. She’d been sitting at the conference table, watching the others. “There are three St. Louis cemeteries in New Orleans.”

  Kevin’s eyes closed. “Look, she gave me this sob story about her friend Lisa being buried. I knew that was the woman Ricker killed in the square. I agreed to stop by the cemetery for a few moments, so she could say her good-byes.”

  Rage was seriously about to choke Dean.

  Victoria eased a bit closer to Kevin. She’d been working in the morgue but had come to join their little screwed up group a few minutes ago. “Lisa Nyle hasn’t been released to her family yet. She’s still in the morgue.”

  Elroy’s hands slammed down on the table. “She was tricking you.”

  Kevin whirled toward him. “Yeah, I get that now. But I thought she was legit, and stopping by the cemetery for a few minutes didn’t seem like too much trouble. I didn’t know she’d pull some kind of Houdini on me and vanish.”

  He should have known. He should have fucking known. “Which St. Louis cemetery?” Dean demanded once more.

  “It doesn’t matter!” Kevin threw his hands up in the air. “I searched. The cops with me searched. That woman is gone. She’s in the wind. Hell, she probably was on her way out of New Orleans five minutes after she cleared the cemetery.”

  He grabbed his ex-partner. Shoved him into the wall.

  “Dean!” Sarah’s sharp voice.

  He didn’t respond to Sarah’s cry. Through clenched teeth, he gritted to Kevin, “You told me that you’d keep her safe. He’s out there, after her. You were supposed to protect her.”

  “She ran away.”

  Because she hadn’t wanted to be caged. And the FBI, oh, yes, they would have caged her.

  “You should have left her with me. I was keeping her safe.”

  Kevin glared right back at him. Voice dropping, Kevin said, “The same way you kept Charlotte safe? Because you were supposed to save her, too, weren’t you?”

  He’d fucking tried.

  Sarah’s fingers curled around his shoulder. “Dean, let him go. This isn’t the way a task force cooperates.”

  No, hell, no, it wasn’t. He was no idiot, but Emma was missing. How could they not all be panicking? “He could have her already,” Dean rasped. He hadn’t let Kevin go.

  Kevin shook his head. “She left on her own. Trust me, I know this.”

  That was the problem. Dean didn’t trust him. And he knew Kevin felt the same way.

  “Let him go, Bannon,” Agent Elroy barked. “We don’t have time for your shit right now.”

  And he didn’t have time for theirs. Dean stepped back. “Where was the cemetery located?”

  “Near the interstate, okay? It’s the one with the voodoo queen.” Kevin’s cheeks flushed a dark red. “Look, I should have been more cautious, okay? Should have realized it was a scam, but I know Baton Rouge, not New Orleans. A woman is crying, telling me her friend is being buried at that place, so I felt sympathy, and I let her stop.” He shook his head. “I didn’t know she was going to run.”

  Dean spun on his heel, but he didn’t get to go far because Sarah was in his path. Sarah with her intense stare and her carefully expressionless face.

  “We need to compare notes,” Sarah said. “I’ve been trying to work up a new profile on the killer.”

  “I’m finding Emma.” Because that was what mattered right then. Guilt had been gnawing at him ever since she’d walked out of that apartment with Kevin. And, now, to find out that she was somewhere in that city, alone . . . hell, no.

  The door opened. Dean glanced over Sarah’s shoulder and saw Wade standing there. Wade, the guy who’d orchestrated this little task-force screwup. Yeah, Dean wanted to discover what data the FBI had, but . . .

  Emma matters more. Knowing that she was safe. Finding her and getting rid of that terrible, pained betrayal that had been in her eyes. “They fucking lost her,” he snarled to Wade.

  Wade blinked, then frowned. “What?”

  A chair squeaked behind him. “It’s a good thing . . .” Elroy’s snapping voice told him, “that your new job enables you to find the lost.” That last part was sneered.

  Dean glared at the guy.

  Elroy waved to the door. “By all means, try to find a woman who chose to run away. See if you’re really better than the FBI. And while you search aimlessly for her, we’ll be here . . . or
rather, we’ll be hunting for the man who kidnapped and nearly killed a sixteen-year-old girl.”

  “You were supposed to protect her,” Wade fired as he glared at Kevin. The same rage that Dean felt seemed to vibrate in his words. “That was the deal. I told you that she was on the killer’s list. You were supposed to guard her—”

  “You can’t guard someone who runs away!” Kevin shouted.

  Screw this. Until he could get some reassurance that Emma was all right, Dean knew he would be useless on the hunt for Ricker. He eased around Sarah. “I’m sorry,” he murmured to her. “But I have to find Emma.”

  Because the twist in his gut was just getting worse.

  He stalked out of the room, his mind spinning through search options. He’d start at the cemetery. See if there were any signs of her, then he’d—

  “Maybe she doesn’t want you to find her.”

  Wade’s voice stopped him.

  Dean glanced back over his shoulder. Wade was standing in front of the conference-room door. As Dean stared at his friend, two uniformed cops slipped into the room. They were all heading for the briefing, he knew that. Once upon a time, nothing would have kept him away from a briefing about that bastard Ricker.

  But . . .

  Emma.

  “I saw the way she looked at you before she got in that patrol car, man,” Wade said as he came closer. His expression was grim. “That woman was pissed at you. So after she gave old Kevin in there the slip, I sure don’t see her rushing to call you.”

  “Because she thinks I turned my back on her.”

  “You didn’t have a choice.”

  Dean’s laugh was bitter. “We always have a choice.” He’d just made the wrong one. He started walking again.

  “So what are you going to do . . . search the whole cemetery? She’s not there any longer.”

  He kept walking.

  “If she’s got friends in the area, you should check in with them first.”

  An image of Jax’s face flashed through his mind.

  “Maybe she turned to someone else, someone who could keep her safe.”