“I don’t meet with creepadoodles.” Emma shook her head.
“Creepadoodles?” Mullins laughed.
“Hush,” Brooks said to his agent. “Go on.”
“Most of the people I’ve met with are teachers, psychologists, or family members. Good people. But some struck me as creepy. We made lists and broke them down. People I met with divided into their relationship to the killer, either victim’s family, professional, or curious lookie-lou. Then there’s another list of people who creeped me out. We also compiled a list of everyone I rejected.”
“We spent some time looking these people up,” Jacob interjected. Social media was pretty damn helpful for telling you about someone’s habits. “I think we have a small pool of suspects for you.”
“Show me.” Brooks held out his hand.
Emma handed it over then wiped her hands on her jeans. “There’s four. Three are people I turned down, but when we looked them up there is substantial activity on their social media sites to indicate a serial killer fascination.”
“And the fourth?”
“The fourth is a teenage kid I met with. I thought he was doing a homework assignment, but he was a total creeper. Followed me around, made threats. Eventually I had to slap a restraining order on him.”
“Which is he?” Brooks flashed the list at her.
“This one.” She tapped the last name on the list. “Max Fischer.”
Black Widow paced through the house.
Patience was a virtue she exercised more often than most people, but after hours of waiting, it was wearing thin. Where was Max?
Something was wrong. By all accounts, Max killed near midnight. His whole ritual took maybe an hour to three, depending on the bodies. Granted, he’d only done a few trial runs before committing to his plan. There were always variances, but not this many.
She went to the front windows and pulled aside enough plastic to peer out.
The sun was up. Cars came and went. Blue and red lights flashed a street over.
Fuck.
She headed for the back door, but the mini-fridge caught her eye.
Max would want his trophies. But if she was found carrying them, there wouldn’t be a good enough excuse to get her off the hook. She’d have to leave them and track Max some other way. God, he was a royal fuck up.
She left the door open. It didn’t matter now, someone would go door to door soon and they would discover his hidey-hole. She peered up and down the street. Since the house was all by itself, it stuck out like a sore thumb. If she went for the sidewalk, anyone driving by would take notice of her.
It was now or never. Her time was running out.
Black Widow walked calmly to the sidewalk, then began jogging as if she did this every day. The small pack bounced on her shoulders, but she couldn’t leave her kit behind. Her prints were all over it.
She jogged down the street, crossing when she ran out of sidewalk and continued toward the lights.
Several cop cars and an ambulance sat outside of one of the cookie-cutter homes while neighbors clustered outside in their robes and slippers. She jogged right up to a group of neighbors and stopped, breathing harder than was necessary.
“Hey, what’s going on?” she asked.
The woman closest to her appeared to be near tears. “It was Mike Robinson. His wife found him dead in the backyard. They said his eyes were gone.” She covered her face and muttered through her fingers, “Do you think it’s that killer?”
Black Widow gasped, feigning horror. “No.”
The woman nodded.
“Oh my God. I need to go check in on my grandmother. I’m so sorry.”
“No, go, go!” The woman shooed her away.
Black Widow jogged off with haste. Not too fast, she didn’t want to draw any undue attention, but the inbound black SUVs didn’t speak well for Max. She had to find him before the FBI did.
Emma paced the length of the entry to the police station. The FBI had rushed out in a hurry, save for the red-headed agent that gave Emma the creeps. The woman was like a robot.
It was all too much to take in. She couldn’t think too hard about the very real possibility she’d set this all in motion years ago. Max had been nineteen when she filed the restraining order. That was nearly five years ago. Someone at the FBI had gathered up a lot of information about Max in a few minutes, and it made the kid out to be even creepier. Emma hadn’t even heard it all. The agents had shut her out almost as soon as the details started rolling in.
She had a feeling they’d kick Jacob out soon too, but at the very least she wanted to hang around and see Rachel and her family. They were caught up in all of this because of her.
“There you are.”
Emma turned toward Jacob’s voice. Her heart fluttered at the sight of him. It was stupid. She’d been apart from him for all of five minutes. It wasn’t enough time to miss someone, and yet, she had.
“Hey. Just waiting on Rachel.” She shoved her hands in her pockets. Rachel and her family were supposed to help create a drawing since Max’s picture wasn’t online anywhere. The most recent one was at least five years old.
“Patrol is bringing them around back, through the bay, to keep them out of the eye of the press.”
“Oh.” Well now didn’t she feel dumb?
“Want to grab a snack with me in the break room?” He thumbed over his shoulder.
“Sure.” She wasn’t hungry, but being near him made her feel better.
They meandered back toward his department, but detoured into a break room with a vending machine. Like the rest of the building, it was a monotone beige room.
“Don’t you people believe in color?” she asked.
“I try to spend as little time as possible here. Mostly, I’m out working cases.”
She shook her head. “I don’t think I could do what you do.”
“What? Be a cop?”
“Kind of, but more the office environment. I couldn’t cut it. I need to be outside, doing stuff.”
“And that’s why I try to spend as much time in the field. Know what you want?” He gestured toward the vending machine. “My treat.”
“Aren’t you Mr. Generous? First breakfast and now a treat?”
One side of his mouth hitched up, and she had to stop herself from sighing. He’d smiled this morning at breakfast. A real, honest to God smile, with teeth and little dimples and everything. Who would have known the man had fucking hot dimples? Not her.
“Anything for you.” He tucked her hair behind her ear, fingertips whispering over her cheek.
Anything? Did he mean that?
“What do you want?” he asked again.
“Chocolate.”
He shrugged and punched in digits, selecting a chocolate and caramel bar for her, and chips for himself.
“When should Rachel be here?” she asked.
“She’s probably already here, but they aren’t going to let us back there for now.” He pulled out a chair and gestured for her to sit.
“Really?”
“Let them do their job. We’ll stick around until they have a sketch and decide what to do then.”
“What about the guy they found dead?”
“They probably won’t share that, either.”
“That’s frustrating.” She tore the wrapper open and popped one of the sectioned squares off and into her mouth.
“Let’s talk about something else.”
“Colorado?” She’d thrown that out as a joke this morning, but he’d seemed serious about it. Suddenly, she wanted that trip.
“Yeah, let’s talk about Colorado.” There was that smile again. It was probably a good thing he didn’t use it often. It was a deadly weapon.
“Would this be a friends-and-us trip?” She focused on the candy and keeping her expression neutral.
“Hell no. Unless that’s what you want?”
She shrugged, not inclined to share her time with him with others.
“Are you tr
ying to tell me you’re second guessing the trip?” Now the smile was gone.
“No. Not at all, I just...well...” She shrugged and squirmed a little. “What are we? Are we friends? Are we fuck buddies? Or something else?”
Jacob put the bag down and stared at her hard.
“What do you want to call it?” he asked.
“I don’t know. Should we call it anything?” If they decided to be fuck buddies, she had to stop caring for him now. But if he wanted to date her, would she have to start dressing the part of a cop’s girlfriend? Was there a uniform?
“I think that decision falls to you.”
“Me?” Panic gripped her by the throat and squeezed.
Jacob leaned across the table toward her, his gaze serious as always.
“I know you don’t know me very well, but I promise you this isn’t normal for me. It’s different. And I’m not going to walk away from something that feels...right.”
She swallowed hard.
“Right?” she echoed.
That sounded an awful lot like a commitment speech.
Emma had always been the relationship type, despite her independence. But he was right, with him it was different. Not just that they were plagued by the same shadows, but it was as if he knew how to lift them away. He knew everything horrible about her life, and he didn’t bat an eyelash at it.
Holy shit. She loved him.
Only love could chase away the kinds of shadows in their lives. Love was the only logical reason for this crazy urge to be near him, always.
“Hey,” a voice barked. It was that agent, Jade Perez. “You two need to see this.”’
Fuck her and her timing!
Emma’s heart pounded in her throat, and her stomach was floating in her chest. She felt dizzy and a little off balance, but then again, she’d just realized she loved a guy.
Jacob turned toward the door.
“What is it?” he asked.
“Come on.” Jade disappeared down the hall.
Jacob stood and offered her a hand. She needed it. The room was spinning and now her stomach threatened to expel the chocolate.
Did people fall in love like this? All at once? Was this normal?
It wasn’t as if her life had ever been normal.
Jade led them into the war room.
“We found an old picture of our suspect. Patrol went by Harold Espinoza’s neighbor’s house with it. Both the neighbors and the family from last night say it’s our guy. He’s blond now, pale and has what looks like scars on his forearms.”
“Fuck me.” Emma sat down hard in a chair. “He had black, long hair when I met him. He was just a scrawny kid.”
Jade had been busy. There was already a board set up with Max’s picture, name, and the details they’d uncovered about him.
“What about the body from this morning?” Jacob asked.
“Brooks called. They found his hiding spot, his trophies—everything except him, it seems. A street over from where they found the body. They think he was trying to get supplies, maybe money to run. There was no reason to kill the man that we can see, but they’re working on it.”
“Stress. His plan was destroyed, and he can’t kill his intended victims. He’s spiraling, so now he’ll kill anyone who either gets in his way or that he comes into contact with. Our body count is probably going to double.” Jacob’s voice was grim, his shoulders slumped.
They knew who TBKiller was, and he was still going to murder more people. It was a terrifying thought.
Jacob turned toward her, no dimples in sight.
“I think our best bet is for Emma and me to go back to her place. He’s clearly familiar with the house and her being there. If we’re someplace he can find us, he might come straight for us.”
“You want to be bait?” Emma asked.
“Yeah. You okay with that?”
“Yeah.” She shrugged.
They were different than his other victims. They knew he was coming. And they would be prepared.
“I will communicate that to Brooks. I need to get an APB out for Max. We’re going to catch him.” If Jade meant her words to be comforting, they weren’t. Emma doubted the woman had a warm, fuzzy bone in her body.
“Great.” Jacob glanced at her, and the room faded from her awareness. “We’re going to head out, get some sleep maybe, or make some more coffee. Keep us updated?”
“Will do,” Jade replied and strode out of the room.
“Ready to get out of here?” he asked.
“You sure this is the best plan?” She stood and took the hand he extended toward her.
“No, but you don’t run and my gut tells me he’s not going to give up his end game. If I thought for a second you’d go into protective custody, I’d haul your ass off.”
“Yeah, I’m not doing that, so let’s go be bait.” She nodded toward her collection. “We leaving that?”
“You okay leaving your scrapbooks? They might find something useful in there.”
“Scrapbooks? I don’t scrapbook.” He glanced at the books.
“Okay, so they are scrapbooks, but I can’t do all that neat, frilly stuff people do with the pages.” She rolled her eyes.
He chuckled and grabbed her hands. “You scrapbook. It’s cute. Come on.”
She’d be adding another chapter to her collection, one that told their story. Eventually. For now, a little sleep sounded good, even if she didn’t think she’d sleep for a second until they caught Max.
Jacob was burning the last of his oil. As much as he wanted to stay at the station, he was about to fall flat on his face. Hell, he was pretty sure he’d hallucinated that moment in the break room when Emma stared at him like someone had hit her with a two-by-four.
What they needed was some sleep, another meal, and for the cops to catch Max Fischer. Once that was wrapped up, they could decide what exactly they were calling this. At some point in the last few days, he’d accepted he was hooked on Emma, and for him, there was no turning back. He didn’t know if it was infatuation, lust, or love, but he wasn’t going to let go. No matter what she thought or did, he was hanging on.
They walked hand-in-hand out of the precinct through a side door. He’d parked away from the building to avoid drawing attention. They’d also opted to not listen to the news, but a few of the officers had told him the media was running with the story of the Ration family and the copycat TBK murderer.
“God, it’s hotter than the devil’s crotch,” Emma said as they stepped out onto the stairs.
Jacob laughed.
“Devil’s crotch, huh?”
“Yeah.” She grinned.
“You think it’s this hot in Colorado right now?”
“I seriously doubt it.”
He was getting into the idea of going away with Emma. Someplace they could forget what pulled them together and get down to who they really were. He was in awe of the person with him now, her strength and tenacity to face down this situation without fear. Of course, he could have done without the secrets.
“I’m thinking a second breakfast and a nap. What do you think?” He pulled his keys out of his pocket.
“I think that sounds perfect.” Emma squeezed his hand and let it go.
He glimpsed something on the seat of his Jeep. Something that hadn’t been there before. Something red.
“Emma, wait.” Jacob grabbed her around the waist and backed up into the street.
“What’s wrong?”
“There’s something in the Jeep.”
He glanced around them, keeping her close to his side, as he pulled out his phone and dialed 9-1-1. He rattled off his badge number and the details. Within minutes a swarm of officers had the street blocked off, and Jade Perez was there.
“He was here,” Jade announced after a glance at the present left on the passenger’s seat of his Jeep.
“What is it?” Emma asked.
“You don’t want to know,” Jacob said over Jade’s answer.
“Huma
n eyes,” Jade replied. “Sorry.”
“Eyeballs?” She twisted away from him and peered into the Jeep.
“You don’t want to see that.” Jacob pulled her back again.
“I grew up in the country. I’ve seen eyes before.” Emma seemed much less shaken by the trophy than he did. “Did he really sneak up here and do that?”
“Yes. I want to preserve the scene until Brooks tells me otherwise. I’ll get patrol to take you back to Emma’s. Sorry about this, Detective.” Jade shielded her eyes from the sun.
“Are you sure that’s still the best plan?” Jacob asked. He hated the idea of letting Emma walk into danger.
Jade lifted her shoulders. “He’s taunting you. He placed the eyes on the passenger side, where Emma would have sat. There’s blood on her side, not the driver’s. I think this is more about her than you.”
“Or, he could be using her to get to me.” Jacob shrugged.
“I want to get patrol to clear out your neighbor’s homes. We can station plain clothes officers there as camouflage. I think it’s the best plan. He’s focused specifically on the two of you. We need to use that to distract him from the fact he’ll be walking into a trap.”
Jacob didn’t like it, but neither could he deny that it was a solid plan.
“Sounds good. Can we get a ride home? I’m starting to get the creeps with all these cameras around.” Emma nodded behind her to the reporters gathering like a pack of hyenas.
“I got it.” Jacob placed his hand in the small of her back. “Come on, let’s get inside.”
“When will this be over?” she asked when they were out of earshot.
“Soon. They’re going to catch him.”
He had to believe they would. He couldn’t live in a world without her in it. Not when he’d found her.
Max paid the cashier for his bag of food and supplies. As he handed over the cash, he caught sight of his nails.
Shit.
There was still blood under them.
“Wow, looks like they know who that killer is.” The man working the register took the money while he stared at a TV mounted behind the counter.
A picture of Max at nineteen floated above the news anchor’s shoulder. A chill swept through his body, but he forced himself to appear casual.
Blind: Killer Instincts Page 19