by Julia Sykes
“That’s what I thought,” he said with grim satisfaction. His voice turned gentler a moment later. “I’ll take care of this, Katie. And I’ll keep you informed every step of the way.”
I blew out a long breath, some of my irritation leaving me. “Thanks, Colton. I appreciate it.”
“No problem.” His attention turned to Reed. “You look out for her until we catch this fucker.”
“I will,” Reed promised.
Could they be any more high-handed? I pushed back my irritation. I would deal with my partner later. We needed to have a conversation about gender equality.
“Call me if you find anything.”
Colton nodded in response to my request, and I turned to leave. I couldn’t wait to get out of his office and away from the two domineering men. Reed had proven to be infuriating at times, but having both of them gang up on me was galling. It was time I talked to my partner about respecting his peers.
Reed flanked me like a bodyguard, even though we were in the police station. I was perfectly safe here. I waited until we were in the privacy of my car to lay into him. I couldn’t allow him to keep acting like this. Not if I was going to maintain the respect of the guys at the office. Not if I was going to keep up the charade that nothing about my job ever got to me.
“Listen, Miller.” His surname was cold on my tongue. “I don’t know what you think you’re playing at, but your behavior is unacceptable. You’re new to the Bureau, so maybe you don’t get it yet. You can’t treat me like this. I might only be a couple years older than you, but that means I have two years of experience on you. If anything, you should defer to me, not the other way around. I want to work with you as a partner, but that’s not going to work if you don’t see me as an equal.”
To my surprise, he gave me a wry smile. “You are so much like Sharon,” he told me again. He said it with fondness. “She doesn’t like being protected, either. But she’s also learned not to be stupid enough to take things on by herself. Would you have gone to Colton for help if I hadn’t asked you to?”
I huffed out a breath and sidestepped the question. “You didn’t exactly ask. You can’t be so controlling. That’s not what partnership is about.”
His light expression turned more serious. “I am controlling, when I need to be. I’m an FBI agent, but I’m also a Dom. I’m going to be demanding when it comes to protecting you. That’s my job as your partner, and that’s who I am as a man.”
A few heartbeats of silence passed as his black eyes bored into mine, impressing upon me the significance of his words. This was who Reed Miller was, and I could choose to either accept that or not. The forbidding glint in his eyes let me know that not accepting wasn’t in my best interest.
The flush that crept up my neck to flood my cheeks let me know that my body very much wanted to accept him. That dark stare did something to me. It awoke an answering darkness deep within me, something that was both fiercely hungry and softly pliant at the same time. I wanted, but I would wait. Because that was what he desired. Reed’s will washed over me, and I didn’t even try to fight it. Fighting was exhausting, especially when what he was offering was so alluring; protection, comfort.
“Now, I believe we were going to discuss your lying.” He kept me locked in his gaze. “It’s okay to be afraid, Katie. It’s natural. Being afraid doesn’t mean you’re not brave. Your bravery is defined by how you face your fear. And facing it alone isn’t brave; it’s foolish. It’s dangerous.”
“You don’t have to be fearless to be a strong person.” Reed’s words from the day before reminded me that I didn’t have to do this on my own.
I dropped my eyes, suddenly ashamed of my pigheaded denial of the truth that everyone could see: I was facing some scary shit. Accepting that was the first step to conquering it.
“Look at me, Katie.” My eyes snapped to Reed’s instantly in response to his stern order. “You’re going to be honest with me from now on. And you’re going to be honest with yourself. Colton’s right. Whoever is sending these notes wants you to seek him out on your own. Don’t isolate yourself in your own fear. Because that’s what will happen if you deny it. True strength is found in accepting every part of yourself, even the parts you’re not so proud of.”
Something flashed in his eyes at the last, an inner pain that I was able to glimpse in his moment of raw honesty. Reed had obviously wrestled his own demons in the past.
His words were a revelation. They were so different from how I viewed inner strength. In my efforts to make Frank proud, I had buried every trace of vulnerability for the last nine years. Now that I was faced with the threat of this sick stalker, I realized that my strength was a fragile thing. It was the illusion of strength, not the true power I saw in Reed.
His chin lifted, and I suddenly felt much smaller under the weight of his imperious stare. “You’re not going to lie anymore, Katie. Tell me you’ll always be honest with me.”
“I won’t lie to you, Reed,” I promised softly.
“Good.” His approval was a deep rumble. My heart skipped a beat when he reached for me. My body remained frozen in place as his thumb gently brushed the single tear that had rolled down my cheek.
Shit. I pulled back and swiped at the wetness on my face. I never cried. I couldn’t. Frank had taught me how to bottle up my tears, how to be brave. But Reed was tempting me to allow my vulnerability to bleed out into the open.
Maybe Frank was wrong. Maybe burying my emotions makes me even more vulnerable when shit really hits the fan. I don’t know how to handle them.
I shook the thought away almost angrily and turned the key in the ignition with more force than was necessary. I didn’t look at Reed as I drove back to the field office, but I could feel his disapproval pulsing over me. Mercifully, he didn’t push me. He seemed to sense that I had taken as much as I could for the time being. I was grateful for his perceptiveness, even if I was deeply troubled by our conversation about personal honesty. Being honest with him was one thing; not lying to myself was another entirely.
By the time I pulled into the parking garage, I had managed to get a handle on my emotions. Frank was waiting upstairs, and I wasn’t going to let him see how shaken up I was.
Luckily, it didn’t come to that. When I stepped out of the elevator, I found that Frank was in his office with the blinds closed, a sure sign he didn’t want to be bothered. I thought about knocking on his door anyway to tell him I had enlisted Colton’s help in investigating the notes. He would want to know about that.
Dex saved me from making the decision. His large body appeared in front of me, as though he had been waiting for me to arrive.
“Where have you been?” He demanded. His eyes cut to Reed where he stood at my side.
My brows rose. “Hello to you, too.”
My friend grimaced. “I’ve done some digging on Martel. I need to talk to you.”
“Okay. Let’s talk.” I began to walk past him towards my desk.
His hand closed around my elbow, stopping me short. I glanced up at him in surprise. It wasn’t like Dex to put his hands on me.
“You didn’t answer my question. I got a call to come out to Dusk last night because you’ve received another threat, and you didn’t even call me to tell me about it personally. Where have you been?”
“I went to see Colton. He’s going to help look into the status of the prisoners I’ve put away to see if any of them might be involved with the notes I’ve received. I’m dealing with it.”
Rather than allaying his anger, my admission of having involved someone else in the matter further enraged him. “You should have come to me.” The words were harsh, almost accusatory. I knew him well enough to recognize that his ferocity masked hurt.
“I didn’t want to worry you,” I told him. “You have more important things to focus on, and so do I. Colton is helping us out so that we can focus on our jobs. I won’t let this creep distract me from catching The Mentor. And on that note, I would appreciate heari
ng this new intel on Martel.”
I pulled away from him, firmly extricating my elbow from his grip. His jaw ticked at my taking charge, but he followed behind me as I resumed my progress towards my desk. I could almost feel his irritation increase when Reed remained by my side. I felt a little guilty for the slight to Dex, but I wasn’t going to go out of my way to make him happy when he was acting like an imperious ass.
By the time Dex pulled a chair up across from mine – straddling it, per usual – and Reed settled down beside me, my friend had schooled his expression to something more neutral.
“I think Martel murdered his adoptive parents,” he said without preamble.
“Why?” I wasn’t shocked by the information – I knew the horrors Martel had been capable of – but I was interested in how Dex had come to that conclusion.
“Our records show that Martel dropped out of high school at seventeen, and that he inherited everything from his parents when they died six weeks later.”
I nodded. “It was a car accident. They lost control and drove into the Jamesville Reservoir.”
“I had forensics go back over the case. The level of decomposition of the bodies when they were found doesn’t match up with their supposed time of death. Martel said his parents had driven to Syracuse and not returned for two weeks, when they were supposed to have been gone for one. Police began a search and recovered their bodies from the water six days after Martel filed the report. It was dismissed as an accident, but decomp suggests their bodies were in the water for much longer than the few weeks that Martel claimed.”
“So you think he staged the accident.”
Dex nodded. “He filed the report the day after his eighteenth birthday. I think he killed them around the time he dropped out of Lincoln High School, and he waited to report them missing until he was legally an adult. That way he could cleanly inherit everything they had and start living his life under the radar.”
“That’s great Dex. I mean, that’s good work. So Martel killed his only family. Where does The Mentor come into this? Who would Martel trust enough to form that kind of bond?” As sick as it was, it did take some level of emotional connection to entrust one person with his secret crimes, to share in his brutality with a kindred spirit.
My job is so fucked up. I hated that I even had to think things like this.
“Well, like you said, Katie, he had no other family,” Reed interjected. “And we don’t know his bio parents. He was anonymously dropped at a hospital, so it’s unlikely that he was able to track them down, either.”
I didn’t get a chance to ponder how this new intel on Martel’s parents fit into the puzzle. My thoughts were obliterated by the sound of Frank’s voice booming through the office.
“Byrd. My office. Now.”
Oh. Shit. That tone usually made even the toughest agents look like they wanted to run in the opposite direction. Frank had never used it on me before. What had I done wrong?
“Do you want me to go with you?” Reed asked kindly.
“I’ll go,” Dex almost barked at him.
“Neither of you are coming.” I couldn’t deal with them. Not when I had my own fear to wrestle down. Besides, I had a feeling Frank would be even more furious if I brought one of them with me. The last thing I needed was for another alpha to challenge my dad when he was mad at me. Neither of them would win going head-to-head with Frank, no matter how good their intentions.
I wasn’t sure how I had gotten there, but suddenly I found myself at the threshold of Frank’s office. I seemed to have floated there, pulled to him by the power of his will. The door was ajar, and his anger slammed into me as soon as I crossed into his office.
“Close the door.” The order was low, dangerous. I obeyed immediately. My fingers trembled as I pressed them against the wood. The click of the latch sliding home seemed to crack behind me like the report of a rifle.
It took all my determination to look Frank in the eye. His stony expression made me glance away instantly, and my eyes found a spot on the floor just beside the toes of my shiny black flats. He didn’t ask me to sit down, so I stood there, waiting to be reprimanded for whatever transgression I had committed.
“Can you explain to me why I just received a call from Colton Hughes regarding your stalker.” It wasn’t a question.
“I…” The word was a squeak. I swallowed and tried again. “I didn’t want to distract anyone at the Bureau with it, so I went to him for help.”
“So you just thought you could go to the CPD with FBI business and I wouldn’t find out about it?”
“No!” Shit. I hadn’t thought about it like that. “I asked him to help me with a personal problem, not a Federal investigation. I wouldn’t go behind your back on a case.”
“That’s exactly what you did. I told you to come to me about this, Katie. You deliberately disobeyed me.”
“I didn’t.” Tears threatened, but I pushed them back. I couldn’t cry in front of Frank. “I didn’t think-”
“No. You didn’t think. That’s why we’re having this conversation.”
He sighed, and the wheels of his office chair squealed as he pushed back from his desk. His arms were around me seconds later, pulling me into his embrace. I couldn’t resist the comfort it offered. I returned the hug fiercely. It wasn’t often that Frank held me like this. He hadn’t since shortly after my father died. But I needed it now almost as badly as I had then.
With one final squeeze, he pulled back from me, but he left his hands resting on my shoulders. I was grateful that he didn’t completely break contact. I needed his strength, his support. How could I have allowed myself to disappoint him when he only ever had my best interests in mind?
“I’m sorry.”
He gave me a small smile, and just like that, all of my anguish was lifted. “I know you are. Just don’t do anything like that again. You need to let me take care of this, Katie. I don’t trust your safety to anyone else. Do you understand?”
Emotion welled up in me. This was the Frank I loved. So serious but so strong. He would see me through anything.
“Yes. Thanks, Frank.”
“You’re welcome. Now, Colton gave me some disturbing news. Apparently Claude Parnell managed to weasel his way out of jail.”
My heart skipped a beat. “What?” The serial rapist I had arrested only weeks earlier was free? “How?”
“Something about evidence being lost. They couldn’t hold him without it.” He speared me with a significant stare. “Parnell is most likely the one behind the threats. You remember how he acted toward you when you brought him in.”
Oh, I remembered. His murky eyes had devoured me, and his lewd comments had been so sick that I almost walked out of interrogation. Frank himself had finally stepped in to shut him up.
“So we have no idea where Parnell is now?” I asked as steadily as I could manage.
Frank’s mouth twisted down in disgust. “No. But we’re looking for him. I asked Colton to put some men on it. We’ll find him. I’ll take care of you, Katie.”
I nodded, knowing my voice would break if I tried to speak. Frank was so good to me. He was tough as a rock, but he loved me. Looking up into his hard eyes, I could see his determination to protect me. If he caught Parnell, the man would never see the light of day again. The knowledge filled me with grim satisfaction.
Chapter 6
Desire rolled through me, the heat of it contrasting sharply with the cool air that caressed my naked flesh. My skin pebbled, and I shivered from something more than the cold. My core throbbed, aroused to the point of sweet pain. It tried to touch myself to ease the ache, but something bit into my wrists, holding my arms firmly over my head. My entire body jerked with instinctive fear, and I realized that rope bound my ankles as well. I was tied to my bed, my arms and legs stretched wide, leaving me open and vulnerable.
A low chuckle teased across my neck, and black eyes appeared above mine. Reed’s weight settled over me, pressing me down into the mattr
ess. Fear morphed into lust, and I rocked my hips up into him. His cock was hard against my belly, and I craved for him to thrust into me and end my sensual torment.
His grin was sharp-edged as he remained motionless, denying me. The fire within me flared hotter. I enjoyed his power over me, reveling in finally allowing myself to let go. I could be vulnerable with Reed. The satisfaction I found in that was more than just emotional. It made my body burn for him.
He lowered his lips to my throat, pressing hot kisses against my sensitized skin, tracing the line of my collarbone with his tongue. I craved to hold him, to pull him closer. My hands tugged uselessly against the restraints, and the feel of the rough rope tightening around my wrists made me moan as I was reminded of my own powerlessness at his hands.
He laughed again, but this time the sound was colder somehow. It sent a chill racing through the heat that pulsed at my core.
“Reed…” Uncertainty made his name waver as it left my lips.
Suddenly, his teeth closed around my hardened nipple. It was a harsh, cruel bite, and it sent a shock of true pain crashing through my arousal. I cried out, but he didn’t relent. His fingernails dug into my other nipple.
“Reed! You’re hurting me. Stop!”
His black eyes snapped up to mine. No, not black. Muddy green.
Martel. His teeth were red with my blood when he grinned down at me. I screamed and twisted against my bonds as terror engulfed me. His cock twitched against my thigh.
“Does my little pet like pain? We are going to get along so well.” His voice oozed over me like toxic slime.
I tried to scream again, but no sound came out. I was restrained, silenced, completely powerless. All of my training counted for nothing. I had willingly allowed him to trap me. I had enjoyed my bonds only moments before. This was sick, wrong. How could I have ever found lust in this vulnerability?
Martel’s face wavered above me, rippling as though it was a reflection in water. When it smoothed again, Dex’s electric blue eyes stared down at me. His expression was drawn into the same cruel leer, his reddened teeth bared in twisted pleasure.