Act of Blood (An FBI/Romance Thriller ~ Book 16)

by Kelley, Morgan

  Elizabeth let her go on.

  This was going to be interesting.

  “He used people to get what he wanted, and then when he saw his big ticket out, he jumped on the gay bandwagon.”

  Elizabeth was intrigued. “You had sex with him, didn’t you?”

  “Yes, he and I had a thing for a few months, and then he ditched me for his boyfriend. He’s no gayer than the next man. He’s full of shit.”

  Bitter much?

  Someone was a jilted lover, and she wasn’t afraid to show it.

  “If someone killed Roman Conley, he would be the ideal candidate. He has a temper, he tried to molest every person on this production, and I fired him.”

  “Before or after you found him bed hopping with Roman?” she asked.

  “After.”

  As much as she loved hearing that a person had ulterior motives, there was one thing standing in Elizabeth’s way.

  He didn’t inherit the money. They weren’t married. His motives for killing weren’t setting off her guilty radar.

  Then again, Roman was buried.

  Maybe he was supposed to stay buried. Then Jasper could go on and spend his lover’s money for a very long time.

  “I’m glad he’s gone from my life, and I hope I never have to deal with him again,” she stated.

  Elizabeth could mention how it looked hinky that this woman was old enough to be Jasper’s mother, but why go there?

  It wouldn’t end well.

  “Can I get that list of people who work on this troupe?” she asked.

  “Certainly!”

  She rushed off.

  “You’re thinking.”

  Elizabeth caught Livy up to speed.

  “You don’t think it’s her?”

  She shook her head. “Ethan said he couldn’t pinpoint the sex of the killer, but this feels like a man to me. It’s dramatic, it’s over the top, and it’s flamboyant.”

  “So a gay man?” she teased.

  Elizabeth laughed. “I wonder if there’s a profile for that? Well, since the killer isn’t touching his victims sexually, and we had a woman thrown into the mix of victims, I’m not feeling it.”

  When Selma came rushing back, she handed it, and the tickets to Elizabeth.

  “There will be a meet and greet after the play. We would love for you and the men in your life to stay.”

  “Husbands. That’s the term we use in our home. It’s perfectly fine for you to call them that too when using me as the reference.”

  Her eyes went wide.

  “Yes, they’re both mine, and I’ll have to let you know about the meet and greet.”

  “Oh my! I have so many questions.”

  Yeah, her and half the world, and she wasn’t spilling them to this woman.

  Hell!

  If they were outed, they were outed. At this point, it didn’t matter. She was going to either be vilified or glorified. She knew the truth, and Elizabeth got to bounce on both men in bed.

  She was the real winner.

  “Where to now?” Livy asked.

  “We’re going to head back in. I want to kick some bigwig ass. I suggest you do it too.”

  She laughed. “Yeah, no thank you.”

  “Afraid?” Elizabeth teased. “Scared of the big bad boss wolf, little Red?”

  “Hell no. I just like to make him suffer.”

  She gave her partner a fist bump.

  “Spoken like a wife.”

  “Amen.”

  Oh, they’d pay, but in due time.

  * * * B l a c k h a w k - W h i t e f o x * * *

  He couldn’t wait for them to come home. Derek had something special planned for the two lovebirds.

  Nothing would ever be the same again.

  In fact, he was really going to hurt them.

  When he broke into their home, he was simply going to scare them.

  Then he found it.

  He found the nursery.

  Merry was hiding his child behind the shield of another man. It pissed him off.

  It had to be his.

  There was no way that mousy little bitch could have found a man, fallen for him, and done the deed. This guy was her guardian, and the child…

  It was his.

  Oh, he wanted to make her marry him before, but now he was going to make her watch this Native half-breed suffer. Then he’d torture her too, breaking her.

  Derek didn’t want kids, and Merry knew it.

  He told her that repeatedly.

  He’d made sure she took her pill.

  He’d made sure he’d pull out—just in case.

  Now she’d gotten knocked up.

  Well, it was a damn good thing he was going to fix that little mistake. When he finally found them, he’d make them both pay for this game.

  She’d stolen his offspring.

  It was his to do what he wanted.

  So, he decided.

  They were all going to die.

  Painfully.

  * * * B l a c k h a w k - W h i t e f o x * * *

  They were near the Hoover building when her phone went off. Livy hit the navigational system and it chimed to live.

  “Hey, angel.”

  “What’s up, sexy?” Elizabeth asked. “We’re due in shortly. Want me to pick you up something to eat?”

  “Yeah, put a hold on that, Lyzee. We just got a call from Metro PD.”

  She knew what that meant. It looked like the killer had struck again, and they were going to be wading through death instead of binging on burgers.

  “Send me the location. I’ll meet you there.”

  “Are you sure you want me on the scene?” he asked. “I don’t want you having to deal with the media too.”

  “Hell freaking yes, I want you there,” she stated. “We have a case to work and you’re my partner. Screw the media. We have a job to do.”

  Callen was glad. He knew she was taking one for the team, and he appreciated it. Besides, he hated being chained to a desk. Don’t get him wrong.

  He really liked Brody and Johanna, but he wanted to be in the field with his wife.

  “I’ll meet you there.”

  Elizabeth figured she should let him in on what had gone down at the interview. Mostly, that she was going to pimp out her men to the media two nights from now.

  “Oh, and we have a date tomorrow night.”

  That was surprising.

  “We do?”

  “We’re going to see the opening of a play. It looked pretty morbid, but I only caught the tail end.”

  “What is it?” he asked.

  Elizabeth could hear him buckling into his Kevlar. There was the telltale sound of Velcro being opened and closed. It was familiar, and it also gave her a sense of relief.

  “There was some guy in a crown, a bunch of women running around, and a noose.”

  “Are you talking about ‘King Lear’? Another Shakespearean play?”

  “What?”

  Livy pulled the tickets out of Elizabeth’s pocket. “Yep. It’s ‘King Lear’.”

  “That’s totally hot, Callen James. I love how you’re all bookish and nerdy. It makes me want to do really wicked things with you when I get you alone.”

  Livy laughed.

  “Well, we’ll discuss it at the scene. Gabe will lose his nut if Livy starts thinking about me nekid.”

  She snorted.

  It was probably true. Gabe wasn’t one to tolerate his woman thinking about sexy Natives—or sexy anything for that matter.

  “Transmit the address. If it’s inside, bring the detective and Merry. We have a wackadoo to catch, and fast.”

  Wasn’t that the truth?

  * * * B l a c k h a w k - W h i t e f o x * * *

  Cochran Home

  Arlington VA

  When he pulled up, his wife was already there. In fact, it looked like the whole world was there. There were cops, Feds, and the media to boot.

  Callen really wished the earth would open up and suck the re
porters into the deepest recesses. All he could hope was these vultures were the ones who harassed them about cases and not his writing career.

  As he hopped out of his Denali and pulled on his blue FBI pullover, he could hear them shouting his name.

  Yeah, there was a mix.

  Callen opted to ignore it.

  Then he saw his wife heading his way. She was geared up, and she was smiling at him. That look would always melt his heart.

  She would always have that effect on him.

  “Hey, Elizabeth,” he said.

  She approached and went up on her toes to give him a kiss. When their lips met, he almost fell over.

  She was kissing him in front of the media.

  When she pulled away and tried to head toward the house, he grabbed her arm.

  The media was freaking out at the lip lock.

  “What the hell?”

  “I told you that I’m not hiding who I love anymore, Callen. You’re already outed with your pen name, so why stress it.”

  They were snapping pictures of the two of them, and he could only imagine the look on his face. Well, he’d see it tomorrow online—that was for sure.

  “Angel.”

  “Let’s sweat this later. I missed you, I felt like giving you a kiss, since you’re my husband, and I wanted to walk with you onto the scene.”

  He couldn’t argue that. His gut instinct was to kiss her too. Well, that and drop his arm over her shoulders. That would surely get him killed.

  She’d only handle so much of a public display of affection, and he knew it.

  “Where’s Livy? You didn’t misplace her, did you?” he asked. “Gabe will lose his mind.”

  On the way up the drive, she told Callen what Ethan and Gabe had done.

  “You don’t say?” he asked.

  She heard it in his voice.

  Elizabeth glared at him. “You knew he sicced them on us, and you didn’t warn me!”

  “I did know, but in my defense, I told them it would get them killed. Cut Ethan a break. He’s not hovering over you right now.”

  Yeah, because Callen was.

  She wasn’t an idiot. His body was blocking hers and she knew he was playing shield. Fighting their pigheadedness was so damn exhausting.

  There were more shouts from the reporters about Callen’s other career as a writer.

  “Well, I’m paying him back later. He’s going to that play with us.”

  Callen laughed. That was pretty damn funny, and he knew it. “He’s going to hate that.”

  “Yeah, I know. A happy wife is a happy life. A pissed off wife is a long, miserable existence for a husband who jacked up the simple shit.”

  He was well aware.

  At the tape, they both dropped their badges over their heads to hang around their necks.

  “Livy is inside with Chris. He beat you here.”

  “I had to update Ethan.”

  That said it all. It was code for ‘I warned him you were going to be out in the open so he didn’t have a stroke’.

  She was fine with that. There was no doubt that Frick and Frack, hers and Livy’s security guys, were lurking nearby.

  “What do we have, team?” she asked, stepping into the mansion.

  Even Tony was on the scene, and that confused her.

  “I was bored,” he said.

  “So you wanted to come look at dead people, Tony? You could have gone to meet Jaxon for lunch.”

  “I could have, but this is a case.”

  Her people were sickos. Who better to catch one?

  “The bodies are upstairs, and you’re going to enjoy this one,” Tony offered.

  Yeah, probably not.

  Climbing the grand staircase, she was glad that while their home was huge, they weren’t considered filthy rich. This killer seemed to be taking out the wealthy, and that worried her. She had two men who classified as prominent.

  The last thing she needed was someone aimed at them.

  “Wait,” she said, stopping to yell down to Tony. “Did you say bodies? As in the plural of body?”

  “I did. Your killer is on a spree.”

  She glanced over at Callen. “How come they’re always my killers when they’re being bad?”

  He snorted. He and Ethan told her that about the kids when they were wrecking the place.

  “Just lucky, I guess.”

  Inside the main bedroom, they stopped.

  “Yeah, someone is trying to say something,” she admitted. “This is insane. This killer is cuckoo.”

  “Welcome to the party,” Chris Leonard said, pulling a liver probe out of the female victim.”

  “TOD?” she asked as she pulled on her gloves.

  “She was killed last night around midnight.”

  Elizabeth took in the scene. On the bed, there was a woman scantily dressed in some flowy lingerie.

  It was hard to tell if her body had been staged. She looked too ‘pretty’ to be going to bed.

  Then again, maybe some people liked that kind of thing. Her lingerie was sort of hooker meets slut, but that’s how her men liked it.

  Who was she to judge a dead woman?

  Since they knew this was related to Shakespeare, somehow, she glanced over at Callen. “Well? Which play is this?”

  He glanced across the room at the male lying prone on the floor. “Uh, I need a little more than this. Do you know how many plays Shakespeare did?”

  “Yeah, he did thirty-seven in all.”

  Callen stared at her.

  “What?” she asked.

  “Why do you know that? Are you just making that up?” Callen asked.

  “Uh, you think our research monkeys are the only ones who know how to use Google, Callen? Really? All I had to do was ask my damn phone.”

  He started laughing. “I love you, Elizabeth. You really are my soul mate. You make my life interesting.”

  All the techs began making ‘ohhh’ and ‘awww’ sounds at his comment.

  “Zip it you freaking voyeurs. Focus on the dead not my lust monkey trying to woo me out of my britches.”

  Callen snorted.

  “Chris, what do you have?” Elizabeth asked. “And before you tell me ‘two bodies’, keep in mind I could have three just as easily.”

  He grinned at her. Chris loved when she threatened him. They always had a little verbal sparring to keep the job interesting. He loved coming to work because of her.

  “Your threat is duly noted, Elizabeth, and I actually do have something for you. They both have Mee’s lines on their nails.”

  That wasn’t the first time she’d come across those white lines on a victim’s fingernails. She and Chris had seen countless victims who’d met their end by consuming a poison.

  And here she’d just said she didn’t think it was a woman. Yet, the number one way women killed…yeah, with poison.

  Shit!

  “So what you’re saying is arsenic poisoning?” Elizabeth asked.

  Callen chimed in before Chris could answer her question. “He’s sick.”

  They all looked over.

  “What?” Elizabeth asked.

  “You asked which play this is, and I finally got it. The poison clued me in.”

  She stared at him, as if she didn’t get it.

  “What’s the most popular Shakespearean play?” Callen asked the room.

  “Romeo and Juliet,” Merry offered, as she was bagging the dead woman’s hands to do trace on later. “Everyone knows that one.”

  “Exactly. That’s why we have two bodies, one male and one female. Romeo kills the man supposed to marry Juliet, and when he comes to find her, he believes she’s dead.”

  Elizabeth knew the story. It was her least favorite play of all time.

  Why?

  It was so wrong. Juliet was a child and Romeo was an adult.

  It screamed pedophilia and all kinds of ‘Chester the Molester’ shit that shouldn’t have gone down. Where the hell were that girl’s parents?
r />   That was the question on her mind.

  Callen continued, “He sees her lying on that stone slab and takes the poison. He dies. She wakes up, finds her true love is dead, and instead of doing the smart thing and going home to her family, she drinks the same poison to join him.”

  No one awwed over that, and they were lucky. Elizabeth would have slapped them stupid.

  “This killer is definitely trying to tell you something, Elizabeth,” Chris offered.

  Merry got her attention. “Look what I found,” she stated.

  They all glanced over.

  There, in her hand, was the white handkerchief with the lily embroidered on it.

  Bingo.

  Their killer struck again.

  “Where was it?” Elizabeth asked.

  “I found it on the floor beside the bed,” she stated.

  Yeah, the killer had been there.

  “I need Ethan to see this. I need to know if the profile stands. He wasn’t sure of the sex of the killer, but poison screams woman, and we all know it.”

  Callen understood.

  If she needed Ethan, they couldn’t bring him there. They both knew that with his meetings and the workload, he couldn’t leave the office, so Callen handed her his tablet.

  It was going to be conversation by technology.

  Elizabeth pinged her husband.

  When his face came onto the screen, it was clear he was in a meeting.

  “I’m so sorry for bothering you, Director,” she said, being professional. Her husband had to keep some sense of decorum in his life.

  “What do you need, Director?” he asked, playing along. Honestly, he didn’t care if his wife called him by his name when people were around.

  She was his freaking wife. If anyone could call him by his name, it was her—and Callen. They were already the talk of the town, but again, he knew why she had done it.

  He appreciated it.

  “As my profiler, I need you to take a quick look at something. I have two more victims. I need your impression on their deaths.”

  His eyebrow went up. “Really? Two victims at once? That’s fascinating.”

  Yeah, it was sick, but different strokes.

  She turned the tablet around so he could scan the room. Slowly, she focused it on the dead woman on the bed. Ethan wasn’t speaking, but she could hear him making notes on paper.