As Anna pulled on her jeans and T-shirt, tied the laces on her Nikes, then pulled her hair back in a ponytail, she thought about her upcoming meeting with Costos. He’d been more than vocal about his resistance to this midnight jaunt to the crime scene. Drilled her repeatedly about the necessity of it.
She couldn’t tell him about the Parapsychology Division, of course. It was as hush-hush in the FBI as the CIA’s Grill Flame, the most secretive operation of the Stargate program. Even during their four-year relationship, she had never mentioned her occasional flashes of insight. Perhaps because she hadn’t understood them herself. Or wanted to.
What now?
Jerry knew her better than anyone had in her life. He hadn’t become the most successful D.A. in New Orleans in the last fifty years for nothing. He had a way of mentally processing a crime, and the criminal mind, that made defense attorneys and their clients quake in their shoes. Within his first four years as district attorney he had become a legend. Any criminal with a fiber of intelligence knew if he was arrested in Orleans Parish he was going down for the maximum count Jerry could wring out of the judge and jury.
He already suspected that her assignment to the French Quarter Killer was not the norm. He’d noted immediately her mind and body’s response to the flash that had assaulted her that afternoon on the Pauline Street sidewalk.
Anna reached for her shoulder holster and gun, checked the Glock—loaded and ready—secured it in the holster, then reached for the jacket she had tossed over the back of a chair.
She needed time—just a few minutes on her own—to prepare herself. Not just for the physical and emotional blows that would come from the crime scene, but from Jerry. She couldn’t allow what they had once shared—still shared—to get in the way of the investigation. It would, of course. She was certain of it.
Reaching for the phone, she called the desk. The operator responded with a bored, sleepy, “How can I help you, Ms. Travelli?”
“I’d like to leave a message at the desk for Jerry Costos: Meet me at Pauline.”
HE REMEMBERS HER, of course. Anna Travelli. Hard to forget her kind. Their paths had crossed many times during her tumultuous love affair with Costos.
He has followed her career with interest, catching her interviews on Forensic Files, The New Detectives, and, most recently, on Dateline. Profilers are big news these days. Especially one of her caliber. Doesn’t hurt that she has a nice ass and spectacular tits.
If he had the time, he might hang around awhile, toy with her a bit. Might be fun to bring her down a peg. Add to the pleasure of humiliating the NOPD and Jerry Costos. What sport. Had he known slaughtering women would make him feel so gloriously wonderful—indeed powerful—he might have done it long ago.
Too bad about the children, of course. Killing them had been an unpleasant necessity, and a very sad occurrence, considering everything. Actually felt a pang of conscience over it. But what the hell. He’d get over it.
Besides, the killing of Laura and her children has succeeded in stimulating the sense of panic in the city. He can feel it, the fear, dancing upon the tips of his nerve endings. It tingles through him in tiny bursts of electricity. Makes him feel buoyant. Enthused. Confident. Oh, yeah. Confident is good. Control is the key. Power the ultimate aphrodisiac.
He watches as Anna drives from the St. Louis. Alone. No Costos. Her plans have obviously changed. Perhaps Costos is meeting her at the crime scene instead of her hotel. Good. Very good. This will give him some time alone with the lady—at least in his thoughts. Time to imagine what he could do to her, should he so desire. What a shame to bury her head in the bayou. Much too beautiful to waste. Might even change up his M.O. again—as he did with Laura and the kids—and leave her head as a souvenir for Costos. Position it on the D.A.’s car, a bug-eyed, mouth-frozen-in-a-soundless-scream hood ornament for his Silver Mercedes SL.
He chuckles and cruises, keeping a safe distance from the rental car. Not that she would notice, of course. She is too preoccupied with her speculations about the crimes, and about her old lover, reminiscing with thoughts of how he fucked her and licked her and made her beautiful body writhe beneath his. She has no doubt creamed her panties already.
Wouldn’t it be fun to watch them go at it? More fun to slaughter them during the act. Imagine what the headlines across the country would do with that one.
She pulls the rental car to the curb, parks it beneath a streetlight, bumper to bumper with the cruiser wherein a cop is smoking and drinking coffee to keep him awake. The cop exits the cruiser and meets Travelli on the street, nodding as she flashes him her FBI shield; then she moves to the sidewalk and stands next to the One Way street sign as the cop returns to the car and continues to smoke.
Might be fun to creep up behind the cop and slide the ice pick into the prick’s throat.
Ah, yes. He is hungry again.
Chapter 4
THE HOT AUGUST night bore down on her, the humidity and heat causing sweat to bead on her body and run down her sides beneath her clothes. The dread looming greater in her mind didn’t help.
Moving close to the One Way sign, Anna glanced over her shoulder, toward the cruiser where the cop continued to smoke and look out at her. The overhead flickering vapor light made his face appear oddly blurred.
The silence and emptiness, and the yellow crime scene tape, gave the area a surreal feel, as did the advancing rumble of the freight train crawling its way along the tracks next to the river.
Turning, slowly, she allowed her gaze to move toward the north intersection of Royal and Pauline as she stepped back against the street sign and prepared herself.
She closed her eyes. Took a deep breath. Told herself to relax. Empty her mind. Breathe, breathe. Focus.
She sank harder against the signpost, felt its hard form press along her spine, cool even through her jacket and T-shirt.
It began then, the heat. Spread at first like warm sparks of electricity along her spine.
Breathe evenly. Relax. Her instructors at Quantico had drilled into her head that she must not fight the flashes. Must not brace herself in preparation for their onslaught. Easier said than done when the flashes were not only too often horrifying, but painful as well.
“Hello,” he says.
She turns, drawing in a sharp breath. Her eyes are wide and her red lips parted.
A groan worked up Anna’s throat. She pressed her fingertips to her temple, the heat at her back growing more intense, uncomfortably so.
Blue eyes made green by the yellow lamplight. Blue eyes are his favorite. They turn dark as a deep ocean when they are dying. He leans against the street sign. One Way. Oh, yeah. One way for her tonight. Isn’t she lucky?
Too hot. Too hot. The flesh of her back was burning. The flashes of sound and images came and went so fast she couldn’t hold them.
Concentrate on Bobbie Cox. Get in her head. Into her eyes. What is she seeing?
She nods and turns away, moving toward the dark alley. He follows closely. Her smile is bright and excited as she glances at him over her shoulder.
Anna moved through the dark, down the narrow alleyway between two buildings. The heat pulsated around her. She reached out, feeling the jagged ridges of the old bricks scrape her fingertips. The stench of garbage and damp mildew was overwhelming, yet there was something else—
Closer now, he can smell her perfume. Something floral. Like jasmine. One Way. Oh, yeah. One way for her tonight. Isn’t she lucky?
A pressure on her. Biting into her shoulders. Weight. Something on his back.
A sound.
The image in her head suddenly gone, Anna blinked as her eyes adjusted to the night shadows. The sweet aroma of Bobbie’s perfume vanished, replaced by the stink of the alley, rank of old age and neglect. Something had intruded. A sound. What was it?
She turned and looked toward the street—a rectangular tunnel-like image where the cruiser sat beneath the vapor light. The cop was no longer smoking. His head rested
back against the seat, as if sleeping.
Deep breath. Easier now. The flashes were coming easier. So damn close. What had disturbed her?
Focus on Bobbie. Get in her head. Imperative. Best to see through the victim’s eyes. Tough. Always tough until the end when the victim’s energy exploded to the forefront with horror.
She stands at the apartment door. Keys in her hand. She feels elated as she hums to herself, Happy Birthday to you…Surprise, Mama, I’m home! Maybe she won’t come back to New Orleans. Maybe this time she’ll get her act together—go to business school like Mama wants. Hate the life. What had she been thinking? Nuts and perverts. But this guy isn’t so bad. Good looking, clean, compassionate. Five hundred bucks! Happy Birthday to you…
Hands reach for the keys—nice hands, well manicured. She tips back her head and looks into his eyes—
The image blurred. Hold on hold on—
Focus!
The vision pulsed, bright and dim, melting like some macabre watercolor picture left out in the rain. Bobbie’s voice in her head crackled like radio static, one station bleeding over into another, the intrusion shattering the sound and vision so the killer’s eyes disappeared into a pinpoint of light that was obliterated by darkness.
Suddenly there were hands on her—hard hands—gripping her shoulders from behind.
Anna’s heart thundered as her body tensed. In one motion, she slid her hand under her jacket and withdrew the gun, angled one way with a swift shift that drove one elbow back into the body near hers with enough impact that there came a grunt as she was released.
Spinning, throwing herself back against the apartment door, Anna lifted the gun and leveled it between Jerry’s eyes.
“Shit.” He stumbled back, gripping his ribs, his dark eyes wide. “It’s me. Jesus, don’t shoot. It’s me, Anna.”
Anna released her breath and sank against the door, slowly lowered the gun. “For God’s sake, what are you doing coming up behind me like that?”
“What are you, deaf? I called your name three times.” He straightened. Winced. “What the hell are you doing here?”
Anna replaced the gun in its holster, her hands trembling. “What do you expect coming up like that in the dark?”
“I told you. I called you. Christ, it was as if you were on another planet. What the hell were you humming ‘Happy Birthday’ for?”
“Was I?” She took a deep breath and released it. “Are you okay?”
“I’ll live.” He moved up beside her. “Since when did the FBI encourage stupidity?”
She frowned. “Meaning?”
“You know as well as I do that agents never go out on their own—at least not in this kind of situation. That’s asking for trouble.”
He was right, of course, so she wasn’t about to argue.
“I needed some time, Jerry. On my own, okay? Besides, I’ve got backup.”
“I had to wake up your backup. Lotta good he was going to do you.”
Jerry scratched his head as he regarded her. “So you wanna tell me why you found it necessary to come out here alone?”
“No.”
“Same old Anna. As immovable as a brick wall.” He fingered aside a stray hair on her cheek, tucked it behind her ear. “Brings back memories. The two of us standing in the dark outside your apartment door and me wondering what would happen if I kissed you.”
“The tough-ass D.A. Jerry Costos afraid to kiss a woman?” She grinned. “Hard to believe.”
“I wasn’t a D.A. then.”
“You are now.”
“So how about it? Just a kiss for old times’ sake?”
Lowering her gaze, Anna did her best to ignore the fluttering of emotion around her heart. “Hardly seems like the time or place.”
He slid one hand around her nape, thumbed up her chin so she was forced to look into his eyes. “There never was a good time for us, was there, Anna? Both too damn caught up in our own careers and too narrowly focused on our own ideals to give an inch.”
He pressed his lips to her temple—a warm sigh escaping him. “Okay, I was unfair. I screwed up. Maybe I didn’t realize just how much until now.”
Anna backed away. Odd that she didn’t want to. Time and space should have eradicated the effect his touch had on her, and her need to give in to them. She tried her best to fight the familiar feelings of attraction…and desire…for Jerry. They had been good together—sexually. And, for a while, emotionally. Even now, in this horrible place that inspired fear and disgust—even with the lingering images of a victim and her killer still burning like acid behind her eyelids—she experienced a rush of old and unwanted emotions that turned her body warm, closing off her throat.
How easy it would be to give in to them. Open her mouth under his. Relish the feel of his hands on her body—so pleasuring, gentle, and hungry.
“Anna.” Jerry reached for her, fingers tenderly closing around her arm and pulling her close. “You haven’t a clue how I felt when I arrived at the hotel to discover you were out here alone. Jesus. I might be a D.A., but I’m a man first. Don’t judge or crucify me because I give a damn that you could be out here in trouble. Christ, I’ve lived the last years kicking myself up the ass that I drove you away. Every time word came down that an agent had been wounded or killed in the line of duty, I felt gut-punched with fear that it had been you.”
Anna turned her face away, refusing to allow Jerry to see the emotions in her eyes.
He tucked his finger under her chin and lifted her face. “I wanted like hell to get over you. I thought I had until I came face-to-face with you at J.D.’s place. I’d tried damn hard the last years to hate you for breaking my heart. And one look into your eyes blew that all to hell.”
“Don’t,” she pleaded. “Jerry, it’s over.”
“I don’t think so. I know you too well, Anna.” He pulled her against him, hard, those eyes that could cut through a perp’s heart and soul like a cleaver now centered on hers—smoldering and yearning, making her knees weak despite the war of refusal that was going on in her heart.
“Don’t,” she repeated throatily, to no avail. His mouth slanted over hers with a purpose that drove her head back, kindling that hot rush of desire that had haunted her memory the last six years—awake, asleep, even in the arms of the few men with whom she had become briefly involved.
His tongue raked the inside of her mouth, flirted with her tongue, drawing a groan from her that made the heat of the night intensify until sweat beaded on her body—hot pinpricks of pain that slid across her skin, making her shiver, making her tremble until, despite her denial, she lifted her arms around his neck and kissed him back. Body pressed against body, her heart pounding against his chest, the erection in his pants like hard burning lead against her loins. Another time, another place they would have fallen to the ground and made shameless love under the watching hot August moon.
Oh, God, she was tempted. So tempted. His hand cupping her breast under her T-shirt, fingers sliding over her aroused nipples until they ached and strained so badly the pleasurable pain made her yearn to cry out.
No. No. She had a job to do. Already his closeness was playing havoc with that. She’d worked too damn hard, for too long, to allow these impossibilities to screw up her priorities, not to mention her life.
Turning her face away from his kiss, her lips still moist and swollen, she shoved him away, backed against the old wrought-iron railing flanking the steps up to Bobbie Cox’s apartment, and covered her mouth with the back of one hand.
“If you ever really gave a damn about my feelings,” she said, “you won’t do this. You won’t make me feel this way. You won’t mess with my priorities, number one of which right now is to help you find a killer. Please, Jerry. I’ve worked too damn hard all these years to become what I am. Don’t fuck it up for me.”
A look of frustration and anger flashed across his face—a familiar look that slammed her back to those years ago. He simply wasn’t capable of seeing her as anything
other than a female whose priorities should be sex, marriage, and children first, and to hell with a career.
Jerry glared at her a moment longer, his face lit by moonlight and grooved by shadows. His breathing sounded hard as he clenched his teeth and removed the apartment key from his pocket.
Hands reach for the keys—nice hands, well manicured.
Anna blinked, the unexpected stab of light and image sharp and blinding. She stumbled back, her hand flying to her eyes that, suddenly, felt as hot as burning coals.
“Hey.” Jerry reached for her. “You okay?”
She took a deep breath and forced herself to relax, and nodded as she looked into Jerry’s eyes. Yet, it was there still. Flashes of shadowy images—tickles of nervousness and anticipation.
Nuts and perverts. But this guy isn’t so bad. Good looking, clean, compassionate.
“Anna?” Jerry reached for her, his hands gripping her arms as he searched her face. Only, for a moment, it wasn’t his hands that were gripping her—and for a moment she felt that she was no longer Anna Travelli, but Bobbie Cox—the grip on her arms crushing and painful, the eyes staring into hers like black holes leading straight to hell.
The whoop of the cruiser’s siren shattered the silence and wrenched Anna out of the momentary horrifying hell. The sound of running footsteps echoed down the alley.
“Mr. Costos!” The cop who had been sleeping in the cruiser appeared through the darkness. “We got a signal thirty-four and possible forty-two. Aggravated battery with a weapon. Hooker assaulted!”
RED AND BLUE lights flashed from the cruisers positioned on the narrow side street. By the time Anna and Jerry arrived, a crowd had begun to form and the wail of the advancing EMT unit reverberated throughout the area.
The victim lay behind a Dumpster amid a scattering of broken glass and garbage. A uniformed cop, his hands already protected by latex gloves, squatted beside her while four others proceeded to cordon off the area, securing the crime scene.
Lover Beware Page 15