His thumb brushed along her delicate jaw. “Aren’t you just incredibly resourceful?”
“Yes.”
Another careful brush of his thumb. What am I going to do with you, angel? He hated to drag her into hell with him. But letting her slip away to heaven wasn’t going to be an option for him.
“Your father is not the one who came after us. He is not. Mitchell Donahue is dead. His remains are bagged and tagged at Quantico. But the person who did attack us? He knew about the Last Breath Killer’s final words to his victims. He knew to say exactly what your father told his victims. How did he know that, Preston? Who else did you tell? Who did you give those words to?”
“No one.”
“Your adoptive parents?” she pushed. “Did you tell them? Or maybe Debra Tooni?”
A shake of his head.
“Did you talk to a counselor? Perhaps you thought that you were in a safe space, that you could reveal your darkest secrets?”
A final, careful caress along her jaw. “I didn’t tell anyone…not until you. You are the first. The only.” His hand fell back to his side. His fingers curled, as he tried to hold on to the feel of her skin. That softness.
They had a problem. A very, very big problem. How could their attacker know the words that the Last Breath Killer had used with his victims in their final moments? Especially with the Last Breath Killer dead.
She swallowed. He saw the gentle movement of her throat. Her shoulders rolled back. Squared. “Then the way I see it, we have some options.”
“Do tell.”
“Option one, our attacker was also a victim of the Last Breath Killer. Another victim who escaped the grave. A victim who became twisted. Who became a predator himself.”
That was what the bastard wanted to do to me. He wanted me to become a monster. Sloane had been right when she said his father had hoped to change Preston. His father had been determined to reshape him. In his image.
“Option two,” Sloane continued, “the Last Breath Killer wasn’t working alone.”
He refused to let any emotion show on his face.
“That’s a possibility that I have considered multiple times—even before you and I were taken—because moving someone is hard. Moving an unconscious person and burying the individual is not exactly light-weight work.”
No, it wasn’t. The task took considerable strength.
“Perhaps the person who attacked us was a secret partner of the Last Breath Killer.” She wet her lower lip. “Now he’s finishing his accomplice’s work. He went after you because you are the victim who escaped. That means you are the one who has to die.”
“What an uplifting sentiment,” he muttered. “Here’s another option for you.”
She waited. Looking beautiful. Eyes so dark. Standing close enough to reach out and grab, and oh, he wanted to grab. To hold. To keep.
Tread carefully. If he acted too quickly, he might lose the thing he wanted.
“What’s the third option?” Sloane asked him.
A roll of one shoulder. “Option three is that you’re wrong, Dr. Armstrong. Mitchell Donahue was not the Last Breath Killer. Maybe he was framed. Maybe Mary Jean lied. Maybe the real killer got away. Maybe the real Last Breath Killer is still out there.” Another roll of that shoulder. “Or, of course, it could just be a copycat. Someone who saw one of the true crime movies about the attacks. Someone who read a book about the murders. Someone who is just twisted in the head.”
“No.” Fast. Adamant. “No, it’s not just a copycat. A normal copycat wouldn’t know what the Last Breath Killer had said to his victims in those final moments. Only someone close to the original killer—or the real killer himself—would know those words.”
The doorbell rang, seeming to blast through the whole house, and she flinched.
Preston spun and stalked for the door. He heard the rush of her footsteps behind him. He glanced through the peephole, unlocked the door, and hauled the door wide open.
Sheriff Debra Tooni stood on the threshold, her hands on her hips. Zero sign of Sloane’s bags. “We have a problem,” Debra told them.
“What kind of problem?” Preston asked. Because she needed to be far more specific, considering the clusterfuck that was the case at the moment.
Debra’s lips tightened. “It looks to me like we may have another victim on our hands.”
