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“Want me to question him?” asked Tanner.
Knox pulled out his cell phone. “I’ll do it now. I’ll put him on speakerphone.”
“Hello?” Marshall soon answered, a nervous tremor to his voice. Well not everyone felt all warm and fuzzy on realizing they were receiving a call from their indisputably merciless Prime.
“I have a question for you,” Knox told him. “When you were loitering outside Sera’s house, I’m guessing—given how nosy you are—that you occasionally glanced through the neighbor’s windows. I need to know if you saw or heard anything suspicious happening in Missy’s house.”
Dead silence. “Is Missy all right?”
“Yes, but she had an unwelcome visitor—something the entire lair will hear all about in due course, so you’ll soon have the answers to the many questions that are no doubt beginning to gather in your head. Right now, I need you to answer my question.”
A puff of breath. “I saw a guy sitting at her dinner table, but I can’t picture him.”
“Is there anything you do remember about him?”
“Uh … well, I heard him whistling a tune—the window was partially open. A song my great-grandmother used to hum. ‘Dreamers Dream.’ It’s from an old musical.”
“I know the song. Anything else?”
“No, sorry.”
“Let me know if something else comes to mind.” With that, Knox ended the call.
“I don’t know that tune Marshall mentioned,” said Tanner.
“Well I’m not singing it to you,” said Knox, making the hellhound snort. “Google it or something.” He cut his gaze to Levi. “Talk to Piper. Tell her what happened and that we’ll need her help. I highly doubt she’ll object.” He squinted. “I do hope you’re not about to object on her behalf.”
Levi would if he thought it would do any good. “I don’t like what using that ability does to her. I don’t like that she’ll have to see and feel what Missy went through. But I won’t interfere. Piper would only get pissed at me. I don’t want that.” They were having enough issues as it was.
Soon, Knox dismissed all but Larkin, since she was his temporary bodyguard. Levi and the other male sentinels headed to their respective vehicles. All three then made their way to the Underground, where they began their walk along the strip to the studio. The place would be closing any moment now.
“It bothers me that the killer went off script,” said Tanner. “Any woman could be next, if he’s so desperate to repeat his crimes that he’ll settle for others whether he enjoys it or not. Devon’s pregnant, that might be close enough to a single mother for him.”
“He won’t get near her, Tanner.”
“No, he won’t,” Keenan agreed. “And she’d claw off his dick if he did.”
Snorting, Tanner rolled back his shoulders. “I’ll be glad when she goes on maternity leave. Maybe I can convince her to do it sooner.”
Levi softly snickered. “Good luck with that.” Arriving at the studio, he pushed open the door. The five females paused in their cleaning, their expressions somber. Levi only had eyes for Piper.
As he crossed to her, she sighed and said, “Harper told us about Missy. She heard about it from Knox. Is Missy okay?”
“She’s doing about as well as anyone could expect of her,” Levi replied, resisting the urge to reach out and place a comforting hand on Piper’s shoulder. Dammit, he shouldn’t have to resist touching his own damn anchor. “I’ll tell you more when we’re in the car.” He wanted to get her home, where she’d be safer. He was always nervous about her being out in public.
Inside his car a short while later, Piper had no sooner clicked on her seatbelt than she prodded him for the information he’d promised.
Levi told her much of Missy’s ordeal, reluctantly adding, “We’re going to need your help with her. She can’t remember the bastard. We think he might be cursed to always be forgotten. Literally cursed.”
Piper blinked. “Wow.”
“Knox is hoping you might be able to help us ID him by taking a dip in her mind.”
“You don’t seem happy about that.”
Levi switched on the engine. “I’ve never liked the toll that ability takes on you. I like it even less now.”
“I’m used to it.”
“You use that phrase too often—when you speak of this gift, when you talk of Celeste’s tantrums, when you mention the shit you get from relatives of the criminals you identify. You’d be lying if you said that being accustomed to it all makes any of it easier on you.”
“In any case, I’ll of course do what I can to help. I can’t promise I’ll see his face, though. Not if Missy can’t recall it. Just like I can’t see events that happened at a time when a person was too young to commit it to memory. And if some curse is really at play, I doubt Missy’s memory of his physical features is simply repressed.”
