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“Youwillcall me if things get too hairy, right?”
“Of course. Don’t worry. I’ll be fine.”
Would she? In any event, one of the last people she needed tagging behind her was Grant, who, despite what she was thinking was a conscience call, had all but told her to go to hell.
Not that she probably hadn’t needed to hear it. It gave her the shove she needed to dig back into her past. It also pointed out very clearly to her how shallow all her relationships had been, Grant being just a carbon copy of the others.
She said good-bye, ended the call, and leaned back in her chair, rubbing her forehead. No way could she tell him she had such conflicting emotions about the whole thing. She wanted answers. She didn’t want them. She wanted to reconnect with the place she was born. She wanted to get as far from it as possible.
And, of course, there was Sheriff Cole Landry, damn him. All her life she’d retreated from men, the horrific memories she’d pushed away freezing everyone out. Killing any desire she might ever have for a real sexual relationship. Yet now, when she was least prepared to deal with it, this arrogant, wildly sexy man had pierced the veil and stirred up feelings she had no idea she was even capable of, never mind how to deal with them.
Damn it all, anyway. Just for once, could things please go her way?
She studied the screen on her laptop. The notes she’d transferred from her study of the case files stared back at her. There was nothing dressed up about the facts. They were brutal. Gruesome, even, and very explicit. The deputies who’d found the bodies had left nothing to the imagination. The pictures they conjured were like something out of a torture chamber.
A shiver skittered over her spine as she felt the ghost touch of those calloused fingers probing her body, heard Kylie’s high-pitched little screams. Remembered the terrible pain. Felt the tape ripped from her mouth and strange hands trying to be gentle with her.
When she’d seen Kylie’s body, she’d thrown her head back and screamed so long and hard her throat ended up raw for days. She’d fought to get to her sister, but other hands restrained her, voices tried to soothe her, and finally, the sting of a needle had plunged her into blackness.
Now, with each case she examined, she relived it over and over again. Her stomach convulsed, and once more, she felt like throwing up. She was going to need a lot of hot tea and antacids before this was over.
The idea of tea sounded good right now. Something to settle her nerves, so she could be objective about all this. Getting up from the table, she headed into the kitchen.
But even as she heated the water, she knew tea wasn’t the solution to what ailed her. She wondered if she’d really be able to go through with this whole project. If she had the stomach and the strength to push forward, searching through all the mental rubble for the tiniest clue that would tell her who the monster was.
Then she realized there was no wavering on this.Armageddon had arrived for her, and she couldn’t run away any longer.
****
Cole leaned back in the desk chair in his office and rubbed a hand over his face, trying to wipe away his exhaustion. It was three in the morning, his eyes felt gritty and a dull ache had invaded the back of his head.
Mickey Garcia and Andi Lowell sat in two chairs facing him, looking just as weary as he did. Murder scenes were never pleasant, but those involving children and teenagers were the worst. Especially like the one they’d had to face tonight.
“This town’s gonna be in an uproar come the morning,” Mickey commented for the second time that night.
“Tell me something I don’t know,” Cole said.
“Sheriff.” Andi cleared her throat, a dry-scratchy sound indicative of fatigue. “Do you think we’re equipped to handle something like what happened tonight?” Andi asked. “And the fallout from it?”
Cole fixed his tired eyes on her, his body tense. “Are you questioning my ability to do the job, Deputy?”
“No, sir.” She shook her head definitively. “I have all the respect in the world for you. And Mickey and I are right there with you. I just don’t know how the rest of the force will do.”
“They’ll do what they have to.” Just what he needed. Deputies who had no confidence in themselves or others to work this case the way they should. “We all will.”
Andi shifted uncomfortably in her chair. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean—”
The ringing of the phone on Cole’s desk interrupted her. His gut tightened as he listened to the caller, gripping the pencil he was jotting notes with so hard it snapped in his fingers. When he put the phone down and looked back at his deputies they were staring at him, questions in their eyes.
“That was Nita Sanchez. I asked her to call me when she finished the prelim autopsy.”
“What did she say?” Mickey asked finally, clearly unnerved by the look on his boss’s face.
“Leanne Pritchard was raped multiple times. From what Nita says, it looks as if he raped and sodomized her using some sort of device, possibly made of glass.”
He could tell from the looks on their faces, they got the message.
“Jesus.” The word popped out of Mickey’s mouth.
