A Whisper in the Dark (11 page)

“It doesn’t,” he said quickly. But he hated the fact that no one could seem to say it. He’d killed an innocent man. A fellow cop with a wife and two kids. Four lives destroyed, not to mention his own . . .

“I briefed my friend on Julia’s stalker,” he said. “He’s expecting a call from her. He’ll take good care of—”

The door to the shop swung open. John looked up to see Julia burst in. He knew instantly someone had hurt her. She was disheveled. Her face was ghastly pale, her eyes wild with terror. She was wearing a skirt, and he could see that at least one of her knees was bloody.

“Julia!” came Claudia’s frightened voice. “Oh, my God. What happened?”

Every cop’s instinct John had ever possessed jumped to attention. “Call 911,” he snapped.

Julia stood just inside the front door. Even from ten feet away he could see that she was trembling violently. A dark emotion he didn’t want to identify rose inside him at the sight of the red marks on her neck.

He crossed to her, aware of the wild look in her eyes. “Are you all right? Did someone hurt you?”

Her hand went to the marks on her throat, and she rubbed at them with trembling fingers. “A man. He . . . jumped me. In the alley.”

“Are you hurt?”

She shook her head. “I’m . . . okay. Just . . . shaken up.” Fury swept through him at the thought of some son of a bitch roughing her up. Gently, he put his arm around her. “Come over to your desk and sit down for a moment so I can have a look at you, okay?”

Vaguely he was aware of Claudia on the phone with the 911 dispatcher. He guided Julia to the desk. Even through her coat he could feel her shaking. So small, he thought, and another hard punch of rage made his heart pound.

“Let me take your coat,” he said before she sat. Not because he was polite, but because he wanted to see for himself just how badly she’d been roughed up.

She didn’t look at him as she worked the coat off her shoulders. He took the coat from her and, gingerly, she lowered herself to the chair.

She was wearing an off-white sweater made of some fuzzy material. The neckline dipped low, and for the first time John got a good look at the deep red marks at her throat. Someone had put his hands around her neck, and he hadn’t been tentative about it. John could see each individual finger mark. Jesus Christ. The son of a bitch had tried to strangle her . . .

“I need for you to tell me what happened,” he said.

Claudia came up behind him. “The police are on the way.” She looked at her sister. “Honey, are you all right?”

Julia lowered her face into her hands. “No.”

“What happened?” John repeated, wanting the details while they were still fresh in her mind.

She raised her eyes to his. Her eyes were dark against the pale cast of her complexion. At some point she’d been crying. He could see the tear streaks in her makeup.

“I was walking home from the convention, heading toward the shop on St. Peter. There’s a courtyard near Mr. Goubeaux’s antique shop.” She drew a deep breath, shook her head. “He must have come out of the courtyard. I didn’t even see him coming.”

Walking alone, he thought, and made a mental note to rake her over the coals later. Right now, she looked too damn fragile.

“Who?” John asked.

Julia shook her head. “I don’t know.”

“Oh, Julia.” Claudia went to her and brushed her fingertips against the angry red marks on her throat. “Honey, you’re bruised. Are you sure you’re okay?”

“Did you get a look at him?” John cut in.

Julia shook her head. “He was wearing a Mardi Gras mask.”

“What kind?”

“A jester. An expensive one, I think.”

Like a thousand other people walking the Quarter tonight. “What about his clothes?”

“All I remember seeing is a dark jacket. It happened so fast.” Julia bit her lip. “That’s not much help, is it?”

“You’re doing fine,” John said, but he wanted more. He suddenly wanted badly to get his hands on the sick fuck who’d put his hands on her and hurt her. He told himself it was more of a big brother kind of anger than anything more complicated. But he was keenly aware of the male need to protect that rose up inside him. “Did he say anything?”

“Just . . . weird things.” A shudder moved through her. “He called me a . . .” Her voice broke. She closed her eyes briefly, then continued. “He called me a whore. A succubus.”

A chill moved down John’s spine. “Succubus. That’s an odd term.”

“Medieval Latin origin, I think,” Claudia said.

John felt her gaze on him, but he didn’t take his eyes off of Julia. “What does it mean?”

“Something like an evil female demon that descends on hapless sleeping men to have intercourse.”

Julia shot her sister a withering look. “And you know that how?”

Claudia shrugged. “I learned it in my humanities class last semester.”

It was suddenly clear to John that this was no random attempted rape or mugging or assault.

Absently, Julia used the back of her hand to rub the tears from her cheek. “It’s him, isn’t it? The guy sending the notes?”

“I don’t know,” he said. But he fit the profile. John bent slightly to make eye contact with her. “Can you tell me exactly where this happened?”

Julia nodded. “It happened just past Goubeaux’s Antiques. There’s a narrow courtyard. I was on the sidewalk. He . . . came out of nowhere. Grabbed me, dragged me into the courtyard.”

John rose abruptly. “You two hang tight. The police should be here any moment. Lock the door behind me.”

“Where are you going?” Claudia asked.

“I’m going to see if that son of a bitch is still hanging around.” But as John started for the door, he knew the stalker was already gone.

 
Julia couldn’t stop shaking no matter how hard she tried.
In the minutes after the attack, Claudia had brewed herbal tea and tried to make conversation while they waited for the police to arrive. John had questioned her; Julia did her best to answer, but everything had happened so fast she didn’t think she was much help. All she could do now, it seemed, was sit at her desk and try not to relive the terror of the attack.

She knew it could have been worse, but she’d never been subjected to violence, and she couldn’t get the terrible shock of it out of her mind. The stark feeling of helplessness. The sensation of being unable to breathe. The keen sense of vulnerability. The incident had probably lasted no more than three or four minutes, but she knew that tiny moment in time would haunt her for the rest of her life.

She sat at her desk, gripping the mug of tea, wishing the warm brew would melt the ice jammed inside her. She’d lost track of the number of police officers she’d talked to. Toward the end, a detective had arrived and asked her the same questions all over again. Claudia had been hovering like a mother hen, brewing tea and talking too much in an effort to put her at ease. But Julia wasn’t sure she’d ever be at ease again.

She’d lost sight of John. After making sure she was all right, he’d left and gone to the scene. By the time he’d come back, the police had arrived and she spent what seemed like an eternity answering questions. Mitch had even stopped by to check on her after hearing the address come across his radio.

It was nearly eleven P.M. by the time the last police officer left.

“Are you sure you don’t want me to take you to the emergency room to have those bruises checked out?”

Julia looked up to see John approach, his expression grim. “The last place I want to go is the hospital,” she said.

Kneeling in front of her, he reached out and touched her throat. “You’re abraded. You’ve got some swelling here. Bruises.” He glanced down at her bloody knees, and some dark emotion she didn’t quite understand flashed in his eyes. “At the very least you need to get those knees cleaned up.”

“For God’s sake, will you two stop hovering?” Julia fought unexpected tears. “I’m fine.”

Claudia picked up a cup of the tea and shoved it into Julia’s hands. “Sip this and we’ll give you some space, okay?”

Feeling like a fool, Julia rolled her eyes, but sipped the tea. Nobody said anything when her hands shook so badly she nearly spilled it.

Claudia looked at John. “Do you think the police will catch him?”

He lifted a shoulder, let it fall. “If they can lift some latent prints and get a hit in the system, there’s a good chance they’ll get him.”

“The police won’t get prints,” Julia said. “He was wearing gloves.”

Claudia’s cell phone chirped. Frowning, she glanced at the display and quickly put the call to voice mail. But Julia knew it was Rory calling for the dozenth time. And it suddenly dawned on her that her sister had missed the first half of
Phantom
.

“You should have gone ahead with your plans,” Julia said.

Claudia rolled her eyes. “Like I’m going to leave you here alone after what you went through tonight.”

“I’m fine. In fact, your hovering and tea brewing are driving me nuts.” When Claudia only continued to stare at her, she added, “Besides, John is here.”

In the beat of silence that followed, John felt a mild rise of panic. Suddenly he found himself in a position he did not want to be in. A position he was probably not qualified to handle.

Claudia’s gaze snapped to John’s. “He’s got to go to Chicag—”

“I’m not going anywhere,” he heard himself say.

After seeing Julia bruised and bleeding, he knew there was no way he could walk away from this. He sure as hell had no intention of leaving her alone.

“But I thought—”

He cut her off. “I changed my mind.”

Julia looked from John to her sister. “Changed your mind about what?”

John held Claudia’s gaze. “I don’t want you walking to the theater alone. Call a cab or have your boyfriend pick you up.”

Claudia sighed. “Okay,” she said and looked at Julia. “Sis, are you sure you’ll be okay?”

Julia nodded. “Of course, I’m sure. Go. I’ll see you in the morning.”

John watched the two women embrace, pleased that Julia had a good support system. With the stalker becoming increasingly violent, she was going to need all the support she could get.

Claudia went to the counter and picked up the phone to call a taxi. Julia turned to John. “Don’t look at me that way.”

“What way?”

“Like I’m going to fall apart. I’m not.”

She was playing it tough. Good for her. But he didn’t put too much stock in the facade. He’d seen the terror in her eyes when she’d burst through the front door. He felt some of that terror himself every time he thought about how things might have turned out if she hadn’t gotten away.

She spent a moment straightening some papers on her desk that didn’t really need straightening. “You mentioned earlier that the police might be able to get fingerprints. He was wearing gloves, John. How could they get prints?”

“Our perp left behind a couple of items.”

“What items?”

“A crucifix and some kind of glass vial.”

Her eyes widened. “My God, I forgot to mention that at some point I thought he splashed something in my face. I was so scared I wasn’t sure. But now I remember him holding some kind of small glass container.”

“Any idea what the liquid was? Did it have a smell or sting your skin?”

She shook her head. “I didn’t notice either of those things.”

The situation just kept getting stranger and stranger. “Did you see a crucifix at any time during the attack?”

Her brows knitted. “I saw something in his hand. It flashed in my mind that maybe it was a gun or knife, but I didn’t get a good look at it.” Her gaze met his. “That’s strange about the crucifix. Are you sure he dropped it? Maybe it was already lying in the courtyard.”

“The cops are pretty certain it was his.”

“How can they know that?”

“Because the crucifix was covered with blood.”

EIGHT

“Blood?” The word reverberated inside her head like the
echo of a gunshot. Julia found herself looking down at her clothes, looking for signs of blood, and she shivered with revulsion.

“Mitch told me,” John said quietly, his gaze sweeping to Claudia as she spoke on the phone.

“Human blood? Animal?” Julia looked down at the drying blood on her knees. “Could it be mine?”

“CSI took a sample of your blood. They’ll test to see if it matches.”

“But you don’t think it will.”

“I think we’re dealing with one sick son of a bitch.”

Queasiness seesawed in her stomach at the thought of how blood might have gotten on a crucifix of all things. Good Lord.

“Did you tell the police about the notes you’ve been receiving?” John asked.

“Of course I did.”

His smile was wry. “But you didn’t tell them about the book.”

Julia blew out a breath, ruffling her bangs. “I’m not in the mood for a lecture, John.”

“It would have been smarter to tell them everything and let them do their job, Julia. This is serious. Dangerous—”

“I know,” she snapped.

“Things could have turned out a hell of a lot worse,” he snapped back.

“John, the detectives can still investigate this without knowing about the book. They have all the evidence.”

“True, but they’re not operating with all the facts. For example, motive.”

The memory of her attacker’s whispered words shivered through her.
You’ve got the devil in you . . .

“This is exactly the kind of thing I was trying to avoid,” she said. “Dad’s already been in the news because of his views. If the media gets wind of the fact that I’ve written a novel, they’ll be all over it. I can see the headlines:
Religious Leader’s Daughter Writing Smut.
”

An emotion she couldn’t quite identify flashed in his eyes, and she realized he knew all too well about the media’s penchant for sensationalism. They’d been all over him after the shooting. More than one so-called journalist had suggested John was guilty of murder.