Broken Bonds Boxed Set 1-3 (14 page)

Ignoring the jibe, I say, “I’ll print a new copy for Wexler.” I grab my files and head toward the door.

“Bonds, stick close. I’m putting you with Carson to work the victimology angle.” He glances between the other detective and me. “The techs have new information we need investigated. And since nothing came of the weaponry shops, I have to navigate the task force on the murder weapon angle. So I need both of you fully focused on the victims.”

I grip the doorknob, anxious to be out of the room. “I can do that, but I don’t need a bodyguard.”
Or a babysitter
.

“If the UNSUB made contact once, he’ll do it again.” A trace of fear flashes across Quinn’s face. “It’s more than for your protection, Sadie. You’re the closest link we have to the killer right now.”

That’s what I’m counting on.

Turning toward Carson, I raise an eyebrow. “You have a problem working with a profiler?”

The newest detective smiles, his straight white teeth contrasting attractively against his tanned complexion. “Not at all, ma’am. I think I’ll rather enjoy it.”

I give him a smug smile in return. I can almost feel Quinn’s smirk burning into my backside as I leave the conference room. If I didn’t have more important things to do, I might challenge Quinn’s latest order—but he hit too close to the mark back there. He always does.

While the captain warns the single women of Arlington to be on their guard against a serial killer still on the prowl, I’ll be paying a special visit to a woman I’ve thoughtlessly neglected over the past two weeks—one who might be in danger should the wrong person start prying into my background. Right now, she’s my first priority.

After I hand off the press release to Captain Wexler, I make quick work of gathering my private notes I keep buried in my desk, and swap out my department-issued phone for the burner phone I bought right after they tapped mine.

Quinn can bitch all he wants later, but no one is tracking my movements today.

I lock up my office and then slip past the gathering officers and agents crowding the front of the ACPD building as they gear up for the press conference.

The UNSUB may have gone dormant for now, but I’m not giving him time to regroup. I
have
to keep the people I care about protected. Even if that means protecting them from me.

M
ost people don’t know
how to handle real fear when they experience it for the first time.

There are all types of fear, but I’m talking about bone-rattling, heart-gripping fear that catches you off-guard. Not the flutter of your heart when you realize you’ve missed a payment and your electricity is about to be cut off. Or the sharp pain that constricts your chest in a near, head-on collision. Not even the late-night worry that suffocates you when a loved one doesn’t return.

Those are all palpable, but there’s a deep, dark fear that levels them all.

Fear of loss.

The climbing panic that clutches you whole and won’t let you drag in a breath the higher it escalates. That all-consuming fear.

They say fear won’t kill you all by itself. But if ever it could, that’s the one to do it. It blocks out all logic and leaves no room for anything else. It devours love, and trust. It hollows out your soul.

I’ve felt this fear before. I’ve been decimated by it. It ate away at everything in my life until I was its bitch. It sucked me dry, stripped me raw, entrails shredded. It’s the worst kind of fear because there’s nothing you can do to make it stop. Just have to wait until the moment you’ve been dreading finally happens.

Then…the blackout.

The final abyss of grief.

Julian likes to play through these emotions, try them on, display them for the world like a brand new suit. I’ve watched my brother make the appropriate facial expressions when offered condolences. I’ve heard the hitch in his voice when he says her name. He’s practiced. And he’s good.

That’s why when the news of his engagement hits, and I find myself standing in a crowded living room pulling at the collar of an annoying, starchy dress shirt, I have the very urgent desire to ditch the engagement party. To flee the city. Get as far away from his artificial life as I can before it infects me.

Only Sadie is keeping my feet grounded.

Someone who’s suffered—really suffered—
should
get a second chance. But the truth of it is, if you’ve truly, irrevocably suffered at loss’s sadistic hands…you don’t.

There are no second chances for those lost souls.

You breathe. You eat, drink, fuck. Then you sleep only to wake up and do it all over again. But you do not get a second chance.

I believed in this truth for a long damn time, until the moment I saw Sadie. She was my gift from the abyss; an offering of truce. I had paid my dues, and somehow I had earned that rare second chance. Hard fought and won. My beautiful prize, Sadie.

That’s why I refuse to let her push me away.

Someone claps me on the shoulder and I tense. Spurred out of my dark thoughts, I turn to face Jefferson, relieved it’s my roommate and not the fucker I call my brother—the second chance stealer.

“Dude, I can’t wait for the bachelor party,” Jefferson says, his brown eyes scanning the crowd gathered in Julian’s opulent home. “That’s the only reason why I’m dealing with this lame shit, because I know you will have something wickedly fucked up planned.”

Offering a smirk, I let my friend believe what he wants. Since the day he found out that I work at a BDSM club, he’s imagined my life to be something of a really bad porno. With half-naked, leather-clad Dominatrixes whipping me before breakfast, and sultry little sex kittens dressed in schoolgirl uniforms sucking me off to bed.

Hey, I’m a guy, so I don’t correct him. Some things are just too ingrained in the male DNA. But given that we’ve lived together for the past five months, and the only woman I’ve ever had over is Sadie, you’d think he’d eventually catch on that I’m not living the high life deep in tits and ass.

“Yeah, we’ll plan something for him all right,” I say, then take a swig of my bourbon. It burns good going down. Hits me right in the gut.

Jefferson nods toward the petite blonde entering the room, her arm hooked to my brother’s elbow. “Can’t believe he’s giving up the club life for her.” His eyes go wide as he looks at me. “Not that Bethany’s not hot…she’s—”

I hold up a hand. “I get it.”

He continues, “But giving up that lifestyle for one woman?” Jefferson blows out a heavy breath. “What a waste. Your brother still looking for someone to take over the club? Because I’d be willing to sacrifice my nine-to-five for the greater good.”

I down another healthy swallow to avoid responding. I should stop discussing personal shit around Jefferson. Although Julian made that almost impossible with his impromptu visit to my apartment late last night, demanding that I show face at his party. Not that I have anything to worry about with my roommate, but he’s somewhat…tactless. Loud. Crass. And doesn’t know when to drop a topic that’s grating on me.

Like now, as Julian raises his champagne glass alongside his new fiancé to make a toast, and the crowd goes hush, Jefferson blurts, “Would I have to wear a Dom outfit?”

The echo of his deep voice filling the stark-quiet room clogs my throat. I can feel curious stares drilling into me, and I grip the knot of rope in my pocket. I’m not one for attention, especially in a brightly lit, packed environment decorated in pastels. It makes my skin clammy, my scalp itch, my stomach sick with a roiling nausea. I don’t like this kind of attention.

My brother has never had any of my issues, however. He looks right at Jefferson and says, “If you actually wear
that
to the bachelor party, you’re paying for your own lap dances, my friend.”

The crowd lightens with peals of laughter and deep chuckles, the tension sliding out of the room as if the whole scene was an orchestrated part of his charming toast. Normally, it very well could’ve been. He’s a people person. That’s why he’s the face of the club, the man in the suit. Sharp. Shrewd. Business savvy, but he’s also charismatic.

Julian sends me a knowing look as he lifts his glass higher, then delves into his practiced speech. The woman to his left, Bethany, watches him in awe and fascination. I’m almost positive she’s clueless to his late-night activities at the club…his past…and she’s probably blissfully happy in her ignorance.

I solute the happy couple and drink, killing the rest of the bourbon in one, hard chug.

I can’t loathe the bastard, though. Envy him. Covet his simple approach to life. Despise his nonchalance… Yes. But
hate
my brother? No, I can’t hate what I’m a part of. We’re both guilty of loving the same woman, and of hurting her. It took the both of us to break her.

But it only took one of us to clean up the mess.

That’s why I get to carry a grudge, and why he lets me.

Placing my glass on a tray of a passing waiter, I turn to leave, but Jefferson catches my arm. “You’re out?” he asks. “The party just started.”

I glance around at all the faces I don’t know. Acquaintances my brother has made since moving here, friends of the bride-to-be. And some faces I do; members of The Lair, who indulge the lifestyle by night, hide in plain sight during the day. They keep my brother’s secrets because he keeps theirs.

We all have secrets. I just choose not to walk that fine line. I am who I am. My shame is my own. I don’t belong here.

“Give my best to the bridesmaids,” I tell Jefferson, slapping him on the shoulder before I leave and make my way through the crowd toward the backdoor.

Once I’m in the sweet release of open space outside, the claustrophobic tension gripping me loosens its hold, and I dig out my phone and tap the message icon.

One new message. From Sadie.

My heart punches my chest. She made it clear that I wasn’t to contact her. I wasn’t to see her. Not until she could get free of her department. I haven’t laid eyes on her—never mind anything else—since the night she left me alone in my apartment.

Only a week, but it might as well be a fucking century.

Getting one taste of her only heightened my need, and the days, minutes,
seconds
away from her have been pure hell. I disobeyed her order today and sent her a text to her new number, all but demanding to see her tonight. I’ll take my punishment, whatever she deems, just as long as it’s delivered directly from my goddess. I’m tired of waiting—the devil himself couldn’t keep me from her for one more day.

So when I read her message:
Okay, tonight…
a hard thrill quakes me.

Tonight
. Pocketing my phone, I escape my brother’s home and head for my truck, my mind spinning with arousing thoughts of Sadie. Her tight and limber body contorted in beautiful, seductive poses. Her features exquisitely strained, her liquid green eyes seeing only me. She was so perfect, just so
mine
in that moment. Only shared for an instant, but it was ours. And it was the foundation that will see us through her doubt.

Maybe I shouldn't have given in to her, allowed her time away to indulge her warped theories. She leapt right over circumstantial and fingered me as her killer. Any other man would take offense, would probably let that be the damning evidence that a relationship is doomed—but we’re not like most people.

When you’ve stared fear right in the eyes, when you’ve tasted bitter despair, you don’t function within the bright, mundane world any longer.

Our relationship operates on a different level of rules and trust. We’re not blind in the dark; we seek it out. We crave it. And I’ve never craved anything or anyone as much as I crave Sadie right now. I need my goddess to exonerate me.

W
hen I was five
, I remember my mother rubbing a smelly leaf over my burned skin. I had wanted to curl my hair—just like hers—and grabbed the wrong end of the curling iron. It was such a careless mistake, but one I never forgot. I recall the sting, the tears, the pleading to stop as she rubbed—I’d rather suffer the burn than endure the recovery.

She never scolded, just applied the sage to my palm and fingers, then wrapped my hand. For the following week, each time she peeled back the bandage to rub the stinky leaf concoction over my flesh, the pain lessened, and the burn was healed a little more.

My mother had many natural remedies, ones that I mocked—like any kid would—up until the time after my abduction. What wounds the doctors couldn’t mend, my mother continued to treat. And though the scars never completely faded, they would be much worse without her effort. I know this.

The sharp aroma of sage oil wafts through the air now as I apply another generous layer to my mother’s hand, rubbing the soothing emollient into her weathered skin.

“I’ve met someone,” I say, hoping that my voice will clear some of the mental fog separating her from me. “He’s…nice.” I twist my lips, trying to think of ways to describe Colton to the woman who brought me into this world.

Dark. Mysterious. Handsome… Person of interest in a serial killer case…

Only Colton’s description could go from cliché to terrifying in a single sentence. And truthfully, it pains me that I don’t know how to define him. As a profiler, yes, with enough background information, I could outline his life, his psyche, and his personality, and I could paint a very vivid and accurate portrayal of the man. But as a woman…he eludes me. I know what I desire from him. I understand what attracts me to him. I comprehend my most basic, carnal needs…and I feel the deep yearning to connect with him in my soul.

But is that true emotion, or only my darkness reaching out to his? Am I so completely twisted that I don’t clearly grasp the dysfunction between us? How can something so haunting and disturbing reach right into me, beyond the depths of me, and feel this…
right
.

“More…”

I blink, and my mother’s small, reedy frame comes back into focus. “Mom? More what?” She rarely speaks anymore, only one word sentences and grunts to gesture toward what she needs or wants.

Alzheimer’s is a cruel disease. It strips the people you love of the very thing that makes them,
them
. By the time I made the decision to move here permanently to be closer to her, she was already forgetting me. No number of visits could remedy that.

She nods her head a couple of times, her thin bun falling loose. “More,” she manages.

“More about Colton? You want me to tell you more about the man in my life?”

She nods shakily, a weak smile forming and stretching her cracked lips. I try my best to match that smile, giving her hope that my life is fine. Normal. I’m an average, twenty-six year-old woman with a new boyfriend and a simple, fulfilling career. She won’t recall any of the details later, but for now, this is the daughter I want her to have.

“All right,” I say, saucing another scoop of sage oil onto my palms. I place my hands beneath her jaw and massage the ointment into her neck, allowing the aromatherapy to work its magic. “He gets me. Maybe not in the traditional sense…but he’s able to look beneath my cover and see the girl I once was, and the woman I want to be. He sees only the best of me, not what I outwardly project to the world, the things we only want others to see—but the real, damaged, unperfected me. And to him, I’m beautiful.”

The word slips past my lips before I can stop it, and my hands still. My entire being freezes like I’ve been struck dumb. I have not uttered that word since I was sixteen—and this is no simple, careless slipup. It’s a profound moment of freedom that scares me more than the word itself.

Colton sees me as beautiful—unsightly, dirty pieces and all. I’ve never desired that before, never allowed myself to long to
be
beautiful. Up until now, it’s only ever mattered how I viewed myself. Which has forever been like staring into a fun house mirror; warped and distorted. But that blurry girl was me, and I embraced her. I’ve never wanted to be beautiful to anyone—until Colton.

It’s more than an alarming revelation; it’s the ease I’m frightened of, the effortless loss of will to fight against my nature. Being on guard has been what’s kept me safe—kept
others
safe—and I fear losing that impassable boundary.

But, oh, that moment when I felt what it would mean to be his beautiful goddess…it rocked the very foundation of my existence. Every wall I’ve spent years constructing came crashing down, and I became utterly his. Despite what the future may bring, the reality that will bleed into our dark little bubble, I do not want to lose his faith in me. That fleeting, shimmering chance that the woman he sees really is who I am. I’m only afraid I’m not brave enough to take that final leap.

My mother places a chilly hand atop one of mine, drawing my attention back on her. “Fear…” she whispers.

My eyebrows draw together, and I lower my hands to my lap, keeping hers tucked between mine. “Fear, Mom? What about it?”
Did I actually say any of that out loud
?

Her hands grip mine and her eyes widen. Her lips move like she wants to say something, and I can see the frustration in her pursed features at not being able to voice her thoughts. “Fear…love.”

My stomach drops. “I should be afraid of love?”

Annoyed, she yanks her hands away from mine and shakes her head. “Love is…fear.” She smiles, so warm and genuine that my own lips tremble.

Placing a hand to my cheek, she nods, urging me to understand her meaning.

I clasp her hand to me and lean into her touch. “Love is fear,” I say, and she nods. “You’re right. We spend a lifetime fearing we’ll never find it, and when we do…if it’s real…we fear losing it. We fear making a mistake. We fear so much that it drives love away eventually.” I meet my mother’s cloudy gaze as I fight back tears in mine. “But you’re saying this is much deeper, aren’t you?”

She tries to nod again, but her movements are jerky and strained. She’s tired, and what clarity she held just a moment before is already fading. My mother never judged me. After I was brought home, when my world remained a dark dungeon, she didn’t look at me as broken. As someone who needed therapy and a problem to be fixed. She always told me we are who we’re meant to be.

That simple. She remains my voice of reason.

And now she’s telling me my love is something to be feared.

No words could ever be truer.

With that, I part from my mother after a lingering hug, then lean her back in her rocking chair. As I give the nurse further instruction on my mother’s care—making sure no one other than me has access to her—and how to reach me should the department make that even more difficult, I glance back once more as she nods off to sleep, and dare anyone to try to hurt me by causing her harm.

Once I leave Resting Pines nursing home, feeling a bit of relief that my mother is safe, I hear a
beep
from my back pocket. I pull out my burner phone. A new message from Colton lights the screen.

Colton:
When? Where? I’ll wait all night for you
.

I suck in a full breath, tasting the hint of fall on my tongue, and a shiver races the length of my body. The crisp, fresh air rushes my senses, and then suddenly I’m engulfed in Colton’s masculine scent. A longing burns beneath my breastbone. Just seeing his name on the screen, reading his determined words, brings a rush to my head.

Playing with fire.

Maybe so, but I cannot turn away from the only person who offered me redemption with no dangling judgment. Until I have proof that he has any connection at all with the serial killings, I have to bend my own rules—I have to return his trust.

And it’s possible a darker part of me enjoys the hunt, the lure. Being close to the devil, poking the embers and watching them spark. It’s the fire that keeps me warm when the callous world would leave me drowning in the frigid, murky water.

I respond:
My place at nine. Text before you come.

He replies right away:
I won’t be late
.

The skip of my heartbeat echos hollowly in my throat as I swallow. With sudden clarity, I realize that, sometimes, being close to the thing you fear is the only way to effect true living—to
feel
.

I slip my phone into my bag and drag out my keys, clicking the car alarm off. As I reach for the door handle, an eerie feeling brushes the back of my neck, causing the little hairs to lift away from my skin.

I never ignore this feeling; I’ve honed it to perfection, and it’s the one that has kept me ahead of the game. Turning slowly, I sweep the parking lot, and spot a lone, black car parked at the back. Tinted windows, but I can make out someone in the driver-seat. They’re watching me.

I start to reach for my phone to call Quinn, then stop. Instead, I shift to unclasp the leather strap over my gun and start for the car.

If the hunter wants to reveal himself and become the hunted, so be it. I was counting on more of a chase…but I’m as ready as ever.

The engine rumbles to life, and the tires peel against the asphalt as the car shoots forward. I’m running toward the black car as it suddenly changes direction and heads right for me. I pull my gun and aim.