Jaid Black (11 page)

Thomas’s frown was thoughtful. The doctor was right about that. He’d check into it, but it probably was a dead end. If there was one thing Lucifer was not it was stupid.

Nikki’s nostrils flared as she looked away. “I, an allegedly intelligent woman, was taken in by the fantastical musings of a serial killer.” She groaned, mortified by her own stupidity. “I actually believed that he was falling in love with me. My God, I’m pathetic.”

Thomas was silent for a suspended moment. She glanced back at him, the quiet making her curious as to his thoughts.

“I think he did fall in love with you,” he murmured, his gravelly voice kept to a minimum. “In his own sick, twisted, delusional way, of course.” He inclined his head. “But I hold no doubts that he believed what he wrote to you.”

Nikki shivered. “If he thinks raping, torturing, and killing are signs of love, well, that’s pretty damn sick.”

“Hence the term ‘psychopath.’ ”

She found her first genuine smile, even if it was a small one. “Touché.”

Thomas rose from the sofa. He held out his hand, waiting for her to make the first move and reach out to him. She could tell that he didn’t want to frighten her, was probably assuming she found the touch of all men repulsive at this point.

She didn’t. Richard—or whatever his name was—was not a man. He was the demon the press had dubbed him.

Nikki accepted his hand and shook it. “I’ll let you know if anything else occurs to me, Detective.”

He winked. “Go get some sleep.”

“Thanks. I think I will.”

Thomas nodded, then turned to walk away.

“Detective—I mean Thomas!” She stood up, waiting for him to turn around. When he did, she blushed. “Those emails . . .” She cleared her throat, the crimson in her cheeks growing more pronounced. “If they get out to the press, my career is over.”

His forehead wrinkled. In that moment she was aware of the fact that he hadn’t had time to read them yet. No, of course he hadn’t. He’d spent the majority of his time on the phone with various officers and forensic specialists, first at the hospital where she and Kim had been checked out—the hospital where Kim was still under observation—and then again when she’d been driven back home.

“When you read them,” she muttered, glancing away, “you’ll understand.” She sighed, looking back to him. “Anyway, if you can keep those emails out of the press until I figure out a way to save face at work . . .”

“Not a problem.” Thomas inclined his head, curiosity as to what the emails contained evident in his dark eyes. “I’ll see to it that those emails never see the light of day.”

“Thank you,” she whispered, her head slightly bowed.

“You’re welcome.”

Her head shot up. “Oh—one last thing.”

One of his eyebrows rose.

She sighed. “The pistachios,” she muttered. “They’re in the kitchen. Go ahead and take the damn things.”

He stared at her for a protracted moment, an enigmatic twinkle in his eye. “You think because you’re a woman I won’t take you up on the offer,” he drawled.

Nikki frowned, a telling gesture.

Thomas held back a smile. His intense gaze swept over her. “I’d let a pretty lady come in between me and many, many things, Doc. . . .” He shook his head slightly. “But not between me and my nuts.” He winked down at her, then turned and strode away.

Open-jawed, Nikki could only stare at him as he disappeared into the kitchen.

Chapter 11

Wednesday, July 16 8:10 P·M·

Feeling rejuvenated after sleeping for eight solid hours,
Thomas booted up his home computer, slid the CD containing the email exchanges between “Richard” and Nikki into the e: drive, and settled in for a long working night.

He’d been itching to read them ever since he found out about their existence, this being the first writings the police department had on file of Lucifer. And then, after his little pistachio thief had blushed so prettily when referring to them . . . well, call him nosy, but his curiosity had increased tenfold.

She was an intriguing woman, Dr. Adenike. He could understand the predator’s obsession with intelligent, strong, driven women—and with Nikki in particular. She wasn’t classically beautiful in the fashion-magazine sense, but she was a beauty in her own way, a woman who held a certain exotic allure. She was sexy, sensual-looking . . . he could understand Lucifer’s attraction. What he could not understand was the desire to murder her over it.

A feeling of inadequacy on “Richard’s” part, no doubt. The need to prove his power by robbing his victim of hers.

Dr. Sydney Horace, the CPD’s forensic psychologist, had skimmed through the emails already. Later, probably within the next few days after consulting with an FBI profiling specialist, she’d render a more complex summary on this particular killer.

The newly discovered knowledge on Lucifer would help immensely as the psychologist would then be able to make guesses on everything from the killer’s profession to what style shoes he favored. Or at least that was the hope.

Dr. Horace’s brief perusal of the emails was how Thomas already knew about the predator’s penchant for Domination /submission games and a few other details. What he didn’t understand was how Nikki came into play in all this. And why a successful, accomplished woman such as herself would agree to meet a man who admitted to the types of fantasies the forensic psychologist had briefed him on.

Thomas opened up the first email. It was time to have some questions answered.

Thomas blew out a breath. He felt like a real asshole because of it, but his cock was hard enough to cut a diamond. Shit.

Whoa! Thomas shifted in his chair, his erection damn near painful.

This certainly explained a lot, he thought, suddenly in the mood for a cool drink. Namely, it explained why Dr. Adenike didn’t want these emails circulating in the press.

It also accounted for why all of Lucifer’s victims, countless numbers of professional, intelligent women, were duped into meeting dominant, yet allegedly gentle “Richard.” They thought they were meeting a likeminded, sane professional male who was into the same kind of D/s games they enjoyed playing. Nothing more, nothing less, as Dr. Felix Goldstein was fond of saying.

Who would have guessed a female trauma surgeon was into those games?

Thomas sipped from his lukewarm coffee and continued working. For the hour or so he’d been reading, it had been hard not to envision Nikki in the types of situations she was so graphically describing, difficult not to see her tied to his own bed, screaming out his name as he pumped her long and hard. But calling him “Master” while he rode her—

That he’d never thought of before. Suddenly he was thinking about it.

Envisioning scenarios like that, especially given the damn near deadly meeting these emails had led to, made him feel like a big jerk. Unfortunately, feeling like a jerk didn’t matter in the least to his raging erection.

Nikki was the victim here, he reminded himself. Thomas’s job was to protect her, to find Lucifer, not to get distracted with images of mounting her.

He sighed. If the pistachio thief’s writing got any sexier, he’d get up and make a glass of iced tea. For now, lukewarm coffee would have to do.

Jesus. If only she’d known he meant that he wanted it in the literal sense.

Thomas felt his anger growing. These women had all trusted the bastard. They had revealed their innermost selves to him, only to have that knowledge used against them for vile, sick purposes.

Thomas frowned, jealousy knotting in his gut. He felt like a moron for experiencing an emotion like that over emails she’d written to a serial killer, but there it was. He didn’t have any claims over Dr. Adenike, but the jealous feelings were still there.

He closed out the email. He opened up the reply from Richard and began reading.

The sick part was, Thomas thought, the wacko hadn’t lied to her. Just as he’d told Dr. Adenike last night, Lucifer probably had believed his maniacal musings. Probably still did.

And, for sure, he had wanted Nikki’s heart. Just not in the way the surgeon had imagined while reading the emails.

Thomas thought back to a line from the movie
The Exorcist
. The experienced priest, when preparing to perform the exorcism on a possessed Linda Blair, had first explained to the younger priest working with him how the devil operates.

He mixes lies with the truth,
the older priest had said.

Just as Lucifer did, with his victims. The Cleveland press had no idea how close to the truth they had come when, a few years past, they’d dubbed him the king of all demons.

Thomas ran a hand over his freshly shaved jaw, his mind working out another detail. For the first time in nine years he truly understood how all of the victims could have been that “stupid.”

The thing of it was, none of them had been stupid, a theory a couple of the detectives in the CPD had previously held firm to. The assumption many of them had harbored all of these years was that these smart women had all made one stupid mistake—a mistake that, unfortunately, had cost them their lives.

But that wasn’t true, Thomas now understood. All of them, from the first victim to the last, had been expertly lured like prey, their desires and emotions used against them by a vicious, meticulous hunter.

The predator knew how to get to them. He knew how to feed on emotions and needs that had been neglected by other men in the victims’ pasts in order to seduce them into meeting him.

Now what Thomas had to figure out was how to turn the proverbial tables around. He would use the very things that made Lucifer tick in order to lure the hunter to another hunter.

Himself.

Chapter 12

Thursday, July 17 1:07 P·M·

Nikki kissed Kim’s cheek before helping her into the rental car. The first thing she planned to do when her Mercedes got out of the police compound (they were checking it for fibers) was trade it in for a new one. She couldn’t stand the idea of driving around in a vehicle
he
had been in.

“I feel like a woman with a black eye and a sprained ankle.” Kim smiled. “But grateful to leave the hospital. Thanks for giving me a ride home, hon.”

Nikki smiled back before closing the door. She resumed their conversation once she had settled into the driver’s side.

“I’ll check that ankle before I go to work—”

“Work?” Kim blinked. “You plan to go to work tonight?”

“I don’t want to.” Nikki sighed. “But I haven’t missed a day in years. If I call in, there will be questions—questions I’d rather not answer. Right now the only one who knows what’s going on is the chief of staff. I’d prefer to keep it that way.”

Kim blew out a breath. “I don’t blame you for that. Good lord, the things this could do to your career. You’re lucky that the chief of staff is a woman, and that’s she’s not judgmental.” She turned a speculative glance toward Nikki. “Hey, speaking of not telling people things . . .”

Nikki choked out a laugh. “Well it was hardly the kind of thing one brings up over crêpes!”

Kim got a smile out of that. “True. But, Nik,” she said, her expression turning serious, “you can tell me anything. Even sexual fantasies. You know that.”

Nikki sighed. “I know,” she whispered. “I guess I was just a little embarrassed.” She turned her head from watching the road long enough to flash Kim a grin. “Now I’m only mildly mortified.”

“Don’t be,” Kim said earnestly. “I can see the appeal to fantasies like that. I’ve had them myself. Both kinds.”