The Killing Times (An FBI Romance Thriller (book 1)) (42 page)

Blackhawk kne
lt beside her and placed his roses alongside hers. “I promise Mrs. LaRue, I’ll take care of her, and keep her safe,” He brushed a tear from Elizabeth’s cheek and continued, “I saw pictures, and I just want you to know that your daughter is gorgeous, just like you. She’s kind, gentle and sweet. Your Elizabeth is an amazing woman.” Blackhawk ran his fingers over the tombstone, never releasing her hand.

Elizabeth was so touched by his words
, that tears began to slide down her face. She didn’t know what she did to deserve him, but she was so glad she had him in her life.

Blackhawk helped her stand,
as he moved her to the plot that held her father. He helped her kneel again and once more joined her, refusing to leave her side for a single second.

“Oh
Daddy, I miss you,” she sobbed. “I didn’t know that you were murdered. Had I known, I would have hunted him down. I promise, I’m going to find who did this and get you justice if it’s the last thing I do. I’ll do it for you and for mom,” she whispered through the tears. “I hope you didn’t suffer, Daddy. Please forgive me for not being here for you,” she kissed the tombstone and gently traced the letters with her busted up hand, knuckles still red from punching Blackhawk’s partner. All the emotion poured out of her body.

Blackhawk felt his heart
ache as the woman he loved was weeping. He touched the tombstone, with his hand and spoke to the man he never knew. “Mr. LaRue, my name is Ethan Blackhawk. I’m an FBI agent. I happen to have fallen in love with your daughter. I promise, on my life, that I’ll make sure she finds the killer and helps you rest in peace.”

Elizabeth hugg
ed him, the tears still falling as he stood with her and walked her out of the way of the machinery. She clung to him, as the equipment fired up. Turning her face into his neck, she hid from the visual of the grave being opened. When they reached the concrete vault and opened it, she still didn’t look. She couldn’t.

He was her eyes, when she couldn’t face it.

All she heard were the sweet words he whispered in her ear, and how he held her tightly against him. He talked her through it, telling her in detail what was happening, but not forcing her to have it burnt into her memory. When the casket was put into the back of a waiting hearse, and escorted by the ME van, he told her it was finally okay look. By then, it looked just as it did the day she buried him, a pile of dirt, and a gaping hole.

“I’m taking you home,” he s
tated, kissing her. Not realizing he had referred to his home as theirs.

“You need to go to the morgue,” she paused, unable to include herself, because s
he didn’t think she could do it.

No, she
knew she couldn’t.

“I’ll go later to make sure he’s respected and taken care of the way he deserves,”
and he meant it. “I’ll bring you home first. They don’t need me immediately baby, but you do.”

Elizabeth let him lead her to his car, and he even handed her tissues. The drive home was a hard one
. She wanted to say so much to him, but she didn’t want to fill the car with a river of tears. When he pulled up to his house, he helped her out and walked her to the couch. Blackhawk sat there with her for a few minutes, just letting her weep and get it all out. When the torrent slowed, he tucked her under a blanket and looked deep into her eyes.

“I’ll be back
in a couple of hours, baby,” he pulled his keys from his pocket and took the house key off the main ring. “Here’s the key. The security code we’ve already discussed, and if you need me here’s my other cell phone number.” He keyed in his number to his private cell, saving it on her phone. Now she had his work phone and personal line, she could reach him anytime. “I promise I’ll be back as soon as I can or sooner if you call me.”

Elizabeth nodded, watching him get h
is badge and clip it to his hip. Going to the safe, he removed his gun and checked the clip. Watching him gave her peace and familiarity.

As he looked over at her, he just wanted to keep her safe and protected. “Lyzee,” he said, and reached back into his gun safe. “Here’s my ankle piece. Keep it beside you in case you need it.”
He wished he could give Elizabeth her gun back, but across state lines, it was best she use one of his.

Elizabeth
accepted it and nodded. It was sweet he was giving her a gun, even though his house was a fortress once the alarm was set.

“I love you
.” Ethan kissed her on the forehead and then on her lips. “I’ll be home as soon as I can. I promise.” Blackhawk set the alarm and made sure the door was locked.

Now he wou
ld go stand watch over the dead, because this one mattered most to the woman who owned his heart. 

Elizabeth sat there having a pity party for
quite a while, and then decided to go for a run. She needed to burn some energy and to think. Just the prospect of a run through her old neighborhood lifted her spirits.

Carefully, she tucked the key ring around her finger
, and her cell and money into her shorts pocket. Elizabeth made sure she locked his townhouse door before stretching out and taking off. A few miles would do her good, and she remembered the route, like it was only yesterday.

Elizabeth LaRue had always been hypersensitive about her
surroundings and could tell when she was being watched, or in danger, but today she was off her game.

She didn’t see the
reflection across the street, and she didn’t hear the clicking of the shutter. Today, she was oblivious to the eyes watching her. She was oblivious to everything but the pain in her heart.

Special Agent Ethan Blackhawk stood in the morgue staring through the glass window. The decomp was so extensive, that the smell would have been overwhelming, and he wasn’t going back to his house smelling like dead body. Not while she was there. He watched as they pulled the body from the coffin, rechecking it and taking more samples. The ME on duty pulled the stomach contents report, re-examining it in detail.

“Agent Blackhawk, it looks like he definitely was poisoned
. There are high levels of toxicity in the stomach contents. Even if he had just taken heart medication with his dinner, they wouldn’t be this high. Something else is here, and that in combination with the meds that he was already taking for his arrhythmia, is what likely killed him. I’ll need a day or two to give you more specifics,” he spoke into the microphone. 

“Thank you, Doctor
Leonard,” he said, watching the clock. Now he just had to wait until Charlie LaRue was placed back in his coffin, and then he could go home.

For now, i
t was time to check in with his team. Blackhawk called his head tech and hoped they had found something. “Christina, what do we have?” he asked, as she answered the line.

“Ethan, this is the most infuriating case yet
. We just completed deep searches on everyone that the sheriff had on her board and list, and I have to say we have nothing.”

“I don’t see how we can have nothing.” Frustration was taking over
and making him edgy, as was the distance between him and Elizabeth.

“All
I know is we haven’t been able to connect the deaths to anything. There is such randomness to it, it’s like the killer isn’t all there.”

“They never are,” he muttered.

“Well, that being said, we can explain Charlie LaRue’s death. He was digging into the case, so the killer offed him,” she said matter-of-factly

“Do me a favor,
Christina. Please have a little more tact when we get back. Don’t be using the word ‘
offed
’ around the sheriff, okay? That’s her father.”

“Sure thing,
Boss. I’m sorry,” and she continued, “and then we have Corrine Gilbride. We called her parents, sent an agent over to talk to them. It’s safe to say that was a spur of the moment get together with her girlfriend. We have pretty much confirmed that the killer just took advantage of there being another woman with the real target.”

“We knew all this, Christina.”

The lab tech could hear the frustration in his voice. “I know, Ethan, but we’re really trying. I swear.”

He let out a frustrated sigh.
“Keep searching. Usually, it’s the most obvious explanation.”

“How did autopsy go?” she asked, cautiously. Her boss had a thing for the sheriff, and she didn’t want to cross that line from ‘
favorite tech’
to ‘
left back in Quantico
tech’
. One of the perks of her job was working with Ethan Blackhawk. There was just something about him that made all the female techs crazy. It was hard to forget the visual of her boss, sitting on the couch with the sheriff wrapped in his arms. There was definitely something between them, and she couldn’t help but wish she was Elizabeth LaRue.

“
It was the same as every other autopsy, Christina. They confirmed poisoning. It’s now just a matter of them isolating out the medication he was on, and finding the poison he ingested. They’ll be sending over all the details tomorrow, and we’ll possibly have the answer shortly after that.”

“When are you returning?”

He looked at his watch. “I’m in route home now for the night. I think we’ll touch down tomorrow as soon as possible.” He still had a few plans for their last night up north.

“See you then,
boss.” Christina ended the call, and was desperately trying to not visualize him, shirtless and tattooed, since it made the room just got hotter.

Elizabeth made the
five mile route and was walking up the steps when Mrs. Feinstein’s door popped opened. The woman greeted her and smiled warmly.

“How are you,
sweetheart?” she asked.

“I’ve had better days,” she said, wiping the sweat off her brow
, but the run had made it a little better.

“Would you like to come in and have
tea and a cupcake with me?” she held the door open for the young woman.

“I’m all sweaty,” she paused, and saw the dejected look on her face. “
Tell you what. Give me ten minutes to shower and change, and you put some water on for tea. I’ll be right over.”

Mrs
. Feinstein smiled a huge smile and nodded as she headed back into her house.

Elizabeth stripped fast, leaving a trail of clothes to his shower
. She jumped in, cleaned off and jumped back out, all in less than ten minutes. Dressing again, she inadvertently left her cell on the floor by her running clothes. The key she tucked into her pocket for safe keeping.

Maybe a cupcake and tea would be a good thing. Mrs. Feinstein might be able to cheer her up. As she
padded across the hallway in a pair of shorts, tank top and barefoot, she tried to focus on life and the living.

Hopefully
that would get her through the rest of the day. 

                            *   *   *

Blackhawk advised Gabe of the details as he watched the remains being placed back into the coffin. It was time to head home, but he felt like he needed to do one last thing. There was something he wanted to say to Charlie LaRue. He dismissed the techs and touched the casket. “Mr. LaRue, it’s Ethan Blackhawk again. I just want to let you know that I’m in love with your daughter. If you were alive now, we’d be having this conversation face to face, but since we can’t, I hope wherever your spirit is that you hear me. I’m so crazy in love with her that I’m going to ask her to marry me. If I ever get up the nerve, that is. I just wanted to ask your permission to have your daughter’s hand in marriage. I promise I won’t ever let her go, I can’t. She owns my heart. I’m going to find who killed you and give her justice, and then I’m going to give her a future. I promise.”

Ethan Blackhawk stepped away f
rom the casket, and headed home to keep his promise to the woman he loved. 

Elizabeth laughed
as she sat on a bright blue sofa, eating a cupcake with Mrs. Feinstein. This older woman was completely amazing. The stories she had were funny and just the energy from her was completely uplifting. There was so much to learn about her, that the time together flew by. She even forgot that she was supposed to be upset.

“
Now, Elizabeth, why are you having a bad day?” she asked, sipping her tea. “Want to talk about it?”

“We
found out my father was murdered, and I had to come here to have him exhumed.”

“Dear lord,
sweetheart, that’s not a bad day, that’s a horrible day! What can I do for you?”

“
You already cheered me up. I’ll get through this.” Elizabeth didn’t know if she would or not, and took another bite of the sugary treat to cover her sadness.

“I hope it gets better, s
weetheart,” she patted her leg, reassuringly.

“
I have to admit, I had fun spending time with you and eating cupcakes.”

Mrs. Feinstein got quiet. N
ow she was unsure if she should bring up the last woman. Before it seemed like a good idea, but now that she knew Elizabeth was struggling, it didn't seem right.

“You look like you want t
o say something, Mrs. Feinstein. I’m a big girl, go ahead.”