When Fall Fades (The Girl Next Door Series Book 1) (16 page)

“I’m sure it will.” Sadie glanced at the time. Past midnight. “Wow, sorry I didn’t realize it was so late. I should go and let you get some rest.”

Unhurried, he stretched his arm across the back of the couch between them, his fingertips lightly brushing her shoulder. “Don’t worry about it. I’m glad you decided to come over.”

Once she met his eyes, she couldn’t look away. In fact, if their suddenly closer proximity were taken into account, she would have to assume she was leaning in.

As if riding to her rescue the blaring signal of the dryer sounded.

Sadie jumped up off the couch with a start, very possibly mumbled something about getting her dress, and disappeared into the laundry room.

“You should just wear my clothes home.” He called after her. “I think it’s still drizzling. I’ll get you a bag for your dress.”

“Thanks,” was all she could think to say.

“Let’s get you home.”

“Oh, you don’t have to walk me out, I can find my way.” She’d bet the farm her cheeks were as blazing red as ripe tomatoes. So she kept her head down and dug around her purse for her keys.

“I’ll follow you home, make sure you get in okay.” He snatched a Cardinals hat from a peg by the door and pulled it low over his eyes.

“You don’t have to do that. You’re already home and it’s la—”

Archer touched her arm, and her ramblings died on her lips. “Sadie, I’m not gonna sleep if I don’t see you home safe. It’s dark, and there’s a murderer out there—one who might not be too thrilled with you since you bested him. Now, I know you can handle yourself, but in this case, I’m not taking no for an answer. Let’s go.” Physically turning her toward the door, he gave her a gentle nudge.

Sighing, she rolled her eyes as she marched stubbornly and ridiculously out of his apartment wearing his baggy sweatpants and her high heels.

Silence marked the elevator ride to the garage and their stroll to their cars. The clicking of Sadie’s heels against the pavement the only sound echoing against the concrete walls of the parking structure … that and her heartbeat’s assault on her eardrums.

Archer stopped behind Sadie’s car. Hesitating, she swallowed some courage and then turned to face him. “Thanks for tonight. It really perked me up after the service today.”

His gaze was intense. Unyielding. Like nothing could have persuaded him to look away. What might have been unnerving was instead riddled with a breathtaking subtext she couldn’t fathom and yet innately understood.

“I had a really nice time.”

“Me too.” She replied softly, then forced herself to back away, removing any and all of the temptations flitting through her brain. Except all she accomplished was one measly step which meant she was still within touching distance. “Good night, Archer Hayes.”

He stayed where he was. His fists clenched, biceps bunching, and those eyes communicating something that felt forbidden, dangerous, and impossibly intimate in spite of their lack of touch.

“Good night, Sadie.”

After locking up, she leaned against the back of the door, reliving the moments of the evening with an unhealthy amount of schoolgirl swooning.

She wondered how big of a fool she’d made of herself at Archer’s place. Wondered, with no small amount of mortification, if he’d gotten an eyeful of fleshy backside when his roomy sweatpants slipped off her hips while she’d fiddled with the lock directly under her very new, very bright front porch light.

She groaned. Well done, Sadie.

Was the guy a total operator or was there something going on between them? Maybe she’d been out of touch so long she was mistaking the poor guy’s charity for something else. She hated that she overanalyzed everything. A chronic ailment with no effective treatments. So the tortured thoughts got to ride the merry-go-round in her brain for a solid twenty minutes of insanity until she put them to rest for good. She hoped.

To keep distracted she thought of how nice the service for Charlie had turned out. How his friends had thanked her for allowing them to say good-bye with such a beautiful tribute. She wondered again when his body would be released for an actual burial—
murder
tossing the norms for a funeral right out the window.

Inevitably, her mind went to the last funeral she’d attended, aside from any of her patients. The familiar heaviness crushed the last of the night’s giddiness that had bubbled up in her heart as she dragged herself to bed.

“Hello?” Sadie clamped the phone between her ear and her shoulder, cranking the steering wheel to whip her Jeep out of Wash U’s parking lot after her night class.

There was an extended silence from the caller. Suppressing the urge to hum to Otis Redding’s “Sittin’ on the Dock of the Bay,” Sadie felt the jivey tune scrub away the depressing residue of the past three tedious hours in Dr. Brimstead’s lecture of “Infectious Diseases.” “Anyone there?”

“... Sadie, it’s Mary Ann.”

“Oh hey, Mrs. Burke.” Sadie pulled the phone from her ear, double checking and not recognizing the number. “What’s up?”

“We’re at St. John’s in the ER. Can you come up here?” Ryan’s mom muffled a sob.

Otis’s classic was drowned out by the heavy thud of her heart in her ears. “I’ll be there in ten minutes.” Ramming her foot against the gas pedal, she floored it, making it in only six. Swerving haphazardly into an ER parking spot, she flung herself from her vehicle and sprinted through the automatic doors.

Her chest heaved, unable to draw in a single sufficient breath as she scavenged the waiting areas until finally spotting Ryan’s mom down the hall. Sadie sprinted toward her, nearly knocking Mrs. Burke over with her embrace.

Mary Ann’s waif body started to spasm, her arms were limp around Sadie’s back. “What happened?” Sadie’s words muffled against matted hair.

Between hiccups and moans Mrs. Burke spoke while ushering Sadie into a room. “There was an accident. Ryan and his dad were headed home from the ball game.”

Mary Ann moved the curtain revealing Ryan, sobbing and hunched over the blood-soaked body of his dad. A large abrasion oozed on Ryan’s forehead, dried blood and tears streaking his face.

Then she was beside him, her arms thrown over his shoulders. Her firm hold doing nothing to soothe his violent shaking as he clung to Mr. Burke’s stagnant chest.

When he finally pulled away from his dad, he buried his face against Sadie’s stomach. She placed her trembling hands on his head, tenderly stroking his hair as endless tears flowed down her neck.

Sadie sat and cried with them for over an hour before any of them spoke. Then Ryan’s face lifted, almost unrecognizable from the trauma and swelling. His bloodshot eyes haunted by what he must have seen. 

“I know what I’m gonna do now.” He stared at the empty space his dad had occupied an hour ago, riveted by nothing but the gleam of the florescent light reflecting from the floor.

Ryan’s mom and Sadie exchanged a look, bereft of cognition.

“It’s been two years since college graduation, and I’ve been praying about what I’m supposed to do.” Other than the breath that expanded his lean chest he was perfectly still. “I’m gonna join the army for a few years, like dad did when he was young. Except I’m gonna be a medic.”

The resolve on Ryan’s face scared her. Before Sadie could voice her concern, Mary Ann spoke to her son.

“Ryan, sweetie, that’s very noble, but maybe you should think some more about it. Right now is probably not the best time to be making these kinds of life-changing decisions.”

“Why not?
This
is life-changing.” He gestured to the vacant space, fresh tears magnified the pain and desperation in his cobalt eyes.

“Ry, I think your mom just means—”

“I know this is what I’m supposed to do. And I think I can just sign up for two years of active duty.” His sympathetic gaze seemed to pity the two most important women in his life. “I know this is a shock, but I want to make dad proud. And I really think this will help give me direction for my life. Who knows, maybe I’ll go to medical school when I get back. Be a doctor like Sadie.”

Frantic fear clawed through her. She reached out to touch his arm, plead with him to stay. But he stood before she could grab on and strode out of the room. She knew Ryan better than anybody. And that’s why she knew there was no changing his mind. 

Heinous beeping cut off the last excruciating moments of the memory. Never had she felt so grateful to wake up. But the resurrected ghosts of the past lingered in the air like dead fish, stomach-curdling and inescapable, and begging questions she still couldn’t find the answers to—like why she’d been dreaming about Ryan so much lately? She kept feeling like it meant something. If it didn’t, her inner psyche, or wherever it was dreams sprouted from, had a sadistic streak she didn’t care for.

Sadie rolled out of bed and lifted the blackout shade. It was still raining, the gray day mirroring her motivational state. A yawn persuaded her back to bed. No running today. The allure of an extra hour of sleep before work was too tempting to deny.

If only she could dream of something sweeter.

She crossed her arms over her eyes and breathed deep from the fabric of the large T-shirt, inhaling the tantalizing and oh-so-manly scent of a certain FBI agent.

Mmm
.
That’ll work just fine.

Chapter 16

Archer Hayes

H
ow had he let this happen?

Long sleepless hours had brought him to a nightmarish conclusion despite the lack of an actual nightmare. Sadie was under his skin. At this point of realization, a nightmare was exactly what he was experiencing.

When she’d emerged dressed in his clothes last night it stirred up something in him he hadn’t known existed—a longing to have someone to come home to. To belong to.

Why was this happening? Just when all of his ducks were lining up with his promotion, his caseload, his partnership with Sal not scaring the daylights out of him, some beautiful and impossible girl had to come barging into the mix. Destroying his carefully constructed life with her wit, compassion, and unparalleled beauty.

What was worse was that he felt so moronically happy when she was near, and the irony wasn’t lost on him that most of that time she’d been berating him with her spitfire tongue or kicking him to the curb—literally.

You’re really losing it.

The denial stage was easier to deal with. But this …

Pulling himself up in bed, he rested his stubborn head in his hands. The only way he knew how to do his job was to avoid distractions. It wouldn’t be safe to operate with his focus at half-staff. Relationships allowed too much wiggle room for error. Like with Jimmy. Had Archer not been running his mouth off, yucking it up like they were best pals, he wouldn’t have lost focus and let the kid wander out into the open.

And Jimmy wouldn’t have died.

What if something happened to Sadie because of him? It was already hard enough living with the pile of skeletons in his closet without adding any more. The consequences of relationships in his line of work were too grave to ignore.

But if he couldn’t lie to himself about his escalating attraction for her anymore, what was he supposed to do with it? Was there some easy fix to make it go away?

An unsettling notion screamed in his ear. The ominous feeling like a dropped anchor in his chest. It wasn’t just attraction. It was something beyond that.

Something much more dangerous.

What happened to “Never again?”

Suddenly the lure of a distraction was exactly what he needed. Archer got up and made a pot of coffee. After his total lack of sleep he needed a little extra kick in the pants. He shook his head and grumbled, “Guess that’s one way to not oversleep for work.”

Taking a cup of the no-frills brew to the couch, he watched the morning news for the first time in ages. Maybe not all distractions were dangerous. Something about the latest update on huge corporate layoffs and the tailspin of the economy droned on as he took the last few minutes of his morning to regroup before heading in to work.

Work, perfect. He still had some leads to investigate for Charlie, plus he was meeting with the members of the Westwick family throughout the day. Finally, he was honing in, itemizing his plan of attack on the dragging case, and thankfully shelving a certain female distraction.

Until something tugged him back to that moment, on this very couch, when he’d been more than tempted to cross the line.

“Aww, come on!” Tantalizing drifts of sugared citrus still flavored the air. He lifted the blanket she’d used, inhaled the sweet scent of her. Swearing under his breath, he bolted from the couch, took a painfully cold shower, dressed for work, and shot out the door of his now Sadie-tainted home.

Archer loved the rain. Muffling the polluting sounds of mayhem in a chaotic world, everything seemed slower, simpler when the rain fell to the earth and washed away the mess.

But not today.

Today, the whispering hush provided an evoking soundtrack for unwelcome introspection. Cranking up the radio to relieve the contemplative lull, the weatherman broke through the steady drum of raindrops to remark on the current conditions.

“
Severe storm warnings throughout the day and on into the week. It doesn’t appear to be going anywhere soon so buckle in and prepare for some stormy weather
.”

A helpless smile unfurled from somewhere deep inside.
“Stormy Weather.”
The melody of Sadie’s voice swirling in his subconscious engulfed all the heaviness and lifted away the oppressive ache.

The sweet relief was too disturbing to ponder a moment longer, so Archer tuned in to the classic rock station for the last three minutes of his commute before hunkering down in his office.

Westwick’s financial statements had just come in, so Archer got to work pouring over the old man’s books.

Whoa. Charlie had done
very
well for himself. The significance of his income and retirement were impressive but wise and timely investments had skyrocketed the man’s value, putting a whole new spin on motive for this case—the inheritance of a fortune.

Yet, even more surprising was the man’s modest budget and a lifestyle far below his means—a humble legacy very few in wealthy societies seem particularly fond of.

No matter the amount, money was always a strong motive. But even assuming those set to inherit didn’t know about the cancer, how many more years would a ninety-one-year-old man live, even one in the best health?

Charlie was a smart guy. Probably had an ironclad will that was, unfortunately, still under questionable lock and key. But it still didn’t make sense to off such an old man for money.  Unless desperation called for immediate funds. Then again, if it was his family, why not just ask for the money?

Digging through the stack for another file, he pulled the background checks for the surviving Westwicks. Financial stability seemed to be a familial trait. He’d have more to work with once he met the rest of the Westwicks later today, but he had a feeling his suspect pool had just dwindled.

Archer’s phone rang. “Hayes.”

“Hi, Agent Hayes, this is Candice Stevens. I got a little more info on the Westwick case if you’ve got a second.”

“Yeah, what have you got for me?”

“You were right about the trace amount of adhesive found on the medial forearm near the wrist. It wasn’t inherently obvious to the naked eye because whoever did this wrapped cloth around the wrists before binding them with tape. From what we can tell, the killer used plain old wash cloths from the victim’s home.

“And before you ask, we know this because the mineral residue tells us that the towels were washed using water specifically from this area and the levels and chemicals from the detergent are an exact match for the victim’s clothes.” Candice waited a moment before dumbing it down for him. “Essentially he used cheap detergent and the water’s a perfect match, you following me, Agent Hayes?”

“Yeah sorry, I was just thinking. So whoever bound him wanted it to look like his wrists had never been restrained.” Archer understood from the placement of the body that the killer was trying to make it look like an accidental or natural death so this new piece of information was consistent.

“Right. Unfortunately we haven’t identified the exact strain of the anesthetic yet, but we are working on it and should have that information to you soon. Another thing we found, contrary to what we originally thought, was that Westwick did not fight back—as the bruising on his arms suggested. Turns out he was taking corticosteroids for his asthma and a hefty dose of anticoagulants that can cause easy bruising. That, plus the decreased amount of collagen and thinning in an elderly person’s skin and aging capillaries make bruising occur more readily with little force.”

“Meaning?”

“Well, I would say that the killer rendered the vic unconscious first and then gripped the arms and applied the towels and tape. Westwick obviously never woke up while the restraints were on otherwise there would be more significant trauma around the ligatures of the wrists while he tried to wriggle loose.

“We were also able to determine, not that it’s very helpful, that the killer is right handed and seemed to have surprised the vic from behind. Does that narrow it down enough for ya?” Her slight laugh betrayed her attempt to detach—a mechanism to help keep her sanity in such a horrific profession, no doubt.

He chuckled to lighten the mood. “Not so much right now, but you never know.”

“Well, that’s all I’ve got for you for now. I’ll let you know as soon as we identify the drug used.”

“Thanks, Candice. Good work.”

Two hours, six phone calls, and one enormous stack of files later, Archer’s back ached from hunching over his desk as he tortured over every detail he could find. He needed a break.

Giving in to a moment to stretch, he looked away from the bleeding words and spotted that crazy partner of his lurking in the sidelight of Archer’s closed office door.

With a beckon of his finger, Sal entered the office.

“Hey, Sal … what’s with the tie? It looks like its got hearts on it.” Archer couldn’t help the spreading smirk. The tie was ridiculous.

Feigning insult, Sal held out his loud tie and inspected it. “My adopted
abuela
gave this to me. Ordered it off the Home Shopping Network a few years ago, but I like it. It’s abstract—apparently you see what you wanna see. You got love on your mind, Hayes?” Sal quipped back.

Archer ignored his taunt. “Is your grandma in town or something? ’Cause that thing is brutal, and kinda girly.”

“Evade all you want brother, but this thing is cool. And it might as well be a Rorschach test for all the weird things people have said it looks like today. Sandy, the secretary, said it looked like kittens and yarn. She’s definitely a weird cat lady, have you seen the pictures on her desk? Her cats are all dressed up in little suits and wedding gowns and stuff. It ain’t right. And then one of the analysts, Garrett, said it looked like voodoo magic. That one creeped me out—I almost took it off after that. That guy’s got some kind of cult fetish. I’m surprised he has security clearance to get in the building. Dude’s a wack job.”

“Did you have a reason for coming in here, or are you just bored? Cause I can give you more work to do.”

Sal leaned back in his chair and propped his feet up on the front of Archer’s desk. “Actually I called ‘Stink Eye’ Frank Snyder from the photo. He’s coming in this afternoon.”

“Ha! ‘Stink Eye,’ good one. What time?”

“Around three.”

Archer scrolled through the schedule on his phone to double check his other appointments. “You’re gonna have to fly solo on this one. I’ve got Westwick’s son at one and his grandson at three.”

“Okay, I’ll let you know how it goes.”

Archer nodded in agreement. “Any word back on the mystery note? I put in a new search red flagging Reamus.”

“Nah, nothing’s back on that yet, but I think the team cracked Westwick’s journal code. Wanna go check it out?”

A yawn garbled the first few words of his response, “Yeah, but I need to grab some coffee first, I’ll meet you down there in five.” Archer stood and strode out, doubling back a second later when Sal didn’t follow. “What are you doing?”

“Dude, this chair is comfy and you said you needed five minutes. I’m relaxing. You should try it sometime.” Sal reclined, bracing his hands behind his head.

Such was Archer’s day. And it wasn’t even noon.

“So, anything useful from these?” Archer tapped the pile of notebooks.

Wayne, the analyst/code-breaking guru, shoved his glasses back up to the bridge of his nose, a chronic habit due to his hyperhidrosis. Why a genius problem solver with a severe sweating problem didn’t get contacts was beyond comprehension.

“Well, it would help if we knew more about what we’re looking for. There are a lot of journals here. They appear to be your average case logs, system checks, and daily activities logs ranging from his time in the battalion until he retired. There were a few experimental ideas in there, a couple of them pertaining to aviation weaponry, but nothing that we know of that has ever been produced. We have some engineering experts needling through the information we couldn’t make sense of.”

Using his stout index finger, Wayne pushed his glasses up again. “There was also one personal reflections journal from the past year. But that one mainly contained a lot of ramblings about his transformation experience of knowing a ‘Lord and Savior’ and some neighbor girl who helped him find his ‘way back.’”

Wayne shook his head as if not knowing what to make of that, his glasses worming down the slope again, barely hanging on to the dripping tip of his nose.

“Wayne, have you ever considered contacts?”

Archer choked back a laugh, barely. Sal could be so dense for a guy whose skills of observation made him almost psychic.

The thin metal bridge was forced up Wayne’s nose again, magnifying perplexed eyes. “Why?”