Dangerous Secrets (9 page)

“Please, more.” He barely heard her plea above the sound of blood rushing in his ears.

“What do you want?” he asked before sucking one of her earlobes between his teeth. He’d discovered how sensitive she was there.

She jerked once and her grip around his neck tightened. “I need more,” she whispered. The desperation in her voice matched the electric energy humming through her.

He crushed his mouth against hers, needing everything she had to offer. For a split second he contemplated being gentle, but the primal side won out. Raw need took over as he ate at her mouth. She was just as hungry as him.

Their lips meshed as he thrust inside her. Like a hot, silk glove, her inner walls tightened and molded around him with no mercy.

As he continued pushing deep inside her, something changed inside him. It was a subtle shift, but he felt it with his entire being. She was his now.

That thought scared the hell out of him.

They’d only been intimate for a couple days, and now he couldn’t imagine
not
waking up to her face. Didn’t want to imagine a life without Izzy.

She clawed at his back as they found their rhythm. Unintelligible whimpering sounds escaped her as he pounded into her. Her soft breasts rubbed against him. He savored the feel of her smooth skin and beaded nipples against his own rough chest.

He could feel her inner muscles contracting around him, milking him as she started climaxing. Her dark eyes glazed over as she threw her head back.

For a moment all he could focus on was the soft curve of her neck. The way it arched delicately as she came.

“Adam,” she moaned.

For some reason the sound of his name on her lips made him lose it every time.

He came long and hard, emptying himself inside her.

Water rushed around them as they both came down from their high. Her exotic scent enveloped him as she feathered kisses against his neck. When she sagged against his body, something foreign gripped his chest and squeezed tight. Izzy trusted him completely to keep her safe. Around him she was unconcerned about anything else and it was obvious that was because of trust.

Her breaths were still shallow and uneven as she lay wrapped around him. Instinctively he tightened his grip.

He kissed the top of her head and tried to push his feelings aside, but it was useless. He loved Izzy. Had realized it for longer than he’d admit. She’d dug her way under all his defenses and now he was screwed. No matter what happened, he knew he’d lose her in the end. Even if they didn’t come from completely different worlds, he’d been lying to her from the moment they’d met. He knew her well enough to realize that it wasn’t something she’d forgive easily. She’d left Savannah to get away from her meddling father and they were blood.

Once she found out the truth about him, it wasn’t hard to see how things would play out. Adam might be crazy for falling for her, but he wasn’t stupid. They had no future.

Jack Dennis clutched the stack of papers Isabelle Ballantine had given to him. He didn’t recognize the face she’d sketched. His gaze trailed to Megan. She sat behind the receptionist desk, frowning at the picture.

“You recognize this guy?”

She glanced up at him. “No, but if I see anyone that looks like him I’m running in the opposite direction.”

“Good idea,” he muttered before heading toward the back.

He’d grown up in Coconut Bay and nothing like this had ever hit the town. Once he was in the conference room, he tacked up the picture Isabelle had drawn underneath the pictures of the four women who had been assaulted. The first two and the woman they’d just found had been raped, but the third had only been assaulted.

Only.
He hated that word. As if that made the trauma she’d experienced any better.

Each woman fit the same description. All brunettes, exotic in appearance, all petite, weighing less than or close to one hundred ten pounds. None of them was able to identify her attacker, even though he’d kidnapped the first three without a mask. The fourth woman he’d blindfolded—something new—and he’d beaten her severely. She’d been able to talk to them for only a few minutes at the hospital before she’d passed out. And she’d been completely incoherent even when she’d been awake. Her tox screen had come back with fewer drugs in her system than the other women, but her brain had swelling. Jack had just gotten the call that her doctors had put her in a medically induced coma.

He turned at the sound of the door opening to see his partner enter. “Hey, Andrew.”

“Hey, man. What’s that?” His lips pursed into a thin line as he nodded toward the picture Jack had tacked up.

“Isabelle Ballantine brought this by. She apparently decided to question Andrea Barclay on her own and came up with this.” The sketch of the attacker was pretty decent. Slightly crooked nose, fairly sharp cheekbones, normal looking. He looked like anyone they might see on the street. Totally unassuming.

“Think we can use this?”

Until now the only thing they’d known for sure was that the perpetrator was Caucasian with dirty blond hair. “I think this is a pretty damn good place for us to start. It’s too soon to publicize this, especially before we speak to Ms. Barclay ourselves, but I think this is the break we’ve been waiting for.”

“Leaking this picture might spook him anyway.”

Jack gritted his teeth. Maybe scaring the guy out of town wasn’t such a bad thing, but he wanted to catch him. This monster had been terrorizing his town. Jack wanted answers and justice. And by the development of their guy’s actions, he was getting progressively worse. He hadn’t raped the third woman, but he had beaten her so bad that she’d need a lot of time to heal. Thankfully she wouldn’t need reconstructive surgery.

But the fourth woman he’d not only raped, he’d taken his time hurting. Her face was a swollen mess and she might not ever come out of that coma.

It was possible the guy hadn’t been able to follow through because the power of raping wasn’t enough anymore. He’d increased the violence on the fourth woman and had been able to sexually assault her. Soon that wouldn’t be enough for him. He’d probably kill his next victim.

“Has the FBI called back?” Andrew asked, interrupting his thoughts.

“Not yet. I’m sure they’re stretched thin and until we’re sure this is an actual serial rapist, they might not send anyone down. Until then we’re stuck with our limited resources.” He rubbed a hand over his tired face.

Two hours of sleep last night. Three the night before. He felt as if he was hanging on by a thread and he needed to be on top of his game.

“We’ll catch this bastard.” Andrew’s voice was less than convincing.

They had no DNA evidence and they didn’t even know where the assaults were taking place. He shook his head and leaned against the conference room table. “How’s Maria?” He should have gone to see her himself, but guilt held him back. The third victim was his best friend’s kid sister and he hadn’t been able to stop this. Until he could bring her good news, he couldn’t face her.

His partner shrugged. “She’s better than Sharonda Herrera, but she still doesn’t remember anything about the guy.”

The heavy traces of GHB and Xanax in her system had messed her up. The large doses of benzodiazepines left all the women in near comatose states, all with significant memory loss.

Andrew walked to the oversized corkboard and placed his hands on his hips. “I wonder why the Barclay woman remembers his face and the others don’t.”

Jack picked up her file, which was lined up on the table with the others. “According to the hospital records, her dosage was considerably less than the others.”

“Which implies he’s feeding them more drugs there…wherever
there
is. And that doesn’t help us at all.” Andrew raked a hand through his normally immaculate blond hair.

Before Jack could respond, the door opened again. This time it was Sheriff King. And they had little to give him.

“Tell me you boys have good news.” The older man crossed his arms over his chest and leaned against the doorframe.

“We might have a lead.” He quickly filled his boss in on everything.

When Jack finished, his boss didn’t seem as pissed as he’d been the last couple of weeks. As the sheriff left the conference room, the only thing he ordered them to do was run a detailed check of Isabelle Ballantine and the man she worked with, Adam Marcellus. Something Jack had already planned to do.

“You ready to head to Ms. Barclay’s?” he asked his partner as he put on his sports coat.

“Sure, let me make a phone call first.” Before Jack could respond, Andrew had disappeared out the door.

As he waited, Jack stared at the bulletin board. This guy was taunting them. Jack’s eyes narrowed on one of the pictures. It was of the symbol the guy carved into his victims. Two half moons back to back. He and Andrew knew it was a clue. They just didn’t know what it meant.

They’d run it through the FBI’s ViCAP database and come up empty. It was possible this guy had gone on a serial raping spree somewhere else in the country but it was unlikely. Even if his DNA wasn’t in the system, his method of marking his victims would be. All his victims were seemingly disconnected from one another. But not to the killer. To him, there was something about the women he liked. Something specific.

He stared at the symbol as if it could tell him more. Unless he and his partner could figure out what the hell it was, this guy wasn’t going to stop. If anything, he was escalating with each attack. The next woman might not survive.

He pounded the center console of his rental car with his fist. After that near miss with that bitch Isabelle, he’d had to dump his truck and rent a car from two counties over. He’d eventually buy another truck, or perhaps a van, but he had to work fast.

As soon as he killed the Ballantine woman, he was moving to another town. Somewhere with a bigger population this time. Maybe Miami. There were a lot of people there illegally. People not willing to go to the cops.

For a split second he contemplated packing up and leaving right then, but that bitch had seen his face. On his way back into town, he’d seen her and her boyfriend pulling out of the police station. She might not remember much now, but the cops were closing in faster than he’d imagined and it was only a matter of time before she remembered seeing him at the bar.

Hell, she’d served him at least a dozen times. He had a face people forgot, but the way things were going, he was pushing his luck.

The police were holding a lot back from the public, but it was only a matter of time before they figured out how the girls were connected. He started his car and steered out of the parking lot. He’d followed Isabelle and her boyfriend to the pier, but it was obvious they were going to be a while. And he couldn’t afford to be caught loitering.

Didn’t matter anyway. He knew where she lived, and if the work schedule he had was correct, she worked the next two nights. Tomorrow was too soon, but if everything went according to his plan, he’d be able to grab her the next night. It would just take the right amount of planning.

After setting the timer, Izzy slid the casserole dish into the oven. Chicken Florentine was the easiest thing she knew how to make and it took limited prep time. Cooking the spinach had taken minutes before tossing all the ingredients into the dish. In less than thirty minutes it would be ready.

Adam was still in the shower washing off the salt and sand. The entire drive back to her place—all five minutes—he’d been giving her strange looks. Not necessarily bad, but she couldn’t figure out what was going on with him.

She’d taken her shower first and now he was taking his sweet time. She poured herself a glass of wine while she waited for the timer to go off, and all she could think about was the man in her shower. As they’d left the beach they’d both realized they hadn’t used a condom. She was on the Pill and he swore he was clean—and she believed him. She wasn’t worried about getting pregnant or anything, but she was worried about things getting too complicated. Adam was leaving.
Leaving.

And she’d gone and had sex without a condom. Something she’d never done before. It was a matter of trust. Around Adam she didn’t think straight though. With him, she felt that small grip of control she always held in relationships slipping away. She snorted to herself. Relationship? She’d been so sure of herself, so ready to have a quick fling with the hot bartender. Why couldn’t she think more like a guy?

“What smells so good?” Adam’s voice startled her.

She glanced up from staring into her wine glass to find Adam standing at the kitchen entrance wearing jeans and nothing else. Of course that top button was undone. Immediately her mouth watered and thoughts of food fled. She inwardly cursed. It was like she’d turned into some sort of sex maniac overnight.

As she ran her tongue over her bottom lip, hungrily thinking about what it would be like to do it on her kitchen table, the buzzer went off. She averted her gaze to his face and fought the heat rushing to her cheeks. “Chicken Florentine. I made extra so I hope you’re hungry.”

When she started to rise, he held up a hand. “Sit, I’ll serve you.”

“I could get used to this,” she murmured and took another sip of her wine. Instead of waiting, she walked up behind him and wrapped her arms around his waist.

“If you distract me like that, we’ll never actually get to eat today.” He chuckled.

The deep rumble vibrated from his body to her own, making her irrationally pleased. He didn’t laugh often, but when he did, it affected every nerve ending she had, straight to her pinky toes.

She ran her hands up his chest and lightly scraped her fingers over his skin before dropping her hands. She was starving and he was right. If they started something now, they’d likely never eat.

“Want a beer?” she asked.

“Please.” He set the large spoon down on the counter after serving both their plates and sat at the table while she grabbed him a drink.

Just as they both picked up their forks, Adam’s phone rang. He glanced at the caller ID, then cringed. “It’s the bar.”

She sighed and put her fork down. “Might as well answer it. With everything going on…”

He stared at his cell for a short beat, then flipped it open. “Yeah?”

Izzy was silent as he spoke. She gathered that he was probably talking to Toby, but his one-word answers didn’t give her much information.

Finally he snapped the phone shut and rubbed a hand over his five o’clock shadow. “Toby wants to know if we can come by in about an hour.”

“Is it work related?”

“I don’t think so. His cousin—Detective Dennis—is waiting for us.” He shook his head as he picked up his fork.

She bit back a sigh and took a bite of the casserole. If the cops wanted to see them again, she doubted it was because they had good news.
Just great.

Jack Dennis paced back and forth the length of his cousin Toby’s small office. After running a background check on Isabelle Ballantine he couldn’t believe who her family was. He didn’t understand why she was living in Coconut Bay, but she obviously had the money for protection and he wanted to convince her to get it or leave town. She’d caught a killer’s eye and if he could save one woman before this guy struck again, he’d do everything he could.

A shuffling sound made him turn toward the entry. Isabelle and Adam stood in the doorway.

“Ms. Ballantine, thank you for coming down here.”

She shot her boyfriend a hooded look, then returned his gaze. “Just call me Izzy. Where’s Toby?”

“He had some sort of liquor emergency. I think he went to the ABC store to pick up some extra bottles or something.”

She crossed her arms over her chest. “So why are we here?”

He pointed at the two folding chairs as he took a seat on Toby’s rolling chair. “You guys want to sit?”

She shrugged and the boyfriend shot him a protective glare. Instead of sitting, the other man leaned against one of the filing cabinets next to her. He’d run Adam Marcellus’s background too. Jack was thankful Isabelle had someone like Adam looking out for her. Mr. Marcellus had an impressive military record. Eight years with Force Recon in the Marines. Six of those were spent in Africa, Afghanistan and places Jack was sure weren’t on his record.

The reason Adam was in Coconut Bay was unclear since he owned a security company in Georgia. As far as Jack could tell, small-time security details weren’t his specialty and he and Izzy didn’t seem to have a working relationship. It was definitely more intimate. Since he’d been with Izzy during the attempted attack of Ms. Barclay though, he wasn’t a viable suspect. And anything else between them wasn’t his business.

“Where’s your partner?” Adam asked before he could speak.

“He’s following up on a lead…thanks to you.” He returned his gaze to Izzy. “I’m sorry I wasn’t more vocal at the station but you took me off guard dropping off that sketch.” After talking to Andrea Barclay, they’d decided to run with the picture. They’d faxed it to all motel and hotel owners in the area and they’d gotten one hit. Andrew had headed down there with one of the bike cops. Jack on the other hand had drawn the short straw and had to come down here personally on orders from Sheriff King.