Eye of the Storm (The Storm Series) (13 page)

“We’ll talk about this later. Right now, we both need some sleep. Tomorrow is going to be a rough day.”

“Yes, it will be. But hopefully something will come of it. But I’m not sure how I will be able to sleep knowing he is here.”

“Do you want to go out to Noah’s? At least, that way you will be surrounded by security.”

“What and leave you here by yourself? Not a chance.”

“I’m a big boy. I can take care of myself.”

“Yes, you can, but that doesn’t mean I still won’t worry. Nope, I’m staying here.”

“Fine, I’ll walk you home.”

“No, here as in the cottage.”

“Like hell.”

“Like hell, I am.”

“No.”

“Yes. You know I can do this all night. You might as well give in. If it makes you feel any better, I’ll sleep on the couch. That way you won’t have to worry about your virtue.” She was willing to do whatever it took in order to be close to him. It always made her feel better, safer to be near him.

“Come here.” He held his hand out to her. She walked over, placing hers in his, and he pulled her close. “I would feel better knowing exactly where you are. But we’ll have to sleep in the same bed. I don’t want you in the other room.”

Evie hoped they would both be able to get some sleep. But if they were going to stay awake, might as well make it torture on him.

“I need to get some things at the house for the night.”

“Let’s go.”

~*~

Jeremy sat there and stared at the screen, there was Evie washing the dishes. He was happy that he had thought ahead to wear a camera for tonight’s adventures. Watching as her face filled the screen as he approached the window, the horror on her face was priceless. He froze the picture when her mouth was open. Stroking himself harder and harder until he finally came, spewing cum all over her face on the screen.

Evie walked into her grandmother’s house in a bad mood. It did not get any better seeing Jackson there waiting for her.

“‘Bout time you showed up. Doing the walk of shame?”

“Perv. No, there is no walk of shame.”
Not for lack of trying on my part.

He stopped her when she tried to walk by. “Do you really think this is the smartest thing to do?”

“What are you talking about Oh Wise One?”

“Spending all this time with Anthony? Spending the night over there? Come on, he’s got a psychopath stalker killing people he’s close to and you can’t get closer than sleeping together.”

“That is all we did. Sleep.”

“Ahh… so that’s what has you in such a pissy mood. No nookie for you.”

“Shut up. We are going to Lexi and Noah’s in a bit to go over everything.”

“Really? This I’ve got to see. I’m coming.”

“No, you’re not.”

“It’s not up to you. I’ll call Lexi, I’m sure she’d love me to be there. Or maybe Noah, we seemed to hit it off.”

“No, Jackson, you can’t go. Who’s going to keep an eye on Grandma?” She thought she had him there.

“Not a problem, I’ll drop her off with the rest of the Trio, remember, it’s Thursday.”

“Fuck.”

He just laughed at her.

A thought crossed her mind. “You know, someone really needs to stay with them and make sure they don’t get into any trouble.”

“Not going to work. They’ve been going without supervision for years. They can’t get into much trouble.”

“Famous last words.”

“Plus Noah, put a security detail on them after last night.”

“Oh, they will love that.”

“Yeah, Grams is up there putting on her makeup right now.”

“Wonderful.”

“Now, you need to move it. I’m ready, but seriously, Sis, you need some work. You look like shit.”

“Asshole.” She punched him in the stomach as she walked by, satisfied when he grunted in pain.

~*~

“Shotgun,” Jackson yelled as he raced to the car.

“Grow up.” Evie yelled after him.

“Never!” He tried to open the door and frowned when it was locked.

Anthony held up the keyfob to him. “Ladies should always get their choice of seats.”

Jackson scowled at him. “Have you met my sister? I don’t think ‘lady’ is even in her vocabulary.”

Anthony raised his eyebrows at him. “And a true gentlemen would never even dream of saying something like that about any woman.”

Evie walked over and thrust her hip toward Jackson’s to bump him out of the way nodding towards Anthony. “See? You could learn a lot from him.” She just grinned as Anthony opened the door and helped her in.

She couldn’t hear what they said to each other after her door was closed but based on the grim looks on their faces, it wasn’t good. She looked back over her shoulder and gave her brother a look, she never liked it when he went all protective big brother on her.

~*~

Evie was so happy when they finally pulled into Lexi and Noah’s. She wanted to slap Jackson so bad. He had scooted up so that his head was in between theirs, talking the whole time about growing up and how much trouble Evie got into.

Noah stood at the door waiting for them. Before anyone could say anything, he spoke. “I’ll kick you out of here so fast you won’t know what hit you if this gets too much for Lexi.”

Anthony nodded. “I understand. I’d feel the same way. Thank you for allowing this.”

Evie snorted. “Oh, and like Lexi has no say in the matter. Men.”

Noah grabbed her in a headlock. “You know what we meant.”

“Yes, us poor, little, weak women. We couldn’t make a decision on our own if it wasn’t for you big, strong men.” She batted her eyes at him. After elbowing him in the gut so that he’d let her go, she said, “Now where are the womenfolk? I need more estrogen.”

Evie walked into the room and saw Lexi standing by the kitchen counter with Kat right next to her. She thought she heard her brother gasp but when she turned around he had his poker face on.

Not sure on what to do next, Evie walked over to Lexi giving her a hug. “Thank you,” she whispered in her ear.

Taking a deep breath, Lexi stepped forward. With tears in her eyes she said to Anthony, “I’m so sorry. I didn’t know. I can’t image what you have gone through, and part of it is my fault.”

Anthony stayed where he was. “It’s really not your fault. I just hope one day you can see the man I am and not him.”

“Well, she’s not going to have to worry about that since you’ll be leaving soon and she’ll never see you again,” Kat said from the background.

Evie turned to Kat. “What makes you say that?”

“He’s got no reason to be here. He gets what he wants and leaves. Isn’t that what you do?”

Evie was surprised by the venom in Kat’s words. They’d spent time together since she was always by Lexi’s side, but she knew her to be reserved and not say much. Every once in a while, she would let loose and they were able to have some laughs.

“Kat!” Evie could tell by the sound of Lexi’s voice that she was just as shocked by what Kat had said.

Kat looked down. “Sorry. It’s just that for over a year now all I have done is studied everything about Anthony and Jeremy; looking at picture after picture, knowing what he is capable of. Watching over Lexi so that Jeremy doesn’t get another chance. So to see him,” she pointed to Anthony, “being able to just walk right in here. It makes my trigger finger twitch.”

Noah walked over to Lexi and moved her away from Kat. “Well, maybe you should leave. We can have someone else come up here while Anthony is here.”

She shook her head. “No,
I
can control myself.”

Evie wondered what she was really getting at. She moved over to Anthony and grabbed his hand so that he was forced to follow her to the living room. She felt a tingle between her shoulder blades but she was sure it was worse for Anthony. After sitting down, so they were facing everyone else she said, “Let’s get started.”

~*~

They worked long into the evening. Sam and Martha made sure that they had enough food and were taken care of. Between Noah’s and Anthony’s men they had a lot of paperwork.

Evie’s anxiety increased as the sun went down. Knowing Jeremy was close by and the curtains were open wasn’t helping. She finally had to say something and Noah pushed a button and all of the curtains came down. Feeling like she could concentrate again, they got back to it.

They created a map of the murders and a summary of each. Going over what Anthony and Evie had learned about Natalie Sutton, Anthony’s parents, and Christina Cooper.

“So Lexi, based on what Jeremy told you Tiffani was the first right?” asked Jackson.

“Yes. From what he said he loved her but she dumped him for Anthony. He couldn’t take that and killed her. He tried to set Anthony up, but he was out with a friend that night.”

“An old friend popped into town that day and called me last minute to go have a drink. He just went through a bad break-up and wanted some advice. Lucky for me, I guess.”

“Then there was Natalie, the maid, and Anthony’s parents. Boy, he was busy there for a few months. Between that and the model in Paris, Monique Diaz that makes his murders international. Not too smart there.” Evie was letting Jackson go through all of this. He was late to the game and she knew that talking it out was how he processed.

“We didn’t get a chance to go over to Paris while we were in London. After finding out my parents were murdered, I wanted to get back here as soon as possible. Besides, a friend had set us up to go to that art opening together. We’d never met before then, another spur of the moment thing.” Anthony shrugged.

“As far as the police reports go, they found nothing unusual about her or what led up to her murder.”

“Next,” Jackson continued, “We have the first grade teacher that was at a conference in L.A., Chelle Michaels. Yet again, another where circumstances came together and she was murdered. So far, five had some kind of long term relationship with Anthony; the next two were essentially in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

“Then there was Heather Roberts. Now she was a kick-boxing instructor, so you would assume she had some moves on her. That must mean she was completely taken by surprise. Although, all Jeremy had to do was show up as you.” He nodded towards Anthony. “And he’d be in. She would’ve let her guard down. But they never found her. That makes me wonder. Did he really kill her, or maybe she just took off on her own to start a new life.”

Evie thought about that for a minute. “It would make sense except for the fact she was part owner in the boxing club. She would’ve drained her portion of the business down. She had two children and by all accounts they were a close, loving family. No, I don’t think she just took off. We need to find some way to put Jeremy at each of the locations.”

“Airline manifests? Is that even possible?” asked Jackson.

Anthony thought for a moment. “I might be able to get them. Not sure if it is completely legal, but I know someone who might be able to.”

Evie jumped up. “If we can see flights around the same time the murders took place, we might be able to tie it to him.”

“It will take a couple of days, at least,” Anthony said.

“Well, then why don’t we take a trip to St. Thomas? Since she was never found it seems like a good place to start.” Evie said.

“Why do you have to go?” Lexi asked quietly.

Evie walked over and sat down next to her. “Because I have to. Because I can. This is what I can do to help.”

“I don’t like it.”

“Neither do I. If I had it my way, she wouldn’t be going at all. But the stubborn woman she is, she’d probably just hop a flight and follow me,” Anthony stated.

Lexi gave a little laugh. “You
do
know her well.” She looked between the two of them.

Clearing his throat, Jackson continued. “So then we have Lexi. And Anthony going to prison. As far as we can tell, he didn’t kill again until Christina Cooper. Which brings us back to Lexi again. Is that it?”

Evie and Anthony looked at each other before Anthony said, “Not quite. When we were searching his New York apartment, we found another woman. The police have tried to keep it quiet but the lady’s name was Jackie Olsen. She had been seeing someone for the past year, but none of her friends had ever seen him. They searched her place and found DNA that matches Jeremy. It appears that he’s becoming sloppy since he has nothing to hide now.”

“That poor woman. To be fooled for so long and to have it end that way.” Lexi said.

“Just be thankful you didn’t see it.” Evie shuddered.

“He’s got to be stopped.” Noah’s fist hit the table.

“That he does. So Anthony and I will take a quick trip. Hopefully the information we need will be here when we get back. Then we can all start going through it and see where it takes us.”

Lexi got up and hugged Evie tight. “Please stay safe. After everything he’s taken I couldn’t bear it if I lost you, too. I love you.”

“I love you, too.” Evie looked at Anthony over Lexi’s head. Her attention was sidetracked by the look of hatred on Kat’s face. It would seem Kat was having a hard time separating the two men.

~*~

Jeremy rubbed his hands together. It couldn’t be going any better if he’d planned the whole thing himself. Thinking it was a stroke of genius, he’d made up for Lexi and Noah a plaque from the Humane Society thanking them for their donation that said ‘Pepper’s Grub – Keep your paws off.’ As he was hoping, they put it above her food and water dishes, which gave him the perfect view of the living room from the kitchen. Since he had made sure someone from the Humane Society had delivered it to them somehow, thankfully it had bypassed security. He was able to see and hear everything that was said. Laughing at the fact it hadn’t been discovered yet, he listened closely to what was being said just a few miles from where he was.

Anthony and Evie were able to get a flight out the next morning so by late afternoon they were in the warm tropics. Since there was nothing they could do until tomorrow, they decided to have a nice dinner on the patio of their room. Anthony didn’t want them in separate rooms, not even adjoining and Evie had to admit, she was happy they would be sharing a bed.

Her hopes were dashed when he fell asleep quickly. Lying there staring at the ceiling, she wondered how one moment he could be so protective and loving and the next turn it off. She supposed it had to do with all of the loss he’s suffered and being locked up for all those years.