“Both kinds?”
Kim grinned impishly. “You know, being ravished and being the ravisher.”
“Ah.” Nikki smiled. “In D/s circles we aficionados call that being a switch.” She winked. “Someday I’ll enlighten ya, little girl.”
Kim got a mild chuckle out of that.
They were silent for a minute, and then Kim said, “You know, this is amazing.”
Nikki raised an eyebrow. “I don’t follow. What do you mean?”
“I mean that less than two days after surviving what is arguably the worst night of our respective lives, we are able to smile. Laugh, even. I think that’s amazing.”
“I think it’s called coping.” Nikki sighed. “I can’t speak for you, but I’ve been trying not to think about it. Right now it still feels surreal. Almost like it happened to someone else.”
“I know what you mean,” Kim replied, her gaze thoughtful.
“Of course, the two cops camped out next door to my apartment are a good reminder of who it did actually happen to.”
“Yeah, I’ll just bet.”
They turned the topic, opting to discuss other things for the remainder of the ride to Kim’s house. By the time the colonial-style brick mansion loomed into view, both of them were feeling hungry.
“Let’s make something light,” Nikki said as she helped Kim from the rental car. “I’m ravenous, but my stomach is still feeling the effects of . . . well, you know.”
“Yeah,” Kim sighed. “Mine, too.”
They decided on tuna salad sandwiches and pretzel sticks with soda—or “pop,” as they call soda in Northeastern Ohio. An hour later, they had eaten, gotten Kim propped up in bed surrounded by all the latest and greatest romance-novel releases, and Nikki had checked her ankle. Satisfied that it wasn’t swollen, she stood up, preparing to go to work.
“I don’t like the idea of you being here alone,” Nikki said, her gaze seeking out Kim’s.
“I’ll be fine. Really.”
“Uh huh.” Nikki frowned. “Seems to me that’s what all the heroines in the movies say right before they get a pickax through the heart.”
Kim rolled her eyes. “You’re the heroine in this movie, babe. I’m just the boring secondary character.”
“Ah. Even better!” Nikki folded her arms under her breasts. “The secondary characters get killed off for sure. Only instead of the pickax going through their heart, they get it in the forehead.”
Kim’s eyes widened. “Gee wiz. Thanks for the pep talk. Do you work at a suicide hotline in your spare time, by chance? If not, you’ve missed your calling.”
“I’m being serious.”
“I know. And you’re scaring the shit out of me, okay?” She swallowed roughly, waving a hand over her leg. “I’m kind of at a disadvantage here if Lucifer decides to come calling. The last thing I need is to be freaked out about it.”
Nikki sighed. The police had assured her that “Richard” couldn’t possibly know who Kim was or where she lived. Only the CPD was aware of those facts. That was no doubt true. From “Richard’s” standpoint, Kim had probably just seemed like a passing-by do-gooder. And if he had given who she was any thought, he’d assume she lived in Cleveland, not Hudson. But still . . .
“I have to go to work,” Nikki murmured. “I can’t afford for people to start asking questions. But I really, really,
big-time
really do not want you here alone.”
Kim sighed, looking every inch the martyr. “I know where this conversation is going, and I won’t do it. Besides, the cops drive by on the hour to make sure I’m okay.”
“And the other fifty-five minutes of each hour? You have to.”
“No!”
“Kim . . .”
“All right!” she huffed. “All right, you win. I’ll phone my stepmother.” Her look promised retribution. “But if she shows up here drunk . . .”
“It’s still better than being alone.”
“Oh yeah, I can see how she’d be a big help,” Kim said sarcastically. “If the killer shows up maybe he’ll think she’s pulling Jedi mind tricks on him when all she’s doing is slurring her words. Hey, at least it gives me time to hobble out of here.”
Nikki grinned. “Kimmie, you’re positively funny when you’re on edge.”
She grumbled something incoherent under her breath. “Go to work.”
“He’s very uncomfortable around women,” Dr. Sydney
Horace said, her spectacles perched on the end of her nose. She glanced up from the paperwork she was shuffling through on her desk. “In fact, it’s a safe bet that he’s more than uncomfortable. I’d say he’s downright afraid of them. Growing up, he probably had an abusive mother or mother figure that he regarded as omnipotent, godlike, if you will. A normal vantage point from any child. A viewpoint that can turn into something deadly if that power is abused.”
Thomas absently glanced around the forensic psychologist’s minimalist office before turning his head to frown at her. “That’s hardly an excuse, Syd,” he growled.
Her eyebrows shot up. “Hey, big guy,” the older woman said. “You and I have been colleagues for years. Friends, too. You know me better than to suggest I’m excuse-making for this sicko.”
He sighed. “I’m sorry,” he muttered. “It’s been a long couple of days.”
“I’ll just bet. You look like shit.”
“Gee, thanks.”
She smiled. “Here’s the thing, Thomas. Richard and Nikki spent an entire month emailing back and forth. I hold no doubt but that Lucifer fell in love with her during that time period. And yet, in love as he probably was, once he revealed himself to her he didn’t have the courage to so much as carry on a face to face conversation before striking. That’s telling, I think.”
Thomas nodded. “True. Plus it’s easier to regard a victim as an
it
instead of as a
person
when you don’t actually speak to them face to face.”
“There is that.” Dr. Horace sighed as she ran a hand through her short, fashionably cropped silver hair. “Let’s see, what else . . .”
He snorted. “Been a long couple of days for you, too, I see.”
She winked before glancing back down at her paperwork. “He’s highly intelligent, but probably doesn’t perform well in life, your classic underachiever.” She glanced up. “He might have difficulty holding down a job, or if he’s held a steady job for years, he probably hasn’t moved up much from the position he first started in.”
Thomas filed that away for future reference. “Anything else?”
Dr. Horace removed her spectacles and placed them on the desk. “Based upon the rudimentary physical descriptions given by both living victims at the latest crime scene, and some of the phraseologies ‘Richard’ repeatedly used in his emails, I’d put him at, oh . . . mid-thirties to very early forties at best.”
“Can you pinpoint what type of a job or jobs he might work at?”
She frowned. “Statistically speaking, men like him tend to work at menial labor because they can only hold down odd jobs. You don’t find odd jobs in the white-collar labor force. Not to the extent you do in the blue-collar world at any rate.”
“From your tone of voice, I sense a but coming on here.”
The forensic psychologist shook her head and sighed. “His writing is terribly educated, Thomas. Almost pompous.
I have to wonder if someone as arrogant as Lucifer here would think menial labor beneath him.”
Thomas chewed that over for a protracted moment before nodding. “Thanks, Syd.” He slowly rose to his feet, tugging at his necktie. “Is there anything else, or does that cover it?”
“Only what you’ve probably already guessed, my friend.” She rose to her feet and handed him a copy of the report she would be submitting. She waited for him to meet her gaze before continuing. “The prey got away, Thomas. He’s feeling very anxious right now and very much like a failure. He’s going to need his ego soothed—soon.”
They held each other’s gaze in silence for a long pause.
“How soon?” Thomas murmured.
Dr. Horace shrugged. “That’s anyone’s guess, you know that. Early in his ‘career’ he struck once every few years. Now the ante has been upped to once every eleven or twelve months. All I can say for sure is that it’ll happen way before a calendar year comes and goes. Sexual sadists tend to be very ritualistic, Thomas. You’ve screwed up his pattern. You can best believe the need for release has got him wound tighter than a drum.”
An uneasy feeling settled in his gut. “You don’t suppose he’d try for the same prey twice, do you?” Nikki’s place was under constant surveillance even though, realistically speaking, serial killers don’t tend to fixate on lost prey. They simply move on, finding someone a bit more vulnerable to attack. Then again, most serial killers didn’t put the amount of effort into luring victims as Lucifer did. They tended to be too disorganized for that. This one was more organized and selective than most.
“I don’t know,” Sydney said honestly. Her eyebrows drew together. “It’s a distinct possibility that shouldn’t be overlooked. With this UNSUB, you simply never know.”
Work had been a true respite from the horror of her
personal life. Nikki had been given no time to think about Tuesday night or the aftermath that resulted from it. No time to think about all of the obscene, blood-chilling things Richard had planned to do to her. No time to think about the Mercedes she needed to trade in, the two undercover cops camping out in the unfinished apartment next to hers, or whether or not Richard would try to finish the job he had started.
No time to think about Detective Thomas Cavanah. And the fact that, by now, he had probably read most, if not all, of those embarrassing emails.
She blushed. She’d never be able to look him in the eye again.
Thankfully, however, she probably wouldn’t have occasion to come face to face with the gruff-looking cop again. Unless Richard made another move or more evidence surfaced.
She didn’t know why she was so mortified by the idea of Thomas reading those emails when that knowledge didn’t particularly affect her one way or another where the other detectives were concerned. Perhaps because, if she was honest with herself, she had been aware of Thomas Cavanah as a man in those few brief minutes they had spent together. Aware of him in a way in which she hadn’t been aware of the others.
She sighed, telling herself there was no use in thinking about that glimmer of attraction let alone mentally admitting to it. Even if he had been aware of her as a woman, which she doubted, their relationship was strictly professional.
“Leaving for the night, Doctor?”
Nikki’s head shot up. She smiled at the young nurse whose face she recognized, but whose name she couldn’t recall. “As soon as I change into my street clothes, I’m out of here. Page me if you need me.”
“Will do.”
“Same with me,” a male voice muttered. “I’m leaving for the night.”
Nikki’s body stiffened. She recognized Dr. Sorenson’s voice, of course, but pretended obliviousness to it. She didn’t know why the man had it out for her, but she conceded that he did. Mentally speaking, she wasn’t up for any of his crap tonight. Putting up with the sniveling whiner was difficult on a normal evening. These days she felt anything but normal.
The rivalry between them, at least in Dr. Sorenson’s mind, had begun several months ago when the chief of staff had overlooked the senior surgeon in lieu of Nikki for a promotion. Sorenson had been at Cleveland General longer, but Nikki now was, for all intents and purposes, his superior.
The perceived insult had never been forgotten. Every time Nikki turned around he was making insinuations about her lack of ability, or lack of moral character, to the chief of staff. Once, when she and a fellow physician in a different department had been dating, Sorenson had seen them holding hands in the hallway. He had become indignant, complaining to their mutual boss that Nikki’s brazen public behavior was not befitting a surgeon.
Nikki had shrugged the complaint off, feeling it was ludicrous. Luckily, the chief of staff had agreed.
There had been other, similar complaints against Nikki put forth by Dr. Sorenson in the past year. She knew her boss didn’t take them seriously, but Nikki was intelligent enough to be cautious wherever her alleged rival was concerned. She couldn’t understand how or why her fellow surgeon had held a grudge for so long, but she supposed it didn’t matter. The point was, he did.
Finished scribbling out her notes on the last patient she’d seen, Nikki filed them away in the proper folder. She turned on her heel to leave.
“Good night to you, too, Dr. Adenike,” she heard Dr. Sorenson sarcastically mumble under his breath.
She came to an immediate halt, her back still to the other doctor. Her nostrils flaring, she took a deep breath, reminding herself that he wasn’t worth getting upset over.
Nikki slowly turned around, cocking her head to regard him. Michael Sorenson was a tall man, a big man, with a well-honed musculature that bespoke of athleticism. He was also, she begrudgingly admitted, a rather handsome man. Quiet. Socially withdrawn. But still handsome. It was too bad the fates had wasted such superior physical attributes on a venomous man.
Their gazes clashed. He immediately glanced away, unable to hold her stare. No surprise there, she thought acerbically. He might be tall, muscular, and hate-filled, but he was also a wimp.
“Good night, Dr. Sorenson,” Nikki calmly replied. She inclined her head. “Have a good evening.”
“Here’s the report you requested, Detective.”
Thomas glanced up from where he’d been going over notes at his desk. His gaze absently raked over the plump female file clerk who’d been employed by the CPD for thirty and some-odd years. He’d always rather liked Nan. She was an overly serious type, but kind, pretty, and efficient. “Oh good. You found it. I was afraid the original report my partner filed on the Pinoza case was lost forever.”
Nan’s arms folded under her breasts. “It is. Luckily, it turns out I made a back-up copy before we switched filing systems four years ago.”