“That’s actually genius.” He swallows, looking as if he might get sick. My skin is prickled from the sickness of it all, but I don’t let it be bigger in my mind than the image of him kissing me and holding me.
The door opens. “They got something. Let’s ride.” Rory nods at the hallway. I hop off the bed, fighting the dizziness. Dr. Dash grabs my arm, steadying me. I linger, feigning just how dizzy I actually am so I might stay in his grip a second longer. He smiles. “Maybe you should stay.”
I shake my head. “I’ve been living in her head for the equivalent of a solid week. I need to see this to the end.”
Rory kisses Angie on the cheek, remaining for a second to whisper something that earns him a wicked grin and a swat. She shakes her head at me. “I don’t know how you spend hours in a car alone with him.”
“He talks about you the whole time. It’s not so bad.” I wink at her and turn away.
He nudges me, glaring down. “Ya might keep some of those things to yourself. What happens on stakeout, stays on stakeout. Ya got me looking weak like a nancy to her. She won’t respect me for that.”
I chuckle, completely aware of the way their relationship works. “You like it when she disrespects you.”
He nods. “Aye, I do.” He opens the door to the roof when we get up the last flight of stairs. I remember the fear of heights and flying that came from Samantha Barnes and grin, refusing to let it get to me. “I’ll drive.”
He looks like he’s about to argue, but he doesn’t. He knows the things I take with me sometimes mess with my abilities at work. No one else knows. Turning on the engines, I sigh and let it all wash away. I have to conquer her fears in order to be rid of them. My palms sweat and my heart races, but I force it, lifting the helicopter into the air.
“How bad was it?” he finally asks when we are halfway to Geneva, Alabama.
“Bad. He used her to lure the girls, treated her like garbage, and locked her away under the house with a notch hole to watch everything he did. He whipped her when he caught her touching herself. That’s those marks on her back. He whipped her until she was unconscious.”
He blows his breath in disgust. “No bloody wonder she tried to kill herself.”
I nod, hating the fact she is a monster because he treated her like one her whole life. Had she been born to a family who loved her, all those little girls would still be alive.
“Where did you leave her?”
That’s the part that makes me smile. “With a new family in a beautiful home with a new memory.”
He sighs again. “At least that’s how she’ll die, with a mind full of good things.”
I don’t want to talk about it anymore, and I can tell he doesn’t either. We like the success, the closure. We dislike the thrill of the chase in their heads. He’s done three. He does the men, and I do the women. If we suspect who they might be, we watch them, stalk them, and get evidence on them as best as we can. But if we don’t know them at all, it’s a hard ride in their mind. Samantha Barnes never popped up on our radar until a week ago when she slit her wrists in the concrete back room of her work. She sat there, bleeding out on the cold floor. Knowing who she was in the system made the right people curious, but her bedside confession to a nurse started this process. She fell into a coma before we could get any information. But luckily I don’t need someone to be awake to give me everything they have.
I land the helicopter in a field near a police car. We hop out and run to it. My legs are shaky, but I force myself to be me, and I’m not scared of anything.
“We got the lake. It’s bad. Over twenty so far. The entire state is there, I swear it. We’ve blocked out media, but they’re trying to get in there.” The local police officer gets the door for us. I climb in the back, letting Rory sit in the front with him. He’s adorable; they always are. I love a man in uniform. My days in the military secured that in me.
“Are they dragging the lake?”
He nods. “Divers and dragging and five medical examiners. The FBI sent the forensics in. They’ve taken over the site.”
Rory grins back at me, making me answer with an eye roll. “I’m not scared of the FBI.”
The police officer chuckles. “Yeah, if I were you I wouldn’t be either. Whoever you are, the entire site has been told to let you in and give you everything you ask for.”
I nod. “Excellent.”
He looks worried. “My boss told me if you asked for my virginity I was to give that up.”
Rory and I both chuckle at his reddened cheeks. “I mean, I’m not a virgin.”