She hated the fact that Amanda was being referred to as the victim, but she understood the need to distance. She knew what it meant to be a cop’s wife. They dealt with the worst things a human could see. They had to have distance to do their jobs and maintain some sanity. “Yes.”
His blue eyes held a wealth of sympathy and he reached out for her hand, grasping it between his. “Then I’m especially sorry for your loss.”
Derek was right there, grasping her elbow and pulling her away from the lovely Ranger. “We need to move on. We have very little time. According to everything we know about this guy, he’ll strike again in the next two weeks.”
Her head was whirling a bit as Derek hauled her toward the conference table and pulled out a chair for her. If she’d had a minute to think about it, she would have found another chair out of sheer stubbornness, but he moved so fast, she found herself settled in next to him in an instant. “We know something about this guy?”
She didn’t even know there was a guy on their radar. The last time she’d talked to the local police, they were checking out Tanya’s ex-boyfriend as the main suspect. She seriously doubted the college kid had been running around killing subs.
Derek frowned her way, but then that was his usual expression when it came to her. “Why did you ask if this was a serial case? Do you know something?”
She bit her bottom lip, a nervous habit. So they didn’t know? “I’m kind of working a case.”
His frown deepened. “A case? What kind of a case?”
“I started working a missing persons case a few weeks ago. The girl was playing in some clubs. Tanya Wilson. My missing person became a murder investigation.”
There it went again. If he frowned any more, she was pretty sure his face would turn in on itself. “The second victim?”
She felt her eyes widen. She’d known there was more to this. It just felt wrong to her. “How many vics have we got so far?”
Holy shit. She’d been hunting a serial. She’d had that feeling in the pit of her gut. It was why she hadn’t been to Sanctum for weeks. She’d been busy letting herself be seen at the more dangerous clubs, the ones Tanya had frequented.
Alex sat down in front of her, Eve sliding in on his side. “Four that we’ve found. Karina, there’s something you should know.”
“What?” Yes, something was so wrong because Alex put a hand over hers as though giving her comfort for the horror to come.
“The Rangers identified the woman he’s targeting as his next victim.”
A little thrill ran through her and now she let herself grin. Oh, she was good. Damn good. Now that she knew what was going on, there was really only one reason to bring her in. Only one reason Alex looked scared to give her the news.
He had no idea she’d been trying to make this happen for weeks.
“It’s you, Karina,” Derek said with a grim finality.
“Fuck, yeah!” She got out of her chair and did a little fist pump. “Finally something goes right.”
She couldn’t help but notice Derek had turned the brightest shade of red.
Well, she couldn’t win them all.
Chapter Two
Derek herded her into his office. Herded? Hell, he’d practically picked her hot ass up and run away with her after the hour-long briefing because all he could think about was wiping that self-satisfied smile off her face. From the moment she’d fist pumped like a teenager winning a video game, he’d thought of nothing but getting her alone.
Karina Mills thought it was awesome that she’d managed to get a serial killer to notice her? Well, she was going to get some serious attention from her brand new Dom, and there was no way she was going to like it.
She turned on her heels, a frown on that gorgeous face of hers. “All right, Detective. You’ve got me alone. You want to tell me what crawled up your ass and died a slow and obviously painful death?”
He was going to enjoy the next few moments because it was painfully obvious to him that she hadn’t understood a damn thing about the way this was going to work. Clayton Hill had used technical words like “liaise” and “report to.” Derek was about to use a few words Karina would fully recognize and then he’d see if she was still ready to jump up and down with excitement.
He ignored her very rude question as he walked around his office, shutting the blinds with a careful hand. Privacy was required for what he was about to do. He could hear her foot begin to tap against the floor.
She was such an impatient woman. They would have to work on that.
He took a minute to gather himself, to calm down. They had to work together. This was a serious case. Alex and Eve McKay were still closed up with the Rangers and their forensic expert, going over all the technical details that would help Eve profile their killer. Sean and Liam were on their way to Karina’s apartment to set up additional security, including cameras. They were going to take jobs at one of the clubs Karina had been frequenting.