“If that was your attempt to discipline me, I was playing the wrong game. But I’m here now. Give it a go again.”
“Don’t tempt me, Kane. I’m still furious with you for drugging me. And how did you get in here?”
“It wasn’t locked and the bar wasn’t in place.”
“Bullshit.”
“It wasn’t locked, Lilah, and I checked it before I left this morning. You haven’t used it?”
“Fuck. No. I haven’t, which means someone’s been in here again.”
His brow lifts. “Again? What the hell does that mean?”
“I have it handled.”
“We do this together, Lilah. We agreed.”
“Together means together, Kane. Not you charging forward and dragging me along.”
“Just dragging you to my side, beautiful, instead of letting you run ahead of me. What the hell does ‘again’ mean?”
“I’m not running from you, Kane, which we both know was your inference. And to answer your question, one of the first notes was left on my desk upstairs.”
“Which means Junior saw your investigation notes.”
“And you know this because you looked at my investigation notes.”
“Yes. I did. Don’t expect guilt. I prefer my dirty emotions to include you naked. Otherwise, I don’t waste the energy. I assume since you’re you, you’ve checked the house and it’s clear?”
“I did, but obviously I need a new security system.”
“I’m your new security system. Have you received any more notes?”
“You are not my security system, and no, I have not, which brings us back to you and your protection. Obviously, Junior knows I’m being watched. We can’t catch whoever this is if your person is breathing down my throat.”
“There are too many dead bodies for me to back off, Lilah. And whoever this is won’t stay hidden long. They have an objective.”
“Maybe it was to scare me off.” My brow furrows. “Unless . . .”
“Unless?” he prods.
“If the murders in LA were meant to bring me here, and Junior seems to be driving me away, then Junior isn’t the same person.”
“Possibly, though Junior could simply be taunting you with a bigger endgame.”
“Taunt me and then kill me?”
“Or taunt me and then kill you.”
“Whoever hired the assassin clearly wanted them disrobed and humiliated before they were killed. That speaks of anger and hatred. What if, in my case, that anger and hatred runs deeper, thus my humiliation is to be drawn out?”
“You need out of this house. You need to stay with me.”
“I don’t need a babysitter, Kane. I’m an FBI agent and you’re—”
“My father’s son? Like you’re your father’s daughter?”
“That line is getting old. Come up with a new one.”
“You want new? How about this? Quit the FBI. Consult instead.”
“And then I can be with you?”
“Yes. Then you can be with me.”
“Then you lose your insider in law enforcement.”
“I have insiders in law enforcement,” he says. “What I don’t have is you.”
“You want what you can’t have.”
“And yet,” he says, “I’ve had you and I still want you.”
“Had,” I say. “Not anymore.”
“Are you sure about that?”
“Yes. Tell me about your meeting with those New York City assholes.”
“They tried to connect me to Woods. And you’re right to assume that they’re posturing to take over and push you out. Your turn. Tell me about Rick Suthers.”
“You know.” I don’t give him time to respond. I hold up a hand. “Of course you know.”
“Was it suicide?” he presses.
“No. It was not. It was just like with Laney: a copycat murder of hers made to look like suicide. He was standing on books that should have scattered, but they didn’t: just like Laney.” I grab the book and set it between us, a fist forming in my chest. “And this was one of the books.”
He looks at it and then me. “How long had he been dead when you got there?”
“Fresh.”
“Who knew you were going there?”
“No one knew I was going to see him, but obviously the right someone knew I was in that region of the island. I assume that was the trigger. Whoever this was may not have planned for me to find the body.”
“The book says you were expected.”
“I would have asked to see the case-file notes no matter what.” My mind tracks back to the crime scene, and I reach into my pocket for the necklace. “I found this in what I believe was the bag holding the suit I’m fairly certain he wore to Laney’s funeral,” I say, setting it on the counter.
He picks it up and holds it in his hand before looking at me. “Virgin Mary.” He sets it beside the book. “And there’s no such thing as a coincidence, right?”
“You know way too much about how I solve crimes. And I don’t believe for a minute that the necklace isn’t connected to those tattoos. Shared symbols mean an organization.” I lift the book. “And this. This was someone telling me to back the fuck off, which makes me believe that I wasn’t lured back here at all. I’m being told to get the hell out of town.”
“A tattooed victim in your region can’t be a coincidence.”
“Maybe not,” I concede. “And on that note, was the lead the old man gave me a setup?”
“Could be, or the person who gave us the clue got busted and confessed what they told us.”
“Right. Talk about a cat-and-mouse game. I’m feeling like we’re the mice.”
“We’re not the mice. Not even close.”
“Our enemy knows who we are, but we don’t know who they are. What do you know about the production company?”
“On the surface, there are no connections that look interesting, but I have their banking transactions being traced. That’s where we will find the answers we’re looking for.”
“When?”
“By tomorrow.” He circles back. “Are you sure no one knew you were going to Suthers?”
“I called Beth hours before I got to Long Island. She knew I was headed that way. We sidetracked the tail I had, and then there was my brother and you.” A thought hits me. “Actually, I did mention Suthers to Greg at lunch today, but it was a flippant, barely spoken mention.”
“He knows you. You don’t do flippant and meaningless.”
“I don’t believe it was Greg. And you like Greg.”
“I don’t like Greg. I simply don’t dislike him. And everyone has a price.”
“What’s yours?”
He pushes off the island and walks around it. By the time he’s on this side with me, I’m facing him, the barstool at my back. “You are, Lilah.” He steps closer, and I don’t back away.
“I don’t want to be a weapon that can be used against you.”
“Anyone who believes they can get away with turning you into that will suffer, and painfully.” He doesn’t give me time to object. “You didn’t cause that man’s death.”
“I know that,” I say, and I feel the pull between us, a warning to back away, and I do, hitting the stool. Kane moves with me, and I end up with my back to the island, his hands on either side of me.
“You didn’t cause his death,” he repeats.
“I told you. I know.”
“Do you?” he demands.
“Yes, damn it, I do.”
“Because if you let it fuck with your head,” he says as if I haven’t spoken, “you’ll get careless and end up dead, and you don’t get to die, Lilah. Understand?”
“I’m not going to die.”
“No. You are not. And as for me wanting what I can’t have, we both know you have me confused with Pretty Boy.” He pushes off the counter. “You know where to find me,” he says before he walks away.
My jaw sets and I follow him, bringing the living ro
om, and him, into view as he reaches the sliding glass doors, at least ten things on my tongue ready to be shouted. All of which I know will piss him off and bring him right back to me. But I’m saved from that stupidity, which would have created a fight, followed by fucking, when he steps outside and shuts the door. Gone. He wants me to follow, but he’s smart enough not to expect me to. And I’m not going to either. But I do charge forward, locking the door and sliding the bar back into place.
I lock him out and then turn to face the house. Someone was here again. The question is, what did they do when they were here?
I search my house and check my camera feed, which is illogically clear. Every window. Every door. Every drawer. And I come up with nothing. There are no signs that anyone has been here. Once I’m 100 percent certain that the house is clear, I grab everything I’ve set up in the kitchen and move to a big cushy chair in the corner of the living room that gives me a view of every door in the house. The giant ottoman becomes my table, and I settle on the floor in front of it with my back to the chair. Everything I need is nearby. Note cards and Cujo to my left. Pizza and cookie boxes, field bag, the book, and necklace to my right. My computer and a plate of pizza and cookie in front of me. I also have a towel over the cream-colored cushion, guarding it from my ravenous, hunger-induced messiness. Not because I care about the cushion but because my mother would care, and this house still feels like hers.
I log on to a private e-mail server and find Tic Tac online. I direct-message: What do you have for me? A tactic that spares him the necessity of hearing me talk with my mouth full, which my current state of starvation would otherwise require.
The murders are spread out: two in LA, one in New York City, one in East Hampton. You are the only common denominator to tie the cases together. You were on three out of four of the cases. I’m e-mailing you the list anyway.
Four out of six, I think, if we include Laney and her brother, but, of course, Tic Tac and Murphy have no idea there’s a probable connection. I finish a slice of pizza and drop another on my plate before typing: What else?
I’m also e-mailing you a list of anyone I can find who is easily connected to that production company you asked about. I don’t see anything that stands out, but you might. I don’t know what you’re looking for to dig deeper.
This is dangerous territory I should never have ventured into with him and that I now attempt to sidestep by typing: It’s a far-fetched lead anyway. I’ll look and let you know if you need to continue.
I disconnect with him and go invisible online before pulling the e-mail list he’s sent me. By the time I’m done, I’ve shoved aside my pizza and come up with nothing. The murders are spread out, with different case personnel. I really am the only common denominator. I pick up the book and the necklace and set them on the ottoman. Correction: me and the Virgin Mary are the only common denominators. Correction again: me, the Virgin Mary, and the killer. And Kane. He’s connected to my attack, the Virgin Mary, and the local murder.
I grab a stack of note cards and write out all the names Tic Tac e-mailed me, but after that I have nothing. “Damn it.” I toss the cards in the air and across the room, watching them flutter everywhere. Why can’t I figure this out? My gaze lands on the cover of my mother’s book, the message left for me. There’s a bigger picture in all this, and I have to figure out what it is. What I’m missing.
I lie down on the floor with it on my chest, staring at the ceiling. “Think, Lilah,” I murmur. “Think.”
I force my mind back to the bar the night of my attack. I tell myself to relive it, but instead I’m remembering the first night I met Kane. I’d been at the Cove, on top of the boulders where Kane and I met several days ago. The place that became our secret escape. The place where no one could hear what we said. The place my mother had also used as an escape from everyone who wanted a piece of her, including my father.
I don’t know why this is the memory I’ve chosen right now, but my mind takes me in circles, leads me places to find other places. I know this, and so I shut my eyes and let myself sink into that moment, the wind lifting my hair, the salt on my lips. I can even see what I was wearing: black. All black because death was consuming me, eating away at me. I sink deeper into the memory, reliving it as if it were happening right now.
Wind lifts around me, blowing off the ocean, waves crashing on the rocks, salt on my lips, and for the first time in the month since my mother was declared dead, it’s not from my tears. It’s changed tonight, more of a cutting, biting pain, not an emotional storm. Exhaustion is starting to take hold, weeks of barely sleeping finally catching up with me, but I don’t want to go to the cottage, to my mother’s home. I remove my jacket and lie back on the rocks, stuffing it under my head, the moon casting me in a beam of light. I shut my eyes, just needing to rest a few minutes, but a sound jolts me, and I sit up. That’s when a man I didn’t even hear approach squats down in front of me, his jacket and tie gone, sleeves rolled to the elbows.
“Lilah Love,” he says, and though we’ve never formally met, it’s a small town. We know of each other. And considering who he is, and who my father is, I know on some level I should feel fear, but I don’t. But then, I’ve already decided I’m not going to die boxed in by other people’s limits, as my mother did.
“Kane Mendez,” I say. “I’ve heard stories about you. Are you here to fuck me or kill me?”
“Are you saying you want me to fuck you?”
“You look pretty good in a suit from what I remember, so maybe I might fuck you.”
He laughs. “Is that right?”
“Yes. That’s right. Why are you really here?”
“I come here when I want to think and be alone,” he says, sitting down next to me and looking over at me. “Why are you here?”
“My mother used to come here for the same reason as you. Did you ever see her?”
“No,” he says. “I did not, but I met her a few times. She was not only stunning but gracious to everyone around her.”
“Yes. She was.”
“I’ve met your father, the police chief, as well. He’s a prick.”
“Yes. He is.” I glance over at him. “Did I read that you have a Yale law degree?”
“I do.”
“Does your father?”
“No. The law doesn’t appeal to my father.”
“Are you dirty like your father?”
He glances over at me. “You’re direct.”
“Yes. I am.”
“Why?”
“I don’t like junk conversations. They waste time.”
“And I don’t do anything like my father, dirty or otherwise. What about you? Are you going to be a law enforcement officer like your father?”
“The FBI recruited me back when I started college. I was supposed to finish law school this year and head to Virginia.”
“Was?”
“I took a job at the NYPD. I start next week.”
“Why?”
“I need to be here. That’s my gut. I don’t have another answer.”
“Death either draws you to the familiar or pushes you to the unfamiliar.” He looks over at me. “Sometimes a combination of both.”
“Spoken like a man who’s lived that experience.”
“Yes. I have.” He offers nothing more.
“Your mother is gone, too, right?”
“Yes. Killed by one of my father’s enemies when I was eight.”
He says those words matter-of-factly, but there is a grit beneath his tone that hints at much more. “You hate him.”
“He’s my father. And this time, I don’t have another answer.”
Being my father’s daughter, I accept that answer. I even understand it. “Tell me about your mother.”
He looks at me, surprise in his eyes. “You want to hear about my mother?”
“Yes. I do.”
“Why?”
“Because. Just because.”
“There’s no such thing as just be
cause, Lilah Love. There is always a deeper meaning, intended or unintended.”
I open my eyes and replay those words in my mind: There is always a deeper meaning, intended or unintended. I sit up, and my mother’s biography tumbles to the floor. I pick the book up and stare at it, something clawing at my mind. Something I need to discover, something that the book tells me. “Intended or unintended,” I whisper. A crazy thought hits me, and I set the book down on the stool and key my computer to life. I go to my mother’s IMDb profile and start researching. An hour later I have the answer I’m seeking. I dial Kane.
He answers on the first ring; no playing hard to get for Kane. “Miss me already?” he asks, his voice rippling with arrogance.
“Kane,” I breathe out.
“What is it?” he asks, his voice somber now, matching my urgency.
“There is always a deeper meaning, intentional or unintentional.”
“Yes. There is. Where are you going with this?”
“The book made me start thinking about my mother’s death.”
“Your mother died two years before any of this started, and before your attack.”
“Two years before we know it started. The Chinese investment firm that financed Laney’s movie financed two of my mother’s.” My jaw clamps down. “I might need you to bury another body before this is over.”
“I’m coming back over.”
“No. I’m not going to be fucking you tonight, Kane. I’m going to be too busy figuring out how to fuck someone else.” I hang up.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
My mother was murdered.
The very thought has me pacing and tangling fingers in my hair, anger burning a hole in my gut and chest. It consumes me. It hurts. God, it hurts, and I find myself standing at the foot of my bed, staring at my mother’s photo in her most iconic role: Marilyn Monroe. My mother was an amazing talent, but most of all, she was good. She was kind. She was gentle. In my youth I wanted to be like her, but not for years. And not right now. Right now, I want blood. I want answers. I inhale sharply, lowering my chin to my chest and deep-breathing, images of my mother’s casket in my mind, followed by another of Rick Suthers hanging by a sheet. I huff out a breath and look at my mother again.