Colby took the file from her hand and tucked the picture back inside. He couldn’t hold it another second. Not right now. Then, with his gaze out on the water, he held the file back, waited for her to take it.
It took her a few seconds, and from the corner of his eye, he saw the slight tremble in her hands. “Damn it, Colby…”
He said softly, “I’ll help.”
He didn’t have much choice now.
He’d seen the dead woman’s face—not through Mica’s memories, either. That, maybe, he could have walked away from.
But the woman had been happy…had been excited about a job, excited about going shopping. About life. She’d been happy and somebody had stolen that from her.
She was his now. He couldn’t walk away without at least trying to stop the monster responsible for turning that happiness into horror.
chapter four
How had this happened?
Colby Mathis stood inside a hotel room, the cool air blowing over his skin, his eyes adjusting to the bright lights and his head still spinning.
He was in fucking Pasadena with Mica Greer.
Mica—a lieutenant in the police department. Working a nasty couple of homicides and she wanted his help.
His help.
After all this time…
“Shit.”
“Everything okay, Mathis?”
Mathis. Apparently sometime in the last fifteen years, she’d forgotten that he had a given name. He shot her a narrow look over his shoulder and stormed into the hotel room. “Everything is just roses, Lieutenant Greer,” he said, not bothering to keep the edge out of his voice.
He had to do this again. Damn it. It filled him with terror. What if he fucked it up? What if he was wrong again? What if somebody—
A hand touched his shoulder. “What’s wrong, Colby?”
“Nothing.” Carefully, he moved away. That light touch, even though it wasn’t her bare skin on his, was way too much. She couldn’t touch him right now. He needed to get focused first. Get focused, get grounded…make sure he wasn’t going to have a mental breakdown—
It would help if you’d stop being such a damned coward. That voice, cool and deprecating, managed to cut through the fog that tried to overwhelm him. You’ve done this work before and you didn’t fall apart. You’ve done it solo and you’ve been fine. You can do this again.
He closed his eyes as a mental battle started to rage inside him. And if I fuck it up, then what?
Then somebody dies. But if you go by what Mica is picking up, then somebody is going to die anyway. At least if you try, there is a chance to stop it. Are you going to be a coward, or what?
Blowing out a breath, he opened his eyes and realized he was standing on the balcony. He barely remembered entering the hotel room, much less coming out here. Sucking in a deep draught of hot summer air, he shoved aside the doubts and worries and fears. They’d eat him alive if he wasn’t careful. Hell, they were already trying to do that. Inner demons were a bitch to deal with.
Turning, he saw that Mica was standing just a few feet away, eying him warily. Her lovely, midnight eyes were unreadable, but he still had a good idea what she was thinking. Just then, it had something to do with his sanity and whether or not he could handle this case. He had a feeling she was also considering a call to Taylor Jones.
You and me both, sugar.
“I need to see where they were found,” he said, forcing the words out through a throat gone tight with nerves, need, and fear. Focus on the job—do that, and don’t think about anything else. “Also, I need to see the reports, evidence, everything you can give me.”
Mica cocked a brow. “I’ll see what I can do on evidence. I can probably get some—”
“All.” He strode to the bed and dumped the duffel bag he had yet to set down. “I can’t help if I’m working totally blind.”
She blew out a slow breath. “Look, Mathis, I’ll do what I can, but these guys aren’t used to working with…your type.”
My type? For some reason, that made him smile and managed to ease some of the tension inside him. My type—just what is my type? Psychic? Psychotic? Or maybe just neurotic. All three probably applied just fine, really.
Still smiling, he slanted a look at Mica. “They work with you.”
Her mouth tightened.
“Now isn’t that a surprise.” With a wry grin, he shifted his attention back to unpacking. Not that it took a lot of attention, but it was easier to look at his clothes than it was to look at her. “They don’t know, do they?”
“There’s nothing for them to know.”
“Uh-huh. And how do you explain it when you manage to figure things out ten steps before the rest of them? Good instincts? You’re just smarter than the rest of them?” He pulled out jeans, socks, underwear, and T-shirts, dumping them in a haphazard pile on the bed. “Bet that wins you a lot of friends.”
When she didn’t answer, he glanced back over at her. “You can’t hide what you are. What you do.”
“There isn’t anything to hide,” she snapped, and her eyes flashed blue fire.
“You don’t believe that.”
Not entirely. He could feel that much. It was complicated—very complicated. Narrowing his eyes, he studied her and waited.
She opened her mouth, then snapped it closed, shaking her head. “I’m not like the rest of you, Colby. I wasn’t as strong after I left. And I never could make it work the way you all could. I had to have a partner, had to have help. Shit, even you managed to make it work without a partner. I never could. After I left, things just…fell apart.”
With a sigh, she tucked a stray lock of hair behind her ear, moving to stand near the window, staring out over the paved expanse of parking lot. “There’s nothing to explain to anybody.”
“So you don’t have an unusual knack for solving things? Making weird calls that the others can’t quite understand?”
Under the light jacket she wore, he could see the way her shoulders tensed, the way her spine went rigid.
“So you’re still hiding,” he said softly. Gathering up his clothes, he moved to the dresser and dumped them in there. He slid it closed, but instead of turning around, he rested his hands on the dresser. A mirror hung over it and he could see Mica’s profile, averted as she stared out the glass. “Fifteen years of hiding what you are, Mica. Doesn’t that get old?”
She cut him a dark glare. “I’m not hiding. I just can’t use what I have the way you all did. And I can’t cope. I’m not made the way you all are, Colby. I’m not good enough—not strong enough for it, I guess. This way, I can still help, but I won’t lose my mind. I’m sorry if that’s not what you wanted to hear. But it’s the best I got.”
“The best you got.” He sighed. Shoving away from the dresser, he cut a wide berth around her—as wide as the small hotel room would allow, at least. “At least you can admit it. More than I can do.”
“Colby?”
He ignored her. He needed air. He needed to walk. Clear his head. “Get me those records, Lieutenant.”
“Damn it—”
He shut the door. The rest of her voice was muffled, and the farther he got from the hotel room, the fainter her voice. He ducked into the stairwell just as he heard the door to his room open.
TWO HOURS LATER, Mica was still brewing over the fact that he’d walked out on her. Walked out. In the middle of a fucking conversation. And just demanded she show him whatever, like it was that easy—
“Make sure he gets whatever he needs to help.”
Mica slanted a look at her boss over her desk. “I’m sorry, Captain. I was…”
The captain waved a hand. “You’ve been pulling crazy hours. The agent—I was asking about him. I just want you to make sure he has everything he needs to do…” She grimaced and wiggled her fingers. “His thing.”
“His thing?” Mica echoed. Then she wondered why she was surprised. Of course the captain was going to want Colby to have what he needed—if for no
other reason than because fate would demand she look silly for arguing with him earlier. Now you’re being paranoid, she told herself as she signed the paperwork needed to make his consultation on the case official. Handing it over to the captain, she said, “He hasn’t signed this yet, but I’ll take it to him later.”
“Hmm.” Kellogg looked it over. “Just ask him to keep things quiet. I’d rather people not know I asked a psychic to consult on this.”
Mica resisted the urge to fidget. Don’t want people knowing, do you? Not that it was a surprise. There were certain people in the world who didn’t blink at the idea of psychic ability. Certain professions where it wouldn’t necessarily incite laughter and sneers. Being a cop wasn’t one of those.
And wasn’t it just sheer irony and utter hypocrisy that Mica felt pissed over the fact that the captain wanted to hide Colby’s presence? Feeling the weight of an intense gaze, she looked up.
The captain was watching her. “That piss you off?”
“No reason why it should,” she said. A nonanswer was the best. If she didn’t say anything, she wouldn’t give herself away.
Kellogg smirked. Propping an elbow on the arm of the chair, she said, “No reason it should piss you off, hmmm? You do realize that I’m aware of the connection you have with the FBI, right?”
The knowledge glinting in the captain’s gaze didn’t do much to ease the tension ratcheting inside Mica. She rested a hand on the desk, just barely managed to keep from curling it into a fist. “There’s not much of a connection there, Captain. I briefly entertained the idea of joining the FBI.”
“Yes…started the training and everything.” Kellogg straightened in her chair and leaned forward, her dark eyes unreadable. “I know about SAC Jones. I have…contacts, you could say.”
“Contacts.”
“Yes.” She shifted in the chair, crossing her legs and smoothing a hand down a skirt that cost more than Mica made in a month. “And I won’t deny the fact that I wasn’t at all bothered by the connection you have to his unit.”
“I don’t have a connection to him, to his unit, and barely the sketchiest connection to the FBI,” Mica snapped. She didn’t like the direction this conversation was headed. Not at all. As a matter of fact, it was well past the point where she was pissed off and veering into explosive territory.
“Sure you do. Just like you have a connection to me.”
“I work for you. I don’t work for him, and I never did. I would have, if I’d stayed.”
“Still a connection,” Kellogg said. “And while I can understand your displeasure, you can simmer down—you’re here because you’re a damn good cop. You stay because you’re a damn good cop. The fact that I’m not opposed to using any weapons at my disposal bothers you, and I understand that. But I’m pretty damn bothered by murder and I know you are, too. We all suspect he’s not done.” Her eyes narrowed on Mica’s, and for a moment, neither of them spoke. Then, finally, the captain said, “But you don’t suspect, do you?”
In the moment, Mica felt stripped bare. She knew. Damn it, the captain knew.
Kellogg cocked a brow. “I know my cops, Greer. I know their strengths, their weaknesses.”
My weaknesses? She fought the urge to laugh hysterically. What Kellogg probably thought was a strength was actually Mica’s biggest weakness. She was a failure, a fraud. Swallowing the bubble that likely blocked that hysterical giggle, she asked quietly, “Is there a point to this?”
Her hands were sweating. She did her damnedest to keep it nonchalant as she pulled them off the desk and swiped them across her trousers.
“I just want you aware of that. I know my cops. And I also want you aware of the fact that you have my okay to show the agent whatever he needs to see.” Kellogg stood up.
Her okay. As she stood there, Mica thought about how helpless she felt, how useless…and then she thought of how calmly Colby had told her to get that information, how easily Kellogg was about turning it over.
Maybe it was petty of her. Mica didn’t care. As Kellogg strode toward the door, she called out, “He’s not an agent.”
Kellogg paused, looking back at Mica with narrowed eyes. “Excuse me?”
Mica jerked a shoulder shrug. “You kept assuming. I called Jones and he said he couldn’t spare anybody to send, but he did know of a former agent in the area.” She gave the captain a what-can-you-do look and shrugged. “It was the best he could offer.”
“So we have a psychic. A former agent.” Kellogg rolled that around, obviously not pleased with the information.
Mica supposed she could have mentioned it earlier, or found a more diplomatic way to deliver it. This worked for her, though.
“Why is he a former agent?”
Now Mica had wondered that more than once herself. But all she did was shrug. She couldn’t answer that question because she hadn’t asked—getting personal with Colby Mathis wasn’t what she needed to do. Ever. “That’s kind of his business, I figure. But Jones wouldn’t have pointed me in his direction if he couldn’t do the job.”
That elicited a grunt. Then, without saying another word, Kellogg was gone.
THIS WASN’T WHERE she had died.
This was where she had danced.
Danced under hot, bright lights for too little money, and sometimes, the men had gotten a little grabby. But she’d had dreams of something bigger. Something better. She hadn’t been angry about her life…she’d been excited.
In front of the squat, simple building, Colby waited. Patiently, he untangled all the lines tugging on him and focused on the one he needed. It took longer than he’d like. He was out of practice, he didn’t have a decent anchor, but in the end, he let the woman be the anchor. He let her pull him in and steady him, this woman who had died too soon.
Head bent, eyes closed, hands jammed into his pockets, he stood there and worked a puzzle he could see only in his mind. A hundred, a thousand writhing lines, all pointing toward him and ending in a snarled mass.
But her line flared hotter, brighter. Her soul. Her life…and her death.
Finally, he had a good enough grasp on it to separate himself and open his eyes. Although there wasn’t much to look at. Shades shielded his eyes from the white-hot brilliance of the sun as he studied the strip joint.
The bright sunlight didn’t do a damn thing for the place. Except to highlight how tawdry it looked, maybe.
It was made of cinder block and painted white. Not exactly a dive. A few steps up. The woman hadn’t been totally down about working here, but she’d had dreams of dancing someplace better. She’d been happy when she left here.
Alive.
Yeah, Colby could already feel that much. She’d been alive when she left here.
But for how long?
Had her killer found her through here or had he already known her?
Once more, Colby closed his eyes and let those emotions wrap tighter and tighter around him, pulling him deeper and deeper. He heard the echo of the music she’d danced to, the whisper of her voice, a young, girlishly high voice as she told her boss she couldn’t work late. He felt her excitement, heard her wondering if she should have gotten her hair done, a fresh manicure.
There was a vague sense of disquiet as she started to walk—her legs were tired and the heels were killing her feet, but she ignored it. Part of the job, part of what she did. If she got this job, she could get better shoes and her feet wouldn’t hurt so much—
His heartbeat kicked as he sensed the exact moment her excitement started to change. When happiness trembled and then stopped. When the fear bloomed.
And as much as he hated it, that was what he needed. Her excitement and her nerves might tug at him, but her fear, it would guide him and suck him straight in—it was the strongest anchor he could hope for.
Without hesitation, Colby grabbed it, pulled it closer.
He heard a low voice—it reeked with evil, but Colby couldn’t describe anything beyond that. Young, old, male, female, who knew.
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Instinctively, as it always did, his mind tried to jerk away from the fear, but he refused to let it.