Paula Graves - Forbidden Temptation

Daniel sighed. “That was a terrible way to hear it.”

“There’s no good way to hear it.” She closed her eyes, her head beginning to ache. “Have you learned anything else?”

“Not yet. I’m hoping to get Frank off by himself to see what I can learn without the feds catching wind of my interest.”

Rose caught sight of Daniel through the windshield. He stood near the edge of the crowd gathered behind the police cars, his cell phone to his ear. Just seeing him, knowing he was close, eased some of her tension. “I see you,” she murmured, her voice tinged with unexpected tenderness.

He turned and looked toward her. “I see you, too.” The low, intimate tone of his voice set a fire in her belly, radiating warmth through her chilled limbs. “You have the doors locked, don’t you?”

She eyed the door locks. “Yes.”

“Keep your eyes open, okay? If you see anyone heading your direction, call me immediately. You have my number?”

“Yes,” she assured him.

He didn’t say anything for a moment, just stared down the street at her. When he spoke, his voice softened. “We have a lot to talk about when we’re through here.”

“I know.”

“I’ve got to go see if I can get Frank to tell me anything. Don’t forget-call me if anyone starts to approach you.”

“I won’t forget.”

“I’m sorry about Melissa,” he said. “I’ll be there as soon as I can.” He rang off, weaving through the crowd again.

Rose clutched the phone to her chest, his warm voice lingering in her ears.

DANIEL EDGED HIS WAY to the police-tape cordon, trying to catch Frank Carter’s eye. When Frank glanced his way, Daniel gestured at him. Carter’s expression darkened, his mouth tightening with annoyance, but he said something to the detective standing next to him and headed toward the street.

Frank didn’t make eye contact with Daniel as he lifted the crime scene tape and ducked under it, but he gave a slight nod that Daniel took as an invitation to talk.

As Frank opened the trunk of an unmarked Oldsmobile Cutlass, Daniel joined him. “Number four?”

Frank didn’t answer. Daniel didn’t need him to. What he’d seen of Melissa’s body confirmed it for him.

“I’d like to come in on the case officially,” Daniel continued.

Frank slanted a dark look at him. “As what? A roving university professor?”

Daniel let the barb slide. “The last time we talked, you offered to speak to your boss about bringing me into the case.”

“Last time, you said no.”

“You think I’m going to horn in on your publicity when you catch this guy? I’m not. I don’t want publicity. I just want this bastard to go down.”

Frank stopped pretending to look for something in the car trunk and turned to face Daniel. “I’ve been doing a little investigating of my own, Danny. Tell me-what made you leave the FBI six years ago? Just felt the need to slow down, stop and smell the roses?”

Daniel could tell Frank knew the answer. “You know why.”

Frank’s voice darkened. “It’s all about Tina, isn’t it?”

Not all of it. But enough. “The FBI wanted me to move onto other cases six years ago, so I quit and took the university job. Might as well put the Ph.D. to work.”

“You think this is the same guy?” Frank looked troubled.

“The M.O. is the same. The victims are similar-young, pretty women.”

“What if you’re just seeing what you want to see?”

Daniel didn’t reply, no longer certain he knew the answer. If Frank, of all people, didn’t see it-

Frank closed the trunk. Without turning around, he asked, “How did you know to be here this morning?”

“Police scanner.”

“You were up at four in the morning listening to the police scanner?”

Daniel saw no reason not to tell Frank about Melissa’s call. He’d learn the truth once he checked the numbers on Melissa’s cell phone, anyway. “Melissa had a fight with her boyfriend, and she left a message on my cell phone to see if I could come pick her up and take her home. But when I went looking for her, I couldn’t find her.”

Frank half turned, cutting his eyes at Daniel. “Why you? Is there something I need to know about you and Melissa Bannerman?”

“I told you before, she and I have been discussing a book.”

Frank shook his head. “But why call you and not a friend? Or family?”

“She said she didn’t want to get into it with people she knew. I get the feeling it’s not the first trouble she’s had with the fiancé.”

“We’ll be checking him out,” Frank assured him. “Where was she when she called?”

Daniel told Frank everything he knew, leaving out only Rose’s involvement. He was reluctant to put her on Frank’s “persons of interest” list, at least until he’d settled for himself exactly what her connection to the case really was.

“I’ll put out feelers with my captain about getting you involved,” Frank said grudgingly. “But it won’t be a paid position, and you can’t be going off on a wild hare and screwing up our case. Understand?”

“Of course,” Daniel said, not meaning it. He didn’t need the locals to tell him how to investigate a case.

“Get lost, will you?” Frank muttered as he headed back under the crime-scene tape.

Daniel took his advice, drifting back through the crowd and emerging on the other side. He walked slowly back down the street to his Jeep, squinting against the glare of the morning sun reflected in his front windshield.

He reached the driver’s side door and looked inside. Rose’s dark gaze met his through the glass, her expression a heady blend of relief and something that sent his pulse racing. She reached across and unlocked his door. “Any more news?”

Sliding behind the steering wheel, he told her about his conversation with Frank, leaving out the part about Tina. He never talked about Tina, hadn’t in ten years. No point in starting now; it would just further muddle the already complicated relationship between him and Rose.

“I think he’ll be able to get me officially in on the investigation,” he added, buckling his seat belt.

“Is that good?” she asked as he started the engine.

“I’ll have better access to the files on the past four victims.” Not that he expected to see anything in those files he hadn’t seen dozens of times before, but it was possible Orion had changed his tactics in a way that might reveal more about him than Daniel already knew.

At this point, he’d take any new information he could get.

“I should have warned her,” Rose murmured.

“I thought you did.”

“Not about the death veils. About Mark.”

He sat forward. “What about Mark?”

“I knew there was a good chance he was cheating on her again, but I never told her. Maybe if I had-”

“Why didn’t you?”

“Because I didn’t have any proof. All I had was a snippet of conversation I’d overheard.” She told him about hearing Mark Phagan set up an alibi with his friends at Alice’s funeral. “I told myself he might have been planning a surprise for her or something, that it wasn’t proof he was cheating. But I knew better.” Misery tinged her voice.

Ignoring all the warning bells in his head, he took her hand in his. “Don’t blame yourself about that. Might not have changed anything. Melissa said on the phone that she wouldn’t listen to her friends when they tried to warn her about Mark.”

“I know you think I’m crazy.” Her voice was soft and sleepy. “Sometimes I think I am, too.”

Which meant she wasn’t, he thought. The really crazy ones never realized it. So she wasn’t crazy. And she wasn’t a liar. Which left one unthinkable explanation.