Janie Crouch - Primal Instinct

Conner put a hand at the small of her back and led her inside the hotel. “I’ll stay here tonight. In the lobby. That should give you a peaceful night’s sleep.”

Adrienne wasn’t sure how to respond. She was so grateful for his offer. The thought of having a night of uninterrupted rest made her feel as if a huge weight had been lifted from her shoulders.

But she didn’t want him in the lobby. She wanted him in her bed.

Adrienne smiled up at Conner shyly, and reached for his hand. “There’s no need for you to stay down here.”

He pressed the button for the elevator then stepped close enough to Adrienne that his lips were just inches away from hers.

“I think we both know if I stay up there, a peaceful night’s sleep is not what’s going to happen.”

The elevator door opened but Conner didn’t move. Finally Adrienne put a finger on his chest and pushed him back into the elevator and didn’t stop until Conner’s back was against the elevator’s wall.

Primal Instinct

Janie Crouch

www.millsandboon.co.uk

JANIE CROUCHloves to read—almost exclusively romance—and has been doing so since middle school. She learned to love Mills & Boon ®romance novels when she lived in Wales, UK, for a few years as a pre-teen, then moved on to a passion for romantic suspense as an adult.

Janie lives with her husband and four children in southeastern Virginia. Her “day job” is teaching online public speaking and communication courses at a community college. When she’s not listening to the voices in her head (and even when she is), Janie enjoys traveling, long-distance running, movie-watching, knitting and adventure/obstacle racing.

Janie tries to live by the anonymous quote “Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well-preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside, thoroughly used up, totally worn-out and proclaiming, ‘Wow, what a ride!'” You can find out more about her at www.janiecrouch.com.

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To my mother, the smartest and most well-read person I know.

I call you family because I have to, but call you friend because I’m blessed.

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

EXTRACT

Chapter One

FBI agent Conner Perigo knew throwing the file in his hand across the room would be childish and ultimately accomplish nothing except making a mess, but he was still tempted.

Ten months.

Ten months they had been on the trail of this psychopath. Ten months of being two steps behind and watching, helpless, as another woman was murdered. It wasn’t in Conner’s job description to attend the funerals of women he had never known. That hadn’t stopped him from attending one last week. Or three weeks before that. Or a month and a half before that.

Each time he saw one of these women buried, it renewed Conner’s determination to catch this bastard.

Five women dead in ten months. Most within a fifty-mile radius of San Francisco, which, of course, had the city in a panic.

“I’m not picking that up, so don’t even think about throwing it,” Conner’s partner and friend, Seth Harrington, said without looking up from his desk.

Conner looked at the file in his hand, then set it down. Maybe flying papers would make him feel better momentarily, but it wasn’t worth the aftermath. He sighed. “This case, Seth. I swear I’m about to lose it over this case.”

“I hear you, man. It’s messed up.”

It wasn’t just the murders, although those were bad enough. Now the perp was taunting them.

Yesterday the San Francisco FBI field office had received another package. It was the same thing every time. The outside was a box addressed with an innocuous label—like a care package. Of course, innocent-looking or not, each had gone through the extensive FBI bomb scannings and toxic screenings. There was nothing dangerous in any of the packages.

Every delivery was box after box, wrapped in plain brown paper, nested inside each other like one of those Russian dolls. Every time, inside the smallest box, Conner and his team had found a lock of a woman’s hair.

And every time, the dead body matching the hair had been found a few days later.

The packages also contained a handwritten note, in third person, with the killer referring to himself as Simon. As if this was all a game of Simon Says.

“Simon says, the FBI is too slow.”

“Simon says, you should try harder.”

“Simon says, uh-oh, there goes another one.”

They had kept all info about the packages from the public, knowing it would cause more of a panic. But around the San Francisco field office, the killer was known as “Simon Says.”

There was no doubt about it: this pervert was calling the shots. The game was consistent. The FBI received a package—with zero helpful forensic evidence—then ran around for the next couple of days trying to figure out where the woman was being held with only the city in the return address to go on.

They were always too late. A body would be found somewhere; usually local law enforcement would call it in, and the Bureau would rush to the address. The crime scene, just like the packages, would hold zero helpful forensic evidence.

And then the game would start all over again.

Conner and Seth worked in the FBI’s ViCAP division—Violent Criminal Apprehension Program—a subdivision of the Bureau’s Behavioral Analysis Unit. Their job was to help law enforcement agencies apprehend violent criminals through investigative analysis. They were the best of the best.

But this killer was always one step ahead of them.

“Perigo, Harrington, my office.”

Upon hearing his division chief’s words, Conner rubbed his eyes wearily then glanced over to find Harrington looking at him, shaking his head. A trip to Division Chief Logan Kelly’s office was never good. The two partners grabbed their notebooks and headed down the hall. The chief took his chair behind his desk and motioned for them to have a seat in the chairs across from him.

“I have spent the entire morning fielding calls. The governor. The deputy director. Even a city councilman. Everybody wants to know the same thing. Where are we on the Simon Says investigation?”

Conner and Seth didn’t answer. Chief Kelly knew full well where they were in this investigation: nowhere.

“It’s getting a little tiresome explaining over and over that we’ve got absolutely nothing on this psycho, despite our best efforts.”

Conner couldn’t agree more, although he didn’t say so out loud.

The chief continued, “After talking with the deputy director this morning, we’ve decided to pull in some independent contractors to help on the case.”

Conner sat up a little straighter in his chair, as did Seth. “Independent contractors, sir? What type?” They had already brought in some outside help on the case—in particular, handwriting experts for the letters. What else could Chief Kelly have in mind?