For Love or Vengeance (8 page)

Chapter Thirteen

Helene wasn’t used to the snuggling thing, Miguel could tell. After they had made love again, this time in her bed, he pulled her close and spooned next to her to get some sleep. Instead of melding into him, her body went stiff.

“Relax, sweetheart,” he said softly.

The tension ebbed, but it had taken quite a long time before her muscles eased completely.

During the night, a persistent sound woke him.

The princess snored. He smiled. Somehow it made her more human. It was a light sound and a normal person might not have awoken, but his life in the FBI had made him more attentive to the slightest of noises.

Since he was awake and her sleep-warmed skin was flush to his, it was impossible to control the response of his body. During the night he had turned, and they were now face to face. The gentle snore stuttered, then stopped, with the shift of his erection as he slowly hardened against her belly.

She opened her eyes, blinked a few times, and contentment softened her gaze. A sleepy smile slowly transformed into one of welcome as she pressed herself against him.

“It’s a good mornin’,” she said, her voice husky from sleep.

“It is,” he replied. He reached up, cupped her breast, and brushed his thumb across the tip. A lazy back and forth, back and forth, until it pebbled.

She murmured a sigh of pleasure, slipped her hand between their bodies and found the head of his cock. Her fingers encircled him and echoed his hand movement, running her thumb across the tip. Back and forth. Around his smooth head.

“That feels good. You feel good,” he said, nuzzling the side of her face and dropping a series of kisses down to her mouth.

She turned her face the last little bit and they kissed. It was a slow kiss, much like their caresses. A lingering exploration that had them both shaking with need. She shifted her body upward and guided him to her center.

Patiently he entered, inch by inch, until she surrounded him with her heat. But he didn’t move, content to be part of her. An incredible peace settled over him just from being within her and having her body skin to skin.

She wrapped her arms around him and held him tight, her head tucked beneath his chin. A long satisfied sigh escaped her.

He tightened his embrace, and murmured, “I feel it, too. I’ve never felt this way before.”

Helene hadn’t either.

But his rumbled declaration, rather than bringing serenity, created a whirlpool of emotions that threatened to suck her down into a world of confusion where black and white became muddied shades of gray.

Gray was not good for the goddess of vengeance. Her world had to remain black and white if she was to keep focused on her mission.

“Helene?” he asked, as if sensing her confusion, or maybe it was the tension that had suddenly gripped her body.

“I can’t do this,” she said, and started to pull away from him, but he cupped her cheek and gently held her close.

“This? We’re two people who are just—”

“There’s no ‘just’ and you know it. I know you feel it, too.”

Miguel gazed at her evenly. “I didn’t expect for this to happen, either. I didn’t want it.”

“And neither do I,” she said, and pushed against his chest.

This time he let her go, and emptiness surrounded her. She grabbed a robe from a chair beside her bed and wrapped it around herself. After turning on a light, she tightened the robe’s belt and came to stand at the foot of her bed.

“I’m going to take a shower and then head into work.”

Miguel understood what she hadn’t said. She wanted him gone before she came out of the bathroom.

So be it. “All right. I’ll see you back at the office.” He leaned back against her pillows and put his hands behind his head as he waited for his erection to subside.

Her eyes drifted down to that tenting of the sheets and a flush worked across her high cheekbones. Then she turned and almost ran to the safety of the shower.

Safety
. That was no doubt why she had put the brakes on this morning’s lovemaking. He had challenged her comfort zone, as she had challenged his.

She was right. Last night hadn’t been just two adults sharing some satisfying sex. Or maybe it had been the first time…and maybe even the second.

This morning it had been about something more. That something more could be dangerous not only for them and their careers, but also the public they were supposed to protect. There was a vicious killer on the loose, and nothing could get in the way of stopping him. Feeling anything remotely emotional for Helene could definitely get in the way.

The thought was like an icy bucket of water. It immediately chilled any lingering desire and drove him from her bed.

No way would anyone at the office have guessed Miguel had spent the night making love to Helene. If anything, she treated him even more coolly than before, and there was no missing the keep-it-strictly-business vibes she was broadcasting at full volume.

Fine with him. It was probably a good thing they were sitting at opposite sides of the long table in the war room, going through the piles of prepaid cell phone forms. They had identified a series of phone numbers that they believed the unsub might have used to call his prospective victims. Although the killer’s information on the forms was probably all false, maybe the handwriting could confirm it was the same person who had bought all the phones. Then they would know where he’d bought the phones and be able to further narrow down the unsub’s hunting ground.

Miguel had been flipping through form after form for nearly two hours when Helene’s head jerked up. “I think I’ve got one!” She read aloud the number and he checked it against the list they had made from the victims’ cell phone records.

“Bingo,” he said, and she jumped up from the chair like a jack-in-the-box, went to the map, and replaced one of the pins with a bright red flag. Then she slipped the form into an evidence bag.

She turned to him. “Which vic was called with this phone?”

“Vic number two,” he said, and she tacked it up on their bulletin board beneath the appropriate photo.

Hands on her hips, she perused the form through the clear plastic evidence bag and shook her head. “This perp has a strange sense of humor. He wrote ‘Rodger Hammerstein’ as his name. The address is ‘One Great White Way.’ ”

“Clearly obsessed with Broadway,” Miguel said, and went to stand beside her. “Hmm. I wonder if there’s some connection between the name he picked and the pose or the location.”

She frowned. “Rodgers and Hammerstein wrote a lot of musicals. Maybe the other forms will help us establish a pattern.”

“Maybe.” He returned to the table and started going through the forms once again, this time also looking for any fake names and addresses similar to the one Helene had uncovered.

He was near the end of his third pile when he found one. “I’ve got a W.A. Mozart here. Address is in Vienna, Georgia.”

Looking at his notes, he realized the number didn’t match any on their list. Puzzled, he walked up to the bulletin board and compared the handwriting. The two forms had clearly been filled out by the same person. He slipped the second form into an evidence bag and pinned it to the bottom of the board, as she had done with the first.

A moment later, Helene said, “I’ve got another one that doesn’t match the list.”

She joined him at the board, although she kept an arm’s length between them. Her form had been filled in as George Cohan residing at Little Johnny Avenue in Berlin, New Jersey.

Sick sense of humor, he thought. “Do you know what shows Cohan wrote?”

Helene’s powers allowed her to know just about everything. All she had to do was open the all-seeing eye in the middle of her brain and pull in whatever information she needed.

Closing her eyes, she reached into the consciousness of the mortal realm and the facts flowed into her mind. “George M. Cohan is famous for musical comedies. James Cagney portrayed him in the movie
Yankee Doodle Dandy
.” She opened her eyes and tapped at the address on the board. “Cohan’s first big Broadway hit was ‘Little Johnny Jones.’ ”

Her partner had a perplexed look on his face.

With a shrug, she said, “I read the encyclopedia when I was a kid.” It was the explanation she always used when anyone questioned the oddball collection of facts she could produce from memory.

“This is not good.” Miguel indicated the two forms. “He’s planning ahead for other victims.”

“At least two.” She frowned at the remaining piles of papers. “Maybe more.”

“We better go through all those other forms quickly. In the meantime, let’s flag where these phones were purchased.”

After checking the addresses of the stores, Helene stuck two red flags into the map, making three different locations where the prepaid cell phones had been purchased. All of the locations were in and around the Times Square and Bryant Park area.

“It’s a start,” he said.

“A good start,” she agreed as she stood looking at the map with satisfaction.

He came to stand beside her and his arm brushed against hers. A shiver of desire danced through her and she stepped away from him.

He glanced at her, his gaze filled with annoyance. “Why are you doing this?”

She looked back at the map with the pins. “Because we’re in the middle of an investigation?”

“This meaning
us
,” he said and faced her, his gaze probing.

She met it head on. “Last night was a major mistake.”

A dangerously major mistake. It had compromised her focus and objectivity. And it had made her care about him in a way she’d never cared for any man before. Caring was always dangerous.

“Last night was amazing,” he said, and as if to prove it, he cradled her cheek.

At his touch awareness sang through her, and her desire for him awoke, but she tamped it down and turned her head away from his touch. “I need to stay centered on this case. I need to be able to do whatever it takes.”

“And being with me—”

“There is no being with you,” she said with a slash of her hand.

An impatient man might have continued pressing her, but if there was one thing she had learned about Miguel in the days of working together—and the night they had spent making love—it was that he was extraordinarily patient.

“Okay. You need distance. I get that, princess.” With those words he stepped back to the table with its still-large piles of paper, sat down, and grabbed another stack of receipts.

Hands clenched, because it was the only way to keep from returning his touch, she took a seat as well. She reminded herself that she had a mission to fulfill.

The Butcher had to be brought to justice, no matter what cost.

Chapter Fourteen

By noon, Miguel and Helene had pinpointed the purchases of six cell phones, three of which they could connect to the victims up on their board. Four of the phones had been purchased at two different locations.

Around two o’clock, they received the forms from the remaining cell phone vendors. By four, they had identified another four cell phone purchases.

Miguel watched with grim satisfaction as Helene stuck the last red flag into the map and tacked the form beneath the victim. “There’s a pattern, all right. I think we’ve nailed the killer’s hunting area.”

She nodded, studying her handiwork. “He’s bought two phones at each of the locations, except for these two.” She pointed to the stores marked by only one flag.

He dragged a hand through his hair and considered all the facts laid out on the boards. It added up, but he didn’t like the conclusion. With a disgusted curse, he said, “He plans on killing twelve people, and we’re only up to number five.”

“And we still don’t know how he picks his victims. That’s key. How does he choose them and why? I’m thinking the special locations—”

“And the poses,” he jumped in. “The poses mean something important that we’re missing.”

“Good work, Alexander, Sanchez,” ADIC Hernandez said as he walked into the war room. “I guess I came at just the right time for you to brief me.”

“Yes sir, it is,” Helene replied crisply and to her credit, she tipped her head at Miguel. “Sanchez made an interesting discovery about the locations. Maybe you want to explain?”

“Sure,” he said, pleasantly surprised. A lot of their coworkers wouldn’t have shared the spotlight.

She moved aside, and he and ADIC Hernandez joined her at the boards. “I’m—that is,
we’re
convinced that the locations and poses—”

“And maybe even the names and addresses used when the cell phones were purchased—” Helene added.

“—All tie together. There’s a reason why the victims were posed this way. There’s a reason for the locations and for the names and addresses the unsub used,” he said.

“We think they’re all related to something from the killer’s obsession to Broadway,” Helene said, and read out the names and addresses listed on the cell phone forms.

ADIC Hernandez folded his arms as for several moments he processed all the information they had gathered. Then he turned and regarded them thoughtfully, searching each of their faces, lingering on Helene. If Miguel didn’t know better, he could swear their boss saw right through their all-business façade, and somehow knew exactly what had happened between them last night. It was unnerving.

“I see you two have gotten over your differences,” the ADIC remarked, making Miguel shift uncomfortably. “You have the makings of a great team.” Hernandez turned back to the board. “This is good. You’ve already got more than the prior agents on the case.”

Helene said, “Thank you, sir. But we’re still not there.”

“No. You’re not,” Hernandez echoed, and pointed at the board. “You’ve got no motive. No idea how the unsub selects the victims.”

“No, sir,” Miguel agreed. “Working on it.”

“What’s your next move?”

Miguel and Helene glanced at one another. She began, “Visit the stores—”

“—Where the cell phones were purchased,” he completed.

Hernandez nodded and faced them again. “Since you two seem to have found a rhythm, can I assume there are no issues with being officially assigned as partners?”

Helene was quick to reply. “No, sir. None at all.”

When Miguel delayed a second, she shot him an irritated look, and the ADIC skewered him with a sharp glance. “Sanchez? How about you?”

Miguel looked at Helene from the corner of his eye, noting the flush across her cheekbones and her barely contained anger at his hesitation.

He said, “Sir, Special Agent Alexander is demanding. Forceful. Incredibly intelligent, and dedicated.” He smiled and winked at her. “I wouldn’t have anyone else for a partner.”

The flush deepened across her cheekbones, but this time from his praise.

Their ADIC chuckled and looked at Helene. “How ’bout you, Alexander? Anything to add?”

“I’m stubborn and a perfectionist, but Special Agent Sanchez knows how to put those traits to good use. Plus, he’s very professional and amazingly observant.”

The ADIC shook his head. “Frickin’ incredible,” he mumbled, and headed for the door. “If you two are finished with this mutual admiration society, I’ll leave you to visit those locations. Keep me posted.”

After he left, Helene rounded on Miguel. “Why did you say all that?”

“Because I’ve heard the scuttlebutt around the office about your stint in Philly and how difficult you are.”

She looked away. For a second he thought he saw a sheen of moisture appear in her eyes, but Helene didn’t strike him as the kind to cry. When she faced him once more, her gaze was clear. “I don’t give a rat’s ass about the gossip.”

“Only a robot wouldn’t care, princess, and you’re no robot.” Because he was too tempted to touch her again, he stuck his hands in his pockets.

She stared at him, and he stared back. Waiting. Expectant, until, with a huff, she dug her fingers into the hair at the top of her head and pulled back the long curls. “I
don’t
care,” she repeated, but he sensed an inner struggle going on.

He decided to give her a pass. “Whatever you say. Are you ready to head out? Got your walking shoes on, I see,” he teased. She had on another pair of ridiculously high and sexy heels.

She laughed lightly and shook her head, sending the curls into motion. “You’re a character, Sanchez.”

“Miguel,” he reminded her. Again.

This time she didn’t argue. “Fine. Let’s head to the stores. Miguel.”

Progress.