Kaitlan’s body shook. How could this … what …?
Somehow she pushed herself off the floor. Call 911! her mind screamed, but her stupid feet wouldn’t move. She swayed like a drunkard, shoulders hunched and breathing ragged. Her gaze glued to the corpse on her bed—the woman’s bugged eyes, drool coming out of her mouth. And her expression! Didn’t faces go slack in death? This one was frozen in shock.
The glands around Kaitlan’s mouth started to drain. She was going to throw up.
She lurched for the bathroom. Rounded the corner, fell on her knees before the toilet, and threw back the lids with a loud crack.
Kaitlan heaved, holding back her hair, eyes squeezed shut. Again and again until nothing was left in her stomach.
When it was over, she trembled from head to toe. She flushed the toilet and put down the lids. Washed out her mouth with toothpaste and water. Trying to tell herself none of this was true. She’d leave the bathroom to see nothing on her bed. She was just tired, that’s all. Too stressed.
Clutching her arms, Kaitlan sidled back into the bedroom.
The body was still there.
She stared at it, mind bouncing. Looking for one rational thought she could grasp.
Why would anyone bring a body here?
Craig. He’d been in the apartment today.
But he couldn’t have done this.
Who was this woman? Kaitlan had never seen her before. She looked … maybe in her forties.
That cloth around her neck. Black with green stripes. It was silk, wasn’t it? Kaitlan forced herself to move closer, peering at its shiny texture.
Yes. Silk.
She drew back, shuddering. This fabric had been used in two other killings in the area over the past year. The last one just two months ago.
Craig.
Kaitlan sagged against the wall, disbelief eating a deep, dark hole inside her. Craig had told her about the two killings. But he knew far too much for a mere beat cop, details only the investigators should know—like the black and green silk fabric. He’d claimed his father, the chief of police, had told him everything. She wasn’t supposed to say a word to anyone.
Kaitlan shook her head. So what? So he knew too much. He and his father were close. Chief Barlow would have talked to him.
But Craig was the only person with a key to her place. And he’d been here. She’d found his pen.
No. He couldn’t have done this.
Three months ago Craig Barlow had stolen her heart. He was charming and a little mysterious. Abercrombie model gorgeous, with deep blue eyes and grooves around his mouth when he smiled. Craig was private, not a lot of friends. Often he didn’t open up as much as she’d like. But he’d been good to her. They’d fallen in love. With her past, finding someone stable and strong like him had been incredible.
Kaitlan shivered. She didn’t care about the pen or the fact that he knew too much about the killings. Craig couldn’t kill anybody. There had to be another explanation.
Maybe the body was here before he came.
But then why did he leave it? A police officer wouldn’t just walk away from a crime scene. And why hadn’t he called her?
Okay, then someone did it after he was here.
But who? And how did that person get in?
How long had the woman been dead?
Heart pounding, Kaitlan edged to the bed. She raised a hand to touch the body, to see if it was cold. Twice she pulled back. The third time she grazed the woman’s wrist.
Still warm.
What did that mean? She died an hour ago? Two?
Craig would know. He lived for crime. He watched all the forensics shows on TV, wrote every chance he got on the suspense manuscript he never let anybody see …
A memory reeled through Kaitlan, and her hands flew to her mouth. He’d told her his favorite scenes to write were about the killer. And he wrote those scenes in first person.
She swallowed hard. No. She still couldn’t believe this.
Kaitlan glanced out the front window. Whoever did this must have thought she’d be at work all day. What if he came back?
She ran out of the room.
Kaitlan stumbled into the kitchen. She had to call 911. Head throbbing, she thrust a hand into her purse for her cell—and it rang just as she touched it. Craig’s tone.
She jumped and snatched back her hand.
A second ring.
Kaitlan pulled out the phone and stared at it, eyes wide.
Third ring.
He expected her to be at work. There, she would answer the phone.
Why was she afraid to answer? He didn’t do this.
Kaitlan flipped the phone open, willing herself to sound calm. “Craig?”
“Hi. You sound out of breath.”
And he sounded … not right. Tight-throated.
“Oh.” She laughed, gripping the edge of the table. “I was just coming out of the bathroom at the back of the shop and somebody said my cell was ringing.”
Her eyes squeezed shut. Why had she lied?
Silence. “Really.” Craig’s voice lowered, heavy with suspicion. Like he knew.
Kaitlan stilled, that deep hole inside her widening. No. This can’t be.
“I was just calling to check on you,” he said.
During his shift? He’d never done that before.
“Oh. Well. Thanks.” She swallowed. “Were you … at my apartment today?”
“No.” The word was clipped, hard. “Why do you ask?”
Kaitlan’s heart flipped over. Her eyes fastened on his pen lying on the table. “No reason.”
“Then why do you sound so funny?”
Why do you?
Her mind thrashed for something to say. “Your day going okay?”
“Yeah.” Defensiveness crept into his tone. “Just out patrolling, giving speeding tickets. Pretty boring.”
Out patrolling. Alone. He could have been here, done this, and nobody would know. Besides, the tone of his voice. Denying he’d been here. He was lying.
She picked up his pen and gripped it hard. “Oh. Sorry to hear that.”
No response. Kaitlan could hear Craig breathing over the line, like he was waiting for her to admit she wasn’t at work.
But how would he know that?
Her fingers curled around the phone. “Are we still on for tonight?
“Why wouldn’t we be?” he snapped. “You know I’d never miss my sister’s birthday.”
He’d never talked to her like that before. “Sure. Of course.” No way could she face that dinner. Like she could eat.
His pen burned in her fingers. She tossed it down.
“Please be ready on time.” His tone evened a little. “You know Dad hates it when people are late.”
“Okay, I will. ’Bye.”
Kaitlan threw the phone into her purse and fell into a chair. She dropped her head in her hands.
He’d just called to say hi. She’d imagined his suspicion.
No, you didn’t. He’d called to make sure she was at work.
But this was crazy. Craig was no killer. She would find another explanation.
Please, God.
Kaitlan had experienced way too much deceit in the past. She knew it could look you in the face and swear it was one thing when it was totally another. Hadn’t she manipulated enough people herself?
But Craig couldn’t be so deeply deceptive. Never him.
She needed to call 911.
Kaitlan retrieved her phone once more and stared at the keypad. She clutched the cell until her knuckles went white. In her mind rose Chief Russ Barlow’s wide, flat-nosed face—on the day they’d first met.
“So you’re Kaitlan.” The chief had slapped a protective hand on his son’s shoulder. “Craig’s told me a lot about you.”
Kaitlan flicked a nervous look at Craig. Just how much? “He’s told me a lot about you, too, sir. Good things.”
“Well.” Chief Barlow had given her a half smile that somehow managed to chill her. “Be good to my son now, hear? I’m watching out for him.”
Kaitlan bit her lip. How could she call 911 now? She’d just lied to a police officer. How to explain that? And what would they say when she tried to tell them Craig had been here?
If he really did this, no one would ever believe her.
She threw a glance over her shoulder, as if the dead body might lurch through the doorway any minute. Craig could be patrolling—close. What if he was on his way back here right now?
Panic took over her body. She had to get out of here.
Kaitlan threw the cell in her purse, shoved to her feet, and ran for the door. There she pulled up short. Eased the door open and stuck her head out. Checked right and left.
No one.
Heart slamming around in her chest, Kaitlan slipped outside and into her car. She started the engine, thrust the car in reverse to turn around, and flew down the driveway.
Two minutes later she was headed up Freeway 280, on the run to nowhere. Who could she possibly go to for help?
Images of the woman’s silently screaming face pulsed in her head.
She’d left a body in her apartment. She should call 911.
But—Craig. His pen on her floor. His detailed knowledge of the previous murders. The black silk fabric with green stripes.
Craig and his strange phone call. Craig and his continual intense focus on that suspense manuscript of his. Writing scenes about his fictional killer in first person …
Manuscript. The word shot light through Kaitlan’s dimmed brain.
There was one place she could go.
Kaitlan blinked at her surroundings. She wasn’t that far. In fact she’d automatically headed north from her apartment, as if in her subconscious she already knew. North toward the one person who had spent his life immersed in crime, who could see through this horrific puzzle and tell her what to do.
If he didn’t meet her on his porch with a shotgun.