Ashes, Ashes, They All Fall Dead (3 page)

“Okay, thanks.”

He strode back toward the front yard, obviously eager to get back to his wife.

Tessa’s visit to the Buchanan household had already proven as awkward as she’d expected. Now she had one more Buchanan to deal with before she could go home to her apartment. Why couldn’t the private investigator in the Buchanan family be Austin, Matt’s twin? Austin might be a smart-ass, but he had a wicked sense of humor and she got along with him just fine. After all, he’d never second-guessed her investigative skills in front of anyone else like Matt had. She squared her shoulders and turned around.

The sight of Matt Buchanan striding toward her, his sweat-slicked, golden chest naked to her gaze, sucked the air right out of her lungs. She grabbed the fence for support and focused on drawing a normal breath. When had he gotten so tall? And where had all those muscles come from?

He stopped in front of her, far too close, forcing her to crane her neck back to look him in the eyes—his very blue eyes, she noted—then cursed herself for noticing.

He quirked a dark brow. “You okay? You look flushed.”

Wonderful.

She forced herself to stand straight without clinging to the fence like a teenager in lust with the high-school quarterback. This was ridiculous. She was at least six years older than him. She shouldn’t notice how drool-worthy he’d suddenly become.

“What is it out here today, ninety degrees or something?” She fanned her warm cheeks, hoping he wouldn’t realize she was wearing a cool, linen suit. And of course, with a skirt on instead of pants, she really didn’t have a reason to be hot, but it was all she could think of to explain her blush.

Both brows rose this time. “I’m pretty sure it’s closer to eighty today, but I suppose . . . in a suit . . .” He shrugged and leaned against the fence, crossing his arms. That action made his biceps bulge under a perfect tan she totally envied. Her red hair had come with a milk-white complexion that tended to burn and freckle instead of turning golden like his.

She crossed her own arms, mimicking his pose. “If you want to grab a shirt, I can wait.” Maybe if he covered all that tantalizing skin she could focus on something other than the way his jean shorts hung low on his lean hips. The man was buff with a capital
B
, his abdominal muscles forming a mouthwatering vee that drew her gaze down in spite of her wishes. She swallowed, hard, and forced her gaze up to meet his.

“It doesn’t bother me, if it doesn’t bother you.” He gave her a knowing look.

Her fingers suddenly twitched with the urge to wrap around his throat and squeeze.

“Do your teachers know you’re ditching class today,
Matthew
?” She batted her lashes and put all the honeyed sweetness she could manage into her voice.

He stared at her for a long moment. As if coming to some kind of decision, he straightened away from the fence and hooked his thumbs in the belt loops on his shorts.

“I graduated
college
three years ago,
Special Agent James
, but you already know that. And I prefer Matt, not Matthew. But you know that too. I’m here today helping out the family business because they were a man short. But when I’m not here, I’m running my own successful business. I don’t have any
teachers
to report to.”

Score one for Matt.

Her boss didn’t realize Matt had asked her out—several times, right after the Simon Says Die investigation was closed—and that she’d given him quite a set down the last time, letting him know in explicit terms that she had no interest in dating a “boy.”

He’d never asked her out again, and she couldn’t think of a single reason why he’d want to work with her after the way she’d treated him. As soon as he realized that she was the agent he’d be working with on the assignment Casey had called him about, he would probably flatly decline to help. Which meant she needed to suck it up, hide her dislike of him, and somehow convince him to take the case anyway.

She reminded herself that she was here to stop a killer and save lives. Her personal likes or dislikes had no place in this conversation. She reached into her suit jacket pocket and pulled out a sheet of paper.

“Casey wanted me to show you this and give you some background on the letters case he mentioned on the phone. This is a copy of the first letter we received.”

He took the sheet of paper and studied it.

“The letter came through regular mail about three years ago,” she continued. “It was addressed specifically to the FBI office here in Savannah.”

“How many letters have there been total?”

“Twenty-three. The last one came about a month ago. I’ve searched every law-enforcement database I know of to see if any of the names on the letters match cases for either a missing person or a murder. Nothing panned out.”

“Looks like a printer was used, rather than an old-fashioned typewriter. But it’s hard to tell what type of printer, since this is a copy. Laser? Ink-jet?”

“Laser. I examined the metadata hidden in each page to determine the printer’s manufacturer. I figured out which superstore the printer was shipped to and confirmed it was purchased over five years ago in Columbus, Ohio. But the store doesn’t have detailed customer purchase records going back that far, and of course no surveillance footage that old either.”

He nodded, not looking surprised. “Postmarks?”

“From all over the South—Florida, Alabama, four in Georgia, three in Tennessee, a couple from the Carolinas. Only two were mailed from the same zip code, Miami, Florida, but they were mailed from different post offices.”

“He’s careful.”

“Very.”

“Fingerprints?”

“Latent partials on several of the letters, but none of them provided enough detail for a comparison.”

He handed the copy of the letter back to her.

“Casey’s convinced the letters are a hoax,” she said.

“And you aren’t?”

She shook her head and tucked the paper away. “I believe we have an extremely prolific serial killer on our hands. Casey gave me seven days, starting tomorrow, to prove the case is worth pursuing. But since our own cold-case unit couldn’t develop any leads, he called you. I’d be the lead on the investigation. You’d have to work for me, follow my instructions.”

His mouth quirked up in a half grin. “Are you trying to scare me away or make me want to help you? It’s hard to tell.”

She clenched her hands beside her. “We would sincerely appreciate your help on the case.” The words felt as if they’d been wrenched from her.

From the way Matt’s eyes widened, she didn’t guess she’d fooled him about her lack of enthusiasm for working with him.

She reminded herself again how critical it was to get his help. Without him, she’d have to drop the investigation or lose her job. Casey had been crystal clear on that point.

“Please,” she added, forcing a smile.

He extracted a white business card from his wallet. “That’s my address. I work out of my home office most of the time. Be there at eight tomorrow morning, and bring the other letters. All of them, including the envelopes. Originals if possible, but I understand if you can only bring copies.”

He turned away, but Tessa grabbed his arm, stopping him. “Wait, you’re taking the case?”

He looked at her over his shoulder. “Of course.”

She dropped her hand, confused and irritated by the pleasant feelings that had shot through her when she’d touched his skin.

Why would he agree to take the case when he knew she could barely stand to be around him?

When he fully turned around to face her again, she realized she’d spoken that last thought out loud.

Wonderful.

He leaned down, close enough that she could see the blue-green flecks around his pupils and smell the tantalizing masculine scent of aftershave and deodorant rising from his overheated body.

She had to force herself
not
to step back. That would make her look weak. Or worse, it might clue him in that what she really wanted to do was step closer. She wanted to slide her fingers over the thick muscles of his chest, up, higher, around his neck to play with the ends of his dark, slightly damp hair.

She dug her nails into her palms, using the pain to take her mind off her ridiculous, unwelcome, and totally unexpected fascination with Matt Buchanan.

“I was actually going to say
no
when you first showed me that letter,” he said. “I’m slammed with work right now, and it sounds like you’ve already done the kind of legwork I would recommend. There isn’t anything obvious I can point to that you should have done but didn’t. Which means this is going to be a damned difficult case.”

“But . . . then . . . wh . . . why?”
Ugh.
She couldn’t concentrate with him standing so close. In spite of her earlier resolve, she took a step back, then another. “Why did you change your mind?”

His lips curved in a grin, as if he knew exactly why she’d moved back. “I changed my mind,” he closed the distance between them again and leaned down, his lips dangerously close to her ear, “because you don’t want me to take the case.”

She shivered at the feel of his hot breath against the sensitive skin on her neck. She caught herself leaning toward him and jerked back.

Matt straightened. And winked.

Damn him.

“My house, tomorrow morning, eight o’clock sharp. Don’t be late.” He strode back toward the construction site, leaving Tessa simmering in a stew of self-loathing, resentment, and lust.

W
HEN THE
B&B crew finished for the day, Matt was totally worn out, but Madison insisted he stay for dinner. He took a shower, dressed in a shirt and jeans borrowed from Pierce, and sat down to enjoy the pizza Madison had ordered. He’d actually been worried when she’d insisted he stay because he knew what a lousy cook she was. Pizza delivery meant he wouldn’t have to choke down something half burned or half raw and pretend to enjoy it.

He honestly didn’t know how his brother survived Madison’s meals.

After dinner he said good-bye to his sister-in-law and headed out. Pierce walked with him, but when they reached Matt’s car, parked at the curb, Pierce leaned back against it.

“Something wrong?” Matt asked.

“The letters case. You agreed to take it on?”

“Should I not have?”

Pierce seemed to consider that as he stared at the nearest oak tree. Its long, gnarled branches hung over the street, throwing sinister shadows beneath the street lamps.

“I know Casey and most of the other agents back at the office think the letters are a prank, nothing serious,” Pierce said, “but I’m not so sure. Three years is a long time to play a joke. And there’s something about that Ashes, Ashes thing that doesn’t sit right.” He shrugged. “Maybe it’s nothing, but the minute I heard you might take up the investigation, I got a bad feeling.”

Matt had been an observer on the sidelines for years as his older brother Pierce worked some of the FBI’s roughest, toughest, most dangerous investigations. Matt had seen enough to respect any “bad feelings” his brother might have. Pierce had rarely been wrong when it came to that infamous sixth sense cops had about danger.

“What exactly is your bad feeling telling you?”

Pierce frowned and glanced back toward the house. “That if it weren’t for Madison being so close to her due date, I’d insist on you not taking the case. I’d take it instead.” He put his hand on Matt’s shoulder. “Just be careful. I mean it. Remember you’re a PI, not a cop, in spite of that nine-millimeter you lug around. If things start to go south, get the hell out. Leave the dangerous stuff to someone else.”

“I’ll be careful. Promise.”

Pierce nodded and headed back to the house.

As Matt drove away, he couldn’t help wondering if his brother’s warnings were a bad omen. Because, even though he’d teased Tessa that he’d only taken the case because she didn’t want him to take it, there’d been another reason he’d agreed to work with her.

From the moment he’d held that letter in his hand and read the “Ashes, Ashes” line, he’d felt the same sense of foreboding and danger that Pierce just mentioned. And even though Tessa didn’t give a damn about him, he’d always had a soft spot for her. If she was jumping into something dangerous enough to make both him and his brother worried, he had no choice but to jump into it with her.

Chapter Three

Day One

M
ATT’S HOUSE WAS
a cabin, an honest-to-goodness
log
cabin. Tessa stood on the covered porch that appeared to wrap completely around the structure. She was somewhat in awe of its simplistic beauty, and the beauty of the surrounding land.

She was a die-hard city girl, had been since her first memories. For some reason, anything remotely rural gave her the heebie-jeebies, as if she’d just stepped into a horror movie and was waiting for someone with an ax to jump out from behind a tree. Even her dreams were often filled with shadowy evil figures hiding, watching, waiting to grab her. But even though she’d been loath to drive this far out of town to the address on Matt’s business card, she couldn’t help but appreciate the honey-gold tone of the logs. And the acres of gently sloping fields that led to a heavily wooded forest beyond.

Pierce had a cabin too, not that she’d personally seen it. Had he given his cabin to his younger brother since Pierce had married Madison and they now lived in town?

The sound of laughter had Tessa stepping across the porch to the screen door. Through the screen she saw a large, open great room with a kitchen tucked in on the right side and, to the left, an alcove that could barely be called a hallway. Judging by the size of the cabin outside, there were probably two bedrooms down that hallway, one bath, and maybe a closet. Overall the cabin was small, but the great room had a high ceiling, which gave the impression of a much larger space.

Laughter sounded again, but Tessa didn’t see anyone inside. She clutched her briefcase and raised a hand to knock on the door, then froze.

A blonde woman wearing a man’s dress shirt stumbled through one of the doorways in the hallway. She was laughing so hard she could barely stand up.