Sins of the Angels (29 page)

And it had decided to come after her.

And the only thing standing in its way was the man holding her. The man whose heat burned against her back, whose strength once again folded itself around her and made her want to lean into it. Become one with it.

Alex opened her eyes. She could feel Seth Benjamin's disapproval and knew that he knew her thoughts. She lifted her chin in defiance and turned to Trent, schooling herself not step into the arms that had returned to his sides as she asked the question burning uppermost in her mind, “How am I the problem?”

“What?”

“
He
”—she shot Seth a look of dislike—“said I'm the problem, not the solution. How am I the problem?”

Trent's own glance in Benjamin's direction held much more than simple dislike. “He didn't mean it—”

Without thinking, Alex put her hand up to her partner's mouth to stop his words. She pulled back even as she brushed against him, but not before the sensation of his lips burned into her skin. Not before shocked heat flared in gray depths and found an answer in her belly.

She swallowed.

Detached her tongue from the roof of her mouth.

Scrabbled together the remains of reason.

“He did mean it,” she croaked. “Now I want to know
what
he meant.”

Trent shook his head. “I can't explain.”

“Then I can't promise.”

“Damn it, Alex—”

“Tell me.”

War waged across his features. “You ask the impossible.”

“So do you.”

Benjamin cleared his throat behind her. “You should get going,
Jacob
,” he said. His emphasis on Trent's name seemed to be a message of some kind, for it made Trent stand taller and glare at him in defiance.

“She needs to know.”

“It is forbidden.”

Alex rounded on the other man. “Shut up,” she snapped, and felt immense satisfaction at his surprise. “You don't get to waltz into my life and turn it upside down without explanation. No one does. You want my cooperation, I want answers. It's that simple.”

Benjamin studied her for a long moment in silence, probing, measuring, thoughtful. Then he looked at Trent again. “Think of the consequences.”

“What if she refuses cooperation and he gets to her?” Trent responded, his voice gruff.

Benjamin shrugged. “Touché.” He quirked an eyebrow at Alex. “You're certain about this, Alexandra Jarvis?”

Alex shored up her crumbling resolve and wiped her palms against her jacket. Roberts called her name. A part of her, desperate to finish the conversation before she lost her nerve, wanted to ignore her supervisor's summons, but a second bellow made her respond with a wave of acknowledgment.

She looked up at Trent. “I have to see what he wants.”

“But you'll stay with Seth.”

“You'll explain later?”

“You have my word.”

She swallowed at the fierce promise in his eyes. “Then you have mine, too.”

Hollow as she knew it to be, Alex found a certain comfort in going through the motions of an investigation. Seth Benjamin's presence, however, was another matter.

Every note she scribbled, every scrap of evidence she stooped to examine, his black eyes never left her. It was downright unnerving, not to mention irritating.

Even more annoying was the way none of the others questioned his being there. They didn't even seem to notice him. It was as if he didn't occupy actual space against the wall near the raised dais. As if he existed only in her head, except she didn't believe that anymore. Not after all she had seen and couldn't deny. Not after that phone call.

Alex tightened her grip on her pen. Crouched beside the pregnant woman, she looked toward the front of the room and saw one of the Forensics team edge between Benjamin and the platform. A little hiss of relief escaped her. So others did see him. That was good, because despite her recently formed opinion that she hadn't completely lost it, it was nice to have proof.

With gloved hands, she opened the woman's handbag and tugged the wallet from the jumbled contents, and then stood and flipped it open. The woman's photo stared back at her from the exposed driver's license. Elizabeth Anthony, born August 17, 1990.

August 17.

Alex glanced at the date on her digital watch and felt her throat tighten. Shit. She stood and looked down at the woman, taking in the carefully made-up face and tidy hair, now sprayed with blood, and the swollen belly that had become a grave rather than a haven for the unborn child within.

“Happy birthday, Elizabeth Anthony,” she whispered.

Roberts joined her. “You doing all right?” he asked.

Alex handed him the wallet, her finger hooked over it to point at the date on the license. Roberts's face went a shade grayer than it had already been.

“Fuck,” he said.

Alex jotted the woman's name and address into her notebook and stooped to retrieve the handbag from the floor. She dropped the wallet into it, slid everything into an evidence bag, and sealed the bag.

Roberts cleared his throat. “I've been thinking about what we talked about earlier. This one's pretty big, so if you'd rather sit it out . . .” His voice trailed off.

Hope flared in her, then sputtered out. Why couldn't Roberts have seen it this way before the killer had placed a personal call to her? Before Delaney went missing? Before Alex had seen this mayhem and slotted away the memories with all her others? She took a marker from her pocket and held it in a grip that numbed her fingers. It was too late to back out now. Hell, if she were to believe Trent, it had been too late for her all along.

She uncapped the marker. “I'm okay.”

Her supervisor shuffled his feet. “I mean it, Alex. There's something about this one that makes my skin crawl. Given your background, I can only imagine how much worse it must be for you.”

“I mean it, too. I'm fine.”

Roberts stared at the floor. “You wouldn't keep anything from me, would you?”

“Like what?”

“Like information pertinent to the case.” Her supervisor held up a hand to stave off her objection. “Like the fact he's after you.”

Shock removed the guard on her tongue. “How did you—?”

“I've been a cop for thirty-two years, Alex, and I've known you for six of those. You were way more shaken than you should have been when you got off the phone with him earlier.”

Alex looked to Benjamin and saw his eyebrows draw together in warning. Rebellion flared in her, but sputtered out almost immediately. She couldn't defy him even if she wanted to, because she didn't know anything yet. Didn't know if what she found out
could
be shared.

“You're wrong,” she lied to Roberts, hearing the bitterness in her voice. “You would have been shaken, too, hearing about Christine like that. Like you said, I have more reason than anyone else to be affected by this whole mess. So no, I'm not withholding information, and no, he didn't threaten me.”

Her staff inspector's piercing gaze held hers for a long moment, rife with questions, doubts, uncertainty. Then his face tightened. “I don't believe you. I'm putting a watch on you.”

“You can't.”

Roberts raised an eyebrow.

Alex bit her lip. Struggled for the right words. “This case makes my skin crawl, too, Staff. But not because of my history. The killer isn't—I'm not sure he's—”

“I know about the DNA results on that claw.”

She blinked at the sudden change in subject.

“I know it was unidentifiable.”

Alex stared at her supervisor and watched him carefully not acknowledge all that stood behind his statement, all that stood behind her clumsy attempt to explain what they dealt with. Roberts looked away first.

“I'm putting a watch on you.”

“Don't. If he is after me, he'll go through whoever is in his way. You won't be able to stop him.”
And I don't want anyone else to die.

“What if someone else on the team was his target? What would you do?”

Alex's silence spoke for her.

Roberts nodded. “I thought so. But if it makes you feel any better, I'll ask for volunteers.”

 

ALEX LEANED AN
elbow on the roof of her sedan and threaded her fingers into the hair at her temple. She surveyed the dozen ambulances on the street, and twice that number of cop cars, all with their dome lights flashing. Yellow tape cordoned off half the city block, and farther away, wooden barriers held back the usual gawkers. The scene had all the earmarks of a Hollywood setting, complete with an air of make-believe, because surely the events here were too surreal to have actually happened.

Two paramedics came out of the building, carrying a stretcher with yet another body bag on it, their faces grim. Alex's grip tightened on her hair. She wished to God she
could
take Roberts up on his offer to let her sit this one out. No one on the squad would question the decision, and she sure as hell wouldn't miss seeing the carnage.

On the other hand, she'd be left with nothing but time on her hands. Time to sit and think about being hunted by a killer she could no longer believe was human; about being protected by someone about whom she harbored the same thoughts.

No, as useless an exercise as this investigation might be, at least it kept her occupied. Kept her—Alex's thoughts halted as, over the heads of the crowd gathered beyond the barriers, one face suddenly stood out. Trent. Tall and strong and watchful, his attention on the proceedings, he had returned from his meeting with the mysterious Verchiel. Alex frowned. But what was he doing out there? Had he seen something? Felt it?

Irritation stabbed. He'd promised her answers, damn it, and should have come straight inside to her and Seth. Speaking of whom . . . She straightened and glanced over her shoulder at the doorway, feeling a prickle of guilt. Her watchdog wouldn't be impressed when he realized she'd slipped away from him like this, but it served him right for taking that holier-than-thou attitude with her. Besides, she hadn't gone far, and eventually he'd figure out where she'd gone and come after her.

She located Trent again in the crowd. He hadn't moved. She hesitated. Part of her wanted to go to him—even needed to—but that still didn't make it easy to do so.

So much sat between them, barely acknowledged, let alone explained. So much that moved like a vast, dark, endless sea she wasn't sure she wanted to explore, despite her earlier, confident words. She studied him for a long moment. Wondered if she was ready to hear his secrets. To finally know who—or what—he was.

No more lies, no more pretense of any kind. Just him and her and . . . Alex looked at the chaos of emergency vehicles surrounding her, lights splintering the night.
And that.

She watched another body bag being loaded into a waiting ambulance. Wondered who would face the task of removing Father McIntyre's remains from the inverted cross. Her stomach twisted. She turned back to the crowd, steeled herself, and walked across the street to the barrier. Pushing her way through the gathered throng, she reached Trent's side and said without preamble, “It's time to talk.”

Trent tensed and stared down at her in shock. He peered around as if to see at whom she directed her words and then frowned.

“All right,” he said warily. “About what?”

She scowled. “What the hell do you think? About this.” She jerked her chin toward the murder scene and lowered her voice. “You promised, damn it. You said you'd give me answers.”

The confusion cleared from her partner's expression and it turned thoughtful. Attentive. “Yes. I think that would be good. But not here.”

Alex took stock of their surroundings. It was unlikely that anyone would overhear them, or even notice their presence, but he was right to be cautious. She nodded. “I'll need to finish up here—” She broke off as the cell phone at her waist rang. Unclipping it, she glanced at the display and then flipped it open. “Jen, this isn't a good time—”

“Alex. Thank God,” Jen whispered.

Alex's entire being tuned in to the edge of hysteria in her sister's voice. The cell phone turned to lead in her grip, weighing down her arm. “What's wrong? Is it Nina? Is Nina all right?”

“I don't know. She came home covered in blood and won't talk to me. I don't think she
can
talk. She's sitting in the living room just staring at the wall and not moving, and I don't know what to do.”

Ice trickled through Alex's veins.
What the hell—?
She moved away from Trent and the cluster of people near him, trying not to make Jen's panic her own. She lowered her voice. “Have you called the police?”

“I'm scared to. What if she—what if—” Jen's voice choked off into a strangled sob and then a hiccup. “Alex, just come. Please.”

“I'm on my way. Just stay with her until I get there. Don't touch her or let her wash—”

“She's my
daughter
. I'm not going to
not
touch my baby.”

Alex tried to separate her professional self from the person her sister needed her to be right now. The person her niece would need when she got to their house. “Of course. But no washing. We'll need her clothes as evidence.”

“Whatever. Just get here.”

 

SHE THOUGHT HE
was Aramael.

Caim clenched his fists at his sides, struggling not to snatch the phone from the woman. Not to grab her arm and pull her into the alley with him and slice her open then and there; to find out, finally, if he was right. If the soul of a Naphil could be the key to his return.