* * *
SO MUCH BLOOD.
Before she’d been escorted to the interrogation room at the station, she’d washed and washed her hands, but Gabrielle swore that she could still feel the blood on her skin.
She’d watched Van McAdams die, and she hadn’t been able to do anything to help him.
Just like before.
“It’s not your fault.”
They were in front of the brownstone. The cab’s wheels rolled away, leaving them alone out there. The night was hot, stifling, and Gabrielle thought she could still smell the overwhelming scent of blood.
He opened the door and led her inside.
When he paused, she didn’t stop. Gabrielle headed straight for the stairs.
But Cooper caught her hand, stilling her on the second step. “You think I don’t know what you’re doing?”
Right then, she was trying to run. “Can’t be in fighting form all the time,” she murmured. “Sometimes...sometimes we all need to crash.” That was exactly what she wanted to do. She wanted to get inside her apartment where she could fall apart and no one would see her break.
He put his foot on the bottom stair. “Whatever you need, I can give you.”
She shook her head.
Cooper turned her back to face him. His hand lifted, and his fingers curled around her chin as he stared into her eyes. “I can keep you safe. You can crash, you can fall, and I’ll be there to pick you right back up.”
Her lips trembled. She caught her lower lip between her teeth because she didn’t want him seeing that weakness.
Just hold it together a little longer.
But McAdams—those last, terrible moments—had stirred up memories of her own past that she just couldn’t shut out any longer.
There was a reason she took the cold cases. A reason she tried so hard to find justice for the ones who had been forgotten.
“Fall into me,” he told her again. “I’m here.”
When had anyone else ever said something like that to her? She’d stood on her own for so long, Gabrielle couldn’t remember what it was like to have someone else there when the storm hit.
She found herself nodding. “Come...upstairs with me?” So she wouldn’t be alone when the crash hit.
Then Gabrielle turned. She headed slowly up that staircase, and Cooper was right behind her. She could feel the reassuring heat and strength of his body following hers.
She opened the door to her apartment, flipped on the lights, reached for the alarm—
And realized that her place had been trashed.
Couch cushions were cut. Furniture overturned. Her files were scattered across the floor.
“Get back!” Cooper’s low snarl. He didn’t wait for her to comply. He grabbed her shoulders and pushed her back behind him.
He had his gun in his hand again. She didn’t even remember him getting that weapon back from the cops at the precinct. While he pushed her back, Cooper stepped inside her place.
No. She grabbed his arm. “He could still be here.” Wasn’t that what they’d feared at McAdams’s place? That the killer was there?
“I hope he is,” Cooper whispered back.
Then he advanced.