After the Dark (Killer Instinct 1)

“I was wrong. The partner—Phil Hyde—he was the one who’d set up Harry. The guy got scared that Harry might be getting too close to the truth, because of what I said. He came down here to Fairhope. He was going to take out both Harry and Samantha.”

Blake realized his hands were clenched into fists.

“Harry Dark was never a man to go down easily.” Lewis swiped his hand over his face. “He took out Phil. Lived long enough for the ambulance to arrive. Samantha—she was thirteen then. Her dad died while she was holding his hand.”

The drumming of Blake’s heartbeat seemed far too loud. “What happened to her after that?”

Lewis sighed. “Her godfather moved down to Fairhope. He took over the captain’s job that had been vacant a few months. He tried to make damn sure he never let her down again.” Lewis held his gaze. “So I hope you hear exactly what I am saying to you, boy. I won’t trust you, not today and not tomorrow. I won’t make that mistake again. I will watch every move that you and your FBI buddies make. If I think you’re going to get her hurt, I will step in, FBI jurisdiction or not. I don’t really give a shit. My goddaughter is what matters to me.” He paused. “Are we clear?”

“Crystal clear.” And he respected that. “But I think I need to tell you a few things now.”

“Guess it’s your turn...” Lewis murmured. He shrugged.

Yeah, it was. “One... I would never turn my back on Samantha. I would never put her at risk. She matters to me. Got it? She matters. So I don’t give a shit what the FBI brass says, Samantha is my priority on this case. I won’t let anyone take her. That prick who thinks getting to her is some kind of game? He’ll have to go through me if he wants her. I came too close to losing her on that damn pier. It’s not happening again.” His voice was grim and rough, and he didn’t care. When it came to Samantha, he wanted there to be no mistake about where his loyalties were. With her.

“I hear you.” Lewis quirked a brow. “But you started with ‘one’—and that makes me think you got more to say.”

He took a step toward the other man. “Yeah, I do. Two... Thank you for taking care of her.” Because he couldn’t stand the thought of Samantha on her own, scared, alone, at thirteen—

“When we stood by her father’s grave,” Lewis spoke slowly, “she didn’t ask me when her dad was going to wake up. She wasn’t a kid anymore. She stared at his grave, then she looked at me...and she said... She said it should have been her. Seems Phil Hyde was aiming his gun at Samantha. He was going to take her out, make it look like Harry flipped his fucking lid and killed his daughter, then himself. One of them murder-suicides. But Harry...Harry loved his girl. He took that bullet for her.”

He’d died for Samantha.

“Sometimes,” Lewis added, voice gruff, “I worry that a part of Sammie died that day, too.”

Samantha wasn’t dead, and she wasn’t going to be.

“How many bad things can happen to a person...” Lewis asked, musing, “before they start to lose their soul?”

“Samantha isn’t losing anything.” He stalked back to the door. “Count on it.” He grabbed for the knob.

“Agent Gamble!”

He looked back.

“You ever wonder how Samantha understands killers so well?”

Only every fucking day.

“There’s a thin line between good and evil. I’ve seen it myself. After her father died, Samantha had a whole lot of anger building up inside of her. I wanted her to channel that anger. Make sure she used it the right way.” He nodded. “So I’m the one who started her on the path she’s on. I’m the one who taught her to study crime scenes. I’m the one who told her that she could make a difference.” Anger glinted in his eyes. “Then you jerks at the FBI turned on her like a pit of vipers.”

“I never turned on Samantha.”

“Make sure you never do.” Lewis’s jaw hardened even more. “Because you do something to my baby girl, and badge or no badge, I’ll be gunning for you.”

Once more, his respect for the other man notched up. “Maybe you should save some of that rage for Cameron Latham.”

“Don’t think I’m not...” Lewis’s smile was sharp. Cutting like a knife. “I’d love to get that man in my sights.”

He believed the guy. Blake opened the door and stepped outside. He wanted to find Samantha, but his phone started ringing. Shit. He yanked it out of his pocket, and when he saw the name—Josh Duvane—Blake put the phone to his ear. “Tell me you’re in town.”

“Just landed.”

“Our vic is dead.” He kept walking, searching for Samantha but not seeing her anywhere. “I need your team to get in the water.” He needed evidence from the bomb scene.

And he needed Tammy. “Our guy is planning to kill again. We have to stop him before he takes another victim.”

CHAPTER NINE

THE SUN WAS too bright. Sweat trickled down Samantha’s back. Even in February. She stood a few yards away from the police station, her hands on the warm bricks as she sucked in air. She’d never lost it like that before, not at a crime scene and certainly not in front of other law enforcement personnel. She kept her shit together, kept her control in place. She wasn’t—

Weak.

Her shoulders straightened. Her hands fell away from the bricks. You have to stop him before he hurts someone else.

If he wanted her, then he should come for her.

Profile him. Focus on him. Stop seeing the victim. That was the problem. Tammy White’s pain—the woman’s face—they were in her head. She had to stop thinking about the victim and focus on the killer.

You needed a place to work on her...a place to make your stupid video. A quiet spot to kill her.

But once he’d killed the victim...

“You weren’t wearing gloves.” Her head jerked up. She remembered the video. Remembered seeing him lift the knife. He’d touched Tammy’s face, touched her. And he’d killed her.

I saw his bare hand when he killed Kristy, too. In that video, the guy had been wearing a ski mask, but nothing had covered his hands. He’d touched her and he’d killed her. Blake had told her that the perp dumped Kristy Wales in a lake. Maybe he used the water for a reason... Like to wash away evidence.

Her heartbeat slowed as she thought, as she profiled. The guy liked to get up close and personal with his kills. He liked to feel them, so perhaps he was trying to—quite literally—wash the evidence away from the bodies by dumping them in the water. If he followed the same MO with Tammy that he’d used with Kristy, then—

Tammy isn’t going to be in the ground. He put her in the water. They’d all been aware of that possibility. With the bay so close, the water was an easy dump site. But she didn’t think the case was about easy. The guy liked the water. The more Samantha thought about it, the more she realized that was true. This perp is drawn to water. He’d even tried to pull Samantha into a watery grave with that bomb of his.

She turned to face the street. Her gaze shot to the left and to the right. The perp had come to Fairhope just for her, so that meant the guy should be close.

“Samantha!” Blake yelled her name.

She jerked and turned to see him hurrying out of the police station. “I’m right here.”

He bounded toward her. There seemed to be extra worry in his green gaze as it swept over her, and she wondered just what Lewis had told him. She loved Lewis, but the man had a serious tendency to overshare. He often said that the two of them were opposites. She wouldn’t talk enough and he...

Give the man gin, and he’ll tell you every secret he has.

Blake caught her arm and pulled her close. “A killer says he’s gunning for you, and you immediately run outside on your own. Great plan.”

Her lips thinned. “Maybe offering myself up as bait isn’t the worst

idea. It could save a life.”

“Samantha...” His voice hardened. She could see the warning flash in his eyes. She chose to ignore that warning.

“I’m dead serious. We need him to come right at me, not go for another innocent like Tammy.”

His hold tightened on her. “In case you missed it, he did come at you. Or are you forgetting the bomb that nearly killed you?”

Hard to forget it. She still had bruises and singe marks. “He’s scared of me.” She believed that with utter certainty. “And I think I know why.” Okay, this was going to be her first profile in a very long time. Bass had tried to tell her she knew jackshit about profiling, but criminals, killers...they were in her blood.

We both know you like the dark. Nothing wrong with that. After all, isn’t that your name? Cameron’s voice whispered through her mind, and she shivered. Samantha pulled in a long breath, then she spoke, slowly, carefully. “This guy is young, probably only in his early twenties. I think Kristy Wales was his first kill, and he was feeling his way with her, half imitating Cameron and half letting go of the twisted hunger he has inside of himself.”

Blake’s gaze sharpened on her.

“He doesn’t use gloves with his victims. He touches them because what he’s doing is intimate. It’s personal. That’s the same reason he’s using a knife...it’s a personal weapon.” And it was Cameron’s weapon. “Because he does touch his prey, he dumps their bodies in water, trying to wash away evidence.” The guy didn’t have a strong grasp of forensic technology. “He’s developing an MO with each kill. Abduction, video—the video gives him power, it’s a performance. He gets his victims to say exactly what he wants. He probably tells them that if they get their lines just right, they’ll get to live.” She shook her head. “Only, that’s never part of his plan. He wants to give them hope and then rip that hope away. He steps in close to kill them so he can better see the hope fade from their eyes.” Because he likes that power.

Blake was just staring at her.

“What?” Samantha asked, worry gnawing at her.

“Keep going.”

Okay. “His MO...abduction, video, killing...then dumping in the water. Our guy is young, and he’s probably been around water his whole life. He feels confident near water. A boater, probably. And the way he talks about Cameron, Dr. Latham,” she corrected, “I...I think he may have been one of Cameron’s students at Georgetown.”

Surprise flashed on Blake’s face.

“He’s got a personal relationship with Cameron, like...like a mentor relationship. I took away his mentor, and he’s pissed as all hell at me.”

Blake seemed to absorb this, and then he asked, “You think Latham realized he had a budding serial killer in his class? Could Latham have been urging the guy on, waiting to see when he’d make his first kill?”

“Like another experiment?” Samantha asked. Her lips pressed together, and she nodded. “Yes, actually, I think he could have been doing just that. Cameron knows people, what makes them tick, what they want most. If this perp was in one of his classes, then Cameron would have figured him out early on.” And that was when the fun would have really begun for Cameron. “We’ll be looking for a white male, one who came from a boating background, probably a loner, tall, muscled.” That part came from the video. “He would have withdrawn from the school after Cameron’s disappearance, so it should be easy enough to find someone from Georgetown who fits this MO and...” She licked her lips. “I think he knew Kristy Wales. He wore that mask in her video, and I think he did it because he didn’t want her to recognize him. He kept his voice as a rasp, disguising it. He didn’t want Kristy to see him for who he really was because he was afraid she’d say something in the video. But Tammy was a stranger to him. She didn’t know his name, so he didn’t have to hide his identity from her.”

Blake gave a slow shake of his head.

Her breath caught in her lungs. “Blake?” He didn’t believe her?

“You’re pretty fucking incredible, you know that?”

She just stared at him.

“I expect to find you out here, sick or scared or...something. But you’re profiling him.” Pride resonated in his voice.

Goose bumps rose on her arms. “It’s easy to think like them. Too easy.” And that scared her.

Because...

For just a moment, she remembered a conversation she and Cameron had had one long-ago day. One of their “what if” conversations as they’d called them.

What if you cross a line one day, Sam? He’d given her a probing glance. What if you stop hunting the killers, and you give in to all of those dark emotions that swirl inside of you?

She’d laughed at the question. I want to put them away. I want to make a difference.

But he’d shaken his head. No, you just want to make up for the past.

“You’re not evil, Samantha.” Blake’s voice pulled her back to the present.

She blinked at him.

“You’re not like any of those bastards out there, if that is what scares you.” He paused. “You’re nothing like Latham.”

She sucked in a sharp breath. “You and Lewis did have quite the talk, didn’t you?”

Blake gazed into her eyes. “Trust me.”

They were so close on that street. His hands were on her shoulders now, their bodies brushing. To passersby, they probably looked like lovers.

Oh, wait, they were. Another line I crossed.

“I’m not going to betray you. I’m not going to turn on you. However this case works out, I want you to trust me. No matter what you may see, no matter what twists or turns come...trust me. Because the one person I will never betray in this world? It’s you.”

Her heart was pounding too hard in her chest. “We...we aren’t partners—”

“Hell, yeah, we are. But that’s not the reason.”

“Why?” Her voice had turned into a whisper. “Why me?”

He smiled at her. An actual, real smile that made his green eyes go even brighter. She’d always secretly loved his smiles and the way they made her feel. “You’re the profiler. I bet if you tried hard enough, you could get into my head and figure it out.”

“You don’t like being profiled.” He’d told her that before.

But his smile stayed on his lips. “Go ahead,” he dared. “Try to figure me out now. Or are you afraid of what you might find?”

Maybe she was. Maybe something about Blake had always seemed too good to be true.

He bent his head and pressed his lips to hers. It was a slow, sensual kiss. Right there, on the street, where anyone could see them. Instinctively, she pushed against his shoulders.

“You’re not my dirty little secret, Samantha.” His voice was a sensual rumble against her lips. “And I won’t be yours, either. I had you in my bed, and that means something to me.”

It meant something to her, too.

“It means—” his eyes glinted at her “—you’re mine.”

* * *

BLAKE GAMBLE WAS an asshole. One who was in the way and needed to be eliminated. He watched Blake put his hands on Samantha. Watched the fool agent press his mouth to hers.

Samantha put her hands on his shoulders. She tried to push him back. But did the dumbass take a clue? No, he didn’t. He leaned close to her. Whispered some shit to her.

Something that made Samantha...

Scared?

As he watched from the shadows, she pulled away from Blake. Samantha shook her head once, a definite no. But Blake kept talking, and then they headed for his SUV.

The watcher’s eyes narrowed as he observed them drive away.

He was tired of Blake Gamble being in his way. Tired of the guy screwing everything to hell and back. He needed to eliminate the SOB. And the best way to do that?

; Well, it just might be by using the killer who was hunting in the quiet town of Fairhope, Alabama. It was a quaint place. Neat little streets. At night, the trees in the city lit up—decorated by thousands of miniature bulbs. It was a cute touch, one he was sure Samantha had liked when she was a girl.

After all, darkness had scared her, back then.

Now it would seem that other things scared her.

I scare her. He knew that truth. He’d seen it when he put a knife to her lovely throat. It was her fear that had stopped him. He’d liked seeing the fear in the eyes of the other women. It had given him a sweet rush. But when Samantha had looked at him and her golden eyes had darkened, he’d realized something very important.

He didn’t want a world without her. Not Samantha. He didn’t care about others. Forming relationships had never been easy for him. Hell, he’d never wanted relationships. But she was different. In some odd way, she seemed to fit him.

She’s mine. Possession. It went deep for him. Samantha had given him her secrets over the years; she’d trusted him. She’d learned the truth about killers with him. They shared a special world.

The SUV had driven away. Blake Gamble, off to save the day. Whistling, he crossed the street. A woman glanced over at him and smiled.

He smiled back, flashing teeth that were extra white and capped. He’d made a few changes to himself over the past few months. Nothing too dramatic, no need for that. He’d darkened his hair, not blond any longer but black. He’d let his beard grow out, and he’d colored that, too. The beard had changed the line of his jaw, made it harder, more square in appearance. The beard also made his face appear longer, a nice touch, he thought.

He’d decided to go with blue eyes. Of course, sometimes, he switched those up—he kept lots of colored contacts handy, just in case.

And he’d put on weight—well, muscle. Twenty more pounds. He wore faded T-shirts and loose jeans now, and he kept calloused hands, the kind of hands a man would have if he worked outside a lot.

Not the hands of a college professor. Not some stuffy guy who spent all day lecturing.