Need Me (Dark Obsession 3)

“It’s better than being on the street.” Her chin was still up. “And you’re going to help me now, right? You’re going to help me get my life back? Once I know who I am, then I can get out of here. I can get my name. Get a job. Get a home.”

Not a shelter.

His gaze locked with hers. He wanted her out of that place right then.

“You’re helping me?” Eve pressed.

Dammit. He hadn’t even started the research on her. The woman could be playing him. If she was, she’d regret it. He’d make sure of it. But for that moment … with Pauley muttering behind them … with a social worker frowning and heading toward them … all Gabe could say was, “Yes, I’m helping you.” He’d find out all of her secrets. Good, bad, and everything in between. Maybe she’d regret it. Maybe he would. But from this moment on he and Eve would be tied together.

Until the case was closed.

***

Gabe returned to LOST, adrenaline pumping through him. He spared a glance for the receptionist, Melody Gaines. “Call the team into my office.”

Eyes wide, she nodded and reached for her phone.

He hurried inside his office, the memory of Eve’s intense gaze following him. The memory of her following him.

When she didn’t have any memories of her own.

He dropped into his chair. Rubbed a hard hand over his face. He’d never taken a case like this before. Normally, his team found the missing. They started with a case, found the person … or sadly and far more often, they found the person’s body. The remains.

This time, they were starting with the body. A very live one.

A faint knock sounded at his door, then the heavy wood opened and Victoria Palmer poked her head inside. A small pair of glasses perched on her nose, and she had her long dark hair pulled back at the nape of her neck. “We’ve got a new case?” Excitement hummed in her voice.

He nodded.

She rushed inside. “Do I have to wait on the others, or can you spill now?” Nervous energy seemed to bubble just beneath her surface. That was the way she always appeared. Tense, moving, on the verge of … something.

“You don’t have to wait long,” a low voice drawled from the doorway. “We’re here.” And Wade Monroe strode inside. Not an excess of energy from him. Slow, deliberate steps.

Dean Bannon followed right on his heels. Dean’s assessing gaze landed on Gabe. “I’m guessing this has to do with the pretty blonde?”

“What blonde?” Victoria demanded. “I didn’t see—”

“Sarah’s out on another case today,” Gabe said, referring to the psychiatrist he kept on staff at LOST. “So go ahead and shut the door. I’ll brief her later.”

Dean shut the door. Gabe’s team—his top team—because there were dozens of other support personnel who worked for LOST, closed in. They took the chairs around his desk and waited for their intel.

Gabe’s gaze swept over them. Each team member had been chosen because of the specific skills he or she possessed. When Gabe had started LOST, he’d wanted the best personnel working for him. He knew that his team was truly the last chance for many families. Those families deserved the best.

So he’d stolen Dr. Victoria Palmer away from Stanford. The forensic anthropologist was using her talents in the field now, and not just in the lecture hall. As for Wade Monroe, the decorated ex-Atlanta detective could dig to the truth faster than anyone Gabe had ever seen. Wade didn’t mind getting his hands dirty. In fact, the guy seemed to relish that part of the business. Wade wasn’t afraid of danger. He thrived on it. And his personal loss had made him a prime candidate for a position at LOST.

“You’re keeping us in suspense,” Dean murmured, his voice calm and flat. Totally without emotion or accent.

Dean had been working with the FBI when Gabe approached him. An agent in the Violent Crimes Division, Dean had known all about the real monsters who hunted in the world. And he knew how to hunt those monsters. With LOST, Dean had the chance to do plenty of hunting, without so much red tape holding him back.

As for the missing team member … Sarah Jacobs … Sarah was just as vital to the LOST unit. She had a fistful of degrees, but it was her experience as a psychiatrist and a profiler that mattered most to Gabe. When they tracked the missing, Sarah created victim profiles and profiles for their abductors. Their killers. Dean hunted the monsters, but it was Sarah who got into their minds. She went into the terrible, dark places that most people feared.

And as for Gabe … his job was to work in the field. To take the knowledge that the team gave him. To find the missing. To work with his team and local law enforcement to close the cases.

And, of course, his job was also to finance the whole business.

Gabe gave a slow nod. “We’ve got a new case.”

“Who does the blonde want us to find?” Wade pressed. “Hope it’s not her husband.” He gave a low whistle, one that had Gabe’s eyes narrowing. “Because that woman was—”

“Off-limits,” Gabe growled.

Wade’s brows shot up.

“That woman,” Gabe gritted out, “is the case.” Then he pushed Eve’s newspaper toward them. “She says her name is Eve Gray—no, actually,” he corrected, “she doesn’t know her real name. Eve is just the name she’s using now.” A name they’d given her in the hospital? He’d have to check on that.

“You’re losing me, boss,” Victoria said, even as she peered at the paper. “What does this ‘maybe’ Eve want us to do?”

“That story’s about the Lady Killer case.” Dean had stiffened. “The FBI’

s been tracking him for months. Ever since those bodies washed up after Hurricane Albert.”

Hurricane Albert had been a vicious storm that struck early in the season, blasting across the southern Gulf Coast.

“We’re going to find one of his victims? One that’s still missing?” Victoria asked, then gave a low whistle. “Talk about high profile.”

“We may have already found a victim.” Gabe pointed to the black and white picture in the newspaper.

The room got very, very quiet.

“Eve doesn’t remember anything before the third of June. According to her, she woke up in a hospital, with no memories whatsoever.”

“Sarah needs to be here,” Wade said, sitting a little straighter. “She could tell if the woman was faking or—”

“Eve Gray wants us to find out who she really is.”

Frowning, Victoria glanced up at him. “What does your mystery blonde have to do with the Lady Killer?”

“One of the Lady Killer’s suspected victims is Jessica Montgomery.” Twenty-six. Blond. Green eyes. Five-foot-six. Last seen down on the Alabama Gulf Coast—on Dauphin Island. “And Jessica Montgomery happens to look exactly like Eve Gray.”

“Define ‘exactly,’” Dean said as he began to lean forward.

“A dead-on match.” Gabe met Dean’s eyes. He knew the ex-FBI agent would understand the importance of this case more than the others. Dean had worked plenty of serial cases during his time at the Bureau. He knew how hard it could be to stop a serial. How unlikely it was that a victim could survive an attack, but if a victim did survive …

“If that’s her,” Dean’s voice was tight with tension, “then she could lead us to the Lady Killer. We could find him.”

“And to the other missing victims,” Victoria added, her fingers tapping on her chin. “She would have been at his kill scenes. She would have seen everything.”

Seen everything and then blocked it all from her mind?

“If she’s telling the truth,” Wade threw out. Because Wade would be the suspicious one. Pretty face or not, Eve wouldn’t just automatically be accepted by him. “You want me to start the check on her?”