The security guard was a tall, lean man with deep creases ironed into his pants and shirt. A neatly trimmed mustache and a sharp part in the center of thick hair finished off the polished appearance.
The security guard’s brown eyes sparked with excitement. “I got a heads-up from your partner. I found something for you. Last Thursday morning. Your victim pulled into her parking space at ten minutes after ten. Here, let me show you.”
He turned and clicked a television remote. The screen behind him flicked on, and a grainy black-and-white tape rolled. “This is her spot a minute before she arrives.”
Malcolm watched, his nerves jumping. Sierra pulled into the spot, checked her makeup in the rearview mirror, and reached for her purse. She got out of the car and opened her hatchback. Tall and regal, she moved with confidence. She was just reaching for the garment bag when a figure approached her. He wore a dark coat and a hat so his face was obscured from the camera. When she spotted him, her pensive expression brightened.
“Seems she knew whoever approached her,” the guard said.
Malcolm nodded. Dixon. But the size didn’t seem right. “So it seems.”
“And look here. He says something to her, and she closes the car up, locks it, and follows him without a bit of hesitation.”
“Do you have footage of where they went?”
“The camera in that section of the mall wasn’t working. Someone had shot it out with a gun.”
“A gun. Like a rifle?”
“So it seems. Came to my attention last Friday. We had it fixed by Saturday.”
“Do you have the old light with the bullet?”
“Maintenance crews didn’t save it.”
Frustration chewed at him. “What about footage of whoever might have shot the camera out?”
“Nope. He never came into camera range.”
“Shit.”
“Whoever you’re chasing after is one slippery bastard who does not want to be caught.”
He didn’t want to be caught, and yet he’d left Sierra’s bones out for anyone to find. He didn’t want to be caught, but he wanted to play a cat-and-mouse game with the cops.
Lulu lost track of time in the shadowy, putrid room. Whoever had spoken to her from the darkness had made no move to approach her.
And so she’d sat in the darkness, breathing in the smell of death as she sat on the stone floor, her back to a cold, damp wall.
Several times she dozed off. But the sleep was not restful or peaceful. Even in her dreams a dark figure chased her and laughed as she struggled to run and get away. But the harder and faster she ran the slower she moved. Her pursuer always caught her, and when his icy hands touched her bare flesh she’d start awake.
Lulu’s head rolled from side to side. “I don’t know if you can hear me, but please let me go. I won’t tell anyone what happened here. I just want to leave. I just want to see my kid.”
Each time she’d plead to the darkness there’d been no response, but this time she heard the creak of a door.
“Now why would you want to leave? The party is just about to get rolling.”
The deep, familiar voice sent her scrambling to her feet. She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. Hunger had her swaying. “Please, just let me go.”
“I can’t let you go. We have yet to play, and I have been looking forward to this for so very long.”
The lights flipped on, and she winced at the sudden brightness. When her gaze focused and she looked into the eyes of her captor, she knew she’d never see the outside of this room again.
She screamed.
The hum of conversation drifted around Angie’s head as she sat in the metal folding chair. Her chair, like a dozen others, was a part of a circle located in the basement of a local church that hosted AA meetings. She attended meetings regularly because they had been so helpful in the beginning, and she hated to fiddle with success.
Everyone in the room shared a common experience: they all struggled with addiction.
Though Angie had not taken a drink in nearly fifteen months, temptation had been nudging her hard the last day or two. She understood the stress of her pending medical test results had been weighing on her. But it was Sierra’s death and Lulu’s disappearance that lurked behind the urges. Was there something that linked the women, other than their association with her? Was she missing a key link that would solve these cases? She wracked her brain for answers, but there’d been none. There’d been only an unholy thirst that beckoned surrender.
“Angie.” Sara Wayne’s soft, soothing voice cut through her thoughts.
Angie uncrossed and crossed her legs as her gaze shifted to the petite woman with ivory skin and a splash of freckles across the bridge of an aquiline nose. Sara couldn’t be more than thirty, but behind her warm gaze was wisdom rooted not just in academics but personal experience. “I’m sorry, my mind drifted to the office.”
If Sara recognized Angie’s white lie, she didn’t call her on it. “We’re making introductions. It’s your turn.”
Her gaze shifted around the circle of six. There was Sandi, a sixtyish school bus driver who’d been beaten and raped and drank to forget; Denise, a plump, round-faced girl of twenty who’d lost her parents in an accident; Jason a slim, nervous man who’d only once been able to talk about his near drug overdose; and Winnie, a waifish woman who loved to wear red and struggled with a meth addiction.
There was a new man in the circle who, to her surprise, had taken the seat next to her while she’d been lost in thought. He’d moved so silently that he’d barely disturbed the air around them. Tall, broad shouldered, he wore a blue dress shirt, a sport jacket, and khakis. He looked neat, pulled together, and she couldn’t imagine him lost to drugs or alcohol.
Angie straightened, cleared her throat, and recrossed her legs. “I’m Angie. I’ve not taken a drink in four hundred and seventy-two days.”At some meetings she mentioned that her mother had left her when she was four. Other meetings she discussed her bout with cancer. And at others she’d mention her sister’s imprisonment. But this time she opted out of the personal details. She couldn’t say why. Maybe Kier’s warnings had put her senses on high alert. Maybe it was the presence of the new guy. Maybe she just wasn’t up to it. It didn’t matter. She wasn’t sharing today.
Sara waited an extra beat, and then smiled. “Congratulations, Angie. That is no small feat.”
And she was proud of it. “Thanks.”
“We have a new member,” Sara said.
With a boldness Angie didn’t feel, she swung her gaze over to the man beside her, as if daring him to ask her a question.
Brilliant blue eyes stared at her with an intensity that warmed and chilled her in an instant. She could see that The New Guy had to be in his late fifties. He had an olive complexion, lines around his eyes, graying hair that dipped slightly below his collar, and a square jaw. He wore no aftershave, but the faintest aroma of soap mingled with his scent.
With ease, he shifted his gaze from Angie to Sara. The brittle blue eyes softened. “My name is Robert. Like Angie, I’m not interested in discussing too many details. But I will say I’ve not taken a drink in six months, two days.”
Robert’s voice was steady, deep—the voice of a man in control. That was the thing with people with addiction. It was a sneaky, quiet affliction, and those who suffered with it worked double-time to look normal.
The others had supplied a good many details initially. Even Angie had said more than she’d intended the first day. But Robert ended his statement with a clear control that piqued her interest. He either didn’t need the group, or he was here to satisfy someone other than himself. Unless the extreme control masked deep chaos.
Sara offered her warm Welcome smile. “I’m glad you could join us, Robert. Feel free to chime in at any time.”
Robert nodded to Sara. “Thanks.”
Again, the brief answer gave nothing away. Angie found his silence intriguing. Was there someone else in the wo
rld who didn’t like blathering on and on about their problems?
Sandi discussed a nightmare. Denise mentioned a panic attack in the grocery store. Winnie talked about her dead sister’s birthday. She’d wanted to toast her with a can of beer. Through it all Angie and Robert didn’t speak, remaining silent witnesses to the carnage.
Finally, when Sara had finished giving Winnie meditations to consider, she shifted her gaze to Angie. “You’re quieter than usual today. Everything all right?”
She refused to talk about Sierra or Lulu. The investigations were open and active, and she did not want to say anything that might compromise the police department’s work. The information shared here was considered sacred and not to be shared. But after her affair with Connor Donovan, she didn’t trust anyone.
Folding manicured hands over her lap, she told of restless nights and the desire to sit on a beach with her toes in the sand. For a moment, everyone in the room stared at her, their expressions reflecting varying degrees of understanding. “My nerves are on edge. I even got a little freaked out in the parking garage the other day. Not like me to worry about shadows.”
Robert’s gaze remained direct and unmoved by the account. “You’ve a talent for saying a lot and not saying anything. You a lawyer?”
Angie glared at him. “I am.”
Robert folded his arms over his chest. “Thought so.”
Sara cleared her voice like the schoolteacher reining in a couple of children. “Robert, I hear judgment.”
A half smile tweaked the edge of his lips as he glanced to Sara and then back at Angie. “No judgment intended.”
Angie didn’t spare Sara a glance. She didn’t need a defender. “If you have something to say you are welcome to say it, Robert.”
The muscle in his jaw pulsed before it eased, and he smiled. “I know you. I’ve read about you in the papers. If I were you, I’d drink too.”
Sara sat forward. “Robert. That’s unnecessary.”
Angie held up her hand. “No, Sara. Let Robert say what he needs to say.”