Love Me Dead (Lilah Love 3)

“I have low blood sugar.”

I scowl. “Is that a lie?”

“I don’t lie.”

“Okay, whatever. Take a piss. Get a snack. I don’t care. Have everyone on our team give us a DNA sample including all the emergency and law enforcement that visited the locations of our crime scenes.”

“They won’t like that.”

“Did I ask if they would like it?” I step around him.

“Agent Love.”

I grimace and rotate to find him facing me now. “Yes, Thomas?”

“You think it’s one of us?”

“Get me my samples, Thomas.”

“Detective Williams still isn’t back.”

“I know.”

“Her boyfriend killed himself.”

“I know,” I repeat.

“The parents of one of the victims killed themselves.”

“You really didn’t need to piss and eat a snack all that badly, did you?”

“A reporter cornered me this morning. She seemed to think Ralph killed those women, that this is all connected.”

“Reporters are like the guy who says he loves you to get into your pants. They suck. Go take a piss, Thomas.” I leave him there and walk down a hallway and into Detective Williams’ office. It’s, of course, empty. I walk to the desk and sit down. She’s not dead yet. I’m sure of it. He has her. That bastard is saving her for me. She’s going to end up an Umbrella Girl, and I haven’t done nearly enough to figure out how the victims connect. Tic Tac is working that angle, but I need to look beyond the data. For that, Thomas gets a cookie. He got me focused on what’s important in that connection.

Standing up, I exit the office, scanning the sea of desks, until I find Lily’s workspace in a wall of cubicles, which is my destination. “What do you have for me, Lily?” I ask, claiming the chair by her desk.

“Agent Love.” She sits up straighter. “I tried to reach the victim’s parents to tell them Shelly was dead like you said, but they didn’t answer. Someone else told them and—it must have gone badly. I think I would have known it went badly had it been me. I think I would have sent help. I’m good that way. I read people’s voices. Now they’re dead, but you’re right; when it gets personal, you get motivated. And this feels personal.” She holds up a pad of paper with a list of names. “I’m calling every person I can find who might connect our victims. I’m going to find something to help you catch this asshole.”

“You didn’t make those people kill themselves.”

“Maybe if I would have called sooner. Maybe I should—”

“No. They were already dead. I talked to the officers on the scene. They’d been dead for days.” I lean in closer. “I believe the killer uses the people close to a victim and forces them to do things by promising he won’t hurt the people they love. And then, he tells them to kill themselves or they’ll get to watch the people they love die.”

Her eyes go wide. “Ralph killed himself. Are you saying—is Detective Williams next?”

“I believe she’s still alive right now. We need to catch this guy. We need someone to tell us what they know because someone knows something. Who do you think that might be?”

“I don’t know.” She doesn’t look away. She doesn’t blink. “I can do research. That’s my thing. I’m good at research. She’s my boss, so I feel weird digging into her personal life, but I can. I want to help. I really want to help.”

I know then that I’m wrong about her. She’s not being held captive but that doesn’t erase the fact that she lied to me the other night about what Mia Moore’s boss told her. What the fuck is this? I need to think. I need to get to Purgatory. I stand up. “You have a new boss coming in soon. I’ll let him direct you.”

Houston pokes his head into the cubical and motions me down the hallway, and I follow him into a vacant office. “First off,” he says, “your guy, Greg, won’t call me back and Murphy axed that idea anyway. He said you already know that. Do you want me to just bring in my guy?”

Fucking Murphy. And fucking Greg. Even if Murphy got to him, he should at least be calling me back. “I’ll talk to Greg and Murphy,” I say. “Give me the weekend. I’ll get back with you by Monday.”

“Okay then, next, in about ten minutes, the mayor is going to claim in a press conference that Ralph’s suicide was a tragic accident and that his focus will be on improving courthouse security. If he’s questioned about the two murders, he’s going to call them isolated and unrelated.”

“Okay.”

“Okay? I thought this was what you wanted. I thought you’d be happy.”

“I might have been a bit too flippant on that topic. This is going to go badly, and you’re going to get fired. It was nice working with you.” I turn to leave and stop. “Damn it.” I rotate to face him. “Murphy says I’m supposed to trust you and all that shit. Call the mayor.”

“And say what?”

“Leave that to me.”

“All right. I just hung up with him. He should answer.” He makes the call, has a short exchange, and hands me the phone.

“Agent Love,” the mayor greets.

“If we don’t give the killer credit, he may lash out. If we do, he may lavish the attention and lash out. He’s just that kind of bastard.”

“How is he going to lash out?” he asks.

“He’ll kill Detective Williams who I believe he’s kidnapped. She’s his prize. Unless she’s him, which I doubt, but it’s possible. Either way, you’ll be blamed for her death because the killer will leak something about your mishandling causing this tragedy to the press.”

“And you know this how?”

“It’s what I do,” I say. “You have to choose to trust me or not, but you’re worried about how you look for political reasons. That tends to make people stupid. Don’t be stupid.”

“Stupid? Did you really just say that to me?”

“You have a serial killer in your city, Mayor. What did you want me to say? Please make smart environmentally friendly choices.”

“What are you advising, Agent Love?”

“I’d delay the press conference a few days and give us time to work. Of course, that’s a risk. He’s impatient for attention, but basically, we’re fucked either way, so I’d wait. If he’s pissed, he’ll act out and that means we have a chance to catch him.”

“He could kill again.”

“And your press conference changes that how?”

“The press is going to leak this anyway,” he argues. “I have to speak to them.”

I shrug. “Okay.”

“Okay?”

“It’s your call. It’s not mine. It’s not Houston’s. But consider my advice official FBI instructions. If you so choose to ignore them, that’s also officially on you.” I hang up and hand the phone to Houston.

He takes it, and I turn to leave.

“Lilah, damn it,” he bites out. “Do not walk away.”

“I need to work, Houston. I need to find Umbrella Man before he kills Williams.”

“And I need to help you do it.”

“Okay then. There was matching DNA found at both murder sites.”

“Thomas told me.”

“And I told Thomas to get me samples of everyone who was at those crime scenes and everyone who is working the cases. He’s afraid to ask or just creepy. O

r both. Either way, make sure he does it and send a team out to get samples from neighbors and co-workers and process them quickly.”

“Fuck. I don’t want to lose Williams.”

This is one of those moments when people want me to say something encouraging or sympathetic. I don’t do that. It’s not natural. But hell, I try. “That would suck,” I say, and with that valiant effort, I leave.

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

I decide I just need to run by the apartment I apparently rented for nothing at this point, and grab the small amount of things I have there. It’s a quick trip and what strikes me during this visit is that I haven’t heard from Junior. Could it be that Junior is Umbrella Man? It’s possible, but it doesn’t feel right. More likely, Junior is in the Hamptons, and it’s not so easy to stalk me when I’m here, and Junior is there.

It’s close to three when I arrive at Kane’s place, our place, and this time, there is nothing waiting for me at the desk when I arrive. I wave to the guard, another familiar face, and head for the elevator when my weather app sends me an alert: Hurricane season isn’t over yet as Tropical Storm Beth charges toward the Long Island coastline, bringing torrential rains.

Fuck. Rain. That’s what he’s waiting for and Beth? It’s really called Beth? I step into the elevator and try to call Beth, but I have no signal. Impatient, I wait until I’m on our floor, and I dial again. Beth doesn’t answer. I leave a voicemail. “Beth. You’re there? All is well? We haven’t talked since you got there, but I need you to have your security person call me. Now. It would be excellent if he could do that now.” Fuck. I just made her panic. I decide not to speak another word. I’ll just stop now.