Deserves to Die (Alvarez & Pescoli)

“Oh, God,” she whispered. Throwing off the covers, she opened her eyes.

The cabin was nearly dark, of course, though she discerned from the bits of gray light filtering through the shades or cracks in the curtains that dawn had broken. Good. It was time to stoke the fire and get moving, face the damn music.

Finally, the waiting, and, oh God, the running, were nearly over.

She flung her legs off the couch and, stretching her arms over her head, yawned as she tried to wake up. Rotating the tightness from her neck, she felt it—that sizzling, heart-stopping sensation that something wasn’t right.

Don’t be silly.

Then she heard a scrape of leather against old floorboards.

Instinctively she rolled off the couch, her arm shooting forward under the pillow, her fingers searching for the hard steel of her pistol.

Nothing.

What? No!

“It’s not there,” a deep voice said.

Turning to look over her shoulder, she saw him then, the huge dark figure standing against the door.

Oh, God!

He’d found her.

Chapter 22

Pescoli had half-expected the atmosphere around the department to be different after Grayson’s funeral, but when she got to work on Monday it didn’t feel that way. Stomping snow from her boots, she felt a wall of heat greet her along with that same sense of somberness. Everyone who’d worked for Grayson may have gotten some closure from the ceremony, but it was going to take a while until it was business as usual again.

Winter had returned full force, a mother of a storm blowing in from Canada that had dumped nearly a foot of snow in the area and wasn’t done yet. The wind was gusting and brutal, the temperature plunging to below freezing. Currently, most of the roads were clogged, some closed, maintenance crews working overtime. Deputies from the department had been called in early to deal with traffic snarls. Parts of the county were reporting electrical outages. Frozen pipes might be next, and the homeless population needed more shelter.

All that along with their current whack job—one who liked fingers and rings and dead women.

Pescoli, who had always claimed to have hated all the folderol over celebrations from New Year’s to Christmas, found she missed the lightheartedness of Joelle’s attempts to decorate the office, or at least her chance to poke fun at it. It was going to take a while until denial slowly morphed into reality and people got back into routine.

She had gotten up early and it was still predawn outside, not her norm by a long shot. She’d been unable to sleep, so she’d come to the station earlier than usual, ready to get back to the job, even though she was working for a man she didn’t much like.

As she unwound her scarf, she told herself it was time for a personal attitude adjustment. She didn’t like Blackwater, and she was pretty sure he didn’t like her. So what? It was time to get along, at least as long as she was employed in the department. Considering her current state—engaged, pregnant, the mother of teenagers who still needed her words of wisdom and guidance—it might be time to pack it in.

But not quite yet.

She still needed to find who’d killed Sheree Cantnor and Calypso Pope. That part—solving the mysteries of homicides, catching the culprits, and slamming their asses behind bars—she would miss. As for the particular freak they were currently chasing, she wanted him behind bars and fast. She and Alvarez needed

to wrap it up.

Unzipping her outer coat as she walked by Blackwater’s office, she caught a glimpse of him on the floor doing a slow, determined set of push-ups. “Detective?” he called before she could move past. “I’d like to have a word.”

She paused. Backed up a step. Stood in the open doorway.

“Glad you’re in early.”

His face was away from her and as far as she could tell he hadn’t even looked in her direction, which was a little disconcerting. She hadn’t spoken, wasn’t usually in before eight, and didn’t think her footsteps were all that unique, yet there was no doubt he’d known it was she who was passing by his door.

“Come on in.” He lifted one arm, still balancing himself off the floor with the other as he waved her inside.

Was he showing off? For her? She could have told him it wasn’t going to work.

She stepped inside the small room that had once held a dog bed and hat rack. Both were gone, as were all of Grayson’s personal belongings. Then again, his memorabilia had been missing for a while because Blackwater wasn’t the first person to claim this office after Grayson had been shot; another man had sat in his chair, wielding his own brand of distorted power for a very short period.