Cold Hearted (Cold Justice Book 6) (39 page)

“So why am I here?” the professor asked.

Darsh produced a picture of a coil of blue climbing rope and pushed it toward the other man. “Is that yours?”

Huxley nodded.

Then Darsh slid a picture of Cassandra Bressinger naked, tied to the bed with that same rope. The professor said nothing for a moment. Then Darsh showed him a photograph of the bedroom wall of his spare room from a distance so the man couldn’t pretend not to recognize the space.

Huxley’s gaze hardened as he stared at the pictures. When he finally looked up all he said was, “I want my lawyer.”

E
rin walked along
the corridor wearing a pair of sweats, sneakers, and her parka worn loose over a Blackcombe College sweatshirt. This was her disguise for blending in and being as inconspicuous as possible. A pale gray beanie covered her long blonde hair, and dark shades covered her eyes. She hit the second floor of the hospital and walked as swiftly as she could along the corridor. There was no way she could leave without checking in on Rachel, despite the girl’s mother’s actions earlier.

Up ahead she saw a doctor and two nurses hurry into Rachel’s room. Erin’s mouth went dry. Had she coded? Was she in trouble? She hurried to the doorway and caught Reilly by the shoulder just as he was about to follow everyone inside.

“Is she all right?” Erin demanded.

He removed her hand gently but firmly and gave her a friendly squeeze to show it was nothing personal.

“She woke up. A bit panicked from the tube so the medical team has come in to remove it. I need to get in there.”

She gave a skeptical quirk of her brow. “You worried one of them is going to hurt her?”

“No.” He smiled, the corners of his eyes crinkling. “But keeping her safe is what I get paid to do. Their job is to keep her alive.”

With that, he left her standing in the hallway.

Often cops on bodyguard duty at the hospital got distracted by the pretty nurses. Reilly looked like he was more likely to start cross-dressing than let anything distract him. She wondered what he’d done before he did this. The guy practically screamed “military.” As much as she wanted to go in there and make sure Rachel was okay, she realized with a faint pang that the girl was no longer her responsibility. It wasn’t her job anymore. Erin had no place here. The idea left a raw spot in her soul. What the hell was she supposed to do now? How did she stop acting like a cop? It was all she’d known for the last nine years. How else could she help people like Rachel?

The questions and uncertainty ran through Erin’s mind on a seemingly endless loop. She leaned against the wall and closed her eyes.

Had anyone told Darsh Rachel had woken up yet, she wondered suddenly. Erin doubted it. She dialed his number before she could second guess herself.

“Erin?”

The velvet tones of his voice did something to her every time she heard them. “Rachel Knight woke up. They’re removing her breathing tube in the next few minutes. You might want to get down here.”

“Wait for me.” He hung up before she could make an excuse. Tears threatened.

She owed him an apology but knew she couldn’t face him. Didn’t want to look into those intelligent brown eyes and see the knowledge reflected there that she was running away again. She was a coward. Suddenly she needed to get out of here before Darsh turned up, and she made a complete fool of herself by throwing herself at the man.

She took a last peek and saw Rachel’s bed surrounded by a crowd of people. She hoped the young woman made a full recovery. Recovering from this trauma might be the hardest thing the girl ever did, but she’d already proved she was a survivor.

Erin turned on her heel and saw Jason Brady stepping out of the elevator with another Blackcombe Ravens player. Their eyes locked, and her heart thumped crazily against her ribs as he moved purposefully toward her. It was gutless, but the last thing she wanted to do was face the student when she’d been kicked off the job and her entire body ached from yesterday’s crash. It was time to pop another pain pill and then catch her flight home to visit her family. It was time to lay that particular demon to rest. She slammed through the exit into the stairwell and smacked into someone else. All her injuries screamed as they collided.

“Erin!” It was Rick Lachlan carrying an array of blooms.

“Rick. Hey.”

Jason Brady opened the door of the stairwell, then paused when he spotted Rick. He opened his mouth to say something, but changed his mind and backed away. She couldn’t read his expression. Maybe he didn’t want any witnesses when he hurled his latest round of abuse.

“You visiting a friend?” she asked Rick.

“Yeah, but she must have been released early so I was going to leave these at the nurse’s station for anyone who didn’t have any visitors. What’re you doing here?” Lines formed between his brows. “You didn’t have any complications from your accident, did you?”

If losing her job and her nerve could be called complications then, yes, she was having them.

“I came to visit Rachel Knight. She just woke up.” Suddenly overcome with emotion, she let out a sob and tried to cover the sound with her fist. Yesterday she’d been so certain Rachel was dead. Her waking up represented a miracle all of its own.

He handed the flowers to a nurse who was passing.

“Hey.” He rubbed Erin’s back in a friendly gesture. She refrained from flinching when he touched a bruise on her shoulder. There were bruises everywhere. “That’s great news.” Rick tilted his head to one side. “You look like you could use a drink. Wanna go grab that coffee we keep talking about?”

Tears gathered in her eyes, but she fiercely blinked them away. “Sorry.” She wiped her eyes. “My allergies must be flaring up.”

“Erin,” he admonished. “You’ve been through a terrible few days, and you just got fired through no fault of your own.”

She winced. Obviously that news was now public.

“Give yourself permission to take some time off. Decompress. Chill. Drink coffee, maybe go wild and have a cookie.”

She laughed reluctantly. “I suppose.” All she really wanted was for Darsh to wrap his arms around her and tell her everything was going to be okay, but she’d stopped believing in fairy tales the day her husband had used her as a punching bag. They started walking down the stairs, taking it slowly in deference to her injuries. Every muscle in her body ached, but most especially her heart. The betrayal by her boss hurt, but it wasn’t unexpected. Strassen tended to look out for number one. What had really knocked her sideways was the fact she’d fallen for a man who’d contributed to her tumble from grace, helped get her fired, and then had gone and solved the damn mystery.

He was a hero, and she was a whore. No double standards at play at all.

“Come on. I’ve had a shitty day too. Hard to discover a man you idolized is in fact a sadistic killer. No wonder he was so good at teaching criminal psychology.”

She tried to smile because he was trying to cheer her up, but her heart wasn’t in it. “I guess he fooled us all.”

They headed to the parking lot. She checked her watch again. “Actually, I don’t really have time for coffee. I’m catching a flight at five.”

His eyes flashed, and he checked his own watch. “How about I drive you to the airport? I know you don’t have a truck anymore. We can grab a coffee before you catch your flight.”

“I guess I could leave Officer Mason’s keys under the visor and text him where I left his car.” Erin pulled the keys out of her pocket.

“I expect he’s going to be here soon talking to Rachel anyway,” Rick said helpfully.

Of course he was right. She looked at him. “Are you sure you don’t mind?”

He shrugged with his hands in his pockets. “I have nothing else to do with myself today except watch reruns of
The Big Bang Theory
.”

It seemed churlish to refuse. “Okay, then.” She opened the passenger door of Ully’s Mustang and slid the keys behind the visor. She grabbed her small travel bag out of the trunk and made sure the car was locked before she shut the door.

She hefted the bag across her shoulder though Rick offered to carry it for her, and walked carefully over the trampled snow to his small sedan. She looked at the hospital and thought wistfully about Darsh. He’d be here soon. Mad and disappointed in her. Nothing she could do about that right now, although, for the first time, the idea she was making a big mistake teased the edge of her mind.

Rick was in the driver’s seat waiting for her to get in. “It’s just coffee, Erin.”

She nodded and climbed inside.

*     *     *

Erin’s phone call
had Darsh striding into the bullpen and tracking down Ully Mason. “Rachel Knight just woke up. Let’s get down there.”

The other man nodded and got off the phone. “I’m coming.”

They took the cruiser, Ully driving while Darsh checked his incoming mail. Monica Ripley was proving impossible to track down, and he hoped she hadn’t become another victim of this ruthless killer. Ully shot out of the parking lot with the sirens blasting.

There was an email from the warden of Riverview, forwarded from Drew Hawke. The list of people who might have a grudge against the quarterback was long, but Professor Huxley wasn’t on it. He frowned, then forwarded it to Agent Chen to crosscheck with the other lists. The evidence against Huxley was piled as high as the snow at the side of the road, but there was nothing to link him to the campus rapes last year.

What if he was wrong about Hawke, and the quarterback wasn’t innocent?

What if Erin had been right about Hawke, and Strassen had fired her anyway?

Had Huxley enjoyed the attention he and the college had received last year and decided to continue it, to manipulate the cops and dabble in some practical application of his academic interests? He was denying everything.

“You serious about Donovan?” Ully asked, turning off the sirens as the traffic thinned.

“Yeah.” Darsh didn’t want to talk about this. “But she’s not interested.”

Ully’s eyebrows hiked. “She’s interested all right. She hasn’t looked twice at a guy in all the time she’s been here, so she’s definitely interested.”

“We knew each other before.” Darsh admitted reluctantly. “A few years ago when she did a training course at Quantico.”

“When she was still married?” Ully asked in surprise.

“She’d filed for divorce. Guy was an asshole.”

“Obviously,” Ully agreed, and he didn’t know the half of it. “Look, she’s a good cop, but we’ve had a hell of a year. Give her time. She’ll come around.”

Darsh grunted. He didn’t want to have to persuade someone to love him.

Christ
. His mouth went dry. How could he have been so stupid as to fall in love with Erin Donovan, a sharp-tongued, stubborn, independent, control freak? Who was also sexy, smart, dedicated, and incredibly beautiful? He stared out of the window at the cold snow, and it reminded him of how it had felt to be abandoned by a woman who shouldn’t have had to be forced to love him. It had felt cold and desolate and lonely as fuck.

He swore.

Erin felt something for him, he knew she did, she was just skittish after that hellish experience with her asshole ex and from everything happening on the case. She’d almost died yesterday, she was bound to be shaken up and confused. And she was mad because he hadn’t told her about visiting Hawke in Riverview. It was a mistake. He should have told her, but he’d known she’d be angry.

He’d see her again in a few minutes. Apologize. Convince her that he meant what he said—that what they had was worth pursuing. They could go slow and easy. He wouldn’t mention the “L” word. That would be his secret. It would scare the hell out of the woman.

Ully flicked a glance at him and opened his mouth to say something else.

“I don’t want to hear it.” Darsh put his hand up in defense.

“I was only gonna say I’m sorry. For being an ass when you arrived.”

“I thought you were always an ass?”

“Meh, it varies on whether or not I got laid in the last few days.”

“Obviously not for a while, then.”

Ully laughed and pulled across two lanes of traffic, making Darsh’s heart slam into his throat. “Damn straight.”

The officer double-parked at the curb outside the hospital doors. They jogged up the front steps then took the stairs, ignoring the press who held out microphones as they expectantly shouted questions.

“Uh, oh,” Ully said checking his cell. “Looks like you have some leg work to do.”

“What d’you mean?” Darsh opened the fire door at the top of the stairs.

“Erin just texted me to say my car’s in the parking lot here at the hospital, and she’s flying down to visit her parents.”

“Dammit.” Darsh’s shoulders sagged.

“You could go after her.” Ully checked his watch. “Flight won’t leave until five.”

But inside, Darsh felt hollow. It wasn’t the first time someone had left him behind without saying goodbye. It shouldn’t hurt quite so much, but hell if it didn’t.

He passed Jason Brady in the hallway, and his footsteps slowed. He paused, then turned on the guy. “What are you doing here?”