Deep Dark (11 page)

Reed said nothing, just watched her. She was standing so close now she could feel his body heat. His gaze held hers, and she wondered if he'd learned something about her that she didn't want him to know.

She'd avoided telling him about her attack because it hadn't seemed relevant. Until today.

You see it from time to time.

But what did that mean, exactly? Laney didn't have any statistics on how often criminals scoped out the crime scene ahead of time and tampered with lightbulbs. She'd looked for that info but had come up short.

She'd looked for other information, too, but April's and Olivia's case files were off-limits to her, and inves
tigators had made a concerted effort to keep details out of the news. They wanted to maintain as much confidentiality as possible so they could gauge the truthfulness of anyone who came forward with a tip or even a confession.

Laney stared at Reed now and felt the urge to tell him. But she didn't know for certain whether her attack was even related. What she
did
know for certain was that if he discovered she had a personal connection to this case, he'd yank her off it in a heartbeat. Of that she had no doubt. And being pulled from the case would be a problem, because she was the only person with the skills to pick up this UNSUB's trail in cyberspace. That wasn't her ego, it was a hard fact.

“What's that look?” She stepped closer and noticed his jaw tighten. “You're all quiet. What is it?”

He gazed down at her with those penetrating blue eyes, and her pulse started to thrum.

“There's something you're not telling me, Laney.”

CHAPTER 10

Reed watched her reaction, and he knew he was right. She was holding out on him. He didn't know what or why, just that she wasn't telling him everything she knew.

There was something elusive about her, something he couldn't quite pinpoint, but he felt it every time he tried to get personal. He'd been interviewing suspects and witnesses for years, and he could spot evasiveness a mile away.

“Well?” he asked.

“Well, what?”

Reed tried to tamp down his frustration. He couldn't
make
her tell him. He couldn't make her do a damn thing, including stay out of his thoughts. She was standing so close now he could smell her hair, her skin. He couldn't stop thinking about her lithe body and her tight breasts. He wanted to kiss her, and he knew she could see it in his face, because her gaze heated.

She stepped closer, watching him with those dark brown eyes. She slid her hand over his chest and rested it on his sternum, where she could feel his heart thudding.

He took her wrist. “Laney—”

“You have a problem with me?”

He moved her hand away. “With you? No. With your age? Yeah, I do.”

“What's the big deal?”

“I'm fifteen years older than you.”

“So?”

She went up on tiptoes and kissed him, and this time it wasn't a shock at all. This time he'd been expecting it, and still he did nothing to stop her. There was something wrong with him. With this. But he kissed her anyway, sliding his hands around her waist and pulling her to him as he hungrily took her mouth.

She tasted good again, hot. And he couldn't stop, even as the cool, logical side of his brain told him this was a distraction. She didn't want him right now—not really. She just wanted him to stop asking questions, stop trying to pin her down. He shifted her hips, pinning her back against the counter, still kissing her and still frustrated with himself for falling for what he knew was a ploy. Her fingers tangled in his hair, and he kissed her harder, driven by a surge of lust. What the hell was it with her?

A phone buzzed, and she stopped. She stared up at him, wide-eyed and breathless, and he saw something in her look—something real, not fake. A genuine yearning that mirrored his own. Did she really want this?

His phone buzzed again. He stepped away and pulled it from his pocket, both grateful and disappointed at the interruption.

He cleared his throat. “Novak.”

“Where are you?”

It was Jay. And by the tone of his voice Reed knew something was very wrong.

•   •   •

The blue-and-red whir of emergency lights signaled their destination well ahead of the outdated navigation system in Reed's pickup truck. He glanced at Laney in the passenger seat. She stared out the windshield and had a white-knuckled grip on the door handle.

“Ever been to a homicide scene before?” he asked.

“No.”

He passed the row of haphazardly parked emergency vehicles and found a space beside Jay's black Tahoe. Jay had been at a baseball game in Round Rock when he'd gotten the call, so he must have sped all the way down here.

“No reason for you to enter the crime scene,” Reed said. “It makes sense for you to wait in the car. That way you don't have to sign the scene log.”

She nodded stiffly as an ME's assistant crossed the crowded parking lot with his evidence case in hand.

“Don't be nervous.”

“I'm worried I know her.” She glanced at him, and something in her eyes made his chest tighten.

“You ever been here?”

She shook her head.

“Given the neighborhood, odds are it's a drug thing,” he said, but she didn't look convinced. He reached over and squeezed her hand. “Sit tight.”

He got out and glanced around, getting the lay of the land. Jordan Lowe stood at the door talking to a uniform, and Reed caught her eye as he walked over.

“Caucasian female, midtwenties, still working on an ID,” she said.

“You caught the case?”

“No, but I happened to be in the area. It's Montoya's.”

Reed looked over the building. It was old and poorly
maintained, judging by the chipping paint and sagging second-story gutters. Just inside the door stood a cluster of uniformed officers.

“Jesus, what's with the crowd?”

Jordan glanced inside. “Slow night. Plus, it went out over the scanner.” She looked at him. “The first responder's new.”

Reed shook his head. It would have been much better if the responding officer had kept things over the phone, at least initially. It would have given investigators a jump on the media, who would no doubt be arriving soon.

“Where's Jay?” Reed asked.

“In the bedroom.”

Jordan moved aside, and Reed stepped into a moldy-smelling living room. A faded blue sofa sat beside a plastic patio table. No lamps in the room, and the only light was provided by a dim ceiling fixture. He glanced at the kitchen, where a CSI was dusting the refrigerator door for prints.

Jay squeezed past the two uniforms milling in the hallway and walked over. “Montoya's about to kick everyone out so the gurney can get through.”

“He's in the bedroom?”

Jay nodded. “Victim's in bed. Clothes torn off, duct tape, the whole thing.”

“Blunt-force trauma?”

“That's right. And I talked to Montoya. He caught the case, but I think he'll toss it to us if we think it's related.”

“It's related.”

“That's my take, too. You seen the back door?”

“No.” Reed glanced down the dark hallway as Montoya's voice echoed from the bedroom.

“Everyone out,” he bellowed. “Unless you got a body bag or an evidence kit, I need you on the other side of the scene tape.”

Reed looked at Jay. “Where are we?”

“ME's guys have been here a while. They're fixing to roll. Veronica's on the back steps now, examining the door.”

“What about a computer? Or a tablet or even a cell phone?”

“No phone. Not that we've found yet, anyway.” Jay glanced over Reed's shoulder, and his brow furrowed. “Damn, who invited the mayor's people?”

Reed turned around and spotted about the last person he wanted to see right now. His ex-wife stood in the doorway arguing with Jordan. She was tall and slim, with a cascade of thick dark hair that hung down her back. As always when she argued, she did it with a slight smile and a gleam in her eye.

Reed muttered a curse.

“You were asking about computers,” Jay said. “There's a desk in the bedroom with a laptop on it—”

“Get it,” Reed said. “Make sure the photog documents it, and then bring it out here. I have Laney with me.”

“Laney?”

“Delaney Knox, from the Delphi Center.”

Reed walked over to the doorway, where Jordan now had her arm physically barring the door. Reed's ex was a head taller, but Jordan didn't seem intimidated.

Erika's gaze landed on him. “Reed. Glad to see someone's in charge here.”

Jordan shot him a look. “I was just explaining that
this is a
closed
crime scene.” She dropped her arm as a parade of bulky officers squeezed past.

Erika stepped back and watched them. Sunday night, and she looked fully put together in a suit and heels, ready for any contingency—such as a briefing with reporters.

“We don't have a statement yet,” Reed told her. “You'll be the first to know.”

She smiled sweetly. “Could I have a moment, please? In private?”

Reed eased past Jordan and stepped onto the patch of weeds that constituted the building's landscaping.

“Why didn't you call me?” Erika asked in a low voice.

“It's not my case.”

“Then why are you here?”

“Professional curiosity.”

She gave him a baleful look. Then she glanced over his shoulder as another uniform exited the apartment. “Tell me this isn't related to the other one.”

“I've been here ten minutes, Erika. I can't tell you jack shit.”

“Do you guys at least have a suspect yet?”

“We're working on it. Obviously. When there's something more to tell you, we will.”

“The mayor is getting concerned, as I'm sure you're aware.”

“I am.”

“Great. Then you're also aware that in three weeks about forty thousand students will be descending on this city. And their parents are not happy to know there's a murderer on the loose.”

“Yo, Reed.”

He turned around to see Jay motioning him inside.

“Stay here,” he told Erika, stepping back into the apartment to find Laney standing at the bar that separated the kitchen from the living room. He wasn't sure how she'd slipped in, but she seemed to have a knack for getting in and out of places discreetly. She had a laptop computer open in front of her, and her latex-gloved hands flew over the keyboard.

“It's password protected,” Jay said. “I don't know how she's going to get in.”

Reed looked over Laney's shoulder. The screen was flat blue with lines of code scrolling up. “We still need a name?”

“Affirmative,” Jay said. “The neighbors say this apartment's being sublet for the summer. We haven't tracked down the lease holder yet. We're running vehicle tags in the parking lot.”

“Detective.”

Erika was standing beside the uniform who was guarding the door now. The man was doing an admirable job of keeping her outside. It helped that he was built like a tank.

Reed walked over as she pulled her phone from her pocket and checked a message.

“You have to give me
something
,” she said. “You know I can't call Bob with nothing.”

“Tell him to call the chief.”

“The chief doesn't know anything. That's why I'm here talking to you.”

“I'm in.”

He darted a look at Laney and returned to the bar to watch as a personalized desktop appeared on the com
puter screen. The desktop background was a candid photo of a smiling blonde with her arms around the neck of a golden retriever.

“How'd you crack that so fast?” Jay asked.

“It was a simple key walk.”

“Key walk?”

“C-D-E-three-two-W-S-X.” She shifted so Reed and Jay could view the keyboard. “See? It's one of the more common passwords.”

Jay gave Reed a look that said
holy shit
, and Reed had to agree. She ran circles around the computer techs back at the station.

Reed touched her shoulder. “Nice work.”

“You say you need a name?” She clicked into an email program and skimmed a few outgoing messages. “Looks like . . . Isabella Marshall. Bella for short. I can give you her email.”

“Give us everything you can,” Reed said, and Jay was already taking out a notepad.

“It's a dot edu.” Her gaze met Reed's. “Looks like she's a student.”

Reed leaned closer and read some of the subject lines. He picked up on a legal theme. Maybe she was at the law school. Shit.

Laney was in a blue screen again, and Reed watched lines of code scrolling at dizzying speed.

“What are you—”

“The webcam,” she said. “Looks like . . . we've got an anomaly.”

Jay leaned closer. “A what?”

“He's been spying,” Reed said.

“Same thing I found on April's system. Where was this laptop recovered?” She looked up at Jay.

“The bedroom.” Jay glanced at Reed, his look dark. “You think she was on that same dating thing?”

“We're about to find out,” Laney said.

“Hey, found the phone.”

Reed glanced across the kitchen where a crime-scene tech crouched beside the open refrigerator. He glanced at Reed. “We need the photographer over here.”

“It's in the fridge?” Jay walked over to take a look. “Weird-ass place for a phone.”

“Not really,” Laney said.

Reed looked at her. She glanced up at him, then returned her attention to the computer screen.

Reed looked back at Erika. She was watching everything from the door, and Reed knew she wouldn't leave until he gave her something, so he walked over.

“We've got a tentative ID on the woman living here,” he said. “I have no idea whether she's the victim. The ME should be able to tell us within twenty-four hours.”

“Who's that?” Erika nodded at Laney.

“A cyber investigator.”

“I don't recognize her.”

“She's with the Delphi Center.”

Erika studied his face for a moment, then shifted her attention back to Laney.

It was the shoulder pat, damn it.

“She's cute,” Erika said. “In an alterna-teen kind of way. You seeing her?”

“She's twenty-four.”

She lifted an eyebrow. “Nice.”

Reed stepped back to let a CSI through the doorway.

“Really, I'm happy for you.” Erika pulled out her
phone and checked a message. “Anything that gets your mind off work.
I
sure as hell never managed to do it.”