If Looks Could Kill (14 page)

She didn't answer.

He hung up. Rafe had all but told him that she still slept with her ex. He could check with Darryl, except that he didn't have any idea where Darryl was staying.

It was really late, but he called Jassy. She came on the line sounding really sleepy. “Madison could be at Darryl's, but she's probably home. She turns the ringer down on her phone after ten all the time because Carrie Anne is such a light sleeper. Call her in the morning, Kyle. I'm sure she's fine.”

He thought about driving out to her house then and there, and banging on the door until she acknowledged him. She would be really ready to kill him, though, and more prone than ever to ignore his warnings. He had to be calm, had to tell himself that it was a good thing she was probably sleeping safely with her ex-husband, that he should get a grip and wait until morning.

He lay awake.

Finally he dozed.

And he dreamed.

He dreamed once again that he and Madison were in the same house. And he was moving down a darkened hallway, trying to get to her. He was wearing a towel. He'd showered, and he was intent on one thing—Madison. It was simply time. It didn't matter that they always argued when they talked. It was time. She knew it just as well as he did. It didn't have anything to do with the kind of emotion that had tied him to Fallon. It had nothing to do with the past or the future, and she knew that, too.

So he walked down the hall. And in his dream the hallway was dark and misty. Long.

Like the hallway in the house Lainie Adair had shared with Roger Montgomery, all those years ago.

Madison was at the end of the hallway, in her room. There was a soft yellow light emanating from her room, sweeping around her. She was wearing a towel, as well. Her hair was dry, burning red in the strange light, creating a cape around her naked shoulders as he walked down the hallway. Her chin was up, her eyes were bright, her lips were poised to speak. She was going to tell him what he should be doing with himself, except it didn't matter. What she said didn't matter. She was waiting, because they both knew that there had to be an outlet for what they were feeling.

His groin tightened.

He met her eyes. Felt the electric fury that burned within her because she wanted him and he knew it. She didn't want to want him, and she definitely didn't want him to know that she wanted him….

He just smiled. And walked closer.

That was when it happened….

When the darkness suddenly deepened. When she suddenly seemed so far away from him. When the air itself changed. When he felt…

A presence.

Someone between them.

Someone lurking in the shadows that were suddenly becoming deeper and deeper. Someone waiting. Someone evil, threatening Madison…

Out of the pitch-darkness he suddenly saw the silver glitter of a knife. Big, long, a butcher's knife, wickedly sharp. It hung in the air, as if suspended in the darkness of a haunted castle in an amusement park, the strings hidden by the eerie lack of light.

The silver streaked through the air.

The shadows shifted and moved.

Madison screamed….

Kyle awoke, drenched in sweat.

For several long seconds he sat there, realizing he'd been dreaming, that he was in his bed in his hotel room, that morning's light was just beginning to filter into his room.

Six-thirty.

The alarm went off.

He nearly jumped off the bed.

Get a grip! he warned himself in silent self-disgust. He crawled out of bed and into the shower, jumping when the water hit him, cold as ice at first.

The water warmed, and he lifted his head, letting it stream over him. Maybe he shouldn't have accepted this assignment. There were criminals all across the country. He should never have come home.

The phone was already ringing when he left the shower. He picked up the receiver. His assistant, Ricky Haines, was calling from Virginia. They hadn't found any matchups with the rose tattoos so far, but he would keep looking.

Kyle thanked him, hung up and glanced at the clock. Nearly eight. He called Jimmy, who was usually in by seven-thirty, if not earlier.

Jimmy was in, and he had information.

There had finally been an identification on their Jane Doe. She was in fact Julie Sabor; dental records brought in from Cincinnati had clinched the ID.

“We think we've got a name on our weekend victim, as well,” Jimmy told him. “Holly Tyler, twenty-eight, worked as a receptionist at a med-tech lab. Only child, parents deceased, friendly, well liked at work. She was incredibly excited and secretive Friday afternoon. She was getting off early for a ‘wild weekend'—and she told the girls at work that she wouldn't whisper a word until she saw them again come Monday.”

“She never showed up on Monday?”

“Her friends in the office even hesitated about calling in this morning—they thought she might be planning to call in sick or something. But then one of them noticed an article in the paper this morning about the torso we found yesterday and decided to call in. I'm expecting Larraine Harrison and Betty Kilbride, two of the girls she worked with, to come down and identify the body—well, the head—in about an hour.”

“I'll be there,” Kyle said, and hung up.

He dressed quickly, then tried Madison's number. He still got the answering machine.

He swore, then decided to drive by her house.

Her beige Cherokee was in the drive, but she didn't answer the bell. He knocked on the door, then walked around the house, pounding on the windows.

“Damn you, Madison!” he muttered out loud.

Finally he used his cellular phone and called Jimmy. “Have you got Madison with you down at the morgue again?” he demanded angrily.

“No, I don't have Madison at the morgue,” Jimmy informed him irritably. “What the hell's eating
you?
”

“She didn't answer her phone last night, and she's not here now.”

“Well, you know, Kyle, she
is
over twenty-one.”

“I'm going in, Jimmy.”

“Kyle, I'm sure that—”

“Doesn't matter. I'm going in.”

“Fine. I'll be there in five minutes. Five—”

Kyle had already hung up.

“G
orgeous, absolutely gorgeous. Now, no smiles for this. Be sultry. Seduce the camera, Madison. We're not being playful here, we're smoldering, my darling. You are pure sensuality…. Give me movement, subtle movement, just a tiny bit of movement, face, eyes…Part your lips, just a hair. That's it, perfect, perfect….”

Jaime Marquesa's camera clicked away as he gave her his instructions. It was an outdoor shoot, on a small private spit of beach at Key West, and as Jaime moved around with his camera, his two assistants hovered in silence behind, ready to move any obstruction or raise aluminum sheets against the sun if the shot demanded it.

Madison liked Jaime, and she liked working with Michelle Michaux, a local woman who had come from Miami's inner-city area to excel in fashion design. Of Haitian descent, Michelle had a beautiful, soft accent. Her swimwear was becoming so popular that the onetime dollar-an-hour seamstress was frequently quoted in
Forbes.
But she also had a deep-seated belief in giving back to her community. Today, she, Jaime and Madison were all donating their time and talents for a poster campaign to support the local arts and students interested in pursuing careers in fashion and the fine arts. The concept was Michelle's. The theme was To Soar Where We Can Dream. To Madison, with Darryl working in Miami and anxious to spend time with Carrie Anne, the opportunity to take the few days necessary to work on the project had seemed incredibly fortuitous. She'd also been anxious to get away.

She'd been curious to discover if she had the willpower to force herself to leave Miami and slip away, knowing that Kyle was there. But if he and Jassy were getting together, she needed to keep herself out of the way. And if she had been misreading the signs…

“Sand!” Jaime exclaimed suddenly—and unhappily. He took up an admonishing stance and stared at one of his young assistants, a handsome New Yorker of Nicaraguan descent named Hector. “Sand!” he repeated.

Hector shrugged and came running forward with his little brush, carefully removing every spec of the offending sand from Madison's buttocks.

“Thanks,” she murmured.

He winked at her with a casual shrug. “Bugger of a job, Madison, but someone's got to do it.”

She smiled back. He wasn't being offensive. He was Jaime's lover.

“And I get to hold the sun shields!” George Nathan, Jaime's other assistant, said with a sigh as he checked a light meter. George was sandy-haired, lanky, a recent graduate of the University of Miami. He'd already won a number of prizes for his own photography, but he was working with Jaime to learn from the best.

“Sun shields are important,” Hector assured him.

“But sand is more fun.”

“Boys, we're working here!” Jaime commented with an exaggerated sigh. “Once again, same look, Madison, sultry, dreamy…Okay, she needs the scarves now. Okay, with the scarves, Madison, you play. Just play. Have fun. Run with them, keep them flying in the breeze. We are showing that dreams are spun like fine silk, that they float in the air, that they are what we make them, yes, you understand? Go with it, run with it….”

She did. Jaime was good, the best. She was certain he could have talked a five-hundred-pound bearded lady into feeling that she could be dressed up and dusted off to look just like Cinderella on her way to the ball. Playing with the silk scarves, running up and down the sand, was fun. Hard work, because—despite the fact that it was growing late in the afternoon—the sun remained intense and Jaime seemed to be taking thousands of pictures. They'd been at it all day. The stylist and makeup woman had left after the last break, and Jaime kept promising that they would be done any minute. His concept of a minute was apparently a bit different from the norm, but he brought out the very best in her, and she knew it.

At a brief pause in the shooting—with Hector once again dusting her flesh free from sand—she was stunned to look up and see Kyle Montgomery standing in the back, beside Jaime and Michelle. He was talking with them but watching Madison. He was dressed for the beach in nothing but a pair of pale blue cutoff jeans. His head was bare; he wore sandals on his feet and, in the sun, his inevitable sunglasses. He looked a lot more like part of the shoot than a dedicated FBI agent. Dark hair fell casually over his forehead; his flesh was incredibly bronzed and covered with a sheen of sweat. He might have been a lifeguard.

At times, she mused, he had been. He had worked as a lifeguard during his last two summers before college.

That was a long time ago. He was no longer a local boy.

So what was he doing here? He was supposed to be working.

Despite herself, she felt her blood begin to race. Her heart pounded; breathing became difficult. She wished Kyle had stayed in Washington.

She commanded her knees to quit feeling so weak. She chided herself in silence for letting him affect her in any way. She wondered whether, if she closed her eyes, he would disappear.

She tried it. He didn't.

Jaime indicated with a smile that Kyle was welcome to go talk with Madison. Kyle nodded, then started walking toward her. The casual beach-boy look of his clothing was immediately belied as she felt his damning stare, despite the darkness of his glasses. He stopped dead in front of her, and she was certain that he was using all his willpower not to reach for her and shake her.

“What are you doing here?” she asked him, annoyed to realize that she didn't sound at all casual. Her voice was irritatingly shrill. She couldn't quite seem to control it around him.

“Trying not to slap you silly,” he responded irritably.

“Why? What the hell is the matter with you?” she asked. She was genuinely puzzled, and her tone was curious.

“You,” he said simply, snatching his glasses from his face as he stared at her, eyes as sharp as green gems. “You!” he repeated, and he appeared restless and angry, running his fingers through his hair in an aggravated manner. “Damn you, Madison, what the hell are you doing here?”

Startled by the depth of his anger, she replied, “Excuse me, this is my job. I belong here. Actually, at the moment, I'm being exceptionally good. I'm working gratis for the community. You got angry when I was involved in your work. Well, I've taken myself far away from it, and far from you, so just what the hell is your problem?” She was proud of herself. She had spoken in a very even tone.

“It didn't occur to you to tell anyone where you were going?” he demanded furiously.

“Darryl knows where I am—he has Carrie Anne.”

“Darryl! That's it?”

“Wait, now, let me think. Should I have told the father of my child—who would be taking care of that child!—where I was going, or should I have thought, no, no, let me tell the stepbrother I haven't seen in more than five years? The one who isn't satisfied with a single thing I do?”

He did grab her then. He reached for her arm with a sudden movement that was violent in its sheer speed, drawing her closer to him, as if he needed to make sure that she could hear his every word. “No, Madison, not me. Maybe your sister, your father, someone else.”

She tried to pull free, but he wouldn't let her go. She opted against the indignity of struggling.

“I left quite suddenly. I intended to call Dad when the shoot was done today, to let him know I'd be at his place, since he's back up in Miami getting ready for your father's show. But then, my father isn't down here acting like Henry the Eighth.”

“Irresponsible little bitch!” he muttered.

Madison was completely stunned by the depth of the anger in his voice. She stiffened and forced herself to remain cool and collected. “Really? I'm so sorry you don't approve. But I need to be responsible to Carrie Anne, not to you. And I would have called my family—”

“I thought I'd made you aware that there's a serial killer on the loose!”

Madison held her breath, feeling as if icy waves of fury were cascading over her and giving her new strength. “There's always a serial killer on the loose somewhere, isn't there? I mean, isn't that why you have your job?”

“This is different and you damned well know it.”

“So how did you find me?”

“I called everyone—including Darryl.”

Madison bit into her lower lip and sighed. “Look, you didn't want me involved. I'm staying away.”

“Madison, damn it, they're all redheads. Every last one of the victims—”

“They're redheads, and they're women, and they're young. And I have the intelligence to be careful, Kyle.”

He frowned. “You knew they were all redheads?”

“You just told me so.”

“But you knew before I told you.”

“The girl in the vision I had was a redhead. That's all I knew. Kyle, I can't stop living because I'm a young woman with red hair!”

“Damn you, Madison—” he began, but he broke off, wincing, because Jaime was calling out to them. “Agent Montgomery?” Jaime came hurrying over. He was obviously concerned. “I know how important your work is, Lieutenant, but if your conversation could wait just a few minutes more…We're ready for the next shots, and we're losing our light.”

“I think the agent is done,” Madison said.

“No, he isn't done,” Kyle said, staring at her hard, his dark lenses back in place. “But I can wait,” he added politely.

“Don't you need to get back to Miami? Follow up on some clues?”

“I'm with you, Madison. Talking with the psychic. I am working.”

“Madison?” Jaime said anxiously.

“I'm ready,” she said, staring at Kyle.

He walked back to join the others. Madison was painfully aware of him, standing with his arms crossed over his bare chest, watching as the shoot continued.

He made her feel awkward. Like a little kid again, trying to play dress-up, trying to be beautiful, mature, impressive.

Jaime started sighing.

Hector went into a fury of sand-dusting, which seemed to make everything worse.

“Come on, Madison, we're losing the light. Remember, this is for the hopes and dreams of lots of people!” Michelle said, wrinkling her nose. “I had help, Madison. My mama was on welfare. I'm not. We're working to make people believe they can create a better tomorrow.”

“Sí, sí,”
Jaime said. “Good speech, but, Madison, I don't want a militant look here. We're not burning bras. Right now, we're going for soft. Sexy.”

“All she has to do to look sexy is be awake,” Michelle said, complimenting her chosen model.

“She'd be sexy as all hell eyes closed, sound asleep,” George added in a husky tone.

“Play with the camera, play with it!” Jaime reminded her. “Make love to it, yes…?”

She wanted to kill Kyle. This was an important shoot. She had to forget that he was there. She had to be completely professional. She didn't know why Kyle made her feel as if she were a little girl, pretending she knew what she was doing. Somehow, she had to forget him!

Sure.

And so she began to use the fact that he was there. She would never be able to laugh and play and flirt with Kyle. She might as well be seductive through the camera.

She hoped she could make him suffer.

She played with the camera. She laughed, smiled, pouted, posed. She felt the luxury of the silk in her hands, felt the sun, the sand, the sheer sensuality of the day shimmering around her. The sun, sinking against the horizon. Touching, feeling. She was damned well going to be sexy. She was going to show him what he'd chosen to throw away all his life.

At last the light was gone. By that time, though, Jaime was as happy as a clam. Michelle, too, was delighted, Hector was assuring her that she'd just made him bisexual, and George was sweating.

Kyle was completely impassive.

Hector slipped a robe over her shoulders as she took a bottled water from an ice chest as they wrapped up. She knew that Kyle was behind her.

“I don't know why you hung around. It's boring for onlookers. Sorry, I guess there was something you wanted. Or did you come all the way back down here to yell at me for not letting more people know I'd be gone a couple of days?”

She swallowed a long drink of her water and looked at him.

His arms were still crossed over his chest; there was no sun left, but he still had those damn glasses on.

“We can talk later. Your friends and admirers want to celebrate a successful shoot and get something to eat.”

“Are you referring to my professional associates?” she inquired politely.

“Yeah, the gay guys, the woman and the tech with his tongue hanging in the sand. Them. Your professional associates.”

“Is George's tongue really in the sand? How sweet,” Madison murmured pleasantly.

“You just might wind up with the wrong man drooling after you, Madison,” Kyle warned.