Rising Heat (74 page)

So, he had done a stint in the military. I admired that. I could barely make out the design on the patch on his sleeve. Four ivy leaves positioned in a compass orientation connected by stems, with a solid circle in the middle. I had seen it before, on the uniform of one of my old girlfriend’s photographs of her fiancé. The Fourth Infantry Division insignia, based at Fort Carson, Colorado. Steadfast and loyal. That was their motto, and it described Hawk to a tee.

Three other men were in the photograph. Two looked Native American, the other Caucasian. I moved on. Hawk standing with a rather large group, everyone smiling, arms around each other. Must be a family photo, perhaps an entire clan. It made me wonder a lot more about Hawk; where he came from, his personal life, his family.

Then to another photograph of him and Detective Cutter, hunting. At least I figured as much. Both wore camouflage, held rifles, and smiled broadly at the camera while Detective Cutter held up a duck of some sort. Once again, I wondered about the relationship between Detective Cutter and Hawk. None of the photographs seemed to display Hawk as a private investigator, although I did see a framed copy of his license mounted on the wall behind his desk.

I didn’t see any other personal objects in the office. A small bookcase behind the desk held a number of manuals and books and magazines, mostly about law, surveillance, investigative methods, and magazines on hunting and guns. A filing cabinet stood behind his desk on the other side of the wall. A window, the shades pulled down, the sofa, the desk and the chair in front of it filled the small office space.

His desk was neatly organized. A flat screen computer monitor, a keyboard and a wireless mouse on one side, a blotter in the middle, and on the left a wire mesh container filled with loose papers, a couple of file folders, and that was about it. I glanced at the folder on the top of the stack, noticed my name on the tab.

I sat down at his desk and reached for it. I didn’t feel like it was snooping. After all, it was my folder, wasn’t it? I opened it, expecting to find notes, a record of his activities, perhaps even receipts for expenditures, but I gasped in alarm when I saw the first item inside.

It was a crime scene photograph — in vivid, living, vibrant color. My heart dropped to the pit of my stomach, my brain following right behind it.

It was terrible. Awful. Worse than I could have imagined.

I was staring at the grizzly photo of a woman crumpled in a bathtub, covered in blood. The walls were spattered and streaked with it, a shower curtain tangled around her lower torso. One calf dangled over the edge of the tub. Her eyes, wide and staring, her mouth open as if she had died screaming.

“Oh my God.”

I stared at it for several more moments, feeling sick to my stomach. Was this one of the victims of the guy who was following me? I swallowed, trying to ignore the somersaults in my stomach, swallowing back the surge of nausea rising in my throat. I placed the photograph face down on the opened side of the folder, just as equally shocked as I looked at the next one. Another woman, lying twisted in an awkward shape on her bed, drenched in blood.

Her throat had been slashed from one side to the other, the edges of the wound gaping. On the bedside table next to her body was a photograph of a young man, spattered with blood. The pillow beneath her head was soaked with it.

My heart pounded in my chest. My ears began to ring. Could you literally feel the blood drain from your face? I think I felt it.

I cleared my throat in an effort to stem my rising urge to retch. My hands shaking, I turned that photograph over as well, saw a piece of paper with notations written in a small, neat hand.

These must be Hawk’s notes, but I couldn’t focus on them. Tears blurred my vision too completely to read. I shouldn’t have looked. I should’ve known better.

“Curiosity kills the cat,” I mumbled. “But information brings it back.”

I was just beginning to read through Hawk’s notes when I heard the tinkle of the bell downstairs, followed seconds later by heavy footsteps coming up the stairs. I froze.

I briefly vacillated between slamming the folder closed and placing it back in his file box, leaving it open. I needed to know information, didn’t I? What happened to those women could easily happen to me. Wasn’t it important for me to know the details? To find out everything I could about this nut job following me?

Before I could make a decision, the door opened and Hawk stood in the doorway, nearly filling it with his bulk. He stared at me a moment, saw what I was looking at, and scowled.

“What are you doing?”

I stared at him in dismay. “I didn’t mean to snoop, but I saw my name on the folder and figured—” He hurried toward the desk, glanced down at the open folder, then back up at me. I could tell he wasn’t happy. “Hawk, where did you get these photographs? These are the crime scenes of the two women that were killed by my stalker, aren’t they?”

“Yes,” he said shortly. “Maybe.”

He reached for the folder, shut it, and then took it away from me. “You shouldn’t be looking at that,” he said.

My mouth was dry, my heart pounding in fear while only moments ago it had been pounding with pleasure. I stared at him, trying to maintain a sense of calm on the outside while inside I felt like jelly. “I think I have a right to know, don’t you? Those photographs… what he did to those women is horrible… don’t you think I have a right to know what I’m up against?”

“What
we’re
up against,” he said.

I disagreed. “He’s after me, Hawk, not you.” I took a breath and then let it out slowly. “Did you find anything on the vehicles?”

He shook his head.

Something about the gesture caught my attention. “What are you thinking?” He stared at me, as if contemplating whether to answer or not. I lifted an eyebrow. “Hawk, I need to know. After all, this is my life we’re talking about, isn’t it?”

He heaved a heavy sigh. “If there
were
tracking devices on the vehicles, they’re not there now. He could’ve easily have put one on your truck sitting out front or even at the motel. Or mine, sitting in front of my office. Or even both of ours, while we were up here…”

That thought brought me back to sex. Yet something else we needed to discuss. I opened my mouth to broach the topic, but he stopped me.

“I know what’s on your mind, Tracy, and yes, we do need to talk about it, but not now. We need to get over to the police station. Detective Cutter wants to see us, remember?”

I slowly stood. “Do you have any idea what he wants to talk to us about?” I asked as I rounded the desk.

“No, he didn’t say over the phone,” Hawk replied as he stepped to the door. “We’ll take my Jeep.”

I nodded as we left his office and I followed him down the stairs. As we emerged from the door that closed off the stairway from the quilt shop, a male voice greeted us.

“Good morning!”

I startled, glanced toward the far side of the quilt shop, where a twenty-something-year-old man was busily sorting bolts of fabric on one of the shelves. He had turned to look over his shoulder with a welcoming smile, did a double-take, and then his smile froze.

“Hello,” I said, glancing around, looking for the older lady.

“Hello… oh, you’re wondering why a guy is taking care of the quilt shop, aren’t you?” the guy said with a grin. Before I could form a reply he continued, “I’m taking care of the shop for my mom today. She’s not feeling well.”

The young man stepped toward us, his gaze literally giving Hawk a wary if not discerning body check, then me. Could he tell? Could he tell what I… we, had just done? Was my hair a mess, my cheeks still flushed? If they were it wasn’t because of our lovemaking, but the horror of the crime scene photos I’d just looked at. Still, I wasn’t sure, so I nervously crossed my arms over my chest, forcing myself to not sniff my hand.

“I don’t think I’ve met you before,” he said, sticking out his hand as he approached. Shit! If only he knew what I’d been doing with my hands not long ago. I kept them firmly tucked in my armpits. Where is GermX when you need it?

Not sensing my discomfort, he prattled on, “My mom mentioned that Mr. Hawk had a new, pretty client—” he paused abruptly. I watched a red flush rise in his cheeks. “I work here part-time. I think I was back in the storeroom the first time you came in. She told me.”

I wasn’t sure quite how to respond so opted for polite. “Nice to meet you. I’m Tracy.” So, Hawk’s downstairs neighbor also appeared to be a gossip. Did the older woman keep track of everyone that went upstairs to Hawk’s office? If the quilt shop was as slow as it usually was when I was here, it was probable. Nothing like boredom to get the gossip mill rolling.

Hawk made a grunting noise in his throat, but I didn’t feel it would be polite to just turn my back on the guy. Finally, I wiped my hands on my pants and returned his shake. Eew. It was a bit sweaty, but his grip was strong, although not so strong as to make me feel intimidated. He was tall and lanky, with a receding hairline. He looked… milquetoast. An old-fashioned word my grandmother often used, but it was the only word I could think of to describe him. Plain, unassertive, nervous… meek even, at least he appeared so.

He kept glancing at Hawk and then away. He was either very shy or Hawk intimidated him. Of course, it didn’t take a rocket scientist to come to that conclusion. Hawk had intimidated me the first time I met him too.

“You must be one of Mr. Hawk’s clients. My name is Zach. I help out here sometimes when my mom has things to do or she needs to take a day off, or like today when she’s not feeling well.”

“Well, nice to meet you,” I said, gently tugging my hand from his grasp. “I hope your mother feels better.”

“She will,” he assured. After one more glance at Hawk and a weak smile at me, he returned to his task on the other side of the room.

He gave us one last discerning look over his shoulder, sniffed, and then shrugged as he turned his attention back to the stacked bolts of cloth he was organizing on the shelves. Once again I wondered… certainly he couldn’t tell…?

Hawk shoved the front door opened. The bell tinkled and I followed him outside. Just before I left the building, I glanced over my shoulder once more. Zach had turned to watch us leave. I waved a goodbye and he smiled and did the same. The door closed behind me.

“I don’t think I’ve ever seen a guy working in a fabric store before, have you?”

Hawk merely grunted, as if the question didn’t even require an answer. He opened the passenger side door and gestured for me to climb in. Then I remembered. “Wait,” I said, stepping to my truck. I retrieved my keys from my pocket. Hawk followed, watching wordlessly as I reached inside the passenger side of my vehicle and retrieved the gun from beneath the overnight bag. He gave me a disapproving frown.

“I told you to keep that on you at all times, didn’t I?”

“It was within reach all night long. When I drove to the Walmart parking lot, it was bothering me. I kept it on the seat next to me—”

“But you left it in your truck when you got here?”

I could hear the dissatisfaction in his tone. “I was distracted, Hawk—”

I knew that was a lousy excuse but what else could I say? I
had
been distracted. Scared. Tired and wondering how I’d ever get out of this mess I found myself in. A situation I had not initiated. The stalker creep had followed me, or else somehow found out I was at the motel. Until Hawk or the police could figure out how that happened, I doubted that I would feel safe anywhere.

“All the more reason to stay alert and focused,” he said. “Come on, Cutter is waiting for us.”

We drove in silence to the police station. My thoughts were all over the place, bouncing between Hawk one minute, the stalker, the fact that I wanted nothing more than to go home and get back to my usual routine, and what Detective Cutter wanted to talk about. Was it possible he had a lead on who the stalker was? Better yet, had he been captured? Could this possibly be over? I dared not get my hopes too high.

By the time we got to the station, it was full daylight. Stores opened. People moved about. The coffee shops and the fast food restaurants were busy. My stomach rumbled hungrily until I remembered the images of the photographs I’d seen in Hawk’s office. Nothing like a grisly crime scene photo to destroy your appetite.

Before I moved to open my door, he stopped me. He reached behind his back and retrieved his gun from his waistband. I hadn’t even seen him put it there. He gestured.

“We’ll need to keep our guns out here. I don’t want to waste time having the desk officer or either of the detectives asking either us a bunch of questions or discouraging us, mainly you, from being armed.”

I looked at him while I did as he requested and placed my gun into the glove compartment next to his. “Do you really think the police would discourage me from trying to protect myself?”

He shrugged. “Wouldn’t be the first time.”

“The first time discouraging you from carrying a gun, or one of your clients?”

“Both.”

He climbed out of the Jeep and I followed suit. My nerves started to get the better of me again. I took a deep breath, trying to calm myself. After all, Detective Cutter might have some good news. Maybe the crime scene techs had managed to pull a fingerprint or some other evidence from my house that would put a quick end to this situation.

We walked inside the police station, Hawk taking the lead. He nodded and offered a small wave to the desk officer.

“Hey, Toby,” he said. “And no, I’m not armed and neither is she.”

“Hey, Hawk,” Officer Toby replied, gesturing. “They’re waiting for you in there.”

I followed Hawk through the swinging gate toward Detective Cutter and Westin’s office. Cutter look just as rumpled as before, and I was surprised to notice that even Detective Westin was beginning to look a little worn around the edges.

“What have you got?” Hawk asked without preamble.

As I walked into the room, Detective Cutter gestured for me to sit in the chair beside his desk. Hawk leaned against the door jamb, arms crossed over his chest. I couldn’t tell what he was thinking, but there was nothing unusual about that. I couldn’t say the same for Detective Westin. For a moment, he stared at me, unsmiling, and then finally, almost gradually it seemed to me, he nodded a greeting. I offered a faint, polite smile and then turned to Detective Cutter.