Man Of Action. Janie Crouch

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СКАЧАТЬ more to that story. Luke’s emotions weren’t necessarily guilt in a specific sense, but a sort of overall vague sense of shame.

      “I was at my house sleeping, after walking home from here. I live off Old Highway 80,” Jarrod said, still staring openly at Andrea.

      “You live alone?” Brandon asked.

      Both the other men snickered. Brandon raised an eyebrow. “What?”

      “No,” Luke said. “He lives with his mother.”

      Jarrod turned away, grimacing. “Thanks, Luke.”

      Andrea couldn’t help but smile a little at Jarrod’s comeuppance. Especially since his desire to bed her practically oozed from his pores. He wasn’t even trying to hide his craving for Andrea.

      “Your mom can vouch that you were at the house?” Brandon asked Jarrod.

      “Yeah, man. She’s always at home. Gets so angry at me whenever I go out.”

      Probably pretty angry that Jarrod didn’t have a job, either, but Andrea didn’t mention that. Didn’t want to draw the attention back to herself.

      She watched all three men as Brandon got their names and contact information. He explained that, at this point, they were eliminating suspects. Telling the truth now would save them from more trouble later. Although none of them were thrilled at giving the info, none of them resisted.

      Jarrod tried to talk to her while Brandon spoke with the other men, but she wouldn’t engage with him. She’d had plenty of practice being standoffish over the past few years. Shutting him down was easy.

      Plus, she wondered if he wasn’t trying to get on her good side because he was hiding something.

      One thing she knew for sure as she and Brandon left the bar, waving to bartender Phil as they went—all three men they’d interviewed today had secrets. All of them had lied or withheld information in some way.

Chapter Five

      They spent the entire next day traveling around Phoenix and Buckeye, checking alibis, talking to the employers and colleagues of the women.

      As the detectives had said, none of the victims had family who had spoken up. It didn’t seem as if they had many friends, either. The killer had chosen well: women whose deaths would go relatively unnoticed. Only the ritualistic placement of the bodies and the symbolic items found with each victim even clued in law enforcement that it was the same killer at all.

      The killer probably hadn’t been able to stop himself from placing the symbols of purity around the women, even if he’d intellectually recognized that it could lead to his demise. The purity rituals had been just as important to the killer as the kill itself.

      The killer was calm, sure of himself—almost definitely a he based on the nature of the crimes and the fact that the victims were all females. These murders hadn’t been done in rage. There had been no mutilation of the bodies, no bruising beyond the restraints on the wrists and the rope marks around the throat.

      If he let himself, Brandon could perfectly envision the rope tightening around the victims’ throats. The killer most certainly would’ve had them on their knees—an act of repentance, needed before one could be deemed pure.

      The killer hadn’t been interested in the women sexually—or perhaps he had and wouldn’t let himself act on it—only in freeing them from their evil. Cleansing them.

      Brandon had been sitting in his hotel room for the past hour, looking blankly ahead. To most people it would’ve seemed as if he was staring out into nothing, but really he was giving his mind a quiet place to sort through all the data he’d been processing for the past forty-eight hours.

      Letting his mind get into the head of a killer.

      It wasn’t a comfortable place to be, and since David’s death, Brandon didn’t let himself get in that dark place too often.

      Brandon was aware of the dark side of his intelligence, of his nature. Was well aware that immersing himself deep into the thoughts of a killer could leave him tainted by that darkness.

      And now there was no one to drag him back but himself. No one to warn him when he was getting too close to the abyss. It was one of the things he missed most about having a partner he trusted.

      And speaking of partners, it was time to meet his temporary one. When they’d arrived back at the hotel, Andrea had all but fled into her room. She’d said it was because she wanted to look over some notes from today’s interviews, but Brandon knew that couldn’t be it. She hadn’t taken any notes all day.

      She was an enigma. Her work ethic seemed impeccable—she was punctual, attentive and focused—but then she’d do something completely unprofessional like refuse to take any notes.

      Even Brandon took notes. He realized a long time ago his brain—all brains—were capable of great things, but they were never infallible. Evidently Andrea thought hers was the exception.

      He should be thankful for her flaw. For her reminder that he didn’t want someone like her as a partner. Because if he woke up one more time, his body hard and wound up, dreaming about her—about kissing her and removing all the professional clothes she wore like armor—he was afraid he would act on it.

      He needed to keep his distance.

      Pulling rank and forcing her to have dinner with him was not helping with that plan. She’d wanted to camp out in her own room all evening, grab some crackers, go over what they’d found. He’d told her they needed to eat real food and could discuss the case while doing so. She put up a bit of an argument, but he hadn’t listened, just threatened to bring dinner to her hotel room so they could work there.

      That got her agreement.

      He moved into the lobby to meet her. They were going to walk a few blocks down the street to the mom-and-pop Italian restaurant. He saw her as she walked in the lobby just moments later. He had changed into jeans and a T-shirt, but she still wore her pants and blazer from the interviews earlier. She looked nice, no doubt about that. But definitely not casual or comfortable. He wondered if she ever looked casual or comfortable, if she ever just let herself relax around anyone.

      He couldn’t seem to make himself stop looking at her. Damn, he wanted to peel her out of those clothes. To see if there was any fire underneath and disprove the ice-queen theory. To show her that it was okay to let go with him. To protect her from whatever demons she was fighting. The sudden overwhelming thoughts caught him off guard.

      “What?” she asked at his continued stare.

      “Nothing. Just hungry. Ready?”

      After walking to the restaurant and ordering, Andrea immediately brought up the case, obviously wanting to offset the chance of talking about anything personal. That was fine with Brandon. He hoped to use this time not only to go over the case, but to give her a lesson in law enforcement about the need to take notes. He wanted to point out how many things she missed by not taking notes and trying to keep it all in her head.

      “So what do we know about each of the victims? Let’s make sure we haven’t missed any details,” he said as the waitress brought their salads СКАЧАТЬ