Once Stalked

Riley felt a renewed wave of guilt as she hugged Bill.

“Bill, Jake – this isn’t fair.”

“What isn’t fair?” Bill asked.

“My getting this award. You two did as much work as I did.”

Lucy took her turn to hug Riley.

“Sure, it’s fair,” Lucy said. “Director Milner mentioned them. He gave them credit too.”

Bill nodded and said, “And we wouldn’t have done anything at all if you weren’t so damned stubborn about reopening the case.”

Riley smiled. It was true, of course. She’d reopened the case when nobody else had thought it was possible to solve.

Suddenly she felt a new wave of confusion over what had just happened.

She looked around and said to Bill, Jake, and Lucy, “All these people – how did they know about this?”

Lucy said, “Well, it was in the news, of course.”

That was true, but it didn’t explain things as far as Riley was concerned. Her award had been announced in tiny news items that scarcely anyone would have noticed unless they were looking for it already.

Then Riley noticed a sly grin on Bill’s face.

He contacted people! Riley realized.

He may not have reached out to every single person from her past, but he’d put the wheels in motion.

She was startled by the contradictory emotions she felt.

Of course she was grateful to Bill for making sure that this day was nothing short of extraordinary.

But to her surprise, she was angry too.

Without seeming to realize it, Bill had set an emotional ambush for her.

Worst of all, he had made her cry.

But she reminded herself that he’d done it out of friendship and respect.

She said to him, “You and I are going to have a little talk about this later.”

Bill smiled and nodded.

“I’m sure we will,” he said.

Riley turned toward her waiting family and friends, but she was stopped in her tracks by her boss, Team Chief Brent Meredith. The big man with black, angular features didn’t appear to be in a celebratory mood.

He said, “Paige, Jeffreys, Vargas – I need to see you in my office right away.”

Without another word, Meredith walked out of the room.

Riley’s heart sank as she headed over to Blaine, Gabriela, and the girls to tell them to wait a little while for her.

She remembered that lurking sense of darkness she had felt over dinner yesterday.

It’s here, she thought.

Some new evil was about to enter her life.

CHAPTER THREE

As Riley followed Bill and Lucy down the hallway toward Chief Meredith’s office, she tried to figure out why she felt so unsettled. She couldn’t put her finger on just what was troubling her.

She realized that it was partly a sensation she was long since used to – that familiar heightened apprehension she got whenever she was about to get new orders.

But something else was mixed in with that feeling. It didn’t feel like fear or foreboding. She’d been on too many jobs in her career to be unduly worried about what was ahead.

It was something she barely recognized.

Is it relief? Riley wondered.

Yes, maybe that was it.

The ceremony and the reception had felt so bizarre and unreal, stirring up conflicting thoughts and waves of emotions.

Heading to Meredith’s office was familiar, comfortable … and it felt like an escape of sorts.

But an escape into what?

Doubtless into a well-known world of cruelty and evil.

Riley felt a shiver go up her spine.

What did it say about her that she was more comfortable with cruelty and evil than she was with celebration and praise?

She didn’t want to dwell on that question, and she tried to shake off that anxious feeling as she walked. But she couldn’t quite do it.

It seemed that she was feeling less and less comfortable in her own skin these days.

When Riley, Bill, and Lucy reached Meredith’s large office, the chief was standing beside his desk.

Someone else was already there – a young African-American woman with short straight hair and large, intense eyes. She stood up at the sight of Riley and her companions.

Meredith said, “Agents Paige, Jeffreys, and Vargas, I’d like you to meet Special Agent Jennifer Roston.”

Riley eyed the woman she’d spoken to on the phone right after solving the Matchbook Killer case. Jennifer Roston wasn’t tall, but she looked athletic and completely competent. The expression on her face was that of a woman who was secure in her own abilities.