No Holds Barred

In Duncan’s opinion, she’d summed up his situation nicely. And what in the hell was he going to do about it?

PIPER CLOSED HER EYES. There was always the chance that she was hallucinating. Or her habit of visualizing was getting the best of her. But when she opened her eyes again, Duncan Sutherland was still crouched on the floor of her apartment.

For an instant, she certainly hoped it wasn’t longer than that. She felt just as she had when she’d stopped short in the open doorway of her apartment and seen the rose petals strewn over the white sheet.

Except that it wasn’t just shock she was feeling. And her blood hadn’t turned to ice. Instead, it seemed to be sizzling through her veins like an electrical current, melting bones and paralyzing muscles so that she wasn’t sure she could talk. Or move.

“What are you doing here?” she asked.

“This is FBI agent Duncan Sutherland, Ms. MacPherson,” Mike Nelson said. “He works for the Behavioral Analysis Unit at Quantico. I asked him here because he worked on the Rose Petal killings.”

“I know Duncan,” Piper said. Okay, she was breathing and talking. In a couple of seconds, she’d get her thoughts back on track. Should she try stuffing him into a bottle? Would he fit?

A young uniformed officer appeared in the open doorway. “Sorry, sir. She got away from me.”

Piper managed to drag her eyes away from Duncan and glanced back at Nelson. “He was kind enough to get me coffee, and the caffeine helped me think.” And she was thinking again. Finally. She waved a hand at the sheet. “I came up here to save you some time, Detective. This isn’t the work of the Rose Petal Killer.”

“Tell me why not,” Duncan said.

Bracing herself, Piper turned to face him and managed to take one step closer to the edge of the sheet. And him. “Because the rose petals are so fresh. I read all the files. He used to buy the flowers over the course of days and save them up.”

“Too many roses purchased at one time, one place, might have drawn attention. Plus, there was some speculation that he bought them over time as little anonymous gifts for his victims,” Duncan said. “And if they saved them, he used those older petals.”

She narrowed her eyes. She’d read those very words in the files she’d worked on. And those details had never been released to the press nor had they made it into the court records. Duncan had worked on the cases, all right. Of course he had. He might even have consulted with the police on the Suzanne Macks murder.

“What else is different?” Duncan asked. “Take your time.”

She shifted her gaze to the sheet. “I should have done that instead of panicking.” She sank to her knees to get a better look. But what she was looking at and what she was feeling were two different things. She was close enough to touch him now. She could certainly smell him—sunshine and soap and something else that bumped up that sizzle in her blood.

Focus.

Ruthlessly, she shifted her attention fully to the details she’d only glanced at before. The edges of the sheet were tucked in to form a perfect square in the available space. That was right. No wrinkles. The RPK had always been neat and precise.

Suddenly, she frowned. “There are fold marks in the sheet, as if it’s been newly purchased.”

“Good point,” Duncan said. “What else?”

Lifting the edge of the sheet, she rubbed it between her thumb and forefinger. “This is wrong, too. The texture is too rough. The thread count should be higher. He always used Egyptian cotton.”

“You did read the files,” Duncan murmured. “You worked on the appeals brief, didn’t you?”

After taking in a deep breath, Piper met his eyes and nodded. She’d prepared herself to find anger, maybe condemnation, censure at the very least. And why not? She’d set a killer free. And now she was facing a man who’d probably worked very hard to bring that killer to justice. But what she saw in the clear green depths of Duncan’s eyes was understanding.

Something moved through her then, something she couldn’t begin to name. But even as her gaze lingered on his, those green eyes darkened and triggered very different feelings. The rush of desire, the flood of heat, was intense and immediate, as if a button had been pushed. The impulse burst into her mind of just grabbing him, shoving him onto that sheet and rolling with him across it as she stripped him out of those clothes.

No. That couldn’t happen.

But the thrill of what that might be like mingled with the accompanying shock that she’d actually thought of doing it. Wanted so badly to do it.

Here.

Now.

If they’d just been alone.

But they weren’t. She dragged her gaze away from him and back to the sheet with its bloodred petals. What in the world was wrong with her? No man had ever made her think this … crazily before.

“Ms. MacPherson did an amazing job on the appeal,” Abe Monticello was saying. “I’ve invited her to take second chair in the trial I’m scheduled for in a couple of weeks.”

“She did an excellent job,” Duncan agreed. “Thanks to her, a shoddy lab was shut down. For a while, our hardworking law enforcement agencies will be very careful about the way they collect and store evidence, and judges will think more precisely about what kind of evidence to admit into the record.”

“Before we throw a ticker-tape parade, let’s remember that the amazing appeal set a serial killer loose on the streets,” Nelson added.

“So put him back in jail,” Abe said. “In any case, our experts seem to agree that this incident is the work of a copycat.”

“Not so fast. Before we jump on that bandwagon, we’d better take a look at this.” Duncan lifted his hand, and out of the corner of her eye, Piper saw the thin envelope he held between two fingers.

“I found this tucked under the sheet.” As he spoke he opened the unsealed flap and pulled out a piece of cream-colored vellum, the kind that a formal announcement might have been printed on.

He turned it so that she could see what was written in block letters. THE NEXT TIME, YOU’LL BE THE ONE LYING BENEATH THE PETALS.

It was only as Duncan read the message aloud to the other two men that the meaning began to sink in. A sliver of fear worked its way up her spine, but a little flare of anger chased it away. She shot to her feet. “Leaving a note was never part of the RPK’s pattern. Who would do this?”

“Someone who’s angry because we won our appeal,” Abe said. “So it’s clearly not Patrick Lightman. He’s got to be very happy with the work we did.”

“Well, someone definitely isn’t,” Nelson muttered.

“Agreed. Your job is to find out who’s threatening Ms. MacPherson,” Monticello said.

Duncan rose to his feet, but whatever he might have added was forestalled by the commotion at the door of her apartment. Turning, she saw her colleague Richard Starkweather stride through the still-open door.

“Piper, thank God you’re all right.” He started toward her.

Duncan quickly stepped in front of her. “Who are you?”

Richard frowned at him. “Who are you?”

“He’s all right,” Abe said. “Richard Starkweather is one of my research assistants.”

Because Duncan was completely blocking her view, Piper edged to his side. Two men now flanked Richard, a uniformed officer and Detective Nelson.

“What are you doing here?” Nelson asked the question that was foremost in Piper’s mind.

“I came to see if Piper was all right. It’s all over the news that the Rose Petal Killer has struck again.” He gestured toward the petal-strewn sheet. “They’re running footage of the crime scene on all three local news stations. It’s even posted on YouTube. When I recognized Piper’s apartment, I had to come over here to make sure she was all right. Surely you can understand that, Officer.”

“Detective,” Nelson corrected.

When the TV blared on, Piper turned to see that Abe was using the remote to find a news channel. The moment he did, they were all viewing a video clip of the scene in her apartment. It was exactly what she’d encountered when she’d returned from her run. There was a shot of the room that took in her kitchen, the open door to the bedroom, all the way to the fireplace. Then the picture on the TV screen narrowed to a close-up of the petal-strewn sheet. She felt a sliver of ice work its way up her spine.