"Have You Seen Her?" - читать интересную книгу автора (Rose Karen)Chapter Twenty-eight It was past midnight when Steven slipped into the spare bedroom and closed the door behind his back. Jenna was sitting in bed reading and she jerked her head up, fear crossing her face in the instant before she realized it was him and she was still safe. "Don't do that," she whispered, then relaxed. "Couldn't sleep either?" He shook his head and sat next to her on the bed. "I was thinking about you. Wanting to touch you." He rubbed his hand along her forearm. "Needing to touch you." "I'm all right," she said softly. "Really." "1 know. Mostly." She took his hand and brought it up to her lips. "What happened today, Steven?" He shook his head, wishing he could tell her all of it, and in so doing wipe the images from his mind. Knowing it was impossible to do so. He leaned his cheek into her hand, taking what comfort he could from her touch. "It was the worst I've ever seen," he whispered raggedly. "God, Jenna." She caressed his cheek. "I'm so sorry, Steven. For you, for that girl's parents." "For the next victim." She shook her head. "You'll catch him. You have to." He shook his head again, harder this time, trying to scramble all the pictures in his mind like a child's Etch-A-Sketch toy. It didn't work. He picked up her book, looking for a dis-traction, and found it. " "Because I'm trying to sleep," she said ruefully. "But it doesn't help." She ran her fingertips over his lips. "Isn't there anything I can do to take your mind off your troubles, Steven?" He leaned in and kissed her gently. "Yes, there is one thing." "Name it." "Make love with me." "You don't have to ask," she said, but he shook his head and captured her face in his hands. "No," he murmured and watched her eyes soften, heat. For him. "Tonight I want to make love to you. Slowly, like I haven't done before." "Steven, I-" "Sshh." He pulled her nightshirt over her head and dropped it off the side of the bed. "Just lay back and let me love you. Please. I need to love you." He covered her lips with his, and pushed her gently to the pillows, following her down. Covenng her body with his. Treasuring her mouth as if he had all night to just kiss her. She arched against him and he pressed her back down. "No, not fast. Not tonight." He ran his lips down the side of her neck, pausing at the much smaller Band-Aid she now wore. He kissed her throat, an inch from where some crazed teenager had nearly taken her from him over a damned game. He kissed the swell of each breast, wishing he had a lifetime just to pleasure her there. He ran his tongue along the underside of one full breast, then the other, and she arched against him again. Minutes later she was writhing under him, her nipples wet and pitted hard from his suckling mouth. He looked up to find her staring at him, her violet eyes almost black. "Steven," she began, but he cut her off. "Sshh. Let me love you, Jenna." He kissed his way down her stomach, gently, slowly, thoroughly until he got to her lace panties which he worried with his teeth. "Steven, please," she gasped, then moaned, almost silently, when he lapped at her through the lace. She was already wet, which made him want to groan. Instead he kissed her there, softly. Promising. Her hands fisted in the blankets, twisting as she moaned again. He rolled away only long enough to slide the panties down her long, long legs and she was totally bared to him. Totally vulnerable. Totally his. He took his time, licking and lightly sucking until she whimpered, arching, pressing her softness closer to his seeking mouth. But he didn't want it to end. Not yet. Where before they'd shared explosive passion, tonight he wanted something more. He wanted… reverence. Gently he pressed her hips back into the mattress with his hands and held her there, imprisoned, and resumed until she drew in a tight breath, her body going taut, and waves of shudders racked her. She cried out, muffling the sob of her passion with her hand. He kissed her then, the soft folds that still quivered from the power of the orgasm he'd given her. Then he pushed himself up on his knees and watched her face relax by degrees as she came back to earth. To him. She was beautiful, and his. Tonight. Forever. Her breasts rose and fell as she struggled to breathe, one of her hands still clenching the blanket, the other lying slack on her pillow. Slowly she opened her eyes and he saw what he hadn't taken the time to see before. Wonder. Lust. And something much, much more. He shuddered out a ragged breath of his own and pushed his sweatpants aside, then thrilled as her eyes slid lower and darkened as she took in the sight of him. He knew when her eyes reached his throbbing erection because she swallowed hard. Licked her lips. Made him yearn. She reached out and took him in hand, her eyes rising to meet his. "What do you want, Steven?" "I want you to look at me in fifty years the way you're looking at me right now." Her fingers teased his length, making every muscle in his body clench. "And how is that?" "Like you'll never, ever get enough of me." Her eyes flashed. "I won't. Please, Steven, I need you now." She'd said please. So without taking his eyes from hers he sheathed himself, then entered her in one smooth stroke that made them one. She shuddered, one hand still clutching the blanket. With the other she caressed his face. "Steven," she whispered. "I wish I could feel you against my skin," he whispered back and nearly convulsed at the power of the image. "I wish you were pregnant with my child." Her eyes flared and she rocked up against him, tightening her muscles as she slid back, torturing him with the tight fist of her body. "I wish that, too," she said and he lost it. Gone was the gentleness he'd intended, the consideration he'd planned. Instead he felt himself falling into rushing water, being drawn into the current, dragged under until he couldn't breathe. He rocked against her, into her, harder and faster until she moaned and convulsed around him and he knew he could no longer keep the words inside. They came in a torrent, matching the thrust of his hips as he sought to make her irrevocably his. "I love you," he groaned and came so hard the world went black. He collapsed, hearing the thunder in his head, feeling his heart beat like he'd conquered the highest mountain. She was stroking his back, kissing his shoulder, the side of his neck, and he needed to say it again. "Love you, love you, love you." The words kept coming as his body quivered and shook. "Love you." She waited until he was breathing again, saying nothing until he lifted his head and looked into her eyes. And saw her response before she uttered the words. "I love you, too," she murmured. He knew he'd found in her the strength to face anything. She actually thought she had a choice. He sat outside her house in his car, so angry his hands shook. He'd almost had her. Almost had her in his clutches. But no. She had to listen to that idiot Thatcher's sermon at the school today. The SBI had been out in force, talking to every young girl in the county. Telling them all to stay home, to not even trust their own boyfriends until the killer was caught. Like Thatcher had a prayer of catching him. Thatcher and his friends were probably still heaving up their breakfasts after stumbling across pretty little Alev. She wasn't so pretty anymore. And a good deal littler. Certainly more compact. It had felt so damn good, arranging the scene. Imagining Thatcher's distress. Wishing he'd be able to see it himself. He needed it again, that rush, the exhilaration of the kill. Of knowing he'd bested the famous Special Agent Thatcher. Be-fore it had been a game, but now it was personal. He wanted Thatcher to pay, and pay he would. He'd had a setback with He couldn't wait for the true fun to begin. But he had needs to fulfill in the meantime. He was hungry. And not for food. He scowled and gritted his teeth. He'd almost had her in his clutches, the little cheerleader with the big smile. Too bad she turned out to have a brain, too. He'd called her, told her to meet him, like they'd planned. But at the last minute she refused. Not because she thought he was a killer, she'd said, no way. She was just being careful. Bullshit. He'd have to break his own rule, just this once, and make another house call. The team was waiting as Nancy came in, white as a ghost. Holding a single sheet of paper. Steven shook his head, knowing even as he reached for the report what it would say. Read it and felt a fist squeeze his gut to water. "No." He looked up at Nancy's pale face, fury and memories of Alev making his hands tremble. "I can't believe this. Not another one." There was silence around the table, then Sandra exploded. "After all the assemblies? The warnings? Dammit, who's missing now? And what was she Steven stared at the report, his brain kicking into full gear. "She didn't meet him, Sandra. She didn't leave her house. Voluntarily." Davies abruptly pushed his chair from the table and crossed to Steven's side, holding out his hand. Steven gave him the report and turned to the others. "She was ripped from her bed. He was there, in her bedroom." His hand closed into a fist. "He's finally popped." "He's out in the open," Liz murmured. "Now we have to find him. Who is she? Who is the girl he ripped from her bed?" Davies put down the report. "Kelly Templeton. Roosevelt High." "Rudy's playground," Harry said from behind clenched teeth. He still looked shaken from the ordeal the day before. "God, I want that little sonofabitch to fry." Steven rose to his feet, every muscle in his body taut. "To a crusty little crisp. Kent, let's get you and as many other Forensics as we can free up over to the Templeton house. He's left something there, I know it. And we'll find it if we have to rip up every damn floorboard and carpet fiber. Liz, can we bring him in now? Liz nodded slowly. "As long as we bring in anyone else that knew her. As long as we don't single Rudy out." "She was a cheerleader," Sandra said curtly. "She probably knew everyone in the school." "Which may include Brad," Nancy reminded him and Steven felt his heart stutter and clench. Even though Brad seemed okay now, Steven still didn't know what had caused the rift. But he knew Brad. Ultimately trusted his son. His heart quieted to normal. "That's okay. He's a smart kid, maybe he can tell us something we don't already know." Then his mind prickled, a plan beginning to form. "You're right, Sandra, she probably knew the whole school, so we'll go to them. Nancy, call the principal and arrange to have any students who knew her brought to a closed room in groups of ten." He looked over at Liz. "I assume a videographer's out?" "Without parental consent? You assume correctly." Steven shook his head. "Damn Bill of Rights," he said and made Liz smile. "Sandra, special duty for you. You'll ensure our teens have liquid refreshment." Sandra raised her brows. "And do I get tips for this?" Steven grinned, feeling his adrenaline pumping. "No, you don't serve. You let the school serve from their supplies. You, my dear, just collect the trash. Label each cup carefully. I want Rudy and his friends to drink something. And I want you to carefully make sure the used cups are garbage they no longer want." They could search garbage without a warrant. He wished he'd thought of this before. "Got it?" Sandra's lips curved. "Got it. We can get DNA from his cup." "You'll have to get DNAs from all the cups," Liz cautioned and Steven shrugged. "Hell, Diane's back from her cruise all rested. I think she can handle the job, don't you, Kent?" Kent nodded with mock sobriety. "Absolutely." "Plus, how we prioritize the evidence won't matter in the long run as long as we run and compare all the samples, right, Liz?" Liz looked amused. "Right." Steven turned to Harry and immediately gentled his voice. "Harry, can you handle another crime scene with Kent?" Harry looked grim. "After yesterday, I can handle anything. How much worse can he get?" The question took the wind from all their sails. Steven saw yesterday in his mind once again, as clearly as if he were still standing amid the body parts and the signs. "I don't want to know. Let's not give him a chance to show us." Jenna was reviewing the reading assignments the substitute had given her class when Lucas interrupted. "Dr. Marshall? Can I have a word with you?" Glad to see himafter the tumult of her weekend, Jenna turned from her ____________________ ____________________with a smile-that immediately dissipated whenshe saw the look on his face. Lucas was Tightened. Her first thoughts flew to Casey as she dusted chalk dust from her hands. Still she injected humor into her voice. "Class, read section six again. You all missed the finer points the first time." She walked to the back of her classroom amid teenaged groans, her heart wildly beating in her throat. Lucas followed her into the hall and pulled the door shut behind them. '"Casey?" Jenna asked immediately. Lucas shook his head. '"No." He looked into her classroom from the oblong window in the door. "There's been another girl abducted," he saiu quietly, still looking into her classroom. Jenna frowned, then her heart rose into her throat again. Sixteen, cheerleader. One empty desk in the front row. The hallway blurred as she sagged back against the wall to keep from falling. "Kelly?' she whispered. Lucas swallowed. "Yes." She remembered the look on Steven's face the night be-fore. The unspeakable horror he'd seen. Perpetrated by the monster that now held one of her innocent girls. "Last night. The police want to talk to the students, ask them what they've seen. Groups of ten. I'm setting it up in the conference room. Since she was in your class, I want your kids to go first." Jenna pushed her trembling body from the wall. "We're halfway into the period. Which kids do you want to go first, because you won't have time for them all." Lucas turned from the window, his face wooden. "Pick ten. We'll get the others in their classes as the day goes on." He raked taut fingers through the silver hair at his temples. "I can't believe this is happening. Does Thatcher have any idea who's doing this?" Jenna shook her head. "I don't know," she murmured, fighting a wave of nausea. Steven, Sandra, Liz, and Nancy had interviewed over a hundred teenagers. Most were shell-shocked, unbelieving that one of their own had fallen prey. Lucas Bondioli was their mainstay, guiding teens into the conference room, preparing lists of names of those they'd talked to, those they hadn't. Bondioli sat in on every group, which seemed to put the students at ease. Steven was glad to have him, knowing he could pick up on expressions that were out of the ordinary for any given teen. The football team was among the first questioned, but none of the boys would admit to knowing anything. They did have the pleasure of watching Rudy's friends squirm, if for no other reason than the fact the boys knew they were still under suspicion for Jenna's attack even though Rudy himself had been cleared by way of alibi. Late morning, Steven had left Sandra in charge and taken a break, first going up to Jenna's classroom where she'd walked silently into his arms, oblivious to the goggle-eyed stares of her third period class. She'd been through hell but she was holding up just as he'd known she would. He satisfied himself with a brief embrace and a whispered "I love you." It seemed like a year since he'd said it, although it had been only a few hours before when he'd woken her up before dawn to make love. Just once more, he'd thought in the darkness, before returning to the horror he knew would be waiting at work. And she'd silently obliged, offering her body, holding him until he finally forced himself out of her arms. Out of her bed. Into the office where the hell had begun all over again. Then he'd visited the Templeton house where Harry and Kent and Davies were literally combing every fiber and every floorboard. They'd found a handful of hair, yanked out by the root, but Kent was now too overwhelmed by the reality of their killer to be as excited as he'd been at the discovery of the partial hair at the Clary clearing twelve days before. They'd found white powder scattered on Kelly's pillow and on the carpet next to her bed. Grimly they'd bagged it. If it was ket-amine in powder form, Kent told him, it meant the killer was not only injecting it intravenously, but forcing his victims to inhale it, rendering them completely helpless in under ten seconds. They'd found a clump of sawdust in the carpet. They had Kelly's cell phone. She'd received a five-minute call just before midnight, no caller ID available. Like Steven expected there'd be one. For a boy who couldn't pass chemistry, Rudy Lutz seemed pretty damn smart. They'd found a footprint in the soft dirt outside her window and Steven was grateful that Mrs. Templeton took such pride in her lawn and flowers. And that she was a conscientious water conserver. Her sprinklers were set to go off at eleven p.m. when water absorption into the soil was most efficient, meaning the ground would stay moist enough for a shoe print until about three a.m. So they had a three-hour window when the kidnapping had taken place. And they had a pair of wildly terrified parents, stunned by grief, unable to give Steven any more information than he already knew. Beyond that, he thought, refocusing on the last group of teens just now filing out of the room, they had nothing. He rose and stretched. "That was fun." Sandra glared at him balefully. "I want double overtime." Steven's lips curved. "You're salaried. You don't get overtime. Besides, you have teenagers. You should be used to this by now." Liz rubbed her forehead. "I'm so out of the loop. How can mothers let their daughters leave the house dressed that way? I haven't seen so many midriffs since the last time I tuned into MTV by accident. It's like a billboard for sex offenders." Sandra shook her head, digging into the garbage for the cups the teens had thrown away. The school had set out a cup of each color before each group and she noted who'd picked up which color while the group was ongoing. "Sex offenders don't need billboards or midriffs, Liz. You know that." Liz handed her labeled baggies one at a time. They'd developed a rhythm over the course of the day. "I know. I just hate to see these young girls displaying themselves so…" "Sluttily?" Nancy supplied, then grimaced. "God, that isn't even a word. One day with these kids and I'm making up words." "And we get to come back tomorrow," Steven declared with false cheer, then pretended to flinch when all three women turned on him menacingly. "Hey, at least we got the football team and soccer team and the basketball team today." "You got part of them," Bondioli corrected, coming into the room, a marked-up roster in his hands. "You've still got about twenty athletes and another hundred kids in the junior class alone." Sandra groaned. "We'll be at this all week." "But we have to talk to all of them," Liz reminded her. "No favorites." Then closed her mouth abruptly when Bondioli's dark brows shot up like a rocket. "You Steven sighed. "We never said that, Lucas." Bondioli narrowed his eyes. "You didn't have to. Just tell me who." Steven wondered if the man even knew he clenched his fists. "You know we couldn't do that even if we did have a suspect." He sat down next to Bondioli. "You want us to catch him, right?" Bondioli nodded, looking completely miserable. "He's killed three girls. And now he has Kelly. I have a daughter her age. I just can't even imagine…" "Nobody can," Steven told him, reaching for the roster in Bondioli's trembling hand. He ran down the list for the names they'd interviewed and the ones they had not. Then frowned. "What?" Liz asked, dropping in the chair next to him. Steven shook his head. "I just noticed that our resident flunkee Rudy has a brother. He never showed up on any of the lists of suspects for the vandalism in Jenna's classroom." Bondioli leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes, weariness etched into his face. "He doesn't run with his brother's friends," he said. "Josh is a special needs student." Steven stared at the name, wondering why Davies had never mentioned a brother. "What's his special need?" "Josh is cognitively challenged. His IQ tests at about eighty-five. He's able to compete with the other kids on a remedial academic level with special help." "Then what's he doing in Jenna's beginning chemistry class?" Steven asked. "That is what she teaches first period, isn't it?" Bondioli nodded. "Josh came to me early this year and begged to be put into 'normal' classes." He punctuated the air with his fingers. "Said he wanted to at least try. I think he wanted to show his father he could be as good at something as Rudy was. And given Rudy's propensity to fail classes for complete lack of effort, I think Josh has a pretty good chance of doing so. His grades are all in except for English and Chemistry. He's got mostly Cs. A "I suppose they've been otherwise occupied," Steven murmured, his mind racing, wondering if trying to trick information out of a cognitively challenged teen was as reprehensible as it felt and not caring one single iota. He'd interview Josh Lutz and he'd use every skill in his repertoire to get anything out of the boy he could. For now, though, he kept his voice even. "I'll be anxious to talk to him tomorrow. He knew Kelly, right?" Bondioli's dark eyes flashed. "He Steven sighed. "I'm sorry, Lucas. That was an insensitive slip. I'm tired, I suppose." "I guess I understand." Bondioli stood up. "You'll be seeing Jenna out tonight?" "I will." Bondioli's eyes softened. "Good. She needs somebody to take care of her." "I plan to," Steven answered, completely aware of the stares of his three female coworkers. Bondioli's face lit in a slow grin. "Well now, that's good to hear. I can only hope she lets you." Steven frowned. "She'd better." "She will," Jenna said from the door. "I'm safe as I'll ever be with these fine people to guard me." She smiled at Steven and his heart did a slow roll in his chest. "Go home, Lucas. I'll be fine." "I'm betting Steven will be, too," Nancy snickered and Liz and Sandra grinned knowingly while Jenna's cheeks heated to an attractive rose. "So will Helen," Liz added. "Now maybe she can concentrate on finding somebody for me. I'm not picky. Tall, dark, handsome. Rich is good." "Don't forget a good kisser," Sandra said. "And, uh, Nancy's snicker became a full laugh. "Is he, Jenna?" Jenna set her mouth in a prim line even as her violet eyes danced. "That would be telling." Liz took Jenna's arm and led her from the room. "Which is just what we had in mind. We have very sophisticated interrogation techniques." Sandra grabbed her purse with an amused backward glance at Steven. "Yeah, it's called thirty-two-ounce margari-tas at happy hour." |
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