Total pages in book: 137
Estimated words: 138642 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 693(@200wpm)___ 555(@250wpm)___ 462(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 138642 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 693(@200wpm)___ 555(@250wpm)___ 462(@300wpm)
“And this is everyone?” I ask skeptically. “No one’s called in today?”
“Not one,” he announces in his deep, rolling voice. His charming confidence doesn’t work on me any more than this invasion of my personal space. I just eye him. “They’re all live-in staff, Captain Faircross. If someone else was missing, I’d escort you to their quarters personally myself.”
“Uh-huh.”
I turn my gaze back to the staff.
Every last one of them stares at the ground, averting their eyes. Nobody meets my gaze except for a few halfhearted glances and quick smiles.
Wonder what the hell they’d tell me if Montero wasn’t in the room.
The men’s outfits are dead ringers for our stalker.
My memory wasn’t failing me when I made that connection.
Exact same cut, same colors, same fit as the man who’s been trailing Ophelia like a demented ghost.
Yeah, something ain’t right here.
Montero claps his hands together.
“All right, everyone, please return to work. You’ll be compensated with an hour of overtime for the inconvenience.” He says it pleasantly, but there’s an undertone there—you’ve inconvenienced my staff and inconvenienced me by having to compensate them for it, you stupid cop. And that nastiness lingers as he steps forward to look at me. “Captain, could you kindly be a tad more clear what this is about?”
It’s a question, but he frames it like an order.
I sigh, taking my time before answering.
“You had any thefts here lately, Mr. Arrendell? Even petty stuff? People raiding the linen closet or anything? Stealing uniforms?”
His aristocratic black brows draw together. “Well, I don’t exactly monitor inventory in the linen supply closet myself.”
“Somebody should,” I growl. “You’re swearing no one on staff meets this guy’s description, but maybe someone stole some of their duds.”
“For what, Captain Faircross? What possible motive?” An edge of cultured exasperation enters Montero’s voice. “What is this man accused of, that you come storming up to my doorstep—as if we’re somehow to blame?”
I don’t get a chance to answer.
He wouldn’t like what I’d have to say, anyway, ’cause right now I’m not telling him shit. Nothing he can use to deflect if he is somehow involved.
And I’ll be damned if he isn’t.
I’ve seen Lucas’ folder.
All those newspaper clippings showing Montero back in the seventies, eighties, and nineties, gliding through high society and hundreds of women like a Grim fucking Reaper, always trailing death in his wake.
No evidence, of course.
But nobody stacks up that many coincidences.
Wherever this man goes, tragedy follows.
And it feels like I’m watching a new tragedy unfolding in slow motion as the staff scatter like startled mice into the walls.
Two familiar faces come strutting in through the main entryway.
Ros and Aleksander, clearly dragging themselves in from a night of hard partying.
Her rumpled bright-red dress gives me a heart-shot of sick rage and cold fear.
For a second, I’m seeing another beautiful young woman in red.
Emma Santos, dead on the floor of that little house where Delilah Graves was living.
Then Delilah herself, sobbing in the back of an ambulance in another red dress while Lucas held her so hard, all while she stammered out the shocking details of what happened for her police report.
Ros is right here, I remind myself.
She’s not in danger—yet.
She’s alive and well and God willing, I’ll keep it that way.
I just need to drive her away from that drug-addled, panty-sniffing fuck.
She doesn’t even notice me, completely absorbed in Aleksander, stumbling against him with clumsy movements and his arm holding her up.
Damn, are they always like this?
I can’t remember the last time I saw her sober. Had to be months ago.
Worse, she’s mooning at him like he’s a rock star, so awestruck she’s barely breathing.
Aleksander, he’s not looking back at her.
The prick stares at me, his green eyes glacial and unblinking like an alien winter.
His smile slow, cruel, and knowing.
Now that I think about it, I think it wasn’t drugs or booze in the bar that made him act that way. He wanted to show me a little glimpse of his real self. Selfish and reckless and arrogant as hell.
A young man who’s so used to getting his way he flaunts it in my face, sneering and asking, What’re you going to do about it, Captain?
That hollow smile says he’s making me a promise.
I just don’t know what it means or how I’ve pissed him off today.
As they stagger past, my blood runs cold.
Aleksander makes a big show of gathering Ros possessively close and kissing her right there in the middle of the grand hall.
Not just for me, I realize.
Because while Montero watches them, his eyes distant and thoughtful, his face changes.
His smile is all teeth and edges, his face a mask.
There’s no shaking the terrible feeling I’m witnessing something vile.
Like I’m looking at the face of the Devil himself, just daring me to stop him before it’s too late.
16
ONLY ONE REGRET (OPHELIA)
Coming home to Redhaven felt like traveling back in time to a frozen past that hasn’t changed much in the decade I’ve been gone.