The uniformed officer nods apologetically at a brunette hunched over in the corner on a plastic seat. She’s wearing a tight black skirt and blazer and black stilettos on her feet. Slender legs. Gorgeous hair, too. Thick and chestnut brown, the sort of hair you could lose your hand in as it tumbles around her naked shoulders.
I frown as I head over to the woman. There’s something familiar about her.
“Yes? What?”
The woman lifts huge, tear-filled eyes to mine, and a jolt goes through me. Alaina Torres. I’ve barely seen her since my Rayleigh High days.
“Oh. Hey. Alaina.” I scan her again. There’s no blood on her clothes. No injuries. No reason that I can see she’d be at a police station this late at night. People don’t usually look me up to reminisce about old times. What do Alaina and I even have to reminisce about? All the times she cried her eyes out on my t-shirt because her father was sent to prison again?
“Rhys…” she whispers. “Sorry, Detective Thorn. It’s been a while, hasn’t it?”
I glare at her, thinking of the paperwork piled up on my desk.
Alaina turns pale and stands up. “Never mind. Sorry, I’m wasting your time.”
I watch her push past me and head for the exit, and her haunted gray eyes have me watching her go. As she reaches for the door, her hand trembles.
“Alaina. Wait.” Why did I say that? Teeth clenched in anger at myself, I take her by the elbow and steer her into an empty interview room. “Sit.”
She sits in the chair I point to, and I take the one opposite. Beneath the harsh fluorescent lights, her cheeks are thin and pinched and there are shadows beneath her eyes.
“You’re here to report something?”
“I didn’t know what else to do.” Her voice wobbles with desperation. “Mitchell says—” She breaks off and stares at her clenched hands on the tabletop.
A smug face flashes before my eyes. Mitchell Caine. Her high school boyfriend, a rich brat who always had his collar popped. He started dating her when she was thirteen and he was a senior, the creep. He was a flaming pile of trash then and he probably still is.
She tucks her hair behind her ear. “I didn’t know what else to do. Sorry. It’s bad manners, showing up at someone’s work unannounced.”
“It depends what it’s about.”
Alaina opens her bag and holds out a stack of letters. I start sorting through them. Envelopes printed with Alaina’s full name and an address in the city. The envelopes are lumpy. I take one out and see that the text has been “written” with letters cut out of newsprint. Pretty cheesy.
Then I read what it says.
You let that fuckface touch your body when you could have me worshipping you. I’d like to rip his tiny dick off and make him eat it.
“Jesus Christ. Are they all like this?”
Alaina takes a shuddering breath. “Most of them.”
“Who sent these?”
“I don’t know. There’s never a signature.”
“Who’s fuckface?”
“Mitchell.”
She’s still dating that moron. Still making decisions like she thinks she’s worthless. I read a few more, and they’re all unhinged and obsessive, all ending in the same refrain.
I’m going to take you.
I hand them back to her. “Talk to the officer on duty. He’ll find a constable who’ll take a report.”
Alaina grabs my wrist and practically shrieks at me, “No! I’ve made three reports at that front desk and each time, nothing happens.”
I glance at the letters. Probably because there’s nothing to go on.
“Please, Rhys. I wouldn’t have come to you unless I was desperate. If you turn me away, I don’t know what I’m going to do.”
I drum a finger on the tabletop. Maybe there’s something in the police report that could help, but probably not. I doubt there’s anything that I can do to stop these letters.
I picture someone pulling a gun on Alaina, forcing her into a car, and her obeying, because no one told her it’s better to scream. Better to get stabbed or shot right there and hope you get someone’s attention. Better to do anything except let him take you.
Because when he takes you, you’re worse than dead. You’re his, and he’ll do whatever the fuck he wants to you.
I get to my feet. I guess I’m not sleeping tonight. “Go home. Lock your doors. I’ll be there as soon as I can.” I can tell her a few things that might save her life. Assess the security of her apartment. It’s more than I have time for, but I’ll regret not doing it if the next body that’s pulled out of the river is hers.
I head for the door, but Alaina leaps out of her chair and stops me with a hand on my chest, gazing up at me with big, liquid eyes. “How long will you be?”
I gaze down at her. She’s standing too close with an expression of breathless gratitude. This happens a lot. It’s astonishing how often gratitude from scared women turns into an invitation for something more. I’m not even good-looking. Just big and mean, but apparently, that’s what some women are drawn to when they’ve been traumatized.
I take hold of her wrist and pull her hand away. “About an hour.”
“I can’t thank you enough, Rhys.”
I watch her walk down the hall and out through the doors into the night, remembering a time she wasn’t so grateful for my interference. It’s amazing the difference a few threatening letters can make.
Chapter Three
Alaina
I’m sitting on the sofa and it’s after midnight when there’s pounding on my front door. The sound makes me jump and drop my phone in my lap. I hurry over and unlock the door, expecting to see Rhys.
It is him, but I wasn’t anticipating the fury on his face.
“Why the fuck can I get up here?” he growls.
“I’m sorry?”
He points to the vidcom just inside my front door. “You’re meant to buzz me up.”
“You didn’t buzz.”
“I didn’t need to. The door to the
