The Cold Room. J.T. Ellison
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took out a bottle of Masciarelli Montepulciano d’Abruzzo. She poured a glass, put the bottle on the counter, grabbed a handful of grapes from the fruit bowl, nibbled a few and chased them with a healthy gulp of wine. The message light was flashing on the answering machine, four new messages. She hit play, then stood in front of it, left arm draped against the wall, her forehead on her forearm, the wineglass by her side, listening.
A political pollster. Delete.
A reminder that she had a dentist appointment next week. She left that one, just in case she forgot.
Baldwin, his deep voice filling the room. Just letting her know he was in early, that he loved her, and planned to ravish her as soon as they got home. Fat chance of that.
She replayed it twice, a smile on her lips. She took a sip of wine and waited for the next one.
There was silence, then static. A chill moved up her spine, she stood straighter. Then a high-pitched voice, almost childlike. “Not. Me.”
The click that followed made her jump. Her heart began to race.
She set her wine down on the counter. The caller ID showed the last number who’d called as Unknown Name, Unknown Number. She hit star sixty-nine for an automatic redial, but a quick beeping told her that it wasn’t going to work without the correct area code.
Damn. She played it back three times, each time feeling a fresh wave of chills whip through her body. Part of her wanted to blow it off, assume that it was just a wrong number. But her instincts were on fire. She’d never heard the voice before, but she knew exactly who that was, and what the message meant.
He called himself the Pretender. He’d been a disciple of a serial killer in Nashville known as Snow White. Snow White had been dealt with, but the Pretender had slipped through the net. Every once in a while, he reached out to her. As recently as last month he’d made his presence known in Nashville, taking care of a pesky threat to her security. In a decidedly gruesome fashion, at that. He’d left what Baldwin termed a “love note” anchored to the dead man’s chest.
What a chance to take, calling her at home. The Pretender wasn’t careless, that much she knew. There had been a trap on their line for the past couple of months, but it would take more than a three-second call to trace.
The message freaked her out on two levels. One, the simple fact that he was still watching her made her toes curl. He was close enough to know about the murder scene tonight, and that was exceptionally unsettling.
Two, her instincts about this evening’s murder were right on. The ritualistic posing, the secondary crime scene, all pointed to an organized offender who had done this before. And would most likely try to do it again.
Baldwin needed to know. After her run-in last month with the assassin the Pretender had so unceremoniously murdered, she didn’t hesitate. She ran up the stairs and flung herself on the bed. He jumped up with a snort.
“I’m not entirely dead to the world, woman. I thought you’d never come to bed. Come here and let me—”
“He called.”
Baldwin stopped, his hand frozen on Taylor’s thigh. “Huh?”
“Our boy. He called the house and let me know tonight’s crime scene wasn’t his.”
She didn’t have to explain further. Baldwin knew that the Pretender was out there, waiting to strike, waiting for the perfect moment to catch them off guard. Every murder they worked, they were forced to stop and think about him. He preyed on their minds.
Baldwin’s rage eliminated all traces of sleepiness, palpable and deadly. The more controlled his voice, the angrier he was. This was as tight as she’d ever heard him. “He called the house.”
She didn’t know which scared her more, the constantly evolving relationship with a mass murderer, or the rigid fury in Baldwin’s voice.
“Yes. At least, I assume it’s him. He left a message. It said, ‘Not me.’”
She heard Baldwin breathe deeply, mastering his emotions. “Son of a bitch. Let me hear it.”
They made their way downstairs. “I wouldn’t worry too much,” she said. “It wasn’t what I’d term threatening. I imagine when he’s ready to strike, he’s going to have a blast setting the stage.”
“That’s exactly what I’m afraid of. And you let me judge for myself. You need to stop downplaying this. He’s dangerous.”
He sounded so possessive, so intense, that it felt like he had stopped her on the stairs and slipped his arms around her body. Amazing how even his voice made her feel protected. Not that she needed protecting, of course, but it was nice knowing she had a fallback position.
In the kitchen, Baldwin replayed the message several times, then made a call, to Quantico, she figured, to see what the trap showed. She took the wine and went into the living room, booted up the laptop, retrieved the cord for the camera, and uploaded the pictures from the Love Hill crime scene. Busy work. Something to take her mind off that voice, the crawling terror that pervaded her senses. Despite what Baldwin thought, she did take the Pretender seriously. She dreamt about him. She caught herself looking over her shoulder, wondering if he was watching her. She’d made some changes to her routine to try and throw him off, but if he was mailing her letters and calling her at home, none of that mattered. He knew where she was, all the time. He knew where she slept, where she was most vulnerable. She had the brief urge to suggest that they move, but it wouldn’t matter. The Pretender was far too clever for his own good.
“Damn,” she whispered. She took a drink of the Masciarelli and willed her stomach to stay put. She needed a distraction, and the computer was ready. Baldwin had installed an e-mail program directly into her photo well. She selected the twenty or so pictures she’d taken and sent them to her work e-mail address so they’d be there fresh for the picking in the morning.
When the files finished uploading, she opened the slide show and scrolled through them, slowly, recreating the sense of the scene in her mind. The music. Fishing line. The Picasso book. A very posed corpse.
Not. Me.
She shook it off, forced the voice from her head. The crime-scene pictures were in vivid color, but they didn’t capture the intensity she’d felt at the scene. This murderer was sending them a very clear message. If she could only decipher it before he felt compelled to tell them again.
Baldwin came and sat next to her, rubbing her leg through her jeans, then inserting his hand into the opening and running his warm fingers delicately up the back of her calf. It made her shiver.
“Now that you’re awake … you mentioned the postcards left at the Macellaio crime scenes? I bagged a Picasso monograph that was on the coffee table. I’ll ask the owner if it’s his—it might have been left by the suspect.”
“That’s a great thought.” He grew silent. “I’m sorry,” he said.
“For what?” she asked.
“I can’t keep you safe from him.”
She sighed. “You do that every time you look at me, Baldwin. And don’t you forget it.” She kissed him, and her heart pounded in a much more enticing way. He tugged at the button on her jeans, slipped her arms out of her shirt. She wrapped herself around him. It didn’t take long. It had been a while for them, and they were both anxious to make the connection. There would be plenty of time for candles and music; right now, all she wanted was to feel Baldwin inside her, to remind her that she was alive. His beard made the insides of her thighs feel red and burned, and she got carried away and raked his back with her nails. The depths of her passion for him never ceased to surprise her. She’d never felt so totally and completely in lust and in love at the same time.
Breath ragged, they clung together on the couch. Baldwin fell asleep in her arms, and she smiled into his dark hair. God, it was good to have him home.
She reached out a hand and managed to get