She didn’t glance his way.
“Noelle, look at me.”
Her body turned. Her gaze found his.
“You were right,” he said. He didn’t know how she was going to react, and in that moment, fear crouched beneath his skin. “We met before you came to work at the EOD.”
She stepped toward him as her brows rose. “When?”
“Years ago.” He exhaled once more. “It wasn’t for long, just an hour, maybe two.” Two hours that changed his life and hers.
“Thomas?”
“The first time I saw you...you were running, in the woods...”
Surprise flashed over face. “What are you talking about?”
“You screamed for me to help you.”
Her body trembled. The little bit of color in her face drained away. He lunged toward her, worried she might be about to pass out. He grabbed her, holding her tightly. “Noelle?”
Her hands twisted so that she was holding him, too. “Why are you saying this? Why are you—?”
The door behind Thomas flew open and crashed into the wall. “I need you two!” Sheriff Hodges yelled. “In the bull pen, now!”
That man had the worst timing in the world. Thomas threw a glare over his shoulder, and he didn’t care if the sheriff saw him basically embracing Noelle right then. “We’re busy. It’s just gonna have to wait—”
“The hell it is.” Red stained the sheriff’s cheeks as he pointed to the pictures on the wall. “I just got a report of a missing girl. A girl who looks just like those others pinned up there.”
Then Thomas heard it. The soft sound of...sobbing? Coming from outside the room.
“Jenny Tucker has been missing since around six this morning,” Hodges told them. “We don’t... Things like this don’t happen in Camden.”
Noelle shoved past the sheriff as she made her way to the door. “Yes, they do.”
She yanked open the door and hurried out of the office. Thomas spared a hard glance for the sheriff. Hodges appeared to have aged about ten years. The lines near his eyes and mouth were deeper, and the sheriff’s shoulders slumped. “I don’t... I don’t know what to do. I arrest a few drunks every now and then.” He swallowed, and his Adam’s apple bobbed. “You’ve got to help us, Agent Anthony. This isn’t what I do.”
It wasn’t what Thomas did, either. He was used to going right after a target and taking out his prey. Not playing a cat-and-mouse game with a serial killer.
He turned on his heel and followed after Noelle. She’d stopped beside a woman with short, red hair. The woman was huddled in a chair, and tears streamed down her cheeks.
“I—I thought she was working late.... I kept waiting for my Jenny to come h-home....” Her body shuddered. “It was... It was her first day. She was gonna work weekends at the diner.”
Noelle patted the woman’s shoulder.
“Sh-she never came home.”
The floor creaked behind Thomas.
“Jenny’s like the girls in all those pictures,” the sheriff said, his voice low and carrying only to Thomas’s ears. “Is she...is she already dead?”
“I don’t know.” His hands had fisted at his sides. “It’s too early to know anything. The girl could’ve run off with a boyfriend. She could be at a friend’s house. We can’t make any conclusions yet.” But his gut was tight, and he couldn’t help remembering another long-ago night. One that had been filled with the sound of screams...and the red of blood.
* * *
THE SMALL CABIN was perfect. Isolated. Secure.
He’d lit a lantern so he could see the girl. She was bound, blindfolded and shivering from the cold.
She hadn’t talked much. But then, with a gag in her mouth, talking wouldn’t be easy. When she’d woken up, she’d cried for her mother, but he’d stopped those cries easily enough with the gag.
He stared down at her. She was slumped in the chair. Just watching her brought back so many memories for him.
He’d been a different man back then.
Unfocused. So eager for the cries...
Everything had changed for him, though. In one night. With one kill.
Everything.
He couldn’t go back to being the same man. The spike of adrenaline in his blood—it just wasn’t the same with the girls any longer. He didn’t feel the rush. The thrill.
His hand tightened around the knife in his hand. There wasn’t any challenge with little Jenny. Once, there had been. No more.
He was used to bigger game now.
He turned from the girl. He needed to head into town for a while. Had Duncan’s body been found? He needed to make sure his bases were covered, and he needed to line up a new job. After he killed Jenny, he’d have to leave the area for good.
It was time to move on.
Camden was a wasteland. Ice and snow. Next time, he’d try someplace warmer.
Maybe he’d head back to Alabama. Or Florida. The memories there were so much damn better.
* * *
“WE HAVE TO call in the FBI.” Noelle turned toward Thomas as soon as he cut off the engine of their rental car. It was another SUV, which the sheriff had gotten for them. They were parked just a few feet away from the entrance of the only diner in Camden—the presumed spot of Jenny Tucker’s abduction. Noelle had known she had to get out here to investigate for herself, but that investigation just wasn’t going to be good enough.
Thomas frowned at her. “As far as the locals are concerned, we are the FBI.”
She shook her head. “The EOD doesn’t investigate abductions like this. You know that.”
Hostage retrieval. Unconventional warfare. Target destruction. She knew the key words for missions the EOD agents took. But this case...
My past.
It was different.
“Mercer will pull us off the investigation as soon as he finds out what’s happening. And we can’t just leave the girl out there. We have to call in the FBI.” She had friends at the FBI who should be working this case. If she put in just a fast call to them, those special agents would be on the first flight out there.
But does Jenny have that long?
“I figure that I’m staring at Jenny Tucker’s best hope of survival,” Thomas said flatly as his gaze held hers. “Mercer told me that you were the best profiler he’d ever seen. If anyone can catch the guy out there, I think it would be you.”
But Thomas didn’t get it. She shoved back the hair that had fallen over her forehead. “My mind... It’s all messed up.” Her voice thickened and she tried to swallow the lump in her throat as Thomas watched her with that deep, golden gaze. “Every time I try to think about Jenny or the man who took her, I just see my own picture, pinned to the wall at the station.”