Not so young after all.
Unlike Holbrook, Santos appeared to work in a more fluid state like I did, the surface of his desk covered in scribbled notes, folders marred with coffee stains, and half a dozen pens with the ends chewed. Sticky notes fanned out around the edges of twin monitors, and not for the first time I felt a pang of longing for my cozy home, where I didn’t have to worry about psychotic killers or racist FBI agents.
Leaning across the desk, Santos extended a hand towards me, and I couldn’t hide my surprise when I noticed that he was missing the last two fingers of his right hand. The skin stretched over the ends of the stubby remnants of his ring and pinky fingers was smooth and shiny, marking them as old injuries. I wondered if he’d acquired the injury before or after joining the FBI, and then if Holbrook had any scars I hadn’t yet noticed. Admittedly, I’d been rather distracted by other parts of his anatomy every time I’d seen him naked, so it was entirely possible that his body was a veritable roadmap of old injuries.
“Ms. Cray, I’m sorry we’ve had to meet under such distasteful circumstances,” Santos said, his voice bearing the faintest hint of his Hispanic heritage. The earnestness in his expression lent credence to his sincerity, and I warmed to him a little despite his decision to refer to the current cluster fuck as merely “distasteful.”
Not trusting my voice, I nodded in response as I accepted his hand in a firm handshake. I was glad that he didn’t feel the need to try and crush my fingers in a show of masculinity, his hand warm and solid in mine. The absence of his fingers made his hand awkward in my own, but I tried not to let the unease show on my face.
“Has Agent Holbrook been keeping you up-to-date on the latest developments in the case?” he asked, releasing his grip and gesturing for me to take one of the open seats in front of the desk.
“He has,” I replied, my hackles rising even though the rational side of me knew he was simply asking a question. I remained standing, my blood buzzing with restlessness, as I braced myself for whatever accusations were forthcoming.
“It’s all right, Riley. No one is holding you responsible for what’s happening,” Holbrook said, appearing to sense the darkness of my thoughts.
Moving forward into the empty space beside me as if to lend me his strength, he brushed a hand over my shoulder, sending sparks of electricity skipping along the back of my arm. My fingers tingled with the traces of his unique energy where I flexed them on the back of the chair in front of me. Letting out a shaking breath, I closed my eyes for a moment, pushing back the wave of emotion that threatened to drown me.
“I’m sorry, it’s all a bit much to take in,” I managed to say, opening my eyes again to see the two men looking at me with similar expressions.
The pity—so evident on their faces—riled me more than if they had been laying the fault of Samson’s actions at my feet. I’d had my fill of pity. First when my mother ran off in the middle of the night, and again when my father died in action, leaving me parentless. All of that paled in comparison to what I saw reflected in the faces of everyone I knew when my grandfather died, slipping away suddenly due to a heart attack while driving into town for a can of bait. His truck, still dented from where it had impacted with the tree when it went off the road, sat smothered under a tarp in the garage beside my cabin. It would’ve cost a fortune to fix, but I’d never been able to bring myself to get rid of it. That rusty old pickup held a childhood’s worth of memories.
When my grandmother was taken from me by the merciless bitch that is cancer, the sympathy of others had been almost too much to bear. By the time Samson sauntered into my life and subsequently turned it upside down, I’d run out of patience for people and their pity. The faintest whiff of an “I’m sorry” would leave me snapping and snarling like a rabid dog. It hadn’t taken long for me to chase off what few friends I had, and even the prosecution attorneys quickly learned to limit their contact to only what was necessary to nail Samson’s ass to the wall.
“Sit down,” Holbrook urged, applying gentle pressure to my shoulders to steer me around the chair.
Waiting until I had settled into the chair, Santos nodded at Holbrook to close the door, cutting off the low murmur of voices filtering in from the hallway.
“We’ve come to believe that Reed is trying to send a message,” Santos began to explain, his words slow and thoughtful. “That he is—”
“They’re love notes,” I said, cutting him off. Somewhere in the back of my mind I knew I should have been concerned by how hollow and faraway my voice sounded.