She wept, wept and wept. Everything she’d wanted in the world, all her hopes, her dreams, her needs, shattered like glass.
How could it all go so wrong? She’d done everything, been so careful, so patient. So true. And now it was all for nothing.
There was no meaning now, no goal, no joy.
The skin on her wrist and forearm was raw and blistered, and the pain like hot knives cutting.
She could fix it, she knew how to fix it. But what was the point? Her life was over, wasn’t it? Her purpose gone, erased. It had been a false purpose, as the single person she’d depended on was false.
All lies, she thought. Everything a lie.
So she’d end it. No one would care; no one ever had. She had nothing and no one now. She knew how to end it – a dozen ways to die. She had only to pick one and slide away into yet another form of oblivion.
Empty death after an empty life.
She lifted her head, and there was Eve, looking back at her. She could hear the voice – and there was purpose.
Stop sniveling! Act! You know what to do. You’ve always known. All the rest was play. There’s only one way we can really be partners, be friends, be together. Are you strong enough, finally? Or are you still a coward?
“Don’t say that! Don’t say I’m a coward. I’ve killed for you. Look what she did!”
She held out her blistered wrist to the photo, and saw Eve sneer.
You wasted your time with her, with the boy. It’s always been about us. Clock’s ticking. The ball’s going to drop. It’s the end of the year, so out with the old. In with the new.
Hope, the first rays, broke in her heart. “Is it what you really want?”
It’s what has to be. You’ll convince me. You’ll do what’s best for us. Better get started.
“Yes, I’d better get started. I know what to do.”
Ignoring her burning wrist, she got up, took the body armor out of her supply closet.
Yes, yes, she could make this work. She knew what to do.
She knew how to end it. It had to end to begin, just like one year ended so the new could dawn.
They’d end together, and begin.
21
Eve woke in the dark with Roarke’s arm wrapped snug around her. She couldn’t see the time, but her body told her it was morning. Early, probably brutally early, but morning.
She couldn’t have said the time she’d dropped into bed, either – or been dropped, as Roarke had just plucked her up when she’d been half asleep at her desk and carted her to bed.
A habit of his she… didn’t mind so much, really.
What she could say was the narrower search parameters had netted her just over two hundred potential suspects.
Too many, of course, but it was better than thousands.
She could carve that down, too, she decided, now that her brain wasn’t so fogged with fatigue.
Of course, that ran on the geography around her old building, and that was gut instinct, not solid evidence.
Take that one out, back to thousands.
Or go with it, narrow the area by a few blocks all around, and cut that number down.
So she’d do both, dump a chunk on Peabody. See who in her division could take the time to take another chunk. Hack away at it.
Pull Mira in, have her do the shrink thing on the most likelies, run a probability on same. And wear out some boot leather tracking those most likelies down for interviews.
Check in, again, with everyone on her target list. Had she left anyone off, as she had Jamie?
DeWinter? The forensic anthropologist wasn’t a friend, but they’d worked together – and fairly closely. Shit.
Dawson? The head sweeper was a go-to, but that was work, not personal. And if she expanded there, what about Harvo? Where did Dickhead fall into the mix?
Christ, did she need to send out a blanket bulletin to everyone she worked with, consulted with, socialized with at some point?
FYI, evidence indicates I’m currently toxic. Any contact with me may result in death. Take the appropriate precautions.
Knock it off, she ordered herself. Concentrate on the work, on the process.
She needs to kill. Who is the next logical target? Determine, protect, and utilize the determination to apprehend the suspect.
Utilize current data and evidence. We have a profile, a probable if incomplete description, skill sets, motivation, and pattern. Apply to current crop of potentials, and pin the bitch down.
“Your brain’s far too busy at this hour.”
Since they were nearly nose-to-nose, Eve stared at the shadow of Roarke’s face. “Is this a new habit?”
“What would that be?”
“Second time in about a week you’re not up buying a solar system before dawn. How can the worlds of business and finance continue to revolve if you’re lying around in bed?”
“I thought I’d find out, and rescheduled my five-fifteen ’link conference.”
“Who the hell holds conferences at five-fifteen in the morning?”
“Someone with interests in Prague.”
“What time is it in Prague?”
“Later than it is here.”
“What time is it here?”
“Almost half-five, and it’s apparent the soother’s worn off.”
She barely remembered gulping it down. “What the hell was in that soother?”
“About five hours’ sleep, it seems.” He rolled on top of her.
“Hey. Who invited you?”
“I live here,” he reminded her, and lowered his mouth to take hers. “The last day of the year.” He roamed to her throat, to the spot just under her jaw that always allured him. “So we’ll end our year the proper way. Then we can begin it the same way after midnight.”
“Is that your plan?”
“Call it spur of the moment.”
“Your alternate to Prague.”
His lips curved against her skin. “Dobry den.”
“Huh?”
“Good morning,” he murmured, and took her mouth again, slow and deep, and his hands glided down her body and up again.
She hoped to end the year with her UNSUB in the box. But as an alternate… this worked.
So she slid her hand over his cheek, into his hair – all that silk – and down the strong, tight muscles of his back.
The weight of him, both comfort and excitement, the taste as their tongues met, both soothing and stimulating. All, all of him, oh so familiar, but never usual. Clever hands that knew her secrets stroked, brushed, lingered until her skin tingled with anticipation. Her blood, sluggish from sleep, began to heat, began to swim.
In the deep, dreaming dark, in the last hours of a year that had brought blood and death, and joy and comfort, she embraced what fate had given her. And the man who’d changed everything.
For a moment she held there, on that gilded curve of quiet bliss, of knowing, of belonging, with her arms around him, with her face pressed to the curve of his throat.
“I love you, Roarke. I love you.”
The words spilled into the center of his heart, glowed there like a candle. Luminous. He gave them back to her, in Irish, in the language of that heart. And slipped inside her, coming home.
She turned her head until her lips found his. She slid her hands up until their fingers linked.
She rose with him, a welcome; fell with him, a yielding. Soft and sweet, the words spoken. Slow and loving, the rhythm set.
Here was peace in a bloody, brutal world both knew too well. And celebration of two souls, lost, then found.