“This case has nothing to do with Daniel. Nothing. The FBI would love to pin something else on him. Left on a public lawn?” Trina scoffed. “Daniel would never do something so rash, so sloppy. And to think that someone else is out there—” She shook her head. “Claiming credit, trading on his reputation. It’s a crime, is what it is.”
Murder is a crime, I thought, but I didn’t say it out loud. We’d gotten what we needed here. Trina Simms wasn’t concerned with continuing Daniel Redding’s work—to her, the copycat was a plagiarist, a counterfeiter. She was female, a neat-freak, and controlling. Our UNSUB was none of the above.
Our UNSUB was a male, in his twenties, subjugated by others.
“We should go,” Dean said.
Trina clucked and protested, but we made our way to the door. “If you don’t mind me asking,” I said, as we were leaving, “what kind of car does Christopher drive?”
“He drives a truck.” If Trina thought it was an odd question, she didn’t show it.
“What color is the truck?” I asked.
“It’s hard to say,” Trina said, her voice taking on the tone she’d used repeatedly with Christopher. “He never washes it. But last I checked, it was black.”
I shivered as I thought of the profile Agent Sterling had given us and felt the ghost of Christopher’s grip on my arm.
“Thank you for having us,” I managed to say.
Trina reached a hand out and touched my face. “Such a sweet girl,” she told Dean. “Your father would approve.”
“Here.” Michael tossed his keys to Dean. Dean caught them. “You drive,” Michael said, sauntering over to the passenger side of the car. “You look like you could use it.”
Dean’s grip tightened on the keys, and I wondered what game Michael was playing. He never let anyone else drive his car—and Dean was the last person he’d make an exception for. Dean was probably thinking the same thing, but he accepted the offer with a nod.
Michael climbed into the backseat with me. “So,” he said as Dean pulled away from the house, “Christopher Simms: understandably upset that his mom has a thing for serial killers, or budding psycho himself?”
“He grabbed Cassie.” Dean let that statement hang in the air for a moment. “He could have gone for me. He could have gone for you. But he went for Cassie.”
“And when you threatened him,” I added, “he left.”
You shouldn’t have come here. I went back over Christopher’s words. This is sick. You’re all sick.
“What’s the holdup?” Michael asked. For a second, I thought he was talking to me, but then I realized the comment was aimed at Dean. The car wasn’t moving. We were sitting at a stop sign.
“Nothing,” Dean replied, but his eyes were locked on the road, and suddenly, I realized Michael hadn’t just let Dean drive on a whim. This was the town Dean had grown up in. This was his past, a place he never would have chosen to go if it weren’t for this case.
“What’s down that road?” I asked Dean.
Michael caught my eye and shook his head slightly. Then he leaned back in his seat. “So, Dean, are we headed back to the house, or are we taking a detour?”
After a long moment, Dean turned down the road. I could see his knuckles tightening over the steering wheel. I glanced at Michael. He shrugged, as if he hadn’t planned this. As if he hadn’t seen something on Dean’s face on the way into town that had made him want to let Dean drive on the way out.
We ended up parked on the pavement next to a dirt road that snaked back into the woods. Dean turned the car off and got out. My gaze caught on a mailbox. Somewhere, buried in those woods, at the end of that road, there was a house.
Dean’s old house.
“You wanted him to come here,” I whispered furiously to Michael, watching Dean from inside the car. “You gave him the keys—”
“I gave him a choice,” Michael corrected. “I’ve seen Dean angry. I’ve seen him disgusted and drowning in guilt, scared of himself and what he’s capable of, scared of you.” Michael let that sink in for a moment. “But until today, I’ve never once seen him raw.” Michael paused. “It’s not the bad memories that tear a person apart like that, Cassie. It’s the good ones.”
We fell into a momentary silence. Outside, Dean started walking down the dirt road. I watched him go, then I turned back to Michael. “Did you give him the keys because he needed to come here, or because once upon a time, he threw your past in your face?”
Coming here might help Dean—but it would, without question, hurt, too.
“You’re the profiler,” Michael replied. “You tell me.”
“Both,” I said. Pseudo-rivals. Pseudo-siblings. Pseudo-something else. Michael and Dean had a complicated relationship, one that had nothing to do with me. Michael had arranged this to help Dean and to hurt him.
“Do you want to go after him?” Michael’s question took me by surprise.
“You’re the emotion reader,” I retorted. “You tell me.”