Ten minutes later they were back in Carmen’s hotel room.
Griff had reached the flower shop listed on the business card and had a confirmation that yes, they’d received an order earlier that day for the roses to be delivered to Ms. Jacobs at the hotel. Yes, it had been a man. Yes, he’d insisted the flowers be delivered directly to Ms. Jacobs’s room. Yes, he’d paid by credit card and added a hefty bonus to ensure the delivery was made despite the icy roads. And yes, the driver had been with the store for the past six years.
Which meant that it wasn’t the killer who’d entered the room.
Ignoring the manager’s curious stare, Griff hustled Carmen out of the office and back to her room. If the killer had left a paper trail, Griff could follow it.
Or at least that was his assumption.
As he sat on the edge of the bed with his laptop balanced on his knees, his confidence took a severe nosedive.
Shit.
It had been a simple matter to trace the invoice for the red roses to a credit card. And to discover that the mystery person tormenting Carmen was not only cruel, but fiendishly clever.
“The flower shop is legit, but the credit card is bogus,” he growled.
She moved to stand next to the bed, her face pale in the muted light.
“How can you be sure?”
His jaw clenched so hard his teeth ached. “The name on it is Frank Hammel.”
She jerked in shock. “It couldn’t be the real one.”
He gave a decisive shake of his head. It wasn’t impossible to manipulate the world from behind bars. But Frank Hammel wasn’t a part of a Mafia organization, or the member of a loyal gang. From what Carmen had told him the man was a loner, like many serial killers, without connection to friend or family. Plus, there was no way he could possibly have known that Carmen was at this hotel. Not when his computer search had just revealed the older man was lying comatose in a hospital bed.
“No, it wasn’t Hammel.”
She wrapped her arms around her waist. “It’s just another part of the game.”
“Yes.” He set aside the laptop and rose to his feet. “We need to find someplace for you to stay where you can be protected.”
She tilted her chin, her features settling into a defiant expression.
“I’m going to Baltimore.”
Baltimore? Had she lost her mind?
“No way,” he snapped. “That’s exactly what the maniac wants. You need to go to a safe house.”
“I’m not going into hiding while innocent women are being stalked and killed.”
“What do you expect to accomplish if you go to Baltimore?”
She blinked. Apparently, she hadn’t thought that far ahead.
“I’ll go to the police,” she at last said.
He held her mutinous gaze. “What do you expect them to do?”
“I don’t know.” She gave a frustrated lift of her shoulder. “Put out extra patrols. Maybe warn women not to walk alone near a college campus.”
He reached out to grasp her upper arms, as if worried she might bolt out the door and drive to Baltimore tonight.
She was stubborn enough to take that risk.
“You can call them,” he told her. “From a safe house.”
She sent him a frustrated glare. “And just where is this mythical safe house?”
“You could stay with me.” The words were flying out of his mouth before he even realized he was thinking them.
Her eyes widened with shock. “Griff—”
Seemingly in the grip of some sort of madness, Griff didn’t try to explain his offer for her to share his home. Instead, he kissed her.
Just like that.
He had a brief memory of when he was seven years old. An older boy had dared him to jump off the fire escape of their apartment building. He hadn’t allowed himself to think about the consequences. He’d simply climbed onto the edge of the iron railing and leaped into the Dumpster below.
This was the same thing.
One second he was watching her lips part, and the next he had them covered in a kiss that blazed with a need he’d been battling for hours. Hell, maybe for months.
She tasted just like her scent implied. Crisp, clean, and a little tart.
His arms wrapped around her tiny waist and he hauled her hard against his body. She grasped his shoulders, her lips parting in silent invitation.
He didn’t hesitate. Dipping his tongue into the warm temptation of her mouth, he allowed his hands to slide beneath the hem of her sweatshirt. She shivered, but she didn’t make any move to pull away.
Griff made a sound deep in his throat. He’d fantasized about this woman a hundred times, but reality was so much better than his dreams.
Her lips were softer. The curve of her hips beneath his searching hands was sweeter. The tentative stroke of her tongue against his was even more erotic.
He was instantly hard and aching.
With a low groan, he turned his head to brush his lips over her heated cheek.
He heard her suck in a raspy breath. “What are you doing?” she demanded.
He nuzzled his mouth against her temple, savoring the citrus scent of her skin.
“Convincing you to come to California with me,” he said.
She released a shaky chuckle. “You have a lot of faith in your kisses.”
“It’s not faith, it’s fate,” he corrected in thick tones. “I knew it would be like this from the first minute I saw you standing on the beach.”
He felt her stiffen.
“I’m sorry I wasn’t honest from the start. I thought . . .” Her words trailed away on a sigh. “I don’t really know what I thought. I just wanted to meet you so I could try to convince you to let me interview you. Then I kept putting off telling you the truth.”
“The past is gone,” he said. “This moment is all that matters.”
For a blissful minute she snuggled against him, all soft and warm and yielding. But even as his fingers stroked up the curve of her back, her hands moved to press her palms against his chest.
“Wait,” she muttered. “You’re not going to distract me.”
Griff swallowed a curse. As much as he wanted to toss the woman on the nearby bed and forget the world outside the tiny hotel room, he needed to be certain she wasn’t going to do something crazy as soon as his back was turned.
He lifted his head to glare down at her upturned face. “You can’t go to Baltimore.”
Something that might have been pain tightened her features. “If I don’t, and women start turning up dead, I’ll never be able to forgive myself.”
His lips parted, only to snap shut.
He wasn’t a psychiatrist, but he knew what this was about.
Carmen hadn’t been able to save her mother all those years ago. Now she refused to have any more deaths on her conscience.
December 23, Kansas
Carmen managed a few hours of sleep. She’d offered the bed to Griff, but he’d refused, instead grabbing a spare blanket and pillow and lying on the floor near the door.
She tried not to feel guilty at the fact he had to be miserable on the nasty carpet.
She’d told him to go home. After an hour of arguing about her trip to Baltimore, she’d pointed toward the door and ordered him back to California. But he’d stubbornly refused to go.
Instead, he’d settled on the ground and turned his back to her.
End of conversation.
By seven the next morning they were both up and dressed. Griff had run to the nearby diner for coffee and doughnuts while she showered and put on the same clothes. At some point she was going to have to hit a store. Or a laundromat.
In the meantime, she was on her second cup of coffee and her third doughnut as she paced the floor while Griff silently worked his magic on his computer. At last he glanced up from the bed, his expression impossible to read.
“There’s nothing.”
She frowned, trying not to notice how very fine he looked in his flannel shirt and faded jeans. His dark hair was rumpled and his jaw was dark with his unshaved whiskers.
Deliciously male.