Her heart crashed against her ribs.
Holden lowered beside him and touched his pulse before cursing and pulling out his phone. “This is Holden Forbes. I need an ambulance to two forty-eight Turner Court. I’ve got a man in his thirties who’s barely breathing.”
Oh God…had he been drugged too? Who did this?
The door behind them swung open and Jesse entered.
Her brother frowned at her. “Clara?” Then he looked from Holden to Malcolm before cursing.
“Did you call him?” Clara asked Holden.
He shook his head as he rose.
Things moved quickly after that. Jesse and his deputies worked to try to help Malcolm until the paramedics arrived. Then they checked the house.
Clara just stood there, Holden by her side, feeling cold and useless, her gaze never moving from the place they’d found Malcolm.
Why him too? And how many more victims would there be?
“What are you doing here?” Jesse asked when he finally returned.
“I wanted to talk to him. I was attacked in my home last night, and I thought he could help me figure out who it was.”
“That’smyjob.” Jesse rarely let his anger get the better of him, but right now, he looked right on the edge.
He was right. Of course he was. She was just so desperate for everything to end and Scarlett’s killer to be brought to justice.
“How did you know to come?”
“We came to take Malcolm in for questioning. That woman who died, Lauren? Malcolm was her masseuse client, and he was sleeping with her. A witness says she tried to break it off the day before she died, and he didn’t take it well. He’s also been the primary caregiver for every patient who’s gotten sick. And he didn’t have an alibi for Scarlett’s attack.”
She swallowed. Okay, all of that made him look bad. Really bad.
A hand suddenly touched her back. A warm, calming hand. “Jesse…it’s done. Why don’t we focus on how to move forward?”
She swallowed, so incredibly glad Holden had come with her, even if she’d pushed to do this alone.
“We found a syringe beside his body,” Jesse said. “We’ll get it fingerprinted, and if the prints are his, it’s possible he realized he was going to be arrested and panicked.”
Clara frowned. “You think he did this to himself?”
“It’s a possibility. We’ll wait and see if he pulls through. If he does, we’ll question him.”
“Why would he agree to talk to me if he was going to do that?” she asked, genuinely confused.
“I’m not sure,” Jesse said, voice gentling now. “What time were you supposed to meet?”
“Eight. But I was ten minutes late.”
When Jesse was called over by his deputy, Holden’s warm hands slipped to her waist and turned her. “Hey. Are you okay?”
“I should have listened to you. I’m sorry.”
“It doesn’t matter now.”
But it could have mattered if she’d come alone and gotten here a couple minutes earlier. Because either Malcolm was the bad guy or the bad guy would’ve been there. Either way, she would have been in danger.
Her focus once again returned to the empty couch where they’d found Malcolm’s body. “I don’t want to be here.”
