“He both loves them and hates them.”
One of the detectives in charge of the case scoffed behind me. “He’s a sexual deviant that hates women.”
I shook my head and finally walked away from the board. I grabbed the nearest chair and pulled it away from the table. After sitting down, I took the copy of the file out of my satchel and opened it in front of me. “Yes, he’s a sexual deviant. But,” I said and glanced at the two local detectives through my eyelashes, pausing briefly at the dark eyes staring at me intently before sliding my gaze over to the ones that showed more malice than I had expected. “He doesn’t hate women. Not like this.” My hand gestured to the display on the wall. I flipped through the pages, already knowing that the question I was about to ask was not in the folder.
“How does he pick his victims?” I wondered out loud.
“He just snatches them off the street,” the detective snapped.
I ignored him as I continued riffling through the pages, then glanced back at the board. “These women weren’t random. It’s obvious by how alike they look.”
“He has a type,” the guy insisted. “That doesn’t mean they aren’t random.”
“Oh, he absolutely has a type,” I agreed. “But these women were carefully hand-picked. The way he rapes and tortures them—it’s almost as if-”
“It’s a punishment,” SSA Walker finished for me. I glanced up and gave him a small grateful smile.
“Yes. The unsub is punishing his victims for rejecting him.”
“And you figured this out by looking at a couple of pictures?” The detective scoffed again. “You’ve been in this room for twoseconds, and you’ve already cracked a case! Good job,” he mocked as he clapped his hands slowly.
I finally lifted my head and looked at him fully. “No, Detective,” I said quietly. “The case is not cracked. We’re looking for a man who scouts his victims. He picks them specifically for their looks. They remind him of somebody. Usually, it’s a family member from his past. A mother, a sister… someone that he loved. Someone who treated him poorly or rejected him when his sexual desires for them were revealed. He’s picking his victims because they remind him of somebody.”
“And when they reject him,” SA Monique Hanson continued, and I nodded my head in encouragement. “He goes into a rage,” she finished.
SSA Walker turned and looked at the Police Chief. “Your unsub is going to be a male between the ages of mid-twenties to forties. His mother, sister, aunt, somebody from his past would have likely been his first victim.”
The detective grumbled and pulled out a chair, dropping into it as my team leader spoke. “Fucking believable.”
His partner gave him a sharp look, indicating that he should knock it off. He sealed his mouth shut but didn’t look happy about it as he glared directly at me.
“So I wonder,” Monique said as she sat down next to me and pulled out her own case file. “What would our killer have done if one of these women hadn’t rejected him?” Her question met with silence as we all pondered it. I wouldn’t admit it out loud, but goosebumps dotted my skin as I considered the fate of a woman who not only didn’t reject a serial killer, but accepted them.
The chief broke the silence in the room. “SSA Walker, Special Agents, I’d like to introduce to you my detectives who have been working this case since the beginning. This is Detective Morris,” he indicated the angry man who had been glaring nonstop atme. “And Detective Nakamura.” Instead of acting as belligerent as his partner, he had been trying to silently keep his partner under control. I got the feeling it was a common occurrence between the two of them. Detective Morris was obviously a hot head, somebody who didn’t like being challenged. He didn’t like authority, and only kept his mouth shut at the reminder received by the silent Detective Nakamura. The message had been clear—his attitude could cost him his job.
“I’ll let you all get to it.” Chief Hardgrove turned to his men, giving Morris a hard stare. “I expect full cooperation and daily progress reports on my desk.” Without another word, the handsome chief nodded at the room and left.
I eyed Detective Morris first, not wanting to judge the man based on my first impression of him. Though he made it difficult, as he not only glared at me, but ran his gaze over me, as if sizing me up. I wasn’t sure if it was lust I was seeing under the hate. Regardless, warning bells were ringing in my head.
I shook it off. I was likely projecting my instant dislike on the man. Tearing my eyes away from him, I looked over at Detective Nakamura to see that he was eyeing me as well. Only from him, I felt a completely different type of emotion. I couldn’t pinpoint exactly what he was thinking. The detective had a good poker face, making it hard for me to read him easily. But what a beautiful face it was.
His Japanese heritage was very clear in his features. He had sharp, high cheekbones and a square jaw. His beautiful, full lips were what any girl could be envious of. His thick, black hair was silky smooth, straight, and styled away from his face, though it seemed to fall over to cover one of his dark eyes quite often. I’d noticed that he’d occasionally toss his head back and to the side to clear his vision. The girly part inside of me, which rarely ever spoke, admired his fine features. I thought of the way the owner of the inn had said that he was her great-nephew’s partner. I letout a quiet sigh. It wasn’t as if I would ever act on any attraction, whether a man was available or not, but I couldn’t help a small pang of jealousy.
As I glanced at him through my lashes, I noticed his dark eyes seemed to be doing some assessing of his own. I could almost imagine that what he was feeling was appreciation for me as a woman, which made no sense considering he was gay. Though I suppose he could be bisexual or pansexual. It didn’t matter regardless. The beautiful man was taken, and I simply wasn’t available, either emotionally or physically. I could be reading him all wrong, and it could be nothing more than appreciation for my profiling abilities.
Someone in the room cleared their throat, breaking me from my thoughts. I didn’t know how long I had been staring at Detective Nakamura, but when I saw a slight uptick at the corner of his plush lips, I realized that he’d known I was watching him the whole time. I felt my cheeks warm and hoped that no one else had noticed my distraction. I dipped my chin and lowered my eyes back to the case file in front of me. I attempted to read the words on the paper, but they all seemed to jumble together, making it necessary to reread the same line a number of times. Inwardly, I shook my head.Focus, Parker,I snapped at myself.
I felt a hand land on my shoulder, making me startle. “Nice job, SA Parker,” SSA Walker complimented from behind my shoulder. I glanced back up at Detective Nakamura. Though his expression was devoid of any emotion, I could see how his eyes were laser-focused on the hand that was still resting on my shoulder. I felt uncomfortable having that hand there, but even more so, that it felt almost proprietary. At the continued touching, irritation flickered over Detective Nakamura’s face. It was there and gone in a flash, and I was certain that nobody else would’ve noticed if they weren’t staring directly at him. I wondered if the man didn’t like my supervisor touching me.Having his hand there almost felt like a claim, and the longer his hand rested there, the more my irritation grew.
As much as I wanted to, I couldn’t shrug him off without appearing rude and ungrateful for his compliment. I just nodded my head and decided to pretend that he wasn’t there. “Just doing my job, Sir,” I said matter of factly. I heard Detective Morris mutter something derogatory under his breath. I couldn’t catch the words, though it wasn’t difficult to guess what such an arrogant prick would have to say.
Surreptitiously, I glanced around at the rest of the table to see if my teammates had noticed the attention our team leader was giving me. Monique had a puzzled look on her face as she watched me. I gave her a slight shake of my head and saw her expression change to one of understanding. With that one look I gave her, she knew that I was uncomfortable with the attention.
I breathed a sigh of relief as she called his name. When he turned to look at her, he let his hand drop off my shoulder, though he allowed it to linger, slipping away slowly, as if he was reluctant to let go. I was already getting frustrated with the man. I was unsure how to get him to stop paying me extra attention. If he continued, it would hurt not only my reputation as an agent but also my standing on the team. I never wanted to be known for even a moment as a woman who would use sexual favors to gain an advance in her career.
I couldn’t stop myself from glancing back at Detective Nakamura, and immediately berated myself. He looked completely composed, not even looking at me anymore. The man seemed more focused on the case than anything else happening in the room. A part of me wondered if I had imagined his attention at all. There was no reason he would’ve been focused on me in the first place.
I shook the awkward moment off, and for the rest of the afternoon, the rest of my team and I put all of our attention into catching a killer.
