“Whoareyou?” Unbridled fury laced her voice.
The metal cuffs dug into her wrists as she tried snapping the boards free. Her legs pulled against the ropes the bastard had placed around her ankles.
They were tied to the slotted footboard, rendering the bottom half of her body useless.
Her position allowed for too many blind spots. She couldn’t see anything but the area of the room directly facing her, and a sliver of the bedroom door from her peripheral.
“Your boyfriend didn’t tell you?” The man remained somewhere in the shadows. “Oh, that’s right. Detective West was too busy bleeding out all over the bedroom floor.”
Oh, Eric. I’m so sorry. Please, please be okay.
“Do you know why head wounds bleed so profusely, Riley?” He spoke with an almost graceful, poetic tone. A calm, quiet volume. No remorse for what he’d done or any real emotion at all.
Because he isn’t human. He’s an animal.
One she couldn’t wait to put down.
Pinpricks of fire spread across her scalp as the asshole fisted the back of her hair. She couldn’t help but cry out when he yanked her head backward
“I asked you a question, Riley.” His hot breath hit her ear. “It’s only polite to answer a question when spoken to.”
Her body shook with anger. “Blood vessels,” she spoke through a set of clenched teeth.
“That’s right.” He shoved her head away, her face pushing into the pillow with his rough release. “The skin covering your scalp and face have more blood vessels than any other part of your body. So even the smallest cut to your head can bleed profusely.”
Hope bloomed within her. Maybe Eric wasn’t hurt as badly as she’d originally thought. Maybe he was going to be okay.
He’s not going to die. If he died, then what would be the point of bringing her here, to his apartment?
The tiny voice was right. She had to believe that Eric was fine and focus on staying alive.
Drawing in a deep breath, she remembered the profile Agent Killion had shown her. The real profile, not the one they’d falsified for the media.
The killer is cold. Calculated. A master manipulator who carefully plots his crimes.
The sight of blood, death, and violence makes him calm. Relaxed.
He’s narcissistic and extremely arrogant. He has no fear of getting caught because he doesn’t believe he ever will.
Riley had worked with arrogant killers before. The belief that they were so much smarter and cunning than everyone else was typically what led to their downfall.
That’s it. You need to play on his ego. Challenge him in some way.
“That stuff about the scalp and blood vessels...you get that from some documentary you watched?”
“I got it from the years I spent in med school,” he revealed with a touch of annoyance.
Worked like a charm.
“So you’re a doctor, then?”
“Not just any doctor, Riley.” The man walked around the foot of the bed and finally—finally—came into view. “I was the doctor who retrieved the bullet from your shoulder three years ago.”
Horrified, Riley stared back at the man who’d once saved her life. “Dr. Hayes?”
The man who’d killed all those women had been herdoctor?
“It’s so good to see you again, Riley.” He stepped closer to the bed. Reaching out, he traced the scar on the back of her right shoulder and smiled. “This healed up quite nicely, don’t you agree?”
