Page 9 of Hot For You

Anger burned inside him. The sonofabitch, preying on women.

Cody pushed away any thoughts that what he’d come up with could be coincidence. His gut told him that dolls with hair matching each woman was no damned coincidence. The fact that each woman was beautiful was probably no coincidence, too.

Instead of heading into the common room, he went into the office and seated himself in the office chair in front of the large screen computer monitor. After entering his password on the keyboard, he opened files for all four victims and arranged them on the screen so that he could see them all at once. The notes for Carilyn’s case were already there as his iPad had automatically synced the information with the computer system. He skimmed through the contents of each file. From the interviews he’d conducted, there were no other common threads, nothing that could be considered a viable lead.

Why would someone be torching businesses, homes, and vehicles of women? Were they random acts by someone who was a stranger to the women? That was possible considering Carilyn had just rolled into town today and the arsonist likely wouldn’t have had the time to establish any kind of relationship with her.

Were these women in danger? Each one would need to be interviewed again to see if anything suspicious had happened since the time each woman’s property had been torched. He could be wrong, but he didn’t think he was. Not at all.

He pulled his cell phone out of the holster on his belt and dialed his cousin, Detective Reese McBride, who was the lead detective on the case.

“Cody,” came Reese’s voice when he answered. “It’s been all of two days and you already miss me?”

Cody couldn’t help a grin, but it faded as he got to the point with Reese. “I need to discuss the arsonist case with you.” He explained the theory he’d come up with.

Reese sounded grim when he replied. “I think you’ve got something there. It’s late, so tomorrow we’ll arrange to interview all four women again, right away.”

“Before someone gets hurt,” Cody said. “Or worse.”

“Agreed,” Reese said.

“I want to go with you,” Cody said.

“You’ve got it,” Reese replied. “I’ll talk with you tomorrow.”

After disconnecting the call, Cody shut down the computer. The chair’s wheels rattled as they rolled across tile as he pushed back, away from the desk.

This just might be the break they’d been looking for.

Chapter 4

Nathan Morris watched the news with rapt attention. He grinned as the newscaster reported that police officials had no new leads in the arson cases. They did, however, believe that today’s car fire was related to the three other arson attacks, but they didn’t give any details.

The fact that there was still no mention of the dolls annoyed him, however, and his grin turned into a scowl. It was one of his better ideas. The damned police were keeping that evidence to themselves.

No matter. He’d leak the information himself if he had to. He wanted the world to know how smart he was. Rather than just having kept the information from the public, the police were probably too stupid to have made the connection between the dolls’ hair color and the women.

He glanced at a duffle on the floor and the half a dozen or so Barbies and glass wool tubes resting inside. He had plenty of both on hand because he would be searching for more victims

Today he’d screwed up, though, and had almost forgotten the doll. He hadn’t had time to stuff the Barbie in the tube and would be lucky if the doll had survived. Although, considering the police believed the arson fires were linked, the doll had probably made it. He never left any other clues behind—he made sure of it.

The redheaded bitch he’d seen today was beautiful. He hadn’t actually met her, but she was so fucking gorgeous that she was probably like the rest—a slut who wouldn’t give him the time of day. Like the girls in high school had, women still ignored him and refused him. Well, he was getting his revenge now, wasn’t he?

Nathan used the remote to turn off the TV and pushed himself out of his recliner and walked to his kitchen table where the scrapbook rested. He started flipping pages, grinning to himself as he did.

Pictures of every woman before and after the fires headed each section. He took pictures of them with his camera phone before researching their property and other belongings. Today was the first time he’d picked a woman and had started a fire without investigating her first. He didn’t know why, but hadn’t been able to help himself.

He’d printed out color photos of each woman on his printer and taped them into the scrapbook along with pictures of their business or home, or car—before the fire. Then he’d taken pictures as they began to burn before fleeing the scene. He’d printed out news articles he’d looked up online and taped them into the albums, too.

People were starting to get scared, and they should. He wasn’t going to stop and he knew the police would never catch him.

He ran his finger over the picture he’d taken of the pretty redhead. He’d managed to avoid her attention and had taken her picture before melting away where she’d never see him.

The news had said the redhead’s name was Carilyn Thompson and she was from Kansas. He’d figured as much from her license plate. He’d thought she was probably a new transplant who hadn’t had a chance to change her plates. According to the news, though, she was here visiting.

He wondered who she was here to see, where she was now, and how long she’d be here. He’d have to make it his business to find out. He was good at tracking people down. Real good. After all, that was his job—to find people. He wasn’t one of the world’s best hackers and trackers for nothing.

Money had never been a problem—he’d always made enough to get by. He got paid very well just sitting on his ass at home and working his magic for his clients.

---