Page 35 of Nora
She started to shake her head but the look in his eye stopped her. She took another deep breath. “I need to go back out to the trail,” she said. “If you want to help me, come with me then. I’ll go as soon as I finish the run. I want to be back for breakfast so that no one notices my absence.”
He paused, then asked, “Why?”
Her mouth tightened at the question. Not because he’d asked it, but at the implications of her answer. Lucian’s hand twitched over hers, and she dropped her gaze to where her fingers were pressed to his chest. He wore a jacket, but he’d unzipped it when they’d entered the hall. Her hand was now pressed against a deep green sweater. Inexplicitly, she had the urge to start stroking her fingers against the soft merino.
“Nora?” Lucian’s voice rumbled out.
She looked up and brought her mind back to the task at hand. “I need to go back out because whoever we saw tonight was looking for something, and I need to find it first.”
CHAPTERFIFTEEN
He and Noraleft the residence hall at just after six the next morning. The sun wouldn’t be up for another twenty minutes, but it would take them almost that long to get to the break in the fence. As soon as they were out of earshot, Lucian started asking the questions that had been swirling in his head for the past few days. Starting with the most important one.
“Other than to be the on-site vet, why are you here?”
She cast him a look, then returned her gaze to the shadowed path. “There have been nine murders during this program. Three at each location you’ve trained. I was asked to come in and investigate. Being a vet let me slip in unnoticed.” She glanced at him again. “Mostly,” she added.
A hundred and one thoughts went through his head at her answer. It hadn’t been what he’d expected, but the surprise wasn’t foremost on his mind. “They sent you alone. To catch a serial killer. With no backup, no support, nothing.”
It was a statement, but she answered anyway.
“I’m alone most of the time, Lucian. Thisisdifferent in that I don’t tend to do murder investigations. Not like this one, anyway. But for the most part, I’m on my own. I live alone, work alone, and often travel alone.”
She wasn’t looking for pity or platitudes, but the pitch of her voice held a hint of resignation. Or perhaps sadness. He knew that Cyn, Violetta, and Devil had all recently met men they now shared their lives with. Did she feel left out? Did she want what her friends had? If so, it was hard for him to believe she couldn’t find it. He didn’t tend to like a lot of people, especially these days, but it was hard not to like Nora. She was smart, caring, patient, and had a quirky—though quiet—sense of humor. She was also strong. An aspect of her personality that many didn’t notice because of her tendency to nurture.
“If it makes you feel any better, ever since you ratted me out to Six, the rest of the club is all over me. I may be physically here on my own, but they are a phone call away,” she said.
He should feel bad, but he didn’t. Not in the slightest. “And last night?”
She exhaled, her breath fogging in the gloomy light of the early morning. “A man was murdered yesterday. That’s why I was late for the afternoon session. Same MO as three of the others. I wanted to see how difficult it would be to get from the training ground to the location of the attack.”
“And?”
“No more than thirty-five minutes. And that’s walking. If he jogged or ran, it would be less than that,” she answered.
Fuck. “And it’s someone in the program? You’re certain of that?”
She hesitated, then nodded. “There have been three murders during each of your prior three sessions. One stabbing, one burning, one strangulation.”
“And yesterday’s death?”
“He was stabbed. A single wound to the right side. The killer is precise. In each, he both nicks an artery—but doesn’t sever it—and punctures a lung,” she responded.
Lucian winced at the thought. It wouldn’t be the quickest way to die. Then again, neither were strangulation or being set fire to. “So we can expect a strangulation and a burning?”
She lifted a shoulder. “If I can’t stop it, yes.”
They walked a few hundred yards before he spoke again. “You think that was the killer who was out last night?”
She nodded. “I tried to get in front of him to see if I could get a good look at his face. Between the woods and the lack of light, though, I couldn’t do it. I considered chasing him down, but we have no solid evidence yet, and I didn’t want to tip him off that we’re onto him.”
Lucian might have been out of the game for a decade, but he knew how hard that decision must have been for her. Did she go after the man and maybe stop the next murder, but risk not having enough evidence to prosecute? Or did she let him go and hope she found the evidence to bring him in before he went after his next victim?
“Any idea how he is picking his victims?”
Nora shook her head. “You have enough going on with your duties to the program, but I’ll show you my files if you want to see them. The victims are a mix of age, race, and gender. I can’t find anything that ties them together. That might change over the next few days, though. I have someone digging into it.” They walked in silence until they reached the break in the fence. She paused before ducking under. “The thing is, your question is what’s been bothering me. If it’s one of the participants from the program, how is he even finding his victims? A few visited the same pubs and bars the participants frequented. But some victims have no apparent crossover with the program at all.”
The frustration in her voice was heavier than what he expected from a seasoned intelligence officer. Then again, this was Nora. She probably felt for every one of the victims. She was new to the situation, and yet he knew she carried the weight of the prior murders on her shoulders.
