Page 4 of Bad Blood
Agent Vance had just delivered me to the observation area. Sterling and Briggs still had their twin gazes fixed on the room I’d vacated a few moments earlier. On the other side of the two-way mirror, guards pulled Daniel Redding to his feet. Briggs—competitive and ambitious and, in his own way, idealistic—would never view Redding as anything other than a monster, a threat. Sterling was more restrained, the type who kept her emotions on lockdown by following preset rules, including one that said that men like Daniel Redding didn’tgetto chip away at her control.
“I swear,” Lia continued with a wave of her hand, “serial killers are so predictable. It’s always all ‘I want to watch you suffer’ and ‘let me quote Shakespeare while I imagine dancing on your corpse.’”
The fact that Lia was being so dismissive told me that the conversation she’d just witnessed had gotten to her almost as much as it had gotten to me.
“Was he lying?” I asked. No matter how hard I’d pressed, Redding had insisted he didn’t know the name of the inmate whose ex’s “death” had resembled my mother’s, but I knew better than to take a master of manipulation at his word.
“Redding might know more than he’s saying,” Lia told me, “but he’s not lying—or at least he’s not lying about Ye Olde Consortium of Serial-Killing Psychopaths. He did stretch the truth a little about wanting to watch said psychopaths have their way with you.”
“Of course Redding doesn’t want to watch.” I tried to match Lia’s flippant tone in an attempt to make this—any of it—matter less. “He’sDaniel Redding. He wants to kill me himself.”
Lia arched one eyebrow. “You do seem to have that effect on people.”
I snorted. Considering not one buttwodifferent serial killers had targeted me since I’d joined the Naturals program, I couldn’t exactly argue the point.
“We’ll track down the case Redding was talking about.” Briggs finally turned to face Lia and me. “It might take some time, but if there’s an inmate who matches Redding’s description, we’ll find him.”
Agent Sterling laid a hand on my shoulder. “You did what you needed to do in there, Cassie. Dean would understand that.”
Of course he would. That didn’t make it better. It made it worse.
“As for what Redding said about your mother—”
“Are we done here?” Lia asked abruptly, cutting off Agent Sterling.
I knew better than to aim a grateful look in Lia’s direction, but I appreciated the interference all the same. I didn’t want to discuss the insinuations Redding had made about my mother. I didn’t want to wonder if there was even a grain of truth to them, no matter how small.
My mentor got the message. As she led the way out, Agent Sterling didn’t try to broach the subject again.
Lia wove one arm casually through mine. “For the record,” she said, her voice uncharacteristically gentle, “if you ever”—want to talk, my brain filled in,need to vent—“ever,” she repeated softly, her voice ringing with sincerity, “make me listen to you recountThe Erotic Hand-Holding Adventures of Cassie and Deanagain, I will exact vengeance, and that vengeance will be epic.”
Next to deception detection, Lia’s biggest specialty was providing distractions—some of which came with collateral damage.
“What kind of vengeance?” I asked, halfway grateful for the diversion, but also fairly certain that this was one time that shewasn’tbluffing.
Lia smirked and let go of my arm. “Wouldn’t you like to know?”
We arrived home to find Sloane in the kitchen, cuddling a blowtorch. Luckily, Sterling and Briggs were still outside, exchanging words not meant for our ears.
Lia arched an eyebrow at me. “Do you want to ask? Or should I?”
Sloane tilted her head to the side. “There’s a high probability that you’re going to inquire about this blowtorch.”
I obliged. “What are you doing with that blowtorch?”
“The earliest flamethrowers date back to the Byzantine empire in the first centuryAD,” Sloane chirped. The words exited her mouth quickly enough to raise a red flag.
I amended my question. “What are you doing with that blowtorch, and who gave you caffeine?”
Michael chose that exact moment to saunter into the kitchen carrying a fire extinguisher. “You’re alarmed,” he said, taking in the expression on my face. “Also: mildly concerned I’ve lost my mind.” He let his gaze travel to Lia. “And you’re—”
“Not in the mood to have my emotions read?” Lia hopped up on the kitchen counter and allowed her legs to dangle, her dark eyes glittering as something passed unspoken between them.
Michael held her gaze for a moment longer. “That.”
“I thought you were fundamentally opposed to giving Sloane caffeine,” I said, shooting Michael a look.
“I am,” he replied. “Most of the time. But you know what the song says: it’s my three-day-long party, and I’ll caffeinate my Sloane if I want to.”
