Page 21 of Lover
“Calm.” Rand finished the sentence for him. He nodded, looking out the window as they drove past the Seattle Aquarium. Mothers were holding their children’s hands, walking from the parking lot to the entrance of the building, not a care in the world. It was a completely different kind of calm. They were enjoying life while Pearson sought to control it.
***
Aportly gentlemangreeted them at the door to Pearson’s condo, wearing a Seattle PD uniform. They showed their badges, and he waved them in. It was huge, spacious, and wide open once you went through the door and down a short hallway. The main room in the apartment held the living room, dining room, kitchen, and a completely open patio. You could slide the floor-to-ceiling windows open and sideways, and the patio became part of the living room. There were two crime-scene techs, one on either side of the room, dusting every flat surface for fingerprints. While Rory was quite certain their efforts were futile, he understood the why. If they could find a print that matched any of the victims or missing persons, it would be another nail in Bruce Jackhole Pearson’s coffin.
“Good lord. Were Pearson not a piece of shit with serious control issues and he had a vagina, he and my sister would be perfect for each other. I mean, look at this place. I bet he has a maid in here daily, and if he found so much as one speck of dust, he’d have her guts for garters.” Rand rattled on.
“I’m telling Claire that you’re trying to marry her off to a psycho of the male persuasion,” Rory replied dryly, finding the hallway that led to the bedrooms. His heart hammered in his chest as he came to the first door on the right, seeing things through Shannon’s eyes. Pushing the door open, he stepped into the room and looked around. It was just a room, nothing special, furnished simply with a bed, a long dresser, and two nightstands. But knowing what his lover had lived through in this fucking room made his skin crawl. Closing his eyes, he could envision his beautiful Shannon on the floor beside the bed, beaten and broken down, sobbing. He could see Shannon standing at the window, looking out over Puget Sound, wondering if he’d ever find a way out.
Rand’s hand on his shoulder was unexpected, catching him off guard, and he jerked away, gasping. Physically turning him around, Rand took Rory’s hands in his and jolt of electricity shot through him. Looking up, he could see the spark of recognition in Rand’s deep brown eyes; he’d felt it too. Thankfully, they seemed to be in silent agreement to pretend it didn’t happen. “I see it too, Rory, see him in here. It’s almost like this place was painted from his descriptions—everything is so perfect and vivid. But he’s not here anymore, Rory. Shannon is back in Dallas with Taylor and Frank and he’s fine, okay?”
Sucking in a breath and slowly releasing it, he nodded. There was something in Rand’s eyes, the way he looked at him, but now was not the place or the time to try and figure it out. “All right, I’ll start in the closet while you go through the drawers.” Rand passed him a pair of latex gloves, and they got to work.
Slipping the gloves on, Rory pulled the top drawer out, and it was empty. They were all empty—as were the small drawers in the nightstands. “He must be between victims. Everything out here is clean as a whistle,” he called out.
“Same here aside from a couple of boxes on the shelf.” Rand grunted, coming back out into the room with three boxes in his hands. They each took a box and meticulously went through it, examining every single piece of paper, but it was all files and court documents, likely from past cases Pearson had worked.
Moving to the master bedroom, Rory wasn’t surprised to see life in the room—unlike the sterile guest room. Still immaculate, but with minimal decor. A couple of pictures on the wall, some bits and baubles on the dresser, and a book on the bedside table. Rand moved past him, picking up the book and chortling. He held the book, laughing so hard he doubled over, bracing his hands on his knees. Rory went over and snatched the book from him, reading the title. “Grey, EL James. Holy shit, are you kidding me?”
It took the better part of ten minutes for them to regain focus and start combing through the closet and the dresser. A large, black leather jewelry organizer on top of the dresser held fourteen watches, at least four of them Rolex, a dozen pairs of cuff links, tie pins, and a set of wedding rings. The rings showed wear and age, so Rory deduced they were likely Bruce’s parents’, maybe even his grandparents’. He set them back in the box and closed the lid. “Hey, look at this.” Rand waved him over.
He held a wooden box with the letter P engraved on the lid. “Where’d you find that?” Rory asked. Rand pointed to the bedside table with the drawer still open. It was almost comical, seeing the big, brash detective hesitant, his hand hovering over the box for a few seconds. He glanced at Rory as if silently asking for permission. He nodded once and Rand lifted the lid, eyes going wide.
Sitting on the side of the pristine bed, Rand lifted the stack of pictures out of the box, handing half of them to Rory. All young men that looked to be between the ages of thirteen and eighteen, all blond-haired, blue-eyed, and beautiful. Some happy, some sad, some looking like they’d been run over by a truck. Turning, Rand started laying the snapshots out on the bed, sorting through and matching them up as there were multiple images of each person. “Son of a bitch. Look, it’s Junior.”
An image of Judge Tullor’s grandson smiling at the camera sickened him. Had the kid been smacked around yet prior to the Polaroid? Was he happy or pretending for fear of getting the shit kicked out of him? Three images later, his question was answered, a picture of Junior on the patio staring out at the water, the right side of his face swollen and bruised. Rory closed his eyes, sucking in a deep breath and concentrating all his energy on staying focused and calm. He had to, not only for Shannon but for each and every young man forever immortalized in Bruce Pearson’s box of pictures. Rand sucked in a breath, and the noise he made truly alarmed Rory. “What is it?” he asked, praying that it wasn’t Shannon, though he already knew it was.
Slowly lifting his head, Rand’s eyes were imploring, full of sadness and pain. “Rory, you don’t...”
Give me the damn picture, Davis,” Rory barked. Sighing, he held it out and Rory snatched it, growling.
Had there been any food in his stomach, he would have thrown up all over Pearson’s pristine bed. His gorgeous, eccentric, vibrant Shannon was sitting on the bed in the other room, legs drawn up to his chest. An area the size of a dinner plate on his back was bruised, the skin angry, purple, and black. At least a dozen more bruises were evident on his body, including his face, but what jarred Rory to his core was the vacant, hollow look in Shannon’s eyes that were a dull shade of blue. “Jesus.” He groaned and almost lost it.
“It’s harder when it’s someone you know, someone you love.” Rand reached over and slid the image from Rory’s hand, starting a new stack on the bed. Eyes lingering on another picture of Shannon in the kitchen cooking dinner, a genuine smile on his face, Rory noticed something. The edges of certain images were more weathered than others, fingerprints dulling the shine of the paper they were printed on.
By the time they were done playing the match game, there were nineteen different people spread out on the bed. Helms, Junior, Doral, and Shannon were all present and accounted for, as well as seven unknown victims. “Do you think Shannon was the only one to make it out alive? Or are we to assume that all the others are dead and buried somewhere, waiting for us to dig them up?” Rand asked, rubbing his eyes with the palms of his hands. God, he hoped not, but it was starting to look that way. Grabbing the box, Rory shuffled all the images together and shoved them in, slamming the lid and leaving the room with Rand on his heels. He stopped long enough to complete an evidence form for the officer at the door before heading downstairs to the car. He sat in the passenger’s seat, cold and angry, while Rand drove them back to the station.
Chapter Eighteen
Rand
––––––––
White-knuckling thesteering wheel, Rand silently fumed. Bruce Pearson was one sick fuck. It wasn’t enough for him to prey on innocent, young, naïve kids. No, he had to demoralize them while immortalizing their pain and suffering on film. Something inside him cracked open when he saw the picture of Shannon, his body a roadmap of fury. Having to hand that image over to Rory and watch the light in his eyes dim made the crack inside him bleed. More than anything, Rand wanted to take Pearson to some dark, remote place and take his time torturing the man until his face looked like Junior’s and his body was a collection of bruises and scars. But that would make him a monster, a piece of shit that was no better than Pearson.
Arriving back at the station, they found Connie at the coffee machine filling a paper cup with sludge thick enough to put hair on your ass. “Well, did you learn anything more while you were babysitting?” Rory asked, pouring two more cups, offering one to Rand. He side-eyed the dark liquid, declining. He could smell the bitterness from five feet away; no way was he drinking that shit.
“Not really. Sadly, he’s a cocky piece of shit, but he’s also smart and not easily rattled.” She groaned, stretching. “You guys find anything useful at his condo?”
“You could say that.” Rand smirked, tapping the box in his hand.
“Excuse me, Detective, there’s a guy here asking about Bruce Pearson.” The desk sergeant pointed to a man in the waiting area. He was tall and broad with black hair and dark-brown, almond-shaped eyes.Ah yes, Pearson’s thug, Tuan Nguyen.
“Tell him to have a seat and get comfortable. It’s going be awhile.” Rand fought the urge to walk over to the man, grab him by his hair, and drag him across the floor. To do the same thing to him that Tuan had done to Shannon. Just his presence was unnerving—the set of his shoulders and the intense look in his eyes rubbed Rand the wrong way.
“All right.” Rory drained his cup before tossing it into the trash. “Let’s do this.”
The three of them went to the room on the other side of the mirror, so they could fill Connie in on the contents of the box. Rand started organizing them individually, placing the happy images at the top. He had an idea of how they could rattle Pearson’s cage. Once he had them in the order he wanted, Rand grabbed a manila folder, giving Rory the empty box. “I want you to walk in there, close the door, walk over to the table, and set the box down. Then come over and stand in the corner by the mirror. Don’t open the box, and don’t say a word to him.”
