Die For Me: A Novel of the Valentine Killer (For Me #1)(33)
Author: Cynthia Eden

They both knew what this scene meant. Either Trent Lancaster had been attacked in this motel room, or he’d attacked someone there.

Someone had cleaned up that room, and it sure as hell hadn’t been the maid.

Dane made his way around the room as he yanked on gloves and went to work.

Katherine forced her shoulders back as she unlocked the door to her gallery. Plainclothes cops were standing across the street, trying to blend in, but their avid gazes kept drifting to her.

The bag of beignets in her hand jostled a bit as she opened the door. She’d made a quick stop by Joe’s Café on her way to the gallery. The gallery was in the Quarter, in a hundred-year-old building that had been partially renovated and rented out to her. Get back to your routine. Try to draw him out by acting normal. That had been Dane’s advice to her.

So she was trying to follow his orders.

The gallery was dark inside, and her hand automatically reached out to hit the lights.

Only the lights didn’t come on. She pushed the switch again and again, but nothing happened.

Her body tensed. Short-circuits were common in buildings this old. She’d had a repairman out three times already in the past six months. Just because the lights weren’t on, it didn’t mean anything.

Get a grip. Right after she’d left Boston, she’d seen Valentine in every shadow. Heard him in every rustle of sound.

But he hadn’t been there.

And just because her lights weren’t working, it didn’t mean he was here, either.

But he is in New Orleans.

Her breath was coming out too hard and fast.

She noticed the alarm also wasn’t beeping. That was normal, though, if the power had shorted. The alarm wouldn’t work until she got the repairman in there.

Katherine turned back toward the plainclothes cops. They’d crept closer when she opened her door. “Can one of you go check the circuit breaker at the back of the building? I’ve been having trouble.”

The shorter cop nodded and immediately took off toward the back. The second cop stepped toward Katherine. “You need me, ma’am?” he asked.

Her gallery was dark. The lights went off there all the time. There was no reason for her to panic.

Right?

“I-I’m fine. Can you just make sure he gets the lights back on?” She turned away from him. Katherine kept a flashlight in her desk. She’d get it, and if the cops couldn’t fix the problem from the outside, she’d look around the gallery to see what she could do about the problem.

She took a few hesitant steps toward her desk. Her eyes strained, trying to adjust to the darkness.

Nothing looked disturbed or out of place or—

She wasn’t alone.

The bag slipped from her fingers, and the beignets spilled across the floor.

A man was slouched in the chair to the left. He was so still and silent that she hadn’t noticed him at first. Her breath heaved in her chest as she took another step forward. Her eyes narrowed as she strained to make out his features. There was a large window behind him, but the curtains were drawn, and only a faint trickle of light spilled inside. But she could just see his profile. The strong lines and angles of his face were familiar.

Trent.

Her thigh bumped into the edge of her desk, and she fumbled in the lower desk drawer. Her fingers slid under the drawer’s false bottom, and she pulled out a small, black gun. Dane thought Trent might have killed his ex-wife, and now Trent was waiting for her inside her darkened gallery? Oh, hell no, that wasn’t good.

“Trent?” Her voice was hoarse as she called to him. Her fingers were trembling around the gun.

Trent didn’t stir.

She wished she could see more of him.

“Trent, how did you get in?”

He still wasn’t moving.

“Trent, the police are outside.” Instead of inching forward, she was now inching back. She was getting the cops, and whatever game Trent thought he was playing, well, the guy could think again. “You stay right there,” she snapped at him. “Don’t even think of coming at me. I-I’ve got a gun.”

Then she heard a loud click—like a lock turning. Behind her.

Her whole body went into high alert. She started to whirl toward this new threat, but strong hands wrapped around her body, and she was jerked back against a hard chest.

“You aren’t going to use that gun on me, are you, Kat?”

That low whisper had haunted her nightmares for so long.

It was a whisper she’d never been able to forget.

Valentine’s whisper.

“What do you think? Is the shrink in the wind?” Mac asked as he backed up and let the crime-scene techs take over the motel room.

Dane shook his head. “He left his wallet behind. All of his credit cards. His cash.” What little there had been of it.

“A guy like him would have plenty of backup resources.”

“No, the ex-wife got all the money in the divorce.” Trent had gotten nothing. Dane’s gaze swept over the room once more. He knew a crime-scene cleanup when he saw one, and this scene—it had been f**king thoroughly cleaned.

No blood drops. No sign of a struggle. Nothing at all.

He glanced at the door once more. They’d already put out an APB on Trent Lancaster, just in case, but the knot in his gut was telling him that he had to do more right then.

He and Mac headed outside. “We’ll need to talk to Evelyn again.” The woman had been damn near hysterical earlier, so sure that something had happened to Trent.

She’d been right.

Dane’s gaze scanned the parking lot. They’d talked to the front desk clerk, and the guy had remembered seeing Lancaster pull up in his sports car. Apparently they didn’t get a whole lot of Jags at that place.

Considering the financial mess the doc was in, Dane was rather surprised he’d even kept the ride.

But that fancy vehicle wasn’t there now. Every cop in the city was looking for it, though. Dane slid into his vehicle.

Find that Jag and they’d find—

The radio crackled to life. Dane leaned forward. “Got a hit on that APB,” he was told. “Your sports car was just spotted in a tow-away zone.” The dispatch rattled off the address—an address that was too familiar to Dane.

“Hell.” His breath rushed out. “That’s three blocks from Katherine’s gallery.” He’d given the guards orders to stay close to the gallery.

They’d better damn well be close. “Send the cops in now!” Dane barked. “I want them standing by Katherine’s side until I get there.”