Scream For Me: A Novel of the Night Hunter (For Me #3)(43)
Author: Cynthia Eden

“Then I’m coming to you! Where the hell are you?”

“About fifty yards northwest of the diner. There’s a tree here, a pine that’s been stripped of bark.” Like it had been struck by lightning.

“Stay there. I’m coming.” She could hear him running. Hear the hard rasp of his breath.

She also heard a twig snap, to the right of her.

Cadence whirled. A deputy stood about twenty feet away. “Sorry, ma’am. Didn’t mean to scare you.” A deep drawl accented his words. He inclined his head. The glaring southern sun was behind him, and his long shadow swept forward. A wide-brimmed hat drifted low over his forehead and he wore a pair of sunglasses. He began to retreat from her. “No sign of him in this area. I’m heading on up to check near the top of the slope.” The rising sun was behind him, pushing shadows over his body so that she couldn’t see his face clearly.

Cadence had to squint against the bright sunlight. She had her gun aimed toward the guy’s chest even as her left hand still clutched the phone to her ear. “Keep your radio on,” Cadence ordered as she slowly lowered her weapon. “If you see anything, you call me.”

With a quick nod, he turned away.

Her gaze fell down his body.

“Cadence, Cadence, you better still be next to that tree.”

The deputy was wearing brown hiking boots.

Hiking boots.

She frowned. He shouldn’t be wearing those boots. The other guys hadn’t been. She’d noticed with a quick, cursory glance that the other deputies were all wearing the usual black boots customary for officers in this area. Not hiking boots.

You wore hiking boots when you knew you would be climbing. The deputies today hadn’t known they’d be searching the woods, not until she’d given them the order.

“Deputy!” she called out.

He didn’t look back. The guy headed into thick patch of brush.

“Deputy!” Her cry sent birds flying into the air.

If she waited for Kyle, the man would be gone.

He could just be a deputy. One who’d come prepared with hiking boots. But why ignore her call?

Just a deputy…

Or he could be their killer. “I’m moving,” she said, clutching her phone with her left hand even as her grip on the gun remained steady. “Heading up the slope.”

“What?” Kyle’s bellow burst in her ear. “Don’t! Just stay where you are until I’m there. Dammit, I’m your backup. Wait for me.”

“Following a suspect.”

“No, Cadence. No!”

She wasn’t a helpless victim. If the SOB turned on her, she’d shoot him straight in the heart.

She hurried forward.

“I’m almost to you, Cadence, stay there. Just stay!”

She hadn’t become an FBI agent so that she’d hide and wait for someone else to protect her.

She burst up onto the slope. Cadence saw the back of the deputy. “Freeze!” she shouted.

The phone fell to the ground. She gripped the gun with both hands, her left coming up to steady the weapon as she took aim.

The deputy froze. His back was still to her. “What’s the problem, ma’am?”

“Turn around!” She wanted to see his face. Needed to see it. The wide hat covered his hair.

Slowly, the man turned. His weapon was drawn.

“Drop it!” Cadence yelled.

He hesitated.

“Drop it or I shoot.”

“Ma’am?”

He dropped the weapon.

She advanced. Cleared the brush enough to realize…

This man wasn’t wearing hiking boots. He had on the regular black shoes of the deputies. The breath left her lungs in a hard rush. Not him. “Where’s the other deputy? The one who just came this way?”

“I didn’t see another deputy. This was my search zone.” His voice was shaking. His eyes wide and nervous.

Probably because her gun was aimed at his heart.

“Cadence!” Kyle rushed to her side. “What the hell is happening?” He already had his gun out, and aimed at the deputy whose whole body was now trembling.

“It’s not him,” she whispered. “There was another man, dressed as a deputy. He had on hiking boots.” Her gaze darted to Kyle as she lowered her weapon. “He was right here.”

A muscle jerked in Kyle’s clenched jaw.

She glanced away from him. Let her gaze sweep the line of trees stretching as far as she could see.

The killer was playing with them.

She was tired of his game.

CHAPTER TEN

The FBI unit director was pissed.

Special Agent Ben Griffin marched back and forth in Sheriff Coolidge’s small office. Since the man was still in the hospital—recovering, thankfully—they’d taken over his space while they were in Maverick.

“What the hell is happening here?” Ben demanded. “A witness is dead. On our watch. Do you know how this is gonna look to the press? In the press?”

Kyle didn’t really give a damn how it looked to them.

But the killer cares. Kyle knew he did. The SOB had brought up the papers. You want the attention, don’t you? He’d hunted fifteen years in secrecy, but now he was trying to catch as much attention as he could. Shooting a sheriff. Dumping a body at the diner. You want all eyes on you.

And they were.

“This perp is jerking us around,” Ben snapped. “He’s slipping right through our fingers.”

He’d been in those woods. Killing close to Cadence.

Ben’s steely blue gaze pinned him. “You know you should be off the case.”

Kyle lurched to his feet. “The hell I should!”

Ben waved that away. “It’s too personal. The connection to your sister, the way this fellow is calling you. You can’t be objective.”

He wasn’t going to be shoved to the side on this one. “It’s because of my connection that you need me. He’s not going to contact any other agents. He won’t. He’s pulling me in because he likes screwing with me.”

“It’s a dangerous game,” Ben said. His stare focused on Cadence. She sat in the chair just a few feet away. “One that could wind up hurting someone.”

Ben had already been briefed on the phone calls. He knew everything the perp had said. Everything he’d threatened.

“I’m not afraid of him,” Cadence said, lifting her chin.

“I am,” Dani muttered from her position behind the desk. She was tapping frantically on her laptop.