His lips quirked. Sam almost slammed the door again. As if realizing it, Lambert moved closer, blocking the jamb with his body like some determined kid peddling magazine subscriptions. “I need to talk to you.”
“Ever heard of making an appointment?” She squirmed, bunching the front of her nightshirt in her fists, knowing there was no chance he hadn’t read the man-bashing sentiment this time.
“Ever heard of answering your phone?” he countered. Without waiting for an invitation, he stepped around her into the living room. “We’ve been calling all morning.”
Sam cast a quick, guilty look toward the telephone. Last night, after Tricia’s third or fourth call demanding info on who had been in her apartment Tuesday, she had turned the ringer off. “Sorry.”
She didn’t mention she’d just gotten up and might not have answered anyway. The bare feet and nightshirt, not to mention the rat’s nest disguised as her hair, made that eminently clear.
“What do you want? What’s so important to have you at my door at this ungodly hour?”
He managed to avoid rolling his eyes. “I know you’re a night owl and this is the crack of dawn for you. But it is important. Why don’t you get cleaned up and dressed? I can wait a few minutes.” His mouth tightened. “As long as you still haven’t gone online this morning.”
Her curiosity rising, she shook her head. “I haven’t.”
“Good. Now go; I’ll be right here.”
Sam sidestepped toward her bedroom, not turning her back on him. Letting the FBI agent fully appreciate the angry-divorcée message on her nightie seemed preferable to flashing her underwear as she departed. Hopefully he had been focused on the saucy words, not on the fact that she was nearly naked beneath the shirt. She’d opened the door to a bitterly cold morning and had almost certainly greeted him with high beams fully lit.
Once in the privacy of her bathroom, Sam multitasked, raking a comb through her hair with one hand while she brutally brushed her teeth with the other. Afterward, she quickly rummaged through her drawers and pulled out a pair of old, premarried khakis that still fit. Considering she’d gained back the fifteen pounds she’d lost on the good-wife-diet-and-exercise program, she didn’t have many other options, unless she wanted to again entertain an FBI agent in her sweats.
When she returned to her living room, she found he’d made himself at home on the couch, which no longer held the mountain of laundry. She hadn’t exactly gone on a cleaning binge, but she’d picked up at least a little.
“What’s this about?” Sitting down at her desk, she flipped the power button on the surge protector behind her CPU. “You mentioned my being online?”
“You haven’t been since last night?” he confirmed again.
She shook her head.
“I read your weekly rant.”
She stiffened, though she had done nothing wrong. She hadn’t hinted about knowing a murder victim, or about being contacted by the FBI. She’d merely called the criminals who preyed on people online the scum-bags they were. “And?”
“It was good.”
Though she hadn’t been looking for his approval, only his acknowledgment that she had kept her word to stay quiet about the FBI’s visit, she still liked the compliment.
“It was also pretty passionate,” he added.
“Who wouldn’t be passionate after hearing about the murders of two teenage boys?”
“You might be surprised.”
That said a lot about the human race that she didn’t want to contemplate. “So what’s the problem? I kept my word; there’s nothing in it about Ryan or the investigation. Or you.”
Especially you. She’d made a concerted effort to think of anything but Lambert. Especially after he’d called yesterday, all big, bad, protective FBI agent criticizing choices she’d made when writing her book. Screw him. He knew nothing about what drove her. Few did.
Actually, maybe he’d done her a favor with the disapproving reaction. It had made it easier to pretend she hadn’t felt a spark of interest in the man. To suppose she’d simply imagined how his hand had felt on her shoulder.
Instead of answering, he reached into his leather at taché and pulled out a few sheets of paper. When he handed them to her, she realized what they were and frowned in bewilderment. “I know what I wrote.”
“Look at the second page. The comments.”
She did, quickly scanning them from the top down.
“Regulars?” he asked.
“Most.”
“What about number six?”
She read it. “ Darwin? Doesn’t ring any bells, beyond the obvious reference.”
“So he’s not a frequent visitor?”
“Not under this name.” Frowning, she read the words again. “And I don’t usually have visitors who are quite so…”
“Condescending?”
“I was going to say hateful. I guess you were right about being surprised by people’s reactions.” She shook her head in disgust. “This guy doesn’t sound at all bothered by the idea of victims walking right into the hands of psychopaths who want to do them harm.”
“We don’t think he is.”
The words were low, measured, his tone even. Sam’s gaze flew up as she realized he was telling her something big. Very big.
She forced herself to remain calm, despite a sudden rising dismay. “Are you saying what I think you’re saying?”
He didn’t reply, waiting for her to lay it out there.
“Do you think this Darwin could be the person who killed the boys?”
He leaned forward, dropping his elbows onto his knees. “Read his other comments.”
She immediately obeyed, noting they were again signed Darwin, though he’d apparently been so riled up he’d mistyped his own name once. “Darwen?”
Alec pointed to the paragraph below. Sam studied the words, gasping as their implication sank in. Then, needing to be sure, she read them again, out loud this time.
“ ‘What would you have us do, Samantha? Should we who have a brain cell in our heads lie in front of the cars of those so foolish they willingly drive into peril? Do we save the reckless ones from the mishaps that so rightfully remove them from our world? Stop the imbe cilic female from falling into the machine, or the greedy youth from drowning or freezing to death?’ ”
Her voice trailed off in shock as the reality of it hit her. Swallowing hard, she let the pages flutter from her hand to the floor, as if she’d been touched by something toxic.
Maybe she had.
“Coincidence?” she asked, trying to convince herself more than him. “He could have chosen those words because he saw the story about the boys on the news.”
“The woman killed after answering the online help-wanted ad five weeks ago was tricked into falling into an industrial hopper.” The details in the case file had been horrific, and he did not elaborate.
She couldn’t manage more than a whisper. “That case was also in the news. I saw it.”
“The specific details weren’t.” Some things were too gruesome even for the evening news.
He fell silent, waiting for her to accept it. Something she truly didn’t want to do. But finally, seeing the certainty in his stare, she knew she had to believe it, to swallow down the truth like bitter medicine and move on.
“A psychotic killer is trying to contact me.”
Lambert nodded. “I think so.”
Her head spinning, she sagged back in her chair. God, no wonder he had been so anxious to reach her. What if she’d gotten back online this morning-or if she’d checked the site one more time before going to sleep last night? In the state she’d been in, she would have given Darwin a piece of her mind.
Which could have angered him so much he might have wanted to rip the rest of her to pieces, too.
She shuddered. “Thank God I didn’t respond.”
For the first time since he’d arrived, the agent’s stare didn’t quite meet her own. He glanced down at his hands, folded together and dangling between his knees.