Drake moves faster than I’ve ever seen and grabs the tub. “Don’t count on it.”
Trent nods in agreement. “Better call her. Get her to cook more.”
“Jesus—she’s gonna pass out in excitement! Can’t you call her?”
“No. I’m hungry. You do it.”
“I’m hungry too.”
“Shut up,” Drake mutters. “Just eat.” He shoves a plate with spaghetti and meatballs on it at me. “Call her after. They can wait. We were here first.”
I take the plate and watch openmouthed as the sheriff of the Holly Woods Police Department and his two leading homicide detectives delve into the containers and pile their plates full with food.
Sheriff Bates wipes some sauce from the corner of his mouth and groans happily. Charlotte giggles from behind the counter.
“I never thought I’d say this, ever,” he says, looking at me, “but thank the Lord for Liliana Bond.”
Trent grunts his agreement. “Woman’s batshit crazy, but when she cooks like this…”
I bite into my meatball, grinning.
Drake levels me with a look. “Time to up your cooking game, Bond. I know you don’t make fresh meatballs because yours ain’t this good.”
I mock-gasp.
“And she buys the sauce,” Trent says around his spaghetti.
“I can make the sauce. I just choose not to,” I argue.
Drake nods. “Start making it. Blame Nonna. I’m gonna start getting picky.”
I grab a meatball from my plate and throw it at him. It hits him square on the cheek, leaving a trail of marinara sauce. It drips onto the collar of his shirt.
I freeze.
Oopsie.
He opens his mouth to say something, but Brody comes barreling out of his office at the other end of the station.
“I smell Nonna’s cooking!”
“Did someone say, ‘Nonna’s cooking’?” Detective Johnson appears from his doorway. “There’s only one Nonna in Holly Woo—oh shit, are those homemade meatballs?”
“Someone say, ‘homemade meatballs’?” someone else asks.
“I haven’t had meatballs in ages,” another officer says. “How much is there?”
I pull my phone from my purse and hold it up, grinning at Drake. “Better call Nonna for more meatballs.”
“I’m gonna pay you back for that,” he warns me, flicking a bit of tomato in my direction.
I sidestep the flying, red missile and give him my “I’m cute and you can’t resist this smile” smile. “I know.”
I stare at the ceiling. Drake’s ceiling is boring. It’s not all swirly like mine is. It’s just flat and plain and, well, boring.
I like my swirly ceiling. I miss my swirly ceiling.
I sigh into the quietness of the room. The rising sun is shooting bright-orange embers of light through the gap in the curtains Drake always leaves, painting one of his walls in fiery shades. I love his house, and I love sleeping over here, but I also like knowing I can go to my own house the next night. It’s now been several nights since I’ve slept at home, and despite the fact that my window has been repaired—and put a pretty dent into my savings account—I’m honoring my agreement with him.
I don’t have the energy for another fight about where I sleep. If I’ve learned anything since we started dating, it’s that compromise is real important. Sometimes in a relationship, you have to pick which battles you fight and which ones you lose. This is one, after a fight, I ultimately chose to lose.
It was always going to happen. It needed to happen. I honestly believe we needed that explosive, emotional discussion. So many things were laid out, like my past—something I never thought I’d share with anyone. Let alone Detective Drake Nash.
And our feelings.
I can still hear the echo of his words in my mind. I can still feel the simultaneous panic and delight I felt when he told me that he loves me.
Let’s be reaclass="underline" I’m not easy to love. I’m stubborn and hardheaded and downright infuriating a lot of the time. I know that. It’s who I am. It’s who I’ve been raised to be. Strong, independent, and fierce. I believe that’s the way all little girls should be raised. It’s far easier to let someone protect you than it is to learn to protect yourself, after all.
Despite that, he loves me. God only knows why. I think he spends far more time exasperated at my antics than he does anything else, but I’ll take it, because I’m so sure that I love the hell out of him. And hey, he’s also stubborn and hardheaded and fucking infuriating. Maybe that’s why we work. We’re cut from the same cloth yet so different at the same time.
I like it this way. The fights keep things interesting.
I smile into the silence. Funny how things change. Three months ago, I wanted to kill him. Not that I’m saying I don’t still, but now, it’s kind of sometimes instead of all the time. It’s easier to manage that way, I think.
The sex helps with that. For sure. Sex is great for repressing murderous thoughts.
If you were wondering. Probably weren’t.
Jesus, and I say Nonna is as mad as a box full of frogs. I’m hardly better. I probably get it from her.
I roll onto my side and look at the clock. After we were all fed yesterday, we made several leaps in our investigation. Well, we took several steps toward the leaps, so it’s kind of the same thing. We managed to get ahold of Annabelle Porter’s roommate, and she’s coming to see me at my office so I can ask her a couple of things. If Alistair recognized her, I’m hoping she was known to a few of the guys at the fair—by all accounts, from her photos, she’s a pretty girl—so she may have been seen with her killer. Her roommate was with her just half an hour before she died, so here’s hoping I pick up on something that was missed the first time around.
If I’ve learned anything about questioning people, it’s that shock and grief can and do influence answers. It can distort your memories and make you forget things you know you should remember.
I hope Annabelle Porter’s roommate remembers something that can help us narrow this down.
We should also get DNA back for Dina White. Judge Barnes should be providing search warrants for both Jackson’s and Alistair’s trailers, and while he’s there searching, Drake will question Eddie Roy. If he can be found.
He was conveniently missing yesterday evening. Not that I’m saying he’s a killer, but it’s all too suspicious for my liking.
The worst part about this whole case is that everything seems to be lining up for Dina White’s murder and not the others. They’re still unsolved, and I don’t feel like we’re any closer.
If we are real lucky, we’ll get a match on Alistair’s semen sample. Unfortunately, that’ll take two days to come back. Tomorrow afternoon at the earliest.
We also still have nothing on Robyn Torre. She’s been missing for three days now, and there’s no body or contact from her anywhere. The longer she’s missing, the more chance we have of finding a body. Not that I doubted it’d be otherwise—and that’s so sad, but it’s true. I’m waiting for the call.
My gut tells me we’ll find her today. She’ll be drugged and raped and mutilated, and another beautiful girl will have had her life ripped unjustly from her.
Drake moves next to me. He rolls over, props his head up on one hand, and rests his other arm over my stomach. I turn my face to him and offer him a weak smile.
“What’s on your mind, bella?” he asks softly.
“Everything,” I whisper. “Dina. Alistair. Eddie. Robyn. Jackson. Toni… All of them. Everything and everyone.”
“Have I ever told you that you think way too much?”
“Only all the time.” I glance away from him and focus on the way the covers fall across his side. “We’re not going to find her alive, are we? Robyn?”
He doesn’t respond for a long moment, but when he does, he’s thankfully honest. “I think we’ll be lucky if we do, yeah. Her disappearance has all the markings of the others. I’ll have a team go out to the fields today and search them. Sheriff also has the media appearance today. Numerous news stations and Internet journalists are scheduled to attend. I’m confident we’ll get something out of it.”