over the past six years. She certainly wasn’t all right with him being in her house.
What if...
She shuddered to think of it—of them meeting. But that wouldn’t happen. She would get rid of Jared quickly. She would make certain he was long gone before Alex came home.
She nodded and assured him, “I’m fine. The doorbell startled me because I wasn’t expecting anyone.” Not for an hour yet. “Especially not you.”
His handsome face moved with a slight wince at her jab. But she knew that she hadn’t really hurt him. He would have had to care for her to be able to hurt him.
“Why are you here, Jared?” she asked, and then reminded him, “You were the one who thought it best we didn’t see each other anymore.”
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t handle anything very well concerning your sister’s case.”
“My sister’s case...” That was all Rebecca had been to him—just part of a case. She was the one who had foolishly thought they were more.
“Why are you here?” she asked again. “You didn’t come here to apologize.”
“I should have,” he said, as if just realizing it himself.
The man was a genius. A real one. He had graduated high school at thirteen, college with a doctorate in criminal psychology at nineteen and then had been recruited into the FBI. He had worked many cases—solving them all—before he’d come up against her sister’s killer. And lost...
Jared was a genius when it came to other people but he was completely oblivious when it came to himself.
She shrugged. “That was a long time ago.” She wanted him to think she had moved on, but it felt like yesterday that she had lost him—so soon after tragically losing Lexi.
“I’m sorry,” he said again, and the sincerity was there in the gruffness of his deep voice.
She didn’t doubt that he was sorry, but she didn’t care. She just wanted him gone.
“Why are you here?” she asked, impatience fraying her voice into sharpness. This was the tone that always—finally—got Alex’s attention.
“Have you seen the news?” he asked. “Do you know about...?”
She grimly nodded as concern tightly gripped her heart. “There’s another girl missing. She was abducted from the last fitting for her bridal gown.”
It could only be one killer. Her sister’s.
“I need your help,” he said.
But he hadn’t come to her when those other women had been abducted. He hadn’t needed her help then. Why was he asking for it now—when he hadn’t listened to her six years ago?
“I already told you who killed Lexi.”
He sighed—that long-suffering sigh that irritated her. Then he pulled a photo from a file he had clasped under his arm and held it out to her. “I need you to look at this.”
She grimaced and backed away from him. The last thing she wanted to see was another crime scene. She already had one that she could not get out of her mind. “No.”
“Please, Becca—”
“Don’t call me that,” she snapped at him. To Lexi, she’d been Becca. And to him...when she’d thought he actually cared about her.
But all Jared Bell cared about was his career—and how this one unsolved case could damage it.
“What should I call you?” he asked. “Ms. Drummond, or Mrs....?”
“Rebecca,” she said, refusing to reveal her marital status. It wouldn’t matter to him anyway since it had nothing to do with the case.
“Rebecca,” he repeated. “Please look at the picture.”
She closed her eyes, and that old crime scene flashed through her mind: the wedding dress soaked with blood spilling out of the trunk of Lexi’s car.
Her body hadn’t been in the trunk. But it didn’t matter. The coroner had confirmed she couldn’t have lost that much blood and lived.
Lexi was forever gone.
“I need your help,” he said again. “Please...”
She forced herself to open her eyes—to look. It wasn’t a crime scene. But it might have been worse to see Lexi like she was in that old photo—alive with happiness—because it reminded Rebecca of how much she’d lost.
Just like seeing Jared again reminded her of how much she’d lost...
Panic pressed on her lungs, stealing her breath. “You need to leave,” she said.
“Rebecca—”
She planted her palm against his chest. Even through his suit and shirt, she could feel the warmth of his skin and the hardness of his muscles. But she pushed him toward the door. “I can’t help you—because you won’t listen to me.”
“Rebecca, I want to talk to you about Lexi—about how she knew this girl.”
She shook her head. She couldn’t look at the picture again—of her and the missing girl. “Ask Amy Wilcox’s family.”
His amber-colored eyes darkened with emotion. “I asked them.” And from his grim expression, it hadn’t gone well. “They had no idea that Amy had known Lexi.”
She shook her head. “I had no idea, either.”
“We need to compare their pasts,” he said, “and find out where their paths might have crossed.” Mercifully, he turned the photo over to the white back. But then he pointed to the date on it. “This was taken the month Lexi disappeared. That’s too great a coincidence. We need to figure out their connection.”
She shook her head again.
“Bec—Rebecca, I need your help,” he implored her.
Heat arced between them as he stared at her. She avoided his intense gaze, averting hers. Then she noticed the clock on the wall behind his head, and her panic returned with even more intensity. She had no time to answer his questions. “You need to leave now!”
Before Alex came home—because if Jared saw him he would have more questions.
More questions she couldn’t answer...
Jared’s heart pounded hard and fast beneath the warmth of her hand on his chest. He’d worried that she might slam the door in his face. After the mess he had made of everything, he wouldn’t have blamed her if she had. But she’d let him in. Although after hearing her soft cry, he hadn’t
