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“You and the fucking world,” Everett rasped.
“Yes.” She nodded. “The fucking world would like to know. That’s why I’m here. I write about people like you. Your motivations. Your crimes. Your punishments.”
His breath came a little faster. He leaned forward just a small bit more.
“Who caught you?” she asked. Because this was something that had captured her attention. Everett would have gotten away from the cops. His car had been gassed up and ready to go.
But someone had gotten to him first.
Given him a concussion. Knocked him out. Left him for the cops with an honest-to-God red bow tied around his neck.
“If I knew…” A low rumble from Everett. “I would have found the bastard, ripped out his intestines, and tied that shit into a bow.”
What a lovely visual. “So you have no clue.”
His jaw hardened.
Everett was a handsome man. Technically speaking. Chiseled jaw. High cheekbones. It was his physical appeal that she believed had disarmed his victims. People tended to go through life expecting, well, expecting monsters to look like monsters. And not like handsome movie stars. Or male models.
They want the bad guys to look as dark and twisted on the outside as they are on the inside. Sadly, that wasn’t the case. In her experience, the worst monsters tended to have perfect exteriors. The better to lure in their prey.
Her breath whispered out. “My goal is to find the person who left you in that barn.”
His head cocked to the left.
“I solve mysteries.” She rolled one shoulder in a calculated shrug. “You are the second killer to have been left—bound and unconscious—for the police in the last two years.”
“I never confessed to being a killer.”
No, he hadn’t. But the evidence was clear. His DNA had been found on three of the four vics.
“Since I never confessed, I prefer that you don’t use the term with me.”
She swallowed. “You are a convicted killer. A jury found you guilty. Don’t blame me if you don’t like the label you were given by the court system.” A deliberate attempt to antagonize him. “In fact, you should blame the person who left you in the barn.”
“I do fucking blame him.”
Heat. It lanced beneath the words. Her head dipped. “Then perhaps you can assist me in finding him.”
He scoffed at her.
Right. Like it was the first time that had happened to her, either. Over the years, most of the criminals and killers she met tended to underestimate her. Their mistake. Her secret skill.
“How the hell would you find him? The cops couldn’t find him.”
She didn’t know how hard the cops had looked. They’d been more excited to just have Everett Thomas in custody. Everyone had been glad when the Slasher was off the streets. “I’m not law enforcement. I can work around the system.”
The guards glared at her. She flashed them her dimpled smile. It tended to disarm people.
They just glared more.
Oh, well. Back to her target.
She lost the dimples and focused on Everett. “You’re set to die. I would think that—before you get that swift trip to hell that is waiting courtesy of a lethal injection—you’d like to know who helped send you on your way.”
He didn’t blink.
“Walk me back through your life,” she invited, keeping her voice calm with an extreme effort of will. “The last few days, before you planned to make your big escape from town, tell me about what you did. Who you saw. What you?—”
