Profiling Nathan: Romancing the Guardians, Book Five Page 9

  Slouched in his chair, he stared at her in obvious surprise when she walked into the interrogation room with Detective Lovett. “Hey, what you doin’ here, puta?”

  “Watch your mouth, Ortiz,” Lovett snapped. “Ms. Werner is an FBI agent. I advise you to show her some respect.”

  The punk guffawed. “Yeah, she flashed her fancy badge at me once. It don’t scare me now anymore than it did then, bitch.” He grinned scornfully at Talia.

  “I said watch your filthy mouth!” Lovett growled, red-faced. Planting beefy hands on the metal table the gangbanger was cuffed to, he looked ready to lunge at him.

  “It’s alright, Detective,” Talia said. “I’m used to foul-mouthed, two-bit punks like him.” Meeting Ortiz’s hate-filled glare, she spoke in a cold, hard voice she’d mastered through years of practice. “I’m down here from D.C. to investigate the murders of three women in Ybor City. You don’t know anything about them, I suppose.”

  At her mention of the murders, Ortiz straightened in his chair. “Damn right I don’t know nothin’ about no murders.”

  “Mmm. But you do know where I’ve been staying in Tampa, right?”

  He glanced from her to Lovett and back, brow crinkled in real or feigned confusion. “How would I know that? I only saw you at Maguire’s lousy tattoo joint and that time on the street in Ybor.” Then understanding dawned on him, obvious from his widened eyes. “I get it. It was your room the cops think me and my boys busted up, right?”

  “Oh, like you didn’t know?” she taunted, arms crossed as she strolled back and forth across the small room in front of him.

  “Hell no! For all I knew, you was shacked up with Maguire.”

  Talia paused to gaze at him impassively. She sensed he was telling the truth but knew it would take more than her profiler’s intuition to convince Lovett that Ortiz was innocent – of this particular crime, at least. Meaning hours of questioning him and his two cohorts.

  The day promised to be a long one.

  CHAPTER NINE

  “Nate! I didn’t expect you back so soon,” Misty said with a big smile when he walked in the back door of his shop after dropping Tally off.

  “Me neither,” he grumbled, approaching the front entry where she stood with a mop in her hands and a bucket nearby. Careful not to step on the floor she’d already scrubbed, he planted his hands on his hips. “The cops picked up that gang leader Ortiz on suspicion of breaking into Tally’s hotel room. You remember him?” At her nod, he added, “She insisted on coming back to question him.”

  “She came back?” Misty asked in astonishment. “After the death threat you mentioned when you asked me to run the shop for a few days?”

  “Yeah, she’s stubborn, too much for her own good. She’s an FBI agent. Did I tell you that?”

  “N-no, you didn’t, but she did. I just thought she’d be too scared to return.”

  “She should have been.” Nate scowled. “But she’s dead set on helping to solve the women’s murders here in Ybor. If Ortiz and his boys aren’t responsible for trashing her room, the killer likely did it.” Nate scrubbed a hand over his face. “I’m afraid she’ll be next on his kill list.”

  “Oh. Th-that’s scary,” Misty said, staring at the wet floor.

  “Yeah, damn scary.”

  Worried about Tally, Nate had the jitters by late afternoon when his cell phone rang. Hoping it was her, he immediately answered but was disappointed when a man’s voice asked, “Is this Nathan Maguire?”

  “Yeah. Who’s asking?”

  “I’m Dev Medina, Michaela Peterson’s friend.”

  Startled, Nate said, “I thought you were going to call Talia. How’d you get my number?”

  “I tried to reach her but she didn’t answer. So I called my folks back and they found your number on their caller ID. Now, are you someplace private so we can talk?”

  Nate scowled, wondering why Talia hadn’t answered her cell phone. He glanced at Misty, who sat at the reception desk flipping through a magazine while waiting to greet customers. “Give me a minute,” he said. Then he headed out the back door.

  Making sure no one was around to overhear, he put the phone to his ear. “Okay, say what you want but make it quick. I’m expecting an important call.”

  “Fine by me,” Medina said curtly. “I’m to tell you the Guardians are gathering. I can’t tell you where because it’s not safe for you to know. You need to meet Michaela and me in Fort Worth. We’ll take you to the gathering place.”

  “That’s a tall order, mister,” Nate snapped. “If I knew who these Guardians are, and I’m not saying I do, why should I believe anything you say?”

  Medina gave a sour laugh. “Michaela said you wouldn’t believe me even with Talia Werner, a federal agent, vouching for me. So she told me to remind you of the time you showed up at a Guardians’ conclave drunk as a skunk and bleeding. Seems you got in a fight at some bar. She had to stitch up your arm where you were knifed.”

  Stunned by the reminder of an incident he’d prefer to forget, Nate touched the scar on his left arm, disguised by a tattoo. Nobody except Michaela and the other Guardians knew about that time three years ago when he’d made a damn fool of himself. It was his first conclave after his father died, bequeathing to him a secret passed down through countless generations in their family. He hadn’t wanted such a responsibility and still didn’t, but he couldn’t escape it without betraying his old man’s trust.

  “Alright, I believe you,” he said, “but what’s so urgent? Why didn’t the High Guardian contact me himself instead of through Michaela and you?”

  “Malcolm Flewellen, the old High Guardian, was murdered. His niece Lara is now in charge.”

  “Jesus! Murdered? How, when?”

  “I can’t explain over the phone. Let’s just say y’all have some nasty enemies. Lara needs your support along with the others.” Medina sighed. “Now, are you going to meet Michaela and me or not?”

  Realizing he had little choice, Nate said, “Yeah, but I can’t leave immediately. I need to take care of some things here first.”

  Medina grudgingly agreed, saying not too take too long about it. They set up a day and time for him to check back with Nate, since he would be unreachable in the meantime. Why, he didn’t say.

  Nate went inside to find a client waiting for him. A returning customer, the middle-aged biker chic insisted she would only let him work on her. Never had he been less in the mood to ink a tattoo. Tuning out most of the woman’s incessant chatter while he worked, he thought about the things he’d have to do before leaving for Texas, one of which was finding somebody to run the shop while he was gone. Misty couldn’t handle it by herself indefinitely. She wasn’t experienced enough.

  The other, more painful consideration was Tally. As he’d told her, he genuinely cared for her, something he’d never expected to feel for any woman, and she’d said she cared for him too. He believed her, but she was a fed. She couldn’t hook up with a guy like him for more than a short fling. If she did, she’d probably lose her job. For her sake he had to break it off with her before he left. His chest tightened at the prospect.

  First, though, he’d make sure she was safe. She hadn’t called by mid evening and he couldn’t wait any longer to hear from her. Done with his latest client, he again stepped out back and phoned Tally. She picked up on the second ring.

  “Hi. I was about to call you,” she said, sounding tired.

  “I hope that means you’re ready for me to come get you.”

  “Not yet. I’m helping Detective Lovett round up some paperwork, but I should be ready to leave in an hour or two.”

  “Good, I’ll pick you up. Hey, Dev called me earlier.”

  “He did? I thought he was supposed to call me.”

  “He did, but you didn’t answer. Was your phone turned off?”

  “No. Oh shoot, it was set on vibrate and I’d dropped it in my bag while I went to the restroom. He must have called at that time. I suppose he got yo
ur number from his parents, hmm?”

  He grinned. She was quick. “Right. So, what happened with Ortiz and his pals?”

  “We questioned them intensively but, in the end, we had to let them go. All of them stuck to their story, swearing they had nothing to do with the breakin, and their alibis checked out.”

  “Damn! I was hoping they were the ones.”

  “I know. So was I, but I’m certain they’re not.”

  “You know what this means. It was the serial killer who threatened you,” he said grimly. “I have one client waiting. Depending on what tat he wants, I might be there when you’re ready to leave. If I’m not, wait for me. Don’t set one foot outside the station until I get there.”

  She agreed to do as he said, but as he set to work on the guy he’d mentioned to her – who chose a complicated, time-consuming design – Nate had to grit his teeth. He wanted to go get the blasted woman right now. He didn’t trust her not to go against his advice and charge off to the bus stop on her own.

  *

  The tedious paperwork was finally done. Lovett offered to drive Talia wherever she wanted to go but she declined, thanking him and saying Nate would pick her up. The gray-haired detective raised his eyebrows but otherwise kept his opinion to himself.

  “I’ll see you tomorrow then,” he said as they walked out to the lobby. “That’s assuming you want to continue working the murder investigation. If you don’t, I wouldn’t blame you a bit considering the threat on your life.”

  She waved off the threat. “I do want to keep working on it. I’ll be here bright and early in the morning,” she assured him. He nodded, wished her goodnight and left.

  Sticking her head out the door but not seeing Nate’s car, Talia took a seat on a bench near the sergeant’s desk. They chatted a bit; then the stocky man went about his work while she leaned her head against the wall behind her and closed her eyes. She was tired after the fruitless hours spent interrogating Ortiz and his gang. All she wanted to do was go to Nate’s place and crash.

  A shrill voice made her open her eyes. Blinking, she saw a uniformed cop haul in a handcuffed woman, a prostitute judging by her scanty attire, outlandish makeup and the foul epithets she screamed at the young cop. He led her forcibly down the hall for booking, and Talia turned her attention to the wall clock opposite where she sat.

  Good grief! An hour had passed since she’d settled on the bench. She must have fallen asleep. Standing, she crossed to the door and looked outside. Nate still wasn’t there. Strange. Surely he should have shown up by now. Intending to call him, she pulled out her cell phone and found it dead. Great! With everything that had happened in the past two days, she’d forgotten to charge it.

  Disgusted, she considered asking to use the desk sergeant’s phone but hesitated. It must be taking Nate longer than he’d expected to finish the tattoo he was working on. She didn’t want to take him away from his work. Besides, she wasn’t helpless. She had a gun in her bag and could take care of herself. She’d catch a bus. Nate would be furious, but she’d deal with him.

  As the bus approached her stop a short while later, she noticed how quiet the entertainment district was tonight, probably because this was Monday and people were recuperating from the weekend. Had it really been only yesterday when she and Nate had made love on that picturesque island in the bay? Only last night when they’d returned to find her room broken into and that hideous message scrawled on the wall? It seemed like days ago. She felt like her life had been turned upside down in that short time.

  She stepped off the bus not far from Nate’s Tattoos. Hiking her heavy bag higher on her shoulder, she walked along the virtually empty sidewalk thinking about what they’d told one another when he dropped her off at the police station. He’d said he cared for her and she’d said the same to him. She wasn’t sure what caring meant to him but she knew what it meant to her. Impossible as it seemed after knowing the man only a matter of days, she was in love with him.

  Smiling at the realization, she longed for a future with Nate, but how? He had his life and a business he’d worked hard to build here in Ybor City. Moreover, he loved his work, something she would never ask him to give up. But she was also dedicated to her work as a profiler, and while she was based in D.C., she often traveled to far-flung corners of the country to fulfill her duties. Was it possible to maintain a lasting relationship with Nate under such conditions?

  Passing an alley between a bar and restaurant, her thoughts were interrupted by a woman’s whimpering cries coming from the dark, narrow passage. She stopped and drew her gun. Heart pounding, she walked slowly into the alley. All she could see were the vague shapes of trash cans along the buildings on either side of her. The whimpers had stopped. She dreaded finding a woman’s dead, mutilated body.

  Suddenly, an arm snaked around her from behind, drawing a cry from her lips. A knife pressed against her throat and a high-pitched voice snarled, “Drop the gun, bitch.”

  She gasped and obeyed, stunned by the familiar voice. “Why are you doing this?”

  “Because you didn’t leave after I warned you. You should have gone back where you belong, miss fancy FBI agent. You’ve got no right to be here, no right to him!” The blade nicked Talia’s throat, making her hiss is pain.

  “And you do, Misty?” she said, determined to keep the crazy girl talking while she devised a way out of the situation. She felt blood trickle down under her shirt.

  “Damn right I do! This is my town and Nate is my man.”

  “Is that why you killed the other three women?” Talia asked as the pieces fell into place. “Because they were threatening to take him from you?”

  “Yesss! They deserved what they got. Just like you do.”

  “How long do you think you can keep killing off your rivals before the police catch you?”

  Misty laughed insanely. “I’m too smart for them. They’ll never catch me.”

  “I wouldn’t be so sure of that if I were you. They already know the killer is a woman,” she lied. “They found your DNA on the last woman you murdered. Sooner or later they’ll trace it to you.”

  “You’re lying. I was careful. I wore plastic gloves just like I’m wearing now.” Misty’s voice wobbled slightly, indicating she wasn’t so sure she’d covered her tracks as completely as she claimed. At the same time, the pressure of her knife lifted just a bit.

  Recognizing the only chance she was likely to get, Talia slammed her right hand into her attacker’s knife arm, knocking the blade aside. It sliced the column of her throat, wringing another pained cry from her as she elbowed Misty in the stomach and spun out of her grip. She clapped a hand to the wound. It was bleeding but not gushing like a fountain, meaning the knife had missed her jugular, just barely.

  Misty gave a blood-curdling scream and charged after her. “You can’t escape me, bitch!” she snarled.

  Jumping out of the way, Talia taunted, “You won’t find me as easy to kill as those poor women you butchered, psycho.”

  The enraged murderess lunged at her again and again. It was a dance of death as Talia struggled to avoid the vicious blade. She sustained several cuts. Blood soaked her clothes and burning pain consumed her. If only she could find her gun, but she’d lost track of where she dropped it in the dark. Growing unsteady, she fought to stay on her feet but finally stumbled and fell.

  “Now I’ve got you!” Misty shouted in victory, launching herself to the ground after Talia, knife poised to stab and slash her victim to pieces. When she encountered only the hard pavement, she screamed insanely.

  Talia had rolled away just in time. Miraculously, her fingers encountered her Glock. She wrapped both blood-slick hands around it, pointed at the shadowed, snarling maniac coming at her again, and squeezed the trigger. Misty screamed in pain but kept coming. Steadying her aim, Talia fired again, this time hitting her assailant square in the torso. A choked cry sprang from Misty’s throat. She grabbed her middle and stumbled forward, still intent on killing her victi
m.

  Before Talia could get off another shot, a beam of red-hot light struck Misty in the head. Without making a sound, she folded like a limp dishrag and hit the ground. Talia stared incredulously at her barely visible form. What had just happened? Turning her head, she saw a man silhouetted in the opening of the alley.

  “Tally?” he called hoarsely.

  “Nate!” she cried. Using her last bit of strength, she struggled to her feet as he ran toward her. Hurting and lightheaded from loss of blood, she almost collapsed, but he caught her just in time.

  “Hey! Easy there, sweetheart,” he said in a choked voice. Lowering her gently to the ground, he cradled her against him. “Christ! You’re bleeding in a dozen places.”

  “It was Misty,” she muttered. “She killed those women.”

  “I figured that when I saw her attacking you,” he said, punching numbers on his phone.

  “How’d you see her? It’s too dark.”

  “I’ll explain later.” Then he spoke into the phone, demanding an ambulance get here fast for a woman who was bleeding out. He meant her, of course.

  He was right. She was starting to feel cold and kind of numb all over. The pain had faded, though, which was a good thing, and she was happy to be in Nate’s arms again. Brushing hair off her face, his hand felt blessedly warm on her clammy skin. He pulled a handkerchief from his pants pockets and pressed it over her neck wound. She didn’t think it would do much good because she had so many other wounds, but he was sweet to try. Murmuring soft words she didn’t always catch in her half aware state, he sat holding her until the ambulance arrived.

  Suddenly there were lights in the alley. They hurt her eyes. She mumbled in complaint when two young men – paramedics, she guessed – moved her onto some sort of stretcher thing. They stuck a needle in her arm and bandaged some of her wounds, but all she wanted was Nate. She managed to mumble his name and he magically appeared, taking her icy hand in his.

  “I’m right here, honey,” he said. “Don’t worry, I’ll stay with you all the way.”