Little Belle Gone (17 page)

“Whose place do you want me to take it to? Liz?” He could see her fading, slipping into sleep.

As she fell into nothing she placed her hand against his cheek and whispered, “Yours.” She didn’t hear him call the nurse back in, or hear the nurse explaining to him that she had given Liz a sedative. The last thing she had seen was the wonderfully, sinfully, shocked look on his face at her request.

Barrow got off the elevator on her floor. He had wanted to get back into her apartment since the day he had set foot in it, but this wasn’t what he was hoping for. Nearing her door, he could see the splintered frame and it made his blood start to boil. Crouching down to take a look at it, he heard a voice from just inside the apartment. Looking up, a C.S.I. was squatting down over a small pool of blood. “What was that?” He hadn’t been able to fully hear her.

“That’s not from the robbery. The first responder had to kick the door open. Apparently, she bolted it before she fainted.” He stood up and nodded to her as she went back to processing the area where one of the surviving assailants had been found. As he looked past her, his mouth went dry. Her expertly appointed, and utterly delightful, apartment was now a whirlwind of shattered glass and shredded cushions. Moving carefully through the disheveled rooms, he came upon the first body. A man, a homeless man judging by the state of his clothes, lay crumpled against the side of her kitchen cabinets. A rather gruesome dent in the side of his head, and the accompanying blood stain on the edge of the counter top, told the story of his final moment. Matt scowled down at him,
serves you right
.

The C.S.I.’s voice broke in on him again. “There’s another body in the bedroom. Two assailants were taken to the hospital with major injuries. It’s hard to believe she managed to do this all by herself. I mean, she looks so small in all these pictures.” She gestured to the multitude of shattered picture frames that had once covered the shelves, table tops, and free wall space of her rooms. Bending down to nudge a photo of her and Alex in graduation gowns free of the debris, smiling so proudly as they held their diploma’s high, he snorted.

“She’s the strongest woman I’ve ever met. I don’t think there is anything she isn’t capable of doing if she puts her mind to it.” His tone had been far warmer and more intimate than he had intended. When she cleared her throat, he looked up to see her grinning sheepishly at him. “I mean, Detective Cord is very highly trained. She is perfectly capable of defending herself.”

Standing, she held her sheepish grin as she said, “She’s quite lovely, too. Though I’m sure that doesn’t surprise you either.” He returned her smile and turned back to his scan of the scene.

“If this was a robbery then why is all her TV stuff still in place? All theses movies and AV equipment are worth a lot of money and yet it hasn’t been touched.” Walking over to the edge of the kitchen, he look back into the nook of her dining room, where she had assembled a tiny office. “See, look, her laptop and print station are untouched, too. What kind of thief tears a room to shreds and then doesn’t take anything?” He wasn’t really talking to her anymore and she seemed to know it. Moving to the far side of the apartment, he nudged the bedroom door open. Her beautiful space was now a nightmare. Her comforter was torn, down spilling over the edge of the bed. The shattered mirror she had mentioned was spread across the floor just beyond the crumpled, and strangely twisted, corpse of yet another apparently homeless man. “Be sure you collect every piece of this mirror. Detective Cord believes we maybe be able to find D.N.A. on it that will connect back to our serial case.” He looked back at the C.S.I. to make sure she heard him. After she nodded, he went back to looking over the room.

Walking around the end of the bed, he caught a glimpse of silver tape under the edge of the foot board. Crouching down, he lifted the edge of the comforter to find a wadded cord of duct tape, tinged lightly with blood. His jaw clinched remembering that she had been bound. “And there’s duct tape bindings under the bed.” He shouted out to her.

“Yes, sir. I’ll be sure to collect them.” Standing again, he worked his way around the room. With each new clue, he pieced together the events that had brought him here. She had been tied on the bed. She must have rolled off when the killer was thrown into the mirror. Then, judging from the location of the two duct tape cords, she must have freed herself under the bed. From there, she fought back. An odd mixture of pride and terror filled his aching heart. She could defend herself, he knew that, perhaps better than most, but it still tore at him that she had had to.

A short time later, the coroner appeared to collect the two bodies. Matt then waited patiently for the C.S.I. to finish collecting everything that could possibly be evidence. When she nodded to him and left, lugging her heavy case with her, he went back to Elizabeth’s bedroom. Finding her luggage in the untouched closet, he set about packing a few of her clothes for her. He started with the innocent things, slacks and blouses, a couple skirts pulled from hangers. Shuffling through the clothes, he came across a rather fetching little cocktail dress in that warm lavender color she loved so much. Imagining her sitting across from him at a small candlelit table, swathed in it, smiling slyly at him with those magic eyes of hers over the rim of a glass of wine made him pull it from the rack.
Just in case
, he though.

As he removed it, it revealed the next outfit in line. That delightfully sinful catholic school girl uniform came into view, complete with the white knee high socks and Al-star tennis shoes. The image of her in it, leaning against the door jam down stairs the night they met, flooded him with heat and tension. The cad in him wanted to grab it, too. Maybe he could persuade her to...
no
. Trying to push the luscious image from his mind, he pulled her closet door closed, quickly, and turned to the bags he had spread out on the bed. Folding the dress gently into the nearest one, he set about gathering the far more personal items. The tension in his thighs only heightened as he slid open her underwear drawer and started pulling silky wisps of lace and satin from within. Each delicate article he rubbed between his fingers sent lustful shivers over him.
I should not be here, should not be touching her things like this
. The thought only served to make him harder. Grabbing up whole handfuls roughly, he turned and stuffed them unceremoniously into a side pocket of one of her bags, breathing deeply to calm himself.

He rubbed his hand across the back of his neck, trying to slow his blood. If he was this excited just from seeing her clothes how was he supposed to behave himself with her in his apartment? Sighing sadly, he decided that he would have to convince her that staying with him would be too dangerous for her sensibilities.
Yeah, right
. He would never be convincing. He wanted her there too much. He was wasting time. Forcing himself to move, he went into her bathroom. Yet another room left completely untouched by the invasion, and everywhere he looked he saw, breathed in, traces of her. The smell of her soap and perfume hung in the air and her cosmetic sundries were spread femininely across the counter top. Warmth began spreading over him again, and he grabbed her shampoo and body wash hastily, tossing them into the small tote bag from her luggage set. Then he added her razor and as much of the cosmetics that he could manage to fit, not really sure what she used every day. To be honest, he wasn’t sure if she even wore makeup. Her complexion was perfect and he couldn’t remember seeing eyeshadow over those mystical eyes of hers. Regardless, if she needed it he was going to get it for her.

Deciding he was done, he turned to leave when his foot knocked Bucky’s food dish over. Remembering the dog, he grabbed the dish and food bag from the corner of the bathroom and headed back to her bed. Gathering up the bags, he left her apartment, sighing at the loss she would feel when she saw it again. He closed her splintered door and headed for his apartment, hoping to get a few hours sleep before he headed back to the hospital to see her again.

Elizabeth shifted uncomfortably in her hard hospital bed. Bucky flopped over on his side between her legs and nuzzled the inside of her blanketed thigh with his snout before huffing himself back to sleep. She couldn’t sit still anymore. They wouldn’t let her leave and they kept coming in and turning on the television. The annoying morning shows were driving her crazy. She was so bored. Her head was finally clear now and she felt fine. Her lip was the only thing that still hurt, and it only hurt a little. She had always been a fast healer and the faint bruise on her jaw had already faded to almost nothing, the split in her lip now no more than a thin red line. She wanted to go home, but her home had been violated. No, she didn’t want to go to her home, she wanted to go to his home. She closed her eyes and sat back into her pillows as she let thoughts of Matthew flood over her. There was so much she had wanted to tell him last night, but the sedative had robbed her of the comfort his presence had brought her. She was wondering when he would get here. She didn’t doubt for a moment that he would come, as early as he could manage.

The smell of the hospital breakfast that they had brought her turned her stomach.
Who eats cardboard flavored cream of wheat?
She had though disdainfully as she had forced herself to swallow her first, and last, spoonful. She was so hungry. Her hands flattened across her growling stomach and she pinched her eyes together, trying to bring the thoughts of Matt back.

“Anyone for a sesame seed bagel and cream cheese?” Her eyes popped open the second she heard his voice, her face spreading wide with her smile, the small cut in her lip pulling slightly.

“I think I might love you!” She had meant it playfully, but when she saw the flush of color spread over him, she flushed, too. What scared her the most was that she quite possibly meant it. Trying to wash away the awkward moment, she patted the bed next to her. A ridiculous gesture as the bed was barely big enough for her and the dog, but he seemed to understand. He moved across the room and held out the evidence box in his arms so that she could take the bag of goodies and the beverage tray off the top. While she held the food for him, he set the box aside and went about rearranging the furniture in her room so that they could eat and work from here.

“Can we eat yet? I’m starved!” She feigned a pout as he smiled at her. Pulling the now cleared bed table up between them, he sat on the stool and took the food from her. Slapping her hands away teasingly, he prepared her bagel for her and then, as she bit into it greedily, he added her customary sugar and cream to one of the cups of black coffee. Setting the cup near her, he started prepping his own breakfast. Then, as if they had been partners for years, they were sitting together, eating breakfast in blissful silence.

When she was licking the remnants of her bagel’s cream cheese topping off her fingers she caught sight of him shifting slightly. The sight filled her with wicked mischief and she made a rather vulgar show of the next one until she made him groan. Smiling slyly, she asked, “Why, Matthew Barrow, what has gotten into you?” Sliding the tray to the side quickly, he drew suddenly close to her. His breathing was heavy and uneasy as he stopped just an inch or so from her mouth.

“You have, you wicked, wonderful thing, you.” His words came out as a lush rasp and she purred in her throat as his mouth found hers. His kiss was too fleeting, though. The cold nose and rough tongue of Bucky lapping at their chins pulled them apart to pet him lovingly. “Ah well, I guess I should ask what’s in the box? Since we are apparently not going to get any privacy.” She ruffled the dog’s soft fur as Matt slunk back to his stool and returned the table to it’s position between them. His lips flattened slightly into a sad smile as he sighed.

“I’ve got the coroner’s report on the bodies from the house in the Hamptons and the lab analysis on that crap we found in the cistern. No pun intended.” They shared a light laugh as he cleared the table and started laying out everything he had brought with him. Elizabeth wanted to squeeze him tight for this. She had been sick with the idea of sitting in this room all day wondering what was happening with the case and he had brought the case to her. “Other than the pants, which sadly yielded nothing new, the blood we found was confirmed as the clerk’s and doorman’s. At least me know where they were carved. It’s strange to me that there were no chemical traces on the doorman’s uniform.” She could see the thoughtful confusion on his face.

Taking the report from his hands, she ventured a possible reason, if only to easy the unhappy look it brought to his wonderful azure eyes, “Maybe he made him take off his uniform up top. There isn’t much I would put past this guy.”

He nodded, but his brows remained furrowed as he found the evidence list still in the box. “It doesn’t look like anything from that cistern deals with our case, but here’s what they were able to find out anyway.” Clearing his throat dramatically he began to read from the rather short list included with the evidence bags. “There were sixteen used condoms,” his eyebrows raised at her suggestively, “three halfway house fliers, all the same one, a pretty destroyed program from some church, though they didn’t really get much more than that out of it, and one laminated Targstead Real Estate brochure.” Elizabeth had been thumbing through each of the described items, save the condoms, as he had listed them, but when she lifted the real estate brochure she had gasped. Matt’s concerned eyes jumped to her on the sound. “What is it?”

As he spoke, he was pushing the table aside so that he could get closer to her. She couldn’t shake the look of shock off her face as she held the familiar pamphlet in her hands. “Matt, this is my uncle Mark’s firm!” The revelation didn’t seem to hit him the way it had hit her, as he had already guessed as much from the name. So, she expounded on what had her so flustered. “No, you don’t understand. These brochures aren’t laminated. I helped him design them a couple of years ago. Plus, did you read the properties list? Matt, the house in the Hamptons is listed on here.” That seemed to get his attention as he pulled the evident bag from her hand.