Redemption is Here (An FBI/Romance Thriller Book 9) (61 page)

Callen snickered.

“Why weren’t they together? He couldn’t pull the trigger and marry her?”

“Maybe she wasn’t the marrying type.
Not all women that men screw are the ones they want to give their last name to. I was dating that flight attendant and never once did I want to marry her.”

Callen was with him on that. “I was only marrying Desdemona because I couldn’t be with you. I wanted to give you my name, and ironically I
still can’t, but at least I get to have you in my heart.”

She could hear the hurt in his voice, and immediately she worked on a way to take care of it. Honestly, it bothered her a little that Cat and EJ didn't share a name with her.

“We better get this interview done. Keep your eyes open and give me an impression of what you see,” she stated.

As they approached the door
, it was wrenched open, and an angry man stood there waiting for them. “When can I get her?” he demanded.

Elizabeth strode in. She wanted to see the inside of his humble abode. “We should go sit down and talk, Mr. Dixon.”

He stormed toward a room to flop down on the couch. “Fine. Talk.”

It was hard not to notice the décor. Yeah, mystery solved. Elizabeth wouldn’t have been able to move in either if she was the mistress. Above the fireplace, there sat a giant portrait of
a woman she imagined was his deceased wife. She was larger than life, and in fact, she looked…angelic.

It was freaking creepy.

This was like a monument to the dead family he lost.

“Nice painting,” she said, pointing it out. She could read the look on both men’s faces. They understood now too.

“It’s Melissa. I believe she watches over me from heaven. She’s my guardian angel.”

Yeah, that was one hell of a statement from a man who was banging his mistress while she died in a fire.

“Are those your children?” she asked, pointing to the other walls.

“Yes.”

No wonder he couldn’t commit to Emelia. He was surrounded by his past whenever he was home.

“We need to ask you some follow-up questions, and maybe you can
enlighten us a little.”

He stared at her.

Elizabeth noticed he looked like hell. His eyes were bloodshot and his skin was pale. The man was suffering, but the big question they had was it from his mistress and wife now both being gone or from a guilty conscience?

“Ask.”

“Why didn't Emelia live here with you?”

He closed his eyes. “She wanted it to be her house, but I wouldn’t erase my kids and wife. I’m not ready to let go. We fought about it all the time, so it became easier to just pay her rent on a small apartment elsewhere.”

“Did you kill Emelia?” she asked.

He glared at her.

“Your wife dies in a fire, and suddenly a serial killer comes to town, and your mistress is next. Did she try and leave you? Were you pissed and had to make her pay?”

He clenched his fists.

“It looks damn suspicious to us.”

“I don’t care what it looks like,” he stated. Standing, he pointed. “Get out of my house. If you want to talk to me, do it through my lawyer. In fact, you’ll hear from him. I’m going to get Emelia’s body released if I have to buy it back.”

They stood. “Yeah, money doesn’t really work with us, but I tell you what, it makes me think you have something to hide. I mean if you have her body, then you can bury what happened, right?”

He got angry.

“Get out.”

They headed
toward the door. “We’ll be back, Mr. Dixon. You may want to get that lawyer on retainer. You’re on the top of my suspect list. By any chance were you purchasing the services of a hooker named Kaylee?”

Her bluntness did what she intended.

His face registered it all. Rushing Elizabeth, he tried to get his hands on her. Unfortunately for him, Ethan was in the way. He shoved him to the ground and rolled him to his stomach.

“Just because you didn't care if your wife was safe, doesn’t mean I feel the same. Consider yourself lucky, Mr. Dixon,” he hissed, releasing his thumb.

The man began sobbing on the floor.

Outside, Ethan brushed the lint off his sleeve.

“I’m so glad you two are back to your own clothes. Watching you take down a man, while you’re in a suit, is sexy.”

Callen
rolled his eyes. “You do realize I let him have all the glory, right?”

She laughed.

Hopping into the Navigator, they
headed down the driveway. “Where to now, Lyzee?” Ethan asked.

She stared at her watch. “Well, it looks like we can head to the house of sexified fun.”

“Can we shop?” Callen asked. “I saw this leather outfit, and it would look smokin’ hot on you, especially while your breasts are all pregnified.”

She stared at him. “Are you
out of your damn mind?”

“Yes, about you.”

She shook her head. It amused her that now he was making up words, much like she did.

“What am I going to do with you two?”

The men looked at each other. “Anything you want,” they replied together, right before breaking into laughter.

She rolled her eyes
.

There were days she was outmatched.

This was one of them.

Pulling up to the sex shop, they noticed that it was quiet.
What astounded her was that in the parking lot, there were people already waiting to shop for sex items.

It was early yet. Now, she knew why Devil’s Lake had very little crime. People were too busy having sex.

Hopping down from the Navigator, she approached the closest vehicle. Immediately, the man behind the wheel rolled his window down.

“She’s usually open by now, hot stuff. Want to join me in the back room to pick out a pair of handcuffs?”

The back door of the vehicle opened and Callen stepped out. His arms were across his chest, and his face said it all.

If that wasn’t a big enough
deterrent, Elizabeth pulled her badge and held it up for him to see.

“FBI. You may want to head out of here, or I’ll be using my handcuffs on you
for soliciting sex,” she said, pulling her jacket back. They sat right beside her sidearm.

It was all it took.

Both cars got the hell out of there, and fast.

Ethan and Callen snickered
as they headed over to the door. It was indeed still closed, which was odd, since they opened an hour ago.

The lights were on too.

Staring in the window, something out of place caught her eye. “Ethan, does that look like blood?” she asked, pointing at the footprints across the floor, leading toward the door.

He peered inside.

“Yeah, it does.”

“This gives us reason to enter,” stated Callen, heading back to the Navigator.
From the trunk, he pulled out a few tools. When he returned, he offered them to his brother. “You want to do the honors?”

He let his brother have this one
. “No, have at it. I got to tackle Wade Dixon. It’s your turn to get her all hot and bothered with B&E.”

Callen dropped and began playing with the lock. It didn't take long for them to hear a click. Apparently, he still had it.

Getting up, they all pulled their weapons. Using the sleeve of her blazer, Elizabeth pulled the door open. Ethan kicked it back, far enough for them to enter.

Heading in, they
immediately smelled it. The first time they were in there, it was all fruity from all the lube samples. Now, it reeked of death.

Yeah, someone was dead, and they had a good idea who.

Rounding the corner, they only needed to follow the trail of blood. It was then that they found her.

Toni Michelle was dead.

On the floor, her arms were splayed out at her sides and the rest of Toni Michelle’s body was mutilated.

“Well, this answers our question on whether or not our killer was going to take a break and regroup or go bat shit insane.”

Callen stared down at her. “Well, at least we don’t have to look for her missing parts. He took her eyes.”

Yeah, they really had a problem.

~ Chapter Seventeen ~

As the tech team and doctors began arriving, a crowd was also beginning to gather. Needing the help, they called in the
local deputies to maintain a perimeter around the sex shop.

The last thing they needed was the media getting pictures of the woman.

When Zane was fully dressed in his protective gear, they all headed in. Once he saw the body, he whistled.

“Well, someone’s a tad bit pissed off,” he stated, staring at the remains. Their victim, Toni Michelle, was eviscerated, laid out with her arms at her sides, and
had her eyes taken.

“Yeah, apparently, we
were right when we believed he would escalate. This one time, I would have preferred to be wrong,” stated Elizabeth.

Zane crouched beside the victim
after the techs had snapped pictures. When he went to move her arm, it was still stiff. “She’s been dead less than twelve hours. That’s going to be the best I can give you. If I check her liver, which is right there,” he said, pointing at it outside her body. “It’s not going to be accurate. The air conditioning is on in here, and it’s going to have dropped the core temperature,” he stated, picking up some of her intestines. “I don’t know if the killer did it on purpose or not, but he managed to mask TOD.”

Just at that moment, Tony walked in with Jaxon right behind
him.

The entire team saw it coming.

The look on her face said it all.

“Get her out of her, Tony. She’s going to
toss her cookies,” Elizabeth said emotionlessly. She only wished that she could still get sick over things like this. Unfortunately, this wasn’t her first evisceration, and in fact, it wasn’t Tony’s either.

Quickly, he pulled her back outside.

“What can you tell me?” Elizabeth asked.

“Well, from the way the she’s cut open, he used a very dull knife
. It wasn’t a scalpel or medical instrument. You can tell that it’s jagged and the edges of flesh appear to be torn.”

They all crouched. There was nothing like the smell of inverted bowel to brighten your day.

“Was she alive?”

He
examined the edges of her wounds before shaking his head. “No, she wasn’t.”

“Well, there’s a small miracle,” Elizabeth
admitted.

“If he
followed his previous MO, like with the other women, it’s likely she was strangled. If she still had her eyes, I would be able to tell by petechial hemorrhaging, but we’re out of luck,” Zane stated. “I’ll need to check out her hyoid when I open up her neck.”

“Yeah, I think she’s more the one who ran out of luck. We’re all still alive and our organs are innies, not outies.”

“We should bag her up. I don’t like leaving her spread out like this. It looks like he positioned her for some reason.”

Elizabeth stood. “He’s mimicking Christ on the cross,” she stated.
“He was stabbed in his side with a soldier’s sword, and then strung up to die.”

“Or so the tale goes,” Doctor Zane said.

“Yeah, he’s escalated,” stated Callen.

Elizabeth looked around the room. “I don’t see cameras, do you?” she asked, hoping for a visual on their killer. Instead, it looked like they were shit out of luck.

“Nope. It’s Devil’s Lake. I doubt there’s a ton of crime here.”

“Tell that to Toni Michelle. She’s the new poster child for having
extra security.”

Ethan pulled up her address on his tablet. “She resided upstairs. We should go check it out while our team does their thing.”

They all watched Zane and a tech try and place her intestines inside a body bag. It was sad, gross, and a little comical all at once.

“Yeah, we will, but
first I want to go talk to the other doctors.”

“
Are you going to bust balls?” Callen asked.

She sighed, lowering her voice. “No. I’m going to send them back to the cabin. Our victim is fleshy. Tomorrow
, she’ll be bones, and they can come in and help. For now, I’ll cut her a break.”