Ripper (6 page)

Daniel’s smile was radiant and I knew he loved someone very much. “He opens himself up to possibilities.”

And then he was off. I let my head hit the soft cushion on the side of the couch and the world slipped away from me.

* * * *

I woke up to the horrible urge to get to a toilet as soon as I possibly could. I threw back the covers, not bothering to wonder how I’d made it to bed, and stumbled to the bathroom, slammed the door, and made it to my knees just as everything in my stomach decided to make a repeat appearance.

After I’d finished the business of getting rid of the toxins left in my gut, I sat on the cold tile of the tiny bathroom listening to the argument going on in the living room. It didn’t help the shakes I had.

“Give her a fucking break, man,” I heard Jamie say.

“How about you give me a break, Jamie,” Nathan shot back. “You’re not the one who has to scrape her off the floor and haul her ass home every time she pulls this crap. You don’t have to see her like that.”

My oldest brother’s voice was serious, and I wondered how long they’d been at this fight. “She hasn’t pulled anything like this in almost a year. What the hell happened?”

I could see Nathan’s hazel eyes roll. “She took a missing person case. The person is a shifter.”

“Damn it,” Jamie cursed. “Who the hell thought that was a good idea?”

“Me,” I whispered because they couldn’t hear me and probably wouldn’t listen even if they could.

“Probably Liv.” Nathan sounded exasperated and I wondered if he’d slept on the couch last night. “I already left a message on her cell giving her my opinion.”

“Maybe it’s a good idea.” Jamie sighed. “She can’t hide forever.”

“Why not?” Nate asked. “Ninety-five percent of the world is normal. Why can’t she ignore the five percent that’s weird? She can’t handle it.”

“What do you mean she can’t handle it? Trust me, Kelsey can handle just about anything out there. I would take her in as backup any day of the week. She’s a badass. The only reason I didn’t offer her a job with me was you talked me out of it. You were the one who thought she should come out here and bury her head in the suburbs.”

It was nice to know my brothers didn’t think I could make a single decision on my own. I’d worked damn hard, well, somewhat hard, to build my business, but for Jamie it came down to letting me bury my head in the sand. I turned on the cold water in my shower and thought about crawling back into bed. I could pull the covers over my head and let the boys fight it out. Instead, I shucked last night’s clothes and nearly screamed as the cold water hit my body. Crawling back into bed wasn’t going to help Joanne Taylor. It was Friday and I had a full day planned. I needed to talk to Professor Peter Hamilton and then tonight I was going to check out those addresses in her book. It wasn’t Joanne’s or Helen’s fault that I got my ass roasted last night and felt like shit.

After I was vaguely clean, I turned off the water and wrapped a towel around my body. I brushed my teeth and decided to let my hair dry on its own. I was thinking I could sneak out, stop by Sonic for breakfast, and be in Dallas before noon. Before I’d gone on my bender, I’d managed to check into Joanne’s e-mail accounts, with her mother’s help. I’d found nothing there. I’d also looked up her class schedule. There was only one that really interested me. Professor Peter Hamilton’s office hours were from one to three on Fridays. I just needed to get past the arguing boys. They didn’t need me to decide how my life should go. The truth was I was feeling a little better. No matter what Nathan said, I was trying to help someone and that felt good.

I swung the door open and ran into the middle of a hunk of nicely made masculine flesh. I caught my breath because I hadn’t sensed him there at all and that was definitely a different experience for me. Usually I could tell when someone or something was close to me. It was all a part of having great hunter instincts. I was aware of my surroundings. This guy had been completely off my radar. I looked up and into the most seriously blue eyes I’d ever seen. They were so dark they were almost purple.

Again, not human, but I couldn’t tell for the life of me what this man was besides gorgeous. He made my breath catch.

“If you’re done with the physical parts of your hangover, might I tempt you with some coffee?” His generous lips cracked into a lopsided smile. His Texas accent was slow, but there was nothing at all uneducated about it. If I had to place a bet on his voice and the way he carried himself, I would say he’d been raised by wealthy parents.

I clutched the towel closer. “You’re tempting me with my own coffee? And who the hell are you?”

I should have been worried about a massive hunk of nonhuman male accosting me outside my bedroom door, but I was too busy staring at him.

“Well, sweetheart, I didn’t bring any of mine.” His eyes roamed the expanse of skin not hidden by the white towel.

I forced myself to back away. The man in front of me was dressed in jeans and a T-shirt. He had well-worn cowboy boots on his feet. I would have pegged him as late twenties, no more than thirty. He was a big, broad man who stood almost a foot taller than me, which made him roughly six foot four. And he spent a lot of time in a gym.

“I’m not your sweetheart.” I didn’t like the way he made my heart pound.

“You can’t possibly know that,” the man said with a smile in his voice. I looked up, and that smile was on his face as well. His hair was a dark brown and cut way too short. I would bet it was thick and wavy when he grew it out, but his cut was almost military. “We just met so there’s absolutely no way for you to know if you’re my sweetheart or not.”

I snorted, not a pretty sound. “I bet you say that to all the girls you accost coming out of the bathroom.”

“Would it help if I told you there weren’t that many?” He backed off a little, giving me the tiniest bit of space. “Normally, I’m a right bastard with everyone I meet.”

My hand was on the door to my bedroom. All I had to do was turn the knob and slip into the room. He wouldn’t follow me. I stood there, unwilling to leave him just yet. “What makes me so special?”

“Well, you’re my best friend’s sister to start with,” he said.

“You’re Grayson Sloane.” Well, that did it. Jamie’s best friend and part-time partner.

His grin faltered for the first time. “You say that like it’s a bad thing.”

“Jamie talks about you all the time.” I quickly relegated any fantasies I was already having to the scrap pile. I wasn’t about to start playing around with my brother’s bestie. I’d tried that with Dan last night and it had gotten me in hot water. “Nice to meet you, Sloane.”

I slipped into the bedroom and shut the door behind me. And I quickly realized that I’d been wrong. He did follow me.

“Dude, privacy.” My towel had been about to hit the floor. I clung to it.

“Do not dude me, Kelsey. Get dressed and I’ll make you breakfast.” Gray was cool as he stood in the doorway, like he often found himself in a strange half naked woman’s bedroom.

“I can find my own breakfast, thank you.” I could feel my face going stubborn.

“Ten minutes, okay?”

“Have you listened to anything I said? I’ll pick up something to eat on my way out.”

“All right, then. Ten minutes.” He smiled like I had politely agreed with him. “See you then, Kelsey. Don’t try sneaking out. I’ll catch you. Do you like your eggs scrambled or fried?”

“I like my eggs in between a biscuit and wrapped in foil so I can eat it while I drive.” No matter how hot he was, he was rapidly getting on my last nerve.

“Scrambled sounds good to me, too,” he said as he closed the door behind him.

I stared for a minute and wondered if the dude had been damaged. In his line of work, it could totally happen. I dressed quickly and used the towel to dry my hair as much as possible. Unfortunately I caught sight of myself in the mirror and then I was a little nauseous again. There was no doubt the girl in the mirror had a rough night. My eyes were bloodshot and there were dark circles under them. I was insane to think that whatever Grayson Sloane was up to had anything to do with wanting my glorious body. Because I looked rough. He was probably here to…oh, god. A really horrible thought hit me. I prayed he wasn’t here to do that. I wouldn’t be able to handle the mortification. I shoved my feet into my sneakers and stalked to the kitchen to confront the big guy.

“Are you here to haul me into rehab?”

Sloane stopped turning over the bacon he was frying and laughed. “No. I’m not here to drag you kicking and screaming into some twelve-step program. Jamie and I were practicing at the gun range when Nathan called. I asked Jamie if he minded if I came along. It was easier than dropping me back at my house.”

“Are they planning an intervention?” The thought made me a little sick. I couldn’t imagine a whole bunch of people sitting around begging me not to drink myself to death and sending me to a place where a psychiatrist would ask me why I drink. I would say hey, doc, have you ever seen a werewolf cut down in the prime of life? Ever been responsible for multiple homicides?

And then I would be placed on a 72-hour hold.

No. I wasn’t heading to rehab.

Sloane pulled two pieces of bacon out of the skillet and laid them on the plate that already had eggs and a couple of slices of toast. The smell should have sent me reeling, but my stomach was pretty strong and it grumbled at the thought of my stubbornness costing me the bacon. Healthy appetite doesn’t begin to cover what I have. Luckily, I’ve always had the metabolism to go with it.

“Are they planning an intervention?” Sloane’s deep voice washed over me like a calm, warm rain. That voice was soothing. “Maybe. Nate seems a little freaked out. Jamie seems…encouraged, maybe. He thinks it’s a good thing you’re working again. According to him, you’re talented and you’re wasting your gifts working for insurance companies and angry divorcees.” He handed me the plate and I gave up the fight.

I sat down at the kitchen table and dug in with gusto. “It’s not like I’ve been sitting on my ass.”

Sloane set a cup of coffee in front of me and then settled his big body onto my dining table chair. The morning light was kind to him, softening the hard planes of his face and making what was almost certainly a tough man look a little gentle. “Jamie thinks you should start working with us.”

I laughed. Sloane was the only person Jamie worked with on a regular basis and even then, it was only when Sloane brought him in. Grayson Sloane was a certified badass. That’s the only way to describe a real Texas Ranger. “Yeah, I bet I could pass whatever test your captain gives to contractors.”

He shook his head, setting down his coffee. “Probably not, but then I’m given an enormous amount of latitude when it comes to who I work with. I answer to the
B
company captain, but that’s technical. He doesn’t want to know what I do. He wishes he didn’t have to deal with me at all. It’s why he doesn’t question the reqs I put in for Jamie’s services.”

I took a long drink, the caffeine starting to work in my system. I supposed it was hard to be the Mulder of the Ranger world. Sloane handled all the “weird stuff,” meaning anything even vaguely supernatural. He was probably an outcast among his own peers. It made sense that he and Jamie were friends. They understood the same world.

“Hey little sister,” Jamie said, walking into the kitchen. “I like the new paint in the living room. How are you feeling?”

“Like shit,” I replied before polishing off the toast. Yeah, food had done wonders for me. “But I still have a job to do so I’ll suck it up. I’m sorry Nate felt like he had to call you. Last night was…a slipup. I ended up in a tense situation with a wolf and he apparently knew Dad.”

Jamie let out a deep breath and slumped into the chair across from me. My thirty-two-year-old brother seemed so much older as he thought about our father. “I’m so sorry, Kels.”

I sat back in my chair. “Do you run into many people who knew him?”

“I do,” Jamie acknowledged. “The bastard cut a wide swath. There’s no getting around it. He hurt a lot of people, and they don’t forget that he’s still out there. But they get used to me and if they don’t, I kick their ass. I won’t lie to you. If you want to work in this world, you’re going to have to make them accept you. Believe it or not, Nate can help you more with that than even I can. Nate has some powerful friends.”

I laughed at the thought. “Yeah, well, I probably won’t be meeting them. I met one of his gamer geek friends last night and I’m sure he’ll run the next time he sees me. I kind of hit on him.”

Jamie laughed but Sloane didn’t. He got up and poured himself another cup of coffee.

“Tell me about this case of yours,” Jamie said.

I shrugged, looking at the clock. I needed to get out of here soon if I was going to make it all the way to Dallas. “It’s a missing person case. She’s a shifter, lost her college scholarship and went on the game. Unfortunately, I’m pretty sure she’s in trouble. I’ve got an appointment with one of her professors in two hours. It’s probably a dead end, but she’d been spending a lot of time with him according to her roommate.”

“Hey, aren’t you working some missing person cases?” Jamie asked Sloane as he settled back down.

“Yeah,” the Ranger replied. “We have some missing supes. It’s not a bunch, four cases, all young women, but considering how small the community is, I was asked to look into it.”

“Were they hookers?” I asked, getting that tingle in the back of my skull that told me I was on to something.

“Not exactly,” Sloane prevaricated. “Look it’s an open case. I really shouldn’t talk about it.”

Something about the way he spoke had me sitting up tall again. He was hiding something. It was there in the way his eyes tightened. If not hiding something, he was definitely blowing me off when he shouldn’t be. If he was working missing persons, he should want to trade notes. “But if I could get a look at your files I could maybe see a pattern. Were the girls all in college? Were they all from Dallas? What do you mean not exactly? How do you not exactly prostitute yourself?”