The Trap Read online

  A kindergarten teacher? Nausea churned in Nicholas’s gut. Gravity pulled the blood from his face as he memorized the woman’s features.

  “The X Marks the Spot Killer.” Madeline Striker, the unit’s kidnapping expert, unfolded her arms and set her elbows on the table. Dark, layered hair with golden highlights framed perfectly angled warm brown cheekbones. A hard light of dedication to find the missing echoed in her dark, rich eyes. Her flawless complexion made her look younger than her age, but any perp who had the guts to take advantage learned Striker had an uncanny ability to handle herself. “He chose women who were in their early to mid-twenties, single, with short brown hair, and were much smaller than him to make it easier to strangle them from behind. He was all about control, domination. She matches his profile.”

  Nicholas’s ears rang as images of his childhood superimposed the faces of the victims from his first case assignment for the unit three years ago. He forced himself to take a deep breath, to come up with some other explanation as to why Kara Flood had been targeted, strangled and mutilated with an X. They’d found the killer. They’d put the bastard behind bars.

  Confusion altered the clean lines of Madeline’s dark eyebrows. “He hunted his victims in that same neighborhood, but Cole Presley was found guilty and sentenced to life behind bars. We need to contact the warden at Washington State Corrections to ensure Presley is still accounted for.”

  “We never released the details of the X Marks the Spot case to the public, and there haven’t been any leaks in information as far as I can tell after the conclusion of the trial.” BAU’s resident cybercrimes expert, Dashiell West, tapped his hand against the table. The light from the agent’s laptop cast shadows along chiseled features and thick beard growth. Two years older than Nicholas, West had more experience in the digital world, but serial cases would always default to Nicholas. Especially this one. “The only way this guy could’ve gotten the specifics of how the victims were killed is if he was involved in the case somehow. Maybe one of the original victims’ family members? They would’ve been informed about manner of death.”

  “The X Marks the Spot Killer strangled and mutilated thirty victims over thirty years that we know of, every year on the same day. Assuming one of the victims’ family members is involved, that leaves hundreds of suspects.”

  Only Nicholas had known the killer by a different name when he’d been a kid. Right up until he’d put the cuffs on a man he’d trusted his entire life. The bones under his knuckles threatened to break free from the calloused skin on the back of his hands. Kara Flood. He didn’t know the victim or recognize her name directly, but instinct heightened all the same as he studied postmortem photos of the woman discovered this morning. He could almost see the resemblance, and a shot of warmth dumped into his veins. Dark brown hair, same shade of honey-colored eyes, possibly a similar face shape. Had the victim been related to Dr. Aubrey Flood, the medical examiner who’d performed the autopsies on the last three victims of the X Marks the Spot Killer? He scanned the file in front of him. “The sister found the body.”

  “Yes.” The lines around SSA Peters’s mouth smoothed. “According to her statement given to Seattle PD this morning, Dr. Aubrey Flood found the map taped to her door this morning, then immediately tried calling the victim. When she didn’t get an answer, she followed the clues the killer had left for her. Forensics is trying to pull prints from the map and the tape, but the lab is backed up as it is. We won’t have results for a few days.”

  “Dr. Flood was the ME in the original case. She performed the autopsies on Presley’s last three victims.” Nicholas licked his suddenly dry lips as a visual of the doc replaced the violent memories in his head. Wisps of soft medium-length brown hair highlighting a creamy complexion, a honey-warm gaze that had pierced straight through him and the voice of a siren tempting him to believe in something other than the worst in people.

  He’d only met the medical examiner a handful of times to discuss the initial case, but there always seemed to be a forged intimacy between everyone involved in a serial investigation. Emergency responders, agents assigned to the case, the first officers on scene. Drowning in that kind of darkness brought out a need for safe human contact that even the most veteran investigators clung to, and Aubrey had been part of the team. She’d been professional, respectful and warm toward the victims under her scalpel, a miracle considering the kind of work she had to face on a daily basis as Seattle’s chief examiner.

  “She gave us the exact type of blade Cole Presley used to carve an X into each of the victims’ cheeks by swabbing particles from the wounds and testing hundreds of blades. Without her insight, we never would’ve caught up to him. We can’t discount the possibility her sister’s death might be some kind of retaliation from one of his super fans.”

  “You think this killer might be trying to get the attention of the X Marks the Spot Killer by drawing out the medical examiner who put him away.” SSA Peters centered himself in the light from the projector as the slideshow ended. The FBI seal tinted the antiterrorism expert’s Cuban American skin tone blue.

  “It makes sense, but I think there’s more at play than we’re seeing here. This is the first victim we’ve uncovered using a previous serial’s MO, and something tells me it won’t be the last.” Not when Dr. Flood was quickly becoming a central element to this case. Nicholas studied the photos of the victim again. “It can’t be a coincidence Kara Flood was strangled and marked after her sister became connected to the case, or that the killer delivered the map directly to Aubrey Flood’s door. His target wasn’t random.”

  Nicholas raised his attention to SSA Peters. The question was why. That was the specialty of the Behavioral Analysis Unit—to make sense of the incomprehensible, to get into the minds of humanity’s worst killers to stop them from striking again. Cole Presley had strangled young women in their twenties with brown hair and marked them with an X to show the victims’ family members where to find his treasure, his masterpieces, but Nicholas wasn’t willing to risk Aubrey Flood’s life in order to add to his profile of this killer. He closed the file in front of him. “He knew exactly what he was doing and whom he wanted to draw into his game.”

  “All right. I’ve got Caitlyn Yang meeting with Dr. Flood and the family now to fill them in on the investigation and explain where we go from here. Dr. Flood is one of us, and we owe her nothing less than the full support of this unit.” SSA Peters straightened. “West, I need you to search through security footage from the good doctor’s apartment building. There might be something there to give us an idea of when our unsub left the note so we can track his movements last night. James and Striker, take Dyson to check out the scene where the killer dumped the body. I want to know if anyone noticed our victim or her killer before she wound up in front of her apartment building.”

  “You got it.” Nicholas pushed away from the conference table and headed for the double glass doors leading out into the main offices. Blinding hits of sunlight glimmered across Puget Sound through the floor-to-ceiling windows. Liam McDare, the tall, lanky IT tech with an easy smile, unplugged the projector from his laptop and nodded as he passed.

  “Agent James, a minute,” SSA Peters said from behind.

  Pivoting, Nicholas let the team maneuver past him as he faced the supervisory agent. “Sir?”

  “Dr. Flood specifically requested for you to work this case after your work together three years ago, but I know how close you were to Cole Presley before you discovered who he really was.” SSA Peters stalked toward him, and Nicholas’s defenses automatically bristled. “No one would blame you if you recused yourself from this case. It isn’t every day we find out the people we trust aren’t who they seem. The team is here for you. However you need.”

  His mind instantly snapped back to the moment he’d cuffed the man who’d taught him how to play catch, how to drive, who’d been the role model he’d needed in his life when his
father hadn’t been around. His next-door neighbor had turned out to be the X Marks the Spot Killer, the very same killer who’d inspired him to join the BAU. SSA Peters was right. He’d never be able to trust the mask people presented to the world, including the pretty face that’d been the key to putting Cole Presley behind bars. “It won’t be a problem.”

  * * *

  THE KING COUNTY Medical Examiner’s Office had already taken possession of her sister’s remains at her request, but Dr. Aubrey Flood could still see the exact position the killer had left Kara in. Low voices carried through the white noise of cars passing, the weight of Seattle PD’s attention on her crushing what little oxygen she’d managed to hang on to since this morning from her lungs.

  She stared at the bench where she’d found Kara this morning, knowing exactly where the map that’d been taped to her door would lead. She didn’t know why she was here, didn’t know what she’d intended to accomplish by coming back. Her sister had been strangled, carved up with a deep laceration in the shape of an X in her right cheek and left for her to find. A knot of familiarity twisted tight in her stomach. Dr. Archer Caldwell, her counterpart for the county, would’ve already done the preliminary examination by now with such a high-profile case, but Aubrey needed to be here. There were too many similarities between her sister’s death and the first serial case she’d handled three years ago. She needed to find answers.

  Wiping her damp palms down her slacks, she maneuvered through the crowd of onlookers and neighbors being kept behind the crime scene tape and flashed her credentials to the officer assigned perimeter security. “Excuse me, I’m Dr. Aubrey Flood with the Seattle Medical Examiner’s Office. I was told Special Agent Nicholas James from the Behavioral Analysis Unit would be on scene.”

  Nicholas James, the serial expert who’d caught Seattle’s most notorious killer on his first assignment for the BAU. She hadn’t interacted with him more than a few times when he’d been present for the autopsies of the X Marks the Spot Killer’s victims, but he’d made one hell of an impression. If anyone could give her answers about the details of Kara’s case, it would be him.

  “The FBI just arrived, ma’am.” He lifted the crime scene tape for her to pass, and she ducked underneath without hesitation. Pointing behind him, he set the perimeter back into place. “Agents James and Striker are setting up the command center across the street. The King County ME already claimed the body, though. They must’ve sent you by accident.”

  Not by accident. Aubrey’s office wouldn’t take responsibility for this case due to the conflict of interest, but she wasn’t going to sit this one out, either. Kara had been disposed of for Aubrey to find. Like so many others before her. She nodded. “Thank you.”

  The command center was nothing more than a generic shade canopy with two folding tables, a few chairs and boxes of equipment the forensics team relied on to collect their evidence. Only there wouldn’t be any. No DNA. No particulates they’d be able to identify on or around the bench. Nothing. If her sister’s death had anything to do with the X Marks the Spot Killer, the attacker would’ve been too careful for that. Her heart jerked in her chest as she walked toward the tent. She forced herself to keep her attention forward, not on the spot where she’d found Kara this morning.

  Sea-salted air grazed against her face and neck as she caught sight of the federal agent she hadn’t been able to forget. Nicholas James. Gull calls pierced through the hard beat of her pulse behind her ears. Sweat that had nothing to do with the rising temperatures of July in the Pacific Northwest beaded along her collarbone and slid beneath her shirt. Green-blue eyes—the same color as Puget Sound behind her—locked on her as though he’d sensed her approach, and a buzzing filled her head. His mouth parted, highlighting the thick, dirty-blond beard growth along his jaw and upper lip. Styled, equally low-lit hair protested the breeze coming off the water as he maneuvered around the table under the canopy. A perfectly sculpted nose with a dent at the bridge—presumably from a childhood injury—divided symmetrical features and deep laugh lines she’d never had the pleasure of seeing firsthand, but she imagined smiles were few and far between in his line of work. Just as they were in hers.

  Aubrey extended her hand. “Special Agent James, you might not remember me, but I’m—”

  “Dr. Flood.” He took her hand, rough calluses tugging the oversensitized skin of her palms. His voice, smooth as one-hundred-year-old whiskey, slid through her and battled to calm the jagged edges of anxiety and grief tearing through her. “How could I forget? If it wasn’t for you, Cole Presley would still be out there.”

  Her neck and face heated. He remembered her from their short interactions during the X Marks the Spot case, even with the added impersonal environment of her morgue in the basement of Harborview Medical downtown. She ducked her head to cut off eye contact long enough to get her head on straight and released his hand. This wasn’t a social visit. This was a death scene, and it was taking every ounce of her being not to break down in the middle of it or in front of him. Swallowing the thickness in her mouth, she cleared her throat. “I gave you the specifics about the lacerations in the victims’ cheeks and the blend of steel. You’re the one who recognized the blade the killer used.”

  Warmth seeped from her hand as Nicholas pulled back. “Dr. Flood—”

  “Aubrey.” She folded her arms across her chest as if one simple action could deflect what he was about to say to her. “You can call me Aubrey, and I know I’m not supposed to be here. I just...” Her gaze wandered to that spot, the bench where she’d found Kara staring out across the street as though her sister had been sitting there waiting for her to arrive. Her clothes had been pristine, probably the same outfit she’d worn to teach her kindergarten class yesterday. Not a single wrinkle or an askew fold. Her face had been flawlessly made up apart from the deep laceration in her cheek. The lack of blood in the wound indicated she’d already been dead when the killer had taken the blade—or whatever he’d used—to her sister’s beautiful face.

  Aubrey covered her mouth with one hand to hide the fact her lips trembled under the visual. She sniffed to gain her composure and refocused on the agent in front of her. The man who was going to find her sister’s killer. She blinked to clear her head, but there was no amount of emotional detachment that would erase the images behind her eyes. Standing tall, she tried to keep the professionalism she used with decedents’ family members after completing the autopsies assigned in her voice when all she wanted to do was fall apart. “Have you found her dog?”

  “The victim owned a dog?” Nicholas hiked his suit jacket behind his hips and leveraged both hands at his belt. A shoulder holster traced the long, lean muscle of his torso and highlighted the strength under the clean white button-down shirt and tie.

  “Yes.” Aubrey nodded, for something to do other than sob in the middle of a crime scene. “Kara walked her white shepherd every night at 10:00 p.m. Dr. Caldwell—the King County ME—placed time of death around then. That’s probably what my sister was doing before she was attacked.”

  “We didn’t find any evidence of a dog, but we’re waiting to hear from the owner of the victim’s...your sister’s building to gain access to her apartment.” A flash of regret colored his expression. “Is it possible she left her apartment on her own last night?”

  “It’s possible, but that wouldn’t explain why Kara was out so late.” She struggled to come up with another reason her sister would’ve been out. “She wrestled with five-and six-year-olds all day at school, and part of her winding-down routine included walking Koko. She said it helped her sleep better.”

  “When was the last time you talked with your sister?” Agent James asked.

  “We talk every night before she goes to bed, around 10:30 p.m. We never miss a call unless something comes up, but we always let each other know in advance so we don’t assume the worst. Our parents—” She closed her eyes as a wave of dizziness threa
tened to rip the world straight out from under her. “My parents are retired, and unless we force them, they’re not interested in leaving the house much anymore. We take turns looking in on them. We bring them groceries, take them for walks around the neighborhood, keep them company, and we update each other on any changes or problems we had during the day.”

  Her blood pressure spiked. Seattle PD had done their due diligence and reached out to Kara’s next of kin, her parents, after Aubrey had discovered the body and called police, and she hadn’t been there with them. The public relations liaison from the BAU—Caitlyn something—had reassured her mother and father that the investigation was moving in the right direction, but Aubrey should’ve been there. Her eyes burned. This wasn’t another homicide that she’d be able to compartmentalize at the end of the day. This was Kara, and she didn’t know how to process the fact someone she loved—someone she’d been responsible for—would be laid out on a cold examination table and dissected for evidence.

  “That’s when you knew something was wrong. When she didn’t pick up the phone?” That brilliant gaze assessed her every move, every change in her expression, and she suddenly felt as though Nicholas James was the only person keeping her anchored to the earth.

  “Yes,” she said. “She didn’t answer when I called, and I kept trying to get through to her, but there was no answer. I was getting ready to go by her apartment when I found the note taped to my door.”

  “Do you recall hearing anything odd outside your apartment last night between 10:00 p.m. and 11:00 p.m.? See anything unusual?” The intensity in his body language slid down to his hands as he reached into his jacket pocket for a notepad and pen.

  “No. Nothing like that.” He had to ask. He had to go over the details multiple times to ensure investigators wouldn’t miss anything. She’d told all this to Seattle PD, but as the lead investigator on Kara’s case, she understood he had to hear it for himself. “Agent James, I worked the X Marks the Spot Killer case, too. I’m familiar with the way Cole Presley killed his victims and left maps for their families to follow the clues to the bodies, and Kara was...”