Page 32 of An Unending Claim

PEYTON

Since B had tried to abduct me, there had been no sign of him, but I wasn’t stupid enough to believe that he’d given up. Things were heating up within the Interspecies Council, taking a lot of Nathan’s focus and driving him batshit crazy. I tried to stand back and give him space to deal with it, but he surprised me by asking my opinion of both Council and pack business.

However, with his attention distracted from his intense pursuit of me, I was able to focus on the deranged killer I knew was biding his time. The last two days hadn’t been very productive in that area, although we’d made some strides in Kellan’s project that boosted my mood.

A knock on my office door broke my concentration from a coroner’s report that had come in from Dana last night. She hadn’t thought the victim fit within B’s parameters, but had shared the file just in case. She’d been right, though. Certain details were off. There was another knock and I glanced at the clock, then shot up in my chair and swiveled it to face the door. I’d been anticipating this meeting since Jax had set it up for me.

“You must be Peyton,” said a tall, beautiful woman with dark brown hair tied in a knot on top of her head, striking blue eyes, and tan skin.

Even if I hadn’t been expecting her, I would have known immediately that she was Jax’s cousin. Then she smiled and it was like looking at an older version of Joss. This family clearly had a very strong gene pool. And a very good-looking one.

I nodded. “Everleigh Grady?”

“That’s me.”

I gestured to one of the comfy chairs in the corner of my office, then grabbed my files, a notepad, and pen before joining her. Once I sat, Everleigh held out a folder to me. I leaned forward and took it, then relaxed back into my seat and propped my feet on the coffee table in front of me.

“This is the specific research you asked for. It’s a lot of technical jargon that even I have trouble translating, so I figured you might want to go over it.”

“Thank you.” I opened the folder and scanned the first page, already feeling dizzy from the number of syllables in most of the words on the page. “Wow, yeah,” I chuckled. “Who writes like this?”

“Men with big PhDs and even bigger egos.” Everleigh’s tone was dry, but it was also clear from the twist of her lips that there was some truth to the statement.

“Well, I’m glad you had time to meet me in person because this might as well be hieroglyphics.”

Everleigh laughed and reached down to grab a set of files from the brown, leather computer bag she’d brought. Then she relaxed back into her chair. “I have looked over the data, the files, and any other research Nathan could send me to get me up to speed. But it would be great if you could give me a rundown of events.” She cocked her head to the side and her lips curved into a crooked smile. “Just a warning, though. I’ll probably interrupt you constantly with questions. I’m trying to fill in some blanks.”

I shifted uncomfortably in my seat, wishing she’d been able to learn all of this beforehand. I knew she needed the information from my perspective, since I was the only one who’d actually interacted with the psychopath. However, every time I had to retell the events that had happened to me in the last couple of months, I had nightmares for a couple of nights, which left me irritable and a little more stubborn than usual. According to Nathan. Not that he seemed to mind, since his primary tactic for calming me down was to seduce me or piss me off until we ended up fucking hard and fast.

I didn’t really have any complaints about his methods, but I still put up a fight because it made it so much hotter when I gave in. And I did give in.Every. Damn. Time. Something that rankled me endlessly, and yet I couldn’t deny that it always resulted in pleasure so intense that I was convinced it would kill me one of these days.

Those thoughts helped to calm my anxiety over rehashing the events and I separated myself as best I could, telling her the details as if I’d been an observer instead of the victim. When I finished, Everleigh’s forehead was puckered, and she was watching me with a piercing gaze while she rubbed her lips with her index finger.

After a minute, she dropped her hand to her lap and crossed one leg over the other. “I have to say, I’m quite shocked at the way you’ve taken this all in stride. I don’t know many people who wouldn’t have fallen to pieces after suffering the way you have.”

I shrugged and mirrored her position with my legs, keeping the files on my lap in place with one palm. “I learned a long time ago that going backward is pointless, and letting the past dictate your future is stupid.” Something about what I’d said niggled at the back of my brain, but I couldn’t grasp it, so I let it go. “It’s not as if I haven’t been traumatized by the events of the past couple of months. But I have my child to think about, and a giant, sexy, bossy, and stubborn Alpha to deal with.”

Everleigh laughed and the tension dissipated. “Well, thank you for going over it all once more. I feel like I can better assist with this case now. Why don’t we start with any questions you have?”

“Perfect.” I pulled my pen off of one of the folders I’d attached it to, and shuffled everything in my lap until my notebook lay on top. I had an eidetic memory, so I didn’t need to take notes, but it would save me from being forced to recite all of this information later. “Tell me more about lust murders.”

“Well, in a most basic sense, it’s an act of homicide where the killer attempts to find erotic satisfaction from killing someone. Their sexual gratification is contingent on the death of a human being. It’s common for the killing to happen during sexual activity, or by mutilation of the sexual organs, like evisceration and/or displacement of the organs. The mutilation of the body usually happens postmortem.”

“But we’ve never found any evidence of rape,” I interrupted as I made notes.

“The act of sex isn’t always involved in the murder. Lust murders are about fantasy, and they are never fully fulfilled, evolving and becoming increasingly violent. The killer will always find something sexually attractive about the victim, and they are very specific about what they deem their Ideal Victim Type. The connections you have found between the victims are helping us to build a complete profile for his IVT, and knowing that will help us hypothesize about his purposes and the root cause.”

I listened with rapt attention, trying to fit the puzzle pieces together in my head. “I obviously wasn’t his ideal victim. So why is he fixated on me?”

Everleigh brushed a few stray hairs out of her face as she looked over a file perched on her lap. “I have a theory, but I want to clarify a few things first.”

“Go on.”

“I think the sexual component to his fantasy is directly related to how he found his victims.”

“How so?”

“The sexual torture is a tool to degrade, humiliate, and subjugate his victim. It’s possible that when he removes their tongue, it keeps them quiet so he can fantasize that they’ve submitted to him. Similarly, with the semen left on the body, it’s an act of sexual dominance, and yet he doesn’t force himself on them. This is just a theory of course, but I don’t think his issue stems from sexual abuse. All of the victims donated to fertility clinics or went for fertility testing?”

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