Page 22 of Devoted

My fingers are shaky as they hover over the keyboard. I've tried hard in the past month to separate myself from Kane and Lace Underground. It feels like, somehow, just researching his name is connecting me back to hisworld.

I take a breath and click on the article. A poorly shot, unfocused, black and white picture of a high school swim team is positioned front and center over the title article. The date is April, 2004. I lean closer to the monitor to get a better look. A pair of intense pale eyes pull me into the photo and hold me there. It's as if the boy in the picture is staring straight at me. I sit back hard against the couch cushion and catch my breath. He can't be more than sixteen or seventeen in the picture, but everything about him is hauntingly familiar. The hard, angry set of his jaw, the cool, almost icy gaze, the stiff, confident posture. His shoulders are broad but nothing compared to the man who held me firmly while fucking me in his underground lair. A warm blush covers my skin as I think about those moments, in his strong grasp, bending to every one of his commands and always wanting more of his eroticpunishment.

I close my eyes to cool my head but it only serves to make me hotter. I wrap my fingers around one wrist to mimic the feel of the leather cuff. I lift the wrist high above my head, imagining his firm grip as he binds me to the bedpost. My panties stick against my pussy withmoisture.

My phone rings, snapping me out of my sensual reverie. It'sSilvana.

I take a deep breath and answer it. "Hey, Sil, what'sup?"

"I decided to call. Texts leave too much of atrail."

I laugh. "A trail? Sounds secretive. What's going on? Moreinformation?"

"Yeah, but first, and this is purely gossip because I don't really know what went down, but Maddox and Clark had one of their infamous yell matches. In the meeting room, of all places. Neither of them looked too happy after it was over. Maddox walked out of the office after that so I never got a chance to ask him what wasup."

"You know how those two love to butt heads. They'll be back kissy-lovey soon enough. What else is up? Did you findsomething?"

"Did I. Shit, Ten. That's all I can say. Holyshit."

"Really? I've just started researching Kane. I delayed it because, apparently, I'm a coward. But I just found his picture in a newspaper article about his high school dive team." The phone cuts out on his side, signaling he has another phone call. I fire off a quick question. "So what is the holy shit part of thestory?"

"I think I'll let you find it yourself. It'll give you something to do and it's a whopper. Does the name Redmonton California ring anybells?"

"Can't say itdoes."

"The town name was in the paper a lot about twenty years ago." His phone beeps out again. "Shoot, I've got a call. Think it might be Clark. Remember, you haven't spoken to me about any of this.Later."

"But, Sil—" the callends.

I adjust the computer on my lap and type in Redmonton California. There is a city site and a real estate site touting the beauty, parks and schools just like for Greenfield. I open a map tab and put in both cities. They are close to each other, separated mostly by railroad tracks and vacant land. Both towns are just inland from the coast and far north of SanFrancisco.

I scroll down a list of entries that don't seem to be of much worth. As my eyes glide past one headline, I see the name Paul Vossnik. It's an unusual name but it's familiar. It's a name I've heard before because it is newsworthy. I click on the entry. The horrid story behind the name comes instantly back to me. Paul Vossnik was a serialkiller.

The earlier tremble has returned to my fingers. I have no explanation for it. Silvana's clue was so cryptic, I have no idea if I'm even getting close to Kane's past. But my cop's intuition says I'm heading toward somethingexplosive.

I type in the name of the dreaded River Bend Slasher. That was the nickname the investigators gave him because every one of his victims' bodies was found at a particular bend in the local river. I vaguely remember seeing pictures of the man, mug shots mostly, and quick, rushed news photos as he was being led to and from police stations and courts. I hit enter. The first entry is a newspaper story. There's a picture to go with it. It's the usual fuzzy black and white newspaper photo. The date on the paper is April 1997 so the quality is especially lacking. Paul Vossnik is shrouded in a bullet proof vest, a necessity when transporting hated villains. His dark head is down making it nearly impossible to see hisface.

I scan the article. "The monstrous River Bend Slasher has been identified as forty-five-year-old Paul Vossnik, a self-employed carpenter and once respected businessman in Redmonton, California. It is believed that Vossnik is responsible for the brutal murder of eight women over the span of three years. Vossnik's first alleged victim, thirty-year-old Verity Olson, a local prostitute, was found stabbed and nearly devoid of blood at the bend of the Durley River, a large tributary that carries mountain snow runoff to the Pacific Ocean. Over the next thirty-six months, the bodies of seven more women were discovered at the same river bend. Each one slashed beyond recognition. Each one of the victims was either homeless, a drifter passing through or a prostitute. To this day, several victims still remain listed as Jane Doe because no family member has stepped forward to identify or claimthem."

I sit back and stare at the blurry picture of the creep that terrorized the area for three years. Eight grisly murders. Eight. The wind is sucked out of me. Eight. Eight scars on Kane's forearm. Histallymarks. Coincidence or heartbreakingreality?

I feel slightly nauseous. I place the laptop with the story about the serial killer aside and head to the refrigerator for a yogurt. I decided to wind down my junk food extravaganza and start eating some morerealfood, as my mom used to call it. I grew up thinking junk food like chips and donuts were made from some kind of plastic or manmade material until I was old enough to figure out my mom's use of the wordrealmeantnutritious.

I carry my strawberry yogurt to the glass door and stare out at the shadowy landscape as I eat. Without the birds and passing beachcombers, it looks like a deserted planet. I drift back to that awful night when Kane had me dropped in the middle of nowhere. In my fear and adrenaline rush to survive, the emotion that stood out most of all was that Kane had so little regard for me, he was happy to see me tossed out like a piece of garbage. When he showed up, I was relieved not only to avoid an ugly death but to know he hadn't easily discarded me. He'd even secretly followed me around that night to make sure nothing happened to me. There were so many contradictions to the man but inside all the twisted wiring, it seemed there was a heart. Possibly even a bigger one thanmost.

I run my spoon around the yogurt cup to get the last bits. I haven't gained back much of the weight yet but I'm feeling stronger than ever. My road to recovery is still long but at least I'm onit.

I look back at the couch and the silver top on my laptop. My recovery doesn't just depend on me fitting snuggly in my jeans. Most of it depends on my mental health. Considering the trembling in my hands while I'm researching Kane Freestone's past, it seemsthatis still a long way off. It's hard to know what I'm grappling with more, the feeling that I lost a piece of myself when Clark led me out of Lace Underground or my utter lack of self-control once I entered Kane's world. I suppose it's easy enough to blame the nectar, but I hardly gave it a second thought once Blake started injecting it regularly. I accepted my addiction readily because I loved the way it made me feel. The entire incident has forever changed my view and opinion of the junkies we deal with on the streets. The streets. All the women Kane brought to the Underground were either homeless or from shelters. Anothercoincidence?

Fortified byrealfood, I return to my laptop. I swipe my finger over the touch pad and bring the news article back up. I scan for critical details. The investigators were chastised for missing critical clues. Apparently Vossnik used a century old bridge, the Delta, a truss bridge that spans the widest part of the river, to dump the bodies. Blood samples matching some of the victims were found along the railing but police were still baffled. It wasn't until the police received an anonymous letter about the trunk of a car and providing them with a license plate number that they zeroed in on thekiller.

My eyes scan the next lines over and over again until I have them memorized. "Police said the letter was in a child's handwriting. The letter was later matched to a writing sample provided by Turner Vossnik, the murderer's ten-year-old son. Vossnik was a singlefather."

I push the computer onto the couch again and wrap the blanket around me to stop the chill running through my body. A chill that I'm fairly certain has nothing to do with ambient temperature in the room. Was Kane the boy? Was he TurnerVossnik?

A text comes through. It takes me a second to unwrap my arms and pick the phone up from the coffee table. It's Silvana. "Well?" It's just a one word text, but I know exactly what he'sasking.

I text back. "Holy shit is right. I can't find any direct evidence but everything lines up. The foster care. The name change. Not to mention personal details I know about Kane that would fall right in line with thetheory."

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