Page 26 of The Killer She Knew

No answer.

A tremor wracked through her legs, and she clutched her weapon tighter. Was hypothermia possible at this temperature? She didn’t know. Didn’t want to know. But at this rate, this entirebasement level would be under water within a couple hours. She had to get out of here. Preferably in one piece.

Still, he hadn’t moved. Hadn’t done a damn thing but stared at her. She couldn’t make out his features—hidden behind the flashlight’s beam—but she could feel him watching her. Waiting. But she wouldn’t be the one to make the first move.

“You are one of the dumbest killers I’ve hunted.” She redirected her weapon’s aim. For the outline centered behind the flashlight. She might not be able to identify him, but his size provided an easy target. It was hard to gauge from their current surroundings, but Leigh had the distinct feeling she wouldn’t be a match for his sheer strength in a physical altercation.

He extended the flashlight toward her in response. She could barely make out the hand holding it out.

He wanted her to… take it from him? This was a trick. At attempt to force her to give up her balance, to shove her off guard. Distract her. If she reached for that flashlight—and every cell in her body wanted it—he would take the opportunity to surprise her. She would be putting herself at a disadvantage.

Leigh sucked in a shivering breath. “Why don’t you keep it? Give me a look at that pretty face.”

Withdrawing his offer, he tossed the flashlight. Into a room she hadn’t noticed until then. The beam twisted down into a watery grave.

Leigh couldn’t let her curiosity take control. She had to keep her gaze on him. She wouldn’t give him the upper hand. She’d made Ava a promise to be there. To make an effort. She couldn’t break her promise mere hours later. “I’m not a dog who likes to play fetch.”

He backed up a step in the muted light put out by the drowning flashlight. Then another. Why wasn’t he saying anything?

Leigh squared her stance, ready to shoot, but he hadn’t attacked her. Hadn’t done anything to warrant a bullet to the chest. Still, her heart climbed her throat with his retreat. Instinct said this was the killer they were looking for—who’d killed Alice Dietz, who’d set his sights on Pierce Morrow’s identity—and yet he’d left Leigh alive when given the chance.

No. This was something else. Like he was… giving her a choice. Follow him or follow her curiosity into that room to her left. Her mind raced to come up with the correct answer. He was almost out of reach now, barely more than a thin outline at this distance. Then gone.

“Leigh!” Her name echoed down the corridor a split second before two flashlights punctured through the darkness. They bounced in erratic rhythms as water parted from the ambush. Ford.

Leigh raised her hand to block the sear of light on her eyes, weapon still raised. “I’m here. I’m fine.”

“What the hell are you doing down here?” The marshal stripped his windbreaker from his shoulders, transferring the flashlight from one hand to the other, then wrapped the thin fabric around her shoulders. He gripped her upper arms and stroked up and down as if trying to start a fire. “Shit. Your lips are blue. We need to get you upstairs.”

It wasn’t until then she realized she was shaking. Cold. Her joints had stiffened in her ankles and knees, and she lowered her weapon to her side, phone still clutched in her other hand. It would take someone else prying it from her fingers to get the waterlogged device free. Her teeth chattered. That was good. That meant her body was fighting back instead of giving up. “He was here.”

She could barely make out the words, but Ford understood her. He did that uncanny thing where he went absolutely still despite his size. As though he could sink back into the shadowsas easily as the killer had. “Who was here? Dean Groves? You saw him?”

Had it been Dean? It’d been hard to tell in the dark. Leigh rolled her lips between her teeth and bit down to give her body something more worthwhile than survival to focus on. The windbreaker holding Ford’s body heat was helping. She shook her head. At least, she thought she shook her head, but it could’ve been the tremors threatening to unravel her from the inside. “My phone died. I couldn’t see anything, but he had a flashlight. He tossed it. In there.”

The flashlight at Ford’s back swung into the room, and Leigh was just able to make out what looked to be one of the campus police officers. She couldn’t remember his name.

“We need to get you out of here.” Ford closed the distance between them, locking his arms around her upper body. The movement was entirely too intimate, and yet exactly what her body needed. His heat, the sensory input, that unique flare of citrus and something darker and velvety—it all worked to keep her in the moment.

“He didn’t want to hurt me. He wanted me to follow him.” Leigh moved to secure her weapon but missed her holster. She tried again, until Ford clamped his oversized hand around hers. Taking her weapon. It disappeared behind his back. Most likely in the waistband of his slacks for safe keeping. Probably the right thing to do considering she could barely coordinate her brain’s commands with her hands’ actions. Shooting him by accident was sure to test the relationship between USMS and the FBI. Not to mention their partnership. “I think he wanted me to go in there. We don’t have much time. The water is getting deeper.”

Leigh could practically feel the nerves coming off Ford and the campus police officer as she put everything she had into taking that first step. The flashlight the killer had tossed into the room acted as a beacon, something for her to focus on while herbody fought to give up. How long did it take hypothermia to set in anyway? She’d have to look that up when she got a chance.

The marshal slid his hand around her waist. Holding her up or trying to stop her from going into that room? Both were valid reasons in her current condition. “Leigh, your body temperature is dropping by the minute. You need medical attention.”

One of the flashlights hit the nearest wall. To the points where water leaked through the stone itself.

“Then, by all means, go back, but I’m staying.” The last word came out more muddled than she’d meant. Stupid failing body. There had to be a reason the killer had focused on this room. Why he’d led her through the maze of the university’s basement. It wasn’t just to confuse or isolate her. There were easier ways to accomplish either or flat out kill her. Leigh grabbed for the killer’s flashlight. The water was deeper here. Flooding this room faster. It must be the lowest point of the basement, collecting every drop breaking through from the surface.

“Get upstairs. Ask Durham PD if they have pumps to control the flooding. I’ll stay with her.” Ford’s flashlight cut ahead of her and hit a row of shelves made of two-by-fours. The racks were empty apart from what looked to be an old pressure canner and… mason jars? “What the hell is this place?”

“Emergency storage.” Leigh clutched on to Ford’s borrowed windbreaker as a different kind of chill emanated from her very bones. Frigid water reached thigh deep here and siphoned her strength little by little as she surveyed the shelves. Cloudy green liquid inside those jars told her whatever was inside had gone bad a long time ago. “The school must’ve had some kind of emergency preparedness class. Used this room to store pressure-canned goods. See? There are lids and rings for the jars in this box. And a dozen canned peaches in the corner.”

“Doesn’t look like anyone’s been down here for years.” Ford branched away from her position, studying the rest of the room.

“Seems whoever used this space for emergencies literally forgot it existed in an emergency.” She searched the rest of the shelves. More of the same. Broken mason jars, mold, and canned goods that had long expired past their due dates. She was hungry, but she wasn’t that hungry.

“It’s you,” Ford said.

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