Page 34 of The Killer She Knew

“There are two ways to knock someone unconscious. Either you hit them, which leaves contusions, bruising, and blood. Or you knock them out with a quick-acting compound that can’t be detected during an autopsy.”

“There’s only one chemical I can think of that knocks out its victims without leaving a trace,” he said. “Chloroform.”

“The medical examiner agreed. Except the use of chloroform was never indicated in Teshia Elborne’s autopsy report, which confirms whoever killed her eighteen years ago,” Leigh said, “is killing these women now.”

TWENTY-ONE

Durham, New Hampshire

Thursday, October 10

10:11 a.m.

“You don’t want to believe it’s him, do you?” Ford was giving her that look again, the one that convinced her he could see directly into her thoughts. Or maybe she was seeing what she wanted to. Wanting someone else to feel this burden of helplessness. Share it. Take some of it from her. “You don’t want to believe Dean Groves had anything to do with this. Alice Dietz. Tamra Hopkins. The four men who died in the past year. You still think he’s innocent.”

“We don’t have enough evidence to make a determination.” Part of her wanted it to be Dean. The other wasn’t so sure. Either way, no amount of time could hide her hesitation as she fidgeted with a highlighter she’d found in one of the open desks on this floor. They’d managed to find a blanket tucked into one of the desk drawers, using it to cover Tamra Hopkins’s body. Now it was a matter of waiting. Making sure no other unsuspectingstudents stumbled onto the scene. Securing this floor until the medical examiner and forensics teams could do their jobs.

She hated waiting. What she really wanted to do was find Ava, and she knew that the longer she let her hesitation rule, the larger the chasm between them grew. But she didn’t know how to go back. To fix… whatever this was between them. There was something Ava wasn’t telling her. A reason that no matter how hard Leigh pushed or how often she made an effort, Ava wouldn’t accept, and that something was festering between them a little more each day. Ava couldn’t seem to let Leigh in. She didn’t want to let anyone in, and whatever she was hiding had started eating her alive.

“I’ve made assumptions during an investigation before. People like us get it into our heads that the crime worked out one way, and then all we’re looking for is evidence to support it.” She leaned back in her chair, more than willing to go back to pretending the past hadn’t come full circle. Interlacing her fingers over her stomach, she kept herself in the moment. Away from that part of her life where the entire world had turned against her and her family. She didn’t want to go back there. Because there was nothing she could do to change it. But she could do something now. She could keep fighting for the truth. No matter how hard it was to hear. “It’s led to more than one innocent person behind bars.”

“Confirmation bias.” Ford folded his arms across his chest. He didn’t have to be here. It didn’t take more than one of them to secure the scene, but he’d chosen to stay with her. It was… nice to have someone to talk to. Made her feel as though she wasn’t entirely alone in this mess. “Is that why you alibied him for the night of Teshia Elborne’s murder despite the evidence showing otherwise? You didn’t want to believe Dean was capable of something like that?”

“There was no physical evidence showing Dean Groves killed Teshia Elborne.” That was the problem. They didn’t have anything. It’d been washed away with bleach and dish soap. “Everything Durham PD had was circumstantial. The source of the poison, Dean’s connection to the victim, the statement about the argument they’d had. There was no blood or DNA on the body. They couldn’t even find the murder weapon.”

It’d had the potential to make a very compelling story.

His sardonic laugh cut her deeper than she expected. “And if the president comes back with a list of key codes used to access the biomedical lab and Groves’s old code shows up, would you believe he killed these women then?”

The mere thought of it dried her mouth. She didn’t know the answer to that question, but her beliefs didn’t matter in the end. She had a job to do, and she was very good at compartmentalizing to get it done. No matter the consequences.

“Then I’ll re-evaluate.” That was all she could do unless the unsub decided to expose himself. A signed confession, a “Hey, it’s me. I’m the problem.” Even leaving something—anything—for them to identify him would be great right about now. But experience said most serial offenders would rather die than give up an ounce of self-preservation. “If Dean’s old code doesn’t show up on that list, are you willing to look for evidence that someone else is responsible for these deaths?”

“I’d be willing to… re-evaluate.” Ford threw her a gut-wrenching smile, and the uneasiness of the past few minutes released the vise around her chest. “That’s all we can do, right?”

“Right.” But he had a point. It was getting harder and harder for her to separate her past from this current investigation. There were too many similarities, dead ends, and obstacles. At this point, the BAU was solely being utilized to solve all the secrets she’d buried in her life. First, her brother’s murder then Elyse’s disappearance. Now police were forced to focus on herromantic entanglements. There wasn’t a single area of her life that hadn’t been touched by murder, lies, and loss. No wonder Ava didn’t want any part of it.

Leigh stretched her legs out in front of her, crossing at the ankles. No matter where she turned, death followed. It was already closing in too fast on her and Ava. And yet she’d agreed to a date with a US marshal she’d met yesterday morning. Sooner or later, Ford would become a victim. Whether by her job or her inability to let anyone get inside her head, he would suffer. Because of her. Maybe it would be better if she was honest up front, if she let a couple skeletons slip free from the closet to put his fascination in perspective. And if those skeletons got under his skin—pun intended—he could get a running head start from the disaster that was her life.

“You weren’t far off base, though. About Dean Groves.”

Ford looked at her as though she was suffocating, and he didn’t know what to do about it. Setting those dark eyes on her, he studied her as if to memorize every detail, every hair, every change in her body language and expression. Looking for a crack in her armor. “What do you mean?”

“Dean and I met my freshman year at college. The first day I moved into my dorms, actually. He was the RA, and he offered to help me move my stuff in.” Leigh couldn’t look at him. Couldn’t face the disappointment sure to hit her upside the head with judgment and disgust. “After that, he asked me out. I said yes, and we started dating. He was…”

Was she really going to talk about losing her virginity to a suspected killer? No. No, she was not. “In a matter of weeks, I fell head over heels in love with him. I thought he was, you know, theone.”

Ford didn’t answer. Didn’t even seem to breathe.

She could slice through the tension between them with her father’s old pocketknife. Four seconds. Five. Leigh tapped herfingernails on the chair’s arm, her heart rate climbing the longer he refused to react. “I’m going to need you to say something now.”

The marshal cleared his throat as he leaned forward, eyes on the floor. “So when you alibied him for the night of Teshia Elborne’s murder…”

“I wasn’t actually with him.” She whispered her confession. She’d lied in the statement she’d given to police eighteen years ago. It hadn’t been the first time, but it was certainly the lie she regretted the most. Would Alice Dietz and Tamra Hopkins still be alive if she’d been honest? That was the thought haunting her now, only a few feet from Tamra’s body. Could this all have been avoided if she’d accepted that she’d been dumb and in love? That she’d been wrong? “Dean was spending a lot more hours than normal in the lab that week. He’d been working on an early Capstone project, and he was close to wrapping up his experimental study, but I don’t know where he was that night. I just knew I couldn’t lose him, too.”

Not like she’d lost her father. Never again would she let someone be taken from her due to the whims of power-hungry predators. Even those with official titles.

“Leigh.” Ford scrubbed at his face. “You lied on an official police report. If the FBI discovers you obstructed a murder investigation?—”

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