Page 331 of Cold Case, Warm Hearts

POINT OF IMPACT

LAST CHANCE DOWNRANGE - BOOK 1

LISA PHILLIPS

CHAPTER ONE

Virginia

It wasn’t Addie Franklin’s choice to meet with a killer. The coffee shop had more than enough open seats. She chose the one beside the table occupied by a serial murderer because she’d been ordered to.

Before she even sat, the barista called out her dry cappuccino. She left her phone on the table and strode to retrieve it. As she did so, the voice of a coworker on the FBI task force sounded in her ear.

“You caught his attention.”

Addie winced as though the cup holding the hot beverage were the cause. Sure, she was here tonight for precisely that purpose—to get noticed. She’d even worn a business-appropriate dress of all things.

But drawing attention to herself hadn’t sat right since…

She could still feel the bugs crawl over her skin. A remnant of that day years ago, the night she’d been homecoming queen.

That had been another life.

The FBI profiler she was now, a Special Agent with the FBI, settled into her seat. She smoothed down the dress in the process and caught the eye of a rapist and murderer. Not exactly idea of a fun Friday night, but considering her lack of social life, she couldn’t say much about that.

Addie lifted the mug. The napkin it sat on came with it, then fluttered to the floor.

William Benning retrieved it out of the air before it could hit the tile and handed it back to her.

“Thank you.” She opted for a polite expression. There was no way she would show interest. Though, with a guy like this, what set him off was precisely the reason she was here.

The team needed him to admit enough of what he’d done that they had cause to bring him in and question him further. And they needed to know where he buried his victims.

Anything she learned would add to the profile already complied on him. “Can you believe how long it’s been raining?” Addie held her smile and waited for his response.

The color in his eyes was so dark it bled into his pupils. His gaze seemed to track her like a laser targeting system as questions resonated in her.

What caused him to flip the switch and decide on destruction?

When he finished, where did he hide the bodies?

Lines ringed his mouth on both sides. Prominent cheekbones. The images they had of him didn’t do justice to the impact of his presence. Life moved around him, the world that hummed with the energy of existence—those electrical impulses and the forces of physics that acted on every human being. This guy was a void. Existence ground to a halt when it encountered him.

Inside there seemed to be nothing. Stillness.

A black hole.

She’d seen it before, and yet every time Addie felt the impact as though it were the first time.

His expression shifted, a slight flex of his nose. “I like the rain. It washes away transgressions.”

She lifted her brows and nodded as though considering that interesting statement. Internally she added “religious bent” to the profile she’d complied of him and his proclivities so far.

Addie had grown up in church, going to summer Bible camps. How she felt about her faith, the past fifteen years was… She pretty much tried not to think about God and how He felt about her—which was nothing good.

She took a few sips of the cappuccino and pretended to be engrossed in her phone.

Benning just sat there without even a newspaper or electronic device.

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