Page 57 of The Survivor
Yet she couldn’t. Giving her body to this man had been hard enough, but giving him her heart, knowing he might hand it right back? No. She wasn’tthatbrave.
So she simply pressed her face against his damp chest, breathed in his soapy masculine scent, wrapped her arms around his neck.
And held on for as long as she could.
* * *
Blake waited for the large conference room the Rose Killer task force was working out of to fill up with the officers involved in the case. Superintendent Jake Fantana stood at the head of the table, an annoyed let’s-get-down-to-business look in his pale-blue eyes. Fantana was six-three, bulky as hell, and could make any man cower in his presence, even without the pissed-off daggers in his gaze.
“Let’s get started,” Fantana barked.
The detectives who’d worked the case for almost a year now lowered themselves into various chairs. A young female officer moved away from one of the large bulletin boards that had been set up in the room and quickly scurried toward a chair.
Blake’s gaze strayed to one particular bulletin board, the one reserved for the fourth victim—Sam. A black-and-white photograph of her was tacked onto the board. Her expression held the hint of a smile and seeing it made Blake’s chest tighten. The way she was smiling in that picture—it almost reminded him of Kate, that sassy little tilt of the mouth, the stubborn curve of the lips. And yet there was something very un-Kate-like about that smile.
From the start, Sam had reminded him of the woman he’d lost, but he was starting to notice the differences between the two. Like Sam, Kate had been headstrong, tough and too damn intelligent for her own good. But Kate had also been serious. She’d rarely laughed, was exasperatingly conservative at times, never called him on his flaws or misdeeds. Kate wouldn’t have rolled around in the snow with him, or forced him to show emotion over Elaine Woodman’s senseless death.
No, that was all Sam. Sam, with her melodic laughter and that air of confidence she was only now starting to display. She’d changed since they’d met. No longer wary, no longer fearful. Or perhaps she hadn’t changed so much as simply reverted back to the woman she’d been before the attack.
And dammit, but helikedthat woman. He liked seeing her grow stronger, laughing, taking control of her body again. Hell, he even liked when she yelled at him. Except for his mother, no one in his life ever challenged him. He knew he could be excessively intense, as Kate had been. He knew he tended to shut down when a situation got too emotional, and the women in his life had always let him get away with it.
But Sam…sheforcedhim to feel.Forcedhim to laugh.
He might be bad for her, but goddammit, she was good forhim.And that just made his decision to walk away from her a million times worse.
“There have been some new developments,” Fantana announced.
Blake lifted his head at the chief’s remark, forcing his personal issues out of his head. He hoped this task force meeting would distract him from his conflicting emotions and finally provide new insight into this case. Rick had phoned earlier and hinted that one of the detectives had dug up something, but Blake hadn’t been able to question his partner about it. He’d been too busy briefing John Perkins, the officer who’d come to the house to stay with Sam until the meeting ended.
Had he been too hard on the young cop when he’d told him to guard Sam with his life or else?
Yeah, thator elsehad probably been harsher than necessary. But dammit, leaving her, even for a few hours, was unbearable.
Yet you plan on doing precisely that once the case is closed.
He ignored the irksome voice and focused on the meeting.
Rick started off. “We tracked down the designer who’d sent flowers to Samantha Dawson and he gave us the name of the florist his secretary had used. It was the Grant Flower Shoppe, located near Wicker Park.” Rick leaned back in his chair. “I’ll let Detective Hodges take it from there.”
Burt Hodges glanced down at a sheet of paper on the table and pushed his reading glasses onto a nose far too large for his angular face. “I had a chat with the store manager, who was kind enough to grant us access to the computer records. Candace Lindley, our first victim, received a flower arrangement from that florist the day she died. Same goes for Roberta Diaz and Diana Barrett. Samantha Dawson, however, received her arrangement—” Hodges scanned the paper “—a week before the attack on her.”
“And Elaine Woodman?” Blake prompted, his fingers tightening over the tabletop. Just saying Elaine’s name out loud brought a rush of guilt to his gut. A part of him still believed her suicide could have been prevented. Thathecould have prevented it, if only he’d caught this maniac sooner.
“It was harder to connect her with the Grant Flower Shoppe, but we finally hit pay dirt when the store manager conducted an address search after Elaine’s name never showed up on the receiver list. A coworker of hers received two dozen red roses the day Elaine was abducted. The woman worked in the cubicle next to Elaine’s.”
“Our guy could have seen Elaine when he was making that delivery,” Melanie Barnes mused, running her hands through her short blond hair.
“So aside from all our vics being slender brunettes, this flower angle is the only thread connecting the five women,” Rick said, taking the lead again. “So we cross-referenced the deliveries with the person who made them.” A slight smile crossed his lips. “We came up with a name.”
Blake’s throat grew dry. “Who?”
“Francis Grant, the owner.”
There was a low murmur from some of the detectives. Frowning, Blake glanced at his partner. “Since when does the store owner make deliveries?”
“The manager said Grant helps out when one of his workers calls in sick. Apparently he’s a hands-on kind of guy.”
“I’ll bet he is,” Fantana said grimly. “As it is now, Francis Grant’s name is at the top of our suspect list.”
