Page 87 of The Morning After (Savannah 2)

Then he heard the old lady’s whimpers…The cries gave him a thrill, made his blood hot and his heartbeat quicken. He thought of Bobbi Jean. And Nikki. His breath came in short, excited bursts.

His lips were so dry he licked them.

Who would be next?

He closed his eyes and ran an anxious finger over the plastic-encased pictures in his album. “Eenie, meenie, miney, moe…”

His hand stopped. He opened an eye to stare down at the smiling, sultry image of a beautiful woman…Though the snapshot had been taken a dozen years ago, he knew that she was still as eye-catching as she had been then.

He wanted her.

God, he wanted her.

His cock began to throb and he wondered how she’d like waking up in a coffin. Imagined her terror, how her gorgeous features would contort in fear, how she’d plead and beg for her life, to no avail. Panic would nearly stop her heart. The air in the coffin would thin…her lungs would be on fire…oh, yes…

He felt powerful.

Strong.

Cunning.

Anticipation thrummed through his bloodstream.

He could barely wait.

“You’re next, sweetheart,” he whispered roughly as his erection strained against his fly. God, he’d love to fuck her. To slide into her. To show her how he could do what he wanted with her. Maybe after. Maybe before. But to dip into the hot warmth of her…or even into her cold, dead cunt. Either way.

He’d never fucked one of them…never let his fantasies take hold so deeply that he couldn’t resist the temptation they presented. But maybe, this once, he could change his ritual a bit.

Anticipation quickening his pulse, he slowly lowered his face to the scrapbook, so that her beautiful, smiling image blurred. Then, without closing his eyes, he planted a wet kiss on the plastic.

CHAPTER 20

“So you’re flaking out on me again, Nikki. Nice,

real nice!” The sneer in Lily’s voice was palpable even with the spotty reception of Nikki’s cell phone.

Reed had dropped Nikki off at her car at Johnny B’s and was now following her as she drove into Savannah. Nikki barely noticed the southern channel of the river, or the traffic, or the speed limit as she headed inland, the lights of Savannah beckoning in the dark night. Her concentration was on the telephone conversation with her angry sister.

“I told you it isn’t safe for me to take Phee,” she said for the third time. “Don’t you get it? My apartment was broken into, Lily. Whoever did it left me a damned note. In my bed.” She shivered, thinking of the intruder touching her linens, running his fingers over her bedposts, rummaging through her drawers.

“This is a surprise?”

“Don’t you know there’s a serial killer on the loose! He might have been the guy in the apartment.”

“Well, gee, I wonder why he would break into your place, okay? Let’s think. Could it be that you keep writing about him? Attracting his attention? No wonder you’re a target. He’s pissed off.”

“He’s not pissed off at me. He likes the attention I give him. He craves it. It’s all part of the serial killer mentality.”

“I wouldn’t know. They have mentalities?”

“Yes, Lily, they do and—”

“He’s killing people, for Christ’s sake! It’s not about ‘mentalities!’” she snapped, then caught hold of her temper. “Listen, Nikki, I understand, okay? I do get it. It’s your life and it’s important.” Obviously Lily couldn’t keep the sarcasm from infecting her words. “So, I’ll leave here and pick Ophelia up at the folks. Forget what I’m doing. Forget that this was a hundred dollar a plate dinner for a candidate Mel supports, that it’s important to him, that it’s important to me. Because it’s all about you, isn’t it? It always has been.”

“No, Lily,” Nikki retorted hotly as she turned off the Island Expressway. “It’s all about you. It always has been.”

Lily hung up so loudly, Nikki winced, then dropped the phone into the cup holder by the driver’s seat of her hatchback. She told herself she should feel bad, but she didn’t. Not for her sister. This was how Lily handled every crisis. By lashing out.

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