Sleeping With Fear

Chapter 12

Riley finished the PowerBar and juice, hoping the calories would help clear the fog in her brain but not very surprised when it didn't happen. She couldn't seem to think except to ask herself questions for which there were no answers.

Yet, at least.

I've been functioning. Normally-or surely Ash would have commented. But I don't remember what I've said or done. And lost hours and a restless night culminating in a dream-or memory-of some kind of Black Mass can't possibly mean anything good.

The panic was crawling inside her now, cold and sharp and no longer something she could deny to herself. This was out of control, she was out of control, and she had no business whatsoever being part of a murder investigation. The right thing to do, the safe and sane thing to do, would be to return to Quantico.

Today. Now.

Something on the TV broke through the panic to catch her attention just then, and she lunged for the remote to turn on the sound.

Bishop. He hardly ever made the news, went out of his way to avoid being photographed or videoed, and always kept a low profile during investigations. So what the hell was he involved in that was making the national news?

"…the agent in charge refuses to comment on the ongoing investigation, but sources within the Boston police confirmed only minutes ago that the latest victim of the serial killer terrorizing the city these last weeks was indeed twenty-one-year-old Annie LeMott, daughter of Senator Abe LeMott. The senator and his wife are in seclusion with family, as police and FBI agents continue to work around the clock to catch their daughter's killer."

The CNN anchor went on to the next subject, her voice turning perky as she reported on something less tragic.

Riley hit the MUTE button on the remote and returned to her laptop. It didn't require either memory of recent events or senses to tell her what to do next; within two minutes, she was reading a more detailed FBI report of the Boston serial killer. And the report explained a lot.

Bishop was hip-deep in his own investigation, all right. In fact, he was tracking a particularly vicious killer with, so far, at least a dozen notches on his belt. Twelve known victims in just under twenty-one days, all young women, all murdered with bloody abandon.

No wonder Boston was going nuts. No wonder this particular series of murders was making national news.

And no wonder Bishop had accepted Riley's assurances that she could handle the situation here, even when she had failed to report in. She doubted he'd had much time to sleep or eat in the past few weeks, let alone worry too much about any of his primaries-people he had handpicked as team leaders because they were highly intelligent, capable agents with all the skills and initiative required to operate independently of both him and the FBI if necessary and for as long as necessary.

It just…usually wasn't necessary.

With that thought in mind, Riley remained online and connected to a special database at Quantico reserved for the SCU, wended her way through the layers of security, and checked on the whereabouts of the rest of the unit.

Jesus.

Chicago, Kansas City, Denver, Phoenix, L.A., and Seattle, plus two small towns she'd never heard of in the Gulf Coast region. The unit was literally scattered across the map, manpower and resources spread thinner than she'd ever known them to be. And every team was involved in high-risk operations ranging from murder to possible terrorist threats-the latter being investigations the unit had only recently begun to be called into as consultants.

As far as Riley could tell, she was the only agent operating without a team, partner, or any kind of backup. But then, she was also the only one who had set off on a very unofficial investigation of a few oddities-not murder or any other major crime.

Then. Now the situation was definitely high-risk. And being on her own here now was both a very bad idea, and seemingly unavoidable.

Unless she bailed. Returned to Quantico. Nobody would blame her for that, not under the circumstances. Hell, when-if-she told Bishop about this latest wrinkle, he'd undoubtedly recall her without even allowing her time to pack.

Riley realized she was fingering the burn at the base of her skull. She forced herself to stop, swore under her breath, and disconnected from the SCU's database.

She couldn't bail. Couldn't leave.

She had to know. Had to figure out what was going on.

"Let's pretend," she whispered. She could do that. It's what she did best, after all. Pretend.

Pretend everything was normal. Pretend there was nothing wrong with her.

Pretend she wasn't terrified.

The sheriff said to Ash, "You realize, of course, that you have no business being involved in this investigation. This part of it, at least. Your part begins when we catch the son of a bitch."

Ash leaned back in his chair at the conference table and shrugged. "I've gotten involved in the past long before the trial stage, we both know that."

"Not in a murder, Ash."

"We haven't had a murder until now, not since I've been DA. And not since you've been sheriff. I'm betting if we'd had one, we'd have worked together. I may not be a cop, but I have experience in investigations-murder investigations included. And you're too good a cop to ignore that."

Leah glanced at Riley, interested to know how the other woman was reacting to all this, and wasn't very surprised to see that Riley was apparently engrossed in reading reports concerning what little information had come in since the previous afternoon.

There wasn't much. Teams had been canvassing Opal Island as well as Castle, literally going door-to-door in search of an identity for their murder victim. So far, the search had turned up three temporarily misplaced teenagers and one temporarily misplaced husband (the former all found sleeping off a late party and the latter discovered on a nearby golf course), but no man missing since sometime Sunday night.

Leah had read and reread the reports Riley was now studying, and wondered what the federal cop found so interesting. Then again, she decided, maybe it wasn't interest so much as a refusal to get involved in the "discussion" going on between the two men.

"I'll take any resource I can get," the sheriff was saying. "But don't you have to be in court?"

Ash shook his head. "Not at all this week, and hardly next week. Unless something unexpected happens, at least. Even my paperwork is all caught up."

"Just bored and have time on your hands, huh?"

"Jake, it's your investigation. Want me to keep my nose out of it, just say the word."

It wasn't really a challenge, Leah thought. And yet it was. If Jake refused Ash's offer of help, it wouldn't be a smart move; Ash had worked as an assistant DA in Atlanta for several years, and whatever rumor had to say about why he left, nobody doubted he had gained considerable experience with murder investigations while he was there. More than Jake had, when it came right down to it.

Refusing the offer of that sort of experienced help might well be something the voters would remember come the next election, particularly if the situation worsened. Plus, it made Jake appear either insecure or jealous of his authority.

Or just plain jealous, period.

So Leah wasn't very surprised to see her boss accept the offered help, albeit with little grace or gratitude.

"As long as we're clear about who's in charge, I got no problem with you helping out, Ash."

"We're clear."

"Okay, then." Jake looked at Riley. "See anything there the rest of us missed?"

"I doubt you missed it," she said calmly. "The blood in the vic's stomach contained glycerol."

"An anticoagulant, yeah. I got that. And an ingredient in all kinds of things, from antifreeze to cosmetics, so not exactly difficult for someone to get their hands on. Which means virtually impossible to trace."

Leah asked, "So what does that mean? That there was glycerol in the blood?" She hated to admit to ignorance, especially when the sheriff had-rather surprisingly, to her-chosen her to assist him on this case, but she didn't feel less of a cop for not having specialized knowledge, and she needed to understand.

It was Jake who said, "Somebody didn't want the blood to clot too quickly."

"I'm still in the dark," Leah complained.

Riley said, "What it probably means is that the blood the victim drank-whether willingly or because he was forced to-wasn't fresh. Someone had kept it for that purpose. Maybe for quite a while."

Leah grimaced. "Bucket of blood. Oh, yuck."

"Was it so much?" Ash asked.

"At least a quart," Riley answered. "That's way more than is used in any ritual I know of."

Ash said, "And more than anybody could have swallowed without vomiting some of it back up, I would have thought."

Riley looked at the M.E.'s report again. "Some minor abrasions inside the esophagus. I'm betting they used a tube. Probably while he was unconscious. Poured the stuff straight into his stomach. And I doubt he lived long enough after that to get rid of it."

"Then what was the point?" Jake demanded. "Fill his stomach with blood and then decapitate him-why?"

"I don't know," Riley said. "But there had to be a reason. Blood in a ritual represents life, power. Human blood much more so than animal blood."

Leah's thoughts were running along a different track. "You mean the stuff I've heard about that is true? Human blood really is used in occult rituals?"

"Some very rare black-occult or satanic rituals, yeah. But the donor-or donors-offer up only a small amount of their blood, willingly, as part of the ceremony. By pricking a finger, usually, or a cut across the palm. It's pretty much a symbolic thing. Nobody gets bled to death."

"But somebody did this time? I mean, other than the guy we found in the woods?"

Riley frowned slightly as she gazed at the now-closed folder on the table before her. "Like I said-there was at least a quart in his stomach. All of it the same blood type, so likely from the same donor, though we can't be sure without DNA testing. But if it all did come from one person, that's a lot of blood to lose at one time."

"Too much?" Leah asked.

"Could someone have lost that much blood and lived? Sure. Five or six quarts in the human body, depending on size and weight. Losing a quart would be serious but not necessarily fatal, especially if it was a ritual blooding and not some traumatic injury."

"Thing is, at least some more got splashed all over the scene." Jake nodded when Ash looked at him. "We've got two blood types in all that, most from the vic but some apparently from the same…donor…who provided what was in his stomach. No real way to measure how much, especially since the ground soaked up a lot. I'm betting it was more than a couple of quarts, all told."

"Then there's likely to be another murder victim we have yet to find."

"Maybe." Riley was still frowning. "Or maybe not. Maybe the anticoagulant was necessary because it took a while to get enough blood without killing the donor. Or donors. You could probably take a little bit every day for several days without too much danger, if you were careful, knew what you were doing."

Ash said, "So, we're looking for somebody with anemia?"

"Failing a second victim. Or a first victim, rather." She looked at the sheriff. "Any luck finding some kind of pattern in the blood spatter at the scene?"

"So far nada. Melissa says the software hasn't run its course yet, but her gut feeling is that there's nothing to find."

"It was a long shot." Riley shrugged.

"What would you have expected, if there had been a pattern?" Ash asked.

"Well, whoever this is seems to be big on signs. So I would have expected another sign or symbol."

"Here there be devil worshippers?" Jake suggested dryly.

"Something like that. Subtle they aren't."

"They?" Leah asked. Then she shook her head. "Of course-it would be a group, wouldn't it?"

"Probably. There are solitary practitioners in most religions, but for any major ritual there would have to be more than one. Anything up to a dozen or so participants is most likely."

"Conspiracy in murder," Ash noted neutrally, "is very rare."

"They wouldn't have viewed it as murder," Riley said.

"Still, for a group of people to keep this sort of secret…How likely is that?"

"If they practice Satanism, very likely. Or at least very possible. Ash, these groups can only survive if they keep their…less conventional activities to themselves. And they learn that early. They're just too far out of the mainstream for community tolerance, much less acceptance."

Leah was faintly surprised. "Do they need community acceptance?"

"If they live in the community, sure. Their religion is only a part of their lives; they shop, go out to eat, go to the movies and the theater, usually send their kids to school. It's not all that uncommon for some of them to hold public office, especially at the local level. So, generally speaking, they keep quiet about occult practices."

Ash was frowning. "But you said whoever we're looking for in this case isn't being very subtle. Deliberately?"

"Maybe. Or desperate. That was a very public place for a ritual," Riley said. "Especially a major ritual involving sacrifice. Add that to the obvious arson sites, all the signs and symbols…It's either deliberately blatant or very careless. Either way, somebody is moving fast. Maybe too fast to avoid mistakes."

"Any idea what that major ritual would have been?" Jake asked her. "You said these things had a purpose, right? So what purpose was there in torturing a man and then beheading him?"

Riley shook her head to the repeated question, and repeated her earlier answer. "I don't know. Yet."

He nodded as though expecting it. "Well, while you're working on that, I've got some people checking out that group in the Pearson house. Because as far as I can tell, they're the only ones in the area who worship Satan."

"Openly, at least," Riley murmured.

He ignored that. "Soon as the background checks are done, probably in the next couple of hours, I mean to have a talk with that bunch. You game?"

"I wouldn't miss it."

"Okay," Ash said as soon as they were left alone in the conference room, "I did what you asked. Got myself included in the investigation. Want to tell me now why that matters?"

Riley felt a little shock, and her mind raced. She didn't remember asking him to do any such thing and, since awakening to the missing twelve hours or so, had been too preoccupied to ask or even wonder why he had accompanied her to the sheriff's department.

She didn't doubt he was telling the truth, but she also had no idea why she would have asked this of him. Unless…

"Riley? Look, I'm not running away with some fatuous idea that you need me to hold your hand, but-"

"Actually," she said slowly, "I think maybe I do. In a manner of speaking."

He waited, brows lifting in a silent question.

Riley hesitated only a moment. "Jake said the background checks he's waiting for would take a couple of hours. There's something I want to check out myself in the meantime. And I don't think I should do it alone."

"Let's go," he said.

It wasn't until they were in his Hummer in the parking lot that he asked the obvious question.

"Where to?"

Riley drew a breath. "The clearing where the body was found."

He frowned. "I know Jake's kept the area roped off and guarded, but you've already seen whatever there was to see. Haven't you?"

"With my eyes, yeah."

He didn't need that explained. "But you said you weren't able to pick up anything clairvoyantly."

"I wasn't. But there were a lot of people around. It might be different now."

"Might?"

"I need to try, Ash." Because I lost more time, and maybe that changed things. Maybe.

He looked at her steadily for a moment, then started the engine. "Mine not to reason why."

"Long as you don't do and die," she murmured. "Or even ride into the mouth of hell."

Ash smiled. "Have I mentioned how much I appreciate having a well-read lover? I would have had to explain that reference to just about anyone else I know."

"Books and imagination see you through a lot as an army brat." Riley dug into her shoulder bag for a PowerBar. "I have a mind filled with facts, poetry, and way too much useless trivia."

"It's only useless until you need it."

She paused in unwrapping the bar to eye him. "You get that out of a fortune cookie?"

"Probably." He glanced at her. "I do have one question. Why me rather than your pal Gordon? He knows all about the clairvoyance, right?"

"Yeah."

"So why not pick a former army buddy as backup if you're expecting trouble of some kind? Not that I'm complaining, you understand. Just wondering."

Riley was wondering about that herself. She had no way of knowing for certain that she had asked Ash to join the investigation for this reason; it was merely logical to assume. Because she'd known from the beginning that she couldn't just accept the status quo, accept her MIA psychic abilities, that she'd have to push herself at some point, have to try with all her strength to tap into what that Taser's electrical surge had damaged.

She had no idea what would happen then. But logic also told her she shouldn't be alone when she tried. As for why she'd picked Ash over Gordon, logic provided a possible answer for that as well.

"Gordon's a civilian now," she said finally. "He can't be officially involved in a murder investigation. You can."

"Ah. Makes sense."

Yes, it made sense. It was logical.

She wasn't sure she believed it, however.

The problem, of course, was that Riley had no memory of what had prompted her request that Ash involve himself in the case officially. Maybe it was because of this, because she'd intended to try her damnedest to tap into her seemingly absent abilities and wanted someone she trusted standing by in case it knocked her on her ass.

Maybe.

Or maybe it was something else. Something that had occurred to Riley as her mind raced when Ash told her about a decision made, apparently, in those missing hours.

What if it happened again? What if she decided things, did things, made choices today that she wouldn't remember tomorrow? It had happened a second time now; had she somehow guessed or known that her spotty memory and damaged senses had only been the beginning of her problems? What if her mind, her brain, had sustained even more damage from the attack on Sunday night than she had any way of estimating?

What then?

Again, logic demanded that if she intended to remain on the case under these circumstances-and she did-then she needed someone trustworthy who not only knew the truth but was also in a position to stick close and observe her virtually around the clock. At any other time, another SCU member would have been the automatic choice. But that simply wasn't possible now.

Her lover, the DA of Hazard County, was the best choice she was left with.

But to say that Riley felt either confident in or comfortable with that decision would have been to overstate the matter. For one thing, it was a very unofficial way to conduct herself during an investigation, and not at all in character for her. For another and far more vital thing…

Can I trust him? I feel I can. Sometimes. Most of the time. But not always.

Doubts she couldn't even put into words nagged at her. It was like catching a glimpse of some movement from the corner of her eye, only to see nothing when she looked directly at it. She felt that way about Ash, that there was more going on than she could see, could know, and it made her wary.

But can I trust my feelings? Any of them?

And even if I can trust him, will he understand?

Can he?