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Her heart beat a rapid tattoo in her chest. Ethan’s words had alarms shrilling in the recesses of her mind. They were a demand for honesty that would be much more comfortable tododge.
“I’ve been trying like hell to deny it.” A hard smile crossed Ethan’s lips. “Damn you, Alexa Grace.” He dropped down on the bed beside her again, his face dizzyingly close. “Twenty years wasn’t long enough to get you out of myhead.”
When his lips touched hers, her hand lifted of its own accord to cup his jaw. It was leaner now. Harder than it’d been the last time they’d touched. And she knew this was a mistake. It had to be. But Alexa wasn’t going to waste a second regrettingit.
Her lips parted beneath his and his fingers speared into her hair as he angled his face closer to take advantage. There’d been so few indulgences in her life. She wasn’t going to deny herself thisone.
She’d known the kiss of the boy but not the man. It was the hint of familiarity that drew her, the foreign demand that left her craving more. His tongue entered her mouth in a slow seductive glide. Alexa could feel his arm around her as she floated backward. It wasn’t until the mattress was at her back that she realized, much too dimly, that he’d lowered her to the bed. Her hand slid to his nape as she urged him closer, her tongue doing battle withhis.
This didn’t feel like catching a nostalgic piece of her past and pulling it close. No, it was different between them.Theywere different. Ethan’s mouth ate at hers with a hunger that torched her own. With him, she held nothing back. Instead, she gave herself over and poured herself into thekiss.
There was heat there, heady and familiar, but the faint hint of desperation was new. As if each of them realized they were hurtling toward disaster, and as one they hit the accelerator. The weight of him, half settled over her, had flame licking up her spine. There was no slow buildup. Just a brutal punch of desire that shook her with itsurgency.
She raked his bottom lip with her teeth, and the tiny bit of savagery unleased his own. Their breaths mingled, tongues tangled and teeth clashed as the world fell away to allow only for the kick ofpassion.
Alexa would never know which of them stilled first. Not because reason had returned. It took several seconds for that. When it did, comprehensionfollowed.
Her phone had soundedagain.
They both rose, but Ethan’s longer reach snagged her cell first to bring to her. And still it took a moment for her eyes to clear. For the fog of desire to dissipate. “There’s another message,” shesaid.
Alexa surged from the bed and crossed to the desk where she’d left the tablet. It was still open to her inbox. She recognized the sender. But this time, there was no subject. Just a jpeg icon to clickon.
The picture that opened was old. Faded. A young woman with big hair and a bright smile holding a toddler. Alexa had never seen the photo before, but she recognized her mom as the subject. Which meant the child washer.
She had no idea who would have taken the photo. There had never been any dad or grandparents in her life. But that wasn’t the most disturbing thing about the image. Alexa had few snapshots from her childhood. This wasn’t amongthem.
But she knew exactly where the picture had come from. And the realization had a cold trickle of dread snaking down herspine.
* * *
“You don’t haveto do this.” Ethan sent a troubled glance across the front seat of the vehicle. Alexa had said very little on the way to Truro from Halifax. She saw now that her silence had worriedhim.
She summoned a wan smile. “Actually, Ido.”
Her sleep last night had been fitful. The second picture the UNSUB had sent had rocked her more than she’d like to admit. Ethan had realized it, and hadn’t pressed her about it. He’d been, in fact, so solicitous that it had taken an hour to convince him she’d be fine if he went back to his own room. The evening might have turned out much differently if not for the offender’s timing. And Alexa still wasn’t sure how she felt aboutthat.
Ethan turned the car off. Waited quietly while she stared at the house where she’d spent the last years of her childhood. She supposed everything in a person’s past shrank when confronted through the lens of time. The house seemed smaller, but it had never appeared this unkempt. The sidewalk leading up to the two cement steps had cracked and heaved in places. What remained of the lawn needed mowing. The siding on the home was chipped and faded, the trim stripped nearly bare of color. The entire structure seemed to tilt a bit, like a tired oldman.
Ethan had never been inside; she’d made sure of that. It had taken weeks for him to convince her to see him outside of the library. Even longer to persuade her to accept a ride from him. If it was nice weather, they’d put her bike in the trunk and she’d insist that he let her out a few blocks away so she could ride it home. In the winter, she’d walk that distance. Always, he’d drive around the block a few times until he saw her safely inside the door. He’d had a strong Galahad streak, even as ateen.
“I tried to imagine back then. What life was like for you in there.” He gestured at the house. “I know I never came close to thereality.”
“It was…sad.” A pervasive hopelessness had seemed to reside inside, almost like another living breathing member of the family. As if Reisman’s disenchantment with the downward spiral of his career had taken form and sprang to life. The more disappointed he was, the harder life became for Alexa’smother.
She shook off the memories and drew a fortifying breath. “He won’t talk to you. He has no respect for the authorities. They were called often enough when I was still at home. I notified them a few times myself.” No charges were ever filed for the domestic disturbances. He knew they never would be. Her mother had been much too indoctrinated by then for that. “But you start the conversation. Show your credentials. And we’ll see where it goes from there.” The conversation would deteriorate as soon as he recognized her, Alexa knew. But she was long past the age when his words could moveher.
She opened her car door and got out, waiting for Ethan to do the same. When he rounded the hood of the vehicle, they walked toward the house she’d once sworn she’d never returnto.
The screen door was minus a window, and it rattled when Ethan knocked on it. A long minute stretched before he repeated the gesture, harder this time. His fist was raised to try again before the inside door swung open wide enough to show a man in the wedge ofspace.
Alexa’s first thought was that the last two decades hadn’t been kind to Thomas Reisman. Like the house, he was showing signs of age. His once tall, spare frame had become slightly stooped, his thinness bordering on skeletal. Wisps of hair clung stubbornly to his head in random gray tufts. He glared at them suspiciously through glasses he’d never worn before. A bottle of orange juice was clutched in one hand. “What do youwant?”
“RCMP Sergeant Manning and my associate, Dr. Alexa Hayden.” Ethan held up his credentials and let the man study them before he raised his gaze to the two ofthem.
Alexa braced herself for the outburst she knew would be forthcoming. But the man only repeated, “What do youwant?”
“Did you have a visitor yesterday, Mr. Reisman? A stranger,perhaps?”