Page 66 of Chaos has a Name (An FBI Romance/Thriller #66)

Scanning the area, they saw the stream that disappeared into the rock they just entered by. They knew what Elizabeth had said about following the water out.

Now, they’d retrace her steps.

“We follow the water upstream,” Gene said, making sure he kept a headcount.

Just.

In.

Case.

As they began moving, it was no easy journey. Oh, for them, it wasn’t bad, but they had headlamps, and were armed with guns.

Gene understood why Elizabeth didn’t want to come back in here. It was creepy in the dark, and to be all alone?

Who could blame her?

The whole team walked for a while, listening to the silence in the cave. For a group of people, they moved rather quietly.

All that they could hear was the dripping of water, and the barely audible sound of water trickling down toward the direction they’d come.

It wasn’t long before they knew they’d reached where Elizabeth had been. Against the one wall, there were skulls stacked.

It was incredibly creepy in just the glow of the headlamps. Thankfully, they had a bigger lamp so the techs could work in some light.

“Light it up,” Callen said.

One of the techs put a portable light down, and hit the button to turn it on.

Oh, and this was a house of horrors.

There were spiders.

Centipedes.

And the wall of skulls.

If it didn’t give you the creeps, then you were a better man than Gene. He was freaking grossed out by what he was seeing.

And he wasn’t afraid of spiders.

This had to be torture for Elizabeth.

“Poor Elizabeth,” Callen whispered. He could see some of the blood on the floor, and that was likely where she’d been.

Gene agreed.

“This would freak me out. I can’t imagine waking up alone and bound in this monstrosity.”

He agreed there.

“Start collecting them,” Callen said. “I don’t want to be here longer than we have to. My idea of funsies is not hanging out in here, or making a walk back through the woods where two weirdos are using arrows to get some attention. It gets dark in the forest well before it does out in the open.”

That picked up the pace.

As the team started photographing, and bagging the skulls, the monotonous task ahead was daunting.

How were they supposed to figure out who all of these people were?

There had to be almost one hundred skulls.

Gene pointed his light further back in that opening, and that’s when he realized there was something there.

“CJ, do you see that? Or am I seeing things?” he asked, peering into the darkness.

Callen looked.

What he noticed was that there was something written in blood. At the angle they were at, it was difficult to read, so they moved closer.

Now, they knew where Elizabeth got it on her arm. She had to have leaned on it. The blood on the floor might be hers from the head wound.

‘You are angering The Hollow. The wrath of our ancestors is now upon you.’

Well, that’s not good.

Not.

At.

All.

“I don’t like this,” Gene whispered. “I think we just pointed this nightmare at ourselves.

On this, Callen agreed.

This was the last thing they needed. It was crystal clear that coming back here, Wyler had fucked them good.

* * * The Blackhawk Family * * *

The RV

Same Time

After managing to get back to the FBI building, she got her police car, and grabbed some food.

Thankfully, Damascus had quite a few different food spots to eat. If you wanted burgers, there was a great joint not far away.

If you wanted Mexican, they had the best tacos.

But in this case, she’d found something better.

Since she knew that Caspian wasn’t a meat lover, she opted to get some Indian food for them.

It seemed like a good choice, considering. Most of the food on the reservation was heavily into hunted prey. A Vegan was NOT going to enjoy venison, and she wouldn’t enjoy grossing him out.

That was for damn sure.

This Indian place had the best Vegan options, and she’d even admit that she ate takeout from here often. Granted, she’d go home and add venison to the meal, but that was neither here nor there.

Tonight, they were going to dine on a plethora of beans and vegetables.

After grabbing the food, she quickly got home, showered, and changed. She didn’t put on girly things, simply because she wasn’t sure how he’d react.

Instead, she wore everyday things so this whole dinner was lowkey.

Elizabeth said he was shy, and she was trying to back off of the whole ‘barrel down on a person’ persona she tended to have.

Sue her.

She was her father’s child.

Hopefully, she could lure him into a conversation where he broke through that ice, and they could have a decent evening.

What was she expecting?

Honestly, Rayna wasn’t sure. While she wasn’t a ‘sleep with anything with legs’ kind of a girl, she was attracted to Caspian.

He was handsome, and she loved his eyes. They were a beautiful grassy green, and reminded her of the lushness of the reservation in spring.

If it went nowhere, she was good with that too. If they didn’t connect, it would be cool to make a new friend. The Blackhawks weren’t here often, but she wouldn’t mind someone familiar she could have a coffee or catch a movie with when they were around.

Hell.

She’d try yoga if that was his thing.

Why not?

Rayna prided herself in being friendly, and willing to try new things in an effort to be a team player.

Time would tell what dinner would net, but she was going in with very few expectations, other than some good conversation, and maybe some laughter over naan bread.

Luckily for her, it didn’t take long to get back to the Blackhawk cabin. The food would be semi-warm, and she hoped the RV had a microwave.

When she parked her truck, her belly fluttered with nerves.

She hoped this worked out, and Caspian wasn’t freaked out by her showing up. If he was, well…that would suck the big one.

Rayna wasn’t sure if the guy did like her or not. Relying on someone else for the information was nerve-wracking. She was sure Elizabeth hadn’t lied, but that awkwardness…

That was something she’d rather avoid.

Heading to the RV, she knocked on the door, and hoped that he was inside this one. There were two, and it was a crapshoot.

Finally, she heard footsteps heading toward the door. When the door was opened, it certainly was Caspian.

And holy shit.

The man was shirtless, and he had to have been working out.

Yep.

Her panties got wet.

Now, she wanted to forget all of that ‘let’s be friends’ bullshit that she’d convinced herself was perfectly fine.

Because it wasn’t.

Now, she had to find a way not to ogle him like she was an idiot.

What caught her the most off guard was that his Kevlar and work gear fit his body, so she knew that he had to have a decent one, but now, shirtless?

And just wearing a pair of shorts?

Oh, boy.

He was spectacular.

As someone who appreciated the male physique, Caspian Collins definitely had one that would be hard to forget.

He had a few tattoos, but it was the big, ornate ones that circled his biceps that had her attention.

“Am I interrupting?” she asked, more than willing to come in and watch him do whatever the hell he was doing inside the RV that he considered working out.

Someone kept his body in shape.

Seriously.

At her question, he looked horrified, and for a few good reasons. She was the last person he expected to show up at the RV.

The panic was back, and he was pretty sure he was going to make this an awkward mess.

It was kind of his thing.

After ditching her, to put space between them, Caspian came back here, and he’d been trying to meditate in a headstand as he cleared his mind for the day.

There’d been a woman running through his head naked.

This exact woman.

It had made the Yoga torture, and the fact that he couldn’t stop thinking about her was stressing him the hell out.

When he opened his mouth, words came out, and he felt like an ass for it too.

What he wanted to say was that she was absolutely not interrupting.

What he ended up saying was the worst possible thing he could.

It was cold, icy, and so goddamn impersonal, but if he didn’t keep it in check, it would go to shit, and she’d find out all about him.

And none of it good.

“Can I help you?”

His deadpan monotone voice worried her. In that moment, she actually believed she was interrupting. Now, she was definitely second guessing this evening’s choices.

Her brain screamed one thing.

‘He is absolutely not into you. Abort your mission!’

But she was stuck holding the bag.

Literally.

In hopes to salvage this, Rayna showed him the bag that she was holding.

“I picked up some dinner. I thought you’d like to join me. It’s a nice night. Want to have a picnic?” she asked, smiling at him.

What she expected was acceptance, and a dinner date. What she got was anything but.

Caspian blinked.

And said NOTHING.

Oh, he looked as if he wanted to say something, but he didn’t, and that freaked her out.

This was bad.

In that moment, she felt incredibly stupid, and absolutely horrified.

The man was NOT into her. Elizabeth had been wrong, and Rayna had just made a fool of herself. What she wanted to do was sink into the ground and disappear.

This was mortifying.

Oh, and the silence…it was awkward.

As he stood there, Caspian tried to find the words, but he was struggling. When he got nervous, he couldn’t control his tongue.

Now, it was about making good choices, and using incredibly short sentences.

To Caspian, it was clear that he was taking too long because she spoke before he could even plan out the words in his mind.

Honestly, this caught him off guard.

BIG-TIME.

For Rayna, Caspian’s lack of an answer made her very uncomfortable.

Him too.

What Rayna knew was this was a huge error on her behalf, so she aborted the mission quicker than she normally would.

There was only one way to survive this, and that was to turn tail and run.

This was more than shyness. She wasn’t an idiot to believe it was only that.

Rayna got the vibe he didn’t want her there.

So, she gave up.

There was only so much humiliation a girl could handle. Tomorrow was going to be a rough day when they had to come back on duty and work this case.

Oh, hell!

How was she going to face him again?

“I think you should just have it. Never mind us sharing it and having a picnic. I’m sorry I interrupted whatever you were doing,” she said, handing him the bag.

Her heart was racing, and all she could think about was finding a way to disappear and get the fuck out of there. As God as her witness, she was never going to recover from this.

This disappointment…

Well, the rejection sucked.

As she handed him the bag, Caspian felt that crash of disappointment.

He’d done it again.

Yeah, he’d turned off a really nice woman, who, for some reason, found him attractive. He’d just been so caught off guard that he couldn’t rehearse what he was going to say.

Or plan out his words.

Now, he was watching her leave. The prettiest woman he’d seen in his life was hauling ass to put as much distance between them as she could.

Rayna was already at her truck, and when she looked back at him, he saw it. As a Marine, you learned to read the room, and this was bad.

She looked…hurt.

God.

What the hell was he supposed to do, and why the bloody hell couldn’t he be normal and just have dinner with someone without this mess?

He had plenty of regrets as he watched her leave.

Part of him wanted to run after her, and explain. The other part knew he’d be a hot mess, and it wouldn’t matter. She’d never give him a chance now that he’d embarrassed both of them.

Well, that took care of that.

Now, he wasn’t sure what to think. He never had a woman pursue him, and he wasn’t sure what the next step was.

This kind of thing never happened.

God.

Damn.

It.

Normally, he found some courage, asked a woman out, and dropped the ball on the whole thing. He finally found a woman who wanted to have dinner with him, and she showed up with it too.

Yeah, this was his worst nightmare.

As she backed out of the driveway, and headed off, he sighed.

What the hell was he supposed to do now?

Tomorrow was going to be incredibly awkward when he had to see her, and he would. He was on Elizabeth duty at seven.

With a myriad of curses, he closed the door, and wished he was anyone else than him. It was a constant letdown that he couldn’t be himself.

Carrying the takeout bag into the RV, he put it on the table, and curiosity was killing him.

What did she pick for them?

When he opened the bag, he knew that smell anywhere.

It was an array of his favorite Vegan Indian food. The woman had been trying, and his dumbass self couldn’t get the words out quick enough.

Sitting down, Caspian was at a loss.

He didn’t know what the hell to do now. This was a whole new world for him.

Oh, he had women check him out, but after he’d been icy and cold toward them, they never gave him another thought again.

But she had.

For some unfathomable reason, she still tried to spend time with him when he’d ghosted her on the reservation. Had there been a chance, it was gone now.

His father was right. He was an idiot for not knowing how to respond to people, and he’d spend the rest of his life alone because of it.

There was no fixing stupid.

This proved one single, solitary thing to Caspian. He was a walking disaster.

Oh, and he was going to forever be alone.

And that hurt.