Page 27 of Darkest Before Dawn (His Perfect Darkness #2)

All that’s changed now. As a Roy, Inara has a security detail a mile deep. Everywhere she goes, she gets media attention, which effectively restricts her movements as much as a cage.

Despite the police’s best efforts, word got out about the connection between the recent murders and the ones in Elyria. The news has run constant stories about the Bondage Killer.

Nadia’s been able to keep Inara out of the news. She’s offered a bigger, better sacrifice: Me. There have been whole news spreads about “the last scion of the Roys.” She even let them cover my threats to the press.

“Rex Roy billionaire shouts threats at press conference,” read the headlines.

One publication ran a long article on “the violent history of the Roy family” that included stories about my boot-legging great-grandfather and our warrior ancestors.

Because Nadia gave them access to the Roy family records, it actually wasn’t bad.

Mostly accurate. I figure I can give it to Inara as an overview if she’s ever curious about the family she married into.

If anything, painting me as a raging monster helps my image. Society allows all sorts of bad behavior from billionaires. Not that I give a damn. My reputation, my money, none of it matters. I only care about Inara.

And she’s fading.

I’ve tried tempting her to leave the room for meals, sleep. . . a shower. Not even a tray of desserts delivered fresh from Paisanos was enough to get her to eat.

I’ve found her sleeping in the room, slumped over the table as if she’d worked so long her head was too heavy for her to hold up any longer. Each time, I’ve carried her to bed, but she’s restless, tossing and turning.

Lack of sleep and enough food has made her hollow-eyed. Lovely but haunted, a stunning statue worn by time.

I enter the situation room where she’s hunched over the murder book Detective Collins sent her. The room seems too dark for her to read, so I command the lights to brighten.

Inara blinks and straightens but doesn’t look at me.

I stand behind her, trying not to pace. I feel like a sailor’s wife on a widow’s walk, staring out to sea, hoping my loved one will come home.

“How’s it going?” I ask, more to break the silence than anything.

“I’m close, Rex. He’s taunting me.”

“I know.” I settle my hands on her shoulders, massaging them. I feel the same frustration. He’s been here all this time, yet Fraternitas has turned up nothing. Neither has Victor, the silent assassin.

Her muscles are rocks under my hands. “We’ll get him.”

“Did you find Ted?”

“Not yet.” Inara gave me a lead to track down, one that could lead us right to the killer.

Her partner Burgess told her a guy named Ted had delivered the latest evidence to her. When pressed, Burgess described the man as white, middle-aged, and skinny but with a gut. “A real ‘loser’ type, ya know?”

We’ve tracked down every reporter in the city named Theodore, Thaddeus, or just plain Ted and interviewed them.

Even the ones that match the description claim that they’ve never seen the journal before.

We’ve dug into their lives and studied their digital footprints and journalistic history, but so far, we’ve found nothing.

I tell Inara this, and she sighs. “I guess it was a long shot.”

“Hamish is compiling a line-up of photos. We’ll run it by Burgess and see if he can ID anyone.”

She lets out a bleak laugh. “If he can, it’ll be the first time he’s ever helped on an investigation in his life.”

I hate hearing her sound so defeated. “Do you want me to ruin his life? Drain his bank accounts, destroy his credit?”

“No. He’s probably doing that all on his own.”

I give a grim smile because Burgess does seem like the type whose karmic punishment is having to live his own life.

“What about the Blackbird murders? And leads there?”

“No. I think it’s a different killer, but I can’t put my finger on it. The killer was careful. He left no DNA evidence, which makes me think he knew how to clean a crime scene. He wore gloves. He might have kept them on his person.”

“Along with a dead bird.”

She huffs. “I guess.”

“Why birds?”

“I don’t know. It could have religious or symbolic significance. But nothing else in the scene points to that.” She worries her lip, lost in her thoughts.

I lay a hand on her shoulder, and my mood lifts when Inara turns toward me.

“Come. You need sleep.”

“You’re not going to threaten to tie me to the bed?”

It’s a good sign that she’s joking about this. “That can be arranged.”

“I guess there are worse fates. It’s not punishment if I like it, right?”

She lets me pull her out of the chair but curls into me. It’s less of a hug and more of a collapse. I keep my touch light on her back, sensing how fragile she is. My little bird. I wonder if she’ll ever allow me to call her that again.

“I’m missing something. I know it. Usually, I can see—” She cuts herself off. I wait, but she doesn’t expound.

There’s something she’s not telling me. I want her to tell me, but I don’t want to push it. Another thing for me to file under Inara’s Secrets.

“I have instincts, I suppose,” she says. “It’s a part of profiling—getting inside the killer’s head. But I don’t want. . .”

It wasn’t much of a guess to realize that part of Inara’s gift is that she’s able to sink into a madman’s psyche. Drown in the darkness. I can understand why she wouldn’t want to do that with the man who killed her family.

“It’s all right. Let me help,” I say. “I’ll do anything to help.”

“ I wish you could. But. . .” She hesitates so long it’s like she’s gone somewhere else.

“Inara?”

She leans on me. “Just be with me. That’ll be enough.”

Inara

Rex is worried about me. I know it.

I’ve retreated into myself, into that dark, solitary place where I’ve lived for so long.

He can’t save me. No one can.

He doesn’t know the secrets I’ve kept for my whole life. I long to tell him but can’t get the words out. It’s like I’m swimming in the ocean, getting plowed under the surf, but every time I break to the surface, I’m buried under another wave.

At least there have been no more deaths. Which also means no more clues, either. BK has a pattern of taking breaks between kills. At least according to the notes Lacy sent over. I pour over her murder book, practically memorizing each page.

The two most recent murders have different MOs, one in the BK style and one in the Blackbird style. Is it two serial killers? Or a copycat emulating both?

All I know is that BK is involved somehow, and he’s not finished. There will be more bodies.

I’m holding my breath, waiting for the next horror to break. Meanwhile, for everyone else, life goes on. The papers are still covering Rex’s secret nuptials. Fortunately, they seem to be more fixated on him and his wealthy family than me.

So far, being married to him hasn’t been so bad. I’m under more scrutiny, but I have all the security money can buy. I can’t move around as easily, but I don’t want to, and until BK is behind bars, it would be wise for me to accept those extra layers of protection. I do feel safer.

And since we called a truce, Rex has done everything he can to support me. He gave me a situation room stocked with everything related to the case, a detective’s dream. No criminal department is this well-funded.

We didn’t say vows to each other, but he seems to be with me for better or worse. And right now, it’s worse.