Page 115 of The Murder Club

“I’m a member.”

“Oh. Of course,” she muttered, the puzzle pieces starting to fall into place. “You’re PJ.”

“PJ for Poetic Justice.” His expression was mocking. “Fitting, don’t you think?”

“Fitting for a crazed killer?”

He shrugged off her harsh accusation. “I am most certainly a killer, but there’s nothing crazy about me.”

“Why?”

“Maybe I should start at the beginning.” Thorpe stepped back, as if preparing to begin a lecture. Clearly in his mind he was the teacher and she was the eager student. Even if he did have to kidnap her to have an audience. “With the Murder Club.”

“You started it?”

“No, I joined a couple of years ago.” The icy façade was banished as a glow of twisted pleasure smoldered in the depths of his green eyes. “It seemed like the perfect way to discover how to commit a murder without getting caught.”

The terror humming through her amped up another level. Murder seemed to give him some sort of perverse happiness.

“Seriously?”

“Where else do you have a group of people scouring police reports and newspaper articles while using skills developed from a dozen different careers?” He studied her expression, no doubt enjoying her blatant horror. “If there was a clue left behind, they could find it. Their expertise taught me to avoid all the tiny details I might have overlooked.”

Bailey shuddered. He was right, of course. There were few activities where a killer could actually practice before they committed their murder.

“Then you came to Pike to start your killing spree?”

“Oh, it started before then.”

She grimaced. It hadn’t occurred to her that the murderer had killed before coming to Pike.

“Where did it start?” she asked.

“A small town called Yarrow. Not much bigger than Pike.”

“Yarrow,” Bailey repeated the name. “Why is that name familiar?”

“Because you solved a murder that was committed there.”

“I did?” Shock jolted through Bailey. What the hell? She had never . . . oh. The memory of studying a case when she first joined the Murder Club floated at the edge of her mind. “The elderly woman who died of a supposed heart attack,” she muttered, trying to dig up the fuzzy details. “What was her name?”

“Jocelyn Courtland,” he smoothly answered. “No one questioned her death. Not until you saw the crime scene photos and pointed out that an elderly woman who suffered from arthritis in her hands would have struggled to open a bottle of wine with an ordinary corkscrew. You were right.” He pursed his lips, as if savoring the memory of the murder. “I brought the wine to toast the imminent death of my grandmother. It was an arrogant gesture. And one that might have destroyed me. Thankfully, the cops weren’t nearly as observant as you were.”

Bailey stared at him in disbelief. “She was your grandmother?”

“And my tormentor.” Thorpe stood eerily still in front of her. He wasn’t like Eric, who’d paced from side to side as he’d gone from pleading to anger to desperation. Then again, he wasn’t emotionless like the psychopaths in movies. His eyes might be devoid of empathy for his dead grandmother, but they burned with an intensity that warned deep inside he possessed a vast hunger that was never sated. A poisonous craving that was destroying him. “It was a shame I couldn’t devise a murder that involved a longer time frame and a lot more pain,” he continued. “My only comfort was knowing in the end that she realized she was about to die and I was responsible.”

The words were deliberately spoken. Not a boast. At least not entirely. But a reminder that he relished the memory of killing his grandmother. And a warning that he wasn’t done.

Bailey tugged on the handcuffs. She had to get out of there. If Eric was unhinged, this man was a lethal predator who would kill without mercy.

“Were you the one who brought the case to the Murder Club?” Bailey asked, knowing she had to keep him talking.

When he was done boasting of his triumphs bad things were going to happen.

“More arrogance,” he admitted. “I was certain I had committed the perfect crime. But then you pointed out my mistake and I was . . . enchanted.” He paused, his gaze sweeping over her upturned face. “I’d finally met a woman who could be my equal. That’s why I left you my grandmother’s favorite necklace.”

Bailey shivered in revulsion. “The pearls belonged to your grandmother?”