“My father was…um…friends with a janitor when I was younger. It’s a habit, almost a compulsion, to use the appropriate cleaners for surfaces after so many years of training the mind to use those. If I were you, I’d look for custodial services in the area and check to see if these apartment buildings ever outsourced to individual cleaning companies.”
I slide the paper closer, my eyes moving over all the facts. “We interviewed all employees and did background checks,” I say absently. “And we considered the cleaning so thoroughly bit to be a case of OCD but ruled it out based on the fact there were different amounts of stab wounds, and they didn’t clean anything other than the kill room.”
“A lot of custodial services pay cash under the table because it’s hard to keep workers. Some of them have a ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ policy because they have to hire whatever walks in needing a job. The company keeps the majority of the money. Workers make crumbs in comparison. So cash under the table that isn’t taxed is a big way to draw in more workers, and also keep from having to supply benefits to said employees. It’s likely they never mentioned them because they didn’t want to have to tell you that.”
“You’re a fucking genius,” I groan.
I grab her face in both my hands and kiss her hard, even though I also want to throttle her at the same time.
“But now I have a call to make,” I grumble, feeling her smile against my lips.
“Make your call. Catch a bad guy. Maybe the lead is solid and you can catch him before he kills again.”
Reluctantly, I pull up my phone, and dial Hadley. She’s going to fucking kill me.
Chapter 12
We have to do the best we can. This is our sacred human responsibility.
—Albert Einstein
LANA
I won’t lie and say it’s not hypocritical to hope he catches the sicko who raped and killed all these women. It’s hypocritical because I’m also hoping he never catches me for torturing and killing a string of men.
But it also feels good to listen to him animatedly tell someone this amazing new lead. I’m worried and shocked when he tells Hadley it’s me who inspired this new lead. He shouldn’t tell them he let his girl give him that info on a case I was never supposed to see.
Maybe the fact he called me his anything has the butterflies stirring. It’s definitely something. The fact he sounds proud of me also makes me feel…good. That word again.
My phone rings as he continues to talk to someone else, and I head outside to answer it when I see it’s Jake. My eyes stay on the window, keeping up with Logan.
“Hey. Any luck?”
“Lots of luck. I hate rushing this date the way we’re going to, but I’m going to help you on these.”
My eyebrows go up in surprise.
“Like in person? You’re going to do this too?”
“Just this once, and only for the securing part.”
“No. You can’t. You threw up when I tried to give you details, Jake.”
“You have no idea how much I wish I had your ability to kill without hesitance,” he says quietly, an edge to his tone.
“But you don’t,” I remind him, still watching to make sure Logan can’t overhear me.
“Doesn’t matter. I can’t risk you taking on something like this alone.”
“I can’t talk about this right now,” I say on almost a whisper when I see Logan hanging up his phone and running a hand through his hair.
“Shit. You’re with him? That’s still a discussion we need to have.”
“I moved my murder room in that secret room you built me years ago.”
“You think that’s enough to keep a profiler from figuring out you’re slowly killing off a list of people?” he asks dryly.
I heave out a heavy breath as I continue to watch Logan through the window. He looks around, then moves to grab a glass.