To havethisman as her partner.
To havethisman’s baby.
“Thank you,” she murmured as tears streamed down her cheeks and she pressed herself against his hard, strong body. Nate had just taken her shriveled up heart and filled it back up.
* * * * *
2:40 P.M.
“How’s Rylla?” Heidi asked.
“Battered and bruised but basically all right,” Matthew replied. He still couldn’t believe his partner had been attacked. When he’d gotten the call his heart had been in his throat. He had jumped straight in his car and driven directly to her house, unable to convince himself she was okay until he’d seen her.
“Nate took her to the hospital today to get her ribs x-rayed and her neck checked. She has a couple of bruised ribs, and one was cracked, but the doctors were happy with the neck wound,” Jonathon added.
“She didn't get a look at the man who attacked her?” their boss asked.
“No, it was dark, and she was busy fighting for her life.” He had no doubt in his mind that if the killer had gotten her into a car that she’d be dead by now. The Fairytale Killer couldn’t take when a woman stood up to him, and he would never be able to control Rylla.
“Why would he go after Rylla?” Heidi asked. “Did he know she’d been working the case?”
“Apparently, he told her that her sister had told him a lot about her,” Matthew replied. “We’re assuming that Mila tried to convince the killer to let her go by telling him that her sister was a cop and would be looking for her.”
“So, he wanted to take her out of the equation so she couldn’t arrest him?”
“I don’t think so,” he answered. “He killed Mila, he wouldn’t have done that if he didn't have another target in mind. I think he wants Rylla, I think he envisions her as his next attempt at finding the perfect woman.”
“But why Rylla?” Allina asked.
“She doesn’t fit his profile,” Jonathon said.
“Maybe he’s changed his profile,” he suggested. “Maybe since what he was originally looking for keeps failing, he decided he should try something else out, and Rylla is definitely very different to the other women he’s tried so far.”
“If he’s changed his mind on what he wants then the decoy profiles we set up are going to be useless,” Heidi said.
“They’re going to be useless for now anyway, he’s going to be fixated on Rylla. If he has decided that she is the woman he’s been looking for, then nothing will stop him from getting her. He won't stop until he has her.” Which was a truly terrifying possibility.
“He must have been watching her house last night,” Jonathon said. “He waited until she was isolated before making a play for her.”
Matthew shuddered at the possibility.
“He could still be watching her,” Heidi said.
“No, we’ve been watching her street, he must have decided that since he tried to get her and failed that he’d have to play things differently now. He knows she’ll be waiting for him to try again,” Allina said.
“Sam has two of his guys keeping an eye on Rylla’s house, and said he’ll make sure he has two people on her twenty-four seven. And Nate is staying with her. For now, she’s safe but this guy is determined, we don’t know what he’s going to try next. He’s never had this happen before. Rylla is different than the others. He hasn’t been grooming her online, he knows that she knows who he is and that abducting her isn’t going to be easy. We have no idea what he might decide to try, we just know he’s going to try something,” Jonathon said.
If they could just narrow down who the killer was then they might know what to expect. “Rylla got him last night. She managed to kick him in the face, she must have got him in the nose because there was blood. Kane has her clothes right now. We’re just waiting to see if he gets anything he can use to run a DNA test and compare it to the samples we have from Jaden Kite and Hendrick Mint.”
“We might have something on Jaden,” Allina announced.
“We already know that he owns a limousine company, giving him access to a perfect vehicle to abduct his victims in, but we also found something that might provide him with a way to get the dresses he sent to the women for their dates,” Jonathon told them.
Arching a hopeful eyebrow, Matthew asked, “What?”
“Jaden was an only child for the first twelve years of his life,” Jonathon explained. “Then his parents broke up, there were lots of accusations thrown around by both parties, an open marriage, threesomes, swingers, affairs. Both his parents wanted custody of him. His dad won and had him for a couple of years, barely let him see his mother, then there were some issues of potential abuse, and the mom was awarded custody. She had remarried and had a daughter with her new husband. Jaden’s half-sister was in a bad car accident when she was seventeen. She was left paralyzed from the waist down. Her dream had always been to be a fashion model, but those were shattered by the accident that also left her with bad scarring on her face. So, Jaden bought her a fashion house. He’s a silent partner, the business is based in London, where his sister lives with her parents, and is run by her.”
“That would certainly give Jaden a way to get the dresses without leaving a paper trail,” he said.