He pulled away. Backed away. “Don’t try to profile me, Emerson. It’s a bad idea.”

  She held her ground. She would not be intimidated by him. “You know a victim, don’t you? Someone close to you. Very close.”

  He marched for the motel’s small office. “Don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  Oh, but he did know.

  So she waited. Right outside of the small office. He went in, talked with the female clerk, got them the late checkout, and when he came out of that door, Emerson made sure she was standing in his path.

  He growled. A sound that should not have been sexy, but, oddly, it was. Deep and dark and it pulled at something equally deep and dark inside of her. Something she’d worked extremely hard to keep hidden. “It was the way you reacted to Misty and her son. There was a crack in your mask. I saw it. For just a moment, she was personal to you. She reminded you of something—someone—from your own past.”

  “Misty wasn’t personal. I’d never met the woman in my life, not until our fun-filled stay here at the Motel from Hell. Late checkout is one p.m., by the way.” He advanced.

  Again, she did not retreat.

  “Who was it?” Emerson asked him. “A friend? A lover?”

  His eyes flashed. “Are you asking me if I hurt someone, Emerson?”

  “No.” Immediate. Then, “Yes.”

  His teeth snapped together. “You think I would⁠—”

  “Not the victim. No, I don’t think you’d ever hurt a victim.”

  Some of the tension eased from his shoulders.

  “But I think you’d hurt the perpetrator.”

  He smiled, and the smile did not reach his eyes. “I’m not the judge and jury. Punishment isn’t my department.” That was a shark’s smile. Terrifying in its beauty.

  And sharpness.

  She exhaled. “We should take this conversation inside.” Not that anyone was out there to hear them, but⁠—

  He took her hand.

  The move surprised her so much that she jerked. Jumped.

  He quirked one brow. “Emerson, are you afraid of little old me?”

  No, she wasn’t. In fact, he was one of the few people she didn’t think she would ever fear. “You wouldn’t hurt me. I’m not a predator.”

  His fingers twined with hers. His touch scorched her, but she didn’t say a word as he led her back to her room. Room twelve. He stopped at the door. “Get some sleep.”

  He let go of her hand.

  “Was it your mother?” Emerson pushed.

  Hit. She saw it on his face. The flash of pure savagery. His mother had been a victim in the past.

  But he shook his head. “Don’t go down this road with me, Emerson.”

  “You’re a protector, straight to your core.” She understood so much now. “Some protectors are born. Some are made. The instinct to help the victims—that’s what drives you. I wondered how you were such a good profiler. Now I get it. You’re so good because you’re working extra hard to understand the victims and to help them.”

  “No.” He leaned toward her. Put one hand on the frame of the door near her head. “I don’t understand the victims. I understand the perps. I know how they think. I know what they want. I know what they need. I understand them completely, and that’s how I become their nightmares.”

  She almost forgot to breathe. “Gray?” A squeak.

  “You are right about one thing, though. I know a victim.” His lips thinned. “My mother left the sonofabitch who hurt her when I was five years old. He tracked us to a motel much like this one.” A shake of his head. “When he came banging at the door, everyone looked away. The lights went out in the nearby rooms, just like they did tonight. People pretended not to hear his yells. Not to see him breaking down the door. Everyone needed it to be someone else’s problem. It was my problem.”

  She wanted to grab onto him. Hold him tightly. “Come in so we can talk.”

  “No.” Another flat denial. “You don’t…” His hand fell as Gray backed up a step. “I’m too raw. I can’t be near you right now. You don’t want me close the way I am.”

  She did want him close. “What happened when he broke down the door?” He…Gray’s father?

  “That’s a story I don’t share.” His gaze cut around the area, then came back to her.

  “You know sign language.” It was how he’d communicated with Timothy.

  “I know sign language.” A roll of one shoulder.

  She stared at him.

  A sigh slid from his lips. “Not a big deal, Emerson. My aunt was deaf. My mom made sure I could communicate with her. I also speak French, some Russian, and a little bit of Chinese. Anything else you want to know?”

  Just a million things.

  “How about you save the rest of your questions for another time?” He edged toward the nearby door. Room thirteen. “Get some sleep, partner. I’ll see you soon.”

  “Gray!”

  He stood in front of the door to his room. Didn’t open it. Not yet.

  Partner. She blinked. “Am I still your partner?” Emerson turned her body toward his.

  The tension between them seemed to thicken. She could practically see what they’d done before flash between them. The kiss. The lust. The tumble onto the bed.

  Is that why he won’t come into the room with me? Because he doesn’t want us to pick up where we left off?

  “You’re my partner.” His stilted reply. “That’s what you’ll continue to be.”

  Ouch. Okay, that hurt. But then again, she’d been the one just picking hard at his painful past. She got that he didn’t like to be vulnerable. She more than understood. And it wasn’t fair to parade his past out for her to see. At least, it wasn’t fair unless she intended to reveal her own pain. “My father was schizophrenic.” The words just came from her. Flat. Unemotional. “Delusions drove him to take his own life when I was seven years old.”

  “Emerson.”

  “For years, I was terrified that the same fate would happen to me. Schizophrenia is supposed to have a strong hereditary component.” She’d pretty much made the study of schizophrenia her life’s focus. In order to be a psychiatrist, she’d had to get her MD. So many years of study. Of research. Of fear. “I grew up with a ticking time bomb inside of me. Always afraid, just waiting for warning signs to appear. Disorganized thinking and speech. I feared when my mind would become scattered and the words I wanted to say wouldn’t emerge.” Should she confess that a ticking, time bomb terror sometimes still came to her in the dark…and in the light? “I worried about hallucinations.” I still worry. “Most people don’t fear that they’ll see things that aren’t there. I spent years trying to make sure that everything I saw was real.” And living in fear that one day, it wouldn’t be real. That she wouldn’t even realize when she was hallucinating. But her fear didn’t stop there. “And then there is the trifecta. The delusions. My father suffered from so many delusions at the end. Delusions that he was being hunted…that he was being tracked and persecuted by those closest to him. Those delusions led my father to run blindly and leap straight off the cliff near my mother’s home in Maine.”

  Sympathy burned in his eyes. And, oh, horror of horrors, was that pity, too? Gray was looking at her with pity now when he’d stared at her with fierce desire hours before? Pity was the absolute last thing that she wanted from him or from anyone. “Don’t.” A sharp snap as Emerson realized that she’d just made a serious miscalculation in her relationship with him.

  I shouldn’t have told him. Why, oh, why did I tell him? I don’t tell anyone. Her father’s condition was a closely guarded family secret. Or it had been, until she’d blurted out the truth because she was going on twenty-four hours of no sleep, shaking with adrenaline, and fueled by too much fear.

  She didn’t normally make mistakes like this one. But it was too late to pull the words back.

  Gray was stepping toward her. Reaching for her.

  She had to minimize the disaster, immediately. “You were right.” Brisk. “We need to sleep. We’ll regroup later and talk about our partnership after we’ve rested.” When she was less likely to spill more deep, dark secrets.

  “Emerson—” His hand almost touched her.

  She fumbled and pressed the keycard against the lock. The little bar flashed to green, and Emerson shoved open the door. Darkness greeted her. She didn’t remember turning off the light, but she must have done it before they’d gone to the police station with Misty and Timothy. Emerson kicked the door shut. She didn’t immediately turn on the lights. Instead, she stood with her back pressed against the door, with her heart racing far too fast in her chest, and she let the darkness surround her. Comfort her.

  It was so easy to hide in the dark.

  “Emerson…” She heard Gray’s voice quite clearly. After all, the door was paper-thin.

  But she didn’t respond to him.

  Was he going to knock? Demand that they talk? Was he going to tell her how sorry he was about her father? Was Gray going to look at her with more pity when she needed him to stare at her with that wild desire? A desire that had made her feel so incredibly alive and wanted?

  He didn’t knock.

  Didn’t do anything but walk away. When she strained, Emerson could pick up the soft pad of his steps. He was leaving her. Check. That was exactly what she’d asked for. They needed space. She needed it. Emerson waited until she heard the creak of his door opening, and then her hand reached out, and she hit the light switch. Illumination immediately flooded overhead, shining down on her and the room.

  Chaos.

  Emerson’s eyes widened.

  Furniture had been overturned. Her suitcase had been ripped open and the contents scattered across the room. Her clothes appeared to have been torn—or slashed—into pieces.

  And, big, dripping red letters hung over the bed, letters that formed⁠—

  You’ll die.

  Letters that promised her death.

  Emerson stopped breathing. Her eyes snapped closed.

  Don’t be a delusion. Don’t be. I can’t—I can’t be like him. Her greatest fear, right there, surrounding her, but maybe, maybe when she opened her eyes, things would be normal again.

  Her eyes flew open. Her breath expelled.

  You’ll die.

  The chaos and destruction remained.

  He could have handled the scene differently. Could have done a thousand different things instead of just gazing at Emerson like the cold-blooded bastard that he was. The woman had poured out her heart to him, and, in turn, he’d reacted by gaping at her. Had he really buried his emotions down so deep that he didn’t know how to respond fucking sympathetically to someone? To her?

  But by the time Gray had realized that he’d frozen, it had been too late. He’d tried to reach out to her, but Emerson had pulled back. Shut down. No, shut him out.

  And letting her go had seemed the kindest choice.

  Especially since he’d already screwed up colossally with her earlier. Should never have gone into her room. Should never have kissed her. Should never have gotten so close to fucking her. Why the hell had he told her how he really felt? He should have kept his need to himself. So what if he’d seen the same lust in her eyes, if he’d caught her watching him with her hungry stare as she nibbled on her plump, lower lip?

  Yes, he’d understood that she was attracted to him. But he could have kept his own damn mouth shut. Ignored the attraction.

  He had not.

  The last twenty-four hours had been a real cluster of a situation for him. If Trevor the Jerkoff hadn’t interrupted Gray and Emerson…

  I would have taken her, and there would have been no going back. Not for either of them.

  He pressed his keycard to the lock. The light flashed green. With his jaw clenched, he pushed open the door, flipped on the lights and⁠—

  What. The. Hell?

  Battle-ready tension poured through Gray because his room had been completely trashed. The mattress had been dumped on the floor. The sheets ripped away. His suitcases had been emptied, his suit bags opened and…

  “Oh, the fuck, no,” he breathed as he shot forward. But, the fuck, yes, some punk with a death wish had slashed his five-hundred-dollar suits. A punk who would pay.

  Gray yanked out his gun as he spun and surveyed the scene. Anger pumped in his blood. Red letters had been spray-painted on the wall. Letters that dripped and distorted but were still clear enough to understand.

  Leave. One word. Just that. Leave.

  The welcome wagon had clearly come to greet him in Briar, Tennessee. He would have preferred a gift basket and not slashed suits and a destroyed room but⁠—

  Emerson.

  He was already running toward the connecting door. Gray doubted he’d been the only one to get an unwelcome visitor. The perp wasn’t in his room any longer, and Gray had a sudden, stark fear that Emerson had walked into her motel room just to find some bastard waiting on her.

  “Emerson!” Gray shouted her name. He grabbed for the connecting door on his side. Opened it. But her door was still locked. Screw that. He didn’t hesitate. Just lifted his foot and kicked in the door that barred her room. It flew forward even as he burst into Emerson’s motel room. “Emerson!”

  A fast glance took in everything.

  The trashed bed.

  The clothes that had been ripped and thrown around the room.

  The painted threat on the wall over her bed. You’ll die.

  And…Emerson. Frozen near the motel’s front door, with her back pressed to the wood. But her gaze whipped toward him. Her breath shuddered out. “Gray?”

  “Did you search the room?” He was already doing it even as he asked the question. Peering into the closet. Looking under the bed. Checking the tiny bathroom. “The bastard is gone.” Fury bled in every word. “The fuck you’ll die. Can’t believe some angry prick left that message for you.” He bounded toward her.

  She seemed rooted to the spot.

  Worry rose to twine with his rage. “Emerson?” His right hand retained its grip on the gun, but his left reached for her. Touched her shoulder.

  She flinched. “I-I don’t have delusions.”

  What? He glanced over his shoulder. “No, baby.” His stare returned to her. “This isn’t a delusion. Some creep broke into your room and mine. They are both trashed.”

  She shook her head and seemed to snap to attention. “Right. Both.” Another shake of her head. Her gaze sharpened. Darted to his gun. Then back to his face. “You’re okay?”

  “No, I’m not okay.” He nearly roared with his fury. “The prick slashed my suits.”

  Her eyes widened. “Oh, no. Not the suits.”

  She could not be mocking him. Not then. “Emerson…”

  “Did you call me…baby…earlier?”

  Damn. He might have. “No idea.” Yes, he had. Definitely. “We need to make sure we weren’t robbed. My laptop was in the room’s safe. Didn’t even check to see if it was still there.” Because he’d hauled ass to her. “Search to see if anything of yours was taken.” He whirled away from her. Glared at the wreckage. “Do you know how many fingerprints are in motel rooms? No way will a crime scene team find anything useful.” And there sure as hell hadn’t been any cameras outside their rooms. The only camera he’d seen had been in the small check-in office.

  That office that would be his next stop.

  He hurried back to his room. Opened the safe. Good. The laptop was still there. Not that seeing it did anything to lessen his fury.

  “Nothing was taken.”

  His head jerked toward the connecting doorway. Emerson stood there. Beautiful, fragile Emerson in her high heels and with her dark hair falling softly around her face and smudges of exhaustion beneath her gorgeous, sapphire eyes.

  She hadn’t slept all night. Neither had he. And this piss-poor motel was not providing any security. He should have done better with her. He’d just—hell, he’d thought they’d be in and out of Briar, Tennessee. Not like he’d planned for a long haul.

  I should have taken better care of my partner. This won’t happen again.

  Because that was what Emerson was. Partner. Not a lover. He could not, would not cross that line. It was too dangerous. Not because of her. Because of him. Because as he’d learned when he finally tasted her, his control did not hold when he had Emerson in his arms.

  “Gray?”

  “You’re not fucking dying,” he snarled.

  “Good to know.” Her gaze dipped to his bed. Over it. To the message painted there. “Guessing someone isn’t keen to have us in town, huh?”

  “Probably one of Trevor’s buddies. Word must have spread about his arrest.” And Gray had left Emerson’s room when Trevor came knocking. So he’d shined a bright signal on their location. But, still… “I’m talking to the desk clerk.”

  “I’m coming with you.”

  Sure, she was. Damn straight. He didn’t want to let her out of his sight.

  In moments, he and Emerson were entering the small check-in office. The bell overhead jingled when they entered, and he couldn’t help but tense.

  Fucking bells jingling make me nervous now. Because of another case. The first he’d worked with Emerson.

  “You again?” The young clerk grimaced at him. “Thought you were all settled with a late checkout.” She blew a big bubble. Popped it. Sucked it back in her mouth.

  A game show played from the TV on the wall. One of those twenty-four-hour game show channels.

  He ignored the TV. He had tucked his gun into the back waistband of his pants. No sense terrifying the woman working the desk. “Our rooms are trashed.”

  She grimaced. Raised her dark brows even as she twirled a lock of very blond hair. “Yeah, that’s pretty much the status for all the rooms here. Sorry. Not like it’s the Ritz. You get what you pay for, you know?”

  “They aren’t trash. They are trashed,” he emphasized. “They are⁠—”

  “Someone broke into our rooms,” Emerson cut in to say. “Destroyed our belongings. Spray-painted our walls.”

  The clerk stopped chewing her gum. Her eyes widened. “Are you serious?”

  “No, I joke about stuff like this for shits and giggles,” Gray snapped.