“I understand the urgency, Jack. I really do.” She braced her foot against the dashboard as he cut off a large tanker. “But if you don’t calm the hell down before we get there, security will see you as a threat and take us both out. Then Tabitha would definitely win. I think it would be best if I approached her alone.”

  Jack shook his head repeatedly. “If I had manned up back when I first thought Tabitha was pregnant, if I had simply asked her if she was carrying my child, none of this would be happening. It’s my fault for backing down in the first place. I need to confront her head-on. I won’t stand by and let her take Johnny away from me a second time. Not when I’ve finally just discovered he exists.”

  When the Papaya Springs private airport entrance came into view, Bexley’s muscles unclenched. She let out a shaking breath. “Fine. But you’re going to have to get your shit together, Jack. Our chances of getting through the gates and onto the tarmac are already slim to none, considering we haven’t heard back from Temperance.”

  Bexley cringed as she uttered her friend’s name yet again. It was becoming painfully clear that she’d only be able to repay her friend by offering up one of Bexley’s vital organs. When the call she placed to Temperance had kicked into voicemail, Bexley left a short, discombobulated message that involved the mere mention of Jack needing a massive favor for reasons she couldn’t get into. Since Temperance and Jack were tentatively seeing each other, Bexley hadn’t felt it was her place to fill Temperance in on Jack’s situation with his estranged son.

  After the security guard motioned them to continue past the gate with the mere mention of Temperance’s name and the access they were granted to her jet, Jack raised his hand for Bexley to slap.

  “Your date with her yesterday must’ve gone extremely well,” she teased as their hands connected. “You should probably fill me in on the juicy details.” She snuggled in a little closer to him, batting her eyelashes. “Did she giggle at all your dad jokes? Did your hands accidentally touch when you were reaching for something simultaneously? Did you share a plate of spaghetti?”

  “I don’t know how Brewer puts up with you,” he teased back, rolling his eyes even though his lips bent with a grin.

  Bexley pointed to the side of the runway. “There’s a jet with the boarding stairs still out! I bet that’s her!”

  Jack accelerated in the direction she pointed, haphazardly parking at an angle alongside a small fleet of black cars and SUVs. He was out of the vehicle and on the move before Bexley could remind him to remain calm.

  Bexley caught up to him at the base of the stairs, where he stood motionless, one hand gripping the railing. She was about to ask him what was wrong when she spotted little Johnny standing in the jet’s open doorway, staring back at them. He was thin with bony cheeks and seemed taller than average to Bexley, even though she wasn’t sure of the usual height for a 10-year-old. In a white t-shirt with the logo of Jack’s favorite basketball team, black shorts, and white high tops, hair tousled like he’d just been running, there was no denying the kid was an adorable clone of the man staring back at him.

  “H-hi,” Jack stuttered, lifting a hand in a small wave.

  The boy waved back with a little smile cracking his smooth lips.

  “Where’s your Aunt Tabitha?” Bexley asked him.

  The infamous news anchor stepped in behind him with a deep scowl. “I’m right here.”

  “Tabitha,” Jack said to her, his deep voice casting a clear warning, “it seems we’re past due for an important conversation.”

  As Tabitha and Jack discussed their situation in the back of her private car, Bexley sat beside Johnny in one of the luxurious leather seats inside the small jet. The toy airplane the pilot gifted the boy sat in his lap, untouched. Johnny tapped his fingers against the armrests at his sides, clearly unsettled by what he had just witnessed. Bexley had become comfortable enough around Olive, but young boys were an entirely different creature.

  “My name’s Bexley,” she said once the silence became stifling. “What’s yours?”

  “Johnny.”

  “Sooo…Johnny, how’s school?”

  “It’s pretty lame,” he replied with a slight shrug of one shoulder.

  “Do you even know the definition of lame?”

  He threw her a quick side-eye. “The opposite of cool?”

  “What about your teachers?”

  He looked back at the plane. “Lame.”

  “Let me guess…the girls there must be lame, too?”

  A smirk titled his lips. “They’re okay.”

  “Not the opposite of cool, eh?” she teased, nudging his arm. “What about friends? A totally not lame guy like you must have a few of those.”

  “I have enough,” he said with another little smirk. He suddenly turned to face her, frowning. “Is that guy out there my real dad?”

  Air whooshed from Bexley’s lungs, making drawing in another breath impossible. “Why would you ask that?”

  “I realized a couple of years ago that I must’ve been adopted. I don’t look anything like Diego, and I once heard him arguing with my mom—he said something about my real mom.”

  Bexley’s jaw worked as she held the boy’s curious gaze, unable to articulate a safe reply. She let out a relieved breath at the sight of Jack boarding the aircraft. As he started for them, his expression was relaxed enough that she assumed his conversation with Tabitha had gone well.

  “Hey, buddy,” Jack greeted Johnny. “It’s nice to finally meet you. My name is Jack Squires.”

  As he crouched in front of his son, Tabitha appeared in the aircraft’s doorway, arms crossed and lips held in a rigid line. Bexley half expected lasers to shoot out of her ice-cold glare.

  Johnny carefully scrutinized Jack’s face. “If you’re my real dad, can I come live with you?”

  Jack’s eyes darted over to Bexley.

  “I didn’t say a word,” she promised with a shake of her head.

  “I’m not stupid,” Johnny said in a defiant tone.

  Chuckling, Jack patted his son’s knee. “I didn’t figure you would be.”

  Johnny’s voice cracked when he asked, “What took you so long to find me?”

  To Jack’s credit, he didn’t turn around to throw blame on the evil woman standing behind him. Tears filled his eyes as he cleared his throat. “That’s complicated, Johnny. Trust me, I wish someone would’ve told me about you the day you were born. I missed out on way too much.” He gave his son a warm smile. “That’s all going to change because from this point forward, we’re going to spend as much time together as possible, getting to know each other. Is that alright with you?”

  A tear rolled down Johnny’s cheek when he nodded. “Can I call you ‘Dad’?”

  Jack choked out another chuckle when he pulled his son into his arms. “I’d be honored.”

  When Johnny’s arms wrapped around his father’s neck, Bexley felt the irritating prick of emotion stirring behind her eyes. She had to fill Brewer in on her suspicion that she was pregnant.

  16

  On Bexley’s drive back to the office following the emotional introduction of Jack to his son, she couldn’t stop thinking about her own pending situation. She couldn’t put off telling Brewer any longer, or it would eat her up inside. She wasn’t sure how he would react to the idea that he might be a father again after he’d lost his only other child to a horrific act of violence.

  There was no doubt Brewer would be an excellent father. But she felt she’d be forcing him into the role since they had both decided not to have children. Maybe she could try one of those home tests before getting too worked up over the idea.

  As she contemplated calling Brewer to see if he could meet her for a late lunch, her dashboard screen lit with a call from her trusted assistant.

  “What’s up, Red?”

  “I’ve been digging as deep as possible into this Arnold Douglas character’s history, like you asked,” Red began before pausing. “Bex…it isn’t good.”

  Bexley gripped the steering wheel until her fingers were bloodless. “What did you find?”

  “I couldn’t locate any employment records after he was let go from a parts factory in the late seventies. It seems he lived off disability checks from the government. And the man moved around a lot after leaving Papaya Springs in the early eighties. Los Angeles, New York, Louisiana, Florida—he inhabited several big cities for quite some time before moving to the next one. He even spent a few months overseas in London, Rome, Paris, and several other major European cities.”

  A cold, crippling chill gripped Bexley’s spine. Those were the same cities Twila had visited in her younger days. He’d been tracking her. “What did you find?”

  “The dates he spent in each city coordinated around the same timeframes as a long list of women who went missing and were never found. We’re talking at least a dozen women, maybe more. And over half of them were artists.”

  The air in Bexley’s vehicle was both too stale and too thin. Her sweet neighbor had unknowingly become involved with one of the most dangerous men in history.

  “We may be dealing with a serial killer,” she choked out.

  “Exactly what I was thinking, boss lady.”

  Bexley cracked her window with a shaking hand and gulped in the fresh ocean air. “Good work, Red. I’ll contact Deputy Danks to fill him in on what you found and swing by Twila’s to update the deputy keeping watch over her place. It’s imperative everyone involved knows what we’re dealing with.”

  “That includes you,” Red warned in an ominous tone. “Be careful…watch your back.”

  After ending the call, Bexley didn’t make it far before she was forced to pull into a gas station.

  It seemed her period had arrived.

  After grabbing the necessary supplies and cleaning up in the restroom, Bexley returned to her Explorer with a gas station burrito and a burst of determination to find Arnold Douglas before he hurt Twila. As she swiped through the dashboard screen to call the deputy, another call came in.

  From J.J.

  The second she accepted his call, J.J. began to speak.

  “She’s gone, darlin’,” he gasped, desperate for air. “I was only in the restroom for a moment…bastard knocked me out cold when I re-entered the hallway. The deputy outside claims he’d been watching the property closely and didn’t see anyone approach from the road. That murdering son-of-a-bitch has her, Bexley. He has her, and I don’t know what to do about it.”

  Bexley inhaled sharply. If Twila’s ex-lover hurt her, Bexley would never forgive herself for not finding him sooner.

  “Hang tight, J.J. I’m on my way. We’ll find her, I promise.”

  Angry tears stung her eyes as she punched the accelerator.

  Brewer furiously paced behind Bexley and J.J. as the former coworkers hovered over Bexley’s phone, carefully reviewing the security footage captured on the app. Once Bexley had called Brewer at his shop to fill him in on Twila’s disappearance, her husband dropped everything to join them in the search. Bexley had secretly loved it when he showed up with grease smudged across one of his cheeks and along a forearm. Her husband was fiercely loyal to everyone he loved and didn’t care about trivial things. He would’ve been too focused on Twila’s safety to regard his reflection on the drive home.

  Deputy Danks and a good portion of the Sheriff’s Department were searching for any signs of Arnold Douglas or Twila. Bexley’s pulse raced as she willed one of them to call, letting them know the alleged killer had been captured. Even if J.J. hadn’t been knocked unconscious, Bexley knew Twila would never have merely snuck away for any reason. Twila cared deeply about J.J. and knew he was in a fragile condition the way it was. And as much as their neighbor openly adored Bexley and Brewer, Twila wouldn’t dream of making them fear for her safety any more than they already had.

  “I don’t understand it,” Brewer sulked, his voice exceptionally low and deep. “The cameras should’ve covered every angle.”

  “I’m sure you did everything right, Son,” J.J. drawled in reply, holding a bag of frozen peas against the back of his head where he was knocked unconscious. Against Bexley’s wishes, he had refused to allow her to call an ambulance to check on his injuries. “He’s clearly not as smart as we are. We’ll find something.”

  “If the officer didn’t see anything from the front of the house, it has to mean our perp snuck in through a blind spot in back,” Bexley told them. She switched to the backyard camera footage, replaying it in slow motion.

  J.J. jabbed a finger at the phone’s screen. “There! What was that? Back it up a little.”

  Bexley rewound the footage for several seconds. A hulking shadow the size of a large adult male flittered across the small screen, passing through Twila’s backyard. Bexley rewound it a second time and paused the footage so they could examine the shadow in greater detail.

  J.J.’s bushy brows drew together. “Is that a⁠—”

  “Cane,” Bexley answered, meeting Brewer’s enraged gaze.

  “Bastard must’ve come in oceanside,” J.J. snarled while gritting his teeth. “Would’a been easy to pretend he was just some civilian out on a casual stroll. I’m guessin’ he broke in through the side window. Took ‘er out that way, too.”

  Brewer nudged between them to get a closer look at Bexley’s phone. “You’re right. The way he stayed out of view, I’d bet he knew exactly where the cameras were installed.” Venom dripped from his voice when he added, “He’s probably been keeping an eye on the place ever since the night I thought I chased him away.”

  Rage clenched Bexley’s entire body as she stared at the shadow. “Based on what Twila said, I’m surprised he had the strength to muscle his way inside, knock J.J. out, and drag Twila back through that window. Even though it was a lifetime ago he was injured, the fact that he’s using a cane must mean he never fully recovered. And he’s no spring chicken either.”

  Turning to Bexley, J.J.’s features took on a defeated expression. It was something she thought she’d never witness on her wise mentor. “What do you think he’s gonna do with her?”

  She swallowed past the lump in her throat and carefully assessed the situation. Under entirely different circumstances, she would have given him a hard time for not anticipating the perp’s next move better than his mentee. “If he intended to hurt her, he most likely would’ve taken you both out here, on the spot, rather than going through the trouble of taking her somewhere else. Twila’s smart, J.J. She’ll figure out how to keep him calm and talk him out of whatever he may have planned.” She nudged Brewer. “Have you been by the old rail yard lately?”

  The way Brewer looked at her, she already knew his brain was on the same wavelength. “Let’s see if that old apartment building is still standing.”

  “Stay here in case she returns,” Bexley ordered J.J., grabbing the keys to Brewer’s GTO and tossing them at her husband. “You drive. I’ll call Danks on the way.”

  As soon as the old rail yard came into view, Bexley stiffened. Though most of the factories had been torn down ages ago, an ancient two-story brick building leaning to one side remained. Twila’s description of the dilapidated apartment was spot-on.

  “I can’t believe it’s still here,” Bexley muttered.

  “No cars in sight,” Brewer observed as he pulled his classic car into the lot. “Maybe he took her somewhere else.”

  “Twila described him as being sentimental,” Bexley reminded him with a slight shake of her head. “And she told us he never went out, never had any friends. I can’t imagine any other place he would want to go.”

  Brewer locked his hand around her elbow when she reached for the passenger door handle. “Wait for Danks to get here.”

  “But—”

  “We know Douglas has access to a gun,” Brewer reminded her, his tone firm. "You’re not going inside there empty-handed, B. And before you say it, this is not about me telling you what to do. I’m reminding you to use your head when I know damn well you’re too busy listening to your heart.”

  She wrapped her arms beneath her chest as she held his stare. “This isn’t just about my heart, Hawk. This guy is extremely dangerous.”

  “I’m scared for her, too,” he said, sinking a hand into the nape of her hair behind her head and rubbing his fingers against her skull. “Still, we’re not going to do her any good if we barge in there without a way to take him down.”

  “There’s something I haven’t told you…I didn’t want to freak J.J. out. Red called right before Twila was kidnapped. She found evidence linking Arnold Douglas to maybe a dozen missing women in the same cities Twila told us she had visited when she was younger.” Tears stung the back of her eyes. “I don’t think the woman he murdered in Papaya Springs was his first kill.”

  Brewer released her head to swipe a hand through his hair. “Shit.”

  “Exactly.” Bexley tapped her phone screen to see if she had missed anything from Deputy Danks. She had worked directly with him as the sheriff never regarded her concerns with the authority they deserved. “If Danks doesn’t get here soon⁠—”

  Two sounds simultaneously cut her off.

  The unmistakable ring of a gunshot coming from the apartment building.

  And a woman’s scream.

  17

  The moment Bexley heard the gunfire from within the apartment complex, she was on the run. She barely had time to register the sounds of Brewer swearing and slamming the driver’s door before he was a few steps behind.

  Bexley didn’t pause as she entered the building. She used lighter steps and strained to listen for other sounds to give Twila’s location away. She remembered Twila saying she wasn’t sure how Arnie would make it upstairs alone with a bad leg, so she started up the broken stairway. It was a difficult feat as over half the wooden treads were either splintered out in spots or threatened to snap beneath her weight.