What Are You Afraid Of? (The Agency #2)(27)

She lifted her arm to point toward the vase of flowers that was placed on the nightstand next to the bed.

“Look.”

She felt Griff tense as he took in the three blood-red roses that were a vivid splash of color in the otherwise drab room.

With a slow movement he laid his laptop on the chair near the door. Then, giving her shoulders a comforting squeeze, he lowered his arm and headed into the bathroom. He did a quick search before opening the closet to make sure no one was lurking inside.

Only then did he slowly approach the flowers. “Did anyone know you were staying here? Someone who might send you an early Christmas gift?”

Carmen wrapped her arms around her waist, giving a sharp shake of her head.

“No one.”

He sent her a brief glance. “Not even your publicist? The one who forwarded the pictures to you?”

Another shake of her head. “No one.”

He returned his attention to the flowers, leaning forward to read the card that was stuck on a plastic holder.

“Until we meet again. The Professor,” he read out loud.

Carmen hissed, feeling as if she’d just been hit with a sledgehammer.

“Oh my God,” she breathed.

“The Professor.” He turned his head, studying her horrified expression with a searching gaze. “That’s one of the killers you profiled in your book, isn’t it?”

She licked her lips, struggling to think through the instinctive fog of fear that clouded her mind.

“Yes. Dr. Franklin Hammel,” she said, her voice hoarse. “He’s the one your program helped to capture.”

“I wasn’t given any details about the case.” He studied her with a steady gaze. “The software was designed so any agency could put in data from a specific suspect and use it to predict their movements. Tell me about him.”

“He was an unemployed English professor who was obsessed with Edgar Allan Poe. He kidnapped coeds from college campuses in Baltimore and held them captive before he would dispose of their bodies with a copy of Poe’s ‘The Raven’ lying near the body.”

She grimaced, recalling the time spent with Hammel. Behind the protective glass that had separated them, he’d looked like a slug. A big, bulbous head that was shaved smooth. His long face, and the lanky body that’d been covered by a white T-shirt and white pants.

Unlike the other killers he hadn’t tried to manipulate her with sob stories of painful childhoods, or protests of innocence. The Professor had been an arrogant, self-absorbed psychopath who’d believed that his superior intelligence assured him the right to abuse women. They were, after all, lesser beings in his mind.

“Carmen?” Griff ’s soft voice penetrated the macabre memories.

She shivered. The room felt like an icebox. “When I interviewed him he told me that he was searching for his perfect muse,” she said. “No woman could give him the satisfaction he needed to create his masterpiece.”

His jaw tightened. “Where is he?”

“North Branch Correctional Institute, dying of prostate cancer,” she said. Hammel had already known he was sick when he’d agreed to speak with Carmen.

She assumed that’s why he’d been so candid during their interviews. It was his last gasp to obtain the fame that had eluded him in his literary endeavors.

Griff nodded. “So he’s probably not responsible for sending you flowers.”

“No.” Another shiver raced through her. “It has to be the copycat killer.”

His attention returned to the vase of flowers. “Why roses? Why not a copy of ‘The Raven’?”

Carmen considered for a long minute. Various possibilities shuffled through her mind before a sick dread twisted her stomach into a knot.

“He’s telling me he’s going to Baltimore,” she rasped.

Griff frowned. “How?”

“The Poe Toaster.”

“Toaster? Wait, I’ve heard about him,” Griff said. “It’s some mystery person who goes to Poe’s grave on his birthday, right?”

She nodded. “Yes, the person cloaks themselves in black and makes a toast at the original gravesite with a glass of Martell cognac, and then leaves the bottle along with three red roses.”

He immediately followed her train of thought. “The grave is in Baltimore?”

“Yes.”

Pulling out his phone, he moved around the vase in a semicircle, taking pictures of the flowers as well as the card from a dozen angles.

“I need to let Nikki know,” he said.

“Nikki?”

“Nikki Voros.” He turned the phone and tapped on the screen, sending the photos into cyberspace. “She’s my FBI contact.”

Carmen didn’t protest. He could contact all the FBI agents he wanted. Hell, she would be happy if he flashed the Bat-Signal.

They could use all the help they could get.

Waiting until he slid the phone back into his pocket, she glanced around the shabby space. A nasty chill inched down her spine.

“Do you think the killer was in this room?”

His eyes darkened, then without warning he was moving to grasp her hand.

“Let’s find out,” he said.

Carmen found herself tugged out of the hotel room and back into the frozen night air.