Keep Me Safe (Slow Burn #1)(35)

“Becky’s father said he’d found her backpack on the roadway where she walked from school, that he found it when she didn’t come home and he got worried. He truly didn’t believe in my abilities or he would have never given me that backpack. He called me a scammer. An exploiter of parents frantic to find their children. Of people trying desperately to find a loved one. I didn’t need to touch the bag to know he’d done something terrible. The police officer knew the same. And yet I wasn’t prepared for what I saw. I picked up that backpack and then I immediately bent over and threw up. And I kept throwing up. I didn’t think I’d ever stop.”

Ramie went silent, her eyes haunted and her throat working up and down as if she were trying to prevent herself from throwing up now.

“What did you see?” Eliza prompted gently.

Ramie licked her lips. Her face was chalk white, and her shaking intensified. Eliza quickly ran cold water over a washcloth, wrung it out and then held it to Ramie’s face. Eliza’s hand was on Ramie’s shoulder, her touch motherly even though there wasn’t a large gap in age between the two women.

It took a few moments for Ramie to compose herself. She sucked in several steadying breaths, and her chest rose and fell harshly, as if she were swallowing away her nausea. Then she sank onto the closed commode seat and scrubbed both hands over her face.

“I was terrified to call him out. I was too afraid of what he might do. The police officer knew, though. He whispered to me where the father couldn’t hear and all he asked me was ‘Where?’ ”

“I told him where to find my foster sister, but I knew they’d be too late. He left her there to die, and I wasn’t in time to save her. Sometimes I wonder if she only stayed alive long enough for someone to know what he’d done. She was so young, so good. How could she have come from such evil?”

Caleb slid his hand into Ramie’s hair and then knelt in front of her. He pressed his lips to the top of her head, uncaring of Eliza’s and Dane’s presence.

“I’m so sorry, honey.”

She twined her arms around his neck and clung to him. He leaned in, touching his forehead to hers, and then he wrapped his arms around her slight body.

“I have to do this, Caleb,” she whispered. “Not only for myself, but for you. For Tori. For the woman who is suffering while we argue her fate. I have to do this. I’ll never be able to live with myself if she dies and I did nothing to help her.”

He closed his eyes, knowing she was right but hating it all the same. He turned his head to look up at Eliza and Dane, who still stood in the doorway.

“Make the call,” he said shortly.

“I guess that means we’re not fired,” Eliza murmured as she brushed past Dane and disappeared down the hallway.

SEVENTEEN

RAMIE sat on the edge of the couch, her gaze focused forward. She rubbed her palms up and down her pants legs and then wrapped her arms around herself, her fingers pressing into her flesh.

She wasn’t even aware of the fact that she rocked back and forth, distress radiating from her in waves. Caleb felt powerless, unable to shield her from what she was about to do.

Her lips thinned and her gaze flickered in question. Her gaze found Eliza.

“How could you possibly know there’s another victim?”

Caleb frowned when he saw Eliza glance rapidly at Dane and they both frowned.

“That’s a very good question,” Caleb said softly. “I think you forget who signs your paychecks.”

“He’s taunting you,” Eliza said bluntly. “He called it in himself. He wanted you to know, to track him. The victim is his message to you.”

Caleb’s pulse leapt in alarm. “She’s not doing this. Are you insane? He’s setting her up. Ramie, you can’t do this.”

“When did he call it in?” Ramie asked. “How did he call it in? How do you know it’s him?”

Dane grimaced. “This morning. He called the Houston police. Left a message for you.”

Ramie stared back at Dane in shock.

“It’s why I wanted to get a sketch artist to draw his face,” Eliza said. “Leak it to the press. Post it on the Internet. Get people looking for him. Houston’s a big city. We don’t even know that he’s here, only that he called the downtown precinct and told them to let Ramie St. Claire know that she couldn’t hide from him forever and that he was waiting for her and until then he’d found someone else to entertain him.”

“Detective Ramirez wanted to bring Ramie in,” Dane said. “We told him we were sitting on you and that he was trying to draw you out.”

“You have to beat him at his own game, Ramie,” Eliza said, her gaze sharp and piercing.

Ramie slowly swiveled her head in Caleb’s direction, question in her eyes. Not a question of whether she should do it or not. But the question of whether he was with her. Whether he’d be here for her.

He sat next to her and slid his hand over her leg to catch her fingers between her knees. He laced their fingers together and squeezed reassuringly, even though the last thing he felt was confident.

He hadn’t felt so much fear since the day Tori had been abducted. Nor as helpless. He wasn’t used to having so little power or control over his surroundings. He was always in command but over the last year, he’d been anything but.