Free BATON ROUGE by Carla Cassidy - Scene of the Crime 09 - BATON ROUGE

he’d never seen before, filled with shadows he could never breach, he would never fully understand.
    “Want to grab coffee at Cup of Joe’s before heading home?” He kept his tone light, knowing that if she sensed any concern for her in his voice she’d decline.
    “Okay,” she surprised him by saying.
    Together they left the room and headed to the elevator. “At least we got a little more information,” she said as they rode down to the first floor. “We know that right now they are all alive.”
    “And I’m adding to Terry and Matt’s workload by having them check every case of any couple murdered in their homes or under suspicious circumstances in the past fifteen years in the state,” he replied.
    “That could take months of work,” she said as they left the elevator and headed for the front door of the building.
    Cup of Joe’s was a small hole-in-the-wall coffee shop three buildings down from the FBI building. It was a popular place for tired agents to fuel up or wind down.
    Joe’s menu offered no fancy froufrou drinks, nothing but coffee and a variety of muffins, cookies and little cakes. As Georgina took a seat at one of the narrow booths against the wall, Alexander ordered two cups of coffee, one black and one with cream and sugar.
    When he joined her with the drinks, she was curled into the corner between the back of the booth and the wall. She looked more fragile than he’d ever seen her. As he sat down, she quickly straightened, her eyes overly bright as if she were working too hard to keep it together.
    He slid her coffee halfway across the table, but when she went to reach for it, he grabbed her hand in his. He held tight even as she tried to pull away.
    “Just sit for a minute and let me hold your hand,” he said softly.
    “I don’t need hand-holding,” she protested, but she didn’t attempt to pull her hand away again.
    “You were amazing,” he said. “You kept your cool and played your own game with him. You forced him into letting us hear from one of the victims.”
    “It didn’t feel amazing. It was terrifying,” she admitted. “I was so afraid that if I said something wrong there would be terrible consequences.”
    This time when she pulled her hand back, he released it and watched as she wrapped both her slightly trembling hands around the hot foam cup of coffee.
    Alexander picked up his own cup and leaned back against the booth. “For some reason or another it’s obvious that he’s decided he wants a relationship with you.”
    Her eyes widened but quickly resumed their normal shape. “If that’s what it takes to solve this, then I’ll be his best phone buddy.”
    Protests rose to his throat, but he swallowed them. The need to protect her from having any contact with this man was overwhelming, but he had to think of what was in the best interest of solving the crime. She was a member of the task force. It was her job to do whatever she could to help catch the creep.
    He couldn’t think like a man who needed to protect his woman. She hadn’t been his woman in a very long time. When he looked back on their marriage, he sometimes wondered if she’d ever really been his woman.
    They sat in silence, sipping their hot coffee. The silence wasn’t uncomfortable. He was accustomed to her being a woman of few words.
    It was finally she who broke the silence. “If what he said about his parents is true, then he’s already killed and won’t hesitate to kill again.” She took another sip of her drink and then continued. “You know he won’t let them live. Once he’s gotten whatever he thinks he needs from them, he’ll kill them all.”
    Her eyes held a hollowness, as if she were already grieving for their loss. He didn’t try to tell her differently. He knew what she said was true. “All the more reason we’ve got to work every angle to find him before that can happen.”
    “He’ll keep calling me.” She said it as a statement, not as a question.
    Alexander nodded.