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

“Yes, I think he will. He’s connected with you and I think he’ll want to maintain that connection until the end, whatever the end looks like.” He took another drink of his coffee and then leaned forward. “What you said, about your childhood being bad. Was that true?”
    She released a sigh, as if she’d known he’d ask and yet had hoped he wouldn’t. “Yes, it’s true, I had a difficult childhood, but it’s not something I want to talk about.” Her chin lifted a bit, as if daring him to pursue the topic.
    It had always been that way with her. When he’d attempted to dig too deep, he’d been met with resistance. He’d quickly learned not to try to get into anything about her past. He’d just been happy to have her in his life. But apparently he hadn’t been enough for her.
    “Maybe the tech department and Tim will be able to enhance any background noise on the recording or they’ll be able to get a handle on his speech pattern and give us some ideas about education or where he might be from if he isn’t a native,” he said.
    “Hopefully, when he calls again, I’ll be able to get more from him. More about the murder of his parents, more of his background information or something else important,” she said. “We need to find them.” Her eyes took on a haunted look. “Macy will be the first one he’ll kill. Even though she’s with her mother and father, she has to be so afraid. No child should ever be that afraid.”
    He had to fight his instinct to once again reach out and grab her hand, to get up and move to sit beside her and pull her into his arms. He had a feeling she knew that kind of fear, the kind no child should ever know. She had lived it in her “bad” childhood.
    “You know how dangerous it is for you to lose your objectivity,” he said softly. “You know that it’s not good to identify too closely with any victim or the perp. Trust me, I lived it. Get too emotionally involved with a victim and it will destroy you if things go bad.”
    She took a drink of her coffee, her gaze locked with his. “Do you still have nightmares?”
    “Only when I sleep,” he said in an effort to lighten the mood. “What about you?”
    “Occasionally I have bad dreams, but not as often as I used to. I work so hard I usually fall into bed too exhausted to dream.”
    “That’s good, and I hope it stays that way.”
    She smiled at him. “Was this a mental-wellness-check cup of coffee?”
    He returned her smile. “Maybe a little bit. It would shake up any seasoned agent to be receiving phone calls from a perp. I should have known you’d be strong enough to handle it.”
    “If it’s a chance to get those people home safely, then I can handle anything.” She finished her coffee and grabbed her purse. “I need to get home.”
    “Wait a minute. I’ll walk you to your car since we’re parked in the same lot.” He got up and threw their disposable coffee cups into a trash bin and then they stepped out into the September night air.
    “It’s odd, he called me both times at about the same time of the day,” she said as they headed back down the sidewalk toward the parking lot behind the FBI building. “Around four o’clock.”
    “Maybe he works a job and that’s his break time?” Alexander speculated.
    “It’s Sunday, you would think he wouldn’t be at work at all today.”
    “We’ll have to wait and see if the pattern continues. That could be another potential clue in this mess we have.”
    “Terry and Matt said the investigations that took place in Bachelor Moon and in Mystic Lake look pretty solid, so they probably aren’t going to find anything there to help us.”
    “How about we end the night by not talking about the crimes,” he said.
    She cast him a sideways glance. “Then what do you want to talk about?”
    “I don’t know...the weather, the latest movie you’ve seen, what you’re reading?”
    She grinned at him, that impish grin that always managed to stir a wealth