Free FADE TO BLACK - Thrilling Romantic Suspense - Book 1 of the BLACK CATS Series by Leslie A. Kelly

looked like some amateur detective solving bloodless murders on an old, pre- CSI TV show.
    “Damn, I think she’s right,” Taggert said. He looked up, caught her eye, and immediately leaped to the next conclusion. “Not many places need that kind of security. You know of a fence like this in the area?”
    Still not quite believing that Lisa could have been killed at a place she drove by practically every day, Stacey nodded. “I do. One of the locals, Warren Lee, has a farm outside of town. He’s a bit of a character.”
    Taggert stiffened. “Violent?”
    She considered it. “Possibly. He’s a survivalist type; I suspect he’s armed to the teeth out there.” Realizing why he’d asked, she almost immediately ruled out the agent’s unspoken supposition. She knew Warren well enough to fear that when he snapped he’d go out guns blazing. He didn’t have the patience, the calmness she’d seen in the video.
    “I don’t believe that was him on the tape, but it could have happened near his place. He has a huge spread. It’s fenced in, with razor wire across the top.”
    Agent Taggert immediately swung to face his boss. “Can we get a warrant?”
    Blackstone shook his head. “We’ve got nothing to justify one.”
    Stacey cleared her throat. “I didn’t mean I thought the crime occurred on Warren’s property. The way he guards his place, the only way it could have is if he did it, and I tell you, everything I know about the man says he didn’t. I think it’s more likely this happened on the other side of his fence. In which case, you can easily look around.”
    They both waited in tangible expectation.
    “Most of Warren’s land skirts along part of the Shenandoah National Park.”
    A quick grin appeared on Taggert’s face, as if he’d heard his first good news in days. “Federal property.”
    “Exactly,” she replied, thinking for a fleeting moment how much younger the man looked when he smiled. “No warrant required.”

CHAPTER 4
    Y ou’re ugly. You’re damaged. Who would want you?
    “Shut up,” he whispered, not even looking away from his computer screen. He’d heard the words too many times to feel anger or fear, and merely brushed them away like he would have a pesky fly.
    But the voice wouldn’t shut up. The voice never shut up. Awake, or in his dreams, it taunted, it ridiculed, it bit with teeth as sharp as the incisors of a hound from hell. Only … he no longer felt the bite.
    Hideous. Evil. Nasty .
    “Go away; I’m busy.”
    It didn’t go away, so he reached for the volume button on the front of his laptop. He jabbed at it ruthlessly, until his index finger bent backward and almost snapped. That might have been interesting, just to see how it would feel and how he handled the sensation. Better than most, he suspected. Better than any woman, that was for certain.
    Pain had interested him for a long time. How to take it, how to deliver it. He’d done some experimenting over the years—starting small, with rats or strays that wouldn’t be missed. And he’d found that when a creature was frightened enough, it almost didn’t even seem to notice when it was dying. Or maybe it was merely grateful for the release.
    Much like Lisa. And all the others.
    He himself hadn’t been tested that far yet, but he’d certainly experienced the acrid bitterness of terror and the cloying taste of physical agony. So he understood how some pain simply ceased to exist when a mind drifted to other places in the sheer, primal need for escape.
    Would it do so if the pain were self-inflicted? He’d often wondered.
    He pushed his finger against the button again. Hard, until the metal bit into his skin and left an indentation. The joint bent backward, the tip turning bright red, the knuckles ghostly white.
    He could snap it. Easily.
    “Not now,” he whispered. He was busy now. He could test that another time, as he’d tested the feel of fire licking the soles of his feet or blades scraping across his