Aberration Read online

  He leaned down until our foreheads were almost touching. “You always look good to me,” he said in a low voice.

  I turned my head so he wouldn’t see me smile. “You always say that,” I said.

  He waited for me to turn back to him. I looked into his eyes. Hazel eyes that seemed to change colors like he changed moods. When he worked they looked dark and intense. When we made love they turned lighter.

  “What are you doing here?” I asked.

  He backed away. I let out the breath I was holding.

  “I’m in town for a seminar. Hone up on my profiling skills. The department sent me,” he said. He looked down at Rocky, who still eyed him distrustfully. “Is this Rocky?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Are you gonna let her know I’m one of the good guys?”

  “You can’t keep doing this,” I said.

  Jory rolled his eyes, and I knew if it wasn’t for Rocky he would scoop me up, cover my face with kisses and let the heat between us incinerate my objections. It had always been that way. The heat between us had always been intense. We met on one of my first cases as an analyst for the BAU. I was working a serial case in Portland, Oregon. Jory was the lead homicide detective.

  We’d spent many nights in my hotel room going over the evidence again and again. The case was tough. The stakes were high. We were catching flack everywhere we turned—the Portland PD, the Bureau, the media, the victims’ families. I was there for a month when I thought I would break. It was my first hot case after the Nico Sala incident. I was still having nightmares and panic attacks.

  I felt pressured by my colleagues in the BAU, most of who believed I only got the position because of the attack. I was on loan to the Baltimore PD when Nico Sala was arrested. Later, when he was released and came after me, it didn’t look so good for the Bureau. It was easier for them to turn me into some kind of hero and promote me to the BAU than to examine any potential fuck-ups on their part that led to Sala’s release in the first place. Culpability for the technicality that had allowed Sala to go free was never quite established.

  Proximity, stress and heat were the factors that led to Jory and me sleeping together. The first time we touched there was raw electricity. You could almost see it in the air. We couldn’t stop after that. It was never enough. At the time, we needed it. We needed the release. I thought once the case was over it would just go away. But heat like that doesn’t dissipate easily.

  Jory extended a hand for Rocky to sniff. After a thorough scenting, she allowed him to stroke her head.

  “Did you hear me?” I said. “You can’t keep doing this.”

  “You always say that,” Jory replied.

  “Because it’s true. You can’t keep doing this. You can’t keep coming around. You’re married for Godssake.”

  His eyes darkened. “What if I wasn’t?” he asked.

  I threw my arms in the air. “Don’t start with this again,” I said.

  The last time I had seen him was at a conference in Denver. During a particularly breathless post-coital moment, Jory had proposed to me. I had taken it for what it was—a joke. He was already married, and after nearly three years of infrequent, clandestine meetings, he’d never even talked about filing for divorce. Jory was an escape for me, a release. Although I had feelings for him, I sometimes wondered if the reason I gave in to him whenever I saw him was because I knew it would never go anywhere. As it was, it took me months to assuage the guilt I felt for sleeping with him each time it happened. Thankfully, it wasn’t very often.

  He peered down at me, eyes somber. “What if I wasn’t married, Kass? Seriously.”

  I folded my arms across my middle. “I’m not having this conversation with you. What we did was wrong.”

  “Wrong? You think what’s between us is so wrong because I’m married, but did it ever occur to you why you keep coming back?”

  “Shut up,” I snapped. “I don’t come back. You followed me to five conferences—”

  He grasped my arm. I hated it when he touched me. I hated it because I wanted to melt into him as I had so many times before. I wanted to forget everything but the feel of him. Everything. The cases, the dead bodies, Lexie, his wife, the scornful looks that still followed me through the BAU, Nico Sala. All of it.

  “I was always perfect for you Kass, because you thought I’d never ask you for more than this. You thought you could stay in that place you’ve been in since Lexie died and Nico Sala hurt you. I was just a warm body to you. Is that really all you want?”

  “That is not true,” I said, but my voice shook. “I don’t—I’m not even sure what I want, but there is no way around this, Jory. What we did was wrong. This is wrong.”

  “What if I wasn’t married?” he asked again. He bore down on me, his eyes relentless. I swallowed three possible replies, and then luckily, my doorbell rang.

  Jory stared at the door. “Who’s that?” he asked.

  I sighed. “I don’t know.”

  With Rocky growling by my side I pulled my front door open for the second time in ten minutes.

  My neighbor, Dale Hunter, stood before me, a squirming Pugsley in his arms. “I found him in my yard again,” Dale explained. “Thought you might want him back.”

  I smiled and took Pugsley from him. I was rewarded with several wet doggie kisses. “He must have slipped out the front door. Come on in,” I said.

  Dale closed the door behind him, patting Rocky’s head and glancing warily at Jory. I set Pugsley down. “Oh yeah. Sorry. Dale, this is Detective Ralston of the Portland PD. Jory, this is my neighbor, Dale Hunter.”

  As they shook hands Dale said, “Portland, Oregon?” He adjusted his wireframe glasses on the bridge of his nose, as if to get a better look at Jory.

  “Yeah,” Jory replied.

  “Jory and I worked on a serial case there a few years ago,” I explained. “He’s visiting from Portland.”

  Still, Dale eyed Jory with suspicion. Dale was significantly shorter and thinner than Jory. Where Jory was all solid muscle, Dale was wiry with a runners’ frame. The difference in size did not stop Dale from staring Jory down, his brown eyes penetrating. “The escort girls,” Dale said. “I read about it.”

  “Yeah,” Jory said. “That was a tough one.” His eyes flickered in my direction.

  I smiled in spite of myself, realizing there was some jealousy there.

  “You live next door?” Jory asked.

  “Yep,” Dale said, motioning in the direction of his house. “Sometimes little Pugsley gets into my yard.”

  “Dale watches the dogs when I’m out of town,” I interjected. “So Dale, we were just going to have a drink. Want to join us?”

  Jory looked like his head might explode.

  “No thanks,” Dale said. He ran a hand through his unruly brown hair, a curl falling across his forehead. “I’ve got a lot of work to do. Just wanted to return the little guy and make sure everything was okay.”

  “Well, thanks,” I said as I walked him onto the front stoop. “I appreciate it.”

  Out of Jory’s earshot, Dale lowered his voice to ask, “You sure you’re okay with him, Kass?”

  I reached out and squeezed Dale’s arm. “Yeah,” I said. “He’s fine but thanks. I really do appreciate you looking out for me.”

  Dale smiled and gave me a mock salute before leaving. “No problem,” he said.

  “What the hell was that?” Jory asked the moment I closed the door.

  “I told you, he’s my neighbor.” I strode past him into the kitchen, heading directly for a bottle of wine.

  “What? He thinks I’m gonna murder you or something?” Jory continued as he took off his jacket.

  I set the wine on the table and retrieved the corkscrew from a kitchen drawer. “Dale is a good friend,” I sai
d. “He knows about Nico Sala, and yes, he looks out for me. That is all.”

  “I don’t think that’s all,” Jory replied. He leaned against the doorjamb and folded his arms, watching me struggle with the corkscrew.

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” I said.

  Jory came up behind me and slid his hands down my arms. His breath tickled my earlobe. “That may be all there is for you but this guy—what’s his name? Dean?”

  He put his hands over mine and together we twisted the cork. It slid out with a hiss. My mouth turned to the sound of his voice. “Dale,” I said. “His name is Dale.”

  Jory’s lips were nearly touching mine. “Dale wants something more from you.”

  He kissed me lightly.

  “He’s just a friend,” I whispered.

  Jory smiled. “Well, he wants to be more.”

  In my head, a resounding crack charged the air around us as his mouth closed over mine, hard and insistent. There was no sound except our breathing, which came in hard, rapid gasps.

  We exhausted ourselves. On the table, in the shower, and finally, on my couch. That was the snap-drive rhythm of our relationship. It was always that way. The enormity of our physical response to each other was unstoppable. A single touch set us off. In Portland, we’d done it everywhere. In squad cars, department bathrooms, the task force conference room, even the morgue. There was something about Jory’s body that I needed—the way it heated mine, the way his skin burned and soothed mine at the same time. I couldn’t say no to him. Which was why I objected to him coming around.

  Three hours and three rounds later, we lay on my couch, sharing a blanket, facing each other. Our legs tangled together. Jory pulled one of my feet out and ran his fingers from my Achilles tendon up the length of my calf and back. I moaned and smiled—a wide, lazy grin.

  “I needed that,” I said.

  He kissed the arch of my foot. “Me too,” he said.

  “What? Your wife doesn’t put out?”

  He looked at me, his eyes serious. “I left her.”

  It took a moment for the words to register. “What?” I said.

  Jory took my foot in his hands and smoothed the sole of my foot with both thumbs. “I left her,” he said, matter-of-factly. “Six weeks ago.”

  I tried to pull my foot away from him but he held it tightly. “Are you crazy?” I said, the words thick in my throat. “Jory. This is serious. You can’t just leave your wife.”

  “I was being serious in Denver.”

  “Jory, we slept together in Portland for six weeks. We saw each other at a few conferences. You can’t just leave your wife.”

  “Remember the conference in Atlanta?” he asked abruptly, ignoring me. “Denver was the sexiest. Snowed in. Conference canceled. The all-naked weekend,” he continued, a warm, dreamlike smile in his voice. “L.A. That was a good time too.”

  “It was sex,” I said. “This is sex.”

  He looked at me then. His eyes were muddy brown. “It’s more than that, and you know it,” he said. “Now come here.”

  “Are you listening to me?”

  “Come here,” he repeated, his voice low. He held his arms out.

  I climbed on top of him, and he swathed me in the blanket. I rested my hands on his chest, wanting him again in spite of myself.

  He cupped my face with both hands. The sudden stark blue in his eyes made me want to squirm. When he spoke his voice was husky. “I’m in love with you, Kass.”

  “No,” I said. I tried to shake my head, but his large hands held it in place.

  “I’ve been in love with you almost from the moment we met.”

  “Jory, this is not going to work.”

  “I’m serious, Kass. I left her and I’ll leave Portland. She can have everything. She’s not contesting the divorce. We’ve been miserable for years.”

  “No,” I said. My lungs weren’t functioning properly.

  “I came here to tell you this,” he said. “That was the real reason I came. Not the conference. I love you.”

  “Stop.” Fear spread itself over every inch of my skin like heat rash. “Listen to what you’re saying.”

  He traced my cheekbones with his thumbs. “You don’t think I haven’t been over this a thousand times in my head? I want to be with you. I know you’re scared. I know it won’t be easy. But I want to be with you. I want you.”

  “Don’t do this. You don’t even know that this will work, and you’re going to throw away your marriage? This is not a good idea.”

  “My wife was seeing someone too. For awhile.” Before I could protest his line of reasoning, he held up a hand and continued, “I’m not telling you that to try to justify my own actions. Both of us were wrong to cheat on each other. I’m not denying that. I’m telling you because there were problems in my marriage long before I met you.”

  “That doesn’t make this right,” I said, my voice trembling. “Nothing will make this right.”

  “You’re wrong,” Jory replied, voice husky.

  He pulled me closer and kissed my face. He slid the blanket off my shoulders, exposing me. He sat up, holding my body against his as if I weighed nothing. He kissed my collarbone, my throat and the tiny scar under my chin left by Nico Sala.

  His breath was soft and comforting against the intimate hollows of skin he probed and consecrated with his mouth. The smell of him—musky, male, a hint of sweat commingling with cologne—made me lightheaded. He lay back again and pushed the blanket down away from my hips. He rested his hands on my thighs and looked at me, eyes meandering along my body in a measured study. We’d been naked together a hundred times, but now I felt more exposed than ever, as if he’d removed something else, some invisible article of clothing I didn’t even know I wore.

  I tried to pull the blanket back up around me, but he gently slid it out of my hands and tossed it on the floor. The room was shrinking. Where our skin met, I felt a slow quiver that increased in tempo as he stared intently at my body. As I tried to wrap my mind around the gravity of what he’d just told me, a tear slid down my face, leaving a wet scar.

  “Don’t, Kass,” Jory whispered.

  “It won’t work,” I croaked. “I’ll lose you eventually.”

  “I’m not going to hurt you, Kass. I know you’re afraid if you let me in, I’ll hurt you somehow, but I promise I won’t.”

  He sat up again, shifting me in his lap and pulling me down onto him. I bit my lower lip as another tear followed the last.

  He moved my hips easily with his hands, using slow and deliberate movements. I put my arms around his neck and buried my face in his shoulder so he couldn’t see me crying.

  CHAPTER NINE

  KASSIDY

  July 8th

  Jory and I drove into Quantico together the next morning. He showered at my house and left his rental car in my driveway. I drove him to his hotel and waited in my car while he changed clothes. He climbed back into the Trailblazer dressed in neatly pressed black trousers and a blue dress shirt. A loose tie dangled around his neck. He smiled at me, and I was glad for my sunglasses, afraid that if he saw my eyes he’d see the longing in them. He looked like something shiny and new, like the single gift under the Christmas tree you wanted more than anything else, like something you gaped at in a store window when you passed it each day. He looked like something I wanted.

  We pulled up in front of the Base Education Center Building.

  “I’ll see you tonight?” he asked.

  I stared straight ahead, both hands gripping the steering wheel.

  “Kass?”

  “It’s not going to work, you and me.”

  Jory checked his watch. His breath was an exasperated huff. “The only way it won’t work is because you won’t let it. What’s going on in that head of you
rs?”

  I stared hard into his darkening hazel eyes. “Is it completely lost on you that our relationship started out as an affair? Why should I think that you’re going to be faithful to me when you were not faithful to your wife? This is not a good idea.”

  He pursed his lips briefly. His brow was a hard line. “I’m telling you that it’s different with you. Kass, I love you. I want you. My wife and I were never truly happy together. We should have ended it years ago—”

  “Do you know who John Douglas is?” I asked, cutting him off.

  He blinked. His voice was tinged with impatience. “What?”

  “Do you know who John Douglas is?” I said again, more slowly.

  Jory arched an eyebrow but answered anyway. “The guy who basically founded your unit? That John Douglas?”

  “Yeah, that one. He practically started the field of criminal profiling. Do you know what he said? He said, ‘the best predictor of future behavior is past behavior.’”

  Jory groaned and rubbed his face with both hands. “For Godssake, Kass. I’m not a serial killer. I’m not some UNSUB for you to profile. I want to marry you.”

  “Don’t,” I said sharply. Tears gathered quickly behind my eyes. I turned away from him and looked out the window, trying to keep my composure.

  He waited a long moment. He leaned toward me, but I didn’t turn my head. “Kass,” he said, his breath against my cheek.

  “Don’t do this to me,” I said.

  “Do what?”

  I swallowed over the lump that had formed in my throat. My voice came out as a croak. “Give me hope.”

  I turned back to him, and his lips were so close I felt as if they were pulling my mouth toward his like a gigantic magnet. “I’ll lose you,” I whispered, unable to conceal the tremble in my voice. “One way or another, I’ll lose you. I can’t handle that.” I can’t take any more, I added silently. Images of Lexie’s lifeless body splayed on the pavement followed by images of Nico Sala’s angry fists raining down on me rose unbidden. I tried to push them down.