Chapter Thirty-Two
They spent the day hiking, dipping their toes in the cold creeks they came across, and soaking in the peace of the surroundings. The landscape was elemental, raw, and it held a sort of simple honesty her spirit had needed.
Josie felt renewed, not only mentally but spiritually.
In soul and in…body. She thought back to the night before, how much she’d wanted Zach.
How beautiful he’d looked as he’d taken her in his arms and smiled at her.
How at first the arousal had been like a surge of energy making her feel powerful, alive.
How it was the laughter that had convinced her to lean in and kiss him.
How things could have gone so badly, how she could have been left feeling more damaged than she had before.
How in the end, he’d known just what she needed, how he’d helped her find healing—light—in the midst of the darkness that had begun to encroach.
He’d known, somehow, what she was experiencing and what to do to bring her back to herself, trust him, allow him to take the lead.
She’d waited a long time to feel ready to allow a man to touch her sexually, to trust her body in the hands of another who could hurt her if he wanted.
And she discovered it wasn’t only sex she’d been afraid of.
It was the response of her own body, the memories each part elicited.
Her breasts had nursed a child under horrific circumstances, her stomach had stretched with her traumatic pregnancy, her thigh had been carved into, causing pain and heartache.
Shame. Every part had been associated with contempt and desolation.
She had been terrified to let someone touch her, to attempt to draw pleasure from the places that still represented such harrowing memories.
And yet…she’d discovered that she could still feel pleasure.
That she wasn’t ruined as she’d once thought.
In that way too, she was no longer a victim.
And yes, she’d have to learn to fully trust again, but the relief that filled her that morning at the knowledge that she wasn’t permanently and irrevocably broken could hardly be described.
To her, the reawakening of her body filled her with a glorious sense of hope.
And yes, it scared her too because it hadn’t just been her body that had opened to him, it had been her heart.
They sat on two rocks at the summit of the trail they’d hiked, the sun high in the sky as Zach bit off a piece of beef jerky.
He chewed thoughtfully, chewed some more…
and some more. Josie laughed. Zach looked at her, his expression bemused, if not slightly panicked as he continued to work the meat between his teeth.
“I think you just have to force it down,” Josie said, a laugh in her voice, hoping she wasn’t going to have to give him the Heimlich out here in the middle of nowhere.
Zach swallowed with obvious effort and then put the dried beef back in the backpack he was carrying.
He met her eyes, his lip twitching before he let out a laugh.
Her stomach flipped. He was so incredibly handsome, his olive skin smooth and burnished under the midday sun, his short hair glinting blue black in the shifting light.
She wished things could stay the same but knew they couldn’t.
“When we get back, things will be different, won’t they?
” she asked, her heart quivering with the knowledge that it wouldn’t always be like this, that this time was temporary.
Zach’s feelings for her might be temporary too, though she’d told herself that morning as she’d stood at the railing, watching the new day arrive, that she would try not to feel sad about that.
The gifts he’d already given her were so precious and plentiful.
And the truth was, though she craved it, maybe she wasn’t quite ready for more than what they’d shared either.
“I don’t know. I… Things might be complicated. We’ll have to…” He sighed, and she watched him as he ran a hand over his short hair. “We’ll have to see what’s what when we get back.”
She nodded.
“Hey,” he said, reaching out and taking her hands in his, obviously reading her disappointment. “I can’t afford to do anything that might sacrifice your safety or get in the way of solving this case. When this is all over, we’ll figure it out, okay?”
Josie nodded again.
“Josie,” he said. “Trust me.”
Her gaze moved over his beautiful face. “I do,” she said honestly.
And amazingly, she had from the first moment she’d met Zach.
He’d looked her in the eye and had been honest without sugarcoating his words.
Yes, he’d been cautious, but rather than belittling her, he’d used discretion and instinct, and she’d appreciated that.
They returned to the cabin where they spent the afternoon making love.
She couldn’t get enough of him, couldn’t get enough of the way he elicited pleasure from her body—the body she thought was incapable of feeling anything close to that type of bliss ever again.
They didn’t have any more condoms, but she was on the pill.
There was really no reason for her to be on birth control.
She hadn’t slept with anyone in eight years and thought maybe she never would.
But she admitted to herself then that being on the pill had represented the control over her own fertility…
in case. Being on the pill had represented the fear that something bad could happen to her again.
That life was unpredictable, that her safety was always at risk.
That’s what a violent crime did to a person, Josie mused.
It altered their entire world view. People always said things like, “Everything will work out” or “That won’t happen.
” But what about when things didn’t work out?
Or when the unthinkable did happen? You had to walk around with the knowledge that life could sweep the rug out from under you at any moment. It could, because it had.
Josie was able to speak openly about her thoughts on the subject with Zach because not only was he a violent crimes detective, but his own family had had the rug swept out from under them with the death of his little brother.
She felt understood by him. Known. And it was yet another gift he gave to her.
They finally got out of bed late in the day, famished and in need of sustenance. They stood at the counter, eating sandwiches and laughing. Zach put his arm around her shoulders as he took a mouthful, not seeming to be able to stop touching her either. Her heart felt warm with happiness.
Zach’s phone rang and their eyes met, Zach’s face going serious as he took his arm from around her and put his sandwich down.
Josie had the sudden feeling that their happy little bubble had just popped.
“Hold on,” he said, walking to the table where his phone was sitting.
“Jimmy,” he answered after he’d glanced at the number.
He sat on the edge of the wood table, and despite the notion that the real world had just invaded their happy space, she took the moment to admire him.
His body was sculpted and trim. Her eyes ran over his smooth brown skin, and down to the waistband of his low-slung jeans where she could see the trail of dark hair.
Her mouth had been there only minutes ago, and at the memory, her skin flushed.
She looked up at Zach’s face to see him watching her closely, his eyes dark.
He knew exactly where her mind had gone.
“Yeah,” he said, obviously responding to something Jimmy had said, his gaze drifting from her as worry altered his features.
“Shit,” he muttered. “Thirteen years? How is that possible?”
A shiver went down her spine, and Josie put her sandwich down, gesturing to Zach that she would be right back.
She was suddenly freezing, and she was only wearing one of his T-shirts and a pair of underwear.
She went into the bedroom and pulled on her jeans, socks, and a sweatshirt, and used the bathroom.
When she walked back into the kitchen, Zach was just hanging up the phone. He pressed his lips together, his eyes filled with worry.
“What is it?” she asked.
“Professor Merrick finally handed over a list of a couple names of women he’d been with over the years.
Apparently, he can’t remember the names of more than that.
” His eyes flitted to her and away. Did he wonder if that hurt her?
She was long past caring what Vaughn Merrick thought of her though.
She’d accepted the fact that he’d only been using her.
More so, she’d come to terms with the fact that she’d let him.
Taking responsibility for her role in the relationships in her life that had hurt her had made all the difference. She’d made bad choices. Period.
“And?” she prompted after he drifted away for a moment.
His eyes snapped back to hers, and he rubbed at the back of his neck. “The first one on the list moved overseas apparently. She lives there now with her husband and two kids. The second one on the list disappeared without a trace thirteen years ago.”
“Disappeared?” she whispered, dread streaming through her. She swallowed, leaning back against the counter. “Do you think she was the victim of Marshall Landish too?”
“Couldn’t be. Marshall Landish was eighteen and had just enrolled in the Army. He was in basic training in South Carolina at the time.”
“South Carolina,” she repeated. “Couldn’t he have driven to Ohio on a weekend?”
“South Carolina is a nine-hour drive from Ohio. And what reason would he have to drive to Cincinnati, abduct a woman, and drive back? He’d never been to Ohio at that point from what we know.
He moved there years later to be closer to his sister who had recently relocated to Cincinnati when she got a job at Procter & Gamble.
But if he did drive to Ohio from South Carolina and abduct that woman, however unlikely, what was his connection to her, and to Vaughn Merrick? It doesn’t make sense.”
Josie chewed at her lip. The abduction—and probable death—of the woman thirteen years before her own abduction and the most recent victims were all similar in that they were involved with the professor.
That couldn’t be a coincidence. But Zach was right, what was Marshall Landish’s connection to the professor, if any?
A sinking feeling made Josie sag against the counter behind her.
It was becoming more and more plausible that the man who had abducted Josie hadn’t been Marshall Landish.
But her mind still fought against the notion.
It had been him. She hadn’t known him well, but she’d recognized his voice—not just his stutter, but his tone, cadence, depth—his smell, his body and the way he’d carried it.
“Did he have a twin?” she asked Zach. “Or a brother?”
“Neither. Just a sister.”
“His sister insisted he didn’t do it,” she murmured.
“The detectives who originally worked my case questioned her thoroughly. She wanted to talk to me but”—she shook her head—“I couldn’t.
I wouldn’t. I was afraid I’d recognize him in her and I just…
” She made a helpless sound. She’d been too traumatized to expose herself to more potential trauma.
As it was, she’d felt like a walking black hole.
Zach approached her and took her in his arms. “I understand that. There was no need for you to speak to her.”
She leaned back. “Sometimes I wonder if I would have questioned her too, if maybe…if maybe she did know something about my son.” But the detectives had assured Josie that Marshall’s sister didn’t know anything.
They’d been convinced, and they’d convinced her as well.
Whatever Marshall had done with her baby, he hadn’t told a soul. At least not one who had come forward.
If it had even been Marshall…
Zach smoothed her hair back, kissed her temple. “They had the best detectives in our department working on your case. Men who know how to tell if someone’s lying.”
Josie nodded, but she still felt unsettled.
“Jimmy’s looking more thoroughly into Landish’s background right now,” Zach said.
“Because all the evidence pointed to him at the time, and because it was assumed you were his only victim, there wasn’t a need to do an in-depth information pull on his past. Jimmy did get his medical file from the Army, though, and found one thing that was unique. ”
“What?” she asked, her muscles tensing.
“He was color blind.”
“Okay. What…what does that mean, exactly?”
“It’s nothing that would have been visually distinguishable. It just meant that he couldn’t perform certain duties in the Army.”
Josie’s heart clutched. Did you not wear these r-red panties for me, you slut? Her eyes flew to Zach’s. “I don’t think the man who abducted me was color blind.” She told him what she remembered.
His eyes went dark as she spoke the words Marshall Landish—or the man she’d believed was him—had said to her that awful, horrific night. “Are you sure that’s what he said?”
“Very. I’ve been going over those memories, Zach. I’ve…allowed my mind to go back…there.”
His jaw ticked again. “There’s no other way he could have known the color of your…clothes?”
“I don’t see how.”
Josie’s mind traveled back to that moment.
Unlike the days prior, she didn’t just probe the memory, she lingered there, recalling the way he’d ripped her clothes and later, the way he’d looked standing in front of that window, the light shining in.
There had been something about that moment…
something, but it remained out of her grasp.
Everything she came up with felt incomplete or circumstantial, like the recollections that didn’t exactly fit could still be explained away. A band of frustration tightened around her.
“I need to talk to his sister,” Josie said. “I wasn’t emotionally able to back then. But I need to now.”
“No, you don’t. I can talk to his sister. Jimmy can talk to his sister.”
“No, no. I need to. If I was wrong about him. If it was someone…I don’t know, posing as him somehow or…” She let out a frustrated breath. “I don’t know, but I need to look in her eyes and talk to her about her brother. About who he was. Zach, I have to.”
His eyes—those kind, expressive, beautiful eyes—moved over her face for a moment. “Okay. I’ll set it up.”
She put her hands on his bare shoulders. “Thank you.”
She wondered if every path she’d gone down to find her son had been wrong. If it wasn’t Marshall who abducted her, it wasn’t Marshall who’d taken her child from her either.
“We need to leave. I…I have to do this. This guy might be looking for his next victim even as we speak, and if I have a key that might open a door that will lead to capturing him, we can’t waste any time.”
She was missing something. She felt it in her gut.