They had frozen. Joel seemed rooted to the spot. Gordon had stopped fighting against the straps. Morgan was barely breathing. And as for Chloe…
She crept forward.
“I said freeze!” Richardson bellowed. “Joel, drop the gun, right the hell now!”
“He was attacking!” Joel shouted back. “Didn’t you see him? I didn’t have a choice! I had to shoot!”
Chloe knelt beside Morgan. There was so much blood. Her hand reached for his. Curled around his fingers.
“Get away from him!” Richardson ordered. “Back away, Chloe! Do it! Now!”
She didn’t. “Joel, don’t drop your gun. Do not.”
“What?”
Morgan’s grasp was so tight. She needed him to loosen his fingers. “Don’t drop your gun. If you do, Paul will shoot us both instantly.” She looked up at the FBI agent. “Won’t you?”
***
“You should call the FBI Brass because Chloe doesn’t believe Paul Richardson was given any authority to take over your crime scene last night,” Marie revealed as she stood just a few feet away from a sobbing Wendy Hyde. “Chloe suspects he lied about that. That he was at the cemetery for an entirely different reason, and when he was spotted, he just lied to cover his ass.”
Cedric peered up at the two-story building. “Why else would he have been at the cemetery?” But the twist in his gut told him the reason.
Paul Richardson always hated Chloe.
“The question Chloe asked,” Reese chimed in, “was this…is Richardson really such an inept FBI agent? Or perhaps were some of his mistakes deliberate? As in, he’s been covering his own crimes for quite some time?”
Cedric whipped out his phone.
“And you shouldn’t trust her, either,” Marie warned as she pointed at Wendy. “Because everyone else in this little play is dead, but she miraculously survives with only a little flesh wound? I don’t buy that.”
Wendy’s breath caught. Then she ran. But she didn’t get far. Marie pounced on her almost instantly, and Marie brought her knife up to press against Wendy’s throat. “You don’t want to piss me off,” Marie warned her. “I am not the enemy you want to have. Trust me, you push me, and I will carve you somewhere vital.”
***
Joel didn’t drop his gun. Paul didn’t drop his.
“Chloe,” Joel growled. “Come back over here.” He wanted her behind him because he wasn’t sure what in the fuck was happening.
Chloe’s purse had fallen to the floor when she dove for Morgan. “In case there’s a weapon in there…” Paul kicked her bag across the room.
Chloe kept pulling at Morgan’s hand.
Paul shook his head. “Always have to be ahead, don’t you, Chloe?”
“I feel behind, if you must know the truth,” she replied. “I feel quite foolish for not having seen your true nature sooner. I just thought you were an incompetent wanker, but all along, you were a sadistic manipulator with low self-esteem who only felt powerful when he was driving others to—”
Paul put his gun to Gordo’s temple. “Drop the gun, Joel, or I will kill him right now.”
Desperate murmurs and groans came from Gordo as he heaved against the straps.
“You’re not going anywhere,” Paul assured the shrink. “If you don’t take my word for it, Joel can back me up. He struggled for hours to get out when I had him on my table, but he did nothing except lose his energy and his blood.”
He struggled for hours to get out, but he did nothing except…
Joel shook his head.
Then Paul…laughed.
Joel’s blood iced.
It was the same laugh Joel still heard in his nightmares. The mocking laughter of the man who’d sliced into his skin, over and over again.
“Come on, Joel.” Paul was taunting him. “You’re the doctor. The healer. Aren’t you supposed to do no harm? If you just stand there and let me blow Gordon’s brains out, then doesn’t that make you a killer?”
“No!” Chloe surged to her feet. She hadn’t been able to get the scalpel out of Morgan’s hand. Joel saw that the bastard was still clinging tightly to it. “It doesn’t make Joel a killer. You are the killer. It’s always been you. Never Joel. And if you shoot Gordon right now, that will still be on you.”
Joel grabbed her arm and hauled her back behind him. He kept his gun aimed at Paul.
“Joel, the first time we met, I wondered if you would make any connection to me,” Paul said. He laughed again. “Hell, I even taunted you back then with a profile about you. But you didn’t put it together. You didn’t see what was right in front of your face.” His chin jutted up. “Neither did Chloe. Not so smug now, are you, Chloe? Here I thought you knew killers so well. But you didn’t know me.”
“Actually,” Chloe’s crisp voice rang out from behind Joel, “I knew there was a reason I didn’t like you. I didn’t realize initially that it was because you were a sadistic killer, but I did eventually put two and two together. Better late than never, am I correct?”
His face hardened. “You know nothing—”
“I know that you are the reason Gordon Jennings moved to New Orleans. I didn’t get why he’d moved here originally. It seemed so suspicious to me. Then when the bodies began to mount—victims that I now know he treated—it looked ever so worse. Gordon seemed like the monster we were after.”
Gordo emitted a muffled scream.
“The perfect fall guy,” Joel agreed. Too perfect. He hadn’t lowered his gun. He wasn’t going to lower it. “You were setting him up every step of the way.”
“I think Paul was involved with Wendy Hyde,” Chloe added as her voice carried clearly. “She gave him access to Gordon’s patient files, and then he moved in on his prey. He was in a position of authority—an FBI agent—so they trusted him. They let him get close. But he just manipulated them. He got them to do exactly what he wanted.”
“Puppets on a string,” Paul declared. “They were so damn weak. Getting them to kill was easy. Point and aim. Didn’t even have to pull the trigger.” His eyes gleamed. “Glenn Towers was a piece of work, let me tell you. I offered to look the other way for some of his activities, but the man told me to go fuck myself. Can you believe that shit? So I fucked him over.”
“You are ever so clever,” Chloe said. “I assume you were also sleeping with Lucia? That was why she trusted you and let you get so close to her in the dance studio. Did seducing Lucia give you an extra feeling of power over her? Lucia and Wendy. At this rate, I’m wondering if you were involved with Kelly, too. You seem to have serious issues with women. If I poke into your past, will I find some deep-seated mommy problems? Did you not get enough love as a child or were you just rejected so many times that you strike out now at the things you want so—”
“You’re the one with the mommy issues, Chloe! I heard all about them. Like mother, like daughter, eh?” Paul taunted. “Speaking of family, I got your brother in my web, didn’t I? Could have killed him if I wanted.”
Joel took a step back. He wanted to maneuver toward the door and get Chloe the hell out of there. He knew Paul wanted her dead. Paul had always hated Chloe.