A boost. There was probably no way to accomplish that without touching her.

My heart pounded as I wrapped my hands around her hips, achingly conscious of each point of contact, and I was suddenly glad I was wearing gloves. After my utter lack of willpower the night before, I wasn’t sure I could trust myself with any more skin-to-skin contact.

Abby glanced at me over her shoulder and her hair brushed my face. “Sometime this month, Jace.”

But that time, I recognized her words for what they were—a distraction from her rapid pulse. Whatever she was thinking had triggered a physical response she wanted to hide from me, and it was probably a good thing I couldn’t read her mind.

Yet I wanted nothing more in the world than to know what she was thinking and how I fit into that.

My hands clenched around her hips involuntarily, and Abby’s soft gasp nearly broke me. That was the sound of unexpected pleasure, and it belonged in a much more intimate time and another place.

A time and place we would never be in together.

God grant me strength…

I lifted her, and got a face full of red curls, and they smelled like sweetened strawberries.

With a nearly silent groan, I realized that from that moment on, I would mentally associate fruit-flavored desserts with the feel of her hips in my hands and her hair against my cheek.

Abby braced herself against the sill, then crawled onto the kitchen counter. “Okay, just give me a sec,” she called as she lowered herself onto the kitchen floor.

I lost sight of her when she rounded the corner, and a second later, something scraped the interior of the back door.

“The door’s padlocked from the inside,” she called, and I probably wouldn’t have heard her if not for the open kitchen window. “Whoever this guy was, he really didn’t want anyone getting in.”

“Or out, evidently.”

“Yeah.” Her voice sounded strained. “I’m gonna have to open a window for you instead.”

Before I could reply, her footsteps echoed to the left, and I followed from outside the house.

Something clattered to the floor.

“What was that?” I called through the thick back door.

“Sorry!” Abby whisper-shouted as she appeared behind a grimy bedroom window.

“I thought you went in first to avoid vandalism.”

She unlocked the glass pane and slid it open. “This place is a wreck. There’s crap everywhere.”

“What happened to your gloves?” I asked as I climbed through the window.

She shrugged, and a long red ringlet fell over her left shoulder. “They won’t stay on.”

I swallowed another growl. “You’re supposed to be helping this investigation, not hindering it.”

“We’re in, aren’t we?”

“Yes, and now your scent is all over the windowsill.” I leaned forward to sniff the metal latches. “And on the locks too.”

“Sorry.” And she truly looked remorseful. No, she looked guilty, as if she’d committed a much bigger breach than a little scent transference. Maybe she was serious about her training after all.

“This is why you need some experience before you start investigating crime scenes. Just be more careful next time.”

“I swear.” Abby shoved her hands in her pockets and glanced at the bedroom door. “But it may be a little late for that in the kitchen. And the living room. Also the bathroom.”

“What?” I sidestepped her and walked through the house, sniffing furniture and walls. Her scent was everywhere except the second bedroom. Even worse, so was Robyn’s, thanks to the jacket Abby wore.

“How the hell did you have time to touch the whole damn house in five minutes?” I demanded on my way out of the bathroom. “You contaminated the entire scene!”

I glanced around the living room, ready to give her hell, but Abby was gone.

“Ab—”

A sharp cry sliced through my anger.

“Abby!” Terror ignited my veins like a river of fire, and I raced through the small house, glancing through every doorway. The rooms were all empty. Abby didn’t answer.

On my frantic rush for the back door, I noticed that the cellar stood open at the end of the hall. Damn it! “Abby!”

I ran through the doorway and down the rickety stairs. Her scent was on the doorjamb and the stair rail, along with those of at least half a dozen humans. Blood had been dripped on nearly every step, but the scent was dull. It had been dry for days, at least. Maybe weeks. “Abby!”

The overwhelming scent of blood hit me halfway down the stairs. It was mostly old and mostly shifter. Specifically, stray. And it had come from many sources.

I found her around the corner from the staircase, frozen in shock. Her pulse was racing, but she looked uninjured. There was no one else in the cellar, but it had clearly seen frequent, recent use.

Against one wall stood a scarred wooden table, ringed with an obviously hand-carved groove all the way around the edge. The table was stained with old blood and still sticky with fresh blood. To the right stood another, slightly cleaner table covered in barbaric-looking tools. Lined up against one wall were several fleshless, cougar-shaped mannequins.

But none of that was the source of Abby’s fear.

I followed her terrified stare to the wall above the bloody table, where a framed corkboard had been hung.

The board was covered with photographs of Abby.

SIX

Abby

Nonononono…

There I was, in the top left photo, walking through the quad at school. The leaves were still green and I wore shorts. That picture was from early fall.

He’d been watching me for months.

“Abby.” Jace tried to tug me toward the stairs, but I pulled free. My gaze was glued to the corkboard. I couldn’t stand to see the pictures, but I couldn’t make myself look away.

Bottom row, fourth from the left. I was in profile at a register in the dining hall, paying for three sandwiches and a cardboard tray of bacon. Robyn had always wondered how I ate so much and never got any bigger, but whoever’d taken that shot knew about shifters and our high metabolic rate. That’s why he’d—they’d?—been following me.

“Abby. Look at me.” Jace stepped in front of me, his hands on my arms, but I stared over his shoulder, still searching the photos for an explanation. For some motivation that would explain why we’d found some kind of creepy Abby-stalker-board in the basement beneath the scene of a murder.