Shadow Warrior (The Shadow Series Book 4) Read online

“Someone murdered Ale Sarto, and the policeman guarding him. Sarto was tortured before he was killed. It was very ugly.”

  Grace tried to jerk her hand away, but Vittorio kept his fingers firmly around hers, pressing her palm into his thigh and stroking his thumb soothingly across her hand. He turned his head to look at her, letting her see he was with her. She wasn’t going through it alone, the way she’d done all of her life. He was there to help her if she needed it, but anyone brave enough to step in front of a gun for a virtual stranger would help the police when she got the chance.

  He held her gaze for as long as it took. He didn’t care if the detectives were waiting. He cared about Grace and her state of mind. The police weren’t going to find Haydon Phillips if the Ferraros couldn’t, not that night. The detectives could wait until she was steady. He saw it in her eyes first. She had the beginnings of trust in him. He needed that from her. To gain the kind of absolute faith and trust he needed from her, he had to show in every way that he would always be there for her. That trust could never be in any way taken for granted or abused.

  He nodded his head at her in approval the moment he saw her conquer the fear that had been so deeply ingrained in her by Haydon. Her restless fingers stopped digging into his thigh, but she pressed her palm harder into his muscle, a purely instinctive kind of reaction she didn’t seem aware of.

  “I’ve known Haydon Phillips for ten years and I’ve been terrified of him for most of that time. I believe he’s a serial killer and that if anyone gets in his way, he hurts them. He’s been doing it since he was a boy. I’ve tried to get away from him. When that didn’t work, I tried to pretend to be his family in order to find proof. Neither worked. I know he lives in the attics of houses that belong to perfectly nice families, ones with children, and he watches them day and night. He’s never been caught. He claims no one’s ever suspected him and he’s gone into their bedrooms and held knives to their throats, including the young children. He’s eaten their food and made friends with the family pets. That’s always risky for the animals.”

  “In what way?”

  “He tortures and kills them and tends to leave them on the doorstep for the family to find.”

  “How would you know that?”

  “He shows me photographs when I don’t cooperate and pay his gambling debts.”

  Now her fingers did dig into his thigh. He kept his body pressed against hers, taking some of her weight. Grace was shaking hard enough that the detectives couldn’t fail to see.

  “I understand this must be difficult, Ms. Murphy,” Art said, gentling his voice.

  That surprised Vittorio. The detectives were fair men, but hard-driving when they were after answers. Grace did look fragile, her arm in its collar and cuff as well as the bracing and padded bandages around the shoulder itself. She had plates and pins in her shoulder. More than one nurse had said it was a miracle that the surgeon had managed to piece her back together. They were all worried that one wrong move could undo everything he’d done.

  “I’m afraid for every single person in this room. He takes delight in taunting me that he can go after the people I care about. I’ve lived a fairly solitary existence in order to placate him. I’m concerned for Katie Branscomb. Once, when I refused to take out a loan to pay his gambling debts, he showed me a picture of her sleeping, with him standing over her.”

  Vittorio glanced over at Emme. She was dutifully using her oxygen mask, fading into the corner, staying quiet. Her phone was in her hand and she was busy texting, using lightning speed and one thumb so as not to draw any attention. If Haydon liked to gamble, so much so that he was willing to use his one real connection to pay his debts, he wouldn’t be able to stay away from it long. They could use that to find him.

  “He’s a drug user, too, right?” Ricco asked.

  She shook her head. “He looks like a drug user when he wants to. People ignore him when he does that. Most people dismiss users and won’t even look at them. He’s got the look down to perfection. He will smoke pot, but not all that often. He doesn’t want the smell on him. He told me that would ruin his living arrangements if someone actually smelled it in their home.”

  Vittorio had to admit he was shocked. He’d believed absolutely that Phillips was a meth addict. He shot his sister another quick look. She was already spreading the word to family members. If Phillips wasn’t using, his addiction was gambling. Gambling and killing. He was probably just as obsessed with torturing and killing as he was with gambling.

  “He passes himself off as a meth user,” Jason muttered, frowning. “That’s unusual. And smart. He blends in. He can be on the streets or in the shelters and make friends there. Street people don’t often talk freely to law enforcement and he knows it. What about a ride?”

  “He mostly walks or uses public transit. He steals cars when he wants to go a distance, but it isn’t his preferred method because there’s always the chance the car has been reported stolen. He usually takes them off a long-term parking lot if he’s going to do it.”

  “How did he get you to go out to the car if you knew it was stolen?” Art asked in his deceptively mild voice.

  Vinci Sanchez strode into the room. He wore the Ferraro three-piece suit, but his was a slate blue gray without the thin pinstripes. His tie was just a shade darker blue. “I’m sorry I’m late, gentlemen, but I had to find out how Grace, Emme and Mariko were doing. And what they should be doing.” His shrewd dark brown eyes took in the room, resting briefly on Emme and the oxygen mask she was wearing. “Shouldn’t Grace be using oxygen as well? That was my understanding.”

  When Grace frowned, clearly wondering who Vinci was and why he needed to know her medical condition, Vittorio squeezed her hand in warning.

  “Thanks for coming, cousin,” he greeted. “I know we shouldn’t need a lawyer, but it’s always nice to have one just to be safe.”

  Grace ran events that cost hundreds of thousands of dollars. She was intelligent and quick, she couldn’t fail to perceive his warning. He wanted her to be very cautious in what she said to the cops. Cooperative, but cautious. He didn’t want Art and Jason to consider for one moment that she was anything other than Haydon’s victim.

  “Grace was just telling us how Phillips lured her to his car even though she knew it was stolen,” Art said helpfully.

  Vinci frowned. “That sounds like a question designed to entrap my client.”

  “Since when did Grace Murphy become your client, Sanchez?” Jason asked.

  “She’s family. Every family member is my client. Grace, perhaps you should use that oxygen mask.”

  She shook her head. “I want to help them catch him if it’s at all possible. I had refused to take out another loan. I have three already outstanding major debts and I told him that. He acted like he understood, but I knew he would do something. I tried to explain it was a matter of economics, I couldn’t take out another loan. I was already in over my head. He told me that I’d left my sweater at a venue and he’d grabbed it. My sweater had been missing for a couple of weeks and just to freak me out, Haydon sometimes showed up at the KB events. He asked me to walk out to his car with him.”

  “Did it occur to you that you could be in danger?”

  “I was always in danger. Always. I felt every minute of the day that I was walking a tightrope and any moment I was going to fall. Part of me just wanted it over.” She looked at Vittorio and there was a plea for understanding as well as definite shame.

  “Il mia bellissima gattina.” Vittorio kept his voice low as he turned her hand over and brought it to his mouth, so he could press a kiss into the center of her palm. “You are very brave. Very few people could have held up all those years of living in terror.”

  Her gaze clung to his for a moment as if drawing strength from him and he hoped she would. He wanted to be her strength. He couldn’t imagine growing up knowing the boy who had protected you was a serial killer.

  “I didn’t see a way out. Once, a long time ago, I had t
old a cop I was certain Haydon had had something to do with a death. The cop all but laughed at me and implied I was jealous because he was seeing another girl. That didn’t go over so well with Haydon.” A shiver went through her. “I had to have proof and I never got it. He never once admitted to doing anything wrong.”

  She looked Art straight in the eyes. “I thought killers liked to brag. That’s the way they’re portrayed in the movies. He never did. He would throw out scary lines, like it would be terrible if anything happened to you, or to them or to that dog, but he never said anything that I could record or admit anything that would help me convince the police he was guilty. I wouldn’t have even been able to tell them where to find him.”

  Vittorio could see she was just about done. The pain meds were wearing off and she was struggling a little with breathing, although he thought that was more emotional than because she’d been exposed to too much gas. They’d gotten there quickly. Phillips had started the gas and then when the alarms went off, he must have taken off and left the hospital. Vinci had twice given Vittorio the signal to stop Grace from saying anything more. His cousin wanted time to talk to her first and go through everything that she could say and caution her how to say it.

  “Grace needs to rest now.” He turned on the oxygen machine and fit the mask over her mouth and nose. “She’s going home today.”

  Art’s eyebrow shot up. “To her apartment?”

  “Of course not. She’s coming home with me,” Vittorio said. “All along we were planning to move in together eventually. This just sped up the process. We knew we couldn’t keep our relationship out of the tabloids forever, but we liked having privacy.” Again, he curled his fingers around her wrist and brought her knuckles to his mouth, distracting the two detectives. “Dr. Arnold is adamant that she not move around too much, although later she’ll need aggressive physical therapy. He wants another week before she gets active, which means it will be difficult for her to answer more questions at the police station, but you’re welcome to come to my home.”

  “That’s a good thing, Vittorio, because the killer left behind a photograph of you. He dropped it right in the middle of what was left of Ale Sarto’s chest.”

  Grace gasped, a sound much like a hurt animal might make escaping. Vittorio stood up and when he did, Ricco did as well. Every bodyguard was already on their feet.

  “That was unnecessary,” Vittorio said, “and just lost you all cooperation. You can talk through Vinci. We’d like you to leave now. This conversation is over.”

  Art hesitated, but Vittorio refused to look away. It was a bullshit move and the detective knew it. Jason went through the door first and Art followed him, leaving him with a very distraught Grace.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  This conversation is over.”

  Vittorio had said it decisively, in that same low tone, but it carried command, so much so that the detectives had left, and Grace didn’t dare bring the subject up. His lawyer had followed the police detectives out and the next thing she knew, the surgeon, Dr. Arnold, signed her release papers and talked with Vittorio about her care. Then she was wheeled out, surrounded by the Ferraro family and bodyguards. She heard cameras flashing and people calling out as they made their way to the waiting car, but in the middle of the moving group, protected from everything, she didn’t see much.

  Grace looked over at Vittorio. She sat right where he’d put her, on the cool leather seat of a very expensive car and somehow, she’d just let him take her over. She knew exactly what that photograph pinned to a dead man’s chest meant—it was a warning to her.

  “Mr. Ferraro.” She started with his name. She had to take charge of her life. Her mind still felt a little woozy, and her shoulder hurt beyond anything she’d ever felt before. The way they had immobilized her shoulder and arm made her feel awkward and clunky, almost frozen and unable to move, making it difficult to think properly. “We have to discuss what I’m going to do.” She poured firmness into her tone, even though it was an effort and she would have preferred to let herself float away. “And we have to talk about Haydon and what that photograph means.”

  Grace forced herself to look up at him. Meeting his eyes was a mistake and she knew it the moment she looked into that deep indigo blue. Liquid heat, so that she fell in and drowned there. There was no saving herself. He smiled, his lips curving, revealing his perfect white teeth. That focus, making her feel as if she were the only woman in the entire world, was heady, especially when she looked a complete mess. For a moment her mind went blank and she could only stare at him.

  Where was her sharp intellect? She relied on her brain. She could think fast and was good at details. When Vittorio was around, the only details she could remember were how his smile was so beautiful and how the sound of his voice was so gentle and yet compelling. She was going to have to take charge of her life and that meant getting her brain going from meltdown to working. She dreaded having to be in charge again. She would much prefer lying on cool sheets, closing her eyes and willing the pain in her shoulder to let up even if it was for just a few minutes.

  “What is it, bella?”

  His voice had a way of whispering over her like a caress. She wrapped herself in the sound of it and forced herself to do the right thing even though it would have been so much easier to let someone care for her.

  “Haydon threatened you.”

  “Yes, he did.” He smiled down at her. “We expected that. Maybe not this soon, but you did say he doesn’t like anyone close to you. Our engagement has been big news. The uproar hasn’t settled down these last two weeks, mostly because my beautiful fiancée is in the hospital. I imagine with me staying right by your side, he’s not so happy.”

  “Please take him seriously.”

  “Why would you think that I don’t?”

  “You’re smiling at me.” He had a gorgeous smile and it was distracting, even in the face of trying to warn him about Haydon. What was even more distracting was the way his fingers were once again closed around hers and that thumb of his was sliding over her inner wrist, wreaking havoc with her ability to think clearly.

  “It’s nearly impossible to look at you and not smile, Grace.”

  She sighed and tried to sit up straighter although she didn’t pull her hand away as she should have. The instant she did, pain sliced through her body, radiating outward from her shoulder. She gave a sharp gasp and froze.

  At once his eyes darkened and every hint of his white teeth disappeared. “Didn’t you hear the doctor say you couldn’t make any sudden movements? He wants you as still as possible for the next week.”

  “I forgot.” It was a lame excuse as excuses went, but it was the truth. She knew Dr. Arnold had insisted on an x-ray before she left the hospital. She had the feeling that he would have been happy to lock her up in a tiny room where she couldn’t move or see the light of day for the next few weeks. Fortunately, Vittorio had insisted she go home with him.

  “Here’s what we’re going to do for the next few days, gattina bella. You’re going to let me take care of you while you get better and you’re not going to worry about Haydon Phillips, the police or anything else.”

  “That sounds like you’re taking over my life. I can’t just let you make all the decisions for me.”

  “Why not? Would that be so bad?” His low, velvety voice stroked over her skin. “I’ve been making the decisions for the last two weeks.”

  That was true. Someone had to have made a lot of decisions for her. She was fairly certain she wouldn’t have an arm if it hadn’t been for Vittorio. Would it be so terrible to let him take over for another week while she rested? The idea was very tempting. Still, there was the matter of Haydon Phillips.

  She steeled herself to do the right thing. “You know you’re not really my fiancé. You don’t have any responsibility to me at all. In fact, you’ve done more than anyone else would have done under the same circumstances, and I appreciate it more than you can possibly know. I can’t let th
is continue no matter how much I want it to. Haydon Phillips will kill you if I stay with you.”

  “Grace, you aren’t thinking straight. I’ve been with you for two weeks. I’ve rarely left your side. He’s going to come after me anyway, whether you’re with me or not. Am I right about that?”

  His deep blue eyes looked directly into hers and she couldn’t look away. She nodded, because it was the truth. Her heart started beating faster for no reason at all other than whenever she looked at him like this, she felt almost as if she belonged to him. For a woman who had been alone her entire life, isolated and afraid, feeling that way was shocking, frightening and exhilarating all mixed together.

  “Then, la mia ragazza molto coraggiosa, be brave a little longer and give me your trust. My home is a fortress. He is welcome to try for me there, but he won’t succeed. Let me have the privilege of taking care of you until you’re well enough to take care of yourself.”

  “I don’t want anything to happen to you.” She blurted it out, terrified she was going to give in. To let the prince take her to his castle like some absurd fairy tale.

  “Nothing will happen to me.”

  He absolutely looked invincible.

  “I don’t know you.”

  He bent his head and gently brushed a kiss across her forehead. “You know me, gattina, you’re just conditioned to think you can’t trust anyone. He did that to you. Don’t let him interfere with us. You have the right to live your life, Grace. Don’t let him take that away from you any more than he’s already done. You’re safe with me. I give you my word, and a Ferraro never goes back on his word. Keep trusting me. I swear you won’t regret it.”

  Her wild imagination immediately interpreted his statement as him claiming her, making her his, letting her know no matter what, he would stand for her. A million butterflies had taken wing in her stomach at the touch of his lips on her skin in spite of the pain threatening to swamp her. He could do that. Make her forget, even if it was just for a few seconds. She couldn’t stop the slow nod of assent. Relief swept through her and she put her head back against the seat and closed her eyes. She didn’t have to think anymore.