Beneath Blackwater River by Leslie Wolfe (love story books to read txt) 📕

Elliot rushed to the door, but stopped short of following Scott into the woods.

“Go on, I’ll be fine,” Kay said, her voice shaky, husky, sounding strange as if it weren’t hers.

“I’m not leaving you,” Elliot said calmly, weapon still in hand. He kicked the door shut, then pulled the curtains to all the windows after securing their locks. “We’ll catch him together, both of us.”

Kay breathed, adrenaline leaving her body a heap of pain and tired limbs. Backup was only a few minutes away, and she could wait. She looked at the bleeding wound for a moment, the sight of her own blood feeling surreal, as if it belonged to another person. She winced and willed herself though the pain.

Turning to Nicole, she squeezed her hand. “Are you okay?” she asked.

The young woman touched her belly with her hand, caressing it as if to soothe the baby growing inside of her. “He kicked me,” she whispered. “He was afraid I took his damn money, but I’d never touch that,” she added, shaking her head convincingly as she looked straight at Kay. “It was blood money. I know it was.”

Kay frowned, summoning all her willpower to shake off her tiredness and think. “What money?”

Nicole lowered her head and looked at her legs covered in bruises, then curled them underneath her, tugging at the hem of her dress to cover herself up better. “He kept saying only idiots work their asses off for careers and glory. He was the only smart one,” she scoffed, “because he only wanted money.”

Elliot approached the two women, and extended Kay a hand, but she refused his help, preferring to sit on the floor, by Nicole’s side. A concert of sirens grew faintly in the distance, while Elliot rummaged through the drawers until he found a clean towel. “Ambulance is on its way,” he said, pressing the folded towel firmly against Kay’s wound. “We need to stop the bleeding.”

“Keep going, Nicole, this might be important,” Kay said, wincing from the pain and closing her eyes for a moment, feeling waves of tiredness and nausea wash over her as she struggled to maintain her focus on her words. “Tell me more.”

“It started a long time ago, when some kid went missing,” Nicole said. Kay’s tiredness vanished in an instant, leaving her brain perked up and ready to work. “He landed that kid’s case; he was the only detective. A few days later, he got drunk and told me he scored a bunch of cash. All he had to do was bury that case.” She ran her hand over her forehead, a sign of shame, of embarrassment. “That’s why I think it’s blood money, and I’d never touch it. But I know where he keeps it.”

Kay closed her eyes, her Lego pieces swirling up in the air again, refusing to let themselves be assembled in shapes that made sense.

Coincidences were a rare occurrence in her line of work; safe to say they almost didn’t exist. When a coincidence presented itself, it usually was a lead waiting to be uncovered. How many other kidnapping cases had been buried by Herbert Scott? Had he been paid off by someone to bury Rose Harrelson’s kidnapping case? Seemed that way. Only the kidnapper could’ve had an interest in doing so. If she followed that money, she could find Rose’s abductor.

“Do you know which case he was paid to bury?” Kay asked, hoping to hear the name that had been at the forefront of her mind since Blackwater River Falls.

Nicole shook her head, and shot Kay an apologetic glance. “No, I’m sorry, it was a long time ago.” She stared at the smoke-stained ceiling for a while. “It was the week after my birthday, the year my mother died.” She mumbled something and moved her fingers slightly, as if counting in her mind. “Um, it was fourteen years ago, last July.”

43Decision

He was tired of her.

He’d stopped feeling excited to be going back to the house a few days ago, when he’d found her dressed as Mira, trying to look like her, to be her.

How dare she…

Since Mira had left, he’d never been the same, and he never would be, not without her back in his arms. And that was never going to happen, no matter how hard he wished for it, or what he was willing to do to make his dream become reality.

She was beautiful, his first and only love, his Mira. She was shy, and loving, and willing to endure pain only to bring him pleasure. She lived for the nights they spent together in furtive embraces, their secret terrifying and exciting at the same time, the danger of it immense. Yet that never stopped her. When they were apart, she suffered just as much as he did, counting the seconds until they could be together again. When he looked into her eyes, he saw the depths of her love for him, her devotion, her willingness to follow him to the ends of the earth.

Then she was gone, forever taken from him, forever lost. Even if decades had passed since, he’d never forgotten Mira’s loving gaze, the look of her beautiful lips when she whispered her love for him, the feel of her body molding around his, a perfect match without equal.

And this girl, this stray, this Kirsten or whatever her name, had dared imitate Mira. She’d put on some clothes that resembled Mira’s style, and combed her hair like she used to, but her eyes were cold and filled with contempt, with hatred and fear. There was no love in those irises, no tenderness in her touch. He could feel her body tensing up whenever he drew near, whenever his fingers touched her frozen skin.

She’d done it just to fuck with his mind, to turn him into someone she could push around as she pleased.

No matter how hard he’d pushed himself to imagine Mira in his arms again, the creature he was