Tag: Garret and Calico

Police found link between current cases and old case.

That was the last headline Calico had read and as they were plunged into darkness she couldn’t help but feel like this link had come to late. Too late to save all those other women and maybe too late for her and Garret as well.

Panic immediately gripped Calico in an icy hold.

Darkness.

She’d spent days trapped in the dark when Derek had held her in his house. He’d wrapped a blindfold on her when he first grabbed her and he’d kept her hands chained behind her back the entire time.

Over the last twelve months she’d worked hard to overcome the phobia the ordeal had left her with, and now in just a single second all of that was undone.

Clutching at Garret now, she felt like a scared little girl, not a woman who had endured an ordeal and survived it, came out the other end stronger.

“I got you,” Garret murmured in her ear as he started moving.

“It’s him,” she whimpered, pressing her face against his neck. It had to be Derek, somehow he had followed her here, and now he was going to come after her and Garret.

“We don’t know that,” Garret said as one of the arms holding her disappeared, He was now supporting her weight with one arm under her backside, and her legs wrapped around his hips, her arms around his neck.

“Of course we do.” Who else would it be? Unless Garret also had a stalker.

“I’m armed, Calico, and I have no intention of letting anyone hurt you. We’re going to go outside, get into my car, and drive straight back to the station. Okay? No one is going to touch you.”

He sounded so strong, so confident, and she longed to believe him. If anyone could protect her from her ex it was Garret, but she was so afraid. She just wanted to be happy and move on with her life.

“I need you to trust me, Calico.”

“I do,” she said without hesitation. It was true. She did. This wasn’t an issue of trust just one of fear.

“You won’t regret it.”

Calico felt lips touch her temple, and then they were moving. Cold air washed over her as they stepped out into the night. Maybe she’d feel safe at the police station, she thought as she shivered.

Maybe.

A big maybe.

A curse falling from Garret’s lips had her lifting her head. Immediately she saw what had upset him. Something red was smeared all over his front door.

Two words.

You’re next.

As clues grow, are the police misreading them?

They wouldn’t be now thanks to the woman sitting so still and silent on the couch beside him. Calico had just broken this case wide open and now that they had a name hopefully it wouldn’t take the police long to find Derek Daniels and lock him up for good.

Who would have thought a small packet of ketchup would break open the case? If it wasn’t for Calico knowing that her ex loved the things and always had them with him, eating them as snacks, then it could have taken them weeks or even months longer to connect Derek to the crimes.

What she’d done today had taken a great toll on Calico though. She was bundled up in blankets despite the mild weather, and she was so withdrawn it hurt to look at her. She was not only reliving the worst thing to ever happen to her but she was also imagining all the terrible things that could happen to her in the future.

Her ex was dangerous and he had a grudge against her.

Not that anyone was getting to Calico on his watch. Whatever it took he was going to protect this woman who had burrowed her way into his heart and taken up residence there.

“They’ll find him,” he assured her, tugging her closer to his side.

“Yep,” she said, but there was no conviction to her tone. It made sense she didn’t have much faith in his kind right now, after all the cops had told her that her ex was dead when it was painfully evident that he wasn’t.

“Now they know he’s alive they won’t stop until they find him.”

“But will they find him before or after he for me?”

The fear in her tone gutted him, and Garret didn’t think, he just grabbed her and hauled her over until she was sitting straddling his thighs. “I won’t let him get you. You hear me? You’re mine to protect and I won’t fail you.”

He’d failed Tony and Natasha, but that wouldn’t happen this time. Couldn’t. Not when failing meant losing this beautiful woman.

A small smile chased away some of the fear in her eyes. “I’m yours, huh?”

“Any objections?”

“Are you also mine?”

“You bet I am.”

“Then no objections.” Leaning in she pressed her lips to his, and they both quickly sunk into the kiss.

As badly as he wanted to pick her up, carry her upstairs to his bedroom, and spend the rest of the night making sure she was thinking only pleasant thoughts, Garret knew they weren’t ready yet to take that step. Especially not under these circumstances. He didn’t want their first time tainted by her ex and his crimes.

“Garret, more, please,” Calico whispered against his lips as she rocked on his lap.

He groaned, his resolve weakening. “Are you sure?”

“Positive.”

Who was he to deny this woman anything? Standing with Calico in his arms, Garret was just heading to the stairs when the power in his house suddenly went out.

Latest victim leaves vital clue, but will it be enough!

The headline gave Calico a little hope as she sat in the uncomfortable chair in the small interview room at the police station. If the cops could find who the killer was then maybe she could let go of the guilt that plagued her.

Garret said it wasn’t her fault, and logically she understood that. If the killer was her ex then she wasn’t responsible for his actions, only he was. But she didn’t feel it. It felt like this was all because of her. All because she hadn’t seen a future with her boyfriend and ended things.

When the door opened and two detectives walked in, Garret reached over and picked up her hand, entwining their fingers together. She felt his strength, his support, his determination to be there for her and it helped more than she could say.

“Good morning, ma’am, thank you for coming down here to speak with us,” the older of the detectives, a woman who appeared to be in her mid fifties.

“Of course. If it’s Derek then I want him to be found and punished,” she said, straightening in her seat.

“I thought your ex was deceased,” the other detective, a man who looked to be around her age, said.

“Thats what I was told, but … there was no body,” she explained. Part of her had always wondered if he was still out there somewhere, she wanted to believe he was dead, but how could she when there was no body for her to see and verify for her own peace of mind?

“Your ex kidnapped you?” the woman asked.

“He grabbed me one night when I was getting home from work. He took me to his house and chained me to his bed,” she replied, her voice wavering just a little. “He was angry I tried to leave, told me I was his and he wasn’t letting me go. Not ever. He hit me and … did other stuff,” she said, unable to say the words out loud.

“Rumor is you guys found something,” Garret spoke up.

The male cop gave a nod. “Something was left hidden under the clothes of the latest victim. Like she was trying to tell us something.”

“It was this,” the female said, holding out an evidence bag.

Calico’s hand was shaking as she reached out to take it, and as soon as she saw what was in it she knew. Her ex wasn’t dead and he was a serial killer taking out her colleagues one by one, before he came for her.

Because there was not a doubt in her mind that eventually she would be his final victim.

Suspicious Syringe Found.

But would it lead anywhere, Garret thought bitterly as he looked over at his couch where Calico was curled up under a mound of blankets.

She’d been different since he’d asked her if she believed her ex and the killer were one and the same. Quieter. More withdrawn. Missing the spark that had drawn him to her in the first place.

Filled with an overwhelming need to comfort her in whatever small ways he could, Garret headed over to the couch. Tony and Natasha had left after Calico had woodenly told them everything she knew about her ex, so it was just the two of them, and he wanted her to know he was there for her.

Sitting on the couch beside her, he picked her up, blankets and all, and settled her on his lap. It wasn’t until she gave a small sigh and snuggled closer, resting her cheek on his shoulder that he realised he’d been afraid of being rebuffed. They didn’t know each other that well yet so he’d wondered if she would even want his comfort.

Seemed he shouldn’t have worried.

“Do you really think it could be him?” she asked after sitting in silence for several minutes while he just held her and stroked her hair, trying to let her know with each touch that he wasn’t going anywhere.

“I don’t know enough about the case to answer that.” Although he’d asked Tony to speak with the lead detectives on the case and see what they thought.

“If … if it is my ex, then … does that make all of this … all those nurses who lost their lives … is it my fault?” Calico asked, looking up at him with wide green eyes so full of fear, and guilt that he wanted to do whatever it took to make her smile again, to put the sparkle back in those pretty eyes.

“Absolutely not,” he growled, harsher than he’d intended, but he wasn’t going to allow her to blame herself for someone else’s actions. Actions that she had zero control over.

“But-“

“No buts,” he said as he placed a finger on her lips. “If it is him that does not make any of this your fault. You were allowed to end a relationship you were no longer happy in. That did not give him a reason to take you and hold you against your will. And it certainly was not a reason for him to hurt other people. If this is him it’s not on you.”

“I want to believe that,” she whispered forlornly.

“I’ll keep saying it until it sinks in,” he promised. Before he could say more his phone, which was sitting on the coffee table in front of them, began to ring. It was Tony’s name on the screen so he leaned over to scoop it up. “What’s up?”

“Spoke with the lead detectives working the case, they asked if you could bring Calico in so they could speak with her,” Tony told him.

Obviously overhearing, Calico nodded. There was still fear and guilt in her eyes but there was determination too. This woman was too strong for anything to break her. And he’d be right there beside her every step of the way.

“We’ll be right there,” he told his partner. Regardless if the killer was her ex or not Calico wasn’t safe, no nurse would be until this man was off the streets.

Suspicion that the nurse killer already has next victim in his sights.

Calico dragged her attention away from the newest headline, insides churning as she realised this man was escalating. He’d just taken another victim and now he was already hunting his next.

When would it stop?

And was it the killer or her ex who was stalking her now?

Garret hadn’t returned so she stood on shaky legs and went looking for him. Finding him, another man, and a woman standing just inside the front door, the looks on their faces put her even more on edge.

“What’s wrong?” she asked, walking straight over to Garret and into his arm. It felt like the most natural thing in the world to rest her cheek on his shoulder and have his arms wrap around her. “I remember you. I saw you at the hospital a few times,” she said to the man.

“I’m Garret’s partner, Tony,” he said, holding out his hand which she shook. “And this is my girlfriend, Natasha.”

Although Natasha smiled there was a haunted look in the woman’s eyes that Calico recognised all too well. The same look she’d seen in her own eyes so many times over the last year.

“Nice to meet you, Natasha,” she said, offering as warm a smile as she could muster, which was returned by the other woman. “Did something happen?”

“Your car was stolen,” Garret told her, his hand stroking the length of her spine.

“Like by random thieves?” she asked, somewhat lamely. From the looks on their faces she knew who the guys thought had taken her car. It wasn’t the fact that her car that had been taken that had her feeling like her blood had been turned to ice, it was knowing that she had likely been followed.

Someone had been watching her?

The killer or her ex?

“Calico, I hate to ask this, but I think we have to,” Tony said, but looked to Garret with an arched brow.

Garret sighed but he captured her chin between her thumb and forefinger, the pad of his thumb gently caressing her skin. “Do you think it’s possible that your ex could be the one killing nurses?”