Beverly Barton 3 Book Bundle. BEVERLY BARTON

the best he could tell the woman driving was alone.”

      “Where’s Ron now?” Bernie asked.

      “He’s over at Taylor’s Wrecker Service, waiting around for those crime scene fellows Charlie Patterson sent over from Huntsville to finish up with Thomasina’s car.”

      Jim shoved back his chair, stood and walked across the room. When he opened the door, Bernie and John turned around and looked at him.

      “Afternoon,” Bernie said.

      Jim glanced at the wall clock above the outer door. Five-thirty-five. “It’s nearly evening.”

      “I’m sorry I couldn’t get over here sooner, but my day has been wild. After this morning’s press conference, I had to meet with Jerry Dale; then Lisa has been fending calls all day from local citizens concerned about the fact we’ve had two abductions in such a short time span. And just when I thought I might escape and come over here, Robyn breezed in with the invitations to Mom and Dad’s fortieth wedding anniversary party, which she was supposed to have sent out a week ago.”

      “Your folks have been married forty years?” Jim’s own parents hadn’t made it to their fortieth anniversary. His dad had died a month shy of their thirty-fourth.

      “Is the party a surprise?” John asked.

      “Yes, they’ve been married forty years,” she replied to Jim. “And they’re still very much in love. Imagine that.” She glanced at John. “No, the party is not a surprise. You don’t honestly think we could keep a secret like that from Brenda Granger, do you? My mother expects something special, and if she didn’t know for sure that Robyn and I were planning an extravaganza for her and Dad, she’d suspect something and start searching for answers.”

      John laughed, but before he could lead Bernie off into some idle chitchat, something Jim had learned John was very good at doing, he motioned to Bernie with a nod of his head, indicating for her to come into his office. He backed up the nonverbal invitation by saying, “If we’re going to leave here before midnight tonight, we should get started on that profile we need to work up as soon as possible. The sooner we send it off, the sooner we’ll see results.”

      “Oh, sure thing.” Bernie patted John on the arm as she passed him. “Tell Cathy not to make any plans for two weeks from Saturday. Y’all will be getting your invitations to the big bash tomorrow.”

      “We’ll be there.” John grinned. “You know Cathy and I wouldn’t miss it for the world.”

      As soon as Bernie entered Jim’s office, he closed the door behind her. “I have the VICAP report, and it looks like there were four almost identical abduction and murder cases, with a possible fifth.”

      “In Alabama?”

      Jim shook his head. “Two in Georgia, one in Tennessee, one in North Carolina and another in South Carolina. All within the past five years.”

      “I’ve never done a profile matrix before,” Bernie said. “Except in theory at the class I took at Quantico.”

      Jim pulled a chair around the side of his desk and aligned it next to his, then indicated for Bernie to sit. “You take my chair.”

      After she sat in the big swivel chair, he sat and scooted his chair closer to hers, then picked up the yellow legal pad lying on his desk. “As you know, it’s a matter of developing a picture of the criminal and his crimes, connecting the dots to see what fits together.”

      “Okay.”

      “We start with asking and answering those six all-important questions.”

      Bernie’s eyes widened. “Who, what, when, where, how and why?”

      He clicked his tongue and grinned at her. “I knew you were a smart girl.”

      Shaking her head, she laughed.

      “What?” he asked guilelessly. “Ah … it’s not politically correct to call you a girl, huh?”

      “I don’t mind, but some female officers do.”

      “I’ll try to remember that. But I’m glad you don’t have a thin skin.”

      Bernie cleared her throat. “So we start with the question of who.”

      “Yeah, who are the victims?” Jim asked.

      “Our three are all young, attractive women in their midto-late twenties.”

      “Hmm … And what else did they have in common?”

      “Thomasina Hardy teaches at Adams County Junior College, Stephanie Preston was a student there, and Jacque Reeves had been a student several years ago.”

      “It could be a coincidence that they all had a connection to the college, but we won’t rule out that fact being important.” Jim glanced down at the legal pad. “Were you aware of the fact that all three women had dark hair and brown eyes?”

      “No, not really. So, they were all young, attractive brunettes.”

      “Young, attractive, popular brunettes.”

      Bernie snapped her head around and looked directly at Jim. “Popular?”

      “Translated that means women who have dated a lot of different men.”

      “Okay. The answer to our who question is young, attractive, popular brunettes.” Bernie counted off each adjective on her fingers. “We need to find out if that description fits those four or five women you came up with through VICAP.”

      “I’ve put in calls to two of the lead detectives, starting with the ones in Georgia, since they were the most recent. I expect to hear from them no later than tomorrow sometime. In the morning, I’ll contact the ones in the other states, too.”

      Bernie nodded.

      “There are two parts to the who question,” Jim said. “Who are the victims was part one.”

      “And who is our killer is part two.”

      “What type of killer is he?” Jim looked directly into Bernie’s brown eyes. Brown eyes flecked with dark gold. Odd that he’d never noticed her eyes weren’t a true brown the way Robyn’s were. But then again, he’d never been this physically close to Bernie.

      “Our guy plans out the details,” she said. “He stalks the woman, which he probably sees as courting her. Then he kidnaps her, rapes her and kills her. Since rape is a crime of power and control and not one of passion, I’d say that is what motivates him.”

      “I agree.”

      “He’s an organized, power/control-oriented killer.”

      “That leads us to the question of what,” Jim said. “What was the cause of death in our two murders? Was there any deviant sexual behavior? Is there anything unusual about the murders?”

      “He slit both women’s throats. He tortured and raped them repeatedly. And as for anything unusual—I’d say the courtship is unusual, the gifts and notes. But what really sets Stephanie’s and Thomasina’s cases apart from the norm are those frightening S&M sketches.”

      Jim wrote hurriedly, jotting down all the information as he and Bernie continued discussing the case. When did the crime occur? Were the dates significant? And where did the crimes occur?

      “All three victims were abducted, but it doesn’t seem any of them put up a fight, so that indicates they knew and trusted their abductor,” Jim said.

      “Well, the how and why of the actual killings are simple. The how is that he slit their throats with a sharp knife, and if we can’t find Thomasina soon, that will be her fate.” Bernie sighed heavily. “As for the why—only God knows.”

      “We’ve got enough information here for me to go ahead and send it to Derek Lawrence,” Jim said. “I’ll fax everything to him before