Déjà Vu. Lisa Childs

Leaving Trent Baines hadn’t been easy; staying away would probably prove as hard as he’d warned her.

      She stared at the facedown book on her lap. His publicity shot added to the mystery surrounding the reclusive author, as his raised hand covered most of his face. Only the strong line of his jaw and wind-tousled dark blond hair were visible around his palm and fingers.

      “Alaina?” Vonner prodded her. “What happened in there? What was going on?”

      Fighting to steady her voice, she said, “I don’t know what you mean….”

      “Why’d you waste so much time?” the dark-haired agent persisted. “He’s not the guy. According to Igor—”

      “Igor?”

      “His butler,” Vonner explained. “According to him, Baines is only twenty-nine years old. As we both know, the last of these murders happened thirty years ago. Whatever Baines knows about the cases, he probably just figured out by reading old newspaper articles or talking to someone who was around back when the murders happened.”

      “But now there’s been another murder.” She reminded him of the call she hadn’t heard because she’d been too distracted. Or captivated.

      Trent Baines had nearly kissed her. And she was disappointed that he hadn’t, that they had been interrupted before she’d learned how his lips would feel, how his mouth would taste….

      Guilt gripped her now. While she’d been distracted, someone else had been murdered. Brut ally. Ritualistically. The M.O. exactly matched those thirty-year-old cases.

      “This murder is further proof that Baines can’t be the killer,” Vonner added. “Because you were with him when we got the call.”

      “We don’t know how long ago the murder occurred.” Due to a weak cell signal, Alaina hadn’t heard much of what her supervisor had said except that she needed to quit wasting her time on an unsubstantiated lead.

      Only she knew it wasn’t unsubstantiated. Only she knew that Baines had used details that weren’t even in the files of those cold cases. But if she told her bosses how she knew—that she remembered a past life … and death—she’d lose whatever respect and credibility she had in the Bureau. They would think she was as crazy as the killer.

      “The guy’s so isolated up here,” Vonner pointed out, cursing beneath his breath as a tire dropped off the edge of the drive onto the loose gravel shoulder. “There are no quick trips for him.”

      “We can’t rule him out yet,” she insisted, “not until we have more information about the murder.”

      “They’re not going to release the scene until we get there,” Vonner assured her. “But still I can’t see how Baines is involved.”

      And Alaina couldn’t see how he couldn’t be involved. He knew too much—and made her feel too much—to not be deeply involved.

      With the murders?

      Or just her?

      He’d found her. Or had she found him?

      With her blond hair and grayish eyes, she didn’t look or sound or smell the same, but then she was in a different body. Only her soul and her spirit had returned in the beautiful form of Alaina Paulsen.

      This time she would love him, only him. And if, like last time, she refused to give him her heart, he’d just have to take it.

      Again.

       Chapter 3

      Emotion overwhelmed him. This was why he isolated himself in the wooded hills of his estate—because he couldn’t block out what others were feeling. He couldn’t help but feel it, too.

      Disgust and fear emanated from the uniformed officers guarding the door. Trent passed them and ducked under the yellow tape. The crime scene had already been processed, so he was alone in the studio apartment. The victim’s body was on its way to the morgue, but he could feel the residual emotion left in the room.

      The paralyzing terror hung heavy in the air. He winced as the echo of the victim’s screams reverberated inside his head. He widened his eyes as he studied the scene—the blood spattered on the white walls and drying to a dark burgundy, the blood pooled on the hardwood floor, as thick and dark as tar. He inhaled deeply, trying to fill his shallow lungs, but he breathed in the cloying metallic scent of blood.

      His stomach cramped, and he doubled over, crippled with pain. But the pain was not his. It was never his. He always felt others’ pain, others’ emotions. Never his own.

      Until today. Until he’d met Alaina Paulsen.

      “What the hell!” a vaguely familiar male voice exclaimed in surprise.

      “How—Why are you here?” asked a woman. The woman—Alaina Paulsen.

      Like earlier today when he’d been with her, Trent felt none of her emotions. He felt no emotions but his own. Attraction, fascination and an overwhelming sense of destiny …

      “You can’t be here,” the man said.

      Trent assumed he was the other agent, the one he’d refused to see because he’d only been able to see her. This time he took a moment to compose himself, schooling his features back into his usual cocky mask, before he straightened up and turned to her.

      “How did you get here before us?” Alaina asked.

      “He must have a helicopter,” her partner answered for Trent. The man stood close to her, protectively. Were they more than professional partners?

      Trent didn’t care what they’d been. The guy was no threat to him. No other man had the claim on her that he did. As he met her gaze, one emotion gripped him—possessiveness. Mine.

      Her eyes widened, as if she’d read his mind, and she dragged in a shaky breath. “That explains how you got to Detroit before we did,” she said, “but how did you get here?” She gestured at the apartment. “Into our crime scene.”

      The “our” to which she referred was not her and her partner; Trent couldn’t accept that. It was him and her. She knew just as well as he did that he was part of this. If only he knew, for certain, which part.

      “I told you,” he reminded her. “I have a few fans in law enforcement.”

      “In the Bureau?” the male agent asked, his dark eyes narrowed with doubt. His suspicion was as palpable in the air as the scent of the victim’s blood.

      “Check out my story,” Trent suggested, more to get rid of the guy than to reassure him.

      The agent turned to Alaina, who offered a brief nod. With a warning glare at Trent, the man ducked under the crime-scene tape and slipped out into the hall.

      “So you’re the senior agent,” Trent observed.

      “What?”

      “He checked with you before leaving.” Or maybe her partner had just wanted to make sure she would be all right alone with Trent.

      Alaina didn’t satisfy his curiosity as she ignored his observation. “That’s why I went to your estate,” she said, “to check out your story. To find out what your involvement was in those old murders.”

      Her brow knitted as she glanced around the room, taking in the crime scene. Again, the color faded from her porcelain skin, leaving her ghostly pale.

      But she wasn’t a ghost. She was real. And for the first time in the memory of his own life, Trent felt real. His emotions were finally his own instead of what he’d empathetically picked up from someone or somewhere else.

      “Those murders happened before I was born,” he reminded her.

      “You do have a friend in the Bureau,” she said, accepting his claim without the confirmation her partner required.