Chapter 3: The last time I saw my sister alive.

TRAVIS WAS FAR TOO big to fit in the only unoccupied booth in the café. He didn't dare suggest somewhere farther from the PD for fear the woman across from him might faint or cry or something. She'd seemed on the brink of falling apart outside, but she'd rallied and followed him to the café without so much as a tear.

"Here's your coffee. Can I get you anything else?" The waitress deposited a carafe on the table along with cream and sugar.

"No, thank you," he replied.

The woman across from him shook her head. Her shoulder length brown hair swished around her face, all glossy looking. For some crazy reason he wanted to touch it. To run his fingers through her pretty hair and see if it felt as soft as it looked. He kept his hands to himself. Girls like her didn't need men like him in their lives.

"Bliss, right?"

She nodded her head, sending those strands moving again.

"Yeah, sorry, I didn't introduce myself did I? I'm Bliss Giles." She cupped the empty ceramic mug with both hands.

He picked up the carafe and poured her some coffee first, then himself. This wasn't his thing. He didn't deal with clients, he wasn't the person to offer comfort or hope. His history hadn't wired him that way, but for her he'd try.

"Tell me about the last time you saw your sister. Do you mind if I take notes?"

"You said you'd tell me what happened to the other women." Her dark brown eyes focused on him. She was no longer on the verge of tears or lost in thought. He kind of liked being the center of her focus.

"You don't want to know that."

"Yes, I do. And I want to know why you think my sister might be one of them." She tapped the photograph of Wendy he'd laid on the table.

The two sisters couldn't be more different. At least on the surface level.

Wendy was petite, blonde, and almost breakable looking. Bliss was shapely, luscious, and that dark hair set off her pale, perfect skin. The one thing the sisters shared was their dark brown, almost black eyes. He'd heard someone call eyes that dark soulless eyes, but looking at Bliss, that sentiment couldn't be further from the truth. It was the intangible quality the camera captured that he'd seen in the other victim's photographs pre-death. A light. An inner brightness. This killer snuffed out truly bright flames, and for what?

He was going to find out.

"Tell me." She leaned closer.

He'd have to give her the Cliff notes version. What would he tell his sister?

No, that was a bad gauge. His sister kept a living collection of TBK documents and coverage. He'd likely tell her everything, because they'd lived through worse.

"Over the last seven years nine Las Vegas women, all blonde, have gone missing. They turn up between a couple months to a year after they were abducted. Dead. About twenty-four hours after the time of death, another girl is taken."

"What aren't you telling me? I could find that out for myself."

"Some things you don't want to know."

"I have a right to know. That's my sister."

"Then tell me about the last time you saw her. Let me find her."

"I want to know what you aren't telling me."

She was a stubborn little thing.

Travis cleared his throat and made himself relax. Their knees bumped under the table and she shifted, bumping into his other knee. Her cheeks tinged pink, and she finally looked away from him. Interesting. She'd challenge him, but a little knee bump was too much? Women were a mystery.

And better off far away from him.

He had no business thinking about Bliss that way. He was a felon. There was no place for a woman in his life.

"When was the last time you saw Wendy?" He picked up his pen. As fun as it was to share coffee with a pretty girl instead of Ethan's ugly mug, this was about life and death.

"Yesterday, around five. I left work and stopped by her place to check on her."She tore open sugar packets one at a time and upended them into her coffee. Her fingers were small, nimble, with nails in three shades of purple. The bangles on her wrist clanged and chimed as she moved, drawing his attention back to her smallest movement.

"Check on her? Was something wrong? Did she tell you anything?"

"Wendy..." Bliss bit her lip and glanced out of the window, tucking her hair behind her ear. There was a small tattoo there, partially hidden. It made him wonder if there was more ink on her body. Not that it was any of his business. "Wendy has post-partum depression. Her in-laws are babysitting Paul while her husband is out of town. They're looking for a nanny to take care of him. Well, both of them, really. She's been very out of sorts since his birth."

"She just had a baby?" He swallowed.

Fuck.

"Yeah. Why? Is that important?"

"Is the baby missing?" His gut rolled, and he gripped the pen so tight the plastic buckled under his fingers.

"No, he's with his grandparents."

"Poor kid," he muttered. "Did she say anything about seeing anyone? Someone following her? Anyone giving her the creeps?"

"No. Wendy barely leaves the house unless someone makes her. The depression is really bad."

"Have you been to her house?"

"Yeah, she was supposed to meet me this morning, but she didn't show, so I went to get her out of bed. The house is perfect. Clean. The beds all made."

"Could she be at a hotel or somewhere?"

"I don't think so. If Wendy didn't have to leave the house, she wouldn't. This depression, it's bad. If we didn't make her eat, she would starve."

"Could I take a look at the house? I might see something you don't."

"What's so bad you won't tell me?" Once more, those dark eyes focused on him, compelling him to share the worst of it with her.

"We're going to find her before that's an issue."

What the hell?

He couldn't promise her that, and yet he just had.