The Naturals: All In Part 13

It quickly became apparent that, yes, Lia could. After Lia dragged Sloane to the dressing room, Judd turned to me. "You don't see anything you like?" he asked.

"Not yet," I said. In truth, I wasn't feeling much like shopping. I'd agreed with Agent Sterling when she'd said we needed to get Sloane out of the suite. I wanted to be there for my roommate, but no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't keep from wondering what the UNSUB was doing right now.

Why did you escalate? Why did you stop?

I forced myself to pick a dress up off a nearby rack. It was simple: an A-line cut in a brilliant, royal blue. It wasn't until I'd joined Lia and Sloane in the dressing room and tried it on that I realized it was the exact same shade as the shawl that had been wrapped around what were, in all likelihood, my mother's remains.

"Dance it off." My mom is wrapped in a royal blue scarf, her red hair damp from cold and snow as she flips the car radio on and turns it up.

This time, I couldn't fight the memory. I wasn't sure I wanted to.

"You can do better than that," she tells me, glancing over from the driver's seat, where she's dancing up a storm.

I'm six or seven, and it's so early in the morning that I can barely keep my eyes open. Part of me doesn't want to dance it off this time.

"I know," my mom says over the music. "You liked the town and the house and our little front yard. But home isn't a place, Ca.s.sie. Home is the people who love you most." She pulls over to the side of the highway. "Forever and ever," she murmurs, brushing the hair away from my face. "No matter what."

"No matter what," I whisper, and she smiles, one of those slow-spreading, mysterious smiles that make me smile, too. The next thing I know, she's turned the music up as loud as it can go, and the two of us are out of the car, and we're dancing, right there on the side of the highway, in the snow.

"Ca.s.sie?" Lia's voice snapped me back to the present. For once, her voice was gentle.

We don't know the body is her, I thought, not for a fact. But staring at myself in the mirror, I didn't believe that. My eyes popped against the blue of the dress. My hair looked a deeper, almost jewel-toned auburn.

"That really is your color," Lia told me.

It was my mother's color, too, I thought. If a person had known my mother, had loved her, had thought she was beautiful-this was the color they would have buried her in.

Her necklace. Her color. An odd numbness descended over my body, my limbs heavy and my tongue thick in my mouth. I took the dress off and made my way back to the front of the store. Across the promenade, there was an old-fashioned candy shop. I fell back on the habits of my childhood, people-watching and telling myself stories about the customers.

The woman buying herself lemon drops just broke up with her boyfriend. The boys looking at candy cigarettes hope their mother doesn't realize they've tried the real thing. The little girl staring at a lollipop as big as her head missed her nap this afternoon.

My phone rang. I answered, still watching the little girl across the way. She didn't reach for the lollipop. She just stared at it, solemn-eyed and still.

"h.e.l.lo?"

"Ca.s.sie."

It took me longer to recognize my father's voice than it would have taken me to recognize Sterling's or Briggs's.

"Hey, Dad," I said, my throat closing in around the words, my mind awash in all the things I'd been trying to forget. "Now really isn't a good time."

Across the way, the solemn-eyed little girl eyeing the lollipop was joined by her father. He held out his hand. She took it. Simple. Easy.

"I was just calling to see how you're doing."

My father was trying. I could see that-but I could also see the ease with which the man across the way hoisted his little daughter onto his shoulders. She was three, maybe four years old. Her hair was red, brighter than mine, but it was easy enough to picture myself at that age.

I hadn't even known I had a father.

"I'm okay," I said, turning my back on the scene across the way. I didn't need to know whether or not the father would surprise his daughter with the lollipop. I didn't need to see the way she looked at him.

"I got a call from the police this morning." My father had a naturally deep voice.

So you weren't just calling to see if I was okay.

"Ca.s.sie?"

"I'm here."

"The forensics team was able to extract traces of blood from the shawl in which the skeleton was wrapped."

My mind took that information and ran with it. If her blood was on the shawl, you must have wrapped her in it at some point before you-before you- "Preliminary a.n.a.lysis suggests it's the same blood type as your mother's." My father's voice was so controlled that I wondered if he'd written this down, if he was just reading a script. "They're running a DNA a.n.a.lysis. They're not sure the sample will be big enough, but if it is, we should have answers in the next few days." He wavered, just for a moment. "If they have to try to do a DNA a.n.a.lysis of the bones..." His voice broke. "That would take longer."

"Answers," I said, fixating on that one word. It came out like an accusation. Her necklace. Her color. "I don't just want to know if it's her. I want to know who did this."

"Ca.s.sie." That was all my father could say. His script had run out.

I turned back toward the candy store. The little red-haired girl and her father were long gone. "I have to go."

I hung up the phone just in time for Lia to pounce.

"I know," I said, my voice taut. "It's not my turn to have issues."

"Exhibit C as to why that's the case?" Lia grabbed my arm and began pulling me toward the back of the store. "Sloane just made a beeline out the employees-only exit," she said, her voice low. "And so did about five hundred dollars' worth of merchandise."

Who takes a stressed-out kleptomaniac shopping? I thought in self-recrimination as we slipped out the back exit. Seriously, who does that? The door closed behind us. Sloane was standing a few feet away, the silk shirt clutched in one hand and some kind of bracelet in the other.

"Sloane," I said, "we have to go back inside."

"It's not just four bodies in four days," Sloane said. "That's what we missed. What I missed. January first, January second-those aren't just days. They're dates. 1/1. 1/2."

"I understand," Lia said, so convincingly that I could almost believe she did. "You can tell us all about it after we get back inside before either Judd or the sales girl notices we're gone."

"One, one, two." Sloane continued on as if Lia had never spoken. "That's the way the sequence starts. 1/1. 1/2. Do you see? The pattern hasn't been broken, because a body every day was never the pattern." Sloane's voice practically vibrated with intensity. "January first, second, third, and fourth-they're all Fibonacci dates. Thirteen, 1/3. One hundred and forty-four, 1/4." The words poured out of her mouth, faster and faster. "I just have to figure out the exact parameters he's using...."

At the end of the alleyway, another door opened. Lia thought fast, pulling Sloane and me back against the wall. She needn't have bothered. The two people who exited were fully caught up in their own conversation.

I couldn't hear what either of them was saying, but I didn't need Michael there to tell me that emotions were running high.

Aaron Shaw. I registered Sloane's brother's presence a moment before I identified his companion. And Tory Howard.

Aaron said something, pleading with her. She pulled back, then went back into the building, slamming the door. Aaron cursed-loud enough that I could make out the words-then kicked the metal door.

"That's my favorite curse word, too," Sloane whispered.

"Somebody," Lia murmured, "has a temper."

The metal door banged open behind me, and I jumped. Judd stepped into the alleyway, scanning the perimeter for threats. I knew the exact second his eyes landed on Aaron Shaw.

"Girls," he said, "go back inside."

We did as we were told. The door closed behind us, leaving Judd in the alley.

"Excuse me." A man in a dark suit appeared in front of us. Security. He eyed the merchandise in Sloane's hand and the direction from which we'd come. "I'm going to have to ask you girls to come with me."

Security had caught Sloane on camera leaving the store. The fact that she'd also returned of her own volition didn't seem to negate their opinion that she'd shoplifted. I tried to trust that when Judd came back in from the alleyway and found us missing, he'd also find his way to the security office, where the three of us had been deposited in front of a man I recognized all too well.

You're the one who came to get Sloane's father the night Camille was murdered, I thought as the man stared back at us. He was of medium height, with unremarkable features and a poker face that would have done any professional proud. Something in the way he sat and moved screamed power and authority, maybe even a hint of danger.

"Do you know how much shoplifting costs this casino every year?" he asked us, his tone carefully controlled.

"Thirteen billion dollars' worth of merchandise is shoplifted annually." Sloane couldn't help herself. "I'd estimate your share of that to be less than point-zero-zero-zero-one percent."

Clearly, the man hadn't expected an actual answer.

"She wasn't shoplifting." Lia made it sound like the very idea of Sloane stealing anything was worthy of an eye roll. "She had a panic attack. She went outside for air. She came back in. End of story."

Lia's lie skated close enough to the truth that even with security footage, they would have trouble arguing her interpretation. Sloane had been agitated from the moment we'd entered the store. Sloane had gone outside. Sloane had come back in. All true.

"Victor."

The head of security looked up. The rest of us turned toward the door of his office. Aaron Shaw stood there, looking every bit as self-possessed and in control as he had the day we met him.

"Aaron," Victor greeted him.

Not Mr. Shaw, I noted. When it came to the hierarchy at the Majesty, it wasn't entirely clear which one of them came out on top.

"Can this wait?" Victor's tone made that sound more like an order than a question.

"I was just checking in on some of our VIP guests," Aaron replied. "These girls are staying with Mr. Townsend in the Renoir Suite."

The words Renoir Suite had Victor stiffening. Big spenders, leave them be, Aaron might as well have said.

"Let me do my job," Victor told Aaron.

"Your job is hara.s.sing teenagers with anxiety issues?" Lia asked, arching an eyebrow at him. "I'm sure a variety of news outlets would find that fascinating."

Once Lia had given life to a creative interpretation of the truth, she was fully committed to it.

"Why don't we hear from the girl in question?" Victor said, narrowing his eyes at Sloane. "Were you, as your friend claims, having a panic attack?"

Sloane stared at the front corner of the man's desk. "Patients with panic disorders are more than ten times more likely to be double-jointed than controls," she said clearly.

"Victor." Aaron's voice held a note of steel. "I'll take care of this. You can go."

After a tense moment of silence, the head of security walked out of the room without a word. Clearly, Aaron held the upper hand here. I might have breathed a sigh of relief, but when Aaron closed the door behind the man, he turned back to us.

"Let's chat."

Aaron took a seat on the edge of Victor's desk instead of behind it. "What's your name?" he asked Sloane quietly.

Beside me, Sloane opened her mouth, then closed it again.

"Her name is Sloane." Lia's chin jutted out as she answered on Sloane's behalf.

"What's your last name, Sloane?" Aaron's voice was gentle. I thought of the way he'd responded to Sloane's statistics with a smile the day we met him. And then I thought about the brief, heated exchange we'd seen between him and Tory.

"Tavish," Sloane whispered. She forced her gaze up, her blue eyes wide. "I meant to steal that shirt."

I groaned internally. Sloane had no capacity for deception whatsoever. Then again, I thought, she's sitting here across from her father's son, not saying a word.

"I'm going to pretend I didn't hear that," Aaron told us, a smile tugging at the edges of his lips. It was hard to reconcile the man in front of us with the one we'd seen in the alleyway.

You know Tory. She knows you. Emotions were running high-I was struck, suddenly, by a possibility. Maybe you really know Tory. Maybe Camille wasn't the one you were looking at that night at the sushi restaurant. Attraction, affection, tension-maybe you were watching Tory.

What if Tory had chosen the Majesty for drinks that night because she wanted to see him? She'd lied to Briggs and Sterling about choosing the restaurant.

What if she's not afraid of Aaron? What if she's afraid he'll leave her? Or afraid someone will find out they're involved?

Someone, I thought, like Aaron's father.

"Tavish." Aaron repeated Sloane's last name back to her, then paused, like his mouth had gone dry. "My father had a friend once," he continued softly. "Her name was Margot Tavish."

"I have to go." Sloane bolted to her feet. She was trembling. "I have to go now."

"Please," Aaron said. "Sloane. Don't go."

"I have to," Sloane whispered. "I'm not supposed to be here. I'm not supposed to tell."

She wanted him to like her. Even panicked, even trying to get away from him, she wanted him to like her so badly that I could feel it.

"We have the same eyes," Aaron told her. "They call them Shaw blue, did you know that?"

"A chameleon's tongue is longer than its body! And a blue whale's weighs two-point-seven tons!"

"I'm sorry," Aaron said, holding up his hands and taking a step back. "I didn't mean to scare you or to spring this on you or to put you on the spot. It's just that I found out about your mother right after I graduated high school. I went to see her. She said there was a child, but by the time I'd confronted my father, your mother had overdosed and you were gone."

Gone. It took me a second to do the math. Aaron would have graduated high school around the same time that Sloane was recruited to the Naturals program.

"You can't know about me," Sloane told Aaron softly. "That's the rule."

"It's not my rule." Aaron stood up and walked around to her side of the desk. "I'm not like my father. If I'd known about you sooner, I promise I would have-"

"You would have what?" Lia cut in protectively. Sloane was our family, more than she would ever be his, and right now, she was vulnerable and raw and bleeding. Lia didn't trust strangers, and she especially didn't trust this stranger-who we'd seen fighting with Tory Howard-with Sloane.

Before Aaron could reply, the door to the office opened. Judd was standing there. And so was Aaron's father.

"Aaron," Mr. Shaw said. "If you could be so kind as to give us a moment."