The nightmares.
He pushed those aside. For now. And hoped like hell that Olivia managed to escape having them.
It took her a moment, some mumbles and some creative profanity to regain her composure, and she looked him in squarely in the eyes. She was fully Olivia now. No trace of Marissa.
That wouldn’t last.
“So according to you, we photographed ourselves having sex here, and then we were murdered?” Olivia sounded as skeptical as Lucian had when this mess had started.
Lucian made a sound of agreement. “From what I’ve been able to work out, someone murdered Damien and Marissa less than an hour after this last photo was taken. Maybe only minutes after. Tomorrow is the anniversary of their murders. And we’re the identical age they were when they died. I think that’s why they’re pressing so hard to come back through us.”
That bleached the remaining color right out of her face.
She groped behind her, searching for some place to sit. Probably because she felt her legs were about to give way, and she settled from the edge of his desk. This had to be bringing back memories of her own stalker, a man who’d nearly managed to kill her.
“Start from the beginning,” she insisted. “Tell me everything.”
Not everything. Yet. But enough to make her understand.
“As you probably remember from your research, Damien was married to a woman named Estelle when he met Marissa.”
Lucian leaned over and brought up the woman’s photo on the screen. Plastic surgery and a personal trainer had helped to keep her looking young, but her dust-gray eyes were old and cold.
“I had a PI interview several people who knew them,” Lucian continued. “And all said it was lust at first sight for Damien and Marissa. That from the moment they met, they couldn’t keep their hands off each other.”
She glanced down at her own trembling hands. “The newspaper articles said Estelle was upset about the affair.”
“Definitely. At the time, Estelle was young, barely twenty-one, and Damien and she had only been married a few months when Damien met Marissa. Estelle repeatedly refused to give him a divorce and was a suspect in their murders.”
“Of course she was. Infidelity’s a strong motive. But I remember reading that she had an alibi.”
“She did. Not a good one, though, if you ask me. Her father claimed she was at their family home all night crying on his shoulder about Damien’s affair.” He paused. “But she might have been telling the truth. Might. Before Lucian, Marissa had been involved with a man named Harvey Jenkins.”
Lucian pulled up his photo, too. No plastic surgery for Harvey so the nightclub owner looked every one of his sixty-one years.
He watched Olivia to see if she had a reaction to Harvey. Perhaps even images of Harvey shooting Lucian and Marissa. But nothing.
“Harvey was a suspect,” she said. “That turned up in my research, too. Marissa had a restraining order against him, and he had a nasty temper. Roughed her up a few times.”
It sickened Lucian to think of any woman going through that. He hadn’t known Marissa, but a part of her—maybe even more than a part—was inside Olivia.
And that made this even more personal.
“It’s strange,” Lucian said. “I can feel the heat, the attraction.” Yet another understatement. “But not the murders themselves.”
Only the gut-twisting emotions that went with the murders.
Olivia stayed quiet a moment, no doubt giving that some thought. “I read every article I could get my hands on, but there are still plenty of questions. You’re sure it was murder and not some kind of suicide pact since they couldn’t be together?”
Lucian debated showing her the next photo, but if she became as obsessed about this as he was—and she would—Olivia would eventually see it. It wasn’t out there for the public but rather a shot he’d gotten from police files. However, if Lucian had managed to get his hands on it, then Olivia could, too.
He didn’t look at the photo when he put it on the screen. Didn’t have to. It was branded in his memory.
Now part of the nightmares.
Olivia gasped and pressed her fingers to her mouth. Her gaze rifled over the image. Damien and Marissa still naked but very much dead. Blood, shiny and dark, pooled out from their cold, pale bodies. The gunshot wounds to their heads had seen to that. The stab wounds were just overkill.
“Probably not suicide,” she whispered.
“No. And Damien and Marissa knew they were in danger. I found Marissa’s journal, and she knew someone was stalking them. She thought it was Harvey and was pissed that he wouldn’t leave her alone.”
Pissed was mild.
“Marissa said if anything happened that she’d come back from the grave and castrate him,” Lucian added.
Olivia looked at her hand again. The floor. Then, shuddered. “After that happened, why would you have an office here? Why would you stay here one more minute?” She pushed herself away from his desk and headed for the door.
Lucian grabbed the folded piece of paper and went after her. He caught up with her in the hall and blocked her path so she couldn’t get to the stairs.
“I stayed because of this,” he said, showing her the paper that’d been left on his car a week earlier.
She didn’t take it. Not at first. And even when she did close her still-trembling fingers around it, Olivia didn’t open it.
Lucian opened it for her. “I believe Damien and Marissa’s killer wants to murder them—again.”
Chapter Three
“I’m sorry,” Lucian said.
Olivia heard the words, but she couldn’t ask him why he was apologizing. That’s because she saw what was written on the note, and her heart dropped to her knees.
Digging up bones will get you killed—again.
“Again,” she repeated, well aware that she sounded hysterical. Felt it, too. “Does this person think we’re possessed?”
Lucian pulled in a long, weary breath. Nodded. “I believe so, and I’m sorry about that as well. When I started researching Damien and Marissa, I had no idea it’d bring this all to the surface again.”
He sounded sincere enough. About that. But even with a death threat staring her in the face, Olivia could feel something else.
This damnable heat.
“Come on,” Lucian said, leading her back to his office. He eased her into the chair next to his desk and poured her a drink.
She rarely drank anything other than wine, but in this case, she made an exception. Olivia took the double shot in one gulp. It burned her throat and watered her eyes. Nearly made her want to throw up. But she’d gladly take another one if it settled the tangle of nerves inside her.
Of course, she doubted mere whiskey could do that.
Logic was the only thing that would help here, and Olivia forced herself to think, to find the flaws. Thankfully, it didn’t take her long to come up with something she could question.
“How would their killer have even known we might be possessed?” she asked. “You and I never even met before today.”
Lucian poured himself a drink, leaned against his