ONLY SPITE by Rylie Dark

Author:Rylie Dark [Dark, Rylie]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2022-06-09T00:00:00+00:00

*

Even in an unflattering orange jumpsuit, Kent Westwood managed to exude a certain charm. The shame that Sadie had seen in him after she had cuffed him in his mansion was long gone, at least externally. He sat casually opposite Sadie and Detective Linden, only a slight flex of his fingers betraying any tension. His lawyer sat next to him, a sharp-suited All-American-looking guy with a designer leather briefcase, expensive veneers, and a shark-like smile that didn’t reach his eyes. Two peas in a pod, Sadie thought with a shudder.

The young woman that Westwood had tied to his bed was in the hospital, stable but in no position to give them a statement yet. Her name was Melissa Davies, and she was an intern at a nearby real estate firm, which was likely where she had come across Westwood.

She wasn’t a college student. Only her age matched the profile of the three victims wrapped in plastic. As far as they had been able to discover so far, Melissa had no ties to any of the victims, and according to her cousin whom she lived with, she didn’t do social media. It was an entirely different profile from the murder victims.

Although she was trying to suspend judgment, Sadie had a sinking feeling that her earlier hunch had been right, and Westwood wasn’t their killer, but an entirely different sort of criminal. Yet everyone else, including Linden, seemed to be operating on the basis that they had their guy. Applying the logic of Occam’s razor—that the simplest explanation was usually the right one—it made sense. Could there really be two predators stalking central Anchorage, with an identical make of car and a similar build, and a penchant for young women in their late teens or very early twenties? It seemed too horrific to be true.

In Sadie’s experience, however, the exact opposite usually turned out to be the case—the more horrific, the more likely it was to have happened.

Detective Linden was tapping his knuckles on the table as he started the tape, his body tense with barely concealed anger. With Westwood’s hotshot lawyer present, Sadie suspected that Linden would do his best to rein in his bad cop approach, but she doubted that he would be very successful. It wasn’t a persona with Linden; it was his personality.

“Mr. Westwood, can you explain how Ms. Davies came to be tied up and drugged in your home?” Linden barked, going straight in. Westwood blinked in surprise at the question, glancing at his lawyer.

“You’re leading my client,” his lawyer drawled in a Southern accent.

“So you’re saying Ms. Davies wasn’t tied up and drugged? You admitted to Agent Price that you had injected her with Rohypnol.” Linden demanded, sounding outraged.

Sadie suppressed a smile. There were times when she could appreciate the older detective’s abrasiveness, she decided, if not his old-fashioned views on gender roles.

“Ms. Davies consented to be tied up,” Westwood said. “There are messages to prove that on my phone. The phone that you guys confiscated,”

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