Chapter 37

They spent the night at Alex's place. He was too tired for anything but sleep, so they curled up together in her bed and talked quietly until he drifted off. Alex fell asleep easily, too. Perhaps she'd been more anxious about meeting his Mom than she'd realized.

Sometime in the night, he woke her with kisses. Alex returned the affection, and he whispered I love you, Alex before the room was filled with their ragged breath. The second sleep was more relaxed than the first.

In the morning, after his shower, Bobby met her at the coffee pot. He set his palms against her cheeks and kissed her, his hands drifting back through her hair, holding it away from her beautiful face. He kept his hands there as he leaned back from the kiss and smiled. "You should wear it this way," he told her, and then kissed her behind the ear.

Alex grinned, handed him a cup of coffee, and went back to the bedroom to finish getting ready for the day.

They ID'd Madeline Strauss with the help of missing persons. As they looked over their board filled with photographs of the women, Bobby pointed at the picture of Anna. He got to his feet. "Anna Dukay, she was killed in her basement. Allison Keele, Brady left her in her SRO. I wonder if Madeline made it out of her building?" He asked Eames, and chewed on his bottom lip.

The owner of the building had seen Brady on the news, and was more than willing to cooperate with the police as long as they kept it quiet. It saved them the hassle of getting a warrant.

Bobby found a place where the wall sounded hollow. The CSU team cut through the wallboard and they saw what appeared to be a body wrapped in canvas, secured with duct tape. Alex got out her pocketknife and cut through the canvas. There was a skeleton beneath.

Eames could feel the cold chills going through her body. Not so long ago, she'd been trapped in a basement. The rescue teams had dismantled a wall to get in, to rescue her.

"She's been here all this time," Alex told Bobby, "Alone."

He heard the tremor in her voice, but his mind was already a step ahead. Bobby studied the back wall of the alcove they'd just found the body in. He smacked it with his hand, and it, too, sounded hollow. "Maybe not," he said, and looked over at Alex.

The CSU man brought the reciprocating saw, and they repeated the procedure, removing a panel of drywall. Another body was hidden there.

"We asked for one, he gave us two," Alex commented.

"I wonder what he wants in return," Bobby retorted.

They stepped back, then, letting the technicians do their work. The bodies were on the way to the ME's office, and it would take some time before Rodgers could give them any information. Alex called the Captain and updated him as they walked to the SUV.

Once they were in the car, Bobby turned to her. "You all right?" he asked quietly.

Alex glanced quickly his way. She shouldn't have been surprised, but she was. Her face screwed into a frown, but she nodded. "There but for the grace of God," she breathed.

Bobby's hand went to her back. "I guess I have something to thank Him for, after all," he said, and gave her a smile when she looked his way. "Kind of… evens out the scorecard, so to speak…"

She started the car, and let out her breath. "Let's get some lunch."

The rest of the day was spent following up on leads with the unidentified women.

As they looked over what was left of Madeline Strauss, Alex fingered the cross at the nape of her neck. She was very quiet, thinking again how lucky she'd been to have survived her own abduction.

"Mummified," Bobby said.

"Field dressed," Rodgers clarified. "Disemboweled, blood was drained, body cavity sprinkled with lime, then wrapped in canvas."

"No decomp smell to give the body away," Alex said.

"And the other corpse?" Bobby asked, throwing a concerned glance at Alex as she folded her arms and turned her head. Her phone chimed, and Alex pulled it out.

"Female, in her twenties, also mummified and strangled."

"We may have a witness," Alex said, reading the text again. "A woman recognized her picture. She's upstairs."

Bobby finished writing some notes in his binder and gave Rodgers a wave as the two detectives left the morgue.

He didn't say anything. There was nothing more he could say to Alex than he'd already said last night. She'd survived, and there was nothing he could do to help her deal with the guilt of that, except to let her know how grateful he was that she was still in his life.

Alex was quiet, as well. As hard as Bobby tried, he would never be able to understand the depth and intensity of feelings this stirred up in her. She was handling it. She wasn't falling apart, she was able to do her job… but this kind of thing was always going to give her chills. It was always going to fill her with incomprehensible sadness.

"That's me," the woman said. "As you can see, I'm not missing, so…I'd appreciate your taking my photo off the internet."

"Mark Ford Brady was your photographer, yes?" Bobby asked, pulling out a chair and seating himself.

She said her agency had sent her to the studio for a headshot.

"How much time did you spend with him?" Goren asked, making a note in his binder. Alex watched the woman with a compassionate eye.

"A few days."

"Just for a headshot?" Bobby inquired.

The woman closed her eyes, and her trauma came back to her. "No," she said firmly, and looked away. "He, uh… he took me somewhere upstate. Said he had a house on a lake. It turned out to be a fisherman's shack."

Bobby tossed down his pen, covered his mouth, and closed his eyes, imagining what horrors Brady might have done in the shack by the lake. How many other victims were there? And why did this one survive?

"Miss Hill, if something did happen to you, we need to know."

The woman glanced Bobby's way and swallowed. Hastily, he got to his feet. "I'm gonna get your photograph removed," he explained, and then went quietly out the door, closing it behind him so the women could have privacy.

"You're the first one we've found who's alive," Alex told her, hoping she would realize just how important that was.

She swallowed again. "The weekend upstate really was idyllic. Then he… he disappeared. A few months later he showed up at my door."

Bobby popped back in, but he could see from the look on Alex's face they weren't finished yet. "Uhm," he said quietly. "Your photo has been taken off." He shut the door but stayed close to it, in case the woman wouldn't talk in front of him.

"Nine hours later, he left. He… I couldn't get up off the floor. I was in the middle of a custody battle. He knew I couldn't tell anyone."

"Why do you think you survived?" Alex asked.

She frowned and rolled her eyes. "I…I let him think I enjoyed it."

Both detectives were quiet. Their eyes met, eyes swirling with darkness. Bobby gave only the slightest shake of his head. They thanked Miss Hill, got her contact information, and sent her on her way.

After closing themselves back into the room, Bobby sank heavily down to the tabletop.

"Well, he's a hell of a lot creepier than we thought," Alex began.

"He raped to resolve his self-esteem issues… he killed when-when… he wasn't good enough. Repressed anger, probably, I don't know, abandonment issues from his father? And he provides himself with his own… pressure valve. He rapes women, and then they don't like it, he lets go of his rage… kills them. He rapes them, and they do like it, well… well, he… satisfies his ego and goes on his merry way."

"She said he raped her for nine hours," Alex told him.

"He… he had to be sure… they weren't faking it…"

Alex filled him in on the bit of conversation he'd missed. "Bobby, she said he showed up at her place months later. She went for the headshot at the studio. He tracked her down."

All of the pieces were fitting together, as Bobby developed his profile of Mark Ford Brady. "Well," he said, trying to change the subject. "We've got to… find this… fisherman's shack."

"I'd hate to think what happened if he decided he wanted more than a one night stand…" Alex muttered as they left the room.