Hold Back the Dark by Eileen Carr Page A

as they had the night before. Josh doubted that she’d slept much. She had on a pair of trousers that had Josh wondering just how long her legs were, and a white blouse with a camisole damnably shielding her cleavage. He couldn’t say what Marian Phillips was wearing. He could hardly tear his eyes off Aimee long enough to watch the road while he was driving.
    “I have to ask you ladies to touch as few things as possible,” Josh said.
    Marian Phillips nodded, her mouth pressed into a tight thin line. Dr. Gannon placed her hand gently on Marian’s back and asked, “Are you okay with this? Do you want to wait outside?”
    “I’d love to wait outside, but I need to do this for Taylor.” Her voice caught. “I need to do this for my sister.”
    Gannon put her arm around the smaller woman’s shoulders. “Okay, then. Let’s go in.”
    Josh opened the front door and stood aside to let them in. He saw Gannon flinch at the vomit by the bushes near the front door, and wondered what her reaction would be to the scene inside. He knew it was harsh, but he wanted to see her response unfiltered by any warning.
    Marian walked in and stopped short. Her hands flew to her mouth; her shoulders hunched as if she might be physically ill. Behind her, Gannon put an arm around Marian and steadied her. Then she looked around and gasped at the blood-covered walls.
    Her face drained of color and she swayed on her feet. He couldn’t blame her. He’d been repulsed even before he found out that Taylor had used the broken shards of a wine bottle to cut herself, then used her own blood to paint the walls with those weird geometric shapes. And it wasn’t as if this was his first homicide.
     

    Aimee felt her gorge rise. “What does that mean?” she asked, unable to look away from the blood-smeared walls.
    “We’re not sure,” Wolf said behind her. “I was hoping you might know.”
    “Why would I know?” Aimee turned to look up at him. His dark eyes were trained on her face and gave her the disturbing impression that he saw way more than what was on the surface.
    “Because you know Taylor better than we do,” he said, looking from Aimee to Marian.
    “You think Taylor did this?” she asked.
    “They’re pretty sure about that.” Wolf gestured to the wall with his chin. “It’s her blood and her fingerprints all over the walls.”
    “Her own blood?” Aimee echoed. Of course—the cuts all over Taylor’s body. The room wavered around her, graying at the edges.
    “You okay, doc?” Wolf reached out a hand and placed it on her arm to steady her.
    She focused on the warmth of his hand, big and strong on her arm. The rest of her felt so cold. “Fine,” she said. “It’s just shocking.”
    Wolf rubbed a hand over his face. “True that.”
    Apparently it hadn’t been easy for him to see this room, either.
    “Any idea what it means? Why she would paint that same symbol over and over again?” Wolf asked.
    Aimee steeled herself and looked back at the wall. “I have no idea.”
    She looked over at Marian, who stood stock still, her hand over her mouth with tears coursing down her cheeks. Realization dawned on Aimee and a fire sparked in her belly. Josh Wolf had known what they were walking into. He’d known precisely what they were going to see, and he had brought them in here unprepared so he could watch them like bugs under a microscope.
    She shook his hand off and put her arms around Marian, turning her away from the gory scene. “You don’t have to look. You don’t have to think about it.”
    Marian began to sob. “Oh, my poor sister. Who would do such a thing? Who could even think of it?”
    Aimee patted Marian’s back and glared at Detective Wolf. “I don’t know, Marian. There’s no telling what goes on in some people’s minds.”
     

    It took nearly a half hour to calm Marian Phillips down. It didn’t help that under the calm Aimee was trying to project, she was seething at Detective Wolf. Could he be more