Confession Read Free Page B

better, she’d think Dante was intentionally trying to frighten her. “I’m happy to see you during your regular hour, and we can schedule more frequent sessions if need be, but for now, I’m afraid it’s time for you to go.”
    He returned to a stand. “You’re here all alone today.”
    A shudder swept across her shoulders. He was right. No one else was in the building. She shared a secretary with an aesthetician down the hall, and today, Stacy hadn’t been at her post. The aesthetician usually worked Saturday mornings, but she must’ve finished for the day and gone home. Home was where Faith wanted to go right now. She wished she’d kept her clutch in hand. Her phone was in that clutch. “We’ll work on that trust issue . . . on Monday.”
    With Dante’s gaze tracking hers, her eyes fell on her lovely macaron bag, lying on the desktop near his fingertips. He lifted the clutch as if to offer it to her, but then drew his hand back and stroked the satin shell against his face.
    The room suddenly seemed too small. “I don’t mean to be unkind. We’ve been working hard these past few weeks and making good progress up to this point, and I’d hate to have to refer you to another psychiatrist, but I will if I have to.” She paused for breath.
    â€œYou’re barefoot.” Slowly, he licked his lower lip.
    Feeling as vulnerable as if she were standing before him bare naked instead of barefooted, she slipped back into her shoes. Jerking a glance around the room, she cursed herself for furnishing the place so sparsely, as if she didn’t plan on staying in Santa Fe long. It wasn’t like she had anywhere else to call home anymore, and now here she stood without so much as a paperweight to conk someone on the head with. Under these circumstances, she’d have little chance against a potential attacker. Her Krav Maga instructor wouldn’t approve of her lack of preparedness. The window was open; at least she could scream for help if necessary. “We’re done here.”
    â€œI’m not leaving, Dr. Clancy.” He opened her purse, removed her cell and slid it into his pants pocket, then dropped her purse on the floor.
    Her stomach got fizzy again, and she gripped the edge of her desk. Screaming didn’t seem like the most effective plan. It might destabilize him and cause him to do something they’d both regret. For now, at least, a better plan was to stay calm and listen. If she could figure out what was going on inside his head, maybe she could stay a step ahead of him and defuse the situation before it erupted into a full-­scale nightmare. “Give me back my phone, then we can talk.”
    Here came that involuntary snarl of his. “No phone. And I’m not leaving until I’ve done what I came here to do.” Carefully unfolding the newspaper he’d brought with him, he showed her the headline:
    SANT A F E S A I N T C L A I M S F O URTH VICTIM.

 
    TWO
    F aith’s vision stuttered across the bold block letters of the headline. Her knuckles throbbed from gripping the edge of her desk, and the nerves that ran from her wrists to her elbows buzzed like bees.
    Fourth Victim.
    Was she destined to become the fifth?
    A chill swept over her, and a fleeting wish that someone wonderful would appear and throw warm, protective arms around her, made her breath catch. Ridiculous. Jerking her chin up, she pushed away the useless thought and focused on the dark, contorted face of the man standing on the opposite side of her desk.
    Dante Jericho.
    His black hair stuck up wildly from the way he’d been yanking it here and twirling it there. As his gaze flitted rapidly about her office, a distended vein pulsed frantically in his forehead. His pumped arms finished in balled-­up, ready-­to-­smash fists, and his nostrils flared like those of a bull that had been offered the matador’s cape. If