by Jami Alden
Unlike the flimsy, easy-to-pick front door, this door was steel core, rigged with an electronic keypad that activated three heavy-weight dead bolts that kept the thing locked.
Cole pulled out his Glock and took aim at the door.
“No!” Jack deflected the gun with a sharp chop of his arm. “It won’t penetrate the locks and will only let him know that we’re here.”
“How the fuck do we get in there, then?”
Jack squatted down next to the keypad and tilted his head, studying.
“What?” Cole snapped.
“I’ve worked with a system like this before,” Jack said. “I’m pretty sure there’s a way to override it.”
“So do it.”
“Give me a minute,” Jack snapped, rubbing at his temples. “I have to be careful. If I do it wrong, it will set off an alarm.” Jack nodded to himself, straightened, and started to trot back up the stairs.
“Where the fuck are you going?”
“I need to get something out of my car,” Jack called down.
He was back in seconds with a small tool set. He pulled out a Phillips-head screwdriver and tried to raise it to the keypad, but his hand was shaking too bad to fit the driver with the screw head.
Cole snatched it from his hand and knelt down. “Talk me through it.”
Megan tried to shrink back but there was nowhere to go. The room blurred around her, and she feo her back, Nate straddling her chest. Her blood froze in her veins when she saw the blade flash in his hand once again.
Megan heard a feral cry that didn’t even sound human. The knife stopped its deadly path as Nate was jerked to the side by the black cord digging into his neck. Talia!
Fear and rage twisted her beautiful face as her slender arms flexed and strained, knocking Nate off balance enough for Megan to wiggle out from under him and land a kick to his chest with her bound feet. She kicked again at his hand but couldn’t dislodge the knife.
Nate roared and thrashed around like a wounded bear. He reached one hand behind him and yanked Talia over his shoulder, throwing her to the floor in front of him. Her scream cut short as her back met the ground, and Megan watched, as it though were happening in slow motion, Nate bury his knife in Talia’s stomach. He yanked the blade out, and blood bubbled from the wound, soaking her abdomen and the hands clutching it.
He grabbed Megan by her bound wrists and dragged her across the room, through the crude door cut into the wall, and into another room. Light from the other room barely trickled in. She could smell dirt and damp. A sharp click and the room was flooded with the light of a single hanging bulb. The room was little more than a cave in the ground with a dirt floor.
He yanked her up by her hair. “Do you see? Do you see how much you were loved?”
It took her eyes a second to focus, but what she saw made her breath freeze in her chest. The only finished wall in the room was covered with pictures.
Of her.
He’d put up pictures of her from the paper, from Sean’s trial. There was even a picture of her and Sean, fishing poles in hand, taken before their parents died.
It had been on Sean’s mantel.
Nate pulled her onto a crudely built wooden platform in front of the wall, set like an altar in front of the pictures. He shoved her face against the wall, and she realized the photos weren’t just of her. Some were of another girl, pictures ranging from infancy to about twelve years old.
The girl had dark brown hair and big green eyes. It was like looking at pictures of herself as a girl.
“I loved you so much,” he whispered, his hand tightening in her hair. “I did everything for you. Did you even know how many times I saved you?”
There were other newspaper clippings, headlines screaming BOY, 14, KILLS IN SELF-DEFENSE AFTER MAN KILLS MOTHER AND SISTER.
Her heart dipped to her stomach. She could only catch a few words of the articles, but the headlines—and the pictures—told her enough of the story. The girl who looked so much like Megan must have been Nate’s sister.
Sarah.
She scrambled to find a way to pull him back from the edge and buy herself a little more time. “I know, Nae. I know what you did for me, how much you love me,” she said in a shaky whisper. “I love you too.” She reached out her bound hands and made herself touch him. “Please don’t hurt me anymore, and I promise I’ll love you and stay with you forever.”
He made a sound that was almost like a sob. “I want to believe you. I wanted you to be the one to save me. But it’s not you.” His hand reached out and stroked her hair.
“I don’t want you to be alone.”
His tender smile made the nausea coil in her stomach. “You don’t have to worry. I found someone new.”
“Who?”
“Her.” He sounded euphoric as he pointed to the photo right in the center of the collage.
Megan wanted to howl in protest. She recognized the ponytailed, freckled ten-year-old immediately. Before she’d streaked her hair purple, pierced her nose, and started caking on the eyeliner, Devany could have been Megan’s little sister. Other than the brown eyes, she could have been Sarah’s twin. Nate had stolen the picture from Dev’s trailer.
“I should have known that first night I saw her that it was her all along.” His mouth pulled into a sneer. “Not a slut like you.”
He pushed her down to the platform and the knife came down. He slipped it up under the hem of her shirt, and she waited for its cold sting against her belly. She started to scream, then realized he was cutting her shirt off. Her heart lodged in her throat as her bra followed, and then she was naked from the waist up, the tip of his knife tracing the soft undercurve of her breast.
“Please, please don’t,” she whispered through swollen, bloody lips. “Please leave Devany alone.”
But he didn’t seem to hear her. “You are so beautiful, so beautiful.” He circled the knife around her nipple, almost like a caress. Then his blue eyes narrowed on her face. “But not innocent. Not like her. I would have worshipped you, and this is the thanks I get. I should have known you were nothing like Sarah. I should have seen you were a whore.” He raised the knife, and Megan turned her head to the side, knowing in her gut this was it.
No more playing, no more taunting.
“You were supposed to set me free,” he whispered.
She felt the muscles of his arm shift as he raised the knife higher.
The room exploded in noise as a deafening cacophony assaulted her ears. Startled, Nate loosened his grasp on her and she flung herself away.
“No!” he screamed, and launched himself at her, knocking her to her back.
Megan shoved her hands up, felt the knife bite into her palms. Through the wail of the alarm, she heard a shout but didn’t dare look away as she managed to bring her knees up against Nate’s stomach. She shoved hard and he rolled to the side, bringing her with him.
A gunshot blasted, and a spray of dirt hit her face. She needed to get out of the way. She kicked, bucked, squirmed, but couldn’t break his hold. Nate rolled to his knees and jerked her up in front of him, using her body as a shield, the blade of his knife pressed against her jugular.
The alarm cut out, leaving eerie silence in its wake.
“Let her go,” Cole said, his voice calm, his gun perfectly steady as he held it on Nate.
The hot sting of the knife made Megan gasp.
“I don’t think so,” Nate said with a laugh that was like an icy finger down her spine. “I think it would be much more fun to kill her while you watch.”
Megan tracked the bead of sweat trickling from Cole’s hairline, its path mirroring the warm tickle of blood sliding down her throat. “Let her go, and you’ll have a chance. You kill her, you die too.”
“I think your suffering will be worth it.”
Megan shrank back into Nate’s chest as the pressure against her neck increased. Don’t look, she wanted to shout to Cole. Don’t watch. But she couldn’t make her mouth move.
She could feel Nate’s arm tensing, the muscles bunching. Megan squeezed her eyes shut.
There was a scuffle and a shout from the other room. “Oh my God! Is she dead? Where’s Megan?”
Devany. No! Megan didn’t want Devany to see this anymore than she wanted Cole to.
The girl appeared in the doorway and froze when she saw the scene laid out in front of her. “No.” She swallowed hard. “Don’t. Please don’t. Not Megan too.”
Megan felt the tension in Nate’s arm ease almost infinitesimally.
“Sarah? Sarah, you need to go. You shouldn’t watch—”
“Let her go!” Dev screamed.
Nate’s hold slackened another degree. He still had his fist in her hair and his forearm locked around her, but maybe he was distracted just enough….
Megan threw herself to the side, felt the cold pain of the knife slicing into her shoulder as she went down. Cole was a blur of motion as he dove to the side.
Gunshots thundered and Megan felt the hot spray as blood and flesh exploded from Nate’s chest.
Another shot, and Nate fell to the side, half of his face blown away.
Then strong arms were around her, holding her tight as the bindings on her hands and legs were cut.
“Cole.” He was cradling her face in his hands, his eyes frantic as he ran his hands over every inch of her. He pressed a frantic kiss on her mouth, hurting her bruised lips, but Megan didn’t mind; she was too overwhelmed with being safe and alive and in his arms to care.
His lips were moving against her mouth and cheeks, but she couldn’t make out more than a low murmur. Then she could hear him, but it sounded like she was underwater. “Thank God, thank God,” he said.
She wanted to ask him a thousand questions, like how he knew how to find her, but all she could do was cling to him as if he were a lifeline and bury her face in his neck. “Devany?”
“I’m here,” the girl sobbed, ducking under Cole’s arm to glue herself to Megan’s side. “Are you okay? Please tell me you’re okay.”
“I’ll be fine,” she said.
Dev sniffed and pulled away. “I’ll go wait for the ambulance and show them where to go.”
A lump settled in Megan’s throat as she watched Devany walk away, her back so straight as she tried to hold the day’s events at bay.
Cole settled her more firmly against him, and she winced as the movement jostled her hands. The cuts on her hands and the slice in her shoulder started to throb, but she knew she was lucky to escape mostly unharmed. Dread settled in her stomach. Talia hadn’t been nearly so lucky. “Is Talia…”
Cole’s mouth pulled tight and he shook his head. “She’s lost a lot of blood. But the paramedics are on their way.” He looked down at her and his expression went soft, almost tender. “I was so afraid I lost you,” he said. “I was so fucking scared.”
“Me too,” she croaked.
He let out a hoarse sound, part laugh, part sob. “Jesus, I love you,” he said. “I love you so much. We’re going to make everything right, and I’m with you every step.”
“I love you too,” she whispered, and the world seemed to go fuzzy around the edges. “I love you too.” Then, as she nestled her head against Cole’s heartbeat, she remembered something she needed to tell him, something important. “Video.” She pushed the word between her swollen lips, her hand gesturing clumsily to the TV. “The video for Sean before it’s too late.”
Chapter 22
The news of Nate Brewster’s death hit the media within two hours. The story of how the Seattle Slasher had recorded his murders and the speculation that he’d framed Sean Flynn for the murder of Evangeline Gord
on had the press practically wetting their pants in excitement.
Carl Grayson opened the door to his stepfather’s office. The man who had married his mother fifteen years ago called himself David Maxwell, but Carl knew that name was an invention, a new identity to hide the past he’d left behind in some dusty town in the eastern part of the state.
The past he’d invited in when he reached out to help his sick fuck of a nephew had come back to haunt him in a big way.
Now David’s powerful shoulders slumped as he stared out the wall of glass at a view that included the Space Needle.
“You took care of it?” he said without turning.
“Yes,” Carl said. “As far as anyone is concerned, Nate was acting entirely on his own.” He’d done a clean sweep of both Nate’s properties, leaving behind the relevant videos, as well as interesting finds like passports for both Nate and Megan Flynn under false names. “I’ve been assured that any official investigation into the murders ends with him.” No one who had any say in the matter would allow an inquiry to move forward. Not if they wanted to avoid total and absolute ruin.
His stepfather nodded shortly. “What about Talia?”
“Still missing,” Carl said grimly. She’d disappeared without a trace from the hospital where she’d received treatment for her knife wound. “Rosario is gone too.”
“How?” David raged. “How the fuck could they just disappear like vapor?”
Carl shrugged. “They probably had help. But we haven’t been able to find a trail.”
“For her sake, she better hope it stays that way,” David said bitterly. “I never thought…” He trailed off, shaking his head.
“I don’t know why you’re surprised. She’s no better than a whore.” A feminine voice cut through the office like a blade.
“Mother,” Carl cautioned.
His mother rolled her eyes. “Serves you right. You got careless, letting him run wild like that. You should have taken care of him years ago.”
Carl couldn’t agree more.
“It’s over now,” David said. “Nate’s dead, and it’s over.”
Carl shook his head at the grief in the older man’s voice. He never understood his stepfather’s commitment to the sicko, his compulsion to protect Nate. So what if David was the only family Nate had left after his mother and sister had been killed? Nate put them all at risk with his behavior. But David had refused to see it, convinced they could channel Nate’s urges to serve the organization.
But Carl had known from the beginning that Nate was flawed to the core, that his appetite, his sickness, was beyond their control, regardless of how they tried to manage and channel it.
Nate had been a vicious dog, one who couldn’t be muzzled or contained. He’d needed to be put down.
Carl’s only regret about Nate’s death was that it hadn’t happened sooner.
Now there was nothing to connect the prostitution ring or the murders to them.
Except for Talia Vega, who knew damn well what would be waiting for her if she ever dared to breathe a word.
“You’ve got a visitor, Flynn.”
Sean rolled to face the door when he heard the voice calling through the cuff port in his door.
Lights-out had been two hours ago—a relative term since the single overhead light in his cell was never actually turned off.
He wondered if it was Megan. She’d been in two days ago along with Brockner. Sean’s brain was still in a twist from what he’d learned about Nate. It still didn’t seem real that the man Sean once considered a good friend could be such a monster. The story Megan told seemed too ridiculous to be real, but he still hadn’t recovered from the sight of her bruised face and bandaged hands.
Because of a man Sean had brought into their lives. He wished he could dig Nate Brewster up and kill him all over again.
In the last forty-eight hours, he’d experienced every emotion from grief to anger to guilt.
Most importantly, he’d felt the cautious burn of hope. They had evidence now that Sean didn’t kill Evangeline; that was the important part. After three years, the
truth had finally come out, and Sean was going to get another chance. Soon he’d be free on bail, and if things went the way Megan and Brockner promised they would, soon Sean would be free for good.
Sean cuffed up as ordered and followed Joe, one of the head guards, down the dark corridors of the prisons to the same common room where Megan and Cole Williams had paid their midnight visit a little less than a week ago.
Sean’s lip curled, half smile, half sneer, when he saw the woman seated at one of the tables. “Ms. Slater. Didn’t expect to see you.”
Her pale blond hair was pulled into a tight ponytail, and she didn’t have on a lick of makeup. But with her big blue eyes and perfectly sculpted features, she was one of the most beautiful women he’d ever laid eyes on. The kind of woman who made his hands itch to mess her up a little.
Not that Sean would ever try. After what she’d put him through, Sean knew better than to tangle with Deputy Prosecuting Attorney Krista Slater.
Sean took a seat at the table across from her while Joe hovered a few feet behind him. He rested his cuffed wrists on the table with a thunk.
She tried but couldn’t quite hide her flinch. “I wanted to apologize in person, for everything you’ve been through.”
Sean kept himself perfectly still, careful not to let her see the rage and resentment simmering under his skin. He raised his shackled hands. “You think that makes up for this?”
“Of course not.”
Sean could see the pulse beating in the delicate skin of her throat, could smell the scent of her perfume getting stronger as her body temperature increased.
She licked her lips, drawing his attention to the plump curve. He felt a faint warmth low in his gut. It had been so long since he’d felt anything close to that, it took him several seconds to recognize it as the beginning of sexual arousal.
