by Tess Oliver
I reached the porch and knocked. The door hadn’t been latched shut, and it popped open. I stepped inside. “Tash! Everly!” No answer. The house was empty.
I raced back to my bike and rode to Gregor’s Market. I wasn’t completely sure yet what I’d do once I came face to face with Landon Gregor, but ripping him to shreds seemed like a good place to start. The usual Saturday morning shoppers were streaming in and out of the store, and I briefly imagined myself outing Landon in front of all the people who’d respected him for years. He’d been mayor almost my entire childhood, and he was considered one of the town’s most upstanding citizens. The fucking irony of it all.
I yanked open the front door and several customers stepped back as I lumbered to the counter. Everly was behind the register ringing up an order. Her eyes rounded with surprise as she looked up and saw me stomping toward her.
“Where’s Tashlyn? I told her to stay with you.”
Her mouth dropped in confusion. “She went home to wait for you. She didn’t say anything about staying with me. What’s wrong? Is she in danger?”
I looked around. “Where’s your uncle?” My pulse was pounding so rapidly, it was hard to think.
“He didn’t feel well. He left me in charge of the store. Jeez, Jem, you’re scaring me. What’s wrong?”
I looked at her. The fright in her face made me soften my tone. Her life was about to be turned upside down. “Everything will come out soon enough, Ever. And I’m sorry. But right now, I’ve got to find Tashlyn.”
I flew down the steps to my bike and headed to Landon’s house. Something told me he wouldn’t be home. His car wasn’t in the driveway, but I walked up to the door and pounded on it just to be sure. No answer.
Adrenaline was pumping through me like fucking jet fuel. I got back on the bike and raced toward the end of the street, toward Dad’s house. Milly’s Diner was bursting with customers, but I didn’t see Draven’s truck in the lot. I was going to twist his ugly fucking head off the second I saw him.
Dane’s bike wasn’t in the driveway as I pulled up. I flew onto the porch and threw the front door open. Dad was in his usual spot on the couch. I’d entered the house like a madman, but he hardly even glanced up.
I stood in front of the couch and glared down at him. “Where can I find him?”
He lifted his yellowed eyes to me. “I assume you’re talking about Landon. I told you to leave it alone. Shit, you’re stubborn.”
I had no patience for his theatrics today. I reached down and grabbed his shirt. He had no choice but to look at me. “Just how many of those truck drivers did you murder personally?”
He flinched at the question. “None. Rocky and I unloaded cargo, but Draven did the killing. He was the one who sent the trucks over the ridge and set them on fire.”
“As you stood by and watched?”
His gaze was like ice as he stared up at me. “Yeah, while I stood by and watched.”
I released his shirt. “What was in the newspaper article? The one you took from Aunt Alice?”
He scrunched his face up as if just thinking caused pain. His chest lifted with a long, stuttering breath. “A couple witnesses claimed that they saw a little girl with the truck driver. They stopped in at the diner. But the driver was alone when they found his remains. Guess you already knew that.”
I stood and stared down at him, wanting to throttle him and yet, wanting to let him know that there were times when I loved him, back when I was young and he would hold me upside down and tickle me or throw a football with me in the yard. “All my life, the one thing about you I could be proud of was that you were too tough to be pushed around by anyone. But I was wrong. You were Landon Gregor’s fucking whipping boy. He had you by the balls, and you fucking handed them to him on a platter.”
“I didn’t deserve better. Elizabeth died because I ran off like a coward.”
“She died because Landon threw her in the fucking water, then told you it was your fault she died.”
“Who told you that?”
“Rebecca Gregor. She told me what happened. Landon framed you and then blackmailed you for your whole fucking life. You knew what fucking scum he was, yet you never questioned him. You’re pathetic.”
He rested back and closed his eyes.
“No, don’t sleep.” I reached for his shirt again. “Where would Landon be? He has Tashlyn.”
“He’ll kill you.”
I shook him hard. “Where the fuck would he be?”
“Try the trappers’ shelter.”
I let go of him and raced out the door. The quickest route to the shelter was to park on Phantom Curve and hike down. I had no weapon, but I wasn’t going to need one. If Gregor or Draven had touched one hair on her head, I was going to kill them both with my bare hands. I had to push the idea that I was too late out of my head or go fucking mad. There was no way I could lose the one person who had ever meant anything to me in my whole fucked up life. I’d promised Tashlyn that I would keep her safe, and I’d failed.
The road peeled away beneath the bike as I tore along the highway. I was running purely on rage and adrenalin. Phantom Curve came into view. Instead of slowing for the turn, I twisted the throttle. I reached the section of metal railing that had been welded together, the place on the deadly road where my dad had been an accomplice to grisly murders. I stopped the bike and jumped off.
I ran down the steep terrain toward the shelter. The trail had not been maintained. Weeds and debris choked it off, but I stomped through. The rusty hatch door had been cleared of forest litter, assuring me that I’d come to the right place.
The shelter had been built at the base of a granite outcropping and you had to step down into it, like a cavern. The no trespassing sign to stay off the historical landmark had been kicked down and buried by pine litter long ago. The town had basically ignored the site.
There was one opening and exit and there was no way to sneak up on them. I grabbed the handle on the hatch door. My feet stomped down the steps. Two flashlights were hanging from wires on the ceiling and one was dangling right over Tashlyn’s head.
“Jem,” she cried. Her face was covered with bruises and tears. Her shirt had been sliced open, leaving a trail of blood trickling down her body.
Draven was standing next to her with a blade at her throat. He flashed his brown teeth at me and laughed as I lunged at him. His eyes bulged as I grabbed the knife. I spun him around and had him in a chokehold with the blade pointing at his throat before he could take his next breath.
“Jem, watch out!” Tashlyn screamed.
I heard the footsteps behind me. I dragged the knife across Draven’s throat. His blood poured like a river over my hand. I tossed aside his limp body just as a sharp pain exploded in my skull.
In my haze, I heard a chain crank through a pulley. My hands were yanked above my head and metal cuffs ground into my wrists as my feet left the floor. I lifted my throbbing head and looked around. Everything was a blur, everything except the figure standing in the center of the dark hovel.
Tashlyn looked ghost white. She gazed up at me with glassy eyes. My feet were dangling in the air. My wrists and shoulders were bearing all my weight. But Gregor hadn’t tied my legs. They were my only weapon.
He walked out of the shadows, where he’d been locking the pulley chain tight to hold me. He took a nonchalant step over Draven’s dead body. A deep pool of blood covered the ground beneath him. My head was clearing, and it was coming back to me. I’d managed to slit Draven’s throat before Gregor knocked me out.
I looked over at Tashlyn. She was shivering uncontrollably, and it looked as if she’d been hit more than once. “Fuck, baby.” My voice sounded worthless in the dark cavern. “I’m sorry. I should have been there.”
“Very touching words coming from Jem Wolfe,” Landon
snarled.
He stood between Tashlyn and me and looked back and forth. “I’m trying to decide which would be more torturous for you.” He lifted a short whip that was studded with shards of glass. “Being beaten yourself or having to watch as I splay the creamy, beautiful skin off her back. I know you well enough to know pain doesn’t really bother you, so I think we’ll start with the girl.”
A sob, a sound that reached in and twisted my heart, erupted from Tashlyn’s lips.
I struggled against the metal shackles, but it was useless. I needed to draw his attention away from Tashlyn and turn all his rage against me. “You sick fuck, you’ve had this torture chamber down here playing out your perverted fantasies with little girls. And all the while, you strutted around town like a big man, like a respectable citizen.” I glanced toward the back of the shelter. “How many girls do you have buried in here?”
He reached up and tapped the chain running across the plank ceiling. “This came with the shelter. The trappers’ used it to hang carcasses and bleed out their kill. Like I’m going to do to the Wolfe I just trapped. And there are no bodies buried here. This was always the first place the police looked.” He chuckled. “Hell, I even had to lead them down here a few times to let them look the place over.” He walked in a circle around me, beaming with sickening pride, apparently at having tricked the police so often. I was just glad to keep his attention off of Tashlyn. “No, I had the expertise that comes from growing up in these woods. It gave me the edge I needed to keep ahead of the investigators. This river is dotted with abandoned beaver habitats, crudely built animal dens that I discovered were the perfect place to hide a body.”
“You are the lowest piece of trash on this earth, Gregor, and I’m going to fucking kill you.”
Landon walked closer and glared up at me. I had to keep his focus on me.
“Still can’t believe that all this time self-important, self-righteous Mayor Gregor was committing the worst crime of all. In prison, they’d kill you for sure. In fact, I would get myself arrested just to get thrown in there with you. Then I could tear you to fucking pieces.”
“Guess you know all about prison. Don’t forget, your dad was part of it all,” he blurted as if that erased his own sins.
“Nope, you fucking deviant, he had nothing to do with the little girls, and you know it. That was you and you alone. You’re all pieces of shit, my dad, Rocky, that scumbag on the floor, even your sister knew what was going on. That’s why she’s sitting in some house with strangers drinking herself into the grave. She’s just as guilty as the rest of you.”
He shook his head and spun around. I worried he was turning his attention back to Tashlyn, but his arm shot out and he snapped the glass covered whip at me. I tightened my fists against the pain. Shards of glass sliced through my shirt and skin, leaving marks that looked as if a tiger had drawn its claws across me.
“You monster!” Tashlyn screamed.
Landon twisted around to face her.
I braced my shoulders and wrists for pain as I lifted my lower body. I got in a solid kick to his back. He stumbled forward and fell to his knees.
Landon hopped back to his feet, and his nostrils flared wide as he turned around with his gnarly whip. It came across my back, slicing through my flesh like butter. Instantly, blood ran in warm rivers down my back. I held my breath to bear some of the pain. I was relieved that he hadn’t touched Tashlyn with the whip. His torture device flew through the cold air again, striking me, leaving my shirt and skin in shreds.
“You always had a smart mouth, Wolfe. But I guess this’ll shut you up for good.” He pulled out the knife I’d used to slit Draven’s throat. It was still coated with his blood.
Gregor shoved it against my throat.
“No, please,” Tashlyn pleaded.
Gregor sneered up at me. “Isn’t that sweet, she’s begging for your life. Bet you never had anyone give a damn if you lived or died before.” He lowered the knife. “I think we’ll see just how much you return that affection, Wolfe.”
He turned back to Tashlyn and made sure to stay out of the circular reach of my legs. I twisted and turned ready to pull the fucking skin off my hands, just to get free. Gregor pushed apart the panels of Tashlyn’s ripped shirt. Tears flowed down her cheeks, and she tried her hardest to squirm out of his reach. He dragged his finger along the scratch on her belly, then pressed his blade against her. She cried weakly as he pulled the tip of the knife along her skin.
“Like ivory silk, young and supple,” Gregor growled.
“I’ll fucking kill you,” I yelled.
He grinned at me over his shoulder and lifted his arm back. The flesh shredding whip dropped back ready to slice the air and Tashlyn’s skin.
Tashlyn closed her eyes. I futilely kicked out, hitting nothing but air.
The hatch was thrown open and daylight poured into the hole. A loud roar followed and a tall figure flew at Gregor, knocking him to the floor. Dane snarled like a wild fucking animal as he grabbed Gregor’s hair and snapped his head back. He pounded Gregor’s face into the floor, splattering blood in every direction. The sickening sound of bones crushing echoed through the shelter. Dane lifted Gregor’s head back and smashed it into the ground again. Gregor was limp but that didn’t stop my brother.
“Dane, it’s done. Let us loose.”
Dane thwacked the asshole’s head a couple more times before finally letting go. He hopped to his feet and looked at both of us. “Shit, good thing I came.”
“Yeah, bro, it’s a damn good thing. The chain running along the pulley is hooked to the wall over there. And there’s a knife under that bastard somewhere to cut Tashlyn’s ropes.”
Dane stared down at the second body on the floor. “Hell, is that Draven?” he asked as he stepped over him.
“Yep, that’s Draven.”
Dane unhooked the chain, and it rattled through the pulley. My hands were numb from being above my head, but my shoulders felt instant relief. My tattered shirt was soaked with blood, and it felt like the skin on my chest and back was on fire. “Right here on the side of the cuffs is a button, Dane. Open these up.”
Dane released the metal bands around my wrists. “Fuck, this is like one of those medieval torture dungeons,” he said with disbelief. “Dad told me to come here and find you. He said I needed to watch your back like you’ve always done for me.”
“We watch each other’s backs, Dane.”
I shot over to Gregor’s lifeless body and turned him to look for the knife. It was still gripped in his hand. I yanked on the knife. He groaned, somehow managing to grip it tighter. But not tight enough. I wrenched it from his grasp and leaned down over him. His face was a flattened mess, and he struggled to take air in through his shattered nose and decimated jaw. “I should let you just lay here and die a long, torturous death, like your victims. But I’m kind of a selfish asshole. I want to know that I was the one who killed you.” I shoved the knife into his throat. Landon Gregor, the man who’d masqueraded around town as a respectable citizen for years but who was hardly even a human being, choked to death on his own blood.
I raced over and cut the ropes on Tashlyn’s hands. She pulled them free and collapsed into my arms. Dane and I helped her out of the shelter. Several state troopers and a few townsfolk, including Finn and Everly were hiking down toward us.
Everly’s face was pale white and stained with tears. She raced past everyone. Tashlyn pulled her arms from around me and ran to her friend. They hugged.
“Thank god, you’re all right,” Everly cried.
“Who called the state troopers?” I asked as the three men tromped slowly down the steep terrain toward us.
Everly took a deep, steadying breath. “I did.” She looked at Tashlyn. “When my uncle knew about the place you lived and I was sure I’d never said a word to him, some
things started coming back to me. Mindy, the friend who died in the fire, she’d told me she was upset and that it had to do with my uncle, but after the fire and with him pulling me to safety and everything, I’d pushed it out of my head. I guess that’s why he was nearby when the fire broke out. I was at the store, thinking about everything, and I decided to call my mom. She confessed the entire horrid story to me. I saw Jem and then Dane ride through town and I figured they were heading to Phantom Curve. I knew something was wrong.” Everly looked toward the shelter and then back at us. “My uncle?”
“He’s dead,” I said.
Everly closed her eyes and absorbed the news, but there were no tears.
The troopers reached us.
I stepped forward to meet them. “Sir, there are two dead bodies inside the shelter. One of the men, Landon Gregor, is responsible for the missing girls.”
Chapter 34
Tashlyn
I stroked Jem’s hair as he slept soundly with his head in my lap. The cuts on his chest and back were mostly healed now but the scars would last both of us forever. My eyewitness testimony and a sharp lawyer had gotten any charges of murder on Jem dropped. He’d been acting to save my life and his own. Alcott Wolfe died the night before he planned on turning himself in to police. Jason Rockfield, Landon’s last remaining accomplice was arrested and is awaiting trial. In the midst of the nightmare, we’d solved the mystery of the missing girls. It didn’t bring any of them back but finding the remains helped bring closure to the families. Because of Jem, I’d been the only girl lucky enough to escape the monster, Landon Gregor. It almost seemed as if our destiny to be together had started back on that deadly curve in the road.
