by Tess Diamond
“You think he keeps them?” Abby asked, like the idea hadn’t even occurred to her.
Zooey bit her lip, shooting an uncertain look at Paul, who gave her the barest of nods.
“The two-year cycle between girls seems to suggest that yes, he keeps them alive for a certain amount of time,” Zooey said. “And when he’s . . . used them up, he disposes of them. And replaces them with a new girl.”
“This is sick,” Abby said, looking white as a sheet. “I dated him. Oh, my God.”
“It’s okay,” Paul said, reaching out, squeezing her shoulder softly, even though it was so far from not. He understood the fear and horror on her face. He was feeling it too.
Had Ryan raped Cass? Or had they had consensual sex? If it had been consensual, had it been the pregnancy that had triggered his rage? Paul knew Cass, she would’ve kept the baby. Had that been the thing that pushed Ryan over the edge?
Or had he been planning to kill her the whole time? Had seeding doubt in her mind about her boyfriend and her best friend been the first in a series of steps that were always going to lead to Cass dead under the olive trees? Was this all just a way for Ryan to show off for the man who had shaped him into a killer?
There were so many possibilities here. Too many possibilities. Until he was across an interrogation table from the bastard, he wasn’t going to get any answers.
They needed to find him. And fast.
“Where would he be?” Paul thought out loud.
“What about the Clays’ hunting cabin?” Abby asked. “It butts up right against the national forest. He took me up there a few times. There’s no one for miles.”
Of course. The Clays had had their hunting cabin in the Siskiyou Mountains for decades. The mayor had been a big trophy hunter back in the day.
“That sounds like a serial killer’s wet dream,” Zooey said. “What do you think, boss? Do we call in the cavalry?”
“I have an idea,” Paul said. “But it’s risky.”
“I eat risky for breakfast,” Abby said. “Tell me.”
For a second, all he could see was her. For a moment, all he could think was you’re mine and I think I love you and this is the biggest mess I’ve ever been in and I’m so damn grateful I’m there with you.
He took a deep breath. And then he told her.
Chapter 23
“Who is this guy we’re going to see again?” Abby asked, as Paul navigated her truck up the narrow dirt road, the thick pine forest looming on either side. Zooey was squished between them, her computer open on her lap. Abby had no idea how she wasn’t carsick.
“Cyrus Rooke,” Paul said. “He’s a search and rescue specialist. And guide.”
“What kind of guide?” Abby asked as they climbed farther up the mountain. He’d driven them out to the middle of nowhere and she was starting to get skeptical over this plan of his.
“Wilderness. Mountain. Desert. Jungle. You name a terrain, he can bring you through it. I met him when he was working for the military, but he retired a few years ago. Gave me a call when he settled in the Siskiyous. Told me to look him up if I ever got home again.”
“You think he can find Ryan?” Abby asked.
Paul shrugged. “That’s not really what we’re here for,” he said mysteriously, coming to a stop in front of a giant wooden gate. There were spikes—wooden ones, carved out of what looked like tree trunks—rising from the top of the gate and a sign that said: Trespassers will be shot.
“Oh, this is going to be pleasant,” Zooey declared, as Paul honked his horn, three short bursts.
After a long moment when the camera affixed to one of the fence beams just blinked at them, with a scraping sound, the gate swung open to reveal a man.
He was pretty much what you’d expect a search and rescue specialist and all-terrain expert to be. Massive and well-muscled, he wore a flannel shirt and faded jeans. His curly black hair was pulled back at the base of his neck, a few strands left to dip into his dark, penetrating eyes. He pointed down the road, and Paul drove down it. Abby turned around in her seat, watching the man follow them.
They stopped at a log cabin, one he’d likely built himself—set in the little clearing carved out of the thick forest. There was smoke chugging out of the river rock chimney, and Abby could see a chicken coop and a garden beyond it.
Abby got out of the truck, and Zooey scooted across the bench seat to follow her. Paul strode up to Cyrus Rooke, holding out his hand.
But Cyrus, a veritable bear of a man, swept him up in a hug, clapping him hard on the back. “Harrison!” he boomed, his voice so deep it was almost a growl. “How are you, old dog?”
Old dog? Zooey mouthed at Abby, who shot her an equally puzzled look.
“Cy, it’s great to see you.” Paul grinned.
“We’ll catch up later,” Cyrus said. He looked over to Abby and Zooey, nodding at them. “Ma’am. Ma’am.”
“This is Abby. She brought the case to me. And this is Zooey. She works with me in DC. She’s head of my forensics team.”
“Nice to meet both of you,” Cyrus said. “Come inside. We’ll get to work.”
Cyrus’s cabin may have looked rustic on the outside, but the inside was another story. Half of the living room was filled with a computer setup that made Zooey look like cartoon hearts were about to pop out of her eyes.
“I’ve pulled up the sat feed on the coordinates you gave me,” Cy said to Paul, leading the three of them over to the computer monitor, where a fuzzy black-and-white image of what looked like a cabin’s roof in the middle of the woods was on the screen. “There’s been movement in the last two hours.”
“So he’s there,” Paul said.
“Most likely,” Cy said.
“How did you even get access to these feeds?” Zooey asked.
“I’ve got my ways,” Cy said with a wink. “So, if we zoom out—” he clicked a few things, and the image changed, giving them a better view of the forest “—we can see there’s a back road right here.” He drew his finger along the narrow line of gray snaking through the trees behind the Clays’ hunting cabin. “This is where I’ll park. Zooey will stay in the truck with the radio. Harrison, you’ll come down from the north, I’ll come up from the south, and Abby? You know how to use a gun?”
Abby nodded. She was starting to realize Paul’s friend, the “wilderness guide,” was more of an off-grid badass—the guy you send in during a hostage crisis.
“You come in from the east. Then, Harrison, it’s your show.”
Paul nodded. “Let’s see . . . Abby, you’ll be coming right up where his truck is,” he explained, pointing to the east area on the screen. “So take it out. Really simple, just slash the tires so he can’t escape that way. Cy? You and I flank the cabin and throw flash-bangs through each of the windows. They go off, we go in, subdue, and cuff him. Then we’ll call the sheriff so we can bring him down to the station for interrogation.”
“Classic,” Cyrus said. “We just gotta make sure he doesn’t bolt for the woods through the west side.”
“He does that, he’ll come right up against me.” Zooey pointed to the spot where Cyrus had indicated the truck would be parked.
Cyrus looked at her, cocking an eyebrow. “You a good shot?”
“No, she isn’t,” Paul said, looking like there was a story behind that as Zooey pursed her lips.
“I’ve taken a lot of classes with Agent Walker since then!” she protested.
“You almost shot yourself in the foot,” he said. “Absolutely not. You get a beanbag gun.”
“You can’t hold that one little mistake against me forever.” Zooey pouted, while Abby tried to hide her smile. Their dynamic, it turned out, was very much like disapproving but loving father and precocious child, which Abby guessed made sense, considering Paul had been the one to usher Zooey out of a life of crime and into the FBI.
“I can hold any action I want against you when your well-being’s at risk,” he said. “I’m the team leader. If
you shoot yourself with the beanbag gun, at least you’re not gonna blow off a foot or a hand. You’ll just break it. And then I’ll have less paperwork to file.”
“Like you do your own paperwork,” Zooey sneered. “You totally bribe Rhonda with those butter cookies so she’ll do it for you.”
“Wow, it’s like watching a dad and his teenager,” Cyrus remarked to Abby, who had to laugh at their synchronicity. “Just, you know, FBI-style.”
“They’re a trip,” she agreed. She looked up at him, her smile warming. “I really appreciate you doing this,” she said as Paul and Zooey continued to argue.
“Harrison’s a good guy,” Cyrus said. “I kinda owe him. He got me out of a tough spot a few years back.”
Of course he had. For someone who loved the rules so much, Paul apparently had a lot of friends who seemed to skate past them with ease. There was no way the sat feeds Cyrus was accessing were a legal tap.
“Fine,” Zooey huffed. “I’ll take the damn beanbag gun.”
“Glad to hear it,” Paul said. “Cy, you got vests for us?”
Cyrus nodded. “Stuff’s in the back shed. Come on, we’ll go get it. Ladies, there’s a trunk in the back room there that’s full of clothes suited for an op like this.”
“Find whatever’s comfortable, not too loose, and make sure it’s dark,” Paul directed. “Change into it. We’ll be hitting the hunting cabin as soon as the sun sets.”
The two men left the cabin, and for a second, Abby and Zooey just looked at each other.
“You nervous?’ Abby asked, as they walked over to the back room and the chest in question.
“We’re in good hands,” Zooey said. “I’d like more backup, but we’re kind of doing this under the radar.” She plucked a black shirt out of the trunk, tossing it to Abby, who found a pair of dark cargo pants that looked like they’d fit her. “I’m gonna go try these,” she said.
Her stomach was jumping by the time she’d changed into the clothes. It took a few deep breaths over the sink to gather herself.
She was a farm girl, so she’d grown up with a rifle in her hand, to ward off predators and to hunt with her father. It was one of the few activities that seemed to cheer him, so they’d spent a lot of time in the woods when she was younger.
But hunting deer and hunting a man were two very different things. When she walked back into the cabin’s main room and found Paul and Cyrus loading weapons and flash-bombs into a duffel, her stomach clenched.
God, she was a journalist, not an FBI agent. She had no training to do this.
But there wasn’t much choice. She was in this to the very end. Just like Paul.
“You know how to use this?” Cyrus asked, handing her a bolt-action shotgun.
She took it, the weight of it almost a comfort in her hands, and nodded.
“You willing to use it?” he asked, and there was something searching in his eyes that made her go cold, that made her want to shrivel away from him and hide. This was a guy who had seen some shit go down—maybe even been the cause of it. And if she didn’t fall into line and have his back, she’d be in trouble.
“I am,” she said.
“Good.”
He moved away, and Paul came up to her, handing her a black beanie.
“Your friend is very intense,” she said, pulling the hat on, trying to hide the beacon that was her red hair.
“Here, let me,” he said, and he reached over, twisting her hair and then tucking it gently into the hat. She tried not to suck in a sharp breath when his fingers brushed against the nape of her neck, but she couldn’t stop herself.
His eyes flickered, dropping down to her mouth, and she thought about how this could be it. She could get shot and die out in the woods tonight. And she would’ve never told him . . .
The regrets threatened to swamp her, because this wasn’t the right time and it wasn’t the right place and she had never, ever felt like the right girl.
“Thanks,” she whispered, because she was a coward.
He smiled. “Any time.”
“Harrison, how many flash-bangs do you want to bring?” Cyrus called, and Paul turned away, the moment breaking.
Abby tugged the hat down over her ears and hurried over to Zooey, to check on the restraints.
The sun was setting soon.
And then the hunt for Ryan would be on.
Chapter 24
Paul traveled, low and quiet, through the forest. Darkness had fallen, and as he moved through the underbrush, he couldn’t help but think of the last time he was doing the same thing, creeping toward a cabin that held a dangerous man.
The Mancuso case had been a turning point for him, even though he hadn’t realized it at the time. He’d been too reckless then. Unable to listen to Maggie’s instincts, too intent on being the one who was right.
He was leaving that behind and focusing on the future . . . as soon as he was finally able to put his past to rest.
Ryan held the answers to questions he hadn’t even realized he was supposed to have. And Paul was going to hear all of them.
“I’m in position,” Zooey said over the radio from her spot on the old mining road, half a mile north.
“Approaching the tree line,” Cyrus said. “Abby, are you in position?”
“Just a second,” she said, sounding a little out of breath. “Nearly to the truck.”
“Remember, a quick stab of the knife,” Paul said. “Then drag down. You’ll need to put some muscle into it.”
“Got it,” she said.
He’d reached the tree line and flattened himself against a trunk, squinting in the weak light of the moon, trying to spot Abby.
There she was, a dark blur coming from the east, circling around the truck that was parked in front of the cabin. He watched, counting silently as she hit the first tire, then the second, then the final two.
“Tires are done.”
“Fall back,” Paul ordered. “Find a place in the tree line. Stay hidden. And keep your eyes on the front door.”
He waited a beat and then said, “Let me know when you’re out of sight.”
Another tense minute passed, and then: “I’m out of the way.”
“Zooey, stay sharp. Cy, start the count,” Paul ordered.
Cy began to count from ten, and the two men moved in unison, coming at the cabin from two sides. They moved like a well-oiled machine, the flash-bangs they tossed through the windows going off, four deafening bangs, one right after another, echoing through the forest, as light brightened the clearing like lightning.
Paul had circled back to the front door, and as soon as the light cleared, he kicked open the front door, his gun drawn, Cy at his back as they charged inside. “Hands in the air!”
Paul peered through the smoke of the flash-bangs rising in the air and as it cleared, he saw what was slumped over in the chair set in the middle of the rustic cabin.
“Christ,” Cy swore, taking in the sight as they both lowered their guns.
Ryan Clay was dead, half of his skull missing, blown away, presumably, with the double-barrel shotgun that was lying on the ground next to him.
“What’s going on?” Zooey asked over the radio.
“Zooey, I need you to get down here,” Paul said. “We’ve got a dead body you need to look at.”
“Ryan Clay?” she asked.
“Yup,” Paul said.
“He’s dead?” Abby asked over her own radio. “I’m on my way.”
Paul, thinking about how Abby reacted to the mere possibility of exhuming Cass’s body, cursed, shutting his radio off. “I’m gonna head Abby off,” he told Cy. “This is . . .” He made a face, staring down at Ryan’s body.
Headshots were always messy.
“She doesn’t need to see this,” he finished. “She’s a civilian.”
“I understand,” Cy said. “Go protect your woman.”
Paul couldn’t deny the satisfaction of Abby being cast as his. It was a base kind of desire that he probab
ly should be more enlightened about, but right now, he felt on edge, primed to protect.
Things weren’t right here. He’d wait for Zooey’s expert opinion, but all his knowledge and training was telling him that Ryan didn’t kill himself.
He stepped down off the porch as Abby approached through the darkness, the rifle strap slung across her chest. She looked like the kind of woman who went off to fight wars, tall and strong and willing to do anything, no matter the cost.
“It’s bad,” he said.
“I figured,” she said, crossing her arms. She looked over his shoulder, at the cabin door and swallowed audibly, her throat working frantically like she was building up the courage to go inside.
His heart squeezed at the little movement. She was so strong. So damn determined to be there, every step of the way.
I owe Cass, she had said, that first day, when she was trying to convince him of all of this. God, had that just been five days ago? It felt like an eternity. Part of him, when he was with Abby, felt like he’d never left home. And another part of him was only aware of how long it’d been. How much they’d both changed.
But deep down, their cores, their hearts, they were still the same. Which is why it was so hard to shake the want, the need to comfort her, to protect her, to keep her with him, close to him, safe with him.
“You don’t want to go in there,” he said.
She glared at him, her eyes growing heated. “Why do you always try to protect me from everything?” she demanded.
Because you’re reckless, he thought. Because you make me want to be reckless. Because the idea of someone hurting you anymore makes me want to use whatever power I have to crush them to dust.
“Because someone needs to,” he said, and her chin tilted up stubbornly.
“I’m a big girl, Harrison,” she said. “I’ve seen plenty of crime scene photos.”
“Abby, trust me here,” he said softly. “You don’t want to see this. Do you really want to see the boy who you used to kiss and hold hands with with half of his head missing?”
She sucked in a sharp breath, her green eyes widening, a dark flush rising on her freckled cheeks. She opened her mouth to say something, but was interrupted by the sound of an engine rumbling toward them. Zooey came driving down the road in the truck and hopped out. She reached into the back, pulled out her messenger bag, and headed to the porch. Paul and Abby watched as she suited up, pulling booties over her shoes and tucking her hair back.
