Dark Hunger (A Nick Teffinger Thriller / Read in Any Order)

by Jagger, R. J.

  Chapter Forty-Three

  Day Four—April 15

  Friday Night

  ______________

  WHEN RAVE REGAINED consciousness she knew she didn’t have time for the pain. Forrest Jones and the slayer were beating each other to death in the middle of the road not more than thirty feet away.

  Do something!

  Now!

  Hurry!

  Her body didn’t want to move, but she forced herself into a standing position and leaned against the car to keep from falling over.

  Blood ran out of her mouth.

  She wiped the back of her hand across it.

  Then remembered the gun.

  Under the front seat.

  She got it, released the safety and then pointed it at the men with her finger on the trigger.

  They didn’t see her.

  They didn’t know.

  She pointed it into the air and pulled the trigger.

  It exploded more violently than she thought.

  And the kickback was fierce.

  So much so that the weapon recoiled out of her grip and fell to the asphalt with a cold steel thud. She scrambled for it as fast as she could, desperate to get it back in control.

  Then she had it again.

  And pointed it at the men who were locked together.

  The slayer was behind Forrest Jones, with his arms wrapped around his head.

  “Put it down or I’ll snap his neck!”

  FORREST STRUGGLED.

  Helplessly.

  Hardly able to move.

  His face was a bloody mess and there was something seriously wrong with his breathing, as if his ribs were cracked.

  “Let him go!” Rave warned.

  “I will,” the man said. “Just put the gun on the ground and step back.”

  “Don’t do it!” Forrest shouted.

  The slayer released one arm from around Forrest’s neck just long enough to punch him in the side of the head.

  “Let him go!” Rave shouted.

  “Drop the gun.”

  She didn’t move.

  Not knowing what to do.

  A second went by.

  Then another.

  Then another.

  Then Forrest said, “Shoot him.”

  The slayer punched him again in the head.

  “Shoot him, I said!”

  Rave knew he was right.

  She knew that if the slayer got the gun, then he’d kill them both.

  Their only way out was for him to die.

  Forrest couldn’t do it.

  So she had to.

  It was their only chance.

  “Let him go and I’ll let you walk away,” she said.

  And meant it.

  The slayer laughed.

  As if it was a trick to get him to stand up so he’d be a better target.

  “I’m going to count to five,” he said. “Then he dies.”

  She took aim directly at his face, which was right next to Forrest’s.

  “I’ll shoot,” she warned.

  “One—put the gun down.”

  “Let him go!”

  “Two.”

  She tightened her finger on the trigger.

  “Three.”

  “Shoot!” Forrest said.

  The man didn’t move.

  Forrest didn’t move.

  She didn’t move.

  “Four,” the slayer said. “Last chance. Put the gun down.”

  She thought about it for a split second.

  Then pulled the trigger.

  Chapter Forty-Four

  Day Four—April 15

  Friday Night

  ______________

  FLESH EXPLODED AS SOON AS RAVE pulled the trigger. Both men fell backwards. Rave stared, transfixed. Not knowing which one she hit. Then the man farthest back began to climb out from under the other one.

  The slayer!

  The slayer was moving!

  His face was covered with blood and torn flesh.

  The sight repulsed Rave and gave her hope at the same time.

  She stepped closer.

  And couldn’t believe what she saw.

  Forrest Jones’ face was blown in; totally and unquestionably disintegrated.

  She had hit him!

  Not the slayer!

  The blood and guts on the slayer’s face were splatter.

  Vomit shot into Rave’s mouth.

  She tried to gag it down but it came out.

  Then she turned and ran.

  She ran so fast that her lungs burned. She didn’t look back.

  Get away.

  Get away.

  Get away.

  Then she realized something.

  Something bad.

  The gun was no longer in her hand.

  What happened to it?

  Did she drop it?

  Did she throw it?

  She couldn’t remember.

  And ran even faster.

  Then she veered off the road, into the field—straight into the darkness. The weeds and dirt and rocks slowed her down and twisted her ankles, but she didn’t fall and didn’t stop. This was her only hope.

  Run.

  Run until she couldn’t run another step.

  Chapter Forty-Five

  Day Five—April 16

  Saturday Morning

  ______________

  TEFFINGER ROLLED OVER IN BED as soon as the first rays of dawn entered the bedroom Saturday morning. He was still tired but couldn’t close his eyes again knowing that Jena Vellone was out there somewhere in the world. He popped in his contacts, threw on sweatpants and bounded out the front door for a jog before doing anything else, to keep at least some measure of fitness going.

  On the way, he wondered what to do next.

  To find Jena.

  But didn’t come up with any brilliant ideas.

  Or non-brilliant ones.

  So far, he didn’t have a clue as to why anyone would take her.

  None of Jena’s friends knew anything.

  Including Jena’s sister, Geneva, who reviewed the Old Orleans tapes yesterday but didn’t recognize anyone in the crowd.

  Geneva.

  Wait a minute.

  Maybe this whole thing wasn’t about Jena at all. Maybe it was about Geneva. Could someone have taken Jena as a way to make Geneva suffer?

  Or Teffinger, for that matter?

  Had some maniac come out of his past with intent to torture him by screwing with the people in his life?

  No.

  That couldn’t be it.

  It was too far-fetched.

  Wasn’t it?

  But Geneva might be a different story. She was attractive, outspoken, opinionated, fearless and liberal to a fault. No doubt her high-octane, well-caffeinated, live-and-let-live, sexually liberated talk show had alienated more than one listener. How much hate mail did she get? Was anyone crazy enough to kill her sister to make her suffer?

  It didn’t make sense.

  But it made as much sense as anything else.

  WHEN TEFFINGER GOT HOME from his jog, London was still sleeping. However, she was up and in the kitchen when he came out of the shower—sitting on a barstool at the counter, reading the Rocky Mountain News and sipping coffee.

  Teffinger kissed her on the back of the neck.

  “Umm,” she said.

  He filled a cup of coffee and said, “This Jena Vellone case is so weird that it’s starting to make me have strange thoughts.”

  She lifted her eyes from the paper.

  “How so?”

  “Jena and I have been friends for years,” he said. “I’m starting to wonder if someone took her, not to get her, but to get me.”

  London didn’t seem impressed.

  “That seems awfully indirect,” she said.

  “True,” he said. “But here’s the extension of that thought. If someone took her, to get me, they might take you next, to get me even more.”

  London laughed. />
  “God, you have an imagination.”

  “Just be careful, is all I’m saying.”

  “I will.”

  “Promise?”

  She nodded and handed him her cup. “Could you fill that, as long as you’re up?”

  He could.

  “So what’s the agenda today?” she asked.

  He frowned.

  “If I had my way, we’d take the ’67 for a ride up Clear Creek Canyon,” he said, referring to his 1967 Vette. “Unfortunately, I’m not going to get my way until I get Jena Vellone resolved. I’m sorry, but—”

  She cut him off.

  “Nick, I’m right here and I’m not going anywhere,” she said. “You do what you have to do. We’ll have lots of time to concentrate on us, later.”

  “You sure?”

  “Positive.”

  TEN MINUTES LATER he was in a 4Runner—a rental until Cherry Hills returned the Tundra—eating a bowl of cereal as he drove to headquarters. On the way, he called Geneva. She answered even though she had clearly been sleeping.

  “I had a thought that maybe someone took Jena not to hurt her, but to hurt someone else who cared for her, someone like me or you.”

  “Me?”

  “Right,” Teffinger said.

  He asked her lots of questions designed to find out if she had any enemies. As far as she knew, she didn’t. Nor had she done anything recently that she could think of that would generate any serious ill will against her.

  “Do you ever get any hate mail?” Teffinger asked.

  “You mean emails? At the radio station?”

  “Yes.”

  “Everyone in entertainment gets that crap,” she said. “It’s part of the job.”

  “Do any stick out in your mind as really threatening?”

  She laughed.

  “Teffinger, I don’t waste my time reading that junk.”

  “You don’t?”

  “Hell no,” she said. “We have people that pull all that stuff out.”

  “Do they save them?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Do me a favor and find out,” he said. “If they save them, get me everything you got from the last year.”

  “Are you serious?”

  “Yes.”

  After he hung up, he wondered if he really was serious or whether he was just creating motion so he could delude himself into thinking that he was actually doing Jena some good.

  SYDNEY’S CAR WASN’T AT HEADQUARTERS when Teffinger pulled in. He didn’t know if she planned to come in today or not. He bypassed the elevator and hiked up the stairs two at a time to the third floor. On the way, Geneva’s statement resonated in his thoughts.

  Everyone in entertainment gets that crap.

  As soon as he got to his desk—even before starting the coffee pot—he called Sydney.

  She answered, groggy.

  Teffinger was waking up the whole world.

  “Hey, sorry to wake you,” he said. “Are you coming in today?”

  “Sure, if you want.”

  “Do me a favor,” he said. “Contact channel 8 and see if Jena received any emails of a threatening or hateful nature. That’s a place we haven’t looked yet.”

  “Okay.”

  “Love you,” he said.

  She grunted.

  “I’ll take that as a threat.”

  Chapter Forty-Six

  Day Five—April 16

  Saturday Morning

  ______________

  TRENT TRIPP SLEPT IN Saturday morning and would have slept even longer except that Jake VanDeventer called from Johannesburg to get an update on what happened last night, if anything.

  Tripp took a piss while explaining how he’d been set up.

  How a fight ensued.

  And how the female vampire—Rave Lafelle—tried to shoot him but hit the other guy in the face instead. “Now here’s the important part,” he said. “The guy looked like Indiana Jones.”

  “You’re kidding me? It was him?”

  “In the flesh,” Tripp said.

  “Well I’ll be damned.”

  “True but not relevant,” Tripp said.

  “That is so sweet,” VanDeventer said.

  “I thought you’d be happy,” Tripp said.

  “There isn’t even a word for what I am right now,” VanDeventer said. “So where is he now? Out there on the road?”

  No.

  He wasn’t.

  “I decided it was best to not leave him there,” Tripp said, “since my blood was all over the ground. So I put him in the trunk of my car and drove down the road until I spotted a car, which I figured was his because it was all by itself out there in the middle of nowhere. I checked, and it was his all right. Then I switched him over to it and drove back to the city and pulled into a dark abandoned area by some railroad tracks. I pulled him out, onto the ground, and hammered a wooden stake into his heart. Then I walked about three miles, called a cab from a 7-Eleven, and had it drop me off a couple of miles from my car. Then I walked back to my car, zigzagged through town to be sure I wasn’t being followed, and went back to my hotel room.”

  “Good job,” VanDeventer said.

  “Oh, there’s something I forgot to tell you,” Tripp said. “The guy didn’t have any ID on him, but I did find something of interest in his pants pocket.”

  “What’s that?”

  “A vial of blood.”

  “That little freak,” VanDeventer said.

  “Yeah, the world’s a better place this morning, that’s for sure.”

  “What did you do with the vial?”

  “I just left it in his pants,” Tripp said. “Let the police worry about it.”

  “Good call. You wiped your prints off, I assume.”

  “Better than that,” Tripp said. “I wore latex gloves the whole time.”

  “Nice.”

  “Oh, one more thing,” Tripp said. “The woman dropped her gun at the scene. I figured it might come in handy later, so I took it.”

  “Come in handy how?”

  “Blackmail her with it, if we have to,” Tripp said.

  He expected praise.

  But got silence.

  “I’m not sure if it’s a good idea for you to have possession of it,” VanDeventer said. “If the police find you with it—”

  “Possession?”

  Tripp laughed.

  “I’m not stupid,” he said. “I stashed it. The important thing is that the woman thinks that I have it; that and the fact that I can have it, if I choose to.”

  “That’s better,” VanDeventer said. “You had me worried for a second.”

  “You should know me better by now,” Tripp said.

  AFTER HE HUNG UP, Tripp jacked off and then went back to sleep. He got up two hours later and bought a bottle of carpet shampoo, a bucket, a sponge and bottled water at Home Depot. Then he drove to Washington Park, found a nice secluded parking spot, and cleaned the trunk of the Dodge repeatedly until he was positive that not a trace of evidence remained.

  Then he went for a walk.

  Under a nice Colorado sky.

  Chapter Forty-Seven

  Day Five—April 16

  Saturday Morning

  ______________

  RAVE GOT PULLED out of a fitful sleep when the doorbell rang and Parker jumped out of bed to check. She looked at the clock—10:15 a.m.—and pictured two cops standing on the front steps. Then Parker shouted, “It’s London.” She pushed out of bed, used the facilities and studied the damage to her face while the shower warmed up.

  She was lucky to be alive.

  Very lucky.

  And she owed it all to Forrest Jones.

  The man she shot in the face.

  Parker tried to convince her last night that Forrest’s death wasn’t her fault. “He was already beat. If you turned the gun over, you’d both be dead right now. Your only option was to shoot. If you hadn’t pulled the trigger when you did, Forrest would have gotten his nec
k snapped a heartbeat later. All you did when you pulled the trigger was give him a chance. That’s what he wanted you to do.” He paused and added, “Forrest was my best friend in the world. If anyone was going to blame you, it would be me. If he was here right now, he’d have no problem with what you did.”

  Those words might be true.

  As far as they went.

  But there was a lot more to the story.

  She violated her directions to stay sober.

  Because of that, she pulled over at the wrong place.

  And because of that, Forrest had to run a long way to get to her; and lost the element of surprise. When he finally did get to her, he was totally exhausted. He fought as well as he could, but the fight started lopsided and quickly got worse. So it was true that he was already beaten when Rave had to decide whether to pull the trigger, but he was already beaten because she had forced him into that situation.

  He was dead because of her.

  That was a fact.

  And it would never change.

  She should have listened to Parker outside the club when he told her to abort.

  Everything was her fault.

  SHE STEPPED INTO THE SHOWER and stuck her head under the spray. The hot water on her scalp felt good. Her ankle felt less twisted this morning, too. Luckily she veered off the road last night when she ran. Otherwise, the guy would have killed her.

  He followed.

  And tried to find her.

  Coming within ten feet.

  As she laid there in the weeds holding her breath.

  He stood there.

  Looking around.

  Listening.

  Then he ran back to the cars and drove away, taking Forrest’s body with him. Why he did that was still a mystery.

  Parker showed up a minute later.

  And got her calmed down enough to drive.

  They searched for her gun but couldn’t find it.

  Then they came home.

  And stayed awake until dawn, waiting for slayers.

  But none came.

  WHEN RAVE GOT OUT OF THE SHOWER, London had scrambled eggs and hot coffee waiting for her.

  She also had news.

  “I’ve been waiting for Nick to volunteer something about the Cameron Leigh case,” she said. “Last night he did. He told me two very interesting things. First, she died with a wooden stake through the heart.”

  “I knew it!” Parker said. “Those freaks.”