by Blake Pierce
Riley’s heart was pounding now.
“What happened next?” she asked.
“The kid was stuck there for twenty minutes. It’s amazing he survived. The cops who showed up guessed that he twisted around a lot to keep some air in front of his face. But by the time they dug him up, he was unconscious. They managed to revive him and he made a full recovery.”
Riley felt a jolt at the those words.
Images and thoughts tumbled through in her mind, connecting with Flores’s words.
A full recovery.
Physically, maybe.
But the trauma had remained, possibly repressed but there ever since.
She thought it possible that no one had ever told him what had happened, not even his parents. Everyone had naïvely thought it was best for him not to remember. And he still couldn’t remember, not consciously. But his bottled-up fear had forced its way to the surface—and rage, too, at having been abandoned by his friends.
And he was wreaking his misdirected rage on innocent people.
“Agent Paige?” Flores’s voice reminded her that he was still on the phone. She brought herself back to the present.
“What was his name?” Riley asked.
“Felix Harrington. And it looks like he still lives at the same address in Abel’s Point.”
Flores gave her the address. Riley thanked him and ended the call.
“So what do we do now?” Bill asked.
“What do you think? We bring this guy in.”
Bill shook his head warily.
“Riley, wait a minute. I’m not sure about this.”
Before she could answer Bill, her phone buzzed. It was Jenn.
Riley answered, “Jenn, what are you doing now?”
“Nothing. I’ve been helping Huang with interviews. We’re getting nowhere. I’ve got nothing to do.”
“Where are you right now?”
“Right here in Lorneville.”
Riley’s excitement was mounting. She had to catch her breath.
She said, “I think we’ve located our killer. His name is Felix Harrington. He lives on the York River at the end of Hatchet Road in Abel’s Point. Bill and I are going there right now.”
“Please count me in,” Jenn said in an urgent tone.
Riley paused to think about time and distance.
Then she said, “Let’s meet at the York River Bridge. It’ll take Bill and me maybe forty-five minutes to get there.”
Riley ended the call, and Bill started the SUV engine.
“We’d better be right about this,” Bill said, with a note of doubt in his voice.
Riley’s teeth clenched with determination.
There was no doubt in her mind.
“Don’t worry,” she said. “We are.”
CHAPTER THIRTY SIX
Jenn had called Riley from the Smokehouse restaurant in Lorneville, where she had stopped for coffee. When the call ended, she used her cell phone to look up the location Riley had mentioned.
“… the end of Hatchet Road in Abel’s Point.”
She was startled to see how close the place was—less than half an hour away. She could get there even more quickly than Riley and Agent Jeffreys if she left right now.
Her pulse quickened.
The last few hours of interminable interviews with Silas Ostwinkle’s friends and family had driven her crazy. None of them had known anything useful—not that she’d expected any of them to.
Everybody working on the case was sure that the killer was choosing his victims at random. There was no reason to expect that any of their acquaintances knew the killer or anything about him. Nevertheless, the interviews had been mandatory procedure.
Jenn was relieved that they were over with.
But what was she going to do now?
Well, she had her instructions from Riley …
“Let’s meet at the York River Bridge.”
She’d get there long ahead of Riley and Agent Jeffreys. She’d wind up parking there and waiting for them.
But what else did she have to do?
She paid for her coffee, left the restaurant, got in her car, and was on her way.
As she drove, she thought back over the terrible day she’d had—and the shame and guilt she’d felt at not showing up for work when she was supposed to. It had all started yesterday, when Aunt Cora had gotten in touch with her. This time Cora hadn’t been pleading with Jenn to help her out. She had been demanding it.
It had been nothing less than ugly emotional blackmail.
Jenn had spent several of her teen years in Cora’s supposed “foster home,” learning criminal skills along with her ordinary schoolwork. Among her foster brothers and sisters, she’d grown especially close to one. Little Linus Quade never had the instinct for ordinary theft or violence that Aunt Cora valued, but he had grown up to be a very smart Internet criminal. And he had kept on working with Cora’s organization.
Jenn hadn’t had any contact with Linus for years, but she remembered him fondly.
Yesterday, Cora had told Jenn that Linus had been kidnapped by one of Cora’s rivals. Linus was going to be killed unless Cora paid a ransom.
It would have been easy enough for Cora to pay that ransom herself. All she had to do was transfer money through a few accounts until it got to Linus’s captor.
But Cora had said she wasn’t going to do it. She had demanded that Jenn go through all the steps of paying the ransom herself.
“Or do you want your brother to die?” Cora had asked. “It’s up to you.”
Jenn knew what Cora was trying to accomplish. She did want Linus back, but she was also willing to use him to pull Jenn back into her criminal orbit. That was the kind of manipulation that had driven Jenn far away from the foster home years ago.
And Cora had succeeded, because Jenn couldn’t be sure that Cora wouldn’t let Linus die.
Jenn herself was skillful enough to carry out the transfers from her own computer at home, and she knew how to cover her tracks. Still, she’d had to get knee-deep into Aunt Cora’s illicit accounts and do some money laundering. So her own involvement was illegal, and Aunt Cora now had yet another threat to hold over her. She’d done that just this morning.
The illicit job was finished, but she knew that Cora wasn’t finished with her. She had no idea what the woman might demand from her next or how she could respond.
Jenn was glad that she’d told Riley as much as she had—and truly relieved that Riley had been sympathetic.
But was that a good thing or a bad thing?
Now that Riley knew what she knew, wasn’t she mixed up in this as well?
Might Cora even gain some leverage over Riley too?
It was a horrible thought. Jenn knew she had to make sure that never happened.
Meanwhile, the shame clung sourly to her. In fact, it had only gotten worse during the string of pointless interviews. Her shame festered with every passing moment of useless activity.
She felt desperate to do something positive, to at least partly redeem herself.
She was eager to stop this killer who had so far eluded them all.
As Jenn came near the big steel bridge—the only public crossing across the York River—she slowed down and found a place to pull her car off the road. She could park here and wait for Riley and Agent Jeffreys to arrive.
She shut off the engine and sat looking along the broad river. The lights of a ship approaching from downstream caught her attention. She knew that this bridge was a double-swing bridge. Was it going to open for the approaching ship?
If so, what kind of delay was that likely to cause?
Jenn got on the Internet and found the website for the Virginia Department of Transportation. According to a notice there, the bridge was scheduled to open ten minutes from now. It was expected to stay open for a half hour or even longer.
Riley and Agent Jeffreys would probably arrive here right in the middle of that time.
Meanwhile, the killer
would be doing whatever he liked—perhaps taunting and torturing a new victim.
Jenn felt a surge of impatience.
Could she really put up with any more waiting?
She felt her teeth clench.
I’ve got to go, she thought.
But should she call Riley and tell her that she was driving on ahead?
No, Riley would just tell her to stay put and wait.
And Jenn simply couldn’t sit here doing nothing—not for another minute.
She started the car and drove across the bridge, stopping only to pay the two-dollar toll.
On the other side of the bridge, she took directions from her GPS service. She turned off the main highway, then continued along several curves into the countryside until the road led back toward the river. Finally she turned off onto Hatchet Road. She passed an area where new houses were being built, and then the road narrowed as it continued into some woods.
For a mile or so, there was no sign of habitation. Finally she saw lights from a house just beyond where the road ended. She pulled over and got out of her car. Everything was quiet except for crickets and other night creatures chirping.
Her hand hovering near her weapon, Jenn looked around, carefully surveying her situation.
She was facing an old two-story house with a few lights on inside and a single light bulb over the doorway. The house looked battered and in need of paint. A pickup truck was parked nearby.
She skirted around the lighted area toward the side of the house. She could see the river flowing just beyond a small yard. She stood there trying to decide what to do next, fighting down an urge to charge into the house alone.
As anxious as she was to take positive action, she wasn’t crazy or stupid.
It was definitely time to contact Riley and tell her that she’d arrived here. After that, she’d have no choice but to wait.
But just as Jenn reached for her cell phone, she heard a noise.
It sounded like a woman’s outcry—but only for a moment. Silence fell again, broken only by the monotonous nocturnal chirping.
Jenn tried to judge where the sound had come from.
Had it been inside the house?
Or had she only imagined it?
She stood dead still and listened.
Then she heard it again—the sound of low, desperate weeping.
And no, it wasn’t coming from the house, but from the waterfront somewhere beyond.
The weeping continued—but it was a raspy voice and not very loud. Jenn guessed that the victim’s voice was exhausted and raw from screaming. This place was far enough from any other habitation that screams would go unheard except by the killer himself.
Jenn drew her weapon and crept around the house. Then her eye was caught by a floodlight burning a short distance away. It was posted on a stand and turned to shine downward.
Her heart clutched. She knew the light must be shining on a victim caught in a trap. She stopped herself from rushing forward.
Stepping into the illuminated area near the light would reveal her presence, but she saw no sign that the killer was there. The woman cried out weakly again, and Jenn moved toward the light.
She arrived at the edge of a large pit, about twelve feet on each side.
To the side of the pit were a wheelbarrow and a huge pile of sand.
And inside that pit, buried up to her waist, was a young woman.
He’s already started burying her! Jenn thought.
But where was the killer? In the glare of the light, it was hard to see anything around the pit.
She called out, “This is the FBI. Show yourself with your hands where I can see them.”
No one appeared, and no one answered.
The woman let out a hoarse moan of despair.
Her eyes were half closed, and she didn’t seem to be aware of Jenn’s arrival.
Jenn stepped nearer the pit and said to her, “Don’t worry. You’ll be all right.”
The woman lifted her head at the sound of Jenn’s voice. She looked around, apparently unable to see Jenn in the glare of the light.
She murmured, “No. No. No.”
Jenn was seized by pity for the poor woman. She seemed to be completely incoherent from fear, exhaustion, and shock.
The woman kept on saying, “No. No. No.”
“Don’t worry,” Jenn said. “I’m here to help.”
The pit appeared to be about three feet deep. Jenn climbed down and stepped out onto its solid-looking floor.
Suddenly, her whole body lurched, and the gun flew out of her hand.
What’s happening? Jenn wondered.
It felt as if the sand under her feet had come to life and was fiercely pulling her downward.
Quicksand! Jenn realized.
Her feet and ankles quickly disappeared beneath the sand.
Jenn saw where her gun had fallen. Lighter than a human body, it remained partially suspended on the surface. Jenn tried to reach out for it.
But a shovel appeared from above, flipping the gun out of her reach.
She looked up and saw a man silhouetted against the light.
“You’ve got a cell phone,” the man said.
“No, I don’t,” Jenn lied.
She knew better than to expect him to believe her.
And he didn’t.
“Do you think I’m an idiot? You’ve got a cell phone. I want it.”
Still silhouetted against the light, the man lifted his shovel high above the captive woman’s head. Jenn knew that one blow from the blade of that shovel would mean death for the victim.
She took out her cell phone and threw it out of the pit in the man’s direction.
He smashed it with his shovel. Then he sat down on the edge of the pit, his face catching the light at last.
A weird, friendly smile spread across his face.
“Well, well, well,” he said. “Things have just gotten interesting!”
CHAPTER THIRTY SEVEN
The sand was up to Jenn’s thighs now, and she could feel herself sinking deeper.
The woman in the pit with her was shaking her head and whimpering miserably.
“You shouldn’t have,” she said in a slurred, stunned voice. “I tried to warn you. I tried …”
Jenn suppressed a groan. That’s what the captive had meant by crying “no, no, no.”
She wished the woman had tried a lot harder, but she was obviously debilitated by what she was going through.
Jenn stared up out of the pit at the killer’s face.
He was looking down at her with what seemed like a truly sympathetic expression.
He said, “Well, you’re in a fix, aren’t you? You poor thing. How did you get into this mess, anyway?”
Jenn was disarmed by the man’s apparent concern.
“Is there anything I can do to help?” the man asked.
Of course Jenn knew he had no intention of helping her. Even so, she wondered what on earth could be going on in his head.
Then she remembered something Riley had said to Chief Belt at the place where Courtney Wallace had been buried …
“The killer is charming, likeable. People trust him.”
Riley’s instincts had been absolutely right, as usual. And now Jenn knew firsthand that the man didn’t drop his charming persona even after he’d captured his victims. He kept taunting them with smiles, toying with them like a cat with a mouse.
As Jenn’s understanding grew, a tactic started to form in her head.
Surely the best way to throw him off guard wasn’t to rage or beg or plead or even to struggle.
If there was a way to manipulate him she should be able to find it.
Jenn knew that she could play mind games at least as well as he could. After all, she’d been taught by the best—meaning she’d been taught by the worst.
She’d been taught by Aunt Cora.
Still sinking and almost up to her waist now, Jenn let her shoulders drop into a posture of resignation, as
if nothing really dire was happening—as if she’d just lost a card game or something.
“I’m so screwed,” she said. “I’m just so, so screwed. I mean, look at me. Can you believe I let this happen? I’m just too damned stupid. Jesus, it’s just been that kind of day.”
The man’s smile faded a little.
“What do you mean?” he asked.
Jenn shrugged.
“Well, for one thing, my partners are both assholes. I mean, imagine—sending me out to this place all by myself. You’ve probably guessed by now that I’m a rookie. They never give me any respect.”
The man looked thoroughly puzzled now.
It’s working, she thought.
Jenn shifted her imagination into full gear.
It was time to get really creative, to tell a story that would really mess with the guy’s head.
And she knew a story that just might work.
It was a prank that her foster brothers and sisters had played on her years ago—a prank that even Aunt Cora hadn’t known about.
She said, “I’ll bet anything my partners sent me out here on a goddamn snipe hunt. It’s all just a joke to them.”
The man looked quite serious now—almost genuinely concerned.
Jenn said, “Never heard of a snipe hunt? It’s a kind of hazing ritual. It happened to me once when I was a kid and I wanted to join this club and I had to go through an initiation. The other kids took me way out in the woods—to hunt snipes, they said. They showed me a hole in the ground and gave me a burlap bag and told me to stay right there and wait for a snipe to come out, then catch it in the bag. It would put up one hell of a fight, they said. I had to be tough—and I had to be patient. It might take a very long time, they said. Then they went away—to hunt snipes on their own, they said.”
The woman in the pit with Jenn was whimpering again. Jenn knew she must be wondering what the hell the newcomer was talking about.
The man’s brow knitted in a curious expression.
He said, “But there are no such things as snipes.”
Jenn nodded.
“Yeah, you’re catching on. Pretty damned mean, huh?”
