The Ivy Nash Thrillers: Books 4-6: Redemption Thriller Series 10-12 (Redemption Thriller Series Box Set)

by John W. Mefford

  “Well, I…”

  He held up his right hand and started counting down. Once he brought his last finger into a closed fist, he locked eyes with Brook. She nodded. He knew she understood he had to do it.

  And he did. He rammed his shoulder into the door. It was flimsy and nearly came off its hinges. But it opened.

  They were hit with a smell that nearly made him throw up the candy bar he’d consumed in his car on the way over. He quickly drew his Sig Sauer, and Brook did the same. Inching through a tiny foyer, they stopped at the same time. There were voices coming from another room in the back, along with pop music. It sounded like it might be a TV show.

  Shuffling at a quicker pace, they glanced into a dining room that had newspapers and magazines stacked to the ceiling. A number of them were framed on the wall. He saw one headline: “Kennedy Assassinated”

  Pearl seemed fascinated by memorable news events. Or at least the splashy headlines.

  They reached a small room that was mostly dark, although Stan could see a flashing light at an open door on the other side, and the voices were louder. It had to be the TV. He looked at Brook and then moved into the dark room. Two steps in, his thigh rammed into a cage. He grunted, doubling over while grabbing at the cage.

  A dog barked and snapped at his fingers. He jumped back into Brook, and she screamed, then started hopping on one foot. “I think you broke my toe.”

  “Sorry.”

  She calmed down while he caught his breath, wiping sweat off his brow. “So goes the element of surprise.”

  “You going to be okay?” he asked.

  “I’ll live,” she said, limping as she took a step.

  Another waft of the foul odor passed through their space. Stan held his arm against his face, then edged closer to the door opening, where light flickered.

  He first saw feet—they were blue and bloated. Brook put a hand on his shoulder but didn’t say a word. He scooted into the room and instantly felt his stomach buckle. He’d seen enough dead bodies to have nightmares for the next twenty years. This one might add another ten years to that. Pearl was covered with splotchy blood. Her skin was discolored, her tongue hanging out of her mouth. He figured she’d been dead at least twenty-four hours, maybe more.

  “Looks like she’s been stabbed about two dozen times,” he said, leaning over the body. “And the perp didn’t use a butter knife.”

  He glanced at the TV. The show was some type of reality singing program. Sitting on top of the ancient console was a police scanner. That must have been how Pearl knew about the various crimes, including the Claude Cooper killing.

  He turned to see Brook following a trail of blood across the room, leading to another doorway.

  “I think I found the murder weapon. And more blood.”

  Stan tried to think how the murder had gone down, although he knew he’d need further evidence to make a more educated guess.

  “What are you thinking?” she asked.

  “The victim was stabbed repeatedly, and the perp ran out without thinking about the murder weapon. It was an emotional killing.”

  A moment of silence fell upon the space as the smell clawed at his nostrils. He glanced to the wall where he found a cheap frame with a quote printed in it: The Whole Truth and Nothing But the Truth.

  Her blog. He shook his head.

  “Your friend Ivy, um, should we put out an APB for her?”

  “Call in the crime-scene investigators. I want prints or something that puts Ivy here first.”

  “Stan, she could be on the run. The longer we wait… Hell, she could have already crossed the border.”

  He looked right at her. “Ivy couldn’t have done this.”

  She pursed her lips. “Everyone has a breaking point.”

  His phone buzzed. Before he took the call, he said, “Call the team and tell them we need the scene processed ASAP.”

  He tapped his phone. “Cristina, tell me you found Ivy.”

  “No, but I did get more information on her so-called stalker, Delmar Amaya. It’s kind of a crazy story.”

  “Hold on.” Another wave of nausea passed over him, and he dropped his hands to his knees. He motioned to Brook while covering the phone. “Need to head outside.” He retraced his steps through the house, wondering if Ivy was the victim of a crime or if she’d finally turned into a vigilante.

  Once outside, he said, “Give me everything you know. And don’t leave anything out.”

  43

  Three steps into the dark hallway, the door slammed shut behind me.

  “Dammit!” I crossed my arms against my chest as a cool breeze washed over me. Still guided by the glow of the yellow arrows, I padded forward. So far, no ill effects from the jug of water I’d downed in about three seconds.

  I came to what looked like a dead end, but it was actually just a T. The hallway went both directions, although the yellow arrows trailed right. Was this some type of trick? Were they baiting me to go in the opposite direction of the arrows? I looked to my left and saw nothing but darkness. My mental faculties were still cloudy at best, and my energy was hovering near empty. I flipped to look over my shoulder, considered going back the way I came, then said, “Fuck it,” and went right.

  Twenty feet down the corridor, I stopped moving. Beyond the constant ringing in my ears, I thought I heard echoes of a scream. Was it real or the playing of a video? I clipped my throat shut, hoping to drown out all other sound. There it was again. I rested a hand against the wall. It was carpeted. A strange sensation came over me, as if I were walking through the bowels of a movie theatre.

  Brushing my fingers along the wall, I resumed walking. Part of me wanted to call out. Maybe Timothy or other poor souls were being held captive behind the walls, being put through the same treatment I had experienced. Or perhaps they’d moved on to the next phase when one of those eight torture methods were used.

  But why? What were they accomplishing by keeping me here, putting me through this routine? The kidnappers’ desires had seemed focused on money. They went to a lot of trouble and took considerable risk to get their hands on the million-dollar ransom. I rubbed my face and then a thought hit me. What if all of this was a ruse? What if the money meant nothing? What if they were nothing more than a couple of deranged, twisted freaks who enjoyed making people suffer? A couple of Milton wannabes.

  My chest felt heavy. I took in a deep breath, but the pressure only increased. Within seconds I became dizzy, leaned against the wall before I fell. Each time I took in air, the pressure became more acute. I made each successive breath shallower, but it didn’t help. It felt like a skewer had punctured my heart. Was I having a heart attack? I pressed my fingernails into my temples, hoping to divert the pain to another part of my body. Pulling my hands away, I took in a breath.

  Another stabbing pain. I cried out, but it only made it worse. Was there some substance in the air that was impacting me?

  It had to be the water. That fucking water!

  Then the wall came alive with video. I flinched, then stopped breathing all together, my eyes wide with fear. The images looked like they were shot with a phone. They were jittery, and the lighting was poor. A large man punched another man who seemed older and fragile. The punches kept coming to the gut and the face. The large man turned to the camera and smiled.

  It was him! It was Muscle Man. He tossed the feeble, beaten man onto some table. The camera turned upward, pointing at the ceiling. It looked like they were in an abandoned warehouse. A person came around to the front and smiled into the camera. It was Floppy Hair. He’d been holding the camera. Now, the picture didn’t move, so I assumed it was locked into a stand. He walked over to the table, grabbed the beaten man’s legs, and attached them to the corner of the table. Muscle Man did the same thing with the man’s wrists at the other end. Then, Muscle Man grabbed hold of a handle and turned it very slowly.

  They were actually using the Rack.

  The pair started laughing as the man on the tab
le wrenched his body this way and that. Then, with Muscle Man cranking the tension, Floppy Hair ran over and grabbed the camera. He held it just above the man on the rack.

  It was Timothy. What little breath I had in me left my lungs.

  His face was fire engine red, as veins bulged, his mouth wide open. The video had no sound, but I could feel his scream in my bones. The camera angle suddenly dropped to the floor, and then it bounced around. A second later, a detached arm fell in front of the camera. Blood oozed from the socket, the fingers still moving.

  I turned away, putting my hands over my face. Tears somehow pooled in the corners of my eyes, and I was panting like a dog. I realized the stabbing pains in my heart had ceased. A silver lining to the worst day of my life. Would I live to see tomorrow?

  Without warning, the wall in front of me shifted. I steadied my sights—part of the wall had opened. It was in the shape of a circle, about three feet in diameter. Just above it, the video flipped to single message: You have ten seconds to jump into the funnel.

  The seconds ticked away. 10, 9, 8.

  I heard the swooshing of water in the dark tube that appeared to descend.

  7, 6.

  I dug a fingernail into my hand, stressing over what the hell I should do.

  5, 4.

  Adrenaline materialized from nothing. My instinct told me to run. But where would I go?

  3, 2.

  I was fucked either way. I jumped into the tube feet first, just as the clock ticked to one. It was a water ride, although I couldn’t see a damn thing. It felt like I was moving at the speed of light. I took a hard turn, and my body twisted around, shooting water into my face. A sudden drop and then a bump—I went airborne for a couple of seconds. I repeated the same pattern another three times. If I were a teenager at a regular water park, it would have been a blast. But the darkness and speed scared the crap out of me. I didn’t know what to expect with each turn or dip.

  I began to lose my strength. I could no longer keep my legs together or my body taut. With my limbs flailing, my movement became even more erratic and unpredictable. A sharp turn, and I banged the back of my head. The water was now shooting up my nose and every other orifice in my body. Exhausted and helpless, I started choking, gasping for air.

  And then the bottom dropped out. I waited to hit the tube and restart the water ride, but it never happened. I was tumbling through the air, and I had no idea which way was up. I could hear my own screams—it sounded like I was in a metal cave.

  I saw the ground a split second before my body hit, crunching my ankle like a walnut. I shrieked and tried grabbing my leg, but I couldn’t reach it. I’d landed on the downslope of a hill, almost like a ski slope minus the snow. I tumbled head over heels, cracking my head two, three, four times. I finally hit the bottom of the hill and came to a stop. It was still and dark. I could smell the dampness of water from above me.

  A hissing sound made me jump to my feet. A stabbing pain in my ankle jolted me. I quickly raised my bad ankle up in the air. A tiny flame popped out of the floor next to me. I nearly gagged on my own tongue. All I could see was a sea of snakes roiling on top of each other. Mounds of snakes hissing, flittering their tongues as if they were teasing me before they went in for the kill.

  I had about ten inches of freedom between me and the snakes that surrounded me. I had no way out. This was how they were going to kill me.

  Death by a thousand snake bites.

  44

  Stan parked his brown, city-issued sedan against the curb and then looked through the passenger window at the refurbished building. “People are going to think I’m nuts,” he said.

  Truth be known, Stan often talked to himself, at least in those rare moments when he wasn’t being hounded by the brass at the station. It seemed like he had a dozen bosses. And then there was his wife. He loved Bev, but she had a tendency to give orders instead of asking kindly. It was okay. Her life wasn’t easy. They had a child with autism. She cared for their son night and day without a break. And after eight years, Stan could see the stress really starting to build. One day soon, real soon, he’d have to break away from his life-and-death job, get her sister to drive in from Baton Rouge to take care of Evan, and just the two of them go on a vacation. Even better, a cruise. The one where they have enormous buffets and fruity drinks. Yeah, that was it.

  He pulled his thoughts away from the ocean breezes and endless plates of fresh lobster to the open package of Cheetos in the middle console. He was hungry as a bear, but another chip wouldn’t do the trick. He’d have to make a run by a twenty-four-hour drive-thru and pick up some real food: a combination package of tacos, burger, onion rings, and fries, topped off by a nice Diet Coke.

  His mouth started watering as he looked up and down the dark city street. An old VW bug drove by, but other than that, the street was empty. Probably a good sign in this part of town.

  He thought more about his conversation with Cristina, what she’d shared about Delmar Amaya. And I thought my life was tough.

  After talking to Cristina, he’d called Delmar, just to verify that it was all legit. During that call, the insurance executive happened to mention his discussion with Timothy Jankovich. It was just a passing reference as he unloaded all his burdens over the last couple of years. Damn, that guy had been put through hell.

  As he listened to Delmar’s elongated story, he felt a lump in his throat. Frankly, he was glad the conversation had taken place over the phone. Guys from back in the neighborhood in Brooklyn rarely showed emotion. If you did, you were considered a fucking wuss. Tears were only acceptable for the death of a close relative or friend, and as long you were under the age of fourteen whenever the Yankees won the World Series.

  After his call with Delmar, he watched his colleagues process the gruesome crime scene at Pearl Griffin’s house. It didn’t take long for the techs to pull a fingerprint belonging to Ivy. It was on the weapon and about six other places at first count. Brook then hounded him to call in an APB to locate and arrest Ivy. She even said, “You can’t keep turning a blind eye, Stan. The evidence is irrefutable. She may have had her reasons, but your friend most likely murdered a helpless woman.”

  Even with this “irrefutable” evidence, he refused to accept Brook’s conclusions for two reasons. First, he’d seen Ivy deal with so much more than a bunch of hurtful words. While Pearl’s blog had disparaged his reputation, and that of Cristina’s, they were only words. Compared to the crap she’d experienced both as a youngster and an adult, Ivy would never revert to killing someone over a bunch of words. He could see her get in anyone’s face and make them wish they hadn’t crossed her, but killing a person over what they wrote? Nope, she didn’t have it in her. And he knew Ivy better than just about anyone.

  The second reason related to a passing observation Delmar had made during his rather long-winded explanation of how he got to where he was in his life. He said he needed to honor those he’d lost. And when he’d learned about Timothy’s plans for the funhouse, an idea came to mind. He reached out to “the eccentric” man, Timothy, and convinced him to offer a tour of his funhouse, even behind the purple wall. Delmar had found all of the attractions both fascinating and gigantic in scope. He called it a mini Disney World. Then, he laughed, saying, “Or should I call it Disney World Zoo?”

  Stan asked why he’d made that clarification. To which, Delmar said that, when they passed through a dark hallway deep within the bowels of the facility to reach this new water ride, he was almost certain he’d seen an aquarium of snakes.

  Timothy had explained them away by saying they were used to help control the rodent population often seen during the construction process. Delmar had laughed it off.

  But for some reason that stuck with Stan—even after Ivy’s fingerprints had been identified and Brook had started riding his case about going after her. He told Brook he needed a few minutes to think through everything, and he stepped away. He called up his old partner, Moreno, and asked him to run a backg
round check on Timothy Jankovich. He quickly learned what most of the free world already knew—that he’d essentially been a recluse living in Mexico for more than twenty years and had been running his companies remotely. All of that was at least believable. But Moreno then pointed out something quite odd: for the first time in his twenty-year stay, Timothy had not registered to vote and had not requested to receive an absentee ballot. He’d apparently been quite vocal on the local political scene in his home state of Utah prior to leaving the country. And he apparently continued that civic duty for more than two decades. And then it stopped.

  Moreno didn’t seem alarmed. He said it could have been due to the fact that Timothy knew he was moving back to the States and, therefore, didn’t bother with the out-of-country voting process.

  Stan, though, wasn’t convinced. Knowing he wanted information the SAPD simply wouldn’t have access to, he called up his cousin, FBI Special Agent Nick Radowski. It was approaching midnight on the East Coast, but Nick was still at work in the downtown Boston FBI office. Apparently his on-again, off-again partner, a woman named Alex Troutt, was a real ball buster. Nick, who’d gotten to know Ivy a few months back during another case, didn’t flinch. Between him and what he called the team’s SOS, a woman named Gretchen, they’d get back to Stan with everything on Timothy, including the size of his inseam. Just give them a few hours, Nick had said.

  Stan picked up his phone. No new phone calls or text messages. It had been two hours since he last spoke to Nick and Gretchen. Maybe the FBI wasn’t quite as nimble and competent as Nick had bragged. Here he was parked in front of TJ’s Funhouse. What was he supposed to do, just sit there and wait on his cousin before he started snooping around?

  Screw that. He pulled himself out of the car and closed the door quietly. Cinching up his pants, he walked up to the glass front door and looked inside. A few canned lights illuminated the large area that had been used for the funhouse party. It was vacant. He noticed another light on in the temporary office at the far end. As best he could tell, it was also empty.