by Debra Webb
Cece put her hand against the wall, her knees suddenly weak. “What did he do?”
“He laughed and said our mother was a whore and that if the devil who fathered me really wanted me he would have come back for me a long time ago.”
“K.C.?” Cece’s voice sounded hollow.
“His name was Jack. Jack Kemp. He was going to take me away from here. He had come to Winchester on some sort of assignment or mission but he said he didn’t care about that. He had to get me away from the bastard raping me.”
“What did you do when Mason said these things to you?”
“I told him I was going to find Jack and that I was leaving. I ran into the kitchen and grabbed his truck keys but he caught me before I could get out the back door. We struggled. The knife was in the drainer with the other dishes I had washed that morning.” She stared at the floor. “I stabbed him.”
Cece swallowed back the bitter taste of bile. “You had no choice.”
“He staggered back and I kept stabbing him. Over and over and over.”
“You didn’t call for help?”
Sierra shook her head, the slightest movement. “I was going to, but Marcus came in. He said I would go to prison. That no one would believe the things he had been doing to me. Everyone always thought Daddy and I were so close. He said they would think I was a monster.”
Cece forced air into her lungs. “That’s when you decided to blame me.”
Sierra’s gaze collided with hers. “Marcus made me say it. He said if I didn’t do what he said, he would make sure everyone knew the truth about me and that he would tell people how I planned the murder and...” She closed her eyes and shook her head. “He said you deserved whatever happened to you for deserting us. You never cared about anyone but yourself. He said because of all the public fights you and Daddy had that people would believe you killed him. He said you would get off on a self-defense plea, anyway. By the time I knew that wasn’t going to happen, it was too late to change my story.”
Cece swiped at a damned tear that rolled down her cheek. “I guess Marcus told you that, too.”
“He said they would know I had planned the whole thing then. I would get the death penalty.”
“You were fifteen years old, Sierra. You wouldn’t have gotten the death penalty. You probably wouldn’t have even gone to prison.”
Tears poured down Sierra’s cheeks. “I didn’t know. I just did whatever Marcus told me to do. When he came in and saw what I had done, he made me swear never to tell a soul. He said everything would be fine. I just had to be quiet for a little while.”
“Did you tell Jack?”
She shook her head. “Marcus said I could never tell anyone, so I didn’t. Not until now.”
“What happened to Jack?”
She shrugged. “I saw him at the trial a couple of times and he kept asking me questions about what happened. About you and everything...and then he just disappeared.”
Cece felt ice slip through her veins. “Did you tell anyone about Jack asking you all those questions?”
“I told Marcus. I was afraid not to.”
Dear God, what had her brother done? No more talking. They needed to get out of here. “Sierra—”
“I know what you’re thinking,” her sister said, cutting Cece off. “You’re thinking Marcus killed Jack.”
Cece had a bad feeling that was the case. “Is that what you think happened?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know. Marcus has taken care of me all this time. He makes sure I’m okay.”
“Did he take you to the doctor who gave you the medicine?”
Sierra nodded. “He’s been a good brother to me.” She looked to Cece then. “But what he did to you—what I did to you—was wrong. We have to fix that now.”
“We should go for help,” Cece urged. She took Sierra by the arm. “Sheriff Tanner can help us.”
Deacon, too, she wanted to say, but she wasn’t sure where she stood with him. He had misled her and she wasn’t certain she could forgive him for lying to her.
“You go,” Sierra said. “I’ll stay here and take care of Marcus. He needs me. He doesn’t have anyone else.”
“Sierra.” Cece took her by the shoulders and shook her a little. “We both have to go. We don’t know what Marcus might do. He isn’t well.” A man who would do the things he had done couldn’t be well. The sort of help he needed wasn’t anything Sierra could give him.
“He’s too close,” Sierra argued. “We can’t get away. If I distract him, you can.”
Well, hell. “We’ll figure something out,” Cece argued. “I’m not leaving without you and then we have to find Levi.”
She hoped Marcus had not hurt Levi.
“There’s no way out,” Sierra insisted.
“Wait.” Cece held up her hands. “Explain to me where we are.” She glanced around the room. “This doesn’t look familiar to me.”
“Marcus and some of the followers built a tunnel between the house and the church. There are rooms down here and...and things stored.”
Things? There was no time for Cece to pursue the idea of what other things might be stored down here. She had been right; this was a basement of sorts. “Where was Marcus when you came down here?”
“He’s at the church with his elders. They’re discussing what to do.” She lifted her gaze to Cece’s. “With you.”
“Then we’ll go back toward the house.” Cece ushered Sierra out of the cell-like room. “Which way?”
Sierra stalled. “If they find us, they’ll give us to the others. No one comes back from the others.”
“What’s the others?”
“A place where you learn lessons you never forget.”
Cece whirled around at the voice. Marcus. Thankfully he was alone.
“We just want to leave, Marcus,” Cece informed him. “We don’t want to be here.”
“Do you want her to tell them what you did?” Marcus asked Sierra.
“She protected herself,” Cece countered. “Protecting herself isn’t against the law.”
“Even if she killed a man in the process?” Marcus glared at her, his brown eyes glowing with anger.
“He was hurting her. You knew this,” Cece accused him. “You let her believe she had done something wrong and you knew better.”
He laughed. “You deserved what you got. More than you got,” he sneered. “You should have died in that prison. Old and withered. You don’t deserve a life.”
Cece scooted Sierra behind her. She wasn’t sure if her brother had a weapon or not but she wasn’t taking any chances. “What did I ever do to you, Marcus? You turned on me for no reason.”
He laughed even louder then, the sound filled with sheer hatred. “You honestly don’t remember, do you?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” She eased back a step, ushering Sierra along with her. “What is it you think I did?”
“You found the hole I made in your wall.”
What the hell was he talking about? “What hole?”
“The one I made so I could watch you. The same kind I made in the wall to Sierra’s bedroom.”
The memory of catching her brother touching himself while staring through a tiny hole in the wall rushed into her mind, pressed the breath from her lungs. “You mean, when you were watching Sierra take a bath? My God, that was when I was, what? Seven? Eight? I didn’t even remember until you mentioned it just now.”
“You were seven. I was thirteen.”
“We were kids,” Cece argued. “Young boys do stuff like that. Trade porn magazines and sneak peeks at any girl available—including sisters. It’s hormones.”
“Do you know what our father did to me?”
She didn’t recall any particular punishment. “Did he beat you?” She vaguely remembered Marcus being
ill. Had he been in the hospital, too? “I’m so sorry, Marcus. I was a child. I didn’t mean to get you into trouble—”
“He and three of his followers said it was necessary to exorcise the lust from me. They kept me in a sweat room, beat me, prayed over me. For days they attempted to rid me of the evil they claimed had possessed me. Then they tested me.”
Cece was terrified of what he meant by the last. “Tested you how?”
“They showed me photos of naked girls. When I grew aroused, they announced I had failed the test.”
“Oh, my God. I didn’t know.”
More of that cruel laughter. “That was when they decided that extreme measures had to be taken.”
What they’d already done wasn’t extreme enough? “Marcus, you know he was evil. He was a sick bastard who damaged us all.”
Marcus shook his head. “They castrated me. He said because I lusted after my own sisters I wasn’t worthy of being a whole man. They had to cut out the wicked part of me. So they removed my testicles. All because you told him what you saw while I was still too young to fight him.”
Dear God. No wonder her brother hated her. “He was the one who was evil, Marcus. Look what he did to Sierra. He threw me out when I was still a kid. He was the devil. He was the evil one.”
“You were the lucky one, Cece,” Marcus argued. “The one who looked like our whore mother. He couldn’t stand it, couldn’t bear to look at you. I remember the night he killed her. He pushed her down those stairs and let her lay there and die. He had realized that Sierra wasn’t his child. He tortured her until she confessed and then he threw her down the stairs like a piece of trash. When I tried to call for help, he locked me in the basement. You see, Cece, you got away scot-free. You were the lucky one. How can you complain about a few years in prison, considering what the rest of us went through?”
“You’re right.” Cece decided the only hope she and Sierra had of surviving this big confession was to play along. To get as much information as possible. “I have no right to complain. What about that man? The one who started all this with our mother? If she hadn’t cheated, maybe our father wouldn’t have turned into such a monster. This is all her fault.”
“He paid for his sins,” Marcus assured her. “He was every bit as evil as our father. He didn’t deserve to live, either. They both were sent to hell where they belonged.”
Cece took Sierra by the hand and then reached for her brother’s. “We are all we have left. Us and Levi. We should make a pact to take care of each other. God knows our parents didn’t.”
Marcus stared at her for a long moment. “You shouldn’t have come back, Cece. You’re not like us.” He looked to Sierra then. “You know what has to happen.”
Cece shifted her attention to Sierra.
“He’s right,” her sister said. “I tried to help you and now it’s too late. You shouldn’t have come back, Cece.”
* * *
DEACON WAS THROUGH WAITING. If Tanner didn’t arrive soon with that warrant and backup, he was going in alone.
Still no movement at the house. They could be doing anything in there. It had been better than three hours since he saw Cece leaving. He wasn’t waiting any longer. His cell vibrated. Deacon snatched it from his pocket and answered.
“Where are you?” the caller demanded.
Tanner.
“I’m at the edge of the woods near the house. Did you get the warrant?”
“I’m coming in.”
The call ended. Damn it. Why didn’t he just answer the question?
Deacon waited for Tanner to reach his position. Two of his deputies were right behind him. “Do you have the warrant?”
“The judge was in court. We should have his signature any minute.”
“That’s a no,” Deacon snapped. “I’m not waiting.”
Tanner started to argue with him but reached for his ringing cell phone, instead. Deacon waited, hoped it was the warrant.
“Got it. Thanks.” He tucked his phone away. “Warrant’s been signed.” He looked to his deputies. “Call it.”
While the deputies took care of notifying the rest of the team Tanner already had in place that it was time to get moving, he and Deacon headed directly for the house.
No vehicles had arrived during the time Deacon had been watching. At the front door, Tanner did the knocking. After three attempts to get someone to the door, he went in, gun drawn.
They moved quickly from room to room, first and second floor. No sign of anyone. Then they looked in the basement. One large brick-floored-and-walled room. Empty beyond a few jars of canned goods and a couple of boxes that had been stored long enough to look vintage.
“No one came in or out of the house while I was watching,” Deacon said, frustrated.
“Marcus and a couple of his followers are over at the church. My deputies should be finished going through the building by now.” He reached for his cell.
“Wait. Did you say Marcus was there?”
Tanner nodded. “He is.”
Deacon turned all the way around in the basement. “Then there has to be an underground tunnel because he was in this house and he did not leave by either of the exits.”
They started with the walls, going over every square inch in hopes of finding a hidden passageway. They moved on to the floors. Nothing.
“Let’s go back to the first floor,” Tanner suggested.
Upstairs the deputies were moving through the house, looking for the shotgun Tanner had listed on his warrant. They went through each room, finally entering the only first floor bedroom, which obviously belonged to Marcus. Male clothes were in the closet. They moved the rug on the floor, the furniture, and found nothing.
Back in the closet, Deacon checked the floorboards. “Got something here,” he said to Tanner.
A square of flooring lifted up, revealing a trapdoor. A metal ladder led downward into the darkness.
“I’m going first,” Tanner said in no uncertain terms.
As much as Deacon would have liked to argue, the sheriff was right. This was his jurisdiction. Deacon followed, moving down slowly and as soundlessly as possible. When they reached the bottom of the ladder, Tanner used his cell as a flashlight and discovered a light switch. He turned it on, revealing a long tunnel lined with doors.
“What the hell?” Tanner muttered.
One by one they checked behind the doors and found nothing. Midway along the tunnel were two doors that were locked. When they couldn’t get an answer from beyond the locked doors, Tanner left two deputies attempting to open them while he and Deacon moved on. At the other end of the tunnel was another ladder. Tanner went up first. He raised the trapdoor carefully and climbed on out. Deacon did the same.
The room they found themselves in was small. Hooks for coats lined three of the four walls. The one window looked out onto the woods. They were at the church.
Voices.
Tanner moved to the door. Indicated for Deacon to keep quiet.
He listened a moment longer, then stepped back and prepared to open the door. Deacon leveled his weapon, ready to fire if necessary.
Beyond the door was the main worship hall of the church.
Marcus Winters, his sister Sierra and two other men looked up from the books they held.
“What is this?” Marcus shot to his feet.
“Where is Cece?” Tanner demanded.
Deacon moved through the room, went down a small hall behind the stage-like pulpit and checked both bathrooms.
Nothing.
Sweat broke out across his forehead. His pulse rate climbed higher and higher. She had to be here.
Marcus was arguing with Tanner about his sister.
“We haven’t spoken in years,” Marcus was saying.
The two older men sat silent, watching. Sierra stared at the floor or the bo
ok she held, presumably a Bible.
Tanner continued to pressure Marcus. Deacon zeroed in on Sierra.
“Where is she, Sierra?”
Sierra lifted her gaze to his.
“Don’t allow him to intimidate you, sister!” Marcus shouted.
Tanner told him to shut up.
“Where is Cece?” Deacon pressed, moving closer to her.
“She’s gone to be with the others.”
Fear knotted in Deacon’s belly. “Can you show me how to find where she is?”
Marcus started to yell again and Tanner pushed him into a chair and shoved his weapon into Marcus’s face. “Not another word.”
“Please,” Deacon urged. “Show me where she is before it’s too late.”
He had no idea what kind of place she meant, but he innately understood it was not good.
She nodded and tossed the book aside.
Marcus dared to threaten her once more but Sierra didn’t look back. Deacon stayed right on her heels. She went out the back of the church. By the time they reached the tree line, two deputies had joined them.
As they moved into the trees, Sierra hurried faster and faster. Deacon sensed her anticipation and her fear. A half mile or so into the thick woods, Sierra stopped. Deacon held up a hand for those behind them to stop.
She pointed. “There.”
Cece was tied to a tree, a gag preventing her from screaming.
Deacon started around Sierra. She put a hand on his arm. “Be careful. The others could be out there.”
Deacon looked to one of the deputies. “Don’t let her out of your sight.”
“Yes, sir,” the deputy agreed.
Deacon and the other deputy moved forward. The deputy kept watch while Deacon went to Cece. He removed the gag of tape and cloth first. She cried out.
“I’ve got you,” he assured her.
The deputy had a knife and cut loose her bindings. Cece fell against Deacon, nearly too weak to walk.
