Vegas Lies ( Lies Mystery Thriller Series Book 3)

by Andrew Cunningham

  And then it hit me. I realized what I should be looking for.

  I stopped at the next one I came to and got out of the car. I looked it over carefully. Nope, not that one. At the third stop I found what I was looking for. They all had signs of some car activity, so I knew that would tell me nothing, but the one thing I was looking for I found at the third road entrance. Footprints. How many people walked on those roads? Probably no one, except Emma and me. And these footprints were coming toward me—the same direction we were headed the night before.

  This was the road.

  I got back in the car, a combination of excitement and sheer terror coursing through my body. This was scary stuff, but I didn’t care. Death didn’t frighten me anymore. What frightened me was the thought of Sabrina, Mo, Peep, and the girls living the rest of their lives in constant horror.

  I was going to find them, no matter what.

  Chapter 41

  I drove it slowly, looking for the vague turnoff I had seen when we were walking. Finding that one turned out to be surprisingly easy, mostly because there seemed to be even more tire tracks making the turn than there had been the night before. And these weren’t ATV or motorcycle tracks. These were cars. Take that, Detective Miller! Had Ludwick come out to check on the girls himself? If he had, he would have had to be careful to make sure he wasn’t followed. I knew that I was making a big assumption about the girls being here, but I had no other choice.

  I drove down the path at a crawl, thanking God that I hadn’t chosen a little economy car. The path was a carbon copy of the one that had led down to where I had escaped my captor. I drove for over three miles, seeing no buildings of any kind. Looking ahead in the distance, it all looked the same.

  I slammed on the brakes. The road had ended and I had come within inches of driving off a cliff.

  “Holy shit!” I exclaimed.

  I backed up a few feet, then got out and peered over the edge. Like the ones I'd seen the day before, here was a large gully carved into the rock, probably from millions of years of nature’s work. Maybe this had once been a vast ocean. The difference between this gully and the ones I hid in the day before was about fifty feet. This one was deep and wide, almost crevasse-like. If my car had gone over the edge, I’d be dead for sure. Beyond it was more desert. From the road, it was impossible to see the crevasse until you were in it. I breathed out. I was lucky that I had been driving slowly.

  So where did this leave me? I had reached the end of the line, physically and figuratively. I was sure that my assumption had been right, but there were no buildings anywhere. I was wrong, and I was out of ideas.

  I got back in the car and turned it around. I couldn’t have felt any lower than I did at that moment. I started back up the path. About halfway up I stopped. In my grief, my breakfast of a couple of hours before suddenly wasn’t sitting well. I opened my door, got out, and threw up. I waited a few minutes to make sure there wasn’t any more coming up. There wasn’t. I grabbed a bottle of water from the car, took a swig, swished it around, and spat it out. As I started to get back in the car, I suddenly smelled bacon. It wasn’t me. I didn’t have bacon that morning. No, the smell was wafting in on a slight breeze.

  Had I missed a building? I quickly looked around. Nothing. Maybe someone was camping? But who’d camp out here? I saw no smoke from a fire, but that smell was coming from somewhere. There was no doubt in my mind that it was bacon cooking.

  And then I saw it. A pipe protruding from the ground. It was about a hundred feet away from me on my right, but it was definitely a pipe. It looked like PVC, three or four inches wide. It had once been white, but had now taken on a gray color almost matching the landscape. That’s why I hadn’t seen any buildings. There weren’t any. Whatever they had was underground.

  They couldn’t have parked the cars underground though, so where were they? I looked around with new eyes and spotted it almost immediately. Off to my left, only about fifty feet away, was a small cluster of boulders. Next to the boulders was a tarp the same gray color as the rocks. At the bottom of the tarp I could see two sets of car tires. How could I have missed that the first time? It’s amazing what you don’t see if you are not looking for it.

  I pulled my jeep over next to the tarp. Oh how I wished I had a phone at that moment. Not that it would have mattered. The desert didn’t seem to be conducive to cellular reception.

  Could they see me? I looked all around for cameras but saw none. It didn’t mean there weren’t any, seeing as how they could make cameras so small these days, but there didn’t look to be any.

  And then I heard the hum. It was kind of a soft throbbing noise. A generator. With the breeze, I had to listen carefully to determine where it was coming from. It was a little further on from where I was currently standing. There it was, in another grouping of boulders. This time it looked as if the boulders had been moved. They were arranged in a cave-like formation, and in the cave was the generator. I walked over to it. The cord from the generator to the underground dwelling disappeared under the dirt.

  The germ of an idea was coming to me.

  I walked over to the pipe emitting the bacon smell. Having thrown up my breakfast and now feeling a lot more positive than I had a few minutes before, I was suddenly hungry. I again looked around for cameras, and again saw none. I put my ear to the pipe. I could hear talking—male voices—but couldn’t make out what they were saying.

  Now I knew exactly what I was going to do. I ran back over to the hidden cars. The tarp had enough room for a third car, so I rolled off the rocks holding two of the edges, pulled back the tarp, and drove my jeep in. I then replaced the tarp and the rocks. Hopefully nobody would notice the additional car.

  Up until then, I'd been hoping that I hadn’t just run across a group of survivalists waiting for the apocalypse, but one of the cars was the van. The other car was a Mercedes. A survivalist would be driving something useful, not a Mercedes.

  I was ready.

  I went over to the generator, found the “off” switch, and flicked it. The throbbing stopped. I picked up a softball-sized rock and hid behind the generator cave. I waited.

  It didn’t take long. From my hiding place, I scanned the area for movement. Suddenly I saw a boulder move. Oh, how clever. They had attached a fake boulder to a door that opened up directly from the ground. A variation on the hidden house key in the fake rock? A guy’s head popped up from the hole and he looked warily around. Satisfied that it wasn’t a trap, he climbed out and started toward the generator. The guy was almost as big as Richard. That wasn’t good. If I didn’t incapacitate him with my first blow with the rock, I was going to be in trouble. How did I get myself into these situations? I held my gun in my other hand. I didn’t want to use it, just in case they heard it down there, but I would if I had to.

  The guy approached the generator and I sunk down even lower behind the rocks. When he reached the unit, he bent down to look at it. It was now or never!

  I came around the side and ... kicked a rock. The big guy quickly lifted his head and looked right at me just as I swung the rock. He moved just slightly and the rock crashed into his collar bone. I had to give him credit, he didn’t scream, and it must’ve really hurt. He grunted loudly. He reached around in front of his body with his right hand and grabbed me by the throat. I didn’t even see it coming.

  When I had hit him with the rock, it had fallen from my hand, so I no longer had that weapon. But I still had the gun in my left hand. Whatever I did, I had to do quickly or he was going to crush my windpipe. I brought up my left hand and crashed the butt of the gun into his face. His nose shattered and blood spurted out everywhere. He let go of my throat and I quickly swung the gun again, this time connecting with his temple. He fell to the ground, out cold or dead.

  I caught my breath, then felt his neck for a pulse. He was alive. That was good. I really didn’t want to kill anybody. I had nothing to tie him up with, so I just had to hope that he would be out for a while. I searched
his pocket. A cell phone. I checked it just in case. It had service! It looked like some kind of satellite phone.

  I dialed Miller’s cell phone.

  “You’d better answer, you asshole,” I muttered.

  He did.

  “What?” He really needed some lessons on phone etiquette.

  “This is Del Honeycutt. Just listen!” He had tried to interrupt me. “I was right about that turnoff I told you about this morning. They are here. They have an underground hideout. I just took out one of them. They have their cars camouflaged with a tarp. I’ll remove the tarp and your helicopter should be able to see them. Get your people out here fast! I’m going in to get my friends.”

  “Don’t go…”

  I hung up on him.

  Screw you, I thought.

  I quickly took off the tarp, then I went over and turned the generator back on. I didn’t want them to get suspicious.

  The guy was still out cold. I took a breath.

  Time to do it.

  Chapter 42

  They had almost made it. Why had Ludwick chosen that moment to show up? And he had Richard and another man with him. It was early morning. Despite the situation, it was somewhat comforting to Sabrina to get a sense of the time of day. She had been feeling totally disoriented not knowing if it was day or night.

  “Well well,” said Ludwick. “Once again I arrive in the nick of time. The fact that you almost escaped means that I really have to get myself some smarter men. I hope you did some serious damage to them. They deserve it.”

  Sabrina and Mo said nothing.

  “Dickie, you go down and check out the situation, then I will herd these girls down.”

  After getting the “all clear” from Richard, Ludwick motioned the two women and four teenagers to go back down the stairs. After getting them situated back in their jail-cell room, Richard said, “I bet you’re surprised to see me back here.”

  Again, nobody said anything.

  “It just so happens,” began Ludwick, “that we’ve had to move up the timetable. We’re moving you all out today. It seems that your boyfriend somehow escaped his rendezvous with death and now he’s causing all kinds of trouble.”

  Del was alive! Sabrina tried hard not to show her jubilation on her face. She knew that Mo was wanting to say, “I told you so.”

  “He also had that little girl with him, which has added a whole level of complication.”

  “Emma’s alive?” cried Lucy.

  “I wouldn’t be so happy,” said Richard. “She’s the lucky one. You’re the ones on your way to a life of hell.”

  “Anyway,” said Ludwick, “we’re flying all of you out of here today.” He looked at his watch. “In just about four hours, you’ll be winging your way into a whole new life. We have a landing strip just a couple of miles away. Once you people are gone, I can go back and fix the problems that Dickie here started.”

  Richard seemed to take offense at that.

  “Hold on. I’m responsible for the adults, but you are responsible for the girls.”

  “Which wouldn’t have been an issue if you hadn’t kidnapped your ex-wife. That’s what started the ball rolling. These girls would have been in and out of here and nobody would have been the wiser.” He gave Richard a stare. “You are walking on thin ice, so I suggest you keep your accusations to yourself.”

  The men backed out of the room and Sabrina heard the door lock once again.

  They had come so close to escaping their prison. There was no way Del could find them in less than four hours.

  It was all over for them.

  *****

  There were going to be no meals, which meant no chance of escape. When they came for them Sabrina knew it was going to be with a show of force. There were six of them now. Granted, some of the men were a little worse for wear, but it didn’t matter. They would make sure Sabrina and Mo were totally incapacitated before transporting them.

  The only good bits of news were that Del and the other girl were okay. It filled her with a great relief to know that Del had escaped death. Now, if only she could.

  Her life hadn’t been an easy one. After a relatively normal childhood, marrying into an abusive relationship started the downward spiral, which eventually led to her six years in prison. Becoming a bestselling author was her rebirth, but meeting Del was her redemption in life. Now she was about to lose him, and everything that was good.

  Mo interrupted her reflection. “Do you see any way out of this?

  “No.”

  “Didn’t think so. I’m not one to blame others, but this is all Peep’s fault. If she hadn’t chosen to lie about things back when she killed her father, none of this would have happened. Lies always have a way of coming back and biting you in the ass. In this case, it bit us all in our asses.”

  They sat in relative silence for a couple of hours. Sabrina realized how hungry she was when she smelled bacon cooking.

  Suddenly, the lights went out. It was pitch black in the room. One of the girls started whimpering. Sabrina heard Lucy try to comfort her. The darkness lasted three or four minutes, then the lights came back on. A moment later, the door burst open and Ludwick and Richard stood in the doorway, a third man behind them. Sabrina figured they had learned that knocking didn’t work out so well for them. The surprise approach was obviously much more effective.

  “Gather your belongings, girls,” said Richard. “Oh wait. You don’t have any belongings.” He seemed to get a kick out of his little joke. It made Sabrina want to kill him slowly and painfully.

  “Get to your feet,” said Ludwick. “You’re going for a plane ride.”

  At that moment, a shot rang out and Sabrina heard a scream.

  Chapter 43

  I opened the hatch. I was expecting a ladder, but there were actual stairs, about fifteen of them. I had a feeling that a lot of money had been put into this operation. Nobody was waiting for me at the bottom, so I started down the stairs and closed the hatch behind me. The place kind of smelled like a locker room. The aroma of body odor was pretty pungent. Whatever filtration system they had probably just couldn’t keep up.

  I had my gun out. I doubted if there were that many of Ludwick’s men down there, but even one with a gun was too many.

  “I think that’s the first time that generator has gone out,” said a voice from a room to the left of the bottom of the stairs. “What was it?”

  Besides the room on the left, there was a doorway on the right. The one on the left had to be the kitchen. It was right under the pipe with the bacon smell. That meant that the main area was probably through the doorway on the right. So my first step was to take care of whomever was in the kitchen.

  I reached the bottom, took a breath, and turned the corner. The room was about 15 x 15, with a smaller room—probably a bathroom—on the far side. The room I was in was a full kitchen with a fridge, a stove, a sink, cabinets, and a table. It was pretty messy. There was one person in the room and he was sitting at the table eating some eggs and, of course, bacon. He took one look at me and jumped up, badly banging his knee on the table. That slowed him down. He had just taken a bit of food, so his mouth was full, preventing a full throttle yell. I jumped at him and slammed the butt of my gun against his head. He went down to the floor dazed.

  I was just deciding whether to hit him again—it was hard for me emotionally to hit someone who was already down—when someone came running in from the other room. This time I didn’t have a choice. I aimed my gun and fired, hitting him in the chest. He let out a scream and slumped to the ground.

  The noise of the gun in the enclosed space was tremendous and I was left with ringing ears.

  I looked down at the guy I had clobbered with my gun. He was still woozy.

  “Don’t fucking move,” I said.

  I heard a lot of movement and yelling in the other room and then a crash. I went through the doorway ready to shoot.

  No need.

  There were actually two rooms. The first r
oom was sort of a combination living room and bedroom for Ludwick’s men. The door to the second room was partially open and I could see the faces of some girls. Emma’s friends. The two I cared about, however, were right in front of me in the first room, and Sabrina was pounding on someone. That someone was Ludwick.

  A table was in pieces, the reason obvious. Richard was lying on his back on top of it. He was holding his mouth and blood was streaming down his chin. A quick read of the situation told me that I must have come in just as Ludwick and friends had opened the door to the back room. When I shot the guy, Sabrina and Mo must have made their move.

  A third man was with them, still standing. He had turned toward me and was pulling out a gun, so I shot him. My hand was shaking so much it actually took three shots to hit him. Luckily, I didn’t kill my friends in the process. He got off one shot, which went wild. From the kitchen I heard a scream. I learned later that his shot hit the man I had clobbered when I first came in. That guy would live. This man with the gun, however, wasn’t so lucky. My third shot got him in the center of his chest. He was dead before he hit the ground.

  Ludwick and Richard weren’t doing too well. Sabrina was pounding on Ludwick and Mo was changing the contours of Richard’s face. Permanently. Ludwick was up against the wall trying to fight off Sabrina, but he was fighting a losing battle. The battle ended for good when Sabrina kneed him in the groin. He dropped to the floor and threw up, holding his hands over his groin. I think he knew it wasn’t going to make a difference.

  Sabrina saw me and ran into my arms. Tears were running down both our faces. We kissed each other repeatedly. I’m not sure our lips even touched. We were just kissing every inch of face we could find. And then we hugged, and as we did I looked over and saw Mo crawling off Richard. He wasn’t moving.