A Trace of Death (A Keri Locke Mystery--Book #1)

by Pierce, Blake

  When she looked around, he was nowhere in sight.

  Oh God, it didn’t work. He’s staying with her. He’s going to kill her.

  She had to do something.

  “Hey, Alan,” she yelled, “what’s wrong? You giving up? Can’t handle a real woman? Don’t know what to do unless they’re tied down? I guess we’re seeing your True Self now. And it looks like he’s a wuss.”

  She stood there, waiting for some response, praying for some kind of reaction. Nothing. He wasn’t biting.

  And then he was in the doorway. He leaned against it for support. He’d taken off his T-shirt and tied it around his leg wound. There was nothing he could do about his face, which was a mask of blood on the left side and mostly clean on the right. He looked like Halloween come to life.

  He stumbled after her, lumbering slowly but with purpose. She staggered ahead of him toward the barn, ignoring her shoulder and her ribs and her face, all of which throbbed remorselessly. When she reached the barn she turned around again.

  “Come on, lover,” she shouted, “don’t you want me? You can’t make me scream if you can’t catch me. I thought you were supposed to be in charge, big boy. But you seem like a little weakling to me.”

  Pachanga stopped for second beside an old sedan, resting his arm on it to keep from falling. Keri thought he was going to say something. Instead, he pulled a gun—her gun—out from the back of his waistband and aimed it at her.

  That must have been what took him so long to come out of the silo. He’d gone back for her gun. He aimed it at her and fired. She darted safely behind the side of the barn and rushed inside. She got into the pickup truck and fumbled for the key before finally managing to shove it in the ignition. She turned it and felt a wave of relief as it roared to life.

  Her left arm was mostly useless so she had to reach across her body to close the door. She put the car in drive, hit the accelerator, and smashed thought the back wall of the barn in the direction she’d last seen Pachanga.

  She’d hoped he was close enough that she could just run him over. But he was moving slowly and was still a good thirty yards away. She steered directly at him and punched the gas hard.

  Pachanga lifted her gun and started firing. The first shot shattered the windshield. Keri ducked but kept driving. She heard more shots but couldn’t tell where they went. Then there was a loud pop and she knew a bullet had hit one of the tires. She felt the truck careen to the right toward the creek bed, then roll over. She lost track of how many times it rolled before coming to a stop.

  Keri tried to orient herself. Eventually she figured out that the truck had landed on the driver’s side and Keri was lying on the door. She could see the blue sky through the passenger window.

  She had no idea if the pain she felt was from new injuries she’d sustained in the crash or old ones. It all blended together. She pulled herself up so that she was upright, standing on the driver’s side door. She reached for the passenger window but something yanked her back. She looked down and saw her foot was trapped under the brake pedal. She tried to wriggle herself free but without the use of her left arm, it was impossible. She was trapped.

  Suddenly Pachanga’s face appeared in the open passenger window. Before Keri could react, he swung a chain around her neck, twisted, and yanked it tight. Keri gasped for breath. She tried to slump down but he yanked her up again.

  “I thought about using the gun but decided this would be more fun,” he said, unconcerned about the loose chunk of his cheek that flapped when he spoke.

  Keri tried to speak, hoping that if she could bait him, he’d drop the chain and try to come in the truck after her. But no words came out.

  “You’re done talking, ma’am,” Pachanga growled, all pretense of charm now gone. “You’ll be unconscious in a few more seconds. And then I’m taking you back to Home Base where I’m going to do things to you that will make you wish you were dead.”

  Keri tried to get her fingers under the chain but it was too tight. She could feel blackness starting to envelop her. In one futile effort to fight back, she pressed her knee against the steering wheel horn, hoping the blaring would startle him. It didn’t. Still, she pressed on it, her last little bit of rebellion.

  The blue sky turned gray and everything went tingly. The light faded. Keri’s eyelids fluttered. Out of the corner of her eye, she thought she saw the shadow of a bird pass overhead. She heard a grunt. And then there was only blackness.

  *

  When Keri came to, she realized she must have only been out very briefly. Her knee was still on the horn. The pressure on her neck was gone. In fact, the chain hung loosely and she was able to pull it off. She heard noises above but couldn’t identify them.

  And then suddenly two bodies slammed onto the truck above her. Pachanga was on the bottom, squirming to get free. But someone was top of him, pinning him down and repeatedly punching him with blows to the face, the body, the face again.

  It was Ray.

  He continued to punch until Pachanga lay still. His head slumped to the side and smushed against the truck’s rear window. He was unconscious.

  Ray stood up, stared at the man below him, then kicked him in the stomach. Pachanga remained silent.

  Ray looked down into the cab of the truck at Keri.

  “You okay?” he asked.

  “I’ve been better,” she replied, her voice raw and raspy.

  “I told you to wait for me,” he said sternly but with a smile playing at his lips. Keri was about to respond when a loud scream pierced the air.

  “It’s Ashley. She’s tied to some kind of rack in that silo. It’s going to rip her limbs off. You’ve got to get to her now!”

  “What about this guy?” he asked, nodding at Pachanga.

  “I don’t think he’s going to be much trouble. Just get to Ashley. Now! I’m okay here.”

  Ray nodded and disappeared from view.

  Keri slumped to the bottom of the cab and closed her eyes.

  A few minutes later, Ashley’s screams finally stopped. Ray had gotten to her.

  Keri slowly opened her eyes. The world rushed back in and with it, all the pain. She tried to shut it out by focusing her attention on getting her foot free from under the car brake. It took a minute but she was able to ease it out. She pulled herself up, preparing for the next big task—climbing out of the truck. She looked up, searching for the best handholds to grab. Immediately she saw that something was wrong.

  Pachanga was gone.

  Trying to stay calm, Keri wedged her body against the back window of the cab and put her feet on the dashboard, creating enough tension to inch her way up. Eventually, she got high enough to hook her right arm around the passenger side view mirror. Her left arm still lay limp at her side so she stepped onto the steering wheel and pushed off while she yanked on the mirror. The combined force got the upper half of her body out of the truck. She looked around.

  In the distance she saw Pachanga limping clumsily toward the silo. He was almost to the door. In his right hand was Keri’s gun.

  She tried to shout out but her voice was still hoarse from being strangled.

  He disappeared inside. Five endless seconds later, a gunshot rang through the air.

  Keri wriggled her lower half out of the truck and got to her feet. She ran toward the silo, ignoring every throbbing part of her body, ignoring the fact that even breathing was difficult.

  As she ran by the sedan that Pachanga had stopped to lean on, she saw a crowbar in the brown grass by the trunk. She bent down, clutched it in her working right hand, and continued toward the silo.

  When she approached the open door, she wanted to burst in but forced herself to take it slow. Remembering the security camera, she looked around and saw it perched on an exposed beam, facing away from her location.

  She hurried around behind the silo, hoping that the back door Pachanga had left open earlier was still ajar. It was. She stole a quick look inside.

  It was bad.

>   Ray sat slumped against the wall, blood seeping from a wound in his gut. She couldn’t tell if he was alive or dead.

  He had clearly freed Ashley but now Pachanga was strapping her back onto the table. She was fighting desperately but losing the battle. He had all her limbs but her right leg strapped down. The gun was nestled in his waistband.

  Keri stepped forward, crowbar in hand. Ashley noticed and glanced involuntarily in her direction. Pachanga saw it too and knew something was wrong.

  He spun around and pulled the gun out. Keri was still four feet away, too far to lunge at him. He grinned, making the same calculation.

  “You are just full of surprises,” he muttered, a ghastly smile spreading across his ruined face. “We are going to have so much fun toge—”

  With her free leg, Ashley kicked Pachanga directly where he’d been shot in the thigh. He gasped and bent over in pain.

  Keri stepped forward immediately, pulled the crowbar back above her head, and then brought the curved end down fast and hard on the top of Alan Jack Pachanga’s skull.

  He dropped to his knees.

  In that moment, Keri knew she could stop, that he would pass out. That it was over.

  But she couldn’t stop.

  She thought of Evie. Of all the monsters like this in the world. Of the scumbag lawyers. Of this man getting out somehow, someday.

  And she could not allow that to happen.

  She raised the crowbar high, and he looked up at her and grinned, blood seeping from his mouth.

  “You won’t do it,” he muttered.

  She brought it down with every ounce of strength she had left—and it lodged in his skull.

  Pachanga remained there motionless for several seconds, then collapsed to the floor. Keri’s gun fell from his hand and rested at Keri’s feet. She picked it up and kept it aimed at him as she rolled him over with her foot. He stared up at her with his one empty azure blue eye.

  Alan Jack Pachanga was dead.

  Keri heard the soft crying from across the room and she realized something even more startling.

  Ashley Penn was alive.

  It was over.

  CHAPTER THIRTY ONE

  Thursday

  Mid-morning

  Keri lay awake in bed, enjoying the solitude. She knew there would be visitors later but for now she had the room to herself. She tried to piece together the last few days through the haze of sleep and pain medication.

  Because Ray Sands had better foresight than Keri, he had called for backup on his way out to the farm. The first officers had arrived fifteen minutes after Keri killed Pachanga and the farm was swarming with cops and EMTs five minutes after that. After stabilizing Ray, who was clinging to life, they got everyone to nearby Palmdale Regional Medical Center less than ten minutes later.

  Keri had refused to undergo surgery on her collarbone until doctors informed her that Ray was in surgery himself. He’d lost a lot of blood but they were hopeful he’d pull through.

  Most of Wednesday was a blur. She drifted in and out of consciousness but stayed awake long enough to learn that Ray was in serious but stable condition. He was in the ICU. Ashley had a fractured left wrist, a shattered tibia, a cracked coccyx, and a concussion, all from her fall. She also had a dislocated left shoulder as a result of Pachanga’s rack device. She was supposedly going to recover from all of them.

  For her part, Keri’s left arm was in a sling. The doctors said her collarbone was a clean break and that she’d recover in six to eight weeks. She had a cushioned mask on her face, much like the one Ray used in his Olympic boxing days. It was designed to protect her orbital bone from any further damage. She’d have to wear it for at least another week. Her neck was in a brace to protect the muscles that had been strained by the chain. There was nothing they could really do about her broken ribs except pad the area. She had multiple other scrapes and bruises, as well as a concussion of her own. But it all seemed minor in comparison to what had happened to the other two.

  A nurse walked in, pushing someone in a wheelchair.

  “You have a visitor,” she said.

  Keri couldn’t see who it was while lying down so she pushed the button on her remote to raise her to a seated position.

  She was surprised to see that it was Ashley.

  Ashley rolled close, then sat there for a while, clearly unsure what to say.

  Keri decided to break the ice.

  “Looks like it’s going to be a while before you’re surfing again.”

  Ashley’s face brightened at the thought.

  “Yeah,” she agreed. “But the doctors say I will eventually get back on the board.”

  “I’m glad, Ashley.”

  “I just wanted to…you know…um, you saved my life,” she said, tears welling up in her eyes. “I don’t really know how to thank you for that.” She wiped away the tears with her good hand.

  “I know a way you can thank me. Make it matter. Don’t let this be a wasted opportunity. You’re a teenager and every teenager takes risks. I get that. But you were headed down a dangerous road, Ashley. I’ve seen lots of girls take the path you were on and not come back. You have a good life. Not a perfect one but a good one. You’re smart. You’re tough. You have friends. You have a bed to sleep in each night and a mother who would fight off wolves for you. A lot of kids can’t say that. And now you’ve got a fresh start. Please don’t waste it.”

  Ashley nodded. A hug felt appropriate but in their conditions neither was up for it, so smiles had to do. In those smiles, they both said more than they ever could with words. This ordeal had bonded them, a bond Keri sensed would last for life. She would check up on Ashley down the road, and Ashley would stay in touch with her. She knew it.

  After the nurse wheeled her away, Keri could not help but think of the other girl she had rescued: Susan Granger.

  She summoned a nurse, who helped her call the group home where Susan had been placed. Susan sounded okay, even upbeat. It seemed as if her hearing the news of Ashley’s rescue somehow gave her hope for the future, too. Bad guys, she was learning, were not all-powerful after all.

  Susan agreed to give Keri another few days before insisting on an in-person visit. Apparently being hospitalized with multiple injuries was a good enough excuse to get a rain check.

  About an hour later, Lieutenant Cole Hillman came into the room. Beside him stood Reena Beecher, captain of the entire West LA Division. She was a tall, sinewy woman in her mid-fifties. She had sharp features accentuated by deep lines caused by years of dealing with the worst of humanity. Her blackish-gray hair was tied back in a tight bun. Keri had seen her in the halls but they’d never spoken before. Beecher walked over to the bed.

  “How are you feeling, Detective?” she asked.

  “Not too bad, Captain. Give me a week and I’ll be back on duty.”

  Beecher chuckled softly.

  “Well, we may give you a little longer than that. But I appreciate the attitude. Before the day gets crazy, I just wanted to thank you for your diligence and hard work. If it wasn’t for you, Ashley Penn would almost certainly be dead and no one would even be looking for her.”

  “Thank you, ma’am,” Keri said, catching Hillman’s annoyed expression out of the corner of her eye.

  “However, in the future, you would do well to more fully read in your superiors on what you’re doing. I’ll be honest—if not for the high-profile nature of this case, you’d be on suspension right now. You understand what I’m saying? No more lone wolf stuff. You’ve got a partner and a force behind you. Use them. Got it?”

  “Yes ma’am. How is my partner, do you know?”

  “I’ll let Lieutenant Hillman catch you up—on everything.” She smiled tightly, patted Keri on the hand, and left the room. Hillman took a seat in the chair in the corner of the room.

  “What does all that mean?” Keri asked him. “Catch me up on everything? The day is going to get crazy?”

  Hillman sighed deeply.

  “Fir
st, Ray is doing better. They’ve been keeping him sedated but they’re going to wake him up later this afternoon. You don’t have to ask—I’ve already made accommodations for you to be there. As to the craziness the captain mentioned, there’s a press conference scheduled for later today in front of the hospital. The mayor will be there, along with the Penns, Beecher, myself, Chief Donald, and reps from the Sheriff, the FBI, Palmdale PD—and, of course, you.”

  “Me? I don’t want to be there, sir.”

  “I know. Frankly, neither do I. But we don’t really have a choice. You’ll be asked to say a few words. You won’t have to answer any questions—ongoing investigation and all. Mostly you’ll have to sit in a wheelchair for an hour, listening to important people prattle on. Don’t ask me to get out of it. It’s an order.”

  “Yes sir,” Keri said reluctantly. She didn’t yet have the required strength to fight back. “Speaking of the investigation, do you know where we’re at?”

  “Payton Penn is being held at Twin Towers. With all the evidence they found at his cabin, not even Jackson Cave can bail him out. He’ll probably go on trial in the spring. The search of Pachanga’s place turned up a lot of evidence of previous abductions. Ashley Penn told them to check the top of the silo. Apparently some of his victims wrote their names on the interior walls. Lots of families are going to get closure this week. They also found a laptop in his farmhouse but so far no one has been able to crack his password. Edgerton’s working on it now. In my opinion, he’s better than anyone the Feds have. So that’s where things stand. I recommend you get some sleep before the press conference.”

  He got up and went to leave and Keri thought he would go without saying goodbye.

  But then he stopped in the doorway, his back to her.

  Without turning around, he muttered, reluctantly: “Damn good work, kid.”

  Then, without another word, he walked away.

  Those few words meant more to Keri than she could say.