Last to Die: A gripping psychological thriller not for the faint hearted

by Arlene Hunt

  ‘Alive?’

  ‘I think so.’

  ‘Jessie?’

  ‘I don’t know, she’d no ID on her, but initial reports reckon she’s in her thirties.’

  ‘Where’s this hospital?’

  ‘Next town over.’

  ‘Well, get in.’

  A large woman in a police uniform came out onto the steps.

  ‘Mr Conway? Mr Conway sir, I’m going to need you to come back here and give a proper statement. Sir?’

  Mike jumped into the passenger seat.

  ‘Mr Conway!’ the officer called.

  ‘Ma’am, I’ll be at the hospital,’ Mike yelled out of the window. ‘You send someone that way and I’ll write out and sign any damn thing you like!’ He turned to Ace. ‘What the hell are you waiting for? Drive. Drive!’

  Ace slammed the truck into reverse, braked, spun the wheel and tore out of there, leaving a cloud of dust in his wake.

  73

  At first the pain was intense and shocking. She felt movements, or thought she did but could not be one hundred percent sure. Only the pain was real, but after a while even that dulled.

  Jessie floated, swimming in and out of the world. She had many dreams and heard voices, some close, others distant and fading. She thought she heard her own name being called, but when she tried to locate the caller she drifted through space and time until she was more lost than before.

  Pain entered and left as if on a whim. Between the jolts she saw faces, people she knew, talking over her. She saw her parents in the distance, standing hip to hip under a chestnut tree, sunlight dazzling behind them. She walked towards them but never gained an inch and then they too began to shimmer and fade.

  ‘I want to come with you,’ she said, beginning to cry softly. ‘I’m here, I’m here.’

  When Jessie opened her eyes Mike was the first person she saw. He was seated ramrod straight by a window, staring out into space. Her tongue was so swollen it scraped against her teeth when she tried to say his name. She swallowed painfully and tried again.

  ‘Mike.’

  She had barely whispered it, but he turned to her and broke into a smile. He looked exhausted and gaunt. The skin seemed to hang from his cheekbones like felt.

  ‘Hello there.’

  She tried to make sense of her thoughts; they jumbled about too freely to catch. Finally, she managed to snag one.

  ‘You’re here.’

  ‘Yep,’ Mike said. ‘I’m here. I am right here and I am going nowhere.’

  She tried to understand how this was possible. But thinking made her head hurt and after a while she drifted back to sleep again.

  The next time she woke she was a little more lucid. Mike was still there.

  ‘Hey lady,’ he said.

  She began to cry and could not stop. She felt Mike’s hands on her forehead.

  ‘It’s okay, it’s okay.’

  ‘I … how are you here?’

  ‘We were here when you were found, next town over. Ace figured out who had you.’

  Jessie furrowed her brow. The faint sound she thought she heard when she first opened her eyes returned.

  ‘You were found in the woods, by a river. Don’t you remember any of it?’

  ‘I … remember climbing. There was a man … he had a beard.’

  ‘His name is Caleb Switch.’

  She digested this news, or tried to do so. Knowing what he was called made little or no impact. So he had a name. What did that change? She wondered why she felt so light-headed. Before she could figure it out she was gone again.

  She woke up a while later hearing muffled voices. Something told her to keep still. She listened. She identified Mike’s voice even though he was speaking very softly. His tone, however, was furious.

  ‘I already told you I don’t know where he is, I already told you. He drove off out of here and didn’t tell me where he was going.’

  ‘He’s a witness. He can’t just drive off when it suits him.’

  ‘He’s gone, that’s it.’

  She couldn’t make out the next part of the conversation. Then she heard a male voice she didn’t recognise say, ‘You need to make a formal statement, and to do that you’ve got to go back to the station…’

  ‘I am going nowhere. You hear me?’

  ‘Sir—’

  ‘Keep your voice down.’

  More mumbling, fierce and protracted, then … ‘I don’t give a shit. If it weren’t for Ace, they wouldn’t even know where to start looking. He has enough information to find this guy if he’d get off his ass and look.’

  ‘She can give us an eye-witness description.’

  ‘Are you deaf? Don’t you think she’s been through enough?’

  Jessie shifted and managed to raise her head. Mike and a man in uniform were standing at the door to her room.

  ‘Mike?’

  Mike turned in her direction. ‘Jessie?’

  ‘Please … let him in.’

  ‘You don’t have to talk to anyone. I told them everything I know about where you were held.’ Mike came to her and took her hand in his. At his touch Jessie began to weep. She did not know why, only that she could not stop.

  ‘I will not let anything happen to you,’ Mike said, speaking with such fierceness his voice broke. ‘I promise you.’

  Jessie felt his hand tighten on hers. She opened her eyes again, her vision blurred from tears. ‘Get the Sheriff.’

  ‘Sweetheart, all of that can wait.’

  ‘You don’t understand.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘If he’s out there, I’m not safe. None of us are.’

  74

  Ace left the hospital parking lot and used the directions given to him by a shaken Everett Wilson, whom he had spoken with in the waiting room of the hospital. He drove directly to the camping ground where the Wilsons had stayed on their fishing trip.

  He unloaded Captain from the back of the truck and filled a small rucksack with water and provisions. He collected his rifle from the rack and set off, following the river upstream.

  He hiked fast and efficiently, making sure to keep his ears and eyes open for any sign of activity. By the time he reached where Everett and his son had been fishing, it was late afternoon and the river looked silver in the light. He allowed Captain to drink river water and rest a little while he scouted the banks near where Jessie was found and he thought about how this expedition was likely to end.

  Satisfied with his direction, he tied a long line to Captain. He opened the rucksack and removed the item of clothing he had taken from Caleb Switch’s cabin and held it out for Captain to scent. ‘Seek,’ he said.

  It took less time than he had expected. At exactly five past four Captain signed and Ace located a badly wounded man dragging his broken body behind him through the undergrowth about two miles east of the river.

  The crawling man stopped moving when Captain barked behind him. He leaned on his elbows and rolled over onto his side.

  Ace reined Captain back and stood staring at the man. His face was black and blue, with scratches all over. One of his eyes was bloodied and torn, sightless in a broken socket.

  ‘You Caleb Switch?’ Ace asked, sticking a cigarette into his mouth and lighting it.

  The man hissed air through his cracked lips.

  ‘You Switch or ain’t you?’

  ‘How did you find me?’

  ‘Captain here never misses.’

  ‘A dog.’ Caleb managed to inject as much venom into two words as brevity would allow.

  ‘Yeah,’ said Ace, ‘a dog.’

  Caleb coughed, turned his head and stared at the sky through the canopy of leaves. ‘I don’t care for dogs.’

  ‘I don’t care for sickos.’

  ‘That what you think I am?’

  ‘Don’t matter what I think.’

  ‘So what now,’ he rolled his eye in Ace’s direction. ‘You going to bring me in, dogman?’

  Ace walked away from him a safe
distance and tied Captain to the base of a tree. When he returned he lifted his rifle and pointed it at the broken man.

  ‘You goin’ to shoot an unarmed man?’ Caleb asked. He had a tinge of incredulity to his voice, but no fear, Ace noticed, nothing remotely like fear. He probably didn’t even know what fear was. Ace knew then, without a shadow of a doubt, what he was dealing with.

  ‘Seems the humane thing to do,’ Ace said, and fired.

  75

  Jessie drank a cup of coffee and watched her husband work through the window of the kitchen. He was bare-chested and the sheen of sweat on his skin emphasised his muscles as he worked, repairing the roof of the barn that had been damaged by high winds during a sudden summer storm. She thought of how lucky it was that she could be here at this moment, present. In small private moments like this she marvelled at the grace she had been given.

  It had been a tough few months for her as she recovered from her ordeal. Her arm, finally out of the cast, was still sore and weak and ached when she overdid it. Some nights she had nightmares so bad she shook until her teeth rattled. Yet somehow, despite her ordeal, or maybe because of it, she had found an inner peace again, a little place she could retreat to and take solace in being alive.

  Caleb Switch had not been found. At first, this news had terrified her and she feared him coming to finish the job he had started. That was until Ace had come early to the hospital for a visit one day and told her that she was to no longer worry about such a possibility.

  ‘I don’t understand,’ Jessie had replied.

  ‘He won’t be troubling you.’

  ‘Have they found him?’

  ‘No, and they most likely won’t.’

  She searched his thin face. The realisation of what he was telling her was a little time coming but when it did she began to cry; great wracking sobs that choked her.

  ‘Oh Ace, no.’

  ‘It’s done.’

  Ace made no move to comfort her. He sat with his head bowed, his hands dangling between his legs.

  When she finally got a hold of herself he said, ‘I know everything is on you now. You decide to tell the police, I want you to know that I’m okay with that.’

  Jessie looked at his bowed head. ‘Ace look at me.’

  He lifted his head.

  ‘I had this moment once,’ Jessie paused, trying to find her voice, trying to find a way to convey to him her emotional state. ‘A long time ago I had a chance to rid this world of a man who … who was like this man you found. I had a choice and I chose the one I chose. I’m not sorry, I wasn’t then and I’m not sorry now.’

  Ace stared at her, saying nothing.

  ‘I wanted him to die, Ace.’

  ‘It ain’t nobody’s business what you wanted.’

  Jessie stared at him, feeling fresh tears prickling behind her eyes.

  ‘Truth of it is,’ Ace continued, ‘not every piece of shit deserves to live.’

  ‘You don’t believe that.’

  He smiled then, an unusual, rare thing for Ace.

  ‘Ain’t nobody’s business what I believe neither.’

  That night, Jessie wrapped her good arm around Mike’s waist and slid over onto his body in the dark. Without either of them saying a word, they made love and afterwards lay naked, holding each other tight in the darkness.

  ‘I thought I had lost you,’ Mike said.

  ‘I think I was lost.’

  ‘Are you home now?’

  ‘I’m home,’ Jessie said, laying her head on his shoulder, ‘I’m home.’

  Letter from Arlene

  Hello everyone,

  Thank you for buying Last to Die, and I do so hope you enjoyed the novel.

  This was a slightly strange story to write, in that the plot came to me almost fully formed. Most unusually I knew the beginning and the end before I’d written a single word – it was ‘only’ the middle I had to fill in.

  If you haven’t read Last to Die yet I don’t want to give too much away. Were I to describe it I would tell you what you have before you is a true battle for survival and a test of wills. I have pulled no punches, and no character is above harm.

  When I’m not writing I do a lot (and I mean a lot) of long distance running. I usually run in the Dublin/Wicklow mountains with only my trusty German Shepherd, Archer, for company. It was during one of these runs that Caleb Switch was born. He is one of the scariest villains I have ever created – and I’ve created some doozies.

  An apex hunter, Caleb Switch is strong, capable, intelligent, and utterly without mercy. He blends into his surroundings, he’s the kind of man of whom neighbours would say, ‘Oh him? He just seemed like a regular guy.’

  There is nothing ‘regular’ about Caleb Switch.

  You don’t ever want to meet him in the mountains.

  Not ever.

  Do drop me a line, as I’d enjoy hearing from you. You can catch me on Twitter where I hang out talking books, films (I review both), long distance running, and why German Shepherds are amazing dogs and every runner should have one ;)

  Finally, if you’d like to keep up to date with all my latest releases, just sign up here:

  Arlene Hunt email sign-up link

  Take Care,

  Arlene Hunt

  @arlenehunt

  Acknowledgments

  Well now, this could take a while. Thank you to my readers; without you the whole writing malarkey would seem rather pointless. I appreciate your mails and chats throughout the year and it is always illuminating. Thank you to my friends who keep me sane while I ponder, scribble and wax lyrical, especially Anna, Antonia, Bryan, Billy, Ciara C, Corrina, Jennie, Madeleine, Megan, Sam, Sarah and Tara, Sinéad G; you guys rock and I’d be a bit lost without you. Thank you to Crossfit Ireland for keeping me fit all year; sitting at a computer all day does not lend itself to a lithe physique, believe me. Thank you also to Declan Burke for keeping Irish crime fiction vibrant with Crime Always Pays (crimealwayspays.blogspot.com).

  A huge thank you to Tana French for taking the time to read this novel when it was in poorly printed form. You’re a gem, lady. I owe an enormous debt of gratitude to Kriss Kuss, who kindly let me crash at LYH and who drove through a storm with only a rat on her shoulder and German technology to deliver us safely. Thank you to Dave Kriebel for taking the time to explain various weapons to me in a calm and patient manner. A massive thank you to Mr Mike Treadway and his good lady wife for graciously taking the time to explain stickbows and how to make them, and for teaching me to shoot a foam deer in a single afternoon. Mike is a master craftsman and the visit to his workplace in North Carolina is something I will remember forever.

  Thanks also to Maeve and Stephanie of Saltwater Publishing, to John and all at Gill & Macmillan, to David Rudnick for his artistic genius and the quite brilliant Annie Atkins for her photography. Special thanks to Susan Condon for her copy editing skills, and to Brenda O’Hanlon for polishing the manuscript to a high shine. Thanks, as always, to my agent Faith O’Grady for putting up with me.

  And, as always, thank you and much love to my family, to Terry and Tim, and to Jordan. There is only one last person to thank and that’s my husband, Andrew. Without his unwavering support this book might never have seen the light of day. I know no finer person.

  Also by Arlene Hunt

  Vicious Circle

  False Intentions

  Black Sheep

  Missing Presumed Dead

  Undertow

  Blood Money

  Published by Bookouture

  An imprint of StoryFire Ltd.

  23 Sussex Road, Ickenham, UB10 8PN

  United Kingdom

  www.bookouture.com

  Copyright © Arlene Hunt, 2011

  Arlene Hunt has asserted her right to be identified as the author of this work.

  Previously published as The Chosen in the United Kingdom in 2011 by Portnoy Publishing.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored i
n any retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publishers.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organisations, places and events other than those clearly in the public domain, are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.

  ISBN: 978-1-910751-99-2