The Tanner Series - Books 1-11: Tanner - The hit man with a heart
Page 55
“The man was quick. I don’t think that bitch knew what hit her, and she ran out of here like the devil was after her.”
Sara was glad that someone had saved the kids, but she couldn’t figure who it could be, and the throbbing pain in her head was distracting.
“What did the man look like?” Sara asked.
“He was a good-looking guy, dark hair, built, but not muscular. You know, he just had that look, like he was in shape. Oh yeah, and his eyes, he had some serious eyes.”
Cameron looked at Sara. “That sounds like the man I saw in the cell next to you. Tanner you said his name was?”
“Yes, that was Tanner, but Tanner must have drowned. You saw that building. I barely made it out before the water covered it, and I had a key.”
“Yeah, so maybe it’s another of the bank robbers. But if that were true, they wouldn’t have saved the kids, and if it was a lawman, he would have stuck around, or taken the kids into custody.”
Sara knew Cameron was right, but even if Tanner had survived, the man would never risk himself to save anyone else. He was a dirtbag that killed for money.
“Mrs. Patton, what did the man do after the deputy left? Did he threaten your daughter and her boyfriend?”
Carol shook her head. “Threaten? No, he saved them from that woman with the gun. After that, he left too.”
That news left Sara convinced that the man wasn’t Tanner. If he had saved the kids, he would have done so only to take the money for himself. And yet, the man’s description did fit Tanner well.
“Do you know where we can find your daughter?” Cameron asked.
Carol didn’t answer; she had become engrossed in her TV show again. Cameron waved a hand in front of her face to catch the attention of her good eye and spoke louder.
“Mrs. Patton, where can we find Amy?”
“She’s in and out, her and that boy.”
“Have you seen her with a large amount of money lately?”
“Hmm? Oh no, but I think she has a job somewhere, you know, after school. She’s in the tenth grade, or maybe she graduated by now, I’m not sure.”
The two women gave up on Carol Patton and went upstairs to look at Amy’s room. They found several bags that indicated recent purchases, but no clue as to where the kids might have gone.
Once they were back in the pickup truck, Cameron passed Sara a bottle of water. Sara used it to swallow the pain reliever Cameron kept in the duffel bag. Sara downed four of the pills and drank half the water.
“I want to go back to the jail. As hard as it is for me to believe that he could be alive, I have to make certain that Tanner is dead.”
“I’ll drop you there, but then I’m going to that farm you told me about.”
“I’ll come with you, but first the jail.”
Cameron reached across the seat and offered her hand.
“I feel like shit for what I did to you. Can you forgive me?”
Sara shook her hand. “You thought I killed your brother; I would have done the same to you if things were reversed.”
Cameron drove toward the jail. When she stopped at a traffic light, she looked over at Sara.
“This Tanner, he did something to you personally, didn’t he?”
“Yes, he killed someone I loved.”
“I figured it was something like that. Leaving him to drown was harsh, but it sounds like he deserved it.”
“I still don’t know why he was in this town in the first place. Before today, I thought he had died recently. I came here because I was tracking a phone, and the phone was in that farmhouse, along with Tanner.”
“These bastards that robbed the bank, they won’t stop until they get that money back. And thanks to the cop they’re working with they’ll know this town, know where to look, so we have to find those kids. Once we do, we’ll follow them and then the thieves will come to us.”
“Wouldn’t that be like using those kids as bait?”
“No,” Cameron said. “They made themselves bait when they took that money instead of turning it in or calling the cops.”
“Maybe, but if they had done that, the thieves would have gotten it back anyway because of the deputy.”
Cameron sighed. “That’s true. What a shitty little town.”
“And this rain doesn’t help. I haven’t been dry since I came here.”
“Reach back in that duffel bag where I grabbed the water, there’s a black sweatshirt in there that will fit you.”
Sara did so, and as Cameron drove along, she changed into it, and delighted an old man who’d caught a view of her in her wet bra.
Cameron chuckled. “Did you see the eyes bulge out of that old bastard’s head? I bet you gave him a boner.”
“It wasn’t intentional, and I would have waited if I had noticed him.”
“Don’t sweat it; he’s probably happier than he’s been in years.”
“You told the chief that you were a bounty hunter, was that true?”
“Hell yes. I track down people like these bank robbers and that Tanner for a living. We’ll find the scum that killed my brother, and if he’s still alive, we’ll find that Tanner too, count on it.”
Sara nodded, while telling herself that Tanner was dead, and his bloated body was locked in a jail cell. But a part of her didn’t believe it. She knew that if anyone could have escaped that cell, it would be Tanner.
“A good-looking guy, dark hair, built, but not muscular, and his eyes, he had some serious eyes.”
That was what Carol Patton had said the man who saved her daughter looked like, and even before she reached the jail, Sara knew, she knew.
The son of a bitch is still alive, and after today, he won’t rest until I’m dead.
She had Tanner at her mercy earlier and he escaped, then she left him to drown and he somehow survived.
When they met again, she would have to kill him outright and forget her fantasies of vengeful torture. The man was too dangerous for such risk.
At their next meeting, the tricky bastard would do his best to kill her, but she would kill the killer. She had promised that on her lover’s grave and it was a promise she meant to keep.
One way or another, Tanner would die.
176
Bye-Bye, Bitch
Lydia was tempted to shoot the smirk off Sherry’s face, but the pleasure of killing her had to go to Tyler. Once he murdered her, Lydia could be certain he was hers.
“It looks like the law lady can’t even handle a couple of teenagers,” Sherry said.
“I told you, it was that guy, Tanner. Somehow he got out of that cell.”
Tyler paced about the kitchen for a moment, then he kicked in the cabinet door beneath the sink, revealing the drainpipe, and sending a can of sink cleanser bouncing off the back wall.
“I should have shot him when I had the chance. And we still don’t have the money.”
Lydia was leaning back against the refrigerator and staring at Tyler.
“I’ll find those kids. This is a small town and there are only so many places they can be.”
A look of disgust crossed Tyler’s face as he considered something.
“What if Tanner took the money from them?”
“He didn’t. I doubled back and watched him leave the house. His hands were empty.”
“If you were watching, why didn’t you follow the kids?”
“I couldn’t. There wasn’t any place to hide the chief’s vehicle, so I figured the kids had run off with the money. Once I saw Tanner walk down the stairs empty-handed, I knew the kids had escaped with the cash, so I left before Tanner spotted me. I will find those kids, but in the meantime, we need to see to that other problem.”
After saying that last part, Lydia shifted her eyes toward Sherry.
Sherry was seated at the table, where she was drinking beer and smoking a cigarette.
Tyler sent Lydia a slight nod, telling her that he understood. As he began talking, he eased his way around behind Sherry.<
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“You have to get back to that jail soon, don’t you?”
Lydia was watching him, waiting to see what he’d do. It took her a second to realize he’d asked her a question.
“Oh yeah, by now the Feds are here and I have to get back there and bullshit them.”
Sherry shook her head. “That won’t work. If Tanner got free, so did the woman, and maybe he won’t talk, but she will, and she knows that you’re working with us.”
“You didn’t see those two, there’s no love lost there. Tanner got out, yeah, but I bet he let Sara Blake drown.”
Sherry rolled her eyes. “You thought Tanner drowned. You believed this place wasn’t being used. And you thought you could get back the money from those kids. Tell me something, Lydia, do you ever get tired of being wrong?”
“I’m not burned yet. If I was, the Feds would be here right now. That’s why I think Blake is dead. I’ll call around and see if anybody has spotted those kids. I’ll also put out an alert; the drug angle can still work.”
“It can,” Tyler agreed. “But only if we kill them and Tanner too.” As he talked, Tyler had moved directly behind Sherry’s chair and gripped the gun in his waistband.
Lydia watched him with a smile forming on her lips.
“Everyone that needs killing will die,” Tyler said. “We’ll make sure of it, then that money will be all ours.” Tyler freed the gun and aimed it at the back of Sherry’s head.
Lydia couldn’t resist. “Sherry.”
Sherry had been taking a drag off her cigarette; after letting out the smoke, she looked over at Lydia.
“What?”
“Bye-bye, bitch.”
The shot was loud, Tyler’s aim true, and the bullet passed through Lydia’s head, entered the refrigerator, and killed the fan motor inside.
Sherry nearly fell out of her seat as she stood up. Afterwards, she looked back and forth between Tyler and Lydia’s body.
“What the fuck?”
Tyler smiled. “The bitch made plans with me earlier to kill you. She said that it was, ‘Time for a change.’”
“She really thought you were gonna shoot me? That’s what all that ‘bye-bye, bitch’ shit was about?”
Tyler laughed. “Yeah.”
“But why kill her?”
“You were right, she’s burned, and she knows too much about us.”
Sherry studied him. “You fucked her too, didn’t you?”
Tyler nodded. “I nailed her in the car.”
Sherry walked over and spat on Lydia’s corpse.
“Stupid bitch! How’s that for change?”
177
A Fine Day Indeed
Sara and Cameron found the area around the police station to be a hive of activity, as not only the FBI, but also the state police had arrived on the scene.
The only body discovered inside the police station was that of the town’s Chief of Police, Matt McCoy, confirming that Tanner had somehow escaped.
Sara silently marveled at the assassin’s knack for survival. It heightened her awareness of how difficult the task ahead of her was. The man wanted her dead, and when Tanner wanted you dead, you died. Meanwhile, Tanner had lived through multiple encounters against superior odds and forces and had already evaded her once that day.
Add to that the fact that the man was as tricky as they came, and Sara knew she could make no mistakes the next time she dealt with him, not if she wanted to live.
The SAC, or Special Agent in Charge, was a man named Cooper, while the Pennsylvania State Police Captain was named Doyle.
Cooper was a thin man in his forties with a fringe of brown hair, while Doyle was a very fit fifty who had a blond crewcut and a muscular physique, which was pronounced, since his gray uniform shirt was wet and clung to his body.
Both men listened to Sara’s story with great interest, as well as Cameron’s account of what she had witnessed just prior to the area becoming flooded.
Once Cooper confirmed Sara’s status as a former agent, his demeanor toward her changed. She was infamous inside the Bureau, and if Cooper had been ignorant of her past, she knew that he no longer was.
Yes, she had shot her partner, and it wouldn’t be lost on the man that the reason for the shooting was her obsessive pursuit of Tanner. The fact that she was still tracking the man down after leaving the Bureau only made her appear more pathological. Despite that, Cooper was wise enough not to dismiss her, especially when she recounted what had happened at the farm hours earlier.
“It sounds like we need to get to this farm,” Cooper said, and Doyle agreed.
“It’s clear!”
Those words were spoken by Captain Doyle, who insisted that his troopers enter the farmhouse first, while the FBI, Sara, and Cameron stood by.
He had called out from the porch steps but walked over to meet them as they exited their vehicles, which were parked behind Tanner’s pickup truck and the chief’s SUV with the shattered rear side window.
Sara had already remarked over the absence of her car, from where she had left it parked at the end of the driveway. An alert had been put out to locate it.
Cooper spoke to Doyle. “What have we got in there?”
“There’s a deceased Caucasian male wrapped in sheets on the porch there, and inside, on the kitchen floor, is our missing female deputy. It seems our happy foursome is now down to two.”
“Any idea of how long ago they left?”
“It wasn’t long; I’m no coroner, but I’d say that the deputy was killed less than an hour ago.”
“All right, I doubt we’ll get any usable prints off that minivan left at the jail, but we should get some here, and I’ve got a forensic unit en route. Plus, we know from what Ms. Blake overheard that their first names are Tyler and Sherry.”
“Then there’s just one more thing to do,” Doyle said. “I’ll shut this town down tight, no one in or out unless they pass through a checkpoint. We not only have to find the bank robbers, but also those kids, and the sooner the better.”
Cooper moved his team into the barn and out of the rain, where a makeshift table was erected using sawhorses and a thick sheet of plywood.
“What about Tanner?” Sara asked Cooper.
“Your Tanner is half-myth, and the last word I remember hearing about him said that he was dead.”
“He was believed to be dead, yes, but he’s here and I’ve been after him all day.”
“If he’s still in the area, we’ll get him. You said you chased him into the woods earlier; that’s probably where he’s hiding right now. I’ll send people out to look for him.”
“I found him literally hiding in a hole in the ground, an abandoned root cellar. If you’d like, I’ll guide your people to its location, and remember, it appears as if he’s armed, likely with the chief’s gun.”
Cooper smiled. “Your boogeyman Tanner may be armed and dangerous, but he’s still no match for my people, or Captain Doyle’s men. If Tanner is in the area, he’s likely hunkered down out there in those wet woods somewhere, all alone, tired, hungry, and cold.”
Tanner was actually none of those things, as four miles away, he was sandwiched between the lovely naked forms of Brittany and Amber, the two young ladies whose acquaintance he had made the last time he was in town.
They knew him as Romeo. When he showed up on their doorstep, they welcomed him with not only open arms, but also kisses, a home-cooked meal, and the pleasures of their bed.
Brittany was a blonde. She was embraced in Tanner’s right arm, while his left held Amber, whose hair was dark.
Brittany walked her fingers across Tanner’s taut stomach and asked a question.
“Did you hear about the flood caused by the Evansville Lake overflowing?”
“I may have heard something about that.”
“Amber and I went and took a look. The police station is underwater, along with the old firehouse.”
“Were there any cops around?” Tanner asked, and Amber answered.
“For a small town, a lot happens here,” Tanner said.
Brittany’s fingers took a walk south along Tanner’s body and her hand began massaging a sensitive area. When said area responded, Brittany’s head disappeared beneath the blanket.
Amber then stood and placed a foot on either side of Tanner’s chest. He looked up at her, enjoying the view, and she smiled down at him and asked a question.
“Hungry?”
“Starving,” Tanner said, and Amber bent her knees.
Even though he’d been hounded, imprisoned, shot at, threatened with castration, and nearly drowned, Tanner thought the day to be a fine one.
178
Nobody Does It Better
Sara escorted two of Cooper’s agents to the abandoned root cellar, while others searched the surrounding woods.
Her car had been found in the parking lot of a strip mall, but was being held as evidence, so she teamed up with Cameron Ryder to search. They were looking for the bank robbers, Tanner, and also Dean and Amy.
It seemed a possibility that the robbers had fled the area before the town was put on lockdown, because that would be the smart thing to do.
However, although ruthless and in some ways clever, Tyler and Sherry did not seem very smart, or else they wouldn’t have killed Lydia. Dirty or not, Lydia was a cop; that meant that police departments nationwide would hunt them down.
Cameron suggested searching inward from the borders of Ridge Creek and working their way toward the town’s center, where most of the shops were, and Sara agreed.
They covered the outskirts of the community in quick fashion, because they knew the Feds and the state troopers would be performing a more thorough search, such as checking out barns, abandoned buildings, and even storage sheds, like the large one where Cameron had held Sara.