This Fallen Prey

by Kelley Armstrong

  His whole body convulses so fast I'm sure it's a trick. I'm about to pull the trigger when I see Diana beside him, holding the knife, blood dripping from the blade. Wallace's mouth works. Then he topples.

  I kick Wallace as he falls, and then I'm on him. He lies facedown on the ground, my gun to his head. Blood gushes from his side.

  "I stabbed him," Diana says, and she's clutching the weapon in both hands. "I took the knife, and I stabbed him. He--"

  "Get down," I say.

  I look around, but there have been no more shots.

  Brady is gone, and the sniper has stopped shooting.

  That is no coincidence.

  "It's your shooter, isn't it?" I say to Wallace. "You put someone out here to kill him. You paid the council to let you bring in an assassin."

  Wallace gives a ragged chuckle. "You have seen too many movies, my dear. And Oliver was wrong. You're a lousy detective. You picked the wrong--"

  "No, I did not. The minute that gun fired, you grabbed Diana to shield you. You stabbed--"

  I look over sharply to see she's got her jacket off and is wrapping it around her arm.

  "He sliced me good," she says. "You're going to need to give me a few stitches. I'm fine, though. Not that he gave a damn."

  She's right. I saw Wallace's face when he pulled her to shield him. When he stabbed her. When he tried to stab me.

  Backed into a corner, we cannot conceal our true selves. I saw his, and I still don't know exactly what we're dealing with here, but Gregory Wallace is not an innocent man.

  I bind and gag him. Then I leave him where he lies, while Diana takes me to Anders.

  59

  When we arrive, Anders is conscious and struggling to get free from an old hemp rope tying him to a tree. His wrists are bloodied, and as much as I want to carefully tend to his injuries and Diana's, Kenny's situation is a much graver concern.

  Our path takes us past Wallace. Diana offers to stay with him. I don't actually give a damn if anyone stays--he's not escaping those ties and if the cougar finds him and thinks he's a fine dinner, I'm okay with that. But I leave Diana behind, armed with a knife and a whistle.

  When we set out again, Anders says, "Rough day?"

  I'm not sure whether to laugh or cry. I think I do a little of both, and he puts his arm around my shoulders as we walk.

  "Kenny was alive and stable when you left him," he says after I explain. "I'm not going to lie and say he'll be fine, but he was alive and he was stable. Also . . ." He glances over. "What happened to him wasn't your fault."

  "He only came out here to clear his name."

  "No, he comes out here all the time as a member of the militia. Odds are just as good that he could have been shot by this psycho sniper while just doing his job. You don't really feel guilty about him being out here. You feel guilty for thinking he was Brady's accomplice."

  I nod.

  "Lesson one in Rockton?" he says. "Trust no one. Except Eric. Well, trust him to not be a killer or a killer's accomplice. I know he has secrets, but I'm sure you already know those."

  I glance over.

  He shrugs. "I can tell. And I'm never going to push. That's his business. But I know his secret isn't our secret--that we've killed people. If you and I have that in our background, though, anyone could. Even Kenny. He was the most likely suspect for Brady's accomplice. So stop beating yourself up. I'll do whatever I can for him. Hopefully he'll be fine."

  We walk a few more steps, and then he says, "There's more, isn't there? Something else happened out there."

  "The sniper shot someone Eric knew, a hostile we . . ." I swallow. "A hostile we might have helped. It was a misunderstanding. She ran into the forest. And there were others. Hostiles. Eric had to shoot them, and he tried to just wound them and . . . things got worse."

  "Shit." He looks over. "And you?"

  I shrug.

  "Casey . . ."

  "I shot one. Had to. Me or him. You know how--" I stop myself. There's a lightness in my voice. Forced casual, sardonic. You know how it is. You were a soldier. Which is not anything he needs to be reminded of.

  "I do know," he says, brushing his shoulder against mine.

  "I'm sorry. I didn't mean--"

  He cuts me off with a quick embrace as we walk. "I do know. And it sucks every last goddamn time."

  "I'm worried about Eric."

  "I know you are."

  "I'm also worried I may have . . ." I inhale. "He may have seen a side of me I'd rather he didn't."

  "You mean the side that just told Wallace he's a piece of shit who deserves to be carved up and fed to the ravens?"

  "Uh . . . possibly."

  Anders laughs. "If you think Eric would be the least bit surprised by that, you are underestimating the man. You might try to hide that part, but you do a lousy job of it. Sorry. Wallace is alive, and you're doing everything you can to keep him that way until he can face his crimes. That's enough."

  I look at him. "Is it too much? If only I'd killed Brady back in Rockton--"

  "Yeah, don't even go there. You aren't that person. If we'd killed him then, yes, people would still be alive, but we had no way of knowing that, and we were right to suspect the council's story, considering Brady turned out to be innocent."

  "Did he?"

  Anders frowns at me. "You still have questions?"

  Yes. Yes, I do.

  We're halfway to the spot where I left Kenny with Dalton and Jacob when we hear the pound of feet on a nearby path.

  "Brady," I say. "That's . . ."

  When I trail off, Anders reaches into his pack and hands me his whistle. "Go on."

  "No, I should--"

  "You've done what you can for Kenny. I'm reasonably sure even I can't do any more until we get him back to Rockton. That's my real role here--the muscle to help make that happen. If I need a nurse, Eric does a fine job. You go get Brady."

  "It might not be him."

  "It is. Go."

  I take off. As I jog along the path, I think.

  So many questions.

  And maybe, just maybe, an answer.

  But for now, I will only say that I have questions. It seemed logical that the sniper works for Wallace. It might also seem logical that the sniper would stop shooting when Brady--his target--fled.

  But that does not explain the fact that the first bullet was aimed at Wallace. That Wallace instinctively grabbed for a human shield. Would you do that if you'd hired the man firing the gun? Of course not.

  And if you did hire that man, and he saw you being taken captive, would he not turn his rifle on those attacking you? You can't collect payment if your client is dead.

  When Diana and I went to free Anders, we left Wallace bound and gagged. And the sniper never returned to check on him, never returned to free him.

  The sniper is not Wallace's man.

  Yet Wallace is guilty.

  I saw that mask slide from Gregory Wallace's face. I could say it was just the mask of civility falling away, like the hostiles in this forest, stripped of what passes for humanity when they are forced to fight for their lives.

  That is bullshit.

  Strip away my mask of civility, and you get someone who would shoot a man who left her to be beaten to death . . . and then blamed her for it. Someone who would have shot Wallace or Brady--not caring which was innocent--if it saved a friend.

  What I saw in Wallace was more than my brand of darkness. It was evil.

  When faced with danger, he pulled an innocent bystander into the path of the bullet.

  Does that mean Wallace has done what Brady claims?

  He could have. For now, I'll only say that. He is entirely capable of it.

  As for Brady . . .

  A theory. That's what I have. Now I need the man himself.

  60

  It's easy enough to sneak up on Brady. He hasn't transformed into a master woodsman. The problem has always been simply getting close enough to find him in this endless wilderness. O
nce I am, I can hear him, stopped to catch his breath. Those gasps cover my approach. Then I grab his broken wrist, still bound by my handcuff tie. He lets out a shriek, half pain, half surprise.

  When he sees me, he deflates.

  "Oh, come on, Detective," he says. "I'm starting to feel like that guy in Les Miz, chased by the cop who just won't give up, even when he knows the poor guy is innocent."

  "Javert didn't know anything of the sort," I say. "And neither do I."

  "Seriously?" He slumps, shaking his head, like I'm a patrol officer who pulled him over for speeding. Just a pain-in-the-ass cop, wasting the taxpayer's money trying to pin some silly little misdemeanor on him.

  "I'm going to ask you again," I say. "How far do you think you'll get with your hands tied behind your back?"

  "Does it matter?"

  "Sure it does." I walk in front of him, my gun lowered. "A few years ago, I went to a party where they played a game called Would You Rather. It's supposed to be two equally shitty choices. Except the host didn't quite get the point and kept giving choices where there really was no choice at all. Like 'Would you rather take a bullet to the head or die of slow starvation in the forest?' Whatever fate you'd suffer out here is much worse than what your stepfather would do to you."

  "Uh, did you miss the part where he's a fucking psychopath? He didn't shoot those people in the head. He tortured them."

  "Yes, I'm sure being tied up and beaten wasn't--"

  "Tied up and beaten? Is that your idea of torture? He cut them. He burned them. He pulled out their fingernails. Their teeth. He did the kind of things you see in movies, when they're trying to get spies to talk. Only he didn't want these people to talk. He wanted them to scream. To cry. To beg. To break."

  "You got a good look then, at that boy you caught him with."

  A heartbeat's pause before he plows on with, "Yes, yes, I did, Detective."

  "And he molested you as a child."

  A glimmer of relief as I move on, and he nods, "Yes."

  "Tell me about that."

  "What the hell is this? A therapy couch?"

  "No, it's an interrogation room. You have accused your stepfather of molesting you. I've dealt with victims of that. I've had to interview them, lead them through it, and it was a horrible part of my job, but it was necessary to properly prosecute the offenders. So I know the stories. I know all the reactions a victim gives. Go on, Oliver. Convince me."

  He starts to rage that he won't give me the satisfaction. That he won't play this bullshit game. Rage. Deflect. Rant.

  I'm lying, of course. I have dealt with those victims. I have interviewed them. But there is no way in hell that I can tell a real accusation from a false one just by speaking to the accuser. Every response is different. I just want Brady to believe I can do it. He does, and so he says not one word about the abuse. He just rages at me until he finishes with, "You want me to talk about that? Put me in front of a real professional."

  "With a lie detector?"

  "Fuck you. My stepfather is a sadistic bastard, and whatever he did to me pales in comparison to what he did to his other victims."

  I ease back. "I don't know. One could argue otherwise. I'm sure a defense attorney would. Gregory may not have molested you, but turning you into a killer? That's some seriously bad parenting."

  "What? No. He's the killer. He's the one--"

  "Yes, I suspect he is. You both are. Partners in crime, who turned on each other. How did it happen, Oliver? Not how he lured you into it. You're right--that's a story for a therapist, and I don't really care. I'm curious about the schism. The break. How did it come to this? Former partners, each desperately trying to pin the crimes on the other."

  It takes three long seconds for him to say, "What the hell are you talking about?," and with that I know I've hit on the truth. The reason I couldn't pick a side. The solution that makes so much more sense than all the ones they've spouted.

  Not a man trying to steal his stepson's inheritance. Not one trying to shield his wife from her son's horrible crimes. Not a young man who stumbled over his stepfather's horrible crimes.

  Shared crimes. Shared blame. Equally shared? I don't give a damn.

  "I've taken Wallace into custody," I say. "I'm doing the same with you. Eric will fly you both back down south and tie you up in a hotel room and place an anonymous call to the police."

  "Sure, do that," Brady says. "And we'll tell them all about you and your town. Do you think you haven't given us enough information to pass on to the authorities? I know your name, Detective Casey Butler. I know his, Sheriff Eric Dalton. I know the names of a half dozen people in your town. I know I'm in Alaska--I've been here before, and I recognize the terrain. They will track you down and . . ."

  He trails off, and I smile.

  "Can't even finish that threat, can you?" I say. "They'll do what? We've given them two serial killers. You tell them that you were turned in by some secret prison camp in Alaska? Why would they care? And why would you presume they don't already know about us?"

  He blinks at me.

  "Turn around," I say. "And start walking--"

  "Not so fast, Casey," a voice says behind me.

  It's a familiar voice, but on hearing it, my heart skips.

  Not possible. That is not . . .

  I turn, and I see Dalton. But it wasn't his voice I heard. It was a woman's. Then I see Dalton's hands on his head, as he's prodded down the path by a woman.

  "Hello, Casey," Val says. "You look surprised to see me."

  "I--I saw your . . ." I don't finish. I will sound like a fool if I do, and I already feel the sting of my mistake.

  But how was it a mistake?

  I saw the bloat of her corpse. I know she was not alive.

  Sharon, Dalton mouths, and with that, I understand.

  Sharon. One of our winter dead. The woman who'd died of a heart attack last week. Whom we'd been burying when Brady arrived.

  Sharon was not a perfect doppelganger for Val. She was older. With longer hair. Heavier. Shorter. But none of that mattered for a water-bloated corpse floating facedown in the water. Cut the gray-streaked hair to Val's length. Dress her in Val's clothing. Put her corpse in the water and send it downstream, and even if we had managed to pull it out, between the rot and the bloat, it would have been hard to say it wasn't Val.

  Peter Sanders had pulled that same trick with Nicole--found a dead hostile or settler and put her in Nicole's clothing and damaged the body enough that Dalton naturally concluded he'd found Nicole. Val knew we didn't have the equipment to test DNA, and that told her the trick might work again.

  "Eric stopped to help me," Val says. "He couldn't resist, even when he considers me dead weight on your precious town. All I had to do was lie in his path, and he holstered his gun and raced over to help."

  "And that's weakness to you, isn't it?" I say. "That he came to your aid, no questions asked, despite all the shit you've put him through."

  "Put him through? I'm the one who's gone through hell in that godforsaken town. Condemned to coexist with people who lack the IQ to carry on a proper conversation with me. Yet they all tried. Even you, Casey. Especially you. You had to try to help a poor fellow female, trapped in her home, cowering like a mouse. I wasn't cowering, you idiot. I was waiting. You said once that the council constructed a prison for me--made me too afraid to leave my house. No. I constructed it. It was my refuge, and you couldn't leave me well enough alone."

  "Yeah," Dalton says. "We're all assholes for giving a shit."

  My look warns him not to antagonize her. I'm all too aware of that gun at his back.

  "You should have left me alone, Casey," she says. "But you couldn't. You had to dig and poke and prod. Destroy what little sanctuary I had. Rob me of what few allies I had."

  "Allies?" I say. "You mean the council? Because I proved they set you up to be raped?"

  "I was not raped." Her voice shakes along with the gun, and I give myself the same warning I gave Dalton.
Stop. Just stop.

  She continues, "I escaped. If you don't believe that's possible, it's because you didn't escape your attackers, Casey. You let them beat you. Let them almost kill you. Almost certainly let them rape you. You could not get away, so you cannot conceive of the possibility that another, stronger, smarter woman might have."

  "Okay," I say, and it's a calm, even response, but she keeps shaking, wanting to fight, to defend herself, and I change the subject fast. "So you helped Oliver here. You ingratiated yourself with him, while pretending you were spying for us."

  "And you bought it." She smiles. "You couldn't help yourself. Your pet project was showing signs of improvement. Joining the community. Making herself useful. I manipulated you into giving me access to him and you jumped at the chance."

  "You brought supplies," I say. "Food. Weapons. That's why Oliver didn't bother retrieving my gun after he shot Brent. And you sent him to Brent. You knew Brent could lead you both to Jacob."

  She says nothing. It doesn't matter. Not now.

  Focus on the facts. On how this fills in the holes.

  Brady attacked Brent because Val said Brent could get them a better hostage: Jacob. Who could also guide them out of the wilderness. And the companion Jacob saw with Brady? Val. From a distance, Jacob mistook her for a man. She brought those protein bars they shared, old stock she had access to. Brady had been so confident, he'd outright lied about it. Didn't even bother making up a story.

  I have no idea what you're talking about, Detective.

  Dalton jerks his chin toward Val, and it takes a moment to see what he's gesturing at--the rifle barrel poking over Val's collarbone, a gun slung at her back.

  "You're the sniper," I say.

  "Yes, I know my way around a gun, too, Casey," she says. "Did you presume I was too weak and timid? I told you I used to stay on my grandparents' farm. They had guns. I insisted on learning. I'm good at it--my aptitude for mathematics comes in handy with distance shooting. Of course, my grandparents didn't think it was a proper sport for a girl, so while they humored me as a child, I had to shoot in secret when I got older. Which was useful, as it turns out. Do you recall those boys who taunted me? Chased me? Tried to assault me? One died the month before he graduated from high school. Shot by a stray bullet in the forest. A careless hunter, it seems."

  "And you shot Kenny," I say. "Who was no threat to you. Was never anything but respectful--"