“I think we’re safe,” I answered, sitting down heavily on an ancient wooden chair. I was facing the door, just in case they did decide to make an appearance. “Let me know what you find.”
I could hear her rooting around behind me. I stood up with a groan and hobbled over to Jackson and searched his pockets, looking for a second magazine for the pistol. No luck. We’d have to make do with just the one. I had ejected the magazine before I shot at the people up top. There were six bullets at that time. Now I was down to four. As I went to sit down I saw Jackson’s knife on the ground. I picked it up and studied it.
“Let’s keep the knife. This might be the knife he killed Daisy with and if so, it probably has her DNA on it somewhere.”
I looked back at Jackson, his skin an other-worldly white. There was a massive pool of blood extending out from his body. As I was searching his pockets for the magazine a few minutes earlier, I came close to vomiting several times. Now as I looked at him, it was with a sense of detachment. I couldn’t help wondering how someone becomes a serial killer. Is it built into their DNA or are they just a product of their environment? Having Lucas and Barbara as parents certainly didn’t help. He seemed so nice though. And the story we got was that he was a timid soul. Was that all an act or just a different side of his personality?
“Lots of items belonging to his victims,” said Sabrina from across the room. “Jewelry mostly.” I could hear her shuffling around. “Wait a minute. Driver’s licenses. Oh my God, he kept the driver’s licenses of all of his victims. There have to be thirty or forty here.” She was silent for a moment. I knew she was looking through the licenses. “Here are the original fourteen from the Boston area. The rest of them are from all around the country: Cleveland, Seattle, Phoenix, Las Vegas, San Diego … the list goes on and on. Most of his victims came after he retired from killing Boston women…” She stopped. I could hear her draw in a breath. "Oh my God. Darlene Muir. He killed Daisy’s friend in Phoenix. So it was a message to Daisy.”
She continued looking through the licenses. “Daisy Leduc. That confirms what he told you. He did it. He killed his own sister.”
I looked back at her. She had tears running down her cheeks.
“How could someone do that?” she asked.
“He was sick. A serious whacko. I don’t think we can judge someone like that in a rational way.”
I looked over at the door with a sense of nervousness. “We need to think about getting out of here.”
Sabrina had found a small bag, in which she put the jewelry, licenses, and Daisy’s package.
“Where?” she asked.
“I guess we follow the tracks. Hopefully they will lead to another part of the mine. Maybe there will be a way out. We certainly can’t sit here hoping the gunmen will leave. If we try going up the passageway, we will be sitting ducks. I think it’s our only choice.”
“Then let’s do it.”
Chapter 35
With the bag of items Sabrina had collected from the killing room, as well as the gun, and four flashlights—Jackson had kept a supply and taking two extra seemed to be smart, just in case we were down there for a while—we left the room and hopped down into the mine tunnel. The water came to our knees. As we passed in front of the passageway to the surface we ducked down under the lip of the ledge, getting soaked by water from the outside storm as it flowed over the edge. My leg was still killing me, but it wasn’t as weak as it had been. I could walk by myself now, but slowly. Sabrina had examined my shoulder, declaring the furrow made by the bullet to be non-life threatening. Still hurt, though.
We had no idea where we were going. We knew that the front entrance to the mine was in the direction we were headed, so we couldn’t get too lost unless we took a wrong turn, but we didn’t know if we’d find a way out at any point along the way.
It was dark and silent, not to mention spooky. So spooky. The only sound was the gentle swishing of the water as we trudged along the tunnel. We constantly moved the flashlights around, the light bouncing off the rock walls and old wooden beams. We were pretending to look for openings to the outside, but I think snakes, spiders, and other slithery and crawly varmints were really foremost on our minds. The Clover Mine had been shut down for many years, but we had a feeling that this section had been abandoned long before that. The bits of discarded equipment seemed ancient and the beams were worm-riddled. They looked like towers of sawdust.
We walked for fifteen minutes without talking. The water level decreased with each passing minute until we were walking on the dry tracks. We heard nothing behind us, so we were pretty sure the shooters weren’t following. Somehow though, that wasn’t very reassuring. We still had no idea if we’d find a way out.
“You okay?” I asked.
“Hanging in there. How’s your leg?”
“Trying not to think about it. You scared?”
“It’s scary,” answered Sabrina, “but I’m not really scared. I don’t know why. I feel like I should be though. Are you?”
“After your answer, I’d rather not say. How did you leave it with your agent?”
She looked at her watch.
“He’ll have called someone by now. Maybe that’s why I’m not scared. They’ll know we’re down here. It’ll just be a matter of time. Maybe we won’t be able to find our way out, but they’ll find their way in. We just have to bide our time.”
“Maybe we should have stayed close to the passageway in case the police, or whoever comes for us, finds that entrance.”
“I don’t think they will. That spot was pretty hidden, and unless they come with helicopters and see the car, I think they are more likely to start at the main entrance to the mine.”
There were places that had had small cave-ins and we had to crawl over the debris. Sometimes a tunnel would shoot off to the left and we would always stop and debate the virtues of taking it or not. Some of the offshoots looked like major tunnels, all heading generally in the direction we were going. Could it be that one of those was actually the main tunnel and we were in an offshoot? But we continued on, following the tracks. After all, they had to lead somewhere.
We rested numerous times. I was trying to downplay the pain in my leg, but I wasn’t fooling Sabrina. She insisted that I sit down every few minutes.
After an hour of walking, I had decided that it wasn’t so scary after all. The extra flashlights turned out to be a Godsend when the first ones ran out of juice. We just hoped that we weren’t still going to be down there when the second ones died.
We were passing a beam when it exploded into a thousand particles of wood next to my head. The sound of the gunshot filled the tunnel and we fell to the ground. I landed on my bad leg and gave a cry of pain.
“Are you hit?” asked Sabrina, quickly moving over to me.
“No. Landed on my leg,” I answered through clenched teeth.
Another boom and a bullet ricocheted off a rock near us.
“Turn off your flashlight,” said Sabrina, an urgency in her voice.
It had fallen out of my hand when I hit the ground and now I had to reach to get it. It had become wedged between two rocks with the beam of light pointing to the ceiling like a homing beacon. As long as it stayed on, we were sitting ducks. It was out of my reach, so I dragged myself over to it, grabbed it, and shut it off. Another bullet bounced off the walls.
“We have to get out of here,” said Sabrina in a whisper. “Before you turned off your light, I saw an open area with a pile of rocks over to the right. It might be our only chance.”
We shimmied up onto the ledge, then as quietly as possible found refuge in the rocks. The pile was high and the rocks mostly large ones, so we were able to scramble up fairly silently.
“Now what?” I whispered.
I could barely make out Sabrina shaking her head.
“Hope for the best, I guess.”
She took my hand. I felt around with my free hand and picked up a softball-size rock and gave it to Sabrina.
I pulled the gun from my pocket and held it close.
We waited.
Chapter 36
We didn’t have to wait long. We heard them shuffling along the tracks as we had done. They had no light shining. How in the world could they see? They must have been using the side of the tunnel as their guide. It was easy when they could see our flashlights ahead, but now they were walking blind.
Walking blind and complaining. At least one of them was.
“They could be right up ahead ready to ambush us,” he was whispering. “We’ve gotta turn on our lights, even just for a second.”
They had stopped right in front of us. The second man was considering the first’s suggestion.
“Even if we turn them on for a second, it will give away our spot if they’re close. And we know they have a gun.”
“Or,” said the first man, “they could be sneaking up on us right now. Shit. Why did we take this job?”
“Because he’s paying us a lot of money.”
“Not enough,” said the first man. “Ready? I’ll point to the left and you point to the right. Then we both point in front then turn them off. Go.”
Lights immediately illuminated the tunnel. We had ducked down before the lights went on, but we saw a beam going over our heads. He was giving our little cul-de-sac a going over. The lights stayed on longer than the men had planned. Not seeing us, they probably felt the need to get a clear picture of their surroundings. The lights went off, but I heard movement. They were climbing onto the ledge that led to our hiding place. It was probably the only logical place we could be. I prepared myself. As soon as I heard them getting closer, I was going to turn on the light and shoot. I squeezed Sabrina’s hand, then got my flashlight ready.
There. I heard it. They were close. Taking a breath to steady my nerves, I stretched to my full height, looked over the top of the rock pile and turned on my flashlight. They were less than ten feet away!
They brought up their rifles. As they did I pointed my pistol and fired. My first shot missed them both. I was only ten feet away. How could I have possibly missed? I shot again and one of them grunted and dropped to the ground. I pointed my gun and flashlight at the second man, but just before I pulled the trigger, he dropped his rifle and raised his hands.
“Don’t shoot. Don’t shoot,” he yelled.
Sabrina climbed off the rocks and came around the side, her flashlight pointed at the guy. The one I shot groaned.
“I’ll check on him,” Sabrina said.
“Lie down on your belly and put your hands behind your back,” I said to the one who had surrendered. He quickly did as I requested.
I had nothing to tie his wrists with. Maybe my shoelaces? I scrambled over the rocks and stepped down beside him to kick away his rifle.
Wrong move. A stupid move. An unbelievably stupid move.
One of his arms lashed out and he hit me hard on my calf, right on a nerve. It would have hurt even if my leg was healthy, but he happened to hit my bad leg. I cried out and dropped to the ground and he jumped on top of me and started to pummel me with his fists. I covered my face while he pounded on me. And then I saw a momentary opening. His punching slowed down as he began to tire. I brought my elbow up and smacked him in the temple, momentarily stunning him. I clawed my way on top of him and grabbed hold of his throat. He grabbed my wrists and broke my hold on him. We rolled around, each trying to get the upper hand.
His mistake, and the mistake most men made, was to ignore Sabrina. He was on top of me again, this time with his hands on my throat, when I heard a sickening thud. Blood spurted over me and the man toppled over. In the dim light I saw Sabrina standing over me with the stone that I had handed her earlier. I looked down at the guy she had hit. There was no doubt that he was dead.
Sabrina asked me if I was okay. At least, that’s what I think she said. The guy had hit me a few times in the ear and I was hearing a lot of ringing. She helped me up and we moved to the rock pile where I found a boulder to sit on. My hearing was beginning to return. I could hear the other guy complaining that he was bleeding. Now that I was comfortable, Sabrina turned her attention to the wounded guy.
“Who are you working for?” she asked.
“Go to Hell,” came his response.
She kicked him in his bloodstain and he screamed.
“I’ll ask it again,” she said. “You have a choice. You can answer me and I will try to stop the bleeding, or you can continue to not answer my questions and you can bleed to death. Frankly, I don’t care.”
He didn’t have to think about it.
“Wheeler. Senator Wheeler.”
Sabrina turned to me with a look of shock. I must have had the same look. Wheeler?
“Now will you stop the bleeding?”
“I’ll try to patch you up,” said Sabrina, “but you’ll continue to answer questions while I do.”
He nodded sullenly and she got to work. I had shot him in the side. Sabrina took off his outer shirt and t-shirt. She used his t-shirt as a gauze pad and wrapped his outer shirt around him, holding the other shirt in place. She pulled the sleeves tight and he grunted in pain.
“I don’t think you have a bullet in you. I think I saw an exit hole. Hopefully your shirt will stop the bleeding until someone comes for us. Now talk.”
“Nothing much to say. We were hired to kill you. We did a piss poor job of it.”
“Why did Wheeler want us dead?” I asked.
“Something about you asking too many questions. We didn’t get paid to ask why.”
“Are you in it with the blonde and her friend?” I asked.
“No,” he said. He grimaced. He was in pain, but I didn’t care. “At first they were our targets, but when you came onto the scene, you became the targets instead. We killed the guy who was with her by accident.” He went silent. He realized what he was saying.
“You were trying for me, weren’t you?” Sabrina asked.
He didn’t say anything. He didn’t need to. We knew the answer.
“Did Jackson know about you?” Sabrina asked.
“He the dead guy back there?”
“Yes.”
“No. Heard Wheeler mention his name. Said if he got in the way we could kill him too, but we didn’t know who he was.”
“How about Daisy?” I asked. “Did you kill her?”
“Don’t know any Daisy. Wheeler hired us to kill you two. That was it. Not a whole lot of explanation went with it.”
He was fading from the blood loss. Shock was setting in and he passed out. Sabrina checked his pulse. He was still alive.
“We’re not very good at judging people,” I said.
“We suck at it,” replied Sabrina. “I actually felt sorry for Wheeler.”
“And Jackson seemed like a nice guy,” I added. “We need to move to a deserted island where we don’t have to interact with people, because we don’t do it very well.”
“I guess Wheeler had a lot more to hide than he was telling us,” said Sabrina. She opened the bag from the killing room and pulled out the package from Daisy. “You’re not going anywhere with that leg and now with your additional injuries, and we certainly can’t carry this guy out. I suggest we stay right here and hope that the search party can find us.”
“I agree.”
“And while we wait,” she said, “let’s see what Daisy had to say.”
Chapter 37
Sabrina read it aloud.
I killed my husband.
A little melodramatic, I thought.
I didn’t wield the knife that killed him (although somehow the police found my prints on the handle), but I killed him nonetheless. If I had told him my history, he might have never made the move back east, which ultimately got him killed. But would it have mattered in the long run? I could never prove it, but I knew that they were behind my husband’s new job in Pennsylvania and Darlene’s death in Phoenix. They knew where we were. They found me. I don’t know how, but they found me. Eventually Derek w
ould have died anyway. I’ll never know for sure why they didn’t just kill me. Maybe it’s the same reason I kept quiet about so many things. Despite everything, family is still family. Of course, if you are reading this, I just disproved my own theory.
What is important now is the safety and financial future of my daughter and her children. I’m hoping you are reading this, Sabrina, as I think you might be the only one who can take my story and do the right things with it.
You didn’t know me in prison. No one knew me and that’s the way I wanted it. It might surprise you to learn that I went to Harvard. My name back then was Lucinda Holt. I was happy and I had dreams. I was even pretty back then. And then my life came crashing down. I learned secrets, terrible secrets about my family. I don’t know the whole story, but I know enough of it—enough to ruin my life and to kill my husband.
I never intended to write this. I did my best to forget it for years, and if I hadn’t had a daughter, maybe none of it would have mattered and I would have forgotten it. But recent events have brought it all back. When I saw reports that Senator Wheeler was retiring, I became angry and it all began to fester inside of me again. Why had he been able to live a privileged life while I rotted away in prison? Why did my little girl have to grow up without parents, when my own parents—scum that they were—were allowed to live. Why was my brother still alive? Someone has to pay for all this and I hope you can make that happen.
“That’s a lot to put on your shoulders,” I said.
“No kidding. But she’s right. I keep thinking of Ronnie and her children. Maybe we can make something good come out of this.”
“If we ever get out of here.”
She digested that for a moment, then continued reading.
The story goes back many years. I was attending Harvard and was loving it. It was a dream come true. I was at my first choice for a college and, more importantly, I was away from my parents, two of the most evil people I knew. They owned a successful coal mine and were rolling in money. But like many rich people, they treated everyone around them like shit, including their children. When I moved to Boston to attend college, my older brother Jackson made an effort to visit as often as possible. He worked for my parents—he was the mine’s sales manager—but he despised them as much as I did. So any chance he got, he was out on the road. When it was announced that a serial killer was preying on women in the Boston area, he spent more time near me and assured me that he would make sure no serial killer ever got me. Little did I know the reason for his assurances.
Fatal Lies ( Lies Mystery Thriller Series Book 2) Page 19
