It was hidden down the road a ways behind a few trees. She was hidden from view but could see the house perfectly.
Betty jerked forward and spilled coffee down her front when someone rapped at her door. She sighed when she saw who it was. She rolled down the window and smiled. "You scared me half to death!"
Those were the last words she spoke. A long barreled black gun fitted with a silencer slid through the car window and fired off three quick shots.
Betty was dead before her body hit the driver's side door.
Chapter Twenty Four
INT: EAGLE VALLEY HOUSE: LIVING ROOM
"So," Cleo said, "You are Derrick's brother." She did not bother to disguise the sarcasm in her voice.
"I know it's hard to believe." Madder said.
"That's putting it lightly."
"There's no need for sarcasm."
"I'm not being sarcastic." Cleo reached for her mug of tea and took a sip to steady her nerves.
"How do I know you're who you say you are?"
"I have proof if that's what you're asking."
"Smart man."
"So they tell me."
Cleo let some of her impatience snap to the surface. "Look, why don't you just tell me why the hell you're here."
"I should of that would have been obvious. I want to see my brother." Madder reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a photograph. In it, there was a boy that was clearly Madder holding a child that looked very much like Derrick.
"We were separated." Madder said. "After our parents died. We were both so young." Madder looked away for a moment, real emotion showing on his face. "Do you mind, Ma'am," he said, not looking at her. "Do you mind getting Derrick so I don't have to say this twice?"
Cleo closed her eyes for a second to sense the air around her. There were secrets inside of him, but he was telling the truth. Sighing, knowing that his coming brought trouble, she went to the doorway.
"Derrick!
They waited in silence. After all, what could Cleo say? The man was clearly Derrick's brother, but there was something else at work here.
There were ulterior motives at work and Cleo had a mind to figure them out.
Derrick arrived in the living room looking disheveled and upset, but was shocked when he looked into the room. A man, a man who looked almost like him, was sitting across from Cleo. Derrick stared at the man in silence.
Then Derrick saw the picture in Madder's hand. He bent forward and took it softly from Madder's fingers. He stared at it, rubbed his thumb over the picture as if it contained a genie.
"I used to have this picture." Derrick said. "Or a picture like this. It wasn't of me though." He looked at Madder, finally. "It was of you."
Madder stood and the approached each other. Cleo could see the differences, the subtleties, but aside from color of hair and other small things, they were undeniably brothers.
They embraced and held on to each other, a piece of the past regained.
Whether it was regained for good or evil, they had yet to find out. Cleo sighed. Yet another piece to the puzzle, one she had no hope of solving.
INT: DARKNESS
WE SEE SUSAN'S FACE SURROUNDED BY SHADOW. THERE IS A LITTLE LIGHT WHERE SHE IS AND WE CAN SEE VAGUE OUTLINES OF HER SURROUNDINGS. THERE ARE BARS AROUND HER AND DARKNESS. BUT ON THE FLOOR IN FRONT OF HER…
SUSANS EYELIDS FLUTTER AND SHE OPENS HER EYES, SITS UP SLOWLY WITH A HAND TO HER HEAD. SHE LOOKS AROUND HER SLOWLY AND THEN NOTICES THE SCRIPT PAGE…..
Susan shook her head and looked again. Another script page. And here of all places. Wherever HERE was. "Hello?" Her voice echoed back at her.
She heard a rustle in the darkness around her. "Is there someone there? I know there is, please answer me!"
There was the sound of laughter, soft and deep.
"Please!" Susan had spied the bars in front of her and her panic was beginning to reach new levels. She had no idea where she was, her head hurt, her mother was unsafe, Erin would go with her questions unanswered and that bitch Sophie was in the house with her Derrick.
Except that he was never his. She shook her head again, trying to clear it. She needed to focus. FOCUS Susan, she thought. Gotta stay on top of things here.
"Pick up the page." A Voice said from the darkness around her.
The voice had an electronic quality to it, as if it were being distorted. It didn't sound real to Susan.
"Please," She tried again. "I'll do anything you want, anything."
"Pick up the page." The voice said again.
Clearly, she had no other choice. Slowly, Susan reached forward and plucked the page from the cage floor.
Chapter Twenty Five
INT: THE DARK CAGE
Susan picked up the sheet of paper. It was a blue color and it sent a shiver down her spine. She tried again.
"Please, whoever you are, please don't do this."
"I won't tell you again, Susan." The voice said. "Read the page."
With shaking hands, Susan put the page into the small amount of light that was filtering into her cage and read:
INT: CAGE
[SUSAN LOOKS AT THE PAGE PLACED ON THE GROUND IN FRONT OF HER. SHE PICKS IT UP AND GLANCES AT IT AND THEN BACK INTO THE SHADOWS. SHE CALLS OUT TO HER CAPTOR WITH A SHAKING VOICE]
SUSAN: Please! Please let me go, I'll do anything you want, anything you ask.
VOICE: You must pay for your sins of the past.
[THE VOICE ANSWERS HER FROM THE DARKNESS. THE VOICE IS MUDDLED, ELECTRIC SOUNDING. THERE IS NO HINT TO HER CAPTORS GENDER]
SUSAN: What sins? What are you talking about?
VOICE: They want to hurt you. I wish to keep you safe.
SUSAN: Who wants to hurt me? Who? What are you talking about?
VOICE: They wish to kill you for your sins. I want to keep you safe from them.
SUSAN: Are you talking about Howard?
[THE VOICE DOESN'T RESPOND, EXCEPT TO LAUGH SOFTLY, THE LAUGHTER SOUNDING LIKE BROKEN GLASS]
* * *
Susan looked up from the page. The blue color of it frightened her. Her captor was writing his own soap opera! Where he was the star. The other script page from a few nights before flashed back in her head.
FLASH!
Susan scanned the page quickly once, then a second time. She felt her breath growing shallow in her chest; She felt as if the world was closing in around her. There was only one page, but it seemed as if it would take forever for the words to sink in. With a shaking breath, she read the pages a third time
* * *
INT: HALLIWELL KITCHEN, EAGLE VALLEY NEW MEXICO
[SUSAN reaches toward the blue pages with a shaking hand. She clutches them to her chest, quickly, as if they might burn her. She looks around the kitchen, it's walls feeling as if they were moving slowly inward.]
SUSAN: Who left these here?
[Silence greets her. SUSAN tires speaking again]
SUSAN: Hello?
[She puts a hand to her throat, her nightgown low cut, revealing the shadow of cleavage]
SUSAN: Won't someone answer me?
[Dark laughter comes from the shadows around her]
SUSAN: Please, is someone there?
YOU ARE BEING WATCHED
FLASH!
She knew in her heart that whoever wrote the first note had written the second. That that person had taken her. For what purpose, she didn't know. The second page had said that he wanted to keep her safe from her sins. What sins did she have? What sins had she committed?
The pat three years had been hell for her, for Derrick, for her mother. All because of sins made against them. She thought briefly of Miriam and felt her chest tighten. She would not crumble now. She would not break down.
"Hello?" She said out loud.
All that answered her was silence.
Susan made a noise deep in her throat that sounded like a growl. Whoever this guy was, he had pissed her off and she would make him regret it. Howard couldn't send his goons after h
er and not expect a fight.
She looked around her prison. She had to think of a way out of here.
Chapter Twenty Six
EXT: EAGLE VALLEY HOUSE
Erin followed Sophie out the back door of the house.
Sophie's red hair looked copper in the setting sun and she looked almost angelic. Erin knew there was nothing angelic about Sophie. Quite the contrary. The woman was a bitch and had a cold heart to do what she did in front of Susan.
Though she had known Susan only a short time, she already felt a kinship with her. She knew it was silly and against her PI instincts to form a personal bond with someone she was investigating, but the woman was going through so much pain.
Erin knew that whatever was going on, these people were the victims. Susan, Derrick, Cleo. Miriam had been the first victim. Erin was frustrated at her lack of progress. She had already been here a night and a day and had found out nothing. She took a deep breath. One day at a time, she told herself.
She watched Sophie kneel in front of the Easter Lilies that grew in the centre of the back garden. Watched as she pulled the flowers out at their roots and began to dig.
What the hell was going on here? She thought.
Sophie looked like she knew where she was digging, as if she were searching for something. As if she knew what she would find.
A shiver ran down Erin's spine as she watched Sophie lift a large wooden box out of the dirt and open the lid. From it, she pulled a gun. No, not just a gun. Erin watched as Sophie pulled out gun after gun, their dark metal menacing.
There were several varieties: two short handled pistols, three medium revolvers and a long barreled black gun that looked deadly.
Sophie was definitely working for someone else. Now, it was time to find out who. Legs heavy with fear, she stepped out behind the bushes she had been hiding behind and stepped into Sophie's line of sight.
"What are you doing, Sophie?"
Sophie whipped around, the pearl handled revolver clutched in her hands, pointing straight at Erin. Sophie smiled when she saw her. "Oh, it's you." Sophie giggled softly.
"What do you think you're doing?"
"It's none of your business." Sophie spat. "Besides, why should I tell you anything when you have secrets of your own."
Erin felt as if she had been slapped. "What do you mean?"
"Miriam's cousin?" Sophie said the words softly. "Is that who you really are, Erin Parker? I think not." She walked towards Erin slowly, the gun held at her side now, pointing to the ground. "What is it you really want?"
When all else fails, Erin thought, play dumb. "I don't know what you're talking about."
Sophie's smile deepened. "You know exactly what I'm taking about, Erin." She leaned in close to her, so close that Erin could smell her cheap perfume. And something else. It smelled a little like rancid meat. "I know who you really are." Sophie whispered.
Erin jerked back. Okay, now this bitch was getting scary, she thought. "What the hell are you ON?" Erin spat at her. "What game are you playing?"
"Oh, don't you know?" Sophie's face-hardened for a second and Erin saw the hate that ran underneath her skin. "I'm playing THE game."
And then Sophie pointed her gun and fired.
INT: EAGLE VALLEY HOUE: KITCHEN
Derrick poured a cup of coffee for the three of them. Cleo and Madder sat at the kitchen table. The house as quiet, almost too quiet. It made Cleo uncomfortable. And then they heard the gun shot.
Cleo jerked, a spoon clattering to the floor. "What the hell was that?"
"It sounded like a gun shot to me." Madder said.
"I think you're right." Derrick said. He looked around the kitchen. "Where's Susan?" He asked.
"I think she's upstairs." Cleo said.
Derrick went upstairs and returned a few minutes later. "No, she's not there. Sophie and Erin are missing too."
Cleo snapped into action. "Madder, you check upstairs and Derrick check down here. I'll check the basement and we'll meet back here."
Minutes later, they all met back in the kitchen. "Any luck?" She asked.
"No." Derrick said. "I wonder where she could be."
Cleo knew whom he was asking about. The fact that Susan was nowhere in the house was troubling, considering their present state of affairs. "We should check the grounds." Cleo knew at that moment that they would not find Susan, that her daughter was gone.
They left the house and stood on the front lawn surveying the land around them. And then they saw it. Cleo pointed it out. "Over there," she said, "behind the bushes. It looks like a car." She knew that the car brought trouble.
Without a word, the three of them approached the black car that was covered by the bushes, the black metal peeking through the green leaves.
When they got to the car, they saw a shape inside, but there was no movement. Cleo felt as if she were going to be sick. There was death here.
Derrick reached forward and opened the driver's side door, letting it open slowly. That was when the body fell out of the car and slumped to the ground, blood dripping onto the grass.
Chapter Twenty Seven
EXT: EAGLE VALLEY HOUSE: Bushes
They stared at the woman's face and for a long time none of them said a word. She had been shot at close range and blood spattered the inside of the car. Pieces of her brain littered the window behind her head where the bullet had exited. Derrick had wondered why he hadn't noticed the crack in the glass from the bullet, the spidery cracks of the window that were now outlined more heavily in red.
Finally, Derrick spoke. "I know her." And then something clicked. There could be others. He grabbed Cleo's hand. "Back to the house, now."
"Derrick, what's going on?"
"She's one of the assassin's from three years ago, the one that went after Miriam the first time."
"Oh my god," she said, holding a hand to her mouth. "Does that mean that Howard-"
"Back to the house, now!" Madder screamed.
They ran like the wind, not stopping, hearts beating, until they closed the door behind them with a soft muted click. And then they heard another click behind them.
CAMERA SWITCHES TO:
[SOPHIE STANDING IN THE FOYER OF THE HOUSE, HOLDING A WOUNDED ERIN IN HER ARMS. IN HER OTHER HAND IS THE PEARL HANDLED REVOLVER.]
"You just made your first mistake." Sophie said.
"Sophie?!" Derrick said. "What are you doing? What happened to Erin?"
"I happened to Erin." She smiled widely.
Erin, for her part, was trying hard to maintain consciousness. Blood was pouring quickly from the bullet hole in her left shoulder. Her skin was pale from the blood loss, but her bright red hair seemed to compliment the blood decorating her shirtfront.
"I'm sorry." Erin spluttered. "I tried to find out…"
Sophie pushed her to the floor and kicked her in the ribs. Erin doubled over into the fetal position. "Did I say you could talk? Did I?"
Cleo rushed to Erin's aid. She smoothed the hair from Erin's face. "It's alright, honey. You did nothing wrong."
"God you make me sick. You just make me so sick, all of you; your kindness is like a disease."
"Why are you doing this Sophie?" Derrick asked.
"Why am I doing this?" Her voice raised up a pitch. "WHY am I doing this? That's the million-dollar question isn't it? Wouldn't you like to know?"
"Where's Susan?" Derrick spat.
"What do you mean where's Susan? She's in the damn house, she's the one we wanted."
"We?" Madder asked. Sophie had forgotten he was in the room. "Who's we?"
Sophie smiled. "Oh, you'll find that out in just a bit. But first where is Susan?"
"You don't know where she is?" Cleo asked.
"She was supposed to be in the house! She's the one we need!"
"You mean you don't know where she is?" Derrick asked.
"No! She was supposed to be here!" Her voice had raised to a fever pitch now. "Dammit!" she screamed and fired a shot at Derrick
. The bullet landed in his left leg and he crumpled to the ground.
Derrick screamed out and clutched his leg where blood was already pouring out.
"Right on the ground, just where I want you. Do any of you want a bullet?"
Cleo and Madder shook their heads. "We'll do whatever you need, Sophie." Cleo said softly.
"Yeah, you will won't you." With a grimace, she pulled out her cell phone and dialed a number. She waited a beat and then spoke: "Howard? We have a problem…"
INT: THE DARK CAGE
Susan had now spent an unknown amount of time in her prison. Her mysterious captor had not returned. She had no idea how long she had been in the cage. There was only the little bit of light that fell into her cage to see by. There were no windows and no indication of whether or not it was light or dark outside.
Susan made a noise deep in her throat that sounded like a growl. Whoever this guy was, he had pissed her off and she would make him regret it. Howard couldn't send his goons after her and not expect a fight.
She looked around her prison. She had to think of a way out of here. She was about to get up and see if the lock on the cage would break when she heard the door to the room open and close.
Her captor had returned.
Chapter Twenty Eight
INT: HOPE FALLS STUDIOS
"What do you mean we have a little problem?" Howard said gruffly.
"Well, it's about one of the captured…" Her voice was tinny over the telephone. Howard's hand clenched into a fist as he looked out at the world below him. Streets filled with cars and with people, shinny things that attracted attention, strings to be pulled. He had been a manipulator for quite some time.
Hope Falls Season 2 - Eagle Valley Page 7
