by Sean Platt
“What was her name?” Mal asked.
Paul looked up. He seemed ready to tell her, but then that smile returned.
“You’re good, Mal. But I’m not playing.”
The fact that he wasn’t telling her the name made Mal hopeful. If he were planning to kill her, then he wouldn’t care what he gave up. He would likely want to boast, knowing it would never leave these walls.
For the first time since slipping on the cuffs, a ray of hope pierced the gloom. “You said the first time was rough. Were the others easier?”
Paul stared at Mal as if trying to decide how to answer.
In Mal’s experience, and in the things she’d learned while at the Academy, serial killers often liked to talk about themselves. They go through their lives with a pitch black secret they could never share. Once caught, they opened up. There is a freedom in no longer worrying about what’s coming behind you.
But even if he fit the personality type, Mal wasn’t sure if Paul was there yet. He might still have some illusions that he could figure his way out.
He finally answered. “Have you ever come upon a stray animal hit by a car? It’s the saddest thing ever. Here you have this animal that was living a horrible life, unloved, hungry, struggling just to survive, and then BAM, it’s hit by a car, a car that keeps moving as it lies dying on the road. It watches as other cars pass, scared and confused. Then you happen upon it. You look into its eyes and see its pain. You see its confusion. You also see that there’s no hope for that poor animal, and the only thing you can do, the only merciful thing you can do, is put it out of its misery.”
“So, that’s what you’re doing? Putting these kids out of their misery?”
“Yes.”
“You don’t see the hypocrisy? It’s you who are hurting them in the first place. If you didn’t steal them from their families, they wouldn’t need your … mercy.”
“They were hurt long before I came along. Their lives were on a downward trajectory.”
“Bullshit,” Mal snapped.
Paul glared at her. “Do you know that your daughter cried herself to sleep almost every night in the weeks before I picked her up?”
“What are you talking about?”
“I watched you and Ashley for months before making my move. Used your in-home security cameras. I couldn’t believe how much you ignored your child’s pain. She wished for you and Ray to get back together, but you were too damned selfish to see.”
The world was yanked from beneath her.
The thought of this monster watching her family for months before taking her daughter was a sledgehammer to her psyche.
“All that time you spent wondering what you could have done differently to save your little girl, the answer was simple: pay attention to your daughter. I never would’ve come into your lives if you had. I would have found someone else. There’s no shortage of shitty parents ruining their children’s lives.”
Tears stung her eyes.
“You did this to her, just like Jessi’s mommy. You are the architects of your pain, not me. I am providing a mercy.”
Jessi buried her face in her palms, sobbing.
Mal saw a surprising glimpse of pain in Paul’s expression. It showed an empathy that many killers lacked, that many killers couldn’t feel.
It might be the leverage she needed. “Is this what you call mercy? Is Jessi’s life somehow better because of what you’ve done?”
“I’m going to release Jessi from her pain.”
“You still don’t get it, do you?”
“What?”
“We can recover from our pain. We can still lead normal, happy lives, no matter what life does to us. You’re not giving these kids a chance to save themselves.”
“Yeah, I’ve seen what happens to these kids when they grow up. They become twisted, terrible people. Mean. Innocent girls turn into monstrous bitches who can’t help but inflict their pain upon others.”
Mal laughed. “Wow, pot meet kettle.”
“I am not like that.”
“No? You’re not acting out your childhood pain upon others? You’re not taking out what Wes did to you and your sister upon the world?”
“I don’t expect you to understand.”
“Oh, I understand completely. As unique as you think you are, you’re not, Paul. Thousands of kids are abused every year by people like Wes, and many kids turn into abusers, just like you.”
“I am not an abuser.”
“Keep telling yourself that.”
“I never touched my daughter.”
“I bet you wanted to, though,” Mal said with a smile.
Paul pointed the gun at her forehead. “Watch your mouth.”
“And what then, after you raped her? Would you have to kill her, too? As a mercy? Face it, Paul, you sit here talking about how other people are to blame, how parents ruin their kids, don’t love them enough, whatever. But that makes you even worse. Because you know the attention and love a child needs, and you find these supposed lost children in need of love, and what do you give them? Nothing. You take! You steal their innocence to fulfill your sick perversions. And then when you can’t look at yourself in the mirror anymore, you kill them so they don’t remind you of what you are: a lying hypocritical monster who wouldn’t know the first thing about real love.”
Paul stared at her.
He looked close to exploding.
She needed to give him another kick, something to shove him over the edge.
“You’re pathetic. You’re not even a man. The best thing your wife ever did was to divorce you before you could ruin Lily. But hey, there’s still time. Maybe she can find a real man to raise your daughter. A man who—”
Paul jumped from his seat, gun falling to the ground as he rushed her, hands raised to choke the life from her throat.
Perfect!
Mal raised her feet and kicked Paul square in the jaw.
He fell back screaming
She leaped from the bed as Jessi scurried to a corner of the room.
Mal raced towards Paul, hands still bound behind her. She had to incapacitate Paul, quickly, before he managed to stand or get the gun.
He started to sit up.
Mal’s only shot was to kick him in the kneecap.
She raced toward him, then slid, bringing her left foot straight at his knee.
He rolled out of the way, surprisingly fast, then sprang to his feet.
Mal was on the ground, struggling to stand, hands pinned beneath her, pain splintering her right shoulder and both wrists.
Blood streamed from Paul’s broken nose as he glared at Mal, eyes full of hate, rage, and a darkness she’d never seen so close and personal.
Paul screamed as he charged her.
She tried to roll out of the way but was too late.
His hand seized the back of her hair, grabbed it tightly, and yanked Mal to her feet.
Paul pushed her fast toward the closest wall.
She managed to use her left heel to kick down hard on the top of his right foot.
He screamed in surprise but didn’t let go of her hair, their momentum rushing them toward the wall.
She turned her head to the side just before it would’ve smashed her face.
The pain was like lightning striking her skull.
She felt dizzy, sick to her stomach.
She fell to her knees.
Suddenly, a scream.
“Stop it!”
Mal looked up to see Jessi holding Paul’s gun.
She was aiming at him with shaking hands. “Let us go!”
Paul raised his hands. “Woah, woah, woah. You know how to use that thing? Miss that shot and you could bring this whole thing down on us.”
“He’s lying!” Mal shouted. “Shoot him!”
Jessi fired.
Paul fell to the ground screaming.
Eyes wide, Jessi dropped the gun and ran toward Mal.
“Get the gun!” Mal yelled.
Th
e girl turned around, too late.
Paul was already standing. If he’d been shot, Mal couldn’t see any blood. More likely Jessi missed, even at that close range, and he faked being shot.
He grabbed the gun, turned it on Jessi, then cocked his arm back and walloped her across the head.
She dropped like a sack to the ground.
Eyes closed.
Not moving.
Mal screamed.
Paul grabbed Mal by the back of the hair again and shoved the gun against her temple. “You fucking cunt! Look what you made me do. I wasn’t even going to kill her. I was going to let her live! I was going to let you both live while I escaped through the secret tunnel behind that shelf over there. But noooo, you had to go and be a stupid fucking bitch!”
He hit her with the gun across the front of her head.
She struggled to get up, but her head was swimming and stomach lurching. Hot blood streamed into her eyes, burning them, blinding her.
“You fucking cunt!” Paul yelled as he hit her again, and again, and—
* * * *
CHAPTER 57 - JASPER PARISH
Jasper eased off the gas and swerved right in his black Mustang, into the middle lane, barely clipping a Beetle as it merged into his path without warning.
A braying honk, then a rough swerve back into the left lane.
He pressed the gas, clawing for speed, hoping they wouldn’t attract any cops or Florida Highway Patrol officers on the road.
He hoped they were all too occupied with the hostage scene to notice him driving erratically as they tried to reach the house before Dodd.
Jordyn was riding passenger, dressed in her kill gear, staring out the window, eyes wide and wild, her hands playing drums on the dashboard.
“Come on, come on!”
The difference between getting inside the house before Paul did could mean the difference between life and death.
Jordyn had seen Mallory die.
She’d also seen Jasper arrive too late to save her.
And to date, Jasper had yet to prevent one of Jordyn’s visions from happening. He could act on them after the fact, and he could extract revenge for the fallen. He could punish the perpetrators and prevent them from ever hurting another person. But so far Jasper couldn’t prevent something once Jordyn saw it happen.
“We were too late,” Jordyn had said.
“It hasn’t happened yet, so we can still stop it,” Jasper had said before grabbing their equipment, getting dressed, and heading out the door.
He looked at the dashboard clock: 1:55 AM.
“They got in there at 2:10 AM?”
“Yes,” she said. “I saw it on the grandfather clock in her living room.”
“And what time did you see us getting there?”
“Two seventeen.”
They were five minutes out. They’d be cutting it very close, but it would put them at the house before 2:17. If they could get in before Paul, they could be waiting, and they could stop him.
Jasper was going 65 in a 45, but he didn’t have time to waste.
They approached an intersection as the light turned yellow.
Jasper floored it.
Zipped through the intersection as the light turned red.
Suddenly, flashing lights in his rearview.
“Shit!”
Jasper slowed, hoping like hell that the deputy was going somewhere else. But the car behind him decelerated as well.
“Shit.”
Jasper pulled to the shoulder, heart pounding.
He thought of the kill gear in the trunk, the duffel with his break-in equipment, the guns, the knives, the rolls of tape and rope, the tarp, all the other tools of his trade.
Everything was hidden in the spare tire cavity under the trunk’s carpeted false bottom. But if the deputy opened the trunk, there was no way he could avoid a thorough search. And Jasper being black only made him appear more suspicious to some deputies.
Jasper grabbed his wallet from the console and set it on the dashboard. Then he lowered his window, placed his hands at ten and two on the steering wheel, and waited. Bright beams bleached his cabin with light, making Jasper feel like any move might get him shot.
Best not to budge.
He looked over at Jordyn.
She stared straight ahead, her own hands on the dash, eyes afraid.
A second patrol car pulled behind the first.
Here we go.
Jasper waited for the deputies to meet and discuss the situation.
Jordyn whispered, “We’re going to be too late.”
Jasper considered telling the deputies where they were headed, maybe warn them that Mallory was in danger. But that would be pointless. Even if they believed him, they’d be too late, or they’d do something to screw things up. Maybe Paul would see them and never take Mallory to the house. Maybe he’d just drive her into the woods, kill her, and keep on going, gone forever, never held accountable for his crimes.
Jasper was the only obstacle to that happening. He might be late, but maybe he could still get inside the house and save Mallory.
But first, he had to escape a traffic stop.
“Sorry, Dad,” Jordyn whispered. “We were out of this, and I shouldn’t have told you about Mallory. We should be home in bed, not out here.”
“You did the right thing. We help those who are in danger. No matter what happens, we did right. You did the right thing. You got that?”
He wanted to squeeze her hand but didn’t dare move from the steering wheel.
The first deputy approached along the driver’s side.
The other officer came around on Jordyn’s side, flashlights probing his car, then falling on them.
The officer was a tall white man with broad shoulders and a thick brown mustache, mid-thirties or so.
“License and registration, please,” he said, his voice deep.
Jasper reached over slowly, grabbed his wallet, then handed it to the deputy, hoping he noticed the small retirement badge from his time on the job in South Florida. He met the deputy’s eyes enough to show that he wasn’t hiding anything, wasn’t nervous, and certainly didn’t have a kill bag in his trunk.
The deputy returned to his vehicle with Jasper’s license and registration.
The other deputy continued to probe Jasper’s car with his flashlight, searching for any reason that a more thorough search or a call to the K-9 unit might be necessary.
Jasper saw the entire night going to hell.
Please, God, let us get through this.
Please.
He stayed with his hands on the wheel, patiently waiting for the deputy. Then finally:
“Do you know why I stopped you?”
“Yes, sir. I was speeding.”
“Do you know how fast you were going?”
“Too fast, and I’m sorry.”
“Where are you headed at this hour?”
“Couldn’t sleep, so I was going to Denny’s.”
“Denny’s?”
Jasper shrugged and offered the officer his most relaxed smile. “Old habits die hard.”
The officer smiled back. “You were on the job?”
“Yes, sir. South Florida. Fourteen years. Overnights for half of that, hence my addiction to cheese sticks and terrible coffee.”
The deputy laughed, then handed Jasper his wallet. “Alright. Go enjoy your cheese sticks.”
Jasper smiled. “Thank you, officer.”
The deputies left.
Jasper exhaled.
He found Jordyn’s hand and squeezed it. “See, everything’s gonna be fine.”
* * * *
CHAPTER 58 - PAUL DODD
Paul paced Mallory’s living room, waiting for her to wake up.
She was sitting at the dining room table where he’d left the gift, arms cuffed behind her. He also tied her ankles, to keep the bitch from kicking him in the face again.
Jessi sat across from her, also tied up, but awake.
His nose was black, blue, and aching. It also looked broken. He’d somehow gone all his life without injury to his face, until now.
He was going to make her pay.
He was going to cut her face.
Cut her all over until she begged to die.
But first, he would make her watch what he did to Jessi Price.
He wanted Mal’s final moments to be filled with helpless dread, unable to stop what was coming.
Unable to stop what she’d wrought.
He was going to fuck Jessi, then kill her.
Mallory would be forced to watch the whole show.
Then, if he had anything left, he was going to fuck Mallory before finishing her for good.
Then he would flee with his go bag, stuffed with money, fake credentials, and weapons. Wes had set him up with some excellent contacts, able to sneak him out of the country. The world was large, full of black markets willing to indulge his tastes rather than punishing them.
Paul wasn’t sure how long they had until the FBI agents and sheriff’s deputies realized that he’d escaped the bunker. Maybe they wouldn’t know for a while since the hatch door was rigged to blow the place to memory if they tried getting inside.
It would be at least a day, if not more, before they found the tunnel and realized that he’d escaped with Mallory and Jessi.
Eventually, they’d come to her house and find the bodies.
Oh, the scene he was going to make!
Paul had never been one for posing his victims, but this time he wasn’t trying to stay under the radar. He wanted to give the authorities something to remember. Give those fuckers on the news something to really talk about!
He’d stage the scene so it looked like Mallory was violating Jessi, with something big he figured. Maybe a leg to the chair, unless Mallory had a broom lying around.
He wished he’d had time to go to the store before all of this. He thought it would fit with the holiday to replace Mallory’s head with a Jack O’Lantern. Maybe he’d even get a cool name from the media like the Jack O’Lantern Slasher or something.
And to really give the crime scene investigators something for their books, he could scoop the child’s entrails out and put them in a Trick-or-Treat bag.
