Black Moon Rising

by Ann Simas

  “No hanky-panky,” she told him, turning over on her side.

  “Okay,” he agreed and promptly cupped one of her breasts.

  Sunny wiggled back against him and smiled when she encountered his man parts straining against his boxer shorts.

  “That’s enough of that,” he whispered hoarsely. “No hanky-panky, remember?”

  “I love you,” she whispered back.

  “I love you, too, now shut up and go to sleep before I decide we can do you-know-what under a blanket without waking up any kids.”

  Sunny might have fallen asleep sooner in her life, but if so, she couldn’t remember when. All she knew as she dozed off was that she’d never felt as secure as she did in Luca’s arms.

  . . .

  Sunny wasn’t sure what woke her. A noise? A dream? One of the kids?

  She listened, but heard nothing. She rolled over, wondering why she wasn’t still in Luca’s arms.

  Luca wasn’t there, that’s why.

  She bolted upright and got to her knees, crawling closer to the slumber bags. Carson and Maisie slept soundly, each hugging their sleepy-time friends.

  She pushed to her feet and tiptoed out of the room. She went first to Luca’s bedroom. Not there. She checked his bathroom, then the main one. Not there, either. Down the hall she went to the living room. He stood at the window, staring out the blinds he’d tilted slightly.

  “What do you see?” she whispered.

  “Nothing.”

  “Did you hear something?”

  “No. I was counting sheep, trying to keep my mind off a certain warm body pressed up against me, when a car went by, then a minute later, another car went by in the opposite direction.”

  “You saw a light pattern through the blinds in the spare room?”

  “Yeah. We just don’t have traffic at this hour on this street.”

  Sunny made her way over to stand next to him. “Could they have found me already?”

  “Boyson’s a brute, but he’s not stupid. I’m guessing he thought you’d show up at the cabin to check out the fire, and when you didn’t, he realized he had to start looking in other obvious places.”

  “He knows about us?”

  “I doubt it, but he knows we’re connected, because of Della.”

  “I beginning to think there’s nowhere I can go that I’ll be able to keep the kids safe from Vale Luna’s clutches.”

  “They’ll only take your children over my dead body.”

  His grim tone chilled her. “Luca….”

  Without taking his eyes off the street outside, he slid an arm around her shoulders and pulled her close to his body. “There’s nothing I wouldn’t do for you and Carson and Maisie, Sunshine. Warts and all, remember?”

  “I remember.” She slid her arms around his waist. “Thank you.”

  She felt him stiffen, and for a moment, she thought he was insulted because she’d thanked him. Then she realized he gone into alert mode. “What do you see?”

  “Someone’s coming up the sidewalk.”

  Sunny disengaged herself and hurried back to the spare room. She rummaged in her luggage bag and returned a moment later. “Use these.”

  He glanced down.

  “Night vision goggles.”

  He gave her a short grunt of approval. “I saw you bought these and a whole bunch of other stuff. You thought of everything, didn’t you?”

  She didn’t know whether to reply or leave well enough alone. She decided on the latter.

  He handed her the gun she hadn’t noticed he was holding in his right hand. “This is a Glock. No safety.” He worked the goggles strap over his head and looked out through the tilted blinds again. “Boyson,” he said, reaching for the cord to close the blinds.

  “He knows we’re here!” she cried as sotto voce as she could.

  Luca also kept his voice low. “I don’t think so. He’s just scoping things out.”

  “Is he alone?”

  “No. There are three of them.”

  “Three? What if they break in?”

  “I’m armed and I’m pretty sure you have a gun in your luggage.”

  “I do.”

  “I’m going to call this in. There’s a good chance we can get them, if patrol comes in silent.”

  “God, I hope so.” She paused. “What now?”

  “Let’s move into the hall. We can hear just about everything from there, plus keep an eye on the kids.” He bent down to pick up his phone from the coffee table. By the time they were back in the hall, he was having a whispered conversation with the FPD dispatch clerk. He disconnected and said, “Units are on the way.”

  Not for the first time, Sunny wondered if she shouldn’t have stuck it out in the safe room. Barring the fire, and the fact that even Luca had been inside what she had considered her last bastion of hope, she realized how ridiculous that idea was. She might be keeping Boyson on the move, but that meant she had to be on the move, too.

  It was definitely time to rethink her plans. Again.

  Luca’s phone vibrated. He accepted the call and said, “Amorosi.” He listened, then said, “I hear one at the southeast corner, one at the front, and one on the north side.”

  Sunny decided he must have the most sensitive ears in the world. She hadn’t heard a damned thing! Even as she wondered how that was possible, the sound of a thud against the front door confirmed she hadn’t gone partially deaf.

  “One down,” Luca said.

  Another thud could be heard coming from the general direction of his bedroom.

  “Two down.”

  Luca slipped out of the hall and moved toward the door leading into the garage. “Midas, come,” he whispered.

  Startled, Sunny realized she’d forgotten all about the golden retriever. The dog padded on silent paws after Luca, who eased opened the door into the garage and stepped down into the darkness. Sunny slipped back into the room where the kids slept and retrieved her Ruger from the luggage bag. She removed the trigger lock by the glow of the night light, released the safety, and planted herself in the doorway.

  A moment later, Midas began to bark. Had she not known he was a friendly, well-mannered dog, she would have thought a crazed animal had been let loose in the yard. A man screamed. Shouting ensued. She couldn’t make out the words, but she recognized Luca’s as one of the voices.

  Sunny remained where she was, hoping the children slept through the commotion. If the three intruders had been captured, or even if one or more had gotten away, she didn’t plan to confirm to them that she and the kids had taken refuge inside Luca’s house.

  In the next instant, the darkness around her burst into light. She had a split second to bemoan the timing of yet another vision.

  Like the previous two, she found herself looking upon a clearing in a forest. This time, instead of Carson and Maisie screaming and fighting against their restraints on top of the flat rocks, Luca’s body had been bound to a pole, with his arms spread wide and roped against a horizontal beam. For all intents and purposes, he looked to be on a cross. At his feet, a pile of twigs and small branches encircled the pole. Nearby, Boyson ranted and raved at him. Though she couldn’t hear the words pouring from his mouth, she intuited his meaning when he struck a match to the tinder.

  The vision vanished before the kindling became totally engulfed in flames.

  Sunny grabbed the door jamb for support, praying for guidance on how to effect yet another change to the future.

  Chapter 38

  . . .

  Sunny saw that Trey’s mouth was moving, but she couldn’t comprehend the words coming out of it.

  He took her by the arm and led her to the kitchen, where he forced a glass of water on her.

  Stupidly, Sunny drank, wondering why water was always the be-all, end-all for someone in shock.

  “Sunny,” Trey said, his tone gentle, “do you understand what I just said?”

  Her eyes shifted to him, but she kept drinking until the glass was empty. She
set it down on the counter and experienced an urgent need to pee.

  “Sunny, did you hear any of what I told you?”

  She shook her head. “Need to use the bathroom.”

  “Go ahead. I’ll wait right here for you.”

  She bolted down the hall, but instead of peeing, she hung her head over the toilet and puked her guts out. Luca. Burned at the stake. By Boyson, a man so evil, he could fill in for Satan.

  Once she was certain nothing else was coming up, she rinsed her mouth twice, splashed her face with water and dried it, then stepped out of the bathroom. Instead of going back to the kitchen, she opened the door to the spare room and checked on Carson and Maisie. Still sleeping like two pint-sized logs.

  Back in the kitchen, Trey eyed her with concern.

  Sunny grabbed the edge of the counter, as if it could give her inner strength, or at the very least, hold her up. “Boyson took Luca.”

  “So you did hear me, after all.”

  “Not really.”

  He planted his hands on his hips and waited for her to continue.

  “He’s going to truss Luca up to something that looks like a cross and burn him.” She uttered the words without thinking how they would affect Trey, who was not only Luca’s partner, but his best friend. His shocked expression made her regret her decision to speak so bluntly. “We have to get there before that happens.”

  “Get where? How the hell do you…?” He rammed his fingers through his hair. “Shit! Never mind. You had another goddamned vision, didn’t you?”

  Sunny gave him a jerky nod. “It was the same place as the last two I told you about, with the flat rocks in the center of the clearing, but my kids weren’t there. Just Luca, tied up, and Boyson, yelling and waving his arms about before he…lit the match.”

  “Jesus.”

  “Luca said there were three of them.”

  “We have two in custody.” His expression grew dark.

  “Who are they?”

  “No ID on them, but we’ll figure it out soon enough.”

  “I don’t want them to know I’m here, but if you get me some pictures, I may be able to help with the identification.”

  Trey spun on his heel and was out the door before she could blink. Less than five minutes later, he was back. He held his phone out to her.

  Sunny took it with trembling fingers and examined the first photo. “This is Preacher Bill, or the one they call Benign Pater now. She flipped to the next photograph. “This is Zeb, also known as Rex. Zach’s brother.”

  Trey’s expression hardened. “Okay, the first thing we have to do is get you and the kids to another safe house. I’m going to call Luca’s dad. He can get the ball rolling on this faster than I can, and besides, if I don’t tell him his son is MIA, I might as well kiss my ass goodbye.”

  “Matty and Elena’s house is a virtual fortress. Do you think they’d mind having my kids there?”

  “Are you kidding? They don’t have a single grandkid of their own and they’re crazy about Carson and Maisie. What do you think?”

  “I think I need to talk to them and see if they’re up for having my parents and my sister there, too, to help calm the kids.”

  “You can do that yourself.”

  She stared at him, incredulous. “Really? You think I’m letting you go to the Vale Luna compound without me?”

  “Are you fucking kidding me, Sunny? This is a job for law enforcement, not—”

  “I either go with you, or I go by myself. Take your pick.”

  “Luca will skin me alive.”

  “Luca will understand.”

  He looked at her askance. “Then you don’t know him as well as you think you do.”

  “Trust me. I know him better than you think I do.”

  His expression softened. “Honey, having a sexual relationship with a man doesn’t give you insight into his thinking.”

  Though her face flamed at the accuracy of his assumption, she said, “Let’s agree to disagree on this. I’m pretty damned certain I know what’s going on in his mind and how he’ll feel when he sees me up there. I’m willing to risk how angry he’ll be, Trey, because I believe me being there is the only thing that will keep him from being burned alive.”

  “Care to enlighten me about whatever plan you’ve cooked up in that crazy little head of yours this time?”

  “I would,” she said, “except I haven’t quite got it figured out yet myself.”

  He shook his head. “Either you’re nuts, or I am.”

  . . .

  Carson and Maisie slept on soundly, not muttering so much as a garbled protest when they were scooped up in their slumber bags and toted off to the Amorosi home. While Elena took charge of getting them settled in one of the guest bedrooms, Sunny and Trey had a brief confab with Angie and Darren.

  Angie, after giving Sunny what-for for drugging her, said, “That Kleinbert guy in Colorado Springs?”

  Sunny nodded.

  “Guess who the niece is?”

  Sunny blurted out the first name she could think of that was related, however remotely, to what was going on. “Sally Box.”

  Angie’s eyes widened. “How did you know?”

  Sunny shrugged. “I’m not sure. It just seemed, from the way you phrased the question, that it had to be someone we knew, or sort of knew.”

  Trey said, “That bitch is in for it this time.”

  “What do you mean?” Darren asked.

  “She’s interfered with investigations before, but she was so vocal about her first amendment rights, the department was reluctant to pursue charges. This time, she’s aiding and abetting a known felon in a kidnapping and unless we find Luca, murder.”

  Sunny’s knees almost gave way beneath her. She grabbed hold of the kitchen counter for support, giving herself a silent lecture to stay strong for Luca’s sake. “I saw Sally in my visions. She was in the crowd of onlookers.”

  “Jesus,” Trey muttered.

  Finished with delivering the only new information she had, Angie left the room to take charge of the children’s care by sleeping beside them with a loaded pistol and a walkie-talkie. Sunny was reassured that they’d feel comfortable when they awoke, knowing Angie was there with them.

  Her parents and Libby were due to arrive any time. Sunny planned to be gone when they got there, thereby avoiding their insistence that she remain with them instead of charging head first into danger.

  She quickly changed into her jeans and a long-sleeved shirt. She had to borrow a pair of socks from Elena before she could put on her sneakers. She tugged her hair up into a ponytail, then pulled on a ball cap Matty provided and worked her hair through the opening in the back. Finally, she rifled through her bag and pulled out a pocket knife and her rescue inhaler, both of which she shoved into a pocket.

  “You might need a lightweight jacket or a sweatshirt, Sunny,” Elena said, casting a worried eye in her direction when she came out of the bedroom. She handed over a black denim jacket that looked much too nice to wear on a rescue outing.

  “I can’t take that,” Sunny said. “It’ll probably get ruined.”

  Elena put her arms around Sunny and gave her a hug. “You think I’m worried about a silly jacket when the woman my son loves is going into the vipers’ nest to try and save him?”

  Sunny hugged her back, trying not to cry. “Thank you.”

  Matty put one of his big hands on her shoulder and gave her an affectionate squeeze. “I hope my son knows what he’s got in you, Sunny.”

  “I know what I’ve got in him,” Sunny said, “and I’m not going to let those maniacs up there kill him, I can tell you that.”

  “We’ll take good care of the children,” Elena said, releasing her, wiping tears from her eyes.

  “I know you will.”

  “Be careful,” Matty said.

  “I will. Give the kids a kiss for me when they wake up.” She swallowed over the sudden lump in her throat. “Tell them I’m sorry I couldn’t take them on th
e next big adventure, but I’ll make it up to them when I bring Luca back.”

  Matty gave her a big smile. “That’s what I like. A girl with confidence.”

  . . .

  “Do we know where we’re going?” Sunny asked Trey as they climbed into the back seat of the Ford Expedition being driven by an FBI agent who had identified himself as Special Agent John Butler. His counterpart, Kurt Spencer, rode shotgun.

  “No, but the FBI does. Their inside person has been diligent about getting out information and we have GPS coordinates for the clearing, so we should be able to locate it, no sweat.”

  Sunny hoped he was right. The vision had showed her the place, but not how to get there. They’d be up Shit Creek if the FBI was wrong.

  Before she could speak again, Butler said, “That was quite a set up you had at the cabin.”

  “My husband put it together,” she said, then added, “before he died. When were you up there?”

  “The day of the fire.”

  Sunny had a hard time getting her head around the fact that had only been two days before.

  Butler took his eyes off the road for a moment to look at her in the rear-view mirror. “You took quite a chance with you and your kids up there alone.”

  “I felt sure I could handle it.”

  “You sure did that,” Spencer chimed in. “You even managed to get these dickheads on video. Nice going.”

  “I just used the tools I had at my disposal,” she said.

  “Maybe so, but you have a good head on your shoulders, from what I can tell, and you utilized what was at your disposal better than most people could.”

  Sunny examined his tone for criticism and found none. “Thank you.”

  Butler went on to burst her bubble. “That doesn’t mean we approve or sanction what you did, Mrs. Fyfe.”

  Her gaze collided again with his in the mirror. His tone alone would have adequately imparted his criticism without the added scowl. “Point taken.” Reading between the lines, she wondered if they planned to leave her behind when they reached their destination.

  Time to formulate a Plan B, just in case.

  “Would you mind giving us a run-through of this vision you had?” Spencer asked.