by Paris Hansen
Zach stood next to a rocking chair, a beautiful redheaded little girl sobbing in his arms, the scalpel pressed against her neck. In the rocking chair was Bethany Gibbons, who no longer resembled the woman in her driver’s license photo. She rocked gently in the chair, her dress wide open, a bare breast pressed to the face of the squalling baby in her arms. Her free hand rested on the baby’s forehead as her vacant eyes stared out into the middle of the room.
It was the creepiest thing Sloane had ever seen. A visual she knew she’d never forget, but weird as it was, she had more vital things to focus on. She needed to get the little girl away from Zach, get rid of his weapon, and then she could worry about the baby.
“Leave now, or I’ll kill her. She doesn’t need Rebecca anymore. She won’t miss her.”
“I’m afraid I can’t do that,” Sloane answered calmly.
She looked around the room to see if there was anything she could use to distract him. When her eyes landed on a collage of pictures she assumed were Zach and Bethany through the years, she knew what she needed to do.
“Tell me about your sister, Zach. Tell me why you went to so much trouble to keep her happy.”
When his shoulders relaxed, just a smidge, she knew she’d made the right call. Now, she just needed to figure out how the hell she was going to get everyone out alive.
Chapter Forty-Four
He yelled her name again and again, even though he knew she wouldn’t hear him. She was already gone, headed toward the house where a killer waited for her.
Fear had him pressing the gas pedal down to the floor. He was so close, yet not close enough. If something happened to Sloane because he was slow to react, Cade would never forgive himself. He should’ve listened to her. Should’ve given her the benefit of the doubt. To hell with his case and trying to be professional. She was more important than all of that bullshit.
He gripped the steering wheel so hard, the stitching bit into his palms. He welcomed the pain and the clarity it brought him. Using the Bluetooth again, he called Morgan, not surprised when the other man answered on the first ring.
“She’s going into the house. He’s already got the baby, and now she’s going in after him.”
“Fuck,” Morgan growled. “How far out are you?”
Cade shot a glance at the GPS on the dashboard. “Five minutes, maybe less if I don’t run into any other cars. I’m going eighty.”
“What’s the status of the victim, Casey Stevens?”
“Sloane said she was hanging on, but barely. Tell me you have an ambulance on the way.”
“Of course. Their ETA is a few minutes after you. Don’t worry about Stevens; go after Sloane. There are more potential victims in the house, and Bennett is proving to be unpredictable. She’s going to need back-up.”
“Got it.”
Morgan didn’t bother saying goodbye before he disconnected the call. Cade didn’t mind. He didn’t need the pleasantry, though, to be honest, he wouldn’t have minded having someone talk him through the rest of the drive. His anxiety was high, worried that he wouldn’t get there in time, or worse yet, he would, but something terrible still happened to Sloane.
“Fuck,” he said as he slammed his hands against the steering wheel.
“In point five miles, your destination will be on your right.”
The dulcet tone of his Australian-accented GPS sent a shot of hope through him. So close. He was so damn close.
A minute later, he pulled into the Gibbons’s driveway, barely bothering to put the car in park before he jumped out and ran toward the house. He rounded the side, heading toward the back door, knowing it was the one Sloane would’ve gone through, which meant it would already be open. Once there, he slowed down. He didn’t know what the situation was like. He didn’t know if Zach Bennett had help or anyone else in the house besides the little girl and his sister.
Cade took the time to clear the bottom floor before he followed the sound of crying and voices coming from the other side of the kitchen. Making his way down the hall, he stopped short just outside the door to the room Sloane was in. He couldn’t get too close. Not knowing the layout of the space left him at a disadvantage.
Would Bennett see him if he got any closer? Were there other doors in the room he could use to move through the house if he felt threatened? The man was unstable. How would he react if he felt like he was being cornered?
He could hear her talking softly to Bennett, trying to get him to speak to her about his sister. The little girl was in the room with them, as was the baby. Their cries mixed with Sloane’s voice, making it hard at times for Cade to make out what she was saying. The situation was too chaotic and dangerous for him to rush in. Not with so many unknowns.
There was a good chance his presence would only make things worse, and he had no idea what it looked like inside of the room. He needed to let Sloane try to diffuse things as best she could before he made his move. He just hoped he didn’t end up waiting too long. Lives depended on him making the right move.
If only he had a crystal ball to tell him what the right move was. He’d never needed one more than he did in that moment.
Chapter Forty-Five
“You don’t really want to hear about my sister. You’re just trying to distract me.”
Sloane shook her head as she leaned the ax against the wall. She held her hands up in the air so he could see them, then took a step to her left, putting some space between her and the weapon.
“I want to know more about you and your sister and more about Rebecca. She seems frightened. Maybe you can let her go, or at least move the sharp scalpel away from her throat.”
She had to practically yell so he could hear her over all the crying. He scowled at her, then looked down at Rebecca, who was still sobbing uncontrollably. While he moved the scalpel so it wasn’t touching her skin, he tightened his hold on the girl, causing her to get louder as he moved her around.
Sloane glanced over to Bethany and noticed that none of the noise was phasing her. She was in her own little world, not even realizing her breasts were useless to the hungry child in her arms. The scene saddened Sloane, but she had to put it out of her head. Bethany wasn’t the danger here; her brother was.
“If you don’t want to talk, why don’t I tell you what I know,” Sloane said as she moved over to the bed and sat down.
She wanted Zach to focus on how comfortable and unthreatening she was. Maybe then he’d let his guard down. He had no way to know Cade was outside or maybe even moving into the house by now. At least she had to believe he was. Knowing she wasn’t alone was the only way she could keep going. Knowing that there was someone out there who had her back would give her the strength she needed.
Hopefully, he was sweeping through the kitchen and the living room, making sure they were safe before he worked his way toward the bedroom she figured belonged to Bethany. There were feminine touches to the room’s decor, and next to the bed was a bassinet for the baby. Once again, Sloane found herself wondering just how aware of everything the other woman was. Could she take care of the newborn, or was she just as useless to the child as the breast next to the baby’s head?
Sloane shook her head, then allowed her gaze to drift back to Zach, who was watching his sister intently.
“She’s your person, right? The one whose happiness is more important than anyone else’s, even yours. She was there for you when your parents died. Instead of leaving you to be raised by a relative or having you end up in foster care, she stayed behind to take care of you. While all of her friends went off to college, she became a single parent to her ten-year-old brother.”
A thought popped into her head then, one she hadn’t put together before. Did their parents’ death teach him what he needed to do to make sure his sister never left him? His sister was about to walk away from him but didn’t because they died, and she felt responsible for her kid brother. Maybe, he figured the same thing would work with her husband.
“She raised you
, loved you. She was your best friend, but then she met Daniel. They got married, and then they got pregnant, and then they had no more space for you in their lives. Were they going to make you move out? You still lived with them then, right? Did they tell you they wanted you to leave so they could grow their happy little family in the house you’d grown up in?”
Anger flashed across Zach’s face. “It wasn’t Bethany. She’d never do that to me. It was that stupid husband of hers. He wanted her all to himself. He hated that she doted on me, that she wanted me around. He told me I had to find a new place before the baby came.”
“So, you killed him,” she stated matter-of-factly. “You’re lucky that Bethany survived.”
“She wasn’t supposed to be there. She wasn’t supposed to be in the car,” he yelled as he hit the side of his head with his fist. “I had everything planned, but then she wasn’t feeling good, and instead of going to work, he took her to the doctor. It should’ve just been him in the accident; then I would’ve stuck around to take care of Bethany and her baby girl.”
“But that wasn’t how it worked out. Instead, you killed her daughter and left her brain damaged, broken.”
“I didn’t mean to,” he screamed, startling Rebecca.
Knowing she needed to back off a bit before he took his anger out on the little girl, she told him how great of a brother he was for taking care of her when she couldn’t always take care of herself. His features softened as he looked at his sister.
“That’s what she did for me. From the day I was born, I was like her doll. She took care of me from that moment on. Our mom used to tell us I was Bethany’s baby, not hers. After everything she did for me, I couldn’t let her down.”
“Is that why you killed Daniel’s parents?”
He nodded. “They kept coming around, saying I needed to put her into one of those assisted living places. They didn’t think I could take care of her in the state she was in. Not if I wanted to keep my job. They didn’t know about Rebecca. I hid her every time they came by. Otherwise, they would’ve wanted to take her away too. I couldn’t allow them to do that. We were doing fine.”
“Why did you start hurting the women again, Zach? I assume the first time you did it so you could get Rebecca for Bethany. But why start again?”
Zach glanced over at her, his face devoid of emotion. “I tried getting what she needed in other ways, but it didn’t work. I even kidnapped a little girl once, but it didn’t stop the chanting. The chanting went on day and night, for hours on end. All she wanted was a baby, and I couldn’t give her that until I realized I could. I just needed to take it from the source.”
Sloane cringed at his word choice. The man was off his damn rocker, yet he seemed to think everything he did was justifiable because it was for someone he loved.
“It didn’t matter that it was messy or that it wasn’t right. I’m not a killer. Not really. But I’ll do whatever it takes to keep her safe and happy. She’s all that matters. She was happy after I brought Rebecca home. That was the name she was going to give to her daughter, so I thought it was only fitting. She took care of her like she’d been the one to give birth to her. Of course, she couldn’t feed her like she wanted, but we worked that out, using bottles and whatnot.”
Maybe she was wrong about Bethany’s abilities, or perhaps they’d diminished over the last five years. Even if the woman had been able to care for a baby five years ago, there was no way she could now. She hadn’t even flinched once since Sloane came into the room. There should’ve been some reaction between the crying and her brother’s outbursts, but there wasn’t. She didn’t even blink.
All she seemed capable of was constant rocking, which didn’t make any sense. And then Sloane noticed it. Bethany wasn’t the one moving the chair. Zach was. His foot rested on the front part of the rocker where he slowly flexed it, then let it go, flexed it, then let it go, creating the perfect rhythm to make it look like Bethany was rocking herself.
Sloane tried to shake it off and get back to keeping him talking. She needed to get him to let Rebecca go so Cade could move in and end this twisted mess.
“So, what changed?”
“She started chanting again. Rebecca was no longer a baby. She’s self-sufficient for the most part, which doesn’t give Bethany anything to do. When she started chanting again, I thought maybe she was talking about Rebecca, but she’s been ignoring her for the most part. Then the chanting got louder and more insistent, and I knew I needed to do something. The first baby was a boy, and she didn’t want anything to do with it. Same with the second.”
“Is that when you decided to give them back?”
Zach nodded. “We were going to keep them. Rebecca and I were going to take care of them, but I couldn’t leave them here alone all day. As helpful as Rebecca is, she’s only five. She couldn’t be responsible for herself, Bethany, and two infants, so I took them to a fire station so they could be reunited with their dads.”
“What happened with the girl you left on the side of the road?”
“She had a seizure. I never noticed her medical alert bracelet. If I had, I wouldn’t have taken her. Instead, I could have asked her out like I wanted to.”
Sloane knew if she could keep him talking, she’d come up with something she could use to talk him down, and now she had. As she brought up Amber Newman, he had a wistful expression on his face, which was quickly replaced by exhaustion.
He was tired.
Tired of living the life he was living. He was tired of killing. Maybe even tired of taking care of a sister that was mostly unresponsive but demanding.
“I know you love your sister, but this isn’t the way anyone should live. Neither of you can sustain this lifestyle. What happens in five years when this baby is self-sufficient, and she starts chanting again? Will you go out and kill again, even though your sister’s faculties will be even more diminished than they already are?”
“I’ll do whatever it takes.”
“Zach, when do you get to live a life of your own? What about your happiness? You could’ve found love with this girl, but instead, you threw it away to try and make your sister happy. She doesn’t even know what happiness is.”
Zach shook his head violently. “You’re wrong. She stopped chanting, didn’t she? She thinks she’s doing what’s right for that baby. It’s not her fault I have to kill to give her what she wants. It’s mine.”
“You could leave us all here today, me, Rebecca, Bethany, and the baby. You could leave and make a life for yourself somewhere. Find your own happiness. Bethany would be well taken care of.”
“You’re lying. There’s no chance for me now. You’re with the FBI. They’ll be here soon.”
“Do you want to leave, Zach? Do you want to find happiness? I can make it happen,” she lied. “Drop the scalpel, and let Rebecca go. I won’t come after you. The FBI isn’t here yet. You could make a run for it.”
She could see the hesitation in his eyes. He wasn’t sure if he should believe her or not. He wanted to, and that made her sad.
Zach Bennett was guilty as sin, but in his head, he’d only done what was necessary for the one person he loved above everyone else. The poor, confused boy turned into a poor, confused, deadly young man.
He slowly lowered the hand holding the scalpel, but he didn’t let it go. He started to lift it again, then thought better of it, and instead loosened his grip on Rebecca and lowered her down, so her feet touched the ground. As soon as she was free, she ran from Zach, the man she considered an uncle, into Sloane’s waiting arms. She would’ve rather had her run out of the room, but she wasn’t sure what was happening in the rest of the house. Whispering in the little girl’s ear, she instructed her to climb onto the bed and hide behind her. If things went badly, Zach would have to go through her to get to the innocent girl.
Now that he no longer held Rebecca’s life in his hands, Sloane had no idea what he might do. He was still close enough to Bethany and the baby to harm them, but she d
idn’t think he would.
This was his last stand. Either he’d decide to make a run for it, believing her lies, or he was going to go out swinging. She just wasn’t sure which way he’d go, so she had to prepare for it all.
Chapter Forty-Six
“Zach, I thought we were going to put the scalpel down when you let Rebecca go.”
He shook his head again. “Something doesn’t feel right. I can’t do it. I can’t leave her. She didn’t leave me. She never left me.”
“She won’t even realize you’re gone. I’m sorry, but according to her medical record, Bethany’s cognitive function is damaged beyond repair. She isn’t aware of much, and as time goes on, it’ll only get worse.”
Sloane didn’t know if that was true, but it sure felt like it. She didn’t know what Bethany’s diagnosis was, but there was nothing about what she’d witnessed to tell her she was wrong; it was a fib that held a lot of truth.
“She knows me. She’ll know if I leave her behind.”
A tear slid down one of Zach’s cheeks as he started calling out his sister’s name. Her vacant gaze never strayed from where they were. The entire time they’d been in the room, she’d never even looked down at the tiny baby in her arms. She never once turned toward her brother or looked at Sloane whenever she said her name. The woman was there in body, but not in spirit.
Sloane wondered if it was even possible for Bethany to have undone her dress and pulled out her breast for the baby. The more she witnessed, the less she believed that was the case. She couldn’t even rock the chair on her own. A shiver tore through Sloane as she realized Zach set up the entire scene. It was what he wanted to see, his sister taking care of the baby he believed she wanted.
Could she even speak? Or was the chanting a figment of his imagination? Something he conjured up to make himself feel useful even though his sister was quickly deteriorating. They had two, maybe three dead women, and another in a coma, all because he wanted to recreate a time in his life where he’d felt like he’d truly taken care of her.
