“W-what?” She moved to push herself up. A sharp pain in her head wrenched a groan from her chest.
Migraine.
“We don’t have much time. He’ll be back.” George was leaning over her, his expression dire. The glimpse of red material at her arm tore her attention away from him.
“George, why am I wearing a red dress?” She hadn’t been wearing this before. She felt down her body. It was a clingy fabric that seemed to flare at her waist.
“He put it on ya while ya were half seas over.”
“Half seas what?”
“Ya know.” He frowned. “Knocked out.”
His words made her skin crawl, imagining a stranger’s hands touching her while she was both unaware and helpless to resist. George glanced toward her again, no trace of humor in his expression. “He’s made ya up to favor Nettie.”
“Who?”
“She died here, long time ago.”
Alexandra’s senses were beginning to clear. She looked around. “Where is she now?”
“Hidin’ from yer ole woman. They all are.” He stood and moved to the door. “I’m the only one fool enough to be here.”
She pushed herself to her feet. The room she was in was familiar. White-trimmed windows stood out amongst the dark red walls. At least the carpet at her bare feet was mostly gray.
So much freaking red everywhere.
“I dreamt about this place.” She took an unsteady step forward, and George hurried to catch her when she lost her balance. Instead of finding support in his arms, she fell through him, collapsing onto her knees on the carpet.
“Sorry, love. That stink done somethin’ to me. I’m not as strong as I usually am. If I were, I’d unlock that door.”
She lifted her gaze to the windows. They were shaded, but dark.
How long had she been here?
She swallowed the foul taste in her mouth. “Tell me about Nettie. How did she die?”
The killer was keen to recreate ghosts’ deaths. She rubbed the palm of her hand against her right eye, where the pain was strongest. Maybe knowing what he, what Dr. Watkins, had planned would give her an advantage. She gave herself a minute, tried to will the migraine away, before moving to stand again.
“Nettie?” she reminded when George said nothing.
“Well, now, she was…ya know.” George gestured at her dress and then tugged at his collar.
“No, I don’t know.” She looked at him. Then something clicked in her brain. “Wait. She was a prostitute?”
“If the scuttlebutt’s to be believed.” He moved around the room, glancing up and down as if he were searching for something. “A bit of a sad story really. This used to be a hotel back in the day. One night, poor Nettie was out on the balcony during a storm. Got struck by lightning. Killed her instantly.”
Think, Alexandra.
The killer had been murdering his victims by injecting them with chloroform, but he liked to stage their bodies afterward to reflect someone else’s death scene. If Nettie had been electrocuted on the balcony, that must be where he planned to take Alexandra.
But Watkins hadn’t yet killed Alexandra, and he could have easily done so.
Her death was meant to be different somehow.
“Do you know where he is now, what he’s doing?” Alexandra asked as she checked the first window she saw. Tree limbs blocked her view of everything.
Maybe she could climb out if she could get the stupid window open. The windows were tall, old. She tried to lift up on the bottom but was too weak to budge it.
Dammit.
“He’s downstairs,” George grunted. “Puttin’ somethin’ together under the stage.”
“The stage?” That didn’t seem right. He should have been setting up something on the balcony. She tried to think harder and squinted against the pain in her head. “What are you looking for?” She moved to the only other window in the room and lifted the shade. There was only an empty alley.
George reached his hand toward her. “Com’ere.” He was standing in front of a desk in the corner of the room. She hurried to join him. He pointed at a paperclip lying on the surface. “Grab that. We can use it to pick the door’s lock.”
She snatched the paperclip and rushed to the door. It was an old door with a large keyhole. “I don’t know how to pick a lock.”
“I’ll tell ya what to do. Hurry.”
Kneeling, she followed George’s instructions. The first try, nothing happened. The second time, a slight metallic click was heard.
Alexandra turned the knob and the door creaked open.
“Run to your left. He’s coming up the stairs.” George hurried in front of her, using hand gestures to guide her along the dark hallway. He pointed to another door. “Quick. Hide in here.”
It was a closet! Alexandra pushed against the clothes hanging inside, tugging the door shut behind her as quietly as possible. She stilled and tried to calm her breathing. She couldn’t see anything. The closet was too dark.
The creak of footsteps nearby echoed eerily in the small space. They stopped suddenly.
“Alexandra?” A man’s voice bellowed her name from somewhere nearby. In a softer tone, she heard him say, “You smart girl.” Louder, he called in a sing-song voice, “Alex-an-dra? Come out, come out, wherever you are.”
The floor creaked again, and again, coming closer.
Sweat coated her palms, and the doorknob began to slip from her grasp. She pulled on it, keeping it shut. He wasn’t getting into this closet without a fight. She’d rather die than let him touch her again.
“I’m impressed!” The man yelled, alerting her that he was standing on the other side of the door. Another creak in the floorboard. “I thought Collins might come and try to rescue you, but I was getting impatient. I never counted on you freeing yourself!”
All movement on the other side of the door stopped. Alexandra swallowed, struggling not to move, not to breathe. Then, a loud thump in the distance was followed by the man’s muttered, “Dammit!” She could tell by his heavy footfall that he was running back the way he’d come. She closed her eyes and listened. The thump of his feet seemed to be going down.
“Someone’s come to help.” George’s voice whispered in the dark. “Hurry.”
Breathing a sigh of relief, she released the doorknob and pushed it open. George stood on the other side, but he wasn’t alone.
Rebecca Collins stood beside him.
Alexandra freed a sigh of relief and stepped toward Dylan’s mother. She must have made the noise downstairs to distract Watkins. Bless her heart.
George tilted his hat toward Rebecca in greeting. “Nice thinkin’, ma’am.”
“I’m so sorry, Alexandra.” The other woman shook her head. “Dylan and Zachary know you’re here. They’re on the way, but we have to get you safe.”
Alexandra started to move but stalled at the unexpected information. “Zach is here?”
“Come on now, ya need to light a shuck this way. We’re not safe yet.” George ushered them both back down the hall, opposite of the way Watkins had run. With very little light to guide her, Alexandra held onto Rebecca’s hand and ran through a doorway, then another, trusting George completely. Light began to pour into the hallway, and Alexandra instinctively ran toward it.
The theater’s interior was lit with stage lights. She was standing in the balcony section above the stage.
Oh no. The stage.
Something had been drawn on the stage. A circle. She was too far away, it was too dark, to see it clearly.
Rebecca tugged at her hand. “We shouldn’t be here.”
George nodded, his expression panicked.
Boom.
Alexandra spun around at the sound of a door being slammed behind her. She rushed to try the doorknob. It wouldn’t budge. She couldn’t go back the way she’d came.
“George?”
But George was no longer there. Neither was Rebecca.
Boom.
Another door
slammed on the other side of the room.
Down. I need to go down.
The red glow of an EXIT sign above a door beside the stage beckoned to her. Alexandra hurried along the wall, behind the seats, ignoring the slamming doors, one after another, in front, behind and below her, in every direction. She finally found a doorway that led to a set of stairs.
Alexandra nearly tripped over the skirt of her dress as she rushed down the steps, clinging to the brass handrail for balance in her bare feet. At the bottom, she could see large, open windows leading to the street. That way. She needed to go that way.
A man’s shadow fell on the wall.
She couldn’t go that way. That had to be Watkins approaching.
She turned and ran through a dark hall that led her into the well-lit orchestra section of the theater. Casting anxious looks over her shoulder, she moved toward the illuminated EXIT sign.
“Not safe. The stage. Hide under the stage.”
The whispered words in her ear sounded familiar. Feminine. Rebecca? Dylan’s mother was still trying to help.
Alexandra glanced toward the emergency exit, hesitating. It made the most sense. She started that way again.
“That way isn’t safe. Hide under the stage.”
The door began rattling, as if someone on the other side were trying to enter. Alexandra turned and clambered for the stage. Watkins might not expect her to hide there. Maybe she could find a spot behind something, somewhere. Just long enough for the police to get here.
Her feet had just touched the stage when the overheard lights shut off, pitching her into darkness again.
The flicker of candlelight lit part of the stage, casting shadows that danced eerily on the curtains and across mannequins draped with costumes.
It was the only source of light, so Alexandra’s feet slowly moved in that direction.
As she grew closer to it, she could see it was a pentagram drawn in white on the stage’s floor. Seeing that was all it took for her to turn and get out of there.
It hadn’t been Rebecca’s whisper she’d heard. It had been the demon, manipulating her.
Click-clack. Click-clack.
Alexandra spun around at the sound of hard-heeled shoes walking behind her.
Click-clack.
The sound stopped.
The old woman stood a few feet away, her eyes as dark as night. A menacing smirk curved her mouth upward.
“We’ve been waiting for you, Alexandra.”
Alexandra took a step back as her fingers curled into fists at her side. All she could seem to think was Crap! What am I supposed to do now?
***
Dylan looked over to make sure Zach’s flak jacket was on right as he secured his own. They’d set up a barricade a block away from the theater. Patrol cars and officers obstructed it on all sides. The FBI had been called in, but the two agents seemed happy to let Dylan keep the lead on this operation.
“Ready for this?” Dylan asked his brother.
A SWAT team was in position to move, awaiting Dylan’s order. He planned to be with them, and Zach had made it clear he was going, with or without the police’s consent. It had taken the threat of handcuffs and the reminder that Dylan’s reputation was on the line to convince him to fall back.
Dylan nodded toward the barricade where Connor Manning stood, watching. “Zach, you’re waiting here until I give you the clear to come in with him. Got it?”
Zach’s expression was stoic. “I’ll give you five minutes after you enter the building. If I haven’t heard from you then, I’m coming in. Just so you know.”
Shaking his head, Dylan lifted his radio and gave the command to move forward, discreetly. Last thing they wanted was to alert Watkins they had the building surrounded.
Graham had discovered that the medical examiner had been volunteering at the theater for almost six months. That meant he probably knew his way around and hadn’t raised suspicion going in and out at all hours. He’d probably stolen or copied someone’s key and would know well enough that there were no auditions or rehearsals tonight.
Dylan had never been inside, but he’d familiarized himself with the blueprints while his team had been getting into position. He and Zach had agreed Alexandra was probably being held in one of the private upstairs rooms, or one of the dressing rooms behind the stage. Those places were his priority to search first.
He followed a man in full SWAT gear across the street, ducking behind trashcans and clinging to the side of the building, praying Watkins wasn’t keeping an eye on the street. Dylan gestured to the first SWAT officer, and the large man entered the building.
The lobby was substantial, with elegant spiral staircases leading up to the balcony on two sides. His men branched off, and Dylan motioned to McCormick to follow him up the service stairs. They’d start there first.
Gun drawn, Dylan entered one room, then another.
In the second room, McCormick pointed toward a chair. Alexandra’s clothes were draped across the furniture. Dylan’s shoulder muscles tightened.
She’d been here, but she wasn’t now.
Advancing back into the hallway, he nodded to his left. They would access the balcony, move down and check the dressing rooms behind the stage.
The balcony seemed extremely dark as he stepped into the area. There was some light, very dim, coming from the stage.
Alexandra stood, tall and straight in a red dress, staring intently at something in front of her. Dylan saw no one on the stage with her.
The door behind him suddenly slammed shut.
He spun and saw Watkins dart from the shadows toward a row of seats further down. The man rounded the section as Dylan gave chase, weaving in and out of rows of seats.
“Dylan!” Alexandra yelled his name, but he didn’t take his eyes off Watkins.
Where the hell had McCormick gone?
Watkins was headed toward a doorway. Dylan sprang over the row of seats, pushed his foot off the back of a chair, and launched himself at the man from a sideways angle.
His teeth rattled in his head as their bodies impacted at the shoulders. His hands grabbed Watkins’ upper limbs and threw him onto his back. He landed a hard punch to the man’s jaw.
“Grrrrrrr!” Watkins’ groan was close to an unearthly growl, his features twisted into something ugly.
His left hand pushed against Dylan’s chest. He quickly lifted his right hand. Dylan glimpsed the hypodermic needle before it sank into his skin. Groaning, Dylan punched his knee forward, connecting with Watkins’ groin. Watkins lost his grip on the needle and doubled over in pain.
Too soon he clambered to his feet again.
Dylan had just pulled the needle out of his arm and flung it across the aisle’s carpet when Watkins roared and launched toward Dylan again. Light glinted off a knife clutched in his right hand.
The boom of a gun echoed loudly in the theater.
Watkins’s body fell forward onto Dylan before sagging limply to the floor.
“Collins, you okay?” McCormick called.
Pushing away from the lifeless body beside him, Dylan scrambled on his knees toward the needle. The plunger handle was still up, the vial still full of liquid. He rubbed at the slight sting in his arm. Close call. Too close. His chest sank in relief.
A SWAT team member was perched on the balcony on the other side of the room, his rifle aimed at where Watkins had fallen. Some of the SWAT team had also entered the orchestra area below.
“I’m fine,” he called back, drawing attention to where he stood. He squinted toward the stage. “Alexandra?”
No response.
Dylan found the stairs, hurried into the lower section, and approached the stage.
She was still standing there, staring straight ahead, looking out to where the audience would sit, not moving. Probably in shock.
“Alexandra, are you okay?”
She turned her head and looked at him. The force of that malicious stare startled him.
What the—?
Unnatural black eyes watched him.
Eyes that did not belong to the woman he knew.
Chapter Twenty
Get. Out. Of. Me.
Alexandra directed all of her energy toward pushing the old woman as far away as she could manage. Pain ripped through her head, and she flattened her ears with both hands and squeezed, trying to release some of the tension. A scream of agony spilled from her mouth as tiny claws tore at the insides of her body.
The pain. It was too much. She doubled over, falling to her knees.
Alexandra struggled to stay conscious. There had only been two times when entities had tried to enter her body. She recognized the familiar tingling, the intense pressure. The old woman, the demon, whatever it was, was trying to overtake her.
No!
As the pain lapsed, she realized with surprise that she was standing again. Forcing herself to focus on her surroundings, she saw Dylan watching her, approaching carefully as if she were a rabid animal he wanted to corner. McCormick and some other officers in black stood not far away, staring at her, eyes widened. No one reacted to her cries for help. No one rushed forward when she sank to the stage in agony.
Hadn’t they heard her scream? Seen her pain?
“Alexandra?” Dylan held out his hand, palm toward her. “Can you hear me?”
Yes.
The word formed in her mind, but she was unable to push it past her lips.
Oh, heaven, please help me. She was under attack, mind and body, and not winning.
This shouldn’t be happening. She had stopped this in the past. Her grandmother had taught her how to protect herself from possession.
Oh, no. Of course.
Alexandra had been drugged, weak. She hadn’t awoken and closed herself off from contact the way she normally did. She hadn’t placed any veils of protection or said any prayers. She’d been afraid, panicked, not thinking clearly. That had left her vulnerable, and that’s exactly what this entity had wanted.
Her arm lifted without her permission. Her finger pointed at Dylan.
“I don’t want you here.” Her voice. She’d spoken the words, but they weren’t hers.
Something Wicked: HarperImpulse Romantic Suspense Page 22
