Dear Ms. Colt,
Thank you for bringing the bracelet to our attention. It is indeed one of ours. It belonged to a Ms. Isobel Joy Niar, who gave us permission to contact anyone who came into contact with it. We are sure her next of kin will be happy to hear it has been retrieved...
Her heart stopped. Isobel Joy Niar? As in Isobel Joyner? The fourth woman on Roy Davis’s list? Here she’d spent hours trying to track down any trace of the woman—not even realizing for a moment she might’ve gotten her name wrong. A chill ran down Samantha’s spine. Had Eric bought her a dead woman’s bracelet?
The front-door chimes sounded. She tapped the new name into the internet and the result she was looking for popped up instantly: Woman found dead in storage unit identified as model Isobel Joy Niar.
The article was dated two days ago. A picture loaded. It was Bella. She reached for her phone and dialed Joshua’s number.
A scream came from the other room, filling the air for a fraction of a second before it was cut short. The front door slammed shut. She heard the lock click into place, then the muffled sound of Theresa whimpering and furniture scraping across the floor.
Slowly, Samantha rose slowly from her seat, like someone who was caught in a nightmare and couldn’t wake up. Her heart pounded furiously in her throat.
Help me, Lord. Help me know what to do.
The phone was ringing but Joshua wasn’t answering. She crept toward the flimsy glass door. Then through the crack she could see them. Theresa was standing, frozen. One hand clenched Theresa’s throat. Another hand pressed a gun to her temple.
“Hey, Samantha?” a voice called. “You in here?”
The phone stopped ringing. She hit Redial. Then she took another step forward until she could see the clear, unmasked face of the man holding the gun to Theresa’s face. It was Eric.
“Hey, Samantha? Where are you? We really need to talk!”
The glass door swung open. Samantha shoved her phone into her pocket praying for Joshua to answer. Theresa’s body pushed through, a gun to her temple, her eyes wide with fear. Samantha forced her gaze on the man holding the gun.
“Eric, what do you think you’re doing?”
“Samantha!” Eric smiled. His face was flushed, with the confusion and panic that clashed with the very deadly weapon he now held against Theresa’s head. “I’m so glad I found you. Look, you’re not going to believe this, but something really bad’s going on. You need to come with me. Now.”
A fighter. Joshua said I’m a fighter. But I don’t want to fight. I don’t know how to fight. I want to run.
“We can talk about whatever you want, but first you have to let Theresa go.”
“I can’t do that.” Eric’s head shook. His grip tightened around Theresa’s throat. “Somebody’s trying to kill you and she might be part of it. They’re called Magpie. I don’t know who they are. But they killed Bella too. They run around killing all the women I care about.”
“Bella’s real name is Isobel Joy Niar, right?” she said softly, feeling the pieces of the puzzle slowly fit together in her brain. “You were right all along. She didn’t move out. She died and her body was hidden with her belongings in a storage unit. Then you gave me her bracelet.”
“I didn’t know it was hers.” His head was shaking. “Or maybe I did, and I forgot. I’ve started forgetting a lot of things. I didn’t know about the storage locker and I don’t know why she died, Samantha! I don’t. One day she was in my life. The next she was gone. Like my friend Jessica at the gym and Monique, who I became friends with at the coffee shop.”
“And Holly, the girl you asked out in high school.”
Eric is the missing link. The one thing that ties them all together. Joshua told me, and I didn’t see it. Because something about it just didn’t fit.
“I want to listen.” She took another step forward. Theresa’s frightened eyes met hers. If she could just create a distraction, Theresa could escape. “Please, help me understand. You’re the Magpie, aren’t you? Did you become the Magpie to hurt the women who hurt you? To kill them because you were afraid of losing them?”
“I didn’t kill them!” His voice rose. “Somebody else did. I love them and they all died.” A pitiful pleading filled his voice. “So I hired a private detective...”
“You hired Roy Davis?”
He nodded. “Yes! That’s him. I found Roy online and explained to Roy that all these women had disappeared or died, and I thought someone had killed them, and that I’d pay him a lot of money to find out who. He asked if I knew who might die next, and I said maybe you.”
Then Roy had gone snooping around the building, and her work, before somehow fixating on Joshua as a culprit. “Where’s Roy now, Eric?”
“I don’t know,” Eric wailed. “He called me from jail and said he’d been arrested, but that he’d overheard someone talking about you coming here. Roy was the one who told me about Magpie. I hadn’t even heard of Magpie until he told me. But now it all makes sense.”
Did it? She prayed. Help me God, what am I still not seeing?
“So you’re going to run away with me.” Eric’s bright blue eyes locked on her face. “Right now, today. Before Magpie can hurt you too. We’ll get in my car, and drive and drive somewhere, until we’re alone, somewhere nobody will ever find us. Okay. We’ll be together, and love each other. I will protect you, and nobody will hurt you like the others.”
God, please help me to be strong.
“No, Eric.” She gritted her teeth and felt fresh strength move through her. “I will leave with you, if you promise not to hurt Theresa and let her go. But I will never love you.”
Something dark glimmered in the cold blue of his eyes. He leaned in until she could almost feel his breath on her face. “Then you’re going to die just like the rest of them.”
FOURTEEN
Dark icy-cold water swirled beneath him. Freezing wood pressed against his back. Joshua gritted his teeth. They were chattering so badly he was afraid the group on the bridge could hear them. When his body had hit the water, he’d gone under, as an explosion of bullets had rained down around him, shattering the ice. He’d stayed under, fighting the current, as long as he dared, then when his lungs couldn’t take any more punishment he’d swum underneath the bridge. Once there, he wedged himself in underneath the frozen wood, with the water flowing beneath him and his hands gripping the wood.
Rolling off the bridge seemed a better idea than staying up there, but still he was far from safe. He could hear them pacing above him, like sentries, or some weird reversal of a fairy tale about the troll who lived under a bridge. If he climbed up, Hermes would see him and shoot. If he tried to swim downstream and come up there, he’d freeze and drown in the icy depths of the river. And if he stayed there, wedged under the bridge, he’d be good for nothing. And he’d eventually fall.
“You see him?” Hermes asked.
“No,” replied the one with missing teeth.
“Is he dead? He’d better be dead!”
“How am I supposed to know if he’s dead?”
“Magpie wants him dead!”
“If you see him, shoot him.”
“What about the girlie? Samantha?”
“Magpie said somebody else gets to have at her.”
A brutal killer was going to get Samantha on behalf of the criminal mastermind behind all this, and all he could do was stay braced beneath a bridge, gasping for breath, feeling the growing weakness in his limbs threatening to send him tumbling back into the water.
Moments ago, his phone had started ringing, clattering above him on the bridge from where it must’ve fallen in the fight. Seconds later it was flung off the bridge, and he watched, helpless, as it skittered across the ice. His heart lurched as he saw the name on the screen before it slipped into a crack and disappeared beneath the ice. Samantha. Samantha was alive and calling him for help. And he couldn’t save her.
God, my gramps taught me that no matter how lost and wr
ong someone gets, they can always turn to You and that You will guide their steps. I don’t know if Alex is right, and that I let myself get pushed into the life I’m living now, out of a sense of duty, rather than charting my own path. But I need Your help right now. Help me know what choices to make and what actions to take. And more than anything please help me know how to help Samantha. Don’t let her get hurt because of me.
He heard a woman giggling in the distance. The sound was so unusual and unexpected, he didn’t know what to make of it. It was bitterly cold and the park was closed. Who in their right mind would go out for a winter’s stroll on a day like this? Straining his neck, he looked down the path. There were two figures, heavily wrapped up against the cold, wandering through the park toward the bridge. Joshua gave a quick thanks to God. It might not be the distraction he would have chosen. But he would take it and be grateful.
Slowly, he unwound his body. Slipping sideways, he braced his legs against the support beams and climbed his way under to the far side of the bridge.
“Hey! Stop!” Hermes shouted. “You two! Go back. This bridge is closed.”
The couple kept walking, like they didn’t hear him. The two other young men walked down to the foot of the bridge toward the couple.
“Stop! Stop now!” Hermes sounded panicked, almost hysterical.
Joshua braced his full weight into his arms, gripped the far side of the bridge and pulled himself up, enough that he could look over the edge.
Hermes had run to the far side of the bridge. He waved his gun hysterically at the approaching couple. “Turn around and leave!”
Hermes raised his gun to fire what Joshua hoped was supposed to be a warning shot. Not that he was about to get the opportunity. Joshua hauled himself up onto the bridge, launching himself on his stomach. He grabbed Hermes by the ankles. The gun went off. The bullet flew high into the air. Hermes fell forward onto the bridge. Joshua dragged himself up onto the bridge without letting go.
The couple were now running through the snow toward the bridge. Joy exploded in Joshua’s heart. It was Alex and Zoe. The one with missing teeth charged at them. Alex launched himself headfirst at him in the football tackle, crashing into him and bringing him down into the snow. The one who stank of cigarettes turned tail and ran.
“Josh? You okay?” Zoe was running toward them.
I am now.
Hermes was still thrashing like a wild animal, trying to claw his way from Joshua’s grasp. Zoe scooped his gun up from where it had landed. Her steady grip pointed it at Hermes. “Stop fighting my friend, or I’m shooting you in the leg. Trust me, I’m not going to miss.”
Hermes fell still. Joshua wrenched his hands behind his back.
“What are you doing here?” Joshua asked.
Zoe grabbed a pair of zip ties out of her jacket pocket and made quick work tying Hermes’s hands. “When I woke up and you were gone, my brother and I had words. I might not like what happened between Theresa and Alex. But you still shouldn’t be heading into something like this without backup.”
“I told him I didn’t need backup.”
“Well, you were wrong, weren’t you?” A smile turned on her lips. She tossed Alex a second pair of zip ties. He caught them and handcuffed the other thug. “We took my car, since you’d taken the truck. We got to Theresa’s and couldn’t find you. But it was pretty clear from the footsteps in the snow that some kind of chase had happened. So we followed them to the park, and then we heard the gunshots.”
Hopefully someone else would’ve heard them too, and called 911.
He leaped to his feet. “I’ve got to get back to Palm Branches. Killing me was a distraction. The real target they’re after is Samantha. Call the police. Then call Daniel and fill him in. I’m going after Samantha and Theresa.”
“You want us to come with you?” Zoe shouted after him.
“Yes, but it’s more important these two don’t get away again. So make sure you hold him until police get here, then make sure the police know they tried to kill us. Last thing we want is Hermes getting back out on the street again.”
Joshua pelted through the snow, praying with every breath that he’d get to Theresa’s offices and find Samantha there safe and sound. His senses strained for the sight and sound of police and emergency vehicles heading their way. But the street was just as empty as before. His feet pelted up the road. His heart prayed. He reached the storefront and froze.
Now what? Do I knock? Do I presume she’s in danger?
He looked down. Three sets of footsteps led in. No footsteps leading out.
There was somebody else in there.
He looked around at the empty sky.
God, I don’t know if it’s true that love makes a man stupid. Maybe it depends on the man. Maybe it depends on the type of love. I don’t even know what to call what I’m feeling right now. But my heart tells me that Samantha’s in trouble and that she needs me.
Carefully he tried the door. It was locked. He peered in the front window. The front room was empty, but through the frosted divider he could see three figures in the second room. A man standing with a gun in his hand. Two women sitting back to back. Joshua reached into his pocket. He had nothing. Not even his phone. All he had were the keys to Alex’s truck.
A grim smile crossed his lips. He climbed inside and gunned the engine.
* * *
Samantha’s hands were tied behind her back. The gag pressed tightly into her mouth. Behind her she could feel Theresa’s hands against hers. Theresa wasn’t moving. Her pulse was faint under Samantha’s fingertips. Just how hard had Eric struck her? Tears filled Samantha’s eyes. Desperate, wordless prayers filled her lungs. Worry for Joshua filled her heart. He should be here. If he wasn’t here, something was very wrong.
Joshua wouldn’t ever let her down.
Eric was standing in the doorway, leaning out through the glass doorway, looking into the main room, as if he was waiting for someone to arrive. Waiting for Magpie to show up and kill her?
“I’m sorry I knocked her out.” He turned back. “But I didn’t want her listening. I don’t know if she was part of it or if we could trust her.”
Part of the fact that women he was infatuated with kept disappearing and dying.
Then a thought hit her like a punch in the gut. Everything she’d found in ATHENA had assured her that Eric wasn’t dangerous. But there were facts Samantha hadn’t known, facts her database hadn’t been able to find and put together.
She closed her eyes. Maybe it was impossible to know all the facts. Ever. People weren’t like numbers on a sheet. Joshua’s gut had told him Eric was part of what had happened to Samantha all along. But she just hadn’t seen it.
Samantha squeezed Theresa’s fingers.
Please Lord, get us out of here alive.
“Look at me!” Eric barked. She opened her eyes. The gun waved in her face. “Now, it’s very important you understand that I didn’t kill anyone. I really did go looking for you in the hospital. I wanted to see if Magpie had killed you. And I’ve known for a long time that whoever had made Holly disappear is who made Bella disappear too.” Did he not know that Holly had drowned? Had he really not known that Bella had turned up dead in a storage locker? “I tried to warn you, though. I just had to be subtle about it, because I didn’t know how far it had gone, or how much you knew. Because I knew by then, women I love disappear. Sure, when Holly disappeared in high school I didn’t think much of it. But then Jessica died, and Monique, and then Bella disappeared, and I realized someone was disposing of women who weren’t good enough for me. That’s why I hired Roy to find this person, so I can explain to Magpie that I don’t want them to kill you. I wanted them to give you an opportunity to show you really cared about me. Now Magpie’s going to come and try to kill you, and I’ll finally know who they are. Because Magpie’s just trying to protect me. Just like I’m going to protect you. You get that, don’t you?”
Then she heard an engine gunning. A truck horn
blared. Then with a horrific screech the truck flew through the front window.
Eric bellowed in anger and charged toward the truck, gun firing. But it was too late. Joshua leaped from the door. He rolled, took Eric out at the knees and dropped him to the floor. Eric thrashed against Joshua’s grip. Joshua pinned him like a rag doll.
“Magpie is on the way!” Eric shouted hysterically. “When Magpie gets here, you’ll be dead. You’ll all be dead. All Magpie cares about is me.”
His hand slipped into his pocket. Too late Samantha saw the knife flash in Eric’s hand. She cried out against her gag, fighting helplessly against the rope.
“You should’ve let me protect Samantha!” Eric slashed the knife through the air. “I’m the only one who can protect her from Magpie!”
Joshua caught the blow with his right hand and knocked the knife from Eric’s grasp. Then with the left he leveled a jab to his jaw. Eric crumpled to the floor.
Sirens blared in the distance. Police. Ambulance. Rescue was coming.
Joshua’s eyes were locked on Samantha’s face. He ran for her.
“Are you okay?” He knelt in front of Samantha. His hand brushed her cheek. He pulled the gag from her mouth. Then his lips brushed her face, simply, tenderly. “I’m sorry I wasn’t here sooner. Are you okay? Did he hurt you?”
“No, but he hit Theresa pretty hard.”
He moved around between them, and she felt his fingers on her skin as he cut their wrists free.
Theresa groaned faintly. “Joshua?”
“Hey, Theresa.” He knelt beside them, his voice gentle. “Don’t worry, help is on their way.”
“You drove a truck into my office?” Theresa’s voice was faint but strong.
“Technically it’s Alex’s truck.” He glanced back at Samantha. “Hermes lured me to the park and two other young men jumped me there. Judging by their appearance, I’m very sure they were the same two that kidnapped you on behalf of Magpie. I’m getting the impression that Eric made people do a lot of terrible things.” He glanced at Eric with disgust. “Zoe and Alex disarmed them and are holding them until the police arrive.”
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