Cold as Ice

by Allison Brennan

  Megan said, “But isn’t Lucy in danger from Paxton? If she betrays him in some way—”

  “No,” Dillon said. “Paxton’s obsession is sick, but it’s not going to turn to hate. Lucy could tell him she hates his guts, and he would understand and forgive her. I don’t think anyone really understands how deep this goes for him. How important Lucy is to him and his mission. To him, Lucy is a hero. She killed Adam Scott. Thus, she can do or think no wrong. He doesn’t blame her for marrying Sean; he thinks Sean manipulated her, that he’ll hurt her, that he puts her in danger simply by the fact that he is a Rogan.”

  “And that’s why he kidnapped Kane?”

  “I’ve been thinking about that,” Dillon said. “I think including Kane and Brad was part of his agreement with Hunt. He wants Sean, he gives Hunt the men who killed his family. But my guess there is that he didn’t use his men for those jobs; he gave Hunt the money, but it’s up to Hunt to follow through. Which is why Kane escaped, and Jack has been working with him to find Hunt. Hunt most likely escaped to Mexico—it’s where he’s most comfortable.”

  “No,” Lucy said.

  “You think he’s elsewhere?”

  Megan said, “Brad Donnelly overhead a conversation between Elise and Jimmy and Jimmy stated that he was still in Texas but would meet her in Mexico tomorrow.”

  Lucy said, “I think he’s dead.”

  And she feared Sean was, too.

  “Why?”

  “Because I do know Jonathan, even better than you, Dillon. I may not have understood his obsession with me until now, but I know him, and there’s no way he would let that man live, knowing what he did. Hunt’s son was too much like the man who killed his daughter; he’d never let him walk away.”

  “Well. You might be right.”

  She was right. “But what does that mean for Sean?”

  Dillon shook his head. “I don’t know, Lucy. I don’t know.”

  Chapter Forty-seven

  MONTGOMERY, TEXAS

  LATE SATURDAY NIGHT

  After Paxton killed Hunt, he’d lost the desire to talk to Sean. It was like a switch, and he wasn’t himself.

  And not in a good way.

  Sean began to wonder if Paxton had snapped. When he lost everything two and a half years ago—everything except his wealth—he broke. His obsession with Lucy and Lucy’s resemblance to his dead daughter took over all reason.

  Colton seemed to sense the change in Paxton and without commenting and waiting for permission, he escorted Sean out of the library.

  His shackles rattled through the cavernous hall until they went outside.

  “What’s going on here, Colton? What is the plan? You must know what’s going to happen next.”

  Colton didn’t say anything.

  “He’s going to kill me, isn’t he?”

  Of course he was, but he wanted to destroy him first. How? By trying to turn Lucy against him? That couldn’t happen, could it? She wouldn’t believe whatever lies Paxton and Colton came up with, no matter what “proof” they had.

  Would his son believe it?

  What if the evidence was good enough for the cops? The FBI? What if he lost his house, his money, everything … and disappeared because he was dead, but no one knew? Everyone thought he was on the run because he was considered a fugitive?

  Lucy would be left with nothing and a teenager to raise, broken, heartbroken, confused.

  Sean felt ill. It might not matter that Lucy would never believe he could kill a cop or … do whatever Paxton had planned … if the world came crashing down, it would crush her.

  What did Paxton hope to gain from it? Just … keeping him away from Lucy?

  Colton remained silent. They walked past the limo and to the garage. Through a side door that was opened only by a code. Colton didn’t even attempt to hide it from Sean—0217. Sean didn’t know if he could use it, but it was always good to have as much information as possible.

  February 17. Lucy’s birthday.

  Sean felt physically sick.

  “You have to see that Paxton isn’t sane. He’s not going to get away with this, and you know it.”

  Colton led Sean down a wide hall, then turned and went down narrow stairs to a basement. It was cold down here, humid, musty. There was also a cage. An eight-by-eight-foot cage.

  “No,” Sean said.

  Colton more than anyone—even Lucy—knew how much Sean hated confinement. He wouldn’t say he was claustrophobic—small spaces didn’t bother him, as long as he knew the way out. But being trapped terrified him.

  And Colton knew it.

  * * *

  Sean had one semester left before graduation; Colton had graduated a week ago. It had taken him four and a half years because he took time off to take care of his ill little brother, and that experience had changed him. In both good ways and bad. But Sean had stuck with him because Colton was his best friend. More a brother to him than Duke, who acted like a dictator, or Kane, who fought other people’s battles all over North America and had made it clear he didn’t think Sean was capable of helping him, outside of a couple of isolated piloting gigs when Kane had no one else to call.

  Sean and Colton lived together off-campus and it was Christmas break. Sean didn’t want to go home—he had hardly spoken to Duke in three years. Only when absolutely necessary. He still hadn’t forgiven him for sending him off to MIT, for not listening to him, not believing him, not trusting him.

  Some things were more important than rules.

  Sean and Colton had four weeks before the next semester started, and time plus genius-level IQs plus anger was a recipe for disaster.

  But all their previous plans had worked perfectly, for the most part. They needed something to do, something to believe in.

  A rumor had been going around campus for the last few months that one of the RAs, Brian Bean, was videotaping the showers in his dorm—both girls and boys. An investigation had been launched, but the campus police couldn’t find any evidence. A few videos that had surfaced on the internet were untraceable, according to law enforcement.

  But Sean and Colton weren’t law enforcement, and nothing was foolproof. They’d been tracking Bean, and Colton cloned his hard drive to figure out how he had been recording when there was no evidence of cameras or wires in the community bathrooms. That’s when they realized he was recording live—he didn’t need wires if he went in between the floors whenever he felt like it. And not just the showers—they found recordings from the dorms as well.

  Because the campus police had screwed up the initial investigation—and because Sean had no faith in the system after he’d been expelled for hacking, for doing the exact same thing as he was doing now—Sean and Colton wanted to destroy this bastard themselves. Justice came in all forms.

  That’s why they had to wait until winter break. First thing they did was break into his dorm room, hack into his computer, and destroy everything he had on the cloud. Sean suspected he’d hidden the files on his computer so they wouldn’t be easy for law enforcement to find—or he hid them on another website. So he downloaded his history—history the jerk thought he’d erased—to analyze later, then he destroyed his hard drive.

  But they couldn’t be sure they had sent a clear enough message to the asshole, so they tracked Brian down to where he was visiting his parents in South Carolina.

  At first, everything went perfectly. They waited until the family left one evening, then they broke into the rural home and found Brian’s laptop. Destroyed it. They searched his room and found an extensive amount of pornography—some of it clearly underage. They grabbed it to burn. The guy was an asshole, and neither Sean nor Colton cared what happened to him.

  It was Colton’s idea to take one of the photos and leave it in the mother’s drawer with a note.

  Do you know that your son is a pervert?

  Sean didn’t know if that was a good idea, but he let Colton do it.

  They were leaving when they saw lights coming down the r
oad. They didn’t know if the Bean family was already home—only an hour after they left—or if it was someone else. They’d parked down the street—smart, considering—but now their car was too far for an easy escape. They ran across a small field to a barn. They hadn’t spent time to do recon because they didn’t know how long Brian would be here.

  But they should have. If they had checked things out first, they would never have entered the barn.

  The structure was falling apart, not used for much of anything except storing junk. It reeked of rotting wood, animal feces, and stale, cold air.

  The car turned down the drive. Sean and Colton watched from a crack in the door. They didn’t want to wait in here longer than necessary—it really stunk—but as soon as the family went inside, they could cut across the lawn and head to the road. They weren’t parked that far away, and it was dark, so minimized their chances of being seen.

  Someone went up to the door, but it wasn’t the Bean family. It was a delivery. The individual dropped two packages at the door and left.

  Sean breathed easier.

  “Let’s go, C. We did what we came to do.”

  “I hate that he’s going to get away with this,” Colton said.

  “What can we do? The police did shit because Bean was good enough to cover his tracks and the cops don’t have anyone good in cybercrimes. We destroyed everything he saved. He’ll think twice before doing it again, especially on campus.”

  “So we protect the dorm, what’s to say he doesn’t go after the girls in the gym? Maybe finds a way to get into the high school?”

  “I don’t know.” Sean had hoped that fear would keep Bean in line.

  “We have to do something, Sean.”

  He thought about it, came up with an idea. “He’s going to have to get a new computer, but I can plant a virus. He records anyone in the dorm and I’ll know. I’ll monitor his cloud account. If he steps out of line once, I’ll send an anonymous feed to the dean, the police, to whoever can do something about him.” He had to do it anonymously. He didn’t want to go through what he went through at Stanford, where doing the right thing had resulted in him being expelled.

  Of course, he had made a big production out of exposing his pedophile professor. And knowing how the police handled a pervert like Brian Bean told Sean that maybe it was worth it.

  “Can you do that?” Colton asked, surprised.

  “Yes.” Sean wasn’t positive, but he would figure it out. He’d never encountered a computer problem that he couldn’t solve. “Let’s go, okay? I don’t want to be here when…”

  As Sean pushed on the barn door something scurried across his foot, startling him. He jumped to the right. The floor cracked, and suddenly he was falling …

  He landed ten feet down into a root cellar of some sort, except that it was small. Dark. He brushed it aside and heard rodents running in the small space.

  “Sean!”

  “Step back or you’ll fall, too.”

  “How far?”

  “Ten, twelve feet.”

  “I can’t see anything.”

  Neither could Sean. He stood up and groaned. He’d fallen on his wrist. He didn’t think it was broken but it hurt. He shook it, but the pain only got worse.

  “Go back to the car. Get the flashlight.” Why hadn’t he brought it with him in the first place?

  Because if you were caught you didn’t want the cops thinking you were a burglar.

  Idiot.

  “Okay. I’ll be back, ten minutes tops.”

  “Drive back, I don’t care if we’re caught, we need the car to help pull me out. Be careful when you walk back in.”

  At first, the silence didn’t bother Sean. He figured Colton would be ten minutes. His watch had a small light on it. Nine ten P.M. He hoped Brian and his family didn’t come back because he had no idea what he would tell them. The truth? That Brian videotaped naked men and women in the shower at college? Like that would go over well. Breaking and entering … destroying private property … what else would the cops throw at him?

  Sean didn’t want to think about that.

  He tried to feel around, see if there was a ladder. The room was small, maybe six feet by four feet.

  A little bigger than a grave.

  Where the hell was Colton?

  He checked his watch. Nine twelve. Shit, it had only been two minutes? It felt like thirty … more.

  Sean took a deep breath. On one wall were jars. They felt grimy, like someone had forgot they’d canned fruits and veggies and they’d been down here for years. There had to be a ladder here, didn’t there? How did people come up and down to get the jars?

  They don’t. They forgot about them.

  A mouse … no, larger than a mouse … ran across his foot. He kicked it and the sound it made when it hit the wall made him think larger than a rat.

  He wasn’t normally skittish about bugs and rodents, but he couldn’t see them, and what if they had rabies?

  Something crawled over his face and he shook his head back and forth. He was shaking; he couldn’t control it.

  Dammit, where are you, Colton?

  He looked at his watch.

  Nine thirteen.

  No, his watch had to be broken. Three minutes? It felt like hours.

  He looked up and saw nothing and for a second thought that the roof had caved in, that Colton wouldn’t be able to find where he was buried. That he could be down here for hours … days. That he would die.

  Don’t be stupid. Colton will get help. If he can’t get you out, he’ll get help.

  Every time Sean moved, he felt something else … a rodent, a bug, a cobweb. So he stood still and waited.

  He couldn’t stop shaking.

  He’d never been so terrified.

  It’s just a hole! Colton is coming back!

  But it wasn’t just a hole. It was a grave. Why was it even here? Why didn’t they board it up?

  Stop, Sean! It’s not a grave.

  He reached up, hoping to feel the floor above him, but he couldn’t. He was six foot one, and with his arm extended what? Seven feet? But he still couldn’t feel a ceiling. Had he fallen farther than he thought?

  He kept telling himself that Colton was coming back, that he was just in a root cellar, that there was nothing here that could hurt him … but he felt the walls closing in on him.

  Nine sixteen.

  Six minutes …

  Something flew by his face and he screamed.

  * * *

  “Please, C. Don’t do this.”

  Colton opened the cage.

  “In.”

  “No.”

  It was just him and Colton. He had cuffs and shackles, but if he could incapacitate Colton then maybe he had a chance to get away. Hide. It was dark outside. He had to try.

  He didn’t want to be locked up again. Prison. The root cellar. Might as well be a well in the middle of nowhere. He didn’t care, he couldn’t do this!

  Sean turned and with all his strength head-butted Colton as hard as he could. He ran up the stairs. He tripped over his shackles, struggled to get up. He half crawled up the stairs. If he could just make it to behind the garage …

  He hadn’t thought this through, he knew, but the panic was real. He could taste his own fear and mortality. He had to get away or he would be dead.

  He was nearly to the top of the stairs when a blinding pain hit him in the back. He collapsed and half fell, half slid down the stairs.

  Colton had shot him.

  His body convulsed and he heard the zap as Colton held the Taser on him until the charge was spent.

  He almost couldn’t breathe.

  His limbs twitched. He couldn’t speak.

  Colton dragged him by his feet into the cage. His head banged on the stairs and he saw stars. He didn’t know if it was from the pain in his skull or being Tasered.

  “D-d-don’t,” Sean squeaked out.

  “It’s over, Sean. Over. You think you are some sort of genius? Y
ou think only you know what’s right and what’s wrong? If your wife knew half of what we did, she would never forgive you. Yet you turned your back on me. On what we were!”

  “C. Please.”

  Colton kicked him, pulled the barbs out of his back and Sean cried out, then bit the inside of his cheek. He tasted blood. Not just from the inside of his mouth, but his face had been cut on the stairs and blood dripped onto the stone floor.

  “You lied to me. Infiltrated my group. You used me, betrayed me, used our friendship to clear your name. You walked away, not caring that everything we did was to make the fucking world better!”

  “Not. The same.” He cleared his throat. His body felt like it was on fire and he had little control of his tingling limbs. He tried to get up, but fell back down.

  “The senator sees the world as I do. The innocent and the evil. We could have done great things!”

  “What are you going to do?”

  “No one will ever find you, but I promise—everyone who thinks they know you will see you for who you really are. A selfish bastard who cares for no one, cares for nothing but himself.”

  Colton leaned over him. “And if you think we won’t get away with it? You’re wrong. It’s already in motion.”

  Sean heard Colton walk away, the cage close, the lock turn.

  Colton walked up the stairs, turned off the light. Sean laid on the cold stone floor in the dark.

  In a cage.

  Trapped.

  He heard a click above him, then speaker static followed by an odd sound. At first he didn’t know what it was. Music? White noise?

  No. The sound of rodents scratching on walls. Scurrying around. Faint, intermittent. Sean couldn’t see anything in the windowless room, but felt as if animals surrounded him. He tried to tell himself it wasn’t real, it was psychological warfare. But his fear grew with every passing minute.

  * * *

  Jonathan left his library while his men removed the body and cleaned the mess.

  He shouldn’t have killed Hunt. He hadn’t planned to kill him until he’d finished setting the plan in motion. His daughter was a problem—a threat, truly, to Lucy—but Jonathan would deal with her accordingly.