A Ride Home: Tampa FBI Two

by C. Soto

  He relayed to the police force his warnings of everyone staying on their toes and to always have a team member with them. That this killer had a pile of bodies already on his record and they were sure there were plenty more. He also relayed the importance to do everything possible to bring in the suspect alive since they assumed there were more victims out there that haven’t been found.

  He wanted those families of the cold cases to have closure and to finally bring them home. He didn’t know who they were, but the rideshare company was compiling the driver’s history over the last five years and would send the FBI every trip he ever picked up a passenger. The killer was operating even before he became a driver, so they needed to get his employment record from before that company to see if they could get more records. Eric would have every single name inputted into their database to ensure there was no missing person’s or cold case out for them. If so, they would dig up details surrounding their disappearance and investigate every single person that came up. It may take them years, but he had hope they would find all his victims since they deserved to be found.

  After the team and S.W.A.T reviewed all the information and blueprints, they were ready to head out. The team headed to the FBI’s SUV and headed to the Police Station to meet up with the S.W.A.T Team they would be assigned with. They had all their tactical gear, weapons, radios, coms, and were ready to go. The teams would be hitting each property at the same time. They had an APB out already on the suspect’s vehicle. They had dispatched undercover vehicles to stake out his house to see if he were home, to give them an idea of where he could be. The killer was not at home, but the wife’s vehicle was.

  The chief called the rideshare company and asked if the driver was logged on to work, he was not. He requested the moment that he was, that they notified him and to not alert the driver of anything being wrong. They promised they would notify Eric immediately the moment the driver logged on to work.

  Chapter 28

  The driver was headed towards the cabin, only a mile away. He smiled as he neared his property. He was imagining all the new areas he would capture on Sara’s body today. He thought about the work he had done thus far. Her body was a beautiful canvas that called for his work to be carved upon, it was truly a masterpiece. He knew with the weekend coming up, he had his son’s games and needed to put in hours at work, he would not make it out to visit her. He would be making up for that though every time he saw her. He didn’t know how long he would keep this one. Right now, he was filled with excitement, but soon she may run out of room for his creation or if he messed up just once, that would be it and his masterpiece would be ruined. He cleaned her up each time to ensure his work wouldn’t be ruined. He took care and pride in his masterpiece.

  He sighed as he still remembered the shrill of her screams on their first night. Once he brought forth the first knife and made the first cut, the scream echoed throughout the woods he was sure. Too bad for her no one was around to hear her. Now her screams weren’t as high, but the tears were still plenty. This pleased him to have the control over her pain and comfort. When he would dig in and when he would let up. He was in control of what he would do to her. She lost that free will the moment she became a passenger in his vehicle. She obviously hadn’t known she was taking a ride with the Devil that would come back and haunt her.

  He pulled up to the cabin, parked the car, and entered through the front door. He took off his sunglasses and set his keys on the kitchen table. Then grabbed his supply kit that he kept locked under the kitchen cabinets. He first got a bottled water out of the fridge and a can of soup and heated it up for her. He was sure she would be thirsty and hungry since he hadn’t visited since yesterday and it was already 7:00 p.m.

  He walked into the room and set the water and soup on the tray. Then he took his satchel that held his knives, his stun gun, and a syringe full of ketamine and set it on the table.

  “Hey Sara, how are you doing today? I’m sure you’re hungry and thirsty by now. I bought you some water and a little soup to eat. Are you going to eat and drink today?” He hadn’t had a problem of her refusing after that first day.

  She hesitantly shook her head in a yes gesture, with her eyes widening as he slowly approached her. “I am going to take off of the duct tape now.”

  He ripped the tape off, then she gave a shocked expression of the new pain from the tape pulling against her skin and her lips. He could see how red her mouth was from days of tape being applied, then ripped off, then applied again. It was raw from the brutal treatment. He reached down and took his finger gliding it over her bottom lip and chin.

  “We will have to put some aloe on that when we are done. I’m sure that wasn’t a very pleasant feeling.” He was always polite in his tone and communications to her. Which might have made him creepier for his actions that he spoke with a calm tone and always afterwards caring for their bodies.

  He took the cap off the water bottle and gently held it to her lips while helping lift her head. He slowly tipped it up so she could take a drink. She tried gulping down the water as the thirst hit her hard.

  “Slow down Sara, you don’t want to get sick now. Just little sips. Let’s get you some soup now too. You must be starving.”

  He took the spoon and fed her a little bit each time while alternating between little sips of water.

  He could tell that she cringed every time he was near, and he felt her turmoil at any of his touches, but her instinct to drink and eat overcame her unease at him being near her. This was the third night since he’d taken her. She hadn’t sunken into herself yet. He knew soon she would become a shell of herself, that there would become a point where she wouldn’t acknowledge his entrance into the room. They eventually all got to that point. The only way their psyche would allow them to keep going. They would go inside their own mind where it was safe and not acknowledge the world around them. They would be locked away inside, huddled in the darkest corner where no one could get to them.

  As he was feeding her and giving her water, his alert system started going off, telling him that something or someone triggered the alarm in the woods on his property. He jumped up, grabbed his knife, stun gun, and syringe of ketamine, and put them in his pockets. He usually wore cargo pants, so his pockets were spacious and had room for his tools.

  He ran to the door, opened, and closed it as quietly as he could. It was the time of night where the sun was starting to set and with the trees surrounding the area, it made it darker than it typically would be in the city. He opened the passenger side of his car and grabbed his binoculars and quietly shut the door and headed west to where knew he had the advantage to whatever was out there. He hoped it was a gray fox that tripped a wire or some other type of animal.

  As he made his way through the woods, he swore thinking, Why didn’t I get the rifle out of the cabin? in case he came upon a wild animal. He didn’t want to be that close to them, to where he would have to use his knife to gut them. He swore after he thought about how he didn’t put the tape back on Sara’s mouth. So, he truly hoped it wasn’t a person since if she heard another person out here, she would surely scream. He hadn’t heard any screams yet, but he wondered if it was because he was far into the brushes of the woods, that the trees absorbed the sound.

  Usually with the signs he posted around his property he didn’t get many hunters on his land. However, there would be some here and there as they either entered in an area where a sign wasn’t posted, or they didn’t care. Usually, he didn’t pay them any mind, he could give a shit less if they caught a deer on his property, that wasn’t why he didn’t want them here.

  He also thought, could someone have wandered off the trails and gotten lost? A few miles from his property were hiking trails, however, he had a lot of acres on his property. His cabin was in the middle of his acreage, so the miles surrounding it was all his.

  He crept forward continuing ahead, he was hiking for about twenty minutes so far, he knew he was about a mile away from where t
he alert tripped from. He hadn’t heard any unusual sounds or anything that shouldn’t have been there. He heard the animals, but he didn’t want to turn back, as he needed to inspect the wire that was tripped and see if anything was unusual.

  About another half mile in, he saw flashlights bouncing around. He froze behind a tree scoping out what was going on. His heart raced trying to figure out why there were multiple flashlights bouncing around. Normally, hunters didn’t go out in big groups. Did someone get lost and they were conducting a search party since it was getting late? He waited to see what they were doing and any conversations he could pick up.

  He took out his night vision binoculars and swept the area to where people were walking. He saw one person had a jacket that read S.W.A.T, then he froze as he saw another lady off to the side, whose jacket read F.B.I. He knew that lady.

  He froze momentarily, knowing this was it. They were here for him. They figured out who he was, there was no turning back now. The F.B.I lady was closest to him, so he needed to get her to come towards him, to hopefully corner her off by herself. He would need to try and capture her for leverage of getting out of this and escaping the area.

  He started slowly backing away from where the traffic was coming from to create a distance between him and them. He had grown up in these woods his whole live, so he knew every square inch of his property. He had the advantage they didn’t have.

  Once he slowly crept far enough away, he created a noise to alert the F.B.I lady to the sound, hoping it would capture her attention and bring her to see what the sound was.

  His plan worked, as she jumped at the noise, then crept towards it while crouched down, the branches pulled against her arms as she advanced forward trying to find what created the sound. She made it five more steps before the killer advanced upon her, first shocking her with the stun gun to momentarily catch her off balance. As he stunned her, she dropped her flashlight and her gun. He hurriedly picked up the gun and shoved it into the back of his pants and then picked up the flashlight, turning it off. He grabbed her flaying body and pulled her up and took the cap off his syringe and injected her with the ketamine, ensuring she would remain in an incapacitated state for a while.

  He was always good with thinking on his feet. He would come up with a plan on what to do next. If he could get her to the edge of the road, he could flag down a vehicle and then with her gun, kill the driver and take her with him. Knowing the direction law enforcement were coming in from, he would have to drag her another direction, as he knew that area would be blocked off.

  He was grunting as he pulled her along, trying to hurry before they noticed.

  James looked around as he was advancing towards the property and found that Tammy was no longer beside him. She was to the left of him a minute ago. Where in the hell could she have gone? He tried to speak to her through their coms, whispering, “Tammy, do you copy? Tammy.” There was no reply. Alerting him something was very wrong. He raged, thinking what could be wrong with Tammy? She knew better than to venture more than a few feet from him after the warnings they received. These woods were creepy enough with all these wild animals and a serial killer on the loose for her to take off somewhere by herself.

  Since he had a sinking feeling in his gut, he caught Derrick and John’s attention with his flashlight, and they quickly went towards him. He signaled for them to turn their coms off. “Guys, Tammy is missing. I don’t know where she veered off to, but she is not replying on coms. She had to go left, one of you come with me. Maybe she heard a sound or didn’t realize as she was moving forward that she created such a wide distance. I need to find her though to ensure she didn’t get hurt or worse. Who in the hell wants to live out here in the boonies anyways? It’s creepy as fuck. All these wild animals out here and it’s dark.”

  Derrick and John both responded at the same time, “Let’s go.” Derrick ran to one of the guys to let him know what was going on. He directed them to keep moving forward to the cabin and they would be right behind them. He also let them know coms could be compromised and to turn to a new channel or turn them off. Tammy couldn’t have gone far, as there was only two minutes that had passed since James last had eyes on her. So maybe she got in a thick bush and couldn’t see the flashlights to show her the way back. He was sure there was a simple explanation on where she was at.

  The S.W.A.T team and the K-9 Unit continued forward while Derrick ran back to John and James. They moved toward the only direction Tammy could have went since she didn’t cross by James, and she was on the edge of the perimeter. They quietly crept ahead and then James suddenly stopped, holding up his first and making a signal to be quiet. They heard the crunch of the twigs and brush on the ground being stepped on and a male’s voice grunting ahead.

  The hair on James’ arms stood up and anger soared through his veins imagining the worst-case scenario. The grunting was not of an animal, but a male’s voice. His thoughts ran on a rampage, Did the killer have Tammy? How in the hell did he know they were out here? They were still a couple miles from his house. They had to park the vehicles at the entrance and walk through to ensure no noises would have alerted him. Then he wondered, Did he have cameras or traps set up in these woods?

  John and Derrick heard the noise as well, and all three crept as slowly as possible. James stopped dead in his tracks once he got visual on the killer pulling Tammy, who didn’t appear to be in a conscious state.

  He took out his Glock 22 and made signals to John and Derrick to surround him. He ensured he advanced further before alerting the killer to them. The killer appeared preoccupied to what he was doing and wasn’t looking around at his surroundings, at least that James saw from when he first witnessed them. They were advancing on him quickly. He waited until he saw Derrick and John in position for Tammy’s safety. He needed to be closer to the killer to ensure a bullseye’s shot if he didn’t let her go and surrender. He put up the signal to wait for him once he was close enough, he made the signal that he was ready and stepped out into the opening where the killer would be able to see him.

  “Freeze you son of a bitch and let her go.” As James stood with his Glock trained on the killer.

  The killer looked up with wide eyes, then pulled Tammy’s body up more so she covered him, using her as a shield. James could see her eyes rolling back and her mumbling words, incoherently. James silently fumed not knowing what he did to her and if she was okay. If it were something temporarily disabling her or something that could cause her permanent harm.

  The killer held his knife to her throat, “You will step back motherfucker, if you don’t want your friend’s blood on your hands.”

  James went to reason with him. He tried to personalize his conversation, “Look Paul, this doesn’t have to get ugly. You have a wife right; you don’t want to put her through this. Let’s talk this out and resolve this peacefully.”

  James saw John and Derrick in position from the corner of his eyes. The killer didn’t know they were near. He thought it was just James right then. He didn’t want to alert him to the other agents, in fear he would react like a dog cornered.

  The killer laughed, “Do you think I give a fuck about that bitch. I only married her because of our son. I don’t give a shit about what she goes through. All she does is nag and bitch.”

  James then pivoted to the mention about his son, “Then Paul resolve this peacefully for your son. You don’t want to traumatize him any further after this story gets out. Think of him. How old is your son Paul?”

  “Oh shut the hell up, you don’t give a fuck about me, my wife, or my son, so don’t act like you care. You need to back the hell up and let us get out here. I’ll leave her on the edge as soon as I get out of here. However, I swear to god if you don’t lower your weapon right now and let us pass, I will slice her throat right now. He pressed the blade further into Tammy’s neck, where the edge of the blade nicked her skin, and a slow trickle of blood appeared. That was all James saw before he pulled the trigger, hitting the kill
er between the eyes.

  The knife fell out of his hands as he was killed on impact. Since he had Tammy pressed up against him and was leaning backwards to support his and Tammy’s weight, the momentum pulled him backwards until he fell on the ground, with Tammy falling on top of him with her back. She stayed there as she was paralyzed. She was hazily aware of what was happening but couldn’t speak or talk.

  James, John, and Derrick rushed to her side and moved her off and away from him. James leaning down feeling for her pulse. Her pulse was racing and having an irregular beat. He took out his radio and called for an ambulance and announcing that the killer was down.

  John took over the radio communication as James reached down and had Tammy in his arms and was rushing back towards the area they had come from to get her to the ambulance right away.

  “The killer had Agent Tammy Walls as a hostage. He had given her some type of drug, as she is conscious but not responding. FBI James Lewis will be bringing her to the starting point, please have an additional ambulance waiting for her arrival. Please continue towards the cabin, as there is a strong possibility that the victim is still being held in captivity.” We will need the ME and forensics to my location to retrieve the suspect. I will set a pin now to my location.”

  The chief responded, “John, I copy and see your pinned location. We will send units to your location now to take over the scene.”

  “Thank you Sir.”

  It killed John and Derrick to be sitting there with the body while their team member had something wrong with her. However, they couldn’t split up and separate even though the killer was down. They were in an area where they were surrounded by wild animals, and it was dark as hell. They knew James would get her to the hospital and get her help. They also still didn’t know what the status of the victim was. Was she alive, was she already disposed of? The killer was here at his property, so they had high hopes that she was still alive. That help was able to get here in time to save her.