Love you to Death Read online

  Of course, he couldn’t let Ashley go. She’d report him to the authorities and his fun would be over. He wouldn’t allow himself to be confined as a prisoner. But he had to make Elise think he’d let Ashley go.

  It was a win-win situation. He’d get to experiment with a willing victim, and if Elise lied, he could bring Ashley back and continue on as he’d originally planned.

  “Okay,” he said. “I’ll let her go. You stay here, and I’ll be right back.”

  “I want to see you let her go. I want to see her walk away.”

  “You’re in no position to make demands. We’ll do this my way, or not at all. You said you’d do whatever I want.”

  She was quiet for a long moment, looking at Ashley with so much compassion and love, he could almost feel what it was like to be willing to sacrifice oneself for someone else.

  He never would have even considered doing such a thing for Lawrence, and he wondered briefly if that made him a bad brother. Not that he cared. Lawrence had never done anything to warrant such a sacrifice.

  “Can I have a minute alone with her? Please?” asked Elise.

  It was the “please” that gave Gary pause. This was what he’d wanted all along—that play of emotional agony between two sisters. How much more agonizing could it be than to say good-bye for the very last time? How much more beautiful?

  “Come with me,” he ordered without turning around to see if Elise followed behind her sister’s dragging body.

  He opened the door to his operating room and tossed Ashley inside. Elise rushed forward to help her sister from the floor.

  Gary pressed the power button to start his recording equipment and left them alone. Whatever they had to say, he’d capture it and watch it later when he was in bed tonight.

  Besides, it was time to fetch his instruments. He wanted to see how long Elise could lie still while he cut her. Wendy’s record was twelve minutes. Maybe Elise would break it.

  Trent’s vision was going in and out of focus, which didn’t exactly fill him with confidence.

  The ground beneath his feet seemed to reach up and trip him every few steps. He stumbled yet again and fell to the dusty ground. His nose was only inches from the dirt, so the dark, wet spot was easy to see in the bright moonlight. Blood. Not his own, but the killer’s. He’d come this way, and this spot was proof of it.

  He was right on the killer’s trail.

  A surge of adrenaline spiked through him, dulling the pain and giving him the added burst of strength he needed. He wasn’t going to give up and let the killer have Elise.

  He loved her. She was strong and brave and loyal. Completely selfless. Sexy as hell. She made him feel needed, useful. How could he not love her? How could anyone not love her?

  She needed him, and he wasn’t going to let her down. He was in rough shape, but he was the only shot she had for a rescue. All he needed was a phone so he could call for help. He just needed to hang on long enough to get to the house.

  Trent pushed himself to his feet. He felt the warm trickle of more blood slide down his leg as the makeshift bandage moved.

  At the rate he was bleeding, he was going to have to hurry or he wouldn’t even have the strength to make a call.

  The yellow light he’d seen was closer now—only a few yards away. He could see that it was a porch light, a bare yellow bulb beside a simple wooden door. A plain white curtain hung over the glass, shielding his view of the inside, but a faint light leaked through the fabric.

  He saw no movement, no sign that anyone was inside, but there was nothing else out here—nowhere for anyone to go.

  Trent prayed Elise was inside, that he hadn’t driven her somewhere else. There was an old Cadillac sitting beside the house, but that was no guarantee the killer hadn’t driven her away in another vehicle.

  There was only one way to find out, and time was sliding away with each drop of blood that leaked out of him.

  As quietly as he could manage, Trent moved up to that door and turned the handle.

  It was locked.

  The door was old and loose in the frame. The knob was even older. Trent pulled a credit card out of his dripping wallet and eased the latch open.

  The door swung in with a wickedly loud squeak.

  Trent froze, bracing himself for another bullet, but no bullet came. He listened hard, but only heard the beating of his heart and the sound of blood struggling to pump through his veins.

  Bugs flew past his head, flocking to the light over the kitchen sink. Trent stepped inside, not bothering to close the door and make another racket.

  The kitchen he stood in was old, run-down. The butcher-block countertops were scarred with use and split with age and neglect. A pot of water boiled away on the gas stove, and sticking out from the top, Trent could see a metal handle of some kind gleaming under the stark light.

  On the wall, there was an old rotary-dial phone. He wasn’t sure if the thing still worked, but he was willing to give it a shot.

  Keeping his eyes and ears open for sounds of any company, Trent went to the boiling pot, grabbed a blue towel sitting on the counter, and lifted out one of the instruments. It was some kind of saw with fine, serrated teeth.

  A bone saw.

  A shiver of revulsion moved through him as he realized what he held in his hand. How many women had been tortured with this instrument?

  As weapons went, it wasn’t a great one, but it was better than the dainty scalpels and clamps he had to choose from in the bottom of the pot. For the first time in two years, he wished for the dense weight of a gun in his hand. Beggars couldn’t be choosers, and he sure as hell wasn’t going to walk around bleeding and weaponless.

  He put his back to the wall and lifted the phone out of the cradle. A dial tone buzzed in his ear, sounding like a chorus of angels. Hallelujah.

  He dialed 911, praying the old phone would work with the relatively new system.

  The operator came on the line asking what his emergency was, and her calm, professional voice seemed to scream through the phone into the silent kitchen.

  Trent rattled off his old badge number, hoping it would light a fire under the local authorities if they realized he knew the difference between a problem and a real emergency. “I’ve tracked the serial killer the CPD is looking for to this location. I need immediate backup.”

  He didn’t wait to see what she said. He couldn’t give her an address, but since this was a landline, he hoped they could trace it. Rather than waiting around to see what she had to say, he simply let the phone dangle at the end of its curly cord and went looking for Elise.

  It took every ounce of strength Elise had not to cry. Chances were good this was the last time she’d ever see Ashley again, and she didn’t want to waste whatever few moments they had left with tears.

  “I’m not going,” said Ashley. “I’m not going to leave you alone here with him. He’s a demon, not a man.”

  Elise took her sister’s hands in hers. They were cold from fear, trembling. Ashley’s fingers were long and slender—the hands of an artist. Elise knew that losing them would end Ashley’s life, even if they made it out of this alive.

  She had to convince Ashley to go and not look back. If that killer got the chance, Elise was sure he’d go after Ashley as soon as he was done with whatever he’d planned for her. Before that happened, Ashley needed to be far, far away.

  “This is the best chance we have. You have to run for help.”

  “Then you should be the one to go. You’re stronger than I am. Faster, too.”

  “I can’t run. I think I have a broken rib.”

  Ashley’s face crumpled in misery. Tears slid unchecked down her cheeks. “I won’t leave you.”

  Elise hugged her sister tight. She didn’t know how much time they’d have before he came back. “Please, do this for me. Be strong for me.”

  “He’s going to hurt you. He’s going to kill you.”

  Elise couldn’t think about that now. She had to pretend it wasn
’t going to happen, that everything was going to be fine. If she didn’t, the hopelessness of her situation would crash down on her and bury her alive. She had to stay strong for just a few more minutes.

  She swallowed down the urge to scream out her helpless rage, to rant at the unfairness of all this. How could she find the one man on earth who could love her despite all her flaws, only to lose him? How could she finally find her sister, only to become a victim of a madman?

  Elise pulled away from Ashley’s embrace, making sure her face was a calm mask. “If you don’t go, he’ll kill both of us.”

  “I should be the one to stay. I was the one who was stupid enough to fall into his trap.”

  She gave Ashley a shake to stop that train of thought before it got started. There’d be plenty of time for her to think about that later, if she was lucky enough to survive. “No, Ashley. I can’t run. You have to go.”

  Tears wet Ashley’s cheeks. Her eyes were huge and luminous with fear. “I wish you’d never come for me.”

  “Of course I was going to come for you. I love you.” It was so easy to say to Ashley. Why couldn’t she have said the same thing to Trent? Why couldn’t she have admitted the truth to herself earlier? She loved him, and she was never going to get the chance to tell him.

  “I love you, too,” said Ashley.

  “Then be strong for me. Get away from this monster, and get help so that no one else has to go through what we have. Promise me.”

  Ashley’s voice wavered, but she whispered, “I promise.”

  Gary went to fetch his toys from the stove. When he reached the top of the stairs leading into the kitchen, he came to a dead stop.

  Small puddles of muddy, bloody water were all over his kitchen floor. The back door was open. The phone was off the hook, dangling by its cord. The bone saw was no longer boiling away on the stove.

  The ex-cop boyfriend. Somehow he’d survived.

  Gary had no idea how he’d gotten out of that trunk, but he’d found a way. He should have put a bullet in his head when he had the chance. Now, he was going to have to subdue the man all over again.

  Only this time, the boyfriend was armed. With his saw.

  The man had already shown he was willing to throw himself into danger—right at a loaded weapon—if that’s what it took to do the job. Gary wasn’t willing to take that kind of risk again. He needed to be smarter this time.

  He needed leverage.

  Luckily, he had what he needed downstairs. Once Gary had Elise in front of him, playing human shield, her boyfriend would think twice about charging at them with the bone saw he’d stolen.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  Trent had searched the entire first floor of the house, and so far he hadn’t found a serial-killing psycho, only empty rooms.

  Well, not exactly empty. One of them had been turned into a home theater with a huge video library. A stack of DVDs were sitting out, ready to be viewed. The top one was labeled “Constance, Volume 3.”

  Constance Gregory. The woman who had been chopped up into chunks so she fit in a garbage sack. The woman with Elise’s name carved into her skin.

  What would he carve into Elise’s soft skin if Trent didn’t find her first?

  Trent suffered through the wave of revulsion that hit him. He didn’t have to see that video to know that whatever was on it wasn’t good, and it was probably a lot worse than what was on the first two volumes.

  He didn’t stay and poke through the rest of the videos. Not only did he not want to tamper with evidence, he also didn’t want to waste the energy. With every second that ticked by, he lost another few drops of blood. The way his vision wavered, and his legs felt like lead weights, he figured he didn’t have a whole lot of seconds left.

  But until he found Elise and knew she was safe, he had to keep moving. He shuffled his feet over the worn hardwood, trying to keep his weight off his injured leg as much as possible.

  A bedroom was next. It, too, was void of serial- killing psychos, but it did have a nice 9mm semiautomatic handgun sitting on the bedside table.

  Trent took that as proof that God was on his side, and he limped over to the weapon. He dropped the saw, picked up the gun, released the magazine, found it full, and slipped it back into place, working the slide.

  He hadn’t touched a gun since that night two years ago, but he hadn’t forgotten how to use one. The deadly weight of it in his palm was reassuring. Comfortable.

  Now, all he needed was that psycho, and his job here was done. If he could keep his eyes and trigger finger working that long.

  A wave of dizziness made him sway. He gritted his teeth and let his fear for Elise seep in. He’d been trying to shut it out, ignoring what could be happening to her right now, for fear that he’d break down or give up. But he needed that fear and the adrenaline it poured into his system to keep going just a little longer.

  He let himself imagine what could happen—saw her perfect body lying in pieces, smeared with dirt and algae. The image enraged him, made his blood pound through his veins. He was not going to allow that to happen. If it took every last bit of life he had in him, he was going to find that man and kill him.

  Only a few more steps. He’d find the killer in the next room and it would all be over.

  But the killer wasn’t in the next room. Or the living room. Trent had searched the whole first floor and hadn’t found him yet. He’d wasted precious time searching in vain.

  The creak of old wood trickled in from the kitchen, almost too faint to hear. Trent thought he’d imagined it, but it happened again.

  The psycho was in there.

  A surge of deadly satisfaction ripped through Trent. His body responded when he ordered it to move and find the bastard. He kept to the shadows as best he could, but his wobbly gait made it hard to stay balanced. His leg had been a throbbing mass of pain, but right now, all that fell away. He couldn’t feel anything but the reassuring weight of the handgun in his grip.

  “I’ve got your woman,” called out the psycho. “I know you’re here. Show yourself.”

  “He’s got a gun, Trent!” That was Elise’s voice, high and strained with fear.

  Elation trickled over his skin like cool rain. She was still alive. There was still a chance to save her.

  Trent peered around the doorframe, into the glaring brightness of the kitchen, and saw the situation. He pulled his head back before the psycho could blow it off.

  He wasn’t lying. He had Elise in there with him, plastered against his front like a living shield. Even on his best day, with rock-steady hands, Trent wouldn’t have been able to make a shot like that without hitting her. Today was not his best day. His hands were shaking like the rest of him, getting worse by the second as his blood pooled on the floor at his feet.

  Damn it!

  How the hell was he going to get them out of this?

  “I’ll shoot her if I have to,” said the psycho. “We both know what happened the last time you held a gun. If you try to shoot me, you’ll only hurt her the same way you hurt your partner.”

  “He’s going to kill me anyway, Trent. He’s going to kill both of us. Don’t listen to him.”

  The killer roared, “Shut the fuck up, you bitch!”

  Elise yelped in pain, but Trent had no idea what he’d done to her. The only thing he knew was that he couldn’t let the man do it again. Not to his Elise.

  He stepped around the corner, aiming the gun at the psycho’s head. He had to use two hands to keep it steady, and he still wasn’t doing a great job. The shredded remains of the plastic handcuffs dangled from his left wrist, vibrating in time with his unsteady grip, blatantly displaying exactly how unsteady it was.

  The killer shoved the gun against Elise’s cheek. “Drop it or I’ll shoot her.”

  “You shoot her, and you won’t have time to blink before I kill you.”

  “Tough words for a man who can barely stand. Look at you. You’re leaking like a sieve.”

  “Worried a
bout your floor? You won’t have to worry about anything for long.”

  “Shoot him, Trent.”

  “Yes, Trent,” said the killer. “Shoot me. Go ahead. I dare you.”

  Trent had maybe two inches of clearance on the left side of the man’s head. The rest of him was covered by Elise. Unfortunately, her head was right next to those two inches.

  The night he’d shot John came back to him, pounding him with a barrage of memories. He remembered pulling the trigger. He remembered John’s pained scream. He remembered the blood—heaping gouts of blood pouring out of his friend’s back.

  If he missed, it would be Elise’s head bleeding.

  “You can do it, Trent,” she said. “I trust you.”

  She shouldn’t. She knew what he’d done—the mistakes he’d made. How could she trust him?

  “He’s going to kill all of us if you don’t.”

  That much was certain.

  Trent’s vision grayed out at the edges. It was creeping inward, blinding him by slow degrees. He felt cold, numb.

  Elise stared at him, her eyes bright with trust, her expression pleading.

  A little more of his vision faded. He couldn’t see the man’s feet anymore. Suddenly, it got hard to breathe.

  “Please, Trent. Don’t let him kill us. I love you.”

  Had he imagined those words? Surely, he was hallucinating. But what if he wasn’t?

  He had to find out, and the only way he had a shot at that was to take it.

  Trent leveled the weapon, lined up the sights on the killer’s left temple, and fired.

  The gun bucked in his hands. Blood bloomed out from the killer’s head. Elise slammed her arm up, knocking his weapon away from her face, and ducked away.

  Trent fired again, this time aiming at center mass, now clear of the woman he loved. He hit something, but he couldn’t tell what. All he saw was the killer stumble backward before that gray tunnel closed down to a pinpoint and winked out entirely.

  He felt his body hit the ground, and this time, he couldn’t get back up.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX