“Drop it, asshole!” Paula crept from the shadows of an earthen hallway.
Winnow whirled around with the syringe held tight against John’s neck. “Stay where you are. Don’t come any closer.”
“John, are you okay?” She pressed forward, the barrel of her weapon trained on Winnow.
“Tommy’s here,” John said.
Winnow backhanded John with his free hand. “Shut up!” He jabbed the needle into John’s neck. “You move and he’s done.” He positioned his thumb over the plunger. “Don’t even think about it. There’s enough phenobarbital in here to kill him twice.”
Paula adjusted her grip on her weapon and centered the muzzle steady at her target. Her knuckles were white from squeezing the Glock’s polymer surface.
“Well look at you. All ready to shoot.” Winnow leaned down over John’s head. “I bet you’ve never ended someone’s life before. I have.”
“Back away. It’s over. You have nowhere to run,” Paula said.
“Shoot me and your partner dies. Are you so eager to sacrifice him so you can bring down the big, bad man and take all the credit?”
A flicker of hesitation from Paula was all Winnow needed. He lifted the table and toppled it over with John still strapped on. Glass shattered, and trays of containers, beakers, and equipment spilled to the floor.
Paula lunged toward her partner and held his head off the floor, carefully pulling out the syringe still stuck in his neck and stopping the lethal drug from injecting into his bloodstream. Winnow used the time to run out a back tunnel.
Paula tore away at John’s restraints until he was free.
Once untethered from the killing table, John took Paula’s flashlight and went after Winnow. The beam revealed a narrow passageway that led deeper into the earthen complex. A flicker of a candle flame to his right revealed a small room lined with cinderblocks. John pressed his back to the wall outside of the doorway and shifted the flashlight to his left hand.
The room and the passageway were silent until a faint rustle from within the room gave away the killer’s trail. John wheeled around and shined the flashlight into the space. In a corner of the room, he spotted Tommy curled up on a filthy mattress. A sheen of sweat glistened from the boy’s skin in spite of the cool surroundings.
“Dad?” It was a weak voice.
“It’s me, Tommy. Everything’s gonna be okay.” John knelt at his son’s side and felt a high fever with a caress against the boy’s forehead.
“I don’t feel good.”
Paula trained her weapon down the dark corridor outside the room in case Winnow doubled back. “How’s he doing?”
“He’s burning up.”
“We gotta get him out of here.”
“Where is here, anyway?”
“The Layton farm. This is an old root cellar under the house.”
Paula ducked into the room with her partner and in a quick motion, gathered Tommy up and cradled him in her arms. “Let’s go.”
The candle flame flickered and brightened, signaling a change in the air within the tunnels. Winnow was on the move.
Paula handed John her weapon. “I’ll get Tommy back up top. You take that son of a bitch down.”
John took the Glock and extended his arms, pressing the back of his flashlight hand against his gun hand for stability, and then stepped out into the corridor.
“Go,” he said, and Paula hurried back through the tunnel, clutching Tommy in her arms.
“Winnow! It’s you and me now.” John took a half step forward and swept the darkness with his light. With another step, he heard a heavy, metallic thud and a brief sliver of light appeared. Winnow had another exit from the cellar.
John ran toward the light. It had to be less than twenty feet away, but the claustrophobic emptiness stripped away any sense of distance. A flush of anger came over him. Winnow had kept Tommy in this soulless place.
He worked his way down one wall until a faint outline of daylight crept through a gap in a doorframe. A metal door marked the root cellar’s access point, cut into the foundation of the old Layton home above. John pressed against the door, and it gave an inch before it held tight. Winnow had managed to wedge a piece of wood through the outside handles during his escape.
John shoved his shoulder into the door, and the dried wood splintered. One more push and the door flew open. Sunlight temporarily blinded him, and he raised his hands to shield his eyes. They were sensitive to the light, but he caught sight of Paula running toward him.
“Where is he?” John said.
“He went into the barn,” Paula said. “I called for backup.”
John hoisted himself out of the root cellar, got his bearings, and spotted the barn on the far side of the gravel-and-dirt farmyard. He took off for the hog barn in a dead run.
“Stay with Tommy,” he called behind him.
“We can wait him out, John!” Paula said.
John kicked at the barn door and readied the Glock. The door swung open, casting a wash of light over the slick-bottomed hog pens. He crossed the threshold and caught a blur of movement to his left. The door flew back onto his arm, and the Glock clattered to the floor. The barn door slammed shut behind him, plunging the inside back into a foul-smelling darkness.
“Winnow. Give it up.”
“I’m not giving up anything, Detective.” Winnow’s voice gave away his movement.
John stepped lightly on the barn floor. Ahead, a whoosh cut through the darkness seconds before a metal meat hook swung in his direction. John dodged, but the heavy hook still cracked him on the skull, above his right ear. He felt a warm, wet sensation drip from his scalp. He didn’t need to touch it to know he’d need stitches if he got out of this.
A chain rattled. This time John ducked down onto his haunches as the meat hook passed overhead.
“Detective? You still there?” Winnow’s footsteps shuffled on the barn floor as he changed position.
John listened and pressed closer to the origin of the sound.
An arm grabbed John around his chest, pinning his arms down.
John bent forward and held Winnow on his back. He took several rapid steps backward, hoping to pin Winnow against a wooden beam or the barn wall. Instead, he heard a chain rattle followed by a wet, rasping sound. Winnow loosened his grip.
John spun away from his attacker, ready to block another blow. But Winnow didn’t make a move forward.
Winnow shuffled his feet, unable to get traction on the barn floor, and held a look of utter surprise. He attempted to reach something behind him and lost his balance. He spun in an awkward circle, and John saw the meat hook embedded in Winnow’s back. The heavy chain supported him when Winnow’s knees buckled. His weight drove the hook deeper into his flesh. Blood flowed from the wound and pooled beneath the killer. Winnow’s feet twitched and painted a gruesome mural as he slipped in his own blood.
“Match . . .” Winnow mumbled.
John drew closer to the killer and took a knee in front of him. “What?”
A blood-speckled cough and a ragged breath steadied Winnow for a moment. He raised his eyes to John. “Your son has a match.” Another cough spit more blood down Winnow’s chin.
“Where is Tommy’s match?” John grabbed Winnow’s head and shook him to keep him alert.
Winnow coughed, and a deep laugh sounded from the dying man.
“Tell me!”
“It’s you.” Winnow collapsed forward, held up by a heavy chain, an ugly puppet in the dark.