A gasp convulsed my lungs. I struggled, but Hunter pressed an arm against my chest, his full body weight behind it. Somehow, he’d pinned my hands, palms inward so I couldn’t scratch him. He covered my mouth and pushed the gun barrel to my temple.
“Shut up!” he growled. “For once in your spoiled brat life, do what you’re told, and shut the fuck up!”
A disorienting buzz, like panicking wasps, sounded in my ears. I tried to stay calm, to think, but shook uncontrollably, my limbs jerking about, stupidly trying to break free.
He leaned down, face inches from mine, his gray eyes stony with the intensity of his glare. His lips drew back in a white-toothed snarl, and hot, sweet breath rushed my face.
“You think you’re so goddamned smart, do you? Little Miss P.I., you’ve got your proof, eh? Well, I’ve got this!” He pushed the gun again. “Not so smart-mouthed, now, are we? No? I didn’t think so. Well, you listen to me, Angel, because I’m going to teach you a lesson. I’m going to teach you real good.”
I kicked out, but he shoved forward with his hips, trapping me against the wall. His groin pressed at my belly, and, as I struggled, I felt him grow hard against me. “A lesson you’ll never forget as long as you live,” he said. He put his cheek to mine. “Though you may not have that much time to remember it.”
Again I tried to shout, but his hand muffled my cries. He laughed low and thrust his chest into me. “You just don’t know when to keep quiet, do you? I keep telling you to shut up, but still you push, and you push, and you fucking push!” His eyes blazed with fire and menace.
Tears flooded my eyes. I’d been so stupid! I’d let my desire blind me. So stupid!
He smiled, sending chills over every inch of my skin. “This is the lesson, Angel. You don’t threaten a murderer when you’ve got no escape.”
My eyes cut to the bedroom.
“Her?” Hunter jerked his head toward the door. “She sticks her head out, and I blow her away. Then I claim that she admitted to the murders. I say she shot you with this gun, which, conveniently, isn’t registered. I had to wrestle the gun away and had no choice but to shoot her.”
I tried to shake my head.
As if reading my mind, he said. “But by admitting I shot her in self-defense, I have a reason to have my fingerprints on the gun and residue on my hands. Then when she’s dead, I put the gun in her hand and shoot the wall next to you and simply say she missed the first time.”
My glance flitted to the doorway of the suite. That got another headshake from him.
“The cousin? Poor thing catches another wild bullet from crazy Tina’s gun.” He paused and dipped his head to my neck, inhaling. “Nice. Lavender? I like it. Did you wear that for me?”
Fury replaced fear. I struggled against him and felt him get stiffer against my stomach.
He lifted his head. His breathing grew more labored, and his eyes blazed with desire. “You’re doing that on purpose, aren’t you? Squirming around, trying to get me hot. You think I won’t kill you if you make me want to fuck you? Oh, sweetheart.” He kissed my neck. “You don’t have to be alive for that.”
My eyes shot wide. I pushed and squirmed, but he didn’t budge. He raised himself to his full height, lifting me onto my toes with the weight of his body. I felt his voice reverberate in his chest. “You really don’t get it, do you, Angel? I’m doing you a favor. I’m teaching you a very important lesson, and you’re trying to skip out of class early? What would your mother say?”
Mom? Oh, God, I’m going to die, and it’ll destroy her. Mom, Mom, I’m so sorry.
“Now, now, what’s this? Tears?” Hunter kissed my wet cheek. “We can’t have that.”
I jerked my head away from his lips.
“Well, then,” he said. “We’d better finish the lesson. It goes like this.” He pushed my chin up, forcing me to look at him. “You think you find proof that someone’s a murderer and, like an idiot, you accuse him. Only you’ve got no backup. And so the murderer immobilizes you. Like this.” He glanced down at my cleavage, traced the globes of my breasts with his gaze and licked his lips. “Then he does this.” He pressed the gun hard into my temple. “And then.”
My ears roared and my stomach lurched. I couldn’t breathe!
Hunter put his finger on the trigger. “And then …” He leaned over and whispered into my ear. “Bang, you’re dead.” Then he stepped back, releasing me. “Thus ends the lesson. Think you can remember that one?”
My knees nearly snapped. I slumped against the wall, unable to think, fear convulsing my stomach like poison begging to be vomited out. My chest heaved and tears streamed down my face. I looked up at him through the wetness. He stood before me, gun hanging harmlessly at his side, his face impassive.
I screamed and lunged at him, punching him hard in the chest. He barely recoiled as I struck. “You dumb fuck! You goddamned, stupid, son of a bitch! You fucking asshole!”
“That’s telling me.”
“I HATE YOU!”
“Maybe, but you’re not going to do anything that stupid again, are you?”
“Who the fuck are you to tell me—”
He grabbed my shoulders and pulled me to him, my chest once more inches from his. His eyes blazed. “God damn it, Madison! This is not a game! You can’t go around accusing killers when you’ve got no backup, no weapons, no escape. There are men out there that will do what I threatened and worse! When they’re finished with your body, your mother won’t recognize it! I’ve seen that happen to women. I don’t want that to happen to you!”
Mutually dumbfounded, we stared into each other’s eyes.
What the hell just happened?
He released me. Straightening his tie, he cleared his throat. “You do something that stupid again, and it just might. I owe it to Jake to keep you from getting hurt.”
I leaned against the wall, trying to detangle the knot of my thoughts and emotions. “Well … well, I … I don’t want me to get hurt either …”
“Then don’t be stupid.”
Anger fell out of the tangle, and my cheeks flushed. “All right, already! I got it!”
“I’m just telling you—”
“I heard you!”
“Good!”
“Fine!”
“All right!”
Tina peeked through the doorway. “Is everything okay?”
“YES!” We shouted together.
Hunter pointed at her. “Get back in there and finish packing!”
She looked at me. “Do you need—”
“It’s okay,” I said, rubbing my cheek. I felt weak, but my trembling had lessened. “We were just … talking.”
She gazed at us, clearly doubtful, but ducked back into the room.
I glared at Hunter. “You’re a jerk, you know that? A complete, utter, fucking jerk. Complicated? Layered? You’re damaged. I don’t know what this woman, Sara, did to you, but she fucked you up bad. And any other woman would have to be insane to want you.”
He grimaced, his cheeks going red. Then he shrugged as if he didn’t care, but it was an unconvincing gesture. “Quit whining. You were never in any danger.”
“Never in any—? You put a loaded gun to my head!”
He shoved his hand in his pocket and pulled out six small projectiles. “I took the bullets out.” With a flick of his wrist, he swung out the cylinder and thumbed them into the holes.
I stared at the gun, blinking, relieved but far from pacified. “So, what? You think that makes it all right? Are you so mentally twisted you think that was in any way appropriate?”
His face hardened with arrogance. “Listen, Angel. This business is dangerous enough without you setting yourself up to get killed. If I scared you …” He shrugged again, closed the cylinder, and shoved the gun firmly into its holster. “Fear’s a part of the game. Deal with it.”
I stared hard at him. “Jake would never have done anything that low.”
He flinched, looking away.
“But, then,” I said, “you never could measure up to him, could you?”
He looked back at me. Pain and doubt flickered in his eyes.
Good!
I set my jaw. “I’m sick of playing your game. You’re going to answer my questions, damn it. You owe me, you son of a bitch. And if you’ve finished getting a hard-on pushing me around, tell me: if you weren’t messing around with Adalida, why did you pay her rent?”
His condescending smile flitted back. “What makes you think I did?”
“I have a copy of the lease agreement.”
“Where’d you get—”
“I got it, that’s all you need to worry about. Now, talk!”
“Humph. You need learn to get your facts straight if you want to do this job. Sure, I signed a lease. Jake took an apartment that summer for them both. She came up first, but he got delayed for a couple of days. The management company of the apartment wouldn’t let her sign the lease alone because she had no credit history. So I co-signed, as a favor to Jake.”
“That … that’s it? That’s all?” I grimaced.
“That’s it, Sherlock. A dickhead manager who wouldn’t wait, nothing more.”
“But … no! Wait. There were checks! Some were big—tens of thousands of dollars.”
Smiling derisively, he said, “Sorry to keep disappointing you, Angel, but you’re way off base there too. I let Adalida redecorate my lake house. Sure, I could have hired a company, but she had good taste, and she cost less. I let her buy what she wanted and even helped her get a credit card to pay for it. I’d give her a check to cover the purchases and her commission, and she’d pay her card off every month. Neat, huh? That was my idea; it helped her establish good credit, not easy for a kid her age. I may be a big, bad bully, but I’ve got good business sense.”
Defeat forced a sigh. “That’s all there was to it?”
“You know, you may have it together when it comes to all of that technocrap. But you got shit-for-brains when it comes to street work. Go back to mommy. You’ll be a lot better off.” He added in a murmur. “We all will.”
But when he looked back at me, I sensed something beneath his derision, as if he fought some internal battle. Did he actually care what I thought? Crap. Maybe, in his own ultra-macho, uber-asshole way, he was actually trying to teach me something with that stunt. I clenched my jaw. But he sucks as a teacher. And there’s no damn way I’m going to let him get away with it.
He made a move to leave.
I stepped in his way. “I’m not finished with you yet.”
“Is that so?”
“Yes, that’s so. You tell me what happened in Chicago. All of it.”
“Why should I?”
“You promised we’d work together. Or does your word mean nothing?”
He rolled his eyes. “Fine. What do you want to know?”
“I know Chris and Adalida fought because he cheated. Jake told Adalida to break it off, but she wouldn’t. And, supposedly, she and Chris tried to kill themselves rather than be parted.”
“That’s about right,” he said.
“I want to know what part you played in all of this.”
“I got the proof on Chris cheating, for one. At least one of the many times, anyway. He’d hooked up with some small-time crook he met in a gay bar, claimed they were just friends. Also I pulled strings to get him in some summer study, art thing he’d applied for in Chicago.”
“Why would you do that?”
“Jake wanted to put distance between his daughter and the little boy-banger.” He stopped and scoffed at me. “What? Am I not politically correct enough for you?”
Exasperated with his haughtiness, I said, “It’s not a matter of being politically correct. It’s a matter of being wrong. You have no right to judge—”
“Whoa! Before you get your socialist ideals in an uproar, Missy, his sick-ass lifestyle aside, that’s not why I had problems with the kid.” He put his hands on his hips and looked hard at me. “He betrayed someone who loved him. Straight or queer, in my book that’s wrong.”
“I’m not trying to defend that.”
“What then? Because he lived some freaking alternate lifestyle, I’m not allowed to say he fucked up? I’m supposed to pretend his kind are perfect? People are people, Angel, some good, some bad. I don’t actually give a shit whether the kid did it with men, women, or ducks. He cheated. That’s wrong. You’re with someone, you’re loyal to them. Period. End of story.”
I cocked my head, peering intently at him. Something in his tone said there was more behind his passionate outburst than met the eye. “You feel strongly about fidelity, don’t you?” I almost asked if that had to do with his animosity toward this Sara, and, by extension, to me.
He shrugged and glanced away. “What I feel is none of your business.”
Irritated to feel that emotional door clang shut in my face again, I shook my head. “Whatever. How about we stick to what happened three years ago?”
“Fine by me.” He crossed his arms over his chest. “Unfortunately, Adalida convinced Jake to let her take an internship in Chicago, too. He never had the heart to refuse her anything. Not two weeks after she’d arrived, Chris got caught again.”
“What did Jake do?”
“What do you think? He went to Chris’s place and read him the riot act, practically standing on the kid’s toes all the while. He got the boy to admit to screwing the crook, even got him to admit he’d been shacking up with someone before Adalida got to town.”
“And then?”
“And then Jake did what any good father would do.” He spread his hands out before him. “He told his daughter the truth.”
“To break them up?” I said angrily.
“Hey. It’s not like Jake had to lie. The little shit had his johnson out every time the wind blew. What happened to him was his own fault.”
“My God, you are so judgmental!”
“I have morals.”
“So do I!”
He pointed at me. “No, you’ve got this naive, romantic concept that there is no right or wrong. Typical bleeding-heart, liberal crap. But, hey, if no one’s right and no one’s wrong, and there is no God, then you can do whatever the hell you want, can’t you?”
I reared back. “How did God get into this?”
“Exactly!” He was breathing hard, staring at me.
Putting my hands out in front of me, exasperation overwhelming me, I said, “You make me crazy! I don’t understand what you’re saying half the time. And the rest of the time when I’m talking to you, it’s like you’re hearing someone else. Listen, I don’t know who you’re confusing me with—maybe this Sara person. But I’m not her. I’m not your enemy! And while you are, without a doubt, an absolute ass, I think you’re not mine, either. So, will you please,”—I put my hands together as if in prayer—“will you please just stay in the moment and talk to me?”
He looked me up and down. “What are you getting so emotional about?”
I groaned. “You are such a man.”
“Thank you,” he said, as if surprised at my admission.
“That was not a compliment. Let’s just stay focused, okay? I need to understand what happened. Adalida and Chris fought, but clearly they made up. Is that right?”
“Yeah, I don’t know how. Jake couldn’t believe it.”
“So he forbade her to be with him, and she killed herself?”
“Christ, I don’t know,” he said, seemingly exasperated. “Jake sure as hell didn’t think so. But we never found evidence of foul play. And we looked. God, we looked.”
“What about the poison they took?”
“Methanol in their iced tea. Chris didn’t take as much, and it left him brain-damaged. Nobody thought he’d live, but Jake wouldn’t give up on him.” Hunter shook his head, frustration creasing his rugged features. “He quit the force. I did what I could. I helped get the kid into a good hospice in Chicago. Jake couldn’t stay in New Orleans. He didn’t want pity, and he couldn’t take the memories.”
“He moved north, with no income, but he still intended to care for Chris?”
“I’d have given him half my business for as often as he saved my ass.”
I moved a step closer, sensing Hunter letting his guard down as he talked about his friend. “And yet he started up his own business in competition with yours.”
Hunter snorted. “He was no competition. He was his own man. It cost him a lot to let me help him as much as I did. I’m not saying it was a bad idea to keep an eye on Chris. Who knows, maybe the kid would have come out of it, and Jake could have gotten the truth.”
“You don’t honestly think Jake only wanted to keep Chris alive in hopes that he might one day reveal what really happened?”
“It would have been the smart thing to do.”
“Maybe it would be the thing you would do, but Jake wouldn’t have used him like that. He did it for the same reason he took care of George: because of what they meant to Adalida.”
“You’re such a female.”
“Thank you,” I said, with deliberate sarcasm.
A smile played briefly at the corner of his mouth. “That wasn’t a compliment. So, are we done? I gave you your story. That’s all there is to it.”
“But where does that put us, Hunter?”
“It puts us back on a plane to Chicago. You’ve had your run, Angel. I’ve got serious work to do now. We’re out of here.” He walked over to the bedroom door and rapped on it, motioning Tina out when she opened it.
I watched them go and then ran down the stairs after them. At the bottom, I grabbed Hunter by the back of his coat. “Hold on.”
Hunter had Tina by the arm. “What now?”
“You went way over the line back there. You ever do it again and I’ll—”
He let go of Tina and put his hands on his hips, towering over me. “You’ll what?”
Body on a mission, I grabbed his lapels and pushed him against the wall. I kissed him, slow then deeper, entangling my fingers in his hair. He flinched at first, gripped my arms as if to push me away, then he moved them around my back, pulling me into him. Leaning down, he bent me backward with the force of his kiss. Just when I felt his body give in to the passion, I pushed him away. Holding him at arm’s length, both of us breathing hard, I stared him in the eyes. “You remember this, mister. You ever try another idiotic stunt like you did back there, and you’ll never taste me again. Understood?”
He nodded mutely, his shell shock gloriously obvious.
Grinning triumphantly, I took Tina by the arm and marched her away, not looking back.
Her eyes wide, even a bit horrified, she said, “What was that all about?”
“I’m not sure, but it was very empowering. And don’t you ever tell my mother!”
She flashed a bemused smile and looked over her shoulder as we reached the open door.
“Is he coming?” I said.
“Well, he’s following us, if that’s what you’re asking,” she said, chuckling.
I grinned. “Yes, that’s what I—”
The shot rang out, and something wet splattered my face. Tina sank to her knees, smearing blood against the white door as she fell against it.
Hands grabbed me from behind and thrust me into the cover of the wall behind the door. Hunter shielded me with his body, his gun drawn. Eyes narrow and focused, he pushed me back farther, scanning the horizon from our safe place. “Get down!” he whispered harshly.
As we knelt, I reached for Tina, her body caught half in and half out of the doorway. Hunter pushed my hand back and shook his head. That’s when I noticed the top of her head was blown open and fragments of bone and gray matter were splayed in a cone behind the body.
I fell onto my hands and knees and held my stomach in, trying desperately to keep from vomiting. Hunter’s hands were soft on my shoulder. “Keep it together,” he said quietly. “We’re exposed here, too many windows, too many doors. We have to get upstairs. Can you manage it?”
I nodded.
“That’s my girl.” He grabbed my hand. “Let’s go.”
Crouched low, we ran up to Tina’s bedroom. Hunter went to the window and frowned.
I sank to a seat on the floor in the corner. “What is it?”
He shook his head. “I’m not sure. I thought I saw—never mind.”
My nausea returned. All the blood rushed out of my head, and my body shook. I put my head between my legs, praying to God I could just calm down. I heard Hunter sit down beside me. He put one arm around me, his other hand holding the gun and pointed at the door. He pulled me closer. “It’s going to be okay,” he said into my hair. “I won’t let anything happen to you.”
I nodded as tears stung my eyes. “And who’s going to protect you?”
He scanned the room, visually securing all entrances. “I guess you’ll have to.”
“Deal,” I said.
“That’s my girl,” he said again.
We sat still. I struggled to stay calm, but he was a rock. His eyes never left the door, his focus as sharp as a surgeon’s scalpel. After another few minutes, when it became clear no further danger would manifest, he pulled out his phone, gun still held high, and dialed 911. Then he called Voltaire, who said he’d smooth things out with the locals—cop to cop—and get the next flight out. He’d be with us in a few hours. Hunter didn’t let loose of me until we heard sirens.
A contingency of Sûreté du Québec police officers took us to safety, surrounding us on our way to their cars. We passed the limo, and I spotted a blanket-covered body slumped in the front seat, an emerald green cap flipped upside down near the wheel. Hunter pulled me closer, trying to spare me the sight. But I’d had enough—enough fear, enough anger, enough bodies. I felt dullness, an emotional emptiness sweep through me. Why was this happening? Revenge? It couldn’t be just that; this wasn’t a single act of vengeance but a blood-thirsty spree. Nestor had as much as said it: No innocent person brings on this much hatred. What had Jake done that could cause all this? “Nestor was right,” I murmured as the patrol car pulled away.
Hunter leaned closer, pulling me up against him. “What did you say?”
My jaws ached with exhaustion. “I was remembering something Nestor said.”
“You saw him too?”
I looked up at him. “Saw who?”
“Nestor. I thought I saw him out the window back there. He was in the distance, but—”
A scream of fury erupted out of me. I kicked the back of the front seat. “That son of a bitch! She warned me! I was so fucking stupid!”
The two policemen in the front whirled around, the one in the passenger seat drawing his gun. “What the hell—” he said.
Hunter pulled me back, pinning my arms to my sides. “She’s all right. I’ve got her. Madison, calm down. Come on, Angel.” He turned me into his body, freeing one hand to caress my hair, rocking me and making “shhh” sounds.
I struggled against him as my mind shrieked in rage. “They didn’t have to die! Don’t you see?” Then the fight drained out of me as suddenly as it had erupted. Tears came, and I groaned, burying my face in his chest.
Hunter cupped my chin. “Madison, look at me. You have to get control. You’re supposed to be protecting me, remember?”
“I could have stopped this. Lilly warned me he was dangerous. I didn’t want to listen.”
Locking eyes with me, Hunter scrubbed away my tears with his thumbs. “Lilly knew that Nestor tried to kill Jake?”
“No.” My head pounded and my throat, raw with emotion, burned. “But she warned me that he had a grudge against Jake. And that I didn’t really know him. Why didn’t I listen?”
Hunter looked off into the distance. “We’ll sort through this. We’ll get him.” He looked down at me. “And I won’t let him hurt you.”
“It doesn’t matter about me! Don’t you get it? If I’d gone with you from the beginning, no one else would’ve died.” I could barely speak now for the pain. I just wanted to crawl away, to hide. “But I had to be so fucking smart. It’s my fault.”
“Stop it!” he barked. “It’s not your fault. You didn’t pull any triggers, you didn’t plant any bombs. Nestor did. It’s his fault. And we’re going to stop him. Do you hear me?”
I fell into his arms. “I don’t care anymore! I want to go home. You were right. I can’t do this. I can’t! Please, I want to go home!”
He sighed and held me tight. “It’ll be okay. It’ll be okay.”
I lay curled up on my side on a cot in the back room of the local police station. For the last two hours, I’d been a zombie. Emotionally and physically exhausted, I’d tried to answer questions, the police bearing down hard, pushing for clarity that I just couldn’t muster. Hunter put an end to it, surging forward like a lion, his baleful glares and tensed muscles getting me the time-out I needed. Thus, I’d been allowed a half-hour rest, while in the rooms outside Hunter liaised between Voltaire on the phone and the local police in person.
As I lay there, Jake’s earlier warning echoed in my ear, “The best, the most dangerous lie is that last one, the one that lets them pull the trigger, the one that says ‘he deserves it.’ Delusional fuckers like that, they’ll do anything. And you’ve got to know them when you see them. Or I promise you, girl, you’ll be dead.” That last phrase resonated in my mind: you’ll be dead. But it wasn’t me who’d ended up dead. Others had. So many people had died in the last two days, all because I didn’t know a delusional liar when I saw him.
I curled up tighter. There was now a full-out hunt on for Nestor. Voltaire had confirmed that no one could find him in Chicago. He seemed to have disappeared into the air.
But he hadn’t. The man I’d once trusted lurked somewhere nearby. He’d tried to kill Jake and had killed Mr. Keeper and the chauffeur. He’d killed Lathos and Tina, and, all the while, he’d been trying to kill me.
That bone-deep despondence, born of the sure knowledge of betrayal and of the anger and shame it evoked, shook me to the core. And what if I’d gone with him at the canal? I closed my eyes. I’d be dead. But Tina would be alive. And the chauffer, I didn’t even know his name. Did he have a family? Kids? Grandkids? Who else would Nestor kill to get to me?
I closed my eyes. Despair sapped my will and my strength, leaving my limbs too heavy to move and my mind trapped in a loop of guilt and anguish.
A thought crept its way through the blackness: If I let him kill me, would he stop? Is that so unreasonable a thing for the universe to ask of me? Oh, make it stop. Please, make it stop.
The door creaked open. I lifted my head.
“Lilly,” I said hoarsely. “Has Voltaire arrived, then?”
Despite civilian clothes—jeans and a red plaid shirt over a gray t-shirt—she looked stiff and authoritative, from her polished boots to the small bun knotted at the nape of her neck. Her somber expression said everything. There seemed no fight left in her either, no fire. She was just as exhausted as I was, and I could tell that she, too, wanted it all to be over.
Lilly closed the door quietly behind her, as if any loud noise would make me crumble into pieces. I couldn’t blame her; my eyes felt swollen to golf-ball size, and I could barely talk for the pain in my throat. One of the police had given me a white cotton uniform shirt, but I still felt cold. I sat up and rubbed my arms.
I said, “Are you here to help them find Nestor? Or try to talk him in?”
She shook her head, her face etched with disappointment. “It’s beyond repair now. We just have to do what we have to do.” She stared at me for a moment and then rubbed her hands together briskly. “You need to come with me. I’m supposed to get you safely to the airport.”
“Aren’t I special?” I said apathetically. “This is my fault, you know? I led him up here.”
“What do you mean?”
“I have Nestor’s phone. It has a GPS locator service. That’s how he found me.”
She shrugged. “Any cop can find a way to do that. Don’t feel bad about it.”
“But I led him to Tina.” I struggled against the overwhelming weight of my guilt.
Lily crossed the room and knelt at my feet, resting her hand on my own. She sighed, as if she couldn’t figure out what to say to comfort me. “We have to go. He’s still out there.”
My head shot up. “They found him?”
“I meant he’s probably close. He’s followed you this far and won’t stop until it’s over.”
I hugged myself, shivering. “He’s not going to stop until either he’s dead or I am, is he?”
She stared at me, lips pursed. “We’re taking multiple cars. Voltaire’s already at the airport, and there are Canadian cops waiting in ambush in case Nestor follows us. There will be cars around us at a distance. Hunter’s already started out. We have to go.”
I shook my head. Behind these four walls was safety. “I’m not leaving.”
She took me by the elbow. “You have to.”
I shook her off. “No!”
Anger flared in her eyes. She turned away, and when she turned back her expression seemed set with resolve. “I’m sorry. I didn’t want to be the one to tell you. You’ve been through enough. But I have to make you understand that no one’s safe until he’s caught. He’ll get to anyone to get to you. He already has.”
Like a lit match, the urge to fight flared in me. But I spit on it. Enough! Damn it, Madison, don’t lie to yourself anymore. You’re a spoiled, elitist child, just like Hunter says. How many people have died because of you? Will you lead Nestor to more? “I won’t go.”
She stared into my eyes, her mouth set in grim determination. “Jake’s dead.”
My ears roared. My knees buckled. I sat down hard on the concrete. My mouth moved but nothing came out. No! I felt my chest constrict and my mouth went dry. I groaned and pulled my knees up to my chest, rocking myself, my eyes shut tight. Please, God. No. Please, please!
Lilly strode over and hauled me into a sitting position. “Nestor told the guy guarding Jake that he was there to relieve him. It looks like he smothered Jake as soon as the guard left. You need to realize that nothing is going to stop Nestor. Our best chance is to get you out of this country and into a place where we have control! We have to go now!”
I shook my head. “I don’t know what to do! If I leave, everyone with me will be in danger. Mr. Keeper, Tina, the chauffeur—they were killed because they were near me.”
“So, you’re just going sit here and let him go after your friends to flush you out? Who do you think he’ll go after next? Hunter? Zach? Your mother?”
I stared at her, incredulous, terrified. She’s right. Until Nestor’s caught, everyone around me is in danger. And yet, the sickening truth was that as much as I feared for the people I loved, I was even more terrified to expose myself. I closed my eyes, trying to think of a way out. But I knew I had no choice. I swallowed hard, scrubbing away the tears. “All right. I’ll go.”
Lilly helped me stand, then led me to the door. Rather than turning toward the front of the station, we turned left. “This way, out to the parking lot in the back,” she said.
When we got to the rear door, she motioned me back, peering out ahead of us. “Keep your head down and follow close. Got it?”
“Yes.” That sickening sensation of mortal fear tumbled in my stomach again.
She ran, and I took off after her. In seconds, we were in a gray Nissan Versa, rocketing away from the police station. As it was a small outpost in a tiny village, we hit the open road in no time at all. The St. Lawrence River was to our left, open lands to our right, and a large forest loomed into view. I looked around us. “I don’t see any other cars.”
Lilly gripped the wheel. “If you can, so can he. Don’t worry. They’re out there.”
I closed my eyes and dropped my head back, wincing. The exertion and lack of sleep were taking a toll. My temples throbbed. “In the hospital—” I said, my mind prodding at me.
“What?”
“Before you came into Jake’s room, Nestor had his hands on my neck. I thought he was trying to soothe my pains. And the pills—just one knocked me out. Was I that tired, or were they something other than Percocet? What if I’d taken both?” I turned to her. “Would I be dead now?”
She cut her eyes to me. “Don’t think about it.”
I sat back, trying to find calm as we barreled down the road. Cool breeze flowed over my arm resting on the open window. I breathed in the heady scent of pine and listened to bird calls over the drone of the engine and the whoosh of air as the car split the atmosphere before us.
I closed my eyes and forced myself to breathe steadily. Jake’s dead. My mind repeated it again and again. Don’t let him down, a voice whispered in my thoughts. Don’t give up. Think. It’s your only weapon. Something doesn’t fit. Timing is everything. Think!
“Why would he do this?” I said, as much to myself as to Lilly.
She glanced over. “Who? Nestor?”
“He can’t have been so angry with Jake over his intervention for Hunter. That’s too petty. But what other reason would there be? Maybe it had something to do with Chris dying. Think of the timing: it happened a few days ago. But what relationship could Nestor have had with Chris?” I scowled, staring into the trees on either side of the steep embankment as we entered the forest.
Lilly chewed at her lower lip. As she shifted, I caught a glimpse of her holster. Apparently being part of an official party meant she could carry her gun into a foreign country. “Chris?”
“Chris Crowel. He was Jake’s daughter’s boyfriend, except he also had his fair share of boyfriends and girlfriends. And that caused a lot of trouble, especially the extra boyfriends. Wait!” A thought circled around in my brain. “It’s so obvious! Lilly! Nestor was Chris’s lover!”
“What!” She whirled to face me, the wheel turning with her. The car skidded into the shoulder, bumping and sliding as the tires dug into the dirt. She gripped the steering wheel hard, twisting it, and slammed the gas pedal down, propelling us back onto the road. “Are you crazy?”
The jolt had thrown me into the side of the car, right onto my bad shoulder. Grimacing, I reached up to massage it. “Think about it! In the note, Nestor called Jake ‘Big D.’ Chris must have told him Adalida’s nickname for her father. And that’s how he knew about Tina and her affair with Lathos. He would’ve realized their regular rendezvous provided the perfect opportunity for setting Jake up. Maybe Lathos was involved, or maybe not, but even if not, he could have easily gotten someone to play Lathos’s so-called wife.” I struck the ceiling with a fist. “It all fits. Nestor said he’d been following Hunter and me, that’s why he was close when the call on the submerged car came in. Hell, maybe he was waiting there to make sure I died!” Anger churned in my gut. “The bastard! He knew you were working a double shift, so he could follow us without drawing suspicion. He attacked me while Hunter went out the back door of the apartment.” Timing is everything, a voice in my head said. “That’s a fact,” I murmured.
“What is?”
“It’s just something that I keep thinking: timing is everything. I even dream about it—stupid dreams about silver snow and piles of soot. Not to mention ‘Candygram for Mongo,’ ” I said in my best Cleavon Little imitation.
“What the hell are you talking about?”
“You know: ‘Candygram for Mongo.’ From Blazing Saddles. When the sheriff tricked the bad guy into taking a bomb. The Zach in my dreams kept going on about the Candygram and how timing is everything and—wait! That must be what the Evil Little Dream Pixie has been trying to get me to focus on.” I held a finger up. “I kept seeing the ingredients of the bomb. The silver snow and disintegrating airplane were aluminum powder. The snow and the jail bars turned into soot: powdered charcoal. The piles of bull manure, like fertilizer, contain explosive chemicals. And Semi-Naked Dream Zach reminding me of resin was a clue too.”
Suddenly, I was slammed hard into the door as we were struck from the side. Airbags slammed Lilly and me backward. I screamed and clutched the dash as the car whiplashed left and veered across the road. We hit the gravel shoulder and went skidding before, just as suddenly, we rocked to a stop.
Disoriented and dizzy, I pulled myself up and looked at Lilly. Her body was limp, and her head lay on the steering wheel, blood dripping over the deflated airbag and onto her lap. As I reached for her, the door fell away behind me, and a hand gripped my arm with manic strength.
I was being dragged away from the car, desperately backpedaling to keep on my feet. A large, rough hand grabbed mine, spinning me around so that I was running in tow down the steep, wooded embankment.
“Nestor!” I yanked, breaking loose from his grip. He reached out again and gripped both my arms so hard I thought my bones would crack. I yelped in pain.
To my surprise, he let go and stepped back. But when I got a good look at his face, I nearly fell to my knees with shock. His eyes were bloodshot and rimmed with red, swollen tear ducts. His unshaven face was streaked with sweat, and his unwashed hair was plastered against his head. Yet it was the look of desperation and despair that staggered me.
“Oh God, Nestor,” I said, in barely a whisper. “Why? How could you do this?”
He looked up the hill, toward the car, and then back to me, his eyes roving my face as if looking for salvation itself. I shifted my footing, readying to run, hopeless as that would be.
Nestor stumbled backward. For a moment, he looked like he might fall. I almost reached out for him as pity flooded through me.
He licked his parched lips. “I’m sorry.”
I stared at him, momentarily incredulous. Pity melted like butter under a blowtorch from the sheer inadequacy of that statement. “You’re, you’re sorry? That’s all you have to say?” My blood rose, pounding in my ears. “You’re sorry? You traitorous bastard! I fucking trusted you!”
He flinched, eyes darting away as he rubbed the thick, short bristles of his beard. “I didn’t mean for it to go so far. It was for my sister. I was trying to save her. That son of a bitch was destroying everything. I had to stop him. But we couldn’t catch him. We tried. God, you have to believe me. Madison, please!” He took lurching steps toward me. As I flinched, he stopped. His hands dropped to his sides, and he swayed, eyes closed. When he opened them again, tears streaked his filthy face. In a coarse whisper he said again, “I’m sorry. Please. I’m sorry.”
I shook my head, resisting the urge to care as I watched a man whom I’d admired and even longed for crumble before me. “Now what? You’ll kill me? Like you did the others?”
He nodded, his red, brimming eyes betraying utter and complete wretchedness. His voice was a hollow echo of his former humanity. “I’m a murderer.”
“Yes, you are, you bastard. And none of them deserved it.”
He broke down, sobbing. Rubbing his hands over his eyes, he nodded. “He didn’t. He didn’t. To die like that, in flames. Did he suffer? Dios, Dios. Forgive me. You were there. Did he suffer? You have to tell me.” He fell to his knees, his hands raised to me in supplication. “For my family, my sister. I was trying to save her. I swear to God. You have to believe me!”
“Fuck you,” I spat at him. “You’re a monster. I don’t believe anything you say.”
He sank down on his haunches. “I don’t,” he said, still sobbing. “I didn’t know—at the office, when the bomb went off—until I heard his description. I only suspected. But he was at the hospital.” He swallowed hard. “It couldn’t be a coincidence. And now they found his body.”
“Whom did they find? Sweet Jesus, Nestor, did you kill someone else?”
He shook his head and dragged a sleeve across his running nose. “On his body … receipts … in my name. The powders, the fertilizer, in my name. I don’t know what happened.” His shoulders slumped. “It’s my fault.”
I studied him. He was distracted, off guard. Carefully, I edged away. “It’ll be all right.”
He laughed a short, hopeless laugh. “No,” he said, his voice almost too weak to carry.
“Sure it will. We can go back. You can make amends. No more killing.”
From behind his back, he pulled out a huge forty-five-caliber handgun.
I jerked to a halt. Ice ran down my spine as I watched death pointed at me. “Please,” I said, my voice quiet and trembling. “Please, you don’t have to do this. I don’t want to die.”
He was still on his knees, his body shaking, but the gun held steady enough. His eyes were full of pleading. “I came for you, because you saw.”
I nodded, my eyes flooding with tears of frustration, my throat too swollen to speak.
“You saw. Did he suffer? Please, I’m begging you. Tell me.”
My mind swirled, buffeted by both rage and terror. “Who? Which of your victims do you want to know about? Do any of them matter? Why would you care?”
“The old man,” Nestor said in barely a whisper. “Did he suffer?”
Swallowing hard, I blinked in confusion. “Mr. Keeper?”
He nodded.
I hesitated, not knowing whether a lie or the truth would save me, or kill me. Finally, I said, “No, I don’t think so. The blast was too big. I think he died instantaneously.”
Relief washed over him like a baptismal rain. He groaned and smiled, lifting his face to the sky. “Gracias, Dios. God is merciful.”
“Not from where I stand,” I said sullenly.
Tears continued to stream down his face. “He is. He forgives all. I know I have to pay: an eye for an eye. But I had to know if he suffered. And now I can put my soul in His hand.” He sniffed back his tears, wetly wiping his nose again. I saw a shadow of his former calm strength return to his features. He gestured toward me with the gun. “Now, you have to go.”
“Go?” Salty tears flowed over my lips, and I scrubbed them away. “You mean die?” I stepped backward, glancing up the hill. “You think God will forgive you for that?”
“I’ve done what I could, up there, for you.” He nodded to the road. “Now, turn around.”
“Why, so you can shoot me in the back? Fuck you!”
“Will you forgive me?”
“No! Never! I hope you rot in hell for eternity, you fucking traitor! You bastard!”
He smiled. Yes, he smiled. It was serene, relieved. “You’re safe. And God will judge me as He should.” Then he raised the gun to his chin. My eyes shot wide. He closed his eyes and whispered something low. His finger contracted on the trigger.
I stepped forward, reaching out to him. “Nestor, no!”
The blast ricocheted through the surrounding forest, startling the birds into flight. A red fountain exploded from the top of his head. He fell forward.