Dean: Marshall’s Shadow – Jaguar Shapeshifter Romance (Marshall's Shadow Book 2)

by Kathi S. Barton

  Bella nearly asked her why when what was going to happen occurred to her. Her brother was going to be ended today. Not killed—that wasn’t what was happening. Hunter was going to be ended—his reign of terror, the murdering of innocents, as well as a great many other things that she was sure would come out in a trial if they had one.

  Chapter 8

  Hunter thought that if one more person came to his room and told him that the manager of the establishment wanted to speak to him, he was going to kill them all. There was no point in telling him that he was going to be tossed out on his ass. He knew that he’d been fucked over by his sister. He couldn’t even call her to tell her to give him some more money.

  The ringing of his room’s phone had him nearly screaming. Stomping to the phone, he was all set to jerk the fucking thing from the wall when a voice, a woman’s voice, told him to pick the receiver up. Laying the phone back on the bedside table, he picked up the receiver and put the phone to his ear.

  Did you know that the force of a bullet coming from a rifle three hundred yards away has the velocity to blow your head out when it comes out the other side? Of course, I’ve never stuck around to see what the end results were when I finished up killing someone that deserved it, but that’s what I’ve heard. Hunter asked her what she wanted. To tell you that information. Also, to let you know that you’ll never feel it enter your heart, nor your brain. You might if the person shooting you isn’t all that good, but I’m perfectly capable of hitting whatever I aim at. You really need to know that part.

  “Are you threatening me?” She asked him why he’d think that was a threat. “Because you just told me that you never miss. Implying that you plan on me knowing that you’re going to kill me.”

  Ah. Well, it wasn’t a threat. Not even close to one. He didn’t know why, but he thought she was lying to him. Hunter didn’t even know who he was speaking to. When I tell you that you’re going to die, then you can bet that you’re going to be dead. I don’t usually call up people like this, but with you—for you, I guess—I thought that I’d make an exception. What are your plans for today, Hunter? I mean, nothing long term, I’m hoping.

  “See? That was another threat. You’re actually threatening me. Do you have any idea what I could do to you if you even try to kill me? Plenty. I’m not one to fuck with.” She laughed. “You think that I’m funny? I’m not. I’m dead serious.”

  Well, you got part of that right. And I already told you, I’m not threatening you. He told her that was good. So, you didn’t answer me. What are your plans for today? I’m going to a wedding at the courthouse. It’s going to be a quiet affair, this wedding. But really, it’s been a little while in coming. Then your sister and Dean are going to go away for a few days. Isn’t that lovely?

  “I thought she was already married to that person.” The voice, what he decided to call her, said that it was only a technicality right now, the two of them being wed. “Technicality? How is being married or not being married a technicality? And why the hell wasn’t I invited? I’m her older brother. Since she’s cut me off from seeing my dad, temporarily anyway, then the very least she could have done was invited me to the wedding. I tell you, there are no niceties in the world anymore. She cut me off from the house and money too. What a fucking cunt.”

  Oh? You think you’re so much better than her? The voice was sort of coming to him, like he’d spoken to this person before. It was just out of his reach, who this person was. You have, moron, spoken to me before. Only this time, it’s not being recorded.

  “Not that it matters, but why not? I mean, I’m sure you took it to your boss, or whoever you report to, and he told you the same thing that I did, that you can’t use it. Didn’t he?” She asked him why he thought that was true. “I know a few things about the law. And without my permission, you can’t ever record me, even with your telephone when we’re standing next to each other.”

  Unless, of course, when you answer the phone and hear that it’s being recorded, you go on with the call. You were told, when I spoke to you the last time, that I was recording you, and you gave me consent. You fucked up there, Hunter. He tried to remember if that was indeed at the beginning of the recording when he’d answered the last time. I’m sure that you remember cutting me off, to tell me your whole name.

  He did. Then each word of their conversation came back to him. Sitting down, aiming for the bed, but hitting the floor, he sat there while he thought of the implications of her having a legal recording of what he’d told her. Her laughter again pissed him off.

  “Why are you calling me to inform me of this fucking debacle?” She whistled and told him that was a nice word. “What? You think I’m stupid? That I don’t know one word from another? Get real. I’m the most intelligent man you will ever arrest.”

  Oh? I didn’t know I was going to arrest you. Where did you hear that? Don’t you hate it when a rumor gets started, and no one will own up to it? Damn it. I hate that. No, Hunter, I have no intention of arresting you. He asked her why the hell not. The paperwork would be horrible. I mean, I have to fill out a form for every death that you committed. Then there is notifying the parents, if there are any, of each person. Or children, whoever is left behind. Not to mention having it come out that you’re such a fuck up, when all your sister and father want to do was get on with their lives. By the way, moron, you can put the phone back. I never placed the call you’re on. I’m speaking to you inside that sick fucked up mind of yours. Can’t have anyone tracing a call to you from me, now can I? That would look bad if someone cared enough to look.

  Hunter pulled the phone from his ear and could indeed hear the dial tone. Putting it back in the cradle, he put the entire thing up on the bedside table again. He had to think. If she was telling the truth, and he had no doubt that she was, about the recording, then he needed an exit plan. One to not just get him money, but a way out of this country.

  “What the hell are you up to now? If you’re not going to arrest me, why the hell are you fucking bothering me? I have shit to do today. Like go and crash my sister’s wedding.”

  He was also going to kill her, but he didn’t bother mentioning that. The less Director Marshall knew about him, the better. Especially since she seemed to already know a great deal about him.

  Well, since you asked, I’m going to kill you. You can even pick the option if you’d like on how it is that you’re killed. Number one is it will happen in such a way that no one will ever think that it was anything but an accident. I don’t care for that one. That means that people will speculate as to why you died. The trial might well go on, and you see, that’s another reason why I don’t care for that way. People will know things about you that I’d just as soon they didn’t. Hunter swallowed hard. He wasn’t entirely sure that he could believe her or not. Asking her what another way might be, he let his mind wander over option one for a moment. Oh, I love this one so much better than the first. You see, you simply disappear.

  “I want that one.” He laughed. “What makes you think that you could even trust me with that one? I mean, you seem to know me fairly well. Why is it you think that I’m going to stay disappeared?”

  Oh, I don’t. I know for a fact that if I were to let you have this option the way that you’re thinking about it, then you will show up. At the worst possible time too. No, you should have let me finish, Hunter. Now you’re stuck with that option. He laughed, but even to his own ears, it sounded forced and not very convincing. Now, in option two, you will disappear. However, it will only be because no one will know where to find you. You won’t be hidden away in some dark place, say a cell or something. No, that’s too nice for a person like you. I’m going to do to you just what you deserve. You’re going to die, yes, but your body will be so beaten, so broken, that at the end of it, you’ll be begging me to blow your fucking brains out.

  Every pore on his body seemed to have sprung a leak. His sweat glands were
pouring so badly that his underwear was sticking to his balls. Hunter was afraid to move. Afraid to even make much more than a sound for fear of what she’d do.

  For every doubt that he’d ever had of a woman being as cruel and as vicious as him, he knew that he’d met his match in this woman. Hell, he’d met someone far superior than he’d ever be or even hope to be when it came to killing someone. Looking down at his crotch, he could see that his dick, usually at half-staff, seemed to have shriveled up and tucked itself right up into his ass.

  So? You now do understand that I’m not one to fuck with, don’t you, Hunter the Moron? You’re going to suffer in ways that poor Dana didn’t. And since you told me that you sent her through the chipper still alive and breathing, along with your son, then you can—

  “What son?” Director Marshall explained to him about the child. “I know that baby was a girl. I know how to tell the difference between a boy and a girl. It was a girl.”

  The only way that you could have figured out, with that much certainty, that it was a girl was to have cut it from its mother. Please tell me that you did not do that. Tell me that there was at least one ounce of some sort of, I don’t know—some nicety about you. He said that he’d not cut anything from anyone. Then tell me how you know that it was a girl. Because according to the DNA that was on the chipper, there was not only a ninety-nine percent probability of it being your child, but it could have been your twin growing up; the comparison was such a match.

  “A man knows these things.” There was no answer back from the director. “When I put my hands on her belly, I could feel it was a girl. All men can do that. It’s why there is so much selective killing going on around the world. We know when we’re having a girl or a son.”

  She sort of did one of those hiccup things like his mother used to do when she was upset with him. As if she was just so pissed off that she couldn’t make her mouth or her mind work because of how mad she was.

  Then the woman laughed. Not a girly laugh, either. Like she was having a difficult time breathing between each bout of it as she went on. Hunter didn’t know what the hell she could have found that funny. As far as he knew, he’d not said a damned thing that would have warranted anyone to lose control like she was. It must have been something going on at her end. Someone must have tripped or something, and she was caught off guard by it.

  Let me get this straight. You think that you are so all powerful that you can tell if someone is having a boy or not simply by laying your hands on the mother’s belly? Is that what you’re saying to me? That you, the idiot of the year, have some sort of divine power that allows you, a layman in the field of medicine, to be able to figure out the sex of an unborn child? Oh my God, Hunter, I may laugh about that for years. She stopped laughing, and he wondered for a brief moment if she’d hung up on him. You moronic fuck. No one can tell that unless they have magical powers, which you don’t have, or they’re using some other means such as an ultrasound. And even that isn’t a hundred percent accurate. You killed your own son. A child that may well have been in your exact image. A son. Think on that while you wait for me to come after your fucking ass. Because I’m coming. After you. And when I get to you, I swear to Christ, you’re going to wish that someone had dumped you in the chipper right along with Dana and her unborn son.

  The connection between them seemed to have simply chopped off. Like a leg or an— Hunter decided that he wasn’t going to think on that right now. What he had to do, and pretty fucking fast, was to get out of town. Not just out of town, but out of the country.

  Getting up, he had to stand still for a moment to get his legs to work again. Sitting there all this time had made them tingly and achy. Adjusting his cock, he was surprised at how small it felt all curled up around him. Hell, if it had been long enough, he thought perhaps the sucker would have curled up around his leg to hide from the woman.

  He had nothing to pack to run with. All he’d had was the clothing on his back and the nice shirt and shorts combo that he’d snagged off the clearance rack right outside one of the stores in town. Hunter might well have shopped there more often had he realized that they carried such nice things. Realizing that he was taking too long, he put everything that he had into one of the dry cleaning bags and turned to the door.

  Someone was standing there. He didn’t know who or what it was until they laughed. It was the director. She’d come into his room without making a sound, and was standing there with a long shiny blade in her hand.

  He might not have seen her at all had she been up against the wall, or even laying on the carpet. From her feet to her head, she was dressed in all black. Not a shiny black, but matt black so that you’d never notice her at all except for her eyes. They were looking out at him from a small slit in the bodysuit, which looked as if it had been poured over her and had adhered to her immediately.

  There was nothing in him to even pretend to act like he had not one care in the world. She was what people would think of when they thought of death the hard way. A woman dressed to kill, and there wasn’t any way that she’d ever spill any of her own blood. Nor would there be a single strain of hair or DNA left behind from her.

  “Hello, Shit for Brains.” He nodded, his brain just pretending that she’d asked him if he’d like for her to kill him, and his brain thought it was a good idea. “You might want to step from that window.”

  Hunter was willing to try anything to get away. Instead of stepping away from the window, though, he moved one step toward it. As something hit him in the neck, then the back, the laughter coming from the black encased woman seemed to surround him over and over in the small room.

  Falling to the floor, he saw her moving around his room. It was like they showed you in movies, where your body was in slow-mo, and the rest of the world was going on around you as you died or whatever. As his head hit the carpet, she was picking up his notes he’d made. Hunter wanted to tell her to leave his shit alone, but his mouth had decided to take a break from him. Not a single sound moved past his lips. Then just like that, he was dead.

  Hunter woke, gasping for air. The cold fucking water that had been thrown over him took his breath away. As he reached up, or tried to reach up to wipe his face clean, he realized that he was handcuffed to a metal chair and his ankles were done the same way. Looking around, he noticed something else. He was sitting over an open drain, the large ones that you see on streets that keep the streets from flooding.

  ~*~

  Harris slipped into the hallway from the bathroom as soon as she changed her clothing. The agent that she had had in her place at the wedding had known just when Harris had arrived, and knew when to go to the bathroom. As soon as she hugged Dean, then Bella, she congratulated them both on their nuptials. She didn’t think that either of them noticed the difference—they only had eyes for each other.

  “You all right?” Harris hugged Shep and told him she was just fine. He was the only one, besides the agent, that knew that she’d not been there the entire time. “I have to tell you, when I saw you coming in through that window a few minutes ago, I didn’t have the slightest idea what was going on. I’m glad you waved at me.”

  “You did look slightly panicky there for a moment.” Harris made herself known to all the people at the wedding party. When she made her way back to Grandda, he kissed her on the cheek and told her that he loved his girls. “I love you too, you old fart.”

  “What a thing to call your grandpa. You should be ashamed of yourself.” They both laughed, and Grandda hugged her again. “I can’t tell you how pleased I am that they’re finally married. And now, if I could only become a great granddaddy, I’d think my life was set.”

  “You’d just want more grandbabies, and you know it.” Grandda laughed. Harris was glad that she’d found this old man out there, giving up his life to join his wife. Sending him to his home or threatening to roll him into an unmarked grave got her the best man in th
e world as a husband, and a ready-made family that she had loved more than anyone else.

  They mingled around the courthouse. The judge for this county had set them up a small place in his office for them to have pictures taken. Standing next to her husband, she thought of all the things she had to do yet, first of which was to get rid of Hunter just the way she’d told him. Or some of the ways, anyway.

  Taking everything from the room that could have been leaked to the police about her being there, Harris had found not just plans to the house that Bella and Dean were staying in, but also more pictures like they’d found in the house. The hotel was currently being cleaned by her crew to see what else they could find. After she’d left and called them, they’d found nothing more than a plane ticket envelope that had a smudged name on it. That, when cleared up, would be Hunter Booth’s name. His prints were all over the room, but there was nothing there that would indicate anything other than the man had been staying there. Everything else had been taken away with his body when she’d left the room.

  Harris knew that where Hunter was, no one would ever hear him if he were to scream his head off. There were sounds around him that he’d be able to hear, but they were sounds from the system that she’d put in the building that gave off the sounds that she wanted, whether it be water sounds, street sounds, or even sounds from close to a restaurant. There was enough noise around him that he’d think he was close to someplace that could hear him. Nothing would. Not ever.