Hikers - The Collection (Complete Box Set of 5 Books)

by Lauren Algeo

  An idea began to spark in Brewer’s mind although he kept writing silently. Mitch couldn’t know anything he was thinking.

  ‘Right, last one. Sodium bicarbonate.’

  Mitch dutifully looked it up. ‘Umm, an antacid used to relieve heartburn and acid indigestion… wait, there’s more. It can be used intravenously to reverse clinical manifestations of acidosis.’ He glanced up blankly. ‘I have no idea what any of that means?’

  Brewer shrugged. It didn’t matter anyway; he wouldn’t need that one. ‘Give me a moment,’ he said to Mitch.

  He stared hard at his notes for a couple of minutes then took the laptop from Mitch and double-checked a few things. Hearing about the uses for the stolen drugs had caused a new idea to bloom. One that was more risky than anything he’d ever attempted before. What he was thinking was all speculation, and he couldn’t guarantee that he would walk out of it alive, but if it went to plan, hopefully Ellen and Mitch would.

  Brewer rubbed at the stubble on his chin and considered his options. There was only one way this might work and that was if Mitch knew nothing about it. But he still needed the kid’s help as part of the plan, he just couldn’t be aware of it beforehand. He closed his eyes briefly and ran through several scenarios in his mind. When he opened them again, Mitch was staring at him with concern.

  ‘You look far too serious,’ he pointed out. ‘What you’re thinking is bad, isn’t it?’

  ‘It’s an idea,’ Brewer replied carefully. ‘I’ll need to do a bit more research before we go, I need to know you’re fully on board though?’

  ‘I’m in for whatever it is,’ Mitch said.

  ‘Good,’ Brewer nodded. ‘The only problem is that I can’t tell you what that is.’

  ‘What?’ Mitch’s face screwed up in confusion. ‘Why?’

  ‘The Master won’t let us into his house armed,’ Brewer said. ‘We’ll need to walk in seemingly empty-handed. He will most likely search our minds to check. Now, I’m pretty sure I can hide what I’m thinking from him with the techniques I’ve practised but you won’t be able to. You’re new to this and he’ll be able to pluck what we’re planning to do straight from your mind.’

  Mitch nodded in understanding. ‘I guess that’s true. I don’t know how to hide anything in my head. But how am I going to be able to help you if I haven’t got a clue what I need to do?’

  ‘When the time comes, I’ll tell you,’ Brewer said. ‘I need you to promise me now that you will do whatever I ask? No matter how crazy it seems, or whatever else is going on around you, you have to do exactly what I tell you. Can you do that?’

  ‘I promise,’ Mitch nodded gravely. ‘I’ll do whatever you say.’ He puffed out his cheeks and let out a slow breath. ‘This sounds really heavy, dude.’

  ‘You don’t know the half of it,’ Brewer said.

  Was what he was planning completely insane? If he told anyone about it they would likely say ‘yes’. It was the only option they had though. He was almost certain he could keep it a secret from the Master’s prying eyes. He would bury it in the deepest depths of his mind, even under Karen’s memory. If he had to sacrifice thoughts of her to distract the Master, it was an agony he was willing to endure. Anything to keep the real idea hidden.

  ‘My heart’s beating hard already,’ Mitch said. ‘It’s going to go crazy when we actually get there.’

  ‘Mine too,’ Brewer admitted. ‘It’s natural to be scared, but you won’t have to suffer this feeling for too long. I want to do a bit more research, so have a shower, clear your head; do whatever you’ve got to do. We’re going to the Master tonight.’

  Mitch nodded. He headed to the bathroom while Brewer carried on researching online and making notes. He scribbled some carefully worded sentences on a fresh sheet of paper and tore it out of the pad. He got three syringes from his rucksack while Mitch was out of sight, and began to fill them with a mix of water and chosen drugs from the various vials. He carefully hid the syringes at the top of the bag when Mitch came back out.

  Brewer loaded two tranquiliser darts with insulin and one with a Warfarin mix, while Mitch got dressed across the room. The kid put on his usual baggy jeans, a black top with an offensive slogan, and a grey zip-up hoodie.

  ‘Should have brought some darker clothes,’ he said when he noticed Brewer looking at him from the corner of his eye. ‘This hoodie’s too light to be very stealth.’

  ‘We don’t need to creep up on the house so it doesn’t matter,’ Brewer said to cover up the real reason he’d been checking what Mitch was putting on. ‘Pack these darts in the holdall with the gun will you, I need a shower too.’

  He carried his own rucksack to the bathroom in cradled arms. He had a lukewarm shower in the small tub and tried to wash away the grime of the last two days. The cut on his cheek stung and the rest of his face was sore and bruised. He still looked a mess after the shower but at least he was clean. He put on the same jeans and a different navy jumper. It was baggy on his thin frame and would disguise what he needed it to.

  He took the syringes from his pack and made his final preparations. There was no going back now. He joined Mitch in the main room and their eyes met.

  ‘Are you ready?’ Brewer asked.

  ‘I’m more nervous than I’ve ever been in my life,’ Mitch replied. ‘But yes, I’m ready.’

  He picked up the rest of the bags while Brewer gave the room a quick sweep to check they hadn’t left anything. Before they went through the door, Brewer moved close to Mitch’s back and slipped a folded piece of paper into the left pocket of his hoodie. Mitch had his hands full with the bags and didn’t feel a thing. The last piece of the plan was in place.

  Brewer closed the motel room door behind him with a firm bang. ‘Let’s get Ellen back.’

  Chapter 31

  Ellen peered at the Master through the haze of painful visions. It had taken him a while, but he was beginning to break her.

  ‘Please, stop,’ she whimpered.

  He only smiled at her. His small, eroded teeth gleamed in the semi-darkness.

  She was back in the study. She didn’t know where she’d been held after the other two hikers had dragged her from the room. They’d put some material over her head, possibly a pillowcase, and left her standing somewhere dark and cold for what felt like ages. She had felt the sickening sensation of a hiker uncomfortably close by for the whole duration. She hadn’t dared to move in case she was balanced near the edge of something and could fall to her death. After a while, they’d brought her back to the study again, back to him.

  She glared at the Master with all the strength she could muster, although it wasn’t much. He’d started small, with memories of her childhood traumas, then her parents’ deaths, before moving on to Martin. The pain and loss she’d felt when he’d left her, pregnant and alone. Everything seemed magnified in the hands of the Master.

  Each devastation felt a hundred times worse than it had at the time. Each recollection twisted the knife of agony in her heart. There were tears streaming down her cheeks and she felt physically and emotionally drained. She didn’t know how much more of this she could take. And he’d only just started on the Lucy years.

  Ellen tried to wriggle her hands only the binds were too tight. The hikers had removed her blinding hood when they’d brought her back into the room so the Master could see her face. See how much his torture was affecting her. She was sat in his armchair, facing the desk he was now sitting behind.

  An image of Lucy on her second birthday flashed to the front of her mind. She was smiling and gazing in awe at the birthday cake on the table in front of her. It had pink frosting and two white candles glowing on top. Ellen’s heart ached at the sight.

  ‘No more,’ she whispered. ‘Please.’

  The image was gone in a second and replaced with merciful darkness.

  ‘Are you ready… to talk now?’ the Master rasped. ‘Be civil?’

  Her head betrayed her by nodding. It was all too much; she just
wanted it to stop.

  ‘Good.’ He nodded in approval. ‘I prefer nice, old-fashioned conversation to just taking what I want.’

  Ellen sniffed in disbelief; he could’ve fooled her.

  ‘Now, tell me,’ the Master said, pressing his palms together in front of him. ‘I saw something curious in your mind. You call us… hikers? Where did that… offensive name come from?’

  Ellen didn’t want to reply, but she didn’t want him to resume torturing her with visions of Lucy’s young life again.

  ‘Scott calls you that,’ she whispered in a voice so low she barely heard it herself.

  She knew she was betraying him but she couldn’t face any more of the alternative. She looked down at her lap, deeply ashamed of herself.

  ‘Scott Brewer.’ The Master seemed to have trouble forming the words. ‘The man who started it all. He found you… and told you about us?’

  Ellen gave a brief nod of her head. Please forgive me, Scott, she thought. I really tried to endure it.

  ‘He trained you to kill us?’ he asked.

  She nodded again.

  ‘It’s strange,’ the Master mused. ‘I had thought us somewhat immortal, until he began his escapades in England. Murdering my kin.’ There was a long pause. ‘You know he killed… my brother, yes?’

  Ellen’s head snapped back up. ‘Brother?’ she asked through dry lips.

  ‘Yes. Charles. That disgusting man and his little whore friend murdered him,’ the Master spat.

  ‘You mean the Grand?’ Ellen’s heart fluttered in her chest.

  They’d had this all wrong. The Master wasn’t a son gone rogue, or a standalone monster; he was the Grand’s brother. He would never let them live after what they had done. Scott and Mitch would be walking into a trap if they came here to rescue her and she had no way of warning them.

  ‘Grand was the name he used, yes,’ the Master said. ‘But back when he was my… baby brother, he had just been Charles.’

  Ellen didn’t know what to say. Should she try and keep him talking to find out more about his life? Not that any of it would help them now.

  ‘I want to know exactly what happened to him,’ the Master carried on. ‘Tell me… how he was killed. How it came to pass that all of his children died too?’

  Ellen was at a loss. ‘I only know what Scott told me.’ She said. ‘The hiker saw that memory before? That’s all I know.’

  The Master delved into her mind to confirm for himself. It only held the same memory that Joseph had already shown him ­– Scott Brewer telling Ellen about the night he and Georgie went to the Grand’s house. It wasn’t enough. He needed to see for himself exactly what had happened, and the only way to do that was through Brewer’s own memories. It was essential for him to come here.

  ‘Do you believe your friends will try and rescue you?’ The Master asked.

  Ellen didn’t reply. She hoped to god they wouldn’t now. The Master wanted to take the full force of his revenge out on Scott.

  ‘I take that… as a yes,’ he said. ‘It’s curious that you have all bonded so… quickly. I didn’t even like Charles… I despised him, in fact.’

  Ellen jumped on that line of thought as a way to divert the Master from questioning her further. ‘How come?’ she tried to ask casually.

  The Master studied her face through narrow eyes. ‘He was more powerful,’ he said eventually. ‘I hated the fact that I was older but… his gift was stronger.’

  Ellen’s heart was thumping wildly. The Master wasn’t as powerful as the Grand had been, surely that had to work in their favour? Georgie had been able to kill the Grand so would Scott be strong enough to defeat the Master?

  ‘You really think so?’ A bemused smile played at the corner of the Master’s wrinkled mouth.

  He’d slipped inside her mind while she wasn’t paying attention and heard her top-line thoughts.

  ‘My brother underestimated that man, but I won’t… I know exactly what he is capable of, and exactly how to hurt him.’ He gave a chesty chuckle that turned into a coughing fit.

  Ellen didn’t like what he was saying one little bit. She tried to steer the conversation back to him and take the heat off Scott. ‘Why didn’t the Grand… Charles, come to America with you? You are originally from England, right?’

  The Master leant back on the hard, leather-covered chair behind the desk. ‘Because he didn’t know I existed. He was very young and I kept… out of his way. I doubt he ever remembered… that he had a brother.’

  ‘Why did you leave?’ Ellen asked.

  She thought he might put a stop to her question time but he seemed content enough to talk about his life. She just needed to find something, anything that could help them. A way for Scott or Mitch to overpower him.

  ‘I wanted to go somewhere where I was the most powerful,’ he rasped. ‘The master of others. I came by boat and found suitable surrogate parents to build my life and fuel my power. I had everything.’

  ‘Except your brother.’ The words tumbled out of Ellen’s mouth before she could think about them and she winced, instantly regretting what she’d said.

  The Master’s face darkened considerably and his eyes bore a hole into her soul. ‘This is all very… nice.’ His voice had hardened and he spoke through gritted teeth. ‘But let’s discuss the… situation at hand.’

  Ellen sat rigidly in the chair, mentally kicking herself. She’d just blown her chance at finding out anything more about him.

  ‘My brother may have made a mistake and been ill prepared… but I’m not.’ The Master spoke slowly, accentuating every word. ‘I have three of my strongest children here with me.’

  He nodded to the two male hikers, who were back in their military positions guarding the door. The female hiker from the motel was there somewhere only she didn’t know where. Ellen tried to remember how many hikers Scott had faced at the Grand’s house but couldn’t recall what he’d told her.

  ‘They won’t get close to the house with any weapons… my children will make sure of that,’ the Master said. ‘Besides, I doubt very much they’d want to risk me harming… one hair on your pretty head.’

  He gave Ellen a thin smile that sent goose bumps crawling along her flesh and chilled her to the bone. It was the creepiest thing she’d ever seen.

  ‘He loves you.’ The smile widened menacingly.

  The words knocked the breath from Ellen’s lungs. Love? ‘I, uhh… I don’t…’ she stuttered.

  ‘He does,’ the Master nodded, still smiling his taunting smile. ‘Joseph showed it to me… from a deep part of his mind. I intend to use his feelings… to my advantage.’

  ‘How?’ Ellen murmured. Her body felt completely numb now.

  ‘The ultimate torture.’ The Master grinned manically.

  Ellen knew that if she ever got out of this alive, she would be haunted by that sadistic smirk for eternity.

  ‘He’s already lost two important women in his life… I’ve seen it all. I doubt… very much that he will want to lose you too.’ The Master’s chest gave another rattle that could’ve passed for a laugh. ‘His tentative feelings of love will make him weak… and irrational. All the more when he sees how I’ve broken you. I intend to use you… Ellen, my dear… to carry out the deed I’ve been fantasising about. The pinnacle of pain for him, and the greatest pleasure for me. When the time comes… I will take control of your mind and you will… kill Scott Brewer.’

  ‘I would never…’ Ellen managed to start through her paralysing fear.

  ‘Oh, but you will,’ the Master whispered inside her mind. ‘I know exactly how to break you.’

  Lucy. Before Ellen had even thought her name, her daughter’s face swam into focus. She was seven years old now, and crying uncontrollably, asking Ellen why all the other children at her school had a daddy and she didn’t. The emotional scene was unbearable and Ellen gave a low whimper.

  ‘You see, I don’t have to worry about what Scott Brewer is planning.’ The Master’s voice echoed
around her head, over the top of Lucy’s heart-breaking sobs. ‘Because I have the most powerful weapon of all… you.’

  Chapter 32

  Brewer handed the tranquiliser gun to Mitch. ‘See, there’s no hope in hell of getting close to that place without being seen.’

  Mitch peered through the sight anyway. ‘I can’t tell, it’s too dark. There might be a way. If we just wait until morning…’

  ‘No,’ Brewer cut him off sharply. ‘We’re getting Ellen back tonight.’

  It was after 3am and they were huddled on an elevated field half a mile from the Master’s house. The kid had insisted on getting closer to scout it out, just in case there was a way to shoot the Master from a distance, and Brewer had reluctantly agreed to humour him.

  It had taken a while to locate the remote address near Piney Creek Road, south of Lexington. There were plenty of empty fields and creeks. Brewer had stopped the car in the shadows of some trees, alongside a deserted road. They could see lights twinkling in the windows of the Master’s house. They were to the northeast of the building so could only see the back. There seemed to be a set of double doors leading out to a patio to the left, and so far there had been no movement in any of the windows.

  ‘There are some trees and bushes nearer the front.’ Mitch kept staring through the sight and wouldn’t let the idea drop. ‘What if we managed to get over there?’

  ‘How?’ Brewer snapped. ‘There’s nothing but flat, open fields all around. They will see us coming a mile off. They’re probably watching us right now!’

  He had his own plan rigidly embedded in his mind and there would be no deviating from it. He was growing increasingly impatient with Mitch’s constant resistance.

  ‘Well, I don’t see any hikers,’ Mitch pouted.

  ‘Trust me, they’re there.’ Brewer snatched the tranquiliser gun from Mitch’s grasp and had another look through the sight. ‘They’ll be hidden in the house, maybe some around the grounds, but they will all be on guard.’

  ‘How many of them?’ Mitch asked.