Trusting Taylor (Silverstone)

by Susan Stoker

  It took a second for Taylor to remember Mr. Trowbridge was Eagle. She nodded.

  “The man who caused your car wreck was Brett Williams. He was forty-three, and we have evidence to suggest he was a prolific serial killer.”

  Taylor gaped at the detective in shock. “What?”

  “We’re positive he’s responsible for almost a dozen young women’s deaths over the last three years,” the other detective said. He’d already introduced himself as James Wolfe.

  “How do you know?” Eagle asked.

  It was just as well, because Taylor was literally speechless. She couldn’t think of even one thing to ask; she was too horrified.

  “He had pictures of his victims,” Detective Wolfe said. “Polaroids. They look like they were taken after he’d killed them. All of the women had been reported missing, but there were never any clues as to where they might have gone.”

  “He lived with his mother, who’s suffering from Alzheimer’s. When we got to her house, she was locked inside a bedroom. She’d soiled herself and was suffering from dehydration. She was completely confused and kept asking where her husband, Donald, was, as well as her little boy, Brett,” Detective Allen explained.

  Taylor felt horrible for the woman. The way Brett smelled made more sense now.

  “How did Brett become fixated on Taylor?” Eagle asked. “Where did they meet?”

  Detective Wolfe opened a folder in front of him, studying a report. “In a search of the basement, where it looks like he spent most of his time, a diary of sorts was found. It clearly implicates him in the deaths of the women we saw in the photographs. He wrote extensively about how he felt as he tortured them. He also went into detail about how he’d strangled them until they were unconscious or dead. Then did rescue breathing, if necessary, to bring them back to life. Apparently, that’s what got him off. As far as we can tell from his diary, he kept each woman for anywhere from a few days up to two weeks.”

  Taylor swallowed hard, and she jerked in surprise when she felt Eagle’s fingers on her cheek. She’d been crying and hadn’t realized it.

  “I know you do this all the time,” Eagle told the detectives in a harsh tone, “but can you please lighten up on the details? My girlfriend narrowly escaped being one of his victims.”

  Both detectives looked contrite.

  “Sorry,” Detective Wolfe said.

  “To answer your question,” Detective Allen continued, “based on the journal, it looks like he first met Ms. Cardin after an incident at a grocery store. He was a witness and was interviewed by the police officers at the scene. Of course, nothing about him stood out as being off, so he wasn’t detained or even looked at twice.”

  Taylor leaned forward in her seat. “Was that when the two guys got in a fight over a parking spot?” she asked.

  The detective looked down at the notes in front of her and nodded. “Yes.”

  “I remember there were a bunch of people who were interviewed,” Taylor said. “I don’t recall anyone being creepy or anything, though.”

  “Well, Mr. Williams wrote in his journal that he’d found his next ‘plaything’ that day. He went on and on about how perfect you were, that since you wouldn’t be able to recognize him, he could mess with your mind. He was planning to pretend to be several different people once he got you in his basement.”

  Taylor felt sick. She wanted to claim Brett’s plan wouldn’t have worked, that she’d have known she was being tortured by the same person. But honestly, Taylor wasn’t sure how she would’ve reacted or what she would’ve thought. If he’d changed clothes, maybe worn a hat, she wouldn’t have known she was being tortured by just one man, over and over.

  She closed her eyes in humiliation.

  As if Eagle knew what she was thinking, he squeezed her hand and told the detectives, “Taylor knew he was the man who’d been stalking her. She refused to get in his car as a result.”

  “How?” Detective Wolfe asked.

  Taylor opened her eyes and looked at the man across the table. She saw only curiosity in his gaze.

  “The way he smelled,” she admitted. “I noticed it after he sat next to me at the dementia care center. And it makes sense now, because he was caring for his mother at home. Bleach, disinfectant, and urine,” she clarified. “That, and I also recognized his car from the time he rear-ended me. I guess he figured since I couldn’t remember faces, I wouldn’t recall his car, either, but that old Cadillac didn’t exactly blend in.”

  “I’m impressed,” the detective said. He glanced briefly at his partner, then back at Taylor. “And you said that you believe he pretended to be a maintenance man to get into your apartment, and that he delivered a pizza, too, right?”

  Taylor nodded.

  “You’re very lucky,” Detective Allen said. “He wrote about both incidents in his journal. He’d planned to grab you when you let him into your apartment, but your boyfriend was on the way.”

  “What else did he do?” Taylor asked, not really wanting to, but unable to not know.

  Detective Allen looked down at her notes. “Looks like he mostly followed you for a couple of months after he met you. A lot of fantasizing about what he was going to do when he finally got you back to his house. Let’s see . . . he talked to you at the post office, at the library . . . you know about the fender bender. He paid for your food when you went through a drive-through one day. He was actually inside, and he told the cashier he wanted to pay for your meal, but to say it was the car in front of you. It looks like he also saw you and a friend having lunch at a diner, and he paid for that meal too.

  “There are quite a few references to your boyfriend, how irritated he was that you’d started seeing more of him and spending nights away from your apartment. He bitched that it took him so long to find out who he was. Seems clear that dating Mr. Trowbridge made it harder for him. He didn’t want anyone to see him interacting with you and possibly remembering him.”

  Taylor couldn’t believe that literally all the times she’d thought strangers were simply being nice, it had been Brett. That he’d been . . . what had he been doing? Not really messing with her mind, since she hadn’t known he was the one behind the gestures. She supposed he’d simply been enjoying the thrill of the chase and reveling in the fact that she had no idea he was watching her.

  “As I said,” the detective went on, “you were very lucky. But you did everything right when he did finally decide to make his move. You didn’t allow yourself to be put in his car. Sometimes it’s best to be docile and let a kidnapper feel as if they’re in control, to wait for the perfect time to run, but in this case, fighting back was absolutely the right thing to do. You gave your boyfriend time to recover from the accident and come after you.”

  “I never even saw him following us,” Eagle said. “One second we were the only ones on the road, and the next he’d run into us. I didn’t see him come up on us because of the curves in the road.”

  Taylor knew he still felt horrible about that. He’d been the one to suggest taking the scenic route, which had made things so much easier for Brett. He would’ve made his move at some point over the weekend anyway—there was no doubt about that—but taking the road through the forest, one that wasn’t well traveled, had given him the chance to wreck their car and attempt to snatch Taylor.

  “We suspect that he’d honed his surveillance skills enough that he was very good at stalking,” Detective Wolfe said matter-of-factly.

  It was Taylor’s turn to squeeze Eagle’s hand. He’d been beating himself up for getting knocked out and not being able to prevent Brett from taking her out of the car. But the officers at the scene had said if it hadn’t been for Eagle’s driving skills, they both could’ve been killed in the accident.

  “Anyway, I know you already know this,” Detective Allen said, “but there will be no charges for Williams’s death. It was obviously self-defense, and”—her voice lowered—“you saved the city and state a lot of money, because now we don’t have
to put him on trial. The families of his other victims will finally get closure. Williams put extensive notes in his diary about where he buried each woman—we think so he could go back and relive everything he’d done to them. It’ll be a long time before the families can process what happened, but thanks to both of you, they can finally put their loved ones to rest.”

  Taylor wasn’t so sure learning your wife, sister, or daughter had been killed by a serial killer would make anyone feel better, but she supposed it was preferable to not knowing anything at all about where they’d disappeared to or what had happened to them.

  Detective Wolfe went on, “Williams apparently went out in the middle of the night and buried his victims in various wooded areas around the city. And he buried them deep; it would’ve been years before they were ever found, if they were ever found.”

  “What will happen to his mother?” Gramps asked from his position against the wall.

  Taylor jumped. She’d completely forgotten the other three men were standing behind her.

  “We haven’t been able to find any kin,” Detective Wolfe said. “For now, she’s in the hospital, but she’s going to have to be moved soon. There’s a place on the west side that takes in indigent people who have little money and no one to care for them.”

  Taylor could tell just by his tone that the home probably wasn’t very good. Even though she hated Brett Williams with every cell in her body, his mother hadn’t known what he’d been doing, and she was ultimately one of his victims as well.

  “I’ll pay for her to be in a specialty care center,” Smoke said.

  Taylor turned to gape at him.

  He didn’t take his eyes from the detectives. “I’ve got the money. I’ll get in touch for the details about where she is and take care of it. The woman didn’t deserve what happened to her.”

  Taylor was crying again, but she couldn’t help it. How she’d somehow found the most generous, compassionate friends, she had no idea, but she vowed never to take them for granted.

  “Generous of you,” the detective said. “I’ll be in touch with the name of her doctor.”

  Smoke nodded. “’Preciate it.”

  “Do you all have any more questions?” Detective Allen asked.

  Taylor’s mind whirled as the Silverstone men asked several more questions. All she could think about was how close she’d come to disappearing exactly like the eleven women before her. She’d been extremely lucky. A serial killer had fucked with her for months, and she’d had no clue.

  Not only that, but she’d put Eagle in danger. And Skylar. And everyone at Silverstone Towing. What if Brett had seen Skylar and decided he wanted her too? Or little Sandra? Or Christine or Leigh? He could’ve sabotaged his own car and called for a tow. Would the others have been as lucky?

  Taylor’s head throbbed, and the longer she sat in the small room, the more claustrophobic she felt.

  But as usual, Eagle was in tune with her and noticed. “I think that’s enough for today,” he announced, and Taylor lifted her head to look at him.

  “If we have any more questions, we’ll be in touch,” he went on, scooting back his chair and standing. Since he hadn’t let go of her hand, Taylor had no choice but to stand as well. As soon as she was on her feet, Eagle released her hand and wrapped an arm around her waist, pulling her into his side. She might’ve protested his heavy-handedness, but she was more than happy to get out of the police department.

  Eagle shook both detectives’ hands, then Taylor did the same before Eagle steered her out of the room and down the hall. Feeling as if she was in a daze, she allowed herself to be led outside, taking a deep breath of fresh air the second they were in the parking lot.

  Eagle turned her to him then, keeping one arm around her waist and using his other hand to lift her chin so she had to look at him. “You okay?”

  Taylor nodded, but said, “Not really.”

  She hated the look of concern on his face.

  “How do your ribs feel?”

  “They’re okay,” she told him.

  “And your foot?”

  Sometime during her flight from Williams, she’d stepped on a piece of glass, which had imbedded itself in the arch of her foot. It was infected, but the doctor said because she was otherwise healthy, and with the antibiotics she was taking, it should clear up quickly.

  “Sore, but not bad.”

  Her arms itched from where she’d been scratched by all the thorns in the forest, but she wasn’t going to complain. She’d been very fortunate; having a few scrapes was nothing more than an inconvenience at the moment.

  “Come ’ere,” Eagle said, then wrapped both arms around her.

  Taylor immediately snuggled into him, grabbing him as if she’d never let go. She rested her head on his shoulder and inhaled his clean scent.

  “Christ,” he muttered. “I can’t believe how close I came to losing you. For the record,” he said without letting go, “I never would’ve stopped looking for you. And I would’ve found you, and rescued you too.”

  She wasn’t sure she believed that, but she loved the thought that he wouldn’t have given up trying.

  How long they stood pressed together in the parking lot, she didn’t know, but eventually Bull wandered up to them and asked if they were ready to get out of there. Eagle nodded and opened the back door of Bull’s Altima. The other man had driven them to the police station, as Eagle hadn’t gotten his Jeep replaced yet.

  No one said much on the way back to Silverstone Towing until Bull parked. He turned to look at her and Eagle in the back seat.

  “So you know, this wasn’t my idea. In fact, I tried to talk Skylar out of it, but she insisted.”

  “Out of what?” Eagle asked wearily.

  Taylor wasn’t in the mood to really do anything other than go and lie down, but she had to admit she was curious as to what Skylar had done.

  “Everyone’s inside,” Bull said.

  “Everyone?” Eagle asked.

  “Yup. All of Silverstone’s employees. Archer made a shit ton of food, and there’s a huge party going on.”

  “Take us to my apartment,” Eagle clipped.

  Taylor put her hand on his arm. “It’s okay.”

  “It’s not okay. You’re stressed way the fuck out, and so am I. Neither of us are in the mood to pretend to be happy about this. I don’t want to hurt any of their feelings by being short and grumpy, and I know you don’t either.”

  She didn’t. And it felt good to have Eagle so firmly on her side. She’d never had a champion, and it would never feel anything less than amazing.

  “I think it’ll be good for us,” she said softly. “I don’t want to dwell on what we learned today. I don’t want to think about how close I came to dying at the hands of that crazy bastard. I’ve never had a surprise party before, never had friends who cared enough to do something like this for me. And . . . Shawn made food . . . I’m not sure you have anything edible in your apartment, and I sure don’t feel like cooking. Besides, I’m starving.”

  Eagle studied her. “You aren’t just saying that, are you?”

  “No.”

  “Okay. But the second you’ve reached your limit, let me know, and I’ll get you out of there.”

  Taylor nodded. “I will.”

  “Skylar didn’t mean anything bad by this,” Bull explained. “She knows firsthand how it feels to escape death. She just wanted to help.”

  “I know,” Taylor reassured him. “I’m lucky to have a friend like her.”

  “Come on, let’s put everyone out of their misery. I’m sure they’ve been watching the security camera, wondering what the hell we’re talking about out here,” Eagle said, reaching for the door handle.

  Taylor scooted after Eagle and followed him out of the car. She could’ve gotten out on her side, but she wasn’t ready to let go of his hand yet. She felt somewhat weird that she needed to keep in physical contact with him, but he didn’t seem to mind.

  The three of them walke
d into Silverstone Towing, put on their name tags—which were the last three attached to the metal board next to the door—and headed into the great room.

  Bull hadn’t lied; every single employee of Silverstone Towing was there—those who weren’t out working, that was. Everyone yelled out a greeting when they entered, and Taylor couldn’t help but tear up. How she’d gone from living a lonely existence to this, she didn’t know . . . but she did know she’d do whatever it took to keep it.

  Skylar came rushing up to them and gave Taylor a long heartfelt hug. When she pulled back, she asked, “Are you okay?”

  “I am now,” Taylor said with a smile, and it was true. A minute ago, no matter what she’d told Eagle and Bull in the car, she hadn’t really been sure she wanted to be around anyone other than Eagle. But now that she was here, and after seeing how genuinely relieved and happy everyone was that she was all right, Taylor didn’t want to be anywhere else.

  As she and Eagle walked around the room saying hello to everyone, Taylor was once again reminded how good it was to be alive. Everyone was wearing their name tags, so she didn’t have to ask their names. She might not have recognized their faces, but she knew a lot about each of them. Robert hated pinball, but was a master at foosball. Jose was a complete softy. Christine bitched about how messy everyone was, when she herself was, in fact, a closet slob. She’d learned about everyone’s children, and each person’s favorite shift at Silverstone.

  Taylor might not’ve been an employee, but she’d spent enough time there to know everyone well . . . and they’d gotten to know her in return.

  This was just what she needed. To be surrounded by friends.

  Shawn came up to her then, and Taylor almost cried again, feeling overly emotional about everything at the moment. He didn’t say anything, simply wrapped his huge arms around her. They hugged for a long moment before he pulled back and looked deep into her eyes. Then he nodded. “You’re okay,” he declared.

  “I am,” Taylor agreed.

  Then Shawn leaned down and whispered into her ear, “When you’re hungry, I made a caramel-peanut-butter pie just for you. I hid it in the crisper drawer of the second fridge. It’s got aluminum foil over the top, and I wrote ‘Touch this, and I’ll never make another dessert again’ on it. No one has dared to even peek under the foil to see what it is. It’s all yours.”