Unbound (Crimson Romance)

by Nikkie Locke

  She stared at her hands. “You’re a Whitley.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Dean, I’m not stupid. Your family thinks you guys are cursed. One-Woman-Whitley or whatever. You only fall in love once or some crap. There’s never been anyone else for your dad after your mom died, and I know your uncle Doc has never been married. Jack is convinced he’ll never love anyone but Bridgett — ”

  “How do you know that?”

  “Maddie has a big mouth. Besides, Bridgett’s always known.”

  “Is that why she wouldn’t date Jack?”

  “Jack and Britt have nothing to do with this! When I told you people were going to talk, you said you’ve waited forever for people to talk about us. Maddie told me you’ve been waiting on me since middle school. Even Burke said you’ve waited forever.”

  “I don’t know what you want to hear, Payten. Give me a hint, here.”

  “Do you think you love me because of some stupid family curse?”

  “No,” he answered immediately.

  “What do all those comments mean?”

  He took one of her hands between his. “I thought you would be my one for a long time. I didn’t want that. My dad, Jack, some of my uncles. I didn’t want to be like that. I avoided it and you.”

  “What changed?” she asked.

  “Someone pointed out that I could lose you without ever having you.”

  “Jack?”

  “Sort of. The point is I thought you could be the one for me. I realized last night that you are. I love you, Payten. More than I’ve ever loved anyone before. I love everything about you. You make me laugh, and I’d make a fool out of myself to see you smile.”

  She smiled. “Really?”

  “When I saw you on the floor, I think a part of me died. I was so scared.”

  “I was scared too.”

  He took her hand. “Payten? Is this too fast for you?”

  Of course he would ask, she thought.

  In answer, she shrugged. “Some of the hardest and scariest things in my life have happened in the past week. You’ve been there every step of the way, and that feels right. This probably is way too fast, and it doesn’t really fit with my plan at all. Either way, I do love you.”

  He smiled. “Go pee and get your butt back down here.”

  “Hey,” she complained.

  “I’m tired. I don’t want to sleep without you.”

  She melted. “I’ll be right back.”

  She slid into her borrowed drawstring pajama bottoms and grabbed Dean’s long-sleeved shirt off the floor. She made her way across the basement to the narrow stairway that led to the main floor. There was one bathroom in the basement, but because it was for prisoners, it was a little too open for her liking. She opened the door at the top of the stairs and stepped into the main room of the police station with all its desks.

  She glanced around but didn’t see Officer Rykers. He was supposed to be on guard. She moved farther into the room.

  “Hello?” she called.

  A head poked up from behind one of the nearby desks. It wasn’t Officer Rykers. It was the man who’d attacked her earlier.

  Fuck, she thought. She started to turn around and run back the way she came, but she stopped. What good would it do to run into the basement with no way out? Besides, Dean was down there.

  “Why don’t you ease on out here and close the door?” the man suggested, pointing a gun in her direction.

  Oh, my God. Oh, my God. Oh, my God.

  She did as she was told. It wasn’t like she had any other options. Run downstairs and let a naked Dean fight off a man with a gun? That didn’t seem smart.

  “What did you do to Officer Rykers?”

  His lips peeled back from his teeth in what she assumed was his version of a smile.

  Oh, God, that’s creepy.

  “Come have a look.”

  She moved closer. Officer Rykers was lying on the floor behind the desk. Forgetting to be cautious, she rushed toward him. She never felt the blow to her head that caused her to black out.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Dean wasn’t sure how long he drifted between sleeping and waking. He thought he should check to see what was taking Payten so long. He wondered if it had even been that long. He pushed himself off the uncomfortable cot and grabbed his jeans off the floor.

  As he made his way upstairs, he thought it was odd to be waking up in a jail cell when everything in his life was falling into place. He was actually amazed he and the guys hadn’t ever spent the night in jail. A handful of years ago, they should have been there a lot. They had been wild together.

  “Dean!”

  He raced up the last several stairs. His father met him at the door to the basement.

  “Are you all right?”

  “I’m fine,” he answered. “What’s going on?”

  He looked over Carl’s shoulder into the main room of the station. He could see Burke crouched behind a desk with his police radio at his mouth. He couldn’t see what Burke was looking at though.

  “Where’s Payten?”

  He looked back at his father. “She came up to go to the bathroom. Isn’t she here?”

  “Dean — ”

  He pushed his father aside to run to the bathroom. He jerked the door open, but she wasn’t there. He knew from the ever-growing wad of panic in his stomach that he hadn’t really expected to find her there.

  He whirled to face his dad. “Where is she?”

  Carl shook his head. “You need to stay calm. Once we get Rykers awake, he can answer some questions for us.”

  “He’s asleep?” he asked, outraged.

  Carl shook his head. “It looks like he’s been tasered.”

  “That doesn’t knock you out, does it?” Dean asked.

  “It looks like the guy tasered him, then beat the holy hell out of him while he couldn’t defend himself. Probably knocked him unconscious first thing.”

  Dean moved to stand next to his father. He watched Burke try to rouse Rykers. “How is that possible? We were just downstairs. Wouldn’t we have heard something?”

  Carl shrugged. “The floor is pretty thick.”

  “He has her, doesn’t he?”

  His dad looked him over carefully before taking his arm and leading him to a chair. “Sit.”

  “Dad?”

  “Yes, he probably does.”

  He was quiet after that. How could he have slept through it?

  He knew he shouldn’t have made love to Payten. All of her initial objections made sense. They were spending the night in a jail cell to keep her safe. Instead of helping protect her, though, he had made love to her and slept through Rykers’ beating and her kidnapping.

  He watched the activity going on around him, but he didn’t really see any of it. His father moved to help Burke. The same ambulance crew who had worked on Payten earlier came for Rykers. Smith and Chase arrived at some point. When Rykers gained consciousness and tried to escape going to the hospital, Smith threatened to beat him back into unconsciousness if he didn’t agree to go. It wasn’t until after the paramedic and EMT hauled him out on a stretcher that everyone turned their attention back to Dean.

  “Did you hear anything?” Burke asked.

  He shook his head.

  “Nothing? Rykers was up here getting the shit beat out of him, and you didn’t hear a thing?” Smith asked angrily.

  He shook his head again.

  “Why was Payten up here?” Burke asked him.

  “She came upstairs to go to the bathroom,” he answered.

  “And where were you?” Smith asked.

  Dean saw Chase wince at her sister’s accusing tone of voice. He didn’t blame Smith. She had a right to be angry.

  “I fell asleep.”

  “Really?” Chase asked curiously.

  He nodded. “I fell asleep. I slept through Rykers being beaten and through Payten being taken. This is my fault.”

  “Actually, the fact you were able to
sleep through it tells us more than you know,” Burke objected. “Rykers told us he never saw the guy. He was tased from behind, then knocked unconscious. He never had the chance to make a sound. Payten might have, but would she?”

  “What do you mean?” Dean asked.

  “Suppose she did have the chance to make noise. Would she have? Wouldn’t she have stayed quiet to prevent you from rushing into danger?” Burke asked.

  “Fuck,” he muttered. “Yes. She would have.”

  A sudden dinging sound interrupted the conversation.

  Dean looked around. “What is that?”

  Burke strode across the room to his desk. “My email. The paperwork the prison was going to send us just came through.”

  “Get it open,” Cark ordered.

  “What paperwork?” Smith asked.

  “The chief and I were headed up to the prison to raid their personnel files after the attack on Payten this evening,” Burke explained.

  “I knew that,” Smith said.

  “What you don’t know is on our way the warden called us. One of their correctional officers is missing,” he told her.

  “What does missing mean?” she asked.

  “He clocked in, but the warden did a head count when we called. He isn’t in the prison. The warden questioned the officer he was working with pretty hard. The officer claims they take turns covering for each other,” Burke answered.

  “Son of a bitch,” Smith said. “That gives him a perfect alibi if anyone ever did suspect him. It would have looked like he was working.”

  “I thought prisons were more secure than that. An officer can just slip off?” Dean asked.

  “Usually, no. They were managing it, though,” Burke said.

  Smith moved to look over Burke’s shoulder at the computer. “How do we know this missing correctional officer is our guy?”

  “The warden texted me a picture of him. It’s the guy I chased,” Burke answered. “I’m sure of it.”

  “What’s his name?” Chase asked.

  “Matthew Arnold Talbot,” Burke read from the open file on his computer. “Twenty-seven years old. No next of kin. Worked as a correctional officer since he turned twenty-one.”

  “That’s it? We need more than that,” Smith complained.

  “Obviously, he has no criminal record,” Burke stated.

  “Why do you say obviously?” Dean asked.

  “You can’t work as a correctional officer if you have a criminal record,” Chase explained.

  “He was put into the foster care system at the age of fourteen after the death of his mother,” Burke continued.

  “Oh, shit,” Carl breathed. He sat down heavily on the desk behind him. “Someone bring me that file on Peterson.”

  “I can pull it up on the computer,” Burke told him.

  “No. Bring me a paper file. I hate those damn computers,” he grumbled.

  Chase moved across the small room and grabbed a file off her desk. She handed it to him.

  “Thank you,” he said as he flipped through it. “This is it.” He laid the file on the desk and showed them a picture of a teenage boy.

  “Is that — ”

  “Matthew Charles Arnold. He was fourteen years old when Kevin Peterson killed his mother. Sandra Arnold was Peterson’s last victim before we caught him,” Carl told them.

  “I don’t understand,” Smith said. “The son of Peterson’s last victim has kidnapped the girlfriend of the son of Peterson’s first victim? Why?”

  “Revenge,” Dean answered. “Kevin told me it was my fault. He blames me for what happened.”

  “He’s attacking Payten to get at you. Makes sense in a weird enough way,” Smith said. “Why would Talbot or Arnold or whatever his name is go along with it, though? Peterson killed his mother.”

  “That’s exactly why he would go along with it,” Carl replied. “Sandra Arnold was abusive. Very abusive. Matthew Arnold was put into foster care several times, but she always managed to get him back.”

  “Fuck it,” Dean muttered.

  “Where do we go from here, Chief?” Burke asked.

  “Where would he take Payten? She’s our priority.”

  “His house,” Dean suggested.

  Burke shook his head. “Doubtful. According to the warden, Talbot lives in a pretty small neighborhood. Someone would notice. We’ll call the local police and send them in, though. Immediate danger and all that.”

  “Call the sheriff’s department here and in Talbot’s county as well. Call the highway patrol too. I want every officer alerted of the situation and looking for Talbot,” Carl told him. “Chase, Smith, find me where he took her. Any other properties in his name or his mother’s. He wouldn’t have taken her far. The idea is to get back at Dean. He’d have stayed close.”

  “We’ll find her,” Chase assured Dean.

  • • •

  There was nothing gradual about the way Payten regained consciousness. Unconscious one moment, she awoke terrified the next. The back of her head throbbed. She briefly opened her eyes, but the light from a small lamp across the room made the pain in her head unbearable. She slammed her eyes closed.

  She took stock of her situation without opening her eyes again. She sat on the floor, leaning against what she assumed was the wall. Her legs stretched out in front of her, and her shin burned where she had been cut. She tried to move her leg to ease the pain but couldn’t. Her ankles were tied together. Lying in her lap, her wrists were tied as well.

  Well, that freaking sucks.

  She worked at getting her hands untied, but it was impossible even after opening her eyes several times to look at the rope binding her hands. She gave up on it when she heard footsteps outside. She doubted it was someone coming to her rescue. She closed her eyes and pretended to still be unconscious. The door opened and closed. She didn’t move.

  “I know you’re awake.”

  “Yippee skippy for you,” she grumbled, still not opening her eyes.

  “Open your eyes,” the man said.

  The sound of his gravelly voice grated like nails on a chalkboard thanks to her headache.

  “No. The light hurts my eyes.”

  “If I turn it off, will you open your eyes?”

  “It’ll be dark. I won’t be able to see anything. What’s the point?”

  He made a sound of frustration in his throat. It sounded like a cross between a groan and a growl. “Are you trying to be difficult?”

  She managed to open her eyes long enough to shoot him a look of disbelief. “Are you kidding me? I’m not trying to be anything. Someone hit me over the head and left me with a pounding headache. I tend to get a little cranky when I’m in pain.”

  She heard the lamp click off. “Open your eyes,” he ordered.

  She hesitantly opened her eyes. He crouched in front of her. The way he looked at her made her uncomfortable.

  Creep, she thought.

  “What do you want?” she asked him.

  He shrugged.

  “Who are you?”

  “Matt Talbot.”

  “Fuck,” she said. “You’re going to kill me, aren’t you?”

  “What?”

  “You wouldn’t tell me your name if you were going to let me go.”

  He shrugged again.

  Fuck! Fuck! Fuck! she thought. Deep breath, Payten. Deep breath. They’ll know you’re missing by now. They’ll find you. Stall for time. That’s what they always do in movies. Make him go through his bad guy spiel. That’ll give them time to find you.

  “If you’re going to kill me, can I at least know why?”

  He looked at her blankly.

  “I didn’t do anything.”

  “You’re dating Dean,” he replied.

  “For a week!”

  He shrugged. “Does the time really matter? You mean something to him. Knowing he’s the reason you’re dead will kill him.”

  “I don’t understand. Why are you so upset with Dean?”

  “He
’s the reason Kevin went to prison.”

  “He went to prison because he killed eight women,” she protested.

  “He stole Kevin’s wife.”

  “Liv was Dean’s mother! He couldn’t expect her to abandon her child!”

  He shrugged. “Women leave their children all the time.”

  How do you reason with a maniac?

  “So you’re working for Peterson?”

  “With,” he corrected. “I’m working with Kevin.”

  “He’s a monster. The women he killed were mothers. He murdered them in front of their children!”

  He shrugged again. “Why does being a mother make them special? Do you know what mine did to me? She used to beat me. She’d beat me almost to death, then tell people I was clumsy. They put me in the system, but no one wants to keep a ‘bad kid.’ They’d send me home to her, and she’d beat me again.”

  It was the first time she really saw the man in front of her. Talbot was as tall as Dean and almost as broad. He had a buzz cut and was dressed in a uniform. It was the uniform from the prison, if Burke was right.

  What caught her attention — what really made her see him for the first time — was his eyes. His eyes were wild. Angry. Empty. His eyes terrified her more than his size or even what he was saying.

  Maybe he wasn’t crazy, but he certainly looked like it.

  “Kevin saved my life. I’d be dead if it weren’t for him,” he continued. “The day he killed her was the happiest day of my life. I thanked him over and over. I owe him.”

  “You think you owe him something? You think by making Dean suffer you’re going to pay him back?”

  “Yes,” he answered. “That’s the plan. That’s why I’m going to kill you. Dean will suffer like he never has before. In a couple months, if the guilt hasn’t killed him and Kevin says it’s okay, I’ll kill him too.”

  She had no idea what to say. Again, she wanted to protest, but the pure glee evident at the idea of murdering her stopped any protest she might have made. There was no reasoning with this man, and there wasn’t going to be enough time to stall. She realized she was going to have to save herself.

  “I have to pee.”

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  “Chief!” Chase called. “I’ve got it.”