by Cassie Miles
"Doris is impossible." He released Blair's arm. His gun pointed down at David's head. "I assume you're talking about the D for Danielle necklace. No one gave that jewelry to Doris. Certainly not Jake."
"But she said he did."
"Doris has a lot of imaginary boyfriends. Since Jake has been staying at the house, he's her pick of the week." He sneered. "Stupid woman. She must have gone through my things and found the necklace."
The hatred in his voice was palpable. "You want her dead."
"Matricide? I think not. A bit too obvious."
"The marking on Pamela Comforti's abdomen. That was a D for Doris. Did you imagine you were killing her?"
"Again and again. But the stubborn old hag still won't die." He nudged David's body with his toe. There was no response. "Your boyfriend isn't much of a fighter. Went down like a sack of potatoes."
Anger rose from Blair's heart, pumping fresh blood through her veins and arteries. Anger gave her strength, cleared her mind. "Leave him alone."
"I warned him. Told him he had no business poking around in the past."
She needed to distract Ted, to pull him away from David. "What do you want from me?"
"Can't you guess? You're my next victim."
From her knowledge of the autopsies, she knew this was the time when he would drug her. Press a cloth saturated with chloroform to her nose. Or plunge a hypodermic into her thigh. She took a backward step. Her balance was unsteady, and she gripped the edge of the side table. Half-opened mail was scattered on the floor.
"Let's go," he said.
"I can't." She tried to buy time. "I'm too weak."
"Don't make me shoot you, Blair."
"Why not? I'm going to die, anyway."
"There are fates worse than death. You remember." His voice turned low and seductive, not at all nervous. He was enjoying this, reveling in the power he held over her. "You remember the pain of your injuries after the accident. The agonizing recovery process. Think of what it would be like if I fired a bullet into your kneecap."
He couldn't have chosen a better threat. Faced with severe injury, she almost preferred the ultimate release of death. "I'll do what you say."
"We'll return to my house. To be exact, the guest apartment behind my mother's hideous dwelling." He gestured with the gun. "Move along. You'll drive. I'll hold the gun."
She had no choice. Head down, she shuffled toward the door.
"Not that way," he snapped "Through the kitchen. I parked in David's garage."
She should have known. He wouldn't be careless enough to leave his car on the street where a neighbor might notice and remember. Ted had thought of everything. In the garage she slipped behind the wheel of his car and adjusted the seat forward.
First, she'd get far enough away from David that Ted couldn't use him as a threat. Then what? "I'll bet the interior and trunk of this car are full of evidence. Fibers and DNA."
"You'd be wrong," he said. "I'm a very tidy person. After I'm done with you, I'll have the car supercleaned and detailed, inside and out. Twice."
She backed out onto the street. "This isn't your usual plan. Why haven't you sedated me?"
"Because this will be so much more instructive and you have a lot to learn."
"Like what?"
"No doubt, you're thinking that you could pull into traffic and cause an accident. But you won't. You can't. You wouldn't want to risk hurting someone else. And the thought of another accident terrifies you more than anything else."
He knew her weakness. Her greatest fear. She gripped the steering wheel with both hands.
"You'll never forget the crash," he said. "It destroyed your life, disfigured you. If I remember correctly, you were trapped behind the dashboard for almost an hour. The pain must have been incredible."
Her head was throbbing. She could hardly maintain her focus on the road. The taillights of the car in front of her glared like the fierce red eyes of a demon.
Her only chance for escape was to yank the steering wheel and swerve into the car beside her. Do it! She could, at least, end his reign of terror.
"By the way," he said. "An accident would be no guarantee that I'd be apprehended. And I promise that you'd be dead."
"How?"
"I'd snap your neck. The injury would be blamed on the accident."
She forced herself to keep driving, to stay within the speed limit, to avoid other cars. There was no escape. Helpless tears streamed down her cheeks. He'd thought of everything.
When they reached his mother's house, Ted directed her into the driveway that stretched toward the back of the house. As soon as she parked, he covered her nose and mouth with a chemical-smelling cloth. The fumes went straight to her brain. Sleep came quickly.
Through a fog David heard a hammering. Somebody was calling his name. He tried to open his eyelids, but they were too heavy.
Voices echoed in his brain. Someone talking to Blair. David had to get to her.
He dragged himself up. He was on hands and knees. His body felt disconnected. And his head hurt like hellfire.
"David, open the door! David!"
Stumbling, he managed to disengage the alarm and open the door. Justin Hunter spilled inside. Behind his glasses, his eyes were huge. "Thank God you're alive," he said.
"Blair," David said. His mouth was dry. His tongue weighed at least a pound. "Where is she?"
"He's got her. The Fisherman."
David looked down at the piece of paper scattered amid the mail. The name Hunter had written was Gary O'Hara. Special agent for the FBI. "O'Hara?"
"No. It's Ted Hurtado. I saw him in the car with Blair. He had a gun."
"We need to call the cops," David said. It was a cogent thought. A good sign. He was coming around. "Call the police."
"What if I'm wrong? What if it's Agent O'Hara?"
David staggered toward the door. Whatever he'd been drugged with was going to wear off soon, and he'd be in a world of hurt. Didn't matter. All that was important was Blair. "We have to go to Ted Hurtado's house. You're driving."
Stumbling like a drunk on a bender, David charged into the dusk. The cool air should help to revive him. He was in the passenger seat of Hunter's car. "What were you doing here?"
Hunter started up the car. "I felt bad about the way we parted. You know, David, you really are one of my heroes."
David's attempt at laughter sounded like a garbled wheeze. "Don't try to be like me, kid."
He'd thrown away five years of his life, searching for a truth that was right in front of his nose. Blair was his truth. His life. His love. If anything happened to her...
"This is all very illogical," Hunter said. "Ted Hurtado is—"
"He's the Fisherman," David said. "Give me your cell phone."
Going through information, David called Adam Briggs on the twenty-four-hour-a-day hotline for CCC. "It's David."
"You sound like hell. What's wrong?"
"He's got Blair."
And David would rescue her. Blair was the woman he loved, and he would not allow the Fisherman to steal his future.
When Blair wakened, her hands were tied in front of her with a nylon rope. Still fully dressed, she was on the floor in a sterile white bathroom. White tiles on the floor and halfway up the walls. An old-fashioned, claw-foot bathtub. White sink. Her ankles were also tied.
"Oh, goodie," Ted said. "You're awake."
He hadn't bothered to gag her, which meant her screams would probably go unanswered. "Where am I?"
"An apartment on top of the garage behind my mother's house. It's the only place I can get away from her."
The place where you did your killing. Though the inside of her head throbbed, she felt surprisingly alert. Her adrenaline level must be so high that it counteracted the sedative.
He started running the water in the tub.
"Wait," she said. "Aren't you going to feed me? You gave all the other women Godiva chocolate at least an hour before you drowned them."
&nbs
p; "But that was to teach a lesson to you, Blair. That was to show you that I outsmarted you and your forensic examiner buddies." He shrugged. "Now there isn't much point."
She didn't want to die. Keep him talking. "The five years. Why did you quit for five years?"
"I quit after Eddy was arrested because his confession was just too perfect. I have no idea how the little sap learned all those details, but I made sure to visit him in jail. Interviews for my column. The kind of thing David does. And I filled in a few blanks for him."
"But you stopped killing."
"Did I?" His eyes were as cold and dangerous as black ice. "I took some time off to work on my book, and I traveled. It's a big country. There were other executions, other women who disappeared without a trace."
"Why start the Fisherman killings again?"
"I'm not sure." He tilted his head back, considering. "I started following Pamela Comforti. And you."
She shuddered and pulled her hands tightly against her body, trying to protect herself. She realized that she was still wearing her fanny pack. The cell phone was inside. And the pepper spray.
"Eddy was in the news again," Ted said. "He was dying. And there were recaps of the Fisherman legend. Maybe I thought I should give them something new to write about."
"You went back to work at The Post."
He frowned. "A dead-end job. It's entirely possible that if my book had sold, I would have moved to New York, a nice town for a predator."
She peeled back the Velcro on her fanny pack slowly. The sound of water running in the tub helped to cover the noise. "The police think you're a copycat."
"And I'll prove them wrong. In the next note to myself, I'll enclose one of my souvenirs from the earlier crimes. Perhaps the necklace from Danielle."
"What about your mother?" Blair slid her fingers inside her fanny pack. "She'd notice the necklace."
"She won't figure it out." He stood, towering over her. "Enough about me. I believe it's time for you to beg for your life."
Blair's fingers closed around the small canister of pepper spray. She held it with the nozzle pointed outward. "I have nothing more to say to you."
"Nothing?" His eyebrows raised. "Not even a curse? Not even something about your darling David?"
When he leaned down to pick her up, she raised her arms. A blast of pepper spray hit the side of his face. He shrieked and backed away from her. "What did you do?"
The bathroom door crashed open. It was David.
His attack on Ted wasn't pretty. He launched himself across the bathroom, shoving Ted into the sink. Still weakened from the drugs, he swung wildly.
But Ted was half-blinded. He reached for his weapon.
"Gun," Blair screamed. "David, he has a gun."
David grabbed Ted's wrist. His grasp was clumsy. With sheer force of strength David slammed him into the white tile wall. Holding Ted by the collar, he swung him around and threw him into the tub. It was full. Water splashed over the sides.
Blair could see what was coming next. David intended to drown the Fisherman.
"No," she shouted. "David, no. Don't kill him."
"He deserves to die."
With one arm, David pushed Ted's face under the water. His arms flailed, but he couldn't get a grip. And David looked down into the distorted face of evil, a predator, a serial murderer. He deserved to be in hell, drowned in the tub he'd used to kill.
But that wasn't David's job. He wasn't an executioner. He pulled Ted up, allowing him a gasp of air.
"Finally," David said, "I know the truth."
Adam Briggs and Justin Hunter came through the door. Adam was armed. He passed a set of handcuffs to Hunter. "Cuff him."
"Me?" Hunter's eyes were shining.
David patted his shoulder. "You're the real hero. If it weren't for you, we wouldn't have gotten here in time."
He went to Blair. Curled on the floor, her frightened gaze locked with his. He cradled her in his arms. "I'm never letting you out of my sight. Never again."
"But I'm safe now."
"The world is a dangerous place." He kissed her forehead. "I don't want you locked away from it. Life is nothing if we don't take chances."
She smiled unsteadily. "Would you untie me now?"
"Not until you give me a promise," he whispered. "Spend every night, forever, in my bed."
Simply, she said, "Yes."
When he held her against his chest, David finally felt a deep, profound sense of peace. She was all he ever wanted. For the rest of his life.
* * * THE END * * *
ISBN 0-373-22820-1
ROCKY MOUNTAIN MYSTERY
Copyright © 2005 by Kay Bergstrom
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