He leaned closer, his face inches from hers. “I can forgive a frightened child, but running away from me three weeks ago…that’s going to cost you.”
Allan looked into her eyes, searching for her fear. Mia did everything she could not to give it to him. She tried to sound brave.
“Did you steal another car to abduct me in?” she asked blithely.
The light huff of his laugh fanned her face. “Sorry. I won’t be carrying you off into the night this time. I have a better plan. We’re going to wait right here for Agent Macfarlane to arrive. He is staying here at night?”
The words chilled her to the bone as she suddenly understood. Eric.
“He radioed, apparently. He sent the two deputies in to sit with you. They were on their way when I dispatched them.” He smirked. “Pardon the pun.”
Then he would find nothing unusual about the squad car being unoccupied in front of the house. He would think the deputies were inside. Mia felt her pulse race. Eric would be walking into an ambush.
Allan stood and went around behind her again, forcing the gag back into her mouth despite her resistance. Then he returned to his seat in front of her. He took her bound hands in his, paying particular attention to the left one with its two scabbed nail beds. Mia felt nauseous. Fresh perspiration broke out on her skin. She wished for a drug to sedate her, but she was painfully alert.
His cold eyes pinned hers. “It might be a while before he arrives. But I have an idea of how we can pass the time. Shall we continue where we left off?”
The cloth stifled her agonized scream as he used his thumbnail to dig into the first of the healing wounds.
39
They were starting to learn more about Allan Levi, including the fact that his real last name was Bolstrup—Levi was the mother’s maiden name. Gladys had dropped the Bolstrup upon her divorce thirty-seven years ago, and changed her small son’s surname. When they contacted the Maryland and Virginia DMVs again, Eric wondered if Allan Bolstrup would appear in one of their databases. It would explain how he hadn’t come up in the previous check. Going by his alternate name there would have been another subtle act of defiance against his mother.
“I just got off the phone with Gladys Levi’s primary physician,” Cameron said as he walked across the pine needle-covered ground toward him. “She suffered a stroke three years ago.”
“The time line matches. It could have been what brought him back to Florida.”
They stood at the edge of the property outside the ranch house, its tidy facade lit by squad cars. A van belonging to the Clay County M.E.’s Office sat in the driveway.
“Forensics is nearly done and the M.E.’s about to remove the body. I say we clear out of here soon.” Cameron peered at him. As if he could read his thoughts, he said, “We’re going to find him, Eric. It’s just a matter of time.”
He traveled off again, yelling directions to keep the recently arrived media farther back. Their presence guaranteed Levi wouldn’t return here. Left alone, Eric heard the low hoot of an owl coming from somewhere deep in the pinewoods. Disregarding the current chaos, the setting was bucolic—a disquieting contradiction to the grim torture chamber hidden out back. It was interesting that despite their evident dysfunction, Levi had still accepted responsibility for his ailing mother’s care. Whether it was out of a sense of obligation or a possible future inheritance of the property, he wasn’t sure.
He also wondered if he might have taken a perverse, extra pleasure in knowing his mother was only a short distance away, unaware, as he tortured and killed.
We’re going to find him. Every fiber of his being hoped Cam was right. They knew who he was now but he’d dropped off the face of the earth once before.
Taking out his cell phone, he used it to request another patch-through to the deputies at the bungalow. A male voice emerged over the airwaves, shrouded in radio static. “Deputy Cutshaw.”
It was the other one who answered this time.
“This is Agent Macfarlane. Are you inside the house?”
“Yes, sir. Have been for a while now. Ms. Hale’s gone on to bed,” he drawled. “She probably just didn’t want to sit around here with us all night.”
“Stay alert. Don’t get caught up watching television—”
“We know how to do our job, Agent. We’ve got the place sewn up tighter than Fort Knox.”
Eric blew out a breath, telling himself she couldn’t be safer than with two armed guards in the next room. “I should be there within the hour. We’re locking down the crime scene now.”
He closed the cell phone. Cameron was right—it was getting late and there wasn’t a lot more they could do here. Alerts were out for Levi and the black van throughout the state and into portions of Georgia and Alabama. He would leave a few men stationed on the property, go back to the bungalow to get a few hours’ sleep and then start up again early the next morning. He felt exhausted and wired all at once. Eric had briefly considered having the deputies wake Mia. He’d wanted to hear her voice but decided to let her sleep.
The more oblivious she was to the drama the better.
Mia watched through watery eyes as Allan tossed the deputy’s shoulder radio onto the coffee table and went to stand in front of the television again. Hearing Eric through the static had caused her throat to clog with tears. She’d cried out to him through the gag, but he hadn’t been able to hear her.
She felt a spiraling hopelessness. There was nothing she could do to help him or herself.
White-hot pain radiated from the reopened wounds on her fingers, the gouged flesh pulsating and dripping blood onto the carpet like two slowly leaking faucets. When he’d grown bored with using his thumb, he had opted for a ballpoint pen lying among Eric’s papers, driving it into her exposed nail beds. Each time she’d started to pass out from the agonizing pain, he had slapped her back to alertness. Her wrists were now tied to the arms of the chair to further restrain her movement. He had been torturing her intermittently, allowing her short reprieves while he kept an eye on the evening news.
Drowning in dread and fear, she prayed it would continue to hold his attention.
The screen showed a ranch house from a distance, lit by the blue lights of police cars. Although he’d lowered the sound when the call came through, Mia could read the caption.
Break in Jacksonville Serial Killer Case.
She looked at the bodies of the two deputies on the floor.
The news broke for a commercial segment. She felt her panic rise as Allan waltzed toward her again. He had Deputy Cutshaw’s name bar pinned to his shirt, his idea of a joke, apparently. No, please. No more. Frantic, she struggled, nearly rocking the chair off its legs as he neared. Her muffled scream burned inside her already ravaged throat. He raised an inquisitive eyebrow.
“What’s this? I thought we were having fun together.”
She tried to gulp air, barely able to breathe through the confining cloth wet with her saliva. Towering over her, he tucked a few strands of her sweat-damp hair back behind her ear. She wore only a bra and panties, her outer clothes cut off her with a kitchen knife he’d also pressed against her throat.
“You’re acting like a frightened child.”
Mia glared at him despite the fresh tears that slipped down her face. With a feigned sigh, he sat across from her, lounging back on the sofa cushions as if they were having a casual chat.
“What were we talking about before the call came through? Oh, yes, I remember now. My initial fascination with you. After the heat died down, I went back to the group home looking for that sweet, dark-haired child. But by then you’d been moved somewhere else. I learned your name from Mother’s files, but I couldn’t find out where you’d been placed. I had no choice but to forget you.”
He leaned closer. The pale blue eyes danced. He traced the scabbed numeral on her stomach, the touch of his index finger sending chills of revulsion through her so intense Mia feared she would vomit. If she did, it was likely she would choke on
it. She fought the urge.
“It’s fate that after all these years you’ve come back into my life. I have to admit I’ve become a little obsessed with you. What’s the old saying? The one who got away. Or at least you were.”
His predatory smile made her go cold. Dropping his gaze to her two damaged fingers, he tsked softly.
“I’ve made a mess of these, haven’t I? Tell you what…”
Allan dug into the pocket of his chinos. No, God, please. Mia whimpered, her throat convulsing at the small pair of pliers he withdrew.
“I found them in a drawer. You heard Agent Macfarlane—we’ve still got some time to kill. How about I leave those two alone and start with a fresh one?”
Headed back to Jacksonville Beach, Eric spent part of the drive making requisite phone calls, including one to SAC Johnston to update him on the break in the investigation. Afterward, he closed the device and returned it to his shirt pocket. He needed the solitude to process the emotions he’d been holding at bay until now.
It was impossible not to dwell on what the final hours of Rebecca’s life had been like. Seeing her name on the vial, grim pieces of her inside it—all of it had taken him back to her murder three years ago. He released a pent-up breath and passed a hand over his eyes. Forgive me for not being able to save you.
Mia’s name had been on one of the vials, as well. At least when they caught Levi, she would finally be safe. There was little doubt she had been scarred both physically and emotionally by what she’d gone through, but unlike Rebecca she would still be alive. Mia was strong. She’d be able to get on with her life.
If he put an end to Levi’s reign, at least one woman he loved would survive.
And he had fallen in love with her, he realized. Lost in thought, he drove past the inlet marina and brightly lit shopping complexes that were only a short distance from the Atlantic. His cell phone rang. Eric glanced at the screen before answering.
“Boyet and Scofield located a cousin of Gladys Levi in South Carolina,” Cameron told him over the airwaves. “They interviewed her by phone. She shared quite a bit of information on the family, including the fact that the father was a convicted felon. Arnold Bolstrup went to prison when Allan was six years old.”
Eric turned onto the A1A, pale sand and the blackened plane of ocean to his right. “What for?”
“Rape and battery of a coworker at his factory job. Bolstrup was a violent drinker and an after-hours flirtation got out of control. He died behind bars twenty-five years ago—shanked by another inmate.”
It occurred to Eric the father’s death would have been around the same time Levi took Joy Rourke, his likely first victim.
“According to the cousin, Gladys was a bible-thumper who got even more religious after her husband’s arrest,” Cameron continued. “She hated Arnold for what he’d done and soured on men in general.”
“Did Allan Levi have any contact with his father in prison?”
“The mother forbade it. She wouldn’t even allow them to exchange letters. The cousin described Allan as aloof, odd and not very masculine. Not all that surprising considering the mother’s domineering personality and the removal of any male figures from her son’s life. Gladys sent Allan to college out of state—he got a degree with honors but never did anything with it. The cousin said he moved around a lot. She’d heard he was living in Maryland before returning home after the mother’s stroke.”
“What about his relationships with other women?” Driving past, Eric noticed the convenience store on the corner was particularly busy, with a pack of teenagers loitering in the parking lot. He turned onto the residential street a block off the beach and traveled down it. The white-and-blue squad car sat unoccupied in front of the bungalow.
“To the cousin’s knowledge, Allan never had a girlfriend—not in high school or college. She suspected he was gay, but she’d never heard of a boyfriend, either. She also mentioned an incident when he was around twelve. He got caught torturing and killing neighborhood cats—he removed their claws. They were still living in metro Jacksonville at the time. Gladys didn’t move out to the country until she retired from social work.”
A psychological pathology was beginning to emerge. Cutting the sedan’s engine in the driveway, Eric went up the sidewalk to the front porch, still talking to Cameron on the phone. Light seeping through the bungalow’s closed curtains cast a hazy glow onto the stoop.
“Are there any other relatives?” he asked. “Someone Levi might trust enough to give him refuge?”
“It’s doubtful. The cousin is the last living relative on the mother’s side of the family. Contact’s been broken with the father’s side since he was a kid.”
The strong breeze coming in from the ocean ruffled Eric’s hair. He wanted to finish the call before he went inside, so he remained on the stoop, listening to Cameron relay what else the detectives had learned. As he stood there, he noticed a line of red pharaoh ants, common to the South, marching over the concrete and under the doormat. The mat had been flipped upside down, its rubber backing exposed. Curious, he kicked up a corner with the toe of his dress shoe to see what was attracting them. The insects swarmed over a dark, wet spot on the woven material. Some of it had dripped onto the concrete.
It looked like blood.
He recalled from a forensics entomology class that pharaoh ants would consume almost anything…including plasma. Alert, his eyes searched the perimeter as Cameron continued talking. An alley ran behind the look-alike bungalows across the street. He barely made out the black van sitting in shadow. Eric felt his heart turn over.
Levi was here.
Based on the blood, at least one of the deputies had gone down.
He’d already been standing outside the bungalow for a full two minutes engaged in phone discussion. Trying to appear calm, he strolled casually back onto the sidewalk, pacing a short distance out with one hand on his hip and the cell phone pressed to his ear as if nothing had changed. He suspected he was being watched from behind the curtains.
“Cam, listen to me,” he interrupted, voice low as he stared onto the road, his back to the house. “I need a SWAT unit at the rental property. Sirens off. Get them here but keep them covert—”
“What’s going on?”
“I think Levi’s in the house with Mia. There’s blood on the front stoop and a black van’s parked in the alley across the street.”
“Jesus. Where are the deputies?”
“I don’t know.” His gut told him both men were dead or incapacitated. Things were too quiet. How had Levi known where to find her?
Maybe Mia was already dead, too. The possibility felt like a knife through his chest.
“Eric.” Cameron’s voice was insistent. “I know what you’re thinking and you can’t go in there. If he is inside, you’re as good as dead! Levi wants you.”
“He’s already seen me outside. If I don’t go in, he’s going to know he’s been made.” And then he’d get desperate. If Mia was still alive, she wouldn’t be for much longer if Levi thought they were on to him.
There wasn’t another choice.
“He’s lying in wait for you! You’ll be giving him exactly what he wants—”
“I won’t leave her alone with him. I’m counting on you, Cam. Don’t let them rush the place—it could get her killed. Levi can’t know he’s cornered or it’s over.” He recalled the sliding glass doors in back. They were covered by cheap vertical blinds that gapped slightly even when closed. It was possible a shot could be fired through the glass. “Get a sharpshooter here, too. I’ll try to get him into the kitchen.”
“He may not give you that chance—”
“Sounds good,” he said loudly, facing the bungalow again. “We’ll talk again in the morning.”
“Eric!”
He closed the cell phone. Eric’s heart pounded. He thought of Mia and prayed there was still a reason to risk going inside. Wind chimes danced in the soughing wind as he stepped back onto the porch.
40
Eric felt a vortex suck the air from his lungs. The deputies’ bodies lay on the floor in front of him. In the same instant, he heard the metallic clink of a round dropping into a chamber. He froze; he hadn’t drawn his own weapon. To do so would be giving away that he’d known of Levi’s presence before entering.
“Good evening, Agent Macfarlane.” He stood about ten feet away, his gun trained. “Careful now. Keep your hands where I can see them or this gets ugly fast.”
“Take it easy, all right?” Slowly, Eric lifted his hands and looked around. Mia was in a chair on the other side of the room. Stripped to her underwear, her head sagged onto her chest, her curtain of dark hair obscuring her features. The sight of her hit him hard. She appeared unconscious but alive.
It had to be good enough for now.
“She’s an exotic little thing, isn’t she? Now, I want you to very slowly remove your gun. Then slide it on the floor to me and close the door.”
He did as told. Once Levi had confiscated the weapon, he motioned Eric farther inside, keeping carefully behind him with his own firearm raised. They stepped around the deputies. The larger of them—the one whose last name was Graham—lay facedown. The back of his skull was a gory mess. The other one, Cutshaw, had at least one gunshot wound to the chest. Eric’s pulse thudded, his mouth dry. Both men’s weapons were gone.
“I’m afraid you’re going to lose your cleaning deposit,” Levi commented drily.
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