by Jessie Cooke
She tried to scream again but this time she felt him let go of her with one arm and catch the sound with a wet rag as he covered her mouth and nose with it. She tried to suck in a breath and realized her mistake immediately. The rag was saturated with something that instantly burned her throat and lungs. She tried holding her breath then as she felt him dragging her down the steps and towards the parking lot; it was a futile effort, though. Her body needed air and it sucked in another breath involuntarily. Her lungs were on fire then as she felt him shove her into the back of a van or an SUV or something big and wide. She let her arms and legs flail out in all directions, and it seemed she had no control over her own muscles. But she hoped if she just let them shoot out that they would connect with him at some point. She desperately wanted to feel the crush of his flesh against her fist.
She was even more pissed off when she realized suddenly that he was enjoying her distress. From the feel of his arms she was sure it was a he…and a big one at that. She still hadn’t seen his face, but she could hear him chuckle as he continued to press the cloth to her face. She felt like she was suffocating and she could feel her consciousness ebbing away no matter how hard she tried to grip onto it. Her eyes wanted to close, they were so heavy. Ava knew she couldn’t let them close, but she was so tired. But she was so afraid if she closed them that she’d never be able to open them again. She didn’t want the last thing she saw to be the back of a rusty old van. She wasn’t ready to die…and she started to pray, “Please, God, I’m sorry for everything I’ve done. Don’t let me die.”
She just couldn’t hold her eyes open any longer…they were too heavy. She told herself that she would just rest them for a second. She let them flutter closed as she felt him shove her in deeper and close the door behind them. He was still holding her with one strong arm as he did. She felt him rest his back against the inside wall of the van and just hold her there. He was waiting for her to pass out. She stopped flailing and let her arms go limp, picturing Noah’s face…and her family…trying to draw strength from them. She was trying to stay awake long enough to convince him that she was asleep.
Through her closed eyelids she began to see shapes and stars, and she wondered if maybe whatever was on the rag had been laced with acid. They were pretty stars…pink and green. The dark sky was covered in them. She almost smiled but something told her that this wasn’t a happy moment…she just couldn’t remember why. The pretty stars vanished as quickly as they had appeared and darkness encompassed her. Why was it so dark? Where was she? She couldn’t remember. The darkness only got blacker and the abyss began to suck her down until all of her senses and all of her hopes were extinguished. She actually felt her body go limp and give in before she lost consciousness.
10
The Valentine Killer
He couldn’t stop smiling. He had taken a gamble following that guy. He was just so curious about what his relationship was to the PI and the girl. After he realized Noah Campbell hadn’t seen him earlier that day, he watched the three of them from his vantage point. He was unable to hear what was being said, but Noah was grinning in that arrogant way he always did. He found himself so appealing, and it was sickening. The blond guy looked pissed and the girl looked nervous. He ended up being really, really happy that he chose to follow the blond guy.
The guy had driven for about six blocks and then parked his car and walked. The killer followed him down to the same general area that he planned on visiting that very night after dark. It was like Karma…all the stars were lining up. Blond guy waited outside the Chinese restaurant and when the red-haired waitress came out for her smoke, he acted like he’d just been strolling by. The resemblance to Noah’s assistant was uncanny and from her body language, it was obvious that they’d met before. He couldn’t hear what they were saying, but the conversation looked easy and light. She finished her cigarette and the guy watched as she went back inside…he looked at his watch and then took off in a hurry. The killer then followed him to a ramshackle two-story house on the east side of Phoenix. There was a woman on the front porch that looked like a tramp and he heard him yelling at her, telling her she couldn’t be high when she was supposed to be taking care of the kid. He went inside and the killer waited. He waited for over an hour before the sun started to go down and he decided that the man was in for the night and so he left. He had some things to pick up from the house before he went out that night.
Imagine his surprise when he got back down to that spot behind Roosevelt Row and the blond guy was there again…this time he was swapping spit with the waitress. The killer wondered if they were all tramps these days. He crouched in the dark and watched them from a safe distance. The restaurant was closed by then and only the occasional junkie or hooker strolled by. His mouth was watering as he saw “his” girl walk by. He almost went after her…but he was so curious…
Noah did a quick run-through of the apartment, but it looked like the killer had taken Ava at the door. He ran back to the car and found it still running as he jumped back in and slammed it into gear. He pushed Hayden’s number on the phone and before he even said hello Noah said:
“Hayden, he has Ava!”
“Who?”
“The killer.”
“Why would he take Ava?”
“I have no idea. But since the girl who died tonight could have been her twin and he left a note for me and now Ava is missing…”
“Wait…Slow down…Ava is missing?”
“Yes, damn it! Keep up!”
“Noah, take a deep breath, okay? I’m finishing up here at the scene, but I’m going to call this in…”
“No. I don’t want anyone else on this, Hayden. It has to be you!”
“Noah, where are you going?” Hayden must have been able to hear the traffic in the background.
“I’m going to find her!”
“Noah, do not go to the suspect’s home…” Noah hung up. He was a cop for a long time and he knew that showing up at the home of a suspected serial killer, demanding to know where a missing girl was at, was not the way to get it done. He was also a PI who had signed a contract with the wife of said suspect and showing up tonight would blow that as well. But what the hell was he supposed to do? The son of a bitch had Ava! His phone was ringing and he glanced at it and saw that it was Hayden again. He ignored it and kept driving.
“Why would he take Ava?” He repeated Hayden’s question to the empty car. That was a good question…why? Even if he made Noah earlier today, and knew that he was onto him…why would he risk it? Besides, he couldn’t possibly have had time to find a girl who looked just like her and kill her and get to her apartment and take her, in the short amount of time between when he lost Noah and that girl was found. It was only a matter of hours. That didn’t make sense. Brian! Son of a bitch! He turned the wheel suddenly to the right, cutting off a cab and getting the horn and the finger, but he never got excited unless the guns came out. He pulled up his contacts in the phone and found Sean’s number. It rang three times and went to voicemail. Shit! He ended that call and tried Collin…no answer there either. Damn it! The only other one he had in the phone was Daniel. He tried him and Daniel answered on the first ring,
“Hello?” He sounded like Noah had woken him up. He honestly had no idea what time it was.
“Daniel, it’s Noah.”
“Hi, Noah, what’s going on?”
“Where’s Sean?”
“He’s on shift tonight so unless there’s a fire somewhere he’s at the house, probably sleeping. Did you try his cell?”
“I did, and Collin’s too.”
“What’s going on, Noah? Is Ava okay?”
“I need to know how to find Brian,” Noah said, ignoring his question. He had no idea how to answer it.
“Sean would know,” Daniel said, the sleep in his voice suddenly replaced by worry. “I’ll meet you at the house.”
He knew by “the house” Daniel meant the firehouse. To the Kelly boys it was their second home.
It was as familiar to them as their own home since Ava’s father began taking them each there from the age of five on up. Ava was the only one who didn’t want to be a firefighter, and now Collin of course…but Noah was the only one who knew that. Noah always suspected that Ava’s father and brothers were happy she didn’t want to go into the “family” business. Ava’s reasoning behind it was not because she didn’t think she could do it as well as them. Noah was sure she thought she could probably do it better. She felt like she’d lived in the shadow of her older brothers her entire life, so she wanted to do something far removed from what they did. She chose human resources and as far as Noah could tell, it bored her to death. That was why she was always sticking her nose into his cases.
Noah had to admit that she had really good instincts most of the time. Maybe when this was all over, he could talk her into getting her PI license and they could do a partner thing. He laughed out loud at that, albeit nervously still. When he was on the force, Hayden was the only partner he ever had that he didn’t want to strangle by the end of the day. He didn’t do partners well…in life, or on the job. He had to wonder why suddenly he was thinking about Ava as both.
He drove as fast as he could through the still thick late-night traffic. He tried calling the fire station phone but they weren’t answering, which meant they were out on a fire. He was sweating and having a hard time sucking enough air into his lungs to breathe by the time he got there. The house looked empty and the trucks were gone. He was just about to call Daniel back when he found him. He had beaten Noah there. Daniel was behind the desk in the captain’s office, on the computer. He didn’t acknowledge Noah as his fingers flew across the keyboard. He was the one of the brothers that looked most like Ava. It was strange to Noah to see her face on a man. He finally wrote something down on a piece of paper and looked up at Noah with the same intense green eyes as his sister and said:
“Why are we looking for Brian?”
“Daniel, just trust me, okay? Tell me where to find him.”
“Tell me if my sister is okay.”
“I honestly don’t know. That’s why I need to find Brian.”
“I’m coming with you,” Daniel said, standing up and clutching the paper he’d written on in his hand. Noah was sure he could overpower the firefighter, but that would take too long.
“Okay, let’s go,” he finally told him. When they found her, and Noah had one of her brothers with him, she was surely going to kick his ass. When they got in the car, Daniel handed Noah the paper and said:
“What does he want with her?”
“I don’t know.”
“For a guy who seems so worried about her, you sure as hell don’t know much.”
“We just need to find her, Daniel…we’ll figure the rest out from there, okay?”
Daniel nodded and Noah drove. The address was about a half an hour from the station house.
Brian watched Ava sleep and smiled, she looked so peaceful. He knew her well enough to know that when she woke up, that peacefulness would be gone and she would fight him tooth and nail. It turned him on when she got rough and when he was tired of that, he had an ace in the hole that would calm her down. He had something that he knew she would want.
Brian had fallen hard for the innocent girl with the emerald eyes…and he’d made her his…or so he had thought. After Ava found out about Brian’s wife, she moved out of the dorms, changed her phone number, and didn’t answer any of his emails. She closed out her Facebook account…she literally cut him off. It was a little over a month before graduation and to this day Brian didn’t know if she’d even finished school. If it had been anyone but Ava…he wouldn’t have been so forgiving. She had just vanished. They had been talking about getting an apartment together and he had honestly planned on leaving Patty. Her usefulness had worn thin anyway. She was more trouble than her money was worth. But then Ava saw them that day at the park, and she took off before he even had a chance to tell her that. He finished up with Patty and by the time he was able to go look for her, Ava was gone.
Brian had managed to make it through almost two years without Ava’s finding out about his wife. Patty wasn’t supposed to show up unannounced. She lived in their home, which her parents had bought for them in Southern California. She would ultimately turn out to be the biggest mistake of his life. He’d met her on a spring break trip to Vegas and they’d gotten drunk and high and then they’d gotten married. When Brian sobered up, he wasn’t worried about it. He just planned on having the whole thing annulled…but then he found out who his new bride’s father was.
Patty’s dad owned a company called Triton Surf. They manufactured surfboards and surf wear and they owned a string of stores across California, Arizona, New York, North Carolina, and Maine. They made custom-designed surfboards for the biggest names in surfing…and most of all, they were old money. Brian’s pretty new wife was worth millions on her own thanks to her fully matured trust fund. Daddy was likely worth a hundred times that, or more. Brian thought that maybe sticking around for a while wouldn’t be such a bad thing. He stayed with her in Newport Beach for two weeks and met her parents and charmed the shit out of them. When spring break was over, he went back to school and when he came back for summer break, her parents had bought them a sweet five-thousand-square-foot house, right on the beach. Patty bought him a shiny new sports car for his birthday and since he was gone so much, they had sex like rabbits when he was home, and he was content for a while. His wife was hot, his life was cushy, and every time the semester began and he went back to school, he got all the pussy he could handle.
Then he met Ava. At first it was just supposed to be bang the virgin…but just one taste and he was hooked. He literally could not get enough of her and when he had to go home and make nice with his wife, who was beginning to annoy him more and more over school vacations, he missed the hell out of Ava. He’d never missed a woman before…not even his own worthless mother. He’d never known one that was worth it, before Ava. After she left him, he was lost. For months he ached for her and grieved over losing her like one would grieve over the death of a loved one.
He stayed with Patty because now there was no reason to leave her…but he grew to resent her more every day. He blamed her for Ava’s leaving; she wasn’t supposed to show up that day…she surely wasn’t supposed to put her arm around him and look sweet Ava in the eye and say, “Hi, I’m Patty…Brian’s wife. Who are you?” Ava never answered her. She just gave Brian a look like her whole world was suddenly falling apart. The strangest part was when he saw the hurt on Ava’s face he realized that it was the first time that he had really been affected by someone else’s emotions. Normally, he couldn’t care less. If it didn’t affect him, he ignored it, and if it did affect him, he just did whatever it took to get his way. The realization that her pain made him sad caused him to believe that she was truly the one he was supposed to be with.
She made a noise now and brought him out of his reverie. He watched quietly as she slowly opened her eyes. In them, he could see a subtle awareness of who he was…she closed her eyes again and he watched as they moved underneath her eyelids. She was thinking…considering her options. Brian knew that she wouldn’t be happy at first that he had brought her there, but she’d come around to seeing things his way…especially after he showed her the surprise that he had for her. Then she’d agree to go to San Francisco with him willingly…away from her large, nosy family…and they could finally be a family.
11
Ava was having such a nice dream. She was with Noah…just lying in his arms as the sun streamed through the window and they basked in the afterglow of their night together. She thought about her feelings for him, and the sweet, sexy glow she was feeling started to fade. He was her boss…and more importantly, her friend. Did she mess that up? She pulled her eyes open slowly and the sun was indeed streaming through the window…it was bright, like maybe it was late morning or early afternoon. She didn’t recognize the window…Where’s Noah?
Why is he sitting there staring at me? Oh my God! It’s not Noah, it’s Brian! Her mind was firing off one synapse after the other and she could hardly keep up with them.
She closed her eyes again quickly. She didn’t want to see Brian. Why was he there? Should she scream? Like a tidal wave crushing down on top of her it suddenly all came back. The voice at the door hadn’t sounded like Brian, but here he was, just watching her. Why? What did he want? Did he think he could force her to want to be with him? This man was not just some jilted ex-lover. He was crazy and he took her out of her home! She considered going back to sleep; sleep was peaceful…and Noah was there. She was safe in her dreams. She didn’t want to wake up and face the nightmare waiting for her.
“Good morning, my green-eyed beauty.”
She opened her eyes again. Brian was smiling at her. She could see just the outline of his features in the backlight of the rays that pressed urgently through the cheap blinds covering the windows. Where had he taken her?
“Where are we?” she asked. Her voice sounded raspy and she realized just then how dry her mouth and throat were. She needed water…but she’d be damned if she was going to ask him for anything.