Hunger Moon (The Huntress/FBI Thrillers Book 5)

by Alexandra Sokoloff

  The two women lock eyes.

  Then with her other hand, Janovy holds out Singh’s phone, demanding, “What the hell does this mean?”

  Singh steps forward warily, takes the phone. On the screen is an alert labeled Lindstrom.

  Chapter Seventy-Seven

  The agents pulled off the freeway to refuel in Banning.

  Roarke got out of the car to walk, bracing himself against the dry desert wind—and checked the dummy email account yet again. But this time his pulse skyrocketed when he saw there was a message from the hunters, routed from Ortiz’s email account.

  He clicked on it . . .

  And stared down at photos of Cara. Chained, battered, bloody. Captured by monsters.

  His body went weak with sheer terror for her pain.

  And then there was a fury so overwhelming he felt he would explode with the force of it.

  Suddenly Epps was in front of him. The other agent got one look at his face and took the phone from him.

  Epps stared down at the photos. Through his own numbness, Roarke could feel the anger radiating from the other agent as he walked several paces away, walked back.

  Roarke tried to focus his thoughts through the gut-punched sense of panic.

  If the hunters had followed Ortiz’s instructions to wait across the I-10 border, they were now in Blythe, a natural border crossing from Arizona en route to Ortiz’s house in Palm Desert.

  But Blythe was also Cara’s childhood home. The place where her family had been slaughtered, where Cara had survived that first encounter with human evil, which she now saw as the monster she called It.

  Is Blythe significant?

  Why would Ortiz want her taken there?

  He couldn’t make any sense of his thoughts.

  Epps typed quickly into his own phone, held it out to Roarke. The screen showed a map of Blythe and the surrounding area.

  “The border on I-10 is just under two hours from Palm Desert. But I doubt he’s going to have them bring her to his home. Or anywhere too near.”

  Roarke made himself concentrate on his agent’s words. Epps was right. There was still time . . .

  Epps paced back and forth, moving as he thought it out. Behind him, the wind rippled the tall dry grass. “These emails sound like he’s making these hunters follow bread crumbs. Get them to one location, give them the next location from there.”

  “I have to go,” Roarke said, through a thickness in his throat. “I can’t explain it. I have to go.”

  “I’m going with you,” Epps said.

  Roarke looked at him.

  “Not for her,” Epps said, his voice hard. He raised his phone, punched a number, stepped aside to talk.

  Roarke gave him his space, but he could hear Epps speak. “Tara. We’ve seen the email—the photos.” He paused. “We’re going to head that way, too.” And then, urgently—“If that’s what you’re doing, you can call us. We can do this together . . .” Roarke felt the wrench as the other agent’s voice faltered. “Please. Call me.”

  Chapter Seventy-Eight

  She packs up the tent and sweeps the campsite clean, finding calm in the ritual. In the fields around her, bright yellow desert sunflowers raise their heads from clumps of gray-green sage. Spring is coming.

  She doubts she will be alive to see it.

  At the exact moment she finishes her clean up, the hunter’s phone pings with a response from Ortiz, one terse line:

  Drive west on I-10 until next contact.

  She lowers the phone, sits on a boulder in the soft, dry wind, facing the river to think.

  So this is how he intends to rendezvous. Throwing bread crumbs until they are right on top of each other.

  He is being very cautious. But of course, he is preparing for any number of felonies. Kidnapping. Rape. Torture. Murder.

  From her present location, she is one hour and forty-five minutes away from Palm Desert on the 10.

  She does not think for a moment that Ortiz wants her brought to his home. He will want to be someplace deep in the desert for what he has planned. And there are so many locations to choose from along this stretch of road. Nearly infinite wilderness.

  She could surprise him at his house instead, on her own time. But wherever he is leading her, or the hunters, he has carefully chosen the destination for privacy. After all, he must be as careful as she now must be. He has already done that scouting work for her. He has chosen somewhere he can never be discovered, where her body could never be found.

  And that works in her favor.

  It means that when she is done with him, his body will never be found.

  She has no intention of following his instructions as sent. That can only be a trap.

  She goes to the hunters’ truck and fishes out the road atlas that she has bought along the way—she is never without one. She knows this part of Southern California well, but she wants to be very clear about what alternate routes are available to her.

  She opens the atlas, studies what lies west along the I-10.

  And she knows immediately the route she will take. Depending on the final destination, this road may take her longer than I-10 would. When she gets the next email, she will proceed from there.

  Ortiz will wait. His blood is up, and he is too close now to bail out. He wants her crushed, degraded, obliterated. He is risking everything to bring her down.

  He will wait.

  Chapter Seventy-Nine

  Singh stares out through the windshield at desert hills as she drives on I-10 toward Palm Desert.

  She is aware of the irony, that Cara Lindstrom’s capture has enabled her own freedom. She has no idea what Janovy, and the other women of Bitch, would have done with her had not the email with the photos of Lindstrom arrived when it did.

  As Janovy watched, holding the gun on her, Singh had logged into the dummy email account to find the grotesque email from the bounty hunters, forwarded automatically from Ortiz’s account.

  The photos of Lindstrom—chained, battered, bloodied—had shaken Janovy to the core. Just as they had Singh.

  And Singh had made her plea so quickly that Janovy and the others had let her go. For now.

  She glances out the car window to the side of the freeway. Fields of winter grass. The towns are already farther apart. Civilization is falling away.

  Her plan, such as it is, is weak. The hunters’ email indicated they have Lindstrom at the California border, on Interstate 10.

  So Singh is driving in that direction, via Palm Desert, until more is revealed.

  Of course Damien has been calling, frantic. And it is of course unforgiveable, what she is doing. Cutting him out. But the decision, this action, is hers alone. She cannot let Epps, or Roarke for that matter, know her plans. Roarke has already compromised himself beyond reason where Lindstrom is concerned. He cannot think rationally in regard to her.

  And Damien . . . Damien needs the structure of rules. Beyond all evidence, he clings to his belief in justice. But the world has been rewritten. Justice has no meaning any more.

  She cannot involve either of them in this.

  She glances in the rearview mirror, at the road behind her.

  Perhaps Bitch is following. And if so, perhaps that is a good thing. She does not know. She knows very little, in fact. She knows Ortiz’s address. She knows there is a good chance he will continue contacting the hunters by email, and she will be able to check that communication through Roarke’s dummy account. She has checked for any activity by Ortiz in all of the forums. There has been nothing from the accounts she is aware of. Which is ominous.

  But mainly, she knows she must intervene in what Ortiz has planned for Lindstrom. She will not stand by and let this happen. She will not let him loose his trolls on the world. They cannot be allowed to succeed.

  She will not allow it.

  So she drives.

  Chapter Eighty

  As the agents’ SUV burned up the desert miles, Epps became more and more agitated. His long
frame was always a tight fit in vehicles. Now it seemed he would burst out of the car at any moment.

  And Roarke had been thinking. He hated going into a situation without the upper hand. Hated it. And they knew nothing about where they were going. Not good.

  He stared out at the palm trees as they raced past the oasis of Palm Springs. And finally the answer came to him.

  “We’re going to make a pit stop.”

  Epps twisted in his seat to face him, incredulous. “We don’t have time to lose—”

  “We need an edge. I know someone who may be able to give it to us.”

  Roarke had Parker’s address, and Parker lived in Rancho Mirage, which was right on their route anyway.

  The address was a small, bland house on an even blander suburban street. Roarke parked the SUV down the block. As the agents approached on foot, Roarke quickly scanned the front door and windows.

  He lifted his phone and dialed Parker’s number from outside. “This is Special Agent Roarke.”

  He was greeted with silence. Before the PI could consider his options, Roarke spelled it out for him. “My partner and I are outside your door. Open it or we come through it.”

  It took a moment, but the door opened. Parker stood in the doorway, still in a bathrobe, glowering out. His face was bloated and he reeked of the morning after a binge.

  Both agents shoved through the door, surrounding him.

  “Where’s Ortiz?” Roarke demanded. “And don’t even try to pretend you don’t know what’s on.”

  Epps moved forward on the PI, towering over him—intimidating even when he wasn’t in a righteous rage.

  “I know what,” Parker blurted. “I don’t know where. He wouldn’t tell me. I swear.”

  “Start talking,” Roarke ordered.

  And Parker spilled.

  As he spoke, Roarke felt the air in the small, dim room closing in on him. It was worse than he could have imagined. Ortiz had far bigger plans than what he was going to do to Cara himself. He was auctioning her off. Men in the rape forums were lining up, paying top dollar to get a turn with her.

  “Ten grand for every fifteen minutes, to do anything you want. Except kill her. You have to pay a double deposit—you lose it all if she dies during your session. That would be killing the golden goose—”

  Parker stopped, choking on the last word, because Roarke had his hand wrapped around his throat.

  Roarke could feel Epps step up behind him . . . and managed not to tighten his hand that fatal inch.

  “What else?” he ground out, staring down into Parker’s crimson face.

  “He’s got it all set up to be recorded, too,” the PI gasped.

  “To sell the video,” Epps said, revulsion in his voice.

  “Pay-per-view.”

  Roarke took a jolted step back from Parker, reeling with the sickness of it. Epps was walking the small living room behind him, equally revolted. Then through the miasma of Roarke’s thoughts, another horror occurred to him. He turned on Parker.

  “There’s an agent of ours headed his way. Who’s in communication with Ortiz. Agent Singh. A woman . . .”

  Roarke felt Epps go rigid beside him.

  Parker shook his head. “I don’t know anything about that. But if she shows—” Something flickered on the PI’s face, and he shut up, obviously thinking better of speaking.

  Now it was Epps who grabbed the PI and slammed him up against the wall. “Say it, motherfucker.”

  Parker choked out, “I expect he could make some money off that, too.”

  Roarke had to pull Epps off the guy. He held him tight, restraining him, but also comforting him.

  Parker doubled over, wheezing. Roarke pulled Epps to the side.

  “We’re going to get these guys. Listen to me. Listen to me.” Epps looked up at him, struggling to focus. And Roarke said it, slowly. “Cara won’t let anyone hurt her.”

  Epps looked at him. A morass of confusion, anger . . . and hope.

  Parker coughed, and finally choked out, “I don’t know where. I don’t. But my guess? It’s not far from Palm Desert.”

  Roarke forced himself to think it through, and realized Parker was right. Palm Desert was minutes from vast stretches of desert wilderness. More privacy than anyone could ever need. Infinite places to bury a body.

  He caught Epps’ eye, looked toward the door. Then he turned on Parker.

  “You’re a lucky man. You get a day to get yourself together before we come back with a warrant.”

  Outside Parker’s house the agents beelined for the car. Roarke was speaking before they were off the porch. “We keep driving toward Blythe. And wait for a sign.”

  “A sign?” Epps asked, thrown.

  “A message,” Roarke corrected himself.

  But as they headed for the car, he wondered if he might have been right the first time.

  Chapter Eighty-One

  State Route 78 from Blythe is an old Gold Rush highway running all the way to the Pacific Coast, ending in Oceanside. Outside of Blythe, it passes through the spectacular Imperial Sand Dunes, the largest mass of dunes in California, famous for their appearance in Star Wars and other films.

  For Cara, the pristine Saharan blankness of them, the shifting sun and shadows on the golden pyramidal hills, the constant ripping of the grains—all are lulling, profoundly comforting, like having her mind dry-cleaned.

  It calms her for what is in store.

  After the dunes, the road turns into a forty-mile stretch past date and citrus groves, following the old Southern Pacific Sunset Route toward the Salton Sea.

  At the tiny town of Niland, dusty Highway 111 veers off northward, skirting the Salton Sea toward I-10, where she can pick up that interstate and proceed as directed. But there has been nothing further from Ortiz. So it is in Niland she will wait for further instructions.

  She turns at the Buckshot Deli and Diner, motoring out of the city proper toward the squatter community called Slab City, known by locals as “the last free place in America.”

  The encampment is made up of painted RVs, long-haul trucks, old school buses, tin shacks, and outdoor art installations, all situated on and around concrete slabs—relics from a long-dismantled World War II marine base.

  Here retirees occupy land with drifters, anarchists, survivalists, and criminals all living off the grid, without basic utilities—but with no interference from the law or the government. She has spent some share of time around encampments like these.

  The entrance to Slab City itself is a hallucinatoric vision: a candy-colored mound of adobe three stories high. Salvation Mountain: straw bales, car parts, reclaimed junk, and ten thousand gallons of paint. The artist is several years gone on to rejoin his maker. But his kaleidoscopic legacy remains.

  Cara has stopped here many times on her journeys. She is drawn to it. A massive outpouring of one man’s mind, a concrete manifestation of one message: God is love. She admires the single-mindedness of it. The creativity and whimsy. The perpetuating drive of it. It is a human heart and soul, made concrete. It has drawn thousands of other artists, lost souls, and tourists.

  It reminds her that not all is darkness. That there are things worth fighting for.

  She parks the hunters’ truck in the sand lot. Hers is the only vehicle here, and the wind is so strong she must wrestle with it to get the door open.

  She walks around the mountain, passing freestanding art installations. A Kabbalistic Tree of Life. A life-sized wooden shark with bloody jaws. A vintage white Falcon station wagon, spray-painted with inspirational quotes.

  The mountain is hollow, a literal maze sculpted of bales of straw built up with adobe and finished with an ocean of paint. The desert wind whistles in the corridors as Cara wanders through arches made of curved tree limbs, rounded rooms painted with gigantic flowers, angels, and demons.

  It is a peace some people must find in church.

  She follows a set of stairs toward the top of the mountain: a yellow-painted path
indicating the safe ascent with a sign: PLEASE STAY ON THE YELLOW BRICK ROAD.

  The view from the top is of flat, flat desert. She gazes out over mini sandstorms, and the silver glimmer of the Sea in the distance . . .

  She could disappear now. No one is forcing a confrontation. She does not have to fight.

  Then her pulse spikes as the hunter’s phone vibrates in her pocket.

  The email message is numbers only. GPS coordinates. A location from Ortiz.

  And as she suspected, she will not have to go far at all.

  Chapter Eighty-Two

  Epps had just taken over the wheel when Roarke’s phone buzzed with an alert from the dummy email account.

  Roarke logged on to find an email from Ortiz.

  He stared down at a weird series of numbers.

  @33.3560671,-115.7414864

  It took him a moment to realize the instructions from Ortiz were GPS coordinates.

  His hands were shaking as he inputted the numbers into Google Maps on his phone. The map showed a spot on the eastern shore of the Salton Sea, a town, if you could call it that, named Bombay Beach.

  “What is it?” Epps demanded.

  “Salton Sea,” Roarke said.

  The Sea was less than an hour’s drive from Palm Desert. It made total sense that Ortiz would have some hideout there, or maybe he was simply commandeering an abandoned building for his purpose. Roarke knew there were any number of them in the area to choose from.

  He tapped on the location and chose “What’s Here?” from the list of options to call up the street view. All he got was a completely flat, dusty road. But by maneuvering around a bit, he found rows of decrepit, abandoned buildings nearby.

  “Bombay Beach,” he said aloud.

  Epps frowned from the driver’s seat. “Never heard of it.”

  Roarke shook his head. “You’re in for a treat.” He laughed, without humor. “It’s like no place else on earth.”

  Chapter Eighty-Three

  The Salton Sea lies dead center in the California Badlands, at the second-lowest elevation in the United States. The largest body of water in California, the second-largest inland sea in the country—350 square miles of salt water in the Sonoran Desert.