To Love, Honor, and Perish

by Christy Barritt

If only I hadn’t dropped my phone. If only there was some way I could contact the outside world. But there wasn’t. No matter how hard I tried to make that happen, it wouldn’t, so I needed to look at other possibilities.

  But I couldn’t think of a single other thing I could do to get out of here.

  I hated feeling helpless, and that’s exactly what I felt now.

  The skin was tender around my throat. I had a knot on the back of my head from one of the times I’d fallen to the ground. My elbow ached. Without food, my energy would start depleting.

  I mentally exhausted all of the possibilities of escape.

  So my thoughts turned to Juliette. She seemed like a sweet girl, really. I almost hated to admit it.

  What I didn’t understand still was why Riley hadn’t told me. The one person who could clear up that mystery was in a coma and unable to communicate.

  I had to think this through. It had only been a month ago that Riley had finally told me the whole story about what had happened with Scoggins. That part of his life was so gut wrenching for him that he didn’t share it often.

  It wasn’t that he’d wanted to maintain that image of being perfect. It was just that he didn’t like talking about that portion of his past, not even with me. I figured with time, that might change and he might be more open. His wounds were obviously still healing.

  Maybe there were things about Riley that I just didn’t understand. As much as I felt like we were soul mates, he still hadn’t trusted me enough to tell me everything about his life. That thought broke my heart.

  Everyone had secrets, though . . . right? Maybe I even had secrets. Were there things I hadn’t told Riley?

  I bristled. I heard something. A sound.

  For the last couple of hours, I’d heard the wind hitting the shabby sides of the house. I’d heard a spattering of rain. But this sound was different.

  It was a car coming up the driveway.

  Was it Jones . . . or was it help?

  I crawled across the floor and shook Juliette. Her eyes slowly pulled open. “Riley?”

  “Riley?” I nearly barked. “What? I’m not . . .” I cut myself off. Had Juliette been dreaming about my fiancé? I wasn’t even going to go there right now. “No, it’s Gabby. Someone’s coming.”

  “It’s probably just Jones. Who knows what he’ll do now.”

  I could sense a change in her. Maybe it was the lack of food. Maybe Jones was wearing her down. But she almost sounded defeated.

  We’d never win this war if we thought we were going to lose. At least, that sounded like a spiffy little saying that I’d heard somewhere before.

  “We’ve got to do this together, okay?”

  “I’m ready to be with Jesus,” she mumbled. Her head flopped to the side and hung there as she stared vacantly at the floor.

  “Juliette, you’ve got to be strong. We need to fight this.”

  “I’m not afraid of dying, Gabby.” Her eyes looked glazed. “I’ve had a lot of time to think about this.”

  I turned her head toward me. “Listen to me, Juliette. You almost killed yourself twice. I’m not going to let you hand your life over to Jones just so you don’t have to face reality anymore. Understand? You talk about Jesus. Jesus is your hope. He has a plan for your life. You’ve got to take this Garrett Mercer to court.”

  She shook her head. “If I get out of here, I’m dropping the lawsuit.”

  “Juliette, what is wrong with you?” Her eyes didn’t even look right.

  She shrugged. “I’m just tired.”

  I glanced around. She had a blanket at her feet, so she’d obviously stayed awake longer than me. What else had she done?

  I eyed that bucket of water. It was the only other thing in the room. “Did you drink out of that?”

  She nodded. “Just a few sips. I was so thirsty, Gabby. So thirsty.”

  Jones had put something in that water. I’d swallowed some when he’d dunked my face into it. But I’d bet she’d swallowed a whole lot more.

  I patted Juliette’s knee. Only in my life would I have to save a woman who’d been secretly hanging out with my fiancé. “It’s going to be okay.”

  I heard the front door open. I heard the familiar sound of boots pounding across the floor. With each step, my anxiety grew to nauseating levels.

  Just then, the lock to our room jangled. A moment later, Jones stood there, that same glimmer in his gaze. I quickly grabbed the handle I’d pried off the bucket and slid it behind me.

  I knew Jones’ M.O. He only kept his victims alive for six days. Juliette had been snatched . . . four days ago, maybe? Her time was limited. Mine was quickly slipping away as well.

  “Still awake, are we?” He sneered. “I thought you’d both be sound asleep.”

  I glared at him a moment. Billy Bob Thornton. That’s who he reminded me of. “What do you want, Jones?” A quiver in my voice betrayed me.

  “I’m just checking on my girls. Making sure you’re ready for our big day that’s coming up. You know me well enough to know what I’m talking about, don’t you?”

  “I know you a lot better than I ever wanted to.”

  He smiled sardonically. “Sweetest words you’ve ever said to me, Gabby.”

  “Why don’t we stop playing this game? You know the police are going to find you.”

  “The police think I’m dead.”

  “You probably put that body in the water yourself, didn’t you? You knew the police would be looking for confirmation that you died. Who’d you kill in order to throw the police off your trail?”

  “Just a bystander. No big deal. No one will miss him.”

  “That’s not your M.O., Jones. You’re supposed to only kill women.”

  He grinned again. “Investigators have only begun to touch on the scope of what I’ve done. Do you know how many unsolved murders there are of people that I had to kill off? No, they weren’t my joy killings. Like you will be. But they were people that got in the way. A few I had to practice on.”

  “You’re sick.”

  “Why, thank you.”

  “It wasn’t a compliment.” I glared up at him. “How’d you survive the fall off the bridge anyway? That along with the gunshot wound? You shouldn’t be here.”

  “It’s like I told you before. People underestimate me. People underestimate what sheer willpower can do. I did swim for my college. I’m not sure if you knew that. I was an endurance swimmer. And I could hold my breath for more than five minutes. Besides, I had a bulletproof vest under my shirt. The bullet just grazed my shoulder. Really, the wound looked much worse than it actually was. Even with that little boo boo, I was able to swim over to the bank of the river before they ever got the police boats in the water. I stole a car and found this old cabin.”

  “Then you started planning on how you could shoot Riley. You didn’t do it yourself. You got one of your followers to do it.”

  “My followers?” He chuckled. “Now, I don’t know if I’d call them followers. In fact, this time I hired someone to do my dirty work.”

  “You hired The Guardians.” Things began clicking in my mind.

  “Perfect choice, huh?”

  “You got money from Freddy.”

  “It was more fun to do it that way, more fun than stealing.”

  “Then you convinced ‘The Godmother’ to give you all of her money before the police arrested her. You could afford to hire someone to be your hit man, especially since you couldn’t do it yourself, not with your injury. That’s where The Guardians came in. You’re a smart guy. You knew they already had a vendetta against me.”

  “Very good. I’ve always said you were a worthy adversary. I did have a hefty sum of money that was gifted to me. I buried it, of course. It was the only way to keep it safe.”

  “Again, you used more people. Sounds just like something you’d do. You go around thinking everyone else is evil, when the truth is that you’re the one who’s messed up.”

  He scowled and rotated his sh
oulder, as if remembering the bullet he took there. “I’ve seen you, you know. I’ve heard you arguing with police. You insisted I wasn’t dead. You believed in me, Gabby.”

  “Unlike your sister.” I needed to turn this conversation around and play mind games with Jones now. When no physical weapons were available, you used what you had.

  His grin slipped. “She was a conniving little . . .” He shook his head, not finishing his sentence. I could fill in the blanks.

  “Keep me alive, and I’ll make sure people keep believing in you.”

  “Shut up,” he sputtered. His nostrils flared.

  I’d pushed him past his limit. Now he was starting to lose it. I gripped the bucket handle, knowing it was my only chance of winning this fight. Jones had a good fifty pounds on me, mostly lean muscles.

  He leaned down to grab me. That’s when I lunged at him. I went straight for his eyes. The metal jabbed at him in the eye socket.

  He howled in pain and grasped his face. Then, in one motion, he threw me back. My head cracked against the wall, and I sank to the floor.

  When I looked back up at him, I knew I was in trouble.

  I braced myself for a fight.

  CHAPTER 24

  “You’re really banged up. You shouldn’t have done that. I told you. Be compliant.” Juliette whispered, peering at me. She started to touch my injured cheek, but I swatted her hand away.

  “Compliant is not in my vocabulary. I’m a fighter.” I could barely say the words. My entire mouth was swollen from where Jones had punched me repeatedly. I could taste blood. My ribs ached from his kicks.

  When he’d finished beating me up, he’d done his little “choke me until I pass out and then stick my head in a bucket of water” trick.

  Then he’d left.

  Meanwhile, the drugs Juliette had apparently taken had worn off. She leaned over me now, trying to make me feel better.

  “Fighting doesn’t always help you to survive, you know.”

  “Fighting is the only way to survive right now. I’ve seen pictures of what Jones does to his victims.”

  Juliette grimaced. “We just have to pray for the best. That’s all I can do.”

  I turned, causing pain to rip through my ribcage.

  “He really got you good.”

  I shrugged. “I’d like to think I got him good too.” I remembered how he’d howled in pain. I didn’t feel satisfied, but if I died, at least I’d know I went down fighting.

  Silence fell between us a moment. “I’ve been thinking about why Riley may not have told you about his relationship with me,” Juliette started.

  “Okay . . .” Did I want to hear this? I wasn’t sure.

  “As much as Riley tried, I think he always felt responsible for Scoggins’ death. He felt guilty that Scoggins died and that he didn’t.”

  “I thought he let go of that guilt when he turned back to Jesus.”

  “I think you and I both know it isn’t that easy.”

  I shifted, an ache in my heart. “I thought it was just me.”

  She shook her head. “Those emotions can be powerful. It’s kind of like a person with a drinking problem who’s trying to recover from addiction. You take it one day at a time. You do your best. But there are days when that beast of addiction or guilt or whatever your demon is will rear its ugly head and you have to make a decision. You have to fight it or let it win.”

  “Those are pretty wise words from someone who thinks I should be compliant now.”

  “You’re right.” She let out a weak laugh. “I’m a work in progress. What can I say?”

  “You know what I think is weird? I think it’s weird that tragedies can pull some people closer to Jesus and push other people far away.” Tragedies seemed to do both for me. Maybe I was an enigma.

  “We all have natural inclinations that we fall back on. That’s why faith can’t be just an inclination. It has to be a choice. I chose all the time to embrace everything that God had for me in life. I continue to choose it every day, even when I don’t feel like it.”

  Funny, I mused silently. Adams and Parker had both mentioned bias and tunnel vision while investigating. People could have those same hang-ups when it came to their faith. My natural tilt was toward independence and doing things my way. When the going got tough, I tended to want to cling to what I’d known for my entire life. My upbringing and life experiences, in many ways, were ingrained into me.

  Juliette was right, though. Faith was about choosing to follow Christ. About picking up our cross. It wasn’t always easy, and it didn’t always feel natural. But that’s what made it so rewarding.

  I rested my head against the wall, listening to the rain spatter on the roof and letting those thoughts sink in. “So, you were really going to sue Garrett Mercer?”

  “Riley didn’t think I should.”

  “But you thought it was a good idea?”

  She shook her head. “Not really. I mean, at first I did. I was angry. I couldn’t believe that Garrett couldn’t see the importance of what I was doing.”

  “You defied his rules.”

  She sighed. “It’s like this. You’re in a burning building. You’ve got to get out. You know the exit. Wouldn’t you feel this urgent need to tell everyone else where it was before the fire consumed them?”

  “So life on earth is the burning building?”

  “We don’t know how long we have on this earth. We could have years left or we could have mere hours.”

  “Don’t I know that?” I looked at the room that could potentially become my grave.

  “Exactly. No one thinks their life is going to end unexpectedly. I’m going to hold myself personally responsible for the people I could have told about eternal life but didn’t.”

  “You’re really on fire, aren’t you?”

  “What’s it mean to be a Christian if you’re not consumed by God’s love, if you’re not living a life of transformation?”

  Her words stuck with me, and I chewed on their meaning. I remembered Pastor Shaggy talking about appearing foolish, about not being afraid to be radical.

  Somehow, in the midst of those thoughts, I drifted to sleep.

  ***

  I couldn’t be certain, but it seemed like a good twenty-four to thirty-six hours had passed. Time seemed to be at a standstill inside this little room with no windows. The minutes crawled by. With each second that passed, I thought about Riley, about how he was doing, about whether or not his parents were still making plans to have him transferred up to that hospital in D.C.

  Outside, the rain continued to beat harder against the house. The hurricane was coming, I realized. We were in this shack, in the middle of a lowland area that was already saturated with water. Trees here didn’t have deep root systems, and we were surrounded by massive, giant-sized oaks that could take down this shack.

  If we were still here when the hurricane hit, there was a good chance the storm might finish us off before Jones could.

  Jones had returned twice since I’d jammed the metal wire into his eye. He wore a homemade gauze and medical tape patch over his wound now, which made me feel a niggle of satisfaction. The emotion was short lived. The first time he’d come back, he’d taken Juliette out of the room. They’d been gone a while. When Juliette returned, half of her face was swollen, her shirt was ripped and bloody, and she was crying.

  Jones had left me alone—this time, he’d warned. He’d be back for more.

  I’d tried to comfort Juliette, but eventually she’d fallen asleep crying.

  Now, I couldn’t sleep. I could feel my soul wearing thin—right along with my physical strength. I’d wracked my brain, trying to figure out how to get out of here. I had no answers. I had no suggestions. With my energy depleting, I didn’t know how I could fight Jones anymore.

  I had nothing.

  I reached into my pocket, hoping to find something. I felt . . . Riley’s vows. With everything that had happened, I’d nearly forgotten they were there.


  Juliette was still sleeping, and I hadn’t heard anything from Jones in a while. Though the light in the room was dim, I pulled out the envelope. Slowly, quietly, I pulled open the seal.

  I momentarily closed my eyes, praying for comfort and self-control, before unfolding the paper. I lowered the sheet to the floor, letting the light from beneath the door flood onto it. Slowly, the words came into focus.

  From the way lines were scribbled, I could tell Riley wasn’t finished with them yet. Things were scratched out, there were arrows, and sentences squeezed on top of other sentences. It took a moment for me to know where to start.

  If I were to quote Westside Story, I’d say we have “One Hand, One Heart.”

  If Carousel were to inspire me, I’d burst into, “If I Loved You.”

  If I were to get sappy, I might say this was “Some Enchanted Evening.”

  The first tears pricked my eyes. Riley had been trying to touch on my love of musicals. Only someone who truly loved me and understood me would begin a task like that.

  He continued:

  I promise to give you my all—

  A shoulder to cry on,

  A hand to hold,

  An ear to listen,

  A heart to love.

  Oh, and I promise to make you coffee every morning.

  I chuckled. I’d been badgering Riley for a couple of weeks before his assault about adding that “coffee clause” to our vows. He’d been listening. Sweet Riley. My sweet, sweet Riley.

  You’re my partner,

  My friend,

  The love of my life,

  The one God has intended for me.

  And I can’t wait to spend forever with you.

  He had loved me. Despite all of my doubts and fears and misgivings, Riley’s heart had always been with me. For me. And I knew that my heart would always be his.

  I wiped away the tears on my cheeks and rested my head against the wall.

  I’d been wrong. I’d been distrusting about everything that mattered, acting as my own worst enemy at times. But now, when everything else was stripped out of the way and my life was on the line, I realized that Riley still loved me. Even more importantly, God still loved me.