“It’s okay.” He put his arms around me and rested his chin on top of my head. “We can take it as slow as you need to. We’ve got all the time in the world. The rest of our lives.”
And there it was. Because only one of us had a life anymore.
What was it Wade had said? You won’t have to live with what you do, but he will. I knew he was right, and I also knew that Lew wouldn’t be talking about the rest of our lives if he didn’t already think he loved me. I had no idea if he really did or not, but I knew that if I let him make love to me now, it would break his heart when I left. I couldn’t do that to him just to satisfy my selfish desire to know what love felt like. I couldn’t let him lose his smile again after me.
I’d been trying to convince myself that I could stay as long as I wanted to. Maybe I could, but I couldn’t stay with Lew. He deserved to be with someone who could give him a family and grow old with him, and I couldn’t do either one. I had to finish my assignment and leave before he fell any harder for me, because I wasn’t gonna cheat him out of the life he deserved just because I’d been cheated out of mine.
So I let him go on thinking I’d freaked out because of the way I’d been used by men in the past. I’d been lying to him the whole time I’d known him, so what was one more lie?
“I’m sorry, Triple C. I thought I could do it, but I can’t.”
He tilted up my face and made me look at him. “You don’t have to apologize to me for anything. Nobody’s gonna make you do anything you don’t want to do ever again.”
I tiptoed to kiss him. “Thank you for understanding.”
After we were both dressed, he untied the boat and moved it to the end of the pier so we could sit in the swing before he took me home. I leaned against his chest with his arms wrapped around me and asked him to tell me some stories about his brother so I wouldn’t have to talk. I needed to plan out what I had to do over the next few days.
As soon as I got home, I had to rev up my search for BOSSMAN, even if it meant going back to the Sugar Daddy chatrooms where I’d met him the first time. Once I found him, I’d set up a meeting no matter where he wanted it to be. I’d find some way to get there even if it meant taking Karen and Brad’s car to do it.
I also had to distance myself from Lew as much and as gently as possible. I’d find some excuse not to see him so much—God knows I was good at coming up with lies. Maybe I could start hinting to him that I might have to change foster homes. But whatever I did, I couldn’t do any of it until after Friday. He needed me to get through that, and no way was I gonna let him down.
When he took me home and I kissed him goodbye at the door, I couldn’t help holding on to him a little tighter since I knew I wouldn’t be able to do it much longer. I guess he noticed because he asked me if I was okay.
“Yeah, I just had such a great time tonight that I don’t want it to end.”
“Me either. But we’ll have plenty more nights like this, I promise.”
“I know. And you need to get some sleep anyway so you can kick ass in your tournament tomorrow.” I gave him one last kiss and started to open the door, but he turned me back around and held my face in his hands.
“I love you, Gwen. I hope you know that.”
Oh, shit. I’d hoped I could do what I needed to do and get the hell out of his life before he said those words to me. What was I supposed to tell him now? I couldn’t bear to hurt him, but if I told him I loved him too, it would only hurt him more later on.
I looked into his eyes and couldn’t stop the tears that slid down my cheeks. “I don’t know anything about love, Triple C. I just know I’m glad we found each other.”
I could tell it wasn’t what he’d been hoping to hear, but at least he didn’t look like I’d just ripped out his heart. He brushed the tears from my cheeks with his thumbs and kissed me again.
“We’ll figure it out together. I’m wicked smart, remember? And like I said before, we’ve got all the time we need.”
I would’ve given anything for that to be true.
* * *
My anger swelled with each step I took as I climbed the stairs to my room. I couldn’t wait to find BOSSMAN and make him pay for all the things he’d stolen from me. While I booted up my computer and logged in to FaceSpace, I amused myself by picturing what I’d do when I found him, and it made Rufus’s last moments look like a peaceful death in comparison.
But all my rage was replaced with absolute terror when I clicked on the red notification and saw the subject line of the new message.
I HAVE YOUR FRIEND
Chapter Thirty-three
I couldn’t do anything but stare at the monitor for several seconds, every muscle in my body paralyzed by fear.
BOSSMAN had Annalee.
There was no reason for me to think so, but I knew it was him. Somehow he’d managed to find me, and now he had my best friend. Without realizing how I got there, I found myself on my knees with my face turned heavenward. It had worked for me once before. Maybe it would work again.
“Please let her still be alive. Please, please hear me. I’ll do anything!”
I had no idea if anybody was listening, but at least I’d tried. I got up and sat at the computer again, my hand shaking so bad that I could barely hold the cursor still to open the message.
WE HAVE UNFINISHED BUSINESS. IF YOU WANT YOUR FRIEND TO GO ON LIVING, COME TO ROOM 347 AT THE PALM WINDS HOTEL. CALL THE COPS AND I’LL SLICE HER THROAT.
Okay, it sounded like he was using Annalee as a lure. Maybe he hadn’t hurt her and would let her go if I did as he said. My fear receded for a few seconds until I realized that the only way he could have found out how to contact me was from Annalee, and she wouldn’t have told him anything unless he’d forced her by doing something terrible to her.
The only thing I could do was go there and hope Annalee was still alive. But once I’d made sure she was out of harm’s way, I’d show him who had unfinished business. That was for damn sure.
My ability to think rationally returned along with my rage. As desperate as I was to get to Annalee, I had some things to figure out before I left since I’d never be coming back. I’d wanted to stay long enough to let Lew down gently, but all bets were off now. BOSSMAN would be drawing his last breath tonight no matter what, and that meant Gwen would have to disappear forever. I didn’t have a choice about what I had to do, but there was one thing I had to make sure of before I left. I e-mailed my request to Flo and got a reply within two minutes.
According to Google Maps, the Palm Winds was only a few miles away, so I wouldn’t need to take Karen or Brad’s car. I put on my Zombie Girl outfit one last time and jumped out the window. I didn’t know if I’d been able to run super fast all along since I’d never tried to do it, but I definitely could do it now. It took me less than fifteen minutes to get to the hotel, just long enough to work out a few final details in my head on the way.
The hotel had seen better days. All the units were accessed from the outside, but there was one wing of rooms with balconies that looked out on Biscayne Bay. The room I was looking for was one of the bay view units on the end of the third level. Perfect for what I had planned.
I listened at the door and heard a television playing inside, but that was all I could hear. I knocked and took a step back. The TV went silent and I heard locks being undone, then nothing for a few seconds.
“Open the door and come in! Try anything funny and your friend dies!”
The red curtain descended over my vision instantly at the sound of the voice that had been the last thing I heard before I died. It took all my self control not to kick in the door and rush the sonofabitch, but I knew I had to play it smart until Annalee was safe. I opened the door slowly and saw him standing across the room behind Annalee. He had her gagged and tied to a chair, a knife to her throat.
I froze for a second when I recognized him as one of the men who’d been at Lew’s house for the meeting—the short guy in the bad suit who’d been lookin
g at me funny. I’d thought it was the mention of a Ferrari that had made my skin crawl, but now I knew it was because I’d been standing three feet away from my murderer.
I went in and pushed the door shut behind me. My vision was still draped in red fury, but this time it made it easier for me to see the things I needed to see, almost as if they were highlighted. The hand holding the knife to Annalee’s throat was shaking badly, and his eyes reminded me of an animal caught in a trap. The whites were visible all the way around the irises, and they darted around the room as though he expected someone to jump out at him any second.
The bastard was scared shitless and holding on to his sanity by a thread.
“I don’t know how the hell you’re still here,” he said, “but you won’t be getting away this time, bitch. Do what I say and maybe I’ll let your friend die quickly. Give me any shit and I’ll make you watch while I take my time with her.”
“Please don’t hurt her!” I used every drop of deceptive skill in me to make my voice sound terrified. I had to make him think he was in control until I could get him away from Annalee. “I swear I’ll do whatever you say.”
He gave me a reptilian smile and motioned to a coil of twine on the bed. “Lie down and tie your feet with that rope. Roll over and put your hands behind your back when you’re done.”
I did as he said and tied my feet, making a point to show him how tight I made the knot. While I worked, I noted a few more details about the room. Annalee was crying and scared, but she didn’t seem to be bleeding anywhere. She was tied to the chair with the same thin twine I was using, and the knife in his hand looked like a steak knife. He obviously hadn’t come prepared for murder, so running into me at Lew’s house had been a freak accident. Once he’d recognized me, he must’ve followed Jaycee and Bud to Annalee’s house so he could snatch her and make her lead him to me.
“Turn over like I told you!” He pressed the knife harder against Annalee’s throat and made her whimper.
“I will, just don’t hurt her!” I turned over and added, “You’re the boss, okay?”
I heard him laugh and knew I’d said the right thing. “You’re damn right, you little bitch. Nobody’s gonna tell me what to do ever again. I’m calling the shots!”
He planted a knee in the small of my back and grabbed my hands to tie them. I didn’t know what he’d done with the knife and couldn’t take the chance that he might lunge at Annalee with it during a struggle, so I decided not to do anything until he turned me over and thought I was bound and helpless.
When he finished tying my hands behind me, he yanked my head back by my hair and put his mouth close to my ear. “You stupid tramp. Now you’re gonna watch while I have some fun with your little friend. And when I get tired of her, the three of us are gonna play some games together. You’ll be begging me to kill you both before the night’s over, but it won’t do you any good. I’m gonna take my time and enjoy it.”
I forced myself to wait until he took his knee from my back to roll me over. As soon as he did, I snapped the rope around my hands and ankles like pieces of thread.
“Change of plans,” I said. “I’m in charge now.”
I grabbed the knife in his hand by the blade and tossed it aside, then I kicked him in the chest hard enough to send him flying across the room. His back struck the television and knocked it against the mirror on the wall behind it. He ended up sprawled on the floor in front of the dresser, covered in shards of glass.
I landed on top of him before he had time to moan. After wrapping a long piece of the twine around his neck several times, I lifted him by it and his belt and threw him against the bed’s headboard hard enough to make his eyeballs rattle.
“Having fun yet, asshole?”
I knotted the ends of the rope around one of the bedposts, tight enough that he couldn’t move but not tight enough to choke him. He was barely conscious, but his hands still clawed at the rope around his neck. I had to see about Annalee before I finished with him, but I indulged myself by kneeing him in the nuts as a parting shot.
I broke the ropes holding Annalee to the chair and pulled the gag from her mouth, then I threw my arms around her. We clung to each other while we both sobbed.
“I’m so sorry, Annalee. Did he hurt you?”
“I’ll be okay.” Her lips were cut and swollen, and she seemed to be holding one of her arms against her chest at a funny angle.
“What did he do to you?”
She shook her head. “It doesn’t matter now. What are we gonna do?”
“He’s the sicko who murdered me,” I said. “I have to kill him.”
“But you’ll go away if you do.” Her eyes were huge with fear. “Can’t you just call the police? Or we could just leave him here like this and—”
“No.” I put my hands on her cheeks and looked into her eyes. “I can’t take the chance that he’ll get away. I have to make sure he doesn’t kill anybody else.”
She hung her head and cried silently a few seconds before she looked up at me again. “He already has. Before you got here, he was bragging about the other girls he’s killed. He’s even got souvenirs from all of them.” She pointed at the table by the bed.
I went to the nightstand and looked in the wooden box sitting beside a MacBook. The felt-lined box held an assortment of jewelry and tokens that would be easy to find on teenaged girls at any high school campus, and my anger returned at the thought of the dead girls they represented. Mostly there were rings and bracelets, but there were some odd things like a grubby rabbit’s foot, a dime with a hole in it on a chain, and a St. Jude medal.
And lying on the very top was the Best Friends pendant that Cassie and I had bought at the mall for my birthday on the night she died. The other half of the split heart had been on a chain around her neck when they buried her. I picked it up and stared at it a second, then I closed my hand around it and turned to hit him in the gut with the fist holding my necklace.
“Your sick hobby ends tonight, you maggot. And I’m gonna make you pay dearly for all the things you stole.”
The rope around his neck kept him from making more than a strangled grunt, but his eyes looked as if they were about to pop out and shoot across the room. His mouth started moving and at first I thought he was trying to beg for his life, then he raised one of his hands between us with his middle finger extended, his eyes bright with an insane gleam.
Well, okay then. If he was too far gone to be sufficiently scared, I’d have to crank up the volume. I picked up the knife then walked back over where he could see me.
“I don’t think you realize what deep shit you’re in, Cupcake. But maybe this will give you a hint.” I plunged the knife into my chest three times in rapid succession. “You’re about to find out what happens when you piss off a dead girl.”
His eyes lost some of their defiance and fluttered as if he were about to pass out, so I slapped him a few times until they opened wide again.
“Uh-uh. No fair running out on the party. I don’t want you to miss a second of all that fun you said you wanted to have with us.”
“Gwen,” Annalee said from behind me, “can’t you just castrate him? Would you get to stay then?”
If my poor dead heart hadn’t already been breaking because I had to go, I would have laughed at her suggestion. I turned and hugged her a second before leading her back to the chair and kneeling in front of her.
“That wouldn’t work because he could still go on killing girls even if he couldn’t rape them. I have to send him to Hell where he belongs.”
“Will you just disappear when he’s dead?” Tears streamed down her face again.
“That’s how it’s supposed to work, but I fixed it so it’ll be a little different for me. And I’m gonna need your help to make it work.”
“What do you mean?”
“We’d be able to keep you out of it if I could just kill him and let the gators in the Everglades eat the scraps, but then everybody would think I ran away when I
disappeared, and I can’t do that to Lew. He can’t think I deserted him.”
She shook her head. “I don’t understand. What are you gonna do?”
“This is the story I want you to tell everybody.” I squeezed her hands. “Tell them I snuck out and went to your place after Lew took me home tonight. Javier saw me on the street after I left your house the other night, so he can back you up that I did it all the time. While I was there talking to you, sleazebag over there broke in and tied us up, then he brought us here to rape and kill us. I managed to get untied when he left for a few minutes, but he came back while I was untying you. I ran to the balcony and he ended up going over the rail in the struggle, but he stabbed me while we were fighting over the knife. Can you remember all that?”
She still looked confused. “Yes, but how will that change anything?”
“Before I left Karen and Brad’s tonight, I made a deal with Flo that my body will stay here so it looks like he killed me. That way Lew will at least know I didn’t want to leave. That it wasn’t my choice.”
Understanding finally registered on Annalee’s face. “You mean I’ll have to watch you die for real once he’s gone?”
I nodded and hugged her. “I’m so sorry to put you through this, but it’s the only way. We have to do it for Lew.” I pulled away to look at her again. “And I need you to tell him something for me, okay?”
It was several seconds before she could say, “What?”
“Tell him I should’ve said I loved him when he said it to me tonight. I told him I didn’t know anything about love, but I was wrong.” I took the ring off my finger and put it on hers. “Tell him I gave you this before I died to remind both of you not to cry for me, because you and Lew are the reason I know what love is.”
“Oh, Gwen.” She put her good arm around my neck. “I’m gonna miss you so much. You’re the only real friend I’ve ever had.”
“That’s not true,” I said. “Lew’s your friend too, and he’s gonna need you to be there for him. You’re gonna need each other, and I hope someday you’ll tell him how much you love him, because I know you do.”
After Me Page 22