by Angi Morgan
IT HAD BEEN almost ten minutes when Jesse pulled onto the third street. The surveillance team agreed that Snake Eyes had to be on foot. Garrison had taken the north streets and Jesse headed south. Back and forth along the streets, one extra block either direction. The team was out beyond the first three blocks.
One more turn and he’d have to admit defeat. How had Snake Eyes got her cooperation? It didn’t make—
A boot was next to the curb. He cut the engine of the motorcycle to pick it up, taking a close look at the darkened homes along the unlit sidewalk.
“Help!”
It was a muffled “help,” but still a cry for help. He came off the bike so fast it toppled to its side. He hurdled a shrub, nearly landing on a woman. He knelt, removing the gag.
“Please help me. He’s crazy. I think...I think he’s going to kill her.”
Jesse didn’t have to ask who. Avery’s boot on the side of the road told him she had got inside the car. He dialed Parker, giving him the address. Then Garrison.
“He’s got her, buddy. Meet me three blocks my direction. Can’t miss me.”
“I’m Texas Ranger Jesse Ryder, ma’am. What’s your name?”
“Um... Cindy Crouch. He had pictures of my little boy and said if I didn’t find the address for him that he’d... He said horrible things. I brought it to him and then he drugged me.”
“You’re very lucky to be alive.” Those were the wrong words. She’d been coherent before. Now she was just hysterically crying. “It’ll be okay. Help’s on its way.”
“You. You might...catch them,” she managed to say between gulps of air. “I’m okay. Go.”
“Can you describe the vehicle?” He propped her up against a tree.
“Black Lexus, tinted windows, Texas tags KWX198.”
“You’re sure about that?”
“I took a good look when he moved me over here. I... She only got in that car to save me.” Cindy began crying again.
“Give them the car’s description first. You can save her.” Jesse started the bike as cars rushed up behind him. He didn’t stay for a plan to be developed.
His only hope was that Snake Eyes would be driving the speed limit so as not to draw attention to himself. There was one way out of the subdivision. Two directions from there.
“Garrison, I’m hitting the main road and taking it west. You’ve got east. Black Lexus, dark windows, KWX189. We have to find her.”
“Taking it east and we will, man. We will.”
He put the phone away and sped up. He had a fifty-fifty chance Snake Eyes was heading west. The open fields seemed to fit what they knew about him when he killed. He took the hill, searching for taillights.
Nothing.
Remember that this bastard is smart. He might have turned off the lights. If he did...he’d be going slower. There wasn’t a moon, no way to naturally light up the two-lane road.
Jesse would find him. There was no way Snake Eyes would be terrorizing anyone else.
* * *
THEY WERE OUT of the subdivision. Snake Eyes was humming under his hood. It wasn’t a song that Avery recognized. Why did it matter? It didn’t. Another distraction. Good for her because he was less likely to hear her popping the plastic cuffs against the seat next to her.
For the past eight months, nights off meant cable television or studying on the internet. She’d decided to test the plastic handcuffs normally used with riots. If you hit them hard enough, they’d break. Just like the instruction video had suggested.
The humming wouldn’t cover the noise. She had to wait or he’d have the gun back in her face.
“Why me? I thought Tenoreno hired you to take care of the witnesses to his wife’s murder.” Avery wanted to see his face, wanted to rip the contacts out of his eyes and make him normal.
“I have special plans for you, Avery. I think you and Snake Eyes are going to have hours of fun together.”
That was not normal. Her imagination didn’t need a lot of help figuring out what this awful man meant. “Wait. Aren’t you Snake Eyes?”
“There is a little bit of him in all of us, I suppose.”
“All of you? If you aren’t him, then who are you?” This was freakier than anything she’d had to deal with throughout her career. This was the same man she and Jesse had faced in Dalhart. He had the wounds proving it.
“I wouldn’t be a good associate if I gave my name to you so easily.”
“Then maybe you can explain why Snake Eyes wants me? Why is he fascinated with me?” She could see around the front headrest and noticed that the lights were off. There was no one around for miles.
“I see you inching toward the middle of the car. Please move toward the door.”
Avery replayed the man’s voice in her head. It had the slightest British accent. A different cadence in the phrasing. If she didn’t know that the same man who put her in the car was still driving it, she might have thought a second had been waiting to drive them away.
There was just one man. Snake Eyes, the murderer.
“We never got to finish phase two of my project with you and Jesse. I’m afraid you took me by surprise by escaping the collar. And I’m afraid that Scott was just too useless. The other two young men, well... They were fine with setting the fires for the right amount of money. But when it came to abducting a deputy sheriff and a Texas Ranger... Let’s just say I won the argument.”
That sounded just like the man behind the hood.
“Phase two?”
“That’s right. I never got to explain it.” He slapped his thigh and hummed his tune. He wasn’t going to give her any extra time to think her way out of his plan by giving her a warning.
Avery heard the motorcycle. Seconds later, Snake Eyes turned off the road. She wasn’t certain he knew where he was, but she could tell it was unplanned by the way he looked around the field. It was easy enough to decipher that even if it wasn’t Jesse, he didn’t want the car he was driving spotted.
It was her last chance at getting help.
She twisted her body and grabbed the dirt in her pockets, then hit the cuffs against the seat. Then hit them again.
Snake Eyes swerved enough that the tires fell off the smoother ruts of the dirt road. She hit the seat and pulled, breaking the cuffs from her wrists. Her captor stepped on the gas, throwing her to the side. Her feet were behind him, so she kicked while he swerved.
When he turned to see what she was doing, she threw the dirt in his face.
He stomped on the brakes and threw the car in Park. The gun must have slid away from him, because he began searching around his legs. While his body was bent, she climbed on top of him and honked the horn.
Short. Short. Short. Long. Long. Long. Short. Short. Short.
Short. Short.
Snake Eyes stuck the gun against her jawbone. “Valiant effort, Avery. Too bad no one can hear you.”
She raised her hands and sat on the smooth leather seat.
“Out of the car. Do it. Now.” He popped the trunk.
Her first thought was that he was going to put her inside. She could break a taillight, get someone’s attention. Then she saw the wire, the duct tape, the vials of drugs. And just as a chef unrolled his knives before he began cooking, Snake Eyes displayed his instruments of death.
Chapter Twenty-Four
The horn had been faint at seventy miles an hour on a motorcycle. Jesse almost ignored it. Then he came to a skidding stop and knew the SOS was Avery and did a U-turn.
Leaving the bike on the side of the road, he used Avery’s shotgun to hold the barbwire fence away from his face as she went through. On the other side, he sent a text to Garrison and Parker, then switched his cell to silent mode before stuffing it in his jeans pocket. He watched the dirt road, listened wit
hout hearing anything—even bugs.
On the next rise he got low to the ground and shoved his way behind a pile of dry brush and dead branches. He could see the black car’s silhouette, along with Avery.
Snake Eyes had her on her knees and was wrapping something around her neck. She wasn’t attempting to get away or struggling. He bent and yanked her head backward, then connected whatever was around her neck to her hands. She cried out in surprised pain.
Whatever the madman had planned to do with Avery when he casually left the subdivision, it was clear that things had changed. Snake Eyes paced the length of the car, hitting his forehead, clearly shaken by whatever had given Avery the opportunity to sound the horn.
He walked to the trunk. The light reflected off a slew of knives neatly laid out in rows. Jesse had to get to Avery fast. Her captor had changed. He was no longer cool and collected, and his hands shook with such force Jesse could see them.
Snake Eyes fingered several knives before dropping the largest and walking away. Jesse began breathing a little easier, but then his target hurried to the trunk and placed the knives in order, talking to himself.
“He’s nuts,” Jesse mumbled.
No time to lose, Jesse backed out of the brush to approach from the front of the car. It was darker there and should give him an advantage. The closer he got, the more he heard Snake Eyes mumbling.
“Kill her now and forget your fun.” He pivoted.
“But you left her new eyes at home,” he answered in a different voice.
“Forget your signature—everyone will know it’s you. Kill her!” He twisted his head as if listening for Jesse. Then kept up his argument.
Totally nuts.
Closer, Jesse crawled on his belly. If Snake Eyes came to this side of Avery, one blast from the shotgun and he’d be stunned for a few minutes. As luck would have it, he continued his debate with himself at the trunk. He’d lift a knife, walk in front of Avery, point it, shake his head, then return it to his stash.
Avery was in the light from the car door. Jesse could see that she was wrapped in wire. Loops around her feet stretching to her hands, multiple wraps around her hands connecting tightly to strands around her neck. If she moved her hands or feet, she’d pull the wire into her neck. Hell, if she fell forward she might slice her neck open.
He couldn’t get her free from that mess without wire cutters. He’d have to unwrap the wire by hand. And he had no time. There wouldn’t be any distractions, then swooping in to pull her out.
His only choice was to remove the threat. And he had to get closer if he intended to use this shotgun to do it. At her Dalhart house, having buckshot wasn’t a terrible decision. It gave Avery enough range and power inside.
Here was a different story. He might hit his target from twenty yards, but he was at least thirty or thirty-five from Avery. To his right, the car blocked everything. To his left, the only cover was well over seventy-five yards away.
Snake Eyes was sure to hear him moving through the grass and twigs before he got close enough. Opposite was the road. Pretty much flat and bare about ten yards on either side. This was his only route.
Getting to Avery would be tricky, and once there, he couldn’t get her free, couldn’t knock her over. She was close enough to Snake Eyes for him to slice her open or just shoot and kill her. Jesse didn’t like his odds. He could save Avery by simply eliminating the target.
This was one time in his life that he wished he could just damn the consequences and head in guns blazing without thinking about it. No thinking. Avery needed him to save her. But he had to think. It was who he was.
Who he was... A planner who thought about everything too much.
Weapons... He’d take the shotgun and keep his handgun ready. Safer. Better coverage. But he’d still have to aim. If Snake Eyes kept up his monologue with the knives, Jesse would be aiming at a moving target for eight or nine more passes. He’d be hard to hit.
Position... He moved to his left for a better line of sight.
Rescue... Then what?
No choice... Take out the target so the hostage would no longer be threatened.
Execution... He inched his way through the field. He had a decent shot. He aimed. He tried to pull the trigger.
All he heard was Avery’s voice telling him she wouldn’t use deadly force as long as there was a chance. She would shoot to defend herself. This was why they practiced and trained...so they wouldn’t think; they’d just do.
Delay... She was right. He loved her with everything and he still couldn’t just shoot a man in cold blood. No matter what kind of man the target was.
With his hesitation, he’d lost opportunity.
Snake Eyes had something in his hand and quickly got behind Avery. I can’t be off six inches or I’ll hit her. “Raise your hand, you son of a—”
His body was braced. He was ready with a follow-through shot and began squeezing. But he immediately stopped when Snake Eyes snipped the wire connecting to Avery’s feet.
What was the perp going to do now?
“You are quite a subject, Avery Travis,” Snake Eyes said. “I haven’t had many who could balance without their panic forcing me to intervene.”
She continued to be perfectly still. Jesse didn’t know how she was doing it. He kept his finger ready. He’d shoot before she could be hurt.
Snake Eyes forced her to her feet. She turned, refusing to get inside the car.
“You can do whatever you want. Do you understand me?” She’d raised her voice.
The words were for him. She knew—or hoped—he was there. She stepped away from her captor. One small step, then another long one before Snake Eyes realized why.
Jesse pulled the trigger, sending buckshot into the man’s side.
Avery ran. Arms twisted high behind her, she ran.
Snake Eyes dropped to the ground, then half crawled, half dragged himself into the backseat.
“Jesse!”
“Over here!” They met a little off the road. “This is the fastest way to the bike.”
“He’s got the car. Can you...?” She stretched her neck and turned for him to help untie her. “Two guns that I know of.”
Headlights bathed them in light as Snake Eyes bore down on them. If she fell, the thin wire could slice her windpipe, but they ran anyway. Jesse couldn’t stop to untwist the wire yet. Up and over the slight rise. The car followed, bouncing through the uneven field, heading to cut them off.
“This way. Do you see them? He can’t follow through the stacked hay bales,” Avery said, sliding to her knee. She needed her hands. It was too dangerous for her to keep going like this. “We can still get to the motorcycle, can’t we?”
“If he stays on the road, he’ll cut us off or be waiting on us. Stop behind the hay bale for a sec. You need to be free.” The shotgun dropped to his feet as he used both hands to untwist. “This thing is worse than a bread tie.”
* * *
NO DEBATE. JUST ACTION and keeping herself from inappropriately laughing at his analogy. Avery lifted her hands behind her as high as possible. It was a bit painful as Jesse twisted and then twisted some more. It was frightening to think of what might have happened if she’d moved before her feet had been snipped free.
Don’t go there. Think about now. They were being surrounded in more light from the car. One wrist could now move.
“You have to hurry, Jesse.”
“Just a couple more and we’re...there. That’s it.”
She started to face him, but he held her in place. She felt him gathering the wire and shoving it down the back of her shirt.
“Done. Now you won’t get caught. Let’s go.”
The wire still around her neck reminded her of the shock collar. The helplessness knowing that a sadistic monster had control of h
er fate. As they took the first steps, the car drew closer to them and Snake Eyes fired.
Jesse dropped to the ground, pulling her with him. He swung the shotgun around and fired the second barrel into the side of the car. Snake Eyes drove past and circled. They had seconds before he’d be able to fire at them again.
“You’re going to listen to me for once, Avery. No questions.”
“I’m not leaving you.” She couldn’t save herself while he stayed behind.
“I didn’t think you would. But one of us has to get to the road and let the team know where we are.” He gave her the shotgun and the phone. “Empty. But you can swing it, okay? First, climb the hay, babe. Up and over. Can you do that? Get clear on the other side and call Garrison. He’s on his way. He just isn’t in the right place yet.”
She nodded. He was right. To a point. Snake Eyes wouldn’t be looking above Jesse’s head. She could take him by surprise. “Don’t do anything stupid.”
“Count on it. Now get out of here so I can stall him.”
Jesse cupped his hands and gave her a boost high onto the bales. They were packed firmly and close together. She lay on her belly, getting ready to swing when Snake Eyes got close.
And he would get close. Even though he had the guns, he was fascinated and fixated on his knives. He was a sicko who would want to end Jesse with a blade.
“Here he comes,” Jesse said below her. “Get ready to move. Please do this, Avery. For me.”
Avery backed away from the edge so the headlights wouldn’t shine on her. It was so dark out here that when you were out of the beam, you couldn’t be seen. Snake Eyes pulled around wide.
The back of the car fishtailed across the pasture. He was going to ram Jesse and the stack of hay. The engine revved. The headlights blinded. She screamed Jesse’s name, but he was already on his toes like someone playing chicken with a two-ton vehicle.
Snake Eyes didn’t flinch. He shot forward. Jesse jumped out of the way at the last second. The car struck the bales, shaking her to one side. She clawed her way back to the top.
Jesse was already pulling the stunned Snake Eyes from the car. He quickly jerked away from a knife arcing toward his abdomen. Jesse continued backing away but took off his shirt and wrapped it around his forearm. It stopped the blade from slicing his skin to the bone and allowed him to get closer.