***
Inside the command vehicle, Robyn, and Russ Smith, watched the image of Numerical being fed to them by the night vision camera attached to a tree limb in Emily Carson’s yard.
Robyn leaned closer to the monitor.
“Why has he suddenly stopped? Could he have spotted one of our agents?”
“No, it’s not that,” Smith said. “He’s not looking in their direction, but something sure spooked him. Maybe we should move on him now, hmm?”
“We can’t be certain that’s Numerical, and if it’s someone else, someone we can’t link to other crimes, the most we could do is charge him with trespassing. No, we need him to enter the home, and once he does that, we can file multiple charges against him.”
“You’re right, so if he turns and leaves, we’ll follow him.”
“Yeah, but I’ll tell you something. That’s Numerical, I can feel it.”
***
Numerical suddenly relaxed. It was a cool night, especially for Florida, and they probably just kept the dog inside, and as for the night owl, who knows, maybe he decided to take some time off.
Numerical was breaking his own rules and he knew it. He had always aborted an attack if more than one anomaly was detected in the patterns around him, and tonight he’d already detected two, but was willing to keep going. Not only that, but he was moving ahead of schedule in the first place, because of Emily Carson’s impending move to Orlando.
He should have scrubbed her as a victim and moved on, instead of speeding up his timetable the way he’s done, and was also aware that the gap between victims was growing shorter, while his need to live out his fantasies was growing stronger.
It was the girl, he told himself, Emily Carson; he wanted her, wanted her body and wanted her mind. He ached to humble her, to control her, instill terror, cultivate hate within her, and then kill her, end her life, and experience that blessed moment of ultimate control.
He was not a religious man, but he did believe that mankind had a creator, a creator who fashioned us so that we would all die. He understood the motivation behind creating something only to someday destroy it, for if he, like God, had the power to create life, to forge his own victims into being, he would do so, but only for the sheer delight of watching them die.
Murder was the ultimate pleasure to him, because it was the ultimate power.
Numerical shook off his sense of dread, headed for the fence at the rear, and scaled it with ease to drop onto the property of Victim 48. The person, Emily Carson, no longer existed in his mind. She was simply his next victim.
Unbeknownst to him, as he dropped to the ground, he passed through the first of the motion detectors set up to chart his progress.
As he approached the back door, he removed the key that would fit the lock he had installed days ago. After stopping to listen at the door for a moment, and detecting nothing, he used the key and entered. After closing the door, he listened once more, and once more heard nothing.
His image was picked up by a night vision camera that had been installed above the kitchen cabinets, and as he crept past the refrigerator and farther into the home, the second motion detector caught his progress.
The bedroom door was open, as he knew it would be, and in the sparse moonlight that passed through the blinds, he could see the shape beneath the covers on the bed. He reached into his pocket and removed a weapon, not an offensive weapon such as his beloved antique knife, but a weapon of defense, a weapon of last resort, and as he entered the bedroom, the third and final motion detector was tripped.
Breaking the beam turned on lights throughout the house and spurred young Agent Williams to toss the covers aside, even as other agents converged on the bedroom.
Numerical leapt atop Williams, pinning her gun arm to the bed, while activating the device he was holding.
He gazed into her frightened eyes.
“We’re all going to die.”
And an instant later, the house exploded.
CHAPTER 12
Summervale, North Carolina,
Alice yawned as she put aside her iPad.
It was well past her bedtime, but she’d been reading a mystery novel and she had stayed up late to finish it.
She turned off her light, settled under the covers, and was just drifting off to sleep when she heard the sounds of car doors opening and closing nearby.
Curious, she rose from the bed, peeked out past a corner of her bedroom blinds, and saw the new neighbors, Rich and June Chandler, as they sat in their car. Seconds later, they were driving away, and Alice wondered where they were off to at such a late hour.
She shrugged, it was none of her business, but as she watched the taillights of their car fade away, she saw movement in the upstairs window of the Chandler home, and when she looked up, she saw that a man was staring at her. The man had a bald head and looked to be middle-aged or possibly even older, but Alice couldn’t make out many details in the faint light.
She sent him a smile and a small wave, while thinking that he must be a relative of the Chandler’s that was staying with them.
The man didn’t wave back, but just kept scowling at her, and then he stepped back from the window and let the curtain fall in place.
Alice felt uneasiness enter her mind as she thought about the man, and afterwards, she sat on the side of the bed and thought about the Chandlers.
She had only met them once, on the day they moved in a week ago, and other than the brief glimpse she had of them tonight, she hadn’t seen them around town, and Summervale was a small town.
She tried to remember what sort of work the couple did, but couldn’t recall Rich Chandler mentioning anything. The man seemed more interested in staring at her breasts as they spoke, and June Chandler never said a word, but only smiled pleasantly.
Maybe they’re lying low. They could be hiding from the law the same way that I am.
She gave a little laugh. That mystery novel had her imagining things. Rich and June Chandler were just an average couple, and the man staying with them, though rude, was likely a relative or friend of theirs. In any event, it had nothing to do with her.
Alice soon fell asleep, unaware that the man she had been watching was back at the Chandler’s window with a pair of binoculars, and if he had spotted her watching the house again, and had come to the conclusion that she was a threat, he would have marched over to her aunt’s house, forced his way inside, and killed everyone in the home.
***
Inside the FBI’s mobile command center, Robyn felt the blast of the explosion even though she was blocks away.
The two technicians manning the recording equipment both howled in pain as they ripped off their earphones, as apparently the listening devices throughout the house transmitted the cacophony of the explosion.
Robyn stared at the monitor that was fed from the camera pointed at the Carson home, and saw only flames and falling debris.
“Oh good God, no!”
She rushed out of the converted mobile home and jumped into the unmarked car parked nearby, with Russ Smith beside her, and within a matter of seconds, she was skidding to a halt near what had been a house, but was now a flaming pile of rubble.
When she spotted the gaping hole on the right side of the collapsed structure, she rushed towards it with Smith running behind her, begging her to stop, to be careful, but in Robyn’s mind’s eye, all she could see was the young, earnest face of Agent Williams, along with the other agents who were stationed within the home.
When she was several feet in, Robyn lost all vision as thick smoke swirled about her, and she had to gasp for breath, as the hot fumes of the fire entered her lungs. She dropped down and crawled forward on her hands and knees, hopefully heading for what had been the bedroom, and above the sounds of the fire, she heard a moan come from her right.
She moved towards the sound and a shard of broken glass embedded itself in the palm of her hand. She pulled it free with a whimper and then kept going towards the s
ounds of distress.
The heat was intense and the smoke had grown in density, had moved downward towards the floor, and made the world appear hazy, but Robyn found one of her wounded men and spoke words of comfort to him, while the man was only able to moan in response.
“I’ll get you out of here, don’t worry.”
Robyn dragged the man along the floor in what she hoped was the way back to where she had entered, having lost all sense of direction amid the smoke. She cursed inwardly at how long it was taking to make progress, but then her effort gained an ally, as Russ Smith appeared and helped her, his sweat-drenched face briefly discernable in the swirling haze of smoke and ashes.
There was a crash, followed by a rise in temperature and light, and Robyn and Smith peeked over their shoulders to discover that the fire had grown dramatically. Their fear escalated, while bringing along renewed vigor, and they scurried out into the night with their wounded colleague, where they were helped to their feet by fellow agents.
Someone stuck an oxygen mask over Robyn’s face as she leaned back against a car, and she sucked in the fresh air greedily. When she looked over at Smith, she saw that he too wore a mask, and in the eyes above it was a sorrow that reflected her own.
Agents had died, of that, she was certain, and as the head of the operation, their deaths fell on her shoulders.
Robyn ripped the mask from her face, leaned over, and vomited from grief and despair.
***
After activating the sparking device he had previously inserted in the home’s natural gas line, where it connected with the water heater, Numerical suddenly found himself lying at the base of a wall, and the mattress he had been lying atop, was now laying atop him.
All he could hear was the ringing in his ears, and thick smoke was limiting his field of vision. He squirmed out from beneath the mattress and saw Agent Williams. She was conscious, but dazed, and her left arm appeared broken.
Numerical reached to a pocket on his black jumpsuit and removed a pair of night-vision goggles. Once activated, the goggles improved his vision ten-fold, even amidst the growing smoke. After removing his backpack, he unzipped the jumpsuit and stepped out of it, to reveal a dark-blue nylon jacket with large, white letters written on the back of it, the letters, FBI.
After freeing his knife from the sheath on his belt, he reached down, grabbed Agent Williams, and attempted to yank her to her feet, but found that his strength was ebbing. Apparently, the concussive force of the blast had affected more than just his ears, and he realized that his legs were quivering.
He gathered himself, grabbed Williams with both hands and managed to get her to stand, but the young woman let out a cry of pain and still appeared to be disoriented, but like himself, she hadn’t been cut by flying debris, and he assumed that the mattress had acted as a shield for both of them.
Numerical pulled her along with him, ready to use her as a hostage if needed. He was headed towards the left side of the house, to an aperture in the wall where a window once was. He would have to get down on all fours to make it through the hole, but before he did so, he slammed Agent Williams up against a sagging wall and went to work with his knife. His only regret in killing her came from the fact that he could not see the life flee from her eyes, because of the ever-increasing smoke swirling around them.
After letting her corpse fall to the floor, he lowered himself beside it, and then crawled over the body of another agent and out into the night, to find several vehicles racing towards the scene.
While staying low and coughing from the smoke, he scurried towards the house next door, which had also caught fire, and went over the fence into its backyard. After traveling through several more yards, he came to a cross street and emerged at the curb, just as an ambulance approached.
He saw the vehicle, but still could not hear it, as the ringing in his ears persisted.
He tottered out into the street on the brink of exhaustion, held aloft his phony badge, and was relieved when the ambulance came to a stop in front of him.
Less than a minute later, both attendants were dead and he was fleeing away from the scene, while wondering just what the hell had gone wrong.
CHAPTER 13
Daytona Beach, Florida, 4:23 p.m.
What had been a trap the night before was now a crime scene, and Robyn sat alone inside the mobile command center in a state of despair.
Four agents were dead, while five others were wounded, and the two ambulance attendants were also added to the tally of victims credited to the man known as Numerical.
There was a knock at the door of the command center and Robyn told whoever it was to enter, but when she looked up, she was surprised to see Lawson.
“Thomas? I thought you were in Montana?”
“I flew back when I heard about what had happened. Robyn, are you all right?”
“No, I am far from all right. I’m responsible for one of the biggest debacles in FBI history, and I’m also responsible for the deaths of six people.”
Lawson sat beside her in a folding chair.
“What happened here was not your fault. No one could have expected that maniac to have rigged the home’s gas line to blow up.”
“I should have thought of it. If I had, those people would be alive right now.”
Lawson looked down and saw her hand, the one she had cut while crawling along inside the demolished house. He leaned closer and held her bandaged hand gently.
“You had just a few hours to get ready for this and you did the best you could. Don’t beat yourself up over this.”
Robyn looked at him with tears in her eyes.
“He murdered the woman who was pretending to be Emily Carson, and after gutting her with a knife, he, he... he carved the number forty-eight into her face, turned her into one of his victims, into just another number. Oh God, Thomas, I want this bastard. I want him and I want to see him dead.”
Lawson stood, pulling her along, and embraced her as she cried.
***
9:42 p.m.
Numerical had made it back to his lair in St. Augustine, and after a light meal, had slept most of the day away. He was relieved to find that he had suffered no lingering effects from the explosion, and was amazed at his luck.
He had not expected to survive the blast, much less remain unscathed by it. He had always considered The Doomsday Device, a gizmo that would set off a spark when it received the proper signal, to be a last ditch effort against spending his life in a cell.
He would rather die than have that happen, and the sparking device had been created with that purpose in mind.
What had gone wrong?
That was the thought that consumed him as he drove away from the disaster, and he kept coming back to one answer.
Cassandra Carson, the sister of his latest target, Emily Carson,
Emily had called the woman when she supposedly had misplaced her key, his key, the key he had made for the locks he had installed.
He suspected that the sister uncovered the switch and had the presence of mind not to let on, and that would mean that she also uncovered his listening devices and the device on her sister’s phone.
A clever girl this Cassandra Carson, so clever that she was nearly his undoing,
He thought about one of Prophet’s apostles, Andrew, and about his assertion that there was a group of women out there hunting his kind.
The idea seemed ridiculous, and he had only agreed with Andrew to be perverse and annoy Prophet, but as he recalled the video he had watched, of the girl gunning down a man who was likely one of the other apostles, Bartholomew, he began to wonder if Andrew was on to something.
Numerical opened his laptop and searched for a picture of Cassandra Carson among the photos he had taken of her, when she had been with her sister. The girl looked very much like her sister, but in place of Emily’s blond hair and blue eyes were brown hair and green eyes.
Numerical stared at the photograph, wondering what secrets were behind tho
se large green eyes. He sent a copy of the photo to his printer and, when it was ready, he placed it on the corkboard above his desk.
After searching online for over an hour, he knew that Cassandra had been abducted, raped, and nearly murdered when she was fourteen. Her rapist had been a man from her neighborhood who had no record and was considered to be a loving husband and father.
Cassandra’s rapist made the mistake of underestimating her, and young Cassandra made him pay with his life.
Numerical leaned back in his seat and considered things.
If there were a group of women hunting predators, someone like Cassandra Carson would fit right in.
Learning more about Cassandra Carson had just become his top priority, and just maybe, he would make her victim Number 49.
CHAPTER 14
His first act upon returning home from the hospital was to hold his children in his arms. He had been away from them just shy of two weeks but could see that they both had grown during his absence.
He would have been home days earlier, but needed to stay longer in order to overcome an infection that had afflicted one of his wounds.
The dog, Stitches, stayed at his side for days after his arrival home, and the pooch’s joy at seeing him again was so great that the hound had nearly knocked him over when he first stepped out of the car.
And speaking of cars, his was no more, for although it had still been mechanically sound, Jessica had ordered the car to be crushed, bullet-riddled seat and all. He groaned when she told him about it. He had liked that car a great deal, a BMW coupe, but with the children a consideration, he would probably go shopping for something with more room inside.
He still walked with a crutch because of his previously damaged foot, and was considerably weakened from his fresh wounds and subsequent surgery, and so Jessica had converted their office on the first floor into a temporary bedroom in order to save him the hike up the stairs.
He was restless from lack of activity, but filled his time by reading. With his 3-D project completed, he had no work to occupy him, and no idea about what he wanted to do next.
The TAKEN! Series - Books 13-16 (Taken! Box Set Book 4) Page 19