by Abbie Roads
He flinched as if she’d slapped him, the same as he’d done the last time she’d said his father’s name.
He turned his face away from her. “You’ll always see him in me.”
“That’s not it. It’s where I went in my mind. I went back to that day. I was there again, and all I could see was him.”
“You saw me.”
“No, I saw him.”
He muttered something under his breath that sounded suspiciously like same difference, then said, “And yet you shot me. You’ll always see him in me.”
“No. I need to explain. Dr. Payne—”
“I want you to go.” His words were monotone.
“Back at the cabin, you didn’t want me to go as far as the end of the driveway without you. Why do you want me to leave now?”
He aimed an angry glare at her. She suspected he thought that if he merely told her to leave, she would leave. No such luck, buster.
“Back at the cabin… Chalk it up to confusion, adrenaline, and your boobs in my face.”
She almost smiled, but he wasn’t being funny. He was serious.
“I gave Payne a beating he won’t forget. By this time, he’s probably been arrested. Hell, he might even be in the room next door getting half his face sewed back on. He won’t hurt you again.”
Mercy grabbed Cain’s hand and squeezed, the feeling of his skin and hers together warm and sweet. “I don’t want to go. I want to stay. I want to be near you. To be your friend. To have a human connection with the one person who understands what happened to me because, in a way, it happened to you.” She resisted the urge to clamp her hand over her mouth. None of those words should’ve been uttered aloud. They should’ve remained locked inside because she should leave. The problem was she didn’t want to.
“What’s wrong with you?” His voice was a gun loaded with hatred and contempt. “You get off or something on being around the guy who looks like the one who killed your family? Who tried to kill you? That’s sick.”
She bore the bullets of his words without flinching. He was angry. Had a right to be. She had shot him when he’d been trying to save her.
“Go.”
Two letters never sounded so terrible or contained so much force. She brushed the hair off his forehead. He jerked at her touch. She pretended not to notice and bent down and kissed his cheek. The scrape of his stubble against her lips was electric, zinging through her body. He tensed. His hands flexed into fists. He trembled as if suppressing the urge to beat her down. No less than she deserved. She had shot him.
“I am sorry,” she whispered, then set his car keys on the stand next to the bed and walked toward the door. She stopped and turned to him, but his eyes were clenched closed, and she could see fresh blood spotting the bandages on his arm and up near his shoulder from his muscles being so tight. She walked out into the hall. And stopped.
Doctors and nurses and frantic people rushed by her. Hospital sounds—intercom announcements, people shouting, and machines beeping—bombarded her ears. She smelled industrial cleaner and body odor. It was all too much. She couldn’t think in the middle of this chaos.
Her legs started moving as if they understood better than her mind. She walked down the crowded hall, out a door, and into that ominous day.
What now? She didn’t have family. Didn’t have friends. Her apartment had probably been rented out to someone else a year and a half ago. She didn’t have a wallet or money or an ID. She had some cash in the bank—not much, enough to survive on for a while, but how could she withdraw it if she didn’t have an ID or her bank card?
There was one place she could go.
Home.
She should’ve had the place demolished when she turned eighteen. Instead, she’d taken the money donated to the Mercy Ledger Trust and Education Fund and gave it all to a security and maintenance company with the understanding that they’d keep the place locked up tighter than a prison. No more pieces of bloody wallpaper, no more scraps of bloody carpet for sale on murderabelia.com.
It was sick that people wanted to own a piece of her family’s suffering.
No, she couldn’t go home. No way. Homeless was preferable to that house of horrors.
She headed across the parking lot, past Cain’s car that she’d carefully parked away from the others. She didn’t have a destination. She’d just walk until an idea about how to survive hit her. And if she didn’t have any ideas, she’d just keep walking.
Chapter 8
For Sale: Letter from Adam Killion to Cynthia Wonnimaker
(authenticity confirmed)
Price: $350 (SOLD)
Dear Cynthia,
Thank you for your kind letter. I do enjoy reading. It is a wonderful way to pass the time. I have added you to my visitors list and hope to meet you in the future to discuss books.
Adam Killion
Cain ripped the IV out of his hand, the sharp stick of pain nothing compared to the shit cooking on high between his ears. He’d been a total jackhole to Mercy. She didn’t deserve it, but he didn’t know how the fuck else to get her away from him. She was like the mouse trying to cozy up to the cat. And he’d wanted to grab her. Hold on to her. Gobble her up. And then tell her he was sorry for all of it—starting with what his father had done, then moving to him leaving the cabin and Payne hurting her.
Everything inside him had trembled with the urge to do just that, but that was selfish. She needed to be away from him, whether she realized it or not. She wasn’t going to heal with a constant reminder of the man who’d tried to kill her.
He wiped the blood dripping from his hand on the bedding.
His room door swung open, banging into the wall. Dolan Watts—Mac’s next in command—stood there panting like he’d run across Ohio instead of using his vehicle. “You’re all right? No major damage? What happened? Where’s Mercy Ledger? How’s she involved?” The questions raced out of Dolan’s mouth.
The guy might be Mac’s second, but he was barely older than Cain. He wore his usual G-man garb. White shirt. Black suit, black tie. Even his hair was black and slicked off his face so severely it almost looked painful. Maybe that’s why Cain had never seen him smile—his hair hurt. Mirrored shades hid Dolan’s eyes despite the guy being indoors.
“Got my bell rung and some flesh wounds. Nothing serious.” Didn’t feel like taking on the Mercy issue just yet, so he changed the subject. “What’s with the sunglasses?”
“I’m going for the incognito movie-star look.” Dolan’s tone rode the line between sarcasm and humor. “For the moment, everything is on the QT. I’m in front of the media storm, but I don’t know if we’re going to be able to outrun this tornado. All it takes is one hospital employee leaking that you’ve been shot and Mercy Ledger is here, and it’ll be all over the damned news.”
Cain had expected local law enforcement to arrive at the ER within minutes of the doctors finding out that he’d been shot. But two hours and no cops later, Dolan had managed to work some magic to keep everything quiet. “You hear anything about Mac?”
Dolan heaved a relieved-sounding sigh. “The surgeon was cautiously optimistic but said he’d know more after they opened him up.”
Cain clung to the word optimistic. A world without Mac was a world he couldn’t imagine living in. From the moment Mac found him, Cain’s life had been about living up to the potential Mac saw in him. Without Mac, what would happen to that potential?
Cain felt like punching himself in same temple where Payne had landed a blow. Wanted to ring his own bell this time because none of this would’ve happened if he’d just stayed at the cabin. If he’d never called Mac. Hell, if he’d never taken Mercy in the first place. But if he hadn’t, she’d probably be dead by now.
The truth would get Payne convicted for what he’d done to both Mercy and Mac.
Cain sucked in a giant breath and
told Dolan everything, starting from the moment he’d called Liz to set up the clandestine meeting with Mercy and ending with Mercy driving him and Mac to the hospital.
Dolan sat at the foot of the bed, leaned forward, elbows on his knees, and aimed his gaze at the floor while he listened. Only when Cain finished did Dolan turn his face in Cain’s direction. “So you were the last person to see Liz Sands alive.”
The words hung suspended in the air between them for a long moment. But a moment was all it took for Cain’s ears to hear them and his brain to translate their terrible meaning. “See Liz alive?” His insides began to tremble, and his head shook in denial. “What’re you talking about? You’ve got your wires crossed or something. I just talked to her two days ago when she dropped Mercy on me.” His voice sounded firm and solid. Not reflecting the rising dread inside him.
Dolan scrubbed a hand over his mouth. “Aww…shit. I assumed Mac told you.”
“Told me what?” Dolan’s words echoed through Cain’s mind. So you were the last person to see Liz Sands alive. There had to be another meaning to that sentence. Had to be.
“Liz Sands…is…dead. It happened two days ago.” Dolan spaced out the words, as if speaking them slower would help them sink in deeper. His lips turned down, and then he spoke one of the ugliest words in the English language. “Murdered.”
A sound partway between a gasp and groan slipped from Cain. A horrible hollow feeling expanded in his chest. He could no longer see the hospital room, could no longer see Dolan. All he could see was the past.
From his earliest memories of Liz at the Center until just last week when they’d split a carryout pizza and watched Frasier reruns. Liz loved Frasier. It made her laugh that a psychiatrist could be so bumbling and good-hearted. So different from those she worked with at the Center.
Oh, Liz.
She was one of the few people to accept him. She never treated him like he was his father’s son.
Raw and roiling emotion traveled up Cain’s throat. He swallowed it back down before he either barfed or bawled. He’d deal with the feelings later, when he was alone.
“I know the timing of this is shitty, but…” Dolan’s voice carried a killing kindness. “The Director is wanting some answers. He’s got some…concerns.”
Cain’s attention snapped to Dolan. “I’d. Never. Hurt. Her.”
One of Dolan’s brows twitched above his shades, and he held up his hands in a gesture of innocence. “I know that. You know that. Mac knows that. But the Director needs reassurance. He doesn’t know you like we do.”
Wasn’t that the story of his life? Everyone always seemed to be waiting for the moment he’d snap and morph into his father. Maybe he would. He almost did today. He could’ve killed Payne with his fists.
His knuckles were scraped, swollen, bloody, and bruised. He clenched his hand, welcoming the stiffness and pain. Pain was a sensation his mind could choose to master or invite—both ways had advantages. That was the only good thing his father had ever taught him.
“I can’t believe Mac knew and didn’t tell me.” Why hadn’t Mac said anything? This wasn’t oops-I-forgot-to-mention-it shit; this was a whole steaming pile.
Cain’s mind raced back to his conversation on the phone with Mac. We caught a case. A bad one. I need to talk to you about it. But then things had gone in a different direction. Why didn’t Mac say anything at the cabin? Cain replayed their talk outside, hearing things he hadn’t heard the first time around.
I don’t know everything that’s going on with the Liz and Mercy situation.
Lay low until I give you the all clear.
Cain had just thought the guy was being overprotective. Overprotective because he thought Cain might be wrongly accused? Or overprotective because he thought Cain had something to do with Liz’s death? Fucking shit. That explained how Mac had acted on the phone. What’s wrong. I can hear it in your voice. Talk to me. Whatever it is, you’ll be fine. We’ll get through it. I’m here for you. Always have been. Always will be. Mac had assumed Cain was in trouble. The I-just-killed-someone kind of trouble.
The temperature inside him rose to spontaneous-combustion level. His armpits went damp, and a bead of sweat slid down his temple. Anger and shame collided inside him, bashing and slashing each other for dominance.
Dolan’s phone buzzed. He yanked it from his pocket and looked at the screen. His lips puckered tighter than an anus. He hit the talk button and held it to his ear. “Director.”
Cain swung his legs over the side of the bed and lurched toward the alcove bathroom. He slammed the door behind him. Couldn’t bear to hear Dolan’s conversation.
It was all too much. Liz was dead, and the Director suspected Cain had done it. The asshole.
His shoulder throbbed and the place where Mercy’s bullet grazed his arm burned, but those things were a welcome distraction from the emotions threatening to burst out of him.
He took a piss, imagining Payne’s face in the water, then washed his hands in the sink and splashed cold water on his cheeks and forehead until some of the throbbing heat receded. He lifted his head and stared at his dripping reflection in the mirror. His features were as sharp and angular as chiseled bone, his hair some color between blond and brown. It was hard looking at himself. Had been difficult since he’d hit his early twenties. Part of him recognized himself, but another part could only see his father staring back at him. Over the years, he seemed to grow into the image of the man he hated, the man who’d hurt him and so many others.
Cain dried his face and hands, then opened the door.
Dolan stood in the middle of the room staring down at his phone. “Dude. The Director is going wack-jack. You’ve got to explain these pictures.” He shoved his oversized phone in Cain’s face.
In shades of charcoal ranging from the palest gray to the darkest black was a sketch of a man’s torso, ripped open, guts strung out in fat worms beside him.
Cain’s knees went wobbly. A shudder ripped through him. He couldn’t bear the images that stuck in his mind from murder scenes, so he purged them by putting them on paper. He never looked through his sketchbooks. They were too terrible to view.
“Those are my private…” Shit. What was he going to call them? “…drawings.” Drawings came out barely audible. It was too innocuous a word for the gruesome images on the page.
“Your right to privacy vanished the moment an FBI agent was shot at your cabin.” Dolan’s words weren’t assholey, just matter-of-fact.
Cain wanted to argue with the guy, but didn’t. Of course they were going to comb every inch of the cabin inside and out, looking for answers.
“The Director wants to know where you were on the evenings of Friday, May fifth, and Saturday, May sixth.”
Cain’s head felt like it was expanding, getting larger and larger, getting ready to pop like a water balloon. “You really think I had something to do with the Dawsons’ murder?” His voice came from a dark place.
“I don’t. But you’ve got to start giving some answers the Director will believe. After what happened with the second-highest-ranking profiler going serial killer, he’s not taking any chances. Look at it from his point of view. It’s awfully coincidental that you are a blood consultant who has some unexplained ability to perfectly profile killers. And he just found out that you’re an artist.” The way he said artist sounded like ar-teest. “And an artist painted a portrait of you on a wall in blood. A portrait that only you could see until we brought in infrared. What conclusion do you think he’s going to reach?”
“Holy motherfucking son of a bitch.” Cain’s brain buzzed against his skull, plugging in connection after connection that he hadn’t made before. Even without being his father’s son, there was an awful lot of circumstantial evidence pointing directly at him.
What had he been doing the nights of the fifth and sixth? He flipped through his memories,
searching back nearly a week to those two days, searching for proof—beyond his word—he hadn’t killed the family. He could never do something so… Who the fuck was he trying to lie to? He could kill. It was in his DNA, in the very foundation of who he was as a person. But he sure didn’t have any memory of himself mutilating that family, beyond what he’d gotten from the blood. He would’ve recognized the scene—the scent and sight and fucking taste of being there before. Right?
But there were gaps in his childhood memories. Large gaping holes that he’d never dared to peer into for fear of what he’d find. His normal memories were already a horror—how much worse could the ones his mind blocked be? Could he have done something to that family, and his mind had hidden it from him?
No. Stop. He wasn’t going to entertain the Director’s suspicions. “The Director wants to know about these drawings? They’re how I fucking survive the shit I see in this job. All everyone else sees is the aftermath. But I see…” He trailed off. No one but Mac really knew what happened to Cain when he worked. All the Bureau knew was that Cain needed disease-free blood to be able to profile.
“The Director wants to accuse me of killing the Dawsons? Tell him to find some proof. In the meantime, Payne killed Liz.” Those words sounded so horrible coming out of his mouth. Cain swallowed and shoved all the unproductive emotions that wanted some airtime into a dark, dangerous corner of his mind. “He was trying to find Mercy. He’s obsessed with her. Liz probably told him I took Mercy, and when he couldn’t find me, he followed Mac.”
“Biggest mistake of his life,” Dolan said.
“Yep.” Cain lifted his hand and bumped knuckles with Dolan.
“I’ve got him pegged as a crier. The moment we catch him and he realizes there’s no escape, I just know he’s going to—”
“Catch him? I thought you had him. He was unconscious when we left him. He got away?” Cain had trouble pulling oxygen out of the air. “Mercy’s out there. She’s in danger as long as he’s on the loose—”