Dark Pursuit

by Brandilyn Collins

  Over the Waters. The cruise-ship story, with the protagonist’s plans to catch the killer gone so awry. The warning was right there this morning, if only she’d made Darell listen —

  Life After Death. The next novel in line. The title leapt out at her.

  Margaret stared at it.

  Vaguely, she registered Darell’s voice on the monitor.

  Life After Death. The title screamed.

  Dreamlike, Margaret drifted to the bookcase, already knowing. Ancient memory bubbled like lava, her nerves singeing hot, so hot. Her arm reached up to the top shelf, to the book she would have read next if she hadn’t stopped too soon, if she hadn’t been so terribly, utterly stupid …

  She slid out Life After Death.

  Craig’s and Darell’s voices were arguing. They barely registered.

  Sam, Pete, somebody in the room uttered a curse.

  Margaret opened the hardback book. She skimmed the first page. The second.

  Darell’s story of years ago—the homicidal ER doctor, the hospital on a far-flung island.

  In Margaret’s mind, the lava-memories boiled higher and plunged over a cliff.

  “Ah!” Kaitlan cried.

  On the third page Margaret found it. The fabric. Black silk with green stripes. The cloth the doctor used to strangle his victims.

  The novel slipped from Margaret’s fingers and slammed to the floor.

  fifty-eight

  Darell stared at Craig Barlow. What was happening here? And how dare the kid talk to him like that?

  He tossed down the manuscript papers. “What makes you think I have another reason?”

  “’Cause I don’t buy the one you gave me.”

  “That so?”

  Craig lasered him with his eyes.

  Okay, if this was the way he wanted it. “You sound guilty to me, boy.”

  “Guilty? About what?”

  “About stealing from my work, that’s what.”

  Craig’s face scrunched. “Huh?”

  “That’s right. You hacked into my computer. Don’t think I don’t know.”

  “Are you crazy?”

  “Not half as crazy as you. I had a computer tech out here. He found your little spy program and traced it straight to you.”

  Craig sneered. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “I was going to handle this more delicately, till you flew off the handle. Just admit it and promise not to do it again, and I won’t go to the police.”

  “I am the police.”

  “How about the Sheriff’s Department? This house is in their jurisdiction. Or the state police. I have some good friends there.”

  “You can’t have half the friends in the state police that my father does.”

  A rank sense of injustice scissored through Darell’s head. Its blades shredded the last of the script he’d hoped to use.

  All right then—Plan B. He was ready.

  “This is about you, Craig, not your father. About how I’m going to prove what you’ve done.”

  “That I’m stealing your work?” Craig laughed derisively. “What’s to steal? The way I hear it, you can’t even write any more.”

  Darell slammed a palm against the table. “Do I look like somebody who can’t plot a suspense? Who doesn’t know how to figure out things? I can tie your hacking to the murders!”

  Craig stilled. His blue eyes burned white hot. Slowly he leaned forward, a snake positioning to strike. “Say again, old man?”

  “You want to see what this ‘old man’ can do?” Darell spat. “I’ll connect you to the black and green fabric. The cloth you used to strangle three women. Yes, three. You were stupid enough to take pictures of the last one.”

  Craig shoved back and jumped to his feet. His chair bounced against the wall and clattered to its side. “I knew this was a setup.” He slid a hand into his jacket and pulled out a gun. “Call Kaitlan in here. Right now.”

  fifty-nine

  At the crack of the book against hardwood floor, Kaitlan jumped. She jerked around to Margaret and saw the woman hunched over with hands to her head. What—?

  Craig’s seething low voice yanked Kaitlan back to the monitor. Pete had zoomed out his camera to show both men, her grandfather’s face in profile.

  “Say again, old man?”

  Kaitlan’s breath hitched. “Somebody do something!”

  Sam filmed on, Ed standing with his feet apart, arms folded. Pete’s hand hung above the console even as he pushed back his chair and slid to its edge, ready to rise.

  “This can’t work.” Margaret blurted. “He read it in a book.”

  What was she —

  “… you were stupid enough to take pictures of the last one.”

  Kaitlan’s fingers clapped to her mouth. Her grandfather had careened off course. Totally lost it.

  She ogled his profile, seeing fury—and something else. Grim determination.

  In that horrifying second, understanding steamrolled Kaitlan. The filming. He hadn’t lost it. He’d planned for this. If Craig wouldn’t cooperate, her grandfather’s accusations were designed to push him over the edge.

  Had he known all along this is what it would take?

  Craig shoved backward and jumped to his feet with a gun. “Call Kaitlan in here. Right now.”

  “No!” Kaitlan and Margaret both cried. Kaitlan swung toward the door.

  Pete heaved from his chair.

  Ed jumped in Kaitlan’s path and caught her hard by the arm. “You can’t go out there.”

  “Let me go!” She pounded him in the shoulder with a fist.

  He wrapped his arms around her and hung on.

  Pete lumbered around the folding table, right hand pulling up his baggy shirt. A gun poked from a holster around his waist. He grabbed it. “Stay here, everybody—and keep filming.” He opened the door and ran with muted long steps.

  “Kaitlan!” On the monitor Craig bellowed her name toward the office door, eyes fixed on her grandfather. The old man hadn’t moved. “Get in here, or I’m shooting!”

  “She’s not here,” her grandfather snarled.

  “Kaitlan! I’ll give you ten seconds.”

  “Go on, shoot me, you coward.”

  His own murder, on tape—that’s what he wanted. To save her from Craig.

  “Let me go.” Kaitlan struggled to break from Ed’s iron grasp.

  He clung tighter.

  She squirmed around to watch the monitor. Onscreen Craig’s head jerked as if he’d heard a noise. He sidestepped toward the office door, out of camera range.

  Margaret surged closer to the table to see, cutting off Kaitlan’s view.

  Crack. Crack.

  Gunshots.

  No!

  Ed started at the sound. His hold on her momentarily loosened. Kaitlan shoved him away and ran.

  “Craig!” She screamed his name as she barreled out the door, veering right. “Craig, I’m here!” Stumbling, she sprinted down the eternal hall, the office so far away, never, ever fast enough to save her stubborn grandfather.

  sixty

  Kaitlan screamed before Ed could stop her.

  Who got shot—Pete or Craig?

  Ed’s eyes cut from the monitor to Kaitlan’s fleeing back. As she hit the door and vanished, he took out after her.

  She screeched her way down the hall. Ed chased, nerves pinging.

  Everything within him wanted to yell for her to stop. But he didn’t dare. He would tackle Kaitlan, pull her into another room … If Craig was still alive he didn’t know Ed was here, another man to fight.

  “Craig!” Kaitlan wailed.

  They passed the living room on their right. Far ahead, across the entryway and in the opposite hall, heaped a body.

  Pete.

  At the edge of the entrance hall, Ed snagged Kaitlan’s shirt. He yanked hard, pulling her backwards. She stumbled and fell against his chest.

  From the office—Craig’s voice. “Stay here, Brooke.”

  E
d swerved toward the kitchen, dragging Kaitlan with him.

  sixty-one

  Heart bludgeoning his chest, Sam stood his ground, camera trained on the monitor. He’d been brought here to film, and veteran that he was, he’d film to the end.

  Margaret flailed two steps and collapsed to her knees.

  “Get up!” he hissed. “Shut the door and come work the remote control.”

  “But—”

  “Do it.”

  “I have to help—”

  “You can’t help out there. You want that man caught; this tape’s the key.”

  Crying, Margaret pulled herself toward the door.

  “Does it lock?”

  “Yes, but they—”

  “Lock it.”

  “What if they need to come—”

  “Lock it.”

  Onscreen Sam couldn’t see Pete. Or Craig. But he’d heard Craig’s voice, commanding Darell to stay put.

  Darell Brooke was pulling to his feet. In four steps he was off-camera. He’d headed not toward the door but across the office.

  Was he calling 911?

  Margaret floundered back to the table.

  “Move the camera around, see if you can pick up Darell.”

  She put a shaky hand to the console and pushed too far. The camera zoomed in on a blank wall. She gripped harder, panning slowly. To the right, Darell’s leg appeared, moving toward the doorway.

  “Follow him.”

  Margaret filmed him until he disappeared around the office threshold.

  Her breath caught. She swiveled around toward the desk. “I’m calling 911.”

  “He may have already done it.”

  “I’m not taking any chances.”

  Sam heard her snatch up the phone and punch three numbers. Her voice trembled as she gave the address. “Hurry. I think someone’s already been shot.”

  She banged down the receiver. “I have to open the gate.”

  The gate. Sam had forgotten.

  Nothing on the screen. The action had moved elsewhere.

  He needed to get it on film.

  Sam turned from the monitor. “Stay here, I’ll do it. Lock the door behind me.”

  sixty-two

  Darell yanked open his desk drawer and extracted his gun. A Glock 17—possibly the same model Craig wielded. It was fully loaded. Darell had inspected it this morning when he moved it from his bedroom nightstand where he kept it.

  He transferred his cane to his left hand and clutched the gun with his right.

  Darell hurried from the office. Pete Lynch lay in the hallway.

  Darell stopped and cranked his body into a stoop. He reached out his gnarled hand holding the Glock, hovered his knuckles in front of Pete’s nose.

  No air.

  With effort he straightened. He cast desperate looks around the body. No sign of Pete’s gun either. Craig had taken it. He was after Kaitlan.

  Idiot girl had been screaming like a banshee. Where had she gone?

  Darell turned around to peer at his bedroom door. What if Craig was hiding in there?

  No. He’d have followed the sound of Kaitlan’s voice.

  Darrel shuffled around and hurried up the hall.

  Had Sam gotten everything on film? Craig, pulling a gun. It wasn’t a murder, but it should be enough.

  With perfect clarity Darell saw Craig’s immediate plan. Wouldn’t Darell have his antagonist do the same, if he were writing the scene? Craig couldn’t just shoot them. First he had to squeeze names out of them—who else had they told?

  How long before Craig discovered others in the house?

  In the distance, somewhere off the entryway—a noise.

  Kaitlan.

  “Craig Barlow!” Darell thumped over the hardwood. “You want to kill somebody, here I am!”

  sixty-three

  On her knees in the kitchen, Kaitlan huddled with Ed behind the cooking island. Ed was crouched down, ready to spring. He’d grabbed a frying pan off the cook top, as if that would do any good.

  Craig would be here in seconds. They wouldn’t get out of this alive.

  She’d seen Pete’s body down near the office. If Ed hadn’t pulled her back, Craig would have already gotten to her. She hadn’t cared then. She’d only been driven to save her grandfather.

  “He’s okay,” Ed had whispered, dragging her away.

  Pete. Kaitlan wanted to mourn the man, but she felt strangely empty. She had no time to feel.

  If only they could get Pete’s gun.

  Somewhere down the south wing, her grandfather yelled for Craig.No. Kaitlan’s eyes squeezed shut.

  Crack-crack-crack. Gunshots rang from the north wing.

  Ed stiffened. Kaitlan pressed against him.

  A stifled yell. Something heavy crashed. The news camera?

  Sam.

  Ed’s chin dropped, as if he guessed the same.

  Deathly silence followed.

  Kaitlan pressed a fist to her mouth, breath roughening her throat.

  Footsteps entered the kitchen.

  sixty-four

  When the shots fired, Margaret knew. Sam hadn’t made it up the hall.

  It should have been her. If he hadn’t gone in her place …

  A sob caught in her throat. Was everyone else dead?

  Through blurry eyes she checked the monitor. The office remained empty.

  She flung toward the desk and grabbed the phone to call 911 again. How would the Sheriff’s Department get here with the gate locked?

  No dial tone.

  She punched the Talk button off, on, off, on.

  Silence.

  Margaret dropped the phone and did the only thing left to do. She prayed.

  sixty-five

  Craig approached the kitchen, muscles taut.

  A gun in each hand, he’d run up the long hallway in seconds flat, the trained, fit policeman chasing his prey. He was the good guy, Kaitlan the bad. He had to view it that way.

  He was in this now. No alternative but to see it through.

  Passing the TV room he’d had the presence of mind to veer inside and stuff the gun from the man he’d just shot under the pillow of a couch. He didn’t need it; he had plenty ammunition himself. Not to mention backup if absolutely necessary.

  On a table near the sofa where he’d hidden the man’s gun, Craig spotted a phone. He knocked it off the hook.

  Then, calmly, he proceeded to find Kaitlan.

  When she last screamed it had been from somewhere near the entryway. Then—poof. Gone. She couldn’t have made it to the stairs.

  The entrance area spilled to a hall leading toward the back of the house. Through a wide door Craig glimpsed tiled floor, the edge of cabinets. Kaitlan could have gone without his seeing her.

  He headed toward it.

  Sudden motion to his left. He pivoted, gun pointed. A man was running up the long wing from the other side of the house. With a news camera.

  Craig pulled the trigger three times. The man tumbled to the floor. His camera crashed and skidded.

  A newsman. Craig’s breath bottled in his throat. What had Darell Brooke done?

  Craig started for the equipment, thinking to find the film and rip it out. Four steps down the hall he turned back. He would take care of it later. First—Kaitlan.

  The minute he’d hit the kitchen Craig heard Brooke calling his name from down toward the office. Yeah, yeah, old man. Wait till you see your granddaughter die.

  He stepped onto the tile.

  sixty-six

  Kaitlan pressed her palms to her thighs, every muscle gathered to run. She could see Ed’s knuckles whiten around the handle of the frying pan.

  Frying pan. A hysterical giggle birthed and died in her throat. How insane, this scene.

  “Kaitlan.” Craig’s voice sounded hard and cold. “I know you’re back here somewhere.”

  She glanced at the short hall leading to the garage. He wouldn’t know if she had gone that way. He’d have to pass the cooking island to
check.

  “Hear your grandfather calling for me?” The footsteps came closer. They stopped near the other side of the island. “Come out now or when he gets here, I’ll shoot him. I figure you got about thirty seconds.”

  No.

  Kaitlan rose. Just like that. Craig stood a mere seven feet away, gun pointed.

  She nudged Ed with a foot—stay down.

  “Well, there you are.” Craig smiled, so cool, so good-looking in his brown sport jacket. Or so she once would have thought. “You’ve led me on quite a chase.”

  “How did you know? That he’s my grandfather.”

  His lips curved to a smirk. “I’ve known since the beginning.”

  Kaitlan searched for words and found none. Her mind had blanked to white.

  She gripped the slick tile of the counter. Maybe if she told him she was pregnant … But that wouldn’t stop him. Not now.

  Sound filtered from the hall—a muted shuffle. Her grandfather, trying to be quiet.

  In a casual move Craig turned and fired.

  “No!”

  From outside her line of sight came her grandfather’s wrenching “hngk!” She heard him fall.

  Kaitlan screamed. Blindly she shoved back from the island. Run, run to him! she told her feet, but they cemented to the floor.

  Craig lunged around the island for her.

  Ed leapt up, whipped back the frying pan like a baseball bat, and swung. He smashed Craig square in the cheek.

  “Ah!” Craig dropped to the ground. The gun flew from his hand and spun around on the tile. Ed threw down the pan with a clang and heaved toward the weapon.

  Dazed, Craig thrust himself up on one elbow and caught Ed’s ankle. Ed dove toward the floor, chin first.

  Kaitlan screamed again and jumped from their path. Ed landed half on top of Craig, and the two men grappled. They clutched, seeking hold, punching each other’s heads. Kaitlan’s eyes jerked with their movements, trying to find the gun. Neither held it.

  They rolled to one side, Ed on the bottom. Black metal poked from beneath his thigh.

  Kaitlan stumbled forward, reaching shaking fingers for the gun. The men rolled again. The gun disappeared.

  Ed slugged Craig in the temple. Craig’s head ricocheted to the side. Rage flamed his face red, a vein throbbing in his forehead. He slapped his hands around Ed’s throat and squeezed.