by Cynthia Eden
“Baby.” He grabbed her, pulling her close, his hands running over her desperately.
He couldn’t find her wound.
“Fiona,” she whispered. “We have to get her out!”
He turned. Dani had already found the other woman. Her flashlight bathed the still figure on the floor. The figure with blood soaking her shirt, and a knife still stuck in her chest.
Dani reached out a tentative hand. Touched the woman’s throat.
“She’s still alive,” Cadence said, speaking quickly, desperately. “We can help her.”
“She’s dead.” Dani’s soft voice told them.
A hard sob choked in Cadence’s throat. “It’s Fiona! She just wanted to go home!” Then Cadence yanked away from him. “He’s still here! He was just here! We have to find him!”
They were going to find the SOB. No, he was. Cadence needed to get to safety. “Dani, take Cadence out of here. I’ll keep heading through the tunnels. I’ll find the bastard.”
“No!” Cadence’s shout. Then she didn’t wait for him to argue. She lunged away from him and ran through the door. Heather hurried back, but she moved too slowly. Cadence grabbed the flashlight from the woman’s hands and fled deeper into the caverns.
“Cadence!” The echo of his shout reverberated as he raced after her.
She didn’t stop at his call.
Was she even looking at the ground? The bastard had planned to cover his tracks before. Why not this time?
“Cadence! Look out for trip wires!”
She didn’t slow. He saw the light bobbing as she ran.
He kicked up his speed, getting closer and closer to her.
He reached out his hand, but before he could grab her, she fell, tumbling down, face first, and he knew she’d tripped on something.
Kyle expected the explosion to rock through those caverns at any moment.
He expected hell to come calling and he threw himself toward Cadence. He’d protect her with his body. Maybe she’d make it out alive.
Only no explosion came.
A sob broke from Cadence. “I found them.”
Her light had fallen to the ground, too, and its beam focused in the middle of the tunnel, on the object that had tripped her.
A skeleton.
No, not just one skeleton.
His own light flashed down the tunnel.
One.
Two.
Three.
The bones stretched in the darkness. A deadly trail.
The victims were now found. Bones. A graveyard in the dark.
But where was the bastard who’d done this to them? Where?
Kyle pulled Cadence to her feet. Held her close. She was shaking against him. Trying to jerk free. “He’s here! We have to go after him!”
Kyle locked his arms around her. “Reinforcements are coming. We’ll search the tunnels. Every damn space in here, I swear.” He breathed the words against her ear.
She didn’t stop struggling. “He’s getting away! Dammit, you wanted to stop him.”
He shook her. Hard. “I want you.” Fuck, didn’t she get that? “I want you safe. I want you out of here.”
She didn’t even have a gun. She was going to run blindly through the darkness? Where the killer could be waiting with his booby traps any moment?
No.
He wanted the bastard. But…
Not at the price of her life.
Footsteps rushed toward them in the darkness.
Keeping a tight hold on Cadence, he whirled, shining his light on their company.
Heather. Randall. They were both out of breath. Both gasping.
His hold tightened on Cadence. “You did your job, baby. You found another lair.”
The tricky bastard. This made three kill sites. Three. Talk about confidence.
“This place connects with the other tunnels,” Cadence whispered. “Fiona said it all connected.”
Then they’d search until they’d covered every possible inch in the caverns. But they weren’t going in blind. It was what the killer wanted. For them to chase after him so he could spring another trap.
Not happening.
“Get Cadence out of here,” he said as he forced his hands to release her. He didn’t want to release her. He wanted to hold her tight. To make sure she was okay.
She needed to be checked out. She’d been in a car crash. Who the hell knew what that bastard had done to her after that?
“I don’t want to go,” Cadence said as she dug in her heels. “I can help.”
“You already have.” They’d set up guards at the entrance to that hell. No one would get out that way. “We’re going to send teams searching through here. We’re going to find every secret the bastard has.”
So many of those secrets were right there. Their bones laid out in a macabre grave.
Is Maria there?
He slammed the door on that thought. He wouldn’t go there.
Not yet.
He had to hold onto his control. Not let the rage and fear break through.
Cadence needed him.
He needed her.
“Come with me,” Heather said softly. “It’s okay, Agent Hollow.” Her voice was low, soothing.
“Fuck that,” Cadence snapped back. “Nothing’s okay. You’ve got a sick, twisted SOB out here. He’s been hunting his victims for over fifteen years. Nothing’s going to be okay until we have him tossed in a cage, because he won’t stop, not until then. He won’t stop!”
“Cadence…”
She choked back a sob. “I couldn’t save Fiona.” She lifted her hands. The cuffs glinted. “If I took the knife out, she would’ve bled out faster. He left me with her, and there was nothing I could do.”
She was breaking him. Cadence backed away.
“I can get the cuffs off you, ma’am,” Heather said, still in the soothing voice. “Come with me. I have something we can use in my car.”
“I was supposed to save her,” Cadence whispered.
“Please, ma’am,” Heather pushed softly.
Cadence moved toward her. Her steps were wooden. Slow. But she left Kyle.
Cadence glanced back. “Screw his rules,” she said. “Screw him.”
Kyle didn’t move. He just stared after her until she vanished with Heather. Then he forced himself to speak. “There are bodies here,” he said to Hollings. “We’re gonna need an evidence-and-retrieval team down here.” Not just local guys. Ben would make sure they had the best team they could get. He’d fly them in.
“Is he here?” Hollings whispered.
Kyle stared down the darkened tunnel. “Get the ropes because we’re about to fucking find out.”
There were too many lights outside. Bright lights flashing from the police cruisers. Headlights turned on high. Searchlights. Local county officers were running around, desperately trying to secure the scene as the rain continued to pound them.
“Chaos,” Cadence whispered as she rubbed at the goose bumps on her arms. This would be just the type of scene the perp wanted. He could slip right out with all these people here. All he’d need was a cop uniform. Or maybe even the clothes of an EMT.
“Agent Hollow?” The EMT frowned at her as Heather pushed her toward the ambulance. Heather had gotten the handcuffs off, as promised, then she’d started yelling for medical help.
I don’t need help.
“Agent Hollow,” the EMT insisted, “I need to examine you.”
“I’ve got a concussion. I don’t have blurry vision, no memory loss. No shaking. I’m fine.”
His gaze slid to Heather.
“We understand why you did it,” Heather said softly. “It’s okay, Agent Hollow. She came at you, you must have needed to defend yourself.”
Cadence blinked. “What are you talking about?”
Heather licked her lips. “The woman in the room with you. The woman you killed.”
“I didn’t kill her!”
“You were alone with her. The knife was in
her chest. Her blood was on you.”
Oh, hell. “My fingerprints are going to be on that knife, too,” Cadence threw out as her head throbbed. “Just mine because the SOB was smart enough to wear gloves.” He was so much smarter than the average predator and that was why he’d been able to get away with his kills for so long. “But I didn’t kill her. I tried to save Fiona!”
“Fiona?” Heather’s voice trembled and her eyes widened. “You mean Fiona Slater?”
“She was working with him.” She raised a hand, rubbing her eyes. “No, not working with him. That’s not what happened. She thought if she helped him bring me in, she’d be free. That I’d take her place.” Only that hadn’t been the killer’s plan.
If Fiona had killed Cadence, then the SOB would have kept her alive. Because he would have proven he had ultimate control over her.
But when Fiona had refused…he took her life away.
“That’s why you stabbed her?” Heather asked, her face solemn. “She was working with—”
“He stabbed her because she wouldn’t kill me.” Her voice was brittle. “Fiona was desperate to be free. Desperate to get her life back, but she wasn’t going to kill another person, no matter what he wanted. When she didn’t do it, he drove the knife into her heart and left her there with me. Left her to die.” She looked down at her hands and realized they were covered with blood. No wonder Heather’s eyes held so much suspicion. “I thought I might be able to keep her alive long enough for help to arrive.”
If only.
“I didn’t take the knife out.” Her words were wooden. “That would have just made her bleed out faster. The knife stayed in, I tried to keep her calm.” Every breath Cadence took seemed to hurt her. “She just wanted to go home.” Her shoulders slumped as the rain pelted her. “I couldn’t stop her.”
Fiona Slater was finally free.
Cadence looked back at the entrance to the gaping cavern. The bushes had been shoved aside. More men armed with bright lights were slipping inside.
Some were coming out.
“Every man here…” Cadence fixed her stare back on Heather. “Take their pictures. Get their IDs. Check them all.”
Heather’s brows climbed. “Didn’t he run away through the tunnel?”
Had he? Or had the guy just been waiting for his moment to escape? “He blends. He slips away.” Nausea was rising in her throat. She couldn’t seem to stop weaving on her feet. “Every man here. Get a record of everyone.”
Heather nodded and hurried away.
“Agent Hollow?” The EMT pressed. “I need to examine you.”
She turned to look at him. His shoulders were narrow and he was small in height, barely around five foot five.
“You’re not fine.” He emphasized her word. “With a concussion.”
“You know that,” she muttered. “I know that.” The killer didn’t.
Her knees buckled.
The EMT caught her and pulled her into the back of the ambulance.
He’d counted six skulls. Six gleaming skulls in the darkness.
Six victims.
And one glittering necklace. A silver chain. A half-moon hung from the chain, a moon encrusted with small diamonds.
The necklace lay in the dirt, right next to a skull.
He couldn’t take his gaze off the necklace.
Maria. Blood pounded in his temples. He sucked in deep gulps of air even as a hard tremble ran the length of his body.
“Agent McKenzie?”
He’d been reaching for the necklace. His hand fisted. “Tell the techs to use every care here. These are people.” Not bones. Loved ones.
Women who’d been beautiful in life. Happy.
His light swept away from the necklace.
He made himself advance carefully through the maze of caverns, using the rope to make certain he didn’t get lost in the endless night. His light swept ahead. No trip wires. No sign of anyone up there.
His light hit on the outline of wood. Just like the wood that had blocked the chamber Cadence had been held in.
Another door. A very old one.
“I heard that back during the war,” came the voice of Hollings behind him, “Confederates had secret gunpowder rooms hidden in the area. They stored guns and weapons, trying to keep ’em out of Union hands.”
Their hideaways had been left behind, the perfect prison for their perp to use.
A long, heavy bar slid across the front of the door. A bar designed not to keep people out.
But to hold someone in.
He wrapped his hand around the bar. Was another victim inside? He pulled it back, and the old metal groaned.
When the door opened seconds later, he was holding tight to his gun and his light.
His light swept the interior of the chamber, landing on a bed, a bucket…
“Agent McKenzie?”
He turned at Hollings’s hesitant voice. His light hit the man, and the video camera in his hand.
“A camera. It was right here,” Hollings said, “half in the wall.”
He kept them down here, and he watched them.
The sick SOB.
“We’re gonna need Dani.” The camera wouldn’t be able to transmit too far. Not down here with all the rocks. They had been going down as they walked. He’d felt the incline.
The man would want to see his prisoner. Watch her all the time.
Kyle stalked out of the room. Hollings was with him. Fuck, the rope didn’t have any more slack. There were no sounds of other footsteps behind them.
Or in front.
To keep searching, they were going to need more help.
He wasn’t ready to give up.
The camera…the room…
He’d seen hell. So had the women the perp had taken.
Hell was a small, five-by-eight-foot chamber. A room with no lights or windows. A room smelling of human waste and decay.
A room with no hope.
Only death.
Deep inside, Kyle knew the room had been the last thing his sister had ever seen.
I’m going to kill you, bastard. I don’t care about doing what’s right. You’re not going to see the inside of a cell. You won’t fucking get off that easily.
A calm settled over him. Chilling him.
The death wouldn’t be easy because the SOB didn’t deserve easy.
He deserved to suffer, as all his victims had suffered.
Kyle would make sure he didn’t get an easy end.
“Looks like we’ve recovered the remains of six victims in those caverns.” Ben Griffin’s voice was soft. “Seven, counting Fiona.”
Cadence flinched at his words. She hadn’t even realized he’d been next to her. She’d been sitting there, her eyes glued to the entrance of the cavern.
Fiona Slater had just been brought out. Judith had already been secured inside a black body bag. The growing sunlight peeked through the remnants of the clouds and fell on the bag.
Fiona was free.
“You did a good job, Cadence.”
Good job, her ass. Cadence pushed to her feet. The dizziness was mild this time. She only staggered a little bit. She dropped the blanket that had been wrapped around her shoulders and squared off with Ben. “He got away.”
Ben shook his head. “They’re still searching the caverns.”
“He left the minute the FBI arrived. As soon as he realized what was happening, he was gone.” She waved toward the scene. “He was one of the ones who just walked right out of the cavern.”
Ben frowned at her.
“He’s authoritative. He knows the area intimately. He’s dominant. Smart. He’s…one of us. He’s working the case because I’m betting he was tipped off the minute the authorities started closing in on this place.” Her words came, faster and faster. “The reason no one has ever been found? He knows what the authorities are gonna do before they do it.”
“Cadence.” His voice was so calm. It made her want to scream. “Cadence, you need to go back
to your motel. Get some sleep. You recovered eight victims.”
“Fiona Slater was alive seven hours ago. If I’d really done my job, she would still be alive right now.” A brutal truth. One that would haunt Cadence the rest of her life. “Her death is on me.”
Ben’s fingers locked around her shoulders. Ben. He’d always been a good friend. But one tough, demanding boss. “It’s on him,” Ben gritted out. “Not you. It’s on that sick prick who gets off on torturing women.”
“It’s not about torture.” She saw that. Torture was a means to an end. “It’s control. He controls everything. He makes them into what he wants them to be.”
If they didn’t live up to his expectations…
He eliminated them.
Ben’s hold on her tightened. “Cadence, did you see his face?”
She shook her head. “It was too dark.” That consuming darkness had been all around her. Then…his light. The blinding light had come from his helmet. The echo of fear beat through her, but she pushed it back. Cadence remembered that light. Remembered him. “I know he’s approximately six foot three, maybe four. Broad shoulders. Strong.”
“If you didn’t see his face, you can’t say he’s one of the men here.” He leaned toward her. “We can’t accuse the local cops. Do you know what kind of media nightmare that would be? You didn’t see him. You were concussed. Trapped in the dark. Hell, take the win, okay?”
The win? Where was the win? Was the win the woman in the body bag?
“We can give those eight families closure now. They can finally bury their daughters.”
They’d rather be hugging them. Welcoming them home. She swallowed, trying to ease the tightness in her throat. Cadence tore her eyes off Ben and looked over his shoulder. Kyle stalked from the cavern. When he saw them, his eyes narrowed.
“I’m not sure.” Her voice was soft, weak, because there was no proof to back up what she had to say next.
She only had the push in her gut. Instincts.
The hope that had been born when she realized Fiona Slater had survived for so long.
Hope that hadn’t died with Fiona. Hope that was too stubborn to die now. They’d had two live victims.
“I’m not sure they are all dead.” A whispered confession just to Ben. She’d whispered her words to Ben because she was afraid to give those words to Kyle.