The Lover: The Luke Titan Chronicles #3

by David Beers

  “Plus Veronica. He ditched her after everything that happened. You’re still her therapist, right?”

  Luke nodded. He picked his wine glass up and breathed in deeply, swirled the dark liquid around, and then breathed in again. He finally took a sip, closing his eyes as he did.

  “How is she?”

  “Well, at this point, she’s better than Christian. He did hurt her, though. Maybe more than Speckle did.”

  Veronica Lopez had probably gotten involved with the wrong group, as far as Tommy was concerned. She was a reporter, and started interviewing Luke about a project he’d worked on in his previous career. Since then, she’d been kidnapped twice by two separate serial killers—and of course, both times were because of her connection with Tommy and Luke’s FBI division: Exceptional Crimes Unit.

  She had, unfortunately as well, fallen in love with Christian. And now the kid (is that the right word, Tommy?) wanted nothing to do with her.

  “That poor woman,” Tommy said and shook his head. After a few seconds, he looked across the table. “Look, we have to do something. He needs, like, an intervention.”

  Luke chuckled. “Those are reserved for addicts, but I understand your meaning. Give me a week or so and let me think about it.”

  Luke sat alone in his living room. The house was dark except for the lights shining in from his estate’s yard. The living room curtains were drawn, letting him view the large lawn. His new car sat in the wrap-around driveway, though Luke paid no attention to it. He stared out the window at the perfectly cut grass, but his mind was elsewhere.

  Fourteen months had passed since Luke forced Christian’s hand in Lucy Speckle’s storage unit. Luke had been planning such an action for some time, but the end result surpassed even his expectations.

  Their little group had solved three crimes in the past fourteen months, and Christian’s work was top notch. Luke often wondered what his internal mansion looked like—the place Christian went when he made the incredible leaps that led to apprehending criminals. At the beginning of Lucy Speckle’s spree, Christian had grown scared of that place; but now Luke thought he might spend more time inside that mansion than he did in reality.

  It must be a wondrous place, Luke thought.

  Despite what Luke told Tommy at dinner, he had no intentions of bringing Christian out of the cold place he now found himself in. Christian’s life had never been a place of spring, or even summer. Christian’s high-functioning autism had made his life one of autumn, where things could be peaceful, but the fear of winter was always around the corner. Luke believed winter had finally set upon Christian, bringing with it a freeze that no life could hope to spring from.

  Unfortunately, Luke couldn’t force Christian’s continuing demise. The past fourteen months hadn’t presented an opportunity for Luke to dive deeper into his psyche, to push through the final barriers that were separating him from his fate.

  A weird word, that. Fate. Especially given Luke’s purpose in life.

  Something would happen, Luke decided. Another opportunity would present itself, and when it did, he would ensure that the temperature surrounding Christian dropped below zero.

  While Luke sat alone in his house, Christian did the same in his office.

  The computer screen lit part of the room while the rest of the lights were off. He knew the time, but only because his mind constantly kept up with every detail around him. At three in the morning, Christian hadn’t moved from his computer since Tommy asked him to dinner.

  He was on to something, and no one else in the country saw it.

  Another woman went missing on Wednesday. No law enforcement organizations had made the connection because the pattern was almost impossible to see. Christian himself hadn’t truly believed it until Wednesday, but now it stared at him like a bright red line on a map that contained nothing else but black streets.

  Five women over two years. One every four months, and four months to the day. One from Georgia, where Christian lived. Another in Florida. Then, South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia, and finally D.C. this past Wednesday.

  Six missing women over two years wasn’t much to go off of, though, and Christian knew it. If he had allowed himself any kind of life outside of work, he would have missed the pattern. Perhaps no one would have seen it, not if the killer kept going at such a slow pace, and with what appeared to be random abductions.

  They’re not random, though, Christian thought as he read over the D.C. police report again. He didn’t need to; his mind had stored all of its information inside his mansion. He read it because he wasn’t ready to go inside the mansion yet. Even if he hadn’t told Melissa, he knew he was spending too much time in there. Finding it more comfortable than the actual world. He spent hours each day inside his mansion—when before, it had always been a support for life, not life support.

  The kidnappings weren’t random because of how they occurred. Four months, six states, six women, and each one of them taken at a bar. Additionally, each woman had been spotted with a man right before the kidnapping. The same description each time: dark hair, dark eyes, approximately six feet tall, and white.

  Only one bar possessed video recording and Christian had requested a copy last night. He probably wouldn’t get it until Wednesday of next week, but if Christian was right, he had four months to catch this guy. Then, another woman would go missing.

  Chapter 3

  “Hey.”

  Keely Wright’s eyes slowly opened.

  “Hey,” the voice whispered again.

  Keely blinked a few times, unsure why she couldn’t see anything. Everything before her was black—she couldn’t even see the person speaking.

  “Can you hear me?” the voice asked. “I don’t think he’s here anymore. He’s at work, wherever the fuck that is.”

  He? Who is he? Keely wondered, but only for a second. Her mind shoved the confusion away, bringing forth memories that Keely wished with all her heart she didn’t have.

  Everything came back at once, a cold tidal wave that threatened to drown her. She remembered why it was so dark in here, and why she had been asleep to begin with. The man, Ted, had hit her on the head last night.

  Why did he hit me? she wondered.

  “SHUT UP!” he had screamed at her. He’d been sitting right in front of her, legs crossed, and trying to talk to her as if she wasn’t chained to a fucking wall.

  “My name is Sarah,” the voice said again, and Keely was able to place more of a location on it. A woman, obviously, and to Keely’s right. “How’s your head? I heard him hit you last night.”

  “Whuh-Where am I?” Keely asked.

  “I don’t know. Somewhere in Virginia?”

  “I’m not from Virginia,” Keely whispered. She slowly sat up against the wall. The chains attached to her hands and feet scraped across the floor, creating an eerie scratching noise.

  “Where are you from?”

  “D.C..”

  A few seconds of silence passed, and then a completely obvious question burst in Keely’s mind like a dirty bomb—biological poison floating across her brain.

  “He took you too?”

  “Yes. But, I’m from South Virginia. So we may not be in either state.” The woman spoke fast and Keely didn’t know if she understood the importance of Keely’s question. She had answered it too quickly to really see what was happening.

  “We’ve been kidnapped,” Keely said. “He’s kidnapped us. Kidnapped us!” Her voice grew more shrill with each word, a red panic rising in her mind and blocking out all hope of concentrating on anything else.

  “HEY!” Sarah yelled, her voice echoing off the walls. “Don’t. Freak. Out.”

  Keely stopped screeching. She heard another voice from across the room, a tiny little scream let loose from someone’s mouth. It died as quickly as it was born.

  “Who’s there?” Keely almost shouted.

  “There’s other women in here with us,” Sarah said. “They don’t talk, though. None of
them do. I’m the only one that will talk to you, and I think you should listen to me for a little while. Ted’ll be back soon, and when he is, you’re going to want to avoid any more hits to the head.”

  Keely was quiet. This was too much to take in at once.

  “Are you listening to me?” Sarah whispered.

  “Yeh-yes.”

  “You can’t panic, okay? If you do, you’re going to lose it and when he gets back, he’ll hurt you again. The reason these women don’t talk is because he’s hurt them a lot … What’s your name?”

  Keely. Only no words came out. Keely didn’t notice, though. Shock was threatening to take over, commanding everything to shut down so that it could take her to a place where this didn’t exist.

  “What’s your name?” Sarah asked again.

  “Keely,” she managed to say.

  “Okay, Keely. I’m Sarah. I’ll tell you what I know, but you have to promise to try and listen? Don’t freak out on me, okay?”

  “Okay,” Keely said, though she didn’t know how that would be possible.

  Ted stood at his basement door, not yet opening it. Last night hadn’t gone as he wanted. Actually, the past few days hadn’t gone as he wanted. Ted was beginning to think it was the women’s ages that created such discord in his home. The first four had been thirty-five to forty years old. The last two were under thirty. Sarah was finally starting to come around, but the past few days with Keely had reminded him so much of Sarah’s last four months, that Ted almost killed her last night.

  His knuckles were bruised and Georgia had noticed them at work. It was the first time she’d noticed something, but that was one time too many.

  These goddamn bitches were causing him more trouble than they were worth. It took fucking months to break them in, so he could finally bring them up to the house’s ground level and consummate their marriage. Months.

  If Keely didn’t fix her attitude right away, Ted was going to call it quits with her. Maybe Sarah, too, just for the hell she’d already put him through.

  “Calm down,” he whispered. Ted stood about a foot in front of the door. His hands were clenched in fists and he had to consciously open them, each finger feeling like a massive weight.

  It was his weekend to have his daughter, Callie. He didn’t want to be dealing with Keely while hanging out with Callie during his visitation time.

  Is it getting to be too much? he wondered. Should you just end it? Maybe you only need a small family. One or two wives. Not six.

  A frown crossed Ted’s face at the thought. He wanted a big family. He’d always wanted a big family and didn’t see any reason why he shouldn’t have one. It had been Christy who only wanted one child. She was the one who dashed his hopes of a large family.

  Ted shook his head, trying to come back to the moment. He needed to go to the basement and talk with Keely. He needed her to understand that what she’d been doing wouldn’t continue any longer.

  Ted opened the basement door and walked down the stairs. He always left the door open, though he knew it probably wasn’t the smartest thing to do. The basement was pretty much sound proof, but with the door open, it was possible that a neighbor might hear the women if they really got loud. Ted couldn’t bring himself to close the door, though, because he knew how large his shadow looked with the light on behind him. He must look like a God to the women below while descending the stairs.

  Ted didn’t go directly to Keely. She said nothing as he crossed the basement. He could somewhat see her, a nasty bruise across the side of her face where he hit her the previous night. He wasn’t going to risk his knuckles anymore—not for some bitch that hadn’t even given him a chance to prove himself.

  He went to the toolbox that sat against the wall. He squatted and opened it, rooting around inside until he felt what he was looking for: the rubber mallet. With that in his hand, he walked over to Keely and sat down in front of her, crossing his legs Indian-style.

  “How’s your head?” he asked.

  Her hands and arms were attached to a chain made up of half-inch links. It was one chain, with four cuffs attached, strung through a clip that he’d bolted into the wall above her. The chain had enough give to allow her to stand, but not enough to reach where he sat.

  Keely said nothing. She didn’t look at him, but stared down at her knees that she held against her chest.

  “Keely, I asked you a question,” he said.

  The girl shook her head slightly, but Ted couldn’t tell if she was answering him.

  “How. Is. Your. Head?”

  Ted’s left hand turned into a fist, and his right one curled tighter around the mallet. She had to see the fucking thing, sitting right there in between his legs. She had to see him go to the toolbox, getting it especially for her. In case she decided to give him more trouble.

  But she still wasn’t respecting him. And maybe this silence was worse than being screamed at. He wasn’t even worth answering; is that what she was trying to say?

  “Keely ….” He was breathing heavier now and thoughts of Christy started coming to his mind. The way she used to make him mad like this, getting under his skin until he could barely talk.

  “SHUT THE FUCK UP!” the woman screamed at him. She sprung up quickly, her chains losing their slack and straining against the bolt above as she lunged at him. She hung suspended from the chains, leaning forward, her teeth snarling at him. “LET ME OUT! LET ME OUT! LET ME THE FUCK OUT OF HERE!”

  Ted’s left hand uncurled from its fist. He stared up at the woman that he had risked so much for, transporting her across multiple state lines and bringing her here to his home—to her home.

  Ted stood, the woman still leaning forward on the chains. He heard the metal grinding together as it supported her weight.

  “LET ME OUT OF HERE!” she screamed again, spittle misting Ted’s face.

  He brought the mallet up and slammed it into her temple. A meaty whack spoke back to him and Ted saw her head move in slow motion as it jerked to the right. All her muscles gave out at once and her right eye bulged forward in her skull.

  She collapsed to the floor.

  Ted stood above her. He watched her chest move up and down, though very shallowly. He didn’t give much thought to his next decision. He simply brought the mallet down with two hard smacks, each one landing on the back of her head.

  Keely’s chest stopped moving.

  Ted looked across the room to Sarah. She was standing but hadn’t said a word. Her eyes darted to the floor when she saw him looking.

  “I …,” he started to say before realizing he didn’t know what came next. Ted dropped the mallet and walked over to Brittany. He wasn’t dealing with Sarah today. Or Keely, anymore. He reached into his pocket and pulled out his keys, then reached down and took the cuffs off Brittany. She was docile as he walked her across the basement and up the stairs.

  That’s why he loved her.

  She knew how to act.

  He would make love to her and then deal with the mess Keely just created.

  “You’re a son-of-a-bitch,” Christy Mackenrow said.

  “It can’t be helped,” her son-of-a-bitch ex-husband, Ted, said.

  “Just like it couldn’t be helped last time? To be honest, I don’t even care that you don’t see her. I prefer it actually. What I can’t stand, is having to tell her again that you won’t be picking her up.”

  “Tell her I’ll see her in two weeks,” Ted said.

  Christy looked across her kitchen. The old rage had risen again, as it did so easily whenever she spoke to this man. She didn’t understand how she’d ever loved him or why she once said yes to his marriage proposal. Except for Callie and the joy she brought, it was the singular worst decision of Christy’s life. If she lived a hundred more lifetimes, she wouldn’t be able to rival it.

  “Fine,” she said.

  “Thanks.”

  Christy hung up the phone without saying anything else. She sat stewing in her anger for a few minutes befo
re deciding to get on the bike downstairs. She didn’t even bother changing out of her jeans, just simply walked down and hopped on. She turned on the television, but only to have background noise. She could never focus on anything when Ted got to her like this.

  He doesn’t sound well, she thought, and then, Fuck him.

  Callie was only eleven, but it was getting harder and harder to explain Ted’s absences. It’s not like he was some kind of deadbeat. The man was a tenured professor of business, and at a decent school, too. There wasn’t any excuse for him simply blowing her off like this all the time.

  How many times has it been this year? She didn’t need to count, though. She knew the number by heart. Six times. He was supposed to have visitation every other weekend, but sometimes he went as long as a month without seeing his daughter. It might be better if he spoke to Callie, but he didn’t. He always left Christy to deal with the details.

  Maybe she should go back to court and try getting visitation taken away. She hadn’t done it yet because she truly wanted Callie to have her father in her life, but what was this doing to her? Would it be better to simply cut him off so that Callie didn’t have to deal with this disappointment?

  Sweat popped out across Christy’s forehead and she kept pedaling.

  She should have never married that man.

  Christy Mackenrow pedaled on a bike while Sarah Yields stared at what she thought was a dead body. She hadn’t spoken since everything happened, only looked across the basement at Keely. Ted had left the door open during it all—the light from above shining down and giving Sarah a front row ticket to …

  Murder. That’s what you saw, Sarah-girl. Murder, plain and simple. How’d you like it?

  Keely wasn’t moving.

  “Keely,” Sarah finally whispered. When nothing came back, she tried again, her voice harsher. “Keely!”

  But the body chained to the wall gave no response. Not a single breath exited her lips.