“If you stay put and take your punishment, I won’t shoot you.”
Shoot her? But today was only day ten, wasn’t it? Surely he wouldn’t kill her ahead of schedule, would he?
As if he had read her mind, he added, “I won’t shoot to kill, only to injure. Maybe shoot off a couple of toes.”
She closed her eyes and waited. And prayed. Every instinct within her told her to fight back, not to wait like a cowering whipped dog for her punishment. But if she fought him, he would shoot her. A wound could become infected. And she wouldn’t be able to run from him as quickly during the daily hunt if he shot off any of her toes. When the opportunity came for her to escape, she wanted to be ready and able. And escape is what she thought about when the rope snapped across her back, sending a stinging jolt through her soiled, tattered shirt. As he struck blow after blow, she gritted her teeth and endured as long as she could without screaming. By the tenth strike, the rope had cut through her shirt and connected with bare flesh. By the fifteenth strike, tears streamed down her cheeks. By the twentieth strike, she was moaning in agony.
Griff telephoned Doug Trotter and filled him in on his brief conversation with Nic, then he contacted Sanders and ordered him to relay the information to all the Powell agents in the field. Narrow the search to the areas where antebellum houses still existed and where Spanish moss grew.
He tried to erase the sound of those slaps and Nic’s wounded grunts from his mind, but they replayed over and over again inside his head. If it took him the rest of his life, he would find the sick son of a bitch and kill him. Slowly. Show him no mercy. Torture him the way he had tortured so many others.
When Griff entered the house through the back door, Yvette met him. Apparently, she had been watching for him. “Nicole’s brother just arrived,” she said.
Griff nodded.
“Do you wish to speak to him now or—”
“Yes, of course.” When Yvette reached out to place a comforting hand on his shoulder, he withdrew from her touch.
She eyed him questioningly, then visually searched him from head to toe. Her gaze focused on his right hand. “You’ve injured yourself.”
“It’s nothing. I’m fine.” When he curled his fingers to make a fist, he winced as pain spread through his whole hand.
Disregarding his assurance that he was all right, she grasped his hand. “Do not pull away. I promise I will not trespass into your thoughts.”
He opened his hand and relaxed the tension in his arm. She inspected his skinned knuckles, the blood covering them beginning to dry in spots.
“This needs to be cleaned and an antiseptic applied,” she told him. “And I believe there are several splinters that need to be removed.” She looked directly at him and asked, “What did you do, run your fist through a wooden plank?”
“Through the old boathouse door,” he admitted.
She released his hand, then reached up and caressed his cheek.
Words were not necessary. He understood how much Yvette cared that he was suffering the torment of the damned. He had thought neither of them would ever again have to stand by and watch helplessly while the other endured such anguish. He went with her to the bathroom off the kitchen and allowed her to wash and doctor his hand.
Fifteen minutes later, once he’d had a chance to meditate for a short while and center his thoughts on the positive and not the negative, he walked into the living room where Judd and Lindsay were keeping Nic’s brother company. The moment Griff entered the room, the young man stood and came toward him. Lindsay and Judd excused themselves. Griff and Charles David met halfway, each with outstretched hands. Charles David was a tall, muscular, exceedingly handsome guy, with dark hair and eyes that reminded Griff of Nic’s. The brother and sister bore a strong, almost twinlike resemblance to each other.
They shook hands, then Griff grasped Charles David’s arm and gave him a reassuring squeeze. “I spoke to your sister. She’s alive.”
Tears welled up in the young man’s eyes. “How? When? I don’t understand.”
“Come and sit down.” Griff led Charles David over to the sofa and the two sat opposite each other. “Her captor let me hear her voice. He had instructed her to give me the second clue, the one he had promised to deliver on her tenth day of captivity.”
Charles David gulped, then cleared his throat. “And she gave you the clue.”
“Yes, only not the clue she was supposed to give me. She called out the words ‘Spanish moss’ and ‘antebellum house.’” Griff willed himself to remain calm as he continued. “I heard him scream at her and then the line went dead.”
Griff and Charles David shared a hard stare that spoke louder than any words could have. They both knew that Nic had paid a high price to relay her message.
“I contacted Doug Trotter and gave him the information, and my assistant, Sanders, has been in touch with my agents in the field.”
“I appreciate everything you’re doing to try to find Nicole,” Charles David said. “I know that in the past, the two of you have been adversaries. But the last time I spoke to Nic, she told me that since you two had been working together, she’d begun to think she might have to revise her opinion of you, perhaps downgrade you from lethal to merely dangerous.”
Griff chuckled. “That’s my Nic.”
Charles David eyed Griff speculatively. “You care about my sister and she about you. She’s more to you than just an acquaintance, more than simply someone you’re working with on a case.”
“Yes.”
“I suspected as much.”
When Griff stood, Charles David did, too.
“I’ll have Sanders show you to your room. Please, make yourself at home. And if there’s anything you need, just let us know.”
As if on cue, Sanders appeared in the doorway. Griffin introduced the two men, then excused himself and went directly to his study. He poured himself a drink, downed the aged Scotch in only a few minutes, and then refilled his glass.
He had drugged her last night and when she awoke this morning, her left shoulder blade was sore, as if she had scraped it against the brick wall during the night. Because she had been obedient yesterday and had given him a good hunt, he had brought her back into the house and allowed her to sleep in the basement, but he gave her no food or water.
“I will not completely forgive you for disobeying me,” he’d told her.
After days without food, she had grown accustomed to occasionally feeling faint. Thankfully, she had managed to return every day to the stream that trickled through the woods, so at least she had had water.
Slightly groggy when he came for her, she’d tried her best to clear her mind before he released her for today’s hunt. If she didn’t manage to stay alert and avoid his relentless pursuit, he would punish her by continuing to withhold food and by forcing her back into the cage tonight.
Today was day fourteen.
And from the moment he began their march into the woods at dawn, she sensed that something was different about today. He wouldn’t kill her. It wasn’t time yet. But he had something planned for her. A surprise?
He always released her in the same spot every day. She wasn’t sure if he knew that she was aware of this fact or not. The less he knew about what she was thinking and feeling, the better.
When he removed the leg irons, she stepped up and down several times, walking in place. He grabbed her wrists and unlocked the handcuffs, then pulled them off and tossed them on top of the ankle chains lying on the ground.
She stared at him, silently questioning his action.
“Today, we change the rules and alter our game,” he told her.
She nodded.
“You’re free, nothing binding you, no tracking device so that I can find you at the end of the hunt and bring you in.”
“I don’t understand.”
“I’m letting you go, Nicole.”
She glared at him, knowing there was more, that he would never willingly release her, that
this was just part of the game.
He smiled. “You’ll be allowed to run free, to find food and water and shelter. I will hunt you today, but if I can’t find you, I’ll allow you to stay in the woods tonight. Alone. Not in a cage. Not bound by chains. We will repeat the hunt every day until either you escape or on the final day, I kill you.”
“Day twenty-one,” she said.
“I’ll give you only ten minutes’ head start today, so you’d better run.” He glanced at his wristwatch, then yelled, “Go! Now!”
Nic ran. And ran. And ran.
As soon as she knew she was far enough into the woods where he couldn’t see her, she backtracked and circled around from where she had left him, being careful not to let him spot her and figure out her maneuver. When she knew for sure that he was deep into the woods, she crossed the open fields and headed due north, away from the wooded area in which he had released her.
Nic understood that he had not actually set her free, had not given her a real opportunity to escape. This was simply a new aspect of his game and she couldn’t allow herself to be duped into having false hope, which was what he wanted.
The most important thing for her to remember was not to panic. Every morning, she had reminded herself of that fact. The urge to run blindly, to flee without giving thought to her actions could result not only in an accident, but could adversely affect her judgment and deplete her energy. Keeping her fear under control was essential to her survival.
Not for one minute did she believe that he did not have a way of keeping tabs on her. Otherwise, this final-week segment of their game made no sense. He had to know that she possessed the skills to stay alive and that given this kind of freedom, she could possibly manage to get away from him.
A niggling sense of knowing something without being aware of exactly what she knew plagued Nic as she thought through a plan of action. She needed food and water and, if at all possible, shelter from the nighttime temperatures, which she guessed were dropping into the forties. But she needed to think, to plot, and to plan as she kept moving. If he hadn’t already realized that she had outmaneuvered him, he soon would and he would come after her with a vengeance.
An hour later, winded and thirsty, Nic took a break. She sat down under a towering tree in a dense area of the woods and scratched her itchy back against the tree trunk. She couldn’t stay here for long. She had to keep moving. When she stood, she tried to reach the spot on her back that felt slightly sore and now itchy, but she couldn’t get at it by reaching over her shoulder. She twisted her arm behind her back and raked her fingers an inch below the spot. Close, but not close enough. When she brought her arm to her side, she felt something damp on her fingertips. She looked down and saw a red stain. Damn, she was bleeding. Apparently, she had rubbed her back too vigorously against the tree.
Hour after hour, Nic trekked through the woods, across a stream, over marshy swampland, and back into the woods. Only once had she seen anything that vaguely resembled a road. She had crawled over a dilapidated barbed wire fence and onto the dirt path, which obviously had been a road at one time, but was now overgrown with weeds and grass. She followed the path in the opposite direction of her captor’s antebellum home, hoping beyond hope that this abandoned lane would lead her to an escape route.
Griff knew that the others were worried about him, about the fact that he slept very little, drank more than he ate, took long walks alone, and for the past several days had begun closing himself off in his study for hours on end. They all meant well, and he appreciated their concern, but there was nothing any of them could do to help him. With each passing day, the chances of their finding Nic grew slimmer. Although he hadn’t given up hope entirely—and he wouldn’t as long as there was even the slightest chance Nic was still alive—he was enough of a realist to face harsh reality.
There were far too many places where Spanish moss grew and old antebellum homes existed for the FBI and Powell’s to find all of them before the twenty-one days came to an end. It stood to reason that if her captor considered himself a great hunter and Nic was his chosen prey, he would need some type of hunting ground. But that area could be no more than a dozen or so confined acres or it could be hundreds, even thousands of acres. He could own the land or rent it or could even be using land that didn’t belong to him.
Griff leaned back in the chair, swirled the last drops of whiskey in his glass, downed the liquor, and got up to pour himself a third drink. When he returned to the chair, he gazed into the fireplace at the glowing flame adding warmth and light to the study. Did Nic have heat tonight? Did she have light? Was she alone in the cold darkness, wondering why he hadn’t found her yet?
If we don’t get a break soon, it’s going to be all up to you, Nic. If any woman I know can find a way to escape, it’s you.
Sitting there sipping his drink, gazing into the fire, and allowing the liquor to somewhat dull his senses, Griff barely heard the light rapping on the closed study door.
When he didn’t respond, Yvette called his name.
Please, go away and leave me alone.
After calling his name a second time and not receiving a reply, she walked away. Griff heard the clip-clip of her heels as she walked down the hall. She would never intrude on his privacy, but she would not leave him to his misery. She would come back later. In an hour or two. And eventually, after several attempts, she would insist that he eat a bite and go to bed. This had become a nightly ritual.
Chapter 19
Pudge stood at the front door and watched the light show in the night sky. Streaks of lightning illuminated the darkness and rolling thunder sounded like the beat of jungle drums. He loved storms and had since he was a child. That was something he and Ruddy had had in common. One of the many things.
Ah, dear cousin, I do miss you. Far more than I ever imagined I would. If only I could phone you and tell you about all the fun I’m having with our lovely Nicole.
When the rain began—thick, heavy droplets splattering against the earth—Pudge opened the door and walked onto the veranda. The late-November wind blew the moisture across the porch, hitting him like soft, fat pinpricks. Nic was out there somewhere, in the woods, alone in the storm, probably wet and miserable. She might get sick. Hypothermia was a real possibility. But tomorrow would be day nineteen and as long as she lived two more days, there was no need for his plans to change. Just the thought of that final hunt, of tracking her down and killing her, one shot at a time, excited him almost beyond enduring.
She had been his most cunning prey, just as he had known she would be. She had played the game from every angle, had been obedient beyond his wildest dreams, and then she had shown him her stubbornness and belligerence. She had obeyed him, had fought him, and on several occasions had outsmarted him. She had given him many days of pleasure. And he would miss her when their game ended. But he would keep her scalp in his secret room in the basement, along with all his other trophies. And when he wanted to relive these heady days of hide-and-seek, he would simply stroke her luscious hair and let his mind drift back to the twenty-one days that Special Agent Nicole Baxter had been his captive.
When the guards threw him into the small prison cell, he fell to his knees. Weak, exhausted, hungry, and thirsty. He couldn’t remember the last time he had been given food. Days? Weeks? His mind had begun playing tricks on him, so much so that he couldn’t believe any of his own thoughts. He had lost track of how long he’d been here. Six months? Ten? A year? It seemed like an eternity.
He’d had another life, a good life. But that life was gone, taken away from him and replaced with an existence that was neither life nor death, but a vague, unholy purgatory holding him captive.
He heard the key turn in the lock, the heavy footsteps of the two guards as they walked away, and the beating of his own heart. After lifting himself into a sitting position, he scooted across the hard earth floor and braced his back against the stone wall. As his eyes gradually adjusted to the darkness, he looked up at
the tiny rectangular window high above his head and saw a twinkling star. If he could reach the window, which he could not, he still wouldn’t be able to escape. The opening was barely large enough for him to stick his head through and was crisscrossed with bars. Even though when it rained, the rain blew in through the window, he was grateful for the fresh air that kept the hole in which he lived from suffocating him with its putrid odor: the stench of human sweat, urine, and excrement mingled with the rot of dead rodents. His stomach growled with ravenous hunger.
“Starving you is simply part of your training,” York had told him. “You will learn that rewards are given for obedience.”
He understood being in training. He’d been an athlete most of his life, playing football and baseball as a kid and moving on to become the star quarterback for his high school team. Then he had attended UT on a football scholarship. He had been the Griff Powell, the young man destined for pro fame and fortune.
Everything within him rebelled against the fate that had brought him here, into the world of a madman who used human beings for his own amusement.
Suddenly he heard her voice calling his name.
“Griff, help me. Please help me.”
“Nic? Nic, honey, is that you?”
“You have to find me before it’s too late.”
“Where are you? Tell me where you are!” He reached into the darkness, sticking his arms through the iron bars. “I can hear you, but I can’t see you.”
“It’s day nineteen,” she said, her voice growing faint. “If you don’t find me soon, it will be too late.”
“No … no … no …”he moaned.
Griff woke in a cold sweat, moisture coating his body. He huffed loudly, releasing the ache in his chest, and tossed back the covers. Sitting straight up in bed, he gave himself a couple of minutes to fully emerge from the past.
Before Nic had been kidnapped, he’d seldom dreamed about his time in captivity, but since she had been missing, the old nightmares had returned, only now, she had become a part of them. His past and Nic’s present were merging in his subconscious, reminding him of the similarities between York and the Hunter, between his abduction and Nic’s.
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