by Lexie Ray
“Why would it matter if I left?” she asked.
“It would compromise everything,” he said.
“What does that mean?” she pressed.
He fell silent.
“You don’t actually care about me, do you?” asked Hunter.
Maybe he was too closed off to make this work. Maybe they were too deep in the middle of a shit storm to hold onto any real feelings that may have developed between them. Maybe liking Hunter was a distraction he couldn’t afford, but Ash knew he didn’t just like her. He was falling in love. Why was it easier to kill for her than it was to tell her how he felt?
He was at a loss for words, overwhelmed by how he would even begin to explain how he had really become involved in all this. His real connection to Hunter, Twitch, and the girls would seem confusing to her or maybe unbelievable. He didn’t know how to start. He didn’t want her to hate him.
Hunter stepped quickly to the bathroom door, grasped the doorknob, and was about to leave when Ash dangled his key chain in front of her face. The rusted bullet hung before her eyes. It was like hers, like Twitch’s, like all the girls’ out there. But Ash hadn’t grown up with her. He wasn’t from the farmhouse.
“Where did you get this?” she demanded.
“Would you sit down?” he asked.
Hunter looked him dead in the eye for a long moment, then sat on the edge of the tub, as Ash resumed his seat on the toilet.
“The moment wasn’t right before,” he said. “Things were chaotic and I didn’t have a second to explain things to you.” Ash let that hang in the air between them as he tried to gauge whether or not Hunter was letting her guard down. Would she be able to really hear what he was about to say, or would she shut down and refuse to listen?
“Just tell me everything,” she said. “Otherwise, seriously, I’m out of here.”
“Okay,” he said quickly, sensing she might leave on the spot if he didn’t get to it right away. “I’m from New Hampshire, but not the same area where you grew up. When I told you that I started killing because of an incident with my family, that was true. I killed my way out of my childhood home. It was only me and my dad. My mother had left a long time ago when I was still a baby. He was a cruel man, and I have my reasons for ending him. I shot him, and he deserved it.”
Hunter stared at Ash with wide eyes as she listened. He seemed so vulnerable, unlike anything she had observed in him prior. His gaze seemed to soften as he was remembering what his life had been like. She was eager to hear more. Whatever fear had gripped her in anticipation of learning who Ash truly was had left her. She only wanted to know the truth.
“It was a small town,” he went on. “Even though I had been calculated and careful about killing him, which led the police to believe it was a suicide, the word got out. Maybe they were just rumors to begin with, I don’t know. But I got approached one night. I got propositioned to kill for money. I was only fifteen, and had squeaked by on some paperwork that helped me avoid going into foster care. I needed money. I needed to eat, so I took the job.”
Ash hesitated to meet her gaze even though he wanted to. He wanted to check her expression to see if she thought he was a monster. He knew it was beyond comprehension that anyone could live with themselves having done what he had done in his life. Her mouth was pursed, her eyes round and wide. He hoped there was some sympathy mixed in with whatever she was thinking and feeling right now, but he couldn’t be certain.
“Four months ago, I was contacted. I met with some men. They explained that a child murderer was out there. It was a woman who killed little girls.”
Hunter’s heart nearly stopped. Did he believe that? Did Ash think that was what she really was? Hunter wanted to cry. She knew the girls out there thought so. Who would ever understand?
“Hunter, I know you aren’t a murderer,” he said. “You probably have your reasons for having done whatever you did. I’m not going to judge that. If I saw an animal hurt in the woods, suffering, I would put it out of its misery.”
“I don’t know that I was putting them out of their misery, Ash,” she said quietly as tears began to fall. “I was putting out my own misery. Looking back, I know how horrifying that must sound, but in the moment, it’s like I’d lost my mind. Living there was maddening. I should never have been there. I should never have been captive like that. None of us should have been there.”
“It’s okay,” he said calmly as he waited for the tears to dry in her eyes. “They lied to me,” he went on. “I know that. It didn’t take me long to figure it out. But at the time, I decided to take the job anyway because they didn’t want you dead. The contract with the men wasn’t to kill you, Hunter. They wanted me to bring you back. It never sat right with me. If you really were a child murderer, why would they want to have you back? No one would want that. I was told you had fled south. I followed a thin trail here to New York. I searched the streets. I found so many girls from the farmhouse. For months it seemed like every other week I found a girl, but it was always the wrong one. When I talked to the girls, though, I learned about what was really happening at the farmhouse, in the barn. Somewhere along the line, I stopped looking for you with intentions to carry out my contract. I was looking for you to help. When you signed the lease on your apartment, I finally had the information I needed to find you. Hunter, when I first saw you, when I first started following you, I don’t know how to explain it, I fell in love.”
“You did?” she asked, her voice thin as thread.
Ash nodded. “I don’t expect you to understand that,” he said in a whisper. “You gave me hope. I guess knowing there was someone like you out there made me feel less alone. And the closer I got to you, and the more I learned about you, the more I realized how similar we are. We haven’t been through exactly the same things, but Hunter, I feel like I understand you. And I sense you might be able to understand me, too.”
Ash slid off his seat to his knees and gently rested his hands on the outside of Hunter’s thighs, looking up at her where she sat.
His eyes were wide, round, imploring her to accept him. He was gorgeous, wounded, and more like herself than she could have ever imagined. It was as though he was a reflection of herself, her other half.
“I’m scared,” she whispered.
“I’m not going to hurt you, Hunter,” he said. “I’m not going to break your heart. I’m going to mend it.”
Hunter leaned down and kissed him. She ran her fingers through his hair up the nape, holding him, as his arms wrapped around her. Ash pulled her gently from her position on the side of the bathtub, helping her to sit, straddling him on the floor. He held her tight as their kisses ebbed and flowed with ever-growing passion. Eventually, deep kissing faded into soft pecks across each other’s cheeks until Hunter had more questions.
“Is that why the men have come? Because they know you’re protecting me?”
“I stopped reporting back to them weeks ago. and before that I was reporting faulty information to try to throw them off. If they don’t know I’m with you, I’m sure they’re here to finish the job themselves. They want you, Hunter, and I’m not going to let them take you.”
“How are we going to stop them?” she asked.
“They have Molly and Devon,” he said. “If we find the girls, we’ll find them.”
“That’s the problem, though,” said Hunter. “I’m sure it will be easy for us to find Molly and Devon. I bet you anything Travis and Dale will use the girls as bait. The question is, how are we going to get them back without getting taken ourselves?”
“We’re going to kill the men,” said Ash.
Hunter stared deeply into his eyes.
“I want to be the one to pull the trigger,” she said.
Her voice was firm, determined. It both excited and scared him.
“You really are my other half,” he said before kissing her long and hard once again.
Finally, she asked the most important question he had failed to answer, “Wher
e did you get the bullet?”
Chapter Eight
The moon was full. Unlike the stars, which hid within the glare of city lights, the moon shined brightly as wisps of clouds swirled around it.
Hunter stared up at it for a moment. It was hard to believe she was gazing at the same moon she had looked at a million times as a little girl. All those nights she had been dragged out to the barn by the men, all those times she had let her legs dangle like dead weights, as though to do so would slow the men down, buy her more time before they crossed the field. It had never helped. But she had tried anyway, looking up at the moon all the while, as though if she stared hard enough at it she could float away. Was this really the same moon?
The tortures of the barn had been a lifetime ago, and yet the pain still resided in her, somewhere between her body and mind, always trembling, buzzing with an electric anxiety, putting and keeping her on edge. She needed a pill. She’d kill for a Vicodin right now. She didn’t like how dark this alley was.
She also didn’t like waiting around. She felt like a sitting duck, which was the point, but made her no less nervous.
She glanced down one end of the alley. Other than a couple stray cats hissing over food scraps, there was nothing in that direction, no one. Towards the other end there was nothing but a stale stench emanating from a dumpster. The area was completely empty and Hunter had every reason to believe it would stay that way. This was stupid. To instruct each of the girls to skulk around in the various dark alleys that made up the grid of the Gowanus was a waste of time in her opinion. What had Ash been thinking when he dreamed up this plan?
Hunter had a better idea, and she was pretty sure she’d have time to execute it before Ash would meet up with her here in the alley, as discussed.
Her hand found its way to the hard lump in her purse, her gun. She wasn’t entirely comfortable with keeping it tucked in her purse, under the flap, beneath the zipper. That’s what had gotten her into trouble in her apartment with Thomas. She hadn’t had time to draw the weapon and fire it.
Quickly, she extracted the gun and made sure it was ready to fire if need be. Then she tucked it down the back of her jeans, and draped her long tee-shirt over it. Thank God she had stolen a few moments to change her clothes back at the apartment. Ash had helped her back into her place to put on some long jeans and get a fresh tee.
She was sweating to death, but at least she felt better protected, less vulnerable than she had in her torn skirt and low kitten heels that clicked everywhere she had gone, announcing her arrival, betraying her secrecy.
Hunter made her way down the back of the alley where she knew a narrow passageway would lead her through to the old sugar factory. If the men from New Hampshire were as good at tracking her as Ash had been, then they would be frequenting the factory in search of her or the other girls. She was certain they would think to go there on the off chance that Hunter would return to life on the streets now that her apartment had been ambushed.
She knew Ash wouldn’t be pleased with her, but she told herself he would never know. She was planning on getting to the factory, putting her ear to the ground in case anyone had seen something, Molly and Devon or perhaps the men, then she would return here in time for Ash. He didn’t know these streets like she did, she reasoned. What she was about to do was necessary.
At the end of the passageway, Hunter hooked a left intersecting with Water Street that would lead her a few blocks down to the factory.
The streets were quiet except for the incessant buzz of the streetlamps. Hunter walked along into the spotlights of the lamps and out again into the shadows. She began to hear the low murmur of voices, footsteps, and burning fires that were the distinct mark of the factory by the time she reached the street. She slowed up, taking stock of who might be around, kids on the street, cars idling nearby. She didn’t see any of the girls. She looked around a moment longer, searching more carefully for familiar faces, but there were none.
Just as she was about to cross the street and go inside, she spotted it. The dark sedan. The New Hampshire plates. The car was idling at the far end of the sidewalk kitty-corner to where she was standing.
She realized she had stopped breathing. Her heart was racing, causing her thoughts to spiral out of control. Ash should have listened to her. She had known the men would come here, she had told him as much, but he didn’t want her to come here. Why?
She tried to put her annoyance out of her mind and harness a plan for what to do next. Hunter assumed that both Dale and Travis had to be in the sedan, or it was possible that one was with the car while the other was searching inside the factory, but in either case, she figured they were together. That would be her first problem. There was no way she could take them both at once.
And where were the girls? From where she was standing, she couldn’t see through the car windows. If they were in the back seat, she wouldn’t know it, though it was more likely the men had tied the girls up at some unknown location. It wouldn’t make sense for them to drag them around town while they hunted for her.
Hunter realized she was standing under the bright light of a streetlamp, so she paced forward into the shadows, concealing herself behind a bus stop sign. She was breathing heavily. It was difficult to control her anxiety. She was getting shaky. Part of her wanted to sprint across the street, jump in the back of the car, and blow the man’s brains out, whether it was Dale or Travis. She didn’t care. But if they both were in there, she’d never succeed. She needed to deal with one at a time, but first she needed to get closer.
Almost without thinking, Hunter acted completely on impulse though she wasn’t deaf to the little voice in the back of her head that was screaming at her not to go through with it.
She began boldly crossing the street, walking under the blaring streetlamp, into plain view.
The headlights on the dark sedan went out. Not a moment later, Dale stepped out onto the curb. His eyes were locked on Hunter.
* * *
It had been more improbable than anything Ash could’ve prayed for. Devon had scored a burner phone at some point during their last scavenge, and had sent him a text. It had been poorly composed, virtually nonsense, as though she had typed it behind her back without looking, but after studying its cryptic letters Ash had gotten a sense of what it said. It was an address. The building number was written out, and followed by the names of two streets. It gave him two possibilities. The girls were either at 413 3rd Street or 413 Hoyt. He had no clue on what floor or in what apartment number they would be, but at least this gave him a place to start.
He turned in a circle slowly, standing on the sidewalk at the intersection, and read the building numbers along both 3rd and Hoyt. They had to be on Hoyt. The building numbers didn’t make sense for it to be 3rd Street. If it were, they’d be twelve blocks east and nowhere near Hoyt. This had to be it.
Ash looked up at the building from the street. There were nothing but warehouses down the entire block, and 413 was no different. The upper half of the warehouse was lined with large windows. It was dark inside. He could see no lights. The windows weren’t open. Unlike the residential apartments around the city, warehouses never had fire escapes, which would have been his best bet for breaking in. He would have to find another way and find it quickly without being caught.
Ash stepped carefully around the side of the warehouse, listening closely for the sounds of the girls, but it was silent. He rounded the back, having found no doors along the side he had just traveled. It was nearly pitch black at the back of the building. The lights from the street couldn’t reach this far, and there were no back alley lights or motion sensors to speak of.
It took a second for his eyes to adjust to the darkness, but when they did, he noticed that a large window high above his head was cracked open. Staring at it, he gauged it was open by about a foot. If he could get up there he could probably fit through, but it was too high up. He looked around to see if there was anything he could stand on, even a dump
ster, but there was nothing.
When he looked back up, something caught his eye. He could’ve been wrong, his eyes could’ve been playing tricks on him, but he swore he had just seen a faint light turn on and then quickly off inside the warehouse. He held his breath, waiting, watching to see the faint light again. His gut was telling him it was coming from a cell phone, as though someone had swiped the screen, and its bright face had lit up, casting a subtle glow upwards.
The girls were in there. He knew it. Even if the light didn’t flare on again, confirming what he already knew in his gut, Ash wasn’t about to wait any longer. If they were in there, if the window was open and they were close enough that he had detected their faint light, then they would be able to hear him.
“Devon,” he whispered softly towards the open window. He held his breath, listening out for any response. There was none. “Devon, are you in there?” Again, he listened intently, but all he could hear was the pounding of his heart in his chest, the pulse of blood beating in his ears.
Suddenly, he heard murmuring whispers. Ash pressed his ear against the brick siding, but it didn’t help. He lifted his head, ear towards the window, praying that they would speak up.
He thought he caught one girl telling the other “no” or something to that effect, as though one was trying to hush the other, but he couldn’t be sure. The frustration was mounting. They had to know it was him out here. Why weren’t they calling back?