Winter's Redemption

by Mary Stone

  About the nasty way he’d grabbed her through her jeans when he’d stopped for gas and how she’d almost thrown up but didn’t want to because she’d have choked on it and died, and she still wanted to live.

  And then, about how she’d gotten out of the shitty truck. Wedged her hands up under the door handle and almost completely ripped off one of her fingernails in the process. About how she’d fallen onto the pavement outside, hitting her shoulder against the concrete lip of the gas pump. Gotten to her feet somehow, which was hard when your hands were tied.

  And how, sobbing, she’d climbed into the open back door of a crew cab pickup truck parked at the next pump and scrunched down on the floor. Her heart had beat like a rabbit’s, and she might have passed out. When she woke up, the truck was moving, and she was afraid she’d been with the monster, but it was just a young Hispanic guy who looked like he was barely out of high school. He had been as scared as she was when he realized he’d closed her in the back of his work truck without noticing.

  He’d pulled over and untied her, careful not to touch her more than he had to. He’d guessed that someone else already had.

  In messed-up English, his warm brown eyes wet with tears and sympathy, he’d told her he wasn’t in the country legally and couldn’t take her to the police. He’d dropped her off at home and made sure she got safely in the front door.

  She didn’t even know his name, but he’d saved her.

  Then, Wynona had cried some more while Winter quietly thanked her, promising things would get better now, and saying how The Preacher was dirty and evil. What he’d done to her was like an infected cut. You had to let out the poison, and it hurt, but she’d feel better for it. She’d waited patiently while Wynona got herself under control, handing her tissues when she needed them.

  Wynona had been as weepy as her mom. Who she suddenly wanted to see, weepy or not.

  Winter agreed to take her back to the other room and helped her up out of the chair. Wynona felt better, but she was so, so weak, and she really wanted to take a hot shower now and see her parents.

  “Hold on.” Winter unlocked the breakroom door but paused to take a little silver case out of her bag. “The title on here’s not right, and I probably won’t be with the FBI much longer,” Winter said, pulling a business card out of the case.

  She took out a pen and scribbled a phone number on the back and an email below it. “But here’s my cell. Call it. Email me, especially if you think you’re bothering me and it’s not important. I only check it once a day, but I’ll answer you.”

  Winter looked at her, locking eyes as Wynona took the little paper rectangle.

  “I mean it,” she added, her voice intense. “The ‘victim’ thing? No one’s going to understand. They’re going to love you and try to protect you by not talking about it. My grandparents did for a lot of years. My grandpa still does. But you need another survivor to really understand. Even Becca won’t ‘get it’ like I will. You’re not a victim. You’re a survivor, just like me.”

  Wynona met Winter’s eyes directly. “I’ll keep in touch.”

  The breathless promise was a solemn one, and she would have spit in her palm and sealed it with a handshake if the FBI agent had asked her. Wynona wanted to keep in touch with Agent Black. Winter. It was like she had a connection now with this impossibly cool person who wanted to be friends with her, Wynona Baines. They were like sisters now.

  She grabbed a last tissue from the box on the table before she could change her mind, and wrote down her own email, handing it over. “You can email me too. If you want, I mean.”

  Winter clinched that feeling of friendship when she took the tissue Wynona held out. She folded it into a neat square, tucking it in her wallet like it really mattered. She reached out again, this time knocking Wynona lightly on the shoulder with one fist.

  Her gorgeous, serious face creased in a grin as she tucked the wallet back in her bag.

  “Count on it. I’ll be emailing you if I don’t hear from you first. Even if it’s just to find out if you’ve asked Barry Klippington out yet.”

  Wynona’s grin fell away.

  Winter winked. “And don’t worry about The Preacher. Pretty soon, he’s never going to hurt anyone again.”

  24

  That stupid little bitch.

  I kicked out at my La-Z-Boy chair, I was so mad still, and forgot I had my house slippers on. Almost broke my toe, it felt like.

  Gentlemen don’t swear, I reminded myself, almost hearing my momma’s voice in my head. I was hearing her more and more lately. I didn’t believe in spirits and devil things, but it was starting to feel like she was trying to haunt me after all these years of being dead.

  I slumped down in my chair, ignoring my throbbing foot, and turned on the TV.

  If God was just, the little girl had gotten hit by a car or taken by a child molester when she’d tried to hitchhike back to Harrisonburg. It was going on four in the morning by the time I’d finally given up looking for her. She’d vanished, right out of my truck.

  Now, I was home. Holed up in my house. I planned on sleeping for a spell and heading back to Harrisonburg in the morning. If she’d made it home, I’d just grab her again. It might take a few days, but I could be patient. I leaned my head back on the headrest and closed my eyes.

  I must’ve dozed, because a quiet voice woke me a while later.

  She’s out of your reach.

  I woke up, mid-snore, snuffling and choking on my own air.

  Ten years ago, whispered a sly voice, you wouldn’t have forgotten to lock the door. You wouldn’t have gone to a gas station in broad daylight and just thrown a blanket over your catch to hide her from prying eyes. You’d have knocked her out, hog-tied her right there in the road, tossed her in the back of your pickup with a tarp over the top and made sure your gas tank was full before you did it.

  I didn’t like the voice.

  At first, it sounded like my daddy, but he’d have never been so harsh to me. He’d always told me I was special, just like him. Momma had been the mean one who made me do chores before I went outside and would take my dinner away if I sass-mouthed her. Daddy popped her in the mouth but good when he’d caught her doing that.

  You wouldn’t have made any mistakes and Winter would be dead. I’d have killed her and drunk her blood by now.

  Was the voice my daddy?

  He hadn’t been a vampire, though. He was a preacher. Vampires were devil creatures.

  “My girlie is a slick one.” My words sounded loud and belligerent, even over the blaring television, and I jumped. I hadn’t intended on speaking the words, and the sound of my own voice startled me.

  You should have fucked her and killed her when she was young. Now, she’s going to fuck you and kill you.

  My daddy would never use such foul language. And even if he did, he’d never suggest a weak woman could best his boy.

  “That’s not true.” My hand shook as I reached for my glass of Jim Beam. “I don’t know who you are, but don’t say such things.”

  A canned audience laughed at a trio of perky, idiotic morning news hosts as my eyes darted around the living room, looking for the source of the soft, hissing words.

  Winter has escaped you. Three times now. The littlest one was just a GIRL.

  The voice boomed on the last word, from a whisper to a roar that seemed likely to shake the house down. The glass of liquor dropped from my fingers to the dirty green carpet beside my chair. It landed on its side, spilling out alcohol that spread in a dark stain on the rug.

  “I kilt the first two.” My voice sounded thin and whiny, even to my own ears. “I punished ‘em good.”

  The voice dropped back down in a whisper again, so low that I almost couldn’t hear it over the commercial man hawking special pillows on the TV.

  She’s going to kill you, you know. The harlot whore of Babylon slut bitch is going to send your wrinkled old ass straight to Hell. You’re going to die, Preacher.

&nbs
p; “The hell she is,” I yelled, struggling to put the footrest down. Fear rose up in a black wave, feeling like it was choking the air out of my chest. Little purple dots danced around in my vision.

  I was old, but I wasn’t dead.

  I was a predator on the sinful women of the world. God’s chosen, given the power and the smarts to cleanse the female filth. But fear still trembled in my hands.

  Go to Richmond. Now. Get her before she gets you.

  I stopped looking for the voice when I realized it had been coming out of my own mouth. My temples throbbed as I sucked in deep breaths. One after the other, till I got my balance back.

  Turning the TV off, I left the empty glass on the floor. I didn’t need to clean it up. The whole damned house could burn down, and it wouldn’t matter now.

  I shuffled to the bedroom to pack. Tiredness dragged at me, but sleep would have to wait.

  I had to get my girlie before she got me.

  There would be no going back to finish what I’d started with Little Winter, to make her pay for running off on me like that. Like the voice had said…she was out of my reach. I had to move forward now. I had to go to Richmond.

  My lips moved in what I thought was a mumbled prayer, and I headed down the cellar steps to gather up my best tools. Some, I hadn’t used since I’d carved up a pretty hippie girl in the seventies. I whispered as I touched a shiny metal scalpel.

  Clean and purifying.

  I laid it reverently in my canvas bag of work tools, still murmuring to myself. I didn’t hear the words, but they trailed after me as I headed back up the crooked stairs.

  Get her now. This is your last chance. You mess up this time, boy, and I’ll just have to do it myself.

  Winter was losing her mind.

  It had only been two days, but two days was too many to be under house arrest. She was technically home alone, barricaded into her apartment, but there was always an agent parked outside in an unmarked car.

  Usually Noah. He’d taken to showing up without texting first or calling about some case-related question she knew damned well he already had the answer to. Like she couldn’t see him sitting in his big-ass red truck through her kitchen window.

  They were playing the waiting game.

  Every law enforcement agent or officer within a hundred-mile radius had been provided with a copy of Winter’s sketch of The Preacher. Bree was working with Parrish and a couple of his BAU team members to identify him, and possibly track down his whereabouts. Meanwhile, Noah hovered protectively over her, and her grandparents were being watched too—without their knowledge—in case he tried to get to her through them.

  Winter wanted to try for another vision, but the last one had scared the hell out of her. Not the content—which was bad enough—but the aftereffects. She hadn’t physically recovered from that yet. Her joints still ached mildly, like her body was getting over a bad bout of the flu, and shimmering migraine lights illuminated the edges of everything she looked at.

  Plus, she still couldn’t face Noah without seeing that blackened and deformed death mask that rested grotesquely over his face.

  It wasn’t worth the risk. The Preacher was already close.

  Though she hadn’t had another vision, and she hesitated to label it as “sensing” because she’d never believed in people who claimed psychic powers, Winter could feel him out there. Mostly at night. The Preacher was like a shadow, hanging malevolently just out of sight.

  Her phone buzzed with a text.

  You good?

  Noah.

  At this point, she’d passed beyond being irritated with him and was heading toward reluctant tolerance. She started to text back a snarky comment when the phone rang in her hand. Her heart immediately froze—The Preacher?—but plunged when she saw her grandparents’ area code.

  She jabbed at the green phone icon on her screen, her fingers trembling. “Winter Black.”

  There was a pause, and someone took a breath.

  Before they could say anything, she blurted, “Gramma Beth?” Grampa Jack had been in poor health—

  A low chuckle interrupted her churning thoughts. Her hand clenched on the phone, dread walking up her spine like a spider on a web.

  “Preacher? Who the fuck is this?” she demanded.

  “My, my,” came a warm, rich voice. “First, you think I’m your grandma, and then a murderer? You must lead such an unusual life as an FBI agent, Winter. I must say, I’ve never had anyone mistake me for a notorious serial killer.”

  It could be him. Bluffing. Her sketch of him had been all over the news. She’d been thankful her number was unlisted and hadn’t been leaked to the media. But that meant that whoever was on the line shouldn’t have her number, either. And this man didn’t sound old or Southern.

  “I asked,” Winter pronounced deliberately, minimizing the call screen and tapping the record app on her phone, “who the fuck is this?”

  The chuckle ended abruptly as if the caller was no longer amused. “My apologies, Winter. I was mistaken in my memory of you. You weren’t so outspoken as a child. This is Dr. Ladwig.”

  Ladwig.

  It was disorienting to hear that name from her past.

  “I’m sure you’re surprised to hear from me, my dear.”

  He’d always called her that as a little girl, like he was some old man, instead of a thirty-year-old just a few years out of shrink school.

  He’d always say, “Hello, my dear,” when she’d been dropped off in his too-fancy office and subjected to tests that she hated but could never remember why once her grandparents picked her up. Thankfully, when they’d moved, she’d talked them into letting her drop the appointments.

  The endearment scared her back then, for some reason, and apparently had the power to piss her off as an adult.

  “I’m sure you’re wondering why I’m calling. I have to say I still think of you often.”

  “How did you get this number?”

  Only a few people had it, and she was FBI. Sure, she’d been quoted in newspapers and appeared in filmed media briefings, but thanks to the IT department, you couldn’t just Google ‘Winter Black’ and find her cell number.

  “That’s not important,” Ladwig replied smoothly. “I was hoping to find out how you’re progressing these days. Any visions? Have your other symptoms gotten worse?” The eagerness in his voice was off-putting, to say the least.

  She was tempted to hang up, but dammit, she had to know how he’d found her…and how he’d known about her visions. Those hadn’t started happening until years after her time with Ladwig.

  “Why are you calling now?”

  “Kismet, my dear! I had a man in my office the other day with a case much like yours. Not completely like yours, of course.”

  There was that fake, avuncular chuckle again that made her molars grind. For a head doctor, he’d shown a distinct lack of care when it had come to the circumstances surrounding her injury.

  “It was close enough that I’d hoped for a moment that I’d found another Winter,” he went on, his voice losing some of its friendly edge. “I’ve been searching for another patient like you for years. He was so promising. Visions, painful headaches, head trauma in his early teens, the same age you experienced yours, nosebleeds…unfortunately, he was somewhat of a mystery. Got up and left my office very suddenly. And, oddly, he filled out all his paperwork with made-up information, so I can’t track him down.”

  Again, his reference to her visions threw her.

  Winter narrowed her eyes as another thought occurred to her.

  “What did the man look like?”

  “The patient? HIPAA laws prevent me from—”

  “Don’t give me that bullshit. You either hacked or paid someone to hack a system and get my FBI-secured cell phone number. Tell me, or I turn you in for that right now. It’s a hefty fine, and if someone were to leak your weird little story to the press—”

  “Fine,” Ladwig snapped. “He was Texan, a big guy. Dumb as a b
ox of rocks.”

  That was Noah Fucking Dalton, all right, she thought, fury starting to boil. Dumber than a box of rocks.

  Ladwig immediately lost any ability to affect her nerves. She was done with him.

  “You will erase my number from your phone.”

  “Now, my dear—”

  “Call me your dear one more time, and I will file a PPO and start a tell-all blog tomorrow. If I see your face anywhere near mine or that of my family, acquaintances, or local grocery store clerks—and be aware, I have excellent vision—I will have you arrested and paint you publicly as a stalky creeper, obsessed with a former thirteen-year-old patient. I’m afraid your reputation would be a little tarnished, and as I remember, your practice was relatively successful.”

  There was a moment of stunned silence.

  “You wouldn’t.”

  “Don’t fucking test me, you stalking creeper son of a—”

  She heard the quiet click of a desk phone receiver being replaced as Dr. Robert Ladwig hung up the phone without saying another word.

  This was going to require her attention, she realized, her anger at Noah flaring hotter. The man sounded unhinged. He was unhinged. For years, he’d called regularly to “check on” her, up until she was fifteen years old. Three whole years. Her grandma had decided it would be easier to change their number than to keep putting him off.

  Grampa Jack had always scoffed at psychiatrists and psychologists, saying most of them were crazier than their patients. If Ladwig was still fixated on her, he was certifiable, and she was inclined to agree with Gramps.

  She picked up her phone and pulled up Noah’s text.

  Doing ok. Bored. You bringing dinner again tonight?

  He responded in less than a minute.

  Chinese?

  Sounds good. You know what I like. (:

  The smiley face was probably overkill, she thought, hitting send anyway. Flirty. But Dalton would just be more curious.

  Curious. She snorted. Such a mild word to describe Noah.

  He was also an invasive, prying, sneaky, nosy, insensitive asshole.