The galloping of her heart in her throat, she stared at the collar hanging on the ceiling track. Then she scrambled to her feet and ran from the room. In the kitchen, she grabbed the single cast-iron fry pan with its wooden handle from under the counter, pushing the cabinet shut before she bolted back to the bedroom.
Her legs were weak, her knees threatening to buckle as she stumbled through the cabin, her muscles unaccustomed to fast motion. She reached the bedroom and closed the door. Outside, the car engine shut off.
She would crawl back into the bed with the collar and make it look like she was still wearing it. Stepping up on the bed, she grabbed hold of the collar and yanked. The collar came down several inches before the cleat caught in the track and jammed. She pulled harder, jerking it, but it didn’t release. The collar was pinned six or eight inches from the ceiling. She let it go, and the cord retracted to the ceiling, the rubber collar swinging back up with it. She grabbed for it again, trying to pull it loose.
A car door slammed. Boots on gravel. Then on the wooden front steps.
She pulled and tugged, but the cord did not yield. The collar hung from the track in the middle of the room. There was no way to hide the fact that she was free.
Palming the fry pan, she crossed the room and pulled the shades closed, trying to darken the room. There was still too much light. The collar hanging from the track was too obvious. She tried to think of a way to conceal it when she heard his voice.
“Everything is good,” Tyler said. “Ready. Just like I promised. I’m here now. You’re probably about ten, fifteen minutes out. You want me to put her in anything special? Make her take a shower or get her cleaned up?”
Ten or fifteen minutes out. That had to be Spencer. Spencer was coming, and then there would be two of them.
Schwartzman shifted toward the door, adjusting the fry pan in her grip. He was coming in. She eyed the collar again, figured she had only a second or two to take him down before he saw it.
“Okay. Take it easy,” Tyler said. “I know the deal. Cash for her untouched. Better bring the cash, though. We don’t take kindly out here to being fucked with.” A low growl. “You’re not in a position to threaten.” A pause. “Not out here you’re not.” A pause, and Tyler mumbled something under his breath. His footsteps grew closer, more rapid. He was angry.
Her pulse drilling painfully into the wounds on her neck, Schwartzman pressed herself into the space behind the bedroom door, between it and the small bureau. She gripped the pan handle in both hands, held her breath, and counted. One, two. The bedroom door burst open. Tyler Butler walked in. His eyes were on the bed, the lump of the pillow where he thought she would be.
It took a moment before they tracked to the collar, hanging from the ceiling.
Schwartzman was already swinging. The flat bottom of the fry pan struck him in the face, the cast iron connecting with his nose with a loud pop. Tyler howled, cradling his face in both hands. Blood streamed down his face and dripped between his fingers. Schwartzman lifted the pan as he blinked in an effort to clear his vision. A moment later, he wheeled around, swinging a fist blindly for her. Schwartzman ducked and swung the pan back in the other direction.
The edge of the cast-iron pan struck his skull above the occipital lobe. He flew forward into the bed. She raised the pan and struck again, this time connecting with the parietal lobe. The head of the pan flew across the room, leaving her holding the short wooden handle. Tyler rolled off the bed, arms splayed to his sides. Blood flowed from his nose. He was unconscious but likely not dead. She wanted to tie him up, but there wasn’t time.
Spencer would arrive soon, and she needed another weapon.
She palmed Butler’s pants, hoping to find a gun. All she found was his phone. She shoved it in the pocket of her sweatpants and nudged him with her foot, still holding the handle of the fry pan. He didn’t move.
She checked his pockets again. No keys. They had to be in the car. She looked again at Tyler, lying unconscious on the floor. He could be out for hours, or he might wake in a few minutes. If Spencer arrived in the meantime, it would be two on one. She reached for the collar and yanked again, seeing if the cleat would unjam from the track. Maybe she could tie him with the cord. But it remained stubbornly stuck.
She had to get in the car and get out.
She left the bedroom door and noticed the lock on the outside. Punched it in and tested the knob. Locked. It wouldn’t stop him, but it might slow him down.
Running across the cabin floor, she stared down at her bare feet. She should have taken his shoes. And she had no weapon. She stopped, considered going back into the bedroom for the head of the pan. It was not an effective weapon, and she couldn’t make herself return to that room.
The sound of another car engine reached her ears. Unlike the first one, this one sounded close. Too close.
She glanced out the window in the front door. A dark sedan bumped along the dirt road, slush spinning off the tires.
Spencer.
50
Monday, 10:43 a.m. MST
Frozen in the front room of the cabin, Schwartzman had only a few seconds to think as the car made its final approach up the road. Even from twenty yards away, she knew it was Spencer. Knew from the knuckles that gripped the steering wheel, caught in the light. Knew from the way he spun the car out before wheeling it around to park facing the house. Knew from the first glimmer of his carefully gelled blond hair and the way he cocked his head as he leaned forward to look through the windshield.
Her fingers found Tyler’s phone in her pocket. Fumbling, she tried to find a way to dial. The screen was locked. She pressed the button to make an emergency call, watching as Spencer cracked the car door and stood, tall and lean and confident. Ugly and cruel. Here to take her.
“Nine-one-one. What is your emergency?”
“My name is Anna Schwartzman. I’m being held in a cabin. In the woods. I don’t know where I am. The man who has me is Tyler Butler. And there’s another man coming. He’s going to hurt me.”
“Ma’am, okay. Slow down.”
“He’s here. Spencer MacDonald is here. Please. Call Hal Harris at the San Francisco Police Department. Send the police. Please. Please.”
Spencer stretched his arms as though he were on his way to a picnic, and she hissed into the phone. “He’s here now. My name is Anna Schwartzman. I’m the medical examiner for San Francisco. Please help me.”
Then she turned and ran for the freezer. She set the phone on the counter, leaving the call live as she opened the door and reached for the icicle at the back.
The ice was cold in her palm, a salve on the wounds she’d incurred carving off the collar. The emergency responder’s voice bled faintly from the phone as she crept toward the door. She peered out at Spencer as he made his way toward the porch.
She crouched behind the door, breathing heavily. Glancing in the direction of the bedroom, she wished she had the fry pan, even without its handle. Spencer’s foot mounted the first stair. It was too late. The icicle would have to do. Stab and run. Get to Tyler’s car. The keys had to be inside.
Get in and lock the doors.
Drive away.
Tears filled her eyes. The icicle burned in her palm. She drew raspy, shallow breaths. Spencer stepped up the second stair, then the third. She raised the icicle above her head as he reached the porch.
His hand in a fist, he rapped on the door. His face was hidden from her. When no one answered, he would sense something was wrong. She drew another breath, tensed, and waited as he knocked again.
Then the door cracked open. His foot crossed the threshold. Schwartzman counted to three and pounced.
She slammed the door hard on his foot. Opened it and slammed it again.
Spencer howled, and she opened the door and charged at him, stabbing at his eye with the icicle.
Spencer turned his head, and the icicle caught his temple, carving a deep scratch in the skin above his ear. The momentum drove her forward. T
he icicle slipped from her fist and shattered against the porch. She gasped and cried out. A sob popped like a balloon in her chest. Stunned, Spencer stepped back, and she used both hands to shove his chest hard.
He fell backward, slipping on a patch of ice and landing with a thump in the snow. His eyes were wide, his body still. Blood dripped from the side of his face.
She jumped off the stairs, tripped, and scrambled up again, running for Tyler’s car. The snow burned her feet. She fell again, scraping her palms on the hard, icy ground as she tried to propel herself.
The shock worn off, Spencer let out a sharp laugh, like a bark. “Bella,” he howled, the teeth of the word biting her as his hand caught her ankle. His fingers were like metal, unyielding and cold.
She tried to kick free, reaching for the root of a tree just showing itself above the snow.
With a yank, Spencer tore away her chances to grab the tree root. He jerked again. Then he was cackling. He laughed so hard that the pulsing sound vibrated in her lungs. His fingers gripped her anklebone like a metal vise. She kicked and twisted, clawing at the ground to get away.
But he held too tight.
The loose sweatpants rode down, the rough ice shredding the skin of her thighs. He swung his other hand up and caught the inside of her leg, grasping her skin and dragging her toward him in angry jerks.
She raised her free foot and kicked out, catching his shoulder. His grip loosened momentarily, and she darted from him. She’d reached the porch steps when he caught her again, his fist descending on her back like an anvil.
She collapsed, striking her chin on the stair. The taste of blood filled her mouth. Wrapping her hands around the first rung, she fought him as he yanked her backward.
There was nowhere to go. No weapons inside. Nowhere to run. She wasn’t fast enough. She wasn’t strong enough. Tears burned her eyes. She’d thought she was smart enough, that she could create a weapon and wield it effectively. But she couldn’t. And there was no backup plan. No one to save her.
Only herself.
Spencer took hold of her hair and yanked, the strands ripping from her scalp like the heat of an open flame. Her hand came free to reach behind her and grab his hand, wrench it free.
He let go to grab her shoulders. His weight pinned her down, pressing her abdomen into the hard edge of the stair. Her baby. He was going to kill her baby.
Again.
Something tiny caught her eye from beneath the stair, a silver object in the half-melted snow. A key.
Her eyes filled with tears. If only she’d found the right key. If she’d gotten free just an hour sooner. How far could she have gotten? She reached through the slats. Her fingers gripped the key, and she rolled it into her fist as Spencer wrenched her off the steps. He grabbed her right arm and hoisted her up. The key slipped in her opposite fist, and she clenched it more tightly, clinging to the idea that she’d been so close.
He would win. Spencer would win.
Would Hal find her? Would he even know what had happened?
Spencer wrenched her to her feet, and she stumbled toward him. He struck her face with the flat of his palm. Stars danced across her vision.
The sound of an engine in the distance.
Someone was coming.
Spencer gripped her arm at the shoulder, drawing her closer.
She clenched the key in her fist, the long, sharp end jutting out between her thumb and forefinger. She dipped her head down, and when he reached to yank her up again, she swung the hand behind her, circling it in a wide arc. He gripped her chin and pulled her face up.
“You are mine.”
She spit in his face.
He stumbled back, still gripping her arm as she brought her fist to his temple. Leveraging the strength of his grip, she drove the short metal end into the bone shielding his temporal lobe.
He spun and stumbled back toward the house, stunned.
His fingers reached for the key in his temple. It had barely entered the skin at all. The key wasn’t sharp enough. She wasn’t strong enough. She scanned the ground and saw a metal shovel leaning against the house. She ran, slipping on the frozen ground, her feet raw and bloody. As she gasped for breath, blood sprayed from her mouth.
She grabbed the worn wooden handle of the shovel. Splinters slid into her skin as she whirled around.
Spencer stood with the bloody key in his hand. Partially hunched over, he watched her with hooded eyes.
She raised the shovel and moved it slowly in circles, like a batter getting ready for the pitch. One shot. She would have only one chance.
His lips curled into a smile as he took a slow, unsteady step forward. “Bella, Bella.” Blood tracked down his face, dripping off his chin.
She blinked quickly, her pulse throbbing, her muscles tight and quick.
He lunged, roaring as he came at her.
She swung the shovel, striking his shoulder as he drove at her. He rammed her into the house, the shovel between them. She tried to wrench it free, to take another swing, but he held the metal spade under his arm. She twisted away from the house, clinging to the wooden handle.
A terrible crack split the air, and she stumbled. In her hands was the shovel’s handle. At the end was a sharp, splintered point.
She spun around.
Spencer stood against the house, the metal shovel raised in his hands like a trophy, his eyes closed, a huge, ugly grin on his lips.
Without hesitation, she lowered the handle like a dagger and ran toward him. She pressed her feet into the hard, frozen ground, dropped her shoulder, and came at him full force, aiming right beneath his ribs.
There was a low, soft thump, almost like music, as the wood entered below his sternum at the xiphoid process.
Spencer’s eyes popped open, as though his lids were connected to the pressure in his abdomen. He made a sound, barely a groan.
His smile was gone.
The shovel dropped with a clank to the ground.
She gripped the handle, partially embedded in Spencer, with both hands. Tucking it under her arm for leverage, she twisted and turned it upward.
He reached for the stick and tried to pull it free. She leaned in and pushed. Her feet numb, she felt only her toenails digging into the snow. Everything she had—everything she’d saved up—drove that stake into him.
His hands dropped to his sides, and his mouth fell open. Blood saturated his shirt and dripped down the front of the handle. Her hands were slick with it.
She gave the handle one last hard push and stepped back.
Spencer stared down at the handle but didn’t touch it. She should yank it out. If it was puncturing his abdominal aorta, he would bleed out faster if she removed it.
But she couldn’t.
What if she pulled it out and there was no wound? What if it was all a joke? He would open his eyes and laugh. Stand up and come after her again.
Slowly, Spencer slid down, his back pressed to the outside of the house, until he was sitting on the ground. His fingers made their way to the handle. He hesitated to touch it, as though it were something strange and foreign.
As he went to reach for it, she cried out.
He looked at her, eyes wide, as though she, too, were something foreign. Then his gaze returned to the handle.
She scrambled away before he could pull the handle free. She grabbed the head of the shovel and lifted it in the air.
The sound of an engine floated over the snow somewhere behind her.
Her eyes felt the pull of the road, but she didn’t let herself look away. She would not be fooled.
Spencer closed his eyes, and she held her breath.
“Bella.”
“No.” She held the shovel high, unsteady on her feet.
His left hand dropped to his side, and she started to step away. It was over. It had to be over.
His fingers caught the bottom of her shirt, and he pulled her toward him.
She stumbled.
His left hand darted out, an
d he caught her leg, jerked her close.
She toppled into him, the two of them falling against the house. The handle still jutted from the soft tissue below his ribs as he curled his lips into a gruesome smile.
“Mine,” he hissed.
She arched her back, lifting the metal spade over her head, and brought it down on the front of his skull. A hard crunch of bone snapped in the air.
He had her—her shirt and her leg—but she raised the shovel up and brought it down again. And again. Over and over until the face of her monster was gone.
The car noise grew louder until the engine was inside her skull, like a thousand bees. Fat white flakes began to fall around her.
Still clutching the shovel, she pulled her shirt from his grip. Tears streamed down her face as she batted his arm away from her skin. Moving slowly, she crawled backward.
She wiped the blood from her face and rose. The shovel in her hand, she turned, ready to fight.
In the dull gray light, the man who ran toward her looked like Hal—his broad shoulders, the fists of his hands pumping as he ran. And then he was there. He lifted her up, and he smelled like dirt and sandalwood and home.
And she realized that she must have died.
51
Monday, 10:59 a.m. MST
Hal jumped from the FBI Suburban before it had come to a complete stop. He had the door open as soon as he’d seen Anna in front of the tiny log cabin, standing in the snow, the spade of a shovel in her raised arms. A lifeless, almost faceless body lay slumped against the house beside her.
“Anna!” He ran, his shoes slipping on the ice, righting himself, then sprinting the distance to where she stood. “Anna!”
At the sound of her name, she swung toward him, her motion off-kilter as though she were drunk. The spade fell from her hands, and it was only then that he saw she was barefoot, the skin on her feet scarlet red and bleeding. Blood splattered across her hands and face and dripped from wounds on her neck.
He took her in his arms, sweeping her up so her feet were off the cold ground. She put her arms around his neck and let herself be held. Her eyes searched his, but there seemed to be no recognition. A moment later, she collapsed.
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