Authors: EC Sheedy
“I can help out there. I’m good with this.” She lifted the gun, waved it. “Damn good.”
Her movement was one April sensed rather than saw, because even with her eyes fully adjusted to the darkness, everything in the barricaded room was shape and blur. When Phylly made to get up from the floor, April grabbed for her and held her down.
Noah said, “You’re not going anywhere, Phylly. You’ll stay here like your son asked you to, and you’ll use that gun of yours to protect yourself and April—if it comes to that.” He got to his feet; Chance stood immediately as he did. “I’ll go. Check things out.”
“Noah, no.” Phylly said. “I’m the one with the gun, remember.”
“And I’m the one who knows this property, every damned inch of it. It’s rough, unpredictable terrain—especially at night.” He let out a breath. “Jesus, you’re probably still in those damn heels.”
“I’ll change my shoes.”
“Jesus,” Noah said again.
Chance whined and Noah shushed him.
April, if the situation weren’t so dire, would have laughed. Laughed until it hurt. Until she could feel something other than fear running along her bones. She knew exactly how Phylly felt—powerless—because she felt the same way. She was desperate to know if Joe was all right. Her stomach had formed a hard ragged knot at the sound of that last gunshot, and every second he was gone it tightened. “I think we should stay here. Give Joe some time to—”
Chance yelped once, whined again. Growling low in his throat, he headed for the closed bedroom door—nothing but an opaque membrane separating them from the hall and living room beyond. In front of it, they’d piled the last of what they could move, a chair, some luggage, and the table from beside the bed. It wouldn’t hold back a marauding teenager let alone an armed killer.
Seeing in the dark wasn’t necessary to know that the three of them had their eyes trained on the presence and sounds of the agitated dog.
In the living room something crashed to the floor. The sound hit the charged atmosphere in the bedroom like an electrical storm surge. Everyone froze—except Chance. The dog went crazy. Alternating between barking and growling furiously, he lunged for the door, desperate to find footing in the accumulated debris at its base.
Someone was in the house.
Dear God, let it be Joe,
April thought. Her hand flattening against her painfully clenched stomach, she waited for his whistle.
“Who the fuck are you?” Joe muttered the words into the air in front of him. He might have a gun in his back, but he wasn’t taking his eyes off the guy leaning against the tree.
“Your new best friend,” a female voice whispered close to his ear. He smelled her heaving breath, hot and sick. He smelled blood. She was having trouble getting her words out.
“Yeah? And that gun in my back. What’s that? Your calling card?”
She panted before answering, “You have to . . . wait . . . for the whistle.” She stopped, took some breaths. “If Braid signals, and bastard number two here doesn’t reply, he’ll know something’s wrong. That . . . someone’s out here. We’ll lose . . . our edge.”
The pressure eased on Joe’s back. She’d lowered the gun, so he risked a semi-turn. The woman’s face was inches from his own, but her features were masked by the dark. “I repeat—who the fuck are you? And who the hell is Braid?”
“Q.” She huffed out some breath. “Quinlan Braid. The guy who”—the gun moved away from his back—“killed . . . my sister. And who’s going to kill . . . everyone in that house. If we don’t . . . stop him.” Her breathing sounded like it was coming through a leaky bellows.
The name Braid meant nothing to him—but the bastard had to be April’s kidnapper. Any other questions had to wait, because there wasn’t time to make sense of any of it. The guy by the tree straightened, as though he were alert for something.
“So . . . what’s it going to be?” she added, wheezing. “You going to look a gift horse in the mouth or—”
A trilling whistle came from the house. Joe’s head snapped around. From the goddamn deck. Had to be. Which meant someone was either in the house or damn near.
“That’s it . . . that’s the signal.” She coughed.
The shadow under the tree whistled in reply.
“I can . . . do that asshole. You go after Braid.” She staggered to her feet, shoved the gun in her jacket and pulled out a knife. “Just make damn sure you kill . . . that. . . filthy scum.” He heard the rasp of her labored breathing just before she headed toward the man by the tree—like a goddamn lightning strike.
Already moving toward the clearing, Joe heard a thick groan, followed by a gasping watery gurgle.
He knew the sound, had heard it before.
Whoever his
new best friend
was, she’d done her job. From here on in, the odds were even.
In seconds he was at the edge of the clearing, circling toward the wooded area at the back of the house.
The whistle brought Phylly to her feet. “It’s Joe, he’s back. He’s okay.”
April wanted that to be true, but there was something about the whistle—it didn’t sound right.
“No,” she said, shaking her head, convinced Phylly was deep into wishful thinking territory. For one thing, whoever had entered the house, had—so far—not come near the bedroom, where Joe knew they were waiting. No, whoever was out there had taken his own sweet time, walking around the house as though he were checking things out.
The dark-eyed man?
April’s stomach took a sinking blow. She got to her feet beside Phylly. Noah did the same.
A light came on from the other side of the wall, and the glass bricks, visible between and above the collected dam of debris they’d created, suddenly glowed like backlit jewels, filtering a dim gold light into the bedroom.
The light was welcome, strangely reassuring; the voice following it was not.
“I know you’re in there, and considering your protection is meager at best, you could save us all time—and me bullets—by joining me in the living room.”
Noah spoke first. “Who the hell are you and what are you doing in my house?”
“You may call me Q. That will do for now,” he said. “And my purpose here is to correct a mistake. I regret the damage to your house, Mister Bristol—it’s a masterwork—but unfortunately it was unavoidable. But you can expect more of the same, if you don’t do as I say. While I don’t relish playing—who is it? Rambo?—I’ll do so if necessary.”
“It’s me you want, and I’m coming,” Phylly said. She was standing close to April, gun in one hand, April’s hand in the other.
“For God’s sake, Phylly.” Noah gripped her shoulders from behind. “Don’t be a fool.”
Phylly turned on him. “This is all because of me. All of it. Rusty. Tommy.” She shook her head, tears not fear in her vivid blue eyes. “I won’t let anyone else die.” Her voice was high but steady. “I won’t.”
“Forget it, Phylly, you’re not going out there. So just be quiet, let me think,” April said, then whispered as an aside, “Do you remember anyone who called themselves Q?”
Phylly shook her head.
Then it had to be him. The man who’d taken her from her mother. The man who sold her to Victor Allan. Her breath snagged deep in her throat.
It was the dark-eyed man—had to be.
And it wasn’t Phylly he wanted, it was her.
“Very noble of you, Mrs. Worth,” Braid said. “But I wouldn’t want you laboring under the delusion your sacrifice will be rewarded. You must all die. As to your friends’ deaths, those were Henry Castor’s doing. Not mine. My interest is centered on April Worth. Such a beautiful child. I’ll be interested to see how you’ve matured, April.” He paused. “And you, Bristol, are simply in the wrong place at the right time—as is your son, Phyllis. You won’t mind my calling you Phyllis, will you?” He paused, as though he were waiting for an answer, then went on. “At this point, the only choice any of you have is whether the route to your final resting place will be short or long.”
He doesn’t know about Joe
—
doesn’t know Joe is out there.
Which meant Joe was safe. April looked at Phylly and together they took a deep breath, sharing a sense of relief.
“We need to buy some time, Noah—or get the hell out of here,” April’s voice was barely a whisper. “We have to hold him off until Joe gets here.”
“It won’t be as easy getting at us as he thinks,” Noah said, his voice equally low. “These walls are mortared glass bricks, and the entry door is safety glass reinforced with wire mesh.” He glanced between April and Phylly, then at the patio doors, where the bed’s mattress was propped upright. April got his plan instantly.
A way out. Yes.
“It’s a twenty-five foot drop,” he warned, hesitating. “You’ll have to shimmy down the uprights.”
“Shimmy, I can do,” Phylly said.
“Not a problem,” April said. “Let’s do it.”
She and Noah went for the mattress, began pulling it to the side.
From the other side of the wall, April heard a brief chuckle. “I should add that if you’re thinking of using the patio as a way out, you will probably be dead sooner rather than later. I do have a man outside.”
Shit,
April thought.
“Shit,” Phylly said.
“I think I’ve waited long enough,” the man called Q said, adding, “My apologies, Bristol.” He fired three shots in rapid succession into the glass door. The blasts were deafening, but Noah was right; the door held. Its opaque glass turned to a million shards within the mesh, but only a few pieces fell to the floor.
Phyllis cried out and fell to her knees, clutching her arm.
April followed her to the floor. “Phylly. Oh, my God. Are you all right?”
Noah went to his knees beside Phylly. “Are you hit?”
Phylly patted him with her good hand. “It’s my arm,” she gasped. “But it’s okay. I’m okay.” Her gun had fallen to the floor from a now useless hand. There was no way to make out the extent of her injury, but if blood flow was any indication—
Q fired again. This time into the glass brick wall just beside the door. The booming shots took out maybe a half- dozen bricks. Glass bulleted through the room. Shards caught Noah on the forehead, April along her jaw. She looked at Noah, the blood trickling down his face, then at Phylly, her shirt already blood-drenched. She touched her own cheek and looked at the ooze in her hand. Numb. The silence after the thunder of the rifle was absolute. Unreal. April panted to bring in air, rubbed at her bleeding face.
Phylly moaned. “That son of a bitch.”
Through the hole in the wall April saw Q, sitting about twenty feet away, a rifle propped against his chair. As she watched, he pulled a handgun from a pocket in his hunter- style jacket and rested it on his knee. He looked as calm as a man waiting for a bus. But this man was waiting to kill— with no more concern than he’d had years ago, when he’d given her mother money and carried her, nine years old and terrified, kicking and screaming into the Seattle night.
She would not scream again. Never again.
Enough . . .
April picked up Phylly’s gun, stood, and walked to the door, fear falling from her shoulders like a tattered, too thin cloak. “This is April Worth, Q whoever-you-are. I’m coming out.” Phylly clawed at her leg. Noah shook his head violently. He’d taken off his shirt and was pressing it to Phylly’s arm, ignoring the bleeding cuts on his own face.
“Just like that, April girl?” The voice was soft, low, simulating kindness. And like a scent it triggered memories. Poisonous, ugly memories. Memories she’d never have had except for this man named Q.
She loathed the sound of her name on his lips.
“Just like that,” she said, her voice flat. “I come out—and you promise to let everyone else go.” She had no doubt he’d make the promise and no doubt he’d break it. It didn’t matter. What mattered was he was evil—and she had a gun in her hand.
“Why would I do that?”
“To save you those bullets you mentioned? And because no one other than myself knows your face,
Mister
Q. Which means they can’t hurt you—but I can.” She stood to the side of the damaged door, again looking through the broken wall. Now certain of his position, she tightened her grip on the gun.
“Very well,” he said, standing, but not moving away from the chair. “As I said, it will be interesting to see how you look as a woman—those amazing green eyes. I’ve never quite forgotten them. You were a beautiful child.”
“A child you kidnapped.”
“A child I bought and paid for. A distinction worth noting, I believe. Although you were somewhat of a bargain. Your mother had other priorities, as I recall. Like putting a needle in her arm.”
The amoral bastard. She wanted to be sick all over him. “Should I apologize for not recognizing the fine line between kidnapper and human trafficker?”
“Not at all. Your bitterness—and perhaps latent taste for revenge—is to be expected. It’s why I’m here. When Henry Castor advised me of your continued existence, I really had no choice but to do what was necessary to protect myself.” He paused, but—thank God—stayed where he was. “But enough talk. Let’s have a look at you.”
“Yes, enough talk.” April, ignoring Noah’s protests and Phylly’s soft crying, threw aside the chair and luggage against the door, and stood in front of its cracked facade. She inhaled to steady herself. She knew where Q stood, and that gave her one chance to get him before he got her. Another inhalation.
One chance
. . .
Holding the gun waist-high, she opened the door and fired. At an empty space.
“Ah,” he said from beside her. “You brought a surprise.” His hand closed over her wrist. “An unpleasant one at that.” He wrenched the gun from her hand.
What happened next was a blur . . . Phylly threw herself on Q’s back. Noah went for his feet. Chance followed his master’s lead.
Q went down under a tangle of bodies, but their advantage ended when he made one snakelike turn and pressed a gun into Phylly’s temple. “Get off me. Get off now.”
They fell back, and Q got to his feet, pulling Phylly up with him, the gun fixed on her temple as if cemented there. “And get that animal under control, Bristol, or I’ll do it for you.”