Authors: Renee Andrews
The covers twisted around her as she snuggled into the mattress and wondered how incredible it’d be to snuggle her baby to her chest, to feel it latch on to her breast to nurse. Vickie smiled in her sleep. She had a baby to take care of, hers to hold, hers to love. She couldn’t wait.
An odd sound echoed through her dream. It wasn’t a baby’s sigh, or cry, or giggle. It wasn’t the wind whistling through the branches outside. Vickie stirred in the covers and tried to decipher between dream and reality.
A gloved hand covered her mouth, and she knew the difference. The man in her bedroom was real.
No.
She fought to get away, but couldn’t move.
My baby. No! Please!
She tried to bite his hand, but his thick leather glove voided her effort. She’d made him mad. The hand around her throat gripped her tighter.
Can’t. Breathe.
Vickie closed her eyes, saw her Mama, then her baby girl...and went to them.
Chapter Six
Removing his shoes, he placed them in the deep mud sink in his laundry room then started the washing machine. He stripped off his gloves, dropped them into the swirling soapy water, then pulled off his clothes and did the same. The items moved and shifted beneath the bubbles. In a short time, they would be clean again. Pure. He wished he could clean the world of sinners this easily, but he couldn’t. And that's just the way it was.
He left the laundry room, walked through the dark empty house then paused to power up his laptop. While the computer came to life and illuminated his bedroom, he moved to his bathroom and started the shower. Turning the water nozzle to the hottest setting, he waited for the steam to envelop him then stepped beneath the scalding spray. His skin burned at the attack, but he gritted his teeth and bore the pain. The water would cleanse the filth away, much like the water in the washing machine cleaned the dirt from his clothes.
By the end of his shower, with the grime of the kill gone, he experienced the euphoria after-effect, the thrill of knowing he'd accomplished his goal and claimed the power. He dried off, then used the towel to wipe the steamy film from his mirror and stared at his body, red from the burning water and exhilarated from the kill. He wrapped the towel around his waist, left the bathroom and found his laptop ready and waiting. He typed the site address for the Fellowship, and within seconds he'd logged into a chat room, abuzz with visitors, even at 6:00 a.m. Did they realize he'd fulfilled his next requirement? That the day had barely begun, yet he'd already accomplished the goal? Were they praising his efforts now?
He scanned the chat list. Disappointment ebbed through him when he didn’t see PROTECT&SERV in the list. He'd so wanted to know what the great John Tucker had to say about his newest kill. But in any case, there were others talking...about Easter. The entire board seemed filled with announcements for sunrise services around Macon, Easter egg hunts and afternoon theater presentations reenacting the resurrection. Frowning, he searched the topics of discussion for something—anything—about his plan, about him. Nothing. The Anti hadn't been mentioned after the posts regarding Cami Talton's body being found. Didn't they realize he’d started the plan? This year he had to fulfill his duty, to teach the city that the rules were to be followed. Didn’t they know?
The last topic caught his eye, as did the number of posts beside the subject line. Over 400 throughout the night. He clicked on Local News then found what he'd been looking for all along.
LIVE4HIM: What Lexie McCain said on the news makes sense. It could be a religious fanatic, as she called him, and it could be the one from before. If there's another kill today, it is.
IBELIEVE: The Anti? Let's pray it's not. And if it is, what is he trying to accomplish?
LIVANDLEARN: Obviously, he's from the old school. He still believes, you know, what our parents believed. He doesn't think these women deserve their children. It isn't right, but what can we do about it? How do we stop him? How do we tell him he's wrong?
LIVE4HIM: WE don't. The police are on the right track. They will figure it out.
IBELIEVE: What if they don't? What if they have no idea why he's doing all of this?
LIVE4HIM: They know. They may be denying it, or may not realize the connection, but too many of our guys in blue were in the Fellowship back then. There's no way they haven't put it together, even if they don't want to admit it could be tied to everything.
LIVANDLEARN: Today's the day. Let's pray they stop him before another innocent person dies.
IBELIEVE: I’m uncomfortable discussing this here. We don’t want to give any of our number
reason to think the Fellowship condones what he’s doing. Let’s end this chat now and spend our time praying that the killer isn’t affiliated in any way whatsoever with us. If he’s from the old school, then let’s leave him there and not let him mar what we’ve worked so hard to obtain.
LIVE4HIM: I agree. I hadn’t thought about it like that. If it is the Anti, if he is back, then if we talk about him here, we’re giving him what he wants. Plus we’re tying him to the New Fellowship, whether we realize it or not. Like IBELIEVE, I think we should spend our time praying.
LIVANDLEARN: Agreed. We’ll end this chat session right here and pray that another innocent person doesn’t die.
The chat room went silent, with the screen names one by one logging out. His disgust rose like bile up his throat. How dare they disregard his efforts? Refusing to acknowledge that he gave them what they wanted deep inside. A pure world. How he wished he could put faces to the cheesy screen names; he’d teach them a thing or two about the one they’d misnamed Anti. He wasn’t the Anti in this; they were. His eyes narrowed as he reread the last post.
"Innocent?" He glared at the screen. What ungrateful trash they all were, what hypocrites. They knew what had to be done yet they acted oblivious to the truth. His hands clenched into fists. If it were up to him, he'd kill them all. They weren't doing anything for the Fellowship by sitting in their homes and typing their ludicrous assumptions on a screen. Were any of them out in the world, doing the will of the Supreme One? Did they think He accepted their tiny church functions and plays for remembrance? He wanted them battling the enemy, and they were twiddling their thumbs, and all smiles about it. And how dare they "pray" that he be stopped? Who were these people anyway? And PROTECT&SERV hadn’t participated in any of the ignorant interchange. Where was John Tucker?
Lexie attended the sunrise service at the Community Church. It’d been tiring to get up that early after such a stressful weekend and hardly any sleep, but she’d been so uplifted by the service. Today, on Easter, she could feel God’s comfort in her soul. He helped her now, gave her the strength to face her fears, her increasing trust toward John Tucker a testament to her progress. But deep down she knew she would never be rid of her fears until they caught the Sunrise Killer.
Did we stop him, Lord? And will You guide our path in our effort to catch him?
She parked her car at the police station at a quarter till two on Sunday afternoon. Fifteen minutes until the task force reconvened, and no sign of another murder...yet. She felt relieved. All indications from his previous kills depicted him as a nighttime stalker, a man who entered homes late in the evening. When last night came and went with no victims reported this morning, Lexie thought they were in the clear.
But were they?
There were still ten hours left in the day, and if he hadn’t made his mark last night, he could strike later. That would still be within the restrictions of his bizarre plan. So even though Lexie felt more at ease, she knew their worries weren’t over until the day had passed and all women fitting his criteria were accounted for.
Church bells rang in the distance. They’d played all morning in tribute to the religious holiday. Lexie had passed the church of her youth on the way in. Ever since she returned to Macon, she’d attended the Community Church instead of the tiny church where she, her mother and her father had spent many Sundays when she’d been a little girl. She would love to visit the old church and see if it stirred memories of her time before she lost her parents. However, the slight chance someone might put two and two together, and realize the true identity of Macon’s
newest television correspondent, even after so many years, kept her away. True, the city saw her on the evening—and currently, the morning—news, but there was something to be said about a face out of context.
Lots of people could see her and realize the face looked more familiar than other TV personalities, but not be able to put their finger on the reason why. Going back to her old stomping ground, on the other hand, might help them put it all together.
She wouldn’t take that risk.
However, she looked nothing at all like she did back then. People change in thirty years. Plus, she had a new name, different hair color, and she hadn’t stepped one foot back in this city since that awful day—until eight months ago, when she became tired of being the victim and ready to be the vindicator.
She closed her eyes and prayed,
Lord, it if be Your will, help us stop him. Help us keep more innocent women and babies from dying at his hand. In Jesus’ name, amen.
A knock on her car window made her jump. She turned to see John Tucker, tall, dark and handsome standing outside.
Lexie unfastened her seat buckle and opened the door. “Have you heard anything?” She grabbed her purse and computer bag, then climbed from the car.
“Nothing yet. You okay? You’ve been sitting there a while.”
“Just thinking and praying.”
“Been doing a bit of that myself—thinking, that is—and wondering if we stopped him.” He inhaled, then let it out with a shake of his head and a hint of a frown.
Lexie resisted the impulse to ask why he wasn’t praying. “What do you think?” They started toward the building.
“I honestly don’t know. Agent Jackson called me this morning to ask some questions about the last series and to discuss how our killer always commits the murders around the same time of day.”
“Always at night, usually very late.”
“Yeah. She’s thinking if it didn’t happen last night, we may have pulled off stopping his pattern. Not many hours of darkness before midnight tonight, but then again, if he’s determined to get a kill in today, that might not be a strong enough deterrent. In fact, I believe if he hasn’t already killed someone, he’ll be even more determined tonight.”
“That’s what I think too.”
A gold full-sized conversion van pulled in the parking lot and parked in front of them. They stopped walking and watched Etta Green bustle out, her hands full of dishes.
“Hold on, I’ll help you.” John moved toward her car.
“Oh, no you don’t.” Etta shooed him away with a twitch of her head, sending big wide curls waving in all directions. Longer than yesterday’s hairpiece, today’s had tiny flowers stuck here and there, undoubtedly for this morning’s Easter service. “I’ve got everything balanced, and all you’ll do is mess with my system. Tell you what, though, you can open the door.” Her orange skirt swished as she trekked across the parking lot, while John and Lexie tried to keep up.
John opened the door and let her shuffle through.
“I talked to your profiler a little bit ago. Poor thing has been here most of the night, from what I can tell. I figured she might need a bit of home cooking. The girl’s way too thin, needs some meat on her bones.”
“You’ve taken a liking to Agent Jackson, haven’t you?” John grinned as Etta continued down the hall.
Etta stopped walking, turned her head back and gawked at John. “Tucker, you’re the one who should be spoiling her rotten. The last FBI guy wanted to lock you up and throw away the key; she believes you’re half-decent, which you can thank me for, if you want to know. And it ain’t that I like her so much,” she corrected. “I’m just trying to fatten her up so she can’t wear that coat. I think it’s the perfect size for my CiCi.”
He laughed out loud. “You’re something else, lady, you know that?”
“And don’t you forget it,” she instructed with a sharp nod, before barreling ahead toward the conference room.
“You think we should catch the next door for her?” Lexie peered down the hall.
“Nah, she’ll round someone up from the break room to help. Etta has no problem getting folks to jump through her hoops.”
“Sounds like she jumped through a few for you.”
“No doubt about it. My main salvation in this place during ‘99 and 2006 came in the form of Etta Green. She never backed down from her claim that I was innocent.” He shrugged. “I helped her out when her husband died in ‘92. Didn’t do much, but I checked on Etta and the girls. I think it meant a lot to her to know someone cared. He was only forty-four when cancer got the best of him. That’s how old I am now.”
“I’m sure she appreciated your help.”
He laughed. “Etta didn’t need any help. She’s about as self-sufficient as they come, but I think it meant a lot to her that I tried. Truth of the matter is, she’s happiest when she’s got someone to take care of, and she took care of me during those last two murder series.” He stopped at the vacant break room and stepped inside. “Guess the guys smelled Etta’s banana nut bread and followed her down the hall.” He tossed four quarters in a soda machine. “You want a Dr. Pepper?”
“No thanks.”
“Anyway,” he took a sip of soda from the can, “it looks like Etta has decided Angel Jackson needs her attention now. Leave it to Etta to decide the FBI needs help in the form of good ol’ Southern cooking.”
“And what do you think about the profiler?” Lexie asked, curious about his take on Angel.
“Considering the last FBI guy pegged me as the prime suspect, I’d say she’s a definite improvement.” He held up his can in mock tribute to the new profiler then took another drink.
Lexie laughed, partly because she enjoyed Tucker’s sense of humor, but more because she enjoyed being so at ease around a man, and around this man.
They left the break area and headed toward the conference room, where three police officers walked out stuffing their faces with big hunks of something that looked like cake and smelled like bananas. One held up half a slice. “You’re too late, Tucker.”