Where Angels Rest (43 page)

A sound stopped him. Rodney whirled toward the driveway and dropped to a crouch. A truck pulled up the drive.

Son of a bitch.

Nick saw headlights through the trees from fifty yards out. He came in fast, running without lights, and put the Tahoe in a fishtail. Grabbed the AR-15 from the back through the window and pushed the Remington to Quentin.

They cracked their car doors to get out and a gun went off. The bullet hit the truck bed.

“Son of a bitch. Get down.”

Quentin crouched back inside the truck. “From over there,” he said, pointing into the spread of darkness beyond the two columns of headlights. Nick led with the assault rifle, moving toward the gunshot. The .38 fired again, hitting just behind him. He dropped to the ground.

“Nick,” Quentin whispered. “Damn it, use the truck for cover. You can’t fire.”

Nick clenched his teeth. Jesus, Erin was out there. He couldn’t fire, not until they knew where she was. Rodney could be holding her up against him just now, using her body as a shield.

He darted back to the truck, and crouched behind it. Nick called out. “Erin,” he yelled. “Erin!”

“You’re fucking crazy,” Quent whispered.

“He knows where we are, anyway,” Nick said. “I have
to let her know I’m here. The motherfucker was firing on her.”

“Then for God’s sake, quit calling to her. If she answers you, he’ll have a bead on her.”

Nick clenched his teeth. “We gotta know where Erin is. My hands are tied without knowing where Erin is.”

Quentin was a good friend: he didn’t point out that Erin hadn’t answered and might already be dead. He didn’t point out that Rodney might be the only one out there. Instead, he said, “Cover me and I’ll get to the house. Got your radio?”

“Don’t use it. I’m gonna move into the woods. If I’m close to Rodney and you use the radio, he’ll finger me.”

Quentin didn’t like it, but Nick was right. “I’ll flip a light inside—twice if I find her, once if I don’t.”

“There’s no electricity,” Nick said. “Take a lighter from the glove compartment.”

“Okay. Ready?”

“Go.”

Quentin stumbled to the front of the truck for the lighter, then ran for the house. Nick sprayed an arc of bullets into the sky, too high to hit Erin if she was out there but intimidating enough to keep Rodney from shooting back. When Quent was in, Nick started working his way into the woods.

Erin heard her name and felt the earth shift.
Nick.
But she couldn’t answer. Rodney was close, twenty feet away. She’d caught his silhouette crossing through the pale reach of the headlights, his light head shining like a moon.

Coming after her.

Don’t breathe, don’t move. He didn’t know where she was just now. He’d gotten distracted taking shots at Nick.

She pressed back against the tree, praying Nick wasn’t hit. She closed her eyes and stuck the knife under her arm long enough to wipe blood from her fingers, then got a new grip on it.

Rodney came nearer.

A tiny light shone in the second story window, flicking back off a second later. Nick watched.
Twice if I find her
…

No more light. Ah, Jesus. He reeled. So, Erin was out here. Somewhere—dead or alive or maybe hurt—Erin was out here with a madman who had nothing left to lose. Or, she wasn’t here at all… Rodney had already killed her and dumped her—

Stop it.
Stop it.

“Erin!” he called out, a stupid thing to do, pinpointing himself like that, but he had to let her know he was here. He crouched with his back against a tree, waiting, then shouted again.
“Erin.”

And the answer that came back was
BOOM
. Right past his ear.

I
NSTINCT TOOK
N
ICK
to the ground. He trained his rifle in the direction of the shot, then cursed and forced his fingers to loosen on the trigger. For seven years he’d been shooting at demons in these woods. Their light-colored remnants still dangled from the trees, the trees themselves worse for wear.

Now, a new ghost haunted him: the image of Erin, caught by his own bullet.

His woods. His hell. And he didn’t dare shoot.

But behind him, he heard footsteps rustling and recognized them. The armored cops, running in lines, flanking his sides and taking up positions in the dark.

Thank you, Quentin.

Erin swallowed, forcing herself to think. The last shot had come from fifteen feet ahead. And there were other sounds now, too, like scurrying animals. Police? She couldn’t think about that. She had to think about Rodney. He’d moved, and she didn’t know where. She clasped the knife in her right hand, the bottle in her left. She got an idea, thought about it for three seconds—worried it would
distract Nick as much as Rodney—and then decided to try. Nick wasn’t likely to react blindly to something. Rodney, on the other hand, might tumble to it.

And the animals?

It didn’t matter. If there
were
other cops out there, Rodney was hearing them, too. The time to distract him was now.

She threw the bottle fifteen feet behind her, into the column of headlights. It smashed against a tree and she held her breath, pressing tight against the big tree with massive holes shot through the trunk. Twenty feet away, Rodney moved—his pale head catching the light. He crept toward the place the bottle had hit, looking for her, moving in a path that would bring him right past her. Closer, closer, five feet away, three… Erin tried to still her pulse as he passed the tree with the holes. Surely, he could hear her breathing, her heartbeat, could
smell
the fear. But he kept going. Erin could actually look through the holes in the tree and see him pass.

And when he took one more step, she lunged.

Nick heard a scream—like a war cry—and shouted, “Hold your fire!”

He bolted toward the voice and a stream of cops descended, flashlights and guns all hunting for the source of the screams. Nick led with the AR-15 and then, in the overcast light of the headlights, saw Erin wobble back on her knees. A body lay at her feet, facedown.

She shuddered, struggling to back away, blood everywhere. Rodney rolled and groaned in agony, and the lights of a dozen cops all converged on his white head, catching him in an eerie spotlight like the star of a gruesome show.

A knife jutted out from his neck.

“Erin,” Nick said, starting toward her. Rodney let out a moan, but Nick saw his fingers move, and a split second later, saw the gun on the ground. Rodney touched it, blood leaking from his throat. He gasped for air but managed to wind his fingers around the butt.

Nick blew him away.

I
T WAS A LONG NIGHT.
Yet another crime scene, and when they could finally leave, Nick took Erin to the sheriff’s office for the remaining few hours of morning. He had some things to wrap up and wasn’t about to let her out of his sight. She was patched up again and insisted on flying home tomorrow. Nick didn’t want her to, but there was Justin to think about. Always Justin.

A little before nine, Nick stood at his whiteboard making a list. Erin stirred and he turned.

“You look like hell,” he said, handing her a cup of lukewarm coffee.

“You sweet-talker, you.”

Nick put her chin in his palm and tilted her face to one side, then the other. Every mark and bruise caught him in the chest.

“I’ll be all right. Stop acting like a father.” Then she asked, “How’s Rebecca?”

“Docs say she’ll make it. Aspiration pneumonia from the clay, but she’ll be okay.”

Erin closed her eyes. “And have you heard from Hannah and Luke?”

“Hannah called. She and my Mom are gonna stay a couple more days. Luke left as soon as he heard that Rodney was dead.” Nick smoothed a flyaway lock of hair behind her ear. “Hannah’s afraid you won’t still be here when they get back.”

Erin shook her head. “We’ve been through this already. I have to go.”

“Layna can handle it,” Nick said. “She’s pretty sure Senator McAllister is gonna be pulling strings right and left, trying to make up for all the terrible things he’s said about you over the years.”

She snorted. “More than a third of Justin’s life has been spent in that prison. How’s the Senator going to make up for that?”

“Justin will figure it out. You’ll figure it out.” He bent in to kiss her, but a knock at the door pulled him back.

“Sheriff.”
Shereef.
Valeria poked her nose in. “Dorian Reinhardt just arrived. He said you asked him to come in.”

“I did.” Nick took a deep breath. First time in five years he was looking forward to seeing the prick. “Bring him back.”

“
Sì
.” She didn’t leave.

“Is there something else?” Nick asked.

“I’m deciding.”

“Deciding what?”

“What bet to place. There’s a new pool going, with all sorts of wagers… When Erin moves in, when you get married, how long until she’s pregnant. A lot to think about.”

“Get out,” Nick said.

Valeria smirked, but it was short-lived and she gave Erin a sad look. “Jensen is waiting for you. You need to go if you’re going to catch your flight.”

A weight dropped on Nick’s shoulders as Jensen ducked in and took her bags, Dorian lagging a few steps behind him. Erin gave him a parting smile then left with Jensen.

Nick looked at Dorian. He looked like a man who’d lost a fortune in a game of craps.

That’s not all you’ve lost, Nick thought.

“You wanted to see me, Sheriff?” he asked, a bitter edge to his voice.

“Yeah,” Nick said. “But, listen, I gotta step out for a minute. I’ll be back.”

Dorian paced Nick’s office, petted his tie, and paced some more. Nick hadn’t told him what he wanted. Had just
summoned
him to his office and then left him there.

Cocky bastard.

He paced another five minutes, complained to Valeria—who told him to
seet back down—
and finally sat down on the vinyl couch. He stared at the wall for a couple of minutes before he realized he was staring at the whiteboard covered with ideas Nick had explored during the course of the Calloway case. He let his eyes roam from box to box, thinking of the case. How big it could have been, and how he’d have been a household name by the end of it if things had gone the way he’d hoped.

Seeing his name in a box.

He came to the edge of the sofa.

DORIAN REINHARDT
. Nick had scrawled his name in capital letters and drawn a rectangle around it. An arrow dropped down from that box to another, in which was printed:
VANDALISM.
And from that, scribbled along vertical lines:

Dorian swallowed, the walls closing in. He moved to the next box, which said,
ASSAULT.
He wanted to get up and leave the office, but like a man passing a gory accident, he couldn’t keep himself from reading:

It couldn’t be. Nick didn’t know any of that. He couldn’t. This was just some power play to jerk Dorian around. And yet, there was a third box, and the tightness in Dorian’s throat turned into a noose.
MURDER.

Dorian thought for ten seconds, breathing like a marathoner, then grabbed his jacket and yanked open the door.

Nick Mann was waiting.

Seven days later…

Thanksgiving Day, November 22

Outside the Florida State Prison, Starke, FL

5:15 p.m.

E
RIN STOOD IN
THE DRIVE
of the prison, Alayna Mann at her side. Senator McAllister spoke to the press—a string of
mea culpas
that would have made Erin sick to her stomach if it hadn’t been for the fact that they had helped speed up Justin’s release. McAllister’s role in Justin’s trial wouldn’t go undisclosed forever—Alayna Mann was collecting evidence—but right now it didn’t matter.

“There,” Layna said, and Erin’s blood raced faster. Collie gave her a wink.

Justin. He walked out of the prison carrying a small bag in his hand, and skimmed the crowd that had gathered. Stopped when he laid eyes on Erin.

Her breath caught. He was a man, timeworn and hard, not a scraggly seventeen-year-old who couldn’t seem to understand what was happening. His frame had bulked up
from having nothing to do besides use the gym every day for eleven years and his eyes—those piercing blue eyes—seemed to look right through her even from forty yards away.

The prison door opened behind him and another man stepped out. Erin gasped. “Nick,” she breathed, and glanced at Alayna, who shrugged. Nick walked up to where Justin stood with a pair of guards, and all four of them approached the inner gate, the median, then the outer gate. There, the guards fell away and Nick and Justin came out to Erin.

Tears gathered in her eyes. She was shocked to see Nick—and thrilled—but she couldn’t stop looking at Justin. Dear God, she didn’t know him at all. She didn’t know if he’d even want to know her.

They stopped in front of her. Nick crossed his arms while Justin’s gaze locked on hers.

“This man tells me I better treat you like a queen,” Justin said, and Erin’s heart did a little flutter. “If I don’t, he’s gonna beat the shit out of me.”

A smile shuddered on Erin’s lips. “He talks pretty, doesn’t he?” she asked, and the faintest glint lit Justin’s eyes. She sobered and looked into that blue gaze. “Can you forgive me?”

His features twisted, a fleeting, tortured expression. “You’ve got that backwards,” he said, his voice like gravel. “It was never you.” Then he nodded to something behind her. “And what about her?”