Thirty
Zach dialed Adam's number again, hoping this time the phone would be answered before the machine picked it up. This time someone did on the fourth ring. “Hello?”
“Jon? What are you doing there?”
“Adam called me. He was in that mess on the Cross Bronx. What the hell is going on here? I just put Barbara in an ambulance. There's a dead cop in the hallway and two more outside.”
“Where's Alex?”
“I don't know. She was gone when I got here. There was a car pulling away when I stopped. Out of habit I memorized the plates and called them in already.”
Which might help track them down if they were still on the road. Where the hell would he have taken her? Every former haunt of his was currently either closed off to him or under police surveillance. He was so frightened for her that he could barely think. He disconnected the call, unheedful of whatever his brother was saying on the other end of the line. “Where the hell would he take her?” he said aloud to Smitty.
He got no response and didn't really expect one. When they got back to the car, Smitty had insisted on taking over the chore of driving. Zach knew where Smitty was heading, back to Adam's house to see if any of the neighbors had seen in which direction they'd driven. It was better than nothing, but it sure as hell wasn't much.
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John McKay couldn't say why he'd started haunting the houses along the New England Thruway on nights he couldn't sleep. Maybe he expected to find the killer out there, or worse yet, one of his victims. Then again, he seemed to have moved on to tormenting Dr. Alex Waters instead. There was a time when McKay would have applauded the man's motives if not his actions, but no more. The investigation had vindicated her in every possible way and left him feeling lower than dirt. Maybe all he wanted was a chance to vindicate himself. But there was no chance of that, since he'd botched things so badly he'd been taken off the case.
He drove silently through the night. He knew about the sting they had planned for just a few blocks from here. If anyone asked him, Williams was too smart for that. But since no one asked he had no one to tell that to but himself. A light flickered from one of the empty buildings. Nothing bright, maybe some candles or a flashlight. Considering no one should be in here at all, he drew the car to a stop and picked up his cell phone.
He knew Zach Stone's number by heart and dialed it. He answered almost immediately. “Stone.”
In a hushed voice he asked, “How'd the operation go over at the Dunkin' Donuts?”
“Who is this?”
“McKay. How'd it go?”
“South. He's got Alex. Why?”
“I'm over here on Baychester and Proust. I noticed a light in one of the vacant buildings. It could be him.”
He didn't hear what Stone said on the other end of the line. His ears were trained to listen to any sound coming from the building. He heard a soft thud, like a body dropping a distance away. He knew Zach would be here, probably with reinforcements, but he couldn't wait. He eased his gun out of its holster and got out of his car.
Thirty-one
Alex lay on the unfinished floor of some half-done house curled into a fetal position. Sensation was coming back to her body in the form of a thousand tiny, excruciating pinpricks. She wanted to scream, but her mouth wouldn't work properly yet.
She heard the sound of something metallic scraping together, and then a table leg came into view. From above she heard his voice. “I really should have had this ready for you, but there were some kids hanging around before. I didn't want to draw attention to myself by frightening them off.”
She heard other sounds, none of which made sense to her. But some of the strength seemed to be coming back to her limbs. She flexed one arm to test it.
“Lie there quietly, or I'll stun you again and this time I won't be so gentle.”
She did as she was told, only because she knew she didn't have the strength to fight him. She might later, so she tried to conserve what strength she had for now.
He moved into her field of vision. He took off the blond wig and wiped his hand across his face, smearing what makeup he wore into a grotesque mask. “Ready for some fun?”
Again, the urge to scream claimed her, and this time sound made it past her throat into the still dark night.
“There's no one to hear you, darlin', or if they do, they'll just think it's some of those kids fooling around where they shouldn't be.” He reached down and scooped her up, depositing her hard on the table.
She winced and her eyes squeezed shut as pain shot through her, mostly from her head hitting the table first. The throbbing had already started. She didn't need this now. She needed all her wits about her if she was going to survive this. For all she knew Zach had no idea where she was; no one did. She was on her own. And her only chance was to talk her way out of it since fighting was out of the question.
“Why do you want to do this to me, Ginnie?” She chose to use his feminine name since that's how he presented himself. “I tried to help Walter. I would have helped you if I'd known you needed it.”
“You tried to help Walter?” he said in a scoffing voice. “You turned him against me. He was always there for me. Always. Until you got to him.” He grabbed one of her wrists in a painful grip and brought it back over her head to fasten it to the table with a leather strap.
Good God, he really did intend to kill her just like the others, to rape her and mutilate her and leave her dead somewhere. She felt sick with both that knowledge and the impending migraine. She would have retched if a sound outside the room hadn't captivated her attention.
Immediately Williams crouched behind the table by her head. He had the .45 in his hand near her face. “Walter?” he asked.
“Walter's dead, you sick son of a bitch. Put down the weapon and kick it over to me.”
That was McKay's voice. She couldn't see him, but she'd never been happier to know he was near her.
“Are you okay, Alex?”
That was the first time he'd used her given name. “For the moment.”
Williams pressed the gun to her temple. “Stay away or she's dead.”
“You won't shoot her,” McKay said. “That isn't in the script, is it? If you want to do her like you like, you have to get rid of me first.”
Perhaps crazed by being so close and being thwarted, Williams lunged toward McKay, his arm held high over his head. Alex saw this as her one opportunity to act. She swung her left leg in a crosswise arc, catching Williams in the belly. She heard the whoosh of his breath leaving his body and something metallic clatter to the floor. A single gunshot fired coming from McKay's direction. The acrid smell and the smoke of it invaded her eyes and nostrils.
Williams went down and McKay was on him. She couldn't see anything after that, but she heard one of the men grunt in pain. She hoped it wasn't McKay, but knew she'd hoped in vain when Williams came to loom over her. He cast her a look that was part defeat and part melancholy. For an instant she could only stare at him, bracing herself for what happened next. While the men had been fighting, she'd managed to almost free her hand. Another couple of seconds and she would have accomplished it. Then she would have been ready for him.
But the sound of sirens reached her. He must have heard them, too, because he froze. “Some other time, then, Doctor,” he said before racing from the room.
That surprised her since he hadn't shown any particular fear of the police before. Maybe he didn't fear them now, but knew they would thwart him from carrying out his taskâdoing her like he liked as McKay had put it.
But there could be no other time. Tonight had to end it. She didn't think she could bear another round of Williams's type of madness. She freed her hand and slid to the floor. McKay was already making an effort to stand. She helped him to his feet, her hands noticing something sticky and wet clinging to his clothing. “What happened?”
“The son of a bitch stabbed me.”
“We need to stop the bleeding.”
“Once we get outside. I'm not dying in this hellhole.”
She wouldn't argue with any man who sounded so determined. Together they made it down the stairs and out of the building. Out on the street there was no sign of Williams. That didn't mean much since there were no streetlights here, no moon, and any illumination came from cars passing on the service road or the highway beyond. The car in which he'd transported her was still there, though, which meant he'd probably taken off on foot.
She didn't have much time to ponder that. She had McKay to deal with. She couldn't allow him to bleed to death, but she had nothing with which to stanch the flow. She wore a hooded jacked that zippered up the front with a T-shirt beneath. The T-shirt was a better bet, since it was softer and had no zipper to complicate things.
She looked down at McKay, who appeared pale and listless. “If you tell anybody I did this, I will kill you myself.” She tugged off the hoodie, pulled her T-shirt over her head, and replaced the hoodie.
A wan smile crossed McKay's face. “Stone is a lucky man.”
“Shut up,” she told him. Neither humor nor a great deal of talking was required now. She folded her shirt, lifted his, and pressed the fabric to the knife wound in his lower right belly. She knew they were coming. The sirens that had once been faint were now almost deafening. But even before they arrived, she felt a pair of strong hands at her shoulders. Smitty moved into her line of view, taking over her ministrations with McKay.
Her mind filled with one thought.
Zach
. She turned and threw herself into his arms. He hugged her to him, his embrace lifting her from the ground. Alex couldn't help smiling. This big, strong man was trembling in her arms.
Thirty-two
Zach held her a long moment, trying to school his emotions into something manageable. He'd nearly lost her tonight. He didn't know what he'd do if that happened, and he didn't want to contemplate it too much, either. But she was still whole and still here, which meant they still had a chance to be together. He needed to focus on that, rather than the images of Alex dead, or worse, that had haunted him on the way here.
But first he needed to make sure she was really okay. He set her on the ground and cradled her face in his palms. “Baby, are you all right?”
“I'm fine, believe it or not, thanks to McKay. He saved my life.”
So McKay was good for something after all. Zach looked at the man lying on the ground, whom Smitty still tended to. “And you have quite possibly saved his.”
“I hope so. Williams has claimed enough lives. “Did you find Barbara?”
“Jon went to the hospital to be with her.” He hadn't heard from Jon since. He didn't know if that was a good thing or a bad one, so he didn't elaborate. “Where's Williams?”
“I don't know. I think he took off on foot. It couldn't have been more than five minutes ago. He's got to be hurting. McKay shot him once. I'm not sure if he's still armed.”
Alex relayed the information as if it didn't make sense to her. It didn't make sense to him either. Why not get back in the car and get the hell out of Dodge before anyone had a chance to show up?
He took out his flashlight and scanned the ground. If Williams had been hit, he wasn't leaving any blood trail Zach could detect. Which meant Williams could be here anywhere or he could be long gone. Zach didn't know which, but he knew he needed to get Alex out of there, especially away from being out in the open. Then again, if Williams was somewhere with a good vantage point, he'd probably have tried to pick them off already. That is, if Williams was still armed with anything powerful enough to reach them from where he was, like the weapon he'd used on the policewoman. That had to be at least a .44. The fact that he hadn't fired on them lent credence to Alex's theory that he was unarmed.
As he turned, Zach's gaze snagged on the bridge that went over the highway into Co-op City. What seemed like a lifetime ago, they'd wondered from what vantage point Thorpe had been scouting for victims. That bridge had been one possibility.
He could imagine Williams watching from there now, watching the police scurry around vainly. That would appeal to his sense of holding power over them. He believed himself smarter than the cops and would probably enjoy watching from on highâgodlikeâwhile they scurried around looking for him. Even on a clear night, the domed fencing covering the bridge more deflected the moonlight than illuminated anything. On a night like tonight it would be next to impossible to spot a man up there unless you were really looking. But now Zach was.
“Son of a bitch,” he said, detecting some sort of movement among the fencing on the near side of the bridge. With a little effort he made out the frame of Williiams crouching. Even though the area was suddenly alive with cars and sirens, Zach didn't hesitate. He couldn't risk that Williams would get spooked by all the activity or decide it wasn't worth his time and run.
To Alex, he said, “Stay with Smitty.”
Smitty, who'd just been relieved by an EMT, asked, “Where are you going?”
Zach nodded toward the bridge. “He's up there. See if you can get someone on the other side.” That way they could fence Williams in. He wouldn't be going anywhere.
Zach moved off, hoping that the arriving cars proved enough of a distraction for Williams not to notice him approaching. It didn't hurt either that Zach was dressed all in black. Between the camouglaging effect of his clothing and the fact that the steps leading to the bridge ran perpendicular to it, he hoped to be almost on top of Williams by the time the other man noticed his presence.
Crouched low, Zach moved between two of the cars parked at the curb and made his way to the opposite side of the street. Hugging the fence that cordoned off the highway, he traveled quickly and silently. Even at this hour, traffic was pretty heavy, certainly dense enough to cover any sound he made, but he wasn't taking any chances.
The stairs were composed of several thick slabs of concrete that made for an awkward ascent, even if it were not a covert one. Zach had his weapon trained on Williams as soon as he got a clear view. He was almost on himâa step from the topâwhen Williams started and his head turned in Zach's direction. The bastard really hadn't seen him coming. Williams glanced over his shoulder, as if to check for someone behind him or to gauge his chances of escape.
“Don't even think about it,” Zach said in a deadly voice. “Lie on the ground and put your hands on top of your head.”
Even in the dim light, Zach saw the feral smile that stretched across Williams's face. He had no intention of giving up. Too bad. Zach had no intention of letting him go. This needed to be over now, tonight, if for no one else's sake but Alex's.
Zach repeated his instruction, or started to. Without warning Williams drew back his arm and flung something at him. Zach ducked to the side, just as a knife whizzed past his head.
Williams used the opportunity to take off in the opposite direction. It wasn't much of a bridge, maybe fifty feet. Williams had made it halfway to the other side by the time Zach followed. But Williams skidded to a stop. Zach immediately saw why. Smitty and some uniforms were making their way up the stairs on the other side.
“Give it up, Williams,” Zach said. You're not going anywhere.” Zach's gun was trained on him and it occurred to him that he should just shoot him and get it over with. Put a few bullet holes in him as Alex urged, only half joking. There would be no trial, no chance of parole, no fear that he might get out one day and come after her again. It also occurred to him that he'd be exercising his own brand of justice, just as Williams had.
But Williams wasn't going to go down that easy. He was near enough to the other side, the part unprotected by the dome, to grasp the lamppost that stood next to the stairs and hoist himself on top of the fence.
Zach knew what he intended to do. It was a bit of a drop down to the northbound side of the New England Thruway, but there was also a fence he could grab on to to break his fall. He hoped to gain a few seconds' advantage, since no one in their right mind would follow his route. Williams himself teetered trying to get enough balance to jump.
Before Zach could say a word, a semi rumbled underneath the bridge blasting its horn. Williams lost his balance and fell backward.
Zach rushed forward, hoping to grab maybe a piece of the man if he could. But he was too late. Rather than landing on the shoulder of the road, Williams tumbled into traffic, landing on the hood of one car, rolled off, and was struck by the SUV behind it with such force that he flew in the air to land twenty feet away.
Zach pushed past Smitty and the others who had just gained the bridge, and hurried down the stairs. He scaled the chest-high fence and dropped down on the other side. Williams still lay facedown and motionless in the middle lane of the highway and traffic had come to a dead halt.
Zach checked for a pulse at Williams's throat. Finding none, he turned the man over. Williams's eyes were open and unfocused, his mouth slack and bloody. He was dead. He couldn't touch Alex anymore. That's all that mattered. For a moment, Zach closed his eyes and focused on drawing much-needed air into his lungs.
Then an equally winded Smitty came up beside him. He clasped Zach on the shoulder. “What lesson have we learned here today, boys and girls? Those who live by the car die by the car.”
Laughter rumbled up in Zach's chest. “I thought you were supposed to be watching Alex.”
“Actually, you told her to stay by me. I convinced her that wasn't such a good idea. She's with Craig.”
Zach glanced across the highway to where Alex was.
Smitty nudged him again. “Go to her. The rest of us can handle the cleanup.”
Zach didn't argue. He needed to be with her, to hold her and tell her it was all over. Then that fresh start they talked about could begin.