‘It’s just the way it is. Now, if you want to live to see an end to this, we have to get moving.’
Bryce ran a hand over his face. Then he surreptitiously wiped his palm on the leg of his trousers, leaving a dark smear. He was frightened. So was I, to be honest, but I wasn’t going to give in to the fear. I was going to use it, the way I always did.
Chapter 11
‘See me.’
An opportunity to test his theory should never be wasted, Luke Rickard thought.
‘See me,’ he said again.
Following his telephone conversation with Joe Hunter, he’d sat on the foot of the bed staring into the vanity mirror. Phasing his vision in and out proved ineffective as he peered into the reflective surface, trying to delve beyond his blurred image to what lay beneath. He could feel the serpent coiling in his innards, but he caught no sign of the slithering thing. Only women had the ability to look upon his true essence.
He finally stood up and looked down on the woman lying on the bed. The drug he’d shot into her had ensured that she remained unconscious while he’d bundled her into the FedEx truck and brought her back to her house. Slumped in his arms, he’d carried her here to her bedroom and laid her out on top of the comforter. That was more than two hours ago; by now the drug should have worn off.
‘See me, Imogen,’ he said.
The day was overcast, precipitation threatening again, so the room was in shadow. Imogen’s face was a pale oval beneath her cap of dark hair, her chin tilted on her left shoulder. He could hear her breathing, slow and long exhalations. To all intents and purposes she looked like she was sleeping, but he knew otherwise. Her eyelids were too taut, as though she was holding them closed, and there was no movement beneath them as there would be if she was lost in dreamland.
He leaned in close to her, blowing on her ear. Imogen didn’t stir as a sleeping person would have.
‘I know you are awake. Open your eyes and look at me.’
Imogen didn’t respond, except for the faintest flutter of her lashes.
‘I said
open your eyes
.’
Rickard grasped Imogen’s chin in one hand, pinching hard. White blotches surrounded his fingertips but still Imogen didn’t respond. Rickard grunted out a laugh.
Releasing her jaw, he trailed his hand down her chest and stomach. She was still in the sweats that she’d worn for her run; damp from the rain. He dipped his hand under the hem of her top and ran his fingers over the warmth of her abdomen. He felt her shudder involuntarily, but to her credit she still feigned unconsciousness. He finger-crawled higher, touching the swell of one breast. She was wearing a plain sports bra, unlike the lace and ribbons and bows that he preferred, but her breasts felt full and firm the way he liked them. Not as full and firm as Alisha’s, but in her defence this woman was fifteen years older and silicone-free. He pawed her, then took a breast in his hand and squeezed. He’d have liked to have felt her respond but there was no hardening of the nub beneath his palm.
Maybe the bitch was still under the influence of the tranquilliser.
He slipped his hand from beneath her top, worming his fingers into the waistband of her trousers.
Fucking cotton panties.
He cupped the mound of her pubis. Pushed with his fingers, trying to insert a finger under the elastic.
Imogen came awake like an alley cat.
Shrieking and clawing, she tore at his hand, tore at his face.
Rickard reared away from her, his laughter ringing loud.
‘I knew you were awake,’ he said.
Imogen tried to bolt from the bed. Rickard grabbed her by an ankle, and she went down chest first on the floor. She kicked and squirmed, and he dragged her back on to the bed, threw her down, her face pushing into the pillows to smother her screams.
Rickard rolled her over, avoiding her nails as they raked at his eyes. He slapped her arms away, then lashed her across the face with his palm. Then he climbed on top of her, bracing his knees either side of her ribs, holding a wrist in each of his hands and forcing them above her head.
‘Are you like this when you’re with Hunter?’
‘Get off me. Get off! Get off!’
‘I can see why he likes you, Imogen. Quite the spirited little thing, aren’t you?’
Imogen screamed again, words lost in her terror.
Rickard smiled, liking her response. ‘I even made myself look like him for you. Though, I must say, I’m more handsome. Don’t you agree?’
She screamed again.
Rickard leaned in very close. Imogen thrashed and their foreheads bumped. He forced his head against hers so that she was pressed down against the mattress. They were eye to eye.
‘Do you look into his eyes when you’re together?’ Rickard asked. ‘Do you search his soul?’
Imogen screwed her eyes tight.
‘Open your eyes, Imogen. Open them, or I’ll cut off your eyelids so you have no option but look at me.’
Imogen cried.
‘Now!’
Her lids flickered open. He was so close he could see her pupils dilate.
‘Do you see it?’
She mewled like a cat.
‘You do? You see it? Tell me what you see.’
‘You’re a
monster
!’ Imogen howled.
‘Yes . . .’ Finally, Rickard thought, proof that he was right all along. ‘Tell me more, Imogen. Describe
it
to me.’
‘Get away from me, you bastard.’
‘Tell me what you see.’
Moaning loudly Imogen tried to fight free. Rickard forced himself against her, bearing down with all his weight. It was no contest. He forced her wrists together, grasping both in one of his hands. His other fingers he twined in her hair, twisting it tight.
‘Tell me, you goddamn bitch.’
‘Touch me and you will die!’
‘No one can help you,’ Rickard said. ‘I can do to you anything I wish.’
‘Joe Hunter will kill you. He’ll come for you and you’ll die.’
‘I didn’t go to all this trouble for nothing. I want him to come. But he’ll be too late to help you.’ Imogen struggled again, Rickard laughing at her ineffectiveness. ‘I’ll kill him as easily as I’ll kill you.’
Imogen screamed.
Surf crashed below the house on its clifftop promontory and gulls wheeled in the iron-grey sky. Her scream was lost amid the tumult of nature beyond the walls.
He let go of her hair, sliding his knees out behind him and forcing a leg between hers. ‘Joe Hunter will suffer before he dies, Imogen. He will know that I’ve had his woman, and the shame will make him burn.’
He ripped her trousers from her, tore at her panties while she fought hard against him. She yanked loose her wrists and pulled at his hair, but he was beyond caring. He pulled down his trousers and he was harder than any time he could ever remember with Alisha.
But his ardour only lasted as long as it took to realise that the pounding on the door meant big trouble.
‘God damn it.’
Pulling away from Imogen, he held out a hand, halting her from following. He pulled up his trousers, quickly reached to a dresser where he’d placed his gun.
‘Say a word and I’ll shoot you in the face.’
He moved across the bedroom to the window, standing alongside the drapes to peer outside. His angle meant he couldn’t see who was at the front door, but he could see the two police cruisers parked on the hard stand next to the house. An overweight cop was standing at the open door of his vehicle, one hand on his radio and one on the butt of his holstered gun. The cop glanced his way, but Rickard pulled back.
Joe Hunter, you sneaky son of a . . .
A fist banged firmly on the front door.
‘Mrs Ballard. State police. Open up, please.’
Imogen struggled into her clothes, throwing her feet over the edge of the bed. Rickard raced across to her, catching her elbow and jamming his gun under her chin. ‘Do not make a sound.’
But Imogen was defiant. She struggled away from the gun, yelling at the top of her voice.
Rickard backhanded her across the jaw, knocking her against a wall so that a photograph of a surly-looking man in Desert Storm fatigues was twisted askew. Rickard glanced at the face and thought that the man was scowling at him.
‘Fuck you, too,’ he snapped.
He grabbed Imogen by the nape of her neck, pushing her towards the door and out on to a landing that overlooked the entrance hall. A shadow moved beyond the glass pane in the front door.
The state trooper shouted an announcement again, trying the door handle. The door swung open and the uniformed man followed inside. His service revolver was out, but it was aimed along the vestibule.
‘Look out,’ Imogen yelled.
The trooper’s eyes went wide, his head coming up, but the gun was a fraction slower.
Rickard fired and blood blossomed on the trooper’s shirt.
The trooper went down on his backside, then spun on the floor, gripping at his gut. Screaming in agony.
Instantly, Rickard forced Imogen down the stairs. There was another cop outside, the fat one. Have to get by him, Rickard knew, before reinforcements can arrive. The last thing he wanted was to be stuck inside the house with a cordon of armed cops all round. He’d been in worse predicaments, but he could do without the inconvenience.
The gut-shot cop wasn’t a concern. He wasn’t going to die immediately, but that was a good thing. His screams of agony would help confuse and dismay his buddy outside and would ultimately slow down any pursuit as any further troopers responding to the scene would see their fallen comrade as their first priority.
Rickard snatched the cop’s revolver off the floor and jammed it into his belt. Then, looping an arm round Imogen’s throat, he moved into the doorway.
The second trooper had retreated to the far side of his cruiser and was leaning over the bonnet, his gun trained on them.
‘Police,’ he yelled. ‘Put down the gun.’
Rickard ignored the challenge and pushed Imogen forwards, down the steps and across the yard. The cop could shoot, but he’d hit Imogen first.
‘Drop your weapon!’ The cop’s words were a loud screech.
Crash through their defences, cut them down. Rickard came on, forcing the trooper to stand up and back away.
Staring into the man’s eyes, Rickard saw that he was jammed firmly between running for his life and doing his duty. While he was stuck there, he wasn’t doing either. Rickard shot him in his huge belly. Twice for good measure.
The cop went down, and his screams matched those of his fallen companion. Imogen joined in, and now it was the surf and the seagulls that had to take a back seat.
Dispassionately, Rickard pulled Imogen away from the sorely wounded man and marched her across to where he’d left the FedEx truck. It was good for carrying an unconscious woman, but too distinctive to avoid detection for long.
‘Give me your keys.’
Imogen’s Suburban was parked next to the house.
When she wasn’t forthcoming, Rickard smacked the butt of his gun on the nape of her neck and she sprawled at his feet.
Leaving her where she lay, he went back inside the house, stepping over the trooper in the vestibule to get to a stand where Imogen had left her purse. A bunch of keys were disgorged from the bag and he swept them into his palm.
He was inside no more than ten seconds, but the scene in the yard had changed. Imogen had crawled a small distance away, and was now on her hands and knees, shaking her head like a dog with a flea in its ear. But more importantly, the overweight cop had managed to claw himself inside his cruiser. White-faced and oozing perspiration, he was shouting into the radio mike.
Rickard glanced between the two of them, then stalked towards the police car. He lifted his gun, aiming it through the window.
‘You should have just kept screaming until I was gone,’ Rickard said. ‘Maybe you would have lived.’