Maybe...
Her thoughts were so muddled she couldn't draw the name of the second person from her memory. She swiped at her face, trying to clear her vision so she could make out the details of the man's appearance, but tears--or maybe it was blood--kept fil ing her eyes.
Somehow, Kalyna managed to break away. She came to her feet, wielding the crowbar. "Get back!" she cried, raising it high. "You can't hurt me anymore, Mark. You're going soft, you perverted necrophiliac faggot!
You might have the police convinced you didn't enjoy what you did with those corpses, but you and I know better. You're probably stil doing it every chance you get. A dead body makes you hornier than a live one."
Mark. Mark
Cannaby.
The last name popped into Ava's mind.
"That's right!" With a hungry growl, he stuck out his tongue and waggled it. "Imagine how many times I raped your sister after I kil ed her."
"No--" Kalyna swooned, and nearly dropped her weapon.
"Yes." He taunted her with a laugh. "But it was good for me."
Searching for her phone, Ava feebly patted the carpet.
"Why?
" Kalyna cried. "Tati never did anything to you!"
"I thought she was you when I followed her into your apartment. I should've known you wouldn't let yourself gain that much weight. You've always been too vain."
"I'm going to kil you," she screamed. "I'm going to kil you for Tati."
Ava's movements nearly made her lose consciousness. Where was her phone? How could she find it and get out of here? These people were demented. Two souls so similar they'd briefly joined together--but so narcissistic they couldn't make even that work. Ava knew it didn't matter which one of them came out of this alive. Neither would allow her to go on breathing. They couldn't; she knew too much.
"Like you kil ed your mother?" Mark taunted.
Kalyna shook her head. "No, more violent than that. Like I kil ed Sarah."
324
He pulled a weapon from behind his back. Ava might've thought it was a gun, but she could tell by the way he wielded it that it wasn't a gun--it was a knife. "Take your best shot. You only get one."
325
F
ear trickled through Kalyna's veins. She never dreamt she'd come face-to-face with Mark again. He'd been gone from her life for so long she'd forgotten how intimidating he could be. She'd figured she had him, that he'd go to jail for murdering Sarah and Norma, and she'd be able to forget him for good. But he'd come after her, just as he'd promised all those years ago.
Had he really kil ed Tati? Kalyna couldn't believe it, refused to believe it, even though she had no other explanation for the wet spot in her bedroom or Ava's claim that she'd found Tati's purse.
Thinking of Ava reminded Kalyna of her presence. She was searching for her phone. Kalyna could sense her panic, was surprised she could even move. That crowbar should've done more damage, but she'd been swinging wildly, hitting Ava in places that wouldn't kil her so she could prolong the pain. She wanted to tell Ava with each blow that she was going to die. And she was. As soon as Kalyna took care of Mark. Her plan was ruined, but she'd figure out some other way to dispose of the body.
The knife he held at the ready glinted in the light from the bedroom.
Unfortunately, Kalyna's knife was in her backpack in the room where she'd climbed in. She couldn't get to it from where she was. She only had the crowbar. But she wasn't a seventeen-year-old girl anymore. She'd grown up, was at least as strong and smart as Mark. She'd been serious when she said he'd gone soft in the past ten years. She'd felt his rounded paunch when they were wrestling, heard his labored breathing. They'd barely exerted themselves, and he was already winded. The shaved head and the tattoos were just for show.
"You're the one who's going to die, Mark. I should've kil ed you a long time ago. I should've done it for Sarah."
He narrowed his eyes in derision. "You think you need to avenge Sarah?
You're
the one who kil ed her! And you enjoyed what we did to her as much as I did. Shit, you thought of half of it!"
326
There were parts of her that'd enjoyed the power. But Kalyna didn't want to admit it. Mark reminded her of her worst self, of what she could be--
or maybe what she was. She didn't want to be around him, didn't want to face the ugly realities he pushed into the light. He was the only person in the world who really knew her. Norma and Dewayne had always suspected the worst; Tati had always seen what she wanted to see. But Mark had embraced her for who she really was, and she'd hated him for it.
"I enjoyed what I did to my mother, but I didn't even know Sarah," she said. "It was your idea to kidnap her."
His wet clothes clung to him, indicating that he'd been in the river.
Those splashes...
"But it was your idea to kil her!" Kalyna shouted. After wrestling with him, her clothes were damp, too.
"What else were we going to do? Let her go? If you think that would've been a better option, you're as stupid now as you were then. We only did what had to be done. And then you did me a favor when you kil ed your mother. But I'm not taking the fall for it."
"Don't worry. You won't be around to take the fall." She swung the crowbar, hoping to knock him down before he could use the knife. She had to make her move, had to kil Mark and stop Ava before Ava could call for help. Somehow she'd make it look as if they'd kil ed each other and then she'd walk away and be done with them both.
But he was quicker than she'd expected. Ducking the crowbar, he slashed up with his knife and caught her on the chin. The sting surprised her, caused her to rock back--and she couldn't recover fast enough. The next thing she knew he plunged the knife into her chest.
"I thought...you loved me. You promised you'd always love me." She attempted to swing the crowbar--but missed. Dropping it, she staggered in an effort to keep her balance.
"You know better than that. Me and you, we don't love anyone," he said as she sank to the floor. "And we don't trust anyone, either. I was crazy to trust you."
Ava had found her phone. Dimly, Kalyna realized she was fumbling with it, trying to dial.
Mark realized it, too. Leaving her where she lay, he yanked the knife 327
from her chest and turned to Ava. Kalyna would die, but at least she'd die knowing that Ava was going with her.
The drive seemed interminable. Luke had called the police as soon as he dashed out of his apartment, but he didn't have an address to give them. He couldn't even remember the name of the town with the bait shop.
He highly doubted that his call--saying he thought Ava's life was in danger because he found a sweatshirt in his laundry that shouldn't have been there--was going to convince anyone that this was an emergency. The 9-1-1 operator would probably send a squad car out to drive through the sloughs and waterways of the delta and take a look, but if an officer came across Ava's houseboat before morning it'd be a miracle. Luke knew in his heart that he was Ava's best chance. But he also knew he might be too late. It was after one o'clock. An hour and a half had passed since that hang-up. And Ava wasn't expecting trouble. It would come without warning and end fast.
Frantic to reach her, in case there was stil a chance, he took the next corner as if he was at Daytona. The centrifugal force caused his back end to drift, but he'd planned for it. Regaining control, he punched the gas pedal again. "Hang on, I'm coming," he muttered, and prayed that he'd arrive in time.
A second later, his phone rang. Thinking it might be Ava, he snatched it off the passenger seat, letting out a whoop of relief when he saw her number on his caller ID.
"Thank God!" he cried, and hit the Talk button. "Ava, get out of the house! Get out right now and hide. Kalyna's on her way but so am I. I'l be there as soon as humanly possible."
There was no response.
"Ava?" he said.
Again, no reply. Then he heard something. But it definitely wasn't hello.
The knife had plunged into Ava's thigh. Mark would've stabbed her somewhere else, somewhere on her upper body, but she'd rolled to the right, away from him. She'd taken the thrust in a less vulnerable area as 328
she'd intended, but the sight of the blade buried in her leg to the hilt was so surreal she almost couldn't believe this was anything more than a bad dream. She had nightmares occasionally. She saw too much, heard too much at The Last Stand. But she usually woke up once the violence hit.
This was real. But she was probably in shock because there was no pain, just an invading numbness that seemed to be creeping up from her toes.
Fight!
her mind screamed, but her body froze as she tried to maintain her precarious grip on coherent thought.
In a hurry to end her call, Mark didn't bother hanging on to the knife.
He left it in her leg so he could grab her phone--and suddenly Ava's panic came flooding back. She needed this call to go through. Her life depended on it.
"No!" It'd been too dark to see the buttons, and she hadn't had time to feel her way through 9-1-1, so she'd pressed the large Phone button twice.
That was the fastest way to make a call. It redialed her last number. But she couldn't hold the phone to her ear long enough to find out if Luke answered. In the next second, Mark twisted it from her grasp and threw it away from them. Then he went for the knife.
He was going to finish the job, stab her in the heart or cut her throat and be done with her. She could feel his intent as clearly as if he'd shouted it. But she seized the knife before he could.
Kalyna counted to keep herself lucid.
One...two...three...breathe....
One...two...three...breathe....
She was growing light-headed but fought the encroaching dizziness by focusing on a single point--the light coming from Ava's bedroom. She wouldn't give up so easily, would not allow Mark to win after all these years.
She'd play dead until he'd finished with Ava and left. Then she'd go, too.
She'd drag her bleeding body all the way to her car, if necessary, but she wouldn't let him get away with what he'd done. Not to her, and not to Tati.
She'd have to plan it for another day. But she'd make him pay if it was the last thing she ever did.
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The pain didn't hit full force until a second after she'd pulled the knife out. Then, like a wave crashing onto a beach, it nearly bowled Ava over and carried her down, sucking her under, into unconsciousness. Closing her eyes to help her withstand the onslaught, she dropped back, gasping for breath, but managed to wrap both hands around the handle of the knife and held it against her chest, with the point toward Mark. She knew it wouldn't matter. The fight was over. She had no strength left. She couldn't move, couldn't even lift her arms to make the thrust she'd have to make in order to save herself.
Mark didn't try to wrest the knife from her. He probably didn't realize how easy it would be. He didn't need it in any case. He simply turned and grabbed the crowbar.
There were no other cars besides Ava's, at least not that Luke could see. There weren't any lights on, either, except one at the back of the cabin. It reflected off the water as the houseboat bobbed and swayed in the river. Ava's call had cut out only seconds after he'd heard a bloodcurdling scream, but that scream was stil with him, echoing in his brain. He wished she was on the line, screaming now. At least he'd know she was alive.
Everything was quiet--
too
quiet.
What would he find inside?
Hesitating for the first time since he'd dashed out of his apartment, Luke swallowed hard.
Please, don't let her be dead. Don't let me be too
late.
Taking his gun, he got out of his BMW and jogged down the pier.
"Ava?" The door was locked. He banged on it to see if he could rouse her, but got no response. The houseboat seemed empty, which left him with an ominous feeling to go with the lump of dread in his gut.
Fearing the worst, he used his shoulder as a battering ram and broke the door. As it gave way, it slammed against the inside wall and hung there by only one hinge.
Luke scanned what he could see of Ava's living room. Despite the dimness of the light filtering in through the hallway, he could make out a few details. A chair had been overturned, a lamp was missing from its table and a painting on the wall had been knocked askew. Obviously, there'd 330
been some sort of fight here.
His heart pumping like the pistons of an engine, he flipped on the light and rounded the short half wall separating the entryway from the living room. Then he stopped short. Blood was everywhere. And there was a body lying on the floor, someone dressed all in black and wearing a ski mask.
Sweat made his shirt stick to his back as he stepped closer. Bending, he pulled off the mask. It was Kalyna. She'd been stabbed in the chest.
Relief swept through him as he stood. If Kalyna was dead, chances were good Ava had survived, weren't they? So where was she?
"Ava?" he called again. But then he saw her feet sticking out from behind the couch.
"Oh, God," he whispered, and set his gun on the ground beneath the coffee table as he knelt to roll her over.
Summoning al that remained of her energy and focus, Kalyna opened her eyes. Luke had barely hesitated when he'd seen her. He'd pulled off her mask to identify her, but he hadn't cared enough to feel for a pulse. He'd stepped right over her in search of Ava. But she, Kalyna, was the one who was pregnant with his child. At least, he believed she was pregnant....
She didn't have the strength to laugh out loud, but she laughed inside. She'd done so much to gain Luke's attention. She'd thought he was special. But he wasn't. He wasn't any better than Mark. Al men were alike.
She'd been a fool to care about any of them, especially Luke, who'd avoided her from the beginning. He hadn't even been willing to sleep with her--until he was so drunk he couldn't think straight.
Maybe that was why she'd wanted him so badly. Because, as much as she preferred not to believe it, he
was
different. Women weren't just a piece of ass to him. People in general meant more.