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There. There it was again. So soft he nearly missed it.
It was a moan. He glanced at Scarlett, saw she’d heard it too.
‘Hello?’ he called softly. ‘We won’t hurt you. Please come out.’
Another moan, even fainter than the last one, seconds before all hell broke loose upstairs.
The front door banged twice before he heard it slam open, followed by the thunder of ru
Marcus stopped short when his foot landed on something hard. Aiming his light at his feet, he realized he’d stepped on a cell phone. The phone lay on a carpet, about eight inches from the edge of a twin bed, positioned with its headboard up against the wall. He went down on one knee to examine it.
‘Holy shit!’ he yelped when bony fingers came into view, appearing disembodied at first glance. Then he realized the hand was co
‘Oh God,’ he murmured. The phone he’d stepped on was unharmed. But the frail, bony hand that reached for it was not. Bruised, with open wounds, it was covered in dried caked blood.
The hand reached and strained, trying to get the phone. Marcus met Scarlett’s eyes, saw that she was as horrified as he was.
‘Deacon!’ Scarlett shouted into a pocket of quiet. ‘We found someone down here. She’s hurt but still alive.’
Cinci
Tuesday 4 August, 1.25 P.M.
Furious, Ken leaned into Stephanie’s face, grabbing the back of her head when she would have pulled away. ‘Who took the goddamn baby?’ he hissed. He didn’t give a damn about the baby, but by God, she’d tell him who else had been there when his men had arrived. He left no witnesses. Ever. ‘I am tired of your games, Stephanie. Who else was in your house?’
She met his eyes squarely. ‘Ask him. She’s his too.’
‘Shut up, bitch!’ Chip snarled. ‘You don’t know anything. Just shut up.’
Ken spared him a cold glance. ‘She seems to know enough, Chip.’ Keeping one hand on the back of her head, Ken gripped her chin with the other, digging his fingers into her cheeks so hard he’d definitely leave bruises. Stephanie’s eyes flared wide, flickered with shock.
He smiled at her, tightening the grip on her hair. ‘You thought you were safe, didn’t you?’ he asked softly, pleased when she began to tremble again. ‘You thought because you’re so pretty and I pla
Stephanie’s mouth opened, but no sound came out. No longer was she being coy or feisty. She was truly petrified. Excellent.
But then his cell phone picked that moment to ring. Cursing the interruption, he was tempted to ignore it until he realized it was the ringtone he’d set for Demetrius. Keeping his fingers clenched in Stephanie’s hair, he released her face to answer the phone. ‘Is it done?’
‘Not exactly.’ A sigh. ‘No.’
Maintaining his smile so that his frustration wouldn’t show, Ken released Stephanie’s hair and patted her cheek. ‘You’ve earned a momentary reprieve, sweetheart. I’ll be right back.’ Telling Demetrius to hold on, he grabbed the two strips of cloth that had been used to gag Stephanie and her father. He wadded the cloth and shoved one gag into each of their mouths, then went up the stairs to the kitchen, where he could watch his captives on the security monitor.
‘All right,’ he said calmly to Demetrius. ‘What happened? You were supposed to shoot him. That’s all.’
‘I did shoot him,’ Demetrius said, disgruntled. ‘I may have missed.’
‘You may have missed?’ Ken hissed. New rage barreled through him, and he put his speaker phone on mute, letting his furious breath shudder out. Breathe until you can speak without raising your voice. He couldn’t let his captives hear him losing it. It would give them hope, and he didn’t have time to strip new-found hope away. He needed to know who’d witnessed the Anderses’ abduction.
‘Ken?’ Demetrius asked through the speaker a minute later. ‘You still there, man?’
Ken unmuted the phone. ‘I am here,’ he said, calm now that he’d vented off some of the rage. ‘What do you mean, you missed?’
‘Don’t take that tone with me, man,’ Demetrius said, his own anger rising. ‘And if you’re thinking about saying if you want something done right, do it yourself, then I’m out of here.’
It wasn’t the first time Demetrius had threatened to close up shop, so Ken let the statement slide. ‘I wasn’t going to say that,’ he said, even though he’d thought it. ‘But how could you miss him? We agreed that you’d take a head shot close enough that you’d be able to get the bullet out of him before the cops found it.’
‘Things changed,’ Demetrius said coldly. ‘I followed him and that homicide detective to Anders’s house. She got out and went to stand with the white-haired guy. The one in the FBI.’
‘Agent Novak,’ Ken said. He’d never met the man personally, but he’d read plenty about him, as the agent was a media darling. ‘And then?’
‘And then O’Ba
‘And then you shot them.’
‘I took care of the plain-clothes cop on watch first.’
Ken groaned. ‘You killed a cop?’
‘I think he was a Fed.’
‘Aw, fuck, Demetrius.’
‘I don’t know if he’s dead. I just didn’t want him coming after me when I did O’Ba
‘Except you missed.’
‘I may have missed,’ Demetrius said through his teeth. ‘The bastard’s fast. He moved at the last second. My bullet hit the door exactly where his head had been.’
‘Why didn’t you shoot him again?’
‘I did. Bastard grabbed the woman, shouldered the door open and went through it like it was made of paper.’
‘Because Burton’s men had already broken the door in.’ Ken rubbed his temples. ‘O’Ba
‘I may have hit O’Ba
‘You think they called the medics because you hit O’Ba
‘They’re not coming for the detective. I don’t think I hit her at all, because he shielded her. It’s got to be for O’Ba
‘Oh my God, Demetrius. Listen to yourself. You shot and may have killed a Fed. O’Ba
‘They didn’t see me.’
‘But they’ll find your bullet! Jesus.’ Ken’s voice had risen, and he sucked in a breath to quiet himself.