Obsession Falls (48 page)
She cried icy tears.
Yet almost at once, the confusion in her mind cleared.
Jimmy had done that. He had used a straw to blow the poisoned needle into her neck and feed drugs directly into her bloodstream. Brilliant. Savage. Effective.
Who did he think he was?
He’d done the same to Kennedy. That’s why Kennedy had collapsed.
Kennedy …
She wasn’t in the Sawtooths, flat on her back on the ledge of a black, bottomless cave. She was in Parnham’s wine cellar. She
had
to be in Parnham’s wine cellar. The wine cellar was better than the cave, because there was no drop. And Kennedy was here somewhere. He had to be here … somewhere.
She threaded the needle into her shirt, then ran her fingers over the concrete floor, stamped to resemble brickwork. Definitely the wine cellar. She sat up and put her hand on her chest to calm her rapidly beating heart, and realized her holster was gone.
Damn it! Her holster was gone. Her pistol was gone. Her jacket was gone. Her tool belt was gone. The framing hammer, her utility knife, her screwdrivers, were gone.
She felt for her leather belt, for the stones that pressed against her waist, and smiled. Her sling was still with her. She was armed, and Jimmy didn’t have a clue.
Jimmy, you aren’t nearly as smart as you like to think.
Of course, if he had locked her in here and left her, her belt wouldn’t do her a lot of good. She would die of thirst, starvation, and madness. Aloud, she said, “Summer, you should be so lucky.”
Off to her right, someone—something?—faintly groaned.
“Kennedy?” she whispered. “Kennedy, is that you?”
No response.
Just like her, he’d been drugged. He was a big guy, and Jimmy really had it in for him, so Kennedy probably had received a bigger dose. Yeah. That noise wasn’t some wild animal Jimmy had stuck in here with her …
He wouldn’t have done that to her. Not unless he had the lights on bright so he could watch as the tiger ate her.
Getting to her hands and knees, she crawled and reached into the cool darkness.
Nothing.
She crawled and reached again.
Nothing.
She crawled and reached—and banged her knuckles into a wall.
She screamed a little. Only a little. Then reached again and cautiously felt the dry, rough texture of sloped walls.
Final confirmation, if she needed it. This
was
the wine cave.
She started searching again, and screamed again, when she put her knee on the warm body stretched out on the floor.
It flinched, and groaned again.
“Kennedy?” She groped.
He was dressed in jeans, a T-shirt, and a leather jacket. He was unmoving. He smelled of gunpowder, as if he’d set off a World War II grenade.
Yes. This was definitely Kennedy. She ran her fingers over his neck, then his face. She found a two-inch-long needle embedded in his cheek.
What a bastard Jimmy was.
Summer pulled the needle and threaded it, like the other one, into her shirt.
Kennedy stirred, and in a rush of movement, he grabbed her and smacked her hard onto the floor.
She gasped for breath, then groped toward his face. She cupped her hands around his cheeks. “Kennedy? It’s Summer. I’m here.”
He was immobile, unspeaking. Then in an abrupt motion he pulled her close. He held her in his arms. His lips touched her forehead. “I dreamed you were dead.”
“I’m fine. I told Kateri…” She trailed off. She couldn’t tell Kennedy that Garik was on his way. Not when she believed Jimmy was listening. “I’m fine,” she repeated. “Are you?”
“I’m stupid,” he said.
“I did say that.” Which was a version of
I told you so,
and one he richly deserved.
“You did. I thought, no matter what, Brachler would honor the rules of the game.”
“Because he was a car thief, drug dealer, and a pimp, and has moved on to become a master criminal and a murderer.” She kept the sharp edge of her fury well honed. “So you thought he would—”
“Yes.” Kennedy sounded earnest. “It’s illogical that he would start the game unless he thought he could play and win.”
“There’s winning, and then there’s cheating. And what do I know? Maybe it’s your fault, because you didn’t give him time to declare his surrender.”
Kennedy started laughing as loudly and as heartily as he had in Jimmy’s office. “He pissed himself.”
“What?”
She had seen Jimmy, white-faced and trembling. But … he’d wet himself? And Kennedy had just admitted he saw it? When she knew—she
knew
—Jimmy was listening? God. There was no hope for either of them.
How could Kennedy be so oblivious? Did he not care whether he lived or died?
Kennedy reined in his glee. “When I was outside. I counted down—”
Summer remembered her indignation. “You threw early!”
“Yeah, I did.”
“After all that crap about synchronizing our entry and all that talk about honoring the rules of the game—you lied!”
“I intended to save you.” His voice was grave. “Now I’ve made the situation worse.”
“He had the needles and the blowgun. He always meant it to end this way.”
“So it doesn’t matter that I threw early.”
They stood at the precipice of death. And he irritated her enough to want to push him over.
He continued, “The first grenade was a dud. It rolled back toward me. I thought we were screwed. I pulled the pin and threw the second one at his oh-so-impressive iron door. It blew right before it hit, slammed that studded monster flat on the floor.” Kennedy’s voice was vibrant with enjoyment. “I headed in.”
“But first, you grabbed the dud grenade.”
“Yes.” Kennedy was audibly smug. “When I ran into Brachler’s command center, I tossed it at him. He saw the grenade flying through the air toward him and—”
“And he wet himself.”
“Yep.” Kennedy laughed again.
She wanted to
kill
Kennedy. “You laughed, and you can’t imagine why he didn’t concede defeat? Not even
you
are that clueless about human nature.”
“No.” Kennedy’s voice lost its humor. “Pissing himself was exactly what I had hoped he would do. In fact, I hope he evacuated his bowels, too.”
She pushed against Kennedy. “If he did, he will seal the entrance to the wine cellar and no one will ever find our emaciated bodies.” She hoped to scare Kennedy into shutting up.
Instead, with keen interest, Kennedy asked, “Are you sure that’s where we are? The wine cellar, aka the Dungeon?”
“Yes.”
“You’re
sure
?”
“
Yes.
I was the construction inspector. Yes!”
“Where’s the door?”
Sarcastically she said, “I would point it out, but—”
He sat up. “Stop wasting time. Let’s find it.”
As she bumbled along through the pitch dark after him, she reflected on how incredibly annoying men were, especially intelligent men who seemed more intent on insulting their enemy than actually living through the ordeal. “It’s not actually a game,” she said softly. “You understand that? We could die. We could never escape and wither and starve and dehydrate and
die.
”
“Do you still have the needles he stuck in us?” Kennedy asked.
He wasn’t listening. Or maybe he wasn’t impressed. “Yes.”
“Great. Because I found the door, and there’s a lock that needs to be picked.”
Summer pushed Kennedy aside, knelt beside the door, and went to work. The lock mechanism was simple; she had picked this kind of lock before. But her tools were nothing more than two long needles; even a professional would be challenged.
Each time she reached in with the needles, she touched the right posts, but she couldn’t manipulate the internal system at precisely the right speed and just the right moment, and time after time, she slipped and failed.
When she stopped, trembling with frustration, Kennedy said, “Let me.” Gently, he moved her out of the way—and within five seconds, he had the door open.
He really
had
learned his parents’ trade.
She blinked at the dim light from the stairwell. A great weight lifted off her chest. They weren’t entombed. They were free. They still had to face Jimmy Brachler, but she was out of the oppressive darkness, so reminiscent of that cave in the mountains, and that was the first step. She stood up.
Kennedy blocked the door. Turning to her, he took her hand and wrapped it around the two needles. “You can do this.”
“Do what?” she asked stupidly.
“Pick the lock.” Kennedy kissed her. “I know you can.” He shoved her back into the wine cellar, stepped out, and shut her back inside.
“What? No!” She flung herself at the door. “No. Kennedy. Listen, don’t. Don’t face him alone. He hates you so much. No, Kennedy!”
On the far wall, a twenty-seven-inch flat-screen TV lit up, illuminating the bare walls of the wine cellar with the camera feed from Jimmy’s office. She turned. She looked. She saw the office in a way she had not seen it when she burst through the Sheetrock.
Shop light fixtures hung tight against the ceiling. A giant map of Washington’s coast covered the back wall, pierced by red pushpins that created the illusion of a military chart recording battle plans. Above the map was a large, schoolhouse clock. The time read five twelve.
P.M
.? Had they been unconscious for so short a time?
If that was true, and Garik had not yet arrived, they might yet be saved.
On the right wall, a heavy iron table was bolted to the floor. A polished walnut desk sat against the left wall with a computer, a monitor, a keyboard, a can of paper clips, a container of pens, a worn sci-fi paperback cracked open and lying facedown. A white calendar desk blotter lay on the surface. On top of that was her pistol, her holster, the dud grenade, and her tool belt.
Jimmy sat in his black leather desk chair, facing the camera, staring at her.
His nose was taped. Yay, Kennedy had broken it good.
She stood and faced him in return, not knowing if Jimmy could see her, aware only that his eyelids drooped in sleepy-eyed menace, his black turtleneck sweater looked expensive—and that she wanted to know if he wore pee-stained trousers. Because if he did, Kennedy had no chance of surviving this encounter.
Kennedy came up and into the room, his back to the camera. He inclined his head. “James.”
Jimmy mimicked him. “Kennedy.”
“What are your terms?”
Jimmy lifted his hand from his lap. He held a Glock 18 automatic pistol in his grip, and he gestured toward the table. “Go over there and lock yourself up.”
Summer looked; at first glance, she had missed the handcuffs. No, not handcuffs—a medieval iron manacle with a short chain welded to the table.
“Don’t do it,” she whispered.
But what were Kennedy’s choices?
Kennedy walked over, calm and dignified, a warrior about to sacrifice himself for … for what?
She could hardly take her eyes away from the manacle. Or from him.
He faced Jimmy. “Why should I do this? What do I get in exchange?”
“I won’t kill your sister.”
“And my nephew. And Taylor Summers.”
“It’s only one manacle. You only get one deal.” Jimmy sounded nasal, the result of the broken nose.
Kennedy shrugged. “Then no deal. Shoot me.”
“God, no.” Summer slid down onto her knees and clasped her hands.
Jimmy faced the camera and smiled.
Yes. He was definitely miked into the wine cellar.
Jimmy swiveled his chair back to face Kennedy. “I’ll never touch Tabitha or Miles for as long as I live. I’ll let them be. I’ll cheer when they thrive. They are no longer part of our fight.”
“We don’t have a fight. I don’t fight with criminals.”
Jimmy came to his feet. He wore dark blue, sleek jeans that fit him as if they had been tailored for him. He’d changed his clothes; no pee stains.
“Really?” he said to Kennedy. “Will you
bargain
with criminals?” He pulled a length of half-inch iron rebar out of the belly drawer and set it with a thump on top of his desk. “What are you willing to do to keep Summer alive?”
“No No No No No. NoNoNoNoNo!” Summer turned and flung herself at the door.
The needles. Kennedy had used the needles to open the lock. If he could do it, she could do it.
“You know the answer to that.” Kennedy sounded disinterested, like a divorce lawyer negotiating the custody of a set of sheets. “To keep Summer alive, and free to live her life as she wishes, I’ll do whatever you want.”
Frantically, Summer worked on the lock and listened to the conversation. She didn’t want to. But she couldn’t shut it out.
“Ever since those inmates held me down while Shel beat my face in, sliced me to pieces, I have dreamed about, obsessed about, imagined one thing.” Jimmy’s voice was both anticipatory and venal. “I’ve wanted to do it to you.”
Summer’s hands shook. Taking a breath, she steadied them and continued her work on the lock.
“That’s the agreement, then,” Kennedy said. “Summer lives her own life, without fear from you or anyone else. And you beat my face with rebar and slice it with…”
“A utility knife.” Jimmy picked it up off his desk and clicked the mechanism, exposing the razor blade. “While you’re handcuffed.”
Summer froze. She listened.
Loud and harsh, the manacle clicked shut.
The needles slipped off the lock.
“Consider yourself lucky,” Jimmy said. “I’m not going to rape you like they did me. You don’t appeal to me at all.”
Summer took another breath. Steadied her hands again. Started again.
“There’s a blessing.” Kennedy rattled the chain.
Jimmy laughed. “I am going to love this so much.”
The needles were in position. The work was precise, delicate; she almost had it …
