At Risk (35 page)

“Lizzy!” Jack stood in the open double doors.

She grasped the pistol in two hands and aimed it at him. “No! Get away!” she screamed.

“Wait! I—”

Lightning made the barn as light as day. Liz shut her eyes against the glare, and in the split second she was blind, Jack lunged at her and grabbed her wrist.

“Drop the gun!” he shouted. His voice was nearly lost in the blast of thunder.

She struggled to hold on to the weapon, but she was no match for his strength. He twisted her arm, forcing the revolver down. “No!” she screamed. “No!”

“Lizzy, I—”

His words were drowned in Otto’s snarl. The German shepherd burst out of the rain and struck Jack with enough force to send him staggering to one knee. Liz slammed her fist into Jack’s face and broke from his grasp. Jack swung the gun barrel back over his shoulder against the dog’s head, and Liz heard Otto yip and then bark furiously as she fled away from the barn toward the water’s edge. A gunshot cracked and then another.

Liz looked back to see Jack pounding after her. Otto’s yelp had become a howl of agony, but the dog was on the attack. A third bullet slammed into a post, not four feet from her head, sending splinters flying like missiles. One embedded itself in her upper arm, another in her side, but she ignored the pain and ran faster.

A narrow opening appeared in the tall reeds. Liz ducked into it. Her feet sank into mud. The water rose over her ankles, but she kept moving, slipping, falling, pulling herself back up to her feet. Behind her, she heard Jack shout her name.

The gun went off again. Instinctively Liz ducked. The reeds opened to a small hummock of ground. She didn’t need daylight to know there were two gnarled cedars here, dwarfed and twisted. The water rose over her knees, making each step more difficult.

To the left, through a tangle of grass, phragmites, and mud bank, lay the river. If she could reach that, she could swim to—

Abeam of light found her. “Game over, Professor.”

Liz turned and threw up a hand to shield her eyes from the powerful mag light. The monster loomed out of the shadows, his big hands smacking together in an eerie parody of applause. But the voice wasn’t right . . . it couldn’t be . . .

“Jack?”

“You lose.”

Realization flooded though her. She didn’t need the flicker of lightning to recognize the man in the hood and black clothing. “Michael?” But if Michael was here, where was Jack?

He laughed.

“Michael? It can’t . . . You can’t . . .” He was standing—had run after her through the marsh. How could he? His legs . . .

He took a step toward her. Liz threw herself against the wall of reeds, clawing against the tall grass, forcing her body through the morass toward the river.

“Enough. My play.”

A blow to her head made her ears ring. She fell forward, rolling onto her back and kicking at him. Something hard slammed against her ankle, and stars pinwheeled behind her eyelids. She cried out and struggled as he leaned down to grab her injured leg.

“I said, ‘enough’!”

“You son of a bitch! What did you do to Jack?” She kicked him in the chin with her free foot. Michael grunted and leaped onto her. She smashed the heel of her palm into his face and tore at his hair, but in seconds he had a knife at her throat.

“Be nice, little bird,” he said. “Or do you want me to slice your throat and let all your pretty blood drain out in the mud?”

“Like you did Tracy’s?”

Michael flicked the blade a fraction of an inch. Liz felt a hot stinging as the steel parted her skin and blood oozed from the cut. “Will you be good? Or shall we end it here?”

Part of her wanted to urge him to do it—to stop the madness once and for all. But she wanted to live. “All right.”

“All right, what?” He pressed the blade harder.

“I’ll be good.”

He withdrew the knife and seized a handful of her hair with his other gloved hand. “Come on, then.” He yanked hard, and she struggled up, wincing when she tried to put weight on her hurt ankle.

“But why?” she begged. “Why are you doing this to me, Michael? I thought we were friends.”

“Shut up! That’s not my name.” He released her hair and shoved her.

“What is your name?”

He cuffed her hard. “I’ll tell you when to speak.” Retracing her steps down the marsh path was a nightmare. And worse, when she reached the edge of the yard, she nearly stumbled over Jack’s slumped body. Michael switched on the flashlight. Blood darkened the back of Jack’s shirt. Another bullet hole gaped in his left thigh. Liz’s revolver lay in the grass a few feet from Jack’s pale, still fingers.

“He shouldn’t have interfered,” Michael said, bending to retrieve the gun and tucking it into his waistband beside a holstered .45. “You were mine. You were always mine.”

It was still raining, but the storm was moving on across the bay. The flashes of lightning came less frequently, and the grumble of thunder was less deafening. Otto lay sprawled in a pool of blood and water between Jack’s body and the barn. Michael strode past the dog without a glance, but not before Liz saw that the ragged hole in the dog’s side was larger than that made by a .22-caliber bullet. Her gun hadn’t killed the German shepherd.

“You,” she said. “You shot Otto.”

“He got in the way.”

“Did Heidi get in your way?”

He slapped her, knocking her backwards onto the grass. “I told you to shut up. I won’t tell you again.” He pointed toward the barn.

Liz bit her lip against the pain and got up. When they reached the open double doors, he gestured toward the car. She hesitated, and he laughed. “Who do you think took your spare?” He reached up on a shelf where her father had kept small tools and produced the missing key.

Michael knew where she kept the key. He’d been the one who’d insisted she keep an extra taped to the car. Liz gritted her teeth and leaned against the wall as he advanced on her. She was acutely aware of the rain drumming on the shingled roof and the scent of Michael’s aftershave.

She was going to die.

How could she have been so stupid . . . why hadn’t she guessed that it was Michael all along?

“We’re going for a ride,” he said.

“You said you cared for me. You asked me to marry you.”

“You catch more flies with honey than vinegar.”

“I’m not an insect!”

“You’re not?”

She tried not to flinch as he brushed past her and unlocked the trunk. “No,” she protested through bruised lips. “No.”

She saw him raise the flashlight. She tried to dodge the blow, but her ankle wouldn’t hold her. The heavy flash light smashed into the crown of her head. She felt a jolt of pain . . . and then nothing at all.

Light flooded Liz’s eyes as the trunk swung open. She’d been vaguely aware of the car’s movement, but the blow had left her too groggy to think clearly. Her head throbbed. When she touched the lump, she discovered that her hair was sticky with what she could only imagine must be her own blood. She wondered if she’d lost so much blood that she was in a state of shock.

“Get out!”

Rain streamed down Liz’s face and arms as she crawled out of the confined space. Her knees felt weak, and it was all she could do not to gag. She knew she had to summon her wits or she’d be as dead as Jack, but, strangely, she was nearly at the point of not caring.

Jack was gone.

Michael wanted to kill her.

One thought was as impossible to comprehend as the other. Shouldn’t she feel something deeper than disbelief? “Move!” Michael’s voice was harsh.

How could Michael be her stalker? Yet he was.
Not Michael,
Liz thought. He’d warned her not to call him that . . . but if not Michael, then . . . “Who . . . are you?” she managed.

“Your worst fear. The faceless shadow that haunts you in the night. I am the Game Master.”

His hand clamped around her upper arm, powerful fingers biting into her flesh. He shoved her forward, and through the pelting rain she could make out the back of his house. “Why?” she asked. “Why are you doing this to me?”

He shook her so hard that a corner of a tooth cut her tongue. “Shut up! I’ll tell you when to speak, Professor.” He strode toward the back door, dragging her after him.

The kitchen was dark, the only light the dim glow of a coffee maker. Liz clutched the edge of the table, wiping the rain from her eyes, dripping onto the clean floor as waves of nausea washed over her. She was cold, so cold. When she looked down, she saw that her legs were scratched and bleeding, but she couldn’t feel the injuries or remember how she’d gotten them.

Her teeth began to chatter. The house seemed large and cavernous, no longer familiar territory. She became acutely aware of the scents of Lysol Disinfectant Cleaner and floor wax. Even the throb of the refrigerator motor and the icemaker’s clicking sounded over-loud and ominous.

“This way. Do I have to carry you?”

His detached, almost mechanical voice made the hair prickle on the nape of her neck. The thought of his gloved hands touching her made her skin crawl, and she forced herself to obey. As she crossed the spotless kitchen floor, one unsteady step at a time to the walk-in pantry, she looked toward the telephone.

The space was bare. Someone, and she guessed it must have been Michael, had removed the telephone. Obviously, he had planned to bring her here, and he wanted to make certain that she had no way to call for help.

She stopped. “You’re walking. How can you walk? Your legs . . .”

His eyes gleamed. “Do you think I’m so weak I’d stay a cripple?” He slapped his right thigh. “I rebuilt my legs—muscle by muscle. Weights. Massage. Water therapy. Electric shock.”

“The pain must have been excruciating,” she said in an attempt to maintain a thread of rapport between them. When he didn’t answer, she added, “You’re still in pain, aren’t you, Michael?”

His mouth curved in a frightening imitation of a smile, a smile that didn’t alter the cold expression in his eyes. “Pain beyond anything you can imagine.”

“But why keep up the pretense—”

“Pain can be your friend, if you let it. Pain can give you power.”

“Please, don’t do this.”

“Shhh,” he warned, making a slicing motion across his throat. He slid open the handicapped-accessible pantry door, paused to lay his .45 on a shelf behind a box of saltines. He then wiped her revolver dry with a cleaning cloth and checked the remaining ammunition. After discarding the spent shells, he reloaded the revolver with .22-caliber bullets from a carton on an opposite shelf.

“You were a policeman. You spent your life saving people.”

“Can you think of a better disguise?”

“Why? Why are you doing this to me?”

Michael raised a finger to his lips. “All in time, all in time.” Smiling grimly, he placed her smaller handgun beside his larger .45 and glanced back at her. “Have you forgotten everything I taught you about maintaining your firearm?”

“Please, just let me go. You don’t want to hurt me.”

“Impatience, impatience.” Michael shook his head. “It’s your greatest fault. I have something to show you, Professor. Something I’ve wanted to show you for weeks.”

“Why? Haven’t we been friends?” Worse than that, she thought. He’d deceived her so completely that she’d considered becoming his wife. “I don’t understand how a friend can . . .”

His face twisted into a grotesque mask. “We were never friends!” Abruptly he lashed out, backhanding her, splitting her lip. She staggered back against the shelves of canned goods with blood trickling down her chin. Before she could run, he caught her by both shoulders and yanked her so close that spittle spattered her face. “You’re nothing. Less than nothing. Understand?”

“No, that’s not true.” She refused to flinch from his chilling stare. “I’m Elizabeth, and I care about you.”

Michael’s eyes narrowed. His brow furrowed. For an instant, she thought he would tighten both hands around her throat and choke the life from her. But his mood shifted, and he laughed. “We’ll see,” he said harshly. “We’ll see who you are.” He shoved her away, reached behind a box of Tide, and flipped a switch. Soundlessly, half of the back section of the pantry wall swiveled to reveal a wooden staircase. “Go on.” Michael motioned to the hidden doorway.

Liz moved to the top of steep steps. Michael had told her that his house had only a partial cellar, barely high enough to allow a plumber and electrician to crawl under. He’d lied. She held tightly to the raw wooden rail as she descended to a dirt-floored basement. The naked bulb at the top of the stairs cast a small circle of light; beyond that, the cavernous room stretched in utter darkness.

The stench blasted Liz’s nostrils, a foul odor so intense that she shrank back. She clamped a hand over her mouth and tried not to vomit as the rank smells of rotting flesh, stagnant water, and decaying wood enveloped her.

“Move!” Michael grabbed a handful of her hair and hurled her ahead of him. She tripped and fell into a heap of half-cured deerskins. “Do what I tell you, Professor. Or pay for your disobedience.” A match flared. Michael lit a kerosene lantern, adjusted the wick, and hung the rusty handle from a peg.

Liz gasped at the dozens of commercial crab pots—wire cages containing glistening white bones and wooden floats—heaped one upon another. Behind the traps, newspaper clippings and women’s photographs lined the rough concrete block walls. A polished human skull with a neat, round hole in the center of the forehead leered from a spike on a post, and in a far corner of the room, standing on a plastic drop cloth, was a stump with a bloody, gristle-streaked hatchet buried in it.

Liz shut her eyes and drew in a ragged breath. This was a nightmare. A dream too horrible to be real. She’d wake to find herself warm and dry in her own bed.

“You have to die,” Michael said as calmly as if he’d announced what he was preparing for the evening meal. “You know why.”

Liz’s eyelids snapped open. She was going to be sick. “No, I don’t know why!” A sour fluid rose in her throat. “Why?”

Michael swept his hand in an arc, his gloved fingers taking in the clippings and the women’s pictures. “It’s all part of the game,” he said. “And so is this.” He ripped a curling, fly-specked page from the wall and held it out to her.