Disarming Detective (22 page)

It wasn’t Ella who answered. “Neither of you are going to be okay for much longer.”

Logan turned his head to face forward. Fury rushed through him that the killer had hurt Ella, and it helped clear the cobwebs in his brain. “Marshall.”

Adam’s nephew nodded. “So, you know me. I wasn’t sure if you would.”

“Why? Why would you do this?”

Marshall tilted his head, his lips stretching into something that might be called a smile if it wasn’t so filled with malice. “Why would I abduct and murder young women? Or why would I kidnap you and your profiler girlfriend?”

Marshall sounded so calm, as though this was a normal conversation.

How had no one around him noticed he was totally nuts?

Logan cursed himself for not following up more aggressively on Marshall and the rest of Adam’s shrimping crew. If he had, maybe he and Ella wouldn’t be here right now. Maybe they’d still be back at his place, tangled together in his sheets, making plans for the future.

Now would they even have a future?

Logan tugged at the knots around his wrists, trying to be subtle about it. “Why would you do any of it?”

And what was Marshall planning to do with them now? Why were they here, tied up in some cabin in the woods instead of already gator food?

Marshall sighed, looking bored with the question, with him. “The profiler over there already wanted to know about the burns.” A light came into his eyes. “You want to talk about the burns?”

Logan studied the dark brown, raised scars on Marshall’s arms, remembering what Ella had said about the killer having burns himself. Judging from the too-excited expression on Marshall’s face, burns were a topic to stay far away from. “Not really.”

Man, the knots around his wrists were tight. Trying to stretch them was just slicing into his skin. But of course, Marshall was a sailor. He would know how to tie a proper knot.

Logan glanced around for anything to work with in case Marshall left them alone, but the room was mostly empty. It just held the chairs he and Ella were sitting on and old newspapers, crumpled up on the floor around them. And his ankles seemed to be tied as tightly as his wrists.

“Don’t bother,” Marshall said. “You think I’d leave anything nearby that you could use to get yourself out of those knots?” He shook his head. “I’m not stupid. Even though I took your gun from you at your sister’s house, I’m not taking chances.”

Becky. A new worry filled him. “Where is she?”

“Your sister?” Marshall smiled again, this one an anticipatory smile that made Logan’s skin crawl. “She’s still at your parents’ house, I assume. She never really went back home.”

Insight flashed through him. “It was you on the phone.” It had been Marshall all along. That was why Theresa had gone to meet him. She’d thought she was meeting Becky. The second number on Theresa’s cell phone records that had looked as if it came from Becky had actually been Marshall. Logan swore, a string of offensive names that just made Marshall shake his head.

“That’s not nice,” Marshall said, taking a step toward him, pulling the Taser from his pocket.

“I want to know about the burns,” Ella suddenly spoke up.

Logan’s head whipped toward her. What was she doing?

Her eyes darted fast to his and then back to Marshall, her face never turning, and he realized. She wasn’t just trying to prevent Marshall from hitting him with the Taser again. She was profiling Marshall, trying to talk their way out of this. Or at least trying to distract Marshall long enough for Logan to make a move.

As Marshall’s attention turned entirely, disturbingly, to Ella, Logan wrenched at his bonds again, but he’d been right before. They were tight, too tight, and all he succeeded in doing was slicing through the skin at his wrists and wetting the rope with his blood.

But as he twisted his hands, he realized they weren’t tied to the chair; they were only tied together behind his back. If he lifted his shoulders and shifted forward, he could yank them over the top of the chair. He’d still have his hands tied behind his back, but if he could just get his ankles free...

He’d been a linebacker when he’d played high school and college football. If he could get his ankles free, he wouldn’t need his hands. He could rush Marshall. Just use brute strength, go low and twist a shoulder up under his rib cage and then run him straight into the wall as fast and as hard as he could.

He just needed to wait for an opening.

Because Ella was as smart and resourceful as she was gorgeous. If he gave her the chance, if he could hold Marshall down long enough, she could get out. Even tied to her own chair, even with a set of stairs to somehow get down, he knew she could do it.

And as long as she was safe, it didn’t really matter what happened to him.

But watching her now as he shifted his legs, trying to see how sturdy the chair was, he realized she’d never leave him there. That just wasn’t her style. And although it was one of the things he loved about her, right now he wished she were just a little bit less courageous.

She was staring at Marshall with her chin tipped up and such a challenging expression in her eyes, as if she was daring him to take her on, that it scared him. Because right now, Marshall held all the cards. Not to mention the Taser and Logan’s gun.

Marshall ran a finger across Ella’s arm with such blatant ownership it made Logan want to shove his chair sideways and slam it into the man as hard as he could. Especially when Ella shivered in disgust. It took all his self-control to remain still, to let Ella use her profiling talent.

“You want to know why I burn them?” His voice dropped to a near whisper. “Or you want to know how?”

“Neither,” Ella said, her voice surprisingly strong and even. “I want to know about
your
burns.”

Darkness fell over Marshall’s face, and Logan watched him carefully, holding his breath as he turned his feet sideways, trying to hook his heels on the sides of the chair legs. But the knots were tight and his heels kept slipping off. Finally, they caught hold, and he pushed outward, testing the strength of the chair legs. They shifted slightly at the pressure.

Marshall took a small step backward. His mouth moved, as though he was having some kind of silent debate, then he said, “Why not? It’s not like you’ll be telling anyone.”

His forehead furrowed, and he looked down at the floor. “There was a fire, back when I was twelve. We were away on vacation. My parents didn’t make it. And I got caught in it, too. But all anyone here knows is that my parents died when I was young. Adam made sure no one knew the details, that no one knew about the fire at all. I told him it was too hard to talk about.”

Ella’s eyes narrowed. “You set the fire, didn’t you?”

His lips stretched a tiny bit as he looked back at Ella. “Not even Adam suspected that.”

“But he’s always wondered about you, hasn’t he? He always knew something wasn’t right.”

Marshall threw his hands up, made an ugly noise in the back of his throat. “Sure, Adam knows I’m...different, but he doesn’t think I killed his sister.”

“You did it on purpose, didn’t you? Were your parents your first murders?”

Logan glanced over at Marshall, whose mouth darted in and out of a smile as if the memory was a mix of good and bad. Which it probably was.

“They deserved it.” His voice rose. “You know what they did to me?” He took a ragged breath, quieted down to tell her. “My father saw things in me. Things he didn’t like. He figured if he beat me enough, I’d stop. I didn’t stop. And after they were gone, it was easier. Adam had no idea what I thought about. He never looked on my computer, never wondered what I liked to look at. He doesn’t know what I’m doing now.”

“But he started to suspect after we talked to him, didn’t he?”

Marshall’s smile slipped and his tone hardened. “Yes. He hasn’t said anything, but I can tell. He knows I’ve taken the van out at night. He wonders if it might be me.”

Ella nodded. “And you found out recently that he’s dying.”

“You profiling me again? Yeah, now he’s dying. And he expects me to take over his stupid business.”

“And you don’t have time for that,” Ella said as Logan worked his feet up and down, frantically trying to fray the rope against the legs of the chair.

He could hear the rope sawing, and it sounded much too loud, but Marshall hadn’t looked at him at all since Ella had asked about his burns.

“I only took the job in the first place because it gave me plenty of time to do other things, plenty of time to plan. To imagine what would happen when I took them. But it never goes quite how I picture it.” He shrugged, visibly trying to calm down. “But it doesn’t matter that Adam wants me to take over the business. It’s not happening.”

Ella must have figured the conversation was heading in a bad direction, because she asked quickly, “Theresa wasn’t the first girl, was she, Marshall?”

Marshall folded his arms over his chest and Logan realized the man had more muscle than he’d originally suspected. Sure, Marshall was big, but big didn’t always mean strength. But he should have realized Marshall would be strong, given what he did for a living.

Logan pulled his feet harder inward, making the ropes dig painfully into his ankles, sliding them against the chair faster. He needed his feet free.

“No, Theresa wasn’t the first,” Marshall said slowly. “Two years ago, I picked up this hitchhiker. She started telling me about her past, and it was like mine. A lonely childhood, parents who didn’t understand her. I thought...” He scowled. “But when I showed her the burns, she looked at me like I was disgusting. And when I burned her, she still didn’t get it. So, I got rid of her. Dumped her in the marsh. I worried about it for a long time, thinking the police were going to show up, but they never did.”

He laughed and looked over at Logan, who went instantly still.

“You never even knew she was missing, because she wasn’t supposed to be here in the first place. And that’s how I figured out what I should do. How I could get away with it. Just wait until they were getting ready to leave before I grabbed them. I thought the second one might work out, but when she didn’t...” He shrugged, turned his attention back to Ella. “No one even knew she was missing. Not here anyway. And I waited, took my time, to be sure. I waited months and months. And then I saw Theresa.”

Praying Marshall wasn’t going to share details about Theresa’s death, Logan started slicing his bonds against the chair leg again. It was working. The bonds were fraying. Just not fast enough.

Suspicion filled Marshall’s face and he started to look Logan’s way again when Ella asked, loudly, “What did you mean, about her working out?”

Marshall looked down at the floor and Logan froze, thinking he might have seen the frayed rope, but then he turned his attention back to Ella and there was something new in his eyes. Something dark and dangerous that made fear rise up, stronger than ever.

Even Marshall’s voice was different when he replied, “When they first come to me, they’re happy and smiling and I think they might understand. But then when they see me, really see
me
, they change. They don’t want me anymore.”

Logan felt disgust curl his lips at Marshall’s fantasy that the women he abducted had in any way gone to him voluntarily. Even when they’d first shown up, they’d thought they were meeting someone else and he knew it. Of course he knew it. That was his plan.

Marshall reached into his pocket and pulled something out. He stared at his closed hand as if it had all the answers. “And so I try to show them what it feels like to look this way. I figure if we’re the same, they might understand, they might feel for me how I feel about them. So, I give them burns like mine.”

His eyes lifted to Ella’s, suddenly dead and empty. “But they still don’t understand. They’re supposed to want me the way I want them. But they don’t.” He lifted his shoulders. “And so they have to die.”

When Marshall opened his palm, Logan saw the lighter there.

Then Marshall flicked the switch on the lighter, firing up a flame. He took a step closer to Ella, and panic took flight in Logan’s chest.

No, no, no. His feet weren’t free yet. Tears stung the backs of his eyes.

Next to him, Ella’s jaw clamped and he could tell she planned to endure it, keep talking, keep giving him time to get free.

But he couldn’t do it. He couldn’t watch Ella get burned. “Don’t touch her!”

Marshall froze, then slowly, very slowly, turned toward Logan. And then, just as slowly, he looked down at Logan’s feet, then back up at his face, and smiled. It was a sick, disturbed smile. He’d known all along what Logan was doing.

Anger tensed Logan’s arms. Forget distraction. There was no way this pathetic excuse for a man was burning Ella. Not while Logan had breath left in his body.

He put every ounce of disgust and contempt he was feeling into his voice. “What kind of coward burns women?”

Next to him, Ella made a noise of distress at his tactic, but he kept his attention focused on Marshall, silently willed Ella to start working on her own ropes.

Rage flickered in Marshall’s eyes, but he was still eerily calm as he took a step toward Logan. “You think you can distract me better than she could?” He snorted. “You think you’re better than me? Smarter than me?” His voice picked up volume, then quieted down again as he said, “No.”

He took another step toward Logan, flicking the lighter on and off.

Keep coming, Logan willed Marshall, as he heard Ella frantically using her chair to saw at the ropes on her ankles.

Marshall glanced briefly at Ella. “There’s no time for that,” he said, monotone, but Ella kept working on her ropes.

He looked at Logan and flicked the lighter back on. “I never wanted her, you know. Your profiler. If she hadn’t come looking for me, I wouldn’t have come for either of you. But you don’t have to worry. I’m not going to burn her.”

He took a step back, away from Logan. “Not like that. No, you both need to disappear. And the marsh isn’t going to work. Not for what I have in mind for you two. That would be too easy, too quick a death.” He scowled, directing a dark glare at Ella. “You ruined everything and I’m going to punish you for that.”