Edge of Sanity: An Edge Novel (15 page)
Read Edge of Sanity: An Edge Novel Online
Authors: Shannon K. Butcher
A second, deeper voice replied, “You’re imagining things. No one’s here.”
“He’ll come. We find the locker first and wait.”
Clay pulled her toward the wall of boxes. The screen on the phone went dark, and she pushed another button to light it up.
This time the beep sounded incredibly loud, echoing off the concrete walls.
Clay leaned close to her ear—so close she could feel his lips brush the outer rim. “Turn it off. If they hear that . . .”
He didn’t need to finish his sentence for her to fill in the blanks. She cradled the phone inside her jacket and muted it.
Footsteps grew nearer outside. The door of a nearby unit squeaked as they pulled it open.
Clay took her by the shoulders and pulled her down to a crouch next to him. His weapon was in one hand; the other he used to cradle her neck, under her hair. His thumb moved in soothing strokes along her throat.
Their door rattled.
“Lod Rat.
cked,” said one of the men, right on the other side of the overhead door.
“Then cut it,” said the second man, as if the first one was a complete idiot.
“There’s no lock to cut, jackass.”
“Skip to the next one. It’s probably broken.”
“We need to find his stash before he shows up.”
The voices became more muffled as they walked away.
“Stash?” whispered Leigh.
The light on her phone went out again. She could no longer see Clay, but she could feel him nearby—feel the heat coming off his body and the slight vibration of tension in his hand. The scent of his leather jacket and the warm body beneath wrapped around her. Her fear began to fade the farther away the voices got.
“I have no idea,” said Clay. “Maybe they’re looking for weapons.”
“Are there weapons here?”
“Could be some in those boxes. I haven’t opened all of them.”
Another door rattled as the men outside lifted it.
“What do we do?” she asked.
“We can’t move until they’re gone. They’ll hear us if they’re not close enough to see us. And there’s a good chance they’ll have a buddy guarding the way out to let them know if I show up. Or try to leave.”
“So we’re stuck?”
“Yeah. Get comfortable. This could take a while.”
* * *
Clay could hardly think straight with Leigh sitting so close to him in the dark. He could smell her shampoo and the sweeter, more subtle scent of her skin. Fear radiated out of her. He kept trying to soothe her with gentle touches, but all that did was draw him tighter.
In the dark like this, there was nothing to distract him from the sound of her rapid breathing or the trembling of her body beneath his hand.
He tried to run through options for escape, recalling the possible ways in and out of this place. But he came up empty.
If he thought he could open the door enough to slip out and take these men on, he’d do it in a heartbeat, but it would make too much noise, and there was no way he was risking Leigh’s safety by drawing any attention to their hiding spot.
“Payton’s on his way,” whispered Leigh. “He’s going to be walking into an ambush.”
“Give me the phone.”
She did. He sent a warning text, telling Payton to stay the hell away. His hand brushed hers as he handed her the phone. It was shaking harder than the rest of her, and cold to the touch.
Without thinking about the consequences, Clay slid her hand inside his jacket, under his shirt. Her frigid fingers were a shocking jolt against his stomach, but he’d suffer through that a million times over if it meant he could do something to make this fucked-up situation easier on her.
The light on the phone went dark again, and she sucked in a startled breath. Her fingers clenched against his skin, and his traitorous body took the movement to heart. In the matter of a few seconds, he was hard and aching, despite the danger perched just outside.
His dick really did have a mind of its own—a deranged, one-track mind.
“It’s going to be fine,” he promised. “Eventually they’ll get bored or the sun will come up and scare them away. We just have to hold out for a few hours at most.”
“I wish we could turn on the light.” Even as quiet as her voice was, he could hear a tremor running through it.
“If there’s even a small crack under the door or a hole in the metal, they could see the light. Our best bet is to stay quiet and in the dark.”
From down the row of storage units came a heavy clang, like something had hit one of the metal doors.
Leigh jumped and her fingers dug into his skin. “What’s that?”
“Probably a piece of broken lock flying around. Nothing to worry about.” He hoped.
Her fingers relaxed against his abdomen again. “This reminds me of when I had to sit around, waiting for the verdict in Garrett’s trial. I’m so tense I feel like I’m going to shatter.”
He stroked her hair, enjoying the cool slide of the strands between his fingers. He knew that touching her like this was playing with fire, but he couldn’t help himself. His need to soothe her combined with the giddy thrill he got every time his hands were on her was enough to make him lose his mind. He didn’t care about consequences, which wasn’t like him at all.
“What trial?” he asked in an effort to get her mind off their current situation.
“The police thought he’d killed Hollis. He hadn’t, but we weren’t sure the jury was going to see it that way.”
“But they did,” he guessed.
“They did. But it took three days of deliberation, and I don’t think I ate or slept the whole time. Payton pulled some strings and got the trial expedited. If not for him, I might still be waiting for the trial, wondering if Garrett was going to be convicted for something I know he didn’t do.”
Clay wanted to ask her how she knew, but it seemed less important than the other detail she’d revealed. “Payton helped? Did he know your brother?”
“No. At least he said he didn’t. He was doing it as a favor for me.”
“Favor?”
“Repayment for services rendered. I’ve patched up morpatace="Time than a few gunshot wounds for people connected to Payton—at his request.”
“You mean you patched them up and didn’t report them.”
“Right. Another black mark on my career. After this is over, you’ll have more knowledge to bring me down than any other man alive.”
Clay grabbed his flashlight from his jacket and upended it on the concrete floor before turning it on. Enough light spilled out that he could see her face. And that she could see his. Their bodies blocked the light from reaching the doorway, reducing the risk of the minuscule light being seen. It was still a slight risk, but this was important. He tipped her chin up until he was looking in her eyes. He needed her to know that what he said was true. “I would never do that to you. When this is over, I’ll never breathe a word to anyone. I swear it.”
Her hand slid around to his back as she leaned forward, hugging him. “Thank you. If I lost my license, I don’t think Payton would need me anymore. And if he doesn’t need me, then I have nothing to offer him in exchange for visits to see Garrett.”
“Wait. What? Why do you need Payton to see your brother?”
“He’s being held in a secret location. I don’t even know where it is. I have to drug myself unconscious in the car before he’ll take me there. I don’t even know what state it’s in.”
Anger seethed just under the surface of Clay’s skin. How dare Payton do that to her?
“That fucking bastard,” said Clay, too loudly. Leigh covered his mouth, and the soft touch of her fingers helped mute some of the searing fury pounding through him.
“No. He’s not. He saved Garrett. He’s still saving him every day—protecting him from what he’s capable of. Without Payton, both of my brothers would be dead. For that I owe him everything.”
“Bullshit.” Payton was using her, but she was too emotionally invested to see it. Clay wasn’t.
Or maybe he was and his feelings for Leigh were getting in the way. In either case, Clay was no longer sure that he could trust Payton. The man had some kind of agenda of his own—one that involved Leigh’s brother.
A memory hit him, filling his mind as if it had suddenly been illuminated by the flash of a camera. He sat in a room with two other boys. They were young. So was he. His scrawny legs stuck out from under a hospital gown, covered in small scrapes and bruises.
The two boys were afraid. They were looking to him for support, but he had none to offer. This place scared the crap out of him, even though he knew better than to let it show.
A man in a white coat walked in. Clay couldn’t see his face—as if someone had blurred it out. But whoever he was, Clay knew he was bad news.
As the door shut, he saw another man standing in the hallway. His face was familiar, but Clay couldn’t quite place it.
He had hidden a fork under his thigh. His fingers were wrapped around it, waiting for the man to get close enough cllwato strike.
The other two boys raced around his bed, hiding behind him for protection.
The man in the coat had a syringe in his hand. The outlines of more were visible in the pocket of his coat.
Terror bubbled up, and Clay found a way to convert it to rage. He propelled himself from the bed, shoving the fork into the man’s groin.
The memory disappeared, and already, Clay could feel it dissipating, like a dream. Only fear and the familiar face of the man in the hall lingered.
“Are you okay?” asked Leigh.
“Yeah,” he said, though he wasn’t sure how true that was. He was sweating and sick to his stomach.
That hadn’t been a dream. It had happened—he’d somehow blocked it out. Or maybe someone had blocked it for him. That would certainly explain the blurred face if whoever had done it didn’t want to be recognized.
Then what about the man in the hall? Clay was sure he knew him.
Leigh watched him with concern. Her bottom lip quivered slightly before she bit it and stilled the movement. He could barely see her in this light. She was more shades of gray than color, with deep shadows painting her skin.
The need to see h
er naked by this light struck him out of the blue. With all the shit floating around in his head, with thugs lurking outside, the fact that he could even go there proved how screwed his brain really was.
At least thinking about her luscious body all naked and laid out for him, draped in heavy shadows, was a pleasant thought. Unlike all the others he was battling.
The phone buzzed and lit up. Leigh grabbed it and checked the screen. “It’s Payton. He’s outside and says it’s safe to come out.”
And suddenly, just like that, Clay knew who had been standing in the hall, watching some doctor do God knew what to Clay and two other little boys. He was much younger in that memory, but Clay was certain of the man’s identity.
It was Payton.
Chapter Seventeen
L
eigh felt the shift in Clay well before the lights came on for her to see it. Tension vibrated out of him, along with a hard, rigid chill. He moved away from her to unlock the door, and by the time it had lifted, his gun was in his hand.
Payton stood outside, breathing hard. His tie was slightly crooked, and his hair was no longer perfect. Lying at his feet was the crumpled form of a man. Another was sprawled a few feet away.
Leigh rushed forward to check on them, but before she could cross the threshold, Clay grabbed her arm and pulled her to a halt.
“I just want to see if they’re alive,” she explained. “They won’t hurt me.”
“It’s not them I’m worried about.”
“Clay?” said Payton, concern making his tone heavy. “What’s going on?”
“That’s what I’d like to know,” said Clay.
Payton’s hands came up toward his shoulders. “I took them both down. You’re safe now. But we really need to go before anyone else arrives.”
“How did you take them down?” demanded Clay.
Payton shrugged. “I’ve been training with Bella. She’s taught me some things.”
“Bullshit. You’re not the man I thought you were.”
“I have no clue what you mean, but we really should go.”
“Not until I get the truth.” Clay stepped toward Payton with lethal intent in his every step. “You knew about what they did to me, didn’t you? You were there. I remember.”
A flicker of fear crossed Payton’s features, ruining his usual composure. “I don’t know what you think you remember, but that’s completely understandable. You’re dealing with a lot right now. Let’s go somewhere safe and talk about it.”
“We’re not going anywhere with you.”
Leigh was confused by what was going on between the two men. Something had happened, but she couldn’t figure out what. “Clay? What’s all this about?”
“Payton was there when they fucked with my head. I was a kid, scared out of my mind, and he stood there, watching as someone drugged me and two other boys.”
“You’ve got it all wrong,” said Payton. “You’re confused. Please, just come with me and we’ll talk about it.”
Raw fury fell from Clay’s tongue. “I don’t trust you.”
Leigh put her hand on Clay’s shoulder, hoping to calm him down. “This could be a trick your mind is playing on you.”
He shrugged her hand away and growled, “It was no trick.”
“Think about it. How better to alienate you and cut you off from any help you might find than to make you distrust your friends?”
“I don’t distrust them all. Just him. He was there, Leigh.”
She opened her mouth to try to talk some sense into him when Payton beat her to it. “Clay is right. I was there. I have no excuse for what I did, but I’m on your side now. I swear it.”
Clay let out a low growl. Leigh’s body went cold as the implications of what Payton had just said sank in.
Her voice was faint and barely audible over the howling wind. “You were there? You let this happen? To my brothers?”
“I did. And I’ll tell you everything, but not here. It’s not safe.”
“How can you stand there so calm, knowing what you did?” asked Leigh.
“Because he’s just that cold. Any man who would let that happen to a kid is a sociopath.”
“No. I’m not. I regret what I did, and I’ve spent years trying to make things right. I’ll never be able to make up for what I did, but I can at least help lessen the pain of those whose lives we ruined.”
“We?” snapped Clay.
Payton shook his head. Sadness and regret fell off him, making the air around him seem colder. “There were many of us. We thought we were doing the right thing. We were wrong. If you want to know any more than that, then you need to follow me.”
Clay let out a scoffing laugh. “Fuck that.”
Leigh stared at Payton. She needed the truth. She needed to know how to fix this so that Garrett could have a life. “I’ll go with him.”
Clay whirled around to face her. His amber eyes were wide with disbelief and scorn. “You believe him?”
“I believe he knows something. I need to know what that is. For Garrett’s sake.”
“You’re not leaving with him.”
“I’ll do what I think is right. It’s up to you to come along or not.”
Payton’s gaze slid past them, into the storage unit. “We’ll need to take this all with us.”
“Why? So you can destroy the evidence?” demanded Clay.
Payton marched closer and didn’t stop until the barrel of Clay’s gun was shoved under his chin. Anger poured off Clay, but Payton was calm and accepting. “Pull the trigger if you want. It’s no less than I deserve, and God knows I’m tired. But know that if you do, everything I know dies with me. I’m probably the only person on the planet who knows all the connections and can piece the puzzle together and help you find who’s doing this to you now. If you want your life back, I’m your only shot.”
Clay stared at Payton for a long minute. Leigh really didn’t know if he was going to fire. She’d never seen him this angry—even when he wasn’t himself, he hadn’t been running this hot, shaking with rage.
“One slip,” whispered Clay, “and I won’t give a shit what you know. Understand?”
Payton nodded as much as the barrel of the gun would allow. “I would expect no less of you. You are as we created you to be.”
Clay shoved away from Payton. “Go get your car and drive it down here.”
Payton turned and left.
Leigh stood there, feeling the cold wind sink through her clothes. Everything she’d thought she’d known had suddenly shifted, leaving her wobbly and off-balance.
< wing the colfont size="-1" face="Times Ten LT Std Roman">Clay stowed his weapon and cupped her face. His hands were strikingly hot against her skin. “Do not let your guard down around him. I know he’s helped you, but you can’t let that sway you now. He’s not a good man.”
“I know. I’ll be careful.”
“You stay with me, okay? Please don’t go wandering off with him. It would—” His words cut off in a strangled sound of frustrated rage. When he spoke again, his voice was calmer. “I can’t stand the thought of you being with him. Promise me you won’t trust him.”
“I promise. If he was involved in what happened to my brothers, then he’s the enemy, even if we are forced to work with him.”
“For now. We’ll see where this goes. Until then, stick by my side.”
Leigh nodded and let her head fall to his shoulder. He hugged her tight for a moment before pushing her away just as Payton’s car slid down the row.
“Come with me.”
She followed Clay inside and watched him shove a few things from the desk into his pocket. She couldn’t see what they were, but she didn’t dare ask what he was hiding now that Payton was within earshot. Instead, she acted as though she hadn’t seen anything, grabbed a cardboard box, and carried it to Payton’s trunk.
They loaded up everything in less than five minutes, emptying the storage unit of everything but the furniture and lighting.
“I have a safe place we can go,” said Payton.
“Safe?” asked Clay as if it were a joke.
“I’m not going to hurt you. Neither of you. I understand your lack of faith, but—”
“But nothing,” said Clay. “We’re taking your car and all the boxes. You can take ours.”
“Will you at least follow me home?”
“To your house? Not a chance.”
“I have a safe room. No one will be able to find you there or hear anything we say. Right now the only thing we have on our side is knowledge. If the others find out what we know, we’ll never be able to find them.”
“The others?”
Payton clamped his lips together and shook his head. “No. Not unless you come home with me. It’s the only place I’m sure is safe.”
Clay looked at Leigh as if seeking her opinion. She didn’t know what to say. She was floundering here, still trying to catch up with the news that Payton was behind what had been done to Clay and her brothers.
“Do you have a better idea?” she asked.
“Not if we’re going to get answers out of him.”
“Then we should go. I’ve seen you fight. Payton’s no match for you if things go badly.”
Clay glared at Payton. “Fine. Lead the way.”
* * *
When Payton had said he had a safe room, Clay had not pictured the sprawling, labyrinthine mass of tunnels and rooms beneath his estate. Behind several layers of security, including a secret entrance hidden by a false wall, there was no way anyone was going to find them.
“How many people have died down here?” he asked Payton.
He pushed a cart loaded with the boxes and items from the storage locker. “Two. Both of them deserved it, if you must know.”
The heavy steel vault door shut behind Leigh, locking with a resounding clang of metal on metal.
“Are we prisoners?” asked Leigh.
“Not so long as I have this gun pointed at his spine,” said Clay.
Payton glanced behind him. “Of course not. I won’t hold you here against your will. Has the part where I told you that I’m trying to make up for past wrongs not quite settled in yet?”
“Some things can’t be forgiven,” said Clay, remembering the way he’d hurt Leigh, and those kids he’d collected for the doctor.
For a moment, that gave him pause. He liked to think he was a decent guy. He tried hard not to be a dick, and yet he’d done horrible things that he felt the burning need to set right. Maybe that was how Payton felt, too. It didn’t mean he was going to trust the man or feel pity for his mistakes, but at least it helped ease some of the bulging rage running under Clay’s skin.
Payton unlocked a room and shoved the cart inside. It was an open area, with twelve-foot-high ceilings and thick, plush carpet. One corner contained a couple of couches and a TV; another was a full kitchen on a much smaller scale than the one upstairs. In the third corner was a large table and chairs, and in the last was a workout area, complete with a variety of equipment.
“The kitchen is fully stocked. So is the bar. Avoid any live TV, but there are several hundred movies you can watch. Sleeping quarters are down the hall to your right. Use whatever you like.”
“We won’t be here that long,” said Clay.
Payton stared pointedly at the cart overflowing with boxes. “You have no idea what we’re dealing with here. It could take weeks to sort through all of this information. Identifying the people in the photos on that wall alone will be days of effort.”
“What’s the point?” asked Clay. “How the hell is a scrapbooking fest going to help us find out who did this to me? I don’t know any of the people in those photos.”
“No, but I do. Once we figure out who everyone is and which of them are still alive, then we may see a connection. Those photos could narrow down the choices to help us find the person pulling your strings.”
Clay looked at the boxes, dreading what was in them.
“You said not to touch any of them,” said Leigh. “You completely freaked, like they’d be filled with live grenades or something.”
“I was worried you’d discover my involvement. Now that you know, there’s nothing for me to hide, is there?”
“You were there,” Clay practically shouted. “You know who did this. Just give me a fucking name and point me in the right direction. I’ll kill the asshole and be free by sunrise.”
“I’m afraid it’s not that simple. Even if killing one person could free you—which it can’t—there were dozens of us involved. I’ve tried to track everyone’s movements, but I learned a few months ago that I made a mistake. At least one person I thought was dead is alive, which means that there could be others, too.”
“Dozens?” breathed Leigh as she sank into a nearby chair. “There were dozens of people willing to hurt kids? And they got away with it? How does that happen?”
“It was a different time then. The fear of a world war ran rampant. We were trying to protect our way of life—trying to protect our country.”
“By ruining its children? And the Ass for Brains Award goes to . . .”
“I’m serious, Clay. There was no excuse for what we did, but there was a reason. And like it or not, apparently not everyone who worked on this project has abandoned the cause. These boxes could hold information on not only who is behind this, but also what they’re doing now.”
A hot burst of fury detonated in Clay’s gut. “That’s why the doctor wanted me to bring him more kids. He’s doing to them what he did to me.”
“He?” asked Payton, as if that shocked him.
“That’s what the guy who was providing the stolen kids implied.”
“Did he mention a name? Stynger, perhaps?”
“No. No names.”
Payton went to the kitchen and poured himself a drink. He sloshed it back and poured another. “I thought for sure that she was behind this. After what she’d done to Razor’s friend . . .”
“Whoa. Razor is involved in this, too?”
“You mean Razor, as in Roxanne Haught?” asked Leigh.
Payton nodded. “It’s a long story, but the short version is that a friend of Razor’s got recruited into what he thought was a special ops group. It wasn’t. He ended up being subjected to all kinds of drugs and mental and physical conditioning. It changed him. It made him stronger, faster, and completely violent.”