The Deepest Cut (45 page)

WHILE THE CAR WAS BUMPING DOWN THE LANE, THE MOST RECENT TIME
she’d seen his face came back to her. The necktie he was wearing had tipped her off. It was the same tie worn by the security team at Terra Cosmetika. The company occupied the building across the street from where Scrappy had last worked. She recalled her conversation with Security Chief Don Balch. Photos of his security officers had been on the wall of the suite. She thought that a few of the faces had looked familiar. She now knew that one was definitely familiar. Fatter, balder, and familiar.

Balch had mentioned the names of the watchmen who worked the graveyard shift.

Mike Iverson, formerly of the Colina Vista P.D., thought the name of the creepy security guard whom Cookie had dated was Teddy Pierce. That wasn’t a bad guess, as Vining suddenly remembered the names of Balch’s two night watchmen: Eduardo Gonzalez and Tanner Persons. In her mind, she saw the photos with the name placards. She finally had a real name, after all this time. She said it in her head, trying to get used to it.

Tanner Persons.

As the car rolled along, Chief Gilroy’s bizarre driving tip came back to her.

The museum is nine-point-eighteen miles from the freeway. Take the V.

Vining interpreted the meaning anew.
918V.
That’s what Gilroy was trying to tell her. It had been a warning. The code 918V was an informational radio code. It communicated the presence of a violent insane person. A psycho.

FORTY-EIGHT

V
INING JUDGED FROM THE STREET NOISES THAT HE HAD NOT
headed farther into the foothills but had turned back toward town. He made a couple of brief stops, which would have been the stop signs along Colina Vista Boulevard heading from the forest.

While traveling the quiet lane that led from the log cabin, she’d strained to detect the sound of another car engine. She heard only the uneven rumbling of the Crown Vic that was in need of a tune-up and was unpleasantly permeating the trunk with exhaust fumes.

After a while, she heard the sounds and felt the speed of traveling on the freeway. He didn’t appear to be taking her to a remote mountain cabin. The closer to civilization, the better for her to find the means to escape or to kill him. While self-preservation was primarily on her mind, bloody and primal vengeance competed as a close second. If she didn’t have Emily, she felt that she wouldn’t care if she had to go down with him in order to take him out.

Given what she knew of him, she guessed he would take her to a place of significance for him or her. He’d confessed what she already knew: He was sentimental. He also enjoyed taking risks, skirting the line of getting caught. Whatever plans he’d hatched to dispatch her, they wouldn’t be executed quickly. The murder of his select women was like a seduction for him, prolonged foreplay leading to the final release.
She hoped to parlay this knowledge of his timeline into an opportunity. Once she saw where the final confrontation was going to take place, she could better formulate a plan. Even though she was in dire circumstances, her moment of disabling panic had passed. The hobgoblin was back inside his cave for now.

He turned on the car radio. She had left it tuned to a station that broadcast a “mellow mix” of Top 40 and oldies. At night, they played love songs with sappy listener dedications read by a woman whose voice always sounded on the verge of cracking with emotion. Vining sometimes listened to that show with voyeuristic fascination. She wondered if T B. Mann— or Tanner Persons, as she knew him now, happy to strip him of the awe-inspiring nickname— hadn’t turned the channel because he had been in love before. Perhaps he was using it as a blueprint to understand the typical human heart.

She rubbed her face against the carpeted trunk floor, struggling to loosen the blindfold. She felt it slide. She might be able to push it off, but then, he’d only tie it tighter. She thought she could see a bit more, but it was too dark to tell.

She tried to search the trunk, scooting backward, extending her fingers from where her wrists were bound to her ankles. It seemed empty. He had taken out her duty bag and car supplies. In one corner, she found a plastic container. Exploring further, she felt a handle and a screw cap. She rapped it with her fingers and it felt full. Her nostrils were full of exhaust fumes, but she thought she detected the odor of gasoline. Why would he need extra gas? Was he taking her someplace remote after all?

She could do nothing more until he opened the trunk. She lay down her head and closed her eyes. After a second, she again raised her head to hear better. Gad, he was singing. She listened to him warbling tunelessly along with a song playing on the radio. It was the Sheryl Crow version of “The First Cut Is the Deepest.”

It used to be one of Vining’s favorites. She cringed behind the blindfold as she listened to him mangle it. Now, like many other things in her life, he’d ruined it for her forever.

While she waited until they got to the next place, she took stock of herself. She was physically uncomfortable, tied up, bouncing along in
a car trunk, breathing exhaust. Her back burned at the two spots where the Taser darts had delivered their voltage. Her butt burned where he’d drive-stunned her. Her jaw ached where he’d slugged her with his fist. She probably had a lump on her forehead from head-butting him. She felt stinging pain on her neck. The jackass had actually cut her there.

She evaluated her mental state. While she might need her fists and feet to get out of this situation, most likely her survival hinged on her mental dexterity. Recalling his hot, excited, minty breath on her face made her stomach turn. Realizing she was now having an involuntary physical reaction to a memory brought tears to her eyes and made her angry. Why couldn’t she control her mind?

She’d lost the mental game to him in the kitchen at 835 El Alisal Road and it had nearly cost her her life. An image of her funeral flashed into her mind. There were her mother, grandmother, and her sister Stephanie and her family. There were Wes, Kaitlyn, and their boys. There were Kissick, Early, and many others in blue uniforms with black bands across their shields. And there was Emily, all standing as her coffin was lowered into the ground.

Her stomach clenched tighter. The kerchief over her eyes absorbed her tears. Bile singed her esophagus.

This is not helpful, Vining.

She gave herself a pep talk.
Okay, lady, a couple of months ago, you stood on your balcony and issued a challenge to that asshole driving this car. “Game on.” The game is on
now.
What’s it gonna be, Vining? You or him?

The nausea in her belly turned into fire. Her tears stopped. She issued a new challenge to Tanner Persons, aka T B. Mann, aka the Asshole Who’s About to Meet His Maker.

You want a fight? You’re gonna get one.

FORTY-NINE

T
HEY EXITED THE FREEWAY AND WERE AGAIN TRAVELING SURFACE
streets. Vining heard other cars on the road. After he made a right turn, the traffic sounds faded.

She heard a dog barking from about a block away. A second dog answered from a different direction. They were big dogs. She guessed they were in a residential neighborhood of single-family homes.

He slowed and made another right turn, this one sharper. Maybe they were going up a driveway. He stopped the car, cut the ignition, and got out. The Crown Vic’s trunk opened.

Vining saw stars— real ones in the night sky. That was all she saw before his body blocked her view and he reached toward her. She’d shoved the kerchief almost all the way off, but hadn’t realized it in the darkness of the trunk.

“Let me fix this,” he said. He went about undoing the kerchief and retying it without rancor, with the attitude of a parent tying a child’s shoelaces for the umpteenth time. “You’re probably wondering why I’ve blindfolded you. Maybe we’ll play Pin the Tail on the Donkey or maybe we’ll play another game.”

She let his words drip off her. Water off a duck’s back. She was no longer going to be intimidated or creeped out by his words. Sticks and stones.

He leaned into the trunk and began untying the cord binding her ankles to her handcuffed wrists.

She heard crickets singing in the night air. Crickets meant he’d parked someplace where there were bushes and green space.

“Oh fudge,” he cursed mildly when he had trouble untying the knots.

Her feet now free, he said, “Let’s go.” He helped her from the trunk, guiding her with his hand on her forearm. Once she was standing, he ordered, “Stay there.”

She heard his footfalls in his dress shoes as he walked around the car and opened and closed the doors. She thought she heard items being placed on the pavement. He slammed the trunk closed. She was certain of one thing. Wherever they were, this was the second place. Where it ended.

She felt him brush past, then the sound of a key being inserted into a lock, followed by a bolt lock being disengaged. A door opened. His footsteps disappeared. A door banged closed.

She back-stepped until she felt the car trunk. She then started walking forward as quickly as she dared. He had driven up a driveway. If she followed it back down, it would lead to a street. If he found her before somebody else did, she’d drop to the ground and force him to carry dead weight. She would kick him and cause a commotion. There had to be neighbors around. He’d tied the blindfold tighter this time and she couldn’t see anything beneath the bottom edge when she leaned her head back.

Stumbling blindly, her legs felt disjointed, as if she couldn’t control them well without her vision. She thought she was putting one foot in front of the other, but then grunted when she plowed face-first into something leafy and dusty— a tall shrub. It was sticky and wispy, too. Spiderwebs. She madly rubbed her head against the woody branches, which maliciously scratched her as she tried to peel off the blindfold.

The door opened and she heard footsteps quickly approaching.

She kept moving, going faster, running as fast as she had the courage to, her elbow brushing the hedge to guide her. She breathed madly through her nose, the duct tape still over her mouth.

She heard a car go by. She must be close to the street. Then that
all-too-familiar pain incapacitated her. He’d again fired the Taser. She was on her knees, then facedown on the ground. When the electric surge stopped, she knew she’d lost this battle. She let him help her to her feet and lead her where he wanted her to go.

After taking a few steps, they stopped. He tilted her head with his fingers beneath her chin.

“You ninny. You’ve scratched your face. You’re bleeding.”

She cringed when she felt something warm and wet trail up her cheek.

“Mmm …” he purred. “Tastes like cherry pie.”

A shiver again surged through her when she felt his breath against her ear. He cooed, “Officer Vining, the more foolishly you behave, the more you’re going to get hurt.”

He led her by the arm. “There are three steps and then you’ll go through a doorway.”

He nudged her in front of him. “Step up. One, two, and three. That’s a good girl. Up again over the threshold.” He led her several feet across what sounded like a hardwood floor, before restraining her by the arm and saying, “Stop.”

She heard him walk back and close the door. The bolt lock slid into place.

He again took her forearm and turned her around.

“There’s a chair behind you. Sit down.”

She moved until she felt the chair against her legs. She sat. The seat was cushioned and the back was not.

He was again tying her feet, this time to the chair legs. Then, thankfully, he was removing the blindfold, pulling it off her head, tearing a few strands of her hair with it.

The first thing she saw was him standing in front of her, a silly grin on his face. She looked around. She was in a well-appointed kitchen. It wasn’t just any kitchen. It had been remodeled. The paint, counters, and floor were different, but she still recognized it. She thought she’d recognize it even if the place burned to the ground. He’d brought her back to the house at 835 El Alisal Road.

Over his shoulder, she saw the door where she had stood that late Sunday afternoon, just about to leave, when he’d rushed her, grabbing
a knife from the wooden block on the island. The island was still there, with a new countertop. His black duffel bag was on it. The pantry was still there, where she’d crawled through her own blood after he’d stabbed her.

After the long months of having nightmares about what had happened here, again and again seeing this room and his face, after reliving the tragedy a zillion times, after many failed attempts to return to face her demons, she was finally
here.
She was surprised that she now felt oddly detached from this place and that other time. In some strange way, those events had finally been transfigured into “the past.” They no longer held power over her. She’d broken free of their sticky clutches and was now free to engage this new drama.

Tanner Persons’s face, on the other hand, while he loomed in front of her, still seemed mired in “what was.” He looked like a tentative suitor who’d just handed his beloved a carefully selected Valentine’s Day card with words that beautifully captured all that he felt and more. He was now anxiously watching and waiting for her response as she read it. Only this greeting wasn’t about delivering love, it was about inciting fear.

She looked at him with as much fake apathy as she could muster. She sought to rob him of his wish to make her afraid. Her indifference didn’t faze him. He continued to smile with his lips closed and slightly trembling, like an excited puppy.

“Officer Vining.” He took a big step to his left, revealing what he had been hiding behind him.

Sitting tied to a chair facing Vining, duct tape over her mouth, was Chief Betsy Gilroy

Vining couldn’t disguise her shock, giving Persons the response he clearly desired as he broke into a full smile, revealing his sharp little rat’s teeth.

He walked behind Gilroy and rested his hands on top of her shoulders. She stiffened at his touch and slit her eyes with disgust.