The Last Kiss Goodbye (46 page)

“Thank you,” she said, doing her best to keep the irony out of her voice. Charlie reached past the pain in her head and the dread that was making her feel shaky all over and forced herself to concentrate. Wherever David was taking them, when he got there he was going to turn into the monster he was at his core. If she had any chance of talking him out of killing them, she was going to have to do it soon. “You know, I could help you with your research, David. We could continue it together. It takes my work and expands on it in a way that is truly groundbreaking. I feel you are on the verge of some major breakthroughs. I could help you get there.”

To her dismay, David laughed. “You can’t pull that one on me, Charlie. I know you through and through. I watched you when you were my student, when you were my intern. I knew you had that encounter with the serial killer who murdered your friend in your past. I thought maybe you were like me. But by the end, I knew you weren’t. Then, when I started to think about including you in my project, I started watching you again. You know how many nights I spent outside your house looking in? A lot. That night I sent that girl running down to you I hung around to observe how you’d handle it. I thought maybe you had developed more—let’s call it ruthlessness—over time. But you took care of her, stayed with her until the ambulance people took her away. I was right there, looking in the back window at first, standing by your front door later, watching as you put yourself at risk for her.”

He paused to shake his head, and Charlie thought,
Raylene.
He’d been outside her door when Raylene had appeared, and Raylene had been attached to him. If Charlie had gone out her front door, if she had seen him then, she would have known.

“But you’re still not what I hoped you’d become,” David concluded almost sadly, “You’re one of those people who doesn’t have it in them to kill.”

There was a change in his voice that made Charlie fear he was starting to get jazzed by the prospect of killing her. Beside her, one of the girls gave a little gasp and turned her head. Charlie didn’t know whether to hope they woke up or not. It all depended on what was going to happen.

Talking past the tightness in her throat, she tried a new tactic. “David, I can help you if you’ll let me. You know my friend and I aren’t here alone. Special Agent Bartoli and Special Agent Crane are here, too.” Charlie prayed once again that they were all right. She didn’t know what had blown up, but it had been big and the men had been close. Thankfully, David wasn’t aware of that, and she wanted to keep it that way. “They already know you’re the man they’re looking for. You’ve been using Ben Motto’s house as a staging area, haven’t you? There will be all kinds of evidence there: DNA, fingerprints, the works. They have other evidence, too, that points to you. Irrefutable evidence. What I’m telling you is, you can’t get away with this. You’re going to get caught no matter what happens to me, to us. I’m a psychiatrist. I can testify on your behalf. I can help you avoid the death penalty, help you stay out of prison. I know you. I can be your friend, and your doctor, and your advocate. And I will.”

David looked at her in the mirror again. “You’re trying to talk me out of killing you, I know. And I don’t want to. I never meant to. But now I have no choice. I knew yesterday, when your friend back there called me to ask about Tommy’s death, that the FBI was on to the connection with traumatic deaths at a young age in the researchers’ pasts. I knew they only would have started looking into that if they’d found out about the link to violent deaths in the victims’ pasts. I knew they would find Dr. Pelletier, whom I intended to be the next researcher I invited to join the study, and the study site I had set up for the next set of subjects. I was afraid if I didn’t take steps, they might keep digging until they found me. So I’ve decided to quit for a while, and let things die down. The plan was to keep them—you—busy by taking these three girls so everyone would be frantically searching for them, while I cleaned up a few odds and ends around here. You almost spoiled things for me.”

Charlie could hear it in his tone: time was growing short. The objectification, the coldness, the distancing—he’d lumped her in with “them”—necessary for him to kill her was coalescing.

Kaminsky’s eyes were wide open. Charlie could hear the controlled quality of her breathing. One of the girls made a sound, a whimper. She glanced that way: the girl’s eyelids were moving. She was one of the blondes, the second one down. If she woke up, what would David do? If the girl got agitated, started moving around, maybe cried or screamed, that might be all the trigger he needed. Kaminsky was looking at the girl, too: Charlie’s eyes met Kaminsky’s, held
. “Keep her quiet,”
she mouthed. Kaminsky nodded. The other woman was frightened, she could see, but had herself in hand. Charlie’s gaze was drawn to Michael, who was cursing a blue streak as he tried, and failed, to grab hold of the padlock.

Another of the girls stirred.

The sense that the situation was getting ready to spiral out of control was strong.

Dread wrapped around Charlie like a pall. Putting a hand on the arm of the moving girl in hopes of keeping her down and calm if she should awaken, Charlie did the only thing she could think of to do: she talked.

“David, you’re overlooking something.” She kept her tone very even, very sure. “Special Agent Bartoli and Special Agent Crane
know your identity.
And they’ll be looking for Special Agent Kaminsky and me. Every law enforcement agent in the state will be looking for us. If you harm us, every law enforcement agent in the country will be looking for you. You can’t possibly get away.”

David laughed. “Oh, Charlie. Do you think I didn’t consider the possibility that this day might come? I have a second identity, a second life that I can go to. David Myers is going to disappear tonight.” He laughed again. “Trust me, I’ve thought of everything. No one will find me.”

“Bartoli and Crane already will have missed us.” Charlie fought to keep her growing desperation out of her voice. “They probably have every police officer in the area looking for us right now. They’ll put up roadblocks. They’ll send up helicopters. They’ll watch the airports. They
are
going to catch you. Your only chance is to let me help you.”

“Your FBI special agents aren’t doing anything right now.” David sounded almost gleeful. “I heard your friend back there screaming about them being in an explosion into her phone right before I zapped her. That explosion was my house going up. I disconnected the hose from the gas stove, and as I was leaving, gas was already filling the house. All it took was a spark to set it off. I knew it would happen soon, although I have to say I didn’t expect it to happen
that
soon. I was thinking pilot light from the water heater, but I doubt it was that.” He paused a second. “I’m guessing your special agents set it off. Yes, I bet that’s what happened. In that case, they’re most likely already dead. So I don’t have to worry about them.”

The garage door opener.
Horror widened Charlie’s eyes. An indrawn breath from Kaminsky told Charlie she was thinking the same thing.

Please let Tony and Buzz still be alive.

“If that’s the case, I really did clean up after myself.” David sounded highly pleased.

“Oh.” One of the girls was definitely waking up. It was the brunette: she rolled free of the others and, before either Charlie or Kaminsky could do anything to prevent her, sat up. She was plump, with a snub nose.

“Oh,” she said again, looking around. Then she began to scream like her fingernails were being pulled out.

The hair stood up on the back of Charlie’s neck.

“Holy shit, shut her up,” Michael barked. “He’s got another can of gas back here.”

“No, it’s all right,” Charlie cried to the girl at the same time as, moving almost simultaneously and with Charlie resolutely ignoring the shooting pain in her head, she and Kaminsky scrambled to crouch beside her.

“Hush, hush, you’re all right,” Charlie babbled at the girl, grabbing one arm, while Kaminsky grabbed the other, shook it, and snapped, “Shut up, you little idiot.”

When the girl didn’t, Kaminsky hauled off and slapped her across the face.

Charlie felt as shocked as the girl looked, but at least the screaming stopped. Eyes wide and tear-filled, her breath coming in gasping sobs, the girl stared at Kaminsky. Charlie slid an arm around her, and the girl collapsed against her shoulder and, more quietly this time, wept.

Across her shaking shoulders, Charlie and Kaminsky exchanged speaking looks.

“That didn’t suit me, that didn’t suit me at all,” David said. “I think I’m going to have to give you ladies another little dose of gas.” Charlie could feel him looking at her, and she glanced up to meet his eyes in the mirror. “It’ll make things easier for you,” he told her comfortingly. “I won’t wake you up.”

Charlie’s blood ran cold. Then, when he reached behind him to slide the plastic door closed, her heart shot into her throat.

“What’s he doing?” The girl jerked upright in Charlie’s arms. Her voice shook with fear. Her head swiveled so that she was looking at Charlie. “I want to go home! I want my mom!”

“Shut up,”
Kaminsky and Michael roared at the same time, and when the girl did, burying her face in Charlie’s shoulder and shaking silently in her arms, Charlie could hear the soft, sibilant hiss of gas.

“It’s coming through the vents.” Michael was making valiant attempts to close them, but Charlie could see his hands passing right through the black plastic slots. She could feel his frustration, his terror for her. Realizing that he was helpless to help her, helpless to save her, Charlie felt cold sweat wash over her in a wave. “Babe, you’ve got to get out of that cage. It’s weakest in the corners. You and Sugar Buns are going to have to try to kick your way through. Try the one on the back left, near the door.”

At instant vision of her kitten-heeled sandals and Kaminsky’s towering pumps flashed through Charlie’s mind, along with the conclusion
, At least it’s better than bare feet.
Charlie looked at Kaminsky. “We’ve got to try to kick through one of the corners of the cage.” She pointed at the one Michael had indicated. “That one there.”

Kaminsky scrambled toward it. Charlie said “It’s going to be okay” to the girl, released her—she crumpled into a sobbing ball—and scrambled after Kaminsky. The other woman was already slamming her foot in its high, stiletto heel against the wire when Charlie reached her.

“We need to do it together,” Charlie cried, and Kaminsky nodded. “One, two,
three.
”

They were just slamming their feet against the wire strut in unison when, so loud it made them jump, they heard the wail of a police siren. Revolving red lights flashed through the van.

“Thank God,” Kaminsky breathed, and she and Charlie stopped kicking the cage and looked at each other.

“Thank God,” Charlie echoed. She was already starting to feel a little dizzy from the gas.

“Did I ever say I don’t believe in miracles? I take it back. Two cop cars are right behind us.” Michael, jubilant, came to crouch in front of them. “It’s going to be okay, babe.”

With a screech of tires, the van sped up like it had been shot from a gun. Charlie was thrown back onto her butt. Kaminsky was spared the same fate only because she grabbed hold of the wire grid. The van rocketed down the road; Charlie could hear the spray of gravel hitting the sides.

“He’s making a run for it,” Michael groaned as the wail of the sirens seemed to fall behind. He rushed toward the cab, for what purpose Charlie didn’t know. The gas was starting to make itself felt: everything Charlie could see was starting to spin. Kaminsky coughed; the girl whimpered, a high, keening sound that grated on Charlie’s nerves.

“It’s a bridge.” Michael was back, roaring. “He’s driving us off a fucking bridge into the lake!
Hold on!
”

Even as he said it, there was a tremendous jolt, and the van seemed to jump forward.

For a moment, Charlie got the terrifying impression that they were suspended in space. Then the front of the van tilted down, and with a tremendous splash and enough force to send all of them flying, it plunged into the lake.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

Charlie tumbled head over heels, crashing into bodies, bouncing off the sides of the cage, which had broken loose from its moorings and was tumbling around, too. When the violent motion stopped, water was already pouring inside the van. It was gushing in through the cab, and from the angle she realized they were going into the water front end first. Unsecured now, the cage lay snugly against the plastic doors that divided the driver’s compartment from the cargo area. A glimpse of night sky at the rear told her that one of the cargo doors had flown open on impact. The strip of starry sky she could see provided the only illumination.

What had become of David she had no idea. She, Kaminsky, and the girls were tangled together in a barely moving heap on what was now the bottom of the cage.

We’re still locked in the cage
.

As Charlie realized that, panic sent a rush of adrenaline shooting through her veins.

Cop cars had been close behind them. Rescue had to be on its way.