Vail 02 - Crush (51 page)

If Vail were to follow standard crime scene procedure, as was her duty, she needed to secure the area and remain with the body. But that was a low priority. Her greater duty was to find the killer. Besides, they knew who did the murder. And Agbayani was dead. No sense in remaining. No one was going to walk up to a dead body.

Vail rose and moved back into the larger room. That’s where she stood while she figured out what to do, where to go.

That’s where she stood when the lights went out.

D
ixon was on the second level, her neck aching and swollen from Mayfield’s attack in the steam room.

 

 

The adrenaline had masked the pain, but now, as time passed and the inflammation increased, she could no longer shrug it off. Her throat was narrowed and she was having difficulty swallowing and breathing.

And her neck’s range of motion was diminished. She had to twist her torso—which was also sore—because the cervical muscles were bruised and in spasm.

Dixon left the room she had just cleared and moved back into the corridor when her phone vibrated. She pulled it from her belt. A text from Vail:

Dixon shifted her weapon to her left hand and texted back.

Flipped the phone closed, proceeded carefully. One run-in with John Mayfield was enough. She felt fortunate to have escaped; trying to pull off a second miracle in the same night might be asking too much of her Creator. Another buzz. Pulled her cell, flipped it open. Text from Vail:

Goddamn it.
She took a deep breath. They had to find this monster.
Fast
. Phone in hand, Dixon steadied her weapon with both hands and moved forward a few feet, toward a doorway that led to a balcony overlooking the square below. Black iron lights hung at various intervals from the brick walls, under alcoves and from rusted brackets, throwing romantic—but minimal—light on the courtyard.

Her phone buzzed again. She twisted her right wrist and read the display.

Dixon stood there staring at the message.
What? How can that be?
Read it again: vic is Eddie.
Eddie?

She started walking, unsure where she was headed, moving toward a staircase that would take her down. Dixon wasn’t paying attention to where she was going or what was in front of her. She kept moving, through corridors, across the square, down a staircase. Someone bumped her. Brix. She looked at him.

“Roxxi, I’m so sorry—”

She blinked away tears. Looked off ahead of her. “Where. Where is he?”

Brix took her by the arm and led her around the gift shop, through tunnels and small rooms lined with barrels and wine bottles. He pulled his Maglite and turned it on, twisted the beam to a wide spread.

“Roxxi, calm down,” Brix said in a low voice. “Relax.”

He must’ve felt me tensing.
“I’m gonna kill him, Redd—”

“Shh,” he said, placing a hand over her mouth. “Hold that thought,” he whispered. “Let’s catch him first.”

They were moving down a long, narrow corridor when suddenly the lights went out. They both stopped. Brought their handguns up, adrenaline flooding their system.

Ready for a fight.

V
ail backed up against the nearest wall and crouched down low, into as small a target as possible. Unless

Mayfield had night vision goggles, she would be nearly impossible for him to find. But she could not rule out him having NVGs—because, thus far, he seemed to be prepared. And because his ending up at the castle might’ve been by design.

But it couldn’t be. He did not have NVGs. He was as much in the dark as she was.

Then why would he cut the lights?

Unless he knew where I was when he took them out. Move—I have to move.
Vail clambered to her left, attempting to be quiet, but the scrape of her shoes against the cement flooring, the fine gravel and detritus from the people who’d walked through here today made stealth difficult. But that worked both ways.

She continued left, bumped into a wall—brought up her right hand and felt around—barrels. Took a step forward to move around them—and stopped. Someone was coming. Noise in the distance.

Vail rose, backed up behind the barrels and brought her Glock in close to her body, holding it low, so it couldn’t be easily knocked from her hands.

Waited. Footsteps.

BRIX HELD HIS SIG-SAUER out in front of him, the Maglite alongside the barrel, illuminating the area in front of him. In such narrow quarters, Dixon had to follow single file behind him. She was a good five feet back, giving adequate spacing.

Up ahead, she saw the mouth to another, larger room. Brix stopped. Dixon stopped.

VAIL LISTENED. Moved forward slightly, peeked around the edge of the barrel. Saw the flicker of a light. Then it went out.

Her heartbeat accelerated. She felt it pounding, an aching in her head, a pulsing in her ears. She backed up a step away from the edge and listened.

“WHAT?” DIXON WHISPERED.

Brix shut his light. “A room up ahead.”

“Could be the one Karen’s in.”

“If so, Mayfield could be in there, too.”

“Split up?”

Brix nodded, leaned in close to her ear. “I’ll take the light. If he goes after someone, it’ll be me because he’ll know where I am.”

Dixon gave a thumbs up. Brix lit up his Maglite and pressed forward. The room ahead appeared to be large, with curvilinear brick ceilings, like multiple gazebos launching from thick square columns.

As Brix disappeared into the room, Dixon started ahead herself, wanting to shout into the dark, “Karen, you in here?” But she knew that was the absolute wrong thing to do. She didn’t even dare open her phone in the darkness, as that would surely give away her position.

But just as she’d gone about fifteen paces into the large room, she saw Brix’s flashlight go flying from his hand. He let out a sickening thump and, in the twirling and carnival-like swirl of his light as it spun on the ground, he appeared to drop to the floor with an even louder thud.

Dixon started to rush forward, then stopped. Mayfield was here. She had to get to him before he killed Brix—if he hadn’t already. She had to risk it. “Karen!”

VAIL SAW THE LIGHT advancing into the room, footsteps approaching. She backed up further, Glock out in front of her, taking an angle on the imminent arrival of her guest. The light was moving, bouncing the way it would with someone’s gait. Or if it were held out in front of you against your gun.

But she didn’t dare call out.

A noise—skin on bone—and the light went flying to the ground. A bump. Something hit the cement. A body?

“Karen!”

Vail looked out into the near darkness.
Dixon
. “Over here!”

And then she saw something dark spring toward her, a mass like a football player plowing into her, a crushing blow that knocked her back into a wall of barrels. Her air left her lungs.

And the Glock flew from her hands.

I
n the distant light that was off somewhere in the background, Vail saw John Mayfield in silhouette, his massive hand over her mouth. He had her shoved against the barrels. And she knew what was coming.

“OVER HERE!”

Dixon tried to locate Vail’s voice—but in the chamber, with its uneven and gazebo-rounded ceilings, she couldn’t triangulate on her position. She moved quickly into the large room, using whatever light was being given off by the fallen Maglite, hoping she wouldn’t run into Mayfield. Because right now, she was sure he was here. That’s what had taken down Brix.

She saw barrels to her left and moved toward them, her right hand
aiming her SIG and her left feeling the metal rims surrounding the flat oak faces, forward, forward, a few feet at a time.