Page 21

TWENTY-ONE

Liam

What the fuck is this?

Is it a whole “Oh, Liam, I trust you, but I want to torture you first” scenario? What the fuck? Isn’t the fact that Caleb is sitting outside of her house enough proof?

No… no… it’s not the proof he’s wanting. Gabriel’s never needed proof for any of my wild accusations. He’s always trusted me. He’s the only one who has unquestioningly trusted every theory I’ve thrown out there. It’s that he wants to feel okay with me killing them, and I know that. He wants to hate them enough that he also believes they deserve to die. But it’s still enough for me to fret that I’m fucking up somehow.

My knuckles are white as I squeeze the steering wheel far too tight for the entire drive. I don’t realize until I arrive that I’ve been so fixated on Gabriel that I haven’t thought a fucking thing about how I’m going to do any of this.

No, no, no. I’m thinking about this all wrong. Completely wrong. I’ve never been more wrong about something in my life. This is no different from any interrogation we’ve done together. And we’ve done so many! Yeah, the setting might be a tad different. And the outcome might be significantly different, but that’s all this is.

A simple, smooth sailing interview.

It’s not too hard to find Caleb’s car a little way down the road. He’s parked in the parking lot of the shopping mall, which makes it ridiculously hard to get him into my vehicle without anyone else noticing. I feel like the teens leaning against an old beat-up SUV might have something to say if I just pop Caleb in my trunk and head off. Yes, my license plate has been swapped out for a fake one, but I still would rather not draw any attention to myself.

I drive by his car and pull into my own parking spot as I watch. He does have a pretty clear view of the grandparents’ house here, and we even get to see them get in the car and head off. But it’s not until the uncle walks Leanne over to his house that Caleb starts his car and moves it to a more secluded area in the alley behind the house. It’s almost like he wants to help me out a bit, which is awfully kind of him. He must have scouted the area out well enough that he parks out of sight of any cameras that I can see.

I watch him for a bit to see if there’s any movement from the neighbor’s house and end up waiting until it starts to get dark, which is thankfully earlier than normal as rain starts to roll in.

And once it’s dark enough, I drive into the alley and pull my car into the driveway of a house with a for sale sign out front. The lights are out and the fence surrounding the property is high. Then I head over to Caleb’s car and knock on the window. He’s so busy watching the house like a dog fixated on a rabbit that he doesn’t even see me walk up, which is his next mistake. I have my hood up, working as the perfect cover for me while the rain strikes his windshield.

“Hey, buddy, you have a flat tire,” I shout when he finally looks at me. He hesitates before rolling the window down just a hair, not wanting to look suspicious. “I was just pulling into my driveway and saw your front right tire was flat. Do you need help changing it? I live right over there, and I have a jack. Are you waiting for a tow truck?”

“What?” he asks, brain apparently not catching up to what’s happening. “What do you mean?”

“Did you not know? I thought that’s why you were sitting here. Sorry, bud. Your tire’s flat. Did you hit something on your way out here? Must have been something pretty big to blow it so quickly. I got a small flat the other day, nail in my tire. I tried one of those can foam things to fix it. Wild shit. Got me through the day to take it in to get fixed, at least!”

Caleb looks a bit panicked that someone has now seen him in the vicinity of Leanne’s house, so I lay into it. I’ve found that when you ramble like an idiot, people are less defensive and quicker to make mistakes because they really do think you’re just a mumbling fool without a care in the world.

“You visiting someone? I don’t recognize your car. We’ve all been on edge after poor Elena lost her daughter. Did you hear about that? Some fucking psycho went in and slaughtered her and her husband. Good lord. Can you imagine? Elena, that’s my neighbor who lives right there, is an absolute wreck… bless her soul. Poor woman. Her granddaughter is so distraught. Sweet girl,” I say.

I don’t want him to run. I want him to get out of his car and come to me. I want him to realize that I’ve seen his face and could go to the police. I want him to panic. I want him to think that the only way out of this is with me in the ground.

Caleb’s hand twitches. He’s torn between leaving the scene and making me leave the scene… and this life.

“You said you have a jack?” he finally settles on.

“Yeah. In my garage. Wife won’t be home until eight, so I have some time to help out before I need to get dinner started. Since she had to work on Thanksgiving, I promised her a special dinner. Got some steaks, that’s where I just got back from… good lord, the grocery store is busy. Anyway, she warned me not to burn them. Only did that once, but boy she won’t let me forget,” I say as I head toward the garage. I keep my back to him. I’m well aware he could stab me or shoot me in the back, but he’s not going to. He knows the risk is too high. He knows that the best place to take me down is behind those tall fence walls.

I hear his car door slam. He’s so fixated on keeping track of me that he doesn’t even go around to see the tire I’m claiming is flat.

“You have a spare in the trunk?” I ask.

“I do,” he says.

“Good. It’d be a bitch to get someone out here on Thanksgiving.”

“Yeah,” he agrees, and I slip past the fence. It cuts off his view of me, and the moment I’m out of sight, I press my back against the fence and wait for him to step into my playground.

I see the glint of a knife… how messy. Does he really think he’d be able to hide the blood? Or did he plan to leave my body, not caring in the slightest what happened to me?

That’s not very nice of him.

Caleb hesitates, not seeing where I might have gone until I slide up behind him.

“Are you looking for me?” I ask as I twist the knife free and press it against his throat with my gloved hand. He tries to jerk back, but I press the knife harder as I shove my knees into the back of his, driving him down. He flails, struggling to regain the ground he’s lost, but there’s nothing left for him here. The only place he has to go is in the trunk of my car.

“What the fuck?”

“It’s okay, I’ll take good care of you, just like you took good care of her parents.”

He really is quite weak as I drive him to the ground. He doesn’t know what to do when the person he’s hunting isn’t cowering on the ground, begging for their daughter’s life. It almost makes me laugh at how simple it all is. Caleb finds his way into the trunk of my car, bound and gagged, before I find my way into his car. I’ve taken his phone as well as another phone that I guess is what he’s using to keep an eye on her.

I simply drive it to the shitty end of town and leave the car running with the door open and phone sitting on the seat. The car will be gone by morning, likely torn apart for parts or scrapped for a few bucks. Even if the police do find it, there’s nothing incriminating toward me in it.

Using an account that is in no way connected to me, I get a rideshare to the nearby mall before walking the rest of the way back to my car. None of it takes very long, maybe fifteen minutes, and my new obsession is well on his way to the end of his life.

Exhilaration settles in me as I drive. At least with Gabriel around, my obsessions haven’t held me as tightly as they once did, but I don’t think I’ll ever be able to escape the inexplicable thrill I get every time a new one finds their way into my path. My hunts create fleeting euphoria… but Gabriel offers me happiness even when that euphoria dissipates.

A part of me thinks about going somewhere else with my prize. Somewhere that I can kill him before Gabriel even has time to realize it.

But his trust in me has me pulling up to the silo as the euphoria I feel gets cut off far too early. Gabriel is already there, waiting. I can’t help but wonder how long he waited and what made him stay. What makes him do anything when it comes to me? What makes him love me enough that he’s willing to look the other way?

I get out of my car as the rain beats down harder and walk over to his. The window rolls down and he looks over at me.

Now that I’m facing Gabriel, I have even less idea what to do than I did before. Of course, when I have no idea what to do, I resort to trying to humor him into leaving.

“Is this sexy man all for me? I think I know something fun we can do back at home.”

Gabriel’s staring at me with a raised eyebrow before his eyes flicker back to my car. “Is he in there?”

“You can pretend he’s not.”

“I get anxious,” he says.

“You don’t have to be here. I’d actually prefer you weren’t.”

“Not… no… not about that. What if he hurt you? These are literal killers you’re dealing with. And many of them are men who aren’t afraid of violence. Men who kill without hesitation or fear. Every time you go out, I realize that it could be the last time I ever see you.”

I hesitate, not expecting his concern. “Every time we apprehend a suspect, it could be the last time. Every time we come across a victim, there could be a killer waiting around the corner. It’s impossible to know what could happen. We can’t predict the future. Trust me, I’ve thought again and again about what I could have done differently when my parents died. But that’s not how life works.” The rain is coming down even harder, dripping off my hood and onto the inside of his car door, but he simply takes his thumb and swipes through it.

“Did you get hurt?” Gabriel asks, voice thick with worry.

“Not in the slightest.”

“Did he try to attack you?”

“He considered it, but I never gave him the opportunity to.”

“Are you taking him in there?” he asks as he nods at the silo.

“When you’re ready.”

“I’m more than ready. I’ve already been here for an hour,” Gabriel says, and I know that he doesn’t mean in his car when his clothes are soaked. “Why’d it take you so long?”

“It was a half-hour drive and then I had to wait for him to go somewhere inconspicuous. You knew it’d take a bit. That’s why I set your phone to track mine, so you’d know when to head over here.”

“I couldn’t sit still. I had to do something and doing something meant coming here. Then I got out and looked at everything. I tried to find something you missed. Something that I could use as proof to be like ‘Look, you could get caught,’ but I couldn’t find anything. The more I love you, the more I worry about you.”

“You really think I would mess up?”

“No.”

“Did you want to have a reason to make me stop?” I ask.

“I don’t know,” Gabriel admits. “I don’t know anything… I don’t know why I’m here. But let’s get this over with.”

Get it over with? Doesn’t he realize that this isn’t something to rush? This is something to enjoy… something to… no… no, that’s not how Gabriel works. That’s not how normal people work.

“What?” Gabriel asks. “Why do you have that look on your face?”

“Maybe this is how my face always looks.”

“Well, it doesn’t because I’ve become quite fond of looking at your face.”

I lean in and kiss him. “What do you think about going home and forgetting all about this?”

“I’m not leaving you, Liam. So suck it up. Let’s go. I’m waiting.”

I back up from the car and head over to the trunk. This is simple. It’s like a standard interrogation. That’s all this is. I’ll kindly ask him to confess in a humane and fun way that Gabriel will enjoy, and then he’ll be on his way.

I pop the trunk and look in at my prize.

It’s not fear on his face but rage. Those ones are always the hardest to break.

“You’re going to make this go super smooth, you got me?” I hiss. “We’re going to strut in and you’re going to be so shocked by his handsome face that you’re going to confess everything.”

Caleb thrashes some as I reach in and pull him out. I cut the tape off his ankles and force him to walk toward the silo. Of course he doesn’t want to and tries to ram into me, so I let him go and watch him fall on his face. Once down, he wallows in a puddle for a second before I haul him back up and check that he hasn’t bled anywhere. All blood still seems to be inside of him for the moment, but his face is red from anger. He decides to stop walking, which means I drag him the rest of the way.

Once inside, I look around for where to put him. He’d be easier to work with if he were lying out flat. It also seems to unnerve people, make them feel more vulnerable, but I feel like Gabriel wouldn’t enjoy it as much, so I grab a chair I’ve used on occasion and set it in the middle of the room before guiding Caleb onto it.

I tape his legs to the chair legs and his arms down to the armrests before Gabriel walks in. Caleb’s eyes immediately go to him, like this might be his one saving grace. Gabriel’s expression is unreadable as he enters, something he’s perfected from dealing with suspects.

I hand him some protective gear and gloves and scrutinize his every movement, but he slides them on as if he’s walking into any other crime scene. Anxiety roils inside me as I stare at this man capable of making me feel emotions that I had convinced myself I couldn’t even feel. How does he have so much power over me? Endless power to make me feel these things that were previously foreign to me.

Gabriel looks over at me and I realize he’s not covering his face at all. I mean… neither am I, but there’s no possible way he would have done so without being fully confident that this man is never going to be able to tell someone what either of us look like. He… really isn’t going to try to talk me out of it, is he?

He gives me a nod, and I turn to Caleb who is giving Gabriel pleading eyes. I reach out and wrap my hand around Caleb’s neck before getting close enough to whisper into his ear. “If you don’t want to die, you’re going to tell us everything you did to Leanne and her parents. Do you understand?”

Caleb nods and I rip the tape off. “Save me! Please, please, he’s fucking crazy! Please! He came up and fucking attacked me. Please.”

He’s searching Gabriel for any semblance of concern, but Gabriel’s face is a completely unreadable mask. Even I’m over here trying to figure out how to read it. I find myself at a loss as I stand here. He wants a confession, but killers don’t offer confessions for no reason. Not if they already think they’re going to die. The only reason they would offer anything up is to brag or to bargain.

That is, until you make them think that there’s no other choice.

So what the fuck am I going to do with Gabriel standing here? Tickle Caleb to death? Beg him to tell me so I can send Gabriel on his way?

“How’d you meet Leanne?” I ask, suddenly falling into interrogator mode. I’m not quite sure where it’s going to get me, and it quickly proves that it’s not getting me anywhere as Caleb starts up the waterworks.

“P-Please. Save me. Please. Please. I don’t know what the fuck he’s talking about. Please. I don’t even know who you’re talking about.”

“I… will… let you live if you tell the truth,” I try. Like why the fuck would that even work? Of course he’s not going to be dumb enough to think that a full-on confession would lead to him living a life of luxury when I currently have him tied up in a silo with both of our faces on display.

Alright… try two.

“Uh… pretty please?” I ask.

Gabriel looks over at me with a raised eyebrow. It’s quite apparent that he thinks I’m being ridiculous, but I’m not sure what he expects me to do. He reaches out to me. “A word?”

“I have many words for you,” I assure him. “Most have to deal with how much I love you.”

He heads out into the rain, and I follow him. “What are you doing?” he asks.

“Simply asking the man nicely for his confession.”

“And how is that going?”

“He looked pretty concerned when I whispered in his ear that I’d tickle him if he didn’t answer.”

“We’ll be here all night if you don’t take this seriously. I want him to recognize what he’s done wrong. I want him to admit it.”

How the hell does he think I’m not taking this seriously? Okay… maybe it was the tickle thing. “Fine, fine.”

We head back inside where Gabriel looks at me. “Where’s his phone?”

“I got rid of his real phone, but he had a second that looks like a burner phone, probably to keep track of Leanne,” I respond. “I assume you’d like to see?”

“I would,” he says as he takes the phone from me.

“Do you need a finger to open the phone?” I ask, since he seemed quite fussy about the last finger I gave him.

“I sure don’t,” Gabriel says. “It looks like it requires a passcode. Get me the number.”

“You heard him. What’s the number?” I ask.

Caleb shakes his head while giving Gabriel a desperate look. Gabriel seems to be his only hope. He’s positive that the only way he’s getting out of any of this is with his help. “It’s not my phone. I’ve never seen that phone in my life! He’s lying! He’s planting shit on me. It’s not my phone.”

I kneel down in front of Caleb and watch him for a minute. I can’t help but wonder how long he watched her. What made him pick her? What made him so obsessed that he thinks she’s his?

Gabriel walks over to me and slides his hand into my hair. It’s such a familiar gesture that it immediately makes me feel warm. He leans over and tips my head to the side so he can whisper in my ear. “I’m going to step out. When I come back in, I’d like the code.”

I smile at him, relieved he’s finally leaving the room. “I can do that.”

His hand lingers for a moment before he kisses the side of my head and walks out the door.

I lift my head, and whatever Caleb sees in my expression rips his former look of sadness right off his face.