Page 35 of Closer Than You Know (Vera Boyett #2)

Carter Farm

Coldwater Creek Road, Taft, Tennessee, 8:50 a.m.

Vera parked on the road, a quarter of a mile or so from the turn for the driveway that would lead up to the Carter home. The location was shielded by the woods on the left, preventing any possibility of being seen from the house.

Bent turned to her, studied her for a long moment. The hat, that face ... almost made her wish ...

“I will be careful,” she said before he could, and in an effort to prevent her mind from going down that other path. “You need to remember that I was a well-trained homicide detective before I became a criminal analyst with the Memphis Police Department. I know how to handle myself in situations like this.”

“All the training in the world doesn’t make you bulletproof, Vee.”

She nodded in acquiescence. “I’m aware.”

“Wait two minutes once I get out, then go.” He looked away a moment before saying, “Just don’t get yourself killed.”

Before she could think how to respond, he grabbed her by the head and pulled her to him. He kissed her hard and fast. He released her just as suddenly and climbed out of her SUV.

She watched in her rearview mirror as he moved around the back of her vehicle and then disappeared into the woods. Her attention shifted to the digital clock on the dash and waited. One minute. Felt like a lifetime. She held her breath, waiting for that digital clock to click over once more. Two.

Staring straight ahead, she tightened her fingers on the steering wheel. “Showtime.”

She removed her foot from the brake and rolled forward. When she reached the driveway, she started to turn into it, but the vibration of her cell phone stopped her. She hit the brake and stared at the device on the console. It vibrated again.

She picked it up and studied the screen.

Unknown Caller.

She tapped the screen to accept the call. “Keep driving,” a voice said.

Male. Not one she knew. The grandson ... Patrick? Maybe. Fear and anticipation exploded in her chest.

“I’m here,” she blurted. Caught herself and forced a sense of calm. “Alone, like you said.”

Laughter echoed over the line. “Good girl. Now, drive straight ahead. Quickly, before your friends catch up to you. You will know what to do then.”

“Where am I going?” she demanded, but the call dropped.

“Fuck.” She tossed her phone onto the seat and rammed her foot against the accelerator. The SUV lurched forward. If she hesitated too long, Bent would rush back to her vehicle to find out what was going on.

She hadn’t gotten fifty yards before her phone started to vibrate again. She glanced at the screen. Bent.

She drove faster. Quickly, before your friends catch up to you. The bastard’s warning echoed in her brain.

A curve had her slowing slightly, and then she gunned the accelerator again.

She blinked ... what the hell? A white van sat sideways in the road ... blocking her path. Someone stood next to it. There was no way to go around ... the ditch on either side was too deep. She couldn’t risk trying to go around.

She slowed. Banged a fist against the steering wheel. As she drew closer, she recognized the wording on the side. A television station’s call letters. Then the person standing outside it ... Patricia Patton.

“Son of a bitch!” Vera slammed on the brakes, squealing to a stop. She rammed into Park and wrenched the door open. “Get out of my way!”

“You have to come with me.”

“What?” Had the woman lost her damned mind?

Patton’s throat worked with the effort to swallow. “He said you have to come with me. Now. Hurry.”

Vera reached back inside her SUV, grabbed the handgun, and tucked it into her waistband beneath the hoodie. “What the hell are you talking about?”

She started toward the woman, who stood mute and staring at her like a frightened animal paralyzed in a hunter’s crosshairs.

“What are you talking about?” Vera demanded again as she grew closer. Then she noticed the spots of dirt and maybe blood on Patton’s high-dollar white sweater and slacks.

The reporter’s lips trembled, and tears flowed down her blush-enhanced cheeks. “He has my friend ... if we don’t hurry, he’ll kill him and your sister.”

Vera charged the rest of the way up to her. “If you’re lying to me—”

“Please.” Patton shook her head. “We have to hurry.”

“I’m driving.” Vera climbed into the driver’s seat of the van, adjusted the position of her weapon and then the seat while Patton hurried around to the other side. “Where are we going?”

“Keep going straight on this road.”

Vera cut the steering wheel sharply to the right, hit the accelerator, sending the vehicle rocketing forward in the direction Patton had said. She thought of Bent and how he and his deputies would be frantically searching ... damn it all to hell.

“Where’s your cell phone?” Patton asked, her face cluttered with fear. “I’m supposed to toss it out the window.”

Vera’s fingers tightened on the steering wheel. “I left it in my vehicle.” Shit.

“If you’re lying,” Patton cautioned.

“Give me the damned directions,” Vera growled, like a woman possessed by the devil himself.

“Just keep going. It’s a couple of miles.”

Vera pressed the accelerator harder. A minute ticked off, then another. Her heart pounded harder with each second. Where the hell were they going?

Patton leaned forward to stare out the windshield. “It’s not far now.”

“Am I taking a left or a right?” Vera asked, glancing at the reporter, who was not acting like herself at all.

“Left. See the satellite dish and that little red barn. It’s the next left. A gravel road.”

Vera braked hard and slid into the turn. Patton grabbed for something to hang on to.

This was wrong. Vera’s cop instincts were screaming at her. “How did he know when I got to the Carter farm?” she demanded as she wrested back control of the vehicle and sent it bumping along the narrow gravel road.

The bastard had set up some way to watch for her approach. There was no other explanation. If this woman admitted to having been his lookout, Vera might just stop this van and kick her ass.

“He set up those little battery-operated cameras. The whole parade of law enforcement vehicles appeared on the app on his phone. But he was never at that location anyway.”

Had Vera been thinking straight, she would have realized he would do something exactly like that. The guy was nearly ten years younger than her. He would be versed on all the latest gadgets. “What next?” Several mobile homes in various stages of disrepair sat on either side of the narrow road. All looked abandoned. Probably uninhabitable. Vines, trees, and bushes, as well as undergrowth, had all but swallowed them.

“Go left at that last one. There’s a shed. Pull the van into the shed.”

Vera made the left. She stared a moment at the shed, assessing if the van would fit. Only one way to find out. She rolled forward, eased into the derelict structure that looked as if it might fall any minute. She shut off the engine and turned to the woman who had been the bane of her existence far too often.

“Get out,” Patton said, her voice wobbling. “We close the shed doors and go inside.”

“How did you get involved in this?” The idea that Patton was somehow just trying to get the story, frankly, scared the hell out of Vera.

“He called me. Claimed to be a guy who had some information about you and what happened with the Messenger last time.”

Vera rolled her eyes. “And you fell for it.”

“I always follow every lead.” She reached for her door, climbed out.

Vera did the same. “So you met with him,” she prompted. “What happened?” She really did not have time for this. Damn it.

The shed doors creaked as Patton closed them. She turned to Vera then, her movements disjointed. “The man, Patrick Solomon—I didn’t recognize him immediately—got into the back of the van. Then he introduced himself, and I knew something was off. Mike prepared to start filming and ...” Her face crumpled. “He stabbed him. Then he told me to drive.” Her voice caught. “Then, a little while ago, he sent me to pick you up. He said if I didn’t bring you back ...”

Vera wanted to shake the woman. “Well, you always did jockey for a front-row seat.” The woman had damned well gotten herself one this time. As soon as she had said the words, Vera felt a little bad. Patton’s friend was injured. Damn it. How many more had to die or be hurt because this sick bastard wanted to get even with her?

“I’m sorry,” Patton sobbed. “I was only doing my job.” She gestured to the dilapidated mobile home next to the shed. “We have to go in there ... he’s waiting for us.”

“Is my sister in there?” Vera held her breath, pulse racing, heart pounding.

“She’s there. My friend too.” Patton searched Vera’s eyes. “We’re all going to die, aren’t we?”

“Not if I can help it.” She started toward the dilapidated mobile home, surveying the landscape as she went. The whole area appeared abandoned. Slowly being devoured by nature.

Vines had grown up the side of their destination. The windows she could see were broken. Probably vandals. “Is anyone else in the house?”

“I don’t think so. There’s no electricity. No water.”

“You didn’t see anyone else with him?”

“No. Just me, Mike, and Eve.” A sob ripped from her throat.

“Did you see any other weapons besides the knife?” Knives were the weapons the Messenger used on his victims. Apparently he’d used one on her friend.

“No.”

“Okay. Just stay calm and ride this out. Let me do the interacting with him. I will get us out of this. You just have to trust me.”

She nodded.

Vera hoped to hell the ambitious reporter would do as she was told. The Patricia Patton she knew always broke the rules.

They had that in common.

But now wasn’t a good time for the woman to go rogue.

As soon as they approached the narrow steps, the front door opened.

Patrick Solomon stood in the doorway. The jeans, sweatshirt, and hiking boots were completely out of character for the young medical resident whose photo she had found on the Instagram page of one of his friends.

He had the same pale-blond hair as his grandfather and mother. He appeared fit. Also like his grandfather. Obviously he was intelligent. But it was his gray eyes—cold, fathomless—that warned just how bad the situation was. This man—this monster—appeared to have just one goal: act out his revenge before he was captured or killed.

Vera’s gut told her that this was also in part about him having held in those desperate urges all this time, and he just couldn’t do it anymore.

This was the eruption ... the meltdown. He’d blamed it on his grandfather’s situation, but it had likely been coming all along.

“If you are carrying any sort of weapon, toss it on the ground,” he ordered.

Vera held up her hands. “I’m unarmed.”

“She’s lying,” Patton said, her voice too high pitched. “She has a handgun. I saw it.”

Vera sent her a scalding look. What the hell was wrong with her?

“Toss it on the ground, Vera,” he ordered, “or I will stick your sister.”

Vera removed the handgun from her waistband and tossed it to the ground beyond the porch. She sent Patton another withering look she hoped conveyed her thoughts. Stupid bitch. Did she really think following an order like that one was going to save them? It was one thing to make a bad move but a whole other level of stupidity to give away a secret unnecessarily. How would he have known Patton had seen the weapon if he found it?

He wouldn’t have, damn it.

“Come inside,” he ordered.

Vera climbed the three rickety steps and walked in first. Patton stayed close behind her.

“Nice of you to join us, Vera.” The door slammed to a close. “Though I do not appreciate your foolishness.”

She turned around slowly, her gaze seeking and finding her sister. She was alive. Thank God.

“I wouldn’t have missed it for the world.” She shrugged. “Your grandfather didn’t mention that I couldn’t come prepared—if that’s what you mean.”

“Mike.” Patton rushed to the man on the floor. Judging by the blood on the front of his clothes and the fact that he only vaguely reacted to her presence, he was barely hanging on.

Shit. Shit. Shit. This was bad.

Eve sat in the opposite corner from the others, hands and feet bound. She nodded, only the slightest dip of her chin, but said nothing. Vera did the same. Eve showed no visible injuries. No blood on her clothes. So far so good on that count. The room was empty, save a couple of chairs and an old cabinet-style television. A bag and about an inch of dust sat on top of it.

“My grandfather insisted you were too clever for your own good. It seems he was correct.”

Vera turned back to the man leaning against the closed door, a long-bladed knife in his hand. A sheath hung at his side. Probably attached to his belt the way a hunter would wear one. Only this man didn’t hunt animals ... he hunted humans—women who fit a certain profile. The occasional male who got in his way or suited his purpose.

Pushing aside all the thoughts and realizations that would change nothing, she asked, “How do you want to do this? It’s only a matter of time before the sheriff and his people find us.”

“I’m aware.” He held Vera’s gaze. “Patricia, secure her,” he barked.

Patton scrambled to her feet. Grabbed something from the bag on top of the television and rushed to Vera.

“Put your hands together,” she said, her face still clouded with that fear.

Vera held her hands together in front.

“Behind her,” Patrick ordered. “I cannot trust this one.”

Vera rolled her eyes and shifted her arms around so that her hands were behind her back. Patton tightened the zip tie into place.

“On the floor,” Patrick ordered. “Next to your sister if you like.”

Vera walked to the corner where Eve leaned against the wall and sat down. Patton quickly secured her ankles with another zip tie. She didn’t meet Vera’s gaze. Unquestionably she understood how utterly stupid what she’d done was. Then she hurried back to stand before the asshole orchestrating this shitshow and to await his next order.

“I have waited a long time for this,” Patrick said, drawing Vera’s attention to him once more. “You took my grandfather away from me. I needed him ... needed his guidance.” He looked away a moment, as if overwhelmed by emotion.

Vera wanted to puke. How dare he pretend to be emotional.

“Now,” he glared at her once more, “he is dying.”

There were many things Vera would like to say to that, but she resisted. No need to egg on his wrath.

“By the way,” he said with a sickening smile, “happy birthday.”

Vera gritted her teeth to hold back a Fuck off .

“Let us all sing happy birthday to Vera,” he directed. “Happy birthday,” he began, waving his arms in encouragement to the others.

Patton joined in. Eve turned to Vera as she did the same. The guy bleeding out didn’t appear to have the energy. Vera wasn’t sure whose voice sounded the most pathetic, Patton’s or Eve’s. Her sister blinked back tears as their gazes met.

Vera wished she could hug her.

When the singing concluded, Patrick clapped loudly. “Bravo.”

“Look,” Vera said, “why don’t you release the three of them, then you and I can go somewhere private and get this party started. Someplace we won’t be found.”

He smirked. “You would do that, would you?” he said to Vera.

“No question.” She leaned forward. “Call it my birthday present. The truth is, it’s me you want. You don’t need all this baggage slowing us down.”

“You are exactly right,” he said.

In a swift, unexpected move, he stabbed Patton. Deep. Then he shoved her to the floor near her friend, who appeared to have gone unconscious. Shock claimed the reporter’s face as blood bloomed across the front of her white sweater.

Vera bit her lips together for a moment to ride out the scream burgeoning in her throat. Her chest tightened to the point of stopping her heart. She had to do something. Now!

But there was nothing she could do ... except ...

“Look,” she urged. “We should go. Finding us will be way too easy if we linger here too long.” If they left now, maybe Bent or some of his deputies would find Patton and her friend before it was too late. Dear God ... they were dying right in front of her.

Ignoring her completely, Patrick reached out and sliced his blade first across the cameraman’s throat, then Patton’s. Blood spewed from the ugly gaps created. Then, as if he’d only been butchering hogs, he swiped his blade clean on Patton’s white trousers.

Next to Vera, Eve started to sob. Deep breath. Vera had to regain control ... couldn’t let this piece of shit get to her with his theatrics. She could grieve the dead later. Right now she had to stay focused on stopping him ... somehow.

“Really,” she said more firmly, barely able to press out the word, “we should go.”

“I want you”—he turned back to Vera—“to know how this level of loss feels.”

The idea that he meant killing Eve speared through Vera. Fear erupted inside her, rained down like volcanic ash. “We don’t have time for you to play, Patrick. If you’re going to do this, we need to move.”

“In good time.” He smiled, the expression evil. He walked out and slammed the door, as if he had all the time in the world.

“You shouldn’t have come,” Eve whispered, her teary gaze connecting with Vera’s.

“How could I save you,” Vera whispered back, trying to sound strong and confident, “if I didn’t show up?”

Eve laid her head on Vera’s shoulder. “Bent will be pissed.”

“Yeah.” Vera allowed her cheek to rest against her sister’s hair. The only thing that mattered to her right now was saving her sister’s life.

“I’m scared, Vee,” Eve whispered, as if she feared the bastard outside would hear her.

“Don’t worry,” she whispered back. “I’m going to kill this piece of shit.”