Page 93 of Zero Divergence
Ihave a little surprise for you, baby.
Surprise? Baby? The voice penetrating Royce’s sleep wasn’t one he recognized. He was too tired to care, so he let the comforting darkness reclaim him. Sawyer would surely be waiting for him there with eager hands and mouth. Royce’s heart started pounding just thinking about his boyfriend. The thumping grew louder, pulsing through him. Sawyer was really rocking his world, even if Royce couldn’t see him. A shrill whistle ripped through his fantasy.Train? Tornado?Alarm spiked through him, and he tried to claw his way out of the brain fog but couldn’t muster the energy. Sawyer’s embrace beckoned for him.
Bam!
Royce’s body lurched hard to the right, and his head smacked against something cold and unyielding, jarring him awake. His jeans were soaked, and for a moment, he thought he’d slipped on Candi’s bathroom floor and knocked himself out. Then he got a whiff of urine and realized he’d pissed himself. Humiliation flooded his body until he remembered getting zapped with a stun gun. Twice. He tried touching the painful knot on his head, and that’s when he discovered his wrists were bound together in front of him with zip ties. Not good. Unfortunately for Royce, understanding how dire the situation was didn’t come until after he let his assailant know he was awake. He’d just given up a significant advantage.
“One false move, and I’ll zap you in the testicles,” Bonita Brothers said calmly.
Royce turned his head and studied her. She didn’t resemble the fresh-faced woman they’d seen in photos from her pre-Franco days. Her hair looked greasy and hung limply over her shoulders, her clothes were filthy, and she reeked of body odor. How Royce hadn’t smelled her coming was beyond him. Then his eyes landed on the scabbed scratch marks on her forearms. Vivian Gross had fought hard for her life, collecting her killer’s DNA in the process. There was no doubt in his mind Fawkes would match it to Bonita Brothers.
“Those wounds look infected,” Royce said. “I hope you stopped at the drugstore for some peroxide.”
“Are you always a smartass?” Bonita asked.
“Absolutely. It’s amazing what people will reveal when you get a rise out of them.”
She hadn’t blindfolded Royce, so he could see they were in his car, and she was driving him out to a very isolated location, which didn’t bode well for him. Bonita didn’t plan to leave him alive to talk. Her driving his beloved car over an uneven, overgrown path between dense trees was what had roused him. Wherever they were, the grass hadn’t been cut in months, maybe even years, and underbrush and low-hanging branches scraped his paint job.
“Take it easy on my ride,” Royce said, bracing his bound hands on the dashboard.
“Why? You’ll never get to drive it again. The fish at the bottom of Boggy Pond won’t care about the scratches.” Boggy Pond was a lake in Bryan County near Pembroke. He and Marcus had visited plenty of times, but they’d never traveled terrain this rough.
Amateur. With little effort, Royce got Bonita to confirm she planned on killing him and how she planned to dispose of his car. “Because you’re going to kill me like you killed Reggie and Vivian? Is Reggie’s body in Boggy Pond?”
Bonita twitched in her seat but didn’t answer him. She’d either realized her mistake or was playing tough girl. Royce knew, with the right prodding, he could get her talking. What did he want to know more? How she planned to kill him, or whether Humphries helped her orchestrate the murders.
“How did Humphries communicate with you from prison?”
“He didn’t,” she said flatly.
“Oh, come on,” Royce said. “You expect me to believe you planned and executed the evidence heist all on your own?” He forced himself to laugh and hoped like hell his plan didn’t backfire. His gun was in the glove box, and she would’ve seen it when she got the zip ties out.
“I didn’t need a man to help me figure anything out. People are stupid, lazy, and love to gossip. I easily gained the information I needed to know, then formed a plan andexecutedit.”
“Impressive,” Royce said. Recalling what Holly said about Bonita’s online alias, he decided to poke the bear again. “I might buy that with Reggie but not Vivian. She was smarter than the average person.”
“She was a traitorous slut,” Bonita hissed.
“Because she fucked Humphries?”
“Shut up! Shut up!” the deranged woman yelled, pounding the steering wheel with her fist. “He wouldn’t touch that disgusting piece of trash. You’re just saying that to get me to talk.”
“Gotta pass the time somehow,” Royce said. “How is Vivian a traitor, then?”
“She conspired against Franco with Tiffany. I saw them meeting at a café when I followed—” She shut up as if realizing she said too much. It didn’t matter. Royce could see it so clearly. Bonita had stalked one of them, witnessed the envelope exchange, and alerted Humphries.
“Are you in the camp who believes I planted the evidence or the one who says Humphries didn’t kill those women?” Royce asked.
Bonita didn’t reply. She gripped the steering wheel tighter and her body practically vibrated with rage. Royce worried he’d gone too far and decided to focus more on escape than gathering evidence. He considered his options. Royce outweighed her by a good eighty pounds, and even with bound wrists, he’d have an opportunity to knock her off balance and get away. The harsh terrain meant she wasn’t driving very fast, and he briefly debated opening the door and rolling out of the car. Bonita had gone through the trouble of fastening his seat belt, but if he timed it right, maybe he could unbuckle his seat belt, open the door, and roll out of the car. It worked in the movies. By the time she stopped, he’d be on his feet and running into the woods. The plan didn’t have a high rate of success, but it beat rolling over and playing dead while she and Humphries tortured him. Royce had no doubt the sick fucker was involved too.
“He’s going to kill you once you’re no longer useful, Bonnie,” Royce said.
“Shut up.”
“You do know his plans to kill Tiffany fell through, right? Oh, wait. Did he tell you he killed his wife while in Mexico?” Royce started laughing, even though there was nothing funny about the situation. A sane person would’ve recognized how forced it sounded, but Bonnie glanced over at him long enough for Royce to see she was fucking out of it. There was a madness in her gaze that froze his insides.
“You’re a liar,” she spat.