“By yourself?”
Another nod. Stacey hid a frown, wishing Mitch had gone somewhere with lots of witnesses who could give him an alibi.
Did she think he was the Reaper? No way. But she was standing beside an FBI agent who had to be building a case against the guy in his head with every word that came out of Mitch’s mouth.
“I didn’t want to give up on her, though, especially once I remembered those tears on her face. So I went back.”
Oh, hell. “Back to Dick’s? What time?”
“I dunno, around closing.” He hunched forward, as if physically ill. “The place was crazy and packed. One of the waitresses said Lisa had just left, though she didn’t see who she was with. I probably didn’t miss her by more than minutes.”
More information nobody at Dick’s had bothered to volunteer. So much for doing one’s civic duty. She could only again surmise that Mitch’s position as her chief deputy had kept people’s lips glued shut.
“If I’d been there earlier, maybe she wouldn’t have left with him.” He sounded on the verge of tears. “Maybe I could have stopped her from going with someone bad who wanted to hurt her.”
“Going with him?” Dean asked, his tone sharp. “How do you know she voluntarily left with someone?”
Mitch slowly straightened. “Well, I just figured it. That was the last time anybody saw her, and Freed’s car was there. She had to have left with someone. Obviously the wrong someone.”
He didn’t speculate that she’d been taken. Then again, Mitch didn’t know anything about the Reaper, or the fact that he forcibly kidnapped his victims.
For all his intelligence and his background, he was still, at heart, a pretty innocent guy. She hoped, for his sake, that he never learned the true details of Lisa’s murder. Because, having seen his eyes and heard his voice, she didn’t doubt one thing.
He had loved her.
The Reaper had had direct, personalized requests before. He’d been offered bribes, had been accosted right in the middle of his playtime, had fielded personal e-mails filled with promises and pleas.
He’d never accepted.
The thrill of what he did was in the control it gave him. Other than someone else deciding how he would do what he did, the rest was in his hands. And the how was incidental. Only the doing mattered. Only the blood. The anguish. The terror. The pain.
All that was in his control. As was the identity of his prey.
So when others had reached out, offering to pay him to kill a man, or a brunette, or a specific person someone wanted out of the way, he had always refused. He wouldn’t be manipulated or controlled. He would never sacrifice the pleasure he gained from killing his favored victims to please anyone else.
At least, he thought he wouldn’t. Now he wasn’t so sure. He’d never foreseen a situation like this one, where he might actually be forced to do so.
He’d had enough of being forced. Enough of being powerless. And the rage over Warren Lee trying to make him that way again had him ready to erupt in ferocious retribution.
He was a hand grenade with the pin pulled. Ready to land right in Lee’s lap.
“Calm. Control,” he whispered, feeling his heart race and his breath grow hot.
He counted to ten, forcing the helpless anger down into his gut, where it had lived, seethed, and taken root years and years ago. He could get through this. Even if he had to, just once, go out of his way to accommodate someone else’s desires.
Possibly sick desires. One potential client, a big fan from the start, had been particularly interested in choosing a very specific type of victim. He not only wanted to name the age, sex, and physical description; he’d insisted on seeing certain acts. Followed by the brand of death he preferred.
And he’d offered an absolute fortune to see it done.
The very idea had repulsed the Reaper. He wasn’t some sicko like that guy. Talk about weird.
The offers had been easy to refuse because, before, it hadn’t mattered. The money hadn’t mattered. He had certain needs. The auctions and drive-in ticket prices allowed him to meet them. All was well.
Now, though, with Warren Lee evading him, hiding out in his fenced fortress, almost certainly armed and watching every one of his security monitors around the clock, he wasn’t going to be able to meet them much longer.
It was Wednesday night. He had three more days to come up with the cash to pay Lee’s blackmail. And so far, his efforts to get at the man by lurking in the tree studded forest along his property in the middle of the night had been useless.
Spotting Lee’s security cameras hadn’t proved a challenge. He’d easily avoided that danger. Hidden by the thick woods of the state park, he stayed out of visual range, only a shadow drifting through the softly blowing leaves. Sitting high in a tree overlooking Lee’s land, he kept his night-vision binoculars close to his face, watching for any movement, any sign of life. Lee hadn’t come out of his house on the previous two nights. That didn’t mean he wouldn’t tonight.
He only needed one shot. Just one.
But he doubted he’d get it. Warren Lee knew who he was. Lee also, therefore, knew he was up against someone who knew how to handle a gun. He couldn’t be stupid enough to think he could threaten blackmail and not face retribution.
Then again, people were stupid.
He could have taken out the security cameras and gone in for a frontal assault. But Lee would be expecting that. The moment security went down, he would go on high alert. The vet supposedly had weapons that would make a terrorist jealous.
No, this was his only option, short of staking out Lee’s driveway by day, following him, and forcing him off the road somewhere. But the potential to get caught was much too great. He had to control the situation. He had to be in charge of the where and when.
Here. And soon.
“You won’t come out in the darkness. But I’ll stay here until morning if I have to,” he whispered, his lips barely moving.
In daylight, the risk of exposure would be great. With the coming of dawn, one of the park guards or some family on a campout could spot him or his truck, which he’d pulled off the road into a well-hidden clearing. They might hear a shot and come to investigate. Or they might just see him driving out of the park and remember his face or his vehicle.
The sheriff and the FBI had already been nosing around out here. If Lee turned up dead, they’d immediately connect the cases. Any chance sighting by a witness could screw him up. He needed to avoid being seen at all costs.
Still, he had to try.
It wasn’t that he couldn’t earn the money to pay Lee off, as disgusting as he found the idea. He just wanted the satisfaction of blowing away the man who’d blackmailed him. “Blowing away isn’t good enough,” he told the night. “What I wouldn’t give to show you what drawing and quartering is like. Let you watch while your guts spill out.”
Nice fantasy. But there was no time.
He had tonight, just this final night. Because if he was going to have to come up with the money, the wheels had to be set in motion by tomorrow. He needed to advertise, get things rolling. After that, things would be tight.
Thursday, the auction.
Friday, the kill.
Saturday, the payoff.
And he’d get his revenge on Warren Lee sometime afterward.
It could work. But he hoped it didn’t have to go down that way. He’d much rather deal with the man right now.
Which was why he settled more comfortably into the crook of the limbs, unblinking, relentless, with the binoculars at his eyes and the scoped rifle in his hands.
13
Lily had made a promise to her boss that she would remain focused on the Reaper case until the murderer was caught. And she meant to keep that promise.
That didn’t mean she couldn’t begin to pave the way toward catching the online sexual predator who haunted her dreams almost as much as the Reaper did. While she’d spent nearly every hour racking her brain, trying to figure out why there was no money trail from the several online auctions the unsub had held, she’d also made a few phone calls.