“Where’s Lilith?” Wyndham demanded. “She’s not dead?”
“That’s what we’re going to find out. Get in.”
Wyndham didn’t even have his door closed when Pucinski ripped his car away from the abandoned building. The patrol car was right behind him.
“Where the hell are we going?”
“Where they found the first two women,” Pucinski said. “Forest preserve. My gut tells me that’s where we’ll find the Mitchell wom… where we’ll find Lilith.”
This was personal now. This was someone he knew despite trying not to. Someone who’d put herself on the line for others, as foolish as that had been. He’d tried to warn her, to convince her how dangerous it was to challenge a killer. She simply hadn’t listened.
Guilt and who knew what else drove Lilith Mitchell.
He didn’t want to think of where that had landed her now.
Chapter 22
THROWN ACROSS the backseat. Hands cuffed behind her back. Feet trussed together. Gag in her mouth.
Lids fluttering as she tried to focus, Lilith saw Gabe’s dark form in the driver’s seat. Gradually, her mind cleared, and she realized what was happening. She struggled to free herself but could barely move. Horrified, she realized she was as helpless as the others must have been before he hunted them.
And as terrified.
The car pulled off the main road and then the road altogether. Uneven ground below made the vehicle buck and twist.
A moment later, it stopped.
An armed Gabe pulled Lilith from the backseat by her hair. She screamed through her gag and thrashed wildly. Though she was nearly upside down, he jerked her even harder so she fell.
“Fighting will only make it worse.”
She wouldn’t give in to fear. She wouldn’t. As long as she didn’t give in, she had a chance.
Gabe righted Lilith, his free hand all over her as she got to her feet. He squeezed her flesh cruelly so that she had to bite back a cry. She wouldn’t give him the satisfaction. Removing the gag and freeing her hands, he stepped around her, motioned to the rope tying her legs.
“Do it!” He pointed the rifle at her.
Wishing she’d come to earlier so she would have had time to think, to plan, Lilith worked on the ropes, while darting her gaze from him to the surrounding dark. She was looking for opportunity, waiting for the moment she could either run or strike back.
She couldn’t give in. She wouldn’t
“Don’t fuck with me, Lilith. Jennifer fucked with me. Turned me in. My own wife.”
“Did you abuse her, too, Gabe?” Certain he didn’t expect her to challenge him when her life was hanging in the balance, Lilith was equally certain he still had something to prove before killing her. “Did Jennifer finally have enough of your abuse and tell people what you were?”
“She didn’t understand a cop needs a release. Neither of you understands what it’s like, living with violence every day.”
Thinking about those three years under Marlon Aldrich’s fists, Lilith said, “You don’t know a damn thing about what I understand.”
She whipped the rope at him, but he was faster. He ducked and hit her in the chest with the rifle barrel.
“Shut your mouth and start undressing!” He waved the weapon at her.
Lilith’s hands shook as they automatically moved from her stomach to the zipper on her hoodie. That blow tightened her chest so she couldn’t talk. She could hardly get her breath.
Gabe laughed. “Before I’m through, you’ll be begging me for mercy just like the others did.”
Like the others? Certain her being naked would give him the advantage, she stopped her hands from undoing anything. She wasn’t like his other victims. She might be terrified, but she wasn’t weak. She could do this. Beat him at his own game. She took a quick look around. A full moon cast a silver-blue glow over trees and more trees. Her mind furiously computed her odds for escape.
The car…
Finally able to take a deep breath, she held her hands palm out toward him and backed up toward his car.
She calmly said, “You’re wasting your time.”
“You deaf or just stupid?”
“You’re wasting–“
“Don’t bother with that interrupt his script crap. Now strip!”
“Or you’ll what? Kill me?” Lilith backed up further and wedged her bottom on the edge of the rear seat. “Do it and you’ll never get all my blood out of this car.”
The night sky was bright enough that it lit his face, now pulled into a mask of pure evil as he said, “No one will have reason to look in there.”
If he came for her to drag her out again, she had a chance. “They will after Caresse talks. She’s the undercover cop working the case. But you already know that. What you don’t know is that she’s alive, Gabe. I found her where you left her in that trash bin and got her to the hospital before she bled out.” And then she lied. “She already fingered you, and Pucinski has the task force tracking you down.”
“Bullshit!”
But she could tell that he didn’t know whether or not to believe her. Pucinski had said Caresse — Carrie — was going to live. So she would be able to finger him.
“That’s how I knew it was you, Gabe. Pucinski told me she’d been working undercover for weeks and that you had nothing to do with the case. Then it all clicked for me. The reason you kept trying to warn me off. That little demonstration at the Street Survival class.”
With a frustrated growl, Gabe lunged forward to grab Lilith, keeping the rifle out of her range. Exactly what she’d beenwaiting for. On the seat and at an angle under him, she snap-kicked, her foot glancing off his groin. Not a solid hit, but enough to slow him down.
“Bitch!”
Flying up out of the seat, she grabbed the rifle and tossed it into the car, then lunged at him, hands striking. He was already recuperating. He dodged and grabbed her, and pulled her down to the forest floor. Before he could get a good grip on her, she pulled away from him.
On her butt facing Gabe, resting her weight on her hands on the ground in back of her, Lilith kept him at bay with raised legs. He pulled his knife. Tried to get at her. But no matter which way he feinted, she spun on her rear, ready to kick, to shatter a knee if he got close enough.
“What’s the matter, Gabe, don’t want to chance getting hurt?”
“You shouldn’t taunt a killer, Lilith. You ought to reconsider your attitude. Now I’m going to make you suffer.”
“Like you didn’t make the others suffer.”
“They only got a taste.”
“Then come show me.”
He lunged, knife-hand first. She kicked out at the weapon. Missed. The knife ripped through her leg. Lilith cried out and Gabe laughed. Blood soaked her exercise pants. He lunged again. She kicked with her other foot, this time making contact with the knife and scrambling after it where it landed.
Gabe threw himself on top of her and flattened her. He punched her in the face. The metallic taste of blood filled her mouth.
An easy flip and he got behind her, wrapped an arm around her neck. He was cutting off her air, which came in striated gasps. She was struggling to breathe and losing the battle.
Think! she told herself, while trying not to panic.
She forced her fingers to the ‘v’ inside his elbow, gouged his flesh and pulled down with all her strength. His hold slackened. She tucked her chin inside his elbow so he couldn’t strangle her.
Quick as lightning, she slid her hands up his arms, over his shoulders, along his neck, anchored her fingers around his ears and went for his eyes with her thumbs. He jerked his head away. Her nails scraped one of his eyeballs and left bloody trails down his cheek.