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“No, no. Just an old man’s silliness. Call me.”
“Will do.”
He was relieved he didn’t have to attend to his grandfather, who, though his mind shied from the idea, seemed to be slipping a little mentally these days. Or maybe he was just overly tired. No sense borrowing trouble. Hale had enough of that as it was.
His black TrailBlazer was white, covered in an inch of snow. He opened the back and pulled out his chains and a small rolled-up rug. Flipping down the rug, he knelt on it and then wrapped the chain around the first rear tire and snapped it together. Snap-on. Like Savannah’s. He did the same to the other rear tire, shook out the wet rug, and tossed it in the back. He was backing out of his parking spot and heading down the long entrance lane to the hospital within a minute. The normally gnarled, wind-blasted trees that lined it were now covered in snow, their mangled limbs softened by the white powder, strangely serene in this frantic night.
He drove intently, forcing himself to stay under control, feeling anxiety buzzing beneath his skin. By his reckoning he was at least forty minutes out. Maybe more. Probably more. But he was going to get there.
Savvy worked herself around, fighting for the driver’s door handle. Tightening her fingers around the handle, she pressed it down and tried to shove the door upward. Were she her old limber self, she would pull out a leg and push it open, but in her current state she had to push with her hand. The door opened easily enough, but she couldn’t get enough power to push it straight up. It snapped back down twice before she gave up.
And the wind was shrieking and shoving snow inside so fast, she was damp by just opening the door a crack. But at least the door would open; the SUV wasn’t torqued too badly. Thank God for small favors.
She was still sprawled across the two front bucket seats. She wondered if she should try to resecure herself with the seat belt. Would that be better or worse? Worse probably. If...
The next contraction hit harder, pain ripping through her abdomen. Savannah closed her eyes and panted, counting, waiting it out. It didn’t seem to be longer, but it sure as hell seemed stronger.
When it was over, she thought about the baby and about Hale and her sister. Kristina. But again she pushed thoughts of her aside, almost furiously. Couldn’t think about Kristina. Not now. Later. After the EMTs got to her. The ones Hale had called through 9-1-1. He said he was going to call. He would. And they would get here.
The Escape’s engine was still on, charging the headlights, two dim yellow lines that illuminated the snow-laden fir boughs beyond. Savvy switched it off but left the lights on. She would turn the engine over after a bit. Didn’t want to lose the battery. She lay still, and then another contraction took her over, squeezing her, leaving her breathless and shaking. Too close after the last one. Too close.
Sucking air between her teeth, Savvy lay still, listening to her own galloping heart.
There was no denying it. This baby was coming.
Soon.
Outside the window, the snow was coming down as hard as Charlie had ever seen it. He watched pensively, his thoughts running along twisting pathways. He’d made mistakes, several that needed immediate attention. The loose ends were unraveling faster and faster, and inside he was starting to feel that same old anxious feeling that meant it was time to take care of business and move on.
He’d seen that woman, that detective, today. Something had to be done about her. A pleasurable something, no doubt, but if he did something soon, his cover would be blown and they would start searching for him. He wasn’t ready for that yet. There was too much to do. Those women at Siren Song . . .
And what the fuck had he been thinking, talking to that ass DeWitt? Dimwit! Damn! Fuck! He wanted to kick something, he was so angry at himself. He’d been bragging to the dense moron, that’s what. Letting the bastard know that he, Charlie, could score with anyone he chose. Anyone! Women wanted him . . . practically spun themselves into a sexual frenzy if he so much as looked at them. Could Dimwit even conceive of that? No. He just sat night after night at one bar or another and drank himself stupid.
Now Charlie tamped down his growing anxiety and rage with an effort. This was not the time to drop his mask and let anyone see what was underneath. Too dangerous.
But Dimwit . . . God . . .
Charlie ground his teeth together in remembrance. He’d made some serious mistakes, which had to be corrected once and for all. He’d foolishly told Dimwit all those things because the fucker had seen him banging Kristina up against a wall at the Donatellas’ Spanish Colonial. Charlie had caught a glimpse of the man’s vehicle as he was tearing away from Bankruptcy Bluff, and he’d known he would have to do something.
A couple of nights later he’d followed him to a bar just down the road from Deception Bay, a local dive called Davy Jones’s Locker. He should have killed him right then and there. But did he do that? Did he? Hell, no. Instead he’d crowed to the stupid ass about all his sexual conquests. Not just about Kristina! About all of them, including Chandra Donatella, who was the reason he’d chosen the Bankruptcy Bluff venue in the first place.
He’d even told the miserable little shit about his alter ego: Good Time Charlie.
Fuck.
Well, now he was going to have to do something about Dimwit tout de suite. And there were more developing problems: that fucker had been way too eager to talk to the sweet female detective. And then, of course, that sweet detective herself.
All three of them had to die.
He realized how close he was to being discovered, and a part of him was both angry and appalled that he’d been so careless. But another part looked forward to the killing that was to come.... He could get a hard-on just thinking about it.
“Hey,” the woman called from the bed, miffed that he wasn’t paying attention to her. His date. The one he’d been so eager to be with just hours earlier. The one he wanted to escape from now.
He’d been standing by the window, naked, lost in thought, watching the snow. Now, as he turned toward her, she patted the sheets, inviting him back in.
But he didn’t want to have sex with her again. He damn well never wanted to see her again. After he had a woman, he didn’t want to go back for seconds unless there was a way to up the ante. Before his first kill, he’d tried anything that was a little more dangerous. Sex in a public place. Sex somewhere precarious, like that time at the construction site. All those Bancroft Development employees around . . . and he’d just silently laughed at them while he was screwing Kristina behind their backs. He knew them all and what they were about. Kristina had helped him know them, and though she didn’t understand his obsessive interest in any and all things Bancroft, whenever she’d asked too many questions, he’d distracted her with sex. She was so easy to control. He just waggled his finger and she was practically writhing on the ground for him. Some of the women were more of a challenge even with his sexual power, but not Kristina. She was always hot and wet and throbbing like a goddamn pulse, although afterward she cried about not being herself, not wanting him, acting like he’d put her under some kind of spell. Jesus. She was just weak, that was all.
Why hadn’t she just died?
