AllFreeNovel
Share Us
The woman? Or the emotion?
Haldyn was too afraid to ask. Then she saw?—
“There! There’s the van!”
Detective Kimball jerked the SUV off the side of the road—and parked it behind the forensic van. “Stay here, Hallie girl. I don’t want you getting hu?—”
He gave an inarticulate cry. And was just gone.
Haldyn was just steps behind him.
That’s when she saw…
Madison.
Madison was in trouble now.
Haldyn just ran to her friend and leaped. She didn’t think of the consequences now—any more than she had ever thought about them when she’d protected Reid or Blake.
She just did it. Like she always would.
Her hands wrapped in Detective Costovia’s hair. Her legs went around his waist. Haldyn yanked until his head went back. She bit him. On his neck. As hard as she could.
When he shook her off she yelled. And fought.
Then she was on the ground. Detective Costovia jerked over her.
And he had his gun in his hand. Pointed right at her chest. “Well, you’re a bit unexpected. Too bad I don’t have time to take advantage. The way you strut around the TSP like you are so much better than the rest of us—really turns a guy on. I have wanted to bring you down and screw you senseless so many times. Sorry about this, Doc. Nothing personal. I’m going to get you out of the way, then finish with Madison. Been planning to play with Acardi’s bitch for a long, long time.”
The shots echoed through the night around them.
80
There was a dead man on top of her. Blood. The blood was hot, almost scorching where it soaked into her. Madison shoved him aside. “Haldyn! Haldyn! Are you okay?”
“Mads!” Haldyn wrapped her arms around Madison and hugged her quickly as the man Madison thought she’d recognized as Detective Kimball took off. He’d grabbed Costovia’s gun. Madison wanted that gun, more than she wanted anything else in the world right now. “Where is Hope? Kimball’s one of the choir hall shooters. He and?—”
“We have to hurry. Hope’s in trouble. Her sister’s ex-boyfriend. He’s hurting her. Really bad. He wants to kill Hope to get back at Heather. He really wants to get to Heather.”
“I know. Kimball told me. We have to hurry.”
“He dragged Hope off to the woods, toward picnic tables back there. He really wants to hurt her. Bad. And she’s breathing hard and struggling and I don’t know how long she can fight him…” Madison pulled Haldyn to her feet. But…why was Haldyn there, and how? Things didn’t make sense. “And Detective Naylor is in trouble, and—How did you even get here? How did you know?”
“Kimball abducted me from the precinct. He killed Bell in the parking lot. Bell is another of the shooters from that day. Wilson helped organize it but he wasn’t there?—”
“Wilson is the sickest bastard I have ever encountered. Evil. He was comparing Hope’s chest to Heather’s right next to me. Telling her how much he’d enjoyed hurting Heather, how he wondered if Hope would be as much fun. If one sister was the same as the other in the dark. That it wouldn’t matter if Hope got pregnant from it like her sister had, since Hope would be dead when he was done with her. Just jabbing at Hope in every way he could. We have to find them. Help her.” Save Hope from him. Somehow. That man disgusted her more than anything she had ever heard before.
She…knew what he had done to Hope’s older sister now. Madison would never forget what he had sounded like, gloating over forcing Heather that way. How almost gleeful. Evil. Now she knew what pure evil sounded like.
“Kimball is obsessed with her, Mads. Hope. Hope and Heather both, I think. He believes he’s protecting Hope from these guys, especially. He thinks he’s protecting all of us from his friends now. You, me, Powell, Char, Zo—all of us. He thinks he’s atoning. From what he has done in the past. Making amends for his part in what happened before. And I think he’s mixed Hope up with his daughter in his head or something. Hope looks like Maribeth a little. She liked to skateboard, too. Maribeth was a big fan of Hope’s when she was alive.”
“I don’t care why he’s doing this, as long as we can save her from Wilson.” They were running. Over the hard Texas ground. Toward the copse of trees.
Toward where they could hear Hope’s screams.
Madison just ran and prayed. Prayed they could stop Steve Wilson before the monster hurt Hope any more than he already had.
81
