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“Like Nat?” she demanded, trying to keep him talking.
His smile widened. “Exactly.”
Rayne’s hands clenched into fists. She’d never hated this man as much as she did in this moment. “You killed her.”
“The bitch had it coming.”
Rayne curled her lips in revulsion. “Because she caught you having sex with a child?”
“Because she thought she could outsmart me,” Mark snapped. “And now you’ve done the same. A deadly mistake.”
Rayne ignored the worddeadly. She just had to keep Mark bragging about his accomplishment of murdering a defenseless teenage girl. Something that should be easy enough. He’d always been a blowhard.
“How?”
“What?”
“How did you kill her?”
“I had my . . .” He hesitated, as if debating whether or not to confess his sins. Then he gave a small shrug. “My friend slipped a few painkillers into Natalie’s water bottle, which she always took on her morning run, while she was at breakfast. Then I climbed through an open window and snuck into the dorms while everyone was busy.”
“I assume your friend was the child you seduced?”
His jaw hardened as he ignored her question. Clearly, he didn’t like being reminded he’d had sex with a schoolgirl.
“I had to hide in the janitor’s closet. Those damned nuns were everywhere. But eventually Natalie returned to her room. I came in behind her. She was already struggling to stay awake, so she didn’t even put up a fight. Once she was unconscious, I placed her on the bed and slit her wrists. It was remarkably easy.”
Rayne shook her head; later she would grieve for her friend. She couldn’t let herself be distracted.
“I wasn’t so easy to kill, was I?” she demanded, suddenly realizing who had shot at her van. “How did you find me?”
“After your mother told me that you’d been nosing around in your old school things I had a sleepless night. I didn’t think there was any incriminating evidence hanging around, but I couldn’t be sure.”
“Nat left me pictures,” Rayne said with a cold smile, careful to avoid admitting that they didn’t have any actual proof of his guilt. “She reached out from the grave to have her vengeance.”
Mark breathed a curse, but he didn’t give into the panic that briefly flared in his eyes. “It doesn’t matter. Not now,” he muttered, speaking more to himself than to her.
Rayne didn’t like the sound of that. “I still don’t understand how you knew where to find me.”
“This morning I got up and went to the hotel you usually stay at when you’re in Chicago. You were just taking off in your van, so I followed you. It was more an impulse than genuine fear of being exposed.” He grimaced. “It wasn’t until you pulled into the Orwell farm that I really started to worry. I wasn’t sure what you’d discovered, but I was determined to stop you from getting to the truth.”
Rayne forced her smile to remain glued to her lips. “Too late.”
“It’s never too late,” he retorted, his tone edged with a smug confidence. “Not for me. I am the ultimate survivor.”
Just like a rat scurrying through the gutters, she silently acknowledged.
“What do you intend to do to me?”
Mark shrugged. “You and your mother are about to have a tragic accident.”
Accident? It was the acrid stench of smoke that forced Rayne to accept what Mark was implying. That wasn’t coming from her mother’s cigarette. This lunatic had set a fire in the house. And he intended to knock her out and leave her and her mother to die in the flames.
She couldn’t wait for Niko to rescue her, she grimly acknowledged. She had to get out of there. With a burst of speed, she made a mad dash toward the doorway. Mark, however, had anticipated her attempt at escape. Leaping to the side, he blocked her path. At the same time he sliced the poker through the air, aiming at the side of her head.
Rayne stumbled backward, knowing she couldn’t risk a direct confrontation. He was not only larger and stronger than her, he had a weapon. She continued to put space between her and the advancing monster. It wasn’t until she heard the rattle of ice as her back rammed into a hard object that she realized she’d crossed the entire length of the room. She was at the bar where her mom had been making a drink when she first arrived.
Keeping her gaze locked on Mark, Rayne reached behind her. She ignored the bottles of booze as well as the glass tumblers. She was searching for something specific. At last her fingers curled around the wooden handle of the small ice pick her mother always kept next to the silver bucket.
