John.
I love you, Rowan.
Another sob escaped her throat, but turned into a moan. Her cheek rested on a hardwood floor. She listened, waiting for Bobby to come and kill her. She had nothing left to live for. But all she heard was the dull, static noise of the waves crashing against the beach below.
Waves. Ocean. The familiar rhythm was soothing. They were on the coast. She breathed deeply, ignoring the stabbing pain in her chest. The house smelled musty, stale. Closed up. The artificial Lysol smell of unused house.
As the tranquilizer wore off, her eyelids became lighter and she managed to open them. Pitch black. She could see nothing. But it felt like she was in a large room with high ceilings. As her eyes adjusted to the darkness, she saw a faint change in the shades of black. Curtains, drawn over windows. That was the direction of the ocean.
Unused house. The house next door? Could he have been in the vacant house next door to her rental all this time? The property management company aired it out once a week, but other than that, no one would have been around.
If he had been living next door, he’d know the shift changes of the FBI agents. Michael. John. Recognize everyone who visited her. Know how to get to Tess.
He’d been watching her.
He’d seen how his actions affected her. He’d been playing his game, using her. He relished it. The control, the power. How long? Had he been to her cabin in Colorado? Followed her to Malibu? Been to the studio to watch her work?
Had he broken into her house and gone through her clothes? Her computer? Her papers? How close had he been without her knowing it? He’d been in her house to steal the advance copy of her book. When? While she slept? While she was working? While she ran?
The emptiness in her soul slowly filled with red rage, so hot it began to physically warm her. Bobby had been in control all this time. She’d been a pawn, reacting to every one of his moves on the chessboard he’d created. Bobby had won each and every move, except the attack on that brave prostitute in Dallas. Now, he was taking his final turn.
She would stop him.
She had to find a way to take him down with her. He wasn’t going to kill her outright. If he were, he’d have done so already. He would have killed her with a bullet in the back instead of drugging her. Because of that, because of his propensity to play with her mind, she had a chance.
Her survival meant nothing to her anymore. But her death would mean something if she dragged Bobby down to hell with her.
Footsteps on hardwood. Stairs. He was coming upstairs toward her. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Closer, heavier. Pause. Rattle. He was behind her. A lock turned and she strained to face him, but couldn’t. The door creaked.
Her heart beat so loudly it drowned out her thoughts. She broke out in a sweat despite the too-cold air conditioning.
Lights blazed and she squeezed her eyes shut, but not before pain shot through her head at the sudden brightness.
“Hello, Lily. I know you’re awake.”
She heard her brother cross the floor toward her. Bobby grabbed her hair in his hand and yanked. She tried to open her eyes, but the light blinded her.
He laughed, dropping her head. He untied her, pulling hard on the ropes in the process, but she refused to cry out. She wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of breaking her. When her limbs were free, the blood rushed to her hands and feet in a painful flood. She tried to get up but failed, collapsed, breathing heavily.
“I’ll let you pull yourself together, Lily Pad. It really wouldn’t be that much fun to kill you now when you don’t even have a chance.” His voice was older, but still held the singsong taunting of his youth.
“I. Will. Kill you.” Rowan’s uneven breath sputtered a curse.
He laughed again. “Hope. Enjoy it while you still have some. I have… things to get ready for you downstairs. So just relax while you can.”
She heard him cross the floor and close the door behind him. The lock turned. He’d left the light on and she slowly opened her eyes. She was in the middle of a large bedroom. Though her vision was blurred, she made out the bottom of a bed, a pale blue dust ruffle ten feet away.
Gradually, she pulled herself on all fours, ignoring the ache in her chest, the throbbing of her shoulder from where the dart had hit her, the hot, painful tingling in her hands and feet. She remained in that position for quite some time, until the nausea passed and she could sit up.
Her vision cleared, and it looked as if someone were lying in the bed. Who? The owners of the house only stayed in the late summer and fall. Someone would have noticed if anyone from the property management company were missing.
She pushed herself up, ignoring the woozy sensation, a leftover from the narcotics. “Hello?” Her voice came out a croak and she cleared her throat.
She looked. Lying on top of the covers was a fifty-something woman. Her vacant eyes stared directly at Rowan, locked in terror. Small flies buzzed around her face. There was a single bullet hole in her forehead.
The pillow was stained dark red. Dried blood. But this woman had been awake when she died. She’d known her fate, her eyes reflecting her fear. Even as Rowan turned away, she knew who the woman was. She and John had seen her picture in the news while at the safe house in Cambria. She’d been driving from the hospital after visiting her first-born granddaughter somewhere in Arizona when she disappeared. Rowan hadn’t thought anything of it at the time, but like any good FBI agent, she made a mental note of her photograph.
Arizona, on the way from Texas to California.
She screamed.
On the other side of the door, Bobby laughed.
CHAPTER 27
Adam dreamed.
He was driving Barry’s truck. He stopped at the flower stand and the man with money was there. But he saw him now like the picture. The picture John had shown him. Blond hair, blue eyes. But they weren’t nice eyes. They were cold. Blue and cold.
“She likes lilies.”
Adam shook his head. “No. No, she hates lilies. She broke the vase last time.”
“Trust me.”
“No, I want to buy roses. White roses.”
And he did. But when he turned into Rowan’s driveway, he wasn’t driving Barry’s truck and he didn’t have white roses.
He was in Rowan’s car and he had lilies. He hid them behind his back so she couldn’t see them.
“I can’t believe you’ve never seen the sunset over the ocean,” Rowan told him as she unlocked her door. Adam followed her to the deck, and at first he was a little scared. The ocean looked awfully big. He couldn’t swim.
“Do you want some cookies?”
He nodded and smiled, and Rowan went back inside.
He stared at the ocean, scared and in awe at the same time. He had never seen anything like it before. He’d seen it in the movies, of course, but nothing like this. He stood on the edge of the world, and that felt powerful.
Something burned his eyes, like a reflection. He turned in the direction it came from. The house next to Rowan’s. He looked up at the second-floor windows, and the drapes fluttered.
He saw him. The money man.
Rowan cowered in the corner for several minutes before gathering her courage. The shock of seeing the dead grandmother had worn off and the viciousness of Bobby’s crimes hit her.
Someone had to fight for the victims.
How many innocent people had Bobby killed, all because he wanted to torment her? All because she was the one who got away?
“I will kill you, Bobby MacIntosh,” she said out loud to no one, except the dead.
She searched for anything that could be used as a weapon. Anything. But there was nothing. Bobby had stripped the room. There wasn’t even bathroom cleaner remaining in the cabinets, a razor blade stuck between drawers, or a wire coat hanger hanging in the closet. There was nothing.
She would have to rely on her own strength and training. She positioned herself inside the door and listened. Waited.