Breath of Malice (20 page)

Two days had passed since Paige had gone missing. Sam had issued a nationwide alert. Agents had swarmed into Kirk County, canvasing neighborhoods in its three towns, searching local businesses, stopping people on the street. No one had seen Thames or Paige. Thames had not been apprehended at any of the roadblocks. Sam’s gut was burning like a four-alarm fire with the fear that they were chasing their tails.

Sam had put a rush on the crime scene reports. In the last two days, he’d been over them again and again. He was missing something. But all Sam could see in his mind was Paige at the mercy of that sadistic bastard.

Sam closed his eyes against another horrific image of Paige hurt, Paige in pain. The photos of Thames’s brutalized victims flashed in Sam’s mind, and the gruesome images became images of Paige.

Sam surged to his feet. He was losing it. Had lost it. Where was the calm control he was known for? Somewhere with the woman he couldn’t live without.

Sam stood at his office window, staring out at the night. Another night without Paige, and he was no closer to finding her. They’d been all over that mountain, all over Kirk County, and they had nothing. Sam did not know where Thames had taken her.

Telling Ivy at the safe house the previous night had left Sam bleeding.

Her tears soaking into his shirt, Ivy had begged, “You have to find her, Sam. Please. Please find her.”

Sam had willed her to see the resolve in his eyes. “I will find her. I will bring your sister home.”

Her eyes shimmering, Ivy had said, “You love her, too.”

“More than my own life.”

Tears had filled Ivy’s eyes again, and she had clung tighter to him as they shared their pain.

A knock sounded on Sam’s office door. Sam wheeled to it. Harry stood on the threshold. “Anything?”

Harry shook his head. “When was the last time you slept?”

“Do you think Paige is able to sleep?” Sam all but snarled the words, then released a long breath.

“You’ll drive yourself crazy, man,” Harry said, his concern obvious.

Sam rubbed the heels of his hands to his eyes. “Already there. Thames left nothing for us to find him, and the longer he remains at large, the colder the trail gets. I’ve been over the reports. You’ve been over them. Our experts and technicians have been over them. We’re missing something, Harry. We’re all missing something. Thames isn’t invincible. He has to have made a mistake somewhere.”

Marian buzzed Sam. She, too, was working tonight. “Sir, the deputy director is on the line.”

“I’ll take it,” Harry said.

Sam nodded. Sam’s personal phone and office lines were being monitored, but he wasn’t expecting a call from Thames. Thames wasn’t looking for a ransom. He now had what he’d been after all along—Paige.

Sam picked up the reports on Thames. He returned to his desk and went over the information from the Lambert murder. Again, he read the reports of the murders Thames had committed in New York. Sam went over Thames’s arrest report. If not for the illegal evidence, they never would have been able to hold Thames in the first place. Thames’s attorney even declared that Thames holding Paige at gunpoint had been self-defense. Paige had not identified herself as a federal agent, and Thames had acted in fear for his life. When agents arrived and identified themselves, Thames had dropped his weapon.

The crime scene report of the warehouse where Jonah was found gave them nothing on Thames. All they had was Paige’s word that Thames had been the one to abduct Jonah, and the last thing Jonah remembered was being in the neighbor’s yard. They’d traced the call Paige received about Jonah to another burner phone. No way to track it.

If they could find Paige, they would have Thames for what he was undoubtedly doing to her now. But it would mean nothing to Sam if it happened too late to save Paige’s life.

Don’t go there.
Sam couldn’t let himself think that way. If he did, he would surely lose the little that was left of his mind.

Sam returned his attention to the reports spread out before him. The bodies in New York were found to have been exhumed from some unknown location and dumped at the various spots where they were found. Traces of sand and rock were found with the bodies. There were numbers associated with the rock. The numbers meant nothing to Sam.

He picked up the report on the bodies and the report from the clearing where Paige had last been. Sam read over the details again. Something bothered him about this. What?

He forced himself to go slowly over each detail again. When he came to a description of a bit of rock that had been found near the crushed plastic of Paige’s earpiece, he went still. Then he sprang forward, rifling through the mess of files and folders on his desk for the one he was looking for.

When he found it, he grabbed it. The numbers identifying the rock found with the bodies matched the numbers for the rock found with Paige’s broken earpiece. What did it mean?

Sam called the lab that had performed the tests on the evidence from the clearing. When a tech came on the line, Sam gave the report number, then said, “The numbers associated with the rock found with the earpiece are different than the numbers for other rocks at the crime scene.” Sam recited that report number as well. “What do those numbers mean?”

“Just need a minute to read through this, sir,” the man said.

Sam waited impatiently until the tech returned. “The numbers indicate that the rocks in that report came from the Adirondack Mountains and from the Blue Ridge Mountains. Rocks from those regions look similar at low magnification, but on closer inspection, there are differences. The rock found with the earpiece is ancient Precambrian. The Blue Ridge Mountain rock is late Precambrian to early Paleozoic.”

“I have other reports I need cross-referenced.” Sam recited the report numbers. The Bureau labs were linked, so the tech would be able to access those reports as well. “The rock found with each of these bodies corresponds to the rock found with the earpiece.”

Sam heard computer keys being struck, then the tech said, “That’s correct, sir.”

Sam said, “So what you’re telling me is that the rock found with the earpiece is the same kind of rock that was found with the exhumed bodies?”

“Yes.”

“And that rock is not found in our mountains but is found in the Adirondack Mountains?”

“That’s right, sir.”

Sam ended the call. One year ago, Paige and her squad had located Thames in a cabin in the Adirondack Mountains. Agents had been all over the area around the cabin searching for Thames’s burial ground but had come up empty. But it was in those mountains somewhere.

Rock from those mountains was found with the exhumed bodies. And now with Paige’s earpiece. Thames must have left rock from that burial ground when he’d stepped on Paige’s earpiece. Thames, the arrogant bastard, had gone full circle, back to where he had started it all with Paige. Thames had taken Paige back to New York, back to the mountain.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

Paige opened her eyes. She awoke to pain. In a rush, Thames striking her foot over and over again with the mallet returned to her. He’d used the mallet to drive the wooden slats into the top of her foot, her toes, her ankle, not only breaking bones with each strike, but also, as the slats filled the boot, her foot was squeezed into the diminishing space. The boot was gone now. Her foot was swollen and bloodied and bent at an unnatural angle, so misshapen it resembled a mass of flesh. The agony robbed her of breath, of her ability to think.

She needed to think. She was on her back. The air was cold, colder now than before. Thames had removed her clothes. Goose bumps sprang on her naked flesh.

Was she in the same place as before? This time she was in full white light, so bright it hurt her eyes, and she squinted against the glow. The light came from above her, the light source suspended on a chrome pole. She was surrounded by white, enclosed in walls made up of what looked to be white curtains. Her surroundings resembled an operating room. The thought of Thames performing surgery on her his way had Paige’s teeth chattering.

But the damp smell from before remained. Again, she heard the plop, plop of water dripping. Where was she? Where was Thames?

She tried to move. All she could manage was raising her head and moving her fingers. Had Thames drugged her to keep her immobile? And then she realized why she couldn’t move. She was on a wooden table of some kind, affixed to it. Thames had driven a thin nail through a pinch of skin on her upper arms and outer thighs, nailing her to the table. Even though Paige had read the autopsy reports and knew to expect this, panic surged through her.

One of the curtains moved. Thames came to stand over her. “Ah, I see you’re awake.”

Thames wore a white lab coat. More white. “I’m a federal agent.” Her breath came harsh. “Law enforcement won’t stop looking for me.”

“I expect that. I want that. I haven’t received the recognition I deserve with the others. But with you, everyone will work harder, look longer. They won’t ever find you, of course.”

So that was her appeal. He wanted her to keep him in the spotlight. “How many others?” Paige wanted to know but also knew that as long as she kept him talking, kept feeding his ego, he’d remain standing over her, not hurting her further.

He smiled. “You’ll see them all for yourself soon enough when I bury you with them.”

Paige shuddered. “Where? Where are they buried?”

“Nearby, Paige. In this very ground. All but Mary. You saw her. I always keep my latest to admire until another takes her place. Soon you’ll be taking Mary’s place.”

Thames turned away from Paige. He went behind her. Paige’s insides quivered. Perspiration coated her skin. Then he appeared at her side once again, tugging a tray on wheels with him.

Again, with reverence, he took an item from the tray. He held it up for Paige to see. It looked a bit like a pair of pliers, though the forks were curved and sharpened to razor tips.

“Another noteworthy instrument,” Thames said. “This is a breast ripper used in medieval times on adulterous women.”

“If you are truly a purist,” Paige said, fighting for breath to get her words out, “then the nature of that instrument prevents you from using it on anyone who hasn’t committed adultery.”

Thames pouted but set the instrument back in the tray. He picked up another. This one resembled large scissors. “This is a tongue tearer.”

He set it back. Paige knew he wouldn’t use that one. He needed her screams to feed his sadism.

He went through all of the items on the tray. Thumb screws. A knee splitter. Something he called a tickler that resembled a rake and would tear skin, bone, and muscle with its talonlike claws.

Paige could well understand how the women he’d used these instruments on had lost their sanity. She was fighting for her own.

He picked up a thick dagger with a wide hilt and turned it over and over in his hand. He gave Paige a playful smile. “This one is for later.” He set the dagger down, then carefully lifted a series of small vises. “Don’t let the size fool you. These instruments are capable of creating immense pressure. See how well honed the grip is?” Thames fondled one of the vises as if it were a lover. “The female body is made up of so many sensitive parts. One of my favorites is the
mammilla papilla
, commonly known as the nipple. The nipple is regarded as an erogenous zone, but it can also be a point of agony.”

He set the vise back on the tray gently but nearer to the edge than it had been, nearer to his hand. Paige’s heart jackhammered.

He put on latex gloves, then picked up a tube of . . . glue.

“Like all the others, you’re going to experience my instruments, Paige, during our time together,” Thames said. “There will be no more drugs to dull the effects. I want you fully aware.”

Thames opened the glue, then reached out and dabbed a line gently on Paige’s eyes. Paige moved her head from side to side, thrashing as much as she could. Undeterred, Thames held her head and pressed her eyes closed.

The adhesive stuck at once. Paige pushed against it, but she could not open her eyes. Her breathing came in choked gasps.

Something cold and hard brushed her nipple. The vise . . .

“Ah, yes, so sensitive,” Thames said.

Despite the pain movement caused, Paige pulled against the nails and pressed back against the table. But there was nowhere to go. No escape.

She felt Thames clamp the vise. He tightened it. Paige screamed.

From his vantage point on a ridge overlooking Thames’s cabin in the Adirondack Mountains, Sam peered down at the man through binoculars. The urge to go to Thames and break his bones one by one until he told Sam where Paige was, was like blood pulsing through Sam’s veins. Only the belief that Thames would keep his secrets, take them to the grave, kept Sam where he was.

And that was why, rather than charging in with a tactical squad and a troop of agents, Sam had opted to come after Thames with just his own small squad and to maintain more low-key surveillance. Taking Thames in and sweating him would not break the man. Thames had already proven that.

But Thames had made a mistake. Thames had made a mistake when he’d stepped on Paige’s earpiece and left a bit of rock behind.

At the moment, Thames was cutting logs with an ax. Thames was smiling, clearly enjoying the bright day and the exertion that made his pale flesh glisten with sweat. Sam’s eyes drilled into Thames, his focus absolute.

For two days, they’d been on this mountain. Sam, Mike, and Riley, watching Thames in shifts. They’d kept their distance. Sam knew if Thames got wind that he was being observed, it would be over for Paige.

So far, all Thames had done in the last forty-eight hours was cut logs. Sam had the floor plan of the cabin from the agents who’d been here with Paige. There was no sub floor, no basement where he could conceal a woman. The brash Thames didn’t even have any shades or curtains on his windows. He had nothing to hide inside, as the Bureau had discovered when agents had searched the place.

But Thames
was
hiding something. A gravesite where he’d buried the three women and maybe more, and the place where he was keeping Paige.

Beside Sam, Mike said, “Sam, let me take over. You’ve been at it all night.”

Sam watched Thames split another log. He couldn’t hear it, but he imagined the thwack of the ax as the wood splintered and chips sailed into the air. Like he had all the time in the world.

Sam lowered his binoculars as Mike raised his own. To keep their presence undetected, they were eating out of cans, foregoing cooking any food that would create aromas, and doing without campfires and flashlights at night.

“Wake me if anything changes. No matter how slight,” Sam said to Mike, though unnecessarily. Sam knew Mike would do so.

Mike nodded.

Sam grabbed a quick bite, then bedded down. Riley had taken an earlier shift and was still asleep. But when Sam closed his eyes, all he could see were images of Paige being hurt by that sadistic son of a bitch. Sam got to his feet.

“He’s gone back inside,” Mike said when Sam joined him again.

“He hasn’t left that cabin in two days. He’s got to be itching to get back to wherever he stashed Paige. We have to wait him out. He’ll lead us to her,” Sam murmured.

Twenty minutes later, Mike said, “Thames is on the move.”

Sam dropped onto his belly beside Mike and peered through his own binoculars. “He’s wearing a backpack. Headed north. Wake up, Riley.”

When Riley joined them, Sam looked to the two men. “We can’t lose him. We can’t let him make the tail.” Sam heard desperation and fear in his voice.

They grabbed their packs and set off after Thames, who took a meandering path as if he was on a hike. Sam worked to curb his impatience, his desperation.

They hung back. Thames continued to climb. Sam watched Thames make his way over the rocky terrain. Eventually, he stopped in front of a patch of bushes that grew out of the rock on this side of the mountain. Sam blinked, then Thames was gone.

Sam spoke into the mic on his shoulder. Impatience and fear riding him, he demanded, “Anyone have him?”

Mike said, “Nada.”

“Negative,” Riley said.

Sam stared at the spot he’d last seen Thames. He’d disappeared.

Paige heard the slip-slide of the rocks that carpeted the ground inside the cave. That sound marked Thames’s return. She knew that sound now. At any moment, Thames would be back with her. Paige trembled.

She wouldn’t see him approach. Her eyes were still glued shut. She’d worked to keep track of the passage of time. She needed to mark the days to know what Thames planned for her next. Wherever she was, the temperature dropped at regular points throughout the day. At night? She wasn’t sure, and really, it didn’t matter if it was day or night, only that another twenty-four hours had passed.

She knew what was to come in Thames’s torture chamber. He was following the same pattern he’d established with the three women found by the Bureau. As he had with the other women, Thames had left her face untouched, but before he’d left her, he’d struck her over and over again, everywhere else on her body. Each breath brought with it pain that had her fighting to remain conscious. Her abused foot had taken another excruciating pounding.

Paige had worked to distance herself from the pain and the fear. She thought of Ivy. Ivy was safe. Sam would make sure Ivy stayed that way.
Sam.
Thinking of Sam brought a new level of pain. Tears leaked from beneath her lids.

Thames didn’t announce his return. But even if his footsteps hadn’t telegraphed his arrival, Paige would have smelled him. His aftershave had her retching.

Thames laughed, clearly delighted with her reaction. She would have spat in his face if she could have, but even if she did have enough saliva in her parched mouth, he’d also glued her mouth closed.

“So silent, Paige?” He laughed at his own humor. “We can’t have that.”

No, again she thought about how her screams stoked his sadism. Thames bent over her. His cloying scent filled her every breath. Fear choked her.

As Thames had tortured her, she had bitten the inside of her mouth to keep from crying out and giving him the satisfaction he craved. Bitten herself so hard, she’d tasted blood. She’d spent the last year terrified of him, but something in her hadn’t let her cower and beg. She knew she’d pay for that defiance, and she had. Her silence served to infuriate him. His smug arrogance gave way to petulance, and he became a little boy striking out because he wasn’t getting his way.

He hadn’t sealed her mouth until he’d done all he’d intended to her. Now Thames applied acetone to her mouth and pried her lips apart.

Paige coughed and heaved. Her battered body felt every cough. Thames ran his soft, pudgy fingers over her breast, poking the flesh that he’d tortured with the vise, which felt swollen to twice its normal size. Again, Paige bit the inside of her cheek to hold in her screams.

“So stoic, Paige,” he said and pinched her. “So determined not to give in. We’ll see about that.”

Paige worked to clear her mind. Down was up and up was down. She was existing in a haze of pain that had her thoughts flitting in and out of her mind. She couldn’t hold onto them. But she had to. She knew what Thames would do to her next, which was an advantage. She had to use it. She would have one chance—only one chance. She would not get another. Soon, Thames would kill her.