Ruthless (11 page)

CHAPTER TWELVE

I HAVE BOTH HANDS ON
the Colt Python. It's shoved up against the base of the Wolfman's skull, and the first thing that happens is I realize just how tall he is. He is unfathomably tall, or maybe my arms make him feel taller than he really is. Either way, I can't maintain this angle. I've got to lower my arms. For a second, as we both stand frozen, this inability to keep my arms up seems insurmountable. I'm scared I'm going to lower my arms, and then he'll spin around and get me. It's all so tenuous, everything held together by the flimsiest thread.

Then a stroke of genius hits me and I say, “Get down on your knees!”

He pauses, and it reminds me of a young horse who tests you to see who is boss. Thing is, I know how to teach an animal who's boss, so I crack his skull with the butt of the gun. I'd never treat a
horse this harshly, but I'm not dealing with a horse. I'm dealing with a monster.

He drops down so fast it's like I swept his legs out from under him. My arms cry with relief.

The Wolfman, now on his knees, doesn't move a muscle. He's afraid. He's afraid of dying. He's afraid of
me
. My fever brain likes this turn of events. It likes it a lot.

“Set your rifle down.” He obeys.

“Put your hands behind your head.” He obeys again.

Even though my gun is worthless, I keep it pointed at him while I stash the rifle in the kitchen broom closet. It's hard to keep the Colt steady, even held level. It weighs probably three pounds. With these broken arms of mine, it feels like thirty.

Rifle put away, I return the barrel to Wolfman's head, so he can feel it. Because this is a revolver, it's easy to see if it's loaded. I've got to keep him from looking at me. If he turns around and sees it's empty, it's game over.

Pulling back the hammer, so he can hear what death sounds like, I say to him, “Walk on your knees up the stairs.”

It's instinct that makes me say this. It seems the main floor is the place to be. But as I watch him walk on his knees all the way to the stairs, then awkwardly navigate his way up them, my crazy fever brain is pleased. Very, very pleased.

We get to the top of the stairs and I say, “This was an exercise in obedience.”

There's more light up here, and I want to do a search, see if he has my cell phone.

“Turn out your pockets. All of them.” Interestingly, a frightening-­looking Swiss Army knife and two zip ties are revealed. “How convenient,” I say, before pocketing the knife and tying his hands with the zip ties.

“Ouch,” he says, when I pull the cord the tight.

“Ouch?” Crazy fever brain thinks “ouch” is hilarious. I double-check all the pockets. No cell. “Where's my phone?” I ask.

“I destroyed it.”

“I don't believe you. Is it in your truck?”

“I crushed it with a rock.”

“No lying! Those are the rules, remember? When you lie to me, I call bullshit. Do you know how light the trigger is on a Colt Python? Super, super light. Don't make me call bullshit, because every time I have to call bullshit, I'm going to get mad, so mad I might just accidentally pull the trigger. It's so, so light, you know? Easy to make mistakes, when you're mad.” I pause. “You hear me?”

“Yes.”

“You understand the game?”

“Yes.”

“You understand the consequences?”

“Yes.”

“Good. Now, I don't know about you, but I'm feeling hungry. I think this game would be a lot more fun for me with some food. So, you lie facedown”—I nudge him with the barrel and he complies—“and I'm going to go get something.”

He's only five feet from the kitchen. Digging around for food, I find a nice, long kitchen towel and bring it back to him.

“You've stared at enough girls in your life. You don't get to stare at me anymore.” I tie the towel around his head to blindfold him. Really, I don't want him to see my gun is empty, but what I've said has the benefit of also being true.

“Get back on your knees. Go forward; now take a hard right.” I direct him around the dining area next to the kitchen. I throw in a few circles, to disorient him. Once he starts moving more cautiously I decide he's dizzy enough, and I put him in an ornate dining room chair. I unplug a lamp, cut the cord with the Swiss Army knife, and use that to tie his ankles to the chair.

Rummaging around the kitchen, I find very little to eat. This is a vacation home, no doubt about it. I come across some straws in the utensil drawer, and an idea strikes me.

“Would you like some water?” I ask.

“Yes,” he says.

I set him up with a big glass of water and a straw, so he can drink with his arms tied behind his back. It's satisfying, seeing him blindfolded and bound; he looks helpless. Neutered.

A small jar of peanut butter and a glass of water look like the best option I have, and I move my meal over to the dining room table. I press the barrel against his head, so he can feel the gun.

“This is pointed at you at all times. You got that?”

“Yes.”

I sit down, gun beside me, and start to spoon up some peanut butter. It's good protein. The water doesn't even have parasites in it. Win-win. Deep underneath the crazy, there's a murmur of protest. Why am I sitting at a table with this man? Why am I talking to
him? This is insane. This is wrong. All the same, it's not something I can stop.

“So, our game of bullshit.” I swallow a big bite of peanut butter. “Where's my phone?”

“I crushed it with a rock and threw it away.”

“Why?”

“Too many calls from Caleb. Got on my nerves.”

This stops me cold. I remember my moment out in the woods, suddenly certain that Caleb had figured out I was in trouble. “Caleb knows,” I say matter-of-factly, but inside there is a jumble of emotion. My connection to Caleb, his connection to me, is more alive and more powerful than I realized.

“I crushed your phone with a rock and threw it into a ravine.”

It's not a direct commentary on what I just said, but it's close enough. I believe he's telling the truth, and I move on. Talking about Caleb makes me feel vulnerable.

“Why was I wearing boots? Where did you abduct me from? I have no memory of it.”

“You were in your horse's stall, changing the bandage on its hoof.”

“His.”

“What?”

“
His
hoof. Tucker is not an
it
. He is a
him
. Go on.”

“You were bent over, changing the bandage. I tried to chloroform you. You struggled. I wound up hitting you on the head.”

So I did fight after all. That's good. “Was there blood left behind?”

“I put the cotton on your head, soaked up the blood. Little bit got on the shavings, but I stirred it up. Put the rest of the stuff away. Used the vet wrap on you. I know what you're asking, and the answer is everything looked normal. No one is searching for you.”

If he used the vet wrap on me and the cotton batting on my head, that means Tucker's hoof was left unwrapped, which means Mom knows something's amiss. If I'm right, and I'm pretty sure I am, people are looking for me.

I ask, “Was there anyone else at the barn?”

“No, it was very early. You didn't trust the other people at the barn to wrap the hoof properly, so you decided to do it yourself before going out of town.”

“How the hell do you know that?” Not even I knew that. My brain holds no recollection of even thinking those things, although it does sound like me.

“You told Caleb this at the Denny's.”

That's right. We grabbed coffee the other day.

“You were there?”

“Yes.”

I search my memory, but I can recall no other diners at the Denny's that day. I can't even remember what our waitress looked like.

“Were you sitting next to me?”

“I was at the counter. You're easy to overhear.” He can't help himself from adding, “You're loud. Unladylike.”

A shiver curls down my spine. I'd sat there in the booth at
­Denny's, sharing a cup of coffee with a friend, with absolutely no clue that a few feet away this creature was condemning me to death because I talk too loudly.

Quiet is interrupted by a slurp on his straw. He's finished his giant cup of water.

“You want more water? You must be dehydrated.”

“Yes, thank you.”

“You're welcome.”

I fetch him more water. He falls to like he's been in a desert.

“So, how long have you been following me?”

“On and off for months.”

“Months?” I'm blown away by this; disbelief obscures anger or fear or any other normal emotion.

“I'd promised to stay clean, but you needed this too much.”

It's a weird thing to be told, but I think he's being honest, and I want to stay true to the rules of the game. I'll only punish him if he lies. Thing is, I want him to lie. I want the opportunity to punish him. I want him to be afraid of me.

There's a pause as I eat peanut butter and he drinks water and I think of something else I want to ask him. Preferably something that will freak him out. Something occurs to me, and I decide to put it forward as a statement, not a question, just in case I'm right.

“You've murdered six girls.”

The blindfold shifts, like he raised his eyebrows. “What?”

“You've murdered six girls. Isn't that correct?”

He hesitates, then says, “No.”

“Bullshit,” I say, sounding as angry as I can. But I'm not angry. I'm satisfied to have gotten under his skin.

“You've murdered six girls. Is that or is that not correct, and do not forget that this Colt Python is inches away from your face.”

“How did you know?”

I lean forward and speak softly. “I know a lot of things, Jerry.”

Five Years Ago

THE GIRL TOLD HER FAMILY
to wait in the stands. Her three grandparents, her parents, the boy, and his mother, all of them are hidden away inside the giant recesses of the Jim Norick Arena. She wanted to warm up alone, free of distraction, free from watching eyes, and most importantly, free of the burden of managing their expectations. Right now it's time for her to manage her own.

As she lopes her horse around the exercise ring, she is surrounded by professionals. She recognizes their faces from her
American Quarter Horse
journals. Those who live in her region are familiar. But most she's never seen before, and some of them are painfully famous.

The girl shows her horse in a class called Ranch Pleasure, a hybrid between the working cow horse and the show horse classes. She was drawn to it because it rewards athleticism as well as a sense of showmanship. At World's, there's only one division. Meaning, as a twelve-year-old amateur,
she must compete against the most accomplished pros in the game, almost all of them middle-aged men. They wear no-frills cowboy attire, and their tack is stripped down. Silver and flash is frowned upon in this competition, but the girl wears a tight-fitting bright pink shirt. She hates pink, but it looks good against her horse's dark coat, and she likes how it flaunts her size, age, and gender. In this setting bright pink works as a giant middle finger, and that's an attitude the girl can get behind.

Eyeballing her competition, she sees a few are struggling, their horses acting up in the cool night air. It's blood in the water. The more she observes, the more confident she becomes that she can manage a top-ten finish. It's a satisfying thought, placing ahead of these people who don't even know who she is, let alone consider her a threat.

A realist, she knows how political horse shows are. But a top-ten finish is conceivable, and it would put the family farm on the map, bringing in the big-money clients her mother needs. She doesn't realize it, but she's ­hoping again.

The ring steward calls her number, letting her know she's on deck. She gives the woman a tight nod. A flutter of nerves in her belly radiates out through her body. It's been a long time since she felt nervous like this.

She makes her horse walk, keeping his muscles warm and her own body moving. Gazing into the night, she's not seeing anything but the pattern she'll perform in a few short minutes.

Then a familiar silhouette cuts across her line of sight.

The boy walks out of the darkness, up to the ring.

She faces down a swarm of competing feelings. Resentment he didn't obey her command to stay in the stands, gratitude to see a friend just as her nerves hit, and an odd, new pull she's not sure what to do with.

None of this comes to the surface. Instead, she says, “Hey.”

He puts a foot up on the bottom rail, looking far too old to be the age he is. “There's something I want to tell you.”

Another round of butterflies takes flight. He sounds so serious, she's worried he has bad news. “What?”

“Whatever is meant to be, will be.”

There is a gravitas about him that shuts the girl up. She leans forward in the saddle, not wanting to miss a word. There is a smell of prophecy in the air.

“There is only one thing you can control right now and that's you. The rest of it is in God's hands. If he wants you to win this class, Ruthie, then you will win this class. If he doesn't, you won't. The only thing you need to focus on is riding Tucker just like you've been riding him. You stay in your zone, don't even look at the crowd, don't worry about the outcome.”

Protests rise up into her mouth. The idea of winning the whole thing is preposterous. The idea of not thinking about the outcome is almost impossible. Before she can speak, he continues.

“I know how much pressure they put on you, Ruthie. But God loves you just the way you are. You don't need to prove anything to him, and you don't need to prove anything to me.”

The protests turn into a lump in her throat.

The ring steward has returned. “Ruth Carver? You're next.”

The boy reaches through the rails and puts his hand on her leg. “Now go in there and show 'em what you and that big black horse can do.”

She laughs. “Kick some ass?”

“Damn straight.”