Sacrificial Muse (A Sabrina Vaughn Novel) (28 page)

SEVENTY-THREE

She went back to
Miss Ettie’s, letting herself in quietly, dropping the key in the dish on the counter.

Val was gone.

She ain’t
gone
gone. Not yet.

“Michael,” she called out as she pounded up the stairs, focusing on ignoring the voice in her head that refused to shut up, no matter how hard she tried to ignore it. The closer to the edge she danced, the louder Wade got.

Maybe you’re hopin’ I’ll push you over, darlin’ …

She reached the landing, rubbing an absent hand over her thigh as she limped down the hall. Without thinking too much about what she was doing, she let herself into Michael’s room. It was empty. She had no idea how much she’d hoped he’d be here until she saw that he wasn’t.

Instead of thinking about it she headed straight for the case she knew would be under the bed. It was locked but she spun the dials, setting the numbers to the date of his sister’s death—the only set of numbers that would matter to him—and was rewarded by the release of the latch that held it closed.

Inside she found what she was looking for. Disposable cell phones, charged and ready to be used. She chose one at random and dialed Strickland’s cell number. He answered on the third ring. “Strickland.”

“It’s me.”

“What the fuck, Vaughn!” he nearly shouted into the phone. “I’ve been calling you for over an hour now. Mandy’s called here about a hundred—”

“It’s David Song. He took Val.”

“Jesus Christ.” He said it like someone had punched him in the solar plexus, on a sharp expel of breath that sounded painful. “Are you sure?”

“Yeah, I’m sure.” She felt her chest trying to flex on her, trying to tighten but she pushed back, slamming her fist into her thigh. “Bradley told me everything. He’s been giving Song blood for months now. He was a chem major at Berkeley, enrolled under his legal name, Seong Ki-wook. My guess is that Liam agreed to take the rap for David rather than have his entire family slaughtered by the
Geondal
.”

“Shit. Stay where you are, I’m leaving the station right now.” She could hear the slam of his desk drawer, imagined him retrieving his gun and settling it into his holster.

Time’s wastin’. Won’t be too long before he starts cuttin’ on your girl …

“No. There’s no time.”

Strickland actually laughed. “Yeah, right. I’ll be there in—”

“There’s blood … a lot of blood. He cut her, Strickland. He cut her,” she said as she picked her way through the contents of the case. Several guns, a few fit with silencers. Knives. Extra magazines. A few forged passports. Cash. Maps. Gadgets she didn’t recognize. One looked particularly promising and after a few seconds of debate, she stuck it in her pocket. “I can’t wait for you, Strickland. I have to go
now
.”

“Shit—” Even through the speaker of the cheap throwaway cell, Sabrina could hear there was more than just anger in his voice. He sounded almost frantic. “What are you going to do?” Strickland said.

She lifted a knife from the case and slipped it into her boot before shutting the lid. “I’m going to get her back.”

SEVENTY-FOUR

Sabrina parked around the
corner from Song’s bodega and killed the engine. He wasn’t there; she knew that. Wherever he was keeping Val, it had to be someplace private. Someplace where he could cut up young women without fear of being interrupted. The problem was, the only address they had for Song was his apartment above his store.

Entering the alley she upended the crate she was sure Jerry sat on while he took his smoke breaks and used it to boost herself onto the closed lid of the dumpster where she’d found Sheila. From there she lowered the fire escape ladder and pulled herself up, her thigh screaming in protest the entire time. The window was locked, so she put her boot through it without a second thought, kicking out enough glass to reach in and free the latch to let herself inside.

The place was bare. Nothing more than a tea kettle on the two-burner stove and a twin bed in the corner. Wherever David Song really lived, it wasn’t here. Still, Sabrina opened cabinets and drawers, careful to snap on a pair of gloves before she touched anything.

Thirty minutes of searching produced nothing aside from a dusty paperback, a chipped coffee mug, and a plastic fork. Nothing that would indicate where he’d taken Val. No clue as to where she would find them.

She turned, heading for the door that would lead her downstairs and into a storeroom behind the bodega’s only cold case. Hopefully
Jerry was working so she wouldn’t have to waste precious time
browbeating a different clerk into giving her information.

Opening the door, she prepared to step onto the short landing. Instead, she collided with a solid chest and a pair of hands that instantly grappled for control of her arms, gripping her by her biceps.

Instinct drove her into a crouch and she managed to slip his grip. As soon as he was holding nothing but air, she drove a fist into his crotch. He let out a retching cough, instantly stiffening against the pain that knocked him off balance.

She stood up and pushed him down the stairs, watching him tumble down the short flight for just a second before she turned back toward the apartment and the fire escape.

“Stop.” This time she was greeted by the barrel of a gun, mere inches from her face, and the distinct sound of a hammer being cocked back.

SEVENTY-FIVE

A few words, harshly
barked in Korean, had the guy at the bottom of the stairs staggering to his feet. “Move,” the guy with the gun said, prodding her with a staccato jab, the barrel of it hitting her forehead hard enough to cut into her skin.

Blood trickled from the wound but Sabrina didn’t move, taking a few seconds to weigh her options. She didn’t have time for this shit, but she didn’t have time for a bullet either. “Don’t poke me.”

He just grinned and jabbed her with the barrel of the gun again.

The instant the barrel made contact with her forehead, she dodged to the left and it slid in the opposite direction, its path slicked with blood. Her left hand shot up to wrap around his wrist, wrenching it so hard he cried out even as he pulled the trigger.

The bullet sizzled past her, inches away from her face, slamming into the wall in a small explosion of dust and drywall. Her right hand gripped the body of the gun and twisted it in the opposite direction, popping it out of his grip.

He dropped back on his hips, ready to fight her for it, cocking back his now-empty fist, but she ended it for him when she clubbed him in the face with the butt of the gun, slamming it into his temple. He dropped like a stone, the fight suddenly over.

The first thug, the one she’d dropped with the crotch shot was crawling up the steps, straight for her. She kicked him back down the stairs on her way down, bracing her hands on the wall of the narrow stairwell to vault over him. Her leg buckled under her on the landing and she fell, sprawling into the bodega’s storage room, her face landing on top of a pair of very expensive two-toned wingtips. The gun she’d taken off thug number two skittered away from her across the smooth cement floor.

She scrambled back until she hit something solid. Wasting no time, her hand moved to her side, lifting her SIG from its holster. She looked up at the man standing over her and felt her blood run cold.

“You’ve made quite a mess,” Phillip Song said, shifting his gaze toward the man she’d just kicked down the stairs. He was moaning, hand flopping against the floor in an attempt to push himself up. “Stand up.” Phillip motioned to her impatiently as if the gun in her hands was nothing more lethal than a squirt gun. Peeking out from under the cuffs and collar of his silk button down were the tattoos she was sure twisted and climbed the entire length of his body, telling everyone who he was and what he’d done to earn his reputation. Phillip Song was not a nice man.

He took a step back, allowing her room to clamber to her feet. That’s when she saw the second man, standing in the shadows. All she could see was his outline, but even that was vaguely familiar.

“You’re bleeding,” Phillip said, reaching a slow and careful hand toward his pocket. She thumbed the hammer back in warning, and he smiled. “I don’t carry a gun.” He put two fingers into his pocket and produced a monogrammed handkerchief and held it out to her. “That’s their job,” he said, tilting his chin in the direction of the stairwell where his men were still struggling to stand. They stepped into the storeroom. One of them had a knot the size of her fist forming on the side of his face, the other was covered in what looked and smelled like yesterday’s kimchi.

“Maybe you should add hanging on to them to their job description,” she said, swiping at the blood that now trickled along her jawline.

Phillip smiled, saying something to them in Korean and they answered back, refusing to meet his eyes. “You’ve embarrassed them,” he said to her, offering her the handkerchief a second time.

“Yeah?” She ignored it, not taking her eyes off his face. “Well, what can I say? I
really
hate being poked.”

Phillip laughed, tucking the handkerchief back into his pocket with a shrug. “My apologies, Inspector Vaughn. They were merely following orders.”

He knew who she was. She’d worry about what that might mean for her later. Assuming she
had
a later. “Where’s David?” she said.

Now Phillip smiled at her again, his gaze slipping from her face to the gun in her hand. “My brother? Why? Are you going to kill him?”

She said nothing. The silhouette in the dark shifted, a shadow within a shadow, and she felt it again. Recognition. She looked back at Phillip and her face must’ve said it all, because the smile on his face faded away into something much more complicated than amusement.

“What has David done now?” His choice of words were not lost on her.
Now
… like he knew exactly what his brother was capable of.

She took a step toward him, leading with the gun in her hand. “I don’t have—”

“A choice but to answer my question. Not if you want me to tell you where David is,” he said. “You pull that trigger, you won’t make it off the block, Inspector. Now, please … what has my brother done?”

She swallowed hard, suddenly finding it very hard to speak. “In less than forty-eight hours your brother has murdered three women. For his grand finale, he abducted my … friend.”
Friend.
Val was so much more than a friend … she was her lifeline. The rock she’d clung to for nearly half of her life. The only thing that had kept her from drowning. Losing her would not kill her. It would destroy her. “He left a message for me:
Expectamus.
”

Phillip’s shoulders sagged as he dug his hands into the pockets of his slacks, muttering something in Korean, words full of shame and disgust. “Latin. It means,
we are waiting
,” he said. Did every creep in San Francisco know Latin? He must have caught her expression. “Our mother had a passion for classical studies and tried very hard to mold her sons into
sinsa
—gentlemen. With the exception of David, we were a grave disappointment to her.”

“David is insane.”

Phillip frowned. For a moment, she was sure she’d finally pushed him too far. “She was not aware of his … predilections. My father made sure of it.” He cut a glare at the figure in the shadows. “This would not have happened if you and Denton had done your job properly,” he said, waving an angry hand at the man in the shadows to silence his excuses before he was able to give them a voice.

“David has been … sick his entire life. Too sick to be trusted with the family business. My father was the only one who could control him. Before he died, he made it clear to me that David would have to be dealt with,” Phillip said, careful to avoid words like
killed
and
crazy,
but Sabrina was able to read between the lines.

“Your father knew what kind of man David was. What he would do if left on his own,” she said, and Phillip nodded. Sabrina felt her arms go tense for a moment before letting gravity pull them to her sides. “He told you to kill him.”

“There was an incident in college. A girl … ” Phillip’s neck remained stiff against the truth. “David is my
hyeongje
—my brother—and I had hoped … but it soon became clear that Father was right.”

“You couldn’t do it so you hired Kenny Denton to do it for you.” The string of robberies with only one murder among them. A clerk in David’s store. “Denton killed the wrong person, didn’t he? He was supposed to kill your brother. The other robberies were just a cover-up.”

Shame dug deep, etching lines and grooves into Phillip’s face, his expression answering the question he couldn’t bring himself to answer with words.

She holstered her gun and swiped a hand across her jaw, smearing more blood than she managed to wipe off. “Where is he? Where is David?”

For a moment she was sure he’d refuse, that a brother’s love would win out over a son’s duty. But then he rattled off an address in Hillsborough. “It was the home my father bought for my mother. She was killed before he could bring her to the states. If you’re looking for David, that’s where you’ll find him.”

SEVENTY-SIX

The home Phillip Song’s
father bought for his wife turned out to be a forty-seven-acre estate in Hillsborough, just outside the city. It came complete with gardens, rolling hills, streams, and a house that looked more like a luxury hotel than any
home
she’d ever seen outside
Architectural Digest.

Sabrina turned onto the long, winding drive, passing beneath an ornate archway hung heavy with ivy. The one lane of cobblestone was edged with pavers and lined with trees on either side, their branches a tangled canopy creating a tunnel of shady green.

She aimed her eyes straight ahead, hands wrapped around the steering wheel to keep her anchored in the now. Green and brown crept by, broken up by flashes of something else she knew wasn’t really there.

Look out the window, darlin’. Looks familiar, don’t it? If you look fast enough, you might catch me before I catch you …

Please be quiet
, she begged.

Dropping a hand to run it over the top of her thigh, she focused her attention on the road ahead. She slowed to a crawl when it split in two. According to Phillip, the main house was to the left. The greenhouse was to the right.

She turned right, following the curve of the road. Untamed trees gave way to manicured gardens. A herd of topiary centaurs caught in mid-gallop chased after nymphs frozen in flight. At the edge of the garden maze, she could see Medusa and Perseus embroiled in battle. Another in the shape of what looked like a Minotaur guarded its entrance, the roof of the greenhouse peeked out from its center, barely visible over the sea of emerald green hedges. Sabrina parked her car in the gravel, next to a dark blue Mustang with a bright white racing stripe.

“You’ll find him in the greenhouse,” Phillip had told her, handing her a hastily drawn map. “Botany was a passion he shared with our mother. It’s where he spends most of his time.”

Sitting there a moment, she felt the electronic crawl of surveillance creep across her skin. She had no doubt David knew she was here. Had known from the moment she turned her car onto the very private drive.

She pulled her borrowed phone from her pocket to call Strickland as promised. No signal. She didn’t know how, but she was sure David was manipulating the cell signal. Searching her pockets, she found what she was looking for. A flattish disc, the size and shape of a large watch battery, its top slightly domed. She hesitated for a moment before she pressed it, feeling hopeful when a red light began a slow blink. She slipped it into the pocket of her jeans and got out of the car.

She shut her car door, not bothering to mask the sound, and approached the entrance to the maze. Like the tree-lined drive, the hedges on either side of the maze grew tall and had been bent and laced together above the path to form a canopy. She stopped in front of the Minotaur and the surveillance camera it concealed for just a moment to look directly into the lens.

“Leave your weapons.” David’s voice came from the speaker at the base of the topiary, shaped to look like a rock.

She didn’t answer him, just peeled off her jacket and tossed it on the ground, exposing the double shoulder holster and her SIG P220s. She took them off, along with her service weapon, and dropped them on top of her jacket.

“You think me a fool, Calliope?” he said, anger and amusement threading through his voice. “The one you keep at your ankle as well.”

Yanking up her pant leg, she lifted the .380 LCP from its holster and dropped it on the pile. The knife she’d lifted from Michael’s case stayed where it was. “There,” she said, nearly biting the word in half.

“Come, Calliope … Melpomene is waiting.”

As smoothly as she could, she slipped a hand into her pocket, finding the flattish disc. Touching it with a silent prayer that it did what she thought it did, she kept walking, allowing herself to be swallowed by the dark.