Soul Seducer (22 page)

“Thank you,” Cassie said fervently, crossing her hands over her chest. “Thank you so much. If I could, I’d give you a hug.”

Moved by the intensity of Cassie’s gratitude, Audra had to blink back tears. If she weren’t careful, she would get attached to the girl. If she were honest, she’d admit that she already had. “You can’t even give me a hint what I’m doing? What this is all about?”

“Remember what I said before?” Cassie said. “About miracles? Sometimes, they really do happen.”

~*~

Another dimly lit motel room. Another young girl. This one was fighting with all her might, begging and pleading. Her wide brown eyes poured tears. Her pale skin glistened with sweat.

“Shut up, little girl,” the man panted as he plunged into her. “It’ll all be over soon. Just shut your damned mouth.”

Dimitri clenched his fists. He was there to take the girl, unfortunately, not the murderous deviant. He thought of the first time he’d seen Cassie. In a room not unlike this one.

Stop it. Those are human thoughts. Stop it.

“Again this soon? The guy is definitely out of control.”

Dimitri glanced over his shoulder, not surprised to find Gaylen hovering behind him.

“Go away.”

“You haven’t changed your mind? Come on. What’s your deal?” He snapped his fingers. “I got it now. Maybe you want Audra dead? Maybe you figure she’s got a shot at becoming a reaper. You can train her. Replace Veronica. She’d be a better fuck, I’m sure.”

“Shut up,” Dimitri growled.

“Even if you want her dead, do you really want her to die like that?”

The guy’s hands tightened around the girl’s throat. Spittle flew from his mouth as he cursed her, even while she lay dying beneath him.

“Why do you want this guy so bad?” Dimitri asked.

Gaylen shrugged. “The prick thinks he’s invincible. I’d like to show him he’s not.”

Suddenly, the killer paused, loosening his grip on the girl so he could clutch his chest.

“Now’s my chance,” Gaylen said. “Come on, man. Let me have him.”

Dimitri’s lips clenched, but he didn’t speak.

“The girl’s still alive. If I take him now, she survives. He’s gone. No more dead girls. No more threats to Audra.” Gaylen clutched Dimitri’s shoulder. “Come on. Let me have him.
The guy works with Audra
.”

Dimitri flashed to the image of the pervert’s face buried in Audra’s panties. Audra wasn’t necessarily his type, but the guy definitely had an unhealthy fascination for her. No telling what might be going on in the asshole’s twisted mind.

Dimitri looked to the girl on the bed, wide-eyed with terror, struggling to free herself from beneath the killer’s weight. He held her down while he fumbled for his pants. Going after his pills. The man had murdered Cassie, filled her last few moments with pain and terror...

“Will you leave the girl alone?” Dimitri asked.

“Yeah, sure.”

“You won’t take her? If I let you have him, you won’t take her while she’s fighting to survive?”

“This one’s a freebie. I won’t touch her. I give you my word.”

Normally, Gaylen’s word didn’t mean shit, but for some reason, Dimitri believed him. Gaylen had been gunning for the killer for some time now. He’d most likely be satisfied with this one conquest.

“You gave me your word,” Dimitri persisted. “The girl doesn’t make it, you’ll have me to answer to.”

“Okay, okay. Now what’s it going to be? He’s got the pills, man. Make up your mind.”

Dimitri lifted his hands up in a gesture of surrender. “He’s all yours.” he said, backing toward the wall. “Make him hurt.”

~*~

Audra felt foolish when she told the deputy at the front desk she was there to see Shane. She felt even more foolish when he led her to Shane’s office and Shane’s face lit with pleasure.

“Audra. What a surprise. Is everything okay?”

“Yes. Everything’s great. I just came by to see you. To see if you had any leads on Camellia’s murder.” She suffered a twinge of guilt for using the poor dead girl in her ruse.

Shane’s expression darkened. “No. Not a clue. The bastard’s killing young girls all over Northeastern Oklahoma, and I don’t have a damn clue.”

“Don’t worry. You’ll catch him. I’m sure of it.”

“Yeah?” Shane lifted his brows. “Like I caught the guys who nearly killed you?”

“Hey, you did your best. I wasn’t any help. I didn’t give you any information. Not until the thing with Scott.” And they still didn’t know who’d actually committed the crime. Scott was still on the loose.

He pointed at a chair across from his desk. “Have a seat. You want something to drink?”

“Sure. That would be great.” She didn’t. She was still bouncing off the walls from the three Mountain Dews she’d consumed at the hospital, but he’d given her the perfect opportunity to slip the picture to him. “Diet Coke, please,” she said as she took the offered seat.

As soon as he left the office, she pulled the sheet of paper from her purse and slipped it on his cluttered desk.

Shane returned and handed her a can of Diet Coke, then settled in his chair. They made small talk for a few moments, and Audra’s nerves began to fray. She was exhausted and confused and anxious to get this over with. It was all she could do not to shout, “Just look at the damned picture already!”

Almost as soon as she had the thought, he did. He frowned and picked the sheet of paper up, studying it. He looked at Audra. “What’s this?”

“I don’t know.”

“Where did it come from?”

“How would I know?”

“It wasn’t here when I left.”

“Oh, that.” She swallowed some of the Diet Coke. “Well, I found it on the floor, and put it there. I have no idea where it came from. I thought maybe it fell off your desk.”

“No. I’ve never seen it.” His brows drew together as he studied the picture again. “Odd. The witness who described the partial tattoo said it was a bluish color. Looked like some kind of monster or dinosaur. Or...it could have been a blue dragon.” He tapped the paper. “Someone left this as a clue to the killer. But why does it look so familiar? I’ve seen something like this lately...” He lifted his head and stared wide-eyed at Audra. “Your friend. At the Halloween party. The nerdy guy with the sword.”

“Wilton? What about him?”

“Do you know where he lives?”

“Yes...I’ve been there a few times. But—”

Then it struck her. The guy on the paper had looked familiar to her, too. She was exhausted and her brain so tired she couldn’t place it exactly, but the outfit he wore looked familiar. Now she remembered why.

It was a photo of Eragon. Wilton had worn that costume at the Halloween party.

Chapter 18

The next day at the hospital, the entire staff was buzzing about Wilton. About how they’d had a killer in their midst and hadn’t even known. About how he’d murdered Mary Lou’s daughter. About how he could have murdered any one of them.

Audra and Wilton hadn’t exactly been best friends, but she was fond of him. Learning the truth about him had hurt—knowing she should have figured out something was wrong, maybe even helped save a young girl’s life, was devastating.

She couldn’t believe it. Even as she’d given Shane the address, she’d been trying to come up with another explanation. Another reason why the tattoo in the witness’s description had matched the Eragon costume Wilton had worn to the party Why, although she couldn’t tell Shane this part, Cassie had used her to give Shane a photo of the guy riding a blue dragon. Nothing else came to her, though.

She’d wanted to go with Shane, but he wouldn’t allow it. She’d heard the details after the fact. Shane had been on his way to Wilton’s house when a call came in that redirected him to a motel. A desk clerk had heard screams coming from the room and called 9-1-1. In that room, Shane discovered Wilton dead. Initial findings suggested he’d died of a heart attack. He hadn’t been alone. A young, naked, traumatized girl had been in his bedroom. Now, that girl—Jessica—was Audra’s patient.

When Audra went into the girl’s room, her heart constricted with sympathy. Jessica looked so tiny in the bed, so lost and wounded. Her physical injuries weren’t that severe. She had some damage to the cerebral vessel and minor laryngeal injuries from being choked. She’d also been raped. Her mind and soul were more damaged than her body.

“Hey, sweetie,” Audra said. “How do you feel today?”

The girl’s brown eyes were glazed with bewilderment. “Good, I guess.”

“We have a therapist coming to see you soon. She wants to talk to you. Make sure you’re okay. You can tell her anything you want. You’re safe now.”

Jessica looked down to where her small hands kneaded the edge of the blanket. “He worked here. You knew him.” Without waiting for Audra’s confirmation, she continued, “How could you not know what he was? What he was doing?”

Audra flinched, guilt blooming in her heart. “I don’t know. I’ve asked myself that a dozen times. Monsters don’t always look or act like monsters.” She thought of Gaylen. He definitely didn’t look like a monster. But he was one of the worst.

“I don’t think he died from a heart attack,” Jessica said softly.

“You don’t? Why’s that?”

“It was...he was...” She sniffed and swiped her hand over her cheeks. “He was screaming. Like he was being tortured or something. It seemed to go on forever...the screaming. Then, he just stopped. His face...it was frozen in this look of...I don’t know...pain, fear.” Her gaze rose to Audra. “You know what? While it was going on? While he was dying? I was scared because I didn’t know what was happening, but mostly, I was glad.”

Audra swallowed back a lump of tears. What this young woman...this child must have gone through. She reached out and patted her hand. “I understand, Jessica. It’s okay that you feel that way. He was a bad, bad man.”

Jessica nodded. “Do you know when my parents will be here?”

“This afternoon. Their flight lands at three-thirty. They were worried out of their minds about you.” Jessica had run away from her home in Eugene, Oregon two weeks ago. Audra didn’t even want to know how she’d made it here to Oklahoma—what she’d seen and done in between.

“I thought I had it bad at home. Mom and Dad fighting all the time. Being too strict. I turned sixteen in July, and they wouldn’t let me get a car.” Jessica shook her head and snorted. “Man, was I ever a dufus.”

“Sometimes life’s like that. We have no idea how good we have it until something worse happens.” Audra checked her IV. “You need anything before I go?”

Softly, her voice filled with sorrow, Jessica said, “I just need my momma.”

Audra brushed the girl’s hair back from her head, then quickly turned away so she wouldn’t see the tears. Fury at Wilton, at herself for not realizing, shot through her. The sorry, piece of shit, sick, perverted bastard. If he hadn’t died, she’d want to kill him herself. Odd what Jessica had said about the way he died. She wasn’t sure, but something told her Gaylen had a hand in it. If so, it was the only thing he’d done that she approved of.

~*~

That night, Audra was changing for bed when Gaylen appeared in her room. She hurriedly jerked the sleep shirt down over her body.

“Asshole,” she bit out. “Couldn’t you knock or something?”

“I could, but this way’s more fun.”

She scowled. “What do you want?”

“Just a chat. You’ve had quite a couple of days, haven’t you? Helping to catch a big, bad killer.”

“It wasn’t me.”

“Well, it was Cassie, through you. She blew the whistle on Starkley. Pretty clever, but it was all for naught.”

“Because you’d already taken care of it?”

He tipped his head toward her as if acknowledging a compliment. “I had, but that’s not what I’m referring to. She went about her little scheme circuitously in order to avoid punishment for interfering in fate...in the human world. She thought if she did it indirectly, it wouldn’t count, but alas, she was mistaken.”

“Punished? Cassie’s being punished?”

“Oh, don’t get your panties—your very lovely panties—in a bunch. She won’t be harmed. The worst that could happen is she’ll have a hundred years added to her sentence. Not such a bad thing. You see how much fun Dimitri and I are having.”

“If that’s all you came to tell me, you can go now. I’m tired.”

“All I came to tell you? Don’t you wish.” He smiled, his entire face beaming with evil delight. “No, my dear. I’m afraid not. Your time is up. I’ve come to put my plan in motion.”

“What plan is that?”

He sighed impatiently. “Don’t play dumb, Audra. I told you. I want to taste your breath. I need Dimitri out of the way.”

“Whatever the plan is, my answer is no. I won’t help you.”

“Won’t you?”

“Absolutely not.”

“Even to save those you love?”

“You can’t take people unless they’re in jeopardy.”

“Ah, yes. Jeopardy. Somewhat like the jeopardy your little friend is in now that she’s got that awful disease.”

Her heart stilled, her body going numb as a rush of icy wind swept through her. “You wouldn’t. You can’t hurt Sadie.”

“I won’t. If you agree to help me.”

“What do you want me to do?”

“All you have to do is trick Dimitri so that you can bind him in copper. Then I take your breath.” A satisfied grin spread across his face. “While he watches.”

Nausea wound through her gut at the image of Dimitri, bound and helpless, watching Gaylen take her breath. She brushed the thought aside. “And if I do, you’ll stop taking people?”

Gaylen shrugged. “People you know, perhaps.”

“That’s not good enough.”

“How about a promise then? A promise if you don’t, it will never stop.”

“You could kill me while you’re taking my breath.”

“I won’t kill you. You will get dizzy, breathless, maybe lose consciousness. Just pretend it’s really amazing sex.”

“Right.” She rolled her eyes. “But how do I
know
you won’t kill me?”

“I give you my word.”

She barked a humorless laugh. “Not even close to good enough.”

“I swear on Louisa’s memory, on her soul, that I won’t.”

“Louisa?”

“She was my wife, Dimitri took her from me. He was my master, and I had no choice but to let her go.”

“Your master?”

“I was a slave. He owned me.”

“He owned slaves?
You
were a slave?”

“An indentured servant. It was in the mid 1700’s. I traded my freedom for passage to America. My wife and I were approaching the end of our seven-year sentence when we were sold to Dimitri. We were going to serve out our time, then we’d be free to start over.” He barked a harsh laugh. “Only we never got that chance. Just a few months shy of paying off our debt, the bastard who bought us destroyed it all.”

A tightness in Audra’s stomach told her the worst was yet to come. She didn’t want to think of Dimitri that way, not a cold, impervious ruler, owning slaves and taking what he wanted with no regard for others. She couldn’t reconcile that with the gentle man who’d risked his life to pose as a priest. Who’d coaxed her body into a mind-blowing orgasm, expecting nothing for himself in return.

When she didn’t speak, Gaylen went on with the story. “Dimitri wanted my wife, so he took her from me. I had no choice. I didn’t even fight that hard. I knew my punishment would be severe. Back then, I was weak, beaten down. I just let her go. Two nights later while I tossed and turned alone in my quarters, I smelled smoke. I ran outside to see the main house aflame. I ran as fast as I could, broke inside to search for Louisa. But the smoke, so heavy, thick, overcame me. I wasn’t able to save her.”

Moisture appeared in his eyes, rendering Audra in shocked silence. Gaylen, crying?

“When I awoke, Louisa was dead. Dimitri was drunk, knocked over a candle, and set the house on fire. He died that night, too. But the only thing his death did was infuriate me. I wanted to kill the bastard myself. Had to wait until my death came. I’ve been trying to make him pay ever since. If she’d been at home with me, she’d have been safe, would have lived. But Dimitri is ruthless when he sees something he wants. He’ll take it and damn the consequences.”

Bile rose in her throat. This wasn’t the Dimitri she’d come to know. Had his years as a reaper changed him, or was she just seeing the side of him he wanted her to see?

No wonder Gaylen hated him. Not that what he’d done since was justified. But she could see where the rage, the desire for revenge had come from. For a fleeting moment, she felt sorry for him.

“I’m sorry for what happened to you. But, I can’t do what you ask. I can’t betray Dimitri, let you take my breath. I don’t trust you.”

His brows rose. “Oh? But you trust Dimitri? Has he told you about the first time we saw you?”

She shook her head. “Wait...we? You were together?”

“We were. You were a small child. A very small child. It was in a cabin up in the hills of the Ozarks.”

The Ozarks. Where she and her mother had fled to get away from her father. Where her mother had died.

“You were there? When my mother died?”

“Dimitri and I both were.” His eyes glinted with victory. “He didn’t tell you, huh? Didn’t tell you about how we watched your mother take her last breath? Watched you struggle to save her, sobbing and terrified. That we continued to keep an eye on you, when you were stuck with her dead body for days, until you were finally rescued?”

She shook her head, her insides crumbling. Dimitri had witnessed the most traumatic time in her life.

Then, a horrifying thought struck her. There could be only one reason for Grim Reapers to be there at that particular time. She stared at Gaylen. “Did Dimitri take my mother?”

Gaylen shrugged. “I think that’s a question you should ask him. Now, how about our deal? You in? Or should I go pay your little friend, Sadie, a visit?”

Numbly, Audra nodded. “I’m in,” she choked out.

She knew she was taking a chance, risking her life. But, if she could save Sadie’s, it was worth the risk. All she had to do was betray Dimitri. And it wasn’t as if he hadn’t done the very same to her.

~*~

The next night as Audra waited, guilt and dread weighed like a stone in her gut. If Gaylen was true to his word, Dimitri would arrive shortly.

Gaylen had set the time for his own arrival at eight. She looked at the clock on her DVR. Seven. She had one hour between the time Dimitri arrived and when Gaylen would show up. In that time, she had to immobilize Dimitri. One hour to carry out the plan that would betray him.

She took comfort in the fact that, helpless or not, Dimitri wouldn’t truly be in danger. Gaylen couldn’t harm him while he was in reaper form, and she would get the copper on him without his turning human. She had to keep reminding herself that Dimitri had deceived her about being there when her mother died. That—even if he hadn’t taken her mother—he could have helped them somehow. Maybe prevented Gaylen from taking her. And, most importantly, if she didn’t go through with this, Sadie would die. She had no other choice.

She was flipping through a magazine, unable to comprehend a single word, unable to concentrate on a single photo, when he came. One second she was alone, the next, he was standing in her living room.

“Dimitri?” She hoped she sounded surprised. “What are you doing here?”

“I was worried about you. Gaylen was making all these innuendos about you. About wearing you down, making you change your mind...give him what he wants.” He came over and lowered onto the couch next to her. His gaze locked on hers. “You’re not, are you? You can’t possibly consider playing into his hands.”