Taken! Alphabet Series - 26 Original Taken! Tales (Donald Wells' Taken! Series Book 14) (4 page)

Haines marched towards her, but stopped cold, as a voice spoke from directly behind him.

“Drop the knife.”

Haines whirled around just as the tall man swung the bat and fractured his left kneecap. The knife fell to the ground an instant before he followed it and cried out in agony as the next blow broke his right arm.

As the man kicked away the knife, the woman walked over with a phone in her hands.

“Where the hell did you come from, mister? I know there was nobody else in that car.”

The man stared down at him and Haines looked away, unable to bear his intense gaze.

“I was in the car with you, on the floor behind the seats.”

“What?”

“I climbed in there while you were damaging the linkage on the other car.”

“You... you were in
my
car? All that time?”

“Yes.”

Jessica spoke into the phone.

“Agent Garrett, this is Jessica White... Yes sir, but it’s more than a theory. We caught him, we caught the Slasher.”

Jessica listened for a moment.

“Yes sir, I’m certain it’s the right man. He tampered with my vehicle and came at me with a knife... no, I’m not alone, my husband is with me and the suspect has been handled... yes sir, now let me give you our location.”

Jessica put her phone away moments later, and stared down at Haines, who was moaning from the burgeoning pain of his broken arm and damaged knee.

Haines pushed the pain aside long enough to make a threat,

“I’m going to kill you, bitch! You hear me? I am going to—”

THWACK!

Haines fell flat upon the road as the bat made contact with his skull.

Jessica reached over and placed her hand on her husband’s arm, halting his next blow.

“That’s enough.”

He nodded, and then the two of them walked over and leaned on the trunk of her car.

Jessica stared over at Haines.

“He looks so normal. How did you know that it was him?”

“I... felt him, could sense his true nature.”

“Is it something you feel, or something you see?”

“I feel it, but I also see it, and I always recognize it.”

“How?”

“It’s what I see whenever I look in the mirror.”

She hugged him, and he gently rested his chin atop her head.

“You’re not like him.”

“I am, but I’ll never be him. I’ll never be him because I have you.”

“We have each other, baby.”

“Yes,” he said, almost absently, while mesmerized by the way the moonlight glinted upon the Slasher’s deadly blade.

(The events in
TAKEN!
G took place one year prior to the events in
TAKEN!
)

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G
rand Canyon, Arizona, 2011

––––––––

P
ark Ranger Bill Roundtree scratched at the back of his neck as he took in the scene around him.

At his left, his partner was checking on the condition of two men lying beside an old pickup truck. Both of the men were the approximate size of a bull moose. One of them was lying face down, while the other was flat on his back, but both men were unconscious and bleeding from facial contusions. The nose on the man facing up was obviously broken, as was his right arm, a muscular right arm that Roundtree guessed was nearly as thick as his thigh.

The other ranger called over to him.

“They’re both out cold, but breathing normally, I’ll call for an ambulance while you see to the other one.”

The other one, Roundtree turned his head to the right and stared at the man leaning back against the short wall that faced the scenic overlook, the man was moaning as if he were in great pain.

Beyond the wall, the canyon lay spread out in a myriad of sunlit colors, as off in the distance, a pair of California Condors flew in a lazy circle.

The moaning man’s hands covered his groin and he appeared to be in agony, as he kept up a steady lamentation of pain.

“His nuts are popped.”

“Sir?” Roundtree said. He was facing forward now and talking to the chubby guy. The chubby guy stood next to his chubby wife and a teenage girl that Roundtree assumed was their daughter. The daughter was not chubby in the least, and in fact, was extremely attractive.

“I said his nuts are popped. He was kicked so hard that I’m surprised they didn’t fly up and squirt out of his mouth.”

Roundtree walked over, bent down, and spoke to the moaning man.

“Sir, is what the gentleman said true? Were your testicles injured?”

The moaning man raised his head and Roundtree saw that his eyes were crossed and that there was a steady line of drool flowing from the corner of his mouth.

He was as thick as the other two men were, maybe even a tad bigger, but he was defenseless now and, due to his injury, as pale as a ghost.

“An ambulance is on the way, sir.”

The man answered with another moan.

Roundtree sighed and stood, but then spotted the long knife lying halfway underneath the man’s right buttock. After donning a clear glove, he reached down and grabbed the end of the blade.

“Whose knife is this?”

The chubby man pointed at the moaning man.

“It belongs to that bastard. He threatened my daughter with it.”

Roundtree peeled the glove off so that it now covered the knife’s handle; he then placed it at his feet until he could retrieve an evidence bag from his car’s trunk.

“All right, folks, let’s start from the top. First, tell me your names, and then tell me what happened.”

“I’m Phil Garber, Officer, and this is my wife, Patty, and my daughter, Jenny, we’re here on vacation from Delaware.”

Roundtree smiled pleasantly at them and noticed for the first time that Garber had a bit of drying blood at the left corner of his mouth, while Mrs. Garber’s face was reddened and slightly swollen on the right side. The daughter, Jenny, looked unharmed, but she was wearing a gray knit sweater, through which, Roundtree could spy a pink bra. He then looked beyond them and saw a torn and discarded blouse lying on the ground.

“What exactly happened to you people?”

Garber pointed around at the three men.

“These fucking assholes happened to us, that’s what happened.”

“Phil!” Patty scolded. “Don’t curse in front of Jenny.”

Roundtree smirked at that. Jenny looked to be sixteen or seventeen, and had probably said, much less, heard those words before.

Garber apologized to his wife and continued.

“These... jerks, rode up in that giant pickup truck over there and began harassing my daughter. When one of them grabbed her by the arm, she slapped him. That’s when the one there holding his nuts grabbed her blouse and ripped it clean off, tore it from her as if it was made of paper. My wife and I ran over to get Jenny away from them and the one laying on the right there with the ponytail, he punched me in the mouth and backhanded my wife.

“Well sir, as you can see he’s a big man and so the two of us fell to the ground, dazed. That’s when the other man grabbed Jenny and began hauling her towards their truck, and I think that they would have kidnapped her too, if not for the tall man.”

“The tall man?”

“Yeah, he was tall like them, and not as big, but lordy he was fast, and strong. Ponytail there tried to punch him in the face and he did this thing where he grabbed his wrist with one hand while slamming down an elbow on the forearm. I actually heard the bone break and I swear it sounded just like when you step on a twig. Then, he yanked that ponytail downward at the same time he raised a knee, and blood flew out of ponytail’s busted nose. That’s when the other guy there tried to grab him from behind, but the tall man made this little pivot, like down and to the right he went, and tossed the guy over his shoulder. Well sir, before that man could even stand up the tall man was all over him. The punches were too quick to count but there must have been a dozen of them, and then there were two of them out cold.”

“And that’s when he went after the guy with the knife?”

“Huh? Oh, no, he never touched him.”

“Then how did he get injured?”

“The lady did that to him.”

“What lady?”

“The blonde lady,” Jenny said. “She was the one who really saved me, and she was pretty too.”

Roundtree looked over at the moaning man again, and guessed that, standing, the man would be well over six-feet tall and had to weigh two-fifty.

“He was armed with this knife and the woman disabled him?”

Jenny grinned.

“He had an arm around my neck and held that knife, but she walked right up to him, moved her foot way back and then kicked him in the nuts as hard as she could, and she was wearing hiking boots. It was so cool, and when he dropped the knife and bent over, she kicked him again, twice.”

Roundtree scratched his neck some more.

“What happened then?”

The tall man asked us to call you, and then he and the woman took off,” Garber said.

Roundtree picked up the knife.

“Wait here a moment, folks, while I go speak to my partner.”

As Roundtree approached the other ranger, the man looked over at the Garbers.

“What’s their story, Billy?”

Roundtree grinned.

“Near as I can tell, they were saved by two guardian angels.”

(The events in
TAKEN!
H took place weeks prior to the events in
TAKEN!
)

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F
ort Jones, Arkansas, 2012

––––––––

D
etective Cal Washburn stared at the Task Force Murder Board for the hundredth time, while reading the names of the victims, victims of a serial killer who had been active in his city for the better part of the last year.

A serial killer nicknamed,
The Reaper
, who also taunted his pursuers by leaving insulting notes at the scene of his crimes, notes that declared his superiority over the cops that were hunting him.

Eleven beautiful young faces stared back at Washburn from eleven photos, and beside each picture was a list of the decedents’ friends, relatives, acquaintances, places of work, venues of play, and any other facts that were of pertinence during their short lives.

The eleven women were all between the ages of eighteen and twenty-three. Eight were blondes, while the other three were brunettes, but all of them were beautiful and each had left behind a grieving family. Still, other than their youth and attractiveness the women shared no common bonds, at least none that would lead to a suspect.

Detective Washburn was not young, nor beautiful. He was sixty-four and a forty-three year veteran of the force who had worked homicide for most of those years and was staring mandatory retirement in the face. Washburn was exceptional at catching killers and had solved more homicides than anyone else who had ever worked in the department, however,
The Reaper
was a killer he knew he’d never catch, and with only six months left until retirement, it would also be the last big case of his storied career.

One of the Fed’s experts, a man skilled in something called Discourse Analysis, claimed that his examination of the killer’s typewritten notes led him to believe that they were looking for someone in law enforcement, and not just anyone, but someone with years of experience, such as Washburn.

Washburn hated the conclusion, but saw how the man had reached it, since a few phrases in the notes were ones he used himself back in the day, when he still wore a uniform.

He looked away from the board and over at his new partner, Rich Connelly. Connelly was a rising star in the department and rumored to be up for Sergeant, something that made Washburn’s blood boil, as it would make the young man his boss.

As far as he could tell from the three weeks they’d been partnered together, the twenty-eight year old Connelly was a lazy, overrated bum who skated by on good looks and family connections. After all, it never hurt to have a father who was a Chief of Detectives.

“Connelly! Are you asleep over there?”

Rich Connelly opened his eyes and winked at Washburn.

“I’m meditating on the facts of the case.”

“You’d better not let Captain Rodgers catch you ‘meditating.’”

“Who? Karen? She’s like an aunt to me. I’ve known her since she and my father were partners.”

“Yeah, well, don’t forget we got company here today. Dr. Jessica White, the profiler. They say that woman can work miracles.”

Connelly made a sound of derision.

“It’s just more of the FBI’s bullshit. Just like that Discourse Analyst they had looking over the notes. That man was supposed to be the best in the business, and what was his conclusion, he blamed the murders on a cop.”

“The evidence points to it I’m sorry to say, and from what I hear, Dr. White agrees.”

“Why? Because of those few phrases in the notes? Hell, lots of people know those, even me. I grew up in a cop household and heard them all the time.”

“They’re watching us; you know that, don’t you?”

Connelly sat up suddenly.

“What are you talking about?”

“The Feds, they’re following everyone on the task force. I think they’re convinced that one of us could be
The Reaper
.”

“They’re following all of us? It’s a twenty-two person task force,”

“Yeah, but only sixteen of us are men, and they’ve been on us for a week now.”

“I’ll be damned, and
The Reaper
hasn’t killed in a week; that means they’ll keep eyes on us until he does.”

“Or, until we catch him,” Washburn said.

Four more detectives entered the room; all were smiling.

Washburn greeted them.

“What’s with all the happy faces?”

“You didn’t hear?” One of the men said, a bearded cop named Burns. “McKinley is bringing in a suspect who he says is
The Reaper
.”

Connelly jumped up from the sofa.

“Bullshit! My grandmother would catch
The Reaper
before McKinley.”

Washburn ignored him. Jeff McKinley was Connelly’s only competition for the Sergeant position, and unlike Connelly, McKinley was a decent cop. If he had truly caught
The Reaper
, the position would be his, hands down.