The Bride Collector (34 page)

Standing here now, tied to the post, his feelings of shame and desire returned. But with them a very simple thought came to
him.

What he’d just said was true. He did love her.

Brad blinked. Why not? Why didn’t he love her?

He was only pretending that he couldn’t love her in order to protect himself. In reality, under all the foolishness that made
him so pathetic, he did love her. And maybe, just maybe, he could win her love as well.

His pulse surged, beating now like a pump desperate for more blood so that it could stay alive. Quinton was laying out his
tools, preparing to ruin a life because he thought it was the right thing to do, and Brad stood behind him, thinking he had
to save this one life, Paradise, who had inadvertently wandered into the killer’s crossfire, a pawn to draw in his seventh
victim.

Saving Paradise was suddenly the only thing that mattered to him.

Allison’s words whispered through his mind.
What he doesn’t realize is that he’s actually killing God’s favorites. He’s got it backward, you see? He’s not an angel, he’s
the devil. Someone needs to correct his thinking
.

“They say you’re delusional,” he said, “that you are mentally ill and suffer from delusions of grandeur. That you think God
speaks to you because you’re psychotic. But they’re wrong, aren’t they?”

Quinton set a bottle of fingernail polish next to three others he’d lined up. Everything in perfect order.

“You don’t need to worry, Mr. Raines. I’ve decided not to kill you.” He turned around. “And don’t try to patronize me or use
your intelligence to talk me down. I’ve been over this before and I know exactly who I am.”

“You do, I can see that now. But you don’t know who I am.”

“You’re Special Agent Brad Raines. You’ve been trying to find and stop me for a long time.”

“Have I? What if I had an entirely different purpose in this”—he looked about the room, then settled back on Quinton—“this
mad shambles of a world? More specifically, a different purpose for being here today, with you, before you deliver God’s bride
to him for eternal bliss?”

Quinton’s face twitched again, but he wasn’t buying it. An unbelieving smile twisted his mouth.

“What if I could prove it to you?” Brad asked.

“Prove what?”

“That I’m not who you think I am.”

The man looked slightly amused.

“Would you listen to me?” Brad asked.

Quinton hesitated, then pulled out his cell phone and checked the time.

“Okay. So what’s your point?”

PARADISE STOOD IN
the middle of her room for long minutes, trembling. The cold sweats had started immediately after she’d hung up the phone.
Her fear made no sense to her. How could a person fear something that clearly didn’t bother most people? Like a fear of the
ground, whoever heard of such thing? Or a fear of air.

Agoraphobia was like that, and she knew she should be able to stop it. But she couldn’t.

The panic attack came so fast and so hard that she couldn’t think, much less get to the medicine cabinet for a Xanax. The
antianxiety medication was supposed to work quickly, but in her case it did nothing but take the edge off. Still, Allison
allowed her to keep a small supply in exception to house rules.

She stood here while the world spun around her, and she was sure that this time her heart would finally tear loose and get
stuck in her throat, and she would suffocate.

She was so disoriented that she forgot how she got here. But then it all came back, like a flood. The phone call. The killer
wanted her to climb into the red truck and go to the beauty salon. If she didn’t, he was going to kill Brad.

An image she’d never seen before, of her father pounding on the door of the closet she’d locked herself in, crashed through
her mind and she gasped. Then it was gone. Now the panic was back, stronger, and she knew that she was going to at least fall
down.

She staggered to the bathroom, desperate for a pill, water, anything that might keep her from dying. She’d just had a new
memory. But she couldn’t think about that now.

He has Brad and you have to get into the red truck.

She shook a couple of Xanax from the bottle; all five came out. She picked two out of the sink, pressed them into her mouth
with trembling fingers, and gulped some water, spilling down her flannel top.

She knew she had to do what the killer wanted. As far as she was concerned, she didn’t have a choice. Because no matter how
much she told herself that she didn’t love Brad, she did.

She loved him more than she loved anything. Much more. Because Brad undid everything her father had done.

In thirty minutes the gardener will climb into his red pickup truck…

Paradise looked at the clock on the bathroom wall. How much time had passed? But she had to get to the truck before Smitty
did, and without anyone noticing.

She spun from the bathroom and ran to the door, grabbed the knob. Then stopped. Her breathing whooshed around her like a jet
engine. She wasn’t dressed to go out.

She was still in the flannel pants she’d slept in!

What does it matter, Paradise?

It mattered a lot. She didn’t fit out there. To her, stepping past the gate was like stepping out onto a platform in a huge
stadium with the world’s worst case of stage fright. They would all be watching, and she would be standing in her pajamas!

But she had to get to the red truck. If she could somehow get under the tarp, then she might be safe.

Tears flooded her eyes again. No, no she wouldn’t be safe out there!

But neither was Brad. And she loved Brad more than she loved herself. What would Brad think about her looking like this? How
could she say she loved him and go to him looking like a skank? The thoughts flew around her mind, one on top of the other.

She tore over to her dresser and yanked out the first pair of jeans she could get her hands on. Quick, quick, she had to get
into the red truck.

Paradise pulled the jeans on and ran halfway back to the door before realizing she’d forgotten a shirt. She hurried back,
clawed into a yellow T-shirt, then rushed back to the door.
The first thing you’re going to do is keep your mouth shut.
She had to go quietly. No one could know.

So she slipped into the hall and snuck toward the stairs as quickly and quietly as she could in her flip-flops. Her panic
attack was back, thumping, spinning, gasping, but she kept her mouth shut and went before anyone could see her.

Smitty usually parked his red truck by the toolshed beyond the men’s wing. Paradise made it to the back door and ran out into
the hot sun. She turned left, running on the gravel back there without stopping to see if anyone was watching. She should,
she knew. This wasn’t the way not to get noticed, but she was too terrified to stop.

She saw the red truck next to the shed when she tore around the corner. A green tarp was stretched over a mound of something
in the back, she didn’t know what. The idea of climbing underneath…

She couldn’t do that. They would see the lump and know someone was hiding, intending to sneak out, which was strictly prohibited.

But there was a lump of something under there already. Another dead body. A pile of dead fish. A dead cow. Manure for the
garden. So they might not notice another lump.

Paradise bent down and hurried up to the truck. Without waiting for her nerves to fail her completely, she slung her leg up
over the opened truck bed and threw herself in, expecting a yell from someone who’d seen her.

But no yell came.

She scrambled to the edge, yanked back the tarp making a terrible ruckus, and rolled under it as if it were a blanket. Then
she pulled it back down over her head and lay still, panting into the green plastic.

The acidic stench of manure filled her nostrils. She was right. The fertilizer felt soft and mushy against her back. Breathing
hard, she thought the smell might poison her.

They would plant her in the ground, dead from asphyxiation. Bringing all her willpower to bear, she lay as still as she could,
praying that no one would notice the green tarp moving as she panted.

With each passing minute she was tempted again to throw the tarp off because she knew she couldn’t do this. She could not
go beyond the gate!

The sound of footsteps prevented her from fleeing. The door opened and slammed. The truck growled to life and, with a grinding
of gears, it rolled forward.

Please, God, please save me. Please, please…

She was suddenly in a closet, and a fist was pounding on the door. “If you don’t come out here right now, I’m going to blow
your mother’s head off.”

The new black memory slammed into her mind and she started to scream. But she clamped her hand over her mouth. She’d been
here before, seven years ago.

“If you don’t come out of there, I swear I will kill her!”

Everything went dark and quiet.

Pop.

It was the first time she remembered hearing the gunshot that killed her mother, and she knew now that it was because she
hadn’t come out of the closet she’d barricaded herself in.

Her father was swearing.

Pop.
Silence.

That was him? He’d shot her and himself. She could barely breathe, barely cry, barely whisper. “Sorry, Mommy. I’m so…”

Then darkness lovingly took her away.

WHEN PARADISE OPENED
her eyes, she was surprised to see that the sky had turned green. Or she was lying on her back, staring up at green leaves.
She’d been dreaming of a prince on a white stallion, sweeping in from the desert with the heroine hanging on for dear life
behind him. They plunged into the trees and then into a meadow, where the white bats had joined with a thousand warriors in
eager…

She gasped. No! She was in the back of the red truck under the green tarp. The guards had stopped them at the gate. They’d
caught her!

Her first thought was one of immense relief. She couldn’t leave. They would take her back and she would cry on Allison’s shoulder
and somehow everything would be all right.

Her next thought was of Brad.

She bolted up and swept the green tarp off her head. A bright sun blinded her and she squinted, and in the brief second before
she instinctively squeezed off the light she saw that something was terribly wrong.

She was facing a street and cars were driving by. This wasn’t the gate that led into CWI.

Paradise twisted around. The large green sign above the glass windows read
STARBUCKS
.
The red truck will drive into the city and stop at a Starbucks…

She was… She was out? Out!

Paradise dropped back down and whipped the tarp back over her head, trembling from head to foot. This was not good, this was
not good, this was not good…
Dear God, help me, dear God, dear God, dear God…

Nothing happened. She could hear the hum of traffic and the sound of voices far off. Then the voices were gone. She had to
get ahold of herself. Or she could lie here and wait till Smitty drove the truck back to the center. Where was she? How far
did Smitty go for his break?

Her memory of her father came back. “If you don’t come out here right now…”

Pop
.

She couldn’t do it again. She had to come out, or this time… She had to come out and stay out. This time, if she didn’t, Brad
would die.

Head swimming with resolve, Paradise eased the tarp away from her face, held her breath as she listened for voices and, hearing
none, peeked over the truck bed. Some people huddled together way down the street.

You will get out without drawing attention, and you will walk due east one block until you see a shopping strip with a beauty
salon.

She clambered over the wall of the bed, dropped to the asphalt, and ran away from the Starbucks, crouched over to make herself
smaller. She got all the way to the end and on to the sidewalk before two things became clear to her.

One, she looked and smelled like a dog who’d rolled in a pile of manure. Running hunched over wasn’t the way to avoid attention.

Two, she didn’t know if this was due east.

But she couldn’t stop now. She’d never get her legs moving again. She glanced over her shoulder and saw that the road headed
in the opposite direction ran past a wide open field. No strip mall. So she must have guessed right.

Paradise stood as straight as she dared and hurried forward, refusing to look to her right or her left, afraid of what she
might see. Cars, people, the killer, monsters, ghosts, demons… Any or all of them were hiding in wait, she was sure of it.
She just had to keep her legs moving until she could find that garbage bin. Maybe she could hide inside until she figured
out what to do.

She was hyperventilating, so she closed her mouth and forced herself to breathe through her nose, counting as taught. One,
two. One, two. What had to be half a block passed. Maybe more. Buildings loomed ahead to her right, that had to be it. If
she could just make it…

A car honked, and she let out a startled cry, but she didn’t look up. Then she thought it might run her over, so she glanced
to her right just to be sure. It was on the other side of the road, trying to get past another car.

The sidewalk ended in a parking lot and she stopped.
At the end there is a large green garbage bin.

“What’s your problem?”

She spun to the voice on her right. Two young women sat on the hood of a car, facing the direction she’d come from. She knew
the type from her outings across the Internet. The narrow jeans like tubes, the black fingernail polish, the cigarettes, the
silver-studded belts.

“You lost, you freak?”

“You think I’m a freak?” Paradise heard herself saying. “Have you looked in the mirror lately?”

She had no idea why she would say such a thing, not now, not ever, especially not here. She’d lost her grip on reality and
was suffering a psychotic break.