Текст книги "Never Die Alone"

Автор книги: Lisa Jackson

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Текущая страница: 21 (всего у книги 23 страниц)

Brianna had wrapped her arms around herself as if to ward off a chill, or protect herself somehow as Jase took a corner a little too fast and the tires screeched in protest.

“Dad,” Jase spat out, remembering how stupid he’d been, how scared, how young. “He swore he’d buried the body under a tree on the farm, and I believed him. It was a mistake and a lie, but that’s what he told me. The tree?” he glanced at her, “It’s still there, kind of a reminder, I guess. And now Prescott, my brother, he wants me to buy the place. Tree and all.”

“Your brother was part of it?”

Jase’s jaw grew rock hard. “Seems as if.”

Jase stole a look at her, saw the revulsion on her face, the same revulsion he felt. “So now Ed says I didn’t kill the guy?” Jase couldn’t believe it. “What kind of man would let his son think he was a murderer?”

“The same kind that wouldn’t let his kid go to the cops and plead self-defense,” she said, her voice cold as ice. “What happened to my sister?” Brianna asked, staring at him as if he were Satan incarnate.

“I went back to Arianna, once things were settled with Dad and Pres. I pleaded with her to go to the hospital, or the police. Or both, but she was frantic, insisted that no one, not even you know.”

Brianna let out a soft moan.

“Trust me, I tried to talk her into it, but she wouldn’t hear of it, wanted to pretend it didn’t happen, made me swear I wouldn’t say anything and I didn’t. Ever again.”

“Except to your father and brother,” Brianna said in an accusatory whisper.

“Right.” His insides churned at the memory and he finally forced out his final confession, “I kept my silence. Even after she drowned three days later.”

Brianna seemed to wilt into herself. “She never said anything,” she whispered. “Arianna, oh, dear God, she was my twin. We shared everything and she thought she had to hide the fact that she’d been raped from me?” she said.

“I don’t know why she didn’t tell you,” he said as he drove past the city and into the countryside beyond. If he’d expected to feel release at unburdening himself, he’d been wrong. All he felt now was guilt. Deep, burrowing guilt. But hadn’t it been with him all along? How many nights had he dreamed of Arianna’s death? A hundred? A thousand? Each version was a little different, none the truth, but all the while he swam in a river of guilt and he never could save her. In all the scenarios in the dreams as in reality, she died. He felt sick inside. Had Arianna taken her own life? Had her drowning been an accident? He doubted anyone would ever know the truth.

Brianna’s reaction only made it—his guilt—burn hotter.

“I’m sorry,” he said, and he meant it. God, how he’d meant it. “I should have forced her to tell your parents or you or the police or someone.”

“Or you should have, instead of relying on your sorry excuse of a family and saving your own damned skin.”

Every muscle in his body tensed. He stole another glance at her and saw her lips curl in disgust.

“You son of a bitch,” Brianna whispered, her eyes narrowed and filled with a newfound hate. “You son of a freakin’ bitch.”

CHAPTER 32

Brianna was stunned. Shocked. Everything Jase had told her rang true, but still, her heart tore as she thought of her twin and what Arianna had endured. Alone. Afraid to confide in anyone, even Brianna.

Fighting tears, she stared straight ahead through the windshield as the Louisiana countryside flew by in a blur.

Jase had lied to her. If not by commission, then omission until now and that thought soured her stomach. She didn’t dare glance his way as he drove a good ten miles above the speed limit, all the while remaining silent, letting her digest everything he’d finally told her. From the corner of her eye she witnessed his own anguish and anger. His jaw was set, his hands clenched over the steering wheel until his knuckles blanched, his eyes focused on the road ahead.

Was everything he’d confessed the truth?

She blinked.

Why would he lie?

He wouldn’t, she thought as she heard the sounds of sirens in the distance. His body language said as much.

So, she was forced to believe him and his tale, no, his confession, for that’s what it seemed like. So Jase had not only been secretly romantically involved with her sister, but he’d witnessed Arianna being attacked, saved her, killed a man, then held his silence as Arianna had requested.

Why? Oh, God, why?

Dying a little inside, Brianna imagined her sister, in pain and shame, dealing with fear and indecision and unable to reach out. Not even to her.

Brianna’s throat swelled and hot tears welled in her eyes. Why couldn’t Arianna trust the one person who had been with her since their conception, the person closest to her with her secret? Why carry the burden herself?

Arianna, oh, dear Lord, I am so, so sorry I wasn’t there for you; that you couldn’t trust me enough to confide in me.

Her stomach roiled and she began to shake.

“Pull over!” she cried as the truck sped across a bridge spanning a small stream. “Pull over, now!”

Jase cast a glance in her direction, got the message and once they were off the bridge, eased onto the shoulder as Brianna scrambled to unbuckle her seat belt, forced open the door and as the pickup ground to a stop in the gravel, flung herself outside. She landed in the dry grass, litter and loose gravel where she took three steps, doubled over and lost what little contents had been in her stomach. Tears ran down her face as she retched violently. Again.

She dropped to her knees as the truck idled and a long shadow fell over her. Jase’s shadow . . . Dear Jesus, how fitting. Hadn’t his damned shadow been cast over her all her life? Squeezing her eyes shut, she tried to block out not only his image but all the pain, the truth, the horrid thought of her sister dying alone and bereft. Guilt consumed Brianna for she knew in some small way, she, like Jase, had failed her twin.

“For what it’s worth,” he said, his voice raw, “I’m sorry.”

“Go away!”

“I can’t—”

“Just leave me the hell alone!”

“Brianna!”

“I—I can’t even think about this,” she admitted, on the edge of hysteria.

“Then don’t.”

“But I can’t freakin’ stop!” She was sobbing now and when he tried to help her up, take hold of her shoulder and pull her to her feet, she threw out her hands. “Don’t touch me,” she warned, then finally looked him full in the face again and saw the agony wrenching his features, the regret pulling at the corners of his mouth. “Don’t!”

He let his arm drop. “Get in the truck.”

“No!”

Again her stomach turned over, but she fought the urge to dry heave and was able to finally straighten.

“Please,” he said softly as over the fading scream of sirens, a motorcycle whined in the distance. “Get into the pickup.”

“I. I. I just can’t.”

He grabbed her then and she fought him, wildly, violently hitting him, wanting to kick and scream and rail at the heavens in her guilt and frustration. Jase held her tight, refusing to let go, allowing her hands to beat his chest impotently, almost as if he welcomed the pain she inflicted as if it were somehow a kind of penance. A balm for all the guilt and torment he, too, had suffered.

Slowly her sobbing subsided and she let her balled fists fall to her sides as she realized what she was doing, how her anger was misdirected.

Still he held her, drawing her even closer, whispering to her. “Let it all out.”

What the hell was she doing fighting ghosts, charging at windmills, focusing her own pain in the wrong direction? For a second she listened to the rhythmic beat of his heart, slow and steady. Comforting. And she closed her eyes to drink in the smell of him as her thoughts swirled not only with images of Arianna, but of Zoe Denning, Selma, and Chloe, she finally stopped, her strength gone.

Chloe. That poor girl.

Brianna blinked suddenly. Opened her eyes to stare up at the man looking down so intently at her. His eyes were filled with pain and all his pride seemed to have dissolved in their struggle. “I said, ‘I’m sorry,’” he repeated so sincerely, her heart nearly broke.

“So am I,” she admitted, then pushed herself out of the arms that held her so intimately against him. What was she thinking, letting him comfort her? “Just drive,” she ordered, as the motorcycle roared by. “Just . . . get in and drive.”

She made her way to his damned truck and hoisted herself inside without his assistance. As he slid behind the wheel and engaged the gears, her heart bled one more time and in this instance she realized her pain was because of the torture he’d obviously been through ever since witnessing Arianna being attacked.

From the opposite direction, a huge truck piled high with bales of hay rolled by but she barely noticed as Jase eased the truck onto the pavement, then hit the gas.

Dashing the tears from her eyes, Brianna squared her shoulders and fixed her gaze through the bug spattered windshield, staring forward to the ever-lowering sun. Whatever fantasies she’d had about Jase Bridges had to be squashed. Forever. The teenage crush. The sexy dreams. The daytime thoughts. All had to be abolished.

Right now she’d concentrate on their destination: the Tillman farm where, she hoped beyond hope, they would find Chloe.

Alive.

From her underground jail cell, Chloe heard him arrive, the excited yips of the dog, the heavy tread on the floor above. So this was it. He was back to kill her. She wondered about Zoe and prayed that her sister was alive. Please, God, save her, she thought as she heard the latch on the lock click open, then the scrape of the ladder as he was readying it to be slid into this rotten-smelling prison.

God, she hated it here, and it pissed her off to think that she would die here, rot here, her body left for who knew how long. She thought of her family, not just Zoe, but her mom and dad. She’d been so mad at her dad for leaving them, for marrying her damned cousin, for having a new set of babies who were her brothers and her second cousins or something as ridiculous all rolled into one, but now, in this darkness, knowing she was about to die, she forgave her father and wished that just once more she could see all the members of her family again, including CJ and Jayden, who were innocents in her father’s drama.

The hatch opened fast. Trapdoor hitting the floor above.

Chloe startled, jumped, and her bonds pulled tighter, pain streaking down her shoulders, agony ripping through her back muscles. At least the torture would end with her death.

Quickly he descended. Faster than usual.

She closed her eyes, didn’t want him to see that she’d given up, that her fear had evaporated into acceptance. Just get it over with, she thought.

“Well, it’s not your birthday,” he said as both booted feet landed on the floor, “but it is your lucky day.”

Her heart pounded and for the briefest of seconds she thought he might let her go. No such luck. “Today, bitch, you die.” He said the sentence without inflection, without a lick of emotion. “So let’s get ready.”

She peered through the slit of a nearly closed eye and saw him cutting lengths of the red ribbon, for what purpose, she had no idea. She wanted to scream at him, ask him about Zoe, but she didn’t. What did it matter? Her curiosity would die with her in this subterranean hell.

He was whistling now, that same damned birthday song, as if reliving his intention of killing them on their birthdays though God only knew how many days had passed since she’d actually turned twenty-one. She had no idea of time but belatedly realized that her sister must be dead. He’d been adamant about Zoe dying first, so if he was back here, it meant that part of his mission had been accomplished.

Bastard!

Sadness welled deep within her, but no tears came. She’d cried them all and now . . .

He turned and reached down, intent on placing the ribbons around her in some precise manner. For his ritual. But he had to move her, it seemed, adjust her so that the rope binding her was perfect, the ribbons in place. As he leaned closer, she looked up beneath the veil of her lashes, to his bruised throat, evidence of her miserable attempt to kill him.

It hadn’t worked.

He was tough.

But the inside of his throat was vulnerable.

If she could somehow reach it—

He placed a hand on her and she saw his neck stretched over her.

She could bite him! If she had the guts, all she had to do was clamp her teeth down on his Adam’s apple. He’d never suspect . . . Oh dear God. Could she? Yes!

Quick as a snake striking, she lunged with her whole body, her mouth open wide.

“What?” he cried as she bit, sinking her teeth as far as she could into his throat.

“AAARrrrrrgh!”

He squealed as she clamped down hard. Blood—thick, salty, and warm—rushed into her mouth and ran down her own chin as he stumbled to his knees, then stood and tried to shake her off. Flesh ripped beneath her sharp incisors.

“You fucking bitch,” he hissed, his voice destroyed, red spit flinging from his mouth.

She held on, clenching her teeth together as he roared and threw his head, this way, then the other. Screaming and stumbling, he flailed, trying to pull her off him, but she suffered his blows, thinking all the time of Zoe and knowing she would never survive.

Well, damn it, if she was going to die, this fucker was going with her!

He threw himself against the wall, rattling her bones and snapping her head back. But she didn’t let go, her jaw locked as she slithered down the wall and in a horrible tearing of flesh, part of his throat ripped and she nearly choked on the thick piece in her mouth.

He fell to the side and gurgled, thrashing as blood spurted from the gaping hole in his neck. And over the noise of his death throes, she heard other sounds, sirens screaming in the distance, and on the floor above, the damned dog barking like crazy.

Please, she thought desperately, unable to move, bound as she was. Please, please save me.

He was moaning, a rippling sound, coughing on his own blood, gasping wetly and lying not ten feet from her, the red ribbon unraveled over his body and drenched in his blood. Overhead she heard shouts and footsteps, the dog’s barking quieted, men shouting.

I don’t want to die.

“Down here!” a deep voice cautioned.

“Careful!” Female voice.

“Police!” Deep voice again. “Bridges, come out!”

“Help me!” she yelled, though her voice was faint and she had to spit against the remnants of the freak’s skin, muscle, and blood in her mouth and then as the thought gagged, causing her body to spasm and her bonds to tighten. She nearly passed out.

“Holy shit.” A man from the room above. “We’ve got a victim!”

“Police! Bridges, come out with your hands up! Throw down your weapons.”

“He’s dying,” she said, and hoped to hell she was right, because she was certain she, too, was leaving this earth. With shouting and footsteps overhead and the rasping final gasps of the man next to her, she closed her eyes and let the calming blackness roll over her.

Bracing himself, his sidearm drawn, Bentz yelled into the dark cavity beneath the Tillman farm’s cabin floor. “Bridges!” he ordered for the third time in as many minutes. “Lay down your weapons! Put your hands over your head and come out!”

No response. Just darkness and the dank smell from a basement that should never have been carved out of lowland soil wafted upward.

Damn it.

A low moan issued from the basement.

“Let’s go!” Montoya, as usual, was pulling at the bit.

This time Bentz agreed and as his flashlight beam washed over the small room below, he saw the dark stain of blood running to a drain in the dark cement. The bruiser of a man who appeared identical, at least facially, to Jason Bridges lay on his side. His throat had been slashed and a dark gaping hole existed where once had been his Adam’s apple. As if his neck had been ripped apart by a hungry wolf. “Jesus.”

Nearby, lying on her back, blood smeared over her lips, her body naked and bound was Chloe Denning. Unmoving. Her skin so white as to be nearly blue, her eyes open.

His heart sank.

They were too late.

“Get the paramedics! Now!” Bentz yelled to Montoya as he swung into the opening and dropped onto the blood-soaked cement floor.

He reached Chloe, checked her pulse and fought the nausea that always found him at a homicide scene.

“Come on, come on,” he whispered to the still girl, willing her heart to beat. But his pleas were for nothing.

If Chloe Denning was alive, she was hanging on by the thinnest of threads.

“Hey! Can’t you read?” a policeman shouted as Jase, ignoring the barricade of police cars and stretched yellow tape, strode through a swarm of cops and EMTs. He was headed toward the small cabin where he now knew his twin brother was holed up.

If Jacob was alive, he was going to meet him. If the son of a bitch was already dead, then he wanted confirmation that his twin had actually existed. Damn. How had he not known? Where the hell was all that twin karma and connection he’d heard about, that Brianna spouted, when he’d needed it. Anger fueled his strides and clenched his fists as he made his way along a patchy, weed-strewn lane. Determination drew him toward the shabby structure that was little more than a shack while lights bars on the parked vehicles flashed wildly against the surrounding fields and forest.

“Didn’t you hear me? Stop. There! Right now!” A cop, identified as Deputy Bill Morrison, was yelling and approaching fast.

From somewhere behind him Jase heard Brianna’s voice. “Jase! Don’t! Please.” As if she were actually frightened for him. The same woman who had tried to beat him to a pulp only minutes before, the same woman who had iced him out on the rest of their short journey to this God-forsaken scrap of land. Now she cared?

“It’s all right.” Another voice. Belonging to Rick Bentz. “Stand down,” he told the other cop as he walked from the direction of the cabin toward Jase.

“But—”

“I said, ‘It’s all right.’ Stand the fuck down!” Bentz glowered at the deputy and the younger cop, turning a bright red, holstered his weapon. To Jase, Bentz said, “You shouldn’t be here.”

“I need to meet my brother.”

“Too late.” Bentz was shaking his head.

“Then to see him.” Jase met the reservation in Bentz’s eyes. “I have to.”

“I don’t think—”

“I have to.”

A muscle worked in Bentz’s jaw and he glanced over at his partner. Montoya hitched his goateed chin toward one of the two ambulances on the grounds. The other was taking off, wheels spinning, lights flashing, siren wailing. The second was in no hurry.

“This way,” Bentz said and headed toward the ambulance where the back doors were still open, a body bag within. With a look to one of the attendants, Bentz said, “We need to open it up.”

The EMT hesitated, then unzipped the bag, the sound a hiss that curled through Jase’s soul as he found himself staring into a face so like his own that if it weren’t for the unshaven jaw, mussed hair, and sightless, fixed eyes he might have been looking into a mirror. Blood was everywhere across a hairy torso and his neck, hell, it looked like it had been ripped apart by a wild animal.

Jase’s knees weakened.

This was his twin? The brother who had been conceived with him, who had grown with him in a bitter womb? A hundred thoughts flashed through Jase’s brain, pictures of a mother he didn’t remember, memories devoid of this person, so like him, so damned opposite.

All the breath left his lungs in a rush and he felt as if he’d been hit, a hard jab to the solar plexus. “Son of a bitch,” he whispered, knowing the truth, feeling something stir deep inside him, a connection that was quickly severed with the reality of who this monster was.

His brother, the twin he’d never known, Jacob Bridges was, indeed, the 21 Killer, a psychopath who had killed at least three sets of twins and probably more, a soulless monster who bore his own face.

Bile rose up his throat and he took a step back. With a nod from Bentz, the attendant quickly zipped the bag and slid it into the back of the ambulance.

“No. Hell. No.” Jase shook his head, as if negating the truth could make it so. “Damn it!” His knees wobbled a bit but he somehow remained on his feet and a second later he felt slim fingers surround his.

“It . . . it’ll be all right,” Brianna said, squeezing his hand. He turned to look at her, felt a glaze of tears over his eyes and blinked it back to see that her gaze, too, was shimmering, a tiny drop rolling down her cheek. “It’ll be all right.”

His heart swelled for the briefest of instants and he saw her smile. Bravely, he thought and he couldn’t do the same.

Brianna was lying of course.

It would never be all right.

Never.

But at least it would be over.