She wished she'd kept her mouth closed. He punched her hard in the kidney. The pain sent her to her knees.
'I might be a pig, Marty, but you'll be dead. Not long now and you'll be dead and rotting and my pa and I will be driving into Virginia. There's some real pretty mountains there and lots of places to hide out. Do your business now, Marty. We've got to get out of here. Hey, you gotta pee because you're so scared, right?'
'That's right, Marlin.' She closed the door on his grinning face, heard him lean against it, knew he was listening. She knew she didn't have much time.
He banged on the door just as she flushed the toilet. 'That's long enough, Marty.'
When she walked out, he shoved her back in. He looked around. 'I'm not the pig. It's my pa. He never learned how to do things 'cause his ma never taught him anything, left him lying in his own shit when he was just a little tyke, made him lie in his own shit when he was older, just to punish him. She wasn't nice, my grandma.'
'She doesn't sound nice,' Lacey said. 'Why'd you come here, Marlin? Why do you want to kill me? It's a really big risk you're taking. Why?'
He looked thoughtful for a long moment, but the gun never wavered from the center of her back. 'I just knew I had to take you out,' he said finally. 'No one can beat me and get away with it. I thought and thought about how I could get out of the cage in Boston and then that judge just handed me a golden key. Those idiot shrinks were a piece of cake. I acted all scared, even cried a little bit. Yes, it was all so easy. There was my pa, sent me a message in prison, and I knew where he was waiting. All I had to do was get in Brainerd to the Glover Motel just at the western edge of town. There he was, had clothes for me, everything, a car with a full tank of gas. I knew then that I could get you, take you out, and then I'd be free. Actually, it was Pa who hit that FBI guy in Boston, nearly sent him off to hell where he belongs.'
'I know. Your pa used your driver's license. We got the license plate.'
Marlin wasn't expecting that. 'Well, I told Pa to be careful. He was sure he'd knocked the FBI guy from here to next Sunday, but he didn't. He really got the plate, huh? No matter. Everything's back on track now. I just wish that the FBI guy had gotten his.'
Hannah moaned from the kitchen.
'Now, let me see if you tried to leave any message for that muscle boy you're sleeping with.'
She didn't move, barely breathed. And waited. He poked around a bit, then straightened. 'You're smart, Marty. You didn't try anything. That's good.'
Hannah moaned again. They heard Erasmus say something to her. They heard a sharp cry. The bastard, he'd hit her again.
'You'll come, won't you, Marty? You'll come to me at the center of the maze? My pa will kill her slow if you refuse. It sounds like he's already got started. You got the picture now, don't you?'
To die for Hannah Paisley, perhaps there was a dose of irony there. No, she'd die anyway. Lacey seriously doubted that Hannah would survive this either. But Lacey naa no choice, none at all. 'I'll come.' Ten minutes.
'Let me see if Hannah's all right.' 'A real buddy, is she? That's excellent. No shit from you then, Marty, or Pa will make her real sorry. Then it'll be my turn to make you even sorrier.' 'No shit from me, Marlin.' 'Ladies shouldn't say that word, Marty.' She wanted to laugh, realized it was hysteria bubbling in her throat, and kept her mouth shut. When she walked into the kitchen, Hannah was sitting on the floor, her back against the wall.
'I'm sorry, Hannah. Are you all right?' Hannah's eyes weren't focused, but she was trying. She probably had a concussion. 'Sherlock, is that you?' 'Yes.'
'Where is this place? Who are these animals?' Erasmus kicked her.
Hannah didn't make a sound, but her body seemed to ripple with the shock of the pain.
'This is my place. These men are Marlin Jones and his father, Erasmus.'
She saw that Hannah realized the consequences in that single instant. She also knew that she was going to die. Both of them would die. Lacey saw her trying to loosen the knots on her wrists.
'Gentlemen,' Hannah said, looking from one to the other. 'Can I have a glass of water?'
'Then you'll probably have to go pee, just like Marty here,' Marlin said.
'Marty? Her name is Sherlock.'
Marlin kicked Hannah, just the way his father had. 'Shut your mouth. I hate women who haven't got the brains to keep their lips sewn together. I just might do that someday. Get myself a little sewing kit. I could use different colored thread for each woman. No water. Let's get out of here. Who knows who's going to show up?'
Five minutes, but it didn't matter now. Lacey was bound and gagged, lying on her side in the backseat of her own car,
a blanket thrown over her. Hannah was behind her in the storage space.
One of them was driving a stolen car she'd seen briefly, a gray Honda Civic. Then she heard her Navajo revved up but didn't know which one of them was driving. She guessed they'd leave her Mazda at the warehouse.
Lacey closed her eyes and prayed harder than she'd ever prayed in her life. If Marlin left her hands tied behind her, then there would be no way she could get to the Lady Colt strapped around her ankle.
Savich stretched his back, then his hamstrings. He heard a woman's voice from the front of the gym and started to call out.
But it wasn't Sherlock.
It had been an hour and twenty minutes. In that instant he knew something was very wrong. He called her house. No answer. He and Quinlan both had this gut thing. Neither of them ever ignored it. He immediately called Jimmy Maitland from his cell phone.
'It's dinnertime, Savich. This better be good.'
'There's no word about Marlin Jones, is there?'
'No, none yet. Why?'
'I haven't seen Sherlock in over an hour. She was supposed to meet me at the gym. She hasn't shown. I called her house. No answer. I know that Marlin and his father are here. I know it. I know they've got Sherlock.'
'How do you know that? What's going on, Savich?'
'My gut. You've never before mistrusted my gut, sir. Don't mistrust it now. I'm out of here and on my way to her house. She was going there to get more stuff. We made a firm time date. She isn't here. Sherlock's always on time. Something's happened and I just know it's Marlin and Erasmus. Put out an APB on her car, Mazda, 4X4 Navajo, license SHER 123. Can you get a call out to everyone to look for her?'
'You got it.'
Savich was at her house within ten minutes. It was dark. Her car wasn't in the driveway. Jesus, he prayed he'd been wrong. Maybe she was at his place, maybe she wanted to unpack her stuff before she came to the gym. No, she wouldn't do that. He went to the front door and tried the doorknob. It opened.
He had his SIG out as he poked the door fully open. He turned on the light switch. He saw the trashed living room. Furniture overturned, lamps hurled against the wall, her lovely prints slashed, beer cans and empty Chinese cartons and pizza boxes on the floor. One piece of molding cheese pizza lay halfway out of the box onto a lovely Tabriz carpet.
The kitchen was a disaster area. It was weird, but he could smell Sherlock's scent over the stench of rotted food. She'd been here. Recently. Then he saw her fanny pack on the floor under the table. He opened it but saw it wasn't Sherlock's. It was Hannah Paisley's. They had both women. How the hell did they get Hannah? How did they know to get Hannah? And why had they taken her?
Of course he knew the answer to that. Marlin knew he'd have to have some leverage, something to make Sherlock do what he told her to do. And that would be? To walk the maze, to get to the center, where he'd kill her, to pay her back for scamming him, for shooting him, for beating him.
So he and his father would have taken the women to some warehouse nearby. But where? There were lots of likely places in Washington, D.C. He knew Sherlock would know that he'd realize what had happened. She had to have left him something, if she'd had the chance. He looked around the kitchen but didn't see anything.
He was on the cell phone to the cops when he walked into the small bathroom off the downstairs hallway. He nearly gagged at the stench. He pulled open the linen drawers below the sink. Nothing. He pulled aside the shower curtain. There was Sherlock's purse on the floor of the shower stall, open.
