Trapped

Missions that involved even more killing. Screaming people. Lots and lots of screaming people.

And coyotes. Taylor remembered the coyotes, eating him alive while he was unable to fight back.

Then somehow, well over a year ago, sewn back together like a crazy-quilt, Taylor had wound up here.

He wasn’t even sure where here was.

His good looks were ruined. His body didn’t work like it should have, due to muscle loss, his voice was gone, and his fingers jutted out at odd angles and were barely functional. The insane doctor who kept him here—Doctor Plincer—had tinkered with Taylor’s brain.

Before the tinkering, Taylor had enjoyed causing others pain.

After the tinkering, causing pain was the only think Taylor lived for.

It was an addiction, stronger than any drug.

And the doctor fed his addiction, for the most part, supplying him with a steady stream of victims.

Of course, the one victim Taylor longed for most was the doctor himself.

He just had to get the bastard in his Magic Box.

The box was based on months of testing and experimenting. Every skewer positioned and angled so it wouldn’t hit anything vital. Taylor’s biggest wish was to get the doctor in there, and make him suffer for weeks.

But until that day came, he had other victims to play with.

Like this tender little morsel clutching a baby.

The woman was cute. Cute ones were so sexy when they screamed.

But the baby…

Taylor had never done a baby before.

It sounded like a lot of fun.

Sara was paralyzed with fear. A tiny part of her brain recognized what a cliche that was. But it was true. She was so terrified, so overwhelmed by dread, she couldn’t move.

Taylor stared at her. Through her. Sara knew he could read her thoughts, sense her helplessness.

He lowered the meat hook and gave her a lopsided grin. Then he limped slowly to Sara’s left, his gait wobbly and twisted, like he had a degenerative muscle disease. But Sara noticed it wasn’t a disease—beneath his scarred skin, some of his muscles were simply gone.

Taylor stopped at a dresser, his bloodshot gaze drilling into her.

Run! Sara yelled at herself. Get out of there!

But her feet remained planted, her veins felt filled with cement. She couldn’t even turn her head, staring at her abductor out of the corner of her eyes, watching as he slowly pulled open a drawer. He put his hand inside, grinning, obviously enjoying himself, and then removed a rope.

No! Don’t let him tie you up, Sara! You have to move!

That’s when the door burst open.

The sound was enough to break Sara out of her frozen state. In one smooth motion she yanked Jack from his sling and dove sideways, keeping him off the floor, and scooted lengthwise under the bed. She placed her baby on his belly, tucked against her side, and felt him kick against her as he woke up.

“You! You killed my pet!”

Lester’s presence seemed to fill the room. He looked twice as big as the last time Sara saw him, and his eyes were wide and lips pulled back to bare his revolting teeth. He was pointing, accusingly, his hand ending in a knife that glinted orange in the candlelight.

But he wasn’t looking at Sara. He was looking at Taylor.

“The pet is dead. Now Lester will kill Subject 33’s pet.”

Lester took two quick steps toward Laneesha’s cabinet, and Sara watched aghast as he flung open the large middle door without removing the skewers.

Laneesha’s insides came out, spilling onto the ground, some of them sliding under the bed and onto Sara and Jack. She shoved her knuckles into her mouth and bit down to keep from screaming. When she looked down at Jack, Sara saw his eyes were open and he was making that pinched, unhappy face he would always make before he started to cry.

Sara shoved her finger in his mouth. He made a tiny little whine of protest.

Lester turned toward Taylor, raising the knife.

“Now Lester will kill Subject 33.”

Taylor held up one hand in supplication as he shook his head. His other hand was gesturing wildly.

Pointing right at Sara.

But Lester wasn’t following the man’s finger, and though Taylor’s lips were moving, no sounds were coming out.

Lester lunged.

For a limping, pudgy man, Taylor moved pretty fast. He danced away from the blade and came up on Lester’s side, the meat hook raised. Taylor swung, cutting through empty air with a whir.

Jack let out a soft cry. Sara massaged his gums with her fingertip. He began to suck.

Lester lunged again, nicking Taylor on the shoulder. Taylor again swung and missed. The taller man’s reach was too long, and he easily kept Taylor at a distance.

When Lester cut Taylor’s other shoulder, she could see the futility on Taylor’s face. He knew he was going to die. That’s when he stared Sara dead in the eyes, and then ran right at her.

Sara shrank back, tugging Jack with her, but it wouldn’t help. This was a cheap bed, light and flimsy. Taylor would be able to upend it with one hand, exposing them both to Lester.

But Lester acted fast, sticking out a foot, tripping Taylor so he fell near the edge of the bed. The fat man flopped onto his belly, momentum making him slide across the gore toward Sara.

The meathook clanged to the floor and bounced away, and Sara locked eyes with the fallen killer, less than two feet between them. Up close, Taylor’s face looked like it had been sculpted by a preschooler, all disfigured and missing parts. He opened his ruined mouth and let out a wheeze, his bloodshot eyes wide with panic.

Then Taylor stretched his hands under the bed and grabbed Jack’s arm.

Martin was feeling pretty good. The drugs had taken the edge off his injuries, the children were all accounted for, and he was about to spend some quality time with the missus. Plus, he was now the owner of a pretty sweet boat. Which, unfortunately, he was going to have to sink.

Martin had told Captain Prendick the truth about his prices being too high, and Martin was fully prepared to takeover Plincer’s supply needs. But the real reason he killed Prendick was because he needed the boat for his plan to work.

A noted psychologist, a ship’s captain, and six teenagers couldn’t just disappear while Martin walked away scot-free. So Martin was going to use Prendick’s GPS navigation system to find the deepest part of the lake; Huron went down 750 feet in some parts. Then he was going to set the boat on fire and sink it, putting in a last minute call to the Coast Guard just as he jumped overboard.

“There was some kind of horrible explosion,” he would tell the authorities. “I must have been thrown clear. Damn lucky thing I had my life jacket on. Oh, my poor now-dead wife. My poor son. Those poor, underprivileged, blown-up children. What a terrible and tragic freak accident.”

He’d work on the story, and his delivery. A few burn marks on his life preserver would lend credence, as would his outstanding reputation in the field of social work.

The best part? Sara was insured for half a million dollars. Enough to buy a nice, new boat. Joe had been right about that one thing; boating life was the way to go.

Martin got to the top of the stairs and wondered if he should drop in on brother Joe, maybe give him a dog bone for old time’s sake. But the growing tension in his groin told him to wait until later. He wanted to get in some husband and wife bonding first.

He walked to his room, smiling when he saw the trunk in the corner. Martin could picture Sara in there, tied up and terrified. He thought of all those countless, wasted nights, holding her in bed because she was frightened, pretending to care.

Payback was a bitch.