Vicious

Jordan look so haggard and crazy. His handsome face was red and dripping with perspiration. He had a knife in one hand; the other was clenched in a fist. He held a weird kind of attack stance as he stood there, trying in vain to block Leo’s view of a third person in the basement.

But Leo saw the man quite clearly. He was in his late thirties—with tears in his eyes and a wadded-up handkerchief crammed in his mouth. There were scratch marks on his face—along with a bloody gash on one cheek. His arms stretched out in front of him, he was leaning facedown over a wooden worktable. Layers of duct tape bound his hands together. A rope tied to his wrists wound around the tabletop several times. More duct tape had been used to secure his ankles to two of the worktable’s thick legs.

The man stared at Leo, his eyes pleading. He tried to cry out past the gag in his mouth.

Jordan swiveled around. “Shut up!” he growled, raising his fist at the helpless man.

Leo stood on the basement stairs and shook his head in disbelief. “Jesus, Jordan, what—what the hell are you doing?”

“I didn’t want you to see this,” Jordan muttered, his back to him.

“But—what—” Leo couldn’t even get the words out. He clutched the banister. “Why are you—”

“Go back upstairs,” Jordan whispered.

“No!” Leo said. “What are you doing? Who is that?”

Jordan turned to glare at him. His breathing didn’t sound normal, and he still had that strange attack stance.

“Who is he?” Leo repeated.

With the knife, he pointed at the bound and gagged man behind him. “He’s Mama’s Boy,” Jordan said steadily. “Remember Mama’s Boy? He killed at least sixteen women. And one of them was my mother.”

CHAPTER TWELVE

“You definitely need some Tic Tacs or something, because your breath stinks!” the donkey with the voice of Eddie Murphy was telling Shrek.

Mattie screeched with laughter as if this were the first time he’d heard that line. Actually, this was probably his eighth viewing of Shrek.

Susan had tried to get him to take a nap after lunch, but he’d been too keyed up. So she’d compromised and let him lay on the sunroom sofa with a blanket over him and Shrek to keep him company.

With a leather-bound folder tucked under her arm, Susan glanced out the sliding glass door at the backyard. Then she went to the window above the kitchen sink and peered out at the woods. Finally, she took a long look out the living room window at the driveway. Since lunch, she’d been going through this routine every few minutes. There was still no sign of Allen. But she wasn’t just keeping a lookout for her fiance. She also needed to make sure that hunter hadn’t come back.

The folder belonged to Allen, and he’d brought it along for the trip. It was full of information he’d gathered for this weekend getaway. He was always very organized when they traveled. Susan had seen him refer to the papers inside his folder a few times this week, but she’d never really looked at it herself. She’d just retrieved it from the nightstand on Allen’s side of the bed upstairs.

Sitting down at the dining room table, she opened the folder and glanced at a printout of the MapQuest directions to the Cullen house—just like the one he’d given her.

In the sunroom, Mattie was giggling at the movie. This weekend vacation was supposed to be spent sailing, hiking, and appreciating the great outdoors. So far, her son had spent most of his time inside watching DVDs he’d already seen.

And so far, this getaway had been nothing but trouble. Allen had never really answered her question last night: “I don’t understand why you felt you needed to bring a gun along this weekend. I mean, were you expecting trouble?”

There was something about his planning this trip that had seemed very rushed and forced. Early in the week, he’d suddenly decided they needed to go to Cullen. Susan wondered if he’d had some ulterior motive for this sojourn. Was there someone else he planned to see here, someone he expected trouble from?

Susan hoped to find something about his personal travel plans in Allen’s folder, some clue that would help her figure out what had happened to him. He’d been gone for two and a half hours for an errand that should have taken fifteen minutes.

He had a printout with photos of the rental house here at Twenty-two Birch—along with a listing of all the dimensions and amenities. He had an e-mail confirmation, too. There was a similar printout of the boat he’d rented, The Seaworthy, and confirmation for that, too. Susan remembered the e-mail she’d read on the computer in the boat’s cabin earlier: We apologize again for the confusion with the other boat, and we’re happy we could meet your specific request. From the table, Susan glanced toward the dining room window at The Seaworthy moored at the rickety, old dock. She wondered, Why that particular boat?

She found a printout for a restaurant, The Willow Tree Inn, along with a coupon for a free dessert. Both the coupon and the printout had Reservations Strongly Recommended for Weekend Dinners and Brunches posted on it. Allen had talked about going there for dinner tonight, but they hadn’t discussed a particular time yet.

She came across another page—from an Internet weather site, showing the five-day forecast for Cullen, Washington. It was supposed to go down to the mid fifties and rain tomorrow.

Finally, Susan uncovered some notes Allen had scribbled on a sheet of yellow legal paper:

CULLEN – Deprt by 8:30 Fri

–Bayside Rentals – ck everything works on boat & arrange delivery.

–Ck w/house rental, make sure place is cleaned. Pick up keys.

–Gas/coal for BBQ?

–Buy groceries.

–Sue & M arrive by 1 PM.

–SAT – sail w/Sue & M by noon for @ least 4 hrs.

Susan glanced at the back of the yellow piece of paper. It was blank. There was nothing about returning the boat or turning in the keys to the house on Sunday. Allen’s notes to himself ended once he’d taken her and Mattie sailing this afternoon.

Another thing that struck her as odd: he hadn’t jotted down any time for dinner at this restaurant, which strongly recommended reservations, and yet he’d allotted a specific time for sailing. Why did they have to sail for at least four hours?

That hunter had shown up in their yard around noon. Was that just a coincidence? It had been the same time they were supposed to be out on the boat.

There were no notes or printed e-mails indicating Allen was supposed to meet someone. But she couldn’t get over the feeling it was part of a private agenda for this trip.

Susan closed the folder. If only she could, she’d pack up their stuff, load Mattie in the car, and just head straight for home right now. She really hated this place. The last straw had been the sheriff—of all people—stealing her panties.

Mattie let out a shriek of laughter in the next room.

Rubbing her head, Susan got up from the table and conducted another window check. She tried to figure it out. Allen had last been seen at Rosie’s Roadside Sundries. Somewhere between there and this house, he’d disappeared. That teenager, Jordan Prewitt, he’d been at the store the same time as Allen. And he’d mentioned yesterday that he was one of their closest neighbors, a little over a mile away.

Susan went back to the dining room table and pulled a pen from her purse. She wrote on the back of Allen’s MapQuest directions:

Dear A,