Love me to death

not walk far, only to the empty barn less than fifty yards from the house. Not even the length of half a football field. But I acknowledge that it is cold and she is surpassing my expectations by not complaining.

I am right to keep her alive for a few more days.

I take another key and unlock the large padlock on the barn door. I push up the metal latch and the wind blows the door inward. We step in and I close it behind us, latching it from the inside. It is still cold, but not windy, and my female says, “Thank you.”

“Thank you” is the only phrase she’s allowed to say without permission.

I nod, and motion for her to walk to one of the stalls on the right. She obeys.

“Step inside,” I command.

She hesitates. The last time we were in the barn it was for punishment. She raises her hand.

I say, “You may speak.”

“What did I do to displease you?” she asks, her voice quivering from cold and fear. I prefer the fear.

“You are a woman,” I tell her. I motion toward the saddle on the wooden sawhorse. She knows what to do. I do not have to instruct her again.

I don’t like to repeat myself.

She whimpers, but bends over the sawhorse and exposes her bare ass to me.

I smile.

I take the paddle off its hook and stare at her backside.

You will behave. You will learn your lesson! I think I shout the command, scream it, but I don’t say a word.

I smack her and she cries out. It does not matter how loud she screams; no one will hear her. I hit her ass with the paddle again, the slap of wood on flesh arousing.

But I will not put my penis in this vile woman. I have not touched any of them like that. I do not know where they have been. I will take care of my needs later.

First I must punish this female.

I hit her over and over, faster and faster, and she’s screaming and crying. One last smack and the sawhorse falls over and she lies there, sobbing, her backside bloodied.

“Get up,” I tell her.

She doesn’t. I grab her and pull her to her feet. She cries out in pain and falls to her knees.

“You will crawl back to your cage,” I order her.

I raise the paddle.

She begins to crawl. I open the barn door and she crawls through the snow.

I smile.

Even the most stubborn females can learn to obey.

Even Lucy Kincaid.

EIGHT

Though after meeting Kate Donovan Noah didn’t think she was a viable suspect, he still took the time to clear both Donovan and her husband, Dillon Kincaid, of Morton’s murder first thing Friday morning. At his desk, he glanced through the reports and statements again. Their alibis were airtight-not only were they out of town, but they’d had dinner with the warden of Petersburg Federal Penitentiary on the night Morton was killed.

A rock-solid alibi didn’t mean that Kate hadn’t hired someone to ice the rapist. But nothing in her financials, or her husband’s, or Lucy Kincaid’s, indicated that they’d hired a hit man. Noah passed the financials over to an analyst for further scrutiny but didn’t expect to learn anything different.

It wasn’t out of the realm of possibility that Kate knew the sort of guy who would take down a prick like Morton out of the goodness of his heart, but that was a stretch. Noah was a good judge of character. He generally believed the worst in people until they proved otherwise, yet Kate simply didn’t hold up as a cold-blooded killer. Had she known Morton was in D.C. and wanted him dead, Noah suspected she would have done it herself, and his body would have never been found.

Abigail walked in a few minutes after nine with two cups of coffee. “Didn’t know how you liked it,” she said, putting his cup down and dumping packets of fake cream and sweetener from her pocket onto his desk.

“Black,” he said. “And thanks.”

“Should you ever decide to bring me coffee, I drink mine light. Very light.”

“Duly noted.”

“Anything juicy? Smoking gun? Alibi didn’t check?”

He shook his head. “The Kincaids-Kate and Dillon-check out. Morton was killed with a nine-millimeter-Kate has her service pistol, a Glock.45, and a personal firearm, a.38 revolver. Her husband doesn’t have a gun registered to him. Lucy Kincaid is licensed to carry, owns a.22 and an H amp;K.45. Not that any of those facts means squat, considering their connections to RCK and law enforcement-and buying a gun on the street would be easy for anyone who knows even a fraction about the underground that Donovan does.”

Abigail laughed humorlessly. “It sounds like you want one of them to be guilty.”

“No, I just don’t assume that they’re innocent.”

“Whatever happened to ‘innocent until proven guilty’?”

He just stared. In his three short years with the FBI, most suspects were guilty.

Abigail shook her head. “Come on, Armstrong. Kate Donovan had nothing to do with Morton’s murder and you know it.”

“I’m inclined to agree.”

“Did Lucy Kincaid come in yet?”

“She called this morning and said she’d be in at ten.”

“I’m surprised Kate is letting her come alone.”

“I suspect that Lucy does what Lucy wants to do.” Noah didn’t think Lucy had faked her reaction when told that Morton was out of prison. It was too raw. He supposed she could be an extraordinary actress, but he didn’t see it. In fact, in Lucy he saw a rare quality: the inability to lie.

Half the night, he’d been thinking about what she’d said and how she’d reacted. She’d been on his mind when he woke this morning after four hours sleep. He’d come in early to finish reading the files and financials that had landed on his desk at eight a.m. And he’d done more research on Lucy Kincaid.

Out of all the suspects, had Lucy shot and killed Morton, she would have gotten away with it even if she’d called the police and confessed. No jury would have convicted her after hearing what she’d suffered at the hands of Morton and his sick partner.

Noah honestly didn’t know exactly what to make of Lucy Kincaid, which made her both suspicious and intriguing. Her FBI file was surprisingly thick-and he’d been able to access it only after Hans Vigo cleared him. Few people knew that she’d killed Adam Scott, pulling the trigger six times, emptying a.357 revolver into his chest. It disturbed Noah, showing him that she could and would kill if threatened.

Six bullets was overkill.

Except he hadn’t been there. And if he’d learned anything in the military, it was to avoid the shortsighted criticism of the politicians and media sitting high and mighty-and safe-in the states, second-guessing command decisions when they didn’t understand the immediate threat.

Morton had been killed with a single bullet to the back of the head. The point of impact told Noah that the killer knew exactly what he was doing and where to aim.

Executions were for betrayal or money. And depending on the criminal enterprise, they were carried out in a variety of ways. A single bullet suggested a calculated hit. It seemed impersonal. A hit or business.

Could Morton have been killed for a reason completely unconnected to his past criminal enterprises? Or by someone upset that he’d turned state’s evidence? Who had suffered when Trask Enterprises went down?