Deadly Illusions (Hardy Brothers Security Book 3) (15 page)

“Oh, yeah, continue.”

“He suggested having the security personnel go through the footage from the Pritchard case and see if they could find a match to our footage,” Mandy said.

“So, you sweet talked Clint,” James supplied.

“I felt guilty about that and couldn’t do it,” Mandy said. “You know how Clint is. It makes me uncomfortable. So, the judge ordered him to do it for me.”

James barked out a laugh. “You’re always full of surprises. What did you find?”

“He sent me two possibilities,” Mandy said. “I ruled out the first one right away. He was too tall.”

“And the second?”

“It’s him.”

“You’re sure?”

“I’m sure.”

“Okay,” James said. “Now we just have to put a name to the face.”

“I’ve already done that, too.”

“Seriously?”

“What? All I had to do was take the time stamp from the court footage and then match it up to the witness list,” Mandy said. “It’s not like it was rocket science.”

“I am so turned on right now.”

“Just to make sure, I then Googled the name,” Mandy said. “It came back to a chemistry graduate student at Wayne State University.”

James sucked in a breath. “What’s the name, baby?”

“Andrew Wayne,” Mandy said. “He was a victim of Pritchard’s, and Pritchard was really sadistic with him. There was piano wire involved.”

James swore under his breath. “Do you have an address for him now?”

“What? Do I have to do everything?”

“Is there an address in the file for where he lived at the time?”

Mandy recited it back to him.

“This is great,” James said. “I’m going to take you out to a special dinner when this is all over with. I’ll even watch one of those stupid shark marathons on the SyFy channel with you. You’ll have to be naked to make it worth my while, but I’ll totally watch it with you.”

Mandy bit her bottom lip.

“I can hear your mind working over the phone,” James said.

“Just … remember, he was a victim, too.”

“I know,” James said. “I’ll do what I can. Emma has to be our priority.”

“I know.”

“Mandy?”

“Yeah.”

“I love you.”

“I love you, too.”

EMMA
was almost out of bread. Finn had been in the shower for more than ten minutes, which probably meant he would be getting out soon. She should finish up here and then get inside. They had a lot to do today – including going to the rental office at the apartment complex. Emma had decided she was comfortable here. She liked the neighborhood and the proximity to easy shopping. She wanted to stay. She was hoping to get a unit in Mandy’s building. Even though the blonde was rarely there, the idea of being close to her unit was a bonus.

Emma grabbed the final two slices of bread and shredded them, tossing the pieces into the air so the geese could fight over them. She crumpled the empty bag in her hand and turned back toward the apartment.

The man standing on the adjacent patio staring at her caused her to pull up short.
When had he gotten here?
She hadn’t even heard him approach.

Emma studied the man closely. He looked harmless enough. His blond hair was shorn close to his scalp, and his green eyes were clear and sharp. His face was handsome, that weird, crooked nose making him interesting to look at.

“Hi,” she greeted him. “I’m sorry, I didn’t see you there.”

The man didn’t respond. Emma didn’t like the way he was looking at her.

“Well, um, I have to be getting back inside.”

Emma moved toward the sliding door, her hand already on the handle, when something stopped her. That something was the man. He was right next to her now, his hand on top of hers as she tried to slide the screen back so she could step inside.

Emma swallowed hard.

Uh-oh.

Finn shut the water off and reached around the shower curtain to grab the towel off of the counter. This was the last clean one, which meant someone was going to have to do laundry today. Funnily enough, the idea of doing something as domestic as laundry with Emma had the same appeal as taking her out on the town. More even.

Finn glanced down at his phone, which was sitting on the closed toilet lid, and checked to see if he’d missed any calls or messages. Nothing. It’s not like he expected the case to magically solve itself or anything, but he would feel better when he knew Emma was safe. When that happened, they would be able to focus on each other and really get to know one another.

Finn was smiling as he plugged his electrical razor into the outlet, flipping the switch. He opted for a close shave today – as close as he could get. He had visions of rubbing his cheeks against every soft part of Emma’s skin later in the day. He would need a close shave for that, even if he doubted that Emma would complain about the stubble burn.

It took Finn about five minutes to complete his task. After splashing on some aftershave, and stashing the razor in the drawer, he dressed quickly. Emma was probably still outside feeding those infernal birds. He had no idea why she was so taken with them. When she’d told him her idea to move into the building, Finn had requested she pick a unit on the second or third floor. Balconies were much safer than patios in places like this – which was another reason James didn’t want Mandy to spend a lot of time at the apartment. When Emma had argued, Finn realized it was because of the stupid geese. He told her she could always walk down to the pond and feed them every day if she wanted to. Reluctantly, she had finally agreed.

Once he was satisfied that he looked as good as he possibly could, he reached down and grabbed his phone, frowning when the missed-call bubble flashed on the screen. Finn peered at it closely for a second, recognizing James’ number. He punched the voice mail button and held up the phone to his ear to listen.

EMMA
didn’t know what to do. Technically, the man wasn’t doing anything to her. He was just watching her. Staring. Staring rather intently, in fact. Sure, he’d put his hand on hers to stop her from opening the door, but that couldn’t be regarded as overtly hostile.

Maybe he was in some sort of trouble? Maybe he needed help?

“Is something wrong?” Emma asked, purposely putting some distance between herself and the stranger.

The man just stood there mutely.

“Do you need help? Do you need me to make a call or something? If so, I have a phone inside.”

Still nothing.

Emma was moving beyond worried and passing straight into terror. Something wasn’t right here. “I, um, need to go inside. My boyfriend is waiting for me.”

The man finally spoke. “Your boyfriend?”

Emma nodded. “Yeah. He’s right in there.”

The man wrinkled his nose, disgust washing over his features. “You have no idea who I am, do you?”

Emma faltered. Now that he mentioned it, there
was
something familiar about his face. “I’m sorry, I … did I meet you at a show?”

Silence again.

“Was it at Detcon? I met a lot of people there,” Emma said, wringing her hands nervously. “Most of them were in makeup, so they’re not so easy to remember.”

If two years of modeling had taught Emma anything, it was that strangers at events always expected you to remember them. It never occurred to them that theirs was merely one of a thousand faces she saw each day. In their minds, they always thought they were special.

“What’s Detcon?” The man asked, furrowing his brow.

“It’s the Detroit ComicCon,” Emma replied, furrowing her brow. “I guess that’s not where I met you.”

“No.”

Emma searched her memory. “Were you at the ice festival last weekend?”

“No.”

“Were you at the boat show?”

The man shifted slightly, the look on his face making Emma’s blood turn to ice.

“Oh … .”

“Yeah, oh,” the man sneered.

Emma considered screaming for Finn. The man would be on her before she finished yelling, but maybe Finn would be quick enough to pull him off of her before he did any real damage. She didn’t make a sound, though. Instead, she waited.

The man just kept staring at her, making her skin crawl. That’s when she knew.

“You’re one of them, aren’t you?”

“One of whom?”

“One of my father’s … one of the people my father hurt.”

“Yeah, I’m one of them.”

Emma searched the man’s face. She’d sat through her father’s entire trial – listening to the depraved things he’d done every chance he got. After a certain amount of time, the faces became a blur. The stories, though, they were etched in her mind. She woke up screaming from the stories at least once a week.

Emma was resigned. “Which one?”

“You don’t know?”

“I know your names,” Emma said. “Not your faces.”

“Why don’t you know our faces?”

Emma decided to be honest. “Because your faces all melded together in my mind,” Emma said. “It was your stories that made an impact.”

The man tilted his head to the side, considering. “In a weird way, I guess that makes sense.”

“So, what’s your name?”

“Andrew … .”

“Andrew Wayne,” Emma finished for him, her face draining of color when his story pushed forward. The things her father had done to Andrew – some of which hadn’t even come out in court – were horrific.

“So, you do know my name,” he mused.

“I try to know all of your names.”

“What else do you know?”

“I know what he did to you,” Emma said. “I know all of it.”

“You don’t know all of it,” he argued. “You can’t know all of it.”

“I know what came out in court,” Emma clarified. “I also know what didn’t come out in court. There was some stuff … there was some stuff that only made it into the police reports.”

Andrew watched her expectantly. “And what are the things that you think you know?”

“I know about the piano wire,” Emma said. “I know that he … tied you to the bench.”

“That was public record,” Andrew shot back. “Everyone got to know about that.”

“I know about the basement, too,” Emma said.

Andrew stiffened. “You know about the basement?”

“I know about the basement,” Emma said. “I know that he tied you up down there with your hands above your head, and your feet about three inches off the ground. I know that he let you hang there for so long you thought your arms were going to fall off. I know he stripped you, and he degraded you, and that was before he got the belt out.”

Emma swallowed the sob bubbling in her throat. “I know that when he finally got around to raping you, it was almost a relief,” she said. “Because that meant, when he was done, he would let you down, or at least you hoped that would be the case.

“And, sometimes he would,” she continued. “Sometimes he would just rape you the one time and be done with you. Then he’d offer you something to eat, maybe even a beer to make you feel better. Then he’d let you go and send you on your way.”

Andrew was watching Emma, fury and fear warring for dominance on his face.

“Other times he would leave you up there,” Emma said. “He would go and make himself a sandwich and have a beer of his own while he watched television a few feet away. All the while you would be hanging there – waiting.

“And you knew,” Emma said. “You knew he would come for you again. And no matter how bad it was, you’d just hang there and hope he’d finish that sandwich and that the beer wouldn’t desensitize him so much that the rape would go on that much longer.”

“How do you know that?” Andrew asked. “I never told anyone that.”

Emma ignored him. “And, even after all of that, you felt guiltier about the times he only raped you once,” she said. “You felt guilty because you took the sandwich – and the beer – and then you went on your way and pretended nothing happened. Those were the times you felt dirtiest.”

“How do you know that?” Andrew hissed, stepping closer.

“Because he did it to me, too.”

FINN
heard the entire exchange from his hiding spot. After talking to James, he’d been relieved to hear they had a viable suspect. He’d been on the way outside to tell Emma the good news when he realized it was already too late.

He’d seen Emma and Andrew Wayne talking through the sliding glass doors, recognizing him almost instantaneously.  As much as Finn wanted to run right through those doors to get to her, to put himself between her and a mad man, he knew that would be a mistake.

So, instead, he’d exited the apartment through the front door and made the long trek around the building so he could approach them from behind Andrew. Since the day was warmer, the snow was melting, making it soft. Thankfully for Finn, the soft snow didn’t crunch under his boots. He’d been slowly making his way closer, taking refuge behind the central-air conditioning units positioned outside of each apartment, as he listened.

Listening hurt worse than trying to get to her.

Emma hadn’t seen him, Finn was fairly certain of that. She was focused on Andrew. As hard as her words had been to hear, they’d kept Andrew fixated on her and oblivious to what was happening behind him. One more unit – just one more – and he’d be close enough to Andrew to take him down. He just had to wait for his moment.

“He did it to you?” Andrew was incredulous. “He liked boys. He only did it to boys.”

“He did prefer boys,” Emma said. “That doesn’t mean he didn’t do it to me, too. With me it was about power.”

“He said he couldn’t get it up for girls,” Andrew countered. “He said that’s why he had to be with me. He said I was helping him, because otherwise he would go crazy. I was stupid. I believed him. I thought I was somehow special. I thought, even while he was torturing me, that I was somehow special.”

“He’s a liar,” Emma said. “He lies. That’s what he does. If he couldn’t get it up for women, how do you think he managed to father two children?”

Finn cursed internally. Emma was purposely baiting Andrew now. While that kept Andrew fixated on her, it also ran the risk of infuriating him to the point where he would attack her before Finn could get close enough to stop him.

“I didn’t think of that,” Andrew admitted.

“Andrew, my father was a monster,” she said. “He did monstrous things, and he didn’t do them because he was hurt or broken. He did them because he liked to. He’s a sadist. That’s what they do.”

“Why didn’t you tell anyone?”

Emma shrugged. “I kept waiting for my mother or brother to come and save me. I didn’t realize … I didn’t realize that they were both his victims, too.”

Finn crawled forward, his hands digging into the snow. It was cold, almost unbearable, but he had to keep low. Once he was behind the air-conditioning unit closest to Andrew, he paused long enough to shove his hands under his shirt to warm them up, and then he focused on controlling his breathing so Andrew wouldn’t be able to hear it.

“They were his victims? But, in court, your brother denied he ever touched him.”

“He didn’t want to admit it,” Emma said. “He’d already lost all of his friends when they found out. They were teasing him, asking him if he liked it. He just denied it. In some ways it was easier for him. In others … well, he’s paid a terrible price, too.”

“And your mother?”

“He did all those things to her, at least that’s what she told me,” Emma said. “She told me before she left. I didn’t believe her then. I thought she was just making excuses for not seeing what he was doing.”

“Do you believe her now?”

Emma shrugged. “I think I do.”

Andrew shook his head from side to side violently. “That’s not right.”

“What’s not right?”

“You covered for him. I know you did.”

Emma ran her tongue over her dry lips. “I guess, in a way, I did. I should have told someone what was happening to me. It wouldn’t have saved everyone. He was doing it to other boys for years before he started in on me. It would have saved the boys after, though.”

“Why didn’t you tell anyone?”

“Shame.”

“Do you think that’s a good enough reason?” Andrew pressed.

“No, but it’s the only reason I have.” Emma studied Andrew, her face nonplussed. “Can I ask you something?”

“I guess.”

“Why did you decide to come after me?”

“I wanted revenge,” Andrew said. “You knew and you did nothing. I wanted to take something from you – like he took something from me. I’d been following you for weeks when I finally decided I couldn’t take it any longer. I had to do something.

“I kept seeing you at all those modeling gigs. You were always smiling and happy,” he continued. “I haven’t been happy since before I met your father. I certainly haven’t smiled since I met him. I didn’t think you deserved to be happy.”