No Escape (17 page)

“So we’re screwed, is that it? We know Gibson did it and we can’t touch him.” Anger crept up inside Lauren and outweighed the residual fear that caromed inside her.

“Sisco said that Gibson killed those women. But for all we know, he was lying. Maybe he was the killer and was framing Gibson, and Roylston just executed him tonight to put an end to everything. There might not be any more White Rabbit killings.”

Lauren pinned him with her gaze. “Do you think the killing is going to stop?”

Heath returned her gaze full measure for a moment, then he blew out a disgusted breath and shook his head. “No. Whoever killed Janet and your sister and all those other women, he’s gotten a taste for blood. Could be he’s always had it. Whatever the case, it’s not going away. I don’t believe Sisco was the killer.”

“So we’re just supposed to pack up and leave? That’s your answer?”

Heath spoke softly, rationally, and that came close to infuriating Lauren. “Leaving is the best thing to do.” He paused and shook his head. “Believe me, I don’t like it any more than you do.”

“What happens to the next girl that Gibson goes after?”

“We need to regroup, find a new way to go at this.”

“You’re just giving him time to kill again. You’ve already said that his timetable is accelerating. How many women can he kill while we’re regrouping?” Lauren answered before Heath could. “I don’t know if you can answer that, but I can tell you this—even one person is too many. You can leave if you want to, but I’m staying.”

Slowly, Heath stood and came over to her. “You’re a stubborn woman.”

“No.” Lauren looked up into his eyes, and she remembered the kisses in the back of the taxi. For a minute she thought he was going to try something like that again. “I’m just right, and you know it.”

“You are right. So we’ll play this out until we’ve got the answers we’re looking for or we’re in jail.” Heath looked at his watch. “You should get some sleep. Tomorrow’s going to start early.”

He walked over to the bed, and Lauren briefly thought he intended to stretch out on it, which didn’t sound as awkward as it should have. Instead, he pulled a pillow from the bed and crossed the room to the couch. He lay down, kicked off his shoes, and placed the big revolver under his pillow.

“What are you doing?”

“I’m not leaving you alone tonight. That’s not happening.”

Lauren wanted to protest because she didn’t like the idea of Heath invading her space, but she also didn’t want to be alone. Reluctantly, she walked to the bed and stripped off the top blanket, then gave it to Heath, surprising him. He didn’t say anything, though, and Lauren was glad. She didn’t know what he would say, and she definitely didn’t know what kind of reply she would make to anything he said.

She returned to the bed, pulled the blanket and sheet back and crawled in before shutting off the lamp. Darkness enveloped them and quietness filled the room.

For a long time, she lay there listening to Heath breathe. After a few minutes, his breathing deepened, and she knew that he had gone to sleep. She felt tired and she wanted to go to sleep, but memory of the shooting and the way Heath had kissed her in the back of the taxi danced in her head, keeping her alert and thinking until sleep finally claimed her.

Chapter 13

B
right sunlight slanting through the heavy curtains woke Lauren. She shifted in bed and tried to doze off again, but then she spotted Heath Sawyer’s lanky body overrunning the small couch at both ends and knew she wasn’t getting back to sleep anytime soon.

He slept like a kid, on his back with one arm folded over his eyes. Sometime after he’d gone to bed, he’d taken off his shirt and lay there naked to the waist. His body was hard, his chest was broad, chiseled from working out, and the sight of that smooth, bronze skin awakened a hunger in Lauren that she’d never felt before. She made herself look at his face, but she couldn’t maintain her concentration.

Giving up, she got out of bed as quietly as she could, knowing that he needed his sleep. He’d been putting in a lot of hours watching over Gibson, and that had gone on for days before she had joined him.

He turned slightly on the couch, and the blanket drifted farther south. That movement caught Lauren’s attention, but his shirt hung by itself on the back of a nearby chair, so she guessed that he was still partially dressed. However, the scar on his left side was revealed. It was pale white with age, but stood out against the tan skin and was at least five inches long. She knew it wasn’t from an appendectomy, because it was on the wrong side and ran too vertical.

The scar and the tan both made her curious because she wanted to know where he’d gotten them. The tan looked real, gotten from working outside, not from a tanning bed, and a homicide detective didn’t often have cause to take his shirt off at work.

Blood spatters had ruined his shirt. Lauren felt a queasy roll in her stomach just for a moment, then she forced the feeling away. She was surprised that no one had noticed the blood last night, but it had been dark. There was no way Heath was going to be able to walk around in daylight without someone calling the police.

And staying in the hotel room all day, as intriguing as that seemed given the sparks that had flared between them last night, wasn’t something Lauren was prepared to risk. The hunt for Megan’s killer was complicated enough without pursuing whatever that had been, and she was more than willing to admit it was a mistake brought on by adrenaline.

She knew she needed to get out of the room, away from Heath Sawyer, and clear her head. A brief shopping spree would serve as a good distraction.

Lauren grabbed khaki pants and an orange pullover that she knew fit her nicely and flattered her figure. She headed to the bathroom.

* * *

Heath’s cell phone woke him with a start. He rolled over on the couch, feeling the aches from sleeping in the cramped space, and grabbed the cell from the floor by the couch. He pulled it to his ear. “Hello.”

“Good morning, Detective Sawyer. Sleep well?”

At first, Heath didn’t recognize the caller because he’d never before heard him on the phone. “Who is this? How did you get this number?”

“It wasn’t hard. I got your friend Janet’s number, too.”

“Gibson.” Heath recognized the carefully enunciated words and laid-back tone then. Gibson was giving a performance.

Heath threw the blanket off and sat up on the couch. He pulled his gun from under the pillow and looked at the hotel door. The interior locks were no longer in place. A trickle of fear snaked down his spine. He glanced over at the bed and saw that it had been made.

Lauren was gone.

Heath got to his feet and shouldered the phone. He walked toward the bathroom, fearing what he might find in there. Even though it didn’t make sense that Gibson or his men could have gotten into the hotel, much less known where it was, it also didn’t make sense that they would kill Lauren and leave him alive.

Except now he’s playing games with you. He’s moved into a new phase of his killing.

“You can call me whatever name you want to. I’ll answer to it.”

Heath rounded the corner to the bathroom with his revolver at the ready. He peered into the room, but it was too dark to see the shower. Flipping on the light switch beside him, his pulse beating at his temples, he looked at the shadows created by the white shower curtain.

There was no blood on the floor. If Lauren had been killed like Janet, there would have been blood everywhere. Heath crossed the room and whipped the shower curtain back. When he saw that it was empty, contained none of the horrors he’d imagined, he let out a long breath.

“What do you want, Gibson?” Turning from the shower, Heath padded barefoot back into the room, looking for some indication of what had happened to Lauren.

Since the bed was made, he felt she’d left of her own volition. The neatly made bed also made him realize how soundly he’d slept. He’d stayed the night to protect her. Some bodyguard.

“I regret having missed you last night.”

“You didn’t miss me. Your people missed me. They didn’t miss your buddy Sisco. I didn’t see you there last night, so I suppose you keep your killing to women.” Heath gripped his pistol tightly and looked around the room, finally turning and spotting a note on the mirror of the vanity outside the bathroom.

Went shopping. Back soon. L.

Shopping?
Heath held back a curse and kept himself calm with effort. Last night should have taught Lauren the danger they were in.

“You made a mistake last night.” Gibson’s anger was apparent in his tone.

“No, I didn’t. It’s just going to be a matter of time till I bring you down.”

“That’s what your partner thought, didn’t she? It didn’t work out for her. It won’t work out for you.”

Gibson broke the connection before Heath could reply. He checked the view screen and only saw Unavailable there. He tried to reconnect the call, but it kept failing out. Cursing, wishing he knew where Lauren Cooper was, he called Jackson Portman.

“Yeah?” Jackson sound tired.

“Catch you at a bad time?”

“Tell me you’re on a plane for ’Lanta and I’ll get to feeling better quick.”

“Gibson just called me.”

“Why?”

“To gloat. Do me a favor—dump the phone records on this number and see if you can trace the phone number that called me this morning. It’ll be the only incoming call today. You probably won’t get anything, but it’s worth trying.”

“I can do that. When are you headed home?”

“Not now.”

“Seriously?”

“Lauren says she’s not leaving. I can’t make her go.” Heath took a breath. “And it’s not just her. I can’t leave this thing unfinished, either. We’ve poked Gibson enough that we’ve got a reaction.”

“‘We?’ That woman’s not a partner, buddy. She’s not even a cop. She’s a civilian. You’re letting her get in harm’s way. That’s not like you.”

“If I leave, she’s going to stay. I can’t let her stay without protection.”

“That’s not your problem.”

“Would you leave?”

Jackson swore.

“Yeah, I didn’t think so. I’m going to protect her, and I’m going to get the answers Janet’s family needs.”

Jackson was quiet for a moment. “Listen, Heath, you and I both have been around the block a time or two. We know there isn’t an answer for what happened to Janet. Gibson’s a predator, pure and simple. He kills because he wants to.”

“Then I’m going to find a way to put him down. I’ve got to try to give them that. I owe it to them.” Heath stared out the window at the tourists walking the street in front of the hotel. There were enough of them that he guessed one or more of the cruise ships were in the harbor.

“Okay. I’ll dump this number, see if we find anything.”

“Thanks.”

“Where’s Lauren Cooper now?”

“I don’t know.”

“Well...that’s not good.”

“I know.” Heath picked up his shirt from the back of the chair and noticed the dark bloodstains all over it. There was no way he could walk around in that shirt without getting the police called. “Get back to me when you can.”

“I will.”

Heath punched the phone off and slid it into his pocket. He took the shirt to the vanity sink and poured soap all over it, then started washing it by hand. Anxiety thrummed in him. He stared at the mirror. What could she possibly have been thinking?

Blood ran down his fingers and swirled in the sink.

* * *

Gibson stood out on the stone veranda at the back of his villa. From that point he had a breathtaking view of the ocean and the harbor in the distance. It was beautiful there early in the morning and at night when the stars filled the sky. Women he’d taken there had all been in awe of the sky and sea.

He sipped champagne and stood there in the clothes he’d worn last night. He’d fallen asleep in the chair in his office, watching some of his best performances and admiring his smooth skills while awaiting word from Roylston.

For a time he’d been enraptured by his performances. Audiences loved him and clamored to know how he did his magic. At least that was what they said. In truth, and Gibson knew this was the truth, they didn’t want to know how he did those amazing feats. They wanted to believe. No one did it better. Not Copperfield, not even Houdini himself.

The gold coin twinkled in the morning sunlight as Gibson rolled it across his knuckles. Magic had been his salvation. He’d found it as a child, watching performers and learning their tricks. Nothing about the rest of his life had satisfied him, not the riches, not the cars, not even the women.

Not until he’d learned how to kill. That was the greatest trick of all: the disappearance of another’s life. He still didn’t know where a person went when they vanished on the other side of death.

He’d been fifteen years old when he’d first killed. The nineteen-year-old girl he’d been dating had told him she was pregnant, obviously planning to burrow her way into the family money because she’d figured out who he really was and had come after him. She’d surprised him with her announcement, telling him while they’d been in a hot tub in a rented hotel room they’d gotten with his father’s money.

Gibson had lost control then. At first. He’d clamped his hands around her neck and shoved her under the water. She’d screamed, but her screams had only come out as bubbles that made no sound. She’d fought, and she’d carved furrows down his arms. The scars were still there, grayed out over the years, but reminders all the same. Now he didn’t think of them as scars. They were badges, commemorations of his performance.

After a time, too short a time, she’d stopped thrashing and had lain quietly, almost floating. The water had stilled, and he’d studied her face, so slack, so surprised. The blood from the cuts along his forearms had threaded the water with streams of scarlet fog.

That was where he’d been when his father’s security people found him after he’d called his father. Years of therapy had followed, but Gibson had worked on his magic in those places, teaching himself more and more. He’d even taught himself to hide his bloodlust from trained observers till he was finally discharged from their care. Everything was illusion.