Wicked Release (27 page)

45

L
yle took one glass of Woodford from Jess's hand, the ice creating a sweaty moisture clinging to the outside. He took a sip, then thrust it back into her hands as though she was his waitress.
No . . . worse than that,
thought Jess. A waitress drops off a drink and is done with it. He was treating her like a piece of human furniture.

“I saw you chatting with someone over there. Was it who I think it was?”

Fear rose like a storm cloud on an already dark day. Jess fought to keep hold of her wits. “I can't read your thoughts. I don't know
who
you think it was.”

He jerked her arm, yanking her closer to him. “Don't be fucking cute with me. Your detective is on board, isn't he?”

“He is, but he's not here as a detective. He's here as my exboyfriend and a fellow dominant in the community. There's nothing for you to worry about. He'll get over me eventually.” She batted her eyelashes at Lyle, nibbling the corner of her lip. “He can't take me to the places I need to go. He's not man enough.”

He yanked the glass from her hand, drinking the contents in one gulp before tossing it onto a side table. Still grasping the upper part of her arm, he pulled her down the stairs, throwing her into one of the rooms. The door slammed shut behind him. “You know where we are?” She looked around, not recognizing the room from Elliot's tour the night before.

“It's the playroom,” Lyle answered impatiently, pulling the revolver from his waistband. His index finger stroked the trigger, his pure joy from holding the gun evident by the gentle smile on his face. “You ever been shot before, Jessica?” he asked.

She dug her feet into the carpet as he gripped her arm, pulling her deeper into the room. “I'm going to take your silence as a no,” he continued. “Well let me tell you, it hurts like a bitch. For years, I ran drugs for Elliot like a little fucking errand boy. I was being groomed to take over. I couldn't wait for him to retire and give the drug ring to me. It didn't seem like he was ever going to leave. And that's when they came to me with an even better offer. I'd still be a runner, but the pay was three times what Elliot offered. And though having organs in my car is a little messier than drugs, the money more than makes up for it. I didn't even give a shit at that point if Elliot stayed or left. Except one stipulation of my new job, the one catch, was that I had to keep on pretending that I was his errand boy. I had to keep tabs on him. And your sister. Make sure they were doing everything they needed to.”

“Oh my God,” Jess gasped as the pieces all fell into place. “Organs. You're illegally harvesting organs, aren't you? Is Elliot a part of this?”

“Your precious Elliot wanted nothing to do with this. They managed to blackmail him into using the boat for surgeries, but other than that, he's squeaky clean. If you don't mind being in love with a drug dealer, that is. He's a fucking moron. The money from the drugs is nothing compared to what we get for organs. Hundreds of thousands. And the more kids we get hooked on O, the more organs we have to sell.”

“Christine harvests them during her autopsies.” She meant it to be a question, but even as she asked it, she already knew the answer. Had seen it with her own eyes when Christine dropped off Dylan's heart.

“You're a smart girl, you know that?”

“But, my sister . . . she didn't . . . she didn't know about this, did she?”

“No,” he grunted. “She was clueless. Until that moron doctor friend of hers stuck his nose where it didn't belong. He and your detective friend practically pulled the trigger themselves.”

“But they didn't pull the trigger—
you
did.” Jess winced as he jerked her closer into his body. “I thought you cared about Cass?”

“I did!” he shouted, his voice becoming shriller with every passing moment. “I fucking
loved
her. But she betrayed me. She betrayed all of us. Went behind our backs, working with that detective. Calling you, trying to leave a clue because she feared for her life. I wasn't planning on killing her that night exactly. But she was going to die. No amount of love I had for her could have stopped it.”

“You said someone else was there when she died? . . . Who? If I'm going to die as well, I need to know.”

“Marc was there. He and I were always in charge of getting the drugs from the parties.”

The other night when Lyle dropped her off. She had opened the medical records in his backseat. She didn't think he was paying attention, but of course he was. She had stayed awake long enough for him to get down to the tunnel and sneak into the house and attack her.

“My phone—the phone I lost the night Cass called . . . the night she died. Did you orchestrate that, too?” she asked.

“We have people in New York . . . all over, really. It wasn't hard for us to get that phone out of your possession.”

They'd been watching her long before she ever knew any of this existed. A raging fear coursed in her body, leaving her desperate and shaking. “I-I mean, I understand. You had to do what you had to do to survive. To . . . thrive.” She smoothed her hand up his chest, curving her palm around the back of his neck.

His grin twisted painfully as his free hand latched onto her throat, squeezing. “You can drop the act now, Jessica,” he growled, slamming her head against the wall behind her. Pinpricks of various colors blurred in her vision. Her purse slipped from her grasp and hit the floor as she attempted to open it, attempted to access the knife buried inside. “I knew you were lying in Elliot's bedroom . . . and yet, I thought this could be fun. Give you hope. Then again, I didn't expect your boyfriend to show up tonight.”

Jess clawed at his hand around her neck, wheezing for a breath, any oxygen she could get into her lungs. There had to be an escape. It couldn't end like this. The pain as his grip tightened was nothing compared to the pure glee she saw in his eyes as he literally stole the last breaths from her body.

The pain melted into weariness; an exhaustion that was planted deep in her bones. He knew just when to ease up on his grip to keep her conscious. He wanted her to feel it. To be present until the utter last moment. If only she could get the gun from his hands. Turn it on him. But her brain wasn't sending the signals to her arms fast enough anymore.

A pounding settled in her brain and just as she thought the world was going to go dark again, Lyle released her throat. She gasped for air, coughing, her lungs burning as she was able to breathe again. There was a pounding in her head—
no, it isn't in my head,
thought Jess. It was knocking on the door.

“Boss, there's a situation out here,” said a voice from the hallway.

Lyle growled, lunging for the doorknob. But Jess knew that voice. Would know it anywhere. She slid along the wall, grabbing her purse and getting out of the way. As Lyle unlocked and swung the door open, a fist slammed into his face. His neck rocked backward as Sam launched himself at Lyle, but even after taking the first blow, Lyle was ready for the fight. Sam had his gun in the air, but Lyle was faster. He yanked Jess by her hair, pulling her back against himself like a human shield. This time the barrel of Lyle's gun pushed into her skull. Drops of blood from Lyle's nose dripped down her arm.

“I will fucking make a Rorschach painting using her brains if you don't back off,” Lyle snarled.

Sam kept his gun drawn, but maneuvered his body out of the way of the door. “Let her go. Release her and we can work something out.”

Lyle snorted, the movement causing another spray of blood to fan out down Jess's arm. “You don't think I'm stupid enough to believe that?”

“What do you want, then?” Sam said.

“I want you to go out there and call off your men. Tell them to stand down. Whatever it is you say to get them to back the fuck off. Or I will put a bullet in her head.”

“Okay. You got it.” Sam's voice was cool. Too cool. And his relaxed state was chilling in its lack of emotion. “But you've got to let her go.”

“You're kidding, right? She's the only reason I'm alive.”

“Take me as your hostage instead.”

Jess couldn't see Lyle behind her but he tightened his hold around her hair. “You must think I'm stupid. Switching out a woman like her for a man who could overpower me? Not a chance. She comes with me until I'm safely off this boat.”

“And how exactly are you going to manage that? Walk through a party of hundreds of people with a gun and a hostage?” Jess could see the tightness of Sam's muscles despite the calmness of his voice. She could see it in the white-knuckled grip he had on his gun.

“I have a plan. Now . . . call off your men.”

Sam's eyes flashed before he called into the hallway. “Stand down! He's coming out and he's got Jess.”

Lyle kept his eyes on Sam as he exited the room and backed down the hallway. The empty hallway, Jess noticed. She was positioned flush against his body, still acting as his shield. They reached a staircase, but Sam followed, the barrel of the gun pointed in her direction. Though she knew he was careful, waiting for his shot, it was unnerving staring into that steel cylinder. One wrong move on either side of her and she was a dead woman. “Stop following me, Detective!” Lyle's voice sounded more panicked with each passing second.

“Or what?” Sam said.

“I'll shoot her!”

“You'll lose your only bargaining chip and you'll be dead less than a second after you pull the trigger. And you know it. You're smarter than that . . . Lyle, wasn't it?”

Lyle's steps slowed behind Jess and her scalp was being pulled so hard that the nerve endings were close to being numb. “Where's your team of people, Detective?” He cackled in her ear. “There's no one else here, is there?”

She could feel the anxiety in Sam, even from how far away he was down the hall, just as much as she could feel the readiness in his body, the way his muscles were braced to react at any moment. “I told them to stand down. They're obeying orders.”

She could feel Lyle's heart slamming into her back and it mirrored her own racing pulse. He pulled her down a small set of stairs and then they stopped, as if they were pressed up against something.
A wall? A door?

Sam rushed to the top of the stairs. “The thing is, Lyle, I don't think you're going to kill her. I think you care about her. And you already had to kill someone else you cared about, didn't you? You already had to kill Cass.”

Lyle inhaled sharply, a small sniff at the base of Jess's hair before he spoke. “Death is the ultimate form of control.” His voice was venomous.

Jess clenched her eyes shut, not wanting to look behind her, but also aching to know where she was being taken. Lyle kicked at the door, using his foot to knock. She heard a curse from inside.

“We cannot open this door!” a male voice called from inside.

“It's an emergency!” Lyle shouted.

“You'll have to kill me to take her through that door without me, Lyle. And the second you move the gun to point it at me instead of her, I'll have my clear shot to your forehead. And you know it. Better to give yourself up now,” said Sam.

“You know what else I know?” Lyle said. “You're here
alone.
And inside this room are more of my people. Armed. Ready.” Lyle kicked at the door again. “Let me in, goddammit. Now!”

Jess slowly moved her hand, unclasping her purse. With Lyle's body rocking and him kicking the door, he didn't feel her as she pulled out the Swiss Army knife, opening one of the blades.

Sam's eyes followed her movements. He shook his head in warning, but she had to defend herself. She couldn't stand there like a victim anymore. Curving her palm around the knife, she hid it in her hand, pressing it flush against her wrist and forearm, the point digging into her flesh.

There was more murmuring from the other side of the door and as it swung open, Lyle ducked inside. Sam launched off the top step, knocking the door wider just before it shut. There was a commotion of shouts and screams and Jess used the distraction to plunge her knife into Lyle's thigh. The other noise around her dulled as the room filled with his scream. His gun fell and skittered across the room, landing in a corner near a stainless-steel rolling cart. Jess shoved off of his falling body at the same time she made eye contact with Christine, dressed in scrubs. Christine wasn't a killer. She was a surgeon. A medical examiner who had participated in some very shady things. But she didn't strike Jess as being a murderer. And yet, it was as though a rubber band snapped between them and they both lunged for the gun.

Behind her Jess could hear grunting and punches being thrown and shouting, and she wondered if Sam had lost his gun in the struggle. She needed Lyle's gun. Without it she was helpless.
They
were helpless. She and Christine landed on the floor at the same time, hands grasping for the weapon. Jess pulled her knee up, delivering a sharp blow to Christine's nose. The woman cried out, hands going to her face as blood flowed through her fingers.

“You fucking bitch!” she screamed.

“You bet your fucking ass I am,” Jess yelled, and kicked the woman again, her foot connecting to her chest. The hard blow sent Christine onto her back.

Jess stood, wrapping her hand around the warm metal handle of the revolver. She was dizzy. Her throat ached and each breath felt like fire entering her lungs. But she had the upper hand, at least. She swiveled, backed against the wall, and grabbed Sam's gun where it had rolled into the corner.