Chapter 89

Abby's head rolled to the side as Brian cradled her in his arms. His heart was a aching stone. A flock of agents surrounded him, all looking as if they have seen a ghost.

"Ambulance is coming." Harrison said. "ETA three minutes."

Brian sat down on the curb of the parking lot and adjusted Abby on his lap. A moan escaped her lips. "Sweetheart," he said.",shaking her head gently. His voice broke. "Abby, honey, come on. It's Brian. Talk to me please. Justice is back, he missed you." He cupped her little face with his palm and he tried to get her to face him. "Come on, baby, come on."

Her pulse was steady, respiration was normal. There had been no sign of broken bones or injuries with the exception of a few bruises on her arms, roughly the size of a mans hand. They had examined her for head wounds or broken bones before they pulled her out of the trunk, and she didn't seem to have any.

But she wasn't waking up either.

"Abby." Brian raised his voice. "Jesus, talk to me___"

"Hey, look here." A deputy pushed into a circle of onlookers, holding a plastic bag. Inside was a medicine bottle. Brian couldn't see the name on the label, but it looked like a dark red liquid.

"Night time Benadryl," the deputy said. "Looks like about two capsules are missing, and here is the cap."

Brian looked around in panic. "He gave her drugs?"

Harrison laughed. "Man, my wife has threatened to do that to the kids a hundred times. Benadryl." He sounded downright joyful. "It knocks them out cold if it doesn't wire them up.'

The knot in Brian's chest loosened fractionally. Harrison was still smiling. Brian hadn't known he was married, let alone that he was a father, but he seemed to know what he was talking about. "You sure man?"

Harrison brushed a knuckle across Abby's cheek. "If this is what he gave her, she will sleep it off and be as good as new in four to six hours. We will tell the EMTs, but think about it man. Brandon hated his mother because she hurt his baby sister. It's looking more and more like he had one helluva a soft spot for Christie. Hurting kids isn't his thing. His party is with grown women."

His party was with Sarra.

2 chapters in one guys....................

Sarra tried to block out the sounds. Cries, screams, shrieks of total agony. The early morning birds and midges of the woods had all  gone silent at the first shrill cry. The forest now, appropriate, was deathly quiet.

A leggy black spider inched across the bench. Sarra had watched its erratic journey for what she presumed was the better part of a half hour now, and stupidly she wondered if spiders had ears. It was one of those things she had probably learned in fifth grade, like the names of every state capital, but she didn't remember those either. Her heart went out to the poor, lost thing, even if it couldn't hear the agony going on around it. It was no doubt searching for a web that had been there before Brandon prepared his stage.

He took away my world too, she thought as someone named Roxy squalled. Sarra closed her eyes.

Her stomach had already given up what little that was in it, her heart seeming to rip from her chest with every guttural cry that came from the tiny speakers. She tried to think about something that could force the screams into the background, but every thought in her head re voled around Abby.

Roxy shrieked in pain. Brandon sat quietly on the bench as if attending a symphony. The tape came to a unexpected end, and he popped it out and shoved another into the machine. His pistol lay next to his thigh. On first glance, he seemed careless with it, but Sarra knew better. She was out of reach, weak, and dazed her ribs and shoulder aching with every breath, and her feet crusted with dirt filled, bloody gashes. She slumped against the bench, telling herself it could only help her for him to think she was beyond the ability to hold herself upright, but wondering if she really was. If the moment came, would she be strong enough, physically, to take advantage of it?

The railing and the bench of the deer stand lined three and a half sides. If he stepped close enough to that fourth side, where the ladder descended, and if she could just get her legs tangled in his...

Then what? A quick scissor cut? A kick? she couldn't think. Someone named Roxy was dying in her ears. Roxy still two agonizing hours from death.

Suddenly Brandon pushed stop. "You are not enjoying my collection, Sarra. That is one of my favorites, and here you are more interested in that little spider than what I am trying to show you." He picked up the pistol and leaned over, squashing the spider with the butt of the gun. But not entirely. Half of its little body smeared into the wood, the other half flailed, anchored to the spot by its own gore. Brandon sat down."I guess it is time to let you hear my most recent acquisition. Someone a little closer to home might stir you."

Oh, no. Not Lexi. Sarra wasn't sure if she could handle listening to a woman who had been murdered in her own home.

Sarra turned and stared into the forest. Click. The plat button caught.

Silence. More silence. then a tiny, tiny voice, "Mommy?"

Sarr's eyes flew open. Brandon James grinned at her.

"Mommy, where are you?" Abby was sniffling, trying to sound brave. "I want to go home mommy, please. This tape is for you. Please mommy come back."

Terror transformed to red waves of rage. Blinded by it she lunged.

Brandon shoved, and Sarra smashed back against the railing. Warm liquid oozed from her shoulder again and she vaguely realized he was working the cassette player, pushing play and record simultaneously.

Fear grabbed her by her throat. It was time. He would make tapes for her murder now. And it wasn't the idea of dying that clenched at her vitals and twisted everything inside. It wasn't even the idea of the pain he would force her to endure. It was the notion that Abby might still be alive, somewhere, calling for her mommy.

"What did you do to her?" Sarra whispered.

Brandon breathed close over her face as he whispered, "I killed her. Or maybe I didn't. Maybe I left her alive and bleeding and crying. Maybe I have more tapes of her for you to hear."

"She is a little girl. Why would you do this?"

"Why?" He straightened, his mouth curled into a sneer. "You know why."

"I know I ruined things for Amy Chaney. I know I let you go to jail. But you deserved it. Even if you didn't kill Amy single handily, you deserved every moment you spent in prison and more." She glanced at the tape player. It was running, recording her stormy swan song. But maybe she could make sure something else got on the tape too. Explanations. For the families of the women Brandon killed.

Sarra lifted up her chin, speaking more clearly for the recording. "You hate me because I ended your killing spree." she glanced at the machine, oddly invigorated by the possibility of leaving explanations. Explanations she had once vowed to never reveal. "You hate me because after you raped me, I raised your daughter while you sat in prison. And how many other women were there before Amy Chaney? How many voices have you collected?"

Brandon's lips twitched at the corners, as if it amused him that Sarra knew plenty of others had walked in her shoes. "Before Amy Chaney? Hmmmm. There were three, not counting mother." He bent down, the pistol brushing Sarra's cheek. "Would you like to hear them?'

"I would like to know what a man gets from listening to women scream in pain and beg for their lives."

"Pleasure." He said simply. " Orgasms so intense sometimes I think I am dying. But mostly...silence."

Silence? He said it with such pleasure Sarra shivered, she wished she could take back her questions. She didn't want to know any of it. She didn't want to listen as this evil man took pleasure in reliving a string of torture Sarra could hardly imagine.

Oh, Abby. Where are you?

Grief smothered every emotion, and Sarra had to grit her teeth to keep from pouring out in great , gut wrenching sobs. She forced herself to concentrate on the tape, on getting something out  there in the world that would someday make sense to of this man's madness. "Why did you want to kill Amy Chaney?"

He had been pacing the long side of the deer stand but stopped. " She was a fraud. All of the frauds." He looked at her hard. "Amy Chaney was lying, deceiving slut. She had lunch with her best friend everyday  at the hotel I was working in. They had been friends since college, they kissed each other on the cheek and laughed and gossiped and talked about old times. And for dinner they would all go out. Amy her best friend from college, and her best friends husband. Now, Sarra, do you want to know what happened after their cocktails were  finished and everyone turned in for the night?"

No, i don't

"Her friends husband came back to the hotel. Amy fucked her best friends husband all night."

Sarra was shocked. "So you have taken it upon yourself to rid the world of adultery? I'm not a adulterer."

His eyes glazed over, two hard copper orbs in his face. "No" he said quietly, " you are not. You are worse. You are the worse kind of fraud there is.:"

A chill slithered down her spine, taking a measure of Sarra;s to resolve this. "Is it because of Abby?"

"I told you, I don't want Abby. Blood is nothing."

"Then what?"

The gun pressed under her chin. "You hurt Christie."

"You keep saying that. I never even met Christie! Christie disappeared eighteen years ago. She is dead."

He seemed to not be listening. He had gone to his gym bag, pushed the pistol in his waistband. Gently almost reverently he used both hands to withdraw something from the bag, something small and round, and white, something smooth and....

Oh, god.

Sarra faltered at the sight of the small skull gleaming like a silvery moon in his hands. He handled it generally, as if it were a quail's egg, and a tear ran down his cheek.

"Christie, meet Sarra. She is finally going to pay...