When I see that she’s slumped over the steering wheel, I immediately unbuckle my seatbelt and crawl over the center console to help her. Her forehead is against the top of the steering wheel. I can see a trickle of bright red blood dripping down the side of her face.
I’m confused about what to do to help her. Should I lift her head and assess the damage? What if she has some kind of spinal cord injury? I don’t want to do anything that could cause permanent damage. Relief washes over me when she lifts her head. She looks past me and her eyes get big. Her hand comes out to grab my coat and she chokes out, “No matter what, stay alive. The brothers will find you. Just stay alive.”
I don’t know why she’s telling me this. I reach for her, but before I can touch her, someone rips my door open. I think for a second that it might be whichever club member is closest. But the man’s hands are rougher than necessary when he jerks me back. And his fingers dig into my arm so hard it brings tears to my eyes.
I try to scream, but nothing comes out. I kick my legs, trying to shove him back off me. But it’s useless. They just slide against the seat as he yanks me out of the vehicle. He rushes a few steps away and shoves me into the back seat of his own vehicle. My head crashes into the opposite door and my knees hit the floorboard hard.
I try to get up, but the man roughly shoves me against the window. The last thing I see out the window is Christina. She’s slumped forward again. Her face is turned towards the window and she’s not moving. I lose the strength in my arms about the same time I become aware of a liquid dripping down into my eyes. Lying in the floorboard, I bring one hand up to my head and I realize it’s blood.
A masculine voice barks out, “Drive, Charlotte.”
Chapter 26
Emily
Iwake up cold, thirsty, and with a splitting headache. I’m unsure how long I’ve been unconscious. My arms feel numb for some reason and my wrists ache. The throbbing in my head makes it hard to think straight. When I gather my wits enough to move, pain shoots up both arms. That’s when I realize I’m tied to a chair.
My eyes adjust slowly to the low-level lighting in whatever room they’re holding me in. I see cinderblock walls, a bare bulb hanging overhead, and hear a slight buzzing noise from what I suspect is a refrigerator. The air smells damp and old. I swallow hard, fighting the urge to scream. I’m clearly in a basement.
I test the restraints and the rope rubs painfully against my skin. My ankles are bound too. The chair shifts but doesn’t tip. It makes me think that whoever did this knew exactly what they were doing.
Even though my mind is racing, I can’t afford to panic. Not when I need to figure out a way out of this situation. I think of Christina slumped over the steering wheel and I begin to tear up. I can’t imagine who would do something like this. Brennan is in jail and I don’t have any more enemies that I know of. Maybe this has something to do with Christina or the club. Either way, she didn’t deserve what happened to her, nor did I.
I freeze when I hear voices drift down from above. A woman’s voice speaks first. Her voice is sharp and filled with anger.
“I told you to keep your mouth shut.”
A strained male voice answers her, “I didn’t even say anything. Why are you acting like I’m arguing with you when I’m not?”
“You don’t understand the strain I’m under. My brother is all over the news. National news outlets have called him a serial killer,” she snaps. “Do you have any idea the impact that’s going to have on me, on my chances of being mayor of this one-horse town?”
The sound of someone slamming a cabinet door comes next.
“Charles is always fucking up my life and I’m tired of it.”
The man whines, “You said this would clean it up. That once they found the bodies, it would end.”
“It was supposed to,” she says. “It would have, if you hadn’t been so sloppy with that last girl.”
My heart stutters. It sounds like this is Brennan’s sister and they’re talking about the women he killed.
“You said get rid of the body and that’s exactly what I did.”
“I didn’t say bury them together. It’s a shame she wouldn’t take the money,” the woman goes on, her voice filled with fury. “She thought she could leverage more money out of him if they were married. She was a greedy bitch who wanted more than what I offered to leave town.”
My chest tightens as the words start to line up in my head. Each thing she says is painting a new picture of the situation we thought we already knew all about.
“You always say that,” the man grumbles.
There is a dramatic pause before the woman says, “The second one was a mistake. I didn’t plan to do it twice. But once you realize how easy poison is to get, how untraceable it can be, it becomes the common-sense solution to rid ourselves of these floozies and gold diggers my brother is so partial to.”
“Neither of them would see reason,” the man states quietly.
“Those kinds of women never do,” the woman snaps. Her lack of remorse is staggering. “When they look at my stupid brother, all they see is our family trust.”
I feel like I’m going to throw up just listening to them. I’m almost certain they don’t know I can hear every word they’re saying. This is two killers colluding with each other, justifying their own behavior. It’s sickening on so many levels.
“When you said bury them on the Emert property, that’s what I did. I didn’t know you wanted me to put them in different places.”
