Michael Prescott - Last Breath

She wondered why she had not fallen prone on the floor. When she drew in a deep abdominal breath, swelling her belly, she had her answer. A cord had been tied around her waist, securing her to the post.

Footsteps on the concrete floor.

He was close, perhaps six feet away. Moving toward her, then away.

She prayed he didn’t know she had revived. Every minute that she maintained the pretense of unconsciousness was a reprieve from whatever fate he had in mind for her.

Not that there was much mystery about it. He’d told her himself, hadn’t he?

Till death do us part.

The footsteps continued circling, now joined by a new sound, hard and regular. It took her a moment to understand that what she heard was the beat of her heart in her ears.

The sound of her own pulse frightened her. Each beat was like the tick of a clock, announcing that her time was limited and fast running out. She almost wished he would just go ahead and do it-whatever it was he meant to do-do it and get it over with and spare her the ordeal of waiting.

But that thought flared and died, replaced by another. She had not lived long enough. She had not done enough.

What did she have to show for her life? A bungalow with a mortgage, a uniform in a locker? Not much for twenty-six years on this earth.

And now he would take even that away from her. But why? How was it even possible? The man she’d married was capable of lying, cheating on her, but he couldn’t do something like this, something insane…

Involuntarily a groan escaped her, so low and muffled that she wasn’t sure Adam heard.

But he did. His circling footsteps stopped abruptly.

She froze, hating herself for the weakness that had voiced itself in that groan. She had shortened her remaining time, and she couldn’t afford to lose any of it, not when every minute was precious now.

He came toward her. She heard the sharp claps of his footfalls on the concrete. He was wearing hard-soled shoes-his dress shoes from work? No, he wouldn’t be that stupid. He would know that shoe prints could be identified by forensics experts. He would not make such an obvious mistake.

A stir of air, and she sensed that he was kneeling by her. Rustle of clothing, caress of leather on her cheek.

His gloved hand. Touching her.

She struggled not to react. He did not necessarily know she was awake. People groaned in their sleep, after all. As long as she stayed absolutely still, he might not be sure if she remained unconscious or was merely playing possum.

It was all about buying time, more time. Time seemed suddenly the most important thing in the world, or maybe it always had been, and these circumstances were required to bring home this truth that she always should have known.

His gloved finger slipped under her chin and stroked her. Tickled her.

“Hey, C.J. Wake up, sleepyhead.”

Words he used to say to her on lazy weekend mornings. Then as now, he had tickled her gently. Then as now, he had eased his hand under her chin, fingering the sensitive hollow of her jaw…

Abruptly his grip tightened. His hand clutched her throat.

She jerked her head back with a gasp.

He withdrew.

“Thought that would get your attention,” he said.

No purpose was served in pretending to be unconscious any longer. She tried to pose a question to him: “Where am I?” The hollow rubber ball clamped between her teeth distorted her words and made them almost unintelligible. She tried again. “Where… am… I?”

“I heard you the first time, C.J. Where are you? You’re in the same place you put me for the last year. You’re in hell.”

Walsh called the other members of the task force on his cell phone while Cellini drove him from Parker Center to the Wilshire Division address. If they had been TV cops, they would have used a dashboard flasher to clear away the traffic, but in reality few unmarked cars carried one. Cellini made good time anyway, guiding the Caprice west on freeways and surface streets. Walsh, in the passenger seat, filled in Stark, Merriwether, Boyle, and Sotheby with the bare details.

“Sounds like the real thing,” Ed Lopez said, his voice crackly and faint on the cell phone’s cheap receiver.

“It is,” Walsh affirmed. “And the worst part is, this woman he’s got-she’s one of our own.”

Walsh finished the last call just as Cellini pulled into the driveway of C.J. Osborn’s bungalow. He was glad to be done with the calls. Ordinarily he would have used a landline to convey sensitive information, but tonight there wasn’t time. He had to hope these digital phones were as resistant to eavesdropping as the manufacturers claimed.

Tanner and his partner, whose nameplate read “CHANG,” were waiting at the back door. The two deputies led Walsh and Cellini inside the house, pointing out the knife that lay untouched on the hall floor.

“What’s this about you seeing us on the Internet?” Tanner asked while Cellini first photographed the knife, then sealed it in an evidence bag.

“There’s a camera in her bedroom,” Walsh explained. “It’s a, uh, whatchamacallit.”

“Webcam,” Cellini said without looking up.

“Right. Live TV feed from the bedroom to the Internet.”

Tanner frowned. “C.J. wouldn’t be into anything like that.”

“No, but the guy who kidnapped her is.”

“So you know who we’re dealing with?”

“Not by name-but I’ve seen his work,” Walsh said, thinking of Martha Eversol on the autopsy table.

“Well, whoever he is, he must have been following her. C.J. told me she was tailed earlier today by a white van.”

“Make, model?”

“She didn’t know.”

“Damn. She tell you anything else?”

“She got an e-mail that spooked her. Spooked Detective Hyannis too, when I told him about it.”

“What e-mail?”

“It said, ‘Welcome to the Four-H Club.’ “

Walsh looked at Cellini. “Oh, Jesus,” Cellini said.

“That’s pretty much the way Hyannis reacted.” Tanner was losing patience, which Walsh figured was understandable, especially if C.J. Osborn was his girlfriend or something. “What is all this shit about the Four-H Club anyway?”

“I’ll explain later,” Walsh said. “Show us the rest of the house.”

Tanner and Chang led the two detectives through the living room and into the kitchen. Walsh spent some time looking at the dinner dishes in the sink.

“We’ll have to call her husband,” Tanner said.

Cellini glanced at him. “She’s married?”

“Ex-husband. Adam somebody. He needs to know.”

“They still close?” Walsh asked.

“I don’t think so, but I saw him with her today.”

“He came by the station to see her,” Chang added.

“Huh.” Cellini pursed her lips. “Under other circumstances he’d be a prime suspect.”

“Maybe he is anyway,” Walsh said. “Maybe he’s our guy.”

“And the other women?”

“Diversions. He killed them just to throw us off the trail.”

“Weak,” Cellini said.

“Very,” Walsh conceded. “I need to interview him anyway. His phone number must be in Osborn’s file.”

“Excuse me,” Tanner cut in, “but what other women?”

Walsh patted the deputy’s arm, a fatherly gesture rare for him. “She’s the third one taken this way. The third one who was spied on over the Web.”

“The third?” Then Tanner understood. He took a step backward, as if to put distance between himself and Walsh’s reassuring touch. “The Hourglass Killer. You’re heading up the task force. And Hyannis-”

“Detective Hyannis is the LASD liaison. You see… Hell, Donna, you tell him.”

“The two previous victims were both found with index cards that said ‘Welcome to the Four-H Club,’” Cellini said. “We think the term stands for Four-Hour Club and that the victims… well, that they’re kept alive for exactly four hours.”