Brian Freeman - Goodbye to the Dead (Jonathan Stride Book 7)

Cat pounded on Anna’s door and waited impatiently for her friend to answer. The quiet neighborhood in Morgan Park where Anna lived was deserted. No cars. No kids playing. Black clouds blew across the afternoon sky, and high winds made the mature trees sway and talk. Drizzle spat on the ground.

‘Come on, come on,’ Cat murmured.

She was afraid that Anna wasn’t home, but finally, she heard the click of the latch and saw her friend peering out at her from inside. Anna didn’t open the door immediately, and when she did, she only opened it a few inches.

‘Cat,’ Anna said. ‘What’s going on? Why are you here?’

Cat shoved the door open and pushed past Anna into the small house, which smelled of cigarette smoke and the must of old furniture. Anna wore a cotton robe that barely covered her hips. It was tied loosely, and her bare skin made a narrow V from her small breasts to the knob of her belly button. Her spiky orange hair was mussed, as if she’d just gotten out of bed.

‘They know!’ Cat told her. She paced back and forth on the worn shag carpet and chewed her fingernails. ‘I knew this would happen. I knew they’d find out. I’m so stupid!’

‘What are you talking about?’ Anna asked.

‘Stride and Serena know about the jewelry you found at Al’s house. I sold the ring you gave me, and they traced it back to me through Curt. I’m such an idiot. I told you, I hate these scams!’

‘You didn’t mind them when you were raking in extra cash,’ Anna pointed out. She grabbed a half-empty pack of cigarettes from a coffee table and lit one. ‘I told you, church projects are the perfect cover. You paint people’s houses and see what shit they keep hidden away. Most of the time, they don’t notice that anything is gone until months later. If they even notice at all.’

Cat shook her head. She was sick with guilt. She liked the money she’d made with Anna — almost five hundred dollars in just a few months. Even so, she’d known from the beginning that the stealing would crash down on her head sooner or later. She wished she’d never agreed to be a part of it.

‘We need to come clean with the cops,’ Cat said.

Anna laughed at her and blew out smoke. ‘Yeah, right. That’s not going to happen. What exactly did you tell them?’

‘I told them I took the ring from Al’s house. I sold it.’

‘Did you mention me?’

‘No!’ Cat said. ‘I didn’t. I would never rat you out, but you know they’re going to figure out you were there, too. And they asked me about a gun! Did you find a gun at the house? They said it was the same gun that was used when that woman got murdered at the Grizzly Bear.’

Anna stared at her. She didn’t even look like Anna anymore. ‘I really wish you’d kept your mouth shut, Cat.’

‘I’m sorry, but what else could I do?’

‘What are the cops doing right now?’ Anna asked. ‘Where are they?’

‘Searching Al’s place. They got a warrant this morning.’

Anna’s face turned sour, and she talked softly, as if to herself. ‘It won’t take them long to make the connection to me. They’ll be coming here.’ Then she announced loudly: ‘Bernd, come on out, we have to go. We’ve got trouble.’

Cat heard the floorboards in the old house shift. In the doorway that led to the bedrooms, she saw a man. A stranger. He wore only briefs and made no effort to cover himself. His skin bore fresh nail marks on his chest. Anna’s. He was handsome, with a taut muscular body, but he conveyed menace like no one Cat had ever seen. His ivory-pale, freckled face was devoid of expression, and his blue-gray eyes watched her with the coiled-up ferocity of a tiger.

‘Who is...’ Cat began, her voice cracking.

‘This is my boyfriend. Bernd, we’ve got a problem.’

‘Another problem?’ the man said, spitting the words at her. ‘What did you do this time?’

Cat watched Anna fold like a flower. She’d never seen her friend intimidated by a man. ‘It’s not my fault, but the cops are coming. We’d better get out of here right now. Both of us. Permanently.’

Bernd marched closer to them. Cat felt nauseated by fright. She spotted men’s clothes in a pile on the floor, and Bernd squatted and dug in the pockets. Cat began to back toward the door, but Anna darted behind her and threw an arm around her head, burying her neck in the crook of her elbow. Cat couldn’t move and couldn’t breathe. Bernd stood up, and he had a gun in his hand, which he pointed at Cat’s head.

Cat whimpered and tried to speak, but she couldn’t.

‘On your knees,’ Anna told her roughly.

Cat sank to the floor. Her arms wrapped protectively around her stomach. Her chestnut hair spilled across her face, and sweat beaded on her forehead. She kept staring at the gun.

‘Tie her hands,’ Bernd said, snapping his fingers at Anna. ‘Quickly. Leave her ankles free for now. She’s going to have to go with us. Where’s the other girl?’

‘In my storage unit across the street.’

Bernd waited in stony silence while Anna ran to the kitchen and returned with a roll of duct tape. Anna bound Cat’s wrists tightly with tape, which was sticky and rough on her skin.

‘I warned you,’ Bernd snapped at Anna. ‘You put the whole operation at risk with your stupidity. I told you not to freelance.’

Anna flinched. ‘Look, I’m sorry, okay? Your people pay good money, but it’s not enough to live on. I found you the other girls—’

Bernd made a slashing motion across his throat. Anna stopped talking. The man stepped into his jeans from the floor. As he zipped himself, he squatted in front of Cat and held her chin between his fingers, pinching so tightly that she grimaced in pain. He shoved her face left and right, and then he put his hand on her stomach, and she tried to squirm away.

‘We’ll use this one as a bonus,’ Bernd said. ‘She’s pretty. Pregnant is a plus. Some buyers like that. And the baby will be worth something, too.’

‘ You leave my baby alone, you bastard! ’ Cat screamed into his face.

Bernd slapped her hard, leaving a welt and choking off the words in her throat. ‘She’s spirited, too. That’s good. They like the ones who fight. Maybe she’ll make up for the one you lost us.’

‘You shot the other girl!’ Anna barked. ‘If you’d kept control of Kelly, there never would have been a problem. I texted you about the cop in the bar. You needed to get her out of there, and instead, we wound up with a mess on our hands.’

‘The mess started with the gun you gave me,’ Bernd replied. He reached out and grabbed Anna’s neck with his hand, pinching his fingers shut like a vise until she began to twitch, unable to breathe. When he finally let go, she jerked away, coughing and crying.

‘Fucker!’ she moaned.

For the first time, Bernd laughed.

‘Anna, why are you doing this to me?’ Cat asked her. ‘What is this about?’

Anna rubbed her neck and looked furious at her humiliation. ‘Jesus, why are girls like you so naive? You’re going to take a trip, Cat. All the way to a desert kingdom. Don’t worry, you won’t be alone. Erin will keep you company.’

Erin.

Cat knew that name. Serena had mentioned that name. Stride had shown her Erin’s photograph.

‘That’s the girl who’s missing. Serena said that she had an online boyfriend who kidnapped her—’

‘Boyfriend?’ Anna retorted. ‘ I’m her boyfriend.’

‘You?’

‘Yeah, me. All these girls are so perfectly clueless. Do you know how many pathetic single women have told me they loved me? How they’ve been searching their whole lives for a man like me? They’ll swallow anything I tell them.’