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

Jay.

He’d given as good as he got. She’d been turned on by his strength in the early years, but after a while, she grew tired of the game. There could only be one alpha in a marriage, and she had no interest in relinquishing the crown. That was when things careened downhill.

It was strange, sharing herself with Howard. She was older now, simply going through the motions. And yet it was heady to watch the adoration in his eyes. She loosened his stained tie, slid it from under his collar, and tugged it like a rope in her hands. Teasing him, she wrapped it around his wrists and yanked it tight. She kissed him again, harder this time. With tongue. She held up his hands and sucked on the fingers one at a time. He quivered.

She let the tie fall and stepped backward, putting distance when he wanted to embrace her.

‘Take off your clothes for me,’ she instructed sharply.

Howard rushed to comply.

She found her thoughts going far away. She paid no attention as he undressed, fumbling with his shoes and belt. Different futures wandered through her brain. A doctor. A surgeon. A teacher. A consultant. Archie was right. She had things to offer the world. She still had power, knowledge, determination, and drive. Prison hadn’t changed who she was. Time hadn’t diminished her.

She was Janine Snow. Dr. Perfect.

Howard stood in front of her, naked.

‘Lie on the bed,’ she told him, and he did.

Yes. She knew now. She could do anything. Jay was a memory. Jay, who’d sapped her confidence, who’d degraded her. Jay was dead, and she was free. She could be whatever she wanted, and what she wanted was to be a doctor again, to hold life in her hands, to be God. No one could deny her that. The board would restore her license. The patients would come to her, because they wanted to live, and she could answer their prayers.

‘This is what I live for.’

She said it out loud. Howard thought she was talking to him. Talking about sex. Maybe she was.

She stood over this naked man on the bed, who was fully under her spell. She gave him a wicked smile. She touched him with warm hands, her fingers spread, playing him like a piano. His chest. His stomach. His legs. His thighs. His eyes were wide open, drinking in what she was doing to him. Fully clothed, she bent over and enclosed him in her mouth. Just a kiss, just for a moment.

I will show them all. I will get my life back. Jay had cost her eight years, but eight years was punishment enough. She had nothing else to answer for. No other sins.

Janine undressed, taking her time. Howard followed each undone button like a revelation. The loosening strap of her bra, then the cups as they fell away. The zipper on her slacks. The lace of her panties, which she peeled down inch by inch, until she was nude in front of him. She climbed onto the bed, straddled him with her thighs, and hovered with her breasts dangling and the V between her legs teasing an inch above him. Making him wait.

This wouldn’t take long.

They would couple, and she would let him hold her briefly. Then she would tell him the truth. It was a fantasy, but the fantasy was over. She’d crush his world, but better to do it fast, leaving him with the glow of fulfillment. She would thank him, kiss him, and send him back to his gray little life.

Goodbye, Howard Marlowe.

Janine lowered herself and felt him sinking inside her. He gasped, almost as if he were in pain, and called out her name. Like a prayer. This was ample payment for his devotion.

She rode him slowly, then more quickly, and as she did, her mind drifted to other things. She thought to herself that she could order the chicken with fig and brie from the hotel restaurant that evening. Maybe the ahi tuna appetizer, too. And another bottle of Chardonnay.

Then she could put on soft music and enjoy the solitude as night fell, and she could plan for tomorrow.

The small row of six storage units was immediately across the street from Anna’s house. The facility was built from cinder blocks, with double-wide green wooden doors, on a dirt lot that was overgrown with weeds. Dense trees swarmed the units, dropping leaves and branches on the mossy roof. Where the lot ended, the ground fell off into a steep ravine.

Anna backed her SUV to the last unit in the row. She got out, making sure they were alone. Bernd was in the back seat with Cat, and he dragged her out of the truck by the collar of her T-shirt. The gun was in his hand. Outside, the dirt under Cat’s feet was wet and spongy. Rain spattered her face, and wind swirled the treetops that grew out of the gully, making a roaring noise.

‘Erin’s inside,’ Anna told Bernd as she opened the tailgate of the SUV.

‘Let’s get her, and get the hell out of here.’

A packing crate filled the rear of the truck. The unfinished wood was stamped with the name of a foreign manufacturing company and labeled for steel shims. A bungee cord looped the square box, and Anna yanked heavily on the cord to drag the crate from the rear of the truck, where it dropped into the mud. She used a crowbar to pry open the lid. The crate was empty.

Cat saw her future, and she knew it was inside the box. Cat and Erin, the two of them, imprisoned together. The thought of being nailed into the wooden coffin, rolling with the waves of the sea, set off panic in her chest. She wanted to shout, but she couldn’t. She wanted to run, but she had nowhere to go. Her legs bowed; she began to fall. Bernd grabbed her elbow and jerked her to her feet.

‘Open the door,’ he told Anna impatiently.

The double doors of the storage unit were secured by a padlock, which Anna undid with a key. She swung open one of the green wooden doors. Cat saw the rear bumper of a purple Nissan Versa with a license plate from North Dakota. Otherwise, the interior was black.

Anna went inside and plugged an orange extension cord into an outlet, which illuminated a floodlight hanging from the ceiling. The breeze blew in, making the floodlight sway. Anna headed for the back of the storage unit, and Bernd pushed Cat inside, pulling the door shut behind them. The space smelled of mold and metal. Strange shadows played across the walls through streams of dust. At her feet, an army of black bugs pushed through the dirt and feasted on scraps of meat and bread.

Anna got to the front of the Versa and stopped cold. A strangled gasp blew from her mouth, and her fists clenched. ‘Oh, fuck.’

‘What is it?’

Anna stared at the floor and shook her head.

Bernd pushed Cat by the neck, and she stumbled forward, trying to keep her balance. When she came up next to Anna, she screamed into her gag. A woman lay at their feet, chained to a metal table that was weighted down with bags of cement. She was on her back, spread-eagled, her skin gray. A two-inch gash was open on her neck, and blood pulsed from the wound, pooling under her head and staining her long hair.

‘You stupid bitch...’ Bernd muttered to Anna.

He let go of Cat and swung his arm in a haymaker to the side of Anna’s skull. The blow knocked her halfway across the hood of the Versa. Her wool hat flew off. Dizzied, she slid to the dirt. She tried to right herself, then crawled on hands and knees to the woman on the floor. She put her fingers on the woman’s neck, coming away with blood on her nails.

‘She’s still alive,’ Anna told him. ‘She’s still breathing.’

‘And we’re supposed to move her like that?’ Bernd demanded.

‘Well, I don’t know — we could—’

‘Shut up,’ Bernd said. ‘Stop talking.’

‘Bernd—’

‘ Shut the fuck up .’

Anna staggered to her feet. She grabbed for balance on the hood of the car. Blood was everywhere now. On Anna’s skin, her knees, her arms, her clothes. She’d bitten down on her tongue when Bernd hit her, and blood dripped from the sides of her mouth.