Adelle Laudan - Killer Scents

“Sssss....” She prayed he understood her muffled response.

“If they think they’ve won, they’d better think again.” Danny stormed in the room, flailing his gun in the air. He stopped in mid-stride and glared at her. “Will you put some fucking clothes on? You’re going to make me puke.” He scooped the jacket from the floor and threw it on her lap, standing there like he expected her to put it on herself. Several seconds passed before he stomped over and wrapped the jacket around her, and pulled the zipper up, tearing the flesh of her breast and forcing it up to the top with her skin still caught in the teeth.

She bit the inside of her mouth to stop from crying out. The taste of blood took her mind off the pain.

The crazed killer strode up and down the length of the room, his finger on the weapon’s trigger.

“This is the police! We have the place surrounded. Come out with your hands up,” a voice through a loud speaker echoed in the farmhouse.

Danny opened the bigger black duffle bag and pulled out a semi-automatic. He stuffed a few extra magazines in the pocket of his newly acquired vest, making it perfectly clear he wasn’t going down without a fight.

He pulled his buzzing cell from his shirt pocket. “I’ve got nothing to say to you. If you’re going to bring out the big guns, I can play that game, too. Oh, and you can kiss your slutty girlfriend good bye.” He tossed his phone. It slid across the floor, coming to a stop under her chair.

“He’s not giving up. The asshole wants a show down.” Randy gritted his teeth.

His boss heaved a sigh.

Randy jerked, startled by the ringing in his hand. “Hello?”

“He’s got a few guns and ammo. Jacob is hurt. Danny thinks I can’t move.”

“Becca?” Relief washed over him and he stumbled back to lean against the car.

“Hurry.”

The line went silent. Why didn’t I have more faith in her? She’s a damn good cop.

His friend rushed to his side. “Becca?”

“Yes, how she got hold of his phone is beyond me.” He chuckled wryly. “Jacob is hurt and Danny thinks Becca can’t move.”

Chief’s expression sobered. “Dammit, he used that blocking drug on them.”

Becca’s partner swallowed hard. “What the fuck did he do to them?”

The shatter of glass pierced the silence. Randy turned to find the muzzle of a gun stuck out the side of the broken pane.

“I want you all to leave and I want it to happen now . If you ever want to see these two again you’ll back the fuck off!”

“Get behind those bushes,” Chief ordered everybody standing by Danny’s car.

Larry hunkered down beside him. “Hey, Chief, now that we have him back here it leaves the front of the house unmanned.”

“Good thinking. I’ll have Jerry and his team go to the front. Maybe we can keep Danny distracted long enough to get those two out before he realizes what’s happening.”

Randy positioned himself like a runner at the starting line. “I’m going with them.”

Chief put a hand on his arm. “You need to stay here. If he wants to talk to you and you’re not here, he’ll know something is up.”

He clenched his jaw.

“Come on, Danny. If you don’t give yourself up now, you got to know this is all going to end badly.” Chief wiped his sweat-beaded forehead with his shirtsleeve. “Why don’t you let Jacob and Becca go? Things will go easier on you in court if you do.”

Danny’s laughter resonated madness. Randy knew he had no intention of handing anybody over to them. The killer was a cop, too, for fuck’s sake. No matter what The Florist did, the rest of his days would be spent behind bars.

A blast from Danny’s gun turned a riding lawn mower into a raging inferno, sending an officer flying through the air in eerie silence. Judging by the force needed to launch a body like that, Danny must have planted some kind of explosive. He knew a single bullet couldn’t ignite the gas tank.

Chief spoke into the radio strapped to his shoulder. “Team One, open fire.”

A barrage of bullets slammed into the aged clapboard, where Danny fired from only moments before. Wood and glass flew in every direction.

“Cease fire!”

An ominous silence permeated the farm. The acrid stench of burning fuel set his throat ablaze and he covered his face with his arm. His eyesight blurred, as he tried to access the situation through the haze.

A short exchange of gunfire crackled from the front of the house, quickly followed by a resounding boom and billowing smoke floating up into the trees.

“Jerry? Are you there?” Chief spoke into his radio with no response.

“Alan, do you think you can get up there without him seeing you?” asked Chief Thomson. “I need to know what the hell happened up there.”

The officer dropped the shield over his face before hunkering down and weaving his way through the trees. It seemed a lifetime before Randy heard the radio crackle. “Team Two is down. I don’t see any survivors. It looks like some kind of trip wire. They never even made it to the door.”

Chief looked at Randy in horror and disbelief. “He’s got the place wired. Alan? Can you see into the house?”

“There’s a light coming from the front room. Hang on.”

With baited breath, Randy waited for the response.

“The room is empty. There’s nobody there.”

Chapter Twenty-Seven

In the midst of all the chaos outside, Danny stormed into the room with knife in hand. He no longer resembled the clean-cut cop she’d worked with over the years. His face now blackened with soot and always perfect hair askew. Becca squeezed her eyes shut and prayed she wasn’t about to die.

Danny cut through the tape binding her to the chair and picked her up. She tried to bring her hands up to rake his eyes, but only succeeded in lightly brushing her fingertips across his cheek, the effects of the drug far from over.

“Ha! You’re something else, Becca. Welcome back.” Amusement now danced in his eyes. He wasted no time in running upstairs with her to a sparsely furnished bedroom where he sat her on a chair and quickly bound her to it.

All the while she prayed. Please don’t see the phone in my pocket. He held a piece of tape in front of her face and shrugged before tossing it to the side.

“Scream all you want. It won’t make a lick of difference.”

“What about Jacob?” She hardly recognized the rasp coming from her mouth.

“Jacob? I could care less what happens to him. He’s no threat to anyone.” His lips curled in a snarl, and he narrowed his eyes at her. “You, my dear, are my trump card. You’ll be safe up here for now.”

He quickly pulled the mattress off of the bed and propped it up against the narrow window, engulfing the room in darkness. He paused beside her and said, “I really hope you’re not afraid of the dark.” His tongue circled the inside of her ear before he continued out of the room.

A shudder ripped through her and she willed away the urge to vomit. The door closed behind him, and a key rattled the lock with a final click.

She wagered Jacob still lay on the couch. Whether he was alive or dead was another matter. Becca squinted, trying to adjust to the darkness. Moonlight streamed in through an uncovered space at the top of the window.

This time he’d taped her good. Her hands stuck out the bottom of her bindings, slowly losing sensation from the lack of blood supply. She took a good look around the room. A single bed sat against one wall and a small chest of drawers stood nearby it. Her breath hitched.

“It’s an old iron bed frame.” She had a bed like it when she was little and knew the ends of the springs were very pointed and sharp.