Wicked Games (McCade Brothers 1.50)

“You don’t think they’ll notice someone stabbed me, and figure maybe I had some help?” She gestured to her bloody side.

Mandy smiled and pulled a kitchen knife out of the folds of the habit. “You stabbed yourself, in an overdramatic suicide attempt, but when you realized you lacked the courage to inflict a fatal wound, you jumped instead.” She held the knife up for inspection, and Stacy recognized it as one from her own kitchen.

“I

took it tonight on my way to the limo, after I overheard you tell Kylie you planned to talk to the press.” She tossed the weapon behind her on the platform, where it landed with a hollow thud, and then she waved her gloved hand at Stacy. “No prints on the thing, except…hmm…yours.”

“Why go to all this trouble? Why not just hide out in my house and kill me in my sleep?”

“You die at home, under suspicious circumstances, and I’m the first person the cops question. You off yourself at some Halloween sleaze-fest, after…let’s add everything up.” She raised her index finger. “Breaking up with your boyfriend last month”—she raised another finger—“confessing your sinful past to the world tonight”—another finger—“downing several drinks in front of hundreds of eyewitnesses”—and, one last finger—“heading to the VIP room for a cheap hookup with a stranger.” She shook her head sadly. “Nobody questions your suicide. You’re clearly a woman in crisis.”

Ian would. He’d question until his dying day. Because as much as she’d tried to convince them both otherwise, they were so not over, and he knew it. Funny how standing on the wrong end of a gun snapped certain things into perfect focus.

“Party’s over,” Mandy said, and gave Stacy a shove. She stumbled and lost her balance. Her arms windmilled for a suspended moment as she fought for footing. Her heels slid off the platform. She screamed and fell backward into open air.

…

Ian hurried down the passageway toward the stage, hugging the wall and keeping his steps quick and light. He doubted anyone would hear him coming over the noise of the party, but he didn’t plan on leaving it to chance.

The passageway widened at the back of the stage. A retractable metal security gate spanned the stage to prevent anyone from moving the festivities to the backstage area. The blackout curtain hung just beyond the security gate. He wrapped his hand around a slat and gave the gate a shake, testing it. Fully secure, with very little give. No one had slipped into or out of the backstage area through there. He worked his fingers between the slats, moved the curtain aside and looked out. A sea of zombies, ghouls, princesses, and pirate wenches danced under flashing purple lights. Nothing unusual.

His phone vibrated. He pulled it from his pocket and checked the screen. A text from Trevor read, At the back door. Wait for me. For a nanosecond he considered waiting, because, procedurally, Trevor was in the right. Smart cops didn’t rush headlong into an unknown situation without someone at their back. But the bloody feathers spelled emergency in big, flashing letters. He couldn’t stand there with his thumb up his ass while time ran out for Stacy.

Another hallway extended from the other side of the stage, and led to the back door of the club. If whoever grabbed Stacy managed to get her out the door…he refused to let his mind go there. They’d have to get through Trevor, and that wouldn’t happen. He hurried across the stage and into the second hallway, moving fast until a realization struck and stopped him in his tracks. No feathers. He looked around. There were absolutely no feathers in the hall.

He retraced his steps, back down the hall, across the stage. Still nothing. When he reached the other side of the stage, he stood by the last feathers in the trail and peered down the hall the way he’d originally come. Had Stacy and her abductor doubled back toward the club while he’d charged off down the other hall? Impossible. He’d been on high freaking alert for any signs of movement, and any hidey-holes. There was no place for them to have stayed concealed while he’d walked past. Was there? Could he have missed a trapdoor in the stage floor or…?

He sprinted back to the stage and quickly paced off the entire floor, all the way to the concrete-block wall at the back. Nothing. He’d missed nothing. So where the hell was she and why did the trail of feathers stop at the end of the first hallway?

Another few seconds brought him back to that spot. He looked to his right and saw nothing but a solid, blank wall. He turned and looked to his left. The rungs of a narrow metal ladder extended from the wall. Dread gripped him. Stacy didn’t like heights. She’d never attempt a climb like that by choice. He started to look up when somebody screamed.

Chapter Ten

Stacy’s scream ended in a grunt of pain as she hit the lighting rig. One hard bounce, and then gravity immediately sent her sliding ground-ward again. She reached up, scrambling for a hold somewhere along the steel frame of the rig. Her right hand touched a smooth steel bar, but she couldn’t keep her grip. The metal might as well have been coated in oil. She caught a bar with her left hand, but her grasp couldn’t withstand the downward momentum of her body. She slipped off. Like a cartoon character running off a cliff, she pumped her legs, stretched her arm, and snagged the last bar with the tips of her fingers. She locked her left hand around the metal, gritted her teeth, and hung on for dear life while she waited for the full weight of her body to test her hold.

When it did, she screamed again, this time in agony. Her side burned like she’d been stabbed with a red-hot poker. Every molecule in her body wept, but somehow, she held on. The one-handed grip wouldn’t last forever though. She needed both hands, and she needed them now.

Come on. You’ve danced through pain. You can do this. She swung her right arm up, but only brushed the bar before the strain on her left arm had her lowering it again. Her fingers slipped a few millimeters. If she didn’t get her hand on the bar with the next attempt, she’d have to hope her angel wings worked.

This time she scissored her legs for an extra boost when she grabbed for the bar. She caught it, slipped, tightened her grip and, yes! Held. With her right hand locked on, she finally adjusted her left hand and secured her grasp. Good. Her weight felt evenly distributed, which took some pressure off her side. Now, if she could just… She swung her legs back, then forward. On the next upswing, she lifted her right foot, snagged the bar parallel to the one she held on to, and looped her leg through. She followed suit with the left leg and hung there for a moment, sucking in oxygen and letting her arms recover from the strain of clinging to the rig while her body had dangled.

Movement to her right drew her attention back to the platform. Mandy stepped gingerly onto the metal framework and made her way toward Stacy.

“Jesus, you’re like a spider.”

Stacy scooted her legs farther onto the bar, flexed her arms, and struggled to pull herself upright. Too late. Mandy crouched down and lifted the gun over her head, butt end out like a hammer. Stacy held her breath and watched, helplessly, as Mandy brought the gun down on her right ankle. She cried out as the impact reverberated through her body. When Mandy raised the gun again, Stacy’s pain-avoidance instincts kicked in. She shimmied her leg free of the frame and let it hang in the air.

Her strappy, thousand-dollar shoe slipped off her foot. She watched as it fell like a stone into the darkness below.

…

The scream from above jerked Ian’s head up, and his heart stopped. He watched helplessly as Stacy fell from the platform into the lighting rig, caught herself, and dangled from the stage light housing, at least two stories off the ground. He stood below, paralyzed with horror, as she struggled to pull herself up onto the rig while a black-cloaked figure closed in on her. The sight mobilized him. He leaped onto the ladder. At the same time, something whizzed by his head and crashed down on the stage directly behind him. He glanced back and saw Stacy’s shoe lying on the floor. If she took her shoe’s path down, she wouldn’t survive.

Chapter Eleven

Mandy squinted into the darkness, following the progress of the shoe, and then cursed and looked back at Stacy. “How sweet, your boyfriend’s here to save the day. Don’t go anywhere. I’ll be right back.” She scuttled off the light rig.

No fucking way. Fear for Ian gave her new strength. She swung her dangling leg back up onto the lighting rig, and then pulled herself through the bars until she sat on top of the metal framework. The world tilted and threatened to topple, but she put her clumsy limbs into motion and scooted back to the platform.