“Hello, Doctor Johnson.”
The man’s voice booms, deep and calm. I don’t recognize it.
“I apologize for this less than cordial meeting, but my time is precious. And I’m running short on it.”
I work words past the burn choking my throat. “What do you want?”
“Seeing how I’m here, taking a great risk to meet with you when I could’ve just snatched you from anywhere, I gather you can imagine. You’re quite intelligent, Miss Johnson.”
I try to shake my head, but my stretched arms interfere with any movement. “I can’t imagine. Who are you?”
He chuckles. “You had little qualms about fabricating evidence for a mutual acquaintance’s unfortunate death.” A beat. “So, I come to you now with the same request. Well, request isn’t quite right. Demand is more appropriate.”
The weight crushing my chest is suddenly gone as I’m yanked upright. I hear a pop in my shoulder, and blinding white pain shoots across my blacked-out vision.
“Gently, please. Doctor Johnson mustn’t be harmed,” the man instructs his thugs.
Shoulder throbbing, I’m guided toward a table where I’m forcefully seated on a stool. “I can’t just change my findings like that. It has to be supported by the evidence. It has to be believable.” It’s like someone else is speaking through me; or the fright has vanished. At one point with Wells, I no longer shook when he made threats.
I’m not accepting my fate—just the opposite. But pleading for my life, begging not to be harmed…it doesn’t work. These men will do what they’ve come here to do, regardless. My only power is in keeping my mind sharp.
With what wits I have, I try not to flinch when something is set on the table before me.
“My associate is going to remove the bag now,” the man says. “Don’t make the mistake of turning around, Miss Johnson.” I feel him brush against my back, then his hand clasps my neck. I recoil, my breaths coming faster. His finger skims my lips through the material. “I, unlike our mutual friend, take no pleasure in the suffering of women,” he whispers near my ear. “Your death will be quick.”
I believe him.
I nod my
answer.
The bag is yanked away, and I blink my vision clear. My head trembles, matching the quake rolling through my body as I strain to keep from turning my head.
“Locate the reports on the recently deceased and conclude that the first woman, our dear Miss Beloff, you deem an accident. And then do the same for Miss Carter.”
I look down at the table. My laptop. “I haven’t even performed the autopsy on the second victim yet,” I say, assuming Miss Carter is who has just been brought in.
“That’s why I’ve made this special trip. I’m here to fill in the gaps and help you. I’m giving you the information you need. Both deaths were an accident.” He tsks. “Such a shame, too. I assure you, it was not my desire for them to die. Quite the opposite.”
Anger lashes through me like a whip. “The severe beating Marcy Beloff took would suggest otherwise.”
My head is wrenched back as he grips a fistful of my hair. His fingers dig at my scalp…and as his nails break skin, I pray he’s leaving behind DNA.
“I hope there’s not going to be a problem with my request.” His hot words sting the side of my face. “Because if pleasantries don’t persuade your cooperation, then I assure you, I have other ways.”
His hand tightens in my hair, preventing me from turning in either direction, as his body draws closer. “Maybe you’re damaged, Miss Johnson. Could it be that after our friend Wells treated you so abhorrently, you now only respond to violence?”
The press of something hard and heavy touches my leg.
My whole body freezes. The air in my lungs, the tremble of my limbs stops—I’m petrified.
I don’t like guns. I’ve worked within the criminal justice field for years and, up until recently, have never had the need for one. Even after I was held captive by a sadistic serial killer, I was never tempted to own a gun.
The cold steel of the barrel assaults my skin as the gun digs under the hem of my skirt. It inches higher, dragging my skirt with it, and I find my voice. “Please…don’t.”
The weapon comes to a stop at my inner thigh. “I don’t revel in suffering, Miss Johnson,” he says. “But I’ve had to do many tasteless things in my past. And it’s just like riding a bike; you don’t forget.”
Within the same moment I swallow my yelp, the barrel is lodged beneath my underwear and bites into the tender flesh of my core. My whole body comes alive with an uncontrollable tremor. Hysteria pulls me under, sucking my mind into a black undertow, void of this abstract reality.