Born To Die (Alvarez & Pescoli)

The horses were restless, almost spooked, shifting in their stalls. He heard the sounds of rustling straw, nervous snorts, and every so often an anxious whinny.

Sarge, too, was out of sorts. Stiff. He’d growled once and stared at the windowless rooms where the oats and other grains were stored. Bonzi, not knowing the drill, hadn’t been all that concerned, but his ears were up. At attention. Aware of an unseen being hidden in the darkness.

The back of Trace’s throat went dry.

An animal?

Or human?

His skin prickled under the collar of his jacket and he knew the answer. An animal would elicit a different response from his dog. This threat was definitely a person skulking in the shadows.

He thought of shouting out. Maybe it was just someone who’d come in for shelter from the storm. But why not stop at the house? Someone on the run? Someone scared?

Or someone intent on doing harm?

His heart grew stone cold.

He thought of his rifle, hidden deep in his closet, the ammunition locked away in an overhead cabinet in the kitchen. Then his mind went to Kacey alone in the house with his son.

Sarge growled again and Trace heard a noise ... the tiniest squeak of the stable’s floorboards. Every muscle in his body tensed.

Blood pounding in his ears, he held his pitchfork like a spear and began moving slowly through the darkness.

“You can’t die, damn it!” a female voice whispered harshly. “Who’s going to take care of Eli? Who?”

Oh, Lord, now she was imagining things, hearing the voices of angels, Kacey thought, pain surging through her body. She fought back the urge to vomit, and when she opened a bleary eye, she saw only darkness. Lying on the kitchen floor, the room spinning , she tried to pull herself to her knees.

Agony ripped through her skull. Get up! Pull yourself together.

The house was still, aside from the wind outside. Her attacker had fled. But he would be back. She knew it. Just as she knew Eli and Trace were in danger.

If they were alive.

She listened for the voice in her head again.

Heard nothing.

And tried like hell to get to her feet.

At the Johnson estate, Alvarez glanced out to the frigid night. Where was he? Where was the killer who had wreaked so much damage? What was he doing?

“And Kathleen?” Pescoli pressed, bringing up the other Johnson daughter who had died.

“She . . . she was killed in a skiing accident,” Gerald said, scowling, as if his own words tasted bitter.

“Skiing accident,” Alvarez repeated. “Any of her brothers present the day she died?”

“What?” Noreen blinked and fiddled nervously with her collar. “What are you suggesting, detective?”

Pescoli’s smile held zero warmth. “Let me guess. Was it Cameron?”

“No!” Noreen said, her face shattering as tears came again. “I mean, yes, he was there. But ... but so was most of the family!”

“Convenient.” Pescoli was irritated as she glowered at this couple whose entire married life had been shrouded in secrets.

Cameron? One of the twins? He was the one Pescoli was zeroing in on? Alvarez thought of the two men who looked so much alike, whose jobs took them throughout the country. Handsome and smart. But deadly? To his mother she asked, “Do you know exactly what happened the day Kathleen died?”

Noreen glanced at her husband and then worried her lip. “Of course ... Cameron was skiing with Kathleen on that last run, but that doesn’t mean . . . there were hundreds, probably thousands, of people on the mountain that day.” She sounded as if she were trying desperately to convince h