Killing Hour - Lisa Gardner [152]
The USGS team members were packing up their gear and loading up their vehicles. According to Kathy Levine’s debriefing, the Dismal Swamp was six hundred square miles of bugs, poisonous snakes, black bears, and bobcats. Trees grew to stupendous sizes, while a dense underbrush of brier bushes and wild vines made sections of the swamp virtually impassable.
They needed water. They needed insect repellent. They needed machetes. In other words, they needed all the help they could get.
Mac and Kimberly had Ennunzio in the back of their car. They would follow Ray’s team to the site. That gave them seven people to search an area that had daunted even George Washington. While the sun once again peeked over the horizon, and the mosquitoes started to swarm.
“Ready?” Mac asked Kimberly as he climbed into the car.
“Ready as I’m gonna get.”
His gaze rested on Ennunzio in the rearview mirror. The agent was wearily rubbing his head; he looked like he had just aged twenty years. “Why didn’t they arrest your brother after the fire?” Mac asked crisply.
“I don’t think they ever found him.”
“Did you tell anyone what happened?”
“Of course.”
“Because you never hold back the truth.”
“I’m a federal agent,” Ennunzio said curtly. “I know what needs to be done.”
“Good, because finding this next girl is only half the battle. After that we go after your brother, and we don’t stop until we’ve found him.”
“He’ll never surrender. He’s not the type to spend the rest of his life in a cage.”
“Then you’d better be prepared,” Mac said grimly, “because we’re not the types to let him go.”
CHAPTER 45
Dismal Swamp, Virginia
6:33 A.M.
Temperature: 96 degrees
HER MOTHER WAS YELLING AT HER. “I sent you to college for an education. So you could make something of yourself. Well, you’ve certainly made something, now haven’t you?”
Tina yelled back. “Woman, bring me a goddamn glass of water. And get those tuxedoed waiters out of here.”
Then she sat down and watched the blue butterfly.
Water. Lakes. Ice-cold streams. Potato chips. Oh, she was hot, hot, hot. Skin on fire. She longed to peel it off in strips. Peel down to the bone and roll in the muck. Wouldn’t that feel good?
The flesh on her forearm squirmed. She watched bloody sores ripple and ooze. Maggots. Horrible little white worms. Writhing under her flesh, feasting on meat. She should pull them out and pop them in her mouth. Would they taste like chicken?
Pretty blue butterfly. How it glided along the air. Dancing up, up, and away. She longed to dance like that. To dance and glide and soar. To drift off to the comforting shade of a giant beech tree . . . or lake . . . or cool mountain stream.
Itched. Her skin itched and itched. She scratched and scratched. Didn’t make a difference. Hot, hot, hot. So thirsty. Sun, coming up. Going to burn, burn, burn. She would cry, but no moisture left. She slathered on the mud, flattened out puddles and sought desperately to wet her tongue.
Her mother was hollering at her again. Now look at what you’ve done. She didn’t have the strength to yell back.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. Then she closed her eyes. She dreamt of deep Minnesotan winters. She dreamt of her mother holding out her arms to her. And she prayed the end would happen quick.
It took over two hours to drive due east to the swamp. The visitors’ entrance was in North Carolina on the east side. Operating under the assumption that the killer would stick to the Virginian playing field, however, Kathy Levine led their little caravan to a hiking entrance in Virginia, on the west side. All three vehicles pulled into the dirt parking lot and Kathy, the official search-and-rescue member of their party, assumed command. First, she handed out whistles.
“Remember, three blasts signifies the international call for distress. Get in trouble, stay put, blow away, and we’ll find you.”
Next, she handed out