Playing Dead_ A Novel of Suspense - Allison Brennan [147]
Yet.
Her only hope was to find a weapon. Disarm him, perhaps, and shoot him. She’d have to shoot him. Could she?
She stared at the television, at her young naked body. Oh, yes, she could kill him . . .
Her teddy bear. The room she’d woken up in, a replica of her bedroom when her mother had still been alive.
The perfect frame. Another killer, someone without a connection to the victims. Someone like Phil Palmer. He hadn’t moved to Sacramento until months after her mother was killed. How did he know what her room looked like? How had he gotten the picture of her and Amy? How had he found her teddy bear?
He’d been in her room before.
“You killed my mom.”
“Yes, I did.”
She reeled as if hit. She’d expected him to deny it, to yell at her, to slap her.
Her voice cracked, but she asked, “Why?”
All these years, she’d been friends with her mother’s killer. She’d blamed her father, and ate dinner and went to ball games with the real killer. She’d been so wrong, both about her father and about Phil. Phil was Dave’s partner. Phil had saved Dave’s life, made a lifelong friend in Bill Kamanski. He’d practically been family.
It was all a lie. All an act. He was a brutal murderer who had slithered his way into her life.
She wanted to throw up. And she wanted to kill him. He’d stolen everything from her: her mother, her father, her privacy, her life. She had lost everything, grew up practically an orphan, angry and lost inside. Unable to love anyone, unable to trust . . .
Until Mitch.
“It was nothing personal. I was blackmailed into it.” He sighed, as if it had been a minor irritation. “In college, I accidentally killed a girl. I didn’t know anyone had seen me bury her body. But they’re all dead now. I’m free. Or I will be free, as soon as I bury you.”
He stared at her forlornly. “I protected you all these years. I was supposed to kill everyone in the house. When you walked in, I was already there, hiding in your room. Waiting for the perfect time. I heard the door and feared it was O’Brien. That would have ruined everything. But it was you. I’d already fallen in love with you—I’d spent hours in your bedroom that morning—though I would have had to kill you if you’d seen me. But you ran out. Good thing. That gave me enough time to kill them and leave. You calling your father was icing on the cake. I couldn’t have planned it better myself. All I knew was that he was alone during his lunch hour while his wife was fucking another man. I did him a favor.”
“You bastard! You’re insane!” She pulled at her cuff; it tightened around her wrist. She tried to hit him with her free arm. He grabbed her wrist, holding it so tight it burned.
“It’s time for you to shower. I don’t touch any woman who’s not clean.”
She spat in his face.
He hit her and she tasted blood. Instead of swallowing it, she spat it in his face. He was going to kill her anyway, dammit, she wasn’t going to let him rape her too. Glancing at the television she felt violated already.
He wiped off her bloody saliva with a tissue from his pocket.
“You were always feisty. So smart. But not intelligent enough to put all the pieces together, were you?”
He unlocked the handcuffs and pulled her into the bathroom. He turned on the shower.
“Take off your clothes,” he told her.
“No.”
He took a knife from his pocket and cut off her shirt, nicking her skin in the process. He cut off her bra, leaving her breasts exposed.
He stared at them. Tears welled in her eyes. She crossed her arms over her chest, trying to cover herself, but he brought up the knife and sliced her forearm. She dropped them to her side. He stared at her breasts. “So beautiful. Even more beautiful than on tape.”
He reached out and touched one breast as if he were caressing a fragile glass figurine. She was shaking and closed her eyes. Try for the knife, Claire. Try for the knife.
Through half-opened eyes, she realized she wouldn’t be able to disarm