Playing Dead_ A Novel of Suspense - Allison Brennan [148]
She would wait for the right time. Claire didn’t want to die. She would live to tell the truth about Phil Palmer. She stood shaking in front of him, dressed only in her small bright pink panties.
“Don’t move,” he said, and cut off the panties.
Tears streamed down her face.
“Shower.”
She stepped into the shower. Hot water stung the nicks on her chest and the gash on her arm. Her leg burned and she couldn’t stop herself from crying out in pain. Maybe she could buy some time. She could withstand the pain if only she had more time!
He was watching her through the glass. Watching her shower. She turned her back on him, but didn’t feel any safer or less violated.
“Use soap.”
She obeyed, more to relax Phil and give herself time to think of an escape. How could she get out of here? Running was out of the question.
Kill or be killed.
You don’t have a choice, Claire. First opportunity, you take it.
“You’re done,” he said after five minutes. His voice was thick. He was turned on by her nakedness. It made her ill.
When he handed her a towel, she noticed how dirty he was. His hands and fingernails were covered with dirt. Had he been gardening while she was drugged?
They’ll never find us. At least not until they find your grave.
He’d been out digging her grave while she’d slept off the drugs. She wrapped the towel around her body. He only had a knife in his hand now. What happened to the gun? She didn’t see it anywhere. She didn’t remember where he’d put it. In a drawer? There, on the dresser.
“I know what you’re thinking, Claire.”
His breath was on her ear.
“Accept your fate.”
He steered her at knifepoint to the bed. She let the towel drop to the floor “accidentally,” counting on his sick obsession with her breasts to distract him.
She reached down to pick it up. “Don’t,” he whispered.
She turned to face him, defiant. He stared at her breasts. He reached out and touched her nipple. She resisted the need to slap his hand away.
“Sit,” he said.
She sat on the edge of the bed. He leaned over her, his breath on her chest, and he reached for the cuffs that were attached to the bed.
“You hurt me,” she said, pointing to the three nicks on her chest where his knife broke skin when he cut off her shirt.
“I’m sorry.”
He actually sounded sincere.
“Please, Phil. Please don’t kill me.”
He gently touched her face. “I’m sorry I have to.”
The handcuffs clicked around her wrist.
“I need to shower now. You really are beautiful.”
He picked the gun up off the dresser, went into the bathroom, and shut the door.
The shower turned on again. Claire breathed a sigh of relief. She took the small fragment of soap she had clenched in her fist and rubbed it all around her imprisoned wrist. He’d been distracted by her breasts and hadn’t ratcheted it too tight. She made her hand as long and narrow as possible, pulling her thumb in toward the middle. Between the loose cuff and the soap, she slipped out.
She didn’t have a weapon, but she had time.
She slipped quietly out of his room, limping.
Get out of the house. Get out of the house now!
FORTY-THREE
It took the FBI twenty minutes to run a quick background check on Langstrom and find property he owned in rural eastern Sacramento County.
“Call the sheriff’s department,” Mitch said. “They may have a unit closer than we are.”
Richardson said, “Belay that. Mitch, this guy is a cop. He’s going to be listening for activity.”
“They all have cell phones nowadays,” Mitch said. “Can’t we do this off the radio?”
“You head over there right now, I’ll call the sheriff at home and get units sent over there without any chatter.”
Hans interjected. “He’s a cop and he’s a sociopath. He’ll be listening for chatter, as well as silence. When you talk to the sheriff, make sure he contacts only off-duty deputies, which will prevent unusual chatter.”
“Point well taken,” Richardson agreed.
Hans and