Without Mercy

  “Goddamned son of a bitch!” Trent muttered as he kept extinguishing the flames, fighting the ever-encroaching fire. He trained the nozzle on the table, a hissing spray of CO2 clouding the air.

  He coughed and tasted smoke. His eyes watered. Still he sprayed, forcing the flames down, killing the fire, trying to salvage something, anything from Lynch’s damning notes.

  Something moved in his burning, peripheral vision.

  He blinked, disbelieving, but there it was again, just out of focus, caught by the corner of his eye. Spinning, he pointed the nozzle warily. What had he seen? Was someone inside? Had Flannagan arrived?

  “Hey!” he called out.

  Crunch. Glass splintered as if someone had stepped on it.

  Oh, crap!

  Bam!

  Pain exploded in the back of his skull.

  His knees buckled.

  Trent fell to the floor, his head slamming against the floorboards. The fire extinguisher clanged as it banged against the floor beside him and rolled away. Flames and smoke rose before his eyes and a deep, searing blackness threatened to pull him under.

  Stay awake! Don’t pass out! For God’s sake, Trent, hang the hell on!

  His eyes swam. He blinked as the fire swept closer, shimmering, slithering waves of flame.

  He tried to get up, to roll over and get his knees beneath him, to gut it out and stand, but his body wouldn’t move an inch.

  Still fire crept closer. Teasing. Toying. While he lay motionless.

  Get up! Get up! For the love of God … Move!

  But he couldn’t. His brain couldn’t connect with his muscles and in a last instant of clarity, Cooper Trent knew he was a dead man.

  CHAPTER 42

  Jules, hiding in the shadows of the frigid night, watching Nell and Shaylee being marched into the chapel, took off after them. Too many kids had died already, been murdered, and now her sister was being marched to her death, a gun pressed to Shay’s back. No way could she let this happen.

  Fingers clenched over the pistol Trent had given her, Jules kept the small group in sight following at a distance. Shay was walking strangely, her hands behind her back, the person with the pistol shoving her, steering her.

  Maybe she should shoot into the air to alert someone—anyone!—but she couldn’t. Shaylee’s captor could lose control, fire and kill her sister in an instant. The same horrible ending would happen if she tried to bluff her way and aim her pistol at the man pushing Shaylee forward. The way Jules saw it, she had no choice but to follow them into the chapel.

  God help me. Oh, please, and be with her.

  Prodding Shaylee, the biggest of them, a tall man or boy, herded the group inside. He was confident, knew his way around, didn’t bother with any lights.

  Jules was only a few steps behind. She moved swiftly and silently, managing to catch the door before it slammed shut. Quickly, she slid into the shadowed warmth of the interior, the door clicking, uninterrupted behind her. She caught her breath as she got her bearings, then softly she crept through the nave. She heard footsteps ahead of her, the sound of feet shuffling along the hallway, then onto the staircase, muted by the carpet. She reached the landing, and thought the footsteps were heading down to the basement rather than up to the loft.

  What was down there?

  A dead end. Be careful.

  Pistol clenched in her fingers, Jules started down the stairs, keeping a short distance between the group of four and herself. At the bottom of the stairs, someone clicked on a flashlight and she stopped midway down, barely daring to breathe. If the light were shined upward, she would be caught in its thin, hard beam.

  “Let’s go! Move it!” a gruff voice ordered and the flashlight’s beam turned away from the stairs, bobbing along the hallway as the group navigated through the dark, tangled corridors.

  Heart in her throat, Jules inched along the hallway behind them. What were they planning to do to Shay? Flashes of Maeve’s dead body cut through her brain, and she vowed nothing so vile would happen to her sister, the girl she’d loved and protected, despite all of Shay’s flaws. Jules wouldn’t allow a fate as brutal and macabre as Nona’s or Maeve’s to happen to her sister. Or anyone else. She had to stop the obscene killing spree and stop it now.

  Nervous sweat collected on her spine as she inched forward, pressed against the wall, trailing behind as they proceeded through the warren of offices and halls.

  Farther and farther into the darkness.

  Her gaze fixed on that bobbing, weaving light ahead.

  She swallowed back her fear and cast aside worries that she would stumble or in some way alert the attackers that she was on their heels.

  Keep your cool, just be steady, she told herself, but was reminded of her nightmare, of walking through a darkened house, slowly following the sound of dripping water until, at last, she came across her father’s dead body.

  In the dream she held a knife.

  Tonight she had a pistol, and damn it all to hell, she’d use it if it meant saving Shaylee.

  Just as she would have used the knife to save her father.

  No way was she going to replay the same scene with its new cast of characters. Jules wasn’t about to come across her sister’s dead body. Not tonight.

  She noticed the light disappear, as if it had turned a corner, outlining the wall in a faint, eerie glow. It’s now or never! Heart racing, dread propelling her, her gloved fingers trailing against the wall until she touched nothing, she followed.

  At the corner she turned.

  Took one step.

  A bright, glaring light flashed in front of her eyes.

  She gasped. Lashing out with the gun, she struck the flashlight down.

  “Bitch!” a deep voice snarled. Eric Rolfe.

  Blinded, she tried to back away. Someone jumped her from behind. Her attacker’s weight pushed her face down on to the thin carpet. She tasted dust and fibers, but fought. Twisting. Flailing. Hitting with the damned gun. Her attacker was breathing heavily, but wouldn’t give an inch. Jules’s eyes were still struggling to focus, the flashlight trained on her.

  A girl screamed, the horrid sound echoing down the corridors.

  Jules struggled.

  She connected once with the butt of the gun.

  Her attacker let out a wounded, frustrated howl, then easily pried the pistol from her fingers.

  Oh, God, no …

  In the stark beam of the flashlight, Jules found herself staring down the barrel of the very gun Trent had given her. Breathing hard, blood drizzling from the corner of her mouth, Missy Albright gloated.

  “No,” Jules said, not really believing that the girl who had been assigned to her class was capable of murder.

  Smiling with smug hatred, her platinum hair shimmering white, Missy seemed to read her mind. Swiping at the blood, she taunted, “So, Ms. Farentino, why don’t you name some of the things from the 1930s that are the same as today?”

  “What?” Jules said, her head thundering. God, what kind of sickness was this?

  “Hey, I know,” Missy said, grinning more widely, blood showing between her teeth. Her little-girl voice irritating. “How about starting with Bonnie and Clyde in the thirties, and today? Uh, how about Missy and Eric?”

  “Oh, shut up!” Eric ordered, but he did laugh, that nasty humorless chuckle.

  Nell Cousineau trembled like a leaf, looking ready to throw up, and Shay, hands behind her back, glowered with pure hatred as she stared at Rolfe.

  “Ms. Farentino,” he mocked, taking the gun from Missy. “I figured you would join us. You know,” he said, wagging the pistol in front of her nose, “you’re just so damned predictable.”

  She met his stare without flinching.

  “I’m thinking,” he continued.

  “That would be a first,” Shay said and was rewarded with Missy jabbing an elbow into her side. “Bitch!” she muttered, doubling over in pain and Jules couldn’t help her.

  “Shh,” she warned, hoping S
haylee would take heed.

  “As I was saying,” Eric said, a little more agitated. “I think maybe we can have some kind of family counseling tonight. You know, a little sisterly one-on-one? You’ve both got dad issues, right?”

  So they knew that she and Shaylee were related. Jules should have guessed.

  “You’re a dick, you know that, don’t you?” Shaylee said. “A real piece of work.”

  “That may be, bitch, but guess who has the gun?” Eric was really rubbing it in now. “So if I were you, I’d shut the fuck up and start pleading for your pathetic life.” He glanced at Missy and his sadistic grin widened. “Not that it will help. You’re as good as dead already.”

  The fire was spreading, Trent was vaguely aware of the shimmering wall of heat, the acrid smoke and the crackling sound of voracious flames.

  He blinked, trying to keep from blacking out, and saw the toes of heavy boots in front of his face. Glancing up, feeling blood ooze from the back of his head, his eyes focused on not one, but two dark figures looming above him, surrounded by creeping, shifting fire.

  The room spun. He thought he was seeing double, but, no, they were different, not twins, not some melded dizzying image. Dressed in black, the men stood together, glaring down at him. Through the smoke, he recognized Kirk Spurrier, the pilot, his dark silhouette outlined by flames, as he said, “This is what you get when you go nosing around where you’re not wanted.” Spurrier grinned with a sense of satisfaction, the smile of a demon.

  Spurrier was behind the murders? Not Lynch? Something was wrong here. Pain pounded in Trent’s head as he clung desperately to the conscious world.

  The pilot’s accomplice was no big surprise, a kid Trent knew well. Tall, athletic Zach Bernsen was shoulder to shoulder with the older man. The piece of oak Trent had dropped now swung from one of Bernsen’s big hands. As Trent struggled, Bernsen raised the bloody stick as if all too ready to bash Trent’s head in once again.

  “You bastard,” Trent spat at the pilot as blackness pulled at the corners of his vision.

  “Make that ‘you superior bastard,’ seeing as you’re on the floor.” Spurrier’s smile twisted evilly and he snorted an amused laugh. “Welcome to your own personal hell, Trent. It’s better than you deserve. I know who you are, that you were hired by Lauren Conway’s parents to find out what happened to her. And I know about Julia Farentino as well.” As if noticing Trent tense, he added, “That’s right, I saw you together tonight, and it didn’t take a genius to realize that the two of you are involved. Then there’s that little fact everyone kept forgetting to cough up, that Julia Farentino is related to Shaylee Stillman.” Before Trent could respond, Spurrier said, “No worries, though, that’s a bit of information that’s going to die here, tonight, with you and Lynch’s files.” He started to laugh, but coughed instead, the smoke getting to him.

  “We have to get out of here,” Bernsen said nervously, covering his face with the crook of his elbow. Zach wasn’t quite as brave as he wanted to appear.

  Another window shattered, hot glass splintering and spraying, but Spurrier barely noticed, not when he had someone to brag to. Eyes glowing like the true zealot he was, Spurrier wasn’t finished gloating.

  “They’ll think it was an accident, you know,” he said as if he’d planned everything, including the damned storm.

  Trent’s head cleared a bit.

  Spurrier motioned to the burning living area. “The spilled lantern fuel, the burnt mattress. You and your lover caught in an inferno. Unable to escape. That’s how it will look.”

  “That … that’s nuts.” Trent said. “No one will believe anything of the sort.” But inside he was panicking. Where was Jules? Already in this megalomaniac’s clutches? Terror ripped through him. God, please, let her have stayed locked in her room at Stanton House. He raised his head, ignoring the pain and skewered Spurrier in his gaze. “You’re a damned psychotic.”

  “Most men with vision are misunderstood.” Spurrier found a lantern that hadn’t yet cracked, and he smashed it onto the floor, next to Trent. Kerosene ran crazily over the hardwood toward the flames already burning bright.

  “Misunderstood?” As battered as he was, Trent pushed up to his elbows. He couldn’t believe the man’s ego. “Give me a break.”

  “Really, we gotta go!” Bernsen was starting to feel real terror. “This place is going up fast.”

  Spurrier didn’t seem concerned. “Lynch is going to be blamed for everything that happens here, all the deaths,” he told Trent in a calm voice. “It’s only fair. They weren’t my fault, you know.”

  “Sure.” Trent spit out the word.

  “Blue Rock will need a new director, someone with vision, someone who understands God’s will.”

  “You?” This guy was certifiable!

  “That’s right. And everyone will see. Everyone including her.”

  “Her?” Oh, God, Jules,” Trent realized. The sick bastard had plans for her.

  “She married the wrong man,” Spurrier said, his mask of calm slipping a bit.

  Was he talking about Sebastian Farentino? That didn’t make sense.

  “Trust me,” Spurrier added, “She’s going to know the mistake she made. That’s what the bitch will get for listening to her father.”

  What the hell was he talking about? Not Jules, thank God. “Oh, don’t tell me. Some woman got smart and dumped you?” Trent mocked. “Now, there’s a surprise. What do you bet, she didn’t see Blue Rock as a stepping stone for taking over the world.”

  Anger flared bright in Spurrier’s eyes.

  Who did this guy think he was?

  “Cora Sue will finally understand,” he said.

  “Cora Sue? As in Lynch’s wife?” Trent coughed, the smoke burning into his lungs. “You and her? Was that before or after she married the reverend?” One corner of Trent’s mouth lifted, he couldn’t help it and pushed hard. “You’re sick, Spurrier. Twisted. You know that, don’t you? Lynch was right. He called it. I saw it in his notes.”

  “Lynch is a fraud!” Spurrier snarled.

  “But not a killer, right? You’re the one. And you started with Lauren Conway.”

  Spurrier’s eyes narrowed, his lips twisted downward. “Lauren was a traitor. She wasn’t who she claimed to be. You didn’t know that, did you? She wasn’t here for an education, to learn about God, to follow! She had her own plans. Cameras. Flash drives. Stealing information. She came here to expose the school and Lynch for what he was.”

  “I would think that would have fit right into your plan,” Trent taunted.

  “We gotta get out, man,” Zach cut in, nervous and trying to back out the front door where flames were chewing through the casing.

  But Spurrier couldn’t let it lie. “She should have stayed with her original purpose. If she’d stayed on course—”

  “For the love of God, just tell him you fucked her and let’s get out of here!” Zach was frantic now, his face twisted in fear. “Before someone sees the damned fire. Before we’re trapped!”

  “It was more than that,” Spurrier said, ignoring the flames, a fanatic defending himself.

  So he’d been played for a fool, falling for a woman who had used him. “What happened, Spurrier? She throw you over for someone more her age?”

  Spurrier’s lips pulled into a snarl. “She thought she would expose me. Me!” He hooked a thumb at his chest in rage while flames started crawling around the arch to the hallway, framing his head. “She became confused and …”

  “You killed her.” Damn, but Trent hadn’t even had Spurrier on his radar until tonight, until he’d read Lynch’s files.

  “I killed no one, you Cretin!”

  “‘Course not,” Trent said, coughing. “You’re a coward! You sent one of your crazy followers to take care of it for you.”

  “You don’t know anything!” Spurrier raged.

  “So where’s her body, huh?”

  The heat was intense, flames soaring, smoke roiling upward. Tr
ent could barely breathe.

  “Her death was an accident.”

  “Come on, man! This is insane!” Zach was heading for the kitchen and the back door as the front entrance was now engulfed, the heat sweltering.

  “A convenient accident. Right,” Trent mocked, goading the egomaniacal bastard. “She tossed you over and you killed her. You’re no great leader, Spurrier, just another idiot whose woman dumped him. Maybe she didn’t want to be with a hypocritical killer. Probably found a better lover.”

  “You idiot. You’ve got it all wrong!” Spurrier swung his foot back and kicked, hard. The toe of his boot was aimed straight for Trent’s face.

  Trent rolled.

  Heavy leather bashed into his shoulder. “Ooof!”

  He wrapped his hands and arms around Spurrier’s pant leg and threw his weight the opposite direction.

  The pilot hopped once, then fell, landing hard on his back.

  Thud!

  The house rocked.

  Flames shimmied.

  Spurrier sent up a howl of pain.

  Trent flung himself upward and rolled atop the pilot. Balling a fist, he let fly, smashing Spurrier’s jaw, jarring his own hand, the two of them wrestling over broken glass and flames.

  “Oh, shit! Oh, shit, oh, shit!” Bernsen edged through the archway and leveled his rifle at the two of them. “Stop it! Let him go! Holy goddamned shit!”

  Trent ignored the TA and his damned weapon. Furious, his fists punching wildly, he straddled Spurrier as he would have a fifteen-hundred-pound Brahman bull.

  “Get him off me!” Spurrier ordered, eyes rolling toward his minion.

  Trent slammed his fist into Spurrier’s nose.

  Crack!

  Bones splintered. Cartilage became mush.

  Blood sprayed from Spurrier’s nostrils.

  The pilot writhed and screamed.

  Trent hit him again, his fist aching.

  “Enough!” Bernsen, eyes round with terror, pointed a rifle straight at Trent’s head. “Get off him! Now!”

  In that moment’s hesitation, Spurrier rolled to one side, bucked up, and landed a fist against Trent’s jaw, knocking him back. Trent swung again.

  Bam! The rifle’s barrel cracked into the back of his head. He collapsed.