CHAPTER TWENTY
BOWEN FELT LIKE HELL. Absolute freaking hell. He was lying in the hospital bed, bandages were all over him, and the light coming through the blinds fell right into his eyes.
And Macey isn’t here. Where is Macey?
He’d woken in that room, and his last memory had been of Macey’s fingers closing around his as she jerked the gun toward Jonah.
Had they shot the other agent? Had the bullet found its target?
Where. Is. Macey?
He grabbed for the side of the bed and began to haul himself up. Pain lanced through him, but he didn’t care. There was an IV line pumping into his vein, but he grabbed for it—
“Are you trying to undo all the hard work that the doctors here did? That I did on that godforsaken mountain?”
Macey.
His head whipped to the right. She was standing there, bruises on her beautiful skin, a bandage on her cheek and a faint smile on her face.
He could only stare at her.
“Bowen?” Her smile slipped away as she hurried to him.
He grabbed her; the IV burned, and he didn’t give a fuck. He pulled Macey closer, wobbling there on the edge of the bed.
“No, Bowen, you don’t even want to know how many stitches you have!” The beep of machines was wild around him. “Stop!” Gently, she pushed him back. “You have to take it easy.”
He didn’t want easy. He didn’t want anything but her. “Couldn’t...remember what happened.”
Her eyes widened. Such perfect eyes. Eyes he could stare into forever. “We shot Jonah.”
Okay, so they had shot him.
“Then you almost died.” Her lips pressed together and pain flashed on her face. “And I have never, ever been so scared in my life.” She eased him back onto the bed. “Not even when I thought Daniel Haddox was taking my life.” She started to back away.
But his hand flew out and curled around her wrist. “Thought...Jonah was going to...kill you.”
“I don’t believe that was ever his intention.” Her lashes swept down. “He was very twisted up. He managed to get past us all, for so long. Managed to work at the FBI. I’d sworn I wouldn’t be fooled again—”
Bowen brought her hand to his mouth and kissed her fingers.
“I wasn’t going to let him get away with what he’d done.” She stared into his eyes. “I wasn’t letting you die on that mountain.”
His Macey was safe. They’d both made it.
“You were in surgery for over six hours.” Her left hand rose and pressed to his chest. “That chunk of metal missed your heart.”
“Because you already had it.”
Her head tilted. “Bowen...”
“I know we won’t be together in the field anymore.” His words rushed out. His throat was sore, his voice a bit raspy—he figured they’d had some tube shoved down his throat during surgery—but he had to keep talking. “If we can’t be partners there...”
She was shaking her head.
“Then I want us to be partners...I want us to be partners in life.” He was screwing this up. Still sick from surgery, weak, but the words needed to be said. He’d come too close to losing the one thing that mattered most to him.
Macey.
She wasn’t shaking her head any longer.
“Will you marry me, Macey?” He could barely breathe.
“This isn’t some delirious proposal that you won’t remember later, after your pain meds wear off?”
“Will you marry me?”
“Yes.”
Fuck, yeah! He yanked her closer and his mouth pressed to hers. He didn’t care about the pain he felt because he had Macey in his arms. Macey in his life, and she’d just promised him forever.
No pain could ever compete with that.
“I love you, Bowen,” Macey whispered against his lips.
He knew they’d come through the darkness. Knew that they’d survived. And now...now he had Macey.
He would fight like hell to always keep her at his side.
As his friend, as his partner, as the woman he loved more than any-fucking-thing.
His Macey.
And he held her even tighter.
* * *
DR. AMELIA LANG hurried back to her motel room. She’d just heard on the radio that FBI Agent Jonah Loxley had been killed—and that the man was the suspected perpetrator in several homicides.
Wesley Kaiser was wanted by authorities.
Wesley... Carlisle.
Oh, God.
She’d worked side by side with him. She’d thought she knew him, but apparently, the guy had abducted Jonah Loxley.
The cops didn’t know where Wesley was. They’d put out an APB for him. She’d had a guard on her last night, but she’d sent him away that morning, thinking she was safe.
I don’t feel so safe any longer. Her hand tightened on her purse. She had a license to carry a concealed weapon. She’d told the cops about her license and the guy who’d taken her to the motel the night before—that cop—had told her it was a good idea to keep the weapon close.
She fumbled with the lock on her room and hurried inside. She shut the door, flipped on the lights and—
“Hello, Dr. Lang.”
Carlisle. No, Wesley. He was there. Screaming, she yanked the gun from her purse and whirled around. He was standing near the window. Sadness covered his face.
“It didn’t work. Susannah is dead, so many people are dead...and I don’t feel better. I just feel worse.” His hands fisted at his sides and he took a lurching step toward her. “Why won’t the pain stop?”
The gun shook in her hands.
“Why won’t it fucking stop?” He stared at her with wild eyes—and then he ran at her.
Amelia fired. He kept coming at her. So she kept firing. Over and over. Until he stopped running.
Until her gun was empty.
The next day...
“YOU SHOULD BE in the hospital, Macey,” Tucker muttered, shooting her a hard glare as she stood in the Gatlinburg police station.
“I’m okay.” But Bowen? He wasn’t as okay. He’d have to stay in the hospital for quite a while longer, but he would recover. He’d survive.
Then she’d marry that man.
“I can do this interrogation,” Tucker continued, motioning toward the one-way mirror. They were in the observation room, and Dr. Amelia Lang—a very pale Dr. Lang—sat in the interrogation room. Her shoulders were hunched and her hands were on the cup of coffee that rested on the table before her. “You don’t have to go in there.”
Yes, she did. “The case is almost closed.” A case that had drawn national attention. An FBI agent as a killer? Of course that story was on every TV channel.
But the story wasn’t over, not yet.
“I just need to ask her a few questions.” Macey gave him a quick nod. “I need to do this.”
The faint lines near his mouth tightened, but Tucker nodded. Macey turned away from him and walked slowly into the hallway. Samantha was waiting for her. When Samantha saw her, one dark brow arched. “I hear congratulations are in order.”
I said yes. I have a life to look forward to. So many good things...not just darkness. “Yes.”
Samantha pulled her close in a hug. “Congratulations,” she said, and her voice was warm. But when she eased back, a shadow had fallen over her face. “I will always remember seeing you on the side of that mountain, your body covered in blood as you fought to save him.” Her chin lifted. “I hope that man understands just how much you love him.”
“He does,” Macey told her, believing this with all of her being. “Because he feels the same way about me.”
Samantha considered that. “Yes, I believe he does.” Her gaze slid to the closed interrogation room door. “I’m assuming you want the honors?”
“I think I deserve them.”
Again, Samantha seemed to consider her words. “Yes, you do.” She opened the door for Macey. “I’ll be watching. If you need me, I’m there.”
Because Samantha had her back. Just as Bowen did. As Tucker did. They were more than just a team. They were a family.
And woe be unto anyone who messed with her family.
Macey walked into the interrogation room. Her heels tapped lightly on the floor. She didn’t have a manila file in her hand. Didn’t have an evidence bag. She didn’t need one.
Dr. Lang glanced up as she entered. Relief swept over her face. “I’m so glad you’re okay, Agent Night!” She rose, almost spilling her coffee cup because her hands were shaking so badly. “I heard about what happened to you and Agent Bowen. It’s a miracle you both survived!”
Macey stopped near the table. “I believe in miracles, Dr. Lang.”
Dr. Lang smiled, a quick flash, but then it was gone. “Please...just make it Amelia. We’re long past the formal point, aren’t we?”
Yes, they were. “I believe,” Macey continued, her voice calm and easy, “that there are good people in the world. People who want to help others. People who want to be happy and help their families and their friends to be happy. People who want to make the world a legitimately better place.”
Amelia still stood, uncertain.
“And I also believe that there are monsters in this world. People who seek out darkness. People who thrive on pain and chaos.”
“You think, Carlisle—I mean, Wesley—was one of those people?”
Macey pulled out her chair and sat at the table. Amelia slowly lowered into her own seat. She pushed her coffee cup away.
“I think Wesley Kaiser was a man driven to the brink of his sanity by grief. He’d lost his sister. He knew that she was dead, that she’d been murdered, but no one would believe him.”
Amelia’s hands fisted before her. “I shot him.” Her voice was weak. “He was in my room, and I—I shot him.”
“I know.” Six of her bullets had hit him. He’d died on the scene.
Amelia’s shoulders sagged. “He never talked to me about his sister. I wish...oh, God, I wish things had ended differently. If he’d told me the truth, I could have helped him! It didn’t have to end this way.”
“No,” Macey agreed with her completely. “It didn’t.”
A tear leaked from Amelia’s right eye. “What happens now? Will I go to jail?” Before Macey could continue, Amelia said, “It was self-defense, I swear! He was running at me—coming for me. He didn’t have a gun, not that I could see, but I was so scared.” A sob burst from her. “I knew what he’d done. And I didn’t want him to k-kill me.”
Macey reached across the table. A tissue box had been placed there. She offered Amelia a tissue. Amelia swiped it over her streaming eyes. Macey waited for the other woman to compose herself.
After a few moments, Amelia seemed to get her control back. “I’m sorry. It’s been a really rough twenty-four hours, you know?”
I know. Macey offered her a smile. “I know you would have helped Wesley.”
Some of the tension left Amelia’s face.
“Actually,” Macey remarked, “I think you did help him.”
“I—I don’t understand—”
“Jonah Loxley told me that someone else helped him. He knew that hikers were disappearing here in Gatlinburg, but he had no idea where their bodies were being hidden. He didn’t know that part of the puzzle, you see. The program that he’d created to find potential serials just showed him a victim pattern in the area. It didn’t show him where those victims were buried. It didn’t show him who his killer was.”
A faint line appeared between Amelia’s brows. “I don’t understand.”
“I didn’t, either, not at first, but then I remembered... You are really, really good at finding bodies.”
Amelia’s lips parted, but she didn’t speak.
Macey gave her another smile. “Let me tell you what I think happened...”
“I—I didn’t—”
“I think Wesley came to you. He came to you not as Carlisle, but as himself. He’d figured out that his sister was dead. He’d figured out that Peter Carter had murdered her, but he had no proof. So he went to someone who knew how to find bodies. He went to you.”
Amelia shook her head. “I—I—No. That never happened.”
Macey squared her shoulders and rolled up her sleeves. She caught a glimpse of her scars and, for the first time, they made her feel stronger. “Peter Carter—in his very warped and twisted way—loved Susannah. So maybe you used that as a starting point. Maybe you went to him and appealed to the emotions he’d had for her. But while you were at the museum, you happen to notice the new exhibit, didn’t you? The hate nails...and the skull.”
Amelia was staring at her with wide, shocked eyes.
“Did a little digging on you,” Macey said, inclining her head. “You’re a forensic geophysicist now, but when you were an undergrad, you were focused on forensic anthropology.”
“Y-yes...”
“That means you know your way around bones. I’m betting with just one glance, you knew you weren’t looking at some two-hundred-year-old skull. You were staring at a recent victim. You were staring at Susannah.”
Amelia’s breath came faster. She was almost panting.
“But then the problem became...where was her body? You realized that Peter was still obsessed with her, and maybe...maybe during that visit he mentioned the spot that Susannah liked to visit. Her favorite place. Her safe place. You headed out there with Wesley, because, of course, he remembered that his sister had loved that spot when they were kids, and you took your equipment with you. You found the cabin and you started searching.”
“This is crazy,” Amelia whispered. She stared at Macey in horror. “You’re crazy.”
Macey glanced down at her scars, and she smiled. “You found a lot that day. Not just Susannah...but so many more bodies. I bet you nearly went wild when you found all of those readings.”
Amelia was shaking her head—
“Did you wonder if Peter was the one who’d killed them all? Bet you did, so you went to Wesley’s contact at the FBI. You met Jonah. You shared what you knew, he shared what he knew...and you realized that you’d found the burial grounds for a serial killer.” She shrugged. “At that point, well, I’m betting Jonah just staked out the cabin, huh? Probably put up some recording devices because he sure seemed to love those.” She knew now that Jonah had been the one to put the devices in her cabin. They’d found the receivers for those devices—in the cabin he shared with Tucker. He was right under our noses the whole time. “Jonah liked to watch. He liked to find sins. So he waited and he watched and he found Curtis Zale.”
Amelia shot to her feet. “This is ridiculous! You were at that cabin! None of those bodies had been dug up! There was no way for me to know that Susannah was there—no way for me to know about—”
“You detected the bodies with your equipment. Most of them were in a nice, neat little line behind the cabin. Those were the work of Curtis Zale. Susannah was all alone, underneath her favorite tree. Her brother would have known that tree was her favorite, right?”
Amelia didn’t speak.
“You saw them, and, no, you didn’t dig them up. Because you had a...well, a team of sorts, I guess. And you all had a plan. That plan involved killing Curtis Zale.”
Amelia was still standing and her body was completely stiff. “Agent Murphy is the one who killed that man! I wasn’t even there! I didn’t arrive until after—”
“After you had Agent Murphy do your dirty work. After you and your team had staged the scene. You liked the nails, huh? Took that from Peter, didn’t you? A nice little ‘fuck you’ every time you used it.”
“I’m—I don’t want to talk to you any longer. You’re lying! Making up lies!”
Macey just stared at her.
“You have no proof about any of this!” Amelia nearly yelled. “Nothing! You’re just making up stories!”
Macey tilted back her head. “Wesley didn’t like what you were doing. He’d started all this—only because he wanted justice for his sister. But somewhere along the line, that got lost. He didn’t realize until too late that the FBI agent he’d turned to for help? That guy was the last person he should have trusted. Jonah Loxley was a monster—”
Amelia’s nostrils flared.
“And Wesley, he was looking for a white knight. Unfortunately for him, he wound up with two monsters.” She rose to her feet and flattened her hands on the table. “He was in your motel room today, without any weapon at all, and you shot him six times. You did that to stop him from talking about what you did.”
“You,” Amelia argued back, her voice strangled. “You shot Jonah, and I heard he didn’t even have bullets in his gun.” Then, before Macey could speak, she made a rough, chopping motion with her hand. “Doesn’t matter. We were both scared. Don’t you see that, Agent Night? You and I are the same. We had to fight back to save our lives.”
They were nothing alike. “Wesley left a full, written confession beneath his sister’s birch tree. He told us everything, including how you helped to give him a false identity. He implicated you completely.”
“No.” Amelia backed up a step and absolute horror flashed on her face. “No!” Then she cried, “That fucking bastard!” Fury blasted in her words. “I did everything for him! No one else was helping that little prick! Me, I did it! Jonah and I were the ones who found the killers. We were the ones who were going to make sure that Peter paid—we were making sure they all paid! We were finally giving those killers the payback they deserved!” She shoved her hair back. “Do you know how many bodies I’ve found? Kids, men, women? Thrown away like garbage? It was time someone stood up for them! Time someone fought back!”
“With torture...and by using innocent people as bait?” An image of Gale Collins flashed before her eyes. “How does what you did make you any better than the monsters you paid back?”
Amelia’s frantic gaze flew around the interrogation room. “I want a deal! I want—”
“There is no deal for you. You murdered Wesley Kaiser in cold blood. You saw him, and you feared he’d tell us about your involvement. So you killed him.”
Amelia’s lips trembled. “My whole life was on the l-line. What was I supposed to do?”
Macey didn’t move.
“I didn’t know he’d written a confession.” Amelia’s eyes squeezed shut. “Oh, God, I didn’t know!”
Macey watched her for a moment. Amelia’s body was swaying, tears sparking on her lashes. “He didn’t.” Her voice was so quiet.
But Amelia heard those soft words. Her eyes immediately flew open.
“He didn’t leave a confession, but you just made one.”
Amelia’s mouth dropped. “You...you lied?”
“And you killed.” Macey turned her back on the other woman. “But you won’t be doing that anymore. You won’t be doing anything but spending the rest of your life behind bars.”
“No!” Amelia screamed.
Macey didn’t look back. She’d gotten what she needed. She opened the door. A uniformed cop waited on the threshold. “Take her back to holding,” Macey told him. “And be sure you read Dr. Lang her rights.”
* * *
MACEY PULLED IN a deep, bracing breath as she stood in the hospital corridor. She’d already checked on Dr. McKinley—he was healing nicely. And Zack Douglas was going to pull through, too, thank goodness. Samantha and Tucker had found him just in time.
There were no more killers for her to hunt right then. No more victims to discover. The case was over.
Three killers—Jonah, Amelia and Wesley. A twisted team that had hunted dark predators but had themselves become lost in the darkness.
Sometimes Macey had worried that she was letting her own darkness consume her. The pain from her past, the need for vengeance...
She opened the hospital room door.
Bowen was sitting up in bed. He smiled when he saw her.
She didn’t worry about getting lost in the darkness anymore. She’d come out of that cage, and she’d gone into the light.
Bowen had shown her the way.
“We got her,” she told him.
Bowen lifted his hand toward her. She hurried to him and her hand extended. Her sleeves were still up. She could see her scars. She didn’t want to hide anymore. Not the good or the bad. Not her fears. Not her hopes. She wanted to take life, to hold it tight. To savor every single moment.
Her fingers curled with his.
And Macey knew her nightmares didn’t matter anymore. The future—that mattered. Her life with Bowen mattered.
What would come next...
That mattered.
* * * * *