Chapter 39

WE FOLLOWED BEHIND AMANDA'S KIA for about thirty minutes. She led us north outside of the city to the east and pulled into the parking lot of a country church. Boards were on the windows, and a padlock secured an outside basement door.

I turned to Paige. "We should have called in and let Jack and Zach know where—"

Amanda rapped her knuckles on the driver side window. Paige put her window down a sliver.

"Don't worry it's a friend's building. I know it doesn't look like much, but Bingham brought me here all the time as a little girl. It used to be glorious at one time." When Paige and I didn't move, Amanda said, "It will only take a minute. Call it in if you like. I watch them cop shows."

Paige reached over and put a hand on my forearm. I knew Amanda had noticed the action. I wondered if Amanda picked up on the underlying connection between us.

"All right we have a few minutes," I said.

We got out of the car and followed Amanda to the basement door. She pulled a key out of her jacket and slipped it into the padlock.

"You said a friend's place. Is it Bingham's?" Paige asked the question, even though we knew Bingham didn't show any properties registered in his name except the one in Salt Lick, Kentucky. Paige glanced at me as if to say, we should have called in.

And we should have, but we were wrapped up in a heated conversation about what last night meant and where it would go from here. For a good portion of the drive, we weren't even speaking to each other.

Amanda smiled at us. "Not sure what that matters." She pulled the lock off and swung the door open. "If you want to follow behind me." She phrased it more as a directive than an invitation.

I wasn't looking forward to descending into the basement of an abandoned church. With this case, the two married together too well—the isolated burials and the religious connotation.

"You said Bingham brought you here when you were young?" Paige took the stairs slowly with well-placed hands on the walls for balance.

A few steps down, my heart sped up and my breathing became labored. The smell of dirt filled the air transporting me straight to the burial chambers in Salt Lick.

Amanda opened another door at the base of the stairs and flicked on a light. "Lance also had a fond place in his heart for this place. He said this is where he really learned about God and became enlightened."

I pulled my cell from its holder and brought up the messaging screen. Jack and Zachery needed to be notified of where we were. We were careless and stupid for not calling it in.

"Enlightened?" Paige pulled from Amanda's statement.

"Yes. It's when you know what God has planned for you. You realize where you fit in and what differences you can make in this world. In a sense, you were enlightened when you chose to become FBI as I mentioned a bit at the college."

I had only a few more steps to text the words I needed to before it would have Amanda's attention. I pushed a few keys but working in a hurry my thumb was too large for the small keys.

"What about you?" Amanda looked around Paige to me.

I quickly tucked the phone behind my back. "About me?"

"Why did you become an agent?"

"To make a difference."

"You could do that being a police officer, a teacher, or many other things. That answer is very vague." Amanda kept walking into the basement but faced us.

All I needed was a few seconds of her attention on Paige to finish the message and send it. "My father served his country."

Paige glanced over a shoulder, her eyes saying, I didn't know that.

"He was FBI?" Amanda asked.

"Navy."

"Impressive. He knew that in order to bring peace, people must sometimes fight."

"I guess so."

"Still doesn't answer about you."

The conversation held the veneer of new friends getting to know each other over a drink. Yet the situation was much different and any interest was expressed to extract and manipulate.

With each step farther into the cellar, the intensity in Amanda's eyes deepened, and she watched our every move.

I would have to play along. "I like to travel. Speaking of which, have you ever been to Kentucky?"

Paige turned to face me, and the impact was so quick, I never saw Amanda lift the gun. Paige crumbled to the dirt floor of the basement.

My training kicked in. I went to draw my gun, but my cell was in my right hand. I hit what felt like the send button.

My God, I hoped it was the send button.

"Don't even think about it." Amanda glared at me from the other side of a gun I had no doubt was loaded. Her green eyes were clouded with rage.

I looked down at Paige wanting to see evidence of breathing, and with a raise of her shoulder it brought hope.

"Don't worry about her. She'll wake up. It was only the butt end of the gun. You'd only have to worry if I had used the other end."

"What are you—"

"Hand me your cell phone and gun—now!"

I assessed my surroundings and my options. The basement was unfinished. Its walls were brick blocks and the floor was flattened dirt. On the wall to the right was a marker board with scribbling on it, none of which I could decipher. Beside it was a large golden cross and a poster of the coinherence symbol. There was an inset in the wall that I assumed led to another room. To the left of the space we were in, there was a coffin. My breathing froze for a few seconds.

Why was there a coffin here?

I tried to rationalize it was an old church, and maybe it was left behind.

I looked down at Paige and back up at Amanda. I knew what my next step would be. I tossed the phone.

With her attention on it flying toward her, she didn't catch me drawing my gun. Amanda caught the phone and connected eyes with me. She rose her weapon and aimed it on Paige. "You put your gun down now or she dies. You have eleven seconds!"

Eleven.

My chest compressed. The height of the ceiling only hovered above my head a few inches. I didn't want to become her eleventh victim, and I didn't want Paige to either. I lifted my hands in surrender, realizing that if there ever was a time to turn to God now would be it. I watched Amanda as I bent down and laid the Glock on the dirt floor.

"Now step back ten feet." Amanda waved her gun.

As I stepped back, I assessed her weight at approximately one hundred ten pounds, shy a hundred of mine. Her structure was petite and compact. I had spent time in the gym lifting weights, and boxing was a pastime for me. There was no doubt that in a physical altercation I would overpower her.

"Why are you doing this?"

"Doing what?" Amanda smiled.

The facial expression brought me back to Bingham in prison, and how he smiled when there was no reason to, how he latched eyes with mine and tried to read my thoughts. His words slammed to the forefront, repent and be forgiven, or don't and be punished. "Are you here to exact punishment on me?"

Amanda laughed loudly.

I watched as she picked up my gun, tucked it into the waist of her pants, and closed the distance between us. I studied the grip she had on her gun. She held it tight enough her knuckles were white.

"On Paige?"

Amanda kept moving toward me.

"Why did you break into my house?"

As she came closer, my breathing tightened. Both unarmed, the odds would be in my favor, but sadly that wasn't the case here. Amanda had the upper hand. My mind replayed the crime scene in Salt Lick. The bodies and how they were mutilated, how they were tortured for days before having the final incision be the one that claimed their life.

"Only those who ask the right questions get them answered."

"You're a smart woman."

"Flattery only works on the vain and simple-minded. I am neither."

"You killed people."

"Only those who deserved it."

That was a confession, yet it made me sick to realize one normally confessed when they felt they would get away with it. "You're going to kill me."

"You are arrogant and cocky. You are proud. Scripture says pride comes before a crash. That too is a punishable sin. But there are greater sins, namely hypocrisy."

I wouldn't die without a fight. I studied her movements, but her eyes followed mine.

She stopped walking a few feet from me. Her eyes faltered from mine for only a fraction of a second. I moved forward and grabbed the barrel of her gun. She struggled to gain control of it, pulling back and to the side.

"Let go—"

A bullet whizzed by my head. It bit the upper tip of my ear. Adrenaline infused my bloodstream. My strength grew. I would kill her if that's what it took. She fought back with the power of a man. She punched me in the left eye, and I hit her in the abdomen.

She wailed.

I thought I broke a rib with the blow, but it didn't stop her fighting power. Instead, the pain seemed to have empowered her.

I tried to pull the gun from her grasp, but I had to be careful that a stray bullet didn't get fired again and somehow wind up striking Paige.

Amanda gripped the gun tighter than before. I punched her in the face. She faltered backward. I mustered the strength and roundhouse-kicked her to the chest. The gun flew a few feet across the floor. She lost balance; her legs came out from under her.

I came at her as a predator to take its prey. But a receiving kick to the solar plexus held a blow substantive enough to propel me backward. I came at her again, my focus on reaching the gun, on winning this struggle.

I saw her hand reach into a pocket and come out, but it was too late to avert the result. Electric juice from a Taser shot into my chest.

My body slumped to the ground, my arms and legs paralyzed. My eyelids fell heavy.

"I never meant for this to happen." Amanda struggled to her feet. I heard her movements. She went to where the gun had come to rest and picked it up.

I fought to open my eyes. The basement was a blurry haze.

I feared for my life and for Paige's. I didn't want to wake up to being tortured and disemboweled. Our deaths would result from our negligence not to notify Jack and Zachery of where we were. But hadn't all the evidence so far pointed to a male unsub? Jack's words came in waves of conscious thought, we need to think outside of the regular parameters with this case.

I felt Amanda loop her arms under my shoulders and hoist me on an angle. She dragged me across the floor. But I couldn't move. I couldn't fight against her. I couldn't scream. She dragged me in bursts of strength, alternated with moments of catching her breath.

I willed my body to fight. No strength came.

"You will be fine." Her words were calm.

My eyes willed to close, but I focused on keeping them open. She dragged me past Paige. It was too hard to focus. My thoughts were whirling and were not rational.

Amanda kept pulling on me, until she stopped. "You will rest peacefully in here and be out of the way."

My eyes flashed open, enlarged, and a surge of pain attacked my forehead.

The coffin! No!

I screamed loud enough the world should have heard it, but it only ricocheted inside my head.

She yanked on me, hoisting me slowly and methodically until I was inside. I blinked tears. My fear being realized, and yet I was powerless to fight against it.

"You must sleep." I barely felt the brush of her hand on my arm, even though I saw the hazy silhouette of her reaching toward me. "When this has passed, you will be resurrected."

I lost the fight, and my eyes shut. I felt the faint caress of a hand across my forehead and heard the words, "Shh, don't cry."

Chapter 40

JACK FLICKED THE CIGARETTE BUTT out the opened driver window. He and Zachery had rented a Hummer H3, the only vehicle left in the lot. Accounting would be on them about it when they got back. People had the illusion the government's budget was extensive, but it had limits like everyone's and sometimes even more so. A requisition form was nearly required for pens.

The Knowles kid had checked out and they were headed over to the Catholic Church. Jack's cell chimed with notification of a new text message. As he pulled it out to check the message, it rang. Caller identity announced it as Nadia. He pushed the button to answer. "You're on speaker."

"I have something you're going to want to hear. I have all the backgrounds on the guards from Kentucky Correctional. None of them stood out except for this one. The guy is a nephew to Keith Knowles. It's his sister's kid. And that's not all. The guard's name is Sean Atwood, and he's normally posted to Bingham's wing of the prison."

"Hmm."

"Boss?"

"Gotta make a call." Jack hung up and dialed.

"Clarence Moore here." The prison warden answered on the third ring.

"Special Agent Jack Harper—"

"There still hasn't been any mail for—"

"Is Sean Atwood working today?"

"Yes?" There was a question contained in the single word. He was curious why they cared. "He works regular day shifts Monday thru Friday, and every other Saturday."

"I need you to pull him, detain him. I'll call Sheriff Harris and take care of the rest."

"Agent?"

"This isn't an option."

"Okay, but what am I supposed to tell him?"

"Make something up. Bring him to your office. Make him think he's done something great to deserve praise. Don't make him feel threatened, or like he's done something wrong. Understand that?"

"Yeah." Moore remained quiet for a few seconds. "Is he dangerous?"

"Just do as I've asked."

"O-okay."

Jack hung up the call and lit another cigarette. "We're thousands of miles away while our unsub could be back where we started."

*****

BINGHAM LAY ON THE MATTRESS, staring at the ceiling. There wasn't much else to do in prison except for track time in your mind as you waited for release. But time wasn't what went through his thoughts. He relived his kills, every one of them. He remembered the way they smelled, how they presented themselves righteous to the world yet sinned in their souls.

Everything had been perfect until now. Anger tainted the recollections.

His follower had been stupid, leading the FBI right to their doorway. They had always been too elevated in mind to think they were vulnerable. For a quality that was potentially great, it could be a weakness to exploit. He feared this would be theirs, but what he cared about more was if they went down so could he.

The truth wouldn't continue. People would sin without consequence.

Bingham heard the voices in the hallway and recognized the man speaking as the prison warden himself. They were a few cells down. Bingham listened carefully.

"You're doing a great job here. I need to speak with you about it. Jamie's going to take the post for a bit."

"Okay."

The man agreeing to leave was Sean. Bingham balled his hands into fists. This wasn't a good thing.

*****

JACK PULLED THE HUMMER OVER to the curb and dialed the sheriff. He explained the importance of bringing in backup to go after Atwood. As the profile indicated, he would be extremely intelligent and dominant-natured. When he hung up, he checked the text message that came in. "Did that kid fall and hit his head?" He held the phone out for Zachery to read.

"We're with Amanda at...what does that even say? XJUCRJ."

"Your guess is good as mine, but you're the genius. I need you to figure it out."

Zachery kept looking at the text. "He added at...but at what? The next word is just gobbledygook."

"Love it when you talk technical."

"So they left the college with Amanda. But why the change to garble?" Zachery depressed the speed dial for Brandon's phone. It rang through to voice mail. "There's no answer."

"Try again."

Ten more rings. No answer.

"Try Paige's."

"It went straight to voice mail."

"Shit! What the hell is going on?"

"I'll try Brandon's again." A one second pause. "It's straight to voice mail now. Someone has shut it off."

Both men spoke at the same time. "Amanda."

Jack continued. "Our evidence lends itself to a male unsub."

"You were the one who mentioned just this morning this case was outside the norm. Look at Bingham's killings. For a serial killer, he gets close to his victims first."

"Shit!" Jack pounded the wheel. "Atwood isn't our unsub. He's Bingham's connection to Amanda."

"Oh no." Zachery maneuvered his body in the seat to face Jack.

"Share it now."

"When Paige and I visited the family of the girl, Sally Windermere, her fiancé's parents remembered her coming to the house a few times with a new friend. Sally had said it was a girl she met at church, but the parents never remembered her from there. They couldn't remember the girl's name, but said they thought it started with the letter A."

Jack dialed Nadia. "The unsub has now been identified as Amanda Knowles. Paige and the kid are with her. We have a text from the kid's phone, and I need you to triangulate and find out where the text message was sent from."

"Just a sec." Nadia clicked some keys. "I'm not showing it on."

"The message just came in."

"I'm not sure what to say, but the phone's not on."

"Both Brandon's and Paige's did ring straight to voice mail," Zachery said.

"What about the kid's personal phone? Track that."

"On it." Seconds later. "It's not on."

Zachery gave Jack the look that said, since you don't allow personal calls that would make sense. Jack wasn't being pulled into the guilt trip. "What about Amanda Knowles? Does she have a cell registered to her?"

"One second." Nadia dragged out the word second. "Yes, she does and...it's not on either."

"Shit! So you're telling me there's nothing you can do, and that our two agents are out there on their own? Is that what you're telling me?"

Nadia spoke quietly. "I'm sorry, boss."

"Don't be sorry. Find them."

*****

NADIA HELD THE PHONE TO her ear for a bit after Jack hung up. What was she supposed to do?

Nadia, think.

And then it struck her. The photographs she had from Royster's home computer. She hadn't had much time to go through them. Maybe they would lend a clue as to another location. Maybe something would stand out among them.

She studied the screen and the picture of the two work boots that were side-by-side. She enlarged it. There was a logo embossed on the side of the beige rubber. She brought up the website for the company to get the ratio of the logo on the full boot and returned to the photo. She made the calculations and she had the proof. The foot on the left was a size eleven, the same as Earl Royster, but the foot on the right was significantly smaller. She dialed Jack.

"You know where they are?"

"I can tell you that the unsub we're looking for is definitely female. The picture of the work boots, the one on the right is a size nine, so unless the man had unusually small feet, this is a common size for a woman."

"Shit!"

"Boss?"

"I let them walk right in there."

Zachery said, "They didn't have to go along with her."

"Go along with her?" Nadia asked.

"They were going to just ask her a few questions about Bingham, what she thought of him, whatever, it doesn't matter now. They went somewhere with her. We don't know where, and now we can't reach them. I don't believe in coincidences," Jack said.

"What alerted you in the first place?"

"The text message, but it's jumbled up."

"Send it to me. I'll see what I can—" Nadia's screen flashed up with a new e-mail. It was marked urgent, confidential, and highly sensitive. The subject was: Sally Windermere, victim number ten, forensic evidence.

"Nadia."

"I'm here. Just a sec..." She opened the e-mail, and as she read the finding her stomach flopped. "You're not going to believe this boss. Give me a sec, and I'll call you back."

"Nad—"

This time she hung up on him.

*****

PAIGE OPENED HER EYES. The room was dimly lit. She strained to hear anyone or anything.

Where was Brandon?

She was on her side, her neck cocked at an unhealthy angle toward the ground. Her head pounded and her neck ached. She went to rub it and found her arms constrained. She stretched out and realized her feet were tied together with rope. She pulled in her legs, tucking them as far to her chest as she could and rocked herself to a seated position and looked around the room.

The lights were off, and the only illumination came through two windows at the other end of the room. When she noticed the poster on the wall of the coinherence symbol and a large cross, fear labored her breath.

She saw a coffin in the corner with a silver lock securing it shut and moved toward it, inching her way there like a worm, knees to chest, pull, knees to chest, pull.

"Brandon?"

She felt he was close, yet far away. She feared he was dead inside there. They had upset Amanda's killing method by getting too close. She could break from the norm and kill without holding and torturing. She would still have a male for her eleventh victim.

Paige called out louder. "Brandon?"

Silence.

She rested her forehead on the cool wood of the coffin and cried.

*****

"DID I MISS ANYTHING WHILE I was gone?" Amanda walked into the college foyer, passed a smile to the receptionist. She was a simple woman, easily manipulated.

"No, I don't think so." She smiled back, pleasantly. "How's your aunt?"

"She's still having a rough go of things, but we're hopeful." Amanda slid a hand along the counter. "Have a great afternoon if I don't see you again."

"You too Miss Knowles."

Amanda opened the door to face her one o'clock class. She smiled at her students—bright, intelligent minds who were interested in exploring the greater power of the universe. In this room, she had the ability to influence them and to make a difference.

*****

"I WANT ALL OFFICERS OUT looking for her Kia. If she so much as goes on the highway, we'll know about it." Jack barked the order to Chief Brennan.

"And now you want our help?"

"It's not a request."

"You're pulling out the feds trump local, are you?"

"Whatever it takes." Jack lit up a cigarette, pulling back on it and living from the nicotine high that never lasted anymore.

"Then I don't have much choice." Brennan disconnected the call.

Jack hung up and merged back into traffic. "Cocky bastard."

They were stuck in a stream of cars. There was barely any forward movement.

Zachery hung up from his call. "I just got off from the car rental. They don't have tracking systems in their cars."

"Son of a bitch."

"We'll find them. I know it. We've faced worse."

Jack looked over at Zachery. "I don't believe in hope."

"Maybe it's time to start?"

Jack's cell rang, and he answered, "You're on speaker."

"It's Nadia. I just received an e-mail from forensics. Doctor Jones in Salt Lick pulled a hair off the tenth victim, who we have already identified as Sally Windermere. The MtDNA is a match to Anna Knowles."

"The killer is related to Knowles." Zachery elaborated, "The MtDNA profile from Knowles would have been on file to help identify the remains back in eighty-six."

"And there's more. The DNA has been confirmed as belonging to a female, but it has markers similar to that of Bingham's."

"Bingham didn't have any children," Jack said.

"At least not according to any legal record."

"And we're certain it ties back to Anna Knowles as well?"

"Yes, sir."

"So Lance Bingham and Anna Knowles had an affair, she got pregnant with Amanda, and Lance found out about it."

Zachery drew out the rest of the scenario. "This must have been his initial stressor. He grew up with the need to be perfect in the faith. When she got pregnant as the result of adultery, he saw his reflection in Anna, yet held her responsible for the trespass."

"So then the question is, how did Amanda find out who her father really was, and can we prove Bingham knew about her being his daughter?"

"We need a conference video call set up to connect us with Kentucky correctional and Sean Atwood immediately. Route it through the Sarasota PD. We're headed there now."

"Right on it."

The call ended.

"For some reason traffic's not even moving." They might have moved three feet since the start of the phone call.

"It might be better to leave the car and run there," Zachery suggested.

Jack hesitated but took the keys from the ignition and got out. "Smoking hasn't killed me yet, running shouldn't."

"Hey asshole, back in your car!"

Horns honked, and people were swearing. Not that they could see it, but Jack was smiling.

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