Chapter Six

"It's him. The Fire Ice Killer." Ty paced the floor and threw up his hands.

Asa cut off his worn path. "We don't know that. He said his work was a step up from painted nails and lips. Implication, not fact, Ty. We focus on facts."

Ty didn't buy it. It was him. Who else could it be? "I shouldn't have given the press conference earlier." He shot a glare at Violet. It had been her brilliant idea. "I know it was him who bumped me and left that envelope. He probably tossed some cash to a kid to pull the alarm and cause the panic, which kept me distracted. Exactly what he wanted." He pounded his fist into his palm. "I could have had him. He was right there."

"I stand by my assessment," Violet said, sipping herbal tea that smelled like lemon and freshly mowed lawns. "The killer has targeted you. He wants to make you suffer. I said seeing you confident in a press conference would infuriate him and cause him to play his hand. He did."

Fiona and Asa sat on the love seat with laptops resting on their legs. Owen sat at the breakfast bar, tapping an ink pen against his chin.

Would Asa make him recuse himself from the case now that it was even more personal? He couldn't leave. He had Josiah now. He'd quit his job before he'd go home without revealing to Josiah he did have a father who loved him.

Violet cupped her mug and held his gaze. "It appears he might be targeting people you love from your past, starting at the beginning with Ahnah. She's an easier mark, and she has a flower in her name. The question is how long he'll keep her alive and when will he escalate, because rest assured, Tiberius, he will."

How long did he have until this killer plucked another loved one from Ty's grip? Bex. Josiah.

Violet. No one had mentioned she had a flower name, and they were close—as close as one could be with Violet.

Ty had no clue what kind of research the killer did to discover he'd once loved Bexley and knew and cared about Ahnah too. "Where's he keeping them?"

"Somewhere they can't escape while he's working on them," Owen said. "I've found three tattoo salons in Blue Harbor alone. He's a tattoo artist or he was. He can't keep them in his own shop. Too many risks. But he could be hiding them in his home. I asked Selah to do a search across the Outer Banks and as far as Wilmington and Charlotte for abandoned tattoo shops. In case they go with him willingly. Know him. Travel that far with him."

Ty nodded. "Good. Good. What about this Skipper?" He'd given Asa the sketch as soon as he'd blown through the door after dropping off Bexley. He'd asked her to stay here, but she refused with the excuse she needed to be home when Josiah arrived or if Ahnah returned. She was holding on to hope, but the letter had thrown her into a tailspin, and Ty wasn't able to answer her endless questions. He had questions of his own.

"Skipper," Asa said, "is a nickname for an Ethan Lantrip. He's a boat captain with a legit business license. Lives in Blue Harbor. Thirty-four. No rap sheet on him. A few speeding tickets." Asa held up a photo they'd printed, stood and walked toward the whiteboard to place it and the sketch Josiah had done—which was a remarkable likeness. "Found this on his website. I think the amount of tattoos on his body is interesting." He had an ink sleeve of nautical tattoos on his right arm, snaking up the side of his neck. Skipper, aka Ethan Lantrip, looked like a fisherman with weathered, tan skin. Dark eyes. Brown hair that was a little long and pulled back in a short ponytail. Decent-looking for a dude, he guessed.

"Any photos of him with Amy-Rose Rydell on his social media accounts or hers?"

Asa shook his head. "No. If they were dating, they kept it private."

"What twentysomething woman doesn't shout to the internet when she's in a relationship?" Ty asked, frowning. Didn't make sense.

"Maybe he wanted her to keep it private. No record doesn't mean he isn't nefarious. It means he hasn't been caught." Violet stood and carried her empty tea mug to the kitchen, rinsing it and setting it in the sink.

"Where is he? You've had all day to find him," Ty barked.

Asa arched a lone eyebrow.

"Sorry. That's the stress talking." Between the case and his present personal life mixed with the past, his insides were like a volcano erupting.

"He was closed for business. Maybe he's taking a long weekend with Labor Day approaching. I don't know. We have his address and visited his residence, but he wasn't home either. We'll try again tomorrow after FedEx picks up the evidence to be taken to the lab in Quantico."

"Yeah, well, last time we used FedEx, the evidence was stolen by a third party." Not that it was the driver's fault, but it had still happened.

"You want to fly your personal plane out?" Asa's sarcasm was a clear indicator Ty was on thin ice. If he was still in the Family, he'd have access to two personal jets, but he refrained from voicing the remark.

"I'm going to bed," Ty said, spent and not wanting to brawl. His nerves were frayed, and he knew he was being a jerk. He climbed the stairs to the top floor, then marched onto his private deck and leaned over the railing, staring out at the sound.

As the water lapped at the beach, he let his mind wander to the past and pick up the random memories. Making mud pies with Bexley. Climbing trees. Swimming in the creek. The first time he told her he loved her. He was eleven. He'd meant it even then. He'd never wanted to be with any other girl. At seventeen, he'd told her again he loved her. On her sixteenth birthday. Sealed it with a kiss under the stars.

He'd never meant it to go too far. Never imagined their secret would be uncovered, and to this day he wasn't sure who saw or how anyone knew. He never dreamed Garrick would ask Father for Bexley's hand in marriage, or that his father, who knew Tiberius loved her, would allow a union with Garrick.

Garrick's laugh as he came downstairs still scraped against his spine like needles. Marrying Bexley was nothing more than a dig at Ty, who was the favorite son, and a way to get his hands on Ahnah more often.

But he didn't get what he wanted. Neither did Ty.

And then there was Dalen. His oldest half-brother, laughing at the news right in Ty's face and rubbing in the fact that the golden child wasn't going to get Bexley after all.

His youngest brother, Lysander, had only been fourteen and thought Ty was mad because he got caught setting off firecrackers in John Marlin's carport. That his dad overlooked. But the eldest son rule was the rule, and Ty still didn't have a clue why he didn't change it. Maybe Rand had always wanted Bexley for himself and saw Garrick's accusation of her defilement as a way to have her as his own bride. She was beautiful, and he had often leered at her when she visited the house. Rand had made a point to bless her before leaving their home when she came over to hang out, which involved touching her hair and pronouncing a blessing before kissing each cheek. At the time, Ty never thought anything about it. Now? Rand was a perv.

"Hey man," Owen said as he opened the squeaky screen door. "I knocked but you must have been in deep thought. Cool if I'm out here?"

"Sure."

Owen took the Adirondack chair next to the small end table, and Ty eased onto the other one. For a while they sat in silence, listening to marsh grass rustle and the water lap in a calming rhythm.

"What's going on, bruh? Ain't like you to unload on Asa. Not unless he's the one acting like a total behind."

"People are dying because of me. Fire Ice Killer or someone else. Doesn't really matter. I'm the cause, and the woman I loved...she could be next. Ahnah could die. I gotta find this nut job. Quick. And we have one lame lead. It ain't Ethan Lantrip or Skipper or whatever his name is. Can't be." Could it?

"Who's got a vendetta against you?" he asked.

"Fire Ice Killer. The MO is too similar. I want to look at the old case files myself."

"Violet has them."

Of course she did.

"You may be too fixated on the Fire Ice Killer. Violet isn't always right."

"She's mostly right, and again—the MO. Plus no one had a vendetta against me that I know about."

"What about someone from your past? From the Family. Your brother—the one that wanted to marry Bexley and was cruel."

"He got what he wanted in the end. Rid of me. I'm not a threat anymore—never was. I never wanted to take the office of Prophet. He knew that."

"Anything I don't know about? I feel like you've been keeping a lot from me when I've been forthright with you. You were there for me when things went south with Jasmin. That one stung, man."

O was right. They'd been through a lot together. He owed him the truth, but he held back Josiah. For now. "No."

Owen cocked his head and narrowed his eyes. "Walk me through your past again. Garrick to the inner workings of the cult. Close your eyes and go back to that place. Before you left to rent an apartment in Atlanta and take Bexley and Ahnah away. Tell me about the women and the girls in the Family. What were the beliefs, and how did they affect the two of you?"

"The Family of Glory honored pure marriages. Women were to remain virgins until after the wedding ceremony. If it was discovered that they weren't prior to the wedding, they automatically went into the Prophet's harem as another wife. Gave the man the chance to marry a virgin."

"Okaaaay, keep going."

"Everyone knew I wanted to marry Bexley, but I couldn't until Garrick was married or at least engaged. But Garrick had zero intention of settling down."

"But he asked for Bexley's hand in marriage, and it was granted."

Ty's eyes were still closed and he nodded. "Yeah. Felt out of the blue at first, but later I suspected it was retaliation. I went to Rand about his behavior specifically toward Ahnah, and just the accusation could have gotten me disfellowshipped. No one, including siblings, were to report negative behavior. It was considered verbal abuse against a man of God, and in our Family, the men of God were never wrong and were above reproach. Complaining against them—even if warranted—could cost a member everything. Rand talked with him, though. Garrick denied any wrongdoing. I was severely reprimanded instead of kicked out, and I think the proposal was Garrick's retaliation."

"So for some reason—that you don't know—your father granted him permission."

"Yes. By the time I heard, it was a done deal. Signed in a contract with her family. Arranged marriages are standard."

"Women—girls—had to marry any old man?"

He opened his eyes and looked at Owen. "Young. Old. If the Prophet said it was ordained by God then it was."

Owen shook his head, his jaw tight. "You set the plan to run in motion. But while you were gone, something happened. Somehow Garrick caught wind that Bexley and you had been intimate."

"Yeah. The elder wives would examine her to see if she'd, and I quote, been ‘deflowered.' Obviously, she had been."

Owen winced. "What, is this biblical times? It's archaic."

"Yeah," he said through a huff. "Upon my arrival, I was brought before my father and the elders to be questioned. I couldn't deny it. And after feeling the wrath of my father's words, I was escorted out of the community and disfellowshipped. Bex was taken into the wives' circle—aka a harem—to await the wedding ceremony. Usually within two to three days. But Bexley said it happened that night." It had been storming that night. Dark. Cold.

"Dude, I don't even know what to say."

What could anyone say? Depravity and hypocrisy abounded in that place. He pinched the bridge of his nose, working to stave off a headache, but it was no use.

Owen reached over and gripped his shoulder. "I can't imagine, but I'm seeing red flags, Ty. Flags you should be seeing, but it's personal to you. Your mind is fuzzy. The note implies that it's the Fire Ice Killer, but it's public knowledge what he did to those women with the polish and lipstick. So while we assume it's Fire Ice, it could be a copycat who has a vendetta against you. Someone who knows the past. Next, did you hear the words you used about your sick cult?"

Ty shook his head. Owen was right, he was fuzzy, completely unfocused. His arrows weren't shooting straight, but he couldn't let Asa know. He had to stay and stick this out.

As long as they had to stick it out. Hurricane Jodie was picking up velocity as it barreled toward Elbow Cay, Bahamas. If she didn't slow, she could head straight for them.

"Deflowered—we gonna come back to that nasty term later—but our guy is tattooing flowers on his victims. One possible victim is Ahnah, who was in the cult with you and who also has a flower for a middle name."

The deck slanted and his blood froze. How had he not already connected the dots? "We had a signature logo of pretty flowering dogwood blooms on a cross..."

"You have any enemies that were in the Family of Glory with you or who left?" Owen asked, leaning his forearms on his knees.

"I was eighteen. I mean, I never got along with my oldest half-brother, Dalen, but I never did anything deserving of this, and he wasn't cruel like Garrick. Just a jerk."

"Was he already married?"

"No, but in our home it was the eldest son based on the wives. Garrick was firstborn of my mother. Dalen was firstborn of Mother Anne."

"That is so messed up. How many half-siblings do you have?"

"I have no idea. Hundreds maybe by now."

"Could it be him? He didn't like you. He was jealous."

Dalen? His jealousy was no secret, but once Ty was disfellowshipped and lost his favorite son status, Dalen would have no reason to give him another thought. "No."

"What about Garrick?"

Ty shook his head and batted a mosquito away. "What would be the point? His motive? Once my dad dies, Garrick will be the new Prophet. He was vile, but he never hated me." Or had he?

Owen gave him the get-real look. "He asked for your woman's hand in marriage. Sounds like hatred."

"He thinks Ahnah and Bex are dead."

"If Bexley helps cult girls escape, what's to say he doesn't know she's alive? What if this is still about you and Bexley and Ahnah?"

Violet had vetted Bexley and Ruth's Refuge. Her website had no pictures, and when Bexley visited churches, recordings weren't allowed. She protected her own identity from the cult. Although now there was nothing they could do since she and Ahnah were of age. No forcing them to return, and it wasn't like they murdered former members.

At least not that he was aware of.

But she wouldn't want them sniffing around. Wouldn't want her parents to get wind they had a grandchild. And if his own father knew... Bexley was right. They might try to contact him if Josiah didn't reach out first. "I don't know what to think."

"We need to bring this to the team and let Fiona and Violet do their wiggy-jiggy on it."

Ty laughed. He and Owen had all kinds of names for the way Fi and Violet profiled. Wiggy-jiggy, hu-du, ju-ju. The jeeper-creeper—that was his favorite. "Yeah. I guess so."

Could someone who had once been in the Family of Glory be the Lighthouse Killer and/or the Fire Ice Killer?

Infernal classical music filters from unseen speakers in my cell. If I survive this I will never listen to instrumental music again. We're let out of our cages sometime after dark. Time and days have disappeared. I can't keep up. But I know we're led one by one to our prisons with nice beds. Sometime after light, he repeats the leading, and we enter the cages again. He calls them hanging baskets, but they don't actually hang. We can't dance in swinging cages.

I've refused to dance altogether.

And I have paid the price. My left ring finger is now a throbbing, aching mess. He'll have to break all of my fingers, because I'm not going to bend. I can't. I'm surely being looked for, and I am holding on to hope.

Yesterday, he entered my room with Xanax and made me take it. I don't want to, but he's going to tattoo me anyway, and it's a few hours that I don't feel like I'm going to come out of my skin and lose my mind. And if he does anything else to me, I don't want to be awake for it.

He wasn't prepared for my quick outburst after swallowing it, though, which had been strategic. When he rolls in the tattooing cart with all his gadgets, I've been eyeing the needles with hopes it'll pick my iron cuff and maybe the door. I knocked over the trays and, in our scuffle, he broke another finger, and I managed to slide a needle under my bed. It's long and hooks like a noose at one end. I'm sure it has a name. I don't know it but it fit the bill.

I'm not sure how long I've been working it into the cuff, but it's not budging and I kick a bare foot at the wall and let out a cry. This has to work. God, let it work. I flex my aching good hand, which cramps from holding the thin, long needle, then inhale deeply. Frustration only robs me of focus. I must focus.

After a few deep meditative breaths, I insert the needle into the lock again and find a little groove. Sweat forms above my lip but I'm cold. Never can get warm. I feel the needle in the groove and begin to twist and turn until it moves, and the click sounds like freedom.

I can't control the dam of tears that breaks, and the heaviness resting on my shoulders dissipates. I. Am. Free. I'm getting out of here.

Preparing to the pick the lock on the door, I'm in shock when I turn the knob to test it and find it unlocked.

Another wave of joy rides my tears, but it's short-lived as I halt.

Why would he leave the door unlocked?

My breath trembles, and I jerk my hand from the knob. Is he expecting me to try again so he can punish me for lack of submission? Is he out there waiting to catch me? Is this a game? I glance upward, searching for a camera, a blinking light, anything to indicate I'm on-screen.

Nothing.

I play the what-if game, and with each scenario, my pulse increases until my chest aches and I can't inhale a full breath. If I don't attempt to break free, I know at some point I'm a dead woman. And if do break out and get got, I'm only deader faster.

I ball a fist and inwardly scream. What choice do I make? What is he up to? Will a sensor signal an alarm and my escape attempt?

The walls close in on me, and spots form in front of my eyes. With no more thought, I yank open the door and pause, waiting for the blaring of a bell or buzz of an alarm, but only silence fills the hallway.

One beat. Two.

No one comes.

Maybe he's not here. Maybe he simply forgot to lock the door because I was dead out from the drugs. Maybe he's overly confident and underestimates me. Two broken fingers will not keep me from trying.

I dart into the hallway and instinctively cover my chest with my arms.

Should I open the other doors and free the remaining garden girls? Would they come with me? No. Too many of them. I have a better shot escaping alone and sending help. I clutch the needle in my hand; it's the only weapon I have for now.

If I can make it to a phone—a landline if he has one or a cell phone or laptop—I could call or message someone for help, but most cell phones and computers have passwords, and landlines are practically obsolete. No, that's too risky. My best bet is to find that canoe at the private dock. I dread returning to the marsh, but I'm going to die if I stay. But I could die out there too. By an alligator. Do I want ripped to shreds by an ancient water monster or ripped to shreds by a wicked human monster?

I take my chances on the alligator. At least the beast will show me mercy as he forces me down into the murky water for the death roll, drowning me and shoving me in a log for later.

I'll never be found. No closure for my family.

But I may never be found otherwise. I head for the stairs. I know where they are and can move fast. One flight. Two. I pause and listen. Nothing but the low hum of the TV he's left on the news channel.

The newscaster warns an approaching hurricane could hit the Eastern Seaboard. She's called Jodie. If I don't make this attempt to freedom, then I hope she comes with all her untamable force. I've been in a hurricane before. You're powerless to stop it coming. You cannot beg, bargain or bolt from something that unrivaled, unmatched.

I hope she comes in with severe judgment and sweeps the entire island under and never vomits it up again. We'll be casualties, but our deaths will be sweet relief. Underwater it's quiet and still and peaceful. I'd open my mouth and inhale death, letting it consume me whole like the alligator but without the sting.

The door beckons me to come. To find my escape. To take refuge in the marsh. I won't make the same mistake twice. I'll hide for hours in one of the thickets until he has to give up.

But then...what if he takes the canoe? What if I make it to the dock and it's gone? Then what?

My throat is tight and my stomach lurches, but I dash to the door.

I unlock the sliding dead bolt.

Turn the lock on the actual knob.

And I freeze, losing my bladder at his voice.

"Where are you off to this time of night, darling?" It's a quiet before the storm kind of tone. I turn but he's not there, and it dawns on me his voice is coming through a hidden speaker.

He sees me. From where I do not know. A camera system. Has he been watching the whole time from working to unlock the fetter that held me to right now in this moment?

A buzzing at the door draws my attention and I gawk in horror as the sliding lock clicks back into place.

With trembling hands, I unlock it again.

But the buzzing repeats and the lock returns to its place.

"I can do this all night if it's the game you want to play," he says. "I do enjoy your determination."

It's a smart house. He can run anything including lights and appliances with the touch of a finger.

I know now he left the door unlocked the last time on purpose to prove I have no power. He's been in control the entire time.

I don't think. My flight-or-fight mode has kicked in and I run. My brain won't process rationally; it screams hide. Run. Get as far away as I can. I slide the bolt once more and reach for the knob, hoping this time I can wrench open the door before it relocks.

I'm not that fast.

"Ah, ah, ah," he singsongs through the speakers. "Outside is a no-no. If you need me to talk to you as a small child, I'll indulge you. But I'd rather treat you like a woman."

"A woman? You're holding me prisoner!" I scream and rotate in a circle, looking upward though I don't know where the hidden cameras are located.

"You gave yourself to me. We're one flesh. You belong to me. You are me."

I run through the living area to the other door, but it's locked too, so I scramble up the stairs to the second floor. My gaze roams over this living area as my blood pressure rises to dangerous heights, pounding in my ears and giving me a sharp pain through the back of my skull.

I know I have nowhere to go. No way out. Nowhere to hide.

I collapse in a heap and pound the floor through my guttural sobs. "Let me out! Let us go. Please, let us go."

He says nothing for a long time. I know he's watching me in a crumpled heap, losing my mind. I feel the shift inside me. The breaking point. It cracks along my rib cage and seeps into my blood, which runs thick and cold through my veins. Buzzing zings in my ears.

Suddenly I'm numb.

"You can march yourself to your room like a good girl or we can do this the hard way. I'll let you have the freewill choice." His voice is soft and slow like a dad reading his child a bedtime story. But I'm not a child, and this is a horror novel. One I don't have a pen to change the chapter ending for. I am powerless. Voiceless.

Hopeless.

Deep below the marrow, a voice calls to fight. To be brave. To hold on and hang in. Not to quit. It's not over yet.

A hurricane is coming.

And people are tracking me. He's seen the press conference.

I push myself up off the floor and shove hair matted from tears away from my face, straightening my spine.

"That's a good girl. Well done."

I lift my chin to the ceiling and my fist too. "You come down here, you son of—" I swallow. "I'm not going anywhere."

And I know I've unleashed a cold fury.