A Deadly Influence (Abby Mullen Thrillers #1)(121)

“Do you have a shot?” Griffin shouted.

“Negative. I don’t have a clear shot,” the sniper on the radio answered.

“If you have a shot, take it,” Griffin snarled.

And then Luther pulled Gabrielle back. For a fraction of a second, only his silhouette remained framed in the window. He was already moving away.

A sudden blast echoed in the street. Luther stumbled back. Disappeared from view. The shutter closed.

“Damn it!” Griffin shouted. “Did you get him?”

“I hit his shoulder,” the sniper said. “He’s not dead.”

“Sir, we should break inside now while he’s down,” Baker said urgently.

“Break in,” Griffin said.

Abby could only stare as the ESU crew moved in.



He dragged Gabrielle to the stairs, shoulder pounding with pain, sleeve wet from blood. His blood. The bitch. The goddamn whore. She’d done this to him. She’d gotten him shot.

They would break in now, kill him. But he would take her down with him.

“Up,” he grunted at her, knife at her back. “Up the stairs.”

She hesitated, and he let the knife cut, just once. She screamed and stumbled up the stairs. He climbed after her. The world spun. One stair. And another. And another.

They reached the third floor; he was breathing hard.

Explosions rattled the house, making his ears ring, everything confusing and slow. He shoved Gabrielle into a room on the third floor. Only one window there. Too small to break through. Downstairs, he heard men running, shouting.

He forced her to the side, flattened himself against the wall. “I’m upstairs with the girl!” he screamed as loud as he could. “If anyone comes near, I’ll kill her! You got that? I’ll kill her!”

Listening, striving to hear them above the constant ringing in his ears, he prepared himself to do it. Slit the girl’s throat.

But they stayed back.



Abby watched as someone ran outside, shouted for a medic. She prayed fervently for Gabrielle and Eden to be all right.

“Sir, the suspect is barricaded on the third floor with the girl,” Baker said on the radio. “He says he’ll kill her if we get near.”

“What about Eden Fletcher?” Griffin asked.

“We have her. She’s hurt.”

The medical crew ran inside with a stretcher.

“Mullen,” Griffin said. “I’m going to order them up to the third floor.”

“No,” Abby blurted. “He’ll kill her. If cornered, he’ll kill her.”

“He’s already cornered—and desperate; you said so yourself. And he won’t answer the phone. We’re out of options.”

“If he wanted to kill her, he would have done it already instead of barricading himself upstairs,” Abby argued. “He wants a way out.”

“If he won’t talk to us—”

“He won’t talk to us on the phone,” Abby said—and ran toward the house.



He was losing too much blood.

His vision was blurry, spots dancing in front of his eyes. Soon, he would faint. And the girl would be free to run downstairs. They would come up and arrest him. He would spend the rest of his life away from Gabrielle, unable to make contact.

No.

He grabbed her hair, pulled it hard. She let out a scream, forced to raise her head, expose her neck. One cut was all it would take.

“Luther.” Abby’s voice from downstairs.

His hand hesitated. He would not answer. It was too late to talk. Much too late. It was time to finish it all.



He didn’t answer. Abby tried again. “Luther?”

Could he have killed himself and Gabrielle already? Abby was about to climb the stairs when she heard a frightened whimper. Gabrielle. Still alive. Listening carefully, she also heard the labored breath of Luther Gaines.

He didn’t want to talk. But he hadn’t finished it either. It was up to Abby to say the right words. To label his thoughts and fears.

“It looks like you’re afraid that if you surrender, you’ll go to prison,” Abby said.

No response.

“I’m not going to lie to you; it might happen. But we can get you that attorney. Remember what we talked about? Whatever you’re charged with will have to be proved in court. Anything could happen.”

No movement. No answer. He didn’t believe her.

What did he want? What was he trying to do? During their conversation he’d been furious at Gabrielle. He felt betrayed by her. He felt— No. Not by Gabrielle. By this girl. That was how he kept talking about her. When he mentioned his interactions with her online, he called her Gabrielle. But whenever he talked about her in the flesh, he called her this girl.

Almost as if they were separate people.

It was that well-known problem of social media—with a perverse twist. When you followed a person online, they always seemed perfect. Their family was the happiest family; their trips were the best trips; every picture was wonderful, enviable, something to be desired. But it hardly ever reflected the truth.

Luther had been obsessed with Gabrielle. Even when he’d met her as a reporter, she’d presented her fake persona, her public face. Now, meeting the real girl for the first time, a girl who pleaded for her life and refused to love him, he was disappointed. And enraged.