Shattered (LOST #3)(86)

“Then I realized . . . he wasn’t coming after me. I could do anything I wanted.”

And Jax remembered that Mitch had become even more violent. That last night . . . when I pushed him down the stairs, he was about to kill Charlene.

“But you thought you were the one in charge. You shoved me down those stairs. I was in a hospital for all those long months! Trapped in that damn bed! Barely able to move!” Spittle flew from his mouth. “When I got out, I killed that bitch. Then I was gonna kill you but . . .” He shook his head. “I wound up in fucking jail . . . got sent—” Mitch broke off, his lips clamping together.

But the way the guy was raging . . . Jax could put the pieces together, and as he did, shock rolled through him. “You were at the same prison with Murphy.” Sonofabitch. Fate could sure be a twisted bitch.

All that time, he’d thought Mitch was long gone, but the guy had been alive. Alive—and what? Getting kill lessons from Murphy the Monster?

After Charlene had died, Jax had left town—moving again—and he’d never looked back. Jax had been on the streets, moving fast and just trying to stay alive. He’d wound up in New Orleans. He’d never even thought about searching for Mitch. Why would he? The guy had been a dead man.

“When they locked me up, that bastard recognized me. The guards were all scared of him. Let the fool do whatever the hell he wanted.” Mitch yanked up his shirt. Jax saw the slashes across his skin. “He used his shiv on me within forty-eight hours of my check-in. But he didn’t want to kill me. That wasn’t what he did. He just wanted to make me beg. To show me that he had the power.”

Fuck, fuck, fuck!

“I know about the power rush that comes from death. I felt that power when I took Charlene’s life . . . and after a while, after all of his twisted torture games, Murphy realized we were more alike than he’d thought. He told me things . . . showed me so much . . .” His words trailed away. “I survived by playing him. Then one day, I was free and he was still rotting on the inside.”

“That’s when you came down here.”

“I was just gonna kill you, then I saw Sarah. Beautiful Sarah.” His hand slid over the scars on his chest. “I couldn’t think of a more fitting payback for Murphy.”

Jax shook his head. No. “You aren’t killing her.”

“You aren’t going to be able to stop me.” Mitch smiled and lifted the phone to his ear. He hummed then, a light tune . . .

A tune that Jax had heard Sarah hum, when they’d been in that little motel near the prison.

“Hello, Sarah . . .” Mitch murmured into the phone as he kept his eyes on Jax. “Are you ready to come and find your lover?”

“I’M READY,” SARAH said. She was more than ready. Gabe could track the phone, just like he’d done before, and they’d have—

“You’re not tracing the call this time. I learn from my mistakes.”

She wasn’t so sure he did. “Proof of life,” Sarah demanded.

He laughed. “Screw that. You know you want him either way.”

“Sarah!”

She tensed. She’d heard Jax’s shout. Heard it so clearly.

“Stay away, Sarah! He wasn’t dead! Stay—”

“Come find him,” the bastard taunted. The line went dead.

Sarah looked up. Emma was on the phone with Gabe. They’d been waiting for this, hoping to get the lock when the call came through.

Emma shook her head.

No.

“Where is he?” Carlos asked as he paced in that narrow room. “Where is he?”

VICTORIA STARED DOWN at the bulletin she’d just gotten. Well, it was a bulletin that the desk sergeant had received, but since her current job was to monitor the intel that came through the police station and report back to Gabe, she’d made a point of snagging that bulletin.

She read it three times to make sure there wasn’t a mistake.

Four.

Then she ran toward Wade and Gabe.

“We didn’t get him,” she heard Gabe snap to Wade. They were behind a group of cops, all leaning over a computer. “The techs didn’t have time to locate the phone—”

Victoria cleared her throat. “Gabe.”

He glanced over at her.

“We need to talk. Now.” Her hand fisted on the paper. “Come on.” Because the cops hadn’t made the connection with the bulletin, not yet. After all, why pay that much attention to a bulletin that had come in from so far away?

She hurried toward the first empty office she could spot. Gabe and Wade followed her inside.

“Viki, what is it?” Wade said. “We need to be out with—”

She lifted the paper. “Murphy Jacobs escaped from prison.”

“Fucking, no,” Gabe said, his eyes widening as he snatched that paper from her.

“He was in the infirmary because of—of some accident that had happened . . .” An accident that seemed to have occurred when Sarah was visiting with him. Only Sarah hadn’t mentioned an accident to Viki. “He was cuffed, the guard had just cuffed him—but Murphy had a key. He got free and he killed the guard on his way out.”

“Sonofabitch.” Wade looked shell-shocked. Victoria felt the same way.

“He’s been missing since then. The cops are searching everywhere, but if anyone can vanish . . .”