Don't Make a Sound (Sawyer Brooks #1)(63)

Sawyer turned toward her dad. “Is she speaking the truth?”

He said nothing.

She didn’t really expect an answer. Her dad had no spine. “What choice do you have but to believe whatever the queen tells you?” Sawyer asked him. “Everyone in this shitty little town has something to hide. River Rock was built on secrets.”

Mom came to her feet. “That’s enough.”

Sawyer also stood. “I guess this is goodbye.” Sawyer kept her gaze fixated on her mom a moment longer. “It’s hard to believe Gramma gave birth to someone like you. She was so caring and sweet, and I was lucky to have her in my life, which makes me wonder, what the hell happened to you?”

Sawyer walked out of the room, made her way through the kitchen, where she grabbed a piece of fruit and headed for the cottage to pack.





CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

Malice opened her eyes and pushed herself to a sitting position. She’d slept on a thin pad she’d taken from one of the cots. She preferred to sleep level with the ground. She didn’t feel well. Her head pounded against her skull—thump, thump, thump.

Psycho’s cot was empty, but Malice only had to look toward the darkest corner of the warehouse to see her silhouette. Other than a quick bathroom break outside every so often, Psycho refused to leave Otto’s side. She’d spent most of her time sitting on the hard ground a few feet away from him, her back against the wall, watching him and saying nothing.

Everyone in The Crew had agreed that they would take turns sleeping in the warehouse, making sure Otto didn’t escape. Psycho stayed every night, regardless of who else was here with her.

Malice wondered if what Psycho was doing, staring at the man day and night, was therapeutic, or if it was merely causing her further turmoil. It was difficult for Malice to wrap her mind around the fact that Otto Radley had repeatedly cut through Psycho’s flesh and then crudely sewn her up using fishing wire.

The man who had used Psycho’s body as his own personal plaything for all those days and nights was sitting right there after all this time, chained and at his victim’s mercy.

What was going through Psycho’s head? The plan had been to scare the man, but after twenty years in prison, this guy wasn’t afraid of anything.

Malice looked around for the gun, panicked when she didn’t see the rifle leaning against the wall.

She pushed herself to her feet.

The weapon had been moved. It now leaned against the wall closer to the door.

Malice took a breath to try to calm herself.

The door was shut and locked in place with a metal bar that slid through two metal hooks. There were enough crevices and cracks in the place for Malice to see that it was still dark outside. She glanced at her watch. Five thirty a.m.

Every joint was stiff and sore as she walked toward their designated cooking area. She needed coffee. One of the women had brought a cooler filled with hard-boiled eggs and cheese and crackers. The sandwiches she’d brought yesterday were long gone.

Using a jug of water, she began the process of making a pot of coffee. She’d never been camping before, but she was a quick learner.

As she went about gathering whatever she needed, she wondered how she would feel if that was her father tied to the metal pipes.

Imp-like glee shot through her.

It always seemed strange that physically her father was miles away, and yet mentally he was right here, right now.

Always.

A day didn’t go by that she didn’t think of him and wish him dead.

Back then, in the light of day, even when he wasn’t sneaking into her room, she would catch him looking at her, his yearning palpable.

Such a secretive man, like a shadow, gloomy and haunting, a dark presence in her life. Nothing had changed. He still troubled her dreams.

Oftentimes she would find herself in another dimension, reliving the horror of feeling her father’s fleshy, hairy body moving, grinding, his breath in her ear, panting and groaning as he fucked his own daughter.

Suffocation—unable to get enough air—Malice had experienced it every day from age six to eighteen. More often than not, his thick body pressed heavily on her, the pressure so much she’d wished he would accidentally smother her.

She never fought him.

Not once.

They had a deal.

A blood-curdling roar tore through the ugly memories and filled the warehouse. Malice dropped the can of coffee. It clanged against the cement floor, rattling along as it rolled out of sight.

Across the room she saw Psycho sitting on the ground, bent over Otto.

“What are you doing?” Malice asked, the words catching in her throat.

“What does it look like, or should I say sound like?” Psycho had to shout to be heard over Otto’s screams and cursing.

“Payback is a bitch,” Psycho shouted. “Isn’t it, Otto?”

Malice walked to the corner of the warehouse where Psycho hovered over Otto. She stopped when she was a foot away.

Her stomach turned.

Psycho’s hands were covered in blood. She had sliced through Otto’s pants and the flesh of his left thigh and was now using a fishhook and wire to sew him up, not bothering to move the denim out of her way as she worked. Sewing the whole thing up, flesh and fabric, just like that.

Had Psycho’s plan always been to torture the man? Sick to her stomach, Malice rushed to the exit, pulled the bar loose, pushed on the creaky metal door, and ran outside. The rage. The blood. The craziness of it all was too much. She got as far as a spindly pine tree before she dropped to her knees and dry heaved. Her stomach was empty, but that didn’t stop her from retching.