Exit Strategy Read online

  “The hotel? So I was right, you knew all along where she was? Theo, damn it!”

  “What is your problem? We have a murder to solve, and we both know that Joanna didn’t kill that woman. That guy, for some reason, has it in it for her. That’s why he said what he said to Mitchell. We find him, this is over.”

  “It’s not going to be that easy.”

  “Why not?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous. We’ll need her here to testify.”

  “That’s not likely to happen, and I don’t see why we can’t avoid it.”

  Allison shook her head. “I know you’re all on some guilt trip about how you had to keep quiet the last time, and you felt you let her down. I can’t cut her that much slack, and how do you know that she didn’t crack under pressure, got involved with the wrong people?”

  “Because she’s planning her wedding! Look,” he lowered his voice, “I’m aware of what’s at stake here. I’d like to have her back here as well, check some boxes, but as you can imagine, it’s complicated. We need to find that Preston guy before anything else.”

  “How do you imagine you can keep all of this under wraps?”

  “I managed so far, didn’t I?”

  She held up her cell phone. “Let’s just hope he doesn’t send any more ‘presents’.”

  * * * *

  Grace Lester hadn’t exaggerated when she said that she had more than enough entertainment. Every once in a while, though, she wondered about the detective’s visit. Joanna’s complicated relationship with her father had been part of Grace’s research at some point, but it was never an aspect she’d been especially interested in.

  If she wanted to hurt Joanna, she wouldn’t start with Lawrence Mitchell—or the Gibson family. Grace had heard talk about the murder, and she, too, was now intrigued as to who wanted to lure Joanna out.

  So much that she got distracted.

  When the door to her cell opened, the younger woman jumped to her feet, covering herself quickly. The guard didn’t blink.

  “Lester, you’re coming with me.”

  “Where are we going?” She hadn’t seen him before. He was attractive, but she had no trouble identifying the hint of cruelty in his smile. In her time in prison, Grace had quickly figured out that a lot of people could be played. She wasn’t sure if that was a possibility with this one, and it bothered her.

  “You’ll see,” he said curtly, and shackled her wrists on front of her. “Let’s go, I don’t have all day.”

  In her mind, Grace went through all the people she might have pissed off. Violet Short might put some blame on her for Edward’s death, but she didn’t have the means to pull this off. The victims’ families…no.

  Joanna?

  She shook her head. This wasn’t possible. Joanna wouldn’t come after her for Rue, after all this time. She watched in awe as he led her through various doors, showing papers, no one stopping them. He pushed her into the back of a van, locked the doors and got in the front.

  Grace was worried. She and Edward always made sure to choose their victims carefully, no rich college kids whose parents might want to start a vendetta, get shadowy people and dark money involved. A boyfriend?

  She’d deny everything and make him believe that the murders, the choice of victim and the execution, had all been Edward’s idea. There was nothing she could have done to help. She was a victim, just like them. As she continued to create her version of reality, she got calmer, certain she would get herself out of this bizarre situation.

  When the van stopped not much later, she waited with a hammering heart for his return.

  The double doors opened, and he climbed in with her.

  “Who are you?”

  “Your new best friend,” he said and reached out to unlock her cuffs. “Now you owe me.”

  Chapter Fifteen

  “Damn it! Tell me how the fuck could this happen!”

  The warden was fairly unimpressed in the face of Theo’s rage. Puzzled, perhaps, but not as shocked as one might think, given the circumstances.

  “We have a protocol in place. That’s why we called you. As for how it happened, the son of a bitch came prepared. Had the uniform, the ID, papers…everything he needed to walk right out with her.”

  “And you’re telling me there was no previous contact whatsoever?”

  They were looking for a man named Liam Preston, though it was doubtful this was his real name. There was no connection. To Joanna. To Grace.

  Together with Allison, Theo had spent hours trying to figure out the mystery. Now, of course, their problems had become much bigger. They had a serial killer on the run helped by someone they assumed to be a murderer as well. Grace was staying true to her M.O., having a man by her side again.

  There was no mistaking their goal: To kill.

  Days like these, he was tired of the job.

  He still had to warn Joanna, but first, he had to put plan B into motion.

  After he got his phone back from the locker, Theo called Marian Rickers.

  “I’m sorry to bother you again,” he said. “It’s urgent. I need some reassurances.”

  “I’ll get back to you as soon as I can,” she promised.

  He scrolled back to the picture of Liam Preston, wondering again why he had taken it upon himself to get Grace out.

  “Who the hell are you?” he said out loud.

  * * * *

  Joanna wished she could spend her days in blissful ignorance, just for one moment, but apparently it wasn’t meant for her. Perhaps Tamara’s and Alexandra’s respective stories hadn’t ended in tragedy.

  But Nate? She felt guilty even though it was irrational. Whoever felt like they had to even a score with her was using innocent people as pawns.

  It had to stop. She needed to make it stop.

  Rue turned to her, hiding a yawn behind her hand.

  “We’re not going to sleep, are we?”

  “Doesn’t look that way.”

  2:18 a.m.

  Joanna sat up against the headboard, shivering even though the night was mild as always.

  “We might not be able to stay here.” There was no point in trying to avoid the inevitable.

  “I guess we’ve established by now that I’ll go anywhere you go.”

  “This would be different. We’d be even more off the radar. We couldn’t talk to anyone.”

  “You’re suggesting running away from home? And our jobs? What about food?” Rue’s tone was still light, a bit amused even, as if she didn’t believe Joanna was serious. Was she?

  Would this help anyone? She didn’t know anymore.

  “I’ll never let you go hungry.”

  “I’ll hold you to that, and you could start right now. Since we’re not sleeping, let’s get up and make a snack, okay?”

  They went into the kitchen where Rue opened the door of the fridge and took out some fruit and cheese. Joanna stood in the middle of the room, not at all sure where to go from here as she watched Rue get more food out of the pantry.

  Finally, Rue turned to her and embraced her tightly.

  “None of this is your fault,” she said. “Get it out of your head.”

  “They would have never come after Nate’s wife if it wasn’t for me—”

  “Stop it. Now.”

  Joanna finally halted her thoughts enough to take a deep breath.

  “I’m alive because of you. That’s what you should be thinking.”

  You could say the same about me, Joanna thought, but she didn’t say it out loud.

  * * * *

  The hits kept on coming, Theo thought as he and Allison watched the security footage from the prison. At this point, they weren’t surprised that the man who got Grace Lester out was Liam Preston, clad in the uniform, arriving with all the right papers. The questions remained. How? Most of all—why?

  Theo had a few theories going back to his time when he and Joanna talked about the slasher daily. Bizarre as it was, murderers gained notoriety and admire
rs. It wasn’t too far-fetched to think that Preston felt “inspired” by Grace’s story? Theo wished he could still bounce off theories with Joanna in a professional setting, selfish as that might be.

  He hadn’t supported her during what had to have been the most difficult time of her life. None of them had because Vanessa and the department’s leaders had made it very clear what the party line was: They didn’t condone vendetta, not because anyone felt sorry for Decker. The next killer could get off on a technicality because a cop threw out the book. A cop might get away with something less righteous. Slippery slope and all. It seemed to make sense back then, but he wondered if those words still had meaning. If things could have been different, had he been a better friend to Joanna back then.

  But Joanna’s life wasn’t bad, with a home and a job on the island, the beach only a few minutes’ drive away…with Rue.

  Perhaps he was paranoid, having set something unnecessary into motion, but Theo felt relieved to know that this time, they had the powers that be on their side. Ironic to think that part of the governor’s platform was strong opposition to the death penalty.

  Confronted with a monster like Decker, or Short, principles wavered. Right or wrong? At this point, all he wanted was to get Lester and Preston behind bars. Perhaps there was something they could do afterwards to ensure the legal status and safety for Joanna and Rue, give them more options—and Vanessa might like to spend a few days on the island too. They’d have a chance for overdue conversations.

  “Are you dreaming?” Allison chastised him. “This is not good.”

  “No it’s not, but hopefully we’ll have the chance to catch those two jailbirds with one stone.”

  She chuckled. “I’m not sure how I feel about your metaphors, but damn, I hope we get a break in this case soon. How is Joanna by the way?”

  His first impulse was to divert. They had an urgent job to do after all. Theo didn’t give in to it—they needed all the allies they could get, and Allison was one in spite of the fact she’d had the wrong idea about Joanna and her father.

  “She’s good,” he said. “Let’s hope it stays that way.”

  “Detectives…” The young officer peeking inside the room looked apologetic. “A couple of tourists found a body in the park.”

  “We’ll be right there.” Theo turned to the tech who had shown them the video. “Thank you. We’ll be back.”

  * * * *

  Allison Kato winced as she crouched down beside the body in the taped off area. The victim was sitting up against a tree. They were mostly sheltered by tall bushes, something for which she was grateful.

  Trying to take in every possible clue, she pushed back against the anger that was flaring in her mind, creating an uncomfortable heat. Only for a split-second, Allison wondered what it would be like to give in to that anger the moment she had the perpetrator in front of her. It wasn’t right. None of this should ever be about her, and all about the victim. Dignity. Justice. Not the headlines.

  Truth be told, part of her still envied Joanna for tossing all of that aside, deciding that somebody who did this to another human being shouldn’t be alive.

  The woman was dressed for a night out, in a sleeveless short dress, wearing bracelets and a necklace. No shoes. Her purse was in her lap.

  With gloved hands, Allison opened the clutch, producing a small wallet complete with ID, credit cards, loyalty cards for various stores and five twenty-dollar bills.

  “Not a robbery then,” Theo said behind her, the same anger belying the sarcasm he was trying to convey. Cynical they all were. Some days it was harder to keep up appearances.

  “Maggie Simmons, twenty-seven,” she read from the driver’s license. “All the information is right there. They wanted us to have it.”

  “They? We are really already thinking that?”

  “How many people do we suspect are on a killing spree right now?”

  He flinched. Allison didn’t blame him. It was a horrific thought either way.

  She could not longer avoid looking at the woman, Maggie, whose eyes were wide open, seemingly staring at a horror only she could see. Her face was smudged with dirt and blood, streaked with tears.

  What was the right punishment for someone who had done this? And a woman who had helped him? Death seemed like an option, though it was too quick, too easy. An eye for an eye? She couldn’t afford to think this, ever, at a crime scene.

  But Joanna hadn’t always envisioned taking out murderers. How long had she resisted?

  “You have a point.” He looked around. “They didn’t kill her here, too much potential exposure.”

  “You think Grace’s M.O. is still the same?”

  She and her former boyfriend had chosen their victims together, and then seduced them for what was supposedly a consensual threesome, until it turned to murder. Lester and Short had operated like that for years, but Preston was still an unknown figure.

  Allison turned the purse around, realizing her gloves were sticky with blood. She turned her attention back to the body, the flimsy dress. For the first time in years, Allison Kato had to fight back the urge to throw up at a crime scene. The fabric wasn’t the color she’d first thought it was.

  Trying to calm her breathing, she took another look at the woman’s wallet. Behind the many cards, she found a photograph that had been folded in two to fit the pocket.

  Allison opened it to reveal a picture of Joanna shaking Liam Preston’s hand.

  For a second or two, she and Theo stood speechless, because there wasn’t a swear word strong enough for any of it.

  “I need to tell you something,” he said. “You can’t share this with anyone.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  In the early morning hours, Joanna had accepted the fact that she wouldn’t be able to go back to sleep, too much running through her mind. Did history have to repeat itself, with no chance of ever changing the story? Or was it just her?

  She had made coffee and taken a cup out on the deck, but the sights around her failed to calm her. Rue had asked valid questions. Where could they go from here?

  There were no safe spaces—or perhaps it was all Joanna’s fault, always had been, because she couldn’t leave things alone. She could have taken down Decker with the help of a SWAT team, instead of going after him with the intent to execute him. Same with Short?

  As Joanna sipped her coffee, she came to the same conclusion she had before. She would have likely done the same thing then, and now when she couldn’t turn away from Alexandra’s distress, even at personal costs. She hated to admit it but perhaps Grace had had a point when she insisted they were both hunters. The difference? Grace had chosen to, and experienced pleasure from causing others pain. All Joanna wanted was for it to stop. She’d come to a point where she’d learned that it was as much about her own pain as it was for the victims’ justice. She wasn’t completely unselfish. That didn’t mean she was completely wrong, was it?

  Something was in the air. Another change. Joanna could feel it. It wasn’t much of a stretch to think that Grace wanted her to suffer. This new guy had an agenda, and it seemed that he wanted to please Grace. They wouldn’t let her be. At the same time, Joanna would have to face the consequences of her actions.

  The most important thing in all of this was that Rue would still be safe.

  The subject of her thoughts came to quietly join her, her own coffee in hand. Barefoot in her shorts and tank top, her hair still tousled from sleep, Rue was so beautiful it hurt Joanna to look at her. Because she had to do what was right for her, and maybe she had fooled herself thinking it meant they could be together. Maybe not. She was tired.

  “Come here,” she said. Rue put her cup on the table and sat on her lap. Joanna pulled her close, resting her head against Rue’s chest.

  “It’s different this time,” Rue said, stroking her hair. “You are not alone in this anymore.”

  She had barely finished the sentence when they heard the sound of the helicopter.
r />   * * * *

  Joanna’s fears were confirmed sooner than she had imagined when a visitor knocked on their door. Joanna could tell that Rue hadn’t made the connection yet. She didn’t seem alarmed.

  “I’ll get it.” Joanna got to her feet, her heart hammering as she went to the front door and opened it. Theo looked uncomfortable in his suit and tie, too hot for the climate, or because he had unpleasant news to share? She assumed it could be both.

  “I thought you might come at some point. You didn’t bring cuffs, so that’s something.”

  Her joke came out as lame as she’d feared, and she could tell he didn’t appreciate it much. “But I’m aware you didn’t come here on a vacation either. Let’s make this quick and painless.”

  “Grace Lester escaped,” he said. “And they already killed together. I’m afraid this changes a lot.”

  “I assume,” she said, stepping back though her mind was frozen in shock, part of her surprised she’d been able to move and talk. This couldn’t be. How could she get out? Joanna gave herself the answer. Her new boyfriend had done for her what Edward Short wouldn’t, lay it all on the line to free her. “Can I get you anything? We were just making breakfast. What do you need from me?”

  “That’s a good question, isn’t it?” Rue asked when they walked into the kitchen. “Why would you think Joanna could help you with any of this?”

  Joanna could tell from Theo’s expression that he hadn’t missed the suspicious tone.

  “I swear, I will explain everything to you. Breakfast would be great, to be honest. I haven’t had much time.”

  Rue sighed and took out a cup and plate for him. After adding a knife, fork and spoon, she closed the utensils drawer with more force than necessary.

  They sat down. Joanna started to eat, assuming that not long from now, she wouldn’t have an appetite any longer. She could feel Rue’s gaze on her.

  “I know it has to be bad. Otherwise you wouldn’t be here,” she finally said.

  “When you helped the women earlier…”

  “I’m not going to apologize for that. Rue and I would know better than to look away.”