Quickly, she saw that she was in a huge room. He’d left her in the middle of a stage with actresses posed across it. No, not actresses. Every one of them were replicas of herself in her movie roles. The clothes, jewelry, an umbrella hanging from Marnie Sylvane’s arm, nerdy glasses propped on Zoey Trammel’s nose, the missing faux pearl bracelet surrounding Paris Knowlton’s wrist. All were props from her movies. Even the two mannequins without faces could be identified by the wigs they wore, Katrina’s long, curling black tresses that fell over the shoulders of a sheer white teddy, the lace a perfect imitation of the costume Jenna wore in the role. The other faceless mannequin already wore a dog collar and held a butcher knife in one hand; no doubt she was soon to become a replica of Anne Parks.
Oh, this was sick…
A roiling nausea crept up her throat at the extent of this man’s depravity. What was this, a weird shrine? A house of wax where she was the only display? Panic gripped her, and she had to force her eyelids to remain almost closed, to keep herself from trembling as she surveyed the stage. A dentist’s chair was the only prop, a drill poised above it and dark stains…blood?…drizzled over the arm and headrest. What kind of sickness was this?
High overhead were pictures of her in her various roles or from magazines, blown up and stapled to the ceiling.
She took another quick look and located a computer room, lit by the glow of monitors, and from the hum, she guessed a generator was supplying energy.
But where was Cassie?
She chanced turning her head just a bit and when she did, she nearly screamed. In a far corner was a contraption that she couldn’t fully understand. A huge glass tub, and above it her daughter was naked, her head shaved and propped on some kind of beam, her hands yanked high over her head, her feet balanced on a slim footing.
Jenna nearly cried out when she saw her daughter. Doom clenched its fist around her.
Jenna had no doubt in her mind that this psycho was going to kill them both.
Upward. One agonizing foothold at a time. Shane worked his way up, digging in, hugging the icy falls, using his rope, feeling the wind tear and shriek at his back. Snow tumbled from the sky and it was still dark—early morning but far from dawn.
Despite his insulated wear, his teeth were chattering from the cold, his body covered in sweat from the exertion. He was making progress—slow, steady, unnerving progress, his thoughts spurring him on.
Jenna could be dead already.
Another person he loved, a casualty of the winter cold and a madman.
Cassie, too, had probably already been killed.
“You crazy son of a bitch,” he ground out, swinging his ice axe, making another niche in the frozen falls. He had less than twenty feet to climb—twenty agonizing feet.
Another gust of wind battered at his back, seemed to laugh at his futile attempts. He reached for the handhold. His fingers missed, his feet slipped. His body dropped, sliding along the icy wall.
“Shit!”
His rope grabbed.
Stopped his rapid descent.
Saved him from dangling or falling nearly three hundred feet to the icy ground below. For a second he thought of David. His heart pounded wildly as he eased back to the cliff face and the icy sheet that was his ladder.
Gritting his teeth, every muscle screaming, he forced himself against the face of frozen water and reached upward, making a handhold. “I’m coming, you son of a bitch,” he said through the frozen bristles of his moustache. “I’m coming.”
“Are you awake yet, Jenna?” he asked, and his voice seemed to come from everywhere, speakers hidden in the darkness. “This is my theater, dedicated to you. Wake up and see what I’ve done, the tribute I’ve made to you.”
“Tribute?” Cassie yelled, and Jenna willed her to be quiet. Don’t antagonize him.
“I know you’re awake…pretending. No need. Not any longer. You’re home with me. You know who I am, don’t you?”
“Who cares, you dumb shit!”
Cassie, no!
Through the veil of her lashes, she watched as he slowly unlaced his boots and stepped out of them. Somehow he lost four inches. Then he peeled off his clothes, insulated camouflage jacket—the kind hunters wear to hide in the fall brush—matching pants, and beneath the outerwear, insulated thermal pants and shirt. Off came the ski mask and hat and she nearly gasped.
Seth Whitaker.
The man she’d trusted to set up her alarm system. How many times had he “checked the wiring”? Oh, God, what a fool she’d been.
“You creep!” Cassie yelled.