Chapter Thirty-Four
Glad she knew about the out-of-the-way bathrooms and wouldn’t have to wait in line, Sarah did her business and washed her hands.
She straightened her hat and slung her leather handbag over her shoulder, then unlocked the deadbolt.
Ben would be fussing outside, no doubt, unhappy that she was out of sight.
She didn’t want him worried about her and would go right back to his side.
This was a happy day. She wanted him happy, too.
Suddenly the door pushed violently inward. A tall, slender man shoved her back. She stumbled hard—almost fell. Her big hat was knocked to the floor. The toilet was to her left, the sink to her right. She was trapped.
The man ripped off the rhubarb head of leaves on his head and threw it down. His hair was mussed, his teeth clenched, but she would know him anywhere—the light blond hair, the pale blue eyes. His slim physique.
“Hi, Sarah. Remember me?” Reaching behind him, he flipped the lock, closing them in.
“Colin,” she breathed. “What—what are you doing here?” Mira’s troubled brother.
Yet, in an instant, she knew why.
Every event that happened in the past month came together in awful finality, like the snapping of a bear trap.
Memories of Colin’s raw, traumatized grief at his sister’s death rushed back.
She clearly recalled his wailed entreaty to her, “Couldn’t you have saved her?
” He blamed her, Sarah, for Mira’s death.
She understood that now. Well, hadn’t she blamed herself?
So, it wasn’t Ridley Kemper after all. Her stalker was Mira’s very own brother, Colin Korhonen, a deeply distressed young man. His grief had morphed into rage. And now that rage grew into a demented desire for revenge.
The Weirdo was Colin!
Cold fear gripped her throat. The lure of pure panic clawed at her. She wanted to shout for help. Her throat worked, but she couldn’t get a proper breath.
“Go ahead and scream.” His eyes glittered with an unbalanced gleam. “Nobody’s gonna hear you.”
“Colin, please,” Sarah choked out. She held up her hand. She would have backed away from him if the tiled wall weren’t already at her shoulder blades. “You know I didn’t want Mira to die. She was my best friend!”
He tore off the remainder of his costume and threw it aside.
Like magic, he produced a knife, silver and glinting, and waved it in the air.
“Some friend you were. Feeding my sister those drugs. It should have been you who died. Not her. She was good. And kind. Her heart was bigger than you ever knew.”
“I didn’t feed her drugs—”
“But no,” he said, ignoring her protest, “you didn’t die, not Super Sarah.
” He spat the words. “You get to live the high life. Going to festivals. Strolling around like a queen. You’re still breathing while my sister is in her grave.
You’re alive while Mira rots in the ground.
After she was gone, there was no one. No one for me. ”
“Colin,” she entreated, “your parents told me they were taking you back to Finland.” She had to keep him talking, at least until her brain started functioning. “They said they’d see to your care just as Mira did in the States. They’d get you doctors, the medicines you need.”
“Bah, their doctors lie. They said I’m schizophrenic. I don’t need them. Or their meds. Fuck them. I left Finland. I needed to be in America. Where you are.” He cut his knife through the air. “Think I’d forget what you did? I came back to get you.” He raised his knife.
With terrified fascination, her gaze clung to the shiny blade. Because Ben had showed her, she recognized the make. It was a Bowie, with a cross-guard and a concave clip point. It must have been a good eight inches long, much longer than hers.
Longer than hers!
Her panic cleared long enough to remember her own knife.
Advancing on her, Colin Korhonen waved his weapon in complex swirls. “I remembered the time you were attacked in your apartment hallway. You told everybody how scared you were by your stalker’s knife. He held it to your throat, didn’t he?”
“Th-that’s why you sent those emails,” Sarah stammered. “Why you left that note on my truck, always with a knife icon.”
“Knew it would frighten you. A little psychological warfare.” He let out a mirthless laugh and took another step closer, now within three feet. His face twisted in deep animosity. An inhuman shimmer fired his eyes. “Scared, Super Sarah? You should be.”
Pulling her leather handbag up to shield her chest, she had to figure out how to get her own knife, somehow lift her skirt, slide it from the sheath. Against the taller, unhinged man she’d have little chance. It was obvious he was intent on murder. Her only hope was surprise.
Think, she told herself. And she remembered Ben’s instructions.
Keep your weapon in close. Face your attacker. Go for his knife hand.
Suddenly, Colin lunged. She wasn’t ready.
Slamming into her with all his weight, he used the heel of his hand to shove her cheek sideways to the tile. With a cruel grip, he laid his blade against her throat.
Instantly, her mind snapped back to the day Ridley Kemper had pressed his knife into her flesh. Inside her, full blown panic threatened to explode.
“Is this your nightmare?” Colin demanded. “Poor, poor Sarah. Have you had bad dreams about dying from the cut of a knife?”
Like a banging drum, her heart pounded. She gasped.
With her left arm crushed between his chest and her purse, she wriggled her right hand down, scrabbled for the hem of her skirt.
Colin’s hot breath smelled of rank hatred.
It fanned her face. His grip was strong, painful.
She could feel his evil intent coming at her in waves. He was going to kill her. Now.
****
This was taking too long. Ben let his gaze scan the sparsely populated street in restless sweeps. It had been a full four minutes since Sarah had gone into the restroom. He didn’t want to be disrespectful, but he needed to check on her. How long did it take to pee?
Abruptly it occurred to him it had been the same four minutes since the rhubarb-costumed youth had gone into the men’s room. In Ben’s line of work, he’d learned long ago to distrust coincidences.
The rhubarb costume.
Earlier in the day when he’d seen the man flitting about the festival, he’d been wearing distinctive red tennis shoes.
The man preceding Sarah into the men’s room had been wearing boots. They’d tapped on the tile floor.
Shit!
****
Inch by inch, Sarah hiked the hem of her dress up until she touched the leather sheath. Her fingers were shaking so hard she feared Colin would feel the vibrations. She had to distract him.
“Mira took care of you,” she said, her voice wobbly. He kept her face shoved to the tile with a brutal hold. “She was kind. She would never have wanted you to be a murderer. Imagine how ashamed she’d be.” Her fingers found her knife’s handle.
“Don’t say her name!” Colin crushed her into the wall. His blade bit into her skin and she felt a sharp sting. Something wet dripped down her neck. “You’re not good enough.” His voice hissed. “You never were. Should have been you dying. Should have been you.”
In one fast motion, Sarah gripped her knife and stabbed it as hard as she could into his side, the only place she could reach. The blade cut through fabric and flesh. She felt its sickening entry into his body.
Colin yelped in shock, reeled back to look at the growing bloodstain on his shirt. “Bitch!” he screamed.
Before he could regroup, she tucked in her chin and thrust out, aiming for his knife hand.
He screamed again, a slash opening on the top of his hand.
It wasn’t enough.
Unstoppable, he raised his arm high in the air and leaped at her. He struck with a hatchet swing from above.
Sarah thrust up her purse. Colin’s knife slashed the leather.
From somewhere deep inside, a sudden anger flooded her system. She didn’t deserve this. She’d loved Mira. In no way did she want her to die. And now, Colin wanted to kill her?
Mira had been a junky. She was responsible for her own death. Ben was right; Sarah couldn’t have saved her.
The swamping anger, both at Mira for killing herself, and now at Colin, for his misplaced grief and twisted blame, gave her strength, dispatched the fear. She wasn’t going to die here, in this bathroom. It would not become her tomb.
She crouched, jabbed again.
Holding his bleeding side, he leapt back.
Outside, Sarah heard shouting.
Then came a deafening gunshot as the lock was destroyed.
The door slammed inward.
Ben stood in the opening, his Glock raised.
Snarling, Colin swung around.
Ben shot him in the head. A double tap.
For one long second, he wobbled and then collapsed on top of Sarah. In a tangle of limbs, knives, and her handbag, they both crashed to the floor.
Ben yanked him off her and shoved Colin to lie in a crumpled heap beside the toilet. For what seemed like an eternity he leaned over the body.
Thoroughly dazed, Sarah felt her mind whirling. Everything seemed so unreal, as though she were watching other people in a movie. She felt completely detached. “Wh-what are you doing?” Stunned and light-headed, she was sprawled on the tile. Her bloody knife was still clutched in her fist.
“Making damn sure he’s gone to meet his maker,” Ben said.
“Bu-but you shot him in the head. He has to be dead. Right?” She was babbling and she knew it, completely incapable of stopping herself. “He has to be dead.”
“Can’t be too careful,” Ben said. Reaching for her, Ben pulled her up into his arms, squeezed her tightly. “Thank God you’re all right.”
She swayed, staring at her knife. Bright red fluid oozed between her fingers, dripped onto the floor. The sight made her skin crawl. All at once she grew frantic. “I want it off,” she said. “I want the blood off. Now!”
Ben steadied her and reached back to twist the sink knob. He pushed her hand under the stream, knife and all. “No problem. It’s washing off, see?”
She stared as the blood turned pink, then clear, rinsing down the drain. And still she gripped the knife. Her fingers had turned to hardened steel.
“Sweet Pea,” Ben said in a gentle tone, “let it go. You’re safe now.”
Stupidly, she looked into his face.
His eyes were lucid, intense, calm. “It’s okay,” he said. “I promise.”
She let her gaze fall back to the rushing water. With effort, one-by-one, she managed to straighten each finger. Her breathing came in painful gasps. The knife clattered onto the porcelain.
Ben’s team rushed into the alcove. Alarmed people gathered outside the bathroom, some with weapons drawn.
Still holding Sarah close to his side, he helped her to the door and gave orders. “Until Chief King and his men can get here, block off the area. Don’t let anyone in.”
Franklin’s gaze swept Sarah, took in the blood at her throat, her mussed hair and dazed expression. He gave Ben a hard eyed stare. “There a body inside, Boss?”
Ben gave a single nod. “The threat is neutralized.”
“Good,” Franklin said. “Leave this to us.”