CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Emotions roiled like a storm at sea within Marcus. Fear for Kate, who was definitely not fine no matter what she was saying. Rage at himself for agreeing to come with her ahead of the tactical team and for rushing alone into the vestry where Cox could trap him.
Mostly, though, Marcus was filled with hate. Hate for Elijah Cox, the goddamned pathetic little bastard who thought he could straddle Kate and throttle her to death while moaning like a fucking dog in heat.
He was going to kill Cox. Fuck policy, fuck procedure, and fuck right and wrong. He was going to put that asshole in the ground, and damned be the consequences. If he went to Hell for that, he’d meet Cox there and kill him again.
He passed Kate’s gun on his way out of the church. His flashlight revealed a splash of blood on the handle, and he didn’t know if it was Kate’s blood or Cox’s.
The breeze enveloped him when he stepped outside, its cool clean scent banishing the odor of rot in the church behind him. He looked around, searching for sign of his quarry and found it in the trail of blood leading toward the parking lot.
A lot of blood. He’d done more than just wing Cox. Maybe he’d get lucky and find he’d already done the job.
He jogged onto the lot and lifted his flashlight toward the rental car. The beam fell on Cox’s silhouette, and Marcus raised his gun and fired without warning.
The distance was too great. The bullet pinged off of the roof, missing Cox by inches. The killer whirled toward Marcus, then, with an animalistic shriek, Cox sprinted toward the trees surrounding the property.
“No you don’t, fucker,” Marcus growled, breaking into a sprint himself.
He scanned ahead, noting the darkness behind the tree line on that side. Here, the church backed into a park rather than the neighborhood surrounding the other three sides. Cox was trying to lose himself in the darkness.
But Marcus had a gun, and Cox had dropped his. Cox was badly injured, and Marcus was healthy. Cox was an old priest turned murderer. Marcus was a federal agent and a former Navy SEAL. This was no contest. This was a hunt, and Marcus had already drawn the blood of his prey.
He reached the trees and scanned through them, looking for any sign of Cox hiding among them. He saw a clump of muddied dirt at the base of a tree near the middle, then a puddle of red staining the grass beyond the edge.
So Cox had chosen to run. It didn’t matter. He was going to die tonight.
Marcus stepped through the trees and found himself on the side of a winding dirt path. The grass extended a few yards in front of him, then a few yards beyond the path where more trees obscured Marcus’s vision.
Marcus cursed and moved forward, scanning with his light. A rustling noise to his right caused him to spin that direction just in time to see a chipmunk dash up a tree and hide itself among the branches.
He cursed again and continued.
“Cox!” he called. “Give up! Come out where I can see you! I can get you medical help.” He felt only the slightest tug of guilt at the lie. “Otherwise, you’re going to bleed to death out here. Is that how you want this to end?”
No answer. He looked right and left down the path, and when he saw no trail of blood, he cursed a third time and moved into the trees.
No sign of Cox. He continued forward, scanning for footprints, sniffing for the coppery scent of blood, listening for labored breathing.
Nothing.
“God damn it,” he swore. “Cox! Show yourself!”
More rustling caught his attention, and when he swung his light that way, he saw him. Pale skin, wide, terrified eyes, a red bloom on the white of his robe.
He fired twice, but the face disappeared just before he pulled the trigger. He swore and sprinted after Cox, searching for an opportunity to fire.
Cox weaved through the trees, keeping them in between him and Marcus, denying Marcus his shot. Marcus picked up speed, ignoring the branches whipping at his face. Cox’s silhouette flickered in front of him, an apparition fading in and out of reality.
A scream split the air, a banshee’s cry of terror. Cox seemed to sink into the Earth, and a corner of Marcus’s mind imagined the killer had been pulled through a pit straight to Hell.
His more grounded senses snapped at him to stop. He pulled up just at the edge of the trees and shone his flashlight down.
He’d stopped inches before falling into a deep ditch. A creek ran through that ditch, water splashing and roiling forcefully. He wondered if a pipe had burst to cause that kind of flow or if this particular stretch of water was always so rapid.
A tattered purple cloth, the bottom half soaked maroon with blood, lay against the culvert. There was no sign of its wearer.
Marcus searched for several minutes, jogging downstream and scanning the ditch and the trees beyond for any sign of Cox. He finally gave up when he reached the end of the park and came to a stop on a sidewalk bordering an avenue.
His phone buzzed. He didn’t recognize the number, but the area code was an FBI code. He answered. “Agent Reid.”
“Sir, this is Sergeant La Roux. I’m the leader of the SWAT team assigned to assist you and Agent Valentine. We’re at the location, but Agent Valentine appears gravely injured, and… where are you, sir?”
Sergeant La Roux made no attempt to hide the irritation in his voice. Marcus could only imagine how much sharper Winters’s irritation would be when she learned of their actions.
“I’m at the northwestern corner of the park just west of the church,” he replied. “I pursued the suspect to a channeled creek near the western edge and followed that to civilization.” He gritted his teeth. “I’ve… lost track of him.”
La Roux’s irritation was considerably softer when she replied, “Understood, sir. I’ll have an officer wait with Agent Valentine until medical assistance arrives. The rest of us will search the area.”
“Look for blood,” Marcus told her. “I wounded him before he managed to escape.”
La Roux hesitated for a brief moment before saying, “Understood, sir.”
She closed the connection, and Marcus stood on the side of the road, staring across at the white puddle of light cast by the LED lamp arched overhead.
A car approached, then passed, a Toyota crossover.
The driver, an older woman with straight gray hair, gave him a suspicious look over her glasses before accelerating away.
Marcus sighed heavily, then turned around and trudged back to the church to meet the SWAT team. Once again, the Lawgiver had slipped through their fingers.