Drained (Edgars Family #6) - Suzanne Ferrell Page 0,117

sayings?”

Katie grinned. “She’s got a million. I did tell you she has three brothers, right?”

They grew quiet for a minute.

Then Paula spoke. “Kirk F better be okay, or his Nana is going to kill him.”

36

Damn, it’s cold.

Slowly coming awake, Kirk tried to find the blanket. Shit. He couldn’t move his arms, only his fingers. He tried his legs. Feet moved, legs no more than an inch. Something held his body in place, too. Even his head felt like it was in a vice grip of some kind.

What the fuck?

“You might as well stop struggling,” a man’s voice, not too deep but definitely not a woman’s, said from his left.

Praying he wouldn’t see a character from a horror movie, he opened his eyes.

His stomach clenched and he fought the urge to barf.

This was worse than a horror movie. This shit was real.

There looking down at him was a very normal, very average face he’d seen on a driver’s license photo.

Stephen Armbruster.

“You’re probably wondering how I trapped you?”

Kirk tried to speak. Nothing came out.

“Oh, you won’t be able to talk for a while. It’s a wonderful medication that lets you be aware, but unable to say anything,” the crazy bastard said with a smile as if he were simply talking with a friend, not someone he’d somehow drugged and strapped to a table.

“Anyways, back to how you ended up on my table. You were trespassing. It happens occasionally. Usually the state of disrepair keeps curiosity seekers at bay, but there are a few who ignore that little voice that warns them when coming close is a bad idea. My mother used to tell me when I was a boy that was God’s angel whispering to me to keep me safe.

“You really should have listened to that voice. But you didn’t, so now you will be next in my queue, thanks to my little friend here,” he held up what at first looked like a gun, but there were bright yellow markings on the side and the word taser near the trigger. He chuckled and walked away.

Damn. That’s why he felt like he’d been hit by a truck. The bastard had tased him.

Next in my queue, he’d said. Next? Was there someone else strapped to a table?

He looked to his right as far as he could with his head held in place. Nothing but concrete and brick walls. He swung his gaze to the left and saw him.

On a hospital-type gurney lay a grey-haired white man. He had leather straps on his legs and body, probably what was holding him in place. Beside him sat a table about a half-a-foot lower than the gurney. The man’s arm was extended on some kind of board and strapped in place. From it looked like a long red tube.

Kirk realized it wasn’t a red tube, but a tube full of blood. Armbruster was draining his next victim.

And when he was done? He’d be next.

“If something happened to that kid…” Aaron’s voice trailed off as he sped through the Cleveland night to the address.

Brianna laid her hand over his and squeezed it hard, but kept her gaze out the window as they flew past other cars and buildings, the streetlamps acting like a macabre kaleidoscope of the fear rolling through them both.

“Why the fuck would he go off by himself?”

Aaron rarely cursed. A sure sign he was scared they’d find Kirk F dead.

“How the hell am I going to tell Nana—”

“Stop it,” Brianna said, swinging her gaze from the darkness to his face. “He’s only been missing an hour and you heard what Carson said about Armbruster’s obsession with how he kills.”

“I heard. This guy likes to take his time. He wouldn’t kill Kirk F immediately,” he said, quoting what the profiler had told them as they raced to their cars. He’d gone with Captain Stedaman, while she and Aaron took their SUV and Jaylon teamed with Matt again.

“He may be a little worse for wear, but we’ll find him. And he’ll be alive,” she said as emphatically as she could.

Aaron glanced at her briefly before focusing on the road once more as they headed across the downtown area to a spot not too far from where they’d found Mia two days ago. “You really believe that?”

“I have to. The opposite is unthinkably horrible.”

This time he squeezed her hand.

They pulled in behind the burgundy Cadillac. To the right was the towpath and the Cuyahoga River beyond. Across the street to the left sat one apparently abandoned brick