His cell phone beeped an incoming call. He glanced at the screen. Blocked number.
“Hey, JJ. Let me call you back,” he said before switching over. “Yeah. Walker.”
“Brantley Walker, I’ve been very interested in talking to the newest player of my game.”
He didn’t recognize the voice, but it was familiar.
“Game? What game are we playin’?”
“Hide-and-seek, of course. And I’m winning, Brantley Walker. I’m winning. You can’t find me.” The laugh that followed was almost childlike while the voice was deeper, like that of an adult.
“Who is this?”
“You don’t know me, but my brother told me about you. Said you might come looking for me. I think he’s scared of you, but I’m not. I’m not scared. I’m supposed to be careful,” he said in a singsong voice, another childlike giggle following.
“Who’s your brother?”
“Detective Collins.” The enunciation reflected pride. “Detective Johnathan Jacob Collins. Recognize the name?”
Jacob. Jake.
Son of a bitch.
“I recognize it,” he replied. As well as the voice now. “And you are?”
“That’s not important.”
“Where’s your brother now?”
“He’s not here. I didn’t want him here. I told him to go away. To quit being a baby.”
Brantley turned back to look at the hotel as Reese was walking out. The man looked good when he moved. Long and lean, with just the hint of swagger.
“How’m I supposed to refer to you if I don’t know your name?”
“You’re not. What you’re gonna do, Brantley Walker, is take yourself back to where you came from. I don’t want you to play my game anymore.”
“I’m actually lookin’ for someone,” he told the man whose voice belonged to Detective John Collins. The same but different in a way.
“You won’t find your friend here.”
“He’s not a friend,” Brantley clarified. “But I think I’ve already found them.”
“No, you haven’t. Nope. No way. You haven’t found them. I’m too good at this game. You can’t find me. Hide-and-seek, you’re it!”
Brantley ignored the eagerness of the child and spoke to the man. “I need to talk to John.”
“He’s not here. He’s … he’s gone.”
“Where is he?”
“Work.”
That sounded like a lie.
“And when he’s not here, you can’t find me. You’ll never find me. Or my friends.”
Oh, hell. “Who are your friends?”
Reese was staring at him with a questioning expression, so Brantley put the call on speaker.
“You don’t know them. You’ll never know them. They’re my friends. Not yours.” The man’s words were picking up speed, more and more anxiety mixed in. “And if you don’t go home, he’s gonna find out, and he’s gonna hurt them. I don’t wanna hurt them, Brantley Walker, but he does. He wants to hurt them. You have to go away, Brantley Walker.”
“Who’s he? Are you talkin’ about John?”
“No. Not John. He’s nice. I can’t say his name. I can’t. You have to go away, Brantley Walker.”
Brantley knew better than to taunt him. He suspected they were right in their theory. This was Detective Collins’s alter ego, the one he referred to as his brother, Jake. And the alternate personality wasn’t an adult, so he didn’t rationalize like one. More than likely prone to violence when he threw his tantrums and wanted to put the blame on someone else.
“Okay. All right,” he said, placatingly. “I’m not here to hurt you, Jake.”
“Hey! You don’t know my name,” he shouted, his pitch getting higher. “Go home, Brantley Walker. We don’t want you here.”
“Jake, let’s—”
The call ended.
“Was that…?”
Brantley stared at the phone, at the blank screen. “It was.”
“What did he say?” Reese nodded his chin toward the phone. “Before, I mean.”
“He started out soundin’ relatively rational. Called me the newest player in his game. Told me to go home. He mentioned we were playing hide-and-seek.”
“You think he was bein’ literal?”
“Has to be. Based on our conversation and his responses, I think we’re dealin’ with an identity that’s somewhere between eight and ten years old.”
“At that age, games would be fun, right?”
“And they’d be worth winning. But they get old after a while, right? You get tired of playing?”
“Which is why he discards the women after a certain amount of time?”
Brantley honestly had no idea. That was where his mind had been going before that call.
“Maybe John puts a stop to the games,” he mused, “takes over so he can clean up the mess, cover it up as best he can. Then Jake has to find another.”
“But why women? Why not kids?” Not that Reese cared to think that either was more at risk. It pissed him off all the same. Didn’t matter if it was a woman, a child, or anyone else who was vulnerable to a madman.
“Good question. And he said we wouldn’t find him or his friends.”
“His friends?” Reese’s eyebrows lifted. “You think he’s referrin’ to the women he’s kidnapped?”
“I do.” Brantley stared out at the parking lot, surveying their surroundings while he considered their next move. “He’s agitated. Not my intention, but I think he’s scared of what John will do to him. We have to find those women and we have to do it now.”
