Page 92 of Be Very Quiet

Ah, too bad. Couldn’t happen to a better person. Luca hoped he’d suffered. Rader wouldn’t live long enough for cancer to claim him. His death would come from lead poisoning in the form of several bullets.

“You let him use trinkets you took from your earlier kills. They were your prized possessions, weren’t they, Teddy?”

Rader heaved a sigh, and the gun moved from Liliana. Luca inhaled for the first time in minutes, but there wasn’t an opening for Christian yet.

“I didn’t want to let them go. Yes, they were my treasures. My memories. But when things looked dire, and I didn’t think I’d make it after you shot me, I told him where to find them. The story about Liliana surviving was big news. Young Theo became fixated on her. It was his idea to pick women that looked like her and to send her gifts.” He leaned close and whispered something in her ear.

“Yeah? Well, you have always been my nightmare.”

Luca made eye contact with Liliana. “Now.”

Liliana grabbed his arm with both hands and crouched into a squat. The move threw Rader off guard. The sharp retort of his gun sounded as she whipped her foot out and tripped him, tipping him over backward. Luca feared she’d been hit, but she used her elbow to crack him in the head, and he went out like a light.

Luca ran to her and wrapped her in his arms. He’d been so damn frightened when he saw Rader grab her.

“Luca.”

It sounded as if she was talking through a tunnel. “What?”

“You’re bleeding.”

He looked down to see a pool of red at his feet. Huh. No wonder everything looked fuzzy. Before he could pass out, he spotted movement behind Liliana. “Watch out!”

Luca tackled her to the ground and covered her with his body as Rader surged up and roared with an unholy fury. Gunshots rang out, and despite Luca’s best efforts to stay conscious, the blackness claimed him.

Chapter Thirty-One

The elation Liliana felt after Theo had been killed was short-lived when someone else caught her off guard and grabbed her. Before she could implement her training, the poke of a gun stopped her in her tracks.

“Hello, Liliana, darling.”

That voice.She heard it in her nightmares. Ted Rader. Theo said he’d died, but he’d obviously lied since Rader was here and very much alive.

Liliana had visualized meeting him again over the years, and each time, her reaction was the same—horror and panic, even after she’d learned how to defend herself. He was her biggest fear. Now that it had happened, her reaction was pure, unadulterated rage.

This man had taken so much from her, from so many people. He wasn’t some invincible being. He was a flesh-and-bone man who deserved the same fate as his victims.

Liliana let Luca extract information from him while she bided her time and lowered her heart rate. Despite the precariousness of the situation, a calm settled over her. Ted Rader would not win this time.

Liliana had been as shocked as her captor when Luca announced that Rader and Theo shared the same fatherandmother. That Theo was his full brother didn’t seem to faze him for long, nor did his sibling’s death. Lack of empathy for others was a trait of a sociopath. Rader was most definitely that.

She fought a shudder when he whispered in her ear, “Theo might’ve loved you, but you were my obsession.”

“Yeah? Well, you have always been my nightmare.”

“Now,” Luca instructed.

Liliana grabbed Rader’s arm and crouched into a squat, throwing him completely off guard. The heat from a fired bullet singed her as she whipped her foot out and tripped him before cracking him in the head with her elbow. He was down for the count.

Luca rushed to her, but all she saw was the trail of red in his wake. Rader’s bullet must have hit him. She tried to tell him he was bleeding, but she wasn’t sure he understood her words. Then he tackled her to the ground as a bellow of rage almost deafened her. Two simultaneous gunshots abruptly cut off the howl.

“Luca, are you okay?”

He didn’t answer. Audria dropped and carefully rolled Luca off her. Liliana scrambled to her knees and grabbed his hand. Blood coated his left arm.

“It was a through-and-through,” Audria deduced. “It looks like it also broke the humerus bone.”

Christian barreled inside the room and crouched down to assist. “Ambulance is on the way.” He took out a knife and cut the binds around her wrists.

---