Page 145 of The Morning After (Savannah 2)

But he’d suffered worse and survived. Nikki Gillette’s pathetic attempt at harming him was nothing.

His mission for the night was nearly accomplished. Soon, the police would arrive and he imagined the look of horror on that bastard Reed’s face as he opened the coffin buried deep in the mud of Le Blanc Cemetery.

“Too late,” the Grave Robber said aloud as he headed steadily north, wipers slogging through the rain that pummeled his windshield. Past the lights of the city, he saw a flash of lightning sizzling through the night sky. Rolling claps of thunder followed.

It seemed fitting.

A storm was raging as Nikki Gillette breathed her last.

Unfortunately he couldn’t finish all of his business. Not right away. He would have to lay low for a while. Now, for certain, the police would know who he was and it would take time, after tonight, for him to be able to continue his quest. But the principals had been punished. Those who’d been most influential at the trial.

The other jurors, had, he’d sensed even then, been weaker, not as strong of personalities, their opinions more easily swayed. They wouldn’t get away. He’d find them, one at a time, and when they least expected it, he’d spring. He’d have to make the first couple look like accidents in a year or so, just so he wouldn’t arouse any suspicion. He smiled to himself as a police car drove past, flying down the road in the opposite direction.

“Go get ’em,” he muttered, watching in his mirror as the cruiser’s lights flashed on and disappeared around a corner.

Chuckling to himself, he felt invincible.

He only wished he could witness Pierce Reed opening the coffin lid and discovering that he was too late. By the time the casket was pried open, Nikki Gillette would be dead.

CHAPTER 30

Reed’s gut clenched with fear. Had the blood in the Gillette home been Nikki’s? What had that twisted bastard done to her?

His headlights cut a wide swath of light through Le Blanc Cemetery, illuminating the old gravestones and plots and he told himself to hang in there, to have faith; he couldn’t help her if he went off the deep end. And yet, terror unlike any he’d ever known tore at him.

Other police cars followed him through the intricately designed iron gates that the caretaker had opened a few minutes before.

“Please, God, no,” he whispered as he parked the El Dorado and the rain poured from the sky.

He saw it as he climbed out of the car. A fresh mound of mud already collecting puddles near the back wall. He started running. Oh, God, was he too late?

No, no, no! She couldn’t be buried here, even now trying to claw her way out.

“Over here!” he yelled, his pants wet over his ankles. Flashlights bobbed, people shouted as other cops wearing slickers and carrying shovels and picks and crowbars poured over the area.

A big cop tossed Reed a shovel and they began digging frantically, trying to save a life, each cop knowing what they were up against with the Grave Robber.

To hell with the crime scene, Reed thought, shoveling faster; all that mattered was to get Nikki out alive! He strained to hear any sound from the earth below, barely noticed that other cops, radios crackling, cell phones jangling, were roping off the area and starting to make a grid.

He dug frantically. Fearfully. Knowing that every second that passed could cost Nikki her life.

Hold on, darlin’, he thought, throwing shovelful after shovelful of the muck over his shoulder. I’m coming. Just you hold on!

Faster and faster he flung mud over his shoulder as rain pounded down in sheets that shimmered on the tombstones and danced in the beams of flashlights. He didn’t bother with a slicker, just kept throwing his weight into each scoop of muck he could loosen.

What were the chances that she was still alive? God damn Chevalier. God damn his soul to hell! If she was dead, Reed would take the law into his own hands. That bastard would never have a chance to get out of jail again.

Come on, Nikki, hang in there, he silently said and remembered another night in San Francisco, recalled sitting in the dark on the stakeout, watching what he’d thought was a sex game through the shades until he’d realized the silhouette he was viewing had turned from a game into a violent struggle for her life. Reed had raced into the building, taking the stairs two at a time to her apartment, but it had been too late.

But not this time.

It couldn’t happen again. Not to Nikki. Not Nikki. Reed sent up another quick prayer. And still he shoveled. Sweat ran down his back, cold rain peppered his head. Voices shouted. Diane Moses was squawking about her crime scene.

Fuck off! Reed thought as his shovel struck thick wood.

“We got something!” another officer said, his shovel clunking against the top of a long box.

Wildly they dug with shovels and hands, scooping away the mud, uncovering the coffin’s lid. Over the rush of wind and the splash of raindrops and voices around him, Reed strained to hear something, anything, coming from inside the casket. He heard nothing. He pounded on the lid. Stomped on it. “Nikki!” he yelled. “Nikki!” Oh, Jesus, was he too late? Like before? Had the blood on the wall been hers?

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