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  PRAISE FOR MATTHEW FARRELL

  What Have You Done

  “A young crime writer with real talent is a joy to discover, and Matthew Farrell proves he’s the real deal in his terrific debut, What Have You Done. He explores the dark side of family bonds in this raw, gripping page-turner, with suspense from start to finish. You won’t be able to put it down.”

  —Lisa Scottoline, New York Times bestselling author

  “A must-read thriller! Intense, suspenseful, and fast paced—I was on the edge of my seat.”

  —Robert Dugoni, New York Times bestselling author

  “One hell of a debut thriller. With breakneck pacing and a twisting plot, What Have You Done will keep you guessing until its stunning end.”

  —Eric Rickstad, New York Times bestselling author

  “A must-read thriller! What Have You Done is a roller coaster of a novel that grabs hold and refuses to let go. Fans of Meg Gardiner and Mark Edwards will find lots to love in this debut. I can’t wait to read what Matt cooks up next.”

  —Tony Healey, author of the Harper and Lane series

  OTHER BOOKS BY MATTHEW FARRELL

  What Have You Done

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  Text copyright © 2019 by Matthew Farrell

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

  Published by Thomas & Mercer, Seattle

  www.apub.com

  Amazon, the Amazon logo, and Thomas & Mercer are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc., or its affiliates.

  ISBN-13: 9781542044974 (hardcover)

  ISBN-10: 1542044979 (hardcover)

  ISBN-13: 9781542044967 (paperback)

  ISBN-10: 1542044960 (paperback)

  Cover design by Rex Bonomelli

  First edition

  For Mackenzie and Jillian:

  I can write about strong women because I live with strong women.

  I’m so proud to be your dad.

  CONTENTS

  PROLOGUE

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  11

  12

  13

  14

  15

  16

  17

  18

  19

  20

  21

  22

  23

  24

  25

  26

  27

  28

  29

  30

  31

  32

  33

  34

  35

  36

  37

  38

  39

  40

  41

  42

  43

  44

  45

  46

  47

  48

  49

  50

  51

  52

  53

  54

  55

  56

  57

  58

  59

  60

  61

  62

  63

  64

  EPILOGUE

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  PROLOGUE

  Although the darkness was too thick to even see his hands in front of his face, he knew the two bodies were with him in the room. A mother and daughter, killed within minutes of one another, each death an escalation in rage and fury, then desperation and futility. The lights had been on then. He’d seen every second of what had unfolded, heard every sound that had echoed in the brick-and-concrete chamber they’d been trapped in, but at the same time, it had felt like a dream. Even now, the sounds were only a whisper of recollection, growing faint as each minute passed.

  The wounds from the shotgun blast appeared to be life threatening. He’d be dead soon. Of that, there was no doubt. No one knew where he was, and at this point, he wondered if they’d stopped looking. In the long run, it wouldn’t matter. He’d be nothing more than a third body on the cold concrete floor, next to the woman and her daughter. This would be his end, his fate. This dark basement would be the last world he’d ever know. He was ready. In fact, he was looking forward to it.

  The heavy chain that connected him to the wall pulled on his wrist and weighed on his right shoulder. It jangled when he moved and sounded loud in the quiet space. He stopped, listening for the man up in the house, hoping the noise hadn’t been loud enough to warrant a visit.

  Footsteps above.

  He could hear the man’s boots walking across the floor. He waited for the inevitable sound of the basement door swinging open and those boots thumping as they made their descent down the stairs. But this time things were different. The footsteps walked straight above him, then turned back in the opposite direction. The man was walking quickly, almost running, from one side of the house to the other.

  A shotgun cocked.

  The footsteps halted.

  Silence.

  He stayed as still as he possibly could, listening for something—anything—that might tell him what was happening. He was waiting for that basement door to open, but there was only the complete quiet that enveloped the house. The chain on his wrist jangled ever so slightly, and he caught it in his left hand. It was too dark to see even a hint of anything. All he could do was wait and die.

  A door crashed open upstairs. Men’s screams exploded in the quiet, one after the other.

  “Police!”

  “NYPD!”

  “Come out now!”

  He listened as he leaned against the wall, instinctively trying to protect himself against the fury in the voices that called out. His breathing was growing weaker. He didn’t have much time left. The stampede of movement continued thundering above.

  “Get your hands up!”

  “I got him here! In the kitchen!”

  “Drop your weapon!”

  A shotgun blast exploded and was immediately followed by return fire that came so rapidly he thought someone might’ve had a machine gun. And as soon as it began, it was over. The house was silent again.

  He could smell the gunpowder and fought the urge to vomit. He tried to stand, but his legs would no longer hold him. His throat was dry, choking off the ability to call out for help. He had no idea what was happening.

  The basement door opened.

  A light came on.

  It was a bare-bulb socket that hung in the center of the room, strong enough to illuminate the space. The sudden brightness hurt his eyes, and he shielded himself with his forearm. Someone crept down the steps, each tread moaning under the weight.

  “Anyone down here?” a voice called. “NYPD.”

  He could see now. In every sense of the word, he could see. He could see the two bodies across from him lying almost side by side. He could see the concrete floor below them a shade darker, stained with their deaths. He looked down at himself and could see the wound from the shotgun blast that had torn apart his stomach and chest. There was no way he’d be able to survive such carnage. Then he saw the dried blood on his hands and arms and knew what he’d done. That blood was not his. He could see his weakness.

  A thin cloud of smoke followed the police officer into th
e basement. The officer, in his dark tactical gear and helmet, looked like a specter, like the angel of death coming to take him away to pay penance for his sins. And that was okay. He deserved whatever punishment was coming. He was weak, and he was a sinner.

  He was ready for hell.

  He’d already lived it.

  1

  Randall Brock adjusted the monitor so everyone would be able to see. He took a breath, then picked up the remote and pressed play, easing himself against the wall, watching as the session began to unfold on the video. He knew what was coming and knew how things would end. It wasn’t good.

  On the screen, Dr. Peter Reems leaned back in his chair, much the same way the real Peter Reems was sitting now, staring at the monitor, observing the monster inside the man. “Go ahead, Jerry,” he said on the video. “You can begin.”

  The patient, Jerry Osbourne, squirmed in his seat, trying to get comfortable, his eyes cut into slits as he repeatedly wiped at the perspiration on his brow. “You sure you wanna hear this?”

  “Yes. It’s okay. I’m right here. You and me. I want you to close your eyes and tell me everything. Just like we talked about.”

  “But I—”

  “It’s okay. I promise. Close your eyes.”

  Jerry did as he was told, and his body began to relax, shoulders slumping a bit, chin hovering just above his chest.

  “Good. Now tell me.”

  A final sigh. “It’s dark. Not the kind of dark where it’s just nighttime, but real friggin’ dark. The kind where storm clouds come in and cover everything: the moon, the stars. Everything. Like a giant blanket over the sky. That kind of dark makes the shadows even thicker, you know? And it makes the places that do have light seem safe. But safety in a darkness like that is fake, and you can’t trust nothing fake. When it’s dark like that, the light is just a trap. And people fall for it all the time. They run to the light. They’ll do anything to get out of that darkness. It’s what makes it so easy. All you gotta do is wait in the light with a stupid grin on your face and that promise of safety, and they come to you. They walk right in.”

  “Who walked in to get out of the dark?” Peter asked.

  “She did. But not like you’re thinking. She wasn’t running from the darkness. She was already in it, stuck there, like she was trapped. I brought the light to her.”

  “Explain what you mean.”

  “I saw her when I went in to get my cavity filled. She was this new girl in charge of patient charting or something. She looked smart. Clean. Attractive enough, I guess. But when I tried to talk to her, she blew me off. Not in a polite way either. I introduced myself and stuck out my hand. She looked down at it like I was offering her a dead fish or something and brushed right past me.”

  “How did that make you feel?”

  “Made me feel like a loser. Like a nobody. I was pissed. So I waited outside in the parking lot until the office closed and she came out. I go up to her and ask why she was being so rude, and she said she wasn’t, but even as she’s denying it, she’s being a bitch. I stuck my hand out again and asked her to shake it. She laughed and told me she wasn’t interested. I told her I wasn’t interested either. I just wanted to be friendly. She said she had enough friends and walked away. She walked away. Couldn’t take two seconds to shake my hand?”

  “What did you do after she left?”

  “I went home and chugged a few beers. Watched the game. Had a little fantasy about her. But then all these mental images of what I wanted to do to her started popping up in my head. Not in a sexual way, though. This was, like, violent. I wanted to hurt her. I wanted to end her. I tried to talk myself out of it. I mean, I couldn’t really want those things, right? I don’t even know where these thoughts and feelings came from, but the more I tried to ignore the images in my head, the more the urges came. They wouldn’t leave. I just kept thinking about it. Obsessing about it. I googled to find out what was wrong with me and ended up on all these freaky websites that did nothing but feed the urge. I was a different person, just like that. But then I figured a person can’t change just like that, so it must’ve been in me all along, growing like a weed or a cancer that I wasn’t aware of. And for whatever reason, this girl brought it to the surface. I think it was her laugh. The way she laughed at me made me realize she was living in this darkness, and she couldn’t escape from it. I had to bring her the light. Simple as that.”

  Peter nodded, jotting a few notes. “What happened next?”

  A thin smile crept onto Jerry’s lips. “I spent the next few days following her everywhere she went. Work, home, the movies, the food store. I watched her when she walked her poodle and knew what her shifts were at work. I even knew when her breaks were.”

  “Tell me how you brought her the light.”

  “I cut the hose to her transmission fluid. I knew how long her commute home was and how long she’d last before the car would give out, and I just followed behind far enough so I was out of sight. The fluid empties, she pulls over, and I drive up to save the day. A light in the darkness. Safety. Or, like I was saying before, the illusion of safety.

  “That part of the road has the lake on one side and the woods on the other, so it was pitch friggin’ black. She took one look at my truck heading over the crest of the hill with my yellow emergency lights twirling, and I could see her relax. The damsel in distress had found her knight driving a tow truck. What a coincidence, right? When I pulled up and rolled down the window, she couldn’t really see me. I asked if she needed a tow, and she said she did. Said she wasn’t sure what happened and that she was so thankful. Figures. Only thankful and friendly when she needs help. Otherwise, she couldn’t give a rat’s ass about anyone.”

  “What did you do?” Peter asked.

  Jerry shrugged. “I got out, hopped down from the truck, and before she could make heads or tails of anything, I knocked her in the side of the head with my tire iron. Didn’t kill her or anything. Just had to make it quick. I got her up in the truck and drove about two more miles so I could pull off into this small clearing I knew about from when I used to go hunting there. I shut everything down and carried her into the woods. Walked about half a mile. She was coming to toward the end, but with the darkness being so dense and her head being all squirrelly, she didn’t start to panic until I was putting the zip ties around her ankles.”

  “How did you feel when you were tying her ankles?”

  “In control. Like I was the boss. She feared me, and that’s what I wanted. She needed to understand the consequences of her actions, and nothing teaches consequences like zip ties around your wrists and ankles.”

  “What happened after you tied her up?”

  “At first she kept looking around, like she couldn’t figure out what was happening. She was yanking on the zip ties, trying to get her arms and legs free. I guess after a few minutes everything finally dawned on her because this tiny whimper came out. It was starting to get louder, like she was going to scream, so I slapped a piece of duct tape over her mouth. When I got close enough to put the tape on her, she got a good look at me. I could see the recognition in her eyes. That was awesome. That was exactly what I wanted. In that second, she understood everything that was going to happen.”

  “You could have stopped right there. What was the point in pushing things further? She would’ve learned her lesson. Don’t you think?”

  “No, I had to do it. I had to. She had to pay, and she had to pay with her life. That’s the deal. I didn’t make the rules.”

  Peter shuffled in his seat behind his desk, his eyes fixed on the screen. From where Randall stood next to him, he could see Peter’s finger tapping nervously on his thigh. Randall realized he was doing the same. The tension in the room was thick.

  “Who made the rules, then?” Peter asked on the video.

  “I don’t know,” Jerry replied. “But I didn’t.”

  “Okay. How did you make her pay?”

  “First, I dumped a can of gasoline all over
her. The fumes made my eyes burn. As soon as the gas hit her, she started freaking out. I guess that was reality slapping her in the face. She was flailing around, trying to kick out of the ties, screaming behind the tape, crying. I loved every second of it. I told her how she could’ve lived if she’d just been nice to me. But this was her fate, I guess.”

  “Did you ever think about letting her go?”

  “Aren’t you listening? I couldn’t let her go. Wasn’t allowed. I lit a match and told her that I had enough friends too. She was trying to say something through the tape when I dropped the match onto her lap. Man, her entire body went up in seconds. It was crazy how fast she caught. And her screams, even through the tape. I watched for a bit, but then the bushes around her started catching, and the leaves on the ground were lighting up. I had to split before someone called the fire department. I started whistling as I walked back to my truck. You wouldn’t think so unless you tried it, but the whistling and the screams actually played off each other nicely. It had a certain melody to it. I guess you could say that was our special song. Written just for the two of us.”

  2

  The room was silent. Randall shut the video off and laid the remote on the desk. He folded his arms in front of him as he watched the other two men, trying to gauge their reactions.

  Dr. Lienhart, the head of the Psychiatry Department at Quarim University, stared at the blank screen. His expression was unchanging, his body completely still except for his head, which shook back and forth ever so slightly.

  “I thought you said we were making progress,” he said finally.

  Peter rubbed his hands on his pants over and over, carefully choosing his words. “We are. But understand this entire experiment is going to have some ups and downs along the way. A patient’s road to wellness is never a linear thing. I’d surmise that Jerry has at least eight to ten more sessions to go before we see more significant changes. But we’re getting there.”

  Dr. Lienhart, who’d been sitting with his back to Peter and Randall, slid to the edge of his chair and turned to look at them both. He absently scratched at the liver spots on his forehead with long thin fingers. “What I just saw was a patient who had been making progress suddenly revert back to his violent fantasies. How do you expect me to go to the board for more funding when we have nothing to show for the funding we’ve already received? This isn’t advancement. This is a step back. A rather large one, if I do say so myself.”