A Reagan Keeter Box Set: Three page-turning thrillers that will leave you wondering who you can trus Reagan Keeter (most difficult books to read TXT) 📖

Kim’s pleas for release came out incomprehensible and muted.

Frank, who was sitting cross-legged and hunched over, his head pressed against the top of the cage, said nothing. He seemed to understand Austin did not intend to let him go.

“Today’s your lucky day,” Austin said.

Finally, Frank made eye contact. A look that said he would kill Austin if he could.

There was a small wooden table along the wall next to Austin. It had been here when he had bought the place and was the only piece of furniture in the cellar. Rotting and discolored, it looked just as old as it was.

He used the keys he had taken from the safe to unlock the cages, then tossed both the keys and locks onto the table. He stepped back and pulled the gun from the waistband of his pants.

“Come out slowly,” he instructed.

They did. But, bound as they were, there really wasn’t any other way for them to come out.

Kim continued to try to speak through the gag. It annoyed Austin. He couldn’t understand her, and he wasn’t taking it off. “Shut up.”

She didn’t.

Austin slammed one hand down on the table while, with the other, he kept the gun trained on the couple. “I said shut up!”

This time, she got the message.

“Up the stairs.”

Kim and Frank complied.

From behind, Austin directed them out of the house and to the van. When Kim saw it, she turned around to stare at him. Her eyes were wide with alarm. She shook her head, again tried to speak. She didn’t want to get back in the van.

Perhaps in a show of support, Frank turned around, too. Chin up, he puffed out his chest.

Austin didn’t have time for this bullshit. He spun the gun around and whacked Frank across the top of the head with the grip. Frank fell to the ground as if some invisible puppeteer had just cut the strings that were holding him upright.

Kim did her best to scream.

Austin pulled open the back door. “Get in the damn van!”

Her eyes darted between Austin and Frank. She shook her head no.

Austin had had enough. He slid the gun back under his belt and forced her into the vehicle. Then, with considerable effort, he managed to get Frank inside, as well.

He slammed the door shut, then went around to the driver’s side door, climbed in and started the engine. He drove to the edge of the lake. But it wasn’t until he got there that he realized he had a flaw in his plan. Unless he stayed in the vehicle, foot on the gas, he had no way to send it careening into the water.

Although he wanted their deaths to be terrifying events that seemed to go on forever, Frank was already unconscious. He would drown without ever knowing what had happened. Austin should probably just shoot them both and be done with it. Burn the bodies. Drop the van in some sketchy neighborhood.

No matter what Connor told the police, the vehicle wasn’t in his name. So if it was gone, Austin’s link to it was gone, as well.

Yes, he decided. That’s exactly what he should do. But he wasn’t going to shoot Kim and Frank in the van for the same reason he hadn’t shot the other couple in the van. You can’t completely get rid of blood. And if the police ever found the vehicle, he didn’t want them uncovering that sort of evidence.

If you’re going to kill someone, you can never be too careful.

Austin put the van in park, went around to the back, and pulled Frank out of the rear door. “You, too. Get out,” he instructed Kim.

This time, she did what he asked her to. Maybe because getting out seemed like a safer idea than getting in. How wrong she was.

It didn’t take her more than a few seconds to realize that, either. Austin hadn’t aimed the gun at either one of them yet, but she already looked terrified and, it seemed to Austin, a little confused.

At first, Austin thought it was the in-and-out instructions he had given her. Why bother putting her in the van at all if he was just going to tell her to get out a few moments later? Then he noticed she wasn’t looking directly at him. Actually, to be more specific, she was looking past him.

That was strange. The van was behind her. The cabin was off to her left. As far as he knew, there was nothing in her line of sight but him. He turned around to see what had gotten her attention and immediately wished he had turned around sooner.

CHAPTER 56

Dylan kept her eyes glued to Connor’s cellphone. Go left, go right. Connor began to doubt the directions when the road turned from two lanes to one, and was almost certain they were going the wrong way when it turned to dirt a few minutes later. But by the time he decided to say something, they were too far down the narrow road to turn around.

“This is what the phone says, okay?” Dylan responded. “If we get to our destination and there’s nothing, we’re probably going to be too late to save them, wherever they are, so we might as well keep going.”

That wasn’t what Connor wanted to hear, but he knew she was right. He pressed down on the gas. The truck bounced over the uneven ground in jaw-jarring thumps. Then, between the trees, he saw another set of headlights, also in motion, but not headed toward them. They were headed toward—Connor looked closer, noticed the way the headlights seemed to twinkle on the distant ground—a lake.

He stopped, killed the lights on the truck.

“What are you doing?” Olin said.

Connor pointed at the other vehicle. “You see that?” Its shape was impossible to make out in the darkness, but everyone got the point: If they had come to the right place, that was almost certainly Austin’s van.

“What do