Should’ve killed them all. But the New Orleans cop had gotten the jump on him and by the time Gideon and his posse had arrived, there were too many of them to kill. He might have taken out two or three, but he wouldn’t have escaped alive. He’d gotten lucky as it was—Sokolov’s shot had been a clean through-and-through and he’d dressed the wound with a first-aid kit he’d found in the truck he’d stolen. He hurt, but he’d had worse. By the time he’d driven into the campground, he’d desperately needed a safe place to sleep.

So, unwilling to continue searching for the perfect victims, he’d killed the honeymooners and claimed their camper. He had let the couple finish what had been a marathon session of sex. And he’d told them he was sorry as he’d stashed their bodies in the truck. I’m not a total monster.

He made some coffee and ate the burrito he’d found in the camper’s mini fridge, while consulting his phone. According to Google Maps, he was about two and a half hours from Sacramento, which was where he assumed Mercy and Sokolov had returned.

He was certain that Gideon had returned to Sacramento as well, because his girlfriend was on the radio at the moment. A search on Daisy Dawson had revealed her to be some kind of local radio personality who did a morning show from six to ten every day.

He was listening to her at the moment, courtesy of an online site that streamed radio broadcasts from all over the country. She was abominably perky and he thought she should die for that transgression alone.

Not to mention that she’d shot at him, for fuck’s sake. Somebody needed to take these modern women in hand and teach them a little respect. He laughed quietly. And I’m just the man for that job.

But he had to come up with a better plan first. There was no way he was going to catch any of them unaware at this point. They’d come too close to dying the day before and they’d all be on guard. Waiting for Mercy to be alone, or any of them for that matter, would take more time than he cared to spend away from Eden. Time was ticking. He needed to get Mercy back to show to Pastor before DJ managed a total coup d’état.

He needed to draw them out. He needed a weak link, the injured gazelle that would get picked off by the predator. There was Mercy’s best friend. Sokolov’s family. Mercy’s family back in New Orleans, her half brothers and sisters. He considered them all.

The New Orleans family wasn’t a viable target. He wasn’t going to be able to fly back to Louisiana, because his face was probably tacked up on every TSA bulletin board across the country.

The best friend was engaged to a cop, so she would probably be protected, too.

He flexed his finger and typed into a new search screen: Sokolov family Sacramento. Then he shook his head. They had almost as many kids as he did, and only one child bearer. Irina Sokolov. He’d seen her face from MacGuire’s window when he’d been squatting there. She seemed open and friendly. According to the article that popped up, she was a retired nurse, so probably empathetic enough to be lured by a fake injury. And she wasn’t so very tall, so even with a hole in his shoulder, he could probably overpower her.