Mississippi Manhunt
Author
R. Barri Flowers
Reads
17.1K
Chapters
19
Witness. Survivor. And a killer's final victim? When a serial killer breaks out of prison, he's got his sights set on Nikki Sullivan, the only witness to his criminal past. But for Special Agent Gavin Lynley, this is one case he's determined to solve. Haunted by the tragic history they share, Nikki and Gavin can't risk letting down their guard even for a moment. And their growing closeness is a distraction neither can afford. Now, with the killer closing in, Nikki's survival skills will be put to the ultimate test…and so will the connection she shares with her high-level protector.
Prologue
Nikki Sullivan was admittedly bored to death on this summertime Saturday night as she paced lazily around her cozy, minimally furnished third-story apartment in Gulfport, Mississippi. An artist, one year removed from receiving a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of Mississippi, she wasn’t especially in the mood to do any canvases. She was single again after kicking her cheating and financially strapped boyfriend, Felix Kovell, to the curb two weeks earlier and was the better for it. She debated whether or not to call her best friend, Brigette Fontana, to see if she wanted to hang out or something. Brigette was currently in a relationship with Gavin Lynley, whom Nikki found to be incredibly good-looking and otherwise drenched in masculinity, while ever attentive to his girlfriend. But one would never know these admirable qualities in the man, based on Brigette—who was stunning herself—seemingly taking him for granted while having a roving eye on other guys, believing there was more than enough of her to go around. And around again whenever Gavin wasn’t looking. Or was otherwise preoccupied. Though Nikki felt bad for him, she thought it wasn’t her place to come between them and expose Brigette. Much less suggest to him that he could do better than her in a partner. Even if he could.
He’ll find out sooner or later and then can decide for himself, Nikki told herself, fantasizing that maybe they could even wind up together someday—assuming things didn’t work out between him and Brigette. Before she could call her friend, having lifted the cell phone from the back pocket of her midrise skinny jeans, Nikki received a call from Brigette instead.
“I was just thinking about you,” Nikki confessed truthfully, feeling a tad guilty as well in thinking about Gavin in romantic terms.
“Hopefully, good thoughts,” Brigette joked, none the wiser.
“Of course,” Nikki claimed, sitting on her leather sofa, folding her legs beneath her.
“So, what are you up to?”
“Not much. You?”
“I was supposed to go out with Gavin, but something came up and he canceled.” She muttered an expletive in displeasure.
“Sorry to hear that,” Nikki said, and truly meant it. But she knew that Gavin worked in corrections and sometimes, maybe more often than not, duty called. Even when he might have wished otherwise.
“Doesn’t mean I need to sit here and mope about it,” Brigette grumbled. “Let’s go out and have some fun.”
“What did you have in mind?” Nikki switched the phone to her other ear deliberately. “We could hang out here and watch some TV,” she suggested. Or not.
“I’d rather do a few shots and some dancing,” her friend countered. “Are you game?”
Nikki considered it for a moment or two before realizing how persuasive Brigette could be. Not to mention feeling antsy herself in wanting to get out of the stuffy apartment. Both were twenty-three, with Nikki having reached that age exactly two weeks ago. “Count me in,” she agreed.
“Cool. I can be at your place in ten minutes or less.”
“I’ll be ready,” Nikki promised and disconnected. She stood and shut her blue eyes for a moment as Nikki pulled her long light blond hair out of the low ponytail it was in, before changing into what she believed to be more suitable clothes for going out.
When Brigette arrived in her white Audi A3—recently purchased after the Arkansas State University graduate landed a job as an event coordinator with a prestigious public relations agency—Nikki hopped in. Taking one look at her gorgeous friend, who had bold apple-green eyes, mounds of wavy raven hair and a stunning body to kill for, Nikki found herself somewhat envious and sad at the same time that Brigette never seemed to appreciate what she brought to the table as a person, and could lose if she wasn’t careful.
“So, where are we going?” Nikki asked coolly.
“I know the perfect place,” Brigette answered evasively, and took off.
Nikki chuckled, ill at ease. “You’re scaring me.” She wasn’t sure if it was from the speed at which her friend was driving, the mystery of where they were headed, or both.
“Really?” Brigette laughed and seemed to go even faster down the narrow street. “Where’s your sense of adventure, girl?”
“Guess I’m about to find out,” she relented, sucking in a calming breath.
They drove to a nightclub on Pickford Street called Johnnie’s Shack in a seedy part of town, again giving Nikki some fresh concern. “You sure about this?”
“It’ll be fine,” Brigette promised. “Relax. I’ve been here a couple of times. We won’t stay long.”
“Okay.” Nikki followed her friend’s lead this time and went inside, where they did some tequila shots and then stepped onto a small dance floor and danced together to an upbeat song, before a tall, muscular man joined them and danced with them. He was in his early thirties and not too hard on the eyes, with defined features, dark eyes, medium-length brown hair in a windblown pompadour and an aquiline nose. He wore a multicolored plaid shirt and black distressed jeans.
He flashed a crooked smile and said affably, “I’m Perry.”
Brigette smiled back flirtatiously. “I’m Brigette and this is my friend Nikki.”
“Nice to meet you ladies.” He grinned again and continued to move his Chukka boots to the music. “Hope you don’t mind if I dance with you?”
Though Nikki’s radar suddenly went up that he was being a bit too friendly and getting in their space—or putting it simply, he was bad news—Brigette apparently felt just the opposite, seemingly forgetting all about the fact that she had a boyfriend in Gavin, and told Perry enthusiastically, “Why not?”
After leaving the dance floor ten minutes later, he joined them at their table for more drinks, but didn’t try to put the moves on either of them. Nikki still felt that something was off with the man, even if she couldn’t quite put a finger on it in so many words, and convinced a reluctant Brigette that it was time to go. With no invitation for Perry to join them. When he thankfully put up no argument, remaining at the table as they left, Nikki thought they were home free of the potential threat. It was only when she began to feel light-headed in the dimly lit parking lot, and noticed the same with Brigette, that it became painfully obvious they had been drugged.
By who? Perry?
Nikki had her answer, as she watched the man in question picking Brigette up off the ground, where she had collapsed, and tossing her like a sack of potatoes in the back of a black Ford E-250 Super Duty cargo van. Then he did the same to her as, barely able to stand on wobbly legs, Nikki was unable to resist him before she passed out in his muscular arms. The last thing to enter her mind was whether or not she or Brigette would survive the night and the monster who had taken them against their will in a manner reminiscent of the serial killer who had been on the prowl in town.
PERRY EVIGAN COULDN’T help but chuckle with delight as he drove his latest captives back to the house he lived in on Robinson Road. Sitting on two acres of grassy land, it was far enough away from neighbors to allow him to come and go freely without attracting too much attention. He’d been planning on drugging and bringing back a single person for his trouble. He hadn’t counted on two women for the price of one for him to have his way with before killing them and disposing of them as he had his other victims. But there they were, ripe for the taking like apples off the tree—for which he was only too happy to oblige.
Admittedly, he could tell that the one calling herself Nikki was suspicious of him from the start. For a minute there, he thought with her watching him like a hawk, he’d never get the chance to spike their drinks with gamma-hydroxybutyrate. Thankfully, her attractive friend Brigette was more amenable to them hanging out together—even to the point of allowing him to buy the next round of drinks and pick them up—which, unfortunately, would prove to be a big error in judgment, as both women would soon regret having ever laid their pretty eyes on him once he was done with them. Something told him they were already regretting this, as he glanced at the two still-unconscious women lying in the back of the van. It had been almost too easy to slip the GHB into the drinks and then watch coolly as they sipped innocently on them while laughing at his stale jokes to keep them occupied. All he needed to do was let the two leave of their own accord for all to see and then pretend to leave casually on his own afterward and abduct them as they passed out, with no one being the wiser. He would come back later for the vehicle they drove in to the bar.
Arriving at the two-story, two-bedroom Greek Revival-style house with a shed and woods out back, he carried the women, one by one, inside the residence, where he lived alone but always welcomed the right company. Soon, the fun would begin. At least for him. For them, he had to admit with a laugh within, not so much.
THE NIGHTTIME RAID by heavily armed FBI agents and Gulfport Police Department detectives and SWAT Team, supported by Harrison County Sheriff’s Office investigators from the Criminal Investigation Division and K-9 Patrol dogs, on the house on Robinson Road, led to the arrest of suspected serial killer Perry Evigan. The nude body of a woman identified as twenty-three-year-old Brigette Fontana was discovered in a bedroom. She had been sexually assaulted and strangled to death, barehanded, by Evigan, according to the autopsy report two days later.
Another woman, Nikki Sullivan, who had been abducted by Evigan at the same time outside Johnnie’s Shack nightclub, and was described as a good friend of Ms. Fontana’s, survived the vicious attack. Upon her full recovery, Ms. Sullivan was expected to testify against her attacker, dubbed the “Gulfport Nightmare Killer,” who was believed to have strangled to death at least ten women over an eight-month span within the city of Gulfport, Mississippi, Harrison County’s co-county seat.