Cobalt (eBook)

Jeff Sauer (Autor)

eBook Download: EPUB

2025 | 1. Auflage
396 Seiten
Bookbaby (Verlag)
9798317811235 (ISBN)

Infos

Locke Christensen jumps from his bed drenched in sweat. His life is no longer his own. Annabel Combs now lives in the fringes of his mind, a haunting reminder of the life he lost. A red blur dancing in and out of the periphery, Combs spills blood wherever she goes. Between recurrent nightmares about the twisted serial killer, his ongoing battles with fatigue and dependency, and the gut-wrenching loss of his girlfriend six months ago, Locke's thoughts drift from one irreconcilable memory to the next. To make matters worse, the crowned prince of Saudi Arabia and his entourage have vanished into thin air during a backcountry ski trip near his mountain retreat in Telluride, Colorado. Nan Genevieve, the FBI's top dog and a woman Locke is all too familiar with, is sent in to sniff around, demanding Locke's assistance. Broken inside, he reluctantly accepts and soon encounters the trained forces that are holding the prince for ransom, as they threaten to bury anyone who crosses their path. Locke must regain his focus in order to save his friend, all while playing a mind-numbing game of cat and mouse with a ruthless killer who is always one step ahead. Turning to his friends, he enlists the help of the savvy Journalist Dan Schultz, who has his eyes set on another prize, and the talented Agent Samantha Fadden, who must control her rage or become the very thing she's sworn to hunt down. Straddling the line between redemption and revenge, Locke must choose between saving his friends and trying to once and for all rid the world of the deadly and devious 'Red,' whom has a dark secret that could drive him to his knees. In Cobalt, Jeff Sauer weaves a tale of deception, intrigue, and the vindication of a man who will risk it all to right his past transgressions and stop a murderous psychopath in her tracks ... at 8,754 feet.

The author is a former sports columnist. His previous novel, Vermilion, was published in 2020, and received favorable reviews on Good Reads and Amazon. He enjoys fishing, spending time outdoors with his wife and English Lab, and is an accomplished harmonicist and guitarist.

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Locke Christensen jumps from his bed drenched in sweat. His life is no longer his own. Annabel Combs now lives in the fringes of his mind, a haunting reminder of the life he lost. A red blur dancing in and out of the periphery, Combs spills blood wherever she goes. Between recurrent nightmares about the twisted serial killer, his ongoing battles with fatigue and dependency, and the gut-wrenching loss of his girlfriend six months ago, Locke's thoughts drift from one irreconcilable memory to the next. To make matters worse, the crowned prince of Saudi Arabia and his entourage have vanished into thin air during a backcountry ski trip near his mountain retreat in Telluride, Colorado. Nan Genevieve, the FBI's top dog and a woman Locke is all too familiar with, is sent in to sniff around, demanding Locke's assistance. Broken inside, he reluctantly accepts and soon encounters the trained forces that are holding the prince for ransom, as they threaten to bury anyone who crosses their path. Locke must regain his focus in order to save his friend, all while playing a mind-numbing game of cat and mouse with a ruthless killer who is always one step ahead. Turning to his friends, he enlists the help of the savvy Journalist Dan Schultz, who has his eyes set on another prize, and the talented Agent Samantha Fadden, who must control her rage or become the very thing she's sworn to hunt down. Straddling the line between redemption and revenge, Locke must choose between saving his friends and trying to once and for all rid the world of the deadly and devious "e;Red,"e; whom has a dark secret that could drive him to his knees. In Cobalt, Jeff Sauer weaves a tale of deception, intrigue, and the vindication of a man who will risk it all to right his past transgressions and stop a murderous psychopath in her tracks at 8,754 feet.

Textauszug

CHAPTER TWO

Alone in the darkest corner of Telluride’s “Historic Bar,” the New Sheridan, Locke again conjures up the evil smirk on Red’s face after she led him through a sparse patch of woods in a downpour of rain, only to seize upon his deepest fears.

His skin crawls at the vivid reflections of the moss-covered well where his hopes first plunged, and then to the rickety shed where his former girlfriend was brutally tortured. The smell of ichor still burns his nostrils. Outside of that hellish structure, a gruesome trophy stash of rotted body parts and weathered bones sits inside a rusty 7 up cooler behind what should be a bucolic Minnesota farmhouse quarried in river stone.

Just six months prior, the retired FBI criminologist helped local, state, and federal authorities hunt down the maniacal killer. Two federal agents had been killed in cold blood, one of which was mutilated in such an act of savagery that it solidified Locke’s need to see the murderer locked away. Strangely, it began with the disappearance of two hunters in a remote wilderness area near Lake Vermilion, Minnesota, and ended with Locke’s ex near death and the killer slipping through his fingertips.

Red, also known as Annabel Combs, was a former federal agent turned sociopath. Since escaping from Locke and other authorities near Cold Spring and vanishing, she has haunted his every step.

Locke rubs his eyes and looks across the bar at a man he hardly recognizes in the mirror. Streaks of grey have invaded his now grown-out brown hair, and stress has cut wrinkles into his once handsome mug.

“Starting to look our age,” he muses.

Outside, the afternoon sun fades into the canopy of the San Juans, painting a violet and orange-hued postcard over the crest of Lone Cone Mountain; the sky appears as soft as a cashmere blanket on a cold winter night. A bustling après ski crowd gathers out on Colorado Avenue, raising Locke’s already elevated blood pressure and awakening the panic he had coaxed into slumber with an abundance of Oban 18 year.

“Not yet,” his mind demands. “It’s not time. I can’t go home. That’s where she lives …”

“You okay, Mr. Christensen?” asks the waitress, Amy.

Her concern briefly shakes Locke from his inner turmoil.

“I’m good, thanks,” he lies. “Yeah, I’ll have the old one-more.”

Locke’s emotions are mixed like a strong cocktail; one part uncertainty, along with a strong pour of fury and a dash of anguish. The psychological blend has left him shaken, but there’s a twist. He finds himself aroused by the mental images of the attractive Red. This adds the final ingredient: hatred, both of Combs and himself. One way or another, what he believes will occur when he finds Red will likely be his last act on this Earth, a prospect that he has come to terms with.

“So be it,” he mumbles.

As much as Locke wants to arrest Red and see her locked in a cage where she can no longer harm anyone, a darker urge lurks beneath his typically calm demeanor - rage. As a former federal agent, duty calls for this vile woman to have her day in court, but his primal side yearns to put two slugs in her temple and call it a day.

After reading a highly redacted file about her childhood, he almost felt sorry for the homicidal bitch, whose upbringing was far from traditional. She suffered a scarring childhood living on the farm with her grandfather, who she later discovered may have even been her biological father. Grandpa sure had a penchant for torturing living things.

Some grandparents take their grandkids to the baseball game, or teach them how to fish or sew. Grandpa taught Red how to savor the simple act of extinguishing life, so much so, that her grim visage was the last thing he saw before his own cruel existence was snuffed out.

Through grandpa’s teachings, Combs developed a skill for killing and her time in the FBI only honed that talent further. She had now eluded a nationwide manhunt for the past six months. Most figured she’d come looking for Locke at some point, so the bureau deployed a tactical team to monitor the area around his home up in Mountain Village for a couple of months. The security detail remained until late fall arrived and the budget season took precedence. The FBI has a short memory and the October winds scattered the surveillance team like a cascade of kaleidoscopic leaves dropping from the aspen trees like confetti.

A few months later, his phone rang. Red had been waiting like a spider guards its web. Patience is the most essential trait for an adept killer.

“Have fun with that cute puppy,” she purred as the line went silent.

And while the realization that she had indeed been spying on him was chilling, what she had said just prior was far more haunting: “Lucky for you, I’m still looking for Mr. Right.” She wasn’t finished with Locke Christiansen … not by a long shot. Like a cat toys with the mouse before devouring it, Red was enjoying herself.

Following that call, Christensen roused Teddy from his slumber and locked the dog in a bathroom. He then scrambled for the Sig P226 he kept in the bedroom and snuck out the back door to the parking lot. A flash of high beams and the acceleration of a pickup engine announced her departure as the vehicle sped off leaving behind a whirl of snowflakes and a crushing sense of dread.

The waitress returned with Locke’s Oban, interrupting his pained memory.

“Three fingers, the way I take it, too,” she said, before catching her faux pas and rushing off with a deep blush.

Christiansen then did something he hadn’t done in what seemed like an eternity: he laughed. Amy was new to town and a very sweet Midwestern girl. She had told Locke that she wanted to move to a real ski town, one where blue jeans were not considered proper downhilling attire. Amy was once engaged at 24, but decided she hadn’t seen enough of the world, and broke it off. Now 26, she was working in a bar for the first time.

“Better get used to dirty jokes,” Locke thought of her new profession.

Bartending isn’t a job for people who are easily offended. He thought about ordering a blow job shot or a sex on the beach, but figured it best to let her off easy and not embarrass her further.

“Wait six more months and you’ll be making three-finger jokes on purpose,” he mumbled while taking a sip.

A large congregation of skiers and mountain hippies were filling the sidewalk now, including one wearing a black cowboy hat that was desperately out of place.

“You’re a long way from Steamboat,” he mused.

But something about the woman’s posture and the animated way she gestured with her hands while speaking made Locke’s heart skip a beat. She was talking to a man who was far too old to be wearing bright red ski pants.

“What are you doing, man?” his internal psychiatrist questioned. “You know it’s not her. She’d never be this obvious. Just keep your cool.”

Cognitive distortion is how his therapist described it, or more commonly, your mind plays tricks on you. Locke’s world had been filled with negative associations since Vermilion. The unconscious part of his brain conspired against him making him believe that Combs was lurking around every corner. Some days were so bad it was as if he never left that awful farm in Cold Spring.

One particularly unproductive night, Locke smoked a joint and came to the twisted conclusion that Red had really shot him dead that night and the rest of his life since was an illusion in Purgatory. She was a demon that haunted him ever since the first night they met while on a stakeout hoping to catch the maniacal killer who, unbeknownst to him, was already sitting in the passenger seat.

Christensen had been summoned to his home state to investigate the disappearance of two missing hunters in the Northwoods and somehow unearthed a serial killer along the way. He sat alongside Combs outside a bar in St. Cloud on a hot summer night. He cringed at the impure thoughts he experienced when they first met.

A sweet smell of lavender radiated from Agent Combs and her mignonette irises stared at him invitingly. She was care-free and playful like an innocent kitten being teased with thread of yarn plucked from a loom. The chemistry and flirtation were real and he often wondered what would have happened if he had given in to his more carnal desires.

The woman in the black cowboy hat entered the Sheridan and stood with her back toward Locke. Her porcelain-skinned face reflected off the back bar mirror and it appeared that she was watching him.

“She’s just looking at the bar’s selection,” a voice from deep within mocked. “Or is she, loverboy?”

After taking a long draw from her glass of red wine, the woman flashed a seductive smile toward Locke through the mirror, her teeth as white as a hydrangea petal.

Instinctively, Christensen averted his gaze to his iPhone 12 Pro, acting as if he had just received a text. His awkwardness exposed the ruse and the woman simply looked the other way. Locke’s confidence was far too shaky to handle any type of flirtation. He was only recently removed from a relationship that ended with his ex-girlfriend nearly being tortured to death by a serial killer that he still fantasized about. He didn’t blame Jennifer for...

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 29.8.2025
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Literatur ► Krimi / Thriller / Horror
• ISBN-13: 9798317811235 / 9798317811235