The Haunted (Sarah Roberts 12) Page 13
Sarah followed him up the corridor toward the front offices.
“What was the name of the first Rambo movie?” she asked.
“First Blood,” the officer said over his shoulder.
“Right, thanks.”
At the door, he stopped. “Why did you ask about First Blood?”
“You remind me of Caruso in that movie.”
The young cop shook his head, a sheepish grin on his face. “Everyone says that. Shit, I hate it.”
“Why? Caruso’s a great actor.”
“I just want to be known for me, for who I am.”
“Doesn’t everybody.” She walked through the door and made a beeline for Kershaw’s office, the escort officer staying close. Sarah wondered how I just want to be known for who I am related to her. She was known for who she was even though Vivian was responsible for most of what she did.
How lucky am I?
At the glass door to Kershaw’s office, she knocked. Kershaw looked up and waved her in.
“You can go, Officer Douglas,” Kershaw said.
The door closed behind her.
“Take a seat, Sarah.” He gestured at one of the chairs opposite his desk.
Sarah decided on the one that was out of the sun beaming through the window. The office was full of trophies, plaques, family pictures and sports memorabilia.
“You a baseball fan or a football fan?” she asked.
“Both.”
On his desk sat a large golf trophy.
“Golf, too?”
He nodded. “But we aren’t sitting across from each other to discuss sports. With all the scumbags I deal with day in and day out, I need my office to have as much of me as it can have to maintain some semblance of sanity.”
“Makes sense.”
“Got a call this morning.”
“From?”
“A woman claiming to be the sister of the dead woman found in your car yesterday.” He paused to lean back in his chair. It creaked under the strain. He tented his fingers and stared at her.
“And?” Sarah prompted.
“It was her sister.”
“Great.”
Sarah waited. It looked like Kershaw was going to spill whatever he knew over the next ten hours unless she was willing to draw it out of him, sentence by sentence. But this tête à tête was his show. So she leaned back in her chair, crossed her legs, and waited, her face expressionless.
“Just like in the movies, this sister received a letter. One of those, in-the-unfortunate-event-that-I-die letters. It spilled the beans on Cole Lincoln.” Kershaw waggled his eyebrows up and down, then stopped when Sarah stayed expressionless. “The sister, the dead woman, feared Cole would have her killed. Her last debt repayment was to play the role of a receptionist for a legitimate psychologist named Dr. Lance Williams. According to the letter the job seemed legit, so she agreed to it. I’m assuming that was to lure you to him.”
“Does the letter mention why she had the debt to Cole?”
Kershaw shook his head.
“Sounds like you’ve solved the murder in my car. So I’m free to go?”
Kershaw got up from his chair and turned to stare out the window. “You don’t seem to be overly excited that we have a letter, something that sways the attention from you.”
“I didn’t kill the woman. I know that. I was the victim here. I’m lucky you aren’t wiping my burnt skin off the floor of that room today and using my teeth to identify me. I was locked inside a psych acute ward with no hope of getting out alive so no, I’m not terribly excited about anything right now. I’m ready to move on. Now that you have all that you need on Cole Lincoln, I can leave it well enough alone.”
Kershaw turned to her. “Parkman and I go way back. He told me a little about you. There’s no way you’re going to move on, as you put it.”
She shrugged. “Why stay involved? With your resources, you could have Cole picked up by tonight and the charges filed for his arraignment in the morning. What else is there for me? He’ll be up on murder one and then some. Sounds premeditated to me.” She stood and brushed her hands back and forth, slapping them together as if to clear unwanted dirt. “We’re good here. I’m done.”
Kershaw walked around his desk and stopped in front of her.
“Why don’t I believe you?” he asked.
“Because you don’t know me. Now, whether you believe me or not, am I free to go?”
Kershaw nodded. “But stick around. I may want to talk to you again.”
“I’ll be at my cabin. I’m sure you know where that is.”
“It’s a mess up there.”
“So I’ve heard. But for now, that’s where I’ll be. And Aaron? Is he free to go?”
“Already gone with Parkman last night.”
She reached the door and turned back. “I thought you detained him?”
“I did. For all of half an hour. Just to calm him down. That guy can be dangerous.”
“Agreed. Oh, my car keys?”
Kershaw shook his head. “Can’t do that. You’re carless.”
“And why’s that?”
“Forensics still has your Charger in the shop. There was a murder committed in it after all. Gotta work all the angles.”
“When they’re done with it, have it brought to me at the cabin.”
“Yes, Ma’am!” Kershaw said, his voice raised an octave.
Sarah slammed the door on her way out.
Chapter 25
Half a mile from the cabin, Sarah instructed the cab driver to stop and let her out. As the cab pulled away from the shoulder of the road, she headed in the opposite direction of the cabin. In the warmth of the spring day, she hiked up her sleeves.
A full minute later, the taxi was out of sight. A ninety-degree turn to the right brought her over the shoulder of the road, down the embankment and into the cover of trees. With Cole and those two men who drugged her in Williams’ office still out there, she wanted to reconnoiter the area before walking into the cabin unarmed, straight into an ambush.
Stepping over the fallen branches and dead leaves that littered the floor of the woods surrounding her cabin, she tried to remember the last place she had put her gun. It was probably still stowed behind the night table by the bed unless the men who ransacked the cabin found it.
Mindful of noise, she watched every step, placing her feet gently, and only paused when the sound of a vehicle traveled by on the road. When her cabin came into view, nothing seemed out of place. No vehicle was in the driveway and the front door was closed, but sitting askew. To an outsider, it would appear as though no one was home and everything was fine.
She leaned back against a tree and waited, watching the cabin and the driveway while she listened to the traffic on the main road. After about ten minutes, she asked Vivian if there was anything she needed to know.
Vivian was silent.
Which meant nothing. Only that Sarah probably wasn’t about to die. Although she wouldn’t put it past Vivian to forget to mention that little detail.
She pushed off the tree and walked the remaining fifty yards to the cabin. Once there, she walked around it, front to back, looking in the windows, testing to see if they were locked.
Even though Vivian was quiet, not even the slightest feeling of her presence, Sarah felt something was off. She couldn’t explain it. It was like there was tension in the air.
At the front door, she spun the knob and shoved the door hard enough for it to smack the inside wall. A quick peek inside revealed nothing untoward except the ransacked mess. No one had cleaned up a thing since it was ripped apart. Whoever came through were bent on destruction. The furniture was flipped over, broken and sliced apart, stuffing protruding from the cushions of the couch. The little kitchen area was covered in broken dishes and glasses. The table where she had her computer was broken into four pieces, one piece sitting in the doorway to the bedroom.
“What the hell?” she whispered to herself, shaking her head.
She walked over broken table pieces and recliner chair stuffing toward the bedroom. Inside the room, nothing was any different than the rest of the cabin. The bed frame was destroyed and the mattress gutted. But the night tables on either side were intact. She rushed over to the one on her side of the bed, pulled it away from the wall and slapped her hand on the back.
The Glock was gone.
“Looking for this?” a man said.
Sarah snapped around, hands up in a defensive posture. After a brief moment, she lowered her hands and stood up straight.
One of the men from the cemetery leaned on the doorframe, her gun hung loosely from his hand in a non-threatening way. The implied threat was evident: move and the gun would be brought to bear. Attack and the gun would fire.
“How?” Sarah asked.
“Luck. I saw you coming and stayed on the opposite side of the house. At one point I thought you saw me, but—”
Sarah shook her head. “That’s not what I wanted to know.”
He frowned and pushed off from the door. “Then how what?”
“How are you such an asshole?”
His lips tightened as if he was going to snarl. It reminded her of a dog, which made her smile.
He started across the room toward her. “Why are you smiling?”
“Because of my sister.”
“Huh?”
He stopped in front of her.
“Yeah, my sister. She didn’t mention I’d see you here. Crazy huh?”
“Yeah, crazy. Maybe that’s why Williams wanted you in that hospital for dummies.”
“It’s not a hospital for dummies—” she cut herself off, gasped and ducked as if a threat was at the bedroom window.
The man jerked out of reflex and looked at the window. Already low, center of gravity balanced, Sarah drove her fist into his groin using her hips for momentum. Upon contact, the gun became her focus.
It all happened in a second. He was spinning back to her when her fist made contact. Then his gun hand was wrenched back and the Glock forcefully ripped from his grasp. He shrieked at the pain between his legs and gave little resistance, or thought, to the gun, which was a mistake.
She spun it around, slipped her finger inside the trigger guard and almost pulled the trigger.
“Step off. Move back.”
“Fuck you,” he said, his voice an octave higher than moments ago.
“As you wish.”
She pulled the trigger. It clicked empty.
“You stupid bitch,” he groaned through clenched teeth. “You think I’d get this close to you with a loaded weapon?”
With both hands wrapped around the butt of the gun, and being too close to him, she barely blocked the backhanded fist that came for her face. All she succeeded in doing was bumping his forearm.
Stars swam in her vision. She refocused, tossed the gun aside, and went on the offensive, both hands flailing in fisted jabs. Only the first two landed before he was out of reach.
“Enough of this stupidity,” another, deeper voice said. “We haven’t got time to play high school fighting games. Grab her and let’s go.”
Sarah turned toward the speaker. It was the other man from the cemetery.
His partner leaned against the bedroom wall, holding his crotch.
“Stop being a baby. I brought the car around. It’s parked out front. Bring her and let’s go.”
“She’s a handful,” he said.
Sarah lowered her fists. The stars had disappeared, but a dull throbbing began where he’d hit her.
The man in the door also had a weapon. This one was probably loaded.
“There’s no play here, woman” he said. “You see that, don’t you?”
Sarah nodded. “No play.” Weaponless and up against the wall of the bedroom, there really was nothing she could do. If he wanted her dead, he could just shoot her. But the Glock had been empty on purpose. The only reason was because their employer probably wanted her alive. He wanted her alive and well because Cole Lincoln wouldn’t want it any other way.
“On second thought, I do have a play.”
The man at the door steadied his weapon, the barrel now aimed at her.
“And what play is that?” he asked.
“To come with you.”
He lowered his weapon. “That’s not a play.”
“It is if I choose to do it willingly.”
“I’ve got the gun. It isn’t willingly.”
“I assure you, it is.”
She stepped over the junk on the floor and walked past the man still holding his crotch.
“This girl is psycho, man. When the boss is done with her, I want her head.”
She looked back over her shoulder. “My head? How odd? I would think you’d want another body part.”
“No, stupid bitch, just your head. So I can crush it with a hammer.”
“Ohhh, how inventive.” She acted like she had chills all over as she held her arms together across her chest and shook as if she was afraid. “So scary. Bash my head in.” She dropped her arms and stared at the man in the doorway. In a deep voice, she said, “Take me to your leader.”
“Fuck off,” he shouted and backhanded her with his gun hand before she could stop him or block it.
Her head snapped sideways, but she stayed on her feet. When she righted herself, the copper taste of blood filled her mouth and spilled over her lips. A couple of teeth felt loose but were too numbed from the blow to be sure.
“That was for what you did to Frank. Now start walking for the car like a good little girl.”
She smiled wide, sure her white teeth would be crimson with blood.
“I will kill you for that.”
“I’m sure you will, Princess.” He shoved her shoulder and brought the gun up again. “Move toward the car or take another shot to the head. The next one will be lights out.”
Sarah wiped her lips and cleaned her hand on her pants. Then she spit a gob of blood on the dirty floor at her feet. “The enzymes that digest your food start to eat you on the inside approximately three days after death.” She met his eyes. “You ready for that? Not just rotting, but being eaten from the inside as well?”
He just stared at her. Possibly trying to comprehend what he was looking at. Most girls wouldn’t respond to a crushing blow to the mouth the way Sarah did.
But that was what made her who she was.
Cole Lincoln had no idea who was coming for him. If he did, he wouldn’t have sent two men to pick her up.
That was like a snitch or Mafia informer sending two men to grab the hit man contracted out to kill him, thereby delivering the hit man to his hit.
Stupid, stupid move.
But most who chose the life of crime were stupid. Violent, but stupid. If a blow to the face was all it took to be escorted to Cole’s door, then she would take two, please.
She started for the cabin’s door.
“Coming?” she asked over her shoulder as she stepped out into the sun.
They followed her to their car.
“Stop,” the man who had hit her with the gun shouted from behind her.
Sarah stopped near the rear of the vehicle.
He walked around her to the trunk, opened it and pulled out a pair of jeans and a black T-shirt.
“Take off your clothes,” he said.
“Fuck you.”
He snickered and stepped closer, holding the clothes out to her.
“We don’t have time to play. Now, change into these so we can get out of here.”
“How do you know my size?”
“If these don’t fit, I’ve got two more pairs,
just in case. Wouldn’t want you to have to be naked.”
When she didn’t move toward the clothes he offered, he raised his gun.