Deep Freeze

by Lisa Jackson

  “Hurry, Nina!” He scrambled toward her. The crack widened into a gaping crevice and Nina—beautiful, trusting Nina—screamed horribly as she fell through the ice in a sickening, heart-stopping splash.

  “No! Oh, God, no!” He threw himself to the spot from which she’d vanished, searching the murky, frigid depths, hearing ice crack and split all around him, but she submerged quickly, disappearing into the black depths.

  He didn’t think. Jumped into the dark, gaping hole. Frigid water engulfed him, strangling him, dragging him down with cold, cruel fingers. He thrashed beneath the surface, searching the murky waters of the lake. Please, oh, God, please…His lungs burned from lack of oxygen. His eyes saw nothing and he was shaking from the inside out.

  Where are you? Nina…WHERE?

  Swimming in wild circles, feeling as if he was going to explode, hoping for a glimpse of her, of the nightgown, of anything, he searched. Frantic. Knowing he might die.

  Bubbles of air came out of his nose. He let in a little breath. Frigid water rushed into his nose and throat. Desperately he kicked upward, propelling himself to the break in the ice. He gasped as his head broke free. Coughing. Sputtering. Spitting water. “Nina!” he cried wildly, his voice a croak in the cold darkness. “Nina!”

  Nothing.

  No sound of her sweet voice.

  His gaze scraped the surface of the lake, but he saw no sign of life. Oh, God, she was still down there. Freezing. Drowning. Dying.

  He dived downward again, deep into the inky depths. Nina, where the hell are you? Oh, baby. Come on, come on! The seconds ticked by and he saw nothing through the murky water. What were the chances that she would survive? How long could someone stay under water, under near-freezing water? Were there air pockets locked near the surface? Could she even now be pressing her sweet lips upward to the ice, hoping to find a small pocket of air trapped beneath the surface? His mind was spinning crazily, a kaleidoscope of sharp images of Nina cutting through his brain as he swam in a panic, his lungs once again on fire.

  Something slippery brushed against his leg; he kicked it away before thinking it might be Nina.

  Forcing himself to sink deeper, he searched the blackness. Thought he heard voices far away. His lungs were stretched tight, screaming in pain, but he couldn’t leave her down here. Wouldn’t. Where are you? WHERE?

  He let out a bubble of air, his gaze trying to pierce the impenetrable black. He saw white fingers…a hand…he reached for it, then realized it was his own numb fingers waving in front of him. The weight of the lake was crushing him, his lungs bursting, when he felt another light brush against his leg. What was it? What the hell was it? Nina? Or…or what…he couldn’t think, unconsciousness tugging on him, his lungs about to burst.

  He let out his breath and kicked hard, shooting to the surface.

  Bam!

  His head cracked hard against the ice.

  Air escaped his lungs.

  Oh, God, he was trapped!

  They both were.

  Air bubbles pouring from his mouth, he slid beneath the surface, feeling with his hands, trying to find a rift in the layer of frozen water. Blackness swirled around him. He gasped and water filled his lungs. Flailing wildly, he heard the groaning crack again and then the ice above him split.

  Coughing and gasping, snorting, he rose, throwing up water, holding onto the sharp edge of the clear, frozen crust splintered across the lake.

  He heard voices…distant voices…angels…or demons? His mind was spinning, the voices muted and far away.

  And then the scream. A wild screech that ripped up his spine and bored through his brain.

  He spewed up more water, and then, just as he saw pinpoints of light bobbling toward him, the blackness that had tugged at his mind gave a final, angry yank.

  He was certain he was going to die and gave himself up to death willingly.

  But God had let him survive. Somehow he’d been spared.

  Now, standing in the swirling sleet, a glaze of rime upon the branches of the gigantic fir and the floor of his blind, he felt the same darkness, the rage, that had been with him for the ensuing years.

  Why had he survived?

  Why had Nina died?

  He’d woken up in a hospital bed and soon realized that he’d been blamed for Nina’s death. He’d seen it in his mother’s unhappy gaze, watched the play of emotions on the officers and counselors who had talked to him.

  Though not convicted of nor charged for the crime, he was forever silently accused by all who knew.

  As he was by himself.

  Had he not lured her out there?

  Had he not wanted her for himself?

  Had he not felt a thrill, just a little tingle of excitement, at the thought that because of him, because of her love for him, she’d lost her life?

  Could he have saved her?

  Probably not.

  But when those small fingers had brushed against his ankle, and now he was convinced that it was her touch that he’d felt, why had he surfaced rather than reached down? What would two more seconds have cost him?

  His life?

  He knew better.

  She had died because of him.

  His lips twisted into a smile with the knowledge. With the power. He refocused his binoculars. With calming crystals of ice pressing against his face, he observed Jenna Hughes’s house from his hiding spot.

  Nina had been the first to die. He’d tried to tamp down his feelings of triumphant exhilaration when he realized that he had the power of death over life. He’d attempted sadness. He’d tried guilt. But, both emotions had worn thin quickly.

  He’d told himself he would never love again.

  And then he’d seen Jenna Hughes.

  In that split second when he’d first gazed upon her, he’d known.

  She was the one.

  From that moment forward, every other woman in his life seemed insignificant. Including Nina. Poor, trusting little Nina.

  Beautiful.

  Like the others.

  He reached into his pocket and fingered the glove he’d stolen…a small, black leather glove, one of the two that Jenna, as Anne Parks, had worn in Resurrection. He closed his eyes and remembered the scene where Anne, dressed in a slick black bra, high-cut panties, this very glove, and a choker around her neck, had advanced upon her lover. Lying spread-eagle upon his bed, the lover was expecting a coy sex game and had ended up experiencing erotic death.

  Perfect.

  He let his binoculars dangle and closed his eyes as the cold kiss of the wind touched the back of his neck. Slowly he opened his fly. He thought of Jenna. He thought of the icy, grasping waters of the lake. He let the first needles of sleet run down his upturned face.

  Slowly he slipped the glove over his cock.

  Then he pretended Jenna Hughes was kneeling before him.

  CHAPTER 24

  It had been a long day. Hell, it’d been a long week. Carter’s wipers slapped at the snow falling from the night sky and his headlights cut through the darkness to reflect on the sheet of snow and ice covering the road.

  On one side of the road, hundred-year-old fir trees loomed upward into the starless night, tall, foreboding, catching snowflakes in their immense branches; on the other side, the Columbia, churning with floes of ice, moved steadily westward. Snow and ice gathered on the corners of his windshield and the defroster lagged behind the condensation that fogged the glass.

  His cell phone rang as he crossed a narrow bridge that spanned Pious Creek. He noticed that the creek appeared frozen solid.

  “Carter,” he barked.

  “It’s Sparks.”

  “I hope you have good news.”

  “It looks that way. Not only do we have a composite sketch of the woman found up at Catwalk Point, but we might have an ID.”

  Shane’s hands tightened over the wheel.

  “We think the missing woman might be Mavis Gette.”

  The name rang no bells with Carter, but it w
as something.

  Mavis Gette.

  No longer Jane Doe.

  Maybe.

  “Twenty-eight years old. Last known residence was Yorba Linda, California,” Sparks said, his voice distinct. “She’s a loner. Estranged from her family, no friends…we’re double-checking with a cousin who lives in Portland, if you can believe that. She’s already scanned and e-mailed the two photos of Gette she has. They’re not top quality, but they’re damned close to the computer-enhanced sketch we’ve got. We should have dental records faxed by the morning, though a positive ID will be tough because her teeth were filed down…We’ll be looking at jawbone structure, missing teeth, any hint of dental work remaining. The last time anyone remembers seeing her was last winter. She talked to the cousin around the end of January.”

  “And no one’s missed her since?”

  “The phone call wasn’t pleasant, which wasn’t unusual. Gette was unemployed and was asking for money again. The cousin—Georgina Sharpe—said ‘no.’ They argued, Gette spat out some expletive and hung up. Sharpe gave us the name of a few of Gette’s acquaintances and other family members, but so far, we’ve only talked to an aunt. Hasn’t seen or heard from Gette in nearly a year.”

  Carter felt a little rush, the kind that kept him on the job. Whenever there was a chance that a case was breaking open, his senses came alive. “Where was Mavis Gette at the time of the call to her cousin?”

  “The cousin isn’t sure, but she thinks Gette was hitchhiking up I-5 from California.”

  “Hitching?”

  “Yeah, well, we’re not talking brain surgeon material here. Dropped out of school in her sophomore year of high school, never done much since. Anyway, Sharpe thinks Gette said she’d gotten as far north as Medford. We’re already checking Sharpe’s phone records to see where the call actually originated, and with her last employer, a motel where she was a maid in Yorba Linda, and with anyone who knew her. She wasn’t married but had two losers for ex-husbands and a string of boyfriends, a couple of whom had criminal pasts, or at least the cousin says so…Not much more information now, but I’ll keep you posted.”

  “Can you e-mail me the sketch?”

  “Already done. Along with the report.”

  Carter slowed for a corner, his eyes narrowing on the road as he listened. “I assume you’re checking out the Sharpe woman.”

  “And her husband. She was a bookkeeper for an independent trucking firm. Her husband owns the company.”

  “And the woman was hitching.”

  “Yeah, we’re checking out all his drivers, but that’s a long shot, considering the fact that the wife called in.”

  “Unless she’s suspicious.”

  “We’ll see. I’ve already talked to the FBI, and the California State Police are going through her things, the stuff she didn’t clean out of her apartment when she skipped, but it’s been so long, the landlady could have sold or dumped whatever was left. Not much hope there, but who knows? As soon as the ID is confirmed, we’ll have a press conference. Maybe someone will come forward with more information.”

  “Let’s hope,” Carter said. “I know it’s a long shot, but I’m going to talk to Lester Hatchell, see if Sonja knew the woman.”

  “You still think the cases are linked?”

  “Maybe, maybe not.”

  “Won’t hurt,” Sparks agreed. They talked a few more minutes, then Carter hung up, his mind working overtime with the possibilities.

  He didn’t learn anything more, but, for the first time since the body had been found at Catwalk Point, he felt as if they were getting somewhere, as if he’d found a tiny toehold in the quicksand he’d been wading through, a toehold that could give out at any moment, he reminded himself.

  A few minutes later he was home, had peeled off his gloves, jacket, and boots, stoked the fire, and settled in at the computer. He logged on, checked his e-mail, found several from Sparks, and opened all the attachments, a report, and a computer-enhanced picture of what Mavis had looked like.

  She’d been a beautiful woman.

  Even features, high cheekbones, strong chin…

  Reduced to bones stuffed into a hollowed-out log.

  Why?

  Who had done this to her? A psychotic who happened upon her when she was hitching? Or someone she knew. He clicked on the photos sent from the cousin and saw the resemblance to the computer-generated image. Pretty damned close. The pictures weren’t very clear, Sparks had been right, but in the images was a woman in her early twenties, with a sullen expression, big eyes, and untamed brown hair.

  “What happened to you?” Carter murmured, staring at the image for a few seconds before walking to the refrigerator and pulling a can of beer from its plastic noose. Cracking it open, he took a long swallow, then settled into his desk chair again. The woodstove was finally putting out some decent BTUs, and he was warm as he clicked on to the Sonja Hatchell information and pulled up a shot of Sonja. Just as he’d remembered her.

  He wasn’t exactly a techno-wizard, but he knew enough about computers to cut, paste, enlarge, reduce, and put the images of the two women side by side. He couldn’t superimpose one over the other, but he didn’t need to. The resemblance was evident in their facial structure and as he glanced over their stats, they seemed more alike. Sonja was five feet, three and a half inches, Mavis at five feet four—same as the analysts had estimated Jane Doe to be. Sonja had a slim build. A hundred and twelve pounds. Mavis Gette’s last driver’s license, issued by the State of California, stated one hundred and fifteen. Close enough.

  And similar to the height and weight of Jenna Hughes.

  Not that the cases were related. There was no evidence to connect Jenna Hughes with Jane Doe or Sonja Hatchell.

  Yet.

  “I can’t find the cool bracelet,” Allie grumbled the next day as she picked at her breakfast.

  “What cool bracelet?” Jenna was seated at her desk in the den, searching the Internet for security services. She’d called three, none of which could come and replace her alarm system for nearly a month. They were all backed up. Jenna had even inquired about a bodyguard, taking Sheriff Carter’s suggestion to heart after her scare last night. Today, she was convinced the idiot riding her tail was Josh Sykes but she couldn’t prove it. Nor could she shake the feeling that she was being watched, that the things that kept breaking down on the ranch were more than just time and wear and tear. You’re being paranoid, she told herself, but decided paranoid sure beat the hell out of unsafe.

  “You know the one,” Allie wheedled.

  Jenna rolled her chair backward, so she could see beyond the last few steps of the staircase and into the kitchen where Allie was spreading peanut butter on an English muffin.

  “It’s got black and white beads and kinda stretches.”

  “Faux pearls,” Cassie clarified. She’d been in her room, ostensibly still cleaning up her continual mess, and, to her credit, was carrying down a full plastic bag of trash in one hand while balancing three plates and several stacked glasses in the other.

  “I think it’s in my jewelry box, the one in the closet.” Jenna flipped to another Web site for a security “team.”

  “No, it isn’t. I looked.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “Yes!” Allie snapped, obviously angry that her mother didn’t believe her. They were all a little tense, trapped in the house for the most part, waiting for the storm to abate. Jenna’s nerves were strung taut, and Cassie was in a bad mood because she was still grounded. Her phone call to her father hadn’t helped, the only result being that Robert was quick to blame Jenna, and from what she could tell, his blood pressure was probably skyrocketing with the pressures in L.A. “I don’t need this right now,” he’d told Jenna when Cassie, near tears, had handed Allie the phone last night. Later, when she’d gotten on the line, Jenna had pointed out that Cassie’s behavior wasn’t about Robert, but he’d managed, as always, to turn the conversation around. She’d hung up feeling more fru
strated than ever. Even Allie, usually all smiles and enthusiasm, seemed bored and at loose ends. “I wanted to wear it over to Dani’s.”

  As if Dani Settler would care. The kid was a tomboy’s tomboy.

  “Let me see if I can find it.” Jenna walked up the stairs to her room and searched through her jewelry box. The bracelet was M.I.A., so she checked another, older box that housed costume jewelry she rarely wore. Not there. Where was the danged thing? The last time she’d seen it, she’d used it like a rubber band to pull her hair off her face, but she’d remembered putting it away. Of course, either of the girls could have “borrowed” it, but she’d thought the piece was in the box. Hadn’t she seen it there just last week?

  Frowning, she searched through the bedrooms, even taking a quick look through the kids’ rooms as well as the guest room on the upper floor. She headed upstairs to a loft where Allie sometimes played. Still nothing.

  So what? Things were misplaced every day, but she couldn’t help the niggle of worry that ate at her. Once again, the missing item was something she’d worn in one of her movies—in this case, as Marnie Sylvane in Summer’s End. Maybe that was significant, maybe not. She walked into her bedroom again and did a 360-degree turn, eyeing shelves and window ledges, her bedside tables, anywhere she’d sometimes left her things, but everything was where it should be and there was no bracelet.

  She thought about calling her cleaning lady, Estella, but didn’t. It wasn’t a big deal. So another thing was missing…no—misplaced, not missing. Jenna would find it. Eventually. She sat on the edge of her bed and told herself to relax. She was just too uptight and a headache was building behind her eyes.

  She walked into the bathroom, downed three ibuprofen with a glass of water, and returned to the bedroom. Out of habit, she opened her nightstand drawer and found the usual things she always kept there—change, a flashlight, a small package of Kleenex, and a paperback she’d been reading. Then she looked across her bed to the other bedside table, one she never used, a perfect match to the one on the side of the bed where she slept.

  Of course there would be nothing in it, she told herself, but rolled across the bed and slid the drawer open. She peered inside.