Deadly Getaway

by Laura Bradford

  Mitch whistled softly under his breath. “Wow. So a storm like this could be pretty serious.”

  “Don’t worry. I’ve got a propane stove in the kitchen for just this kind of storm, so I’ll be open all day no matter what the weather brings. Well, except between two and four. That’s my one break each day.”

  Eerie. It was just as Madame Mariah had predicted during Elise’s palm reading last summer. Here she was with Mitch on an isolated island. A blizzard, like Sophie was describing, would certainly make this qualify as “an eventful trip.”

  “I’ll leave you two kids alone for a few moments and go check on your food. Drink your cocoa, it’ll warm you up.”

  Elise watched Sophie disappear into the kitchen, her thoughts suddenly back in Madame Mariah’s House of Fortunes. Could the psychic really have mystical powers after all?

  She shook her head gently, forced her mind into the present. And Mitch.

  Looking into his eyes, she saw a sparkle of amusement. “What? What’s so amusing?”

  “I know what you’re thinking, Elise. But just because Mariah said ‘eventful’ doesn’t mean we can’t have an absolute blast. Right?”

  He was right. A few extra days together would be a dream come true.

  ~ ~ ~

  The soup did the trick. The chill that had seemed to cling to her from the moment the snow-covered stranger entered the restaurant was finally gone. Unfortunately, dinner was over and it was time to head back into the snowy night air. Elise put her arm into the coat Mitch held out, buttoned the front all the way up. They headed for the door, past the stranger, who sat hunched over his food, reading the local paper Sophie had placed on his table.

  “Wait!”

  Elise and Mitch turned. Sophie was walking toward them, a camera in hand.

  “Heading back to the hotel already?”

  “In a little while. First we’re gonna stop by the police station.”

  “Is everything okay?” Crease lines appeared across Sophie’s forehead as she looked at them.

  “Everything’s fine. Brad Matthews is an old college buddy and I was kinda hoping to surprise him,” Mitch said, pulling on his left glove. “Is the station easy to find?”

  Sophie nodded, a warm smile replacing the momentary concern in her eyes. “Sure is. Take a right when you head out the door. Go two blocks. Turn left at the next alleyway. The station will be up just a little ways on your right.”

  “Thanks, Sophie.” Mitch turned to Elise, placed his hand on the small of her back. “Ready to go?”

  Before she could answer him, Sophie spoke.

  “Oh no you don’t. You kids can’t leave until I get your picture.”

  Mitch’s arm slid around Elise’s waist and pulled her in for a hug. “How’s this?”

  “Perfect!” The woman snapped their picture. “Unfortunately, you’ll probably be gone by the time I get your picture on the wall. My Polaroid camera broke last night so I’m using a regular camera today.”

  “That’s okay.” Elise smiled warmly at the woman. There was something very endearing about Sophie. She was the kind of woman you could sit across a table from and gab with for hours. Like Mitch’s Aunt Betty. “With any luck we’ll be back again someday. Maybe we can see it then.”

  “Absolutely. Once a picture is up, it stays up.”

  Chapter Five

  7:30 p.m.

  “Sophie wasn’t kidding, was she?” Mitch slid his arm around Elise’s back and guided her through a pile of newly fallen snow outside the island’s small brick police station. “It looks like we’ve gotten at least six inches since we left the hotel. And I think that’s a pretty conservative guess.”

  “If it keeps falling like this, we’ll be snowed in for a month.”

  The sound of her sweet laugh made him wish that would be the case. A month without mundane paperwork and petty theft cases would be awesome. And to spend it with Elise . . .

  He stopped outside the station house window and peered inside. Brad Matthews was doing exactly what Brad Matthews had done all through college. Skate by. If only Mitch had brought his camera. A picture of Brad sleeping on duty, feet outstretched on the desk in front of him, would be a great addition to the next alumni magazine. He laughed out loud at the image.

  “What’s so funny?”

  Mitch pointed at Brad. “He’s got the life of a prince, even now.”

  “Maybe he’s had a tough day,” Elise suggested.

  “Deciding what to eat for breakfast constitutes a tough day for Brad.”

  “Mitch! That’s not nice.”

  He ducked to miss her playful swing and grabbed hold of her hand instead. “Watch this, Elise.”

  He quietly opened the door and stepped inside the station.

  “Nice to see our tax dollars are being put toward such good use, young man,” Mitch said loudly, disguising his voice to sound older.

  The sound of wood scraping wood echoed through the room as the blond, uniformed man nearly fell out of his chair in an effort to rise to his feet.

  “Wh— I was just taking a quick break. What can I do for you this evening?” Brad said.

  Mitch watched in amusement as a look of recognition began to creep across his buddy’s face. “Gotcha!”

  “Man, Mitch. You scared the crap out of me.” Brad leaned back against his desk and raised his hand to his head.

  “Sorry, I couldn’t resist.” Mitch walked across the room and held out his hand. “How ya doing?”

  “Aside from the heart attack you just gave me? I’m fine. What are you doing here?”

  “Vacation. I noticed your name on an information sheet at the hotel. I couldn’t miss an opportunity to stop by and say hello, could I?”

  “Maybe you should have,” Brad said. He reached out and grabbed hold of Mitch’s head in a playful headlock.

  “Okay, okay. I’m sorry. I just couldn’t forgive myself if I let your power nap go unchecked.” He felt Brad’s grip on his head loosen and he pulled away.

  “Glad I could help your conscience there, pal.” Brad straightened the collar on his uniform shirt. “Seriously though, it’s great to see you. When did you get here?”

  Mitch watched Brad’s eyes move past his face and settle on Elise, who was still standing just inside the doorway. He turned and reached for her hand, pulled her close.

  “We got here a few hours ago.” He looked back at Brad and smiled. “Brad Matthews, I’d like you to meet my girlfriend, Elise Jenkins.”

  The look of blatant approval that crossed Brad’s face wasn’t missed by Mitch. And judging by Elise’s red cheeks, it wasn’t missed by her either.

  “It’s nice to meet you, Brad.” Elise extended her hand and shook Brad’s gently.

  “It’s real nice to meet you too. You must be somebody special to have captured this guy’s heart.”

  “She is.” Mitch pulled Elise’s hand to his mouth and kissed her cold skin. Surprised, he looked around the room, his gaze stopping on the far end of the station room. “Man, Brad, isn’t this island cold enough for you without having to leave the window open?”

  “You know what they say about people who like to be cold.”

  “No, what?”

  “I’m not sure. But I’m sure they say somethin’.”

  “That’s what I thought.” Mitch laughed and shook his head. “Some things never change.”

  “Consistency is part of my charm. The chicks dig it.” Brad pulled two chairs over to his desk, then walked around to sit in his own. “So, what are you doing here? I figured you’d be at the FBI or somethin’ by now.”

  Mitch sat down beside Elise. “Why do you say that?”

  “I read about those murders you solved last year in Jersey.” Brad leaned back in his chair and popped a Tic Tac in his mouth. “I wasn’t surprised though. You were always an overachiever. And I know how you are about not letting the bad guys get away.”

  “You’re reading now? When’d you learn how?” Mitch laughed as a Tic Ta
c flew past his head.

  “Seriously, man, that must have been one crazy time, huh?”

  Damn it. Mitch had really thought they could put all of that behind them, especially this far from home. But he was obviously wrong.

  “Yeah, it was crazy.” Mitch looked at Elise quickly, watched her eyes cloud over briefly. “But that’s all over now.”

  Brad stopped inhaling Tic Tacs long enough to stare at Elise with wide eyes. “Hey, wait a minute. Were you involved in that whole thing too?”

  “Yeah. I’m a reporter for the Ocean Point Weekly and I guess you could say I kind of got wrapped up in the whole thing.” She shifted in her seat.

  “Reporter? Were you the one who wrote that article when it was all over?”

  Elise nodded.

  “Wow! That sure ended up in some big-time papers, didn’t it?” Brad puffed his cheeks out momentarily and swung his gaze from Elise to Mitch. “So you two decided to get away for a few days, huh?”

  Mitch heard Elise exhale deeply before she finally answered. “I got some reward money after the case was solved and decided I could use a little bit of a vacation.”

  “I can imagine.” Brad leaned forward in his chair. “We don’t have to worry about stuff like that here.”

  “I’m banking on that.” Elise smiled, her familiar sparkle returning. “The brochures I got in the mail sounded heavenly. And so here we are.”

  “Well, I’m glad. Even if it means having to put up with doofus here,” Brad said, looking at Mitch. “It’s funny, we’ve always been popular in the summertime, yet no one ever seemed to think about us once October rolled around. But that started to change about two years ago when one of the locals came up with marketing the island as a winter paradise. It’s still relatively quiet in the winter, but we’ve started attracting cross-country skiers and a decent number of honeymooners.”

  “The info sheet back at the room said there’s just two of you out here.” Mitch looked around the room. Two desks, a few filing cabinets, and a tiny waiting area just about filled every square inch of the room.

  “Yup. My partner’s on vacation too. Somewhere in the Caribbean, the lucky dog.”

  “Think you can handle things by yourself?” Mitch asked. The teasing felt so natural, like they hadn’t missed a beat since college.

  “Don’t knock it till you try it, Mitch. I get my fair share of calls from distressed citizens.”

  “Can’t get their horses hitched to the sled?”

  “Ha, ha, ha. You’ve got it all wrong. They call me when they can’t get their sled out of a ditch.”

  The ringing of the telephone brought an abrupt end to the laughter in the room. Brad waved his right hand in the air, then reached for his desk phone.

  “Mackinac Island Police Department. This is Officer Brad Matthews, how can I help you?”

  It didn’t take long for Mitch to realize the call was important. Brad’s face showed definite signs of tension as he listened to the caller.

  “What makes you think he’s on our island?”

  Looking quickly in Elise’s direction, Mitch could sense that she, too, felt the unspoken urgency that now blanketed the tiny police station.

  “Agent Walker, as you know this is a very small, secluded island. Particularly at this time of year. I’m one of only two officers assigned to this station, and my coworker is out of the country. But a college friend of mine is visiting the island and he’s sitting right here. He’s a detective from New Jersey. Should we bring him in on this?”

  “What’s going on, Brad?” Mitch whispered, jumping to his feet. He glanced at the pad of paper Brad was using for notes.

  Brad shot his index finger into the air quickly and pulled the phone closer to his ear.

  “Detective Burns’s girlfriend is in the station as well, but that’s it.”

  Mitch shrugged at Elise’s questioning eyes.

  “Okay. Let me put you on speaker,” Brad said. He pressed the small black button at the bottom of the phone and motioned to Mitch. “Okay, sir. Go ahead.”

  “Detective Burns, my name is Agent Bud Walker with the FBI. As I was telling Officer Matthews a moment ago, we have good reason to believe a serial killer may be hiding on your island as we speak.”

  Mitch’s stomach muscles tightened, his grip on the corner of the desk intensified. This couldn’t be happening.

  “We’ve been tracking this scumbag across three states as he leaves a body behind in each location. He’s a tough one to find because he changes his appearance so often, taking the vocation of each new victim.”

  “Vocation?” Brad asked.

  “Yeah. He kills a teacher, he pretends he’s a teacher. He kills a counselor, he pretends he’s a counselor,” the agent explained.

  “What makes you think he’s here?” Mitch asked. He rubbed his palm down his face as he waited for the agent’s reply.

  “The last report we have as to his whereabouts put him within easy reach of Mackinac Island. Which, from all accounts, would be the perfect place to hide right now with the storm you’re getting.”

  “We’ve already got somethin’ like eight inches and it’s still coming down fast and furiously,” Brad replied.

  Mitch turned to look outside. There was no doubt about it, this would be an ideal place for a killer to hide. To regroup.

  “What role do you want us to play?” Brad continued.

  “You may very well be handling this whole thing for right now. The snow is so bad that we can’t fly in at this point. If we get a break in the weather, we’ll do our best, but—”

  “The runway out here will be a mess,” Brad finished aloud.

  “That’s what they’re telling me. Anyway, I need your fax number so I can send you a couple of the drawings we’ve gotten from witnesses along the way.”

  “Great,” he said and then relayed the fax number.

  Mitch listened as the FBI agent repeated the fax number, his mind whirling around the task in front of them.

  “Agent Walker, are there any particular traits or mannerisms this guy has that might help us pick him out? Or do you think he’ll be hiding from us?” Mitch asked.

  “This guy is as brazen as they come. He’ll be right under your nose. That’s half the thrill for this loser. Hold on, let me put this into the fax.”

  Within seconds the station’s dedicated fax line rang and the sound of paper feeding through the machine echoed against the cinder-block walls.

  “I’ll get it.” Elise rushed to the small desk in the back corner of the room.

  “Is it coming through?” the agent asked.

  “As we speak,” Mitch answered.

  “We gotta get this scumbag, boys. His last victim was a—”

  Silence filled the station house as the caller’s voice and accompanying background sounds ceased simultaneously.

  “Was a what?” Mitch asked quickly. “Agent Walker, are you still there?”

  Brad rapidly pressed the button on the telephone, his shoulders rigid with tension. “Damn it! The phone’s dead!”

  The feeling of helplessness that suddenly enveloped the room was magnified as the station’s lights flickered briefly then went out, leaving the threesome in total darkness.

  “Crap.” The sound of a drawer opening and things being pushed around filled the otherwise silent room. “Hang on, guys, I’ve got a flashlight here somewh— Damn!”

  “You okay, Brad?” Mitch asked.

  “Uh, yeah. Scraped my hand on something in the drawer. Wait, here it is.”

  A beam of light suddenly shone across the room, stopped on Elise and the fax machine.

  “The fax stopped too,” Elise said, her voice panicked.

  In a second Mitch was by her side, yanking the paper out of the machine.

  “Did we get anything to go on before the lines went dead?” Brad asked.

  “He’s got hair.” Mitch dropped the piece of paper onto the floor and slammed his fist down on the table. “We’ve got reason
to believe there’s a psychopath on this island and we don’t know anything about him. Except that he’s not bald—at least not at the time this particular sketch was drawn. The only thing we do know is that we might be stranded on an island with this loser during the snowstorm from hell.”

  “Agent Walker said that he takes the vocation of his victims.” Brad’s words were of little help and they all knew it.

  “But the line went dead before the agent could tell us who the last victim was.” Elise picked the incomplete fax off the ground and tossed it onto a nearby desk. “And Mitch is right. This drawing—or lack of one—isn’t going to help shed any light on who we’re looking for.”

  “What now?” Brad asked, his voice a clear giveaway of the fear gripping them all. “This kind of thing just doesn’t happen here. I was only semi-joking when I said my police calls are pretty much confined to helping a neighbor out of a ditch.”

  Mitch rubbed his palm down his face and took a deep breath. The calmness that was his during a crisis was returning. Finally.

  “What we need to do is take a deep breath and come up with some sort of plan to keep everyone safe until this thing is over.” Mitch looked straight into Brad’s eyes, willed his college buddy to get it together somehow. “There is still a chance this guy never made it onto the island.”

  “And if he did?” Brad asked.

  “If he did, it’s possible he’ll simply choose to hide.”

  “Hide?”

  “Yeah. So he can slip out a little easier when the storm ends.”

  “I hope you’re right, Mitch.”

  So do I, he thought.

  “Excuse me.”

  Mitch turned, his gaze riveted on the man standing in the doorway shielding his eyes from Brad’s flashlight.

  “I’m sorry. We didn’t hear you come in.” Brad squared his shoulders and lowered the flashlight’s beam. “How can I help you?”

  “My name’s Dan Friar. I need to report a missing person.”

  ~ ~ ~

  He was careful to stay in the shadows near the window, yet still be close enough to hear everything that was said inside. The frustration in Agent Walker’s voice was invigorating, the power failure a dream come true. The storm was proving to be everything he’d hoped and more.