Deadly Getaway

by Laura Bradford

  Speechless, Brad dropped his head back onto his desk.

  Mitch resisted the urge to continue, resisted the desire to accuse Brad of stupidity. It wouldn’t solve anything.

  He grabbed for the album he’d placed on his desk, ran his hand across the soft leather.

  Merlin had died at the hand of a psychopath. Someone who couldn’t face his own inadequacies.

  Mitch flipped the cover open, stared at the face of Merlin Webber that peered back at him from the Michigan-issued driver’s license. A document that undoubtedly found its way into the album as a sort of keepsake. What other use could it serve on an island with no cars?

  His gaze hovered on the man’s piercing brown eyes, the thick crop of gray hair. This was the way he wanted to remember the man he’d never met. Not as a corpse being buried in the snow.

  Mitch turned the album page and studied the next picture. Dark brown eyes stared back at him, serious eyes that held little joy.

  “Who’s that?”

  Mitch raised his eyes momentarily, met Brad’s. “I don’t know.”

  Brad pushed back his chair and joined Mitch.

  “That’s gotta be Merlin when he was a little younger.” Brad leaned over Mitch’s shoulder. “Yup, that’s Merlin. Grumpy face and all.”

  Mitch slipped the picture out of its clear plastic sleeve and turned it over. A date was written in the upper right-hand corner.

  “Wow. Merlin sure aged over the last ten years.” Brad snorted.

  “How long have you been here again?” Mitch asked.

  “About five years.”

  “Hey, boys, what’s going on around here?”

  Startled, Mitch looked up. “Hey, Jonathan. I didn’t hear you come in.”

  “I could tell. You guys looked pretty engrossed just now.”

  Mitch motioned to a chair across from his desk, waited for Jonathan to sit.

  “Where’s Elise?”

  “She wanted to stay and talk to Sophie. I figured she could use that,” Jonathan said. “So, what’d I miss. What happened with Mark?”

  Mitch set the album down. “You missed a lot. The first victim, Pete, had a very high-tech compass he was using during the competition. Mark heard Josh Cummings trading it with a guest at the Lakeside Inn for a pair of gloves the other night. Then, when Mark asked him about it the next morning, Josh denied the whole incident.”

  He saw the lightbulb go off in Jonathan’s head, was grateful for the keen instincts the retired police officer still possessed.

  “Do you think he—”

  “I sure do. It jives with what Dan told me the morning of the search party. It jives with the way Mark was so worried about his money. And it jives with Dan’s belief that Pete’s killer had to have been a strong skier.”

  “Then where is he?”

  “At his hotel. Asleep.”

  Jonathan dropped into the chair. “Come again?”

  “We’ve got other fish to fry. Bigger fish.”

  “Meaning?”

  “Meaning Pete’s murder was a one-time snap for a pathetic fool who isn’t going anywhere in this storm. I’d stake my life on that. But we’ve got a bigger threat that needs our full attention.”

  He could see the question in Jonathan’s eyes, feel it in the man’s demeanor.

  “I think Josh is one of two killers. It’s the other killer that’s taking out residents of this island. And it’s this other killer that the FBI was tracking.”

  Mitch paused for a moment then continued. “And we think we’ve figured out how he’s been able to keep a step ahead of us. How he’s known to target Annie. And Merlin.”

  “How?” Jonathan asked.

  Brad pushed against the wall with a thud. “Me.”

  Jonathan’s voice was gruff when he spoke. “You?”

  “My window.”

  A low whistle escaped Jonathan’s mouth. “Crap! Why didn’t we think of that?”

  Mitch recognized the frustration in Jonathan’s face. But they both were smart enough to know that dwelling wasn’t going to solve anything. Moving forward would.

  Mitch set Merlin’s picture down on the desk and reached for the pad of paper he’d been jotting notes on all week.

  Jonathan reached across the desk, turned the photograph in his direction.

  “Where’d you get this picture of Merlin?”

  “From an album. I found it in a fire box in his bedroom. Thought maybe it would help somehow.”

  He scanned his notes, reviewing and discarding various scenarios he’d been playing with since that first night.

  “That’s kinda odd.”

  Mitch forced his attention away from his notes and onto Jonathan, saw the man furrow his brow as he looked at the picture more closely.

  “What?”

  “Merlin. Why would he shave his head? It makes him look so much older.”

  Mitch stared at Jonathan, waited for an explanation for his odd statement. But there was none.

  “Merlin’s head wasn’t shaved.”

  “Yeah, it was.”

  Mitch turned and looked at Brad standing behind him, saw the look of confusion in his buddy’s face. He turned back to Jonathan.

  “Merlin wasn’t bald. He had a thick crop of gray hair. The same gray hair that was on the body Brad and I buried.”

  “Maybe he was wearing a wig?”

  “Merlin? Wear a wig? Not likely,” Brad said, chuckling under his breath.

  “What did this bald guy look like?” Mitch asked, Jonathan’s words beginning to form an unsettling image in his mind.

  “Just like that.” Jonathan pointed to the picture on the desk in front of them. “Except bald.”

  Mitch pushed his chair back and jumped to his feet. “Brad, was that Merlin we buried under the snow?”

  “Sure was.”

  Mitch smacked his hand on the desktop. “Then that wasn’t Merlin that you and Elise talked to! That must have been our guy.”

  “But this is Merlin, isn’t it?” Jonathan pulled the picture from the desk and held it up in Brad’s direction.

  “Yup. That’s Merlin. A younger version anyway.”

  “Well, this is the guy Elise and I met. I’m sure of that.”

  Mitch stared at Jonathan, his thoughts racing a mile a minute. How could they be referring to the same man? A man they both saw within the last few days?

  On impulse, Mitch crossed the room and yanked the file cabinet open. He pulled the journalism magazine from the top drawer, flipped it open to the article Elise had found and began reading the letter to the editor the killer had written.

  The letter had been of interest from the beginning, but now parts leapt out at him as if they’d been written in bold print.

  . . . Walter James’ article on hard working kids being the “stars” of the future was the final straw. According to Walter James, underachieving kids are the future dregs of society “just as they’ve been for each previous generation.”

  But has Mr. James ever looked to the adults surrounding the underachiever for answers?

  No, he hasn’t.

  Mitch’s hand tightened on the magazine as his eyes continued to scan the letter.

  . . . I was one of those so-called “underachievers,” and in my opinion the world has more “stars” than it needs. Especially in light of the star-making qualifications dreamed up by the press and accepted as gospel by the rest of the world.

  Just because I wasn’t a straight A student or a member of some academic honor society doesn’t mean I was an underachiever. Just because I didn’t slap a helmet on my head and plow into other kids doesn’t mean I was an underachiever. Just because I didn’t win a spelling bee or paint my pictures with “happy colors” doesn’t mean I was an underachiever . . .

  . . . But to you it did. To my teachers it did. To the coaches in my school it did. To the police officers on the street it did. To my father, who wrote about my wonderful overachieving counterparts, it did.

  “To my father, w
ho wrote about my wonderful overachieving counterparts . . .” Mitch’s hushed voice trailed off as he reread the last sentence. “That’s it!”

  “What?” Brad asked.

  “The man we buried was Merlin.”

  “Okay. I knew that.”

  “The man you saw, Jonathan, wasn’t Merlin. It was his son.” He stared at Jonathan across the room, saw the frightening realization creep across the man’s tired face.

  For a moment the station was silent, not a word was spoken. Brad’s face was the epitome of confusion, Jonathan’s eyes a window to the rapid-fire thoughts racing through his mind.

  “Oh, my God, it makes sense,” Jonathan said. “Sophie was talking about Merlin just this morning. She said the reason he came to Mackinac was because it was the best of both worlds.”

  “Both worlds?” Mitch asked quickly.

  “Yeah, a place to tell the news he loved, and a place that allowed him to escape his family.”

  Mitch tightened his hand into a fist and raised it in the air.

  “We got him.”

  Chapter Twenty-six

  4:00 p.m.

  Elise looked at the picture in her hand once again, felt her heart twist at the sight of the family she loved so much.

  “Sophie, I’ve got to go see Uncle Ken. Gotta make sure he’s okay.”

  The woman nodded. “I know, hon. But it’s almost dark out there. It’s too dangerous.”

  Elise squeezed the woman’s hand, forced the corners of her mouth upward in some semblance of reassurance. “I’ll be fine. I’m a good skier. Pretty fast too. I need to do this.”

  Sophie stood. “Then let me pour some hot cocoa in a thermos for you while you get yourself bundled up.”

  Elise watched Sophie push through the swinging doors into the kitchen, then looked back at the picture in her hand.

  Oh, Uncle Ken. I know you loved them.

  Sophie reappeared just moments later, a tall green thermos in her hands.

  “I attached this strap to the thermos so you can sling it over your head and across your shoulder. It’s what I do when I—”

  Elise waited for the woman to continue, realized she wasn’t going to.

  “Thanks, Sophie.” She knotted her scarf around her throat and pulled her insulated gloves above her wrists.

  “What do I tell Mitch if he comes looking for you?”

  “That I went back to the hotel to take a nap. He’ll buy that with the poor sleep we got last night.” Elise turned toward the door, her gaze falling on the undeveloped roll of film atop Sophie’s counter. “Sophie, would you mind if I take that roll with me?”

  “Not at all.”

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  4:25 p.m.

  She was a good skier. Fast. Better than he was. But he could catch her if he wanted to. Completing his list had given him a burst of energy like he’d never known before.

  Sure, he would have liked his dad to be the last one. The cherry on the sundae so to speak. But it was impossible. He needed to take care of the last two people who could identify him.

  Jonathan would have to wait ’til later, when he was alone in his hotel room without the other cops around. But Elise—she’d made it easy when she left Sophie’s and headed away from the police station.

  Unfortunately, he was curious now. What would make a young woman head off into the woods alone? Especially when she knew he was out there? Somewhere.

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  5:25 p.m.

  Elise stared at the flames in front of her, waited for their warmth to chase away the chill that permeated her entire body.

  “You took quite a chance coming out here at this time of the day.” Uncle Ken slipped a long brown afghan around her shoulders and gave her back a quick rub.

  “I had to.” Her voice sounded raspy, tired.

  “What’s wrong?”

  She slipped her hand into the right front pocket of her jeans, closed her fingers around the photograph Sophie had given her. It was hard to reconcile what was right. Her head knew that showing the photograph to Uncle Ken might be a bad idea. But her heart longed to see the look on his face.

  “Elise?”

  Slowly, she pulled her hand from her pocket, the photograph cutting into her fingers.

  “What do you have there?”

  Wordlessly, she held the picture out, waited for him to take it from her hand.

  She felt his questioning eyes on her face as he reached for the photograph and held it into the lantern light.

  Elise saw Uncle Ken’s eyes widen, his lips part.

  “Where did you get this?” he asked, his voice suddenly hoarse.

  “A woman in town had it. She figured out that I was the girl in the picture.”

  Uncle Ken raised his right hand to his cheek, his eyes never leaving the photograph. “Oh, how I miss them.”

  Elise reached out, grasped his empty hand with her own.

  “I know you do. I do too. But Ray is still out there. Somewhere.”

  Uncle Ken’s entire demeanor changed. He pushed the photograph back in her hand and walked across the room. “Little Ray is better off without me in his life. To lose his father to cancer, and his mother to my stupidity? That’s more than any person should have to bear.”

  She opened her mouth to argue, but stopped. The pain in Uncle Ken’s eyes was so intense, so raw. It was a pain she couldn’t wipe away in mere minutes. Or even days.

  She turned to the fire once more. The flames crackled and popped as they danced on the log pile.

  “I guess my afternoon angel isn’t coming today.”

  “Afternoon angel?”

  Uncle Ken nodded, pointed to a small framed photograph on a shelf beside the fireplace. A photograph she hadn’t noticed during her first visit.

  “That’s Sophie!”

  “She’s been a lifeline for me these past few years.” Uncle Ken walked over to the shelf and picked up the photograph. “I would have given up on life long before now if it weren’t for her goodness and quiet understanding.”

  Realizing her uncle was speaking as much to himself as he was to her, Elise stood perfectly still. Listened.

  “I’m not sure why, but she’s made it her mission to be my contact with the outside world for the past twelve years.” He stared at the picture as he continued. “Nearly every day she arrives here around two thirty and chats about this, that, or the other. Even on days when I’ve not said a word the entire time.”

  “So you’re why she shuts her restaurant down every day from two ’til four?” Elise asked.

  Uncle Ken nodded, quietly placed the frame back on the shelf. “Faye would have liked her.”

  “Yes, she would have,” Elise said quietly. “I like her too. Though I’ve been a bit worried about her these past few days.”

  “Worried? Why?”

  Elise bit back the excitement she felt at his obvious concern.

  “She seems to get confused at times. I’ve been hoping it’s just stress.”

  “Confused how?”

  Elise pulled the afghan more closely around her shoulders and stepped away from the fire.

  “Like today. I was at the restaurant with Jonathan.”

  “Jonathan? I thought your young man’s name was Mitch.”

  “It is. Mitch went to question someone with Brad, while Jonathan and I stayed at Sophie’s.” Elise sat on the battered sofa in front of the hearth and pulled her legs up underneath her. “Jonathan is a retired police officer from Georgia. He’s been helping in the investigation and we’re very lucky to have him.”

  Her uncle nodded, his left eyebrow slightly cocked as he waited for her to continue.

  “Anyway, I said something about Jonathan being a police officer and Sophie was surprised by that.”

  Elise stared at the fire as she continued. “Then she made a comment about how lucky we are to have four police officers on the island at a time like this.”

  Uncle Ken sat on the edge of a nearby recliner. �
��And?”

  “I corrected her, pointed out there’s just three. Mitch, Brad, and Jonathan,” Elise said. “But she insisted there was another. One that she thinks was with Mitch and me that first night.”

  “Is there?”

  Elise shook her head. “No. In fact, other than one very cold stranger, Mitch and I were the only ones in the restaurant that first night.”

  “Does she have a picture of this man she thinks is a cop?”

  She stuck her hand into her left pocket and pulled out Sophie’s roll of undeveloped film. “I’m hoping it’s on here.”

  She studied her uncle, saw the way he looked at her with a twinkle in his eye. A twinkle she hadn’t seen in years. “And you want to develop it now, right?”

  “I thought you’d never ask. But is it even possible without some sort of light?”

  “Does your watch have a light?” Uncle Ken asked.

  Elise stared down at her wrist, at the watch that her grandfather had given her when she graduated from college. “Yes, it does, why?

  “That’s all we need.”

  ~ ~ ~

  It had taken five days, but they finally knew who the killer was. Even knew what he looked like. But now they needed to find him.

  “Read that letter again. Doesn’t it seem as if his father would be the last person on his list?”

  Brad’s question hung in the air, the first coherent thing he’d uttered in hours.

  Mitch scanned the article in his hand once again, then studied the photograph on the desk in front of him. Brad’s question made sense. Perhaps the killer was done.

  “Maybe. Maybe he feels a sense of freedom now that the people who he feels wronged him are gone.” Mitch stared into the eyes of the killer, waited to see if they’d speak to him somehow.

  “Maybe. But he’s got to know he isn’t out of the woods yet,” Jonathan said.

  Mitch looked up from the photograph, the meaning behind Jonathan’s words crystal clear.

  “Why? Because we know who he is?”

  He heard Brad’s question, saw Jonathan’s slow nod. But suddenly none of it meant anything to him. He knew the answer Brad was seeking. And it was an answer he didn’t like.