“What did you do with them?”
He shrugged. “They were frogs. Not much you can do with them but catch them. My grandfather used to take me squirrel hunting, too.”
“You killed squirrels?” Jamie was appalled. Squirrels were cute.
“Yep.”
“What for?”
“Fun mostly. Sometimes my grandfather made squirrel stew.”
“Yuck.”
He laughed. “I promise, no squirrel stew.”
It was the first time he’d laughed since they’d left the condo and it made her feel better. Maybe he didn’t hate her after all.
“The cabin’s up there, just around the bend.” He pointed ahead through the trees, which looked like all the other trees they’d seen.
They’d left the paved road several miles back and were now bouncing long a rutted dirt lane. Jamie continued to peer into the distance where Todd had pointed. Finally, a small log cabin came into view.
“It’s a bit rustic,” Todd said. “But that’s its charm.”
Rustic, yes. Charm, maybe. Jamie was withholding judgment. On closer inspection it looked more like a shack than a cabin. And definitely not a compound.
Todd parked in a small clearing near the side of the house. Jamie eased her stiff legs from the car while Todd retrieved the key from its hiding place under the porch.
“Still here,” he said with obvious relief. “I had visions of having to break in.”
Remembering the fiasco at the condo, she looked at him in alarm. “You didn’t check with whoever owns it?”
“I own at least part of it. I don’t think anyone has been here in a while, though.”
The door stuck a bit and Todd had to push it open with his shoulder. He stepped inside and Jamie followed.
The interior was dark, and her eyes took a few minutes to adjust. The cabin consisted of a single room with a kitchen area at one end and a wood-burning fireplace at the other. The furnishings were sparse and the windows bare. A ladder led to what Jamie assumed was a loft. The place looked cold, dark, and dusty.
“Let’s open up before we bring our stuff in,” Todd said. “I’ll turn on the propane and fill the water tank.”
“Water tank?”
“It’s either that or pump the stuff from the well.” He looked around and grinned. “Once we get the place cleaned up, it will be great.”
This was the cheerful Todd she knew and loved. Maybe he was embarrassed about messing up the arrangements for the condo, which he’d intended as a treat for her. He’d wanted to please her and it hadn’t worked out. She was touched knowing he cared so much.
She turned and gave him a kiss. “It’s awesome,” she said.
Three hours later, as she stood at the stove stirring the pan of canned chicken soup they’d found in the cupboard, she could think of many words more fitting than “awesome.”
They’d swept, wiped, and scrubbed, plowing through layers of grime that stubbornly resisted the hardest scouring. She’d dealt with plenty of spiders and mouse droppings, too. With some effort (and swearing) Todd had managed to coax the gas refrigerator and lights to work. He’d found supposedly clean sheets and sent Jamie up the ladder to make the bed. She was almost glad the light was poor in the loft because she didn’t really want to get a good look at the mattress.
When the soup was hot, she poured it into mismatched bowls. Todd had the fire lit in the fireplace, although the flames were thin and the fire smoky. He brushed his hands on his pants.
“Good thing dinner’s ready,” he said. “I’m starved.”
Jamie set the bowls on the small, rickety table. “Not too starved, I hope. It’s not much of a dinner.”
“I thought there was more stuff here, okay?” His tone verged on angry again.
“I wasn’t complaining.”
“Could have fooled me.”
She bit her lip.
He sighed. “I’m sorry, Jamie. I wanted this to be fun.”
“It will be,” she said with faked enthusiasm.
He poured bourbon from a dusty bottle into two chipped glasses and handed her one. “Anyway, we’ve got booze. Super-aged in fact. This stuff must have been here for years.”
He lifted his glass in a toast and Jamie did the same. “To us,” he said.
She took a small sip. The liquor was bitter and burned her throat.
“I know we didn’t exactly plan on this trip to the cabin, but I’m glad it happened. The place has special meaning for me. It’s nice I can share it with someone who’s special to me.” He touched her chin. “You’re a wonderful and amazing girl, Jamie. I don’t know how I got so lucky.”
She was the one who was lucky. A sexy guy like Todd, and he’d chosen her. She still couldn’t believe it. She just wished she knew what he expected of her. She took a second small sip of whiskey. It didn’t burn as much as before. In fact, it emboldened her. “You must have known lots of wonderful girls,” she teased.
“Not so many as you might think.”
“But there had to have been one or two special ones, no?”
Todd set his glass on the rickety table and lowered his gaze. “There was someone I thought was special. But turned out she was just using me. I was heartbroken. It put me off all women.” He looked up and smiled. “Until you came along.”
Jamie melted inside. If only they were someplace nicer than this creepy, buggy cabin, she’d be the happiest girl on earth.
*****
The next morning Todd was out of bed and dressed before Jamie even woke up. When she opened her eyes, he was standing over the bed and pulling on a jacket.
“Where are you going?” she asked.
“To town for supplies.”
She must have slept longer than she thought. There was so little light in the cabin it was hard to tell what time it was. “It’ll only take me a minute to get ready.”
“No need for you to come.”
“But I want to.” She had assumed they’d go together. It was part of the adventure.
“Better that you stay here. Someone might see you in town.”
“So?”
“Jamie, we’re hiding out. Remember?”
“No one in town is going to recognize me, or even care.”
“We can’t take that chance. You’re not coming.”
Jamie sat up, gripped in fear. What if he left and never came back? There was nothing around but wild animals and wilderness. She’d die of fright if not starvation.
“Please? I’ll wear a hat or something.”
“Jesus, Jamie. Get a grip. I won’t be gone long. Maybe you can clean the place up a bit more while I’m in town.” With that he headed downstairs and out the door.
Jamie didn’t get out of bed, even when she heard the car pull away. She was too miserable to move. How could Todd be so sweet one minute and so . . . so mean the next?
She didn’t want to be alone in the stupid cabin. She didn’t really want to be here at all. Through the haze of last night’s whiskey and the crackle of a fire, the cabin had seemed adventurous and oddly romantic. But the reality was that the toilet was filthy, the water ran at a trickle, and the whole cabin smelled. During the night she’d heard howling in the woods, and when she’d woken Todd, he’d turned his back to her. “It’s just coyotes,” he’d said. “They won’t hurt you.”
And then this morning he’d left with barely a word. Even if he didn’t want her to go to town with him, why did he have to act like he was mad at her again?
Afraid to think how Todd would react if he came home and found her still lying there, she got up.
He wanted her to clean some more, so she would. Maybe then he’d be nice to her again. She washed the dinner dishes in the rust-stained sink, dried them, and put them away. She swept the floor and restacked the logs by the fireplace. There was nothing else for her to do. The cabin was beyond cleaning. It needed a bulldozer.
When she heard Todd’s car rumbling down the road, she ran outside to greet him, r
elieved beyond reason.
“You’re back!”
“Shit hole of a store.” He pulled a couple of grocery bags from the car. “They’ve got nothing there.”
“Maybe there’s a better store farther on.” She reached to help him carry a bag and he practically threw it at her.
“Yeah, if we want to drive for an hour.” He slammed the car door shut.
Jamie followed him into the cabin and began silently putting the groceries away. Mostly cans: canned beans, canned stew, canned pasta, more soup. He had bought eggs, instant coffee, bread, and more whiskey. No meat and not a single fresh fruit or vegetable.
“Next time we’ll go together and make an outing of it,” she suggested. “An hour’s not so far and we can explore along the way. I’ll wear some sort of disguise if it will make you feel better.”
He ran a hand across the shelf where the whiskey bottle was stored. Jamie could see the dust fly up in the air. “What the hell did you do all morning?” He grabbed her by the arm. “I thought I told you to clean up.”
“I did.”
“Not so as you’d notice.”
Jamie felt the prick of tears. “Why are you being so mean?”
“Why are you being so difficult?”
“Difficult? What am I doing wrong?”
“How about you just stop whining and do what I tell you.”
Hadn’t she just cleaned up? And she wasn’t whining. In fact, she’d made an effort to sound upbeat about his whole stupid plan. “Maybe I should go home,” she said angrily.
“It’s not that simple.”
“What do you mean?”
“I went out on a limb for you. Don’t you forget it.”
“I haven’t. But I don’t see why—”
“You are not going to hang me out to dry. Is that understood?” He headed for the door. “I’m going to split some wood. See if you can do something about the dust.”
Jamie had dusted yesterday, but the whiskey shelf was too high for her to reach easily, and there had been plenty of other places that screamed for her attention. Besides, what did it matter if the shelf was dusty? It wasn’t like they were putting dishes or fresh food there.
Her great adventure didn’t seem so great anymore. She missed Alyssa. She missed her family. She missed the sweet Todd she’d known back home. Nothing was turning out the way she thought it would.
Still, she’d better dust the stupid shelf. She grabbed a chair to stand on. Then she noticed Todd’s jacket on the table where he’d tossed it in anger when he came home from the store.
Going to the window, she glanced outside. He was at the woodpile, ax in hand.
Jamie lifted his jacket as silently as she could. She reached into the pocket for his phone and turned it on, praying for reception.
Her prayers were answered with two bars. Good enough. She called home.
Chapter 38
The phone was ringing when Marta opened the door. Balancing the box of Carol’s papers in her arms, she hurried to answer it. She only made it to the hallway when the answering machine picked up.
“Mom? Are you there?” Jamie’s voice was tentative and pleading. “Mom, pick up. Please.”
Marta dropped the box where she stood, sending papers and folders flying onto the floor in a heap, and raced to the phone.
“Jamie? Thank God. Honey, are you ok? Where are you?”
“I’m fine. It’s just . . . Mom, I think I made a mistake.”
Marta was frantic. She wanted to reach through the phone, hold Jamie tight, and never let her go. “Are you with Todd?”
Jamie made a sound that Marta took to mean yes.
“You’re sure you’re okay?”
“I’m not hurt.” Her voice broke. “I want to come home.”
“Of course. Tell me where you are. We’ll come get you right away.”
“I don’t know where I am. The woods somewhere. About five or six hours from San Francisco, but I don’t think we took a very direct route so it might be closer.”
“Okay.” Marta’s mind raced. “Do you know which direction you headed?”
“No. But we’re sort of in the mountains. There are trees. Pines and some other stuff. And there’s supposed to be a stream nearby.”
That didn’t narrow it down much. “What about landmarks along the way?”
“We went through a bunch of little towns.” Jamie’s voice was soft, almost a whisper. “I slept for a lot of it. But there was an old-fashioned gas station in one of the towns. And a mobile home park called Royal Gardens or something like that.”
Royal Gardens. Marta wrote down the name. “What about other houses?”
“There’s nothing around. I think . . .”
Jamie grew suddenly silent. Marta heard the squeak of a door in the background and the sound of footsteps approaching. Jamie whimpered, then a male voice said, “What the fuck?”
There was a scuffling noise and the phone clanged to the floor.
“Jamie?” Marta’s voice rose. “Talk to me, Jamie.”
Nothing.
Then Jamie cried out in pain.
“Jamie!” Marta screamed into the phone.
Finally, she heard breathing on the other end of the line. Her heart raced.
“Jamie?”
“You had your chance, Marta.”
She recognized Todd’s voice instantly. “Please, don’t do this, Todd. Let me speak to my daughter.”
But she was talking to dead air.
Hoping to keep the line open, she didn’t end the call until the damned recording told her to hang up and try again. She punched *69, hoping the call-back function would connect her again. She got another recording.
She called 911. “What’s your emergency?” the dispatcher asked.
“I need to talk to Detective Phillips. Right away.”
“This is the emergency number, ma’am. You need to call the main number.”
“Please, this is urgent. Can’t you transfer me?”
“I can give you his number, if you’d like.”
Marta knew she should have called Phillips directly, but she hadn’t wanted to waste time looking up the number. Now she’d squandered even more precious minutes.
Thank God, he picked up when she called. Marta told him about Jamie’s aborted phone call.
“Did you get the number?” he asked.
“It came through as ‘Name not found.’ Can’t you pinpoint the locale?”
“Not after the fact. Even during the call, we’d need a longer connection time than you had. But we should put a tap on your phone in case she calls again.”
“Okay.” Although Marta felt certain Jamie wouldn’t get the chance to call again. Todd would watch her like a hawk. God only knew what he would do about this call.
“I’ll set things up on this end,” Phillips said. “Someone should contact you shortly.”
“But what do we do now? We have to find her. All she was able to tell me was that she was in the mountains with trees. That covers a lot of territory.”
“Six hours from San Francisco, right?”
“Approximately. Jamie wasn’t sure of the timing. She slept for some of the drive.”
“We’ll start by alerting the authorities in the San Francisco area.”
Where Jamie no longer was. The elation Marta had felt initially at hearing her daughter’s voice gave way to a heavy heart. Jamie might as well be in the middle of the ocean.
“She wants to come home,” Marta reminded him. “Todd Wilson is holding her prisoner. He physically attacked her. I’m worried about her safety.”
“I understand. Without more to go on, however, our options are limited.”
Gordon was in class right then, which meant his phone was probably turned off. Marta called and left a message. Then, ignoring the mess of papers in the hallway where she’d dropped the box, she sat down at her desk and got to work. She couldn’t simply wait, worry, and hope for the best.
She started by Googling Roy
al Gardens Mobile Home Park. She found listings for Florida, Louisiana, and southern California, nowhere near mountains or trees. She tried mobile home parks in northern California, but nothing for Royal Gardens showed up.
For the next several hours, Marta faxed and phoned every newspaper, television, and radio station she was able to find in the San Francisco area. She sent them a press release she’d written herself, a photo of Jamie, and pledged to be available for an in-person interview should they decide to do one. She attached a flyer and asked them to make it available to the public.
Then she got out a map, drew concentric circles around San Francisco, and was in the process of repeating the fax and phone outreach to smaller towns in rural areas when Cassie called.
“I can’t talk right now,” Marta told her. “I’m in the middle of sending a press release to every town in California.”
“Wow, a big new client?”
“No. Jamie called.”
“What? That’s great news. So she’s okay?”
“Not really.”
“What’s that mean? Where is she?”
“She doesn’t know. Probably somewhere in California, but maybe Oregon. Or Nevada. She wants to come home.” Marta told her about the phone call.
“This man is holding her captive? Like a prisoner?”
“That’s what it sounded like. The police are taking it more seriously than before, but there’s still not a lot they can do. That’s why I’m contacting media outlets myself. Our only hope of finding her is to get the word out and pray someone recognizes her.”
“My God, how awful.”
“She sounded so scared, Cassie. I have to help her.”
“What can I do?”
“Nothing. I need to go to California and make a stink. Rattle the airwaves until she’s found.”
“I’ll come with you,” Cassie said.
“What about your job?” Marta wasn’t sure she wanted to deal with the chaos of her sister.
“Screw my job.”
“Cassie, you can’t—”
“I can and I am. Jamie is my niece. Besides, two of us can do twice as much as one.”
It was a decent point. “If you’re sure—”
“I am. The job is no great shakes anyway.”
Payback Page 20
