Dead Too Soon: A Thriller (Val Ryker series Book 3)

by Ann Voss Peterson

  Carla couldn’t breathe. She couldn’t move. First step? Did he expect her to go through with it? To pull the trigger? To die for him?

  “But I still don’t believe you.”

  She shook her head.

  “You can do better than this. If you really love me, you will do better.”

  Carla reached down the length of the weapon and brushed the trigger with the pad of her thumb.

  “Good girl.”

  Carla almost smiled. So he could see it. He could finally see it. How much she loved him. How hard she was trying. All she was willing to risk.

  “Go ahead.”

  Carla let out a shuddering breath, fogging in the night air.

  “You say you love me. That you’re willing to sacrifice everything. If you don’t believe your own words, why should I?”

  Her own words… her own words…

  Carla had given him everything, and all he wanted was more.

  More than even she could give.

  She started to lower the barrel, to slip it from her mouth.

  And that’s when he skated his finger on top of her thumb and drove the trigger home.

  Val

  The crack of a gunshot echoed through the trees just as Lund made the turn into the park entrance.

  Val’s stomach lurched. Were they too late? Had Grace tried to get away, to fight, and now…

  “It could be anything,” Lund said, stopping the truck near the locked gate. The truck’s headlights illuminated a sign hung in the middle, PARK CLOSED FOR THE SEASON.

  At least the parking lots were officially closed, to save on the costs of plowing snow. But tire ruts circling the gate testified to how easily the rules could be broken.

  They both threw open their doors. It took Val a few extra seconds to grab her crutch and secure the rifle strap over her shoulder. When she caught up with Lund, he was staring at tire ruts leading around the gate and into the park.

  “Has to be half a dozen tracks here.”

  “We know he’s been in and out.”

  “Why? Grace was at the train depot. They seemed to be staying at the depot, too. What was he up to?”

  That was the question. What was Hess setting up? What kinds of horrors were they about to stumble into? What horrors was Grace already in up to her neck?

  Val followed the tracks, her crutch slipping and sliding in the mud and last vestiges of snow. Ever since she’d figured out Grace’s message, Val had been on the phone with various small-town police departments located along the lower Wisconsin River. Some were evacuating, all were scrambling, and none had officers to send out to a state park on pure speculation. Iowa County had promised deputies, but it was no telling how long it would take for them to arrive. And if something happened with that dam, Val doubted they would be able to make it at all.

  She pulled out her phone. No bars. Not the first time the signal had dropped out, blocked by the bluffs. Now she couldn’t even contact Harry.

  She and Lund were on their own.

  They passed the administration building and entered the park. Standing water pooled in depressions, the ground still frozen under the surface. Snowdrifts decayed on the north sides of buildings and swells. The tracks followed a one-lane road into the forest, then up the slope to campsites that spotted the edge of the bluff.

  The sites were rustic, an area in the woods overlooking the river. Even through the darkness, Val could see that some featured a picnic table. Some had a small, rough chimney built from stone, a place for campers to build their fires and cook their burgers and bratwursts. They passed one after another. All vacant.

  Val and Lund followed the road, snow and dead leaves crunching under their boots. Val kept her rifle ready, finger indexed along the trigger. The rainy night was dark, and with the blur in her right eye, she found herself squinting to make out anything through the shadows.

  They were well into the forest and approaching the sharp climb of a bluff when Lund paused and pointed.

  Across a small gulley and through skeletal trees was the hulking mass of an older-model Winnebago. A weak light streaming from inside illuminated two cars parked to the side of it, one a hatchback that had seen better days, the other a squad car.

  Hess.

  Val’s hands were shaking when she pulled out her cell phone. Still no signal. Lund raised his brows, and she shook her head in answer.

  No way to call for help. They were on their own.

  Val readied her weapon once again and the two of them moved toward the RV. With each step, her knee wobbled. Tingles and pricks raced up her leg. Sticks and mud made the ground uneven. Pine needles turned level patches slick as ice. And the ice…

  “Val…” Lund motioned to one of the stone fireplaces.

  At first Val couldn’t make out what he was pointing to. Then, as they crept closer, she was able to catch the darker shade of a blue-jeaned leg against a small patch of melting snow.

  Val’s pulse rate doubled.

  The figure lay on her back, her legs sticking out from behind the stone flue. The jeans were dirty, splotched with brown. The soles of boots were clotted with mud. She wore a fleece workout jacket, not nearly warm enough for the weather, and the jacket, Kevlar vest, and shirt underneath rode up, exposing a sliver of skin.

  Val’s hands trembled, and she gripped her rifle, trying to steady herself. Grace had been wearing jeans with the same dark wash, and she owned a similar jacket, but the boots were wrong. Grace had been wearing her old sneakers. Val was sure of it.

  She also doubted Hess would dress her niece in Kevlar.

  Val took a step closer, leaning heavily on her crutch, craning her neck to see around the fireplace.

  Arms splayed out from the body’s sides. The hands faced upward, fingers curling into the palms. Bits of leaf and pine needles stuck to her skin, and her nails… her nails…

  “Baby pink,” Val whispered aloud.

  Lund frowned.

  “Her nail polish. It’s Carla,” Val said, her hushed words almost derailed by a giggle. A wave of relief made her knees feel even weaker than they had a moment ago. A glance back at the Winnebago, at what they might find inside, wiped her relief away.

  Circling to the far side of the fireplace, Lund checked the body and held up a hand. “Still warm. You might not want to see the rest.”

  Val stepped forward despite the warning. She wanted to see Carla’s face. She needed to make sure. But there was very little face left to see.

  Val had seen the aftermath of suicide with a shotgun before. An older man dying of cancer who’d put the barrel in his mouth and pulled the trigger while his wife was baking a birthday cake for him downstairs. And while the outdoor setting did a lot to hide the bits of brain, skull, and blood, the scene was still plenty disturbing. “It looks like suicide.”

  “Or execution.”

  Nodding, Val turned away from Carla and focused on the RV sitting at the edge of the clearing. With Carla dead out here, there was no telling what they’d discover inside. Hess? Grace? But as afraid as Val was of the possibilities, she needed to look. She needed to know.

  Returning her rifle to her shoulder, finger on the trigger, she led the way this time. The night was quiet, so still all she could hear was the light patter of rain on last autumn’s leaves, the soft shuffle of pine needles underfoot, and the pained cry of an animal in the distance, bouncing off the sandstone bluffs.

  They reached the motor home, and Lund grasped the door handle. He held up three fingers.

  Then two.

  Then one.

  He pulled the door open, and Val climbed the steps, Lund behind her, supporting her with his body.

  The Winnebago smelled of something scorched on the stove, but the space was tiny, the bathroom door open, and a quick visual told Val no one was inside.

  Val pointed out what she noticed to Lund. A box of board books for small children. A chef’s knife perched on the foldout table. A blood-covered zip tie.

  Val’s vision
blurred. “She got away. Grace got away.”

  Lund was about to speak when Val’s cell vibrated in her pocket. She looked at the readout and brought the phone to her ear. “Jack. We found them.”

  “Shit. I hope you can handle it, Val, because we can’t get to you.”

  “Chandler…”

  “I can’t reach her at all. The dam, Val. It’s gone. And soon, so will be everything downriver.”

  Chapter

  Thirty-Six

  Everyone sees what you appear to be, few experience what you really are. The police have made it appear that I am the criminal, the monster. That I am weak. That I am stupid. They have put me behind bars for a murder I didn’t commit. They have thwarted justice at every turn.

  In the end, none of that matters.

  They have failed to see what I really am. But that failure is their undoing. I am more than they know. More than they can imagine. I am the sword of justice.

  And I have just begun.

  —Convicted murderer Dixon Hess, from his A MANIFESTO FOR JUSTICE, as received by the Wisconsin State Journal.

  Chapter

  Thirty-Seven

  Grace

  The forest was dark, no moonlight visible through the thick clouds. But if Grace couldn’t convince Ethan to be quiet, they might as well be lit with spotlights.

  His wails had downgraded to sniffles with an occasional squawk thrown in. No longer echoing-off-the-bluffs loud, but if Hess came near, he’d hear for sure.

  Grace paused, rebalancing Ethan on her hip. She could barely move her hand, and her fingers felt fat as bratwursts. She hoped her punch had hurt Carla as much as it had hurt her.

  “Down, down.” Ethan leaned forward in her arms, as if wanting to dive headfirst into the forest floor.

  “Hold on, buddy.” Grace smoothed Ethan’s hair back from his sweaty forehead with her good hand. “Hey, hey, hey. Everything’s okay.”

  He stared at her as if he expected her to change into a monster at any second.

  “Come on, Ethan. You’re not hurt. You’re okay. There’s no reason to be scared now.” Grace hoped she sounded convincing. Grace was more than scared herself. She was petrified. Ethan could probably sense it, no matter how she acted on the surface. Just like horses could.

  “Remember the last time I saw you? Remember that ice cream we ate?”

  He sniffled, his little mouth still locked in a frown.

  “Mmm, ice cream. Wasn’t that good?”

  “Ice cream?”

  “Yeah. That was yummy, wasn’t it? Ice cream. And if you’re really quiet, we can try to find some ice cream again, okay?”

  Grace broke through the leafless brush, and a path opened up in front of her. One direction doubled back the way she’d come, back to Carla and the RV, the other wound up a steep hill.

  Grace took the hill. Paved with asphalt, the path was blanketed with dead leaves and pine needles, making the surface slick under her sneakers. But slick or not, it was faster than threading her way through trees and brush.

  She followed the path. It had to lead somewhere, right? To the road? To a shelter with a phone? To help?

  The trail of rough asphalt skirted the edge of the bluff and wound up the hill. Nearing the crest, the path split. The left fork canted downward, hugging the edge of the bluff. The right led sharply upward toward a small building perched right at the top. The building’s door stood ajar. A sliver of light streamed out.

  “Ice cream?”

  “Shhhh.” Grace watched the building, waiting for someone to emerge. She’d been hoping the path would lead to help, but this didn’t feel right. When Hess had stormed from the RV, he hadn’t taken one of the cars. He’d walked somewhere nearby. What if that somewhere was here? What if Grace ran to the light for help and ended up face-to-face with her nightmare? What if he cornered her at the top of the cliff and there was no way out?

  Ethan laid his fingers on her cheek, trying to turn her face to him. “Ice cream?”

  “No, not in there,” Grace whispered. “Can you be quiet? Shhhhh?”

  “Shhhh.”

  “That’s it. Good job.”

  Grace turned away from the steep path and followed a fork that flanked the edge of the bluff. Her sneakers squished in the mud and slid on patches of ice. Her breath roared in her ears, drowning out the slamming beat of her pulse. Her jaw ached with cold, and it had never occurred to her that such a little boy could weigh so much.

  The path crested and started downward. Asphalt transitioned to stone steps, their surfaces covered with moss and melting snow and ice. The rustic staircase twisted down the steep incline, closer and closer to the edge. Dark sky opened beyond leafless trees. Below, a river and its tributaries snaked through the faint glow of remaining snow. The lights of a town twinkled cold in the distance.

  A two-board fence ran along the trail, the only thing between Grace and a plunge down the cliff. Every step felt as if she was teetering on disaster. Her shoe slipped, and she almost went down, her free hand plunging into gritty snow and mud.

  “Oops,” Ethan said helpfully.

  “Shh.”

  Grace could barely carry Ethan now. He was heavy, so heavy. Her arm pulsed with pain. With each step, she seemed to skid closer to the meager fence, closer to falling. She had to find someplace to hide. Someplace where she could have a moment to rest and figure out what to do next.

  Ahead, the stone receded in a series of shallow caves. Beyond that, the building from above stretched down the rocky face, clinging to the edge of the sheer cliff as if forming a long wooden shaft.

  She’d heard of this place. She’d studied it in school.

  The building on the edge of the cliff was a shot tower, used to make ammunition back before the Civil War. The building at the top was called a smelting house. Lead would be melted over a big fire, then dripped down the long shaft, and gravity would form it into round balls by the time it hit the cooling pool deep in the rock below.

  At the time, Grace had thought it would be fun to see this place. The whole thing sounded so weird, and the photos the teacher had taken were beautiful. Now Grace wished she had visited. Then she would know how to get out of here and find someone to help.

  She took the next series of steps. Holding Ethan tight with her injured arm, she clung to the rickety rail with the other. One step. Two steps. Ice slick under her shoes. Then mossy stone. Then a wood railroad tie that was even slicker.

  The going was slow, inching along, but she finally reached the bottom of the tower. Here a wooden walkway spanned twenty feet, kind of like a deck, before the path continued down the steep bluff on the other side. She walked up two creaking steps. In the center of the walkway, a doorway opened in the base of the wooden shaft that stretched down from the building above.

  Grace ducked inside the doorway and found a small vestibule. She set Ethan down in the corner and rubbed her sore arm.

  In the back of the tiny space, a thick steel screen covered an entrance into the tower shaft itself. Grace peered inside. If she looked up, she could see the wooden shaft stretching up the side of the cliff to the smelting house. If she peered down, the roughly-hewn shaft burrowed down through rock and into perfect darkness.

  “Gra-cie.” His singsong voice echoed off rock.

  Grace covered her mouth, choking back her involuntary gasp. She joined Ethan tucked into the corner, shielding him with her body, willing them both to be invisible.

  “Gace,” the little boy whispered.

  Grace held a finger to her lips.

  “Shh,” Ethan said.

  “Gra-cie. There’s no use hiding. I can hear you whispering. I know right where you are.”

  And now he would find them.

  And now he would catch them.

  Grace had obviously taken the wrong trail. She’d gone the wrong way. If she’d chosen the right direction in the first place, the steep path up to the smelting house, maybe they would have had a chance to reach the highway. If only she’d kn
own which way to run…

  Wait.

  Grace held her breath, waiting for Hess to speak again.

  “Gra-cie. You’re trapped. You know that, right?”

  Hess’s voice didn’t sound like it was coming from outside the nook where she and Ethan hid. It sounded as if it was coming from above. Up in the smelting house.

  She stepped to the shaft and peered up. No sign of Hess. Just a faint glow of light. If she was right and he was up there, she might have a chance.

  Hess would have to come down the path to get them. The path she’d just walked. And if she could hide in one of the shallow caves, surprise him, maybe she could hurt him enough that she and Ethan could get past him and reach the highway.

  But she had to be ready.

  “Ethan?” She knelt down and faced the little boy. “I need you to be very quiet. I want to play hide and seek.”

  The toddler stared at her blankly, obviously too young to have heard of the game.

  “I want to show you something, okay?”

  “Ice cream?” he squeaked. Either he’d picked up on her fear or the sound of Hess’s voice had him hovering close to tears.

  “After I show you. Okay?” Grace took his hand and guided him onto the wooden walkway. She peered over the railing. The forest sloped sharply below until it reached the edge of the cliff. But right beneath the walkway, the ground was only a couple feet down.

  Picking up the toddler, Grace climbed through the rail and stepped down to the sloping earth. Right in front of her, there was a gap under the walkway. A crawl space large enough for a little boy.

  “We’re going to hide, okay? Just for a little while. It’s a game.” She guided Ethan into the space. “Now you have to stay here, and be very, very quiet. And when I get back, we’ll find that ice cream. Can you do that?”

  He nodded, but his face was squaring off the way it did when he was about to cry.

  “It’s okay, Ethan.”

  He didn’t look like he believed her.

  “Be very quiet.” She brought her finger to her lips again. “Shh.”