Ultimate Fear (Book 2 Ultimate CORE) (CORE Series)

by Kristine Mason

  He looked down into the alley between their building and the neighboring one—nothing but parked cars. He moved away, then went into the closet and pulled out the safe. Paranoid, he left the room and rushed into the empty spare bedroom. When he reached the window in there, he looked out and down. More parked cars and—

  His stomach dropped. He leaned against the glass and looked to the left, where a police cruiser made a turn and slowed. He looked to the right and saw two more cruisers do the same.

  “Too late,” he whispered against the glass. After nearly thirteen years of running from one state to the next, living under the radar, covering their tracks, it was all coming to a swift end. Every child they’d taken and returned flashed in his mind, along with Missy Schneider and the blood that had stained Dimples’s hands.

  They would go to prison. He shoved off the glass and hurried to the bedroom where he’d left the safe, then looked out that window again. The alley was still lined with parked cars, only now there were police cruisers there, too, blocking both exits. His legs weak with terror, he dropped to a knee and rubbed his forehead. If they’d left last night—

  Didn’t matter. They hadn’t left and now they faced a lifetime in prison. The dog breeder’s dead body filled his head again. Maybe worse.

  Dimples would never survive. Her sweet nature, her innocence…the inmates would eat her up alive.

  He’d spent the majority of his life loving and caring for her. He’d promised her mama he would always keep her safe and, up until this moment, he had. All last night he kept trying to figure out what he was going to do with Dimples once they settled into a new city. Now he had only two options.

  He looked over his shoulder to the safe on the floor. Option one would kill Dimples—prison would destroy her. Once those female inmates learned what she had done, jailhouse justice would prevail. She would have no friends on the inside. She would be alone and without him. She might have her God, but He wasn’t going to be able to save her.

  He could, though.

  He crawled to the safe, quickly punched in the code, then opened it. His hands shook as he moved the stacks of cash and pulled out the .22. He stared at the gun, the only thing connecting him to his bastard of a father.

  Phlegm coated his throat and his vision blurred with tears. With his free hand, he wiped his eyes and nose, then dragged in a shaky breath. He loved Dimples, but hated the woman she’d become. He hated himself even more for allowing it to happen. He’d thought he could fix her, help her, but by giving her those boys, he’d only done more damage. He’d been fueling her obsession for years and had enabled her to destroy herself.

  She couldn’t go to prison and he couldn’t imagine living the rest of his days without her. Holding the gun in his right hand, he stood. When he reached the door, he curled his fingers around the .22, pressed his head against the wall and wept. For the families and lives they’d devastated, for the bad choices he’d made, for the lost future. For the bright, hopeful girl his wife had once been, and the disturbed, mentally unbalanced woman she’d become.

  For what he was about to do.

  He shoved off the wall and used his shirt to dry his face. Squaring his shoulders, he left the room, then stopped just short of the living room. Dimples, oblivious to the police surrounding their building, stood in front of the TV, which aired their pictures again. A stream of morning sunlight filtered into the room and surrounded his wife. With the way the rays kissed her, and how her curly, blond hair haloed her head, she looked like an angel. At one time she was. She was his gift from God. She’d saved him from his father, and had given him love when he’d only known hatred. And at the moment, an awareness he’d never experienced settled on his soul and gave him strength.

  Keeping his steps light, he approached her from behind. When he reached her, he stared at the back of her head. “Dimples,” he whispered.

  “We’re all over the news,” she said, still staring at the TV. “I’ve been praying for guidance, and I think we should head south. Not too far, maybe West Virginia or—”

  “Heather.” He wrapped his left arm around her shoulder. She stiffened, but he held her tight. “We’ll find a new home together,” he said, and kissed the top of her head. Tears bathed his face as she relaxed in his arms. “I love you. As long as we’re together, it’ll always be home.”

  He raised his right hand and aimed the gun at her head. His finger curled around the trigger.

  “I love you, too, Wayne,” she said, and moved her head, just as he pressed the trigger.

  She slumped against his chest. A sob tore through him as he clutched her tight and fell to his knees. “I’m so sorry,” he cried, and put the barrel of the .22 to his temple.

  *

  Jessica jumped when the second gunshot fired. Fueled by outrage, she kept her weapon raised and raced after the lead detective, Jim, taking two steps at a time. Dante was by her side. She glanced at him and caught the fury lining his face. Like her, he wanted justice. Suicide, death—that was too damned easy for these people.

  They reached the sixth floor. Jim used the key the building owner had given him, then opened the apartment door. Gun held outstretched, he rushed inside. The second detective investigating the case, along with several uniformed officers, entered the apartment. She and Dante followed behind, then stopped when they reached the living room.

  “Clear,” one officer shouted, as he left one of the rooms off the back of the apartment.

  “This one, too,” another said, joining him in the short hall.

  She looked away from the two men, then down at the bodies on the floor. The male was slumped over the female, a puddle of blood beneath his head.

  Jim checked for a pulse, then shook his head. “Get Forensics in here. Coroner, too.”

  “Check the woman,” she said.

  “Jess,” Jim, who she’d known since her academy days, responded. “They knew they were busted and fell back on a suicide pact.”

  “They saved a shit-ton of tax dollars,” an officer said.

  She looked to the TV, then back to the bodies. Although there were some dissimilarities, the way they were positioned eerily resembled the Palmers’ murder-suicide at their son’s grave. “Check her anyway,” she demanded. “She could still be alive.”

  Jim shook his head, but reached down for the woman’s arm. “Gunshot to the head. What’s the point? So doctors can spend hours trying to save her, only to have her locked away for life? She’s— Oh, my God. I’ve got a pulse,” he said. “Call in EMS.”

  Sheer satisfaction rushed through her veins.

  On the lead’s command, two officers moved Wayne Cooke’s body off the woman they’d yet to identify. Wayne’s blood, the woman’s blood, she wasn’t sure which, coated the woman’s upper back and blond hair.

  “Looks like the bullet grazed her head and knocked her unconscious,” Dante said, walking around the bodies. He pointed to the wall near the living room window, where a small hole cracked the plaster. He peered at the hole. “There’s a bullet lodged here.”

  She glanced to the woman. “Good. She’ll survive.”

  “Hopefully to get the death penalty,” Dante said.

  “Illinois doesn’t have the death penalty,” an officer countered. “Neither does Iowa.”

  “If she’s tried in a Federal court, the death penalty is a definite possibility,” she said, stepping aside and letting EMS work their magic. She couldn’t wait to sit through the woman’s trial and listen to the guilty verdict and sentencing. She couldn’t wait for the day Missy Schneider, Jane Doe, and those four boys and their families, received justice.

  *

  Later that evening, Jessica approached Heather Marie Cooke’s hospital room, armed with information. Fortunately their Jane Doe had awoken this morning while they were at the Cookes’ apartment. They not only knew the girl’s name, but thanks to the forensics lab CORE uses, they confirmed through DNA that the baby found outside of MetroHealth Medical Center belonged to Chl
oe Young.

  Although Chloe had been found out of her jurisdiction, because of her and Dante’s investigation on the four kidnappings and subsequent murder of Missy Schneider, Jim Melski and his counterpart had allowed Jessica to speak with Chloe and handle Heather’s initial interview. She’d spoken with Chloe a couple of hours ago, and had soaked up every gory detail the young girl could remember.

  While still angry with Dante, she wished he could have taken part in her conversation with Chloe and the interview with Heather. Despite her disappointment and resentment toward him, her conversation with Chloe would be forever seared onto her brain, and she could have used a strong shoulder to lean against. Unfortunately, he’d been called away while they were still at the Cookes’ apartment, and he’d had to return to CORE.

  Jessica exhaled a deep breath, nodded to the officer outside the hospital room, then opened the door. Heather Marie Cooke lay on the bed, an IV hooked to her arm, a bandage around her head, and handcuffs chaining her to the metal bedrail. After going through the purse they’d found on the kitchen counter of the Cookes’ apartment, they’d learned Heather’s identity. The opened safe in the bedroom contained both Heather’s and Wayne’s birth certificates and social security cards, along with their marriage license and a photograph of a newborn baby. Initially, she’d been alarmed and had worried that the Cookes had abducted more children than the four they knew about. But after an extensive background check, they’d discovered that nearly thirteen years ago, Heather had given birth to a stillborn baby. During childbirth, complications had caused her to flatline. She’d been resuscitated, but had been in a coma for nearly a week. The photograph they’d found in the safe was, they assumed, the child Wayne and Heather had lost.

  The couple had lost a child, then had proceeded to take what had never belonged to them. Why? Why put other families through the same trauma they’d experienced?

  She stared at the woman, who looked back at her with big blue eyes that held no guilt or shame, but sadness and fear.

  “Are you a doctor?” Heather asked.

  Jessica showed her badge. “Detective Jessica Donavan Russo, Chicago PD.” She put her badge away and approached the bed.

  “No one will tell me what’s happened to Wayne,” Heather said. “Can you?”

  Jessica placed the small recording device she carried in her satchel on the nightstand next to Heather’s bed. “You’ve been read your rights,” she said, after turning on the device.

  Heather nodded and her eyes filled with tears. “I’m going to jail, aren’t I?”

  “Prison. There’s a difference.”

  She blinked. “Oh?”

  “Yep. The charges that are being lodged against you include kidnapping, child endangerment, child abandonment, murder and attempted murder.”

  “Child endangerment? I never harmed any of my sons.” Her eyes narrowed and her mouth drew into a grim line. “I heard on the news they’re alive.”

  She hadn’t known? Which meant that Heather had thought her husband had killed the boys. While Jessica wanted to dive in and question her about that, she also couldn’t shake that Heather hadn’t denied the other allegations.

  “So you admit that you killed Missy Schneider, and that you attempted to murder Chloe Young?”

  “God took Missy. He was supposed to take Chloe, too.”

  “And the boys you and your husband kidnapped? Was God supposed to take them, too?” Fucking fantastic. The woman was going to tell her God made her do it. Heather could try to make it appear as if she were insane or mentally incapacitated during the kidnappings, murder and attempted murder all she wanted. She’d basically admitted culpability for the crimes she’d been charged with, and she doubted a defense attorney could prove—without a doubt—that Heather was insane. With no history of mental illness and the evidence they had against her, it would be a bullshit plea.

  “Yes. In God’s kingdom, there is no suffering. We couldn’t keep the boys anymore, and I certainly couldn’t trust that anyone else could give them the love and care Wayne and I gave them.”

  “If you loved them so much, why send them to God in the first place? I guess what I’m having a hard time understanding is why get rid of one boy, only to take another? You said you loved them and never hurt them, so how could you give them up?”

  “Are you a mother?”

  She swallowed and nodded. “Yes. I have a daughter.”

  “How old?”

  “Seven.”

  “Then you know what kids get like after a certain age. They become too independent and mouthy. It hurts when you realize they suddenly don’t need their mama anymore.”

  While she had no personal experience with the toddler years, she had Alex and her cousin’s boys, and had lived vicariously through them. “You traded each boy in for a new baby when they hit a certain age?”

  “Now you make it sound wrong,” Heather said with a frown. “I like to think we saved those boys. Look into their parents’ background and you’ll see. Their mamas and daddies were no good and selfish. They shouldn’t even be allowed to have children.”

  This was where Heather was dead wrong. She and Dante had read the case files from each kidnapping. Every one of the boys’ families had been thoroughly investigated when their babies had been initially abducted. There hadn’t been one red flag, or sign of abuse or neglect found. “That’s not what we discovered.”

  “Well then, you didn’t look very hard.”

  “We certainly did. We also looked into Missy Schneider’s background, too. Did you think she was unfit to be a mother?”

  “Absolutely. Her husband left her, she was broke and about to give birth. I was so worried about her baby.”

  “Why’s that?”

  “Her only source of income was the dog breeding business. I figured she’d likely spend what little money she had on taking care of those dogs, rather than on her baby.”

  “You figured wrong.” Jessica moved a chair closer to the bed, then set her bag on the floor and sat. “Missy also worked from home as a web designer, and earned close to one hundred and twenty thousand a year. The dog breeding—that was a side business. Three years ago she paid off her house with her father’s inheritance money. When she was murdered, she had no debt.” She leaned forward. “So, I guess you were wrong about Missy, huh?”

  “I might’ve been wrong about her finances, but God led me to her for a reason. Trust me, she’s better off dead.”

  Jessica opened her satchel, then pulled the plastic bag containing the small picture of Heather and Wayne’s stillborn son. “Is this why you think she’s better off dead?” she asked, and held the bag in front of Heather.

  A tear slid down Heather’s cheek. “Yes. No mother should have to suffer losing a child.”

  “And yet you took four babies from their mothers, attempted to take another from Missy, then succeeded with Chloe. If you know what it’s like to suffer losing a child, why would you put another mother through the same pain?”

  “I told you. Those mothers didn’t deserve their babies. I might’ve been wrong about Missy, but God wasn’t and had His reasons for leading me to her. As for Chloe, the girl is a drug-addicted whore. What she did to her body and my son is shameful. If he wasn’t so sick, I would have never let Wayne get rid of him. We’d be a family right now.”

  “Chloe’s child wasn’t your son. Ever. Face it, Heather. You wanted a baby. Since you couldn’t have one of your own, you found a way to get what you wanted.”

  A sob racked the woman’s body. “He was my son.” Heather fisted her hand and tugged on the cuffs. Her face reddened as she glared at her. “I won’t answer any more of your questions until you tell me what’s happened to Wayne. He’ll tell you that I was a good mother. He’ll—”

  “What do you think happened?”

  Her frown deepened. Panting, she rested her bandaged head against the pillow. “The doctor said I was lucky the bullet grazed my head. Your police bullet. Did you people shoot Wayne,
too?”

  “The doctor said that you were shot by a police officer?”

  “Not exactly, but I—”

  “The bullet came from a .22 that your husband owned. We found it clutched in his hand. After he shot you, he turned it on himself.”

  “What?” she gasped. Her chin quivered and her eyes widened with confusion. “He shot me?”

  “You two didn’t make a suicide pact?”

  “Suicide is a sin against God,” she said with a catch of her breath. “He is the creator of life. Only He can give it and take it away.”

  “You took Missy Schneider’s life,” she countered.

  “I told you. God led me to her,” she cried. “Don’t you see? Don’t you believe?”

  “I believe you’ve been using God as an excuse to take what you wanted.” She leaned back in the chair. “I have a hard time believing God suggested you buy a dissecting kit and use it to give Missy a C-section, or to wear latex gloves while you murdered her.”

  “God led me to her,” she repeated. “He also gave me a brain and I put it to use.”

  “Then you admit to planning Missy’s murder. How about the attempt you made on Chloe? You used the brain God gave you to come up with an ingenious way to restrain her. A safety harness was a great idea.”

  “It was a good idea. Humane, too.” She used her shoulder to dry her cheek. “Chloe needed to be comfortable and to get to the pail to do her business.”

  “Humane,” she echoed quietly, anger simmering low in her belly. “There was nothing you did for Chloe that even came close to humane. You kept her hands cuffed behind her back while she gave birth on a mattress full of urine and feces. Then you turned off the fans and lanterns, and left with her baby. Alone and in the dark, that nineteen-year-old girl delivered the placenta, then was forced to lay in it. When she was found, it was estimated that the temperature in that storage unit had reached close to one hundred and twenty degrees. And you think that’s humane?”