by B. J Daniels
The bridge glittered dully in the dying light. Dust settled deep and dark along the river’s edge. Tree limbs drooped into the rushing water, pockets of darkness pooled beneath them as the daylight slipped away.
She brought the van to a stop just before the bridge, just as she’d been instructed, turned off the engine and climbed out. Across the expanse of steel and rotting timbers, she could see another vehicle parked on the other side. The car door opened. A man stepped out. He held a bundle in his arms.
She felt her heart leap. It took everything in her not to run across the bridge to him and rip her child from his arms. She listened intently for the sound of her baby, cooing, even crying. Any indication that Susannah was finally within reach.
But she heard nothing over the sound of the water surging under the bridge as she ducked under the barricade and started across. On the other side, the man did the same. They were to meet in the middle and make the exchange. She gripped the ledger in her hand and walked toward him.
As she grew closer, she could make out his features. She wasn’t surprised that she didn’t recognize him. Kincaid would use someone she didn’t know. So would Gage. Not that it mattered now who’d kidnapped Susannah. Just as long as Amanda got her baby back, safe and sound.
But as she walked across the old bridge, the boards making a hollow sound beneath her soles, something cold and hard settled in her stomach, a fear she couldn’t shake off. What if she was wrong? What if the person who had her baby wasn’t going to give Susannah up easily?
She didn’t dare look around for Jesse. She didn’t dare stop walking. She could feel the gun digging into her back but she knew she wouldn’t draw it, wouldn’t fire it. Even though she’d learned to shoot, she’d never used a weapon against anything more than a paper outline of a man.
She was almost to the man when he stopped.
“Where is the ledger?” he called out to her.
She held it up for him to see.
“Lay it down and back up,” he ordered. “I’ll take it and leave the baby.”
“No,” she said, surprising him and herself.
“We make the trade, eye to eye.”
He shook his head. “No. You want the baby? Then you do it my way.”
She took a breath. Susannah was so close, so close. She swallowed. What choice did she have but to trust him? She’d come this far. “All right.” Hands shaking, she put the ledger down on the wooden boards that spanned across the bridge supports. Through a crack, she could see the river raging far below her. She felt dizzy and sick to her stomach with fear.
Slowly she backed up, one step at a time. The man waited until she had retreated a good distance before he advanced. She felt her heart thundering in her chest, her pulse so loud she couldn’t hear the river anymore.
He approached the ledger lying on the boards, appearing wary. Carefully, he put the baby down, scooped up the ledger, took a quick look inside, then turned his back and began to walk quickly back to his car.
She could wait no longer. She took off at a run, tears blinding her, a cry in her throat as she rushed to her baby daughter.
* * *
JESSE SLOWLY approached the vehicle on the far side of the river. He could see a man hunched down in the seat, hiding, waiting. For what? He had watched the first man cross the bridge to meet Amanda, carrying the baby in his arms, and waited, not about to do anything until Amanda had Susannah and the two were safe.
Once the man put down the baby and moved away, Jesse knew he had only a few seconds to get to the second man in the vehicle before the first man started back. If he could disable the man in the car, it would even the odds and keep the men from possibly reneging on the trade.
It bothered Jesse that the first man had taken no precaution to keep from being recognized in a police line-up. Were they so sure that Amanda would never press charges? Or were they planning never to give her the chance?
The moment the man surrendered the baby, Jesse moved quickly up the right side of the car. His hand had just closed over the door handle when he heard Amanda scream, a blood-chilling scream that set his heart pumping.
The man in the car sat up with a jerk and threw open his door. Jesse barely got out of the way before the man leapt from the car. Jesse recognized him instantly. Gage Ferraro.
Gage didn’t even see Jesse behind him. All of his attention was on the bridge. Before Jesse could react, Gage took off running toward the first man—and Amanda.
With a curse, Jesse went after him, his heart in his throat. Was something wrong with the baby? Oh, dear God, don’t let Susannah be dead.
Gage didn’t seem to hear Jesse behind him over the rush of the water. Amanda had dropped to her knees in the middle of the bridge. The baby seemed to roll out of her arms. Her scream still echoed off the steel girders.
The first man was running hard back toward Gage and the car, the ledger in his hand. Jesse watched in horror as Amanda straightened and reached behind her.
The shot reverberated across the river. The man with the ledger jerked, stumbled and fell face first onto the bridge.
For a moment, Jesse thought she’d shoot Gage as well, but she lowered the gun as he ran toward her as if she thought he was running to her. If she did, she was dead wrong.
Gage rushed to the downed man, grabbed the ledger from the dead man’s hand and turned around, already moving back toward Jesse before he saw him.
The look on Gage’s face gave him away as much as his actions. Jesse saw Gage go for his gun. Jesse hadn’t even realized it, but he already had his weapon in his hand. Amanda was still on her knees, out of his line of fire. He raised his gun, almost in slow motion and squeezed off a shot, then another. He could hear Amanda scream, “No!” A shot whizzed by Jesse’s left ear and pinged off the steel girders.
Gage lost his grip on his gun as he fell. The weapon hit the worn boards of the bridge before Gage did and skittered off, dropping over the side into the river.
Gage was trying to get up as Jesse ran to him.
“Don’t kill him!” Amanda was screaming. She’d gotten to her feet and had run toward them. She still had the gun in her hand and what at first looked like a baby dangling from the other. But as she drew closer, Jesse saw that it was a doll. Not Susannah, but a doll.
Jesse jerked Gage up to a sitting position. Gage had taken a bullet in his side; he’d survive. The second shot had grazed his arm. “Where is Susannah?” Jesse demanded.
Gage shook his head. “I know my rights,” he said recognizing Jesse for the cop who’d sent him up on the drug charge a few years ago. “I don’t have to tell you anything.”
“I’m not a cop,” Amanda said behind Jesse. The quiet calm in her voice made him turn. She stood over Gage, the gun in her hand, the barrel pointed at Gage’s chest. “Where is my daughter?”
“Our daughter,” he growled.
The shot was deafening and too close for comfort. Jesse jumped back.
“The next one will be in you,” Amanda said quietly.
Gage swore. “You can’t let her do this,” he cried to Jesse. “You’re a cop. Tell her, I have my rights.”
Amanda got off a second shot before Jesse could get to her. Gage let out a howl and grabbed for his knee. Blood spurted through the neat round hole in his pants.
“Where is my daughter?” she asked again, a deadly calm in her voice. Her eyes were glazed over. She appeared to be in shock.
“All right,” Gage groaned.
Jesse reached for Amanda’s gun but stopped as Gage began to talk.
“I don’t know anything about Susannah,” Gage said. “I just had to have the ledger.” He was crying now, holding his knee. “It was the cops. They got me on drug trafficking. We’re talking the Big House. I had to do what they told me to.”
“You made a deal, your neck for Crowe’s and your father’s?” Jesse asked in disbelief. “For…what?”
“A lighter sentence,” Gage said. “Maybe even minimum security.”
/> “You never had Susannah?” Amanda whispered.
“When I heard through my sources in the Organization that Susannah had been kidnapped, I didn’t know of any other way to get you to deliver something big on your father,” Gage said between sobs. “I knew you’d do it for Susannah. So I pretended I’d been contacted by the kidnapper and that the ledger was the ransom.”
“After everything else you did to me?” Amanda asked.
Jesse had forgotten about the gun in Amanda’s hand until she raised it and aimed point-blank at Gage’s chest.
“No, Amanda!” Jesse shouted as he grabbed for her. As much as he despised Gage Ferraro for what he’d done, Jesse was still a cop. He still believed in playing by the rules. No matter how hard they were to abide by at times like this.
But as he grabbed for Amanda’s gun, he made a fatal error. He diverted his attention from Gage for just a split second. Gage kicked his feet out from under him, knocking the gun from his hands and sending Amanda’s weapon into the river.
Jesse came down hard, then Gage was on him, wrestling for Jesse’s dropped weapon, and at the same time trying desperately to hang on to the ledger.
Jesse got a grip on the gun as they rolled dangerously close to the edge of the bridge where no railing would prevent them from dropping to the raging river below. Jesse’s head and shoulders hung over the edge of the rotted timbers. Gage banged Jesse’s hand with the weapon in it on one of the bridge’s steel guy wires and tried to force him over the edge.
With everything going against him, Jesse felt the gun slip from his grasp and knew he’d be dropping to the river next. He could see Amanda out of the corner of his eye. She’d run down the bridge a few yards and picked up what appeared to be a piece of pipe. She was running back toward them, but Jesse knew she wasn’t going to make it in time. He felt the rotten edge of the timber give a little more under him.
He could grab for a guy wire as he fell—or the ledger. He grabbed for the ledger, knocking it loose from Gage’s grasp. The ledger skidded across the wood along the edge of the bridge, headed for the river.
Gage let out a howl and dove for it, coming down hard on the rotted timbers. As Jesse grabbed the guy wires and pulled himself back onto the bridge, he heard the timber give way next to him and saw Gage fall.
Jesse scrambled to his feet and rushed over to where Gage had dropped over the edge. Gage had managed to grab hold of one of the girders with his free hand as he went over. He now dangled by one arm, his prize, the ledger, in the other hand.
“Let go of the ledger,” Jesse called to him as he laid on his belly and reached down to take Gage’s hand. He could see that Gage’s fingers were slipping on the rusted metal. “Drop the ledger and give me your hand!”
Gage’s pupils were huge. He glanced down at the roaring river far below him, then up at Jesse. With great reluctance, he released the ledger. It fluttered down like a dried leaf to the water below.
Gage started to lift his free hand toward Jesse’s but it was too late. His hold on the metal gave. He fell, his scream finally drowned out as he disappeared like the ledger into the turbulent water.
Jesse let out a curse. As he got to his feet, he turned to look at Amanda. She stood staring over the edge after Gage, the piece of pipe in her hand, a look of shock still on her face.
“He never had Susannah,” she said, her voice a whisper. “He never even knew where she was.”
Jesse pulled her into his arms and hugged her tightly. “It’s all right. We’ll find her.” But suddenly he felt numb with fear: why hadn’t the real kidnapper demanded a ransom?
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Jesse didn’t know how long he stood on the bridge holding her. For a long time, she felt like a granite statue in his arms. Then she began to soften and tremble, then shake. The sobs rose as if coming from someplace deep inside her. He wrapped her in his arms and waited for the storm to pass, not knowing what else to do.
When she stopped crying, she quickly wiped her eyes and stepped from his arms. He saw the determination and strength come back into her.
“Amanda, something is wrong with all this,” he said, when he was sure she was ready to hear it. “Why hasn’t there been a request for a ransom?”
She stared at him in confusion, then shook her head. “I thought there had been. But if Gage was telling the truth…”
Jesse nodded. “Then there never was a ransom demand.” Did that mean that whoever had taken Susannah didn’t want anything from the Crowes? Suddenly he felt the hair on the back of his neck stand straight up. A chill skittered across his skin. He shivered as if he’d stepped on a grave. Maybe he had.
“Amanda, remember what Molly said about Roxie’s baby? About it being God’s will, conceived in sin, the son of evil.”
She nodded.
“Jesse, what are you saying?”
“Molly said Frank found out who the father was by tracking down the jeweler who made the hearts.
J.B. had the hearts made. Wasn’t that what you told me?”
“You think Frank thought J.B. was the father of Roxie’s baby?”
He nodded. “Amanda, the man who grabbed your baby in the department store, could he have been Frank Pickett?”
She could only stare at him.
“It’s a long shot,” he told her as he quickly ushered her from the bridge toward the van. “If there was no ransom, no demand for money or favors or evidence, then why kidnap your daughter? Unless it was revenge. I know I’m probably crazy, but I think we’d better go talk to Molly Pickett again. Maybe we’ll get lucky and her husband Frank will be home from fishing.”
* * *
IT WAS DARK by the time they reached Molly Pickett’s apartment. This time a half dozen men loitered on the front steps, but Jesse didn’t offer them money as he shoved his way past, drawing Amanda in his wake.
Jesse laid on the buzzer, but no one answered. He tried the door. To his surprise and uneasiness, it wasn’t locked. “Molly?” he called as he pushed the door open and stepped inside.
Only one light glowed in the living room, a small desk lamp next to the phone. Otherwise, the room was pitch-black. He snapped on the overhead living room light. “Molly?”
No sound. Moving slowly, he searched the small two-bedroom apartment. It was empty. Worse, it appeared Molly had left in a hurry. The crust for the pie she’d been making was still curled around the rolling pin where it had been earlier. The apples, all neatly sliced in the bowl, had turned dark gray.
He glanced at Amanda. She motioned to the desk lamp. In the circle of gold light, the phone book lay open, the phone next to it.
Amanda moved to the desk. Jesse followed her. The yellow pages were open to the F’s. Firewood. Fireworks. First Aid Supplies. Fish and Seafood. Fishing Consultants. Fishing—Resorts. Fishing—Tackle and Supplies.
“Wait a minute,” Jesse said, remembering the photo of Roxie and her father in front of a fishing lodge. He moved to the wall of photographs. Behind him, he heard Amanda pick up the phone, then the sound of the line being redialed. “I’m going to try the redial button,” Amanda said. “Maybe Molly tried to call him after we left.”
He found what he was looking for. The wooden sign over the cabin door with the words carved in it, Woodland Lake Resort. Behind him he heard the distant voice on the speaker phone say, “Good evening, Woodland Lake Resort.”
“Woodland Lake,” Jesse said with a curse as Amanda hung up the phone. “Red River is between here and the lake.”
“Oh, my God, Jesse.”
He nodded, that cold chill turning to ice as it moved like a glacier up his spine. “Frank Pickett. Molly said he was there at the birth. He must have been the one who left me beside the road.”
“No wonder Molly was upset,” Amanda gasped. “She really believed you were dead.”
“Until I showed her the heart pendant.”
“Oh, God. Jesse, she must have gone up to the lake when he didn’t come home tonight. She thinks he has Susan
nah!”
“So do I.”
They scrambled out of the building and down the steps to the van. Fortunately, all four tires were still attached as they leapt in. Jesse started the engine and popped the clutch, praying they could reach Woodland Lake in time, praying this wasn’t just some wild-goose chase.
* * *
WOODLAND LAKE RESORT sat at the edge of the lake, a large old log lodge with boat docks, rooms and a restaurant. Amanda stayed in the van while Jesse ran in to ask how to get to Frank Pickett’s cabin. She could only assume either Frank didn’t have a phone at the cabin or he hadn’t been answering it when Molly had called, so she’d called the resort looking for him.
Amanda sat perfectly still, trying to remain calm. She’d had such high hopes earlier on the bridge, now it was hard to hope at all. She was still shaken by finding the plastic doll wrapped in the baby blanket. How could Gage have done that to her?
She pushed him out of her mind and thought of Frank Pickett. She could understand greed. She’d grown up around it. But Frank hadn’t asked for money.
She also had a good understanding of revenge. If Frank Pickett believed that J. B. Crowe had fathered his daughter’s baby, he might blame J.B. for Roxie taking her life. An eye for an eye. A child for a child. After all, he’d left Jesse beside a dirt road to die.
But why not take her, J.B.’s child, if he wanted an eye for an eye? She felt a chill, remembering what Consuela had said about history repeating itself. Someone had tried to kidnap her when she was a child but had failed. Oh, my God, could it have been Frank Pickett?
If that were true then why had he waited so long? Or had something happened to remind him? She thought of recent articles in the paper about her father. The announcement that he’d been chosen for that stupid humanitarian award had come out in the paper the day before Susannah’s kidnapping.
