Trailing a Killer

by Carol J. Post

  Instead, he’d find it freeing.

  * * *

  Erin opened the sliding glass door, and Alcee shot into the backyard. As Erin and Cody followed, the dog danced in front of them, dark eyes darting between Erin’s face and her hands.

  Usually, a trip out back meant playtime, especially if it happened right after she arrived home from her shift.

  “Not tonight, girl.”

  She glanced at Cody. Beyond him, the sun sat perched against the treetops. “I’ve got the panels standing against the wall inside the shed.”

  Sunday and Monday there’d been little change in the storm’s projected path. Most models showed it traveling due east across the southern tip of the state.

  This morning that had started to change. By lunchtime, the huge mass of wind and rain was moving more northeast than east. Although another eastern turn was expected, no one agreed on when that would happen.

  She slid the key into the shed’s lock. Alcee still watched her, but her excitement had dwindled. Once this was over, Erin would give her some extra playtime.

  She led Cody inside. “I know we’re supposed to get just the northern edge of this, but I’d rather be safe than sorry.”

  He raised both hands. “You won’t get any argument from me. After my recent experiences, I’m in support of any precautions you want to take.”

  “Good.”

  This one made her uneasy. It was as if something ominous was waiting to pounce the instant they let down their guards. Maybe the images of the emergency personnel pulling Cody’s grandfather’s unconscious form from the rubble were still too fresh in her mind. Or maybe it was knowing she was responsible for Cody’s safety. Or maybe it was the combination of the storm and everything else that had been going on.

  Whatever the reason, she was uneasy enough to go to the trouble of reinstalling the shutters she’d removed after the last storm, even if it meant finishing in the dark via flashlight. Cody’s home was already secured. Joe, aka Bobby, had gone in with Cody’s key and lowered all of the shutters.

  Mimi and Opa were safe, too. LaBelle was forty-five minutes inland from Fort Myers, but they’d gone to stay with some friends in Altamonte Springs, well north of the storm’s projected path.

  Erin grasped three of the fourteen-inch-wide metal panels and headed for the open door.

  Cody followed her out with his own panels. “What about the hardware?”

  “The bolts stay in the lower track, and I leave the wing nuts screwed onto them. So this is it.”

  Soon they had a good stack of panels leaning against the front of the house. After removing the wing nuts, Cody picked up a panel and slid it into the H-track over the first window, then secured it onto the bolts at the bottom.

  He glanced at the western sky. All except the top edge of the sun had disappeared, and streaks of orange and pink stained the horizon. “I think we’re going to be finishing this project via flashlight.”

  “You’re right. But by daylight we’ll probably be getting outer bands. I’d rather work in the dark than the rain.” And she’d rather work with Cody than alone. Being alone had never bothered her. It beat spending her life tethered to someone who didn’t make her happy. There was a third option—finding love with Mr. Right in one of those relationships that ended in happily-ever-after.

  Except hers never did. So that left her with options one and two. Option one won, hands down.

  But Cody’s nearness over the past two weeks had her rethinking the appeal of being alone. There was something comfortable about having someone to cook and clean alongside her, someone to talk with and share the events of her day. Someone to hold her and chase away the remnants of a nightmare.

  Someone to...love? No, she wouldn’t go that far. She cared for him, always had. At one time she’d loved him. Things were different then. There’d been no need for protective barriers, because neither of them had had their ideals crushed and their souls bruised.

  Erin removed the rest of the nuts and then frowned as Cody picked up another panel. “Are you sure you don’t want me to lift those?”

  “Broken bones heal in six weeks. Since I just passed three, I’m halfway there. Besides, these aren’t that heavy. Not like using plywood.”

  Erin let him continue while she secured each panel with the wing nuts. “We had an interesting development in the McIntyre disappearance. Not sure if it means anything, but several of the guys that frequent Dixie said he showed up there alone the night before he disappeared and was trying to borrow money.”

  “Did anyone loan him the money?”

  “Not that we know of. They claimed they didn’t have the kind of money he was looking for. We’re not talking beer money. We’re talking several thousand dollars.”

  “Interesting.”

  Yeah, it was. They’d looked into his finances, and though he didn’t have large sums of money in the bank, there weren’t past-due loans or any debt, for that matter, other than his vehicle loan. And that was current. His girlfriend told investigators the same thing.

  Cody frowned. “Maybe he borrowed money from some bad dudes, and they’re calling in the loan. He might have disappeared on his own to keep from ending up in concrete boots at the bottom of Charlotte Harbor.”

  She nodded. Financial problems provided motive. Were the man’s problems serious enough to prompt him to take down the apartment building to speed up the purchase of his property? Just how desperate was Jordan McIntyre?

  As dusk gave way to darkness, they finished the front of the house, and Erin went in to retrieve a flashlight.

  “Come on, girl. Let’s go inside.” The dog wouldn’t run off. Even if she did, a simple command would bring her right back. But she and Cody had enough to do without the distraction of keeping up with Alcee.

  They’d just finished the side when her cell phone rang. She pulled it out of her pocket and checked the screen, intending to let it go to voice mail. Instead, she frowned at a familiar number. “I’ve got to take this. It’s my supervisor.”

  As she listened, Cody watched. She finished the call and pocketed the phone.

  “I have to go in. McIntyre’s girlfriend stopped by his place and surprised someone when she opened the front door. Her car’s lights hadn’t shut off yet. A guy ran out of the house, knocked her down and took off on foot. When he crossed through her headlight beams, she got a good look at him. Medium height and build, shoulder-length blond hair and a beard.”

  Cody’s eyebrows dipped toward his nose. “What does our guy want with McIntyre?”

  “I don’t know.” She handed him the wing nuts she held. “I’m sorry. I have to leave you.”

  “No problem. I’ll finish this.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “I’m positive. All we’ve got left is three windows in the back and what’s on the other side. When I’m working inside the fence, Alcee can keep me company.”

  “The minute you’re finished, get in the house and lock the doors.”

  He gave her a salute. “Yes, ma’am.”

  A few minutes later she was in her vehicle headed toward the station. As she turned onto Cleveland and left her neighborhood behind, her thoughts churned.

  How were McIntyre and the guy who’d attacked Cody linked? Had McIntyre learned something? If so, he would have shared it with the police. Unless he was using it to blackmail someone.

  McIntyre’s girlfriend had lots of reasons for concern. There were too many scary scenarios. Whether a killer thought McIntyre knew more than he did, or McIntyre had stumbled onto knowledge about Cody’s grandfather’s murder, his life was in danger. And if he was stupid enough to get involved with loan sharks or attempt blackmail, that compounded the danger a hundredfold.

  And now he’d disappeared.

  Whatever the threat, things weren’t likely to end well for Jordan McIntyre.

&
nbsp; * * *

  Cody lay in bed, eyes struggling to take in the minuscule amount of light that seeped into his room from Erin’s at the end of the hall. She was home. He’d heard her come in, then gone right back to sleep.

  Now he was wide-awake, an underlying tension flowing through his body. The moonlight that usually filtered in around the edges of the mini blinds wasn’t there. With the hurricane shutters in place, darkness swallowed the window against the far wall.

  Maybe Erin’s practice of sleeping with night-lights wasn’t a bad idea. Three was a little overkill, but one would’ve been nice. Because tonight something about the darkness disturbed him. It was making him feel...unsettled.

  A whine intruded on the silence, followed by the click of claws against the hardwood floor. Alcee padded past his room toward Erin’s, emitting another whine. What had the dog been doing in the living room, and what had her upset? Maybe his uneasiness didn’t stem from the darkness.

  Cody threw the covers aside and sprang to his feet, retrieving his phone with a quick sideways swipe. Whatever was going on, he needed to alert Erin.

  It wasn’t necessary. When he burst into her room, she was already sitting up. Alcee stood and put a paw in Erin’s lap as Erin swung her silk-clad legs over the side of the bed. “What’s going on?”

  He shook his head. “I don’t know. Alcee just came from the living room. I think she might have heard something.”

  Alcee turned from the bed and left the room, her repeated backward glances telling them to come with her. Erin snatched both her phone and her weapon from the nightstand and took off after the dog.

  As Cody followed them into the living room, the uneasiness that had plagued him when he’d awoken bore down on him. With hurricane shutters covering every window, they were cut off from the world.

  That could be good or bad. The killer couldn’t see them, even though Erin had turned on the hall light. But the shutters also kept them in the dark, ignorant of whatever threats lurked outside.

  They’d just reached the living room when the dog erupted into frenzied barking, her eyes focused on the locked front door.

  Erin raised her weapon. “Someone’s out there. Call 911.”

  The next moment, the crack of splintering wood punctuated the sharp barks. The metal head of a sledgehammer appeared through a jagged hole, then withdrew to strike again.

  Alcee went nuts, charging back and forth in front of the door. Though Erin shouted at her to stand down and move away, none of the commands seemed to register. This scenario probably hadn’t been a part of her training.

  Erin grabbed the dog’s collar with her free hand and pushed her in Cody’s direction. “Quick! Get into the hall, and take Alcee with you.”

  “Come, Alcee.” He moved away from the door, tugging the dog with him. “It’s okay, girl.”

  By the time he reached the hall, four more hammer blows had opened a two-by-two hole in the heavy wooden door. With the locks undisturbed, the alarm hadn’t been triggered yet.

  Cody punched the three numbers into his phone and waited for the dispatcher. The killer had found him. With a few more strikes, he’d be inside the house.

  Erin was ready. She stood next to him at the end of the hall, ready to shoot whoever came through the opening.

  When the dispatcher answered, Cody relayed the situation, his words tumbling over one another. The woman said she was dispatching police immediately.

  “Please hurry. He’s almost inside.”

  Cody clamped down on his lower lip. For the past several seconds everything had been quiet. They could escape through the back door, but running out blind didn’t seem like a good idea. Had the assailant heard his 911 call and given up? Or was he waiting somewhere outside?

  Cody had his answer right away. An object protruded through the opening, small and cylindrical. Like the barrel of a pistol or rifle. His heart leaped into his throat, and he jerked Alcee farther into the hall.

  But something was off. The barrel had looked like a hard plastic. Why bring a toy gun? He peered around the corner in time to see a liquid stream arch through the opening. Several followed it, the angle shifting with each one to encompass the entire room. Erin fired three shots, but no grunts or shrieks indicated that any of them had found their target.

  Within moments the stench of gasoline assaulted Cody’s nostrils. Panic spiraled through him. The assailant planned to burn them alive inside the house. But even with the windows and sliding glass door covered, there were two other ways out.

  He shouted one more command into the phone. “Send the fire department, too. He’s soaking the living room with gasoline.”

  Cody slid the phone into the pocket of his gym shorts and grabbed Erin by the arm. “Come on.” She’d want to stand her ground and protect her house. He understood. But it wasn’t worth their lives. “We can escape out the back.”

  She gave a sharp nod. “Come, Alcee.”

  They’d just reached the back door when fire crackled behind them. Cody spun. A knotted bundle of cloth lay in the middle of the living room floor, engulfed in flames. Another missile followed, landing three or four feet away. Mini walls of fire erupted, flaming paths following the trails of gas. Within seconds the fire was moving across the living room rug.

  He twisted the doorknob lock and threw the dead bolt while Erin grabbed the extinguisher from its holder two feet away. She pulled the pin and aimed a stream of foam at the base of the flames. The fire retreated as she swept left to right, then back again. Alcee stood at the door, her barking rapid and piercing. The alarm sounded, adding its shrill screech to the chaos.

  Before Erin could make her third sweep, the stream sputtered and went out. She shook the extinguisher, then pressed the discharge lever again, eyes wide and panic filled. “It’s empty.”

  “Don’t worry about it.” He pulled her toward the door. “We’ve got to get out of here.”

  He twisted the knob, but when he leaned into the door, it didn’t budge. He gave it a harder shove. It still held fast.

  When he looked back at Erin, the flames were moving forward with a vengeance, as if angry at her attempts to extinguish them. “The door’s stuck.”

  Erin’s eyes widened, and Alcee barked louder. They had to get out. Cody steeled himself for what he’d have to do. In spite of his broken ribs, he had a good seventy pounds on Erin.

  He leaned back, then slammed his left shoulder into the door. The impact jarred his whole body, sending a bolt of pain through his right side. The door moved a half inch.

  It wasn’t stuck. Someone had wedged something against it. He cast another glance over his shoulder. Behind Erin, most of the living room was engulfed in flames. They danced across the couch and licked at the curtains. A haze hung in the air, and smoke rolled toward them.

  He gave the door another try, with no better result than before. Perspiration soaked through his T-shirt, as much from fear and desperation as the wall of heat pressing into him. His nostrils burned, and his eyes watered. He inhaled, and his throat closed up midway through, inducing a coughing fit. After he recovered, he took several breaths through his damp T-shirt.

  When he looked at Erin, she was filtering the smoky air through the neckline of her silk pajama top. Her eyes reflected his own desperation.

  He attacked the door with renewed vigor, then shook his head. He couldn’t do it. The only thing he’d accomplished was giving his body a beating. He looked frantically around him. The front door wasn’t an option. Neither was the door to the mother-in-law suite. Reaching either one would involve a sprint through an inferno.

  Desperation pressed down on him. “Is there any other way out? A pet door, anything?”

  He knew the answer before he asked the question. He’d already looked the entire house over in preparation for the renovations. There was no other way out. Except...

  Hope tumbled through
him. “The attic.” He’d noticed the framed opening in the hallway. “Do you know if the gable ends are vented?”

  Her eyes widened, and a smile curved her lips. “Yes, they are.” She grabbed his hand and pulled him toward the living room. “If we can get to the gable over my bedroom, we can kick out the grate and drop to the ground.”

  The flames had almost reached the dining room. The heat was intense, and he struggled to hold his eyes open against the stinging black smoke. Would his idea even work? The roof wasn’t that steeply pitched. Erin was small enough to fit through the trusses, but he didn’t know about himself. Then there was the challenge of climbing a wooden fold-down ladder carrying a full-grown German shepherd. In his current condition, he wasn’t sure he could do it.

  Erin scurried along the edge of the living room, back pressed against the wall, and Cody followed. Alcee held back, whining, flames reflected in her dark eyes.

  “Come on, girl.” Erin clapped her hands. “You can do it.”

  While Erin coaxed the dog, Cody reached up to pull the hinged panel down. He’d just finished unfolding the ladder and planting its end against the hardwood floor when Alcee shot around him and bounded up the wooden steps.

  At his silent question, Erin smiled. “Ladders were part of her SAR training.”

  Erin made her way upward while a furry white face watched from above. She was barefoot. So was he. But moments taken to get dressed and retrieve shoes could cost them their lives.

  Finally, it was Cody’s turn. He released his shirt and held his breath. When he poked his head into the attic space, it was illuminated. A beam of light came from the back of Erin’s cell phone.

  He squatted on the step and reached below him. “I’m closing this back up. It’ll help keep smoke out and buy us some extra time.”

  The hinges creaked as he folded the two bottom sections of the ladder against one another. His ribs again protested the abuse. He ignored the pain. He’d have time to recover later.

  If they survived the night.

  The access door creaked shut, and he looked around. Trusses lined up ahead of him, braces at uniform angles, held in place by metal fasteners. It would be a tight fit, but he was pretty sure he could make it, if there wasn’t an air handler or anything obstructing his path.