Night Chill

by Jeff Gunhus

  FIFTY-NINE

  The trees rushed past in a blur of motion. Jack held on tightly as the Bronco bumped down the gravel trail leading back to the main road. The overalls from his muddy climb up through the cave lay in the back; the earthy smell of them permeated the cab. The climb out had been quick even though the tight spots were more challenging working against gravity. But he was a fast learner and the technical aspects of climbing through holes were the same going up or down. Besides, the way down had been a hesitant path to the unknown, while the journey up was spurred by the promise of fresh air and open space.

  And the fear that Huckley really did have his little girl.

  He tried to make himself believe it wasn’t true. Couldn’t be true. Huckley was in a coma at Midland hospital. Lauren and the kids had left that morning and were going straight to Baltimore. Even assuming that the ghostly apparition of Huckley was real — which, outside of the cave and back in the real world, Jack found harder to believe — there wasn’t even the opportunity for Sarah to be taken. Not unless the men stopped them on the open road out of town. But that seemed too audacious, even if these men were as intent on getting Sarah as Lonetree said they were. Then again, what wasn’t audacious about the events of the last two days? Was anything really out of the realm of possibility?

  Jack took stock of the situation. A cult was trying to abduct his daughter for some bizarre ritual involving human sacrifice. There was a secret underground chamber filled with skeletons, in the backwoods of Maryland. And now a psychopath in a coma was haunting him from his hospital bed and was able to take physical form?

  He wanted to laugh at it all, pass it off as a grand delusion worthy of university study. But the images of the cave were too clear in his mind to be laughed away. A chill passed through him as he pictured Huckley’s apparition in front of him. The complete helplessness he felt with his body immobilized.

  He absently rubbed his right wrist and hand, the one that had held the gun. The skin wasn’t broken but a deep bruise had already developed. Purple and red smudges covered his wrist and lower forearm.

  The irony was that Jack was thankful for the bruise. At least it was something he could see. Something he understood. Proof that this wasn’t all in his head but that it, whatever it was, did exist at least in some small, painful, bruised measure in the physical world. His world. But even as the bruise comforted, it confirmed his worse suspicions.

  However Huckley engineered his activities outside of the hospital room, he was getting better at it. This was the first time Huckley had the strength to take form and use force. But he hadn’t been able to sustain the force for long.

  Jack wondered how long had it taken to empty the chamber into Lonetree? Five or six seconds? Then the force gripping his wrist had disappeared, as if the energy required for the action drained Huckley, forcing him to retreat back to his own body. It was all theory, but it seemed likely. Jack was starting to get a better feel for his enemy. If it had been possible, Huckley would have stayed around to gloat over Lonetree’s corpse. Not only that, but Huckley had said ‘first him, then yourself.’ He was certain that Huckley had intended the last bullet for Jack. Whatever the reason, Huckley hadn’t been able to finish the job and was forced to leave as Jack discharged the gun at Lonetree.

  Jack smiled as he pictured Lonetree’s wide-eyed expression when he raised the gun and started firing. The ex-Navy Seal still had sharp reflexes but nothing was fast enough to dodge the blasts from such a short range. Lonetree had reached the same conclusion in the few hundredths of a second between the time Jack first raised the gun and the sound of the first shot exploded into the cave. Years of training hardwired into his nervous system made him drop and roll for cover even though he knew it was useless to avoid the gunshots. By the time he hit the floor, Jack had already fired three times with deadly accuracy. If there had been bullets in the gun, Lonetree would have been dead.

  Luckily for both of them, Lonetree was a liar and a cheat. The whole scene before they started down the cave, handing Jack the gun as a sign that he trusted him, was a scam. Blanks. The gun was loaded with blanks from the beginning. Lonetree had played him for a fool.

  Lonetree wasn’t apologetic for his deception. After the reverberations of the gun shots finally died down, he’d looked up at Jack standing over him, shrugged and said, “Didn’t think I’d trust you with bullets, did you?” And that was the end of the conversation about the gun.

  Jack looked over at the driver’s seat and wondered what else the man had lied to him about. He pushed the thought from his mind. The last few hours had been a nauseating ride of emotions and the last thing he needed was to wander through the minefields of his own paranoia. He needed to trust someone and Lonetree at least knew something about what was going on. An old saying about strange bedfellows tried to work its way through the clutter in his mind. Lonetree interrupted him.

  “You might get cell reception right about here. The main road is around that bend.”

  Jack took the phone from Lonetree and flipped it open. He watched the Sprint icon flashing, Searching for signal. Another fifty yards up the road and the message blinked off and a single bar appeared. He punched the speed dial number for Lauren’s cell.

  Busy.

  He knew the hospital had a back-up pager to reach Lauren in an emergency. He needed that number.

  He dialed Midland General and waited impatiently through four rings before the on duty nurse picked up.

  “This is Jack Tremont. I need Dr. Tremont’s pager—”

  “Mr. Tremont, they’ve been looking for you,” the nurse blurted out.

  Jack felt a wave of nausea. Something must have happened. Please tell me Lauren’s not there. Please tell me she’s not there. “Is Dr. Tremont in the building?”

  “Hold on. I’ll get her.”

  Jack’s stomach dropped with the words. Then the line went dead. For a second he thought she’d disconnected him by accident. Then a sharp beep signaled that he was on hold. The beep only sounded twice before Lauren was on the line.

  “Oh God, Jack. Where are you?”

  Jack tried to answer but his throat was suddenly too dry. The panic in her voice answered his question. They had his little girl. It wasn’t a lie. Only then did Jack realize how well his subconscious had created a parallel explanation for everything that had happened, a carefully constructed rationalization that would lead him and his family back to their simple, quiet lives. But it all balanced on this phone call, on hearing that Sarah and Becky were safe, that they were in Baltimore watching the dolphin show at the National Aquarium. That the whole thing was a nightmare, a sticky cobweb that he had walked through, messy and hard to get out of his hair, but nothing a hot shower and a change of clothes wouldn’t fix.

  “Jack! Are you there?”

  “Yes,” Jack shouted into the phone, as though the volume of his voice would somehow clear up the choppy cell connection. “Are the girls with you? Is Sarah safe?”

  Lauren said the words he expected, but still could never prepare himself to hear. “Sarah’s gone. Someone took her.” She broke down and started crying.

  Jack wanted to soothe her, tell her they would get her back, that nothing bad would happen. But he felt numb and couldn’t speak.

  Lauren’s tears stopped and she cleared her throat. “Where the hell are you? I’ve been trying to call you all day. And…” the tone of her voice changed, lowered as if she were guarding her words from someone nearby. Even over the bad connection the words came across edged with trembling accusation. “How did you already know about Sarah?”

  “Listen carefully. I know who took Sarah.”

  “Jesus. Who? Where is she?”

  “Huckley. Nate Huckley took her. I know this sounds crazy but I saw him and he told me what he was going to do.”

  There was dead air. He could hear her breathing so he knew he hadn’t lost the connection. Lonetree tapped his shoulder to attract his attention, but Jack ignored him. He shouted int
o the phone. “Did you hear me? It was Nate Huckley. And there are others involved. Janney’s one of them. You’re in danger. You’ve got to believe me.”

  “Oh Jack,” Lauren moaned.

  With those two words, the bottom fell out of his world. He had been in a free fall all day and now the safety net had just been yanked away. She didn’t believe him. “Listen I’ll be there in half an hour, OK? Half an hour.”

  More dead air. Then Lauren’s defeated voice, “Sheriff Janney wants to talk to you. I think you should do what he asks you.”

  “No. I’ll be there in—”

  “Hello Jack, this is Sheriff Janney. How are you?” He talked slowly, pleasantly, like a hostage negotiator asking the bad guy what kind of pizza he wanted while the SWAT team took their positions.

  “Janney, I know you’re in on this. If you hurt my little girl I swear to God I’ll kill you.”

  “Now, there’s no reason for threats here. Let’s just calm down now. Why don’t you tell me where you are? I can have one of my men escort you in. That way you won’t get slowed down, you know, get lost or something like that. This is, of course, assuming you are planning to come here.”

  Jack sensed the sheriff was playing to the people around him, including Lauren. Threatening to kill the man when he didn’t know who else was listening on the line probably wasn’t the best PR move. “Just don’t hurt her. I’ll do anything to get her back. Anything.”

  The sheriff paused for a beat. When he did reply he was still soft spoken, in control. “I’d like you to come in and talk. I have some questions for you. So does your wife.”

  Jack didn’t answer. There was nothing in Janney’s tone to suggest negotiation was possible. He wondered how much the sheriff knew about the last two days. Had Lauren told them about last night? About the baseball bat? Had they convinced her that he was on some hallucinogenic binge? Then it hit him. How had he been so stupid not to see it sooner? He knew there was something in Lauren’s voice that bothered him, and it was more than disbelief over Huckley.

  “Put Lauren on the line,” Jack said, barely managing to keep his voice steady. “Right now, Janney. Put her on the line.”

  “She’s not available. Tell me where you are, Jack. If you didn’t do anything, then you have nothing to worry about, right?”

  “You son of a bitch. You’re trying to make Lauren think I kidnapped my own daughter.”

  “Are you coming in or not?”

  “I’ll be there in twenty minutes, you bastard. You better be there.” He slammed the phone on the dash of the Bronco. “Godammit!”

  Lonetree looked over at him. “That went over well.”

  “Yeah, real well.”

  “You know you can’t go to the hospital, right? If you show up he’s going to figure out a reason to arrest you.”

  “At least I could tell the story. Tell people about the cave. The missing girls.”

  “Every person there already thinks you’re crazy. Including your wife. What do you think would happen if you showed up talking about ritual sacrifices and underground caves full of skeletons? Strait-jacket time. Not only that, but within an hour of being in custody, you’d be dead. Probably shot while you were allegedly attacking a deputy or attempting to escape.”

  “No one would believe it.”

  “Are you kidding? After your performance on the phone? People would think it was a damn shame, but they wouldn’t lose sleep over it.”

  Jack shook his head. “This is crazy. I know who has Sarah but you’re saying not to do anything about it?”

  “I didn’t say that. You didn’t want to use Sarah as bait, but it’s already happened. Now we have to use it to our advantage.”

  “You mean your advantage. Don’t act like you care what happens to Sarah. Don’t play me.”

  “O.K. Fair enough. But we do have the same interests here. You may not believe in the ritual performed down in that cave, hell I have a tough enough time believing it myself, but there’s been enough strange shit to make me believe it’s at least possible. Somehow, every sacrifice makes these bastards stronger. And, if they’re willing to take all these risks over Sarah, then…”

  “Then what?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe she’s some kind of key for a whole different level of power.”

  Jack rolled his eyes. “This is nuts.”

  “Think about it. Why else would they take so many risks? You told me that Huckley said something about her being the one they were looking for, right? What do you think that means?”

  “I don’t know,” Jack admitted. “But I still don’t see how this helps.”

  “Huckley said they’re planning to bring Sarah to the cave, right? So, we know they have to keep her alive until then.”

  “O.K.” Jack said. “So we got back to the cave and wait for them.”

  Lonetree shook his head. “If it was just Huckley, maybe. He’s impatient and brash enough to go ahead whether or not he knows where are. But there’s the leader of the group, the one Huckley called the Boss. He’s careful. Careful enough to keep his identity secret. So I’m guessing he’s smart enough to tie up loose ends before he allows Sarah to be brought to the cave.”

  “So what are you saying?”

  “I’m saying we need to force the issue. Go on offense. Make this Boss guy do something. Hope for a mistake.”

  “That’s our plan? Hope for a mistake?”

  “Well, we could call them up one by one, tell them we know who they are and threaten to kill them. Worked well with Janney.”

  “Listen, I don’t care about your revenge. I just want to get my girl back.”

  “Fair enough.”

  “You still haven’t told me where we’re going.”

  Lonetree reached into a stack of papers wedged into the space between the driver’s seat and the console. He pulled out a folder and tossed it over to Jack. “Take a look at that. You’ll see why I still need you.”

  Jack flipped through the papers Lonetree had tossed him. The last page was a large photograph. It took his breath away. “Is this for real?” he asked.

  Lonetree nodded.

  “Jesus,” Jack whispered

  “You’re going to get one chance at this. You have to be ready for some dirty work if you want to save your daughter. Tonight might be your best chance to get her back alive. Your only chance.”

  Alive. Before that moment, Jack hadn’t contemplated Sarah being anything other than alive, and the idea of his little girl being hurt in any way made it difficult for him to breathe. The thought of her being killed was not within his ability to process.

  Jack took a deep breath and studied the photograph he held in his hands. Just when he thought things couldn’t get any worse. “All right. Tell me what I have to do.”

  SIXTY

  A half hour had passed since the phone call and still no Jack. Lauren tried his cell a half-dozen times, but it went directly to voicemail without ringing. Janney hovered nearby whenever she picked up the phone. Each time she hung up in frustration he gave her a thin, patronizing smile. She wondered if that was the effect he intended. If it was an attempt to comfort her it didn’t work. If anything, Janney’s presence, his squinty eyes and creepy smiles, made her more anxious. What was she doing trusting the sheriff’s judgment over Jack’s?

  She looked over and saw Janney on the phone in a nurse’s station. A glass window separated them, but the door was open so she caught snippets of the conversation. He was giving a detailed description of Sarah and telling whoever was on the other end of the phone what had been done so far to search for the girl. When he was done, he gave a full description of Jack. Janney turned in mid-sentence and made eye contact with Lauren through the window. She looked away, and couldn’t shake the feeling that Janney had turned to make sure she could hear him. Maybe she was just being paranoid. Then again, she scolded herself for the hundredth time that hour. If she had been more paranoid about leaving her children alone, none of this would have happened.


  “Dr. Tremont.” The voice shocked her out of her thoughts. It was Janney, back from his phone call. “I have good news. That was the FBI. They’re treating it as a kidnapping now.”

  “Wh-what does that mean?”

  “They don’t work kidnapping as much as they did before they became primarily anti-terrorism. But they still have great resources available. They’ll check all major transit points, train stations, buses, airports, you name it.”

  “I want to talk to them. Do you have the number for the agent in charge?”

  Janney lowered himself into the chair next to her. He reached out to take her hand but she pulled it back away from him. “Listen, you let them do their job, all right? They’ll find them,” Janney said.

  “You mean her. They’ll find her.”

  “Yeah, that’s what I mean. They’ll find her.” He tapped the table with his fingers, drumming out a slow, methodical beat, his eyes never leaving Lauren’s face. “Have you had any luck reaching Jack?”

  Lauren didn’t answer. The sheriff already knew she hadn’t. She shifted her eyes to look out the window. Janney pressed on. “You know, it seems strange to me that a man whose daughter has just gone missing wouldn’t…” He let the sentence hang over the table, his fingers still thumping the table. Lauren didn’t take the bait. She turned her back to the sheriff, not wanting to give him the satisfaction of seeing tears welling up in her eyes.

  “Lauren, there’s someone I’d like you to meet,” Dr. Mansfield said from behind her. Lauren turned in her chair. A man stood next to the doctor, dressed casually in slacks and a button down, looking very uncomfortable. There was no color to his face and he wrung his hands as he waited to be introduced. “This is Scott Moran. He saw Jack earlier today.”

  Lauren accepted the psychiatrist’s outstretched hand. It was cold and clammy, like shaking hands with a cadaver. Even in the midst of her own emotional agony she couldn’t help feeling sorry for the man. Something weighed heavily on his mind, and she suspected it had to do with Jack.