Love Inspired Suspense January 2014

by Shirlee McCoy

  The front door wasn’t locked—yet. The housekeeper was scurrying toward it as David burst inside. The plump woman shrieked and ran the other direction, yelping about calling the police. He needed to work fast and be gone, or he’d be in lockup too quickly to help Laurel.

  David strode up the hallway and flung wide the double doors of Gil’s study. Half expecting to find the room empty, he halted just over the threshold, mouth agape.

  Gil Montel sat behind his desk, snifter in hand, nearly empty brandy decanter at his elbow. Bleary eyes regarded David.

  “Whatsh the meaning of thish intrusion?” The man wobbled to his feet.

  “Did your sister have a tattoo below her left collar bone?”

  Gil’s eyes narrowed. “How did you know?”

  “Was it a raven’s talons gripping a jewel?”

  “Shum bird’sh claw.” Gil waved a dismissive hand.

  “Would you be surprised to know that the man who killed your sister also killed your fiancée, Melissa, and my girlfriend, Alicia? That tattoo links all three of them, plus two more.”

  Gil’s lips parted, but his only response was a blank stare.

  “These women were part of a pact to seduce wealthy men with their beauty,” David said. “Now this vengeful man has kidnapped a child, Caroline Adams, and left her dying of an allergic reaction to some kind of chemical he dosed her with. Plus, he’s taken another woman, as well as Caroline’s mother—a fine person whose only crime is to physically resemble someone who was a part of this ungodly sorority.”

  “What dosh thish have to do with me?”

  “I think the person responsible is your former brother-in-law. Where would Lawrence take those women?” David strode across the room and put his face in Gil’s. “Think! Was there any place in the area that he and Paula liked to go? Someplace secluded?”

  The other man’s pudgy cheeks sank into his jaw, and he collapsed onto his chair with a sob. David gazed down at Gil Montel’s balding head and shaking shoulders. If he could knock the slightest information out of this pitiful specimen, he wouldn’t hesitate, but he was fighting a losing battle.

  “Thanks for nothing.”

  David strode from the room and up the hallway. Any minute he could expect to hear sirens approaching, and now he had no more leads to follow. He’d failed Laurel again.

  “David Greene!”

  The bark of his name brought David to a halt. Grant hurried toward him, eyes blazing, something crumpled in his fist. David braced himself. Was he about to be assaulted by a teenager?

  The young man stopped in front of him, chest heaving. “I overheard. Caroline’s…dead?”

  “She was fighting for her life when the ambulance took her away.”

  “Here!” Grant extended his hand and opened his fist. A crumpled newspaper article lay in his palm. “Now you should go. I told the housekeeper not to call the cops, but she might not listen to me.”

  David gingerly accepted the segment of yellowed newsprint. Grant whirled on his heel and ran away. The bowels of the house swallowed his lanky figure.

  Paper in hand, David hurried to his car and drove out the gate. Though he heard no sirens, he lost himself deep in the residential neighborhood, then pulled over to the curb and opened the wadded-up newsprint.

  Blood congealed in his veins. No need to read the article. The photograph and the caption beneath it told the story. David knew where he needed to look.

  If he wasn’t already too late.

  SIXTEEN

  “I never wanted you to know,” Janice rasped. “I’m so ashamed. We were a capricious gaggle of fools—all thinking we had good reason to despise men, wealthy ones in particular. We convinced ourselves that we were on a holy mission to use our God-given assets—our looks—to punish them. We only punished ourselves.”

  Laurel’s heart beat erratically against her ribs. How could she ever look at Janice with the same trust and affection again? Did she want to hear the rest of this bizarre story? But how could she not, considering what was at stake?

  “Go on,” she said. “I have to know who might have stashed us here—who might yet have Caroline, if he hasn’t already—” Laurel choked on finishing the awful sentence.

  “I don’t expect you to forgive me.” A shuddering breath heaved from the woman Laurel held close but wanted to shove away. “We had no idea what terrible events we were setting in motion. Many lives have been torn apart. Most of us are dead.”

  “Other than you and Melissa Eldon, who was part of this pact?”

  “I didn’t know Melissa with the last name of Eldon. She must have had a marriage in between our college days and when she landed in Denver as a schoolteacher—which, by the way, was a totally out-of-character occupation for her. She thought people should be born adults and skip the messiness and dependency of childhood. I think her childhood must have been horrible, but I never knew the details.”

  “Didn’t you recognize her face on the news broadcasts?”

  “You know me and the news. Can’t even stand to have a television in the house.”

  “An odd phobia that you’ve glossed over as a personal idiosyncrasy. There’s got to be a deeper story.”

  “Another time. If we live, and you still want to talk to me.”

  Laurel had no answer for that. “Who else was a Talon?”

  “Fernanda Gonzales—”

  “Fernanda? David’s girlfriend’s name was Alicia.”

  “Really! I’m not surprised Fern changed her name. She hated the one her parents had given her almost as much as she hated them.”

  “So after you got back from your tour of Europe, if anyone mentioned the notorious Alicia Gonzales murder case, you wouldn’t have connected it with your Jeweled Talon Society.”

  “Never crossed my mind. I knew Paula Tregarth had been murdered on her honeymoon by her wealthy groom four years ago. She was the mastermind of the Talons. All her idea. Paula was a true siren, vindictive to the core, but supreme at hiding her feelings and intentions behind a mask of sweetness and light. She couldn’t stand her half brother, and hated her stepfather, who left her high and dry in his will. Marrying for money was her only recourse to sustain the lifestyle she craved.”

  “Who was the fifth Talon—the one our murderous captor thinks I am?”

  Janice let out a small sound like a chuckle mixed with a moan. “Here’s the kicker, sugar. I engineered for Kurt and me to move in next to you so I could do anything possible to help you and Caroline after April Hannover—the fifth Talon—stole your rich husband. Little did I know how glad you were to be rid of the jerk. You ended up being more of a blessing to me than I ever was to you. Without you and Caroline, I never would have survived the loss of Kurt or come into a personal relationship with God.”

  “April really is the fifth Talon? I thought she might be, but I couldn’t be certain.” Laurel snorted. “At least she made out like a bandit. Steven obligingly died in that boating accident and her ship came in.”

  “Knowing April, I always wondered how much of an accident Steven’s death was.”

  Laurel’s breath caught. How did she feel about the possibility that Steven had reaped what he’d sowed in the ultimate way? Sad for him—truly and deeply—but glad for the people he never had a chance to hurt. What a weird dichotomy. She would have much to sort out in her thinking…if she survived to enjoy that luxury.

  The warmth seeping down to them from above had begun to wane. They must be huddled beneath a fireplace, and the fire was dying. Before much longer, Janice and she would be doing the same.

  *

  A drive that would take close to two hours overland took only a third of that by helicopter. Nor was a formal landing strip necessary in order to touch down in a parking lot of a small mountain town like Big Elk Meadows. The flash of generous green ensured the chopper and pilot could wait there as long as necessary for David to check out his hunch. Vehicle-rental agencies didn’t exist in the little burg but more green bought the
parking lot owner’s rust-bucket four-wheel-drive SUV outright.

  Fifteen minutes later, David turned in to the driveway of his mountain cabin. This cabin was the very one, according to the newspaper caption and photograph, where Lawrence Taylor murdered his bride four years ago. A detail David’s Realtor failed to mention when she sang the cabin’s praises and closed the deal.

  Easing up the driveway, fingerling snow drifts went whump-whump under the SUV’s tires, signifying that no other vehicle had passed here in a while. Tension sang in David’s veins. If Lawrence had transported his prisoners by land, then the man hadn’t been here. David was banking on the scenario appropriate to a man of Lawrence’s resources—a willing hired brute of a pilot and an air approach.

  The yard contained plenty of space for a helicopter landing, especially since the area had been cleaned out by the police-commandeered snow plow not many days ago. David would have preferred the swift approach himself, but dared not make so much noise and risk panicking the killer. Any miscalculation and Laurel and Janice could pay the ultimate price.

  Please God, if my theory is all wet, and they aren’t here, guide the police to the women. Please let it not be too late.

  And how was Caroline? His gut churned. He couldn’t even find out if she was hanging in there unless he had Laurel with him. He’d called but the hospital wouldn’t tell a non-family member a thing.

  He neared the end of the tree line. So far, the sound of the wind in the trees would have muffled his approach. A few yards more, though, and the car would burst into the clear and become visible from the cabin. He couldn’t risk being spotted too soon.

  David stopped the vehicle, but left it running. Brisk wind slapped his face as he got out. He moved on stealthy feet until he stood behind the last evergreen tree before the clearing. A long breath shuddered from his chest.

  The packed few inches of snow left in the yard bore the clear indentations of a helicopter landing, but the bird was no longer there. The yard lay empty, and no lights showed in the cabin, though a wisp of smoke curled from the chimney.

  David’s knees went weak, and he sank into a mound of snow piled up against the tree’s lowest branches. He was too late. The killer had been here with his victims, done his worst and gone. All that remained was for David to find what was left.

  He couldn’t do it. Fiery claws ripped at his heart. How would he face life without Laurel? When had she come to mean so much to him? The thought of finding her dead body—

  David doubled over, a dry retch heaving his stomach. Heat flashed through him and sweat popped from his skin. He plunged his hand into the snow and rubbed a fistful on his face. The cold slapped him back to clarity.

  He had no choice but to go inside and face whatever he might find.

  David staggered to his feet and trod the distance to the porch. A man trudging to his own gallows couldn’t dread his destination more.

  What would he tell Caroline? If she wasn’t already with her mother.

  The thought drove him to his knees on the top step, and the thud of his landing echoed hollowly. Then echoed again.

  What?

  David held his breath. Nothing. He shook his head. Grief was making him loopy.

  He got up and tried the cabin door. It was locked even though the chimney smoke betrayed someone had been inside today. Anguish twisted David’s face. He’d been here so seldom that having the lock changed after he purchased the property somehow got left on the back burner. Of course, Lawrence would still have a key to the place.

  David pulled out his own key and let himself in. Gritting his teeth until his jaw creaked, he flicked on the light. His chest cavity went hollow. The place looked normal. No dead bodies. No blood. No smell of cordite as if a weapon had been fired. Just dying embers in the hearth. Why had the killer lit a fire? And what had he done with Laurel and Janice?

  He strode to the fireplace and peered into the mass of glowing wood fragments. A few shreds of paper toward the back caught his attention. He grabbed the poker and pulled the scorched bits onto the hearth stones. A few traces of handwritten words showed around the edges, but not enough to offer a clue what the paperwork might have been. He gave the poker a frustrated shove into its container. The set of metal implements clattered together.

  A hollow thump followed the clangor. This thump he hadn’t imagined.

  David stamped the floor, and the floor stamped back. His heart attempted to flail out of his chest. Someone was alive in the crawl space below. The temperature down there couldn’t be much above what it was outside. Whoever it was—Laurel, Janice, both—must be freezing to death.

  Where was that trapdoor? He’d seen it once beneath one of the thick oriental rugs.

  David went into a frenzy of throwing carpets back from the hardwood floors. At last he discovered the spot in the corner of the dining room behind the piano. At sight of the shiny new padlock on the latch, David slammed the edge of his fist into the leg of the baby grand. He had no key for this lock.

  Narrowing his eyes, David rose. He may not have a key, but he did have an ax outside in the wood box on the porch. No sounds had come from below since the thump he heard near the fireplace. Every moment counted. He ran for the tool. He’d chop up his entire floor if he had to do it, but it was best to work smart and fast.

  He lifted the ax and brought it down on one of the trapdoor hinges. The hinges would succumb more quickly than the latch with its sturdy padlock. Again and again and again he struck at the hinges. One hinge cracked and sprang loose. He attacked the other one. Strike! Strike! His muscles were energized. Fire pounded in his veins. He wouldn’t fail Laurel. Not now. Not when he was so close.

  A roar like muted thunder halted the upswing of David’s ax.

  Lawrence was returning? Did the vicious scum plan to finish with a bullet the job that he’d started by placing the women in the crawl space? No doubt the man had spotted the SUV sitting in the trees. David hadn’t come armed. Maybe he should have, but he was a dreamer, a gardener and a piano man. When he’d scrapped as a snot-nosed kid, he’d done it with his fists. He didn’t even own a gun.

  The ax he held in his hands could serve as a weapon, but it was a feeble thing against a firearm. Nevertheless, it would have to do. He couldn’t let that monster enter the cabin.

  How much longer could the women last down there? He had to create the opportunity for them to reach warmth.

  David brought the ax down once more on the second hinge. It sprang free of the wood. He grasped the edges of the trapdoor and ripped backward with all his weight and might. The latch bent and twisted. He heaved backward again, and the trap pulled open wide enough for someone to crawl out.

  “Laurel!” he cried down into the dank and frigid blackness below. “If you can hear me, get out of there. I’m going outside to deal with Lawrence Taylor. Fire up the CB radio and call for help. I don’t have time to do it.”

  Snatching up the ax, David raced to the front window. The chopper was settling to the ground in a swirl of white kicked up by the blades. There wouldn’t be a better time to get out the door and take up a position of advantage behind Lawrence and the pilot, who would have their eyes on the cabin. Surprise might be his only advantage.

  He raced down off the porch into the whirlwind of stinging snow particles and took up a stance facing the rear rotor blades of a sleek chopper, smaller but much nicer than the one he’d hired to fly up here. The whirling slowed and the snow began to settle.

  David blinked and wiped at his eyes with his jacket sleeve. Then he drew back his weapon, primed and ready.

  The view before him cleared, and the largely glass bubble of the main housing revealed one man inside. Lawrence was his own pilot? Certainly not out of the question, and the skill simplified matters greatly for a man bent on murder. The door of the chopper opened and a man toting a hefty handgun climbed out. Shock rippled through David. This was no stranger.

  His entire understanding of the events of past years and prior enc
ounters reshaped themselves even as new questions formed. Time enough for those later. The man with the gun took a step toward the cabin.

  “Gil.” David spoke softly, but in the cold stillness left in the wake of the silenced engine and rotor blades his voice rang clear.

  “I see I was right to fear what my son might have communicated to you,” Gilbert Montel said, not turning around. “You were so determined, and I couldn’t be sure my silly sot act had fooled you.”

  “If I were in charge of the Emmys, you would win.”

  “Most gratifying.” The man’s breathing deepened as if in the grip of great emotion. “Lawrence killed my princess here.” Gil waved toward the cabin. “I found him with her blood on his hands, babbling about the Society and her cruel contempt for men—especially him. The arrogant fool couldn’t bear to think he’d been used. I killed him and tossed his body out there.” He motioned toward the wilderness. “Now I must finish the task of eliminating the treacherous females who lured my princess into such a foolish pact.”

  “I have to stop you.” David enunciated the words like hammer’s blows.

  Snarling a curse, Gil whirled. His gun lifted and barked even as David flung his ax. Something yanked his jacket sleeve, and he staggered back a step as Gil stared in wide-eyed shock. Bright crimson spread from the blade in his chest and the gun slowly lowered, then dropped to the ground. Gil’s plump body crumpled and joined his weapon, lying still on the snow.

  With a hoarse cry, David ran for the cabin and rushed inside. Laurel stood swaying near the trapdoor—bleary-eyed and only half-conscious. Battered and bruised, Janice sat slumped against a wall. Both women quaked with violent shivers.

  At his abrupt entrance, Laurel staggered, and David raced to scoop her in his arms before she could hit the floor. The woman was an icicle, but she was the best thing he’d ever held in his life.

  “Oh, David,” she wailed, “I thought he must have shot you. I couldn’t bear it. I need you.”