Second Life (Will Finch Mystery Thriller Series Book 4)

by D. F. Bailey

  “Give me a minute, okay.” He sat down again and leaned forward so that his head dipped between his thighs. “They drugged me with something,” he muttered.

  After he took a few deep breaths, he regained his composure and lifted his head.

  “You all right?”

  “Maybe.” He turned his head from side to side to restore his sense of balance. “How did you find us?”

  “Same as before. We got Eve’s voice message and when you didn’t show up, we checked your cellphone. We could see you were on the move and started to track you.” Vickers turned his head in the direction of the driveway where the white truck was parked. “The cell was in your bag. In the back of one of the panel vans.”

  Will recalled striking out with his feet after he regained consciousness as they drove along the highway. With the hood secured over his head he was hoping to make contact with Eve. Instead his knee nudged against his courier bag—where Eve had tossed his phone after she’d given it a full charge. Then he remembered the kidnappers pulling his prepaid phone from his pocket as he was abducted in front of the Javits tower on Worth Street. Once they’d snatched the prepaid, they tossed him—along with his bag—into the van and injected him with whatever had caused the nine-point-oh headache still quaking in his skull.

  The room was now busy with a squad of five SWAT ops, Vickers and Cruz. With Parker secured, Cruz instructed two bulls from the SWAT team to hoist him to his feet. His right hand was cut from the shattering glass and he wailed miserably as he was led from the room and into the front hallway. Finch realized that Parker was about to be interrogated and locked away—and with him, his last chance to find Eve was about to disappear.

  He charged across the room and with all his weight broke Parker free from the two guards and drove him onto the floor.

  “Where in hell is Eve?” he hissed into Parker’s ear.

  “Finch, what are you doing?” Vickers tried to tug Finch away, but in desperation Finch pressed his thumbs over Parker’s eyeballs.

  “Tell me, or I’ll blind you!”

  “Finch!” Cruz screamed—but she didn’t intervene.

  “Where is she?” He pressed down on the soft globes until the tension reached a breaking point.

  “In the solarium,” Parker said with a wheeze.

  “Where the fuck is that?” He kept the pressure on. He could feel the glassy orbs wobbling under his thumbs.

  “On the hill,” he muttered as two of the SWAT bulls yanked Finch away and trussed his arms behind his back in a twin armlocks.

  “What the hell are you doing?” Cruz demanded. “You want to be cuffed and locked up, that’s fine with me.” A look of astonishment flashed across her face. “But we got enough trouble on our hands here without you fucking up.”

  Finch struggled to recover his breath. After he settled down he leaned toward her. “What’s going on around here?”

  “You don’t know?” She seemed genuinely surprised. “There’s over twenty people dead. Outside and in the basement alone. Looks like mass poisoning.”

  “Jonestown,” he whispered.

  “What?”

  “Jonestown,” he repeated but when it failed to register with her he glanced away and tried to wrestle his arms free. “Look, tell these guys to let me go.”

  She nodded to the two cops holding his arms. They released him and turned their attention to Parker who still lay on the floor, his arms cuffed behind his back as he mumbled incoherently.

  Finch stared at him and wondered what to do next. “Okay, I’ve got to find Eve.”

  “Where is she?”

  “I don’t know. In some solarium, wherever that is.”

  She gave Vickers a questioning look. He shrugged.

  “If she’s here, we’ll find her. Don’t worry.” She fixed him with a heavy stare that said, I’ve got to trust you, so don’t mess up. “First we’ve got to secure this hellhole. So you—Finch—you don’t go anywhere. Understand?”

  “Yeah. Sure.” He shook his head and put on a submissive expression. “Listen, it must be ten hours since I’ve taken a leak. You willing to let me go to the bathroom on my own, or do I need one these bulls to escort me?”

  She tilted her head toward the hallway. “Yeah, you and an escort. Vickers will take you to the can and then outside to one of the cars.” She gave Vickers a look that suggested she’d seen enough of Finch for now. “This is a catastrophic crime scene and I will not have you screwing it up. And no photos, either. You got that?”

  He pulled the linings of his pants pockets inside out. “Remember, you have my phone, Cruz. I got nothing here.”

  As Vickers walked with him along the corridor to the kitchen, they passed the corpses of two women lying on the floor, their arms and legs bent under them in distorted positions. On the tile floor in the kitchen a man had collapsed and died. Next to the stove, another woman. It appeared that they’d died in an abrupt shock that somehow lurched them backwards and sideways in spasms. The third woman’s mouth was open, frozen in the instant of death it seemed, her lips still bubbling with foam. Finch imagined they’d all died within minutes of ingesting whatever poison Kali and Salter had prepared for them.

  “It’s fucking insanity,” Vickers muttered when they reached the bathroom. “There’s ten or more of them outside.”

  “And more upstairs.” Finch pointed to the ceiling as a sense of dread washed through him. But knew he had to concentrate if he was going to find Eve. Cruz had admitted that her tactical team was overwhelmed by the mass suicide. He knew she had to dedicate all her resources to sorting out the disaster in the lodge. Which meant finding Eve would have to wait.

  “Give me five, all right?” he told Vickers. “I’ve got to take a dump.”

  “Sure.”

  Vickers seemed relieved to have a momentary break from the carnage. They both knew it would take days, possibly weeks, to sort out what had happened. Vickers glanced away and Finch closed the door and set the thumb lock on the inside knob.

  He took a moment to assess his surroundings. In the mid-60s someone had done a dollar-store make-over of the bathroom. An avocado green porcelain sink had been installed against the shortest wall. He opened the cold water tap and was about to press his lips to the spout and take a long drink when he came to his senses. Poison, he whispered to himself. The entire plumbing system could be contaminated. He drew a hand over his dry lips and tried to focus. At the end of the wall sat a toilet centered below a shuttered window. He pulled the shutters open, dropped the seat cover over the bowl and lifted the hinged window above the toilet tank.

  Ten seconds later he was on the ground and clambering uphill in the dawn light.

  ※ — TWENTY FOUR — ※

  WHEN EVE NOON attempted to brush the cloth away from her eyes she realized that both her wrists were strapped to a chair. As she tried to tug herself free from the restraints a bolt of lightning flashed from the back of her neck out through the top of her head. She blinked twice and decided it was better to keep her eyes closed.

  “Open your eyes,” a guttural voice commanded. A hand pulled the hair at the back of her head so that her face rose a few inches. “Your boyfriend wants to see you.”

  Her eyes flickered open and she tried to respond. “What?” she muttered, “What’s happening?” But the distinct words failed to emerge from her mouth.

  She saw the hand-held camera wander in front of her face and she glanced away. “What the fuck!” she mumbled, then immediately understood that her mouth had been taped shut. A rush of panic surged through her chest and the air in her lungs gushed through her nostrils in tight, short bursts.

  “Settle down,” the man said. “No need to panic. Just look at the camera and smile.” He let out a sadistic laugh and tightened his grip on her hair.

  A final burst of energy coursed through her body as she tried to break the restraints at her ankles and wrists in a single, violent outburst. Her arms and legs, her abs, every particle of her inner strength
seemed to implode. A second attempt to wrench free exposed her desperate situation.

  After her brief struggle the camera withdrew from her line of sight. From behind her she felt two hands clasp her breasts, knead them roughly and release them. She felt the heat of a man’s breath on the back of her neck and caught a sigh of longing.

  Next she heard the man walk a few paces behind, and then away, from her. Perhaps she heard a door click shut, footsteps thumping down a staircase and dissolving into the distant silence. She couldn’t be sure. Her breathing settled into an unsteady pattern. She turned her head from side to side but could see no one. Ahead of her she barely glimpsed the dawn light through a series of vertical glass panels that formed a long curving arc in front of her. She thought she was in some kind of circular observation room, a place that looked across a valley into the outlying wilderness. Minutes passed—perhaps a half hour slipped by as she sat bound and helpless.

  She realized that she’d wet herself. When? She tried to piece together what had happened. The sequence that led from walking over to Seventh Avenue with Will at her side. The taxi down to the FBI office near Foley Square. She remembered the moment when she’d stepped off the curb … and then nothing. She felt as if her consciousness was a long band of recording tape, a reel-to-reel sequence that recorded every passing thought and idea and emotion and feeling. But from the moment she stood on the street, until she’d come to this strange place of curved glass panels, someone had cut the tape and erased that part of her life. Then she understood. She’d been drugged.

  Where was Will? The question seemed as pointless as asking where was God. At a time when she needed someone—Will, God, her mother—she sat completely alone waiting for the inevitable. The lightning bolt struck through her head again. Part of her prayed that it would kill her. Just let me preserve some dignity, she whispered to herself as she felt the urine sopping through her jeans under her thighs. Spare me the pain and be done.

  From somewhere below and behind her she heard the heavy clank of a door closing in a basement. Then the sound of three voices, two men and a woman speaking with quiet urgency. The rising conversation became sharper and louder, then finally the woman seemed to take command of the argument.

  “All right,” she pronounced. “We do this now. Once and for all. Are we agreed?”

  Eve couldn’t make out the response, what seemed to be a low mutter of assent as the two men spoke over one another. Then she heard their feet coming up the staircase, the heavy footsteps rising toward her as they increased their pace to a fast jog. Then she heard the door behind her swing open and the woman speak.

  “Robert, find something to cut her loose.” She said his name as if he was French. Row-bare.

  Three people strode across the room and stood before her. She recognized Kali Rood from her pictures in the eXpress. The man beside her had a shaggy crop of short gray hair. He was lean, early-fifties, well dressed, wore canvas boat shoes. The second man, younger than Kali by at least ten years, bore a darker look. His black hair was slicked to one side and an old scar cut through one eyebrow. He was dressed in jeans, a camo vest and wore blue, Nike shoes. In his right hand he brandished a steel box cutter with the blade extended about two inches. In his left hand he balanced a pool cue.

  “Cut her free,” Kali said and glanced out the windows. “Deacon, keep an eye out, would you?”

  The tension in her face suggested that she was expecting someone. Another criminal to join their band?

  Robert passed the pool cue to Deacon who moved to the array of glass windows and looked into the distance. Then one at a time, Robert slipped the blade between her wrists and the wood armrests on the chair. When she had both hands free Eve took a swing at him but he backed away with a dreary smile. “Don’t try it,” he said. “We’re far from done with you.”

  “Tie her hands in front of her. Then cut her feet loose.” Kali fixed Eve with a determined look then let her face soften. “Nothing will happen to you if you cooperate. We’re just moving to another location.”

  Robert wrapped her wrists with four turns of the adhesive. He cut the binding from her ankles and set the knife on the floor.

  “Keep the tape on her mouth,” Kali said. “We don’t want her calling out to anyone.”

  Eve tried to scream, but the effort was useless. She drew a few deep breaths through her nose as she realized that her situation had now improved. Her legs were free, her hands—though still tightly bound—were unobstructed in front of her. Better still, she knew that Kali was under pressure. If she didn’t want Eve calling out, it meant they were trying to flee.

  “Anyone coming up the hill, Deacon?”

  He shook his head. “Not yet.”

  Kali turned her attention to Robert. “You ready?”

  He nodded.

  “Then let’s go.”

  Kali grabbed the discarded hood from the floor and nodded to the two men. Deacon passed the pool cue back to Robert. He examined it a moment, then set the tip of the cue against the edge of a baseboard heater. He raised his right leg and drove his foot into the wood two or three inches below the tip of the pool cue. It snapped off in one piece and left a needle point where the wood had splintered away. He examined the spear tip and smiled at Deacon with a narrow grin.

  They stood beside Eve and lifted her by her forearms to a standing position. After allowing her a moment to find her balance they turned her toward the staircase which descended to the basement. As she stumbled forward, Eve noticed a digital clock on a side table. It read 6:22.

  Kali led the way downstairs, through a large open space filled with indoor game equipment. Tables for ping-pong, pool, foosball—all of it covered in dust and apparently unused for years. The pool table had seven balls resting on the green felt, the action apparently arrested in mid-game. A single cue leaned against one of the table blinds. A two-column bookcase held stacks of board and card games crammed atop one another in disarray: Monopoly, Stratego, Starfall, Anticipation and dozens more that Eve didn’t recognize.

  Kali opened the basement door and stepped onto a path which led uphill and into the forest. They walked in a line along the trail: Kali, Deacon, Eve and Robert who prodded Eve along with the sharp end of the cue whenever she faltered.

  After ten minutes, she noticed that the forest began to thin and open into a meadow of tall grasses and shrubs. The path veered along a cliff edge that looked east across the valley towards the sun which was now shrouded in layers of torn clouds. Below them, she could see scruffs of mist, a patchwork of grays and blues drifting above the bright summer foliage that lined the mountains from top to bottom. Somewhere behind her she heard a single crow cawing into the wilderness. For a moment she felt she could be the crow. Alone, wary, bitter. If she could have anything that the black bird possessed, it would be the ability to fly.

  ※

  Above him Finch could make out the top of the solarium. As he rose to the crest of the hill he knew he was approaching the building that Parker had identified. A round, two-story structure with sheets of vertical glass panels installed side-by-side formed a long arc on the top floor. The lower level was covered with stained wood siding that had fallen into disrepair. Some of the boards had warped and twisted in the summer sun and brutally cold winters. A few planks had sprung free from the frame and the old nails that once held them in place were now half dissolved with rust.

  He walked around the base of the lower floor until he reached an open door. He dipped his head inside and considered the interior gloom. The dawn light seeped through a row of narrow windows just below the ceiling. After a moment he could smell the must and mold, then his eyes adjusted to the shadows and he could make out the toys and diversions of a well-stocked games room. He stepped inside and listened for the sound of voices, footsteps, heavy breathing. Nothing.

  Opposite the pool table he spotted an open staircase leading to the top floor. He grabbed a pool cue that leaned against the table and began to ascend the stairs. One step,
another. Not a sound. Convinced now that he was alone, he quickly climbed the steps to the second floor. He walked down a short corridor and entered the vast emptiness of the solarium. The light hit his eyes and he paused before he approached the chair where Eve had sat bound and gagged through most of the night.

  “Eve.” His voice was barely a whisper. When he heard no reply, he howled out in a desperation. “Eve!”

  Nothing.

  He scanned the circular room and behind the chair he noticed the clock that he’d seen on Parker’s computer tablet. It read 6:51. When Parker had shown him the image of Eve the time was 4:13. Over two and a half hours had passed—enough time for her to be lost forever.

  Below the clock sat a waist-high bar fridge, the sort he’d seen in dozens of hotel rooms. He opened the door. Inside stood a case of twelve water bottles. Evian. He pulled one free from the plastic wrap, snapped open the top and took a long drink. He tugged a second bottle from the wrapper and pushed it into his back pocket.

  As he drank off the first bottle he paced in a circle around the room. Beside the chair he noticed the discarded bands of duct tape that had been cut from Eve’s wrists and ankles. On the floor behind the chair he found a box cutter. He ran the pad of his thumb over the blade. A smudge of gum from the tape still adhered to the steel, but the edge was sharp.

  He walked to the bank of windows and scanned the forest that rose up the hill. To the east, just below the haze of the sun, a broad valley seemed to fall from a cliff edge about twenty yards away from where he stood. On the west, a steep, rocky bluff rose at least a hundred feet above the solarium. The lay of the land meant that Eve could have gone in one of two directions, up or down the hill. If they’d taken her downhill—toward the lodge—they would have run straight into the arms of the FBI.

  No, he decided, she’d been led uphill and away from the solarium. Likely Kali and Deacon had taken her hostage. So it would be Kali and Deacon with Eve in tow. He knew that if she was capable she’d be resisting them every step of the way. He took a moment to assess his condition. His exhaustion, his raw hunger, the hammer still pounding in his brain. He could make his way back to the lodge and bring Vickers and Cruz up here to help him. That would take another twenty minutes. More, if he had to convince them that Eve’s life was at stake. Or worse, they could arrest him on the spot for escaping custody. He considered the options and set his jaw.