by Ladew, Lisa
Knox sipped his drink. “Who’s watching him?”
“We’ve got two patrol cars on the house.”
Knox’s gaze fell on the picture of a young Frank Oberlin on the table. “Who’s this guy?” he said. “His brother?”
Hawk watched Knox curiously. “You don’t think that’s Troy?”
“Nah, the face is too thin and long, and the nose isn’t crooked.”
Hawk picked up the piece of paper. He was right. “This is Frank Oberlin,” he said, dropping the printed picture.
Knox’s eyes came alive, burning holes in him. “Your case?”
“Yeah.”
“They related?”
“We don’t know. He says no. This picture says maybe.”
Hawk looked around the room, then decided to come clean with Knox. He could trust Knox. “There’s something you may not know about Oberlin. He’s the father of my wife, and of Craig’s wife, and of JT over there on the couch. They’re triplets.”
“Isn’t that interesting,” Knox said, drawing every word out and looking around the room, his eyes bouncing from JT to Vivian and back to Hawk.
“Why? He had a panic room too?”
Knox leaned forward and shook his head slowly. “No, his mansion had a whole underground, reinforced cave, like he was freaking batman.”
Craig shot out of his chair. “What? We searched that house a dozen times, we went through it brick by brick almost, and we never found anything like that.”
Knox shrugged. “And you wouldn’t. I did the concealment myself.”
Craig crossed the room and stood over Knox menacingly. “What the fuck, man! You put those things in without blueprints and nobody even knows they exist?”
Knox appeared unconcerned with Craig’s anger. “That’s the whole point.”
“Why didn’t you ever tell us?” Hawk asked softly.
Knox shrugged again. “I only found out you guys were investigating him recently. We put that room in years ago. Maybe a decade ago. And when I did discover you two were on this case it seemed like you had it locked. If I thought you were missing any evidence I would have called you, but it didn’t seem like you were.”
Craig locked eyes with Hawk. “Let’s go.”
Hawk stood up. It was the best chance they had right now. He leaned over to give Vivian a kiss and tell her that he loved her. She grabbed him forcefully by his shirt. “Bring my sister back,” she whispered, her face deadly pale. Hawk nodded and prayed he would.
As Hawk, Craig, and Knox tromped down the porch steps Craig spoke, his voice a thin wire. “No search warrant this time.”
“Nope,” Hawk agreed, knowing their jobs were probably toast no matter what. He couldn’t find it inside himself to care. All he wanted was to find Emma and take a nice long vacation somewhere with his wife.
“All right boys, we’re going rogue,” Knox said, and let out a laugh. Hawk wished he could join him, but he knew Emma’s life and Craig’s sanity were resting on what happened in the next hour.
Not good times.
Chapter 20
Jerry sat in his car, in the parking lot of Sara’s therapist’s office, thinking about what had just happened. Something was off and he just needed to figure out what. He had driven Sara to her appointment, planning on going inside with her to sit in the waiting room and talk to Dr. Velasco when they were done with the appointment. It was Saturday, and that meant Jerry’s car was the only one in the parking lot. The Saturday appointment wasn’t unusual though, Sara’s appointments had been on Saturday for several weeks now. Sara had said she requested the doctor to see her on Saturdays in order to work around her schedule better. Jerry hadn’t thought anything of it at the time, but now it seemed strange to him, especially since Sara had full control over her schedule and also because she hadn’t gone to work in over a week.
But what was bothering him right now was what had happened when he went in with Sara, expecting to meet a kindly therapist who would have no problem with his presence. The reality was far different. Dr. Velasco, an older gentleman with dark skin, salt and pepper hair and tiny, round spectacles, had narrowed his eyes immediately when he saw Jerry. He hadn’t shaken Jerry’s hand and had insisted that Jerry not wait inside the building. Jerry could understand the doctor not wanting him in the room during the session, but inside the building? Dr. Velasco had said the cleaners would be arriving any minute and would need the waiting room to be empty.
Then, when Jerry thought of Sara’s demeanor during this exchange, he really felt his anxiety meter trip over to high. He knew she was wearing her gun and her knives, knew it just because of the long-sleeved outfit she had chosen on this hot day. She’d been quiet all morning, barely speaking to him, but not protesting when he said he had wanted to go. Then, when she pushed through the door of the clinic she had seemed to turn into a different person. His strong, solid girlfriend had seemed to shrink, to pull in on herself. She hadn’t looked at him or said goodbye when Dr. Velasco asked him to leave, only stood there, her nervous gaze on the door to Dr. Velasco’s office. Jerry had complied with Dr. Velasco’s request to leave the building, knowing something was wrong, but unable to figure out just what. He’d taken one final look over his shoulder and saw the therapist pulling Sara into his office by the sleeve.
Jerry played that moment over in his mind. He didn’t understand it. He’d never seen Sara afraid of anything, even with guns and knives shoved in her face, but she had seemed scared of Dr. Velasco. Scared in a psychological way, like a small child might be scared of an abusive parent.
The thought sent Jerry scrambling. He pushed open his door and ran to the building. The front door was now locked, the waiting room completely empty.
Sudden conviction that Sara was in trouble flooded through Jerry. He ran around to the side of the one-story, red-brick clinic, peeking in the first window he came to, staying as low as possible. An empty office. Jerry ran on the grass surrounding the building to the next window. Empty again. The blinds were drawn and the window closed, but he could still see enough of the room to know it wasn’t the right one.
Distress inundated Jerry, telling him something was very, very wrong with Sara and he had to hurry. He ran to the next window and peeked in. Jackpot. Sara sat in a chair, her head dropped forward on her chest. Dr. Velasco stood only two feet from her, his hands on his hips, his back mostly to Jerry, his stance tense and angry. Jerry held his breath and watched, acidic outrage filling his gut. What was going on? Sara looked asleep almost, or hypnotized. Dr. Velasco looked as if he were lecturing her, or chewing her out. Jerry heard the tone of the man’s voice and strained to hear the words through the glass.
Monster … butcher of … worse … person … you deserve .. die … take your … life .. tonight … care how …
Jerry straightened to his tiptoes and laid against the window, wanting to hear one complete sentence before he reacted. His heart thudded dully in his chest as he realized this man who was supposed to be helping Sara was poisoning her instead.
The words came more clearly now.
I don’t care how you kill yourself, but make sure it’s painful. However you killed my brother, that is how you should die.
Jerry pushed himself off from the window, looking around wildly for something, anything to break it with. All he could think of was stopping this horrible person from destroying his Sara anymore.
The lawn stretched green and empty, without even a stick to pick up. Jerry cocked back his fist, preparing to punch his way in, even as his mind screamed to him not to do it. He would be cut to ribbons if he broke the window and tried to enter that way.
Jerry said a prayer that Sara had a few short seconds and ran to the front of the building where a small, cement planter sat, filled with purple flowers. He snatched the planter up and heaved it through the floor-to-ceiling window at the front of the building. Glass sprayed everywhere as the noise shattered the quiet morning.
Jerry kicked out the remaining glass from the bot
tom of the window and rushed into the waiting room as Dr. Velasco peeked out the door of his office, his face alarmed. Jerry ran for him, bellowing out his hate and rage.
Dr. Velasco pulled his head back in his office and slammed the door shut, but Jerry reached it at the same time, his entire weight and momentum carrying him through the swing of the door, smashing it open. Dr. Velasco fell backwards to the ground, then scuttled away from Jerry on his hands and knees.
“Get out of my office,” the therapist screamed.
Jerry advanced on him, then snuck a quick look at Sara. Her head was still on her chest, her face slack, her eyes closed. She hadn’t reacted at all.
Dr. Velasco reached the back wall and pulled himself up, his indignant but scared eyes locked on Jerry.
“What did you do to her?” Jerry snarled. “Why isn’t she moving?”
“She’s hypnotized,” the doctor panted. “It’s standard procedure.” He pulled himself up to his full height and stared Jerry down. “You can’t just break into my office like some … some madman. I’m calling the cops.”
“You call them, I’ll be sure to tell them how you were telling her to kill herself—but wake her up first.”
Dr. Velasco’s eyes narrowed. Jerry saw the understanding fill his face that Jerry had overheard what he had said. Jerry saw several emotions cross his face and knew the therapist was seeing his entire practice and maybe his freedom disintegrate in a flash.
But still, he did the stupid thing.
Dr. Velasco sprinted for the door. Jerry saw that he was going to do it a moment before he acted. The set of his body and the shift of his eyes gave him away. Jerry threw his body into the man and they both crashed into the wall. Jerry grabbed the other man around the throat and pounded his head against the wall until the doctor begged for his life.
“Wake her up and I’ll let you go.”
“I can’t wake her up. She’ll wake up on her own in forty-five minutes. It’s a drug-induced hypnosis.”
“Then fix it. Fix everything you said to her. Take back your commands,” Jerry ordered, his hands still around the man’s neck.
Dr. Velasco just stared at him, his lips moving soundlessly. Finally he spoke, spitting out the words like teeth. “She killed my brother.”
“If she killed him, your brother was either a drug dealer or a child molester or both, so I don’t give a shit,” Jerry snapped, his temper exploding.
Dr. Velasco’s face reddened. He blustered but didn’t say anything. Behind them, Sara let out a long moan. Jerry turned to her, his hold on the doctor weakening. In a flash, the therapist yanked Jerry’s hands away and sprinted past him.
Jerry let him go. The man wasn’t going to help him anyway. He watched as the man ducked through the shattered window and ran away into the parking lot.
He went to Sara. “Sara, sweetheart…” he started, but didn’t say anything else. He was scared he was going to mess her up more. What could he do? What if she really tried to kill herself tonight?
His mind ran through all the people he knew who might be able to help him. He knew several doctors, but none of them were psychiatrists. Finally he settled on the station psychiatrist, the one he had to see after Norman had shot him and tried to run him over while on duty. The incident that had led to him meeting Sara in the first place. Jerry pulled out his wallet and rifled through it, finding Dr. McNamara’s card deep in a pocket. He turned it over, praying that he remembered correctly. Yes! Her cell number was on the back.
Jerry snatched up the phone on the desk and dialed, his throat constricting in fear.
Chapter 21
Preston Troy watched out his picture window at the patrol car with the cop sitting inside it that was placed at his curb for the whole world to see. There was another one at the back of the house, he knew.
His blood boiled at the thought. He was a goddamned United States Senator! He should be above something like this. Those pissant cops out there should be scared to be pulling this detail. But there they sat, bright as daylight and ugly as sin.
He hadn’t dared turn on the news. He knew the facts about his search warrant had to be all over it. His phone hadn’t stopped ringing since the FBI assholes had left but he hadn’t answered that either. No one who was calling could help him. The governor hated him, he knew that. His threat to call the governor had been empty. He had gotten the governor to appoint him as interim senator by blackmailing him, using information he had found in his father’s house when he snuck in late at night after the cops had left. No, the governor wouldn’t help him, he would hand Preston to the cops on a silver platter.
Preston paced in his living room trying to figure out how to get past this nightmare. Those two FBI agents were more clever than he had given them credit for. He never thought they would have traced any of this to him, not in a million years. But they had. And now everything was at stake. He’d already lost his billions, he knew that, but maybe he could still get out of this with his job, his freedom, and his status intact. Damage control, he needed to do some major damage control and quickly.
He couldn’t do it trapped in this house. His cardinal rule was to never hire anyone to do his dirty work, that way, there was no one to rat on him, or cut a deal with the cops in exchange for him. He was the only one who could clean all of this up. The first thing he needed was to get out of there, but not let those cops see him. Maybe he could sneak out somehow, then take care of his little problem, then sneak back in and no one would be the wiser. He had a car stashed less than a mile away—a car that wasn’t traceable to him. If only he could get to it …
He heard the rumble of a diesel engine down the street from him and an idea started to form in his mind. The rumble sounded like a delivery truck. Could he call for a Saturday delivery or pickup and sneak out that way?
Preston sat on the couch and folded his hands together like he always did when he was thinking hard. He was smarter than the cops. He was smarter than the FBI agents. He could pull this together. All he needed was a delivery truck to pull into his driveway for a moment … and then a little luck.
And Emma. He had to figure out what to do with Emma. If she hadn’t seen him, he would rape her with a mask on a few times, drive her to Canada or somewhere and just push her out into the wilderness, then let the locals find her. Problem solved. A crime of passion that had nothing to do with him and who he was related to—there would have been no reason to turn a suspicious eye on him. But she had seen him. She had looked right into his face for a split second before he had wrestled her into his car with a rag soaked in chloroform pressed over her face.
So what did that leave? He had to kill her. Kill her and dump her somewhere, then get back and let the whole thing blow over … somehow. He’d never been a criminal before and he never would be again once this was done. He’d find another way to get his billions.
Preston sighed and dropped his head into his hands. How had this all spun so far out of control? A small moment of regret twisted through his soul. He wished he could take it all back. Wished he had never heard of Frank Oberlin, never known the man had been his father, never, ever discovered Oberlin had just under four billion dollars sitting in estate, waiting to go to his next of kin, and certainly never discovered that besides himself, there were three other next of kin who stood to receive that money.
Preston felt a tear drop from his eye and stared at the tiny, dark spot on the carpet below him for a long time. A voice rang through his head. A voice chastising him for being weak, for crying when he should be acting. Preston heeded the voice and picked up his phone. He had work to do.
***
Emma blinked in the darkness and stared up into nothingness, her brain reeling in terror of the unknown. She tried to sit up, but her hands were bound, keeping her laying flat on her back, stretched out on some sort of hard, uncomfortable bed or cot.
“Hello?” she whispered into the darkness, her throat scratchy, sore, and dry. The simple movement of her jaw sent her tongue sn
aking out to wet dry lips. Thirsty. She was so thirsty.
Realization crashed in on Emma and her thin, heady fear began to turn. Anger twisted it and lent her strength. The alley … the man screaming .. she’d rushed in and knelt next to him … asked him what was wrong … he’d muttered something and when she leaned in to hear him better … a towel over her mouth .. she’d held her breath and struggled, fighting him, but he’d thumped her head against the door of his car and the pain had made her gasp, and that was the last she had known.
Anger turned to poisonous rage in Emma’s body. What, did she have some sort of a Please Kidnap Me sign on her back? Wasn’t two kidnappings in one lifetime enough? Just what in the hell made anyone think they could just take someone, force them into a vehicle and take off with them? Resentment for twisted personalities who thought that was acceptable filled her. She was a person! A living, breathing, thinking person who had feelings and thoughts and rights!
Strong and sour emotions coursed through Emma at the unfairness of it, the awfulness of it, the absolute disgusting truth that some people were so sick as to do this. Sound exploded into the room and Emma realized it was coming from her. A dark and caustic screech that bubbled up from the very depths of her soul.
Emma’s mouth shut with a snap, cutting off any further sound as she listened, hard. The scream had sounded … strange. There was something in that strangeness that was important. Something she needed to make note of. Something that could help her escape maybe. Because that was the only thing on her mind. Escape. Well, escape and a drink of water.
