by D. K. Hood
Jenna examined the books and took copies with her cellphone. The pages for the time of Sky’s disappearance and since were blank. She turned her attention to a cabinet filled with lines of keys, some with labels. “What are those used for?”
“Machinery, toolboxes, the lunchroom and the john.”
She walked over and stared at them. “So the crane and the crusher keys are here too?”
“Yeah.” Sawyer gave her a long, patronizing look. “I can’t leave the keys in the machinery. It’s against health and safety.”
“I see. And I guess it would be difficult for one man to operate the crane and crusher at the same time?” Jenna met the man’s gaze. “I figure a person would have to be highly trained to use it as well?”
“Around here? I would say there would be at least twenty or so NCCCO qualified men working in this area who could drive a crane. It only takes one man, Sheriff.” Sawyer lifted his brows and sighed. “The crusher has a crane attached and an automatic push-button set-up so one man can operate it. Same with the shredder, just one red button.”
“NCCCO?” Jenna made a note. “What does that stand for?”
“That would be the National Commission for the Certification of Crane Operators.” Sawyer leaned casually against his desk. “This is an industrial area and no boss in his right mind would hire anyone without the right credentials. Heavy machinery is in use all over. If you believe someone broke in here and used my crusher, you’ll have a pile of people to talk to.”
Jenna tapped her pen against her bottom lip, running the information through her mind. She came up with a pile of “what ifs” but often they were the triggers to solve a crime. What if the Axman used the crusher to dispose of cars and bodies and had done for some time? Kane had mentioned people and their vehicles vanish daily. Surmising the Axman worked in this location, had a key to the yard, and the skillset to operate the crusher, time would still be a factor. In Sky’s case, the Axman had to tow the car and her body here to crush them, then hightail it out of the area to give the snow time to cover his tracks. He wouldn’t have risked the chance Ella had made it back to the highway and waved down a passing truck to get help.
Her mind went to Doug and Olivia’s disappearance. The Axman could have used one of the wrecked vehicles in the lot to conceal the bodies. She glanced at the shells of rusty vehicles well within reach of the crane, then at the stack of metal cubes, and a shiver of dread crawled up her spine. The Axman killed at night and could have disposed of the bodies in this deserted junkyard. If he could get in and out again fast enough without someone seeing him, it would be the perfect crime.
The sound of Sawyer’s voice dragged her back to the now.
“Is there anythin’ else I can help you with, Sheriff?” He pulled out a tin of chewing tobacco and stuffed a wad into his mouth.
“Just one more question and then the ME will do a sweep of your office and other buildings.” She cleared her throat. “How long does it take to crush a car?”
“Forty-five seconds.”
Thirty-Seven
The walls of the hospital room wavered in Doug’s vision and he gripped the side of the bed, not quite believing what Olivia had said. A rush of euphoria hit him at the possibility of finding Sky alive. He swallowed hard. “Sky is my sister. Is she here?”
“I don’t know but we can ask someone when we look for my mom.” Olivia pulled off the electrodes to her monitoring machine and dragged out all her encumbrances, then slid to her feet. “First we need water. They haven’t given me anything to eat or drink since I arrived. Everything we need to survive is apparently fed through the drip.” Using the wall for support, she staggered toward the sink, took two paper cups from a dispenser and filled them. She drank thirstily, then filled a cup and returned to him. “Here. Take it slow.”
After upending the cup, Doug looked down at his blanket and her paper nightgown. “We’ll need something to wear.”
“I figure our clothes are in those bags by the door.” She pointed at two bulging plastic bags leaning against the wall. “Jim asked the other guy to incinerate them and I guess he forgot, then they argued and stormed out. They haven’t been back since.” She smiled at him. “I guess the nurse forgot to set up the drug-administer machines and that’s why we’re awake now.” She made her way to the bags and peered inside. “Yeah, these are mine and I figure the others are yours.”
“So how come you were awake during their argument and not me?”
She dragged the bags toward him and her. “Jim was visiting me. Even drugged, I can hear and feel everything, like I said before. He enjoys frightening me and threatening to cut out my eyes, it’s like he’s a sadist or something.” She handed him a bag. “Usually the meds in the drug machine knock me out after he leaves.”
Aware of time passing and fighting waves of excruciating pain and nausea, Doug went behind the curtain and struggled into his clothes. He went through the pockets of his jeans and found them empty. “Dammit, I left my cellphone in my truck with Ella.” He blinked a few times. Oh my God, Ella.
“Who is Ella?” Olivia’s voice came through the curtain. “You decent?”
“Yeah.” Doug slid back the curtain with trembling fingers. The pain had increased with the effort of dressing. He swiped at the sweat leaking from his brow. “A friend of my sister. I was with her looking for Sky when we came across the wreck. She’s smart, and she had a shotgun, and if she saw Jim do anything to me she would have gone for help.”
“I hope so.” Olivia glanced around. “We gotta get out of here right now while we have the chance.” She shrugged into her coat and stared in the direction of the doorway, absently picking at the dried blood on her sleeve. “You do know Jim could be just outside that door.”
“There’s only one way to find out.” As Doug struggled into his coat, a cold sweat dampened his skin. He took a few steps across the floor and staggered. Flames of pain washed over him and he leaned heavily against the wall. “Just give me a few seconds to catch my breath.”
“You need pain meds.”
“No thanks.” He slid his hands into the coat pockets and his fingers met the familiar cold metal of his key fob. He distinctly remembered leaving the engine of his truck running to keep Ella warm. “Shit.”
Olivia stared at him, wide-eyed. “What’s wrong?”
“My keys are in my pocket, which means Ella is here too.”
He edged along the wall, then pushed open the swinging doors an inch. He stared both ways in astonishment; he was looking at a dim corridor lit only by a few tiny downlights. His heart raced with the implications of the scene before him; it was as if the hospital room was part of a movie set. Nothing outside fit with any hospital he’d seen before; in fact the place resembled a prison. Alarm bells went off in his head and the adrenaline pumping through him sped up his heart. He allowed the door to shut silently and slumped against the wall. “I’m convinced Jim is involved with the sex-slave industry. We’re not in a real hospital. I figure he’s keeping us here until he can sell us off to the highest bidder.”
“What are we going to do?” Olivia gripped his arm.
He scanned the room. “Open the drawers and search for anything we can use as a weapon.”
Olivia complied and came back with two scalpels. Doug took one of them from her, then looked at her pale worried expression. “If anything happens, go for the neck. You can do a lot of damage with one of these blades.”
“My brother taught me how to defend myself and he told me the only way to win when the odds are stacked against me is to fight dirty.” She held the scalpel in her palm and practiced an upward thrust.
Doug nodded. “Ready?”
“Yeah.” Olivia moved closer to him.
They eased out into the hallway and, keeping their backs to the wall, edged along, peering into the shadows, Doug led the way. The temperature had dropped considerably and cold seeped through his clothes. The lack of windows worried him and with each step he took into the
narrow dim passageway, his senses insisted they were underground. He led the way, checking the rooms as they went and finding only a locker room and a small office with no phone. A cloud of worry settled over him, the place looked deserted and they found no sign of any other wards let alone patients. Ahead, the hall ended in the glint of metal on a pair of double doors. He turned to Olivia. “That might be another ward. Keep behind me.”
She nodded, her eyes appearing dark in her ashen face. “Okay.”
Out of breath and fighting waves of incredible agony, Doug peered through the glass panel in the door then slumped against the wall. Despair caught him by the throat. “It’s not a ward. Looks like we’re alone.”
“So where is the exit?” Olivia gripped his arm with trembling fingers. “We’ve checked everywhere; there has to be a way out.”
Lightheaded, Doug indicated the room. “It has to be in there but I’m not sure if I have the strength to push the darn door open.”
“Come on.” Olivia leaned against the door and it opened with a whine. “Look over there. I can see a door.”
They’d made it halfway across the floor when a rumbling noise echoed through the room, along with the sound of someone whistling. Doug’s heart raced so fast he thought it might burst through his chest. He looked around for somewhere to hide, but it was too late; he stared in horror as the door opened slowly and a gurney slipped inside, with Jim at the helm. The slow smile crossing Jim’s face made Doug take a step back. It was like looking into the face of pure evil.
“Well, look what we have here.” Jim slammed the gurney into him with a maniacal grin.
Red-hot pain seared through Doug and he buckled, falling to his knees. He saw Olivia dart forward, scalpel in hand, and the next moment she flew across the room and hit the wall landing like a rag doll on the floor. Doug tried to get up but failed. “Leave her alone, you asshole!”
He winced as Jim lifted a wrench from the gurney and advanced toward him, swinging it casually in one hand.
“You plannin’ on goin’ somewhere, Doug?”
Thirty-Eight
Saturday, week two
Kane’s day seemed to be going from bad to worse. After completing his workout with Jenna, the first since she had gotten ill, he’d headed out to his garage and discovered his truck had a flat tire. On closer inspection, he found a sharp piece of metal wedged deep in the tread, no doubt picked up during the search of the junk yard. That investigation had been a complete waste of time, they had found nothing of interest and although Wolfe had climbed all over the compactor and any suspicious crushed vehicles collecting samples he’d found no evidence of blood.
Changing the tire and heading into George’s Garage for a replacement had taken time and after calling Jenna to explain the situation he’d avoided going into the office and headed out to chase down two delivery drivers and the mail truck driver.
After finishing night shifts in sub-zero temperatures the men were none too pleased to see him on their doorsteps early on a Saturday morning. It was the same at each house. The men answered each question with a curt “No.” It was as if they had turned into the three wise monkeys—see no evil, hear no evil and speak no evil—just to annoy him. By the time he left the postal worker’s house, he wondered if they all had something to hide.
He slid behind the wheel of his truck, glad to be inside in the warm, and checked his notes. His head hurt like a bitch but he decided to chase down one more lead before returning to the office. Jenna had arranged to interview Ella Tate after lunch and a quick glance at his watch told him time was running short. He turned and rubbed Duke’s ears in the back seat. Curled up asleep, wrapped in his blanket, the bloodhound opened one dark brown eye to look at him before sighing and burying his head in the soft blue covers. “I’ll get you into the office as soon as I can. Although, Maggie is spoiling you and by spring you’ll be too fat to keep up with the horses.”
His last stop would be about a call that came through the information line from the local mailman, John Wright. He punched the mail carrier’s address into the GPS and turned his truck onto the road. Ice crystals had formed around his windows even with the blast of hot air from the heater, and snow piled up on the wiper blades with each pass over the windshield. Saturday in Black Rock Falls was normally busy, with people milling around, but this morning the town was unusually quiet. Apart from the odd bundled up person walking a dog and the smoke from the chimneys, he would have thought the entire town had headed south for the winter. No doubt, the predicted blizzard was keeping everyone at home. He negotiated the blinding white streets and turned into a driveway. Leaving his engine running to keep Duke warm, he made his way with care along the partially cleared pathway to the front door.
His boots crunched on the small patches of ice as he ducked under the icicles hanging from the front porch to peer through the falling snow at the festive wreath hanging on the front door, looking for a bell or knocker. Finding neither, he rapped on the door with his knuckles. The sound of music drifted through the door and the blinking green and red lights of a Christmas tree reflected against the snow-covered windowsills.
The door opened a crack and a young girl looked up at him with big blue eyes, blonde curls tumbling over her shoulders. Her face broke into a wide smile. He smiled back, appreciating the ray of sunshine on a bleak day. “I’m Deputy Kane, is your dad home?”
“I’ll tell him.” She frowned. “But I have to shut the door. You stay there.”
The door closed and a few moments later opened again. A man in his thirties, tall and robust with thick brown hair, peered at him. “Mornin’, Deputy, what can I do for you?’
Kane pulled out his notebook. “John Wright? You called in on our hotline about the missing woman?”
“Yeah, that’s me.” Wright looked at him expectantly.
Kane winced as a snowflake melted and slid down his neck. “I’d like some more information, if you have time?”
“Sure do.” Wright stepped back and glanced at his snow-covered coat. “Why don’t you leave your coat in the mudroom? We can talk in the kitchen. Jilly has just made a jug of hot chocolate.” He waved to a small room filled with coats and boots close to the front door.
“Thanks.” Kane kicked the snow from his boots and wiped them clean on the mat before stepping into the house. He removed his gloves, then shrugged out of his coat and found an empty peg on the wall in the mudroom to hang it.
The house smelled of hot chocolate, cinnamon and freshly baked cake. Kids peered at him from around corners. As he followed Wright along the hallway, he glanced into the family room complete with a deliciously warm log fire. A small woman with a mass of blonde curls and the same big blue eyes as her daughter welcomed him as if she had known him for years.
“Come on in, you look frozen.” She gestured to a seat. “Sit down. I have hot chocolate and fresh-baked cookies straight from the oven if you’re hungry?”
Kane smiled at her. “Thanks, that would be great.” He sat down in his appointed chair and Wright sat down opposite.
“This is my wife, Jilly.” Wright leaned forward in his seat, cradling a cup between his hands. “She convinced me to call. It sounds a bit trivial but the newsreader did say if we’d seen or heard anythin’ unusual to call in, so I did.”
Kane nodded in thanks as Mrs. Wright gave him a cup of hot chocolate and pushed a plate of cookies in front of him. As much as he wanted to devour them like the Cookie Monster, he laid his notepad on the table and lifted his pen, then looked at Wright. “What do you have for me?”
“Two things. One might not be much but the other might be important. Being a postal worker, I get to see the daily lives of people more than most.” Wright dropped his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “You heard of a man by the name of Jeff Knox? He is out of Blackwater, drives a pickup on a regular run a few times a week from Blackwater to here at night and has priors. The sheriff charged him with raping a hitchhiker. He never made it to court. I hear the Blackwater
DA didn’t find enough proof or somethin’?”
Kane made notes, then gave in to the temptation and helped himself to a cookie. “What makes you figure he’s involved?”
“I overheard someone talking in the line at Aunt Betty’s. They said someone saw Knox carrying a woman into the Blackwater Motel, same night that young woman went missin’. They mentioned his name.” Wright gave him a smug smile. “And I just happen to know who that was; his name is Ty Aitken and he opened that fancy bakery in Blackwater, last fall.”
The lead was hearsay at best but he wrote down the information. It wouldn’t hurt to shake down Aitken and see what fell out. He sipped the hot chocolate. “You mentioned two things?” He bit into a cookie. Not as good as Jenna’s chocolate chip, but very tasty.
“Yeah, it is probably nothin’ but I often see Doc Weaver on the road up in the industrial area. I pass her on Tuesdays as I’m heading out of town and she’s on her way back. I guess she has a patient out that way but yesterday she passed me on the highway heading way too fast and took the turn to the industrial area.” Wright shrugged. “Seemed strange considerin’ everywhere up there is closed.”
I need to dig a bit deeper on Doctor Weaver. A shiver slid across Kane’s neck and he lifted his gaze from his notes. “What time do you normally see her?”
“On Tuesdays, around four, but yesterday, I was held up by the snowplow, darn thing goes so slow, I didn’t get to my last stop until late, maybe four thirty, or it could have been later.” Wright scratched his chin. “I didn’t get back to the post office until way after five and my boss was none too pleased.”
Kane finished his hot chocolate and closed his notepad. “Thanks, you’ve been very helpful. If you hear or see anything else, give me a call.” He pulled a card from his pocket and slid it across the table, then stood. “Thanks for the drink and cookies.”
