Disarming Phil was a great option, but she didn’t possess those kinds of skills. That option would get her shot the quickest.
She could wait and see...but hadn’t she heard never to go with an abductor, not to cooperate? She’d already done that—a mistake, but one she’d seen no help for—and it didn’t make sense to her to compound that mistake by staying passive.
That left running. The path to the construction site of the museum was the obvious choice, which was probably why Phil had positioned himself between her and that pathway.
What about...
Their beach—hers and Matt’s—was only a quarter mile or so away. Hadn’t he told her there was a kayak hidden there, too? Another place he’d used to store the boats that had let him escape his life with his dad.
She couldn’t know for sure if the boat was usable. And she’d have to paddle through open ocean from here to the Hamilton Estate. Treasure Point itself was too far. So she’d still have to run through the woods, get the kayak, paddle away without getting shot and from there...would there be people she recognized at the construction site now, or just more of Phil’s guys, ready to manhandle her into the back of another truck and then who knew where?
Gemma didn’t know. But it was all she had.
As soon as he was distracted, she ran. Again. Feet pounding the same Georgia dirt they’d pounded against ten years ago when she’d run from this same man.
Except this time she was less afraid. This time she didn’t wonder what would happen, didn’t harbor the same level of anxiety. God had brought her through the past ten years right up until now, even when she hadn’t believed He was watching over her, hadn’t acknowledged that He cared about her anymore. So whatever happened now, He’d bring her through it. She knew now, from experience, that He gave strength. Grace. And, hopefully, speed.
Gemma didn’t dare glance behind her as she ran, knowing it would only slow her down. Dirt flew up, leaves crunched under her and she pushed through the brush anywhere it had grown over the trail. She was pretty sure she’d have several scratches on her arms when this was done, but right now she wasn’t taking the time to check. A little blood on her forearms was better than being dead.
And then she was there, safely at the beach and when she looked around, she was still alone. He hadn’t followed her? She couldn’t decide if that comforted or concerned her. If he wasn’t following her, what was his plan?
It didn’t matter right now. All that mattered was that she did the best she could to save herself.
She found the kayak tied to an old piece of driftwood at the edge of the beach. She untied it, thankful she’d found it, and then remembered. Paddle. She needed a paddle. Had Matt mentioned where he kept that?
Panicked, she looked around the kayak, didn’t see it anywhere. Finally she glanced inside the boat itself. There it was, broken into two pieces for storage purposes. She snapped it together, dragged the boat down to the ocean.
God, please let this work.
And then she was out in the open water, the waves by the shore gently rocking her boat up and down. The water would only get more rough the farther out she went.
Gemma hoped she wasn’t just moving from one type of certain death to another.
* * *
When both he and Ryan were in his truck—he’d had to turn in his patrol car when he’d been put on leave—Matt had immediately started for the dock. Whitetail Island had already served as the hiding place for two bodies; it seemed a likely location for whoever was behind this to stash one more. The thought made his stomach revolt. He would do anything he could to prevent Gemma from becoming another missing body. And one way or another, this was going to end today.
Matt just hoped it ended the way he wanted it to. With Gemma alive and willing to forgive him for being an idiot and ever even considering letting her go.
His truck practically flew down the road, kicking up dust and throwing rocks. Matt didn’t care. He couldn’t be too late to save Gemma.
Not that he didn’t think she could take care of herself. She’d proved that she had a sharp mind, could pay attention to details, could get herself out of some scary situations.
But this was different. This was a face-to-face showdown with a man who wanted her dead. A man who’d already killed the three other people who had gotten in his way.
Matt swallowed hard, jammed his foot down a little harder on the gas, not easing up until their destination came into view.
“The docks?” Ryan asked.
“We need to head to Whitetail Island.” It was just a hunch, but it was the best he had.
A patrol car pulled in beside him as soon as he’d opened the door. For a second, Matt thought his part in this was over. He was going to be forced to sit on the sidelines and wait to hear if Gemma was rescued or not.
But instead of the chief or Lieutenant Davies, both of whom probably would have benched him for good, it was Clay.
“Hey,” he said in his easy way as he climbed out of his patrol car. “What are you doing over here? Not going back to Whitetail Island to investigate more, are you? Aren’t you off the case?”
Off the case and maybe out of a job.
“Listen, Gemma’s gone. The killer has her and I need to find her now.”
“And you think they’re at Whitetail?” Clay shook his head. “This area has been my patrol this morning, and I’ve kept a close eye on any boats, any activity out here at all. No one has gone that way.”
“No one? You’re sure?”
“Positive.”
Only seconds passed before Matt climbed back into his truck. Clay was not only a coworker, he was a friend, had been for a long time. Matt trusted him.
Clay knocked on Matt’s window before Matt could put the truck in gear. He rolled it down.
“Where are you headed?”
“Back to the Hamilton Estate. We didn’t see any evidence that they were still there, but there are trails in the woods. I guess we’ll check those.”
Clay nodded. “I’ll follow you.” He turned to his truck, paused, then turned back around. “There’s also another place those trails connect to, farther down the road. Have you been down there?”
Matt had forgotten about it. But he nodded now, remembering going that way with buddies once or twice when they went hunting on someone else’s land near there as high schoolers. “I think I know where you mean. You lead.”
“See you there.” And Clay was back in his car driving away, Matt and Ryan following close on his tail.
The dirt road past the Hamilton Estate was at least as dusty as the road to town, and since he was following another car now, visibility was even worse for Matt. He fought to keep his eyes on the road while keeping his speed up as high as he dared.
The road ended in a small clearing, nothing remarkable or memorable. Matt threw the truck into Park, opened his door and ran to the edge of the woods. “This way, right?” He turned to confirm with Clay, already set to take off when he got confirmation.
“Stop.” Clay shook his head. “We can’t just run in there.”
“Why? He’s got her, we don’t. So we go.” Even as he said it, Matt knew it didn’t follow standard operating procedure, something he’d always done his best to follow down to the letter in his desperation to win approval. Right now none of that mattered, though. If what he was doing now was the last nail in the coffin of his career and saved Gemma? It would be worth it. Anything would be worth it.
Because he loved her.
“Let’s get a plan together. You’re thinking with your heart, man, but we’ve got to use our heads, too.”
Matt nodded, eyes still focused on the paths through the woods that he believed would lead him to Gemma. “All right. Two minutes. You lay out a plan because you can think straight. And then we’re going in.”
Please don’t let two minutes be too long.
* * *
The waves tossed Gemma with more force than she’d expected. Salty spray hit her in t
he face as she struggled to jam the paddle back into the water, push herself forward one more time. The wind tossed her hair around, long dark strands of it sometimes obscuring her vision. Surely it couldn’t be far now. She squinted at the shoreline. Almost there. The Hamilton Estate had a little dock on a corner of land closest to the house, and that was where she was aiming.
God, please help.
It was all the prayer she could articulate, but her spirit meant it with everything within her, and her trust in God to hear her filled her with something that felt a lot like faith, like the faith she’d had before everything happened.
“Thank You.” She whispered that one because He had helped her already. If nothing else, He’d helped her find her way back to Him, and there on the stormy gray-green ocean waves, something inside her finally felt at peace.
Whole.
Gemma paddled harder, determination growing with every stroke. She did the best she could to ignore the pain in her still-broken wrist, wishing she didn’t have that working against her. Kayaking had been her only chance to stay alive—still was—and she wasn’t going down without a fight. The dock grew larger in her vision and she aimed her kayak straight for it. The current ran this way and even though she had to fight with the waves now, it would be even more of a challenge to try to get back to the dock if she missed it. She had one shot at this. If it didn’t work, she’d have to abandon this plan and try to kayak all the way into Treasure Point through marsh grass that would block her view.
This was it. She had to do it. Hands grasping the paddle tightly, she pushed one more time. Got it. The boat hit the dock and she reached with her hands, holding on to the old wood planks for dear life. A wave hit, slamming her into the dock and capsizing the kayak. Then it was gone, pulled back out when the waves went, and Gemma scrambled up onto the dock, dripping wet, but still alive.
For now.
She crept into the woods, doing her best to be as quiet as possible. From here, she’d need to turn right onto a narrow game trail that paralleled the shore, then work her way back left toward the—
“Hello, Gemma.”
Hard steel jammed between her shoulder blades. She almost couldn’t swallow. Couldn’t breathe.
How had Phil gotten behind her? And how had he known where she’d be?
He chuckled. She hated it, wished she could plug her ears, make it go away—the worst sound she’d ever heard. “Did you really think you could climb into a boat like some kind of adventurer and somehow get away from what you deserve? It was logical to wait for you here—where else could you have gone? You broke your word, Gemma. And you have to pay.”
“Broke my word?”
“Yes, I let you live a decade ago because I thought it was understood that you would keep quiet. When you never gave the police my name, I thought you’d agreed.”
“But I didn’t.”
He jammed the gun tighter. “Arguing? Aren’t you supposed to beg for mercy at this point?” More laughter. “That’s what everyone else has done. All four of them so far.”
“Four?”
“That’s right. Four. No one will ever link me to that fourth. Now.” He used the gun to push her forward a foot or two. “I’m going to bury you right here, so you may as well be close. You’ve caused me enough trouble. Which is why I’m looking forward to killing you more than any of the o—” A gunshot cut him off.
Gemma closed her eyes, waited for the pain, for the nothingness.
Instead, the pressure on her back eased and Phil crumpled to the ground. She swung around and looked at his body. Dead.
Gemma looked up. Friend or foe? After walking up on the argument between gang members last time, she knew that fights within a crime ring could turn deadly. Yes, the shooter wanted Phil dead, but that didn’t mean he wanted Gemma to stay alive. She wasn’t going to calm down until she knew it was a law enforcement officer who was her rescuer. Movement caught the corner of her eye, maybe fifty yards away. Not an officer, at least not one in uniform.
Michael O’Dell.
Matt’s father.
SEVENTEEN
Matt, Clay and Ryan had been moving through the woods slowly until they heard the shot.
Then they ran. Clay was in front at first, and Matt tried to overtake him, determined to find her first but before he caught up, a guy he didn’t recognize wearing a construction outfit appeared out of nowhere and pulled a weapon from the waist of his pants. Leveled it at Clay.
“No!” Matt shot and the man fell.
Matt glanced at him, indecision making him almost useless. He had to get to Gemma.
“I’ve got him. You go get her.” Clay already had his handcuffs off his belt, was moving toward the suspect.
Matt nodded and took off running again, hearing the footsteps behind him that said Ryan was right on his heels. The two of them were close to the end of the trail, approaching the clearing where Gemma had first stumbled upon the crime ring hiding their loot.
The first he noticed—even from far away—was blood, pooled on the ground underneath what looked like a human body. And his whole world stopped. Matt had thought things were bad when his mom left and he realized she wasn’t coming back. Had thought the way his dad loved alcohol more than his son was bad enough. But the realization that he was looking at what had to be Gemma’s body was worse than any of those, worse than both of them together.
More than he could take.
Anger felt like fire building in his veins and he ran closer, ready to find the man who had done this when he realized...it wasn’t Gemma’s body.
The body belonged to a man. One more glance at the gruesome sight confirmed the body was wearing a postal uniform. Phil? Phil Winters? It almost couldn’t compute in Matt’s brain that the older man had been the one who’d so desperately wanted Gemma dead.
“That’s the guy?” Ryan asked. Matt then heard him throw up somewhere behind them. “Sorry, I’m not used to stuff like this.”
“Don’t apologize. No one should have to be.” Sometimes Matt wondered if citizens realized how much police officers gave up to do the job they did, wondered if anyone ever appreciated the hate and hurt and gore they absorbed every day so the general public wouldn’t have to. He looked around the area, and his eyes landed on the last man he’d ever expected to see again.
“Dad.”
And it was as if someone had taken the world, turned it upside down and shaken it. And Matt wasn’t even sure yet if the world would ever right itself, stop spinning. Because there was his dad.
And then Matt noticed the gun. “I need an explanation.”
His dad pointed. “She’s down there, on the beach somewhere. You should find her before she tries to escape and hurts herself. I tried to tell her I wouldn’t hurt her...”
But she hadn’t believed him. Matt didn’t blame her. He still wasn’t sure he believed it, either.
“Come with me,” Matt ordered. “Leave the weapon here.”
He nodded, followed Matt as he’d been asked to do.
Matt made his way down to the beach, visually scanned it until he noticed footprints in the sand, places where it looked kicked up. The trail led under the dock.
“Sit down,” he told his dad. “Watch him.” Those words were directed to Ryan.
“Matt?” The soft voice from underneath the old dock was the most beautiful one he’d ever heard.
“Gemma. You’re alive. You’re alive and I’m an idiot for ever letting you go, for not telling you how I’ve felt about you ever since high school PE class.”
“Your dad. He shot him.”
“Shot Phil?”
He’d made his way to the front of the dock now, and he could see Gemma underneath it, way in the back. He held out a hand and she crawled out. “Yes. He shot him and I didn’t know for sure if he was really on our side or if he’d be after me, too, but there was nowhere to run anymore. So I stopped running. I hid and I prayed.” She looked up at him, gave the smallest hint of a smile. “And you cam
e.”
He squeezed her hand. “I’m sorry for what I said, for how I left the other day.”
“I needed to hear it. You were right, Matt. But that’s in the past, just like everything else. Let’s try to move on.”
Matt lifted her face to his, locked his eyes with hers to make sure she’d hear his next words. “I’d love to move on if it’s with you. I love you, Gemma Phillips.”
“I love you, too.”
* * *
Gemma couldn’t believe how quickly crowds of law enforcement descended on what had been a desolate spot in the woods. Some came, she gathered from hearing conversations, to take away the construction worker who worked for Phil and had been shot. According to that man, who’d been happy to give them all the details the police wanted about the crimes he’d committed when he heard it might lessen his sentence, there were three other construction workers who’d been on Phil’s payroll. The chief dispatched several officers to round them up, but didn’t seem too worried about catching them.
“You’re sure you’re okay?” Gemma’s dad had gotten to the scene right away.
“I’m fine, Daddy.” Gemma glanced over at Matt, who stood near his own dad, watching him be handcuffed for the second time in Matt’s life. Matt said something to his dad, brushed at his own cheek and then walked her way.
“What will happen to him? He saved my life.”
Matt nodded. “I know. Everyone else knows now.” He shrugged his shoulders. “I don’t know what will happen to him. But I think I’ll go visit this time. He...he did a lot of things wrong...” Matt reached for Gemma’s hand and squeezed it. “But if he really broke out of jail for the reasons he says—because he heard about Phil stalking you and wanted to stop him—then maybe he’s done something right, too.”
“He could have made things a lot easier on everyone by just telling the authorities about Phil. But I suppose he had his reasons for keeping quiet on that point. And given the lengths he went to, to make things right, he should get a lesser sentence,” Gemma’s dad agreed. “Also, Matt...we were wrong about you, Gemma’s mom and I. I want you to know we are sorry for the way we treated you when you were a guest in our house.” He smiled at Gemma. “Our daughter is special to us. We may be a bit overprotective. But we look forward to getting to know more about who you are. Not who your family is, although as you said, there may even be some good there, too.”
Cold Case Witness Page 17
