by Joe Hart
He would do it.
Liam pushed away from the rock without a sound, muscles bunching into knots in his thighs. He gauged the distance to the figure to be a little over twelve feet. Intertwined pine branches partially blocked his way. He would have to be fast. Liam took several quick breaths, vision vibrating in time with his heart. He leaned forward, a downhill skier beginning his run.
And stopped.
Dani’s face floated through his mind again. She wore a black veil and her eyes; they were empty save for the tears that clouded them.
The man turned back the direction he had come and picked his way through the rock flow, away from where Liam crouched. He watched his attacker grow fainter until he was only a shadow mixed with the night, his footfalls trailing back in short susurrations.
Liam collapsed into the pine needles, their soft touch like that of a lover. He willed his heart to slow and closed his eyes before cursing himself. No matter the pleadings of his rational mind telling him he might have died or he might have killed Valerie’s kidnapper in the attempt to disarm him, a sour pulse of self-disgust continued to beat in his veins. There would be no other chance like the one he’d just given up.
He listened to the night air, its chill invading his coat, cooling the ache in his chest and stomach. Settling deeper into the needles he wrapped his arms around himself, grimacing with the effort. He would listen and wait. If the man came back, he would have to be ready. He would have to be fast. So fast.
His assurances followed him into a fitful sleep glazed with dreams of shadows smiling with shining teeth like the grille of a truck.
CHAPTER 21
When he woke it was still dark and he was welded to the ground.
He thought for a moment that someone had come and driven long spikes through his chest and shoulders, pinning him to the earth, but then he moved and the pain dropped over him in a waterfall of awareness. Every muscle fiber was a rusted strand of wire, his nerves telling him this over and over as he sat up, his air whistling out between his teeth in what normally would have been a scream.
Liam climbed to his feet, supporting himself on a rock and looked around. He must’ve passed out for a few hours. Dawn was only a suggestion in the east but the feeble light it possessed cast the side of the hill in a ghostly spray of monochrome. Frost encased everything down to the last fallen leaf.
He watched the hillside for five minutes, then climbed from his hiding place. He moved slowly back to the route he’d taken down the incline, pausing carefully at the largest boulders in case his attacker was concealed and waiting above. When no bullets rained down, he climbed upward, his body protesting like a machine left in the rain for years, corrosion on every joint. He tried to control his breathing, his mouth and throat a channel dried to parchment. When he arrived at the wall of brush he’d pushed through hours before, he stopped, hearing a faint sound in the distance.
Someone was calling his name.
He shoved his way through the gap he’d made earlier and hurried as fast as he could up the narrow trail. Near the top he had to pause to catch his breath, and as he heaved in air he heard his name yelled again. It was a woman’s voice, not far away and coming closer.
Perring.
Liam grabbed at roots and saplings, yanking himself up the last stretch of hill until he stood on level ground. Caulston’s yard was beyond, the blades of grass lit by the spill of headlights. He stumbled and almost fell coming through the last of the trees, halting as he nearly ran into Perring who held out her gun in both hands.
“Liam! Fuck, I almost shot you.” She lowered her weapon. “Oh my God, what happened to you?”
“He was here,” Liam said, trying to swallow saliva that didn’t exist. “He followed me and hit me with my truck.” Perring holstered her gun and turned to glance at the odd angle of his pickup still resting on the concrete stoop leading into the house.
“How?”
“Left the keys in it.”
“Are you okay?”
“Doesn’t feel like it.”
“Let me help you.” She looped one of his arms over her shoulders and supported his weight the best she could. They crossed the yard to her sedan, which idled behind his silent truck. “When you didn’t come back I called your phone and when you didn’t answer I came out here.” She eyed the damage to the house and swore quietly. “I’ll call this in. You’re sure it was him?”
Liam drew his arm away from her and limped around the end of his truck, examining the frosted grass. After a minute of searching he bent and pulled his Sig from the ground, tucking it into the holster at the small of his back. He gazed around the area, dropping to his knees to look beneath the pickup before rising with a groan.
“I’m sure,” he finally said.
“Why?”
“Because Valerie’s diary is gone.”
Perring drove through the waking city, lights of other cars shining across Liam’s closed eyes as he dozed in the passenger seat. Even as exhaustion tried to drag him beneath the waves of sleep, he returned to everything that had happened the night before, poring over all he could remember clearly. He analyzed the attacker’s gait; how he held his shoulders, his height, general build. He hadn’t been able to see the exact make and model of the gun he’d carried, but Liam knew it was a compact pistol of sorts, possibly a .380 caliber by the sound of the report in the garage.
“I’m bringing you to the hospital,” Perring said.
Liam opened his eyes. “No.”
“You were hit by a truck.”
“It wasn’t going very fast.”
“I know guys can be really dumb, but you may be vying for the world title. You’re really setting new standards for the stupidity of your gender.”
“That’s me, always raising the bar.”
“Seriously, you need to see a doctor.”
“Have a paramedic come to Owen’s. I’m feeling better already.”
“You’re so full of shit,” Perring muttered. But when the pulled to a stop at the intersection leading to Owen’s home, she turned toward it instead of in the opposite direction toward St. Luke’s.
When they arrived, Owen’s driveway was packed with vehicles. Most of them were doppelgangers of Perring’s sedan but there were several squads and one nondescript conversion van with blackened windows. Inside the house the largest congregation of officers and investigators Liam had seen yet milled around the dining room table. The house smelled of coffee and competing colognes. He and Perring walked into the dining room and dozens of eyes took in his ripped jeans and hunched form. After a moment of silence Heller cleared his throat.
“Uh, detective? We have the final arrangements here from the coast guard.”
“Thanks, I’ll go over them with you in a second.” She turned to Liam. “You go sit down someplace. You look like hell in the light.”
“You’re such a charmer,” Liam said, moving into the living room.
Owen sat on the couch, his face in his long-fingered hands. He looked up as Liam entered the room.
“Liam?” Owen stood and took in his appearance. “Where the hell have you been?”
“I got waylaid at Caulston’s. I ran into the kidnapper, or actually he ran into me. I don’t know if he followed me or if there were other reasons for him stopping by.”
“Like what?”
“Like if Caulston was on his list.”
“Why would someone want to kill Caulston?”
“I don’t know. Doesn’t seem to fit with the modus operandi. I’m thinking it was an ambush for me. We’re getting close to the truth, and with Davis still missing it’s more likely he’s this guy’s next target, or he’s already been crossed off the list.”
Owen stared at him, his eyebrows drawn, taking in the extent of his injuries. “You need to see a doctor.”
“Don’t say that in front of Perring, I just got her convinced otherwise.” Liam moved to sit on the arm of a chair but took in the filth and blood that stained his jeans and
thought better of it. “The diary was there, but he took it from me. I’m sorry, Owen.”
“Don’t be. You did what you could. I can’t ask any more of you.”
“Did you get any rest?”
“Not much. I bet you’re exhausted.”
“Getting there. No more contact or demands?”
“None. I think he said everything he was going to say yesterday.” Owen turned to the window and the dawning sun across the lake. “This is going to be the longest day of my life. Longer even than the last three. I can’t stand the waiting. It’s like each minute is a sliver underneath my fingernails going deeper.” He glanced over one shoulder, his face so pale he appeared wraithlike in the strange morning light. “Nothing will ever be the same after this, will it?”
Even though it was more of a statement than a question, Liam said, “No, it won’t. But that doesn’t mean things will be worse. When Valerie is home safe and this bastard is locked up you’ll have time to come to terms with what happened. Right now everything’s out of focus, but it will get clearer. You’ll have each other to make it clear.”
Owen looked away and resumed studying the sunrise. Liam watched him for another second before leaning against the closest wall. It wasn’t long before Perring stepped up beside him and said, “Liam, the paramedic’s here.” He nodded, moving to the dining room where a handsome black paramedic with a name tag reading Paul waited holding a duffle bag.
“The detective here tells me you’re afraid of hospitals,” Paul said as they walked toward the main-floor bathroom.
“Not afraid, just hate them. Babies are the only good thing that come out of them,” Liam said.
Paul huffed a laugh and motioned to a stool in one corner of the room. “Why don’t you take your shirt and pants off and have a seat.”
Liam stripped to his boxers, wincing again at the movement of bringing his arms over his head. It felt as if he’d been caught in a car crusher that had relented at the last minute and left him alive. When Paul had donned latex gloves and laid out an array of tools, gauze, and vials, he glanced at Liam’s back, letting out a low whistle.
“Damn, man, you got some mileage on you already.”
“I guess you could say that.”
Paul began to examine the lacerations on his back from where he’d landed on the glass, asking the occasional question every few minutes. There were several deft tugs and then a cool burning as the paramedic applied disinfectant to the wounds. When that was done, he had Liam stand and examined his chest and ribs, prodding painfully at each one with gloved fingers before having him open his mouth then moving onto the shallow cuts dotting the front of his legs.
“Well, you’re damn lucky, my friend,” Paul said, stripping the gloves from his hands. “The cuts on your back and legs are superficial, you don’t need any stitches. You have a lot of bruising on your torso but no broken ribs, though the very bottom one on the left side might be cracked. You got a cut on your tongue that’s clotted, won’t need any stitches. My official diagnosis is you should take up a different career.”
Liam chuckled. “Only thing I know how to do.”
“Then be more careful,” Paul said, cleaning up his equipment.
“This is me being more careful.”
“Then I’d say see my prior recommendation.”
Liam laughed. “Thanks for the advice, and the patch up.”
“No thanks needed, you take care.”
Paul left and Liam locked the door behind him, then faced the mirror over the sink. His hair was in disarray and black half moons hung below his eyes. Dark stubble coated his cheeks and chin. His chest was covered in a purplish hue that yellowed at its edges.
“You look like shit,” he said to his reflection.
He dressed as quickly as he could in the last set of clean clothes he’d packed. As he pulled on a warm, knitted sweater there was a knock at the door.
“Yeah?”
“It’s Perring. Can I come in?” Liam unlocked the door and she stepped inside, glancing at the pile of his bloodied clothes on the floor. “I want to hear everything that happened at Caulston’s. Start at the beginning.”
He sighed and motioned to the toilet. “Mind if I take the throne? My legs are tired.”
“Be my guest.”
Liam sat and began relaying everything that had transpired, after leaving the night before. He hesitated at the portion of his story where he had faltered instead of trying to apprehend the kidnapper. Perring must have noticed because when he’d finished she said, “You’re beating yourself up, aren’t you?”
He shrugged. “I missed my chance. Who else do I have to blame?”
“If what you said was accurate, he’d have heard you coming and instead of talking to you, there’d be men hauling your corpse out of the woods right now. You made the right choice.”
“Doesn’t feel like it.”
“When you’re a cop all the choices feel wrong sometimes.”
He gave her a tired smile. “I’m not a cop.”
“Could’ve fooled me.”
“I think I’m just trying to fool myself. You were right, I’m not so sure anymore of my motivations here.”
“You want to help your friend.”
“I do.”
“You want to get Valerie back.”
“Yes.”
“Then I’d say your motivations aren’t something you need to worry about.”
He wanted to say more to her. Tell her about the fear that had driven him to threaten and hurt Houston and Richard, but the moment passed and Perring changed the subject. “Paul fixed you up?”
“There wasn’t a whole lot of fixing to do.”
“Umm hmm.”
“No really. He gave me a clean bill of health.”
“You’re trying to stay on this no matter what, huh?”
“I want to see it through. You’d do the same.”
She appraised him for a beat, then nodded. “Everything’s arranged for the exchange. There were no leads on anyone asking questions or acting suspicious down at the harbor. The cameras at the high school turned up nil as well.”
“How’s that possible? He must’ve been driving a car. He wasn’t leading Valerie around on foot.”
“I don’t know but there wasn’t anything on the tape. No one in or out of the parking lot after sunset. I also dispatched a crime scene team to Caulston’s house. They should have something for us before tonight. At the very least we’ll have a ballistics report on the weapon that he used in the garage.”
“Hopefully it matches the rounds collected at Rowe’s.”
“It would make things easier, that’s for sure.”
Liam lowered his head and ground one fist into the opposite palm. “If I could’ve just gotten the diary . . .”
“You don’t know that there would’ve been anything of use in there.”
“No, I don’t know.” He raised his head. “But I can feel it.”
“Regardless, it’s gone. We have to move forward with what we do know.”
“Which is what?” Liam asked. “We know only what we’ve been allowed to know. We’re being led like lambs to slaughter. Don’t you feel it?”
Perring’s eyes hardened. “I feel like we’ve done the best we can with what we have.”
He wanted to say more, to dig at the wound and open it up fully so that it could bleed. But then he saw her feeling her pants pockets again for cigarettes that weren’t there and his anger deflated.
“Any update on Rex?” Liam asked.
A cloud dimmed Perring’s features. “He’s about the same. Hasn’t woke up yet but his vitals have improved. The doctors are hopeful.”
“He’s going to make it.”
She nodded and seemed to come back to herself from far away. “Owen’s sleeping now and you should do the same.”
“I still need—”
“You need to rest. I’m putting you in charge of Owen tonight when everything goes down.” She paused. “The
re was a complication with the boat we didn’t foresee.”
“What was it?”
“There is no below deck on The Mare. It’s a simple trawler with only a small cabin at the front. There’s no room to hide a SWAT team anywhere.”
“Son of a bitch,” Liam said. “He picked it out specifically.”
“Yeah.”
“Is there any way to modify it to fit the men inside?”
“Not in this short a time. Besides, I don’t want to risk him seeing us messing around with the boat before it leaves the harbor tonight. He could execute Valerie simply because he didn’t like what we were doing.”
“But how are you going to have police presence there? You can’t just hand the money over and hope he plays fair.”
“We have an army helicopter waiting at the airport that will have a SWAT team on board. They’ll be in the air and in contact with the captain of The Mare the entire time as well as with our surveillance boat. The moment the exchange is made they’ll be there. He shouldn’t have more than a two-minute head start.”
Liam shook his head. “I don’t like it. There’s too many variables left open. Too many things could go wrong.”
“What would you have me do?” Perring yelled. The acid in her voice startled him. “Tell me, Liam, because I’d love to know where I’m falling short.”
He opened his mouth to reply but a knock came from the other side of the door.
“Everything okay in there?” Heller’s voice.
“Fine. We’re fine,” Perring said, opening the door and disappearing down the hallway. Heller stood framed in the doorway as though he wanted to say something, but in the end he simply nodded once and moved out of sight as well.
Liam rose and gathered his things before walking to the living room. Owen stood near the windows but he didn’t spot Perring anywhere in the kitchen or dining room.
Exhausted, he sat on the couch and leaned into its soft folds. For a time he searched for another tack that could give them the upper hand when evening arrived, but came up with nothing. The kidnapper had planned this out too well. He reached out and drew Alexandra’s diary to him, turning the pages arbitrarily, and came upon the very last passage she had written.
