Dark Justice

by Brandilyn Collins

  She hit “Play.” The noise continued. Then at fifty-nine seconds, it stopped.

  Why?

  Emily went back to the beginning again and watched a third time. And a fourth. A fifth and sixth. After seven views, she was sure of one thing.

  The noise had a pattern.

  There was something here, but her laptop didn’t have the software she needed to figure it out.

  She snatched her cell phone off the bed and checked the time: 4:15 a.m. If she left soon she’d get to the office by 5:00. She’d have three hours before anyone else showed up.

  Emily threw on some work clothes and makeup. She grabbed her computer, stuffed it in her laptop bag with wallet and keys, and headed for the door.

  Chapter 15

  SPECIAL HOUSE SELECT COMMITTEE INVESTIGATION INTO FREENOW TERRORIST ACTIVITY OF FEBRUARY 25, 2013

  SEPTEMBER 16, 2013

  TRANSCRIPT

  Representative ELKIN MORSE (Chairman, Homeland Security Committee): Sergeant, I’m now going to turn to the early morning hours of February 25, at the address of 738 Powell Street, San Carlos, California. The home of Hannah Shire. How were you informed of the events that occurred there?

  Sergeant CHARLES WADE (Sheriff’s Department Coastside): Throughout the night I’d been in contact with Deputy Williams, who was running surveillance on the property. Sometime after 3:00 a.m. he stopped responding. At about the same time I was informed by the San Carlos bureau on a possible shots-fired dispatch to that location. I hurried to the address. It took me about half an hour to arrive. There I met San Carlos officer Tim Dunmeyer, who’d checked the house through an unlocked back door and discovered it empty. He reported seeing blood drops in the house, leading out that back door. There seemed to be no sign of forced entry. If the house had been broken into, someone had very efficiently picked the lock. Hannah Shire’s car was not in the garage. Williams’s unmarked van was still parked on the street. He was behind the wheel, dead, with a single gunshot wound to the head.

  MORSE: An unfortunate, sad victim, to be sure. As for Mrs. Shire and her mother, did you think they’d been kidnapped?

  WADE: A neighbor reported seeing Mrs. Shire drive away in her car in the middle of the night. There was no doubt she’d left of her own volition.

  MORSE: So what was your assessment of the situation?

  WADE: I couldn’t be sure. But here now, in a matter of hours, I had a third homicide. Plus—where were Hannah Shire and her mother? Were they hurt? Or had Hannah Shire shot the deputy and taken off?

  MORSE: That isn’t really what you thought, now was it, Sergeant Wade? They were indeed the questions you voiced to the San Carlos bureau, and expected them to act upon. In truth, you knew far more about what had happened that night at the Shire residence, did you not?

  Did you not, Sergeant Wade?

  WADE: You are mistaken. I did not know the details of what happened.

  MORSE: I’m not asking if you knew every detail. I would expect not, since you weren’t present. I am asking: why didn’t the death of Deputy Williams and the disappearance of Hannah Shire and her mother make you believe her story? She’d said she was in danger. Now she was gone, and there was blood in her house. Didn’t you question whether it was her blood?

  WADE: Of course. But as I began questioning neighbors, I learned more.

  MORSE: And a deputy had been killed. One of your fellow law enforcement officers. How could you not face your own culpability in his death?

  WADE: I object to the term culpability.

  MORSE: Really. Just what would you call it, sir?

  Chapter 16

  Monday, February 25, 2013

  My head swam.

  I felt like a refugee—so near to home and yet so far. The night seemed to close in around our car. Mom informed me two more times she had “to go,” and I knew that meant now.

  I didn’t have time for this. But there was no choice. I had to find an all-night grocery store. It would have a bathroom.

  At Woodside Road I turned left toward town, away from the freeway. My own hands wanted to fight the turn. If nothing else I could go to the Safeway at Sequoia Station in Redwood City. The one where I shopped. But my car and license plate felt like glowing neon as I drove down the almost empty road. How long before the people who were chasing us discovered I wasn’t dead? How long until Harcroft and Wade learned I’d bolted?

  I so needed my computer. If I could find a hotel we could hide in for awhile, I’d want to get online, learn more about Morton Leringer. Who was in Raleigh? Someone who could help me out of this mess?

  Without my laptop, I felt more helpless than ever.

  My brain churned and churned—until I realized I was already nearing El Camino. Had I passed an open grocery store? Too late. Turning north on El Camino, I headed toward the familiar Safeway.

  “I have to go.” Mom’s face pinched.

  “I know. We’re almost there.”

  “Why don’t we just go home?”

  “Mom, please—!” I bit down on my frustration, fingers curling into my palms. This was not the time to lose patience with my mother.

  Not the time for her to lose it either.

  I would have to think of something to tell her. Something to keep her quiet and make her just . . . go along with me.

  We reached the store and the near barren, huge parking lot. I pulled into a space and turned off the engine. Mom pulled her hat from the pocket of her coat and put it on.

  “Mom, you can’t wear that right now.” Weren’t we easy enough to spot already? The two of us looking disheveled, Mom in mismatched blue and green? What store employee wouldn’t remember us if she sported her purple hat?

  “Of course I can.”

  “No, you can’t.”

  Her face started to crumble. “Why are you being so mean to me?”

  Tears bit my eyes. I couldn’t do this. Not with Mom. She’d fight me every minute.

  “Listen.” I touched her cheek. “We don’t want people in the store to remember us, okay? And if you wear your hat, you’re always so pretty in it, people will remember.”

  Her eyebrows knit. “What does it matter?”

  “Remember that man in our house? He had a gun. He was going to kill you. If he comes looking for us, we don’t want people remembering they’ve seen us.”

  “Oh.” Confusion twisted my mother’s face, then her eyes caught a glimmer. “Was he trying to find out about Morton’s daughter in Raleigh?”

  “Yes, Mom. He was.”

  My mother’s lips firmed. “Well, we just won’t tell him.”

  “That’s right. So we don’t want him—and the other men he’s working with—to know where we are. Because if they find us, they’ll try to pull the information from us.”

  “They’re bad people.”

  “Very bad.”

  “But they acted so nice when they came to visit.”

  So she’d recognized Samuelson. “They were just trying to trick us.”

  “Oh.”

  “Do you see why you can’t wear your hat?”

  “I do.” Mouth set, Mom placed her hat on the floor of the car. Chin held high, as if she held back the forces of evil, Mom allowed me to herd her into the store, bare-headed.

  After we’d hit the bathroom I thought about food. Mom would be hungry in a few hours. Hustling her around as best I could, I grabbed some donuts—not very nutritious, but Mom loved them—and crackers and cheese. And two large water bottles.

  At the counter, we were both silent. Mom refused to even look at the checker, as if the man were a personal spy for the “bad people.” Still, there were very few customers in the store. And we didn’t look like typical night-shift shoppers. How easy it would be for someone to remember us.

  I hustled Mom to the car, placing the food in the backseat. One w
ater bottle remained up front for us to share.

  We headed south on El Camino. Back up Woodside to 280, then south. I didn’t know where I was going or where I would stop. But we would at least be a little closer to Emily. Not that we could see her, but I couldn’t bear to flee in the opposite direction.

  “Hannah.” Mom’s voice quivered. “We’re in trouble, aren’t we?”

  “I’m afraid so.”

  She pondered my answer. “‘Lord, be gracious to us. We wait for You. Be our strength every morning and our salvation in time of trouble.’”

  With that, Mom leaned against her door and soon fell asleep, her mouth open.

  Around San Jose, I-280 ended. I took Highway 101 south and in time turned east on 152 toward I-5, the long, flat freeway to Southern California. Every car that neared us made me tense. Was it them? Would they try to run me off the road? Before long my back and neck ached.

  I tried to sort things out but came up with the same questions. Again and again I searched for the ability to trust the sheriff’s department so I could call them for help. I so wanted to believe they hadn’t told the “FBI agents” I’d copied that video. But I kept returning to the picture of Samuelson clutching my computer and backup drive even as he staggered out of my house.

  I hit I-5 and turned south.

  The time neared 6:30 a.m. My scratchy eyes fighting to stay open, I took an exit that led to a chain hotel. No way could I drive any longer. And the sun would rise all too soon, making our car all the easier to spot. I pulled into a parking space and cut the engine. Mom slept on. I aimed a dull gaze at her, biting my lip. Leaving her in the car was risky. If she woke up alone, she’d be frightened and might wander off. If I took her inside she’d be safe, but together she and I would be much more identifiable if anyone came looking for us.

  I started the car again and moved to a space I could watch through the hotel door. With any luck, the employee behind the counter couldn’t see the car as well as I.

  Holding my breath, I opened the car door, purse in hand, and slid out. Then I remembered the large gun in my tote bag, lying on the backseat. Couldn’t leave Mom with that.

  Couldn’t take it inside, either. What if somehow I was caught with it? Plus I had my own gun in my purse. They’d think I was out to rob the place.

  The bag could go in the trunk. But closing the trunk might wake Mom.

  I hesitated, then leaned over the front seat and picked up the bag. I pulled my body out of the car and eased my door shut. Peered through the window. Mom didn’t move.

  The few steps to the hotel flamed my body with heat. Was the shape of the gun evident through the tote bag? What if a hotel employee called the police? What if Rutger was following me this very moment? Everything within me wanted to throw wild looks over my shoulder. Was he just waiting until we slipped into a room so he could break down the door? My nerves sizzled and my breaths puffed.

  How could I live like this?

  A tiny voice in my head hissed that I had it all wrong. I’d fallen down a rabbit hole of pure paranoia. My problem wasn’t Bad People chasing me. It was my own delirious brain. Bad People I could run from. My brain, I could not.

  Sweat popped out on my forehead as I opened the door.

  The small lobby sat empty and foreboding. A young woman behind the counter shot me a penetrating look, as if she saw right through me. The sound of a TV filtered from the employee office behind the counter. I tried to smile. It came out lopsided.

  “I need a room for today.”

  “Today? As in checking out at noon?” Her name badge read Tina.

  Of course, what was I thinking? My heart sank. Check-in would be around 3 p.m. “I don’t know if we’ll be out by noon. So maybe I should say for today and tonight.” Would that cost me double? My cash would run out so fast.

  “So, checking out by noon tomorrow?”

  Not that we’d stay here—or anywhere—near that long. “Yes.”

  The hotel had an available room. Two queen beds. “I’ll take it.” I slipped a glance out the front door. Mom still seemed to be sleeping.

  “Okay, I’ll need a credit card.”

  Credit card. That could be traced. “I’d like to pay in cash. I don’t . . . believe in credit cards.”

  Well, not at the moment, anyway.

  “Okaaay. How about a bank debit card?”

  I swallowed. A debit card could be traced too.

  “It’s just to hold funds against your room. If you pay in cash tomorrow, we’ll release the hold right away.”

  But wouldn’t that hold show up in my bank account immediately? Even quicker than a credit card charge.

  I stood there, vacillating. Feeling my face go hot. “Can I just give you cash to hold against the room?”

  “We’d have to take money for three days. Gives us a cushion against incidental charges.”

  Three days. That would be close to $375.00. “Will I get back what I don’t use?”

  “Yes.” Tina regarded me steadily, but I could almost hear her mind working. What kind of person didn’t want to show her credit or debit card? Everything I was doing was making me more memorable.

  Then it hit my tired brain. Even with cash, she’d want to see my driver’s license. I’d still be traceable. But only if the Bad People managed to trace me to this hotel. If I didn’t use a credit or debit card, that would be so much harder.

  I nodded. Tried to smile again. “Okay. I’ll give you cash for three days.” I tilted my purse as I pulled out my wallet so Tina wouldn’t see the gun inside. With trembling fingers I handed over the money. Had Tina noticed? “Sorry. I’ve been driving too long.”

  Her head dipped. “You do look tired. Let’s get you a room so you can rest.”

  She asked to see my driver’s license. With reluctance, I showed it to her.

  “Okay, Mrs. Shire.”

  I winced at the sound of my name.

  Tina gave me the plastic room key in a small holder with the unit number written on it. “You can come through here and go down the hall, or you can park down there a ways”—she pointed—“and go through the outside door closer to the room.”

  “Great. Thanks.”

  I got out of there as fast as possible without seeming obvious. As I slid behind the car wheel, Mom still slept. How I envied her that ability.

  I drove toward the door at the end of the hotel, turned around, and backed into a parking space. Didn’t want my license plate blaring out to the world.

  Wait. A license plate sat on the front of my car as well.

  I closed my eyes, bringing two fingers to my forehead. Such a little thing, yet so big. So indicative that I had no idea what I was doing.

  With some difficulty I woke Mom and got her moving. I gave her the bag of groceries to carry. I gathered my purse, her suitcase, our coats, the tote bag. Loaded down, I struggled to find enough fingers to push the key into the slot and open the outside door into the hotel. When we reached our room, I had to manage the feat a second time.

  Once inside I locked and bolted the door. Dropped everything but the tote on the floor. The bed looked so inviting it almost made me cry.

  Mom looked around, lost. “Is there a bathroom?”

  “In here.” I walked over and turned on the light for her. She went inside and closed the door.

  I hid the tote bag under a pillow on one of the beds. Then sat down hard. Now what? We had so little. I didn’t even have a toothbrush or change of clothes. All I had were two guns, one of them not registered to me. And I had a mother suffering from dementia with needs I wouldn’t be able to meet.

  I had to call Emily, tell her we were okay. Why hadn’t I found a pay phone before checking into a hotel?

  And I needed a different car. Couldn’t keep driving my own with people looking for it. But I couldn’t rent a car without leaving a t
rail.

  Plus I’d soon need more money. But how would I get it without leaving a paper trail?

  My head hung. Hot tears stung my eyes. Lord, please help me. I have no idea what to do.

  Mom shuffled out of the bathroom. Her face drooped with tiredness. I pulled myself together and stood. “We have to call Emily. She’s worried about us.”

  “Okay. I’ll tell her we’re fine.”

  “But we have to use a pay phone.”

  “Oh.” Mom frowned. “Why?”

  “It’s safest.”

  “Oh.”

  I should have done this first. How stupid of me. Now we’d have to go back out and search for a phone at a gas station. More driving around—as the sun rose. More danger.

  Purse over my arm—with gun still inside—I mobilized the two of us and headed for the parking lot. We both wore our coats against the chilled air. In the car I drove to the gas station across the road, already open for the day, but saw no pay phone.

  On the other side of the exit was a second station, also open. Two cars were getting gas. There I spotted a phone—and my heart surged. I pulled up in front of it.

  “Stay in here, Mom, I’ll just be a minute.”

  “I want to talk—”

  “Next time. Right now I have to hurry.”

  I got out before she could protest.

  Breath on hold, I fingered multiple quarters from my wallet and fed the first into the slot. It had been so long since I’d used a pay phone, I hardly remembered how they worked. Or if I had enough coins.

  I dialed Emily’s number and was told how much money to put in for the first three minutes. I fed in the quarters, the ching-ching rattling my nerves. As her line rang I prayed she’d answer the unfamiliar number.

  “Hello?” Emily sounded on edge.

  “It’s me.”

  “Oh! Where are you?”

  “We’re at a hotel off I-5. Not far down from Highway 152. I’m using a pay phone.”

  “No one followed you?”