Taylor nodded slowly. “Come with me,” he said, his voice suddenly hoarse. He turned and started walking toward one of the clusters of cops farther ahead.
Jeremiah was impressed at how Cindy had manipulated him. Hopefully she could do it a couple more times with other officers. It would certainly make their job easier.
As it turned out she didn’t have to. Taylor talked with the officer that seemed to be in charge. Jeremiah thought his name was Jackson. He looked exhausted and after staring from Taylor to them and back he finally lifted his hand and turned away.
Taylor turned back to them. “Okay, be careful. Lou is down there and he can help you. Just please, don’t touch anything.”
“Thank you,” Cindy said, putting her hand on Taylor’s arm again for a moment.
The officer nodded before hurrying back to his post.
They began to walk toward the ditch. They could clearly see the car now. It was indeed upside down and had been ravaged by fire. Lou looked up and saw them. Jeremiah waved to him as he and Cindy moved to the easiest part of the slope.
“Careful coming down,” Lou called.
Jeremiah held onto Cindy’s arm, stabilizing her as they slowly made their way down, feet sliding a bit on loose pebbles. The smell of smoke and charred flesh was heavy in the air and Cindy began to gag slightly.
“You don’t have to go any farther,” Jeremiah said.
“Yes, I do,” she answered doggedly.
“It’s going to be bad.”
“I know.”
~
Cindy didn’t want to look, but she knew that she had to. If there was anything she could do to help find Mark she had to do it. She kept telling herself over and over that it wasn’t Mark in the car. She told herself it was a complete stranger and she needed to figure out why he was driving instead of Mark.
The smell was horrific and she kept choking, trying not to throw up. She could feel Jeremiah’s hand on her arm, but that was about all as she walked to the side of the car.
God, give me strength, she prayed as she leaned down and looked inside.
In some way the charred body hanging in the seatbelt didn’t even look real. It was like some terrible prop from a movie. With the car being upside down it was incredibly disorienting as she tried to get a good look at the inside. She tilted her head to the side trying to see everything.
She kept hoping to see something, anything that would tell her it wasn’t Mark. She wished she knew what she was looking at. What she was looking for. She tried to see what shoes the body was wearing. Mark always wore leather shoes when working. Always. Did leather burn faster or slower than tennis shoes? She had no idea and frustration began to overwhelm her. As it was she couldn’t crane her neck far enough to even see if she could see feet under the steering column.
She glanced at Jeremiah who was frowning slightly. His eyes were roving over everything and he kept making small adjustments in the way he was standing. Clearly, he was seeing more than she was and he would almost certainly understand more of what he was seeing.
She wished she could ask someone, but they were on thin ice just being there and she was trying to avoid calling too much attention to them. She kept looking, hoping that something would at least catch her eye. She took a closer look at the left hand which was wrapped around the steering wheel. It had a wedding ring on it. She knew Mark wore a ring but had never looked closely at it to even think about trying to compare the two. From there her eyes shifted to the left wrist.
She straightened with a flush of excitement.
“It’s not Mark!” Cindy and Jeremiah exclaimed in unison.
“What?” Lou asked. “Are you sure?”
“The height. He’s at least two inches shorter than Mark,” Jeremiah said, relief flooding his voice.
“The watch on the left wrist. Mark never, ever wears a watch,” Cindy said.
She threw her arms first around Jeremiah then around Lou as relief flooded through her.
“It’s not him. It’s not him,” she said, choking back tears of relief.
Lou gave a shout and all the other officers immediately came closer.
“It’s not him!” Cindy yelled up to the rest. “Too short and wearing a watch.”
There were shouts of joy from all around them.
“Thank you, God,” Cindy whispered.
“I told you it’s the season for miracles,” Jeremiah said.
The detective who seemed to be in charge scowled slightly and pinned her with his stare. “We still have a big problem,” he said.
“What?” she asked, reaching for her phone so she could call Traci and the others and tell them the good news.
The detective pointed at the car, his scowl deepening. “If that’s not Mark, then where the hell is he?”
15
Mark had no idea where he was. All that he knew was that he was wet, cold, and had a splitting headache. He sat up slowly, struggling to remember where he was and what had happened. He seemed to be lying on the side of the road, although what road he wasn’t sure. He was completely disoriented.
He reached into his jacket for his phone, but it wasn’t there. He frowned, searching his other pockets for it. His car. Maybe it was in his car. He turned his head, looking for his car, but didn’t see it. That made no sense.
He did see a motorcycle with a flat tire a few yards away from him. Something about that seemed vaguely familiar, but for the life of him he didn’t know why.
He struggled to stand up. He had to get to work. He remembered Liam calling and telling him about a murder. He got up and the world started spinning and he fell down. Whatever had hit him in the head had done a number on him. He found a lump and what felt like dried blood.
He sat there for a moment, struggling to clear his head. He had no phone and no car and was somewhere between home and work. Sooner or later someone had to come looking for him.
Maybe they already did and didn’t see me lying in the grass, he thought to himself.
He gingerly tried to stand up again. The world was still spinning around him, but this time he managed to keep his feet. He straightened up and managed to stay upright.
So far, so good.
He slid one foot in front of the other, heading in the direction of the motorcycle. The tire was flat as a pancake and the keys were gone. There was no way he could drive it anywhere even if he wasn’t so dizzy.
He had a flash of memory. He’d been driving behind the motorcycle when the tire blew out. It had fishtailed before coming to a stop. Even though he’d been in a hurry he’d gotten out to see if the driver was okay and needed him to call someone. He remembered the guy acting real nervous. He asked him to call a tow company. Mark had turned to walk back to his car because he’d left his phone inside.
Then…
There was nothing after that. Then he woke up on the side of the road with no car.
He touched his head again and realized the motorcyclist must have hit him and stolen his car. Great. That was all he needed.
He was on a stretch of road where there was pretty much nothing for almost a mile. It looked like he was hoofing it until he could get to the intersection that was almost half a mile away.
“Come on, Mark, it’s just one step at a time,” he muttered to himself as he carefully put one foot in front of the other.
~
Cindy and Jeremiah retreated several feet away from the car as several officers pressed in closer.
Cindy yanked her phone out of her pocket with a shaking hand. She called Geanie.
“Hello?” Geanie asked.
“It’s not Mark! It’s not him in the car!”
“It’s not Mark!” Geanie shrieked.
Cindy could hear the relief in the voices of her friends as they all shouted and talked at once.
“Where is he?” she finally heard Traci ask.
“We don’t know, but we’re going to find him,” Cindy said. “You can count on
it.”
“Call Liam, he’s heading your way,” Geanie said.
“When did he leave?”
“About five minutes ago. He should be there shortly.”
“Okay. We’ll call when we have something more,” Cindy said.
She said a quick goodbye and then called Liam.
“Hi, Cindy, I’m heading toward you,” he said, sounding defeated.
“It’s not Mark in the car,” she said.
“What? Are you sure?”
“Positive.”
“Thank heavens,” he said. “I’ll be there in just a couple of minutes. Wait for me.”
“Okay. Hurry,” she said, before hanging up.
“Liam’s coming to us,” she told Jeremiah.
“Okay. Wait here. I’m going to walk around the car a bit. The terrain’s really uneven and it’s dark.”
Cindy nodded. “As long as you’re not trying to slip off I can stand here and wait for you to look around.”
“I promise, I’m not leaving here without you.”
“Good. If you need me, I’ll be right here,” she said.
Jeremiah was only gone for a few minutes. Most of the time she was able to keep him in sight as he walked around the car and back and forth from the ditch to the road. He finally came back, shaking his head.
“I don’t see any tracks of any kind. I think whoever that guy at the wheel is he was alone when this happened. No one else was in the car.”
“Well, that’s good, right?”
Jeremiah winced. “Maybe. It does beg the question of how someone else came to be in possession of Mark’s car.”
“That’s true,” she said. “I guess it’s time to retrace his route and see if maybe we can figure that out.”
“I agree. Let’s wait a minute for Liam to get here. Last thing we need is for him to send the cavalry out looking for us when they need to be focusing on looking for Mark.”
“That might be him now,” Cindy said, pointing to a car that was pulling over behind Jeremiah’s Mustang.
“Let’s go see,” Jeremiah said.
He grabbed her hand and together they climbed out of the ditch and began walking toward the cars. A figure got out of the car and as soon as they got a few feet closer she recognized Liam.
“It really isn’t Mark?” he asked as soon as they got close.
“Not him. Too short,” Jeremiah said.
“Then we need to find him,” Liam said.
“That’s the plan,” Cindy told him. “We’re going to retrace his route from the house to the station and see if we spot anything, figure out why he wasn’t in his car and someone else was.”
“I’ll join you. The more eyes the better at this point.”
“Do you know which route he was most likely to take?” Cindy asked.
“I do. Let’s head to their house then you can follow me,” Liam said, getting back into his car.
Cindy and Jeremiah climbed into the Mustang and moments later were back on the road trailing Liam. When they made it back to Traci and Mark’s house they all stopped and got out to stare for a moment at the smoking remains of their house.
“I’d kind of hoped firemen could save some of it,” Cindy said softly.
Liam shook his head. “This guy has to be stopped.”
They stood for a moment more then turned away.
“I should drive,” Cindy told Jeremiah. “You have better vision than me. It will free you up to see whatever there is to see.”
“Okay,” he said, moving to the passenger side.
“You’re okay with me driving your car, right?” she asked.
He looked at her and chuckled. “What’s mine is yours or will be in a few months.”
She felt a warm glow at the thought which quickly faded as she slid behind the wheel. Liam eased away from the curb and she followed him. They were going about ten miles per hour and she did what she could to scan the street and the sidewalks on both sides of the road as she drove.
Jeremiah rolled his window down and leaned slightly out of the car. The cold night air caused her to turn on the heater.
They drove for two miles through residential neighborhoods and none of them seemed to see anything. Cindy could feel herself getting frustrated, but reminded herself that at least they were ruling areas out that didn’t need to be searched. It made sense at any rate. If something had happened here there could have been witnesses.
They finally hit one of the main streets and a couple of cars honked at them as they sped around them. Cindy clenched her jaw in irritation. They came up to an intersection and Liam turned right onto a long, dark stretch of road.
“I wouldn’t have picked this direction,” she muttered.
“Less traffic, fewer lights,” Jeremiah said shortly.
Given how dark the street was Liam slowed down even more and Cindy stayed right behind him. Liam put on his high beams and they proceeded carefully down the road.
“There’s a motorcycle parked on the side of the road up there a ways,” Jeremiah said.
They drew near the motorcycle.
“Looks like it blew a tire,” Jeremiah said.
She started to pass it.
“Stop!”
She hit the brakes and looked at him questioningly. He opened the door and she flashed her headlights to alert Liam. Ahead of them Liam also stopped.
She watched as Jeremiah took a quick look at the motorcycle. Then he walked a couple of feet away.
“There was a car parked here on the shoulder,” he called out.
He started to walk back, eyes glued on the ground. Suddenly he veered off to the side. He pulled a pair of gloves out of his pocket, put them on, then bent down. He picked something up. He carried it back and stepped in front of the car where he used the headlights to inspect the object he was holding.
It was a motorcycle helmet.
Liam got out of his car and came around to see the helmet.
“There’s blood on this,” Jeremiah said.
Cindy’s stomach twisted slightly as she wondered whose it was.
Liam went back to his car and came back with a large evidence bag. Jeremiah placed the helmet inside. After another quick look around both guys got back in their cars.
“Do you think Mark stopped here?” Cindy asked as they began driving again.
“I don’t know, but whatever happened here, the blood was on the outside of the helmet and not the inside. I’m inclined to believe that it’s not the motorcycle rider’s blood.”
They kept driving slowly. It felt like Jeremiah was halfway out of the car and Cindy was on pins and needles waiting to stop at a moment’s notice. Suddenly he threw open the car door and leaped out.
Cindy shouted as she slammed on the brakes. She hadn’t been going very fast, but what he’d just done terrified her. She flashed her headlights and Liam stopped, too. He must have seen what Jeremiah did because he jumped out of the car and raced toward him. Moments later they were both bending over something in the grass.
Cindy got out of the car and hurried toward them, heart in her throat. As she drew close she saw a dark shape on the ground between them. She staggered to a halt as she recognized Mark. His eyes were closed and his face was pale.
“Mark! Is he?”
“He’s alive,” Jeremiah said. “But he has a head injury.”
“Open the backdoor of my car,” Liam said.
“No, I think we should call an ambulance. I don’t want to move him,” Jeremiah said.
“I’m fine,” Mark suddenly said, the words slurred. He blinked open his eyes and stared up at Jeremiah. “What took you so long?” he asked.
“Don’t worry. I’m going to have you chipped so it will never take this long again,” Jeremiah said.
“First sensible thing I’ve heard in a long time,” Mark said.
He moved as though trying to sit up, but Jeremiah held him down. “Easy, no rush.”
“I’ve got to get to work,” Mark said. He shifted his eyes and seemed to suddenly see Liam. “Oh good, you’re here. What’s happening?”
“You are,” Liam said, grinning in relief.
Liam stood up and went to his car. Cindy could hear him calling in that he had found Mark and requesting an ambulance. She could practically feel the adrenaline leaving her body and her legs suddenly felt weak.
She took a couple of steps so that she could lean against Liam’s car and hold herself up that way. She said a quick prayer of thanksgiving as she pulled out her phone and called Geanie.
“We found him. He’s alive.”
She could hear the rejoicing on the other end of the line and realized Geanie had put her on speaker.
“He’s hit his head, but he’s awake and obnoxious. They’re going to take him to the hospital to check him out.”
“I can come down,” Traci said.
Cindy was about to say yes then hesitated. The image of the house and Traci’s car blowing up replayed itself in her head. What was best for Mark at that point was to have Traci safe.
“I don’t think he’s going to be there long enough to worry about it,” Cindy fibbed. “Just try and get some sleep and I’ll call as soon as we’re on our way back with him.”
“Are you sure?” Traci asked hesitantly.
“Yeah. You’ve been through a lot tonight, too. No sense in making the trip to be there for ten minutes.”
“Okay,” Traci said and Cindy could swear she heard relief in the other woman’s voice.
Cindy felt a little guilty since she didn’t actually know how bad off Mark was or how long the hospital would keep him, but she figured this was better for Traci. Safer, at any rate.
“Tell Traci I’ll be home shortly,” Mark said.
“He says he’ll be there shortly,” Cindy said.
“Okay, tell him I love him.”
“Tell him we all love him,” Geanie piped up.
“Okay, will do. Bye.”
“Oh, that’s right, she’s at Joseph’s,” Mark said, voice getting weaker.
“Don’t worry about it. Everyone’s safe,” Jeremiah said.
“You’re not mad at me anymore,” Mark said.
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