Justin looked at her. “Better hurry, though, they should be arriving any minute.”
Ashley laid on the indignation. “I hope so! This is totally unacceptable having to wait this long! We have a dinner and theatre engagement to get to!”
The driver chuckled and Sean called out after her.
“Watch out nothing bites you where the sun doesn’t shine!”
All three men burst into laughter.
“That’s some feisty wife you got there,” Justin said.
“Yeah, she is. Sorry she’s being so impatient. I know you guys are doing your best. But you know how women are when their plans get re-arranged.”
Steve muttered under his breath and grinned in the rear view mirror at Sean. “Ain’t that the truth? Reason I’m not married.”
Sean noticed Steve’s bony jaw and crooked nose. The hair coming from under his cap was scraggly at best. His nails were dirty and gripped the wheel like claws. His eye was twitching again too.
Could be other reasons you’re not married dude, he thought.
Steve reached in his pocket for a cigarette.
Justin snapped at him. “Smoke that outside. And get it over with quick,” he said.
Steve shot Justin a dirty look and got out of the car. He lit up and stood there gazing in the direction Ashley had disappeared into.
Justin and Sean sat silently in the car. It was almost dark now. Sean hoped Ashley was already on her way down the road.
“What’s taking her so long?” Justin snapped.
Sean’s voice was casual and relaxed. “Well, women have to take longer, right? She should be coming back soon.”
Justin glared at him in the rearview mirror. “She better be.”
Sean stared at the back of Justin’s head. His dark blonde hair curled at the bottom of his cap. His hazel eyes darted back and forth as he glanced out the window looking for Ashley and watching Steve at the same time. Sean noticed his jaw was clenched so tightly that veins were protruding on his neck.
Sean knew he’d have to make a run for it soon. He gripped the door and started to silently count down.
Just then, headlights started to come up the road. Steve pointed and shouted, and Justin jumped out of the car. While they both were looking in the vehicle’s direction and waving at it, Sean quietly opened the door, slipped out, and ran low to the ground in the opposite direction.
“Over here!” Justin shouted. “Get up there and flag them down,” he yelled at Steve. He then turned around and jumped back in the vehicle with a snarl. “I told you they were coming. Surprise! Here’s what happens when you interfere—”
As soon as Justin saw the empty backseat, he got out and started to yell at the approaching vehicle. “Get everyone out and comb the area! They both took off! Find them!”
***
Sean had instinctively made his way toward the stream, where the pumping facilities were, as he knew any noise he made would be masked by the sound of the machines. There was thick brush all around and he climbed up the hill and hid in it. It was too dark to outrun them down the mountainside now. He crouched low and tried to keep calm but his heart was pounding out of his chest. He heard the shouts of the men down below and prayed Ashley had made progress down the road. And that she was safe. His fingers flew as he tried to text her.
Ashley had followed the road downhill as fast as she could while staying off to the side and out of sight. The dark night impeded her travel now, but she kept on a course. Her time advantage was helping her at the moment, but the men could head down in the truck shortly and intercept her. She moved back a little farther away from the road as she stumbled down. She had texted Detective Miller to update him on the situation, but hadn’t heard back as some of the texts went through and some didn’t. She kept the sound off but continued trying to send messages.
Her text lit up. It was Sean. Where are you now?
Still on the way down, she answered. Where are you?
Hiding at the stream behind the pumps. Keep going, get help. Stay safe. Please.
You too, she wrote.
Her text pinged again. This time, it was Detective Miller. Where are you?
Up here at the pump station. Come quick! she wrote. We’re in danger.
***
Miller put a track out on Ashley’s phone and quickly radioed for back up. He climbed into a sport-utility-vehicle with another policemen and they headed up the mountain. He cursed under his breath.
Why did this person and her husband have to come up here in the first place? he thought. He answered his own question. Because you told them to Miller! He cursed again.
Too late now. Their safety was of the utmost importance for this town after all the negative publicity from the recent crimes.
He winced. A hot wave of shame swept over him. He had an obligation to save their lives, and not just to avoid negative publicity.
What’s become of me? he thought. Too many reporters and social media bloggers hanging around the town these days. Not to mention the water company’s executives approaching me all the time to pave the way to make it easier for them to make a profit here.
He had resisted PWCS and also the town’s politics, but in the process, he had made a lot of enemies. It seemed you had to pick a side these days. It was impossible to remain neutral. But he had no stomach for how this was all playing out.
He saw his daughter’s image in his mind’s eye. Laughing in the back yard after school as she played with their dog. And then the sorrow on his wife’s face as they buried her as a young woman after the car accident. The pain was unbearable. He would retire after this case was solved. But first, he had to prevent any more unnecessary deaths.
“Go as quickly as you can,” he told the cop driving the car.
They climbed the hill and Miller made a note of the cop cars behind them in his rearview mirror. He had no idea what awaited them up there, but he knew the men were ready.
They tracked Ashley’s phone to where she was and Miller texted her that they were on the road. Ashley peered out from the trees and saw him standing with his arms extended as he swept the area holding a powerful flashlight. She ran towards the SUV.
“We have to get up there quickly. Sean is still hiding. We have to save him. Now! Please!” Ashley said.
Miller nodded and opened up the back seat for her. “Stay down. I’ll tell you if and when you can get out.”
“I have to get out when we get up there,” she pleaded. “We have to find him!”
He stood at the car door and stared at her for a moment before he spoke. “You’ll do as you’re told. I’m not compromising your safety, or the safety of these police officers. They have to get home to their families too.”
He shut the door and climbed in the front seat. Ashley dutifully crouched down in the back seat and stared at the back of Detective Miller. She felt ashamed for only thinking of herself and Sean.
But it’s normal, isn’t it? Don’t we all think of our loved ones first during emergencies?
Miller spoke aloud to no one in particular. “Don’t know what we’ll find when we get up there. Officer Newton here driving this rig has a newborn baby waiting for him at home. Officer Fernandez in another car behind us has a two-year-old and a four-year-old to get back to. And Officer Luskin just got married and is back from her honeymoon just two weeks ago. Like to see her get home safely tonight too.”
“Of course,” Ashley said quietly.
“So how about you tell me what you observed before you escaped?”
Ashley filled him in on everything she and Sean had seen and heard while they were with the guide, and driver before and after the tour. “Obviously when Justin called for help when we got stuck, he was actually calling his cohorts to come get us.”
“Obviously,” Miller said dryly.
“Look,” Ashley snapped. “I’m sorry all of this happened, and I’m sorry that I was insensitive back there. But you asked us to come up here, and by doing so, you’ve put us
in danger. So excuse me for making statements that you feel are obvious.”
Miller turned around with a look of surprise on his face. “Oh wait a minute. I did ask you to come up here, that’s true. But for some reason, you pissed off the wrong people when you were still in Comfortville. You could have easily been hurt there with strange phone calls and a criminal trying to break down your door. Now you’re up here and out in the open, so as dangerous as it is, it’s now going to be easier to catch whoever is behind all of this.”
Ashley had just started to contemplate what Miller had said when a truck barreled right at them with no headlights on. She screamed as the cop swerved their SUV to the left. Then she heard gunshots.
Chapter Thirteen
“Stay in the car!” Miller yelled at Ashley.
Miller got on the radio to the backup policemen immediately, but they had already seen the truck barreling down on them in their headlights and had moved to block it from going any further. The driver of the truck tried to veer into the woods, but quickly became entrenched in the mud and thick brush. Several policemen surrounded the rogue truck as the occupants staggered out of the vehicle.
“Freeze!” shouted a policemen.
Miller ran down the road to assist. Everyone moved quickly to apprehend the suspects and started loading them in the cop cars. There were three men, but none looked familiar to the detective. He’d have to get Ashley and Sean to identify them if they could.
Ashley could hear the shouts from where she was, but she could only think of one thing. How is Sean? Is he hurt? She had to get up there quickly and see if he was okay.
“Officer, I need to go and find my husband. Please,” she said.
Officer Newton got on the radio to Miller. “Passenger requests search for her husband.”
“Tell her to hold on. I’ll be there in a minute,” Miller replied.
As soon as the suspects were loaded into the squad cars and they were heading down the hill, Miller trudged back up. His back and legs hurt as he climbed, and his breath drew in sharply. As he approached Officer Newton and Ashley, she noticed his face was very pale and beads of sweat were on his forehead, even in the cool night.
“Are you all right?” she asked him.
“Dandy,” he replied. “Let’s go find your husband.”
***
They drove slowly up the last climb to the pumping facility. The windows were rolled down and Ashley called out Sean’s name. She kept texting him but there was no answer. Miller and Newton kept shining high-beam flashlights into the woods. Near the top of the rise, the only light came from the facility’s outside security lights. The rest of the landscape was dark and foreboding. They parked at the crest and got out of the car. Miller swept the landscape with his light again.
Ashley texted Sean once more. Nothing. She called out his name as loudly as she could.
“Sean! Where are you? I’m with the police! Please come out!”
Save for the sound of the distant pumps, the night answered her with stillness. It was beautiful and eerie at the same time. The moon was clouded over and nothing moved in the windless night. She took a step toward Miller and heard a cracking sound off in the woods. A branch?
They stood there in silence for a few more moments, then just as Miller turned sideways, Ashley thought she saw something move in the tree line. She squinted in that direction. Was it Sean? Miller suddenly grabbed her arm and forced her down by the side of the car.
“Don’t move,” he whispered.
She definitely saw movement in the trees again, then slight crunching sounds that seemed to move further away. They both held still for what seemed like a long time. Then they heard another rustle close by, this time behind them.
“Ash? Ash?”
Ashley recognized the voice. “Yes,” she barely whispered.
Miller still held on to her, keeping her down. Then he jerked his light towards the sound and Newton drew his gun. Sean stood there with his hands up. He had a terrified look on his face. Ashley bolted over to him and almost knocked him down with her embrace.
“Shh!” Miller’s voice was a hoarse whisper. He pointed off in the distance, but Ashley didn’t hear anything else. She and Sean just stood there quietly, holding one another.
Miller whispered again, “Come on, get in the car you two. Time to go.”
Sean wobbled stiff-legged with Ashley’s help to the car and Miller made sure everyone was securely in before they took off down the hill.
***
Ashley lay on Sean’s shoulder and stifled her sobs in his shirt.
“Are you all right?” she kept asking.
“I’m okay,” he said. “Just stiff from crouching for so long.”
He held on to her as tight as he could. “All I could think of was if you were okay. I was so worried.”
“I’m sorry to break up the happy reunion, but we need some info fast,” Miller said. “We’ll need your help to identify the suspects when we get back to the station.”
Ashley quickly explained that she hadn’t gotten a good look at the men who came up in the truck as she took off before they arrived, but could identify the driver and Justin.
“Except I don’t think Justin was in the truck when it took off,” Sean said.
“What do you mean?” Ashley said.
“I crept out from the stream and went behind the pumping station to try to see where you might have gone and what was happening with the men down below. Even though it was dark, I could see Justin in the headlights of the big truck that came up the hill. He took off into the woods the opposite way when he yelled out that he lost us. I don’t know if he was trying to find us, or just ran to hide. I could see the skinny driver Steve talking to some men in the headlights too, and then it seemed they all got in the truck together and took off toward the road.”
“That explains the other noises I heard back there just now. He must’ve been hiding in the woods and watching us to see what was going on,” Miller said.
“And no doubt looking for me,” Sean said.
“That’s right,” Miller said. “As soon as we get back to the station, we’ll let you take a look at everyone, and if this Justin guy isn’t in the lineup, we’ll send reinforcements up here to search for him. He can hide out for a while, but he won’t get far in this terrain.”
***
They rode the rest of the way in silence. Ashley kept her head on Sean’s chest. She could only hear the tires on the road as they went down. The pumping sounds were long gone, swallowed up by the forest. It was amazing how nature had its own built-in screens and walls with its trees and bushes. The dense ecosystem up here was a natural barrier from intrusions. It was a perfect place to hide. For the native animals, for the birds and the insects, and for all the flora and fauna that needed shade and moisture to thrive. And for PWCS as they took the natural resources for profit.
And now for Justin? she wondered. Had he gotten away?
A Shakespeare quote from King Lear came to Ashley’s mind. “Tremble, thou wretch, thou hast within thee undivulged crimes, unwhipped of justice.”
***
At the station, Ashley and Sean gave Miller a full run down of the events of the day and night for the record. They couldn’t identify the two men that had come up in the truck, but were able to identify the skinny driver Steve. As for Justin, Sean had been right. Justin was not in the group of men that had been apprehended. Miller questioned Steve about the whereabouts of his cohort, but only got a few grunts and a sullen, “How should I know?”
All the detective could do was lock up the three suspects at this point and begin the questioning process again in the morning. His body ached and his throat was sore from tramping around in the damp woods, but he felt a sense of satisfaction that the recent events would help him finish putting most of the pieces of the puzzle together.
Just have to apprehend Justin first, he thought. But is there someone else? Are most of these people dupes, pawns in a larger plan? Who’
s at the top of the food chain here?
He glanced up at his board and all the lines that were drawn between the photographs. He peered at each photo carefully. He had studied the yearbook from Heatherton Middle School that Ashley had given him with Ben’s picture in it. Of course it looked different than the Ben that had been working for the acting troupe. Older, but the soft eyes were the same. Miller stared at the two photos of Ben. He must have been a nice guy. A decent guy. And that was what probably got him killed.
Miller walked out of his office and saw Ashley and Sean with their heads leaning against the back wall where they sat. Sean’s eyes were closed, but Ashley had one bleary eye on the detective.
“Can we go get some sleep now?” she asked.
“Yeah. I’ll have two of my men drive you back to the hotel. I’ll keep a car on you tonight. Don’t leave, even for food, unless you let me know where you’re going,” Miller said.
“Okay.”
Ashley and Sean got up wearily and shuffled to the waiting car. One of the policemen accompanied them into their room and checked it out before saying good-night.
“Night. And thank you officer,” Ashley said.
“Thank you,” Sean echoed.
“We’ll be outside if you need us,” the officer replied.
They stared at each other hollowed eyed before jumping into bed.
“We survived. We actually survived. So important to count our blessings,” Ashley said. Sean nodded and kissed her good night. Ashley barely remembered laying her head on the pillow before she was out cold. Their room was deathly quiet and the moon was still shrouded in clouds on the windless night.
***
Ashley Crane Cozy Mystery Boxed Set Page 68