by Lisa Gardner
This time of year, the youth dairy served as indoor tennis courts—not bad once you got used to the overwhelming stench of manure. Another building had been converted to a roller-skating rink, while various organizations rented out the auditorium for banquet functions.
But the effort at granting the fairgrounds a second life during the off-season had always been feeble, and the results were plain to see: four o’clock on a Tuesday afternoon, not a single car in the empty parking lot.
The fairgrounds remained a vast, empty, echoing space. It would take an entire SWAT team to secure the premises. Perhaps two or three. The abductor had chosen well, and for the first time, Quincy felt himself falter.
Was it years that aged a man? Or simply the growing realization of all the things he was powerless to control? That identifying a predator didn’t always lead to justice. That even when the courts finally ground out a guilty verdict, it didn’t bring a murdered child back from the dead, or help her parents sleep any better at night.
All Quincy wanted was his wife back. He wanted to be in their family room, in front of a roaring fire. Rainie reading a book, snuggled up against his chest. Him, stroking her arm, watching the way the flames reflected in her long chestnut hair. They would both be comfortable, wordless, the way it had been just six months ago.
It seemed so little to want out of life, and yet he honestly didn’t know if he would ever have that again. In Quincy’s world, happiness had always been a luxury and never a guarantee.
Mac was watching him, waiting for instructions, a plan of attack.
“I don’t see signs of other officers,” Mac said at last.
“That simply means they’re doing their job.”
“You’re sure this Kincaid guy is here?”
“He would be negligent not to send at least a few bodies. Kincaid might be aggressive in his handling of the case, but he’s not stupid.”
“So we just march on in?”
“No. If the kidnapper doesn’t shoot us, Kincaid’s officers probably will. They’re doing their job; let’s not muck it up now.” Quincy took a deep breath, considering the vast space once more. “Main entrance building is too exposed,” he murmured. “The upper-level loft supplies a bird’s-eye view of the lower floor, rendering it worthless. The barns are also big open spaces with no place to hide. Same with the auditorium, the convention center. These places are meant to allow the maximum exhibit space, not conceal a kidnapper. So where would he go? He chose this space. Why? What does it give him that he needs?”
“Grounds are big, hard to cover.”
“But that works both ways. Bigger it is, the more time it’s going to take him to get in and out.”
Mac was nodding now, picking up the train of thought. “Like us, he’s going to want to conceal his vehicle. That means walking in, but he also has a hostage. Maybe she can walk herself, led by him, or maybe . . .” Mac hesitated, not wanting to say the words in front of Quincy, so Quincy said them for him.
“Maybe he’s carrying a body.”
“Yeah,” Mac said softly. “Maybe. So he would want to be near an entry point, someplace readily accessible but that would still offer cover.”
“This is the main entrance, but it’s no good.”
“Too visible,” Mac agreed, “being right off Third Street.”
“There are fields that serve as extra parking spaces behind these buildings, closer to the racetracks.”
“The racetracks,” Mac mused, and Quincy knew the GBI detective got it the same moment he did.
“Grandstands,” Mac announced. “Plenty of places to hide—”
“But still offers a vantage point of the grounds—”
“And the approaching police task force.”
“Right by the back exit,” Mac concluded.
And then all of a sudden, Quincy knew the rest. “He’s not going to walk off the grounds,” he said excitedly. “Even if he enters near the grandstands, he’d still have to cover hundreds of yards of open fields. No way someone wouldn’t spot him coming or going. The only way to do it is to drive, but look at the ground around us. He stands a very good chance of getting stuck in the mud; God knows the police will the minute they try to give pursuit.”
Mac’s eyes got very wide. “ATV.”
“Parked in the paddocks where no one can see. Easy in, easy out.”
“Throw on a helmet . . .”
“And all any of us can report is the back of a mud-splattered man, driving away.”
“Screw the grandstands,” Mac declared. “Let’s head straight to the paddocks. We find that ATV, and Mr. UNSUB’s ten-thousand-dollar dreams are history.”
“You sure know how to show a guy a good time,” Quincy said.
“Aw,” it was Mac’s turn to say modestly. “That’s what they all say.”
Tuesday, 3:58 p.m. PST
THEY WERE ON THE MOVE AGAIN. Not being drugged this time, and sitting in the backseat instead of being stuffed inside a trunk, Rainie was trying to pay more attention.
The roads were rough. Dirt roads, partially washed out by the rain, would be her guess as the vehicle heaved and rolled across the miles. Her stomach moved with it; she could still taste bile in the back of her throat and desperately wanted to vomit.
Not a good idea. Her captor had replaced her cotton gag with duct tape. Vomiting risked aspirating the contents down into her lungs, which would lead to asphyxiation. Basically, she’d choke to death on her own puke. It wasn’t a comforting thought.
The vehicle itself smelled vaguely of pine-scented air freshener. She had expected the odor of cigarettes; in her mind’s eye, her captor was a smoker. But now that she considered the matter more, she didn’t remember the man’s clothing or breath reeking of nicotine. Smoking was hard to hide. Drinking, too. Didn’t she know.
Last time, she’d assumed she’d been riding in the trunk of a car. But upon further consideration, she felt as if she were riding higher than one would in a car, plus she had a hard time believing any sedan could handle these kinds of roads. So maybe the UNSUB drove a pickup truck or SUV after all. Maybe she’d been stuck in some kind of equipment locker in the back. She’d seen those in the numerous trucks around town. Guys had to have room for their toys.
The truck hit a bump, soared up, flopped down, and her stomach lurched dangerously.
Don’t think of food, don’t think of the smell. Come on, Rainie, focus. And then: Yellow-flowered fields. Smooth-flowing streams. The decades-old mantra returned so easily, it was as if it had never left. She was sixteen years old again, detached and helpless as her mother’s boyfriend labored over her body. She was twenty-five, drunk, and being felt up by some guy in the back of a bar. She was thirty, being touched by Quincy for the first time, and realizing how much the promise of love scared her out of her mind.
Yellow-flowered fields. Smooth-flowing streams. Yellow-flowered fields. Smooth-flowing streams.
The vehicle cranked hard to the left. She fell over on her side, helpless to right herself with her hands bound tight at her wrists. Bump, bump, bump. Rhythmic, fast. A gravel road maybe, or hard-weathered asphalt.
The truck came to a sudden halt, and her feet slid off the seat, catching the brunt of her weight hard against the floor. She tried to slither back up into position, hips up first, followed by feet. She heard the driver’s door open, then close. He would come around to the back now, fetch his prize.
Kick him, she thought abruptly. Lying on her side, her feet positioned in front of the passenger-side door, all she needed to do was bend her knees for a bit of leverage, then nail him hard in the gut. He’d go down and she could . . . what? Hop out of the car like a bunny, ankles bound, wrists bound, tape across her mouth? Most likely, she’d fall face first in the mud and drown in a pool of shallow water.
She still wanted to do it. Wanted to feel the satisfaction of her feet sinking into his soft belly, hear his surprised Oomph. He made her feel small and helpless; she hated him for that.
&nbs
p; The door opened. Belatedly, she lashed out.
He caught her feet with his hands and pushed her legs aside. “Oh, for Christ’s sake, I don’t have time for this bullshit. Get up. Move.”
He used the rope tied around her ankles to drag her like a side of beef out of the back. Her head whacked the running board. Her shoulder drove into the muddy ground, forcing the breath from her lungs. Immediately, her nostrils flared, her back arched. She fought desperately for oxygen, lips straining against the duct tape. She couldn’t breathe, she was going to die.
She flailed on the ground, panicked and terrified. Her captor kicked her, the toe of his shoe digging into the small of her back.
“Get up, I tell you. Move!”
Dark spots started to swim before her eyes. At the last minute, her captor seemed to realize her predicament. He bent down, jerked her to her feet, and ripped the duct tape from her mouth.
“Scream, and I will kill you.”
She didn’t scream, couldn’t have if she’d wanted to. She gulped giant, beautiful lungfuls of wet, rainy air and absorbed them into her body. She tasted coastal breezes and fir trees and cow dung. She tasted field grass and dirt. And in that instant, she was pathetically grateful to be alive.
She heard a rasp. It sounded like a knife being drawn from a leather sheath.
She turned toward the noise, still a little dazed, a little confused.
“Lorraine,” her captor said in a tone of voice she hadn’t heard before. “I’m afraid I have some bad news.”
Rainie tried to run, but it was already too late.
18
Tuesday, 4:03 p.m. PST
APPROACHING THE FAIRGROUND PADDOCKS was easier said than done. Mac and Quincy advanced with their backs pressed against the exterior of the livestock barns and their eyes peering out into the gray shrouded fields, looking for signs of movement. The rain drummed hard upon the metal roofs above them, periodically dousing them in walls of water while relentlessly deafening them with the sound.
Quincy slid, was caught by Mac. They made it four more feet, then Mac careened forward in the ankle-deep mud and swamped them both. They picked themselves back up gingerly, breathing hard and soaked to the bone.
“Your entire left side is covered in mud,” Mac reported.
“You’re assuming it’s mud,” Quincy replied.
Mac caught the innuendo—they were next to a cow barn, after all—and grimaced.
They reached the end of the second barn, and life got trickier. There was no way to reach the horse paddocks without crossing fifty yards of open ground. Quincy’s gaze went to the top of the grandstands, searching for signs of a sniper. The rooftops appeared clear.
They ran for it, dashing across the exposed space, around a chain-link fence, then wove through a slew of metal bleachers until they finally hit the horse paddocks. Quincy flattened himself against the wooden building, quickly followed by Mac.
The overhang of the roof offered them a temporary respite. Mac could see the water trickling down Quincy’s face, disappearing beneath the collar of his shirt. The older man was flecked with specks of mud, the silver of his hair more pronounced, now that it was wet. For a moment, Mac felt a pang of worry. Quincy was in his fifties, and field work was a young man’s game. But then Quincy grinned and Mac could see that beneath the stress and fear, the man was jazzed. You could take the man out of law enforcement, but you couldn’t take the law enforcement out of the man.
“Ready?” Quincy whispered.
“Let’s go.”
They entered fast and low, Mac leading with the shotgun, followed by Quincy, who held the rifle nestled in the crook of his forearm. The change in environment was immediate and distorting: from a slippery marsh to hard-packed mud, from a lightly overcast sky to a deep, pervasive gloom, from the smell of wet pine and cut grass to the pungent scent of wood shavings, hay, and old horse manure.
Mac took a split second to glance down the long center aisle, then ducked inside the first stall, adrenaline pounding in his veins, his hands shaky on the shotgun. Hard to see everything in such a long, dark space. And even harder to hear, given the rain beating against the roof in a deafening roar.
He held up his left hand to Quincy and silently counted off one-two-three.
He popped up, flashed a second glance at the interior, then disappeared back down behind the cover of the stall wall.
He indicated his findings to Quincy with a simple shake of his head: nothing. No person standing in the aisle, no ATV magically parked in the middle of the stable. Their search would have to be more methodical now, foot by foot, stall by stall.
Once more, Mac took the lead, creeping into the center aisle. He kept his back hunched to provide a low profile, and his footsteps were small and nimble. His hands steadied on the shotgun. He focused on small even breaths and felt himself sliding into that zone.
Searching to the left, searching to the right.
Inch by inch, row by row, and then. . . .
Movement. Mac caught it first from the corner of his eye. A person, darting out of the end stall, dashing toward the back door.
“Stop! Police!” Mac roared. He unfurled to his full height, pointing the shotgun, finger moving toward the trigger.
Just as another voice spoke up in the gloom behind him. “One move and your friend is dead.”
Mac whipped around to find a sharply dressed black man leveling a nine-millimeter at Quincy’s head. Mac was still frantically considering his options when Quincy declared wearily, “Kincaid.”
And the black man replied just as despondently, “Ahh shit.”
Tuesday, 4:38 p.m. PST
“I THINK HE’S A BIT MIFFED,” Mac said fifteen minutes later. He and Quincy had been ushered into the roller rink at the front of the fairgrounds. The space was vast, cold, and echoing.
“I was thinking more like irked.”
Halfway across the room, Kincaid looked up from his mini-huddle with OSP detective Ron Spector and glowered at them. It was nothing Quincy and Mac hadn’t seen before.
Mac was cold. His teeth chattered as he sat on a hard metal folding chair, clothes soaked, face splattered with mud. Quincy was in the same shape. No one had offered them a towel, let alone a hot cup of coffee. Mac wasn’t surprised. He’d crossed jurisdictional boundaries once before, investigating a case in Virginia. Interestingly enough, the Virginia State Police hadn’t taken it very well either.
The front door swung open. A young guy in a tan police uniform appeared, dragging a disheveled guy in his wake. Mac and Quincy were already on their feet as the deputy thrust the person into the roller rink.
The man, dressed in a khaki trench coat Mac recognized from the horse paddocks, was covered in mud. In fact, he appeared in much the same state as Mac and Quincy, meaning he’d obviously been moving around the grounds for a bit. Now, he stumbled forward, blinked several times fast, then croaked, with both hands in the air, “P-p-press!”
“Ahh shit,” Kincaid said again.
He crossed to the intruder and glared down at him. “Who are you?”
“Adam Danicic. Bakersville Daily Sun.”
“Credentials.” Kincaid held out his hand. A very nervous Danicic reached inside his damp trench coat and gingerly pulled out a billfold. He held it out to Kincaid, who snapped it open.
“So Adam Dan-i-chic,” Kincaid stressed the reporter’s last name, “what the fuck were you doing in the stables?”
The reporter braved a smile. “Getting a scoop?”
“Ah, Jesus Christ. Is anyone in this building a kidnapper? Anyone, anyone? Because there’s an awful lot of non-OSP bodies in this room, considering it’s an OSP case!”
Not the smoothest thing to have said, and Kincaid seemed to realize it the moment the words left his mouth. The Bakersville deputy gave the OSP sergeant a “thanks for nothing” stare, while Kincaid sighed heavily, paced four feet away, then sighed again. Finally, he turned back to the reporter.
“My understanding is th
at your role is to work in cooperation with us. The prime reason being that you certainly wouldn’t want another paper hearing from ‘confidential sources’ inside the Oregon State Police how the inexperienced, self-centered, aggressive reporter from the Daily Sun heedlessly endangered a woman’s life.”
Danicic didn’t say anything. At least he had the good sense to shut up and take his beating like a man.
“Now, I would think that to work in cooperation with our office, you would need to notify our office of your activities,” Kincaid continued.
“I investigate on my own, I write on my own,” Danicic said levelly. “That’s what a reporter does. What my editor chooses to print is a matter left up to him.”
“Are you serious?”
“Yes, sir.”
Kincaid eyed the young reporter again—the clean-shaven cheeks, short-cropped dark hair, conservative trench coat. “You certainly don’t look like a left-wing liberal.”
“Fox News,” the reporter said smartly. “My goal is to be hired by them before I turn thirty. Let’s face it: News teams could use some young go-getters like me.”
“You have got to be kidding me. You work on a hick paper—”
“Gotta start somewhere.”
“You just fucked up a major police investigation.”
“Not really. Let’s be frank—we all know you’re only here as a precaution, and since by all appearances the kidnapper didn’t show, no harm, no foul. Now, what I would really like to understand is the presence of those two men right there. Why does his jacket say ‘GBI’? Doesn’t that stand for Georgia Bureau of Investigation? And does that mean this case now involves multiple policing agencies working together on a cross-jurisdictional task force—”
“Out,” Kincaid said tightly.
“Can I quote you on that?”