He went over, grabbed his pajamas and toiletry kit from his suitcase, and headed into the bathroom to change. When he was finished he exited back into the room. Cindy gave him a smile before disappearing into the bathroom with her things.
He sat down on the edge of his bed and took a few deep breaths. At least they had found out some good information tonight. It didn’t put them any closer to finding out what had happened to Malcolm. At least, not yet, but it was a start.
He heard the shower go on in the other room and he closed his eyes in frustration. Once again he was thinking about water pouring off Cindy’s skin. He laid back with a groan and tried to pray. They needed to wrap this up fast or it was going to be a very long week indeed.
When Cindy emerged from the bathroom Jeremiah appeared to be asleep. She was a bit relieved. It saved some potentially awkward conversation, particularly since all she could think about was the other two times she’d stayed overnight in any kind of hotel or resort with him and they’d had to share one bed. She found herself wishing that they hadn’t been able to get a room with two beds in it and then scolded herself for the thought. Why did things between them have to be so complicated?
She turned off the light and got under the covers. As soon as she laid down she realized that she hadn’t gotten a chance to ask Jeremiah what he’d found out about Malcolm and she felt instantly guilty. They were here to find a missing man and with every minute that passed that was going to be harder to do. Yet all she could think about was her relationship with Jeremiah.
Pull it together, Cindy, she scolded herself.
It didn’t help her focus more when she reflected on the fact that since the beginning she’d been sure that what they were actually looking for was a dead body and not a kidnap victim. After all, if the man had been kidnapped surely his wife would have gotten some sort of ransom demand.
Unless like I did in Hawaii he stumbled into a situation and his kidnappers need him alive for some reason.
A brief wave of anxiety rolled over her. She hated remembering that experience. There had been so much pain, so much terror. She wouldn’t wish that on anyone, especially a friend of someone she knew. What if Malcolm was like her? Desperately hoping that rescue was on its way but knowing that he would probably never be found?
Her stomach twisted in knots. If he was alive, he had to be found. They needed to stop wasting time.
She got out of bed and turned on the light. “Jeremiah, wake up!” she said.
He stirred and then rolled over and looked at her. “What’s wrong?”
“Do you think Malcolm is dead?” she asked.
“I honestly don’t know what to think. All I know is that he was here at some point.”
“Then it’s possible that he’s still here.”
“I guess. It’s not exactly the ideal place to hold a hostage, but if whoever took him knew what they were doing it could be pulled off. And it might even be easier than trying to move him offsite without being seen.”
“We have to check those other buildings, the staff only ones.”
“Okay. In the morning we’ll look at our schedule and see if we can find time to sneak over there.”
“No, if he’s alive then every second is crucial to keeping him that way. We need to go tonight.”
“Are you serious?” he asked, blinking at her in surprise.
“Deadly serious. If he’s alive we need to find him.”
Jeremiah sat up. “If we go to those buildings we can’t get caught. Not when they’re so clearly off limits. No amount of blushing and bickering will get us out of that one.”
“I know.”
“If we’re caught, that’s it. They’ll throw us out of here and there will be no one who can stop them from doing that.”
She nodded. It was a huge risk, but so was every minute that they delayed. They could miss the opportunity to save Malcolm or the evidence they needed to catch his murderer could be destroyed. Either way time was of the essence.
“Okay, but I would feel a lot better if you stayed here with the door locked,” he said.
She should agree with him. She wanted to agree with him. Earlier when she had been hovering near that door watching for signs that someone was about to spot them it had been completely nerve wracking. And despite her efforts they had been caught anyway.
“I know you would. And I would probably feel better, too, in some ways, but I can’t. I can’t stay while you go out.”
“Why not?”
“Because I couldn’t stand the fear of losing you again.”
“Again?” he asked, frowning.
It felt like her chest was tightening, squeezing the breath out of her. She didn’t want to talk about this. Not now. Not ever. She’d said it, though, the words were out there and he’d never understand if she didn’t explain. She moistened her lips and cleared her throat before continuing.
“When we were in Iran, you let me think you were dead. I believed it and I had to live with it and those hours were the longest, worst hours of my life. Worse than my sister dying. Worse than my brother nearly dying. I was lost. And ever since then I’ve been afraid that you would die for real.”
He reached out and grabbed her hand. “I’m not going to die.”
“Can you promise me that?”
“I promise you, I’m not going to die,” he said, staring down at their hands.
“Look me in the eyes and tell me that.”
Jeremiah slowly raised his eyes to meet hers. “I promise you that I am not going to die tonight.”
She took a deep breath, leaned forward and kissed him. “Thank you,” she said as she pulled away. It did make her feel better even though she knew that he couldn’t completely promise something like that. Aside from desperate kidnappers and murderers there were a lot of things that could hurt someone. Accidents happened.
She felt her heart skip a beat for a moment. She didn’t want to go down that road in her mind. It was not a good road and it led to an even worse destination.
“So, it’s agreed,” he said. “I’ll go alone.”
Mark woke up to the sound of a baby crying. His brain was fuzzy as he turned his head to see the clock. It was nearly two in the morning. Traci was dead to the world, not even a twitch to show that she heard the crying. He didn’t know how she did that. Every time one of the twins cried it woke him up, even if he knew it wasn’t his turn to go check on them. Traci, however, managed to somehow lock into her subconscious when it was his night to handle things and she would never wake up. It baffled him and he would have given almost everything he owned to know how she did it so that he might replicate it.
He staggered out of bed. It was Ryan crying, he could tell. Ryan was a lot quieter in his crying than Rachel was. Rachel’s cries were enough to wake the dead, which meant he really didn’t know how Traci slept through it. Maybe she was undead, he thought. That was the only possible answer. Rachel was destined to grow up and be a scream queen with the set of lungs she had. Either that or a drill sergeant.
He winced as he entered the twins’ room and the cries just became more piercing. Maybe when she got older he’d take her to work with him and see if she could outscream a police siren.
Ryan was awake, but quiet, just staring up with round eyes as Mark glanced at him. When Mark picked up Rachel she blessedly lowered her volume several notches. “What do you need, sweetheart?” he asked even though he suspected he already knew the answer.
He was so bleary-eyed and out of it that it took three times as long as it should have to get her into a fresh diaper. When he had finally put her back down he staggered out of the room, made it back to bed, and flopped down on it hard enough to make the bed shake.
Traci still didn’t wake up. It was a good thing. She needed her rest. And yet some perverse part of him had the urge to reach over and shake her awake so that she would be suffering along with him in the moment.
He was grateful when the urge had passed because he knew that if he h
ad actually given into it the most likely outcome would have been that he ended up with his eyes scratched out.
He closed his eyes and let his body relax back into the bed. He was so tired he was shocked he wasn’t back asleep already. He waited for the sweet oblivion to claim him.
Fifteen minutes later he was still waiting. He tried flipping onto his side and readjusting his pillow. What was wrong with him? He wanted to sleep, he was desperate for it. His mind, however, had begun spinning, cataloguing the events of the day.
He couldn’t get the coded papers out of his mind. When he’d gotten home he hadn’t even had an opportunity to see if Kent and Paul’s codes seemed similar. When he’d walked through the door he’d had just barely enough time to choke down some quasi-warm dinner before heading off to bed with Traci. She had been asleep the second her head touched her pillow so he hadn’t even had a chance to discuss what he’d found with her.
Again he felt the urge to wake her up and again he managed to resist. It was possible that the papers he had discovered in Kent’s files pertained to the truth of Paul’s life and his real identity. That would make sense although he wouldn’t have thought that Paul would have trusted anyone with his secrets. Is that why he’d put Kent through law school? Was it a bribe to keep his secrets? Attorney-client confidentiality could be a powerful thing and if Paul were to tell someone his secrets he’d want it to be someone who couldn’t be called to testify against him. The two best candidates for that were a spouse or an attorney.
Even if that was what the papers were about, though, it didn’t explain the key Paul had entrusted Kent to give Georgia. What could the key possibly lead to? If it was just papers confirming Paul’s real identity, why bother? He could have instructed Kent to just tell Georgia the truth instead of sending her off to find heaven knew what with that key.
And the fact that the key had come with no instructions, just that coded message meant one of three things. Either Paul had expected Georgia to know or figure out what the key was for, or he had expected her to be able to decode his message, or he had expected her to bring Mark in to help.
Well Georgia certainly seemed clueless about the key just as he was. So that meant Paul must have been counting on either Georgia or Mark to be able to decode the note.
“Why couldn’t you have just made it easy?” Mark whispered.
“Who are you talking to?” Traci said suddenly and loudly enough to make him jump.
“That? That you wake up for?” he asked incredulously.
“It sounded important.”
“It is. I found some more things out about Paul, but they’ve only led to more questions than answers. Now I’m left with a bunch of coded papers, a key that fits heaven knows what, and no idea what to do with either of them.”
Traci didn’t say anything.
“Hon?”
Silence.
“Hon, you still awake?” he said, significantly louder.
She snored softly and he rolled his eyes. If he wanted to talk to Traci he was going to have to wait for morning.
From the other room Ryan began to softly cry.
Jeremiah was on edge as he snuck from building to building. He honestly didn’t think he would find Malcolm, or anything that would lead them to Malcolm. It was possible, though, that he’d stumble onto something questionable or downright illegal. If he did that might provide a motivation for someone to have gotten rid of Malcolm if he’d discovered the same thing. As long as no one tried to get rid of Jeremiah or Cindy, everything should be fine.
The only building he’d steered clear of appeared to house some sleeping quarters for staff members staying on overnight. It made sense. There were no activities late at night and no expectation that guests would need anything, but having staff at least present in case of an emergency was smart. Plus he was pretty sure that they took turns patrolling the grounds at night. He had managed to avoid running into the dance instructor as he met up with the yoga instructor outside the dormitory and handed her a set of keys and the flashlight. Jeremiah noticed that both of them were incredibly light on their feet so he knew he’d have to stay alert and not trust to his ears to give him warning of their approach.
The final building appeared to just be a storage facility. There were all manner of items from extra yoga mats to cases of toilet tissue. One wall was even lined with canned foods, the kind that could keep for a long time. He moved through the building, using the flashlight app on his phone to get a better look at some things.
On the far right side toward the back he encountered a door which was locked. He reached into his pocket for tools to help him pick it. Just as he was starting to insert the first metal instrument into the lock he froze.
Something wasn’t right. He could feel it. He held his breath, the better to listen. Then he heard it, a very soft footfall. There was someone else in the building and that person was headed straight for Jeremiah.
11
Jeremiah turned off his phone and shoved it in his pocket. For a split second he thought about going ahead and picking the lock on the door and then hiding in whatever space was behind it. It was too risky, though. He probably had just enough time, but if the door’s hinges creaked at all it would give him away.
He glided back the way he’d come, trying to remember everything he’d seen in the front part of the building. One window in the building high up on the side was letting in just enough moonlight to keep him from tripping over anything in the dark.
He had nearly made it to the front door when he heard the knob twist and the door begin to open. He backpedaled, realizing he was caught between two different people. He looked at the pallets of toilet paper that were stacked on top of each other and realized there was just enough room between them and the wall for him to squeeze in.
He moved quickly but carefully, making sure not to knock into anything. He reached the pallets and wedged himself behind them then crouched down with one foot on the floor and one on the edge of the bottom pallet. It was an awkward position and he had to brace himself with one hand against the wall.
He heard the front door close and then footsteps, these much louder than the ones that had been coming from the back of the building. The speaker clearly felt confident of his reason to be in the building.
The footsteps stopped not five feet from Jeremiah’s hiding place. He tensed, readying himself to spring out if need be even though he was fairly certain his presence had not yet been discovered.
“Hello,” a male voice called out in a loud whisper.
“There you are,” came an even quieter response. The second voice was definitely female. “Isn’t it a little early to be having this conversation?”
“I thought we should get started. I think we have some interesting prospects this time around.”
“Like that old couple?”
“No, we need to leave the regulars alone,” the man said firmly. “Besides, those two strike me as inseparable.”
“Then who do you have in mind?”
“Jack and Levi. I have a feeling we could get them in a heartbeat.”
“And I don’t think their wives would even notice until it was too late,” the woman said.
Jeremiah was struggling to believe his good fortune in happening into this building in time to overhear this conversation. He thought about Cindy’s sudden insistence that they not wait any longer to check out the other buildings. Maybe G-d had been prompting her. He was grateful that she had stayed back in their room, though. He would never have known that the woman was in the back of the building, in the dark, waiting for someone. He and Cindy probably would have spoken or made some sound that would have alerted her and ruined everything.
The question now was, what did these two think that Jack and Levi were likely candidates for? The woman was right about one thing, Jill and Kim certainly weren’t paying very close attention to their husbands thus far at the retreat and they could likely be gone for hours before they were even missed.
&nbs
p; He still wasn’t sure who the two speakers were, but he dared not risk trying to get a look at them at this point. They were so close they would almost certainly catch the movement if he peeked out from behind the pallets.
“Any other likely prospects?” she asked.
“I’m not sure yet. Things should get a lot clearer tomorrow when we have a chance to really work with them.”
So, they definitely were staff members. He’d been certain that was the case, but it was nice to have confirmation. Now he just had to figure out which ones. If he couldn’t get a good look at them or if they didn’t raise their voices louder than a whisper then he’d have to spend the next day watching to see who was watching the guests.
“Are you sure it’s safe, doing this again so soon?” she asked.
“I’m positive,” the man said. “What happened last time was a fluke. And besides, no one can touch us here.”
Jeremiah wondered if the last time that they were discussing had involved Malcolm. If so, it hadn’t gone the way they expected things to go.
For a moment Jeremiah considered leaping out from his hiding place and confronting them. It would certainly be the faster way to get things done. It could also prove highly problematic. They weren’t likely to spontaneously confess to anything. He wasn’t a police officer so he couldn’t just arrest them, and on what little he’d overheard Mark would never be able to come onto the reservation to arrest them. Even if he could there wasn’t near enough evidence of any kind of wrongdoing to be of use.
Of course, he could threaten or otherwise force a confession, but he knew it wouldn’t hold up in court if they confessed under duress. Besides, he didn’t yet know if anyone else was involved, and he didn’t want to risk letting any co-conspirators get away.
Whatever was going on here he’d have to get more information before he or Mark could do anything. He also noted that separating couples from each other was an essential element to their plans. Which meant that aside from being watchful he’d need to stick to Cindy like glue.
Thou Art With Me Page 10