True Vision

by Joyce Lamb

  Noah started to pace. Time was slipping away, damn it. Charlie was slipping away. “What about desk clerks? The bartender in the lounge? Cocktail waitresses?”

  “We went through them all,” Logan said. “We can do it again.”

  “We’re wasting time.”

  Logan spread his hands. “Then what? What do we do?”

  Noah swung around, wanting to punch something, anything. “Fuck. I don’t know.” He scrubbed his hands over his face. They needed another angle, another avenue. “What about the blackmail? How’d they do it?”

  Logan clenched his jaw, swallowed. “We don’t know for sure yet, but we think they targeted wealthy guests who checked into the suites on the top floor. We’ve cleared the guests out of those rooms for the investigation but haven’t had a chance to do more.”

  Noah whirled toward the door. He didn’t bother with the elevator. He headed for the stairwell off the lobby and took the stairs three at a time to the fifth floor, Logan right on his heels.

  Their harsh breathing synchronized, they strode down the hall to the first suite door. Logan used the master key he’d gotten earlier from the desk clerk to let them in.

  Noah went straight to the bedroom, decorated with a nautical theme in teak wood and a mural of a sky with myriad birds flying overhead painted on the ceiling. A large, framed picture of a sailboat floating on serene water hung above the king-size bed. Noah lifted it away from the wall, knowing it was too easy, but what the hell. Damn it. Nothing behind it but a nail for the wire.

  Logan checked behind the mirror in the shape of a sailboat steering wheel above the bureau. Nothing.

  Noah examined the walls, looking for peepholes, while Logan went to the window, where he drew aside curtains made to look like billowing sails and scanned the outside stucco walls.

  “No cameras outside,” he said. “How the hell did they do it?”

  “Maybe they didn’t use this room,” Noah said as he tilted his head back to study the sky blue ceiling covered with wispy clouds, seagulls, pelicans and some other kind of birds.

  The ceiling fan caught his eye, and he moved to stand beside the bed so he could study it. Simple, white, with five wide blades. The light kit consisted of four bulbs cupped in delicate, frosted-glass globes. In the center, a decorative bronze seagull spread its wings as though coasting on the breeze created by the blades.

  “You see something?” Logan asked.

  Noah shoved the bed aside, then went into the next room and grabbed a chair from the table. After placing it under the ceiling fan, he hopped up onto the seat.

  “Wait,” Logan snapped before he could touch anything. “Fingerprints.”

  Noah dropped his hands and squinted up at the belly of the seagull. Something was off about it. A reflection? Perhaps from a lens? He squinted. No, just a shiny bird belly.

  He shifted his gaze to the ceiling, registered that separate tiles made up the mural, fit together like straight-edged puzzle pieces. Removable. “I’ll be damned.”

  “What?” Logan asked. “What is it?”

  “False ceiling.”

  Very carefully, using just the tips of his fingers, Noah lifted a three-by-three square of ceiling tile, surprised at how light it was, and moved it to overlap its neighbor. The chair wasn’t tall enough, though, to allow him to see into the ceiling. “Call the front desk and get someone to get a ladder up here.”

  Logan picked up the phone on the bedside table while Noah jumped off the chair. His heart was pounding, raging, the clock ticking. How long would it take to get a ladder? Too fucking long.

  He went to the bureau and dragged it away from the wall, straining muscles in his back and arms. Damn, but the son of a bitch weighed a ton. Then Logan, off the phone already, was at his side helping.

  “Front desk said it might be a while,” Logan said. “Their maintenance guy didn’t show for work today.”

  Noah didn’t respond. He had his own ladder now. He hefted himself up onto the top of the heavy furniture and stood up. The perfect height.

  With his head in the ceiling, he could see the large piece of plywood overlaying the tiles to the left. Perfect size for a body to recline while snapping some dirty pictures.

  Noah dropped off the bureau, landing with a jarring thud that vibrated through his knees and hips. “What’s next door?”

  Logan followed him out into the hall, where they stopped in front of the supply closet. Logan tried the knob. “Locked.”

  His master key didn’t work. Before Noah had finished swearing in frustration, Logan drew his gun and shot out the lock.

  Noah laughed darkly as he pushed the door inward. “I like the way you work.”

  Logan just smirked as they surveyed the narrow supply closet that held no supplies. It did hold a ladder, however. Open right under a trapdoor in the wall to the right, just inches from the ceiling. A bulky black bag sat on the floor between the legs of the ladder. While Logan zipped open the bag and peered inside, Noah climbed the ladder and swung open the trapdoor.

  “Bingo,” Logan said below him.

  Noah glanced down. “Camera equipment?”

  “Yep. What’ve you got?”

  “Looks like it was set up so the guy with the camera could crawl out into the ceiling. He cut holes in the plywood that probably line up with holes in the ceiling mural, most likely in darker spots, like the shadows of the birds, so they wouldn’t be noticeable.”

  “Jesus.”

  “Pretty simple and low-tech, really,” Noah said.

  “Who’d be able to set something like this up without drawing a bunch of attention?”

  Noah got it. It made perfect sense. “Maintenance guy.”

  “Who didn’t come in today,” Logan said. “Shit.”

  CHAPTER SIXTY-TWO

  When his calloused hand closed over her cuffed wrist, Charlie jerked at the contact, ignoring the answering pain as the manacle cut into her already abused skin. No, no, no.

  “Please, don’t,” she said, not above begging. “I can pay you. Whatever you want.”

  He shook his head, tsked under his breath, his index finger stroking the inside of her wrist while the rest of his fingers banded the fine bones as surely as the cuffs did. “I don’t need money. All I need is you.” His fingers tightened. “As long as it takes.”

  She twisted her wrist in his grasp, and his grip slipped in her blood. He glanced down, and his flinch vibrated through her hand.

  “You’re bleeding,” he muttered. “What did you do to yourself?”

  Confused that he would care, she looked down, her vision watery and too bright. The throbbing in her head was secondary at this point, overwhelmed by the dread of what he planned to do to her. She searched for more words, anything to stall him, to stop him. But she couldn’t think, couldn’t focus. A dazzling flare of light behind her eyes, inside her head, told her time was running short.

  While he dug around in his pocket for who knew what, she tried to pull away, ashamed at the whimpering sounds coming from her throat but unable to make them stop. Fight, you idiot. Fight.

  She yanked her arm, felt the tendons and ligaments in her shoulder wrench, felt his calluses rasp her skin.

  And then he did something she didn’t see coming: He inserted a key into the cuffs and cranked. The bracelet fell away from her hand with a metallic clink.

  She was free.

  She didn’t think. She shoved at his shoulders with all of her strength, levering up with her legs, and knocked him on his ass. Shock blanched his features as she scrambled to her feet and swayed a moment as her head swam. But then she loomed over him, her feet planted between his spread knees. He must have realized the vulnerability of his position in the same instant that she did, because he started a frantic crawl backward. She took her shot while she had it, maybe it’d be the only one she’d get, and kicked him as hard as she could, square in the crotch.

  A wild howl erupted from his throat, and he curled onto his side, clamping his hands be
tween his legs.

  Charlie, her knees trembling, stepped over him, sickened by the viciousness of what she’d just done. She’d felt a crunch. Bone? Cartilage? Whatever it was, she’d damaged something big-time. Self-defense, she thought. He was going to rape her. And not just once. She protected herself. Still, she couldn’t help the revulsion that gripped her stomach.

  Disoriented, her temples pounding, she stumbled toward the way out. At least, she hoped it was the way out. She had no way of knowing. She simply followed the light. The light was salvation. A hysterical giggle caught in her throat. Old movie line. Something about souls that had lost their way. She could relate. She had no idea where she was, how to get out of wherever the hell this was. Old factory? But, no, the machines wouldn’t be running if it were old. Boiler room? Hell? Did it matter?

  She had to get to Mac. That crazy bastard had hit Mac with a wrench. Maybe killed him.

  The first door she tried opened into a smaller room. Finished walls but unfinished concrete floor. Bare lightbulb blazing overhead. A tool bench against the wall to her left. Maintenance equipment lined up along the wall to her right—floor buffers, ladders, wet vacs.

  And straight ahead, stuck to the wallboard surrounding another door, maybe the way out, oh, God, hundreds of glossy photos. Naked bodies in the throes of various carnal acts.

  She forced her feet to move despite the urge to turn and run the other way, forced herself to approach the door, keeping her eyes averted from the intimate images.

  Focus.

  Get out.

  Now.

  Her hand shook uncontrollably, her breath noisily sawing in and out of her lungs, nausea climbing up her throat, as she grasped the knob and tried to turn it. Locked. Damn it.

  She pivoted. Go back.

  And froze.

  He was behind her, crawling, reaching for her, his sweaty face pasty, his pain-filled eyes wide and crazed.

  She darted around him, but he flung himself to the side, directly into her path. She couldn’t stumble back fast enough to avoid the fingers he closed around her calf.

  Agony erupts like a volcano, burning, searing, slamming into my gut and sending fire through my veins and to every nerve ending. In the next instant, I’m on the floor, retching, curled around myself, red like blood flashing across my vision. Air locks in my lungs. Can’t breathe, can’t breathe. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck!!!!

  Charlie came back to herself, her cheek throbbing where it rested against the cold, sandy floor. Her body, tucked into a tight, protective ball, twitched from a phantom agony whose echoes were already fading. Every muscle trembled, the aftermath of staggering pain she’d inflicted on another. Self-defense, she thought. God help me, it was self-defense.

  Focus.

  Get out.

  But her head, oh, God, her head. The pressure grew, expanded, like something inside her skull wanted out as badly as she did. It clawed at her temples, seeming to shred the soft tissue.

  Where was he?

  There, less than a yard away, on his side, groaning and breathing heavily like a horse that needed to be put out of its misery. For the moment, not a threat.

  Fighting the urge to be sick, she unfurled, forcing tensed muscles to unclench, pushed up onto her knees and locked her elbows. A starburst whited out her vision, and dizziness slammed her world sideways. She closed her eyes while nausea did its queasy dance, a dull roar beginning in her ears.

  Stop. Please, stop. No time.

  Crawl.

  She made it as far as the end of the tool bench against the wall, intending to use it to pull herself up, before the inside of her head went supernova. The detonation was so fast and vicious that it drove her back down onto her side and onto her back, where she pressed her palms to eyes that threatened to implode. Oh, God, oh, God.

  It wasn’t even flash fatigue. Not yet.

  The prelude, though. If she was going to save herself, she had to do it now.

  His fingers, clammy, trembling, clutched weakly at her ankle, and she kicked his hand away, more of a flick, really, and ignored him, focused entirely on forcing her reluctant body to obey the commands of her increasingly sluggish brain. Overload. Circuits fried. Consciousness circling the drain.

  Twist, turn, onto your stomach, brace your elbows, lift your butt, get your legs under you, up onto your knees, grab the edge of the tool bench and pull. There, that’s it. You’ve got it.

  Only a few feet away, he was trying to get up as well, obviously in a monstrous amount of pain. Pain she caused. Incredible, sickening pain she’d felt.

  Move. You have to move.

  Light dazzled like the flashbulbs of a million cameras. Huge red spots obliterated everything in front of her, and she tried to blink them away. But they weren’t going away. They hovered, splattered, spread, turned to darkness.

  Blind. She was blind.

  She heard him stir more decisively, heard shuffling followed by a ragged grunt and wheezing. “Bitch,” he panted. Closer now. “You fucking bitch. You’re going to beg me to kill you.”

  He crashed into her from behind, carrying her sideways, away from the tool bench and into the wall. She managed to twist in his arms, striking out at him with her fists as they both smashed into the wall and slid down it, landing in a heap. Her head bounced off the floor, sending sparks through her reeling senses.

  And then his hot breath was in her face, his forearm braced across her throat.

  “You really shouldn’t have done that.”

  CHAPTER SIXTY-THREE

  This is it!” Noah shouted. He had to brace a hand on the dashboard to keep from flying into the windshield as Logan stomped on the brake. The squad car screeched to a stop in front of the house where Skip Alteen lived on the top floor.

  Logan ordered their backup to approach with sirens and lights off.

  “I don’t suppose you have an extra weapon,” Noah said, his gaze fixed on the door at the top of the stairs.

  Logan reached down and pulled a gun out of the holster strapped to his ankle. “Don’t tell anyone I gave you this.”

  Noah glanced at the weapon, a subcompact Glock not much different from the one he used on duty. Just what the doctor ordered. “Just so you know. If this son of a bitch left one tiny mark on her, I’m taking him out.”

  “Get in line,” Logan said in a low voice. “Ready?”

  “Let’s do it.”

  Logan kicked in the flimsy old door, shouting, “Police!” in his authoritative voice.

  Noah went in behind him, the Glock braced and sweeping. He vaguely registered the three other squad cars pulling up out front as he took in the apartment.

  The creep who resided here lived a spartan but apparently rewarding life. New, black leather sofa with matching recliner, the kind that looked like a first-class seat on a brand-new jumbo jet. A huge plasma-screen TV on a fancy black stand. Home theater system. Video game console with stacks of games, some still in their packaging. On the sofa, a textbook sat open, as though a student had left in the middle of studying. The place could have been the college dorm room of a filthy rich student.

  A filthy rich, demented student who’d kidnapped the woman he loved.

  “Charlie?” Noah called, aware that his voice sounded strained, shaky. “Charlie!”

  He’d already noted that nothing moved inside the apartment. Not a peep. Not one furtive shuffle.

  No one was here.

  “Charlie!” Logan yelled, a hint of desperation in his voice. He sensed it, too, the utter stillness of the apartment.

  Noah lowered the gun, dropped out of his stance. He’d never felt so hopeless, so lost. “She’s not here.”

  CHAPTER SIXTY-FOUR

  Charlie didn’t open her eyes right away, aware first that everything about her head throbbed. Jaw, cheek, chin, temples. He’d hit her again, though it hadn’t taken much at the time to knock her unconscious. The headache, thank God, had receded to a steady pounding without the jagged lightning edges. No blazes of light now, no freight
train in her ears. Apparently, she’d been out long enough for her system to level. Good to know for future reference.

  Unfortunately, he’d been busy while she’d been out. She was tied up now, sitting with her back against a wall. Her hands, bound in front of her, rested between her slightly spread knees, the thick rope binding her wrists lashed to her tightly secured ankles. She wondered vaguely why he hadn’t used the cuffs again. As if it mattered, but still.

  The floor under her was hard, familiar. Still the boiler room. Or whatever it was. Or maybe not. It was quieter here, the steady roar of machinery muffled, as though behind a wall. Despite the stifling heat, she started to shiver.

  “I know you’re awake.” His voice strained. “I can tell by the way you’re breathing.”

  She opened her eyes, blinked against the harsh light, but relieved she could see. And then not relieved. She was still in the smaller room with the tool bench and maintenance equipment. And the photos. Plastered all over an entire wall, surrounding the door that had let her down by being locked. Men and women. Men and men. Women and women. People she recognized. People she didn’t. Captured during their most intimate moments.

  “Nice, aren’t they?”

  She leaned her head back, swallowing convulsively, and slid her eyes to the man sitting gingerly on the large, upturned plastic bucket. He looked bad. Pale, almost gray, sweating profusely. His red-rimmed eyes glowed with a feral madness.

  “My art,” he said, his breathing uneven. “People have paid me good money for those.”

  He shifted, squeezed his eyes closed, grimaced. “Man, you fucked me up. I don’t think I’m going to recover from this.” Tears slipped out of his eyes, and he swiped at his running nose. “I may be permanently damaged.”

  Charlie stayed quiet. Assessing. Don’t piss him off again. A tug at her hands verified the strength of her bonds. And then she noticed the pipe wrench on the floor at his feet. His weapon of choice. She knew how it felt in her hand. Heavy and powerful. Had felt him swing it at Mac’s head. Oh, God, how long had it been since he’d struck Mac? He might be dead by now.