by Kylie Brant
“Oh, but Courtney…”
His gaze returned to the barn. “They’ll take care of her, too. And Soph…it’s good to hear your voice.”
“Yours, too.” Her words sounded thick. “Be careful.”
He put the car in gear and drove ahead to take position. The entire exchange had taken less than a minute, and had served to allay some of his worries for her.
More, she’d given him valuable information that would impact how they’d approach the suspect inside. Cam stopped at the edge of the property and reached over for the whisper mic on top of his gear. Donning it, he zipped up the gear bag and took it out of the car, easing the door shut behind him. As he rounded the vehicle and made his way into the ditch to approach the barn, he saw Tommy exit his car and do the same. Staying as close to the fence line as possible, Cam veered around the scrub brush and a few half hidden scraps of metal from some ancient farm equipment until he reached the far end of the barn.
He stopped. “We’ve got a set of sliding double doors, one is standing open.” He spoke into the mic in a near whisper. “Looks like a shiny new padlock on the door.” The rotted board that had likely once served to slide across the doors to secure them was leaning against the side of the structure.
Cam’s gaze turned to the vehicle. It was parked in view of the doors. If Vance was still inside, depending on where he was situated, there was a good chance he’d see any movement around the van.
But if the suspect had gotten there ten minutes earlier, as Sophie had attested, he’d have seen that his captives were gone. So what would keep him inside?
Franks’ voice sounded. “There’s a big square door near the top of the barn on the east side.”
Which meant a hayloft. The original owner would have needed the opening for ventilation, and to load and unload hay for the livestock. “Any method of escape from it?”
“Not unless someone doesn’t mind breaking a dozen bones by jumping.”
“Stay out of range of it.” If Vance had taken position up there, he’d be in perfect sniper position. “Any sign of movement inside?”
“Negative.”
Cam crouched low and made a beeline for the van. Crawling under it, he used the tack stick to puncture the sides of each tire, before rolling out again. Looked toward the barn. “I’m going in. Cover the back.”
Weapon in hand, he ran in a crouch to the yawning expanse revealed by the open door. Set the gear bag down. “Mason Vance,” he called in a loud voice. “DCI. Put your hands behind your head and come out.” There was no response. All was silent save for the shrill of a songbird. The near complete quiet lent an eerie quality to the scene. He tried again. “Vance! You are surrounded. Come out now. Hands behind your head.” As seconds crawled into minutes he said to Franks, “Let’s go.”
Weapon drawn, Cam swung around the doorway, scanning the dim interior. There were stalls lining one side. A rickety ladder led from the pulverized and dusty concrete barn floor to an overhead opening near the center of the barn.
He took the left side, Franks the right. Cam looked in each of the stalls. All were gated with the tallest livestock gates he’d ever seen. The gate of the first cell yawned open. Inside it was only a blow up mattress and a wadded up Bryson’s bag and cup in the corner. His gaze lingered for a moment on the familiar sack. A similar one had served as the paper for Sophie’s revised profile. Woven wire effectively penned in the stall from the top, making an escape proof cell in which Vance could keep his victims.
But not exactly escape proof, apparently. Somehow Sophie and Van Wheton had managed to get out.
A crazy grin threatened at the thought. The suspect was cunning, but he’d underestimated Sophie’s training and intellect.
He moved on. The place was massive. There were ten cells in all, but only the first and eighth had been used as cells. Cam stopped a moment at the eighth gate to marvel at Sophie’s ingenuity. At least he assumed Sophie had been kept here. A cup was in the corner, but no bag. And from the sounds of things, Courtney Van Wheton had been in no shape to escape on her own.
One board was missing from the side of the stall. Parts of it had been used in two spots above to wedge the wire open far enough to allow a slender person exit. That stall too, was empty.
Cam took a moment to wonder at Vance’s reaction when he’d found his victims gone. The man was prone to fits of rage, Sophie had said. Capable of fits of violence, and impulsive, erratic behavior.
He found nothing in the cells. Turning to Franks, he pointed upward and the other agent nodded. Cam retraced his steps to where he’d left his gear. Going to one knee, he unzipped the bag and found a navy cap emblazoned with DCI. He joined Franks on the other side of the barn and briefly explained his intent. The other agent bent down and retrieved a long length of heavy pipe.
“That’ll do. Cover me.” He headed back to the ladder, re-holstering his weapon. Affixing the hat to the top of the pipe, he grasped a bent wire rung with his free hand, and began to climb, the pipe held high above him.
“I’m coming up, Vance!” he shouted. He ascended far enough that the hat atop the pipe would be partially visible to anyone above, half expecting to hear shots fired in its direction.
What he was not expecting was to hear a woman sobbing.
“He’s not here! He’s not here! Oh, please God, get me out before he comes back.”
# # # #
Rhonda Ann Klaussen, as the ID from the purse in the van identified her, didn’t fit the profile of Vance’s usual victims. By her own admission she had no money. A quick check showed that she’d twice been arrested a decade ago, once for solicitation and the other time for assault. What she did have was a long professed association with Mason Vance, both before and after his time in prison.
“Where is he now?” Cam had been in contact with the agents he’d sent to Alleman. Vance still hadn’t been sighted. While Agent Loring had found an Ankeny based health club that admitted to having a member by that name, the employee Loring had spoken to claimed that the man had come and gone already that day.
Klaussen was seated in the back of Sheriff Dusten Jackson’s county-issued Ford Explorer, rubbing her wrists. They were red, with visible indentations from the tight zip cuffs Cam had cut off. Her feet had been similarly bound. “I don’t know. He made me drive him here, gave me the directions. He never let me out much, but when he did, he always made me drive him.”
She was a big-boned woman, but lean, dressed in jean shorts, a tee shirt, and flip- flops. Below the bleached blond hair and heavy make up she looked older than the age on her driver’s license. But her prints had already been taken with a portable fingerprint device, and the results had come back in minutes. She was exactly who she said she was.
It just wasn’t clear what relationship she had with Vance.
“What did he tell you?”
“Nothing.” The sheriff reached into the front seat for something and Klaussen shrunk away as if expecting a blow. “Mase is…he’s a mean guy. And whatever he had in mind wasn’t good. I knew that. Whenever he got that nasty little smile on his face I always knew something was coming I wouldn’t like. He said he had a surprise for me. You learn not to ask a lot of questions with Mase. So I just drove, already shaking. But this place…” She gestured to the barn. “What the hell is it? He said for me to wait in the van and if I moved he’d cut me.” She held out an arm, which bore a fresh barely healed scar. “I know he means it. So I stayed in the van.”
“You weren’t in the van when we found you.” Both ambulances went by just then and Cam followed their progress with his gaze. Jenna’s vehicle followed them. He’d told the agent to remain with the women and report back when doctors had seen the two. Van Wheton still hadn’t regained consciousness.
Klaussen began to shake. “Mase wasn’t inside for more than a minute or two before he came out, screaming and yelling. He dragged me out of the van and into the barn, raving about all women being worthless cu—…” Her gaze drop
ped. “He uses the ‘c’ word a lot. Kept ranting about finding two bitches and bringing them back to burn the place down with all of us in it.” Tears welled in her eyes at the memory. “That’s when he made me climb the ladder. He tied me up. I was begging and pleading with him.” She pointed to her mouth. “So he hit me and told me to shut the fuck up. Then he left. When I heard you calling, at first I thought it was him. He plays games sometimes. Tries to get me to call for help by pretending to be someone else and then if I do…well, this is what you get if you try to get away from Mason Vance.”
She turned a little on the seat, reached in back of her to lift up the hem of her shirt.
In a meandering line over her right shoulder were several round scars that were a match for those found on the six victims they’d unburied. Some looked like fresh wounds had been inflicted over healed ones.
“He likes to burn people,” she said with a catch in her voice. “I always figured someday that wouldn’t be enough to satisfy him anymore and he’d just kill me. If you hadn’t come along I think today would have been my last.”
“Do you believe her?”
“Hard to say.” Cam’s response to Tommy’s question was reflective. The two were in Cam’s car parked on the side of a road perpendicular from the Stanford house. “She could be an accessory. Dr. Channing said from the beginning the crimes could actually be the work of a team.” But he’d thought if there were two criminals working together the other might be the man matching the sketch Jenna had done in Edina. Nothing about this case had turned out the way he’d expected.
“Or she could have been Vance’s first victim. She says they lived together for a while before he went to prison, and practically held her captive. When he went to jail it took her ten days before she summoned the courage to venture out of the apartment they were living in.”
“Wouldn’t be the first time a victim was forced to be an accessory,” Tommy observed.
“It’s touchy.” Broodingly, Cam watched the elongating shadows from the line of birch trees that edged the property. It was almost dusk, and still no sign of Vance. He found himself wishing he could get Sophie’s take on Klaussen. Which was never going to happen, because if he had his way Sophie would never be reminded of this case again. “If Klaussen’s story is true, the grilling she’s going to receive will be just one more trauma. She said she was often kept chained in the basement. And we saw the chains when we were inside.” After the warrant had been okayed, they’d done a quick walk through, with the help of a crowbar on the back door. The hasty search had yielded a rifle, a Glock, a list of bank accounts numbers and twelve thousand dollars stuffed in a duffel bag in a bedroom closet. Cam had called Maria to give her an update, and she was working on freezing the assets in the accounts.
But the most damning thing they’d found by far was a pair of tennis shoes whose soles looked like a match to the footwear report Fenton had sent him that very morning. The treads still held traces of dirt Cam hoped would be identical to that found in Sophie’s apartment.
He had two deputies stationed in bushes closer to the house. Stakeout in a vehicle was a piece of cake in comparison.
“Place isn’t as isolated as the barn, but located on the outskirts of town like this, he wouldn’t have to worry about nosy neighbors,” Tommy noted. The next nearest house was another couple hundred yards away.
“Perfect for a son of a bitch like this one,” Cam agreed grimly. “The van is in Klaussen’s name. She said she bought it a couple years before Mason showed up in her life again. Claims he took it as his own and doesn’t have another vehicle.”
“He’s got to realize with the two victims missing that someone would be coming for him. We had to have missed the bastard by minutes.” Tommy’s tone mirrored Cam’s frustration. “Dr. Channing said the van had pulled in about ten minutes before she flagged down Boggs. That matches up with the timeline Klaussen gave, too.”
Though Cam had headed to Alleman, he was still receiving updates about the search for Vance. And there had been a depressing lack of progress in that area. To have been that close to the man and missed him was the worst kind of timing.
“Probably thought he’d be finding Van Wheton and Sophie fairly quickly, given the location. He couldn’t know our arrival would be minutes after his. Instead of killing three more victims, he ended up on the run himself.” Cam considered the house across the road. The smartest thing for Vance to do would be to leave the area, but he might also want to get the contents the agents had found in the house. Or maybe he kept souvenirs there. Cam wondered if the sadist was also a collector. A lot of these sick bastards were.
Franks worked his shoulders tiredly. “Missed him by minutes. Thought the search plane might come up with something, but there are usually waterways in fields. I suppose he could have hidden in the grass in one. Made his way along it a couple miles to the next farmhouse.”
Or maybe, Cam thought bleakly, the man was long gone. He could have hitched a ride and be on his way out of the state by now. Cam had already checked the stolen vehicle reports in the vicinity, but the closest theft that day had been in Ankeny, during the time a desk clerk at U-Fit said Vance had been working out. She’d identified him from a faxed photo as the suspect they were seeking.
“How long are we going to give it?”
“A few more hours.” If Vance hadn’t shown up by midnight, Cam would have to review his options. Once it got dark, they’d also be calling off the ground search in the area surrounding the barn. He’d leave in place the deputies the Polk County sheriff had stationed at the nearest farmhouses, though. Vance might be holed up somewhere in the area of the barn, waiting for the cover of darkness before he…
The thought trailed off suddenly. A car pulled up in front of the drive across the street and stopped, motor running. “Honey, I’m home,” he crooned in a singsong as Franks straightened in the seat next to him. A bulky man in gym shorts and tee shirt got out of the vehicle.
“You getting that license plate?”
“Might be older than you, but there’s nothing wrong with my eyes.” Franks scribbled it in a notebook he took from his suit jacket.
Vance withdrew his wallet and took out some bills, handing them to the driver. Then he walked up the drive as the car took off, temper evident in every step.
They let him get in the house. Waited for lights to go on while Cam shrugged out of his jacket, took off his tie and pulled his dress shirt loose from where it’d been tucked in his trousers.
“How do I look?”
Franks spared him a glance. “Like a guy who’s been waiting hours to kick some ass.”
That was an understatement. “Exactly what I was going for.” Cam fastened his holster under his shirt, weapon to the back. Then he reached up to turn off the overhead light. “Showtime.”
They opened their doors simultaneously, Cam heading toward the house and Franks making a long circle that would eventually take him to the back of the Stanford property. The other law enforcement personnel would see his approach and be ready.
Cam wanted to give Vance time to get inside, but not long enough to get in the shower, on the phone, or anything else that might prevent the man from answering the door.
His hammering on the front door wasn’t subtle. Neither was the threatening look on Vance’s face when he yanked it open, after Cam waged a second assault on it.
“You got a problem, buddy?”
“Actually, yes.” It wasn’t difficult to summon the frustration rife in his voice. “I’m in town to visit my grandma. You know Hannah Barnett? On Oak and Third?” He turned and pointed behind him. “I tried to leave two hours ago, but the damn car won’t start. My phone is dead, my wife took the car charger, grandma doesn’t have long distance on her landline…” He bared his teeth, the picture of a man at the end of his rope. “Doesn’t seem to be anyone in town under the age of eighty who knows a darn thing about vehicles. I’m hoping maybe you do. Or if that’s not your thing, that you’ll at l
east let me use your cell to get a tow truck out here, so I don’t have to spend the night sleeping in the damn thing.”
Sophie had been right. The guy was big. His arms were roped with muscles and hung a little away from his sides, giving him an apelike appearance. A sly look came over Vance’s expression as he peered past Cam. “What kind of car is it?”
“Dodge Charger. I figure I might have blown the ignition relay. But with all the damn electronics in these new cars, hell if I know where to find it.”
“New model, huh?” The farce had worked. Vance was shoving his feet into tennis shoes. Probably already salivating at the thought of getting his hands on a new set of wheels. After he’d gotten rid of Cam first, of course. “I’ll take a look. I’m pretty good with my hands.”
“It’s across the street.” Cam let the man precede him down the steps, pulling his weapon as soon as Vance’s back was to him. “Get down on your belly. Down, down, now!” Agents and deputies burst from their hiding places to swarm the yard.
For all his bulk, there was nothing wrong with Vance’s reflexes. He spun around and lunged toward Cam, his meaty fist whistling through the air as it came perilously close to Cam’s temple. He dodged, slightly off balance, and aimed a vicious kick at the man’s knee, designed to dislocate his kneecap. When it connected, Vance squealed like a girl. Went down hard. He latched onto Cam’s ankle, intent on pulling him to the ground. Even with a half dozen guns trained on him, the man was trying for a weapon.
Cam swung away, one foot purposefully finding Vance’s injured knee. The man’s scream was hideous. Franks and Sheriff Jackson moved to restrain him as Cam stepped to the side, weapon still trained on the man.
“Mason Vance.” A primitive sense of satisfaction filled him as he spoke the words. “You’re under arrest for eight counts of kidnapping and six counts of murder.” It took four law officers to bring Mason to his feet. It was an oddly surreal moment for Cam to watch the sadistic rapist and murderer who had enacted atrocities on multiple women sniveling about the pain in his leg.