ONCE BOUND

by Blake Pierce

  “Please do that,” Riley said. “What’s your room number? I’m coming right over.”

  “Fifteen,” Eggers said.

  “Just a few doors down,” Riley replied as she hung up.

  She hastily put on her clothes without bothering to straighten her hair. Then she hurried outside and down the sidewalk to Eggers’s room and knocked on the door.

  Still in his pajamas and a rather old-fashioned robe, Eggers was holding his out-of-date folding cell phone when he answered the door.

  “I just talked to Hank,” Eggers told her. “He says a freight train runs through Dermott most days at around two o’clock—about an hour after the passenger train from Chicago departs again.”

  Riley felt a chill of apprehension.

  Those two trains followed the same pattern as passenger and freight trains had for the other three murders.

  Eggers shook his head and added, “Look, I know I’m just a an over-the-hill railroad cop, and maybe I’d do the world more good if I just gave up this kind of work and took up fishing. But I’ve got a really bad feeling about this.”

  Riley was struck by the expression on Eggers’s face.

  She had a strong gut feeling …

  This guy knows exactly what he’s talking about.

  She simply had to trust his instincts.

  “Get dressed—fast,” Riley said. “Then come to my room—it’s number seven.”

  She already knew that Bill and Jenn were in rooms on either side of hers. She hammered on each of their doors, demanding that they get up and get dressed and come to her room. A few minutes later, Bill, Jenn, and Eggers were all in Riley’s room.

  Eggers was the only one aside from Riley herself who seemed especially awake. He took a look at the others, then went about setting up the coffeepot that was in the room. In a few moments, the smell of fresh coffee filled the air.

  Riley paced the floor, hoping she could persuade her colleagues to agree with her. As she told them about the passenger train and the freight train that would follow soon after it, Eggers passed around cups of coffee.

  Then Riley said, “The killer is working faster. And he’s going to kill again tomorrow, in Dermott. We’ve got to do something to stop him.”

  Jenn said, “Not if we’ve caught him already. Not if he’s Timothy Pollitt.”

  Riley flashed back to the interrogation room.

  She remembered what Pollitt had said when Bill asked him about Sally Diehl.

  “She was friendly. She liked to talk to us.”

  Riley realized something.

  Those were the only words that Pollitt had said that sounded truly sincere.

  Riley realized that some parts of the puzzle were falling into place in her mind.

  She blurted, “Timothy Pollitt didn’t kill Sally Diehl. He didn’t kill anybody. Don’t ask me how I know that, I just do. I’m absolutely sure of it.”

  A silence fell in the room.

  Am I going to have to beg? Riley wondered.

  Jenn looked confused and indecisive.

  But Riley noticed a welcome and familiar change in Bill’s expression. After working together for so many years, they’d learned to give each other the benefit of the doubt. And Riley could see that Bill was ready to do that.

  He finally said, “OK, what do we do next?”

  Riley thought for a moment.

  Then, without another word to the others, she picked up the motel phone, called the front desk, and asked to be connected with Bull Cullen’s room. Seconds later, she heard the groggy sound of Cullen’s voice.

  “Agent Paige? What the hell do you want?”

  Riley said, “Cullen, you can’t take the FBI off the case.”

  “Do you have any idea what time it is?”

  Riley ignored the question.

  “My colleagues and I think there’s an excellent chance that the killer will strike tomorrow just outside of Dermott, Wisconsin, sometime around two o’clock.”

  Riley heard a groan of annoyance.

  “You really don’t know when to quit, do you, Agent Paige?”

  Cullen hung up the phone.

  Riley immediately called the front desk again and asked for Cullen’s room number.

  Then she put the phone down and headed for the door.

  “Come on,” she said to the others.

  “Where are we going?” Jenn asked.

  “To wake Cullen up.”

  Followed by Bill, Jenn, and Eggers, Riley strode down the sidewalk toward Cullen’s room.

  She pounded on his door.

  A voice inside called out, “Who is it?”

  “You know who it is,” Riley yelled.

  “Go away,” Cullen replied.

  Riley pounded on the door again. This time a handful of tired-looking people poked their heads out of other motel room doors, grumbling about calling the police.

  Riley ignored them but she saw Bill flash his FBI badge. The complainers disappeared back into their rooms.

  “Damn it, Cullen,” she yelled. “This is your wakeup call. We’ve all got work to do. And we’ve got to start right now. Get up and open the door.”

  A moment later, a bleary-eyed, pajama-clad Cullen opened the door, and Riley and her colleagues filed inside.

  “You guys are being ridiculous,” he said. “We’ve got our guy and you know it.”

  “Has Pollitt confessed yet?” Riley asked.

  “No, his lawyer won’t let him talk. And why do you think that is? Why do you think he tried to run in the first place?”

  Riley could think of too many reasons to mention. The guy had a domestic abuse record, for one thing. And he had a secret life that he’d gone to a lot of trouble to conceal from everybody. The last thing he wanted to do was talk to any cops. And in any case, no lawyer was going to let him do that.

  It doesn’t mean he’s a murderer, she thought.

  In fact, she now felt absolutely sure that Pollitt wasn’t a murderer. Certainly not the one they were looking for.

  Cullen rubbed his eyes.

  He said, “I know what I’m doing, believe me. There are lots of people we can interview who knew the victims. Sooner or later, we’ll find a connection between Pollitt and all of the victims. We’ll find corroborating evidence.”

  Riley could hardly believe her ears.

  What made Cullen so sure that there was a connection between Pollitt and the victims—even if he really was guilty of the murders?

  He really doesn’t have the first idea of what he’s doing, Riley thought.

  Cullen was starting to seem more awake now. He was grinning smugly.

  “You guys really can’t deal with this, can you? That I’m going to wrap up the case, I mean. Without the FBI’s help. You’re going to get outshone by a railroad cop. I’ll get all the glory, and you’ll look like idiots. Well, that’s just too damned bad. You’re off the case. Orders are orders. And I’m giving the orders here.”

  Cullen finally seemed to notice Mason Eggers’s presence in the room.

  “What’s old Grandpa doing here?” he asked.

  “He’s come up with a theory,” Riley said. “And a damned good one.”

  Cullen’s eyes lit up.

  “So Grandpa’s got a theory! This I’ve got to hear!”

  Mason Eggers’s hands and voice shook nervously as he spread his map out on a table and explained everything to Cullen. Cullen didn’t stop grinning during Eggers’s whole explanation. Riley could tell by Cullen’s expression that he thought the theory was complete nonsense.

  When Eggers finished, Cullen crossed his arms and shook his head.

  “You guys are really grasping at straws, aren’t you? Listening to this over-the-hill old coot. You can’t even come up with an idea of your own!”

  Riley suppressed a moan of discouragement.

  What’s it going to take to get through to him? she wondered.

  She said, “We’ve got to set up a stakeout in Dermott. And we’ve got to get to work
right now. If you don’t want to be involved, my people are going to do it anyway.”

  Suddenly Cullen’s expression changed. He chuckled and said, “OK.”

  Riley was startled.

  OK? she thought.

  This had been easier than she’d expected.

  Cullen added, “Let’s get moving. Let’s wake everybody up. Just one thing, though. I want Grandpa to come along.”

  Now Riley understood.

  Cullen expected the stakeout to be a bust, and he wanted to see all of them made fools of—Riley, Bill, and especially Jenn, for having bloodied his nose.

  And of course, he wanted to make a fool of Eggers too.

  But that didn’t matter to Riley.

  What mattered was stopping a killer—and saving a life.

  CHAPTER THIRTY ONE

  As the FBI jet took off from the small Caruthers airport, Riley sat staring out the airplane’s window. Dawn was breaking, and she felt uneasy about what this new day was going to bring.

  They finally might have a chance to stop this serial killer once and for all.

  She hoped they could do that.

  If not …

  She didn’t want to think about what might happen otherwise.

  She closed and opened her right hand a few times. She felt some twinges now, but no pain to speak of. The injury she’d gotten from punching the hobo named Dutch was healing up nicely.

  That was a good thing. She might need to function at full physical capacity very soon.

  The small plane’s cabin was more crowded than usual. Riley had taken a window seat, and Mason Eggers had sat down next to her. Bill and Jenn were both on board, of course, and so was Chicago FBI field chief Proctor Dillard.

  Bull Cullen was on the plane as well. He’d managed to seat himself a safe distance away from Jenn. The leering interest he had shown toward her before was completely gone. Now he looked scared that Jenn might punch him in the nose again at any moment.

  Riley wondered …

  Is that a good thing or a bad thing?

  Well, it was certainly good that Cullen wouldn’t be harassing Jenn anymore. And Riley was pretty sure that Jenn had gotten her hostility toward Cullen out of her system. Riley only hoped that Cullen wouldn’t get so jittery about Jenn that his mind wouldn’t be on the case. Right now, the team needed all the brainpower it could get, even his. She didn’t think he could have become this area’s Deputy Chief of Railroad Police if he was a total idiot.

  But then Riley thought about Carl Walder back in Quantico. Somehow, that bureaucratic flunky had managed to become the Special Agent in Charge. And Walder was a constant drag on Riley’s work.

  As soon as the plane reached cruising altitude, Riley managed to get Dermott’s Chief of Police, Royce Ulrich, on the phone. The poor guy sounded sleepy and confused, but he promised that someone would meet Riley and her team at the airport. And he assured her that she’d have the full support of his department.

  Riley was about to tilt her seat back and try to sleep a little when she noticed Eggers’s face was pale and he was gripping the armrests of his chair.

  She asked him, “Are you scared of flying?”

  He nodded and said, “It’s bad enough in those big commercial airliners.”

  Riley smiled sympathetically.

  “I guess you’ve never been in a plane this small before,” she said.

  “I flew once in a little Piper Cub many years ago. It was a lot smaller, but this is even worse somehow.”

  Riley said, “Well, this plane is pretty much no frills as far as service is concerned. But I could go get you a drink of water if you think that would help.”

  She almost added …

  And I’m pretty sure we can find a paper bag somewhere.

  But she realized that the mere suggestion of vomiting might be enough to induce it.

  “I’ll be OK,” Eggers said.

  Riley wondered if maybe she should try to strike up a conversation with him. That might distract him from his apparent fear of flying.

  After all, she knew almost nothing about him.

  She’d noticed earlier that he was wearing a wedding ring. This had struck her as odd, since he seemed so insistent on following railroad police cases all over the place. At his age, wouldn’t he prefer spending more time with his wife and family?

  She said, “I see you’re married.”

  As if by reflex, Eggers covered up the ring with his right hand, and a pained expression crossed his face.

  Riley immediately understood her mistake.

  A widower, she thought. The loss of his wife was surely the last thing in the world he wanted to talk about.

  “I’m sorry,” she said.

  Eggers simply nodded.

  Riley quickly tried to think of some way to change the subject.

  But then it dawned on her …

  He doesn’t like to talk about himself.

  He was a lonely old man who managed to stave off boredom and grief by staying involved with railroad cases. That was all Riley knew about him, except she was sure that he had a better mind than Cullen and the newer generation of railroad police gave him credit for. She respected his insights and his expertise, and she felt sure that he understood the nature of this case as well as anybody else—perhaps even better.

  And the truth was, that probably was all Riley had any reason or right to know about him. He valued his privacy, and she needed to respect that.

  She looked out the window and saw a landscape of forested hills dotted with lakes that shimmered in the early morning light.

  Tourist country, Riley realized.

  It certainly was a beautiful view, and it was unsettling to think about the implacable monster who was probably lurking down there somewhere at this very moment, scheming to corrupt all that beauty.

  But Riley told herself …

  We’ll be on time.

  This time we’ll be able to stop it.

  She tilted her chair back and closed her eyes, hoping to catch just a little sleep before the plane landed—which was going to be very soon.

  *

  When Riley and her colleagues got off the plane at the little Dermott airport, a police SUV awaited them on the tarmac. Riley was surprised to see who was standing beside the car. She could tell by his uniform that he was none other than Chief Royce Ulrich himself. He’d come in person instead of sending any of his local cops.

  As Ulrich opened the SUV doors and escorted everyone inside, Riley noticed that the man didn’t have the face of a law enforcement official. He had a certain slick, plastic look that Riley quickly found a word for:

  Commercial.

  Ulrich looked like a male fashion model, or a salesman, or a tour guide. And Riley could understand why. In this beautiful part of Wisconsin, law enforcement typically had little to do except cater to tourists’ needs and troubles. A police chief here had to be as skilled in PR as in law enforcement—more so, probably.

  As the chief drove the short distance into downtown Dermott, he said, “I thought you’d caught that serial killer already—over in Caruthers.”

  Riley was briefly startled. But she realized she shouldn’t be surprised. The news about the arrest of a seeming hobo must be all over the news by now.

  What should she say to Ulrich?

  Riley glanced uneasily at Bull Cullen, who of course still believed that Timothy Pollitt was the real killer and that coming out here to Dermott was a waste of time and resources.

  Cullen smirked at Riley but said nothing.

  Riley said to Ulrich, “We’ve got a new lead. We need to follow up on it.”

  It wasn’t a satisfactory answer and Riley knew it.

  Chief Ulrich said, “How many people know about this? That you’re trying to catch a murderer here today, I mean?”

  Riley thought for a moment and said, “Just the people in this car.”

  Ulrich nodded and said, “I’d like to keep it down to the smallest number of people possible. I have
n’t even mentioned it to any of my own cops just yet. Let’s keep things on a need-to-know basis. This town is right next to a state forest. Tourism is our whole local economy. If people get scared to come here, this town could be in serious trouble.”

  Riley understood his concern, but she knew she couldn’t promise him anything.

  She also wanted to keep the stakeout as secret as possible in order not to tip off their target. But afterward, especially if they caught their killer, they would all be all over the news.

  *

  In Ulrich’s office at the police station, Riley and her colleagues stood looking at a large computer screen, surveying a satellite image of the local train tracks. Eggers pointed to the curve in the railroad track and explained his theory—that the killer would try to stage his next murder there, because the engineer wouldn’t see the victim soon enough to stop the locomotive.

  When Eggers finished, Riley said, “We need to monitor that stretch of tracks. But we need to do it without being noticed.”

  Ulrich seemed thoroughly engaged now.

  “I think I know how to do it,” he said.

  He got up from his chair and pointed to a spot on the screen. It was a square-shaped object in the woods.

  Ulrich said, “That’s an old wooden tower, built for looking out for forest fires. Its base is at an altitude of two hundred fifty feet, and it’s sixty feet tall. You can see twenty-five miles in all directions from it—including that entire length of railroad track.”

  Riley was pleased.

  She said, “We’ll post a couple of people up there, and we’ll also put several people on the ground, hiding in the woods near the tracks. The tower lookouts can alert the ground people by radio if they see anyone suspicious, and the ground people will move right in and apprehend the perpetrator. He can’t possibly get out of a trap like that.”

  Riley noticed that Bill was squinting at the screen, looking slightly dissatisfied.

  He said, “All this assumes that we catch our killer after he’s already abducted his victim. That’s OK as a last resort. But we should do everything we can to keep him from abducting anyone in the first place. We need to take a two-pronged approach.”

  Riley agreed.

  She said to Ulrich, “Have you got good surveillance cameras on the platform where the trains arrive?”