“That doesn’t change the fact that I helped put a man in prison for something he didn’t do.”
“Val…”
Val slumped back in her seat. “Maybe he’s right.”
“Who? Hess?”
“Haselow. Maybe Pete can do a better job. He certainly can handle the physical part of the job better than I can.”
“You don’t always have problems. You said you haven’t for more than a year.”
“I know, but it is a matter of time.”
“I don’t accept that.”
“It doesn’t matter what you accept. Or what I accept, either. Pete is chief. I’m no longer a cop.” She pulled in a breath, held it for several counts, then let it out. “At least I won’t have to brief the press and try to schedule the normal number of shifts with half the number of officers.”
“There you go,” Lund agreed. “We can focus on Grace.”
Lund crossed the river just downstream from the Prairie du Sac dam. Killing the siren so as not to alert Hess, they raced down roads flanked by slush-covered fields and bare-branched forest. As the highway drew closer to Lake Wisconsin, Lund could catch glimpses of lights bouncing off the water through trees and around homes lining the shore. Now and then, the gap grew wide, revealing the ferry hovering between gray waves and gray sky. The raised ramps and yellow operator tower became larger with each glimpse.
“They’re bringing the ferry in.”
“The Columbia County guys must be set up already.”
Lund accelerated along a straight stretch, only to have to slow to make it around a sharp bend.
Val switched on the police radio. Nothing but static.
“Damn. They don’t want to tip him off in case Hess has a scanner. They’re probably working on a different frequency.”
“Can you call? Ask what’s going on?”
“And get ahold of the tac team? No. But we’re getting close.”
Sure enough, the next space between cabins showed the ferry had reached the landing. One of the ramps started to lower.
Up ahead, two Columbia County Sheriff’s Department cars blocked off traffic from both directions, and an armored truck huddled behind the ice cream shop at the ferry landing. The road to the landing was desolate, any drivers waiting to board the ferry having been diverted to the nearest bridge.
Reaching the roadblock, Lund slowed and lowered his window.
“I’m sorry, sir. The road is—”
“Closed. Yeah, we know. This is Chief Ryker from Lake Loyal.” Lund gestured to Val, assuming news of her resignation hadn’t already reached the next county. “I’m Fire Chief Lund.”
“The tactical team is already in position. I’m going to have to insist you wait back here.”
Two cars drove off the far right ramp, each set of tires clunking from steel to asphalt.
“Is there any way I can speak to the commander?” Val asked, leaning down to meet the deputy’s gaze through the driver’s window.
“I’m afraid not. The operation has begun. They are on radio silence. I can let you stay here. Observe. But that’s it.”
Lund shifted into Park. He’d never been good at observing. It was always easier to do than watch. And he found himself bouncing a knee against the steering wheel, wishing he could get out and pace. Something.
As the middle ramp lowered, Lund spotted movement on the far side. The emergency response team moved quickly, out from a clump of brush along the shoreline and up the ramp, rifles ready. The cars cleared the ramp, and the team surrounded the ambulance.
Lund tensed, waiting for the rev of an engine, the squeal of tires, the pop, pop, pop of gunfire and breaking of glass, a last-ditch effort by Hess to escape.
Nothing happened.
The deputies converged on the ambulance. “No one is inside the vehicle,” a voice said over the deputy’s radio.
Val’s eyes rounded. “Oh, no.”
“What is it?”
“Hess. He might have taken something from Kasdorf’s today. What if…” She threw open the door and scrambled out into the rain.
Lund followed suit. “What? Guns?”
Val didn’t answer him. “Tell them to get out of there,” she yelled to the deputy, her voice half-lost in wind and rain. “There might be a—”
The explosion hit like a kick to the chest. Lund flung his arms out, as if he could shield Val with his body. A ball of fire bloomed on the shoreline, followed by thick black smoke.
Holy hell.
Lund’s ears rang. His aching head throbbed, despite the distance. He braced on the car’s hood, willing the dizziness to pass. The first smoke cleared, and he could see the ambulance… and the bodies scattered on the ferry deck.
Even for a blue-eyed blonde, Val looked pale. “I should have seen this coming. Why didn’t I see this coming?”
Before Lund could answer, Val’s radio erupted. Emergency tones, shouting, and static. But one voice cut through the rest.
Oneida’s. “We’re under fire. The Lake Loyal police department is under fire. We need assistance. Now.”
Carla
When Dixon opened fire on the police station, Carla thought they were both dead for sure.
Boom!
Boom!
Boom!
The front windows shattered. Alarms split the air.
Carla wrapped her arms tighter around her body and shrank back against the brick wall. She’d done everything he asked. From the very beginning. He wouldn’t have the ambulance and police car and the rest of it if it wasn’t for her. He wouldn’t have a safe place to hide. He wouldn’t have the tools he needed to get back his son.
Their son.
And now, not only did he give her no credit or—God forbid—thanks, he was about to get himself killed. “Dixon, please.”
The muzzle still pointed at the shattered windows, he opened the action and loaded another shell. “Hear that? They aren’t shooting back.”
“You wanted them to?”
“I wanted to see if there were still cops inside.”
“Maybe you killed them.”
“No, cops are like cockroaches. Not enough die to matter. But it is possible to spread them too thin. Come on.”
“You’re going inside? She’s not even here.” They’d watched her and the firefighter race off, lights and sirens, ten minutes ago.
“I’m not here for her. Victorious warriors win first and then go to war. You’re as dense as the rest of them.”
His words stung. Carla wasn’t like everyone else. She’d done so much to make him see that.
“Ready?”
“Wait.” Carla held her pistol in front of her. Her hands trembled. Her pulse drummed in her ears. Dixon was fearless. He’d been to prison and survived. He could probably survive anything.
Carla wasn’t that strong. She should run. Get out now. Disappear. Maybe someday, she could have a normal life, far away from here. At least she wouldn’t hurt anymore. She wouldn’t be ignored. She wouldn’t be dead.
“No more waiting. The name we need is inside. And while I take care of a few things, I need you to find it.”
He fired another round into the station, then stepped through the frame where the window had been.
Carla took a deep breath, and God help her, she followed.
Chapter
Seventeen
Valerie Ryker—
Who made you the authority? Who gave you delusions of grandeur? You destroyed my life and my name because of your hubris. You took away my child. You took away everything.
And I am considered the monster?
It takes a strong man to fight for justice, to claim his due when it’s withheld. So many in this community have erroneously thought I was not that man. That I didn’t have enough money. That I was not from a respected family in town. I have beaten them all. I have proven them wrong.
I will prove you wrong, too.
I will have my due.
—Convicted murderer Dixon Hess, f
rom his A MANIFESTO FOR JUSTICE, as received by the Wisconsin State Journal.
Chapter
Eighteen
Val
The police station looked like something straight out of a war zone. Red and blue lights sparkled in the shattered glass scattering the sidewalk. Smoke snaked out of smashed windows and dispersed into the evening air. The television news vans had left after Val’s earlier press conference, but she was certain they’d be back any minute.
“Chief, am I glad to see you.”
The rookie’s voice sounded high enough to belong to a little girl, but overall she seemed to be holding it together.
“Jones. Have you been inside?”
“Just got here, but yeah.”
“The building is clear?”
“Deputies were first on the scene. And Chief…” A choked sob wrenched from the rookie’s throat. “Baker and Carruthers, they’re in there with her now.”
The pounding of blood rose in Val’s ears. “Her?”
“Oneida.”
Oh, God.
Even before Val made it into the building, the smell hit her. Smoke. Blood. And something unmentionable.
Bullets had obliterated monitors. The table where Oneida had set up the phones for volunteers was turned on its side, equipment and chairs scattered over the concrete. And in the midst of it, a body lay curled on its side. Dark hair, yellow sweater. Blood soaked through her sweater. Her arms were wrapped around herself as if she had a belly ache.
Val didn’t remember the woman’s name. How could she not even remember the woman’s name?
“She’s gone, Chief.”
Val looked up, focused on Oscar Carruthers. “She volunteered. Just came in to help with the tip line.”
“I’m sorry.”
Val focused on Oscar, beyond Oscar, on the stretcher folded low on the floor, on the blue-flowered fabric, on what Baker was doing, on what was in front of him.
On who.
Val stumbled toward him. “Oneida?”
“You might not want to see this, Chief.”
“I’m not chief.”
“What?”
“I’m no longer chief. I have multiple sclerosis.” Val didn’t know why she’d said it. At the moment, who really cared? And then she was beside the stretcher, looking down at her friend, and Val couldn’t say anything at all.
Grace
Things are going to start happening…
Carla’s words drummed in Grace’s mind, as relentless as the drip, drip, drip of water along one of the interior walls. Her body ached with cold, the floor bruising hard through the thin foam. The smell of vomit hung in the air despite Carla’s half attempt to clean it off the mattress. And Grace needed another bathroom break. She’d been alone for hours now. With no way to tell time, she couldn’t be sure how many.
As soon as Grace had heard them leave, she’d started trying to work her hands out of the cuffs. When her right hand got too sore, she’d tried the left. Right. Left. Right. Left. Now both wrists ached, the skin hot and raw and sticky with blood.
No use.
Next she’d screamed for help. Letting the panic rise inside her, she’d directed the force of it into her voice. Over and over. Pleading and begging.
Silence answered. All alone in the world.
Exhausted from the effort and the pain and the helplessness, Grace shifted flat on the mattress.
So tired.
So cold.
So hopeless.
Aunt Val would come for her, eventually. Of this, Grace had no doubt. And when Aunt Val did find her, Hess would be waiting. He’d use Grace against her. To destroy her.
Grace couldn’t let that happen. She couldn’t let that happen. She couldn’t…
“Life is good, Gracie.”
Grace blinked against the artificial light streaming from the doorway. She hadn’t heard anyone coming. Wasn’t even aware the door had opened. At some point she must have dozed off.
“Didn’t you hear me, Grace?” Dixon Hess asked.
“I heard.” She needed to think. She needed to come up with something. “I don’t know what you want me to say.”
“Don’t you think life is good?”
“Of course.”
Hess smiled, as if what she’d said was particularly funny. “You’re shackled to a radiator, sitting on a stained mattress, getting ready to die, and yet you still believe life is good. You think everything’s going to work out, don’t you? And why wouldn’t you? It has always worked out before.”
“It hasn’t always.”
He watched her, his eyes reflecting the flashlight in his hand as if they glowed with a pale blue light of their own.
Maybe this was a mistake.
It was the only thing Grace had come up with in all her hours of thinking. Hess had used what he knew about her to make her vulnerable. Expose the things that were important to her. Use them to beat her down.
But what if she volunteered?
What if she was open with him?
What if she let him in?
Grace didn’t know what would happen. And seeing the eerie sharp look in his eyes now, she suspected she was doing a dumb thing. But if she could understand where he was coming from, maybe she could figure out how to stop him.
“It hasn’t always worked out for poor Grace, huh? Oh, that’s right. Your boyfriend is too stupid to go to the same college.”
“Aunt Val says that’s not a bad thing. That I should meet more people. Not rush into things.” Grace took a deep breath and forced herself to go on. “I was thinking of when my mother died of cancer. I was only twelve.”
Hess’s expression didn’t change. Sharp. Hard. “My mother died when I was in prison.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Your aunt should be the one who’s sorry.”
“I’m sure she is. She didn’t mean to—”
“Oh, Grace. You really think I’m that easy? Your aunt hasn’t even begun to feel sorry.”
That wasn’t the response Grace was looking for. Not at all. “Do you, uh, miss your mom?”
“My mother wasn’t the type of person anyone misses. And before you continue with this ridiculous conversation, I don’t miss my father, either.”
“Any friends or anything?”
“Good try. No.”
“Ethan?”
“I can’t miss the boy since I’ve never met him.”
“How about your dog?”
Hess froze, and for a moment, Grace wished she hadn’t said anything.
“It was a dog.” Hess turned to leave.
A tremor settled in Grace’s chest. “Rascal, wasn’t it?”
He stopped in the doorway and looked back at her. “How do you know that?”
“It was in the files. What kind of dog?”
“What does it matter?”
“It doesn’t, I guess. I just like dogs.”
“Mutt. Nothing special.”
“It wasn’t fair. For your neighbor to hurt your dog, I mean.”
“Kill. He killed my dog.”
“It wasn’t fair.”
“What do you know about fair?”
“I know what my aunt did, to arrest you for a murder you didn’t commit, I know that wasn’t fair.”
“You make it sound like she was cheating at Monopoly.”
“She never meant for any of that to happen. But what you’re doing, killing people…”
“What I’m doing is necessary.”
Grace had read the files. She knew what happened after the neighbor killed Hess’s dog. She knew what Hess had thought was necessary. “Like killing that girl?”
“‘There are two types of fighting: one with laws and the other with force. The first is most suitable for men, the second is most suitable for beasts, but it often happens that the first is not enough, which requires that we have recourse to the second.”’
Grace opened her mouth to argue, then closed it without uttering a word.
“That’s
Niccolò Machiavelli.”
Hess’s fondness for quoting Machiavelli and Mahatma Gandhi had been in the files, too. Entered by Aunt Val. And while Grace had never thought she’d be quizzed by Hess, she’d wanted to know what made him tick. “I read The Prince.”
“Then you know why force has become necessary. Your aunt’s law doesn’t punish men like him. Not for killing a dog. Just like it doesn’t punish cops for putting the wrong man in prison. Not as long as they claim it was a mistake.”
Grace took a fortifying breath. “‘An act of justice and gentleness often has more power over the human heart than violence and barbarism.”’
Hess paused, staring at her hard. He unsnapped the keeper of the sheath on his belt. “You want me to be gentle when I cut you?”
“It’s…” Grace’s voice trembled. She hoped he didn’t notice. “It’s Machiavelli.”
“I know who it is.” He pulled out the knife, the blade reflecting the overhead light. “So that’s it? You pull out a single quote that supports your position and expect me to change my ways? Forget my son? Forget all the wrongs your aunt did to me?”
“No. I just thought…”
“What did you think, Gracie?”
“I thought we were talking.”
“Hmm, trying to make me think of you as a human being, huh? Someone I can’t bring myself to kill? Psychology 101.”
Grace choked back a whimper. She had no idea what to say now, but she was pretty sure breaking down in uncontrolled sobs wouldn’t help at all.
“I like you, Grace. You’re a hell of a lot smarter than Carla. But I will cut you just to hear you scream. I will burn you just to smell the scent of your flesh cooking. If you read the files about Rascal, you also saw what I did to that girl. I’ll do the same to you. I’d prefer your aunt watch you die, but that doesn’t mean I can’t enjoy myself with you in the meantime.”
“I—I’m sorry.”
“‘Men judge more by their eyes than by their hands, because everyone can see but few can feel.’ I am one of the few, Gracie. You look sweet and innocent, but I can feel what you are. You can’t fool me. Don’t try to manipulate me again.”
Dead Too Soon: A Thriller (Val Ryker series Book 3) Page 11