Stranded

by Alice Sharpe

  “That’s why my hands are in my pockets,” she said. “I’m married to a cop, you know. I figure stuff like this out.”

  He grabbed a couple of gloves so he wouldn’t destroy any evidence that might be in the drawer, and stopped to kiss her forehead before he once again knelt in front of the drawer.

  “Okay. There are a few blank index cards, a couple of pencils...not much else. Frankly there doesn’t seem to be room for much else.”

  She knelt beside him, touching her belly as she did so. “For the first time, it feels like there’s a baby between my chest and my knees when I bend over,” she said, and they exchanged excited smiles. She studied the drawer before adding, “Is that a false bottom?”

  “Yeah, I think it is,” he said as he withdrew his knife. Wishing the light were better, he inserted the blade at the front edge of the drawer bottom and immediately felt the thin wood wobble. He removed the few things that had been scattered atop the false bottom, then carefully slipped the wood out of place.

  They found themselves staring at a hypodermic needle and three small empty medical vials whose labels Alex recognized as the drugs John Miters’s lab had confirmed were injected into the Vita-Drink bottles.

  Beside him, Jessica’s sigh sounded like a very soft, sad refrain. “I didn’t want to believe it,” she said.

  “Look,” he said as he lifted the needle out of the drawer to reveal an index card covered with simple illustrations and directions. “Here’s how you load a needle with the drugs and then inject the contents into the high shoulder of a plastic bottle. Sound familiar?”

  “Of course it does.”

  He slid the entire drawer from the table and gestured at the index cards. “Is that Billy’s writing?”

  “I don’t think so. What are we going to do with all this?”

  After shifting the drawer into position under his arm, he helped Jessica stand. “I’m going to call downtown and get a crew out here,” he said, grabbing his phone from his pocket. “I’ll stay with everything until someone arrives. The place has already been broken into once tonight, we can’t walk away and leave it unguarded.”

  “Actually,” she said with a fleeting smile, “it was broken into twice.”

  “You and your technicalities,” he said.

  “What do you want me to do?”

  “I want you to drive to Silvia’s house. I want you as far away from all this as you can get.” He pulled out his phone but before he could place a call, her fingers lit on his arm. He looked down at her.

  “I’m not leaving you here alone,” she said. “You should know that about me by now.”

  He did know it. He just wanted her to be safe and that meant away from this shed.

  “Just make the call,” she told him.

  He nodded, but before he could tap even one number the window beside them shattered. From the corner of his eye, he saw a missile fly into the room. It hit the chair and immediately burst into flames. “Get out of here!” Alex yelled, pulling on Jessica’s hand. The fire quickly spread to the wooden floor and then to the worktable where it ignited the solvents and paints stored on the shelf.

  They reached the safety of the outside right before a small explosion inside the building signaled the beginning of the end. They ran to get as far away as they could.

  Alex handed Jessica the drawer and pulled out his gun. She stood with her back against the house, her face pale in the weakening light. She clutched the drawer in one hand while she took her cell phone from her sweater pocket with the other.

  “Are you all right?” he asked her.

  “I’ll live. I’ll call the fire department.”

  “Stay here,” he added, and took off to the front where he could hear what sounded like a far-off motor. Their attacker was getting away. By the time Alex rounded the corner, the yard was clear and nothing looked one bit different than it had since they entered the shed. The tractor still stood off to the side, the Dumpster beside it, Alex’s truck pulled in close to one of the wrecks that occupied the side yard.

  His head pounded with the images of what could have happened inside that shed, not to himself, but to Jessica and their baby. He’d thought earlier about irony, and how saving his marriage might have actually hinged on being stranded in the mountains for three months.

  But now it occurred to him that coming home might have put a whole host of people in jeopardy. Billy and Lynda were dead, the Cummings twins were under investigation, his wife had been scared out of her wits half a dozen times.

  He returned to Jessica, unsure what to do to protect her except to disappear again...and that was not an option. She’d set the drawer aside and found a garden hose and had turned it on. He took it from her and aimed the water higher into the flames.

  “Did you see anything?” she asked.

  “No,” he said. The water pressure wasn’t great and seemed to be having no positive effect, so he switched his efforts to making sure the blaze didn’t spread to the house, the trees or any of the abandoned cars that stood nearby. It was a relief to hear screeching sirens. Within minutes, firemen had taken over, the bomb squad was waiting nearby and police cars started arriving.

  Alex explained that what he’d seen was a Molotov cocktail, a gas bomb made out of a beer bottle, gasoline with a burning rag as a wick. He didn’t add what everyone there knew—such things were easy to construct out of universally available materials. Anyone could have done it.

  Kit Anderson acted fidgety and ill at ease as he ran around doing his best to take charge. As soon as he could, Alex steered Jessica toward his truck. The smell of a fire and the resulting ash was never a pleasant one, but with all the burning garbage in the lean-to, this one was particularly noxious and he didn’t want her exposed to it.

  Kit caught up with him. “Where are you going with that?” he asked, gesturing at the drawer and its contents tucked under one of Alex’s arms.

  “Downtown,” Alex said succinctly.

  Kit held out his hands. “I’ll take it.”

  “No, thanks,” Alex said, and continued walking. Kit trotted behind him.

  “The chief said I should handle this kind of thing,” he insisted.

  Alex turned and looked over his shoulder. “The chief doesn’t even know this stuff exists.”

  “Well, not what you’re holding in particular,” he said, “just evidence in general.”

  “Let me get this straight,” Alex said. “The chief told you not to allow me to transport evidence?”

  Kit looked uncomfortable as he shuffled a bit. “Yeah.”

  “Too bad,” Alex said and kept walking, relieved when Kit fell behind.

  He paid close attention to the road and was relieved when he saw the landmark he’d chosen, the broken branch on an old oak tree, and subsequently the tire marks on the roadbed. They would be easy to find again in the daylight. He searched his mind for the feeling that someone was watching him, but it didn’t come like it had earlier in the day. At least there was that.

  A few minutes later, Jessica touched his arm. “You’re pretty quiet,” she said. “What are you thinking about?”

  He glanced over at her beautiful face illuminated by the dashboard lights. “Why would the chief tell Kit to make sure I wasn’t handling evidence?”

  “Maybe Kit was lying. Maybe he just wants to control everything.”

  Alex thought for a moment longer. “No, I don’t think Kit was lying. The guy doesn’t exactly have a poker face.” He thought for a few seconds longer and added, “You know, the first part of the equation is relatively simple.”

  “What equation?”

  “The beginning, back when someone wanted me and Nate and Mike dead. We represented an immediate threat to the Shatterhorn Killer. I think he overreacted. He got someone to try to run Nate off the road when he w
as on his way to Nevada to meet with me and Mike. They got someone else to sabotage my airplane. And then they drove up to Mike’s house and shot him dead.

  “If things had gone according to their plans, Nate would have died in the desert north of Vegas in a car accident. I would have slammed into a handy mountain somewhere or imploded in the middle of a desert and there wouldn’t have been a lot left of my plane. Forensics being what they are now, the government may have uncovered a conspiracy but it would have been a lot harder and if everything else hadn’t happened the way it had, they might not have even looked for one.”

  “But Nate didn’t die,” Jessica said, her hand warm on his thigh, her voice very soft.

  “No. And no one else has tried to hurt him since then. It appears he isn’t a threat anymore.”

  “Someone is sure trying to get you,” she said.

  “Yeah, but by the oddest backdoor methods. Ruining our garden, killing the guileless kid they set up to sabotage my plane, perhaps killing his mother because, well, I don’t know why. Add that fake call to the emergency room and frightening you—it’s crazy.”

  “And it’s escalating,” Jessica said. “There was nothing tentative about lobbing a bomb into an occupied building.”

  “But if they just wanted me dead, why not kill me? Shoot me, stab me, you know. Why all these antics? Get it over with already.”

  “Be careful what you say,” she told him. “The universe may be listening.”

  * * *

  THEY AWOKE YET again to a ringing phone, only this time it was Agent Struthers. “I’m in kind of a hurry but I wanted you and your wife to know we just got word that the man known as William Tucker is actually named Charles Bond. He was thought to be dead, one of several victims in a very messy terrorist attack in New Orleans several years ago. He obviously survived the terrorist attack and used the opportunity to disappear. There’s nothing to tie him to that attack and in fact, the people behind it were caught, tried and convicted. But Bond apparently took on a false identity and moved in with his ex-brother-in-law, aka the Shatterhorn Killer. It now appears Bond is the one who’s been pulling the strings.”

  Alex rubbed the sleep from his eyes and muttered, “Do you know where he is now?”

  “Unfortunately, no. His last call was yesterday and he mentioned leaving Seattle. He didn’t give a clue to his destination.”

  “Okay,” Alex said with a sigh. “Is Seattle still on alert?”

  “Absolutely. He’s proven he doesn’t have to be around to cause mayhem. He’s pretty good at coaxing other people to do it for him. There’s another lead suggesting the target for a Memorial Day attack in Seattle is a big food-and-wine festival. Security is being tightened.”

  “I hope they get the bastards,” Alex said.

  “So do we all. But it makes sense that after Nate foiled the parade attack a year ago, Bond might be hot to try the same thing on a different one. Use caution, Detective Foster. Stay alert.”

  “I will,” Alex assured him. After turning off the phone, he met Jessica’s nervous gaze and put his arms around her, nuzzling her neck. “You’re the best thing that ever happened to me,” he said softly.

  “Oh, Alex. Was that about William Tucker or whatever his name is?”

  He put his hands on her shoulders and held her a short distance away so he could look into her eyes. “His name is Charles Bond.” He told her what Struthers had said.

  “Then he could be on his way here?”

  “Here, there or anywhere. Who knows?”

  Tears spilled onto her cheeks and she buried her face against his chest.

  He kissed her hair and raised her chin so he could look in her eyes. “I’m here for you, sweetheart.”

  She nodded. “I just want it to be over. And I thought if he was behind our yard and the emergency-room stunt and then the bomb last night, well, at least we’d know who our enemy was. But if he’s been in Seattle...”

  Her voice trailed off and he finished the sentence in his head, then it could be anyone.

  She put her lips against his. “I love you so much, Alex.”

  He kissed her again, losing himself in her tender warmth. And then the nature of the kisses changed as they often did, grew deeper, longer, merging into one long cacophony of sensation that awakened every part of his body. “It’s still pretty early,” he whispered with a rasping voice while cupping one of her succulent breasts in his hand, dipping his head to lick her nipple through the silk of her gown.

  “Let’s make the most of it,” she said, and pulled him down on top of her.

  * * *

  SOON AFTER, ALEX joined the team investigating the tire marks he’d found on Blue Point Road south of the Summers house the night before. Dylan showed up a few minutes later and walked beside Alex.

  Alex’s attention was divided between searching the ground for some other sign of mishap and the sight of Frank Smyth’s car pulling off to the side of the road beside the police van. A spray of gravel suggested the chief was either in a hurry or distracted. He jumped out of his car and began talking to the techs.

  “I heard about what happened to you and Jess last night,” Dylan said at last. “I was too far away to respond.”

  “I know you were,” Alex said, watching the chief. “Smyth didn’t show up, either. We left so Kit could play detective all by himself.”

  “Well, I want you to know something,” Dylan added.

  “What?”

  “I’ve been thinking about everything that’s happened to you and Jessica. I took it all too lightly. Hell, man, you guys could have been killed last night. From now on, I have your back. I’m going to get to the bottom of whatever is going on or die trying.”

  Alex looked closely at his partner. He wasn’t used to the serious tone he heard in Dylan’s voice and it touched him. “Thanks,” he said.

  “Sure thing. And I mean it. However, you do realize the tire tracks on the roadbed could have been made days ago, like even when you were still up in the mountains.”

  “I know. I can’t believe I’ve been home a week.”

  “Neither can I. And I want you to know that I would have gone back to those houses tonight like I said I would. You didn’t have to do it for me.”

  “I know. I was just restless and needed something to do. You know, one of those places is totally empty.”

  “Guess that explains why no one answered the door.”

  The chief came to a stop near them, pausing for a second to shield a cigarette with his hand while he lit it with his trusty lighter. “I heard you were out here,” he said, addressing Alex. “I also heard what happened last night. Is your wife okay?”

  “She’s fine, thank heavens,” Alex said.

  Smyth’s thin lips all but disappeared off his face when he scowled and he was scowling now. “What were you thinking, taking her with you?” he growled.

  Alex almost blurted out something like, “You think I’d leave her alone?” Only trouble was, the chief was right. He’d endangered her, not protected her. He should have hustled her out of that shed the moment he saw the broken window. Instead he said, “It seemed like a good idea at the time.”

  “Well, it wasn’t. Furthermore, Kit Anderson reports the hasp on the door of the shed had been removed. I take it you’re responsible for that, too?”

  “I was just looking around,” Alex said. Once again the image of Smyth standing close to that dwindling stack of index cards played in his mind.

  “By breaking and entering?”

  Alex didn’t respond. He was angry and he wasn’t sure he had a right to be.

  Smyth jabbed the air between them. “I’m told you made a deposit in the evidence room last night.”

  “I found a drawer in that little table in the shed,” Alex explained. “There were directions
for how to fill a hypodermic needle with drugs and inject it into a plastic bottle so no one would know the contents had been tampered with. Maybe the lab can lift fingerprints or analyze the writing. It could help the government with their investigation.”

  “If you haven’t jeopardized the provenance of that evidence,” Smyth said sternly. “You should have handed it over to Kit.”

  “Since when do I hand evidence to Kit?” Alex asked.

  “Since now.”

  There was a moment of silence, broken when Dylan cleared his throat. He looked at Smyth. “Where were you last night, Chief?”

  “Not that it’s any of your business, but I had a meeting,” Smyth said as he rubbed his bald head.

  Alex took a deep breath. “The shed is destroyed, right?”

  “Totally,” Smyth said.

  “It’s true I broke into it, but someone else did it first only they came in through the window. The place had been ransacked. The only thing I could see that was missing was the big model of the red-and-white biplane that used to hang over the table. The Cummings twins helped with the model and they were anxious to get it back, so someone should talk to them.”

  “We may be able to use that in further questioning,” Smyth allowed. “I had them in yesterday for another round of interviews. I can’t say they divulged anything new. Neither one of you mention this to anyone else, okay?”

  “Okay,” Alex said. “I should also mention the FBI reports the man known as William Tucker is actually Charles Bond. They have currently lost track of him.”

  “You spoke to the FBI?” Smyth snapped.

  “Yeah.”

  “Did you mention what you found?”

  “No, not yet. The agent was in a hurry and I thought you should be part of any exchange of that kind of information. I’m sure they’ll be contacting you.”

  “Yes,” Smyth interrupted. “I should think so.” He nodded decisively. “I have another meeting this afternoon,” he said, zeroing in on Alex. “We’re busier than a mosquito at a nudist colony getting ready for God knows what disaster. I can’t change any of that but by golly, I can change this. I want you to step back.”