Bound by Suggestion

by L.L. Bartlett

  “No, really, once we case the place, it might be a five or ten minute drive to drop you off. If you waited an hour from then, that might only give us fifty minutes to deal with whatever we find.”

  “Which is still about forty-five minutes too long.”

  “If it doesn’t take as long, we’ll call you,” Richard said.

  “Maybe we shouldn’t try to make any concrete plans until we see the lay of the land. Literally,” Jeff said. He unfolded the map for at least the tenth time. “The area looks to be mostly rural. A silver Lincoln zipping back and forth may be a bit obvious.”

  “What do you suggest?” Richard asked.

  “Let me go in on foot, reconnoiter, then we’ll regroup and make plans. We’ve got plenty of time.”

  The dash clock read four-fifty; Krista had given them until eight.

  Richard’s cell phone trilled. They’d taken the precaution of forwarding calls from home to that number. He took out the phone, ready to hit the receive button, when Jeff stopped him.

  “Don’t let them know we’re already on Grand Island.”

  Richard nodded. “Hello?”

  “Where are you Dr. Dick?”

  Timberly.

  “On my way to see Krista Marsh. I assume we’ll have the pleasure of your company, too?”

  “Very likely.”

  “What is all this, Wes? Being chair of the capital campaign isn’t that big a deal. What are you really up to, and why are you so intent to get rid of me?”

  “That’s none of your business. Is your brother with you?”

  Richard didn’t answer.

  “He’d better be,” Timberly said, the menace rising in his voice.

  “Jeff’s got nothing to do with whatever problem you think you have with me.”

  “Krista told both of you to come.”

  “That wasn’t possible. You’re damn lucky I went over to feed his cat, otherwise I’d have never seen his answering machine blinking and heard Krista’s message.”

  “Where is he?” Timberly demanded.

  “I won’t tell.”

  “Then maybe your wife will.”

  Richard’s cheeks flushed with heat. “I’m not stupid enough to risk my family’s lives when you’ve already threatened to kill one of our friends.”

  “Two friends,” Timberly corrected. “And if you don’t do as I say, their deaths will be on your conscience.”

  “Let them go, Wes, before this goes too far.”

  “It’s already gone too far. And Krista’s got nothing to lose.”

  “What about you?”

  “Never mind me. Where are you, and how soon are you going to show up?”

  “I just got in the car.” The phone crackled in his ear, as though to belie that. “And I’m not even sure where I’m going. I’ll have to stop and get a map.”

  “I’ll call you back in half an hour with instructions.”

  Timberly hung up. Richard put the phone down on the seat.

  “I didn’t know you could lie that well,” Jeff said.

  “Only in a good cause.”

  “Why didn’t you tell him Jeff was coming?” Brenda asked.

  “Never give the enemy any ammunition,” Jeff said. “Richard shows up at the door, alone, then I bust in like John Wayne only moments later. The element of surprise, my dear Watson, is the only real weapon we have.”

  “We also can’t expect them to be stupid enough not to figure out this brilliant plan,” Richard pointed out.

  “I still don’t understand why that idiot Timberly is doing all this,” Brenda said. “What’s he got to gain? He’s only losing a dumb volunteer job.”

  “Not so dumb when it involves millions of dollars.”

  “So, he can’t get his hands on it.”

  “I think he already has,” Richard said.

  “How so?” Jeff asked.

  They reached the second Grand Island Bridge, with Richard grateful the traffic would soon be behind them. “Remember I told you about Wally Moses’s murder? Wes had to be behind it. Wally had the computer know-how, and from what I gather, Wes is no slouch, either. Working together they may very well have fleeced the Foundation for a hell of a lot of money. Maybe even hid it in bogus accounts within the hospital’s own accounting system. And without a partner—”

  “There’s a lot more for Wes,” Brenda finished.

  “So where does Krista fit in?” Jeff asked.

  “How about a former—maybe even current—lover? He’s got to be blackmailing her, too,” Richard said.

  “Then she could be in as much danger as we are,” Brenda said.

  Richard nodded.

  “Good.”

  “Brenda!”

  “Well, she hurt our Jeffy and she’s taken my best friend hostage. How else am I supposed to feel?”

  “Get off at the last US exit and head north on Route 104,” Jeff said, folding the map so only a portion of it was visible.

  They were quiet for the next ten minutes until they hit the exit. Richard left the expressway, heading north toward Route 18. Once there, he stopped for a traffic light and wrenched the wheel, which was suddenly sluggish in his grasp. “Damn power steering,” he grated. He made the turn and the wheel freed up.

  “I knew we shouldn’t have brought this car,” Brenda griped.

  “Tell me where to turn,” Richard said.

  Jeff studied the map. “You’ve got a ways to go up the parkway. Maybe seven miles.”

  They drove in silence past miles of farmland and orchards.

  This is stupid, Richard told himself. Brenda’s pregnant with our baby. I’m going to walk into an ambush and be killed. I’ll never know my daughter. Maggie and Doug will die. Jeff probably will, too. Dear God, why did you let this happen?

  “Make a left up here,” Jeff said.

  Richard spun the wheel, grateful the power steering held. The side road was dirt and gravel; a cloud of dust roiled in the Lincoln’s wake.

  “We’re going to draw attention to ourselves,” Richard said.

  “Can’t help it,” Jeff said. “We’ve got to scope it out. Whose house is it, anyway?”

  “It must belong to Wes, or his wife. I heard she came from money.”

  They passed hundreds of trees in well-tended groves. Occasionally a drive, with a mailbox at its end, marked the different property lines.

  “It should be coming up soon,” Jeff said.

  Richard slowed the Lincoln. Number 4476 winged past. Just another mailbox on a post. No house discernible from the road.

  Richard kept driving. “Well?”

  Jeff shrugged. “I’d have a better chance of sneaking up on the place if it was dark.”

  “It’ll still be light at eight. And Wes already knows I’m on my way. So what do you want me to do?”

  “Keep going—about three-tenths of a mile,” Jeff said.

  Richard watched the odometer and slowed the car to a halt. “Okay, now what?”

  “I’m taking a walk,” Jeff said, unbuckling his seat belt. He retrieved the gun from under the seat.

  “Be careful,” Richard warned.

  Jeff nodded and got out of the car, shoving the gun into the waistband at the back of his pants, pulling his denim jacket down to cover it. Shoving his hands in his pockets, he started walking back the way they’d just come.

  Brenda rested a hand on Richard’s shoulder. “After everything we did to save his life on Sunday, how can we just let him walk away like that?”

  “It’s his turn to save someone,” Richard said. “What goes around, comes around.”

  Now if they could only pull this off.

  My heels kicked up dust motes as I walked down the dirt road. Not for long, though. The threatening sky was going to let loose some time soon. That could either work for or against us.

  It was lucky for us that Timberly hadn’t obliterated the old orchard surrounding his property. I staring down the rows of trees, most of which stood no higher than ten feet high. I
f nothing else, they’d give me cover. The drive might be a quarter of a mile long. According to the map, the road followed the shore of Lake Ontario. I passed the last mailbox before Timberly’s property and took a shortcut down a line of trees, heading east. The wind picked up, rustling millions of new leaves all around me, giving me goose flesh.

  I still hadn’t tuned into Maggie’s wavelength. At the country club Saturday night, I could’ve reported her pulse rate. Now I got nothing. Krista was just nasty enough to kill her without even waiting for us to show. She’d known Maggie was my Achilles heel and hadn’t wasted a second to use her against me.

  Lush, calf-high grass rustled against my jeans. I was out of sight of the road when I took out Sam’s gun. Still no sign of a house.

  I kept walking, trying to squelch the urge to run. Keep calm. Doing anything else would likely mean the end for Maggie.

  The woman who’d dumped me.

  The woman who took up with her college sweetheart because he had more money than me.

  Okay, so I didn’t know if that was true, but it seemed the most likely explanation. Yet who had she called when she was in trouble?

  Me.

  Okay, she was in trouble because of me.

  Lost in thought, I’d almost walked past the house, some thirty yards to my right, an ultra modern structure with lots of sharp angles and windows jutting out in odd places. No doubt some architect kept the site plans and photos on the top of his portfolio, but it looked butt ugly to me. The back of the house overlooked the lake, its floor-to-ceiling glass walls giving the owners a grand vista to enjoy. On a clear day you could probably see Toronto on the northern shore, looking like Oz gleaming in the sunlight. All those windows meant it was going to be hard for me to sneak up on the place.

  I backtracked a few yards, cut over three lines of trees so that I could see the front of the house. The orchard thinned out about twenty yards from the main entrance. One car in the drive. A dark green BMW 5 series sedan, last year’s model, I guessed. Doug had good taste as well as big bucks.

  Where was Krista likely to be holed up? The windows on this end were small. Would she be watching for me, or did she have Maggie and Doug trussed up somewhere else in the house? She’d want to keep an eye on them, not trusting them to be left alone.

  “Come on, Maggie, give me a clue,” I said and closed my eyes, trying to home in on my lady.

  Doug’s lady.

  I thought about the first time we’d made love, the surprises we’d experienced, the sweet sensual taste of her. The first time I’d touched her soul. I breathed deeply and connected with her at last, basking in the other life I knew so well.

  She was startled. Don’t give me away, I pleaded. Concentrate, babe. Look around you, show me what you see.

  I squeezed my eyes so tight, impressions of the trees, in green, glowed before my mind’s eye. Then, like bad television reception, I could see the room through Maggie’s eyes. A rough-hewn stone fireplace, cold and empty. Furniture draped in sheets. Doug, his arms wrenched behind him, tied to a chair, the buttons staining his pinstriped vest. Duct tape covered his mouth. Krista yakked on a cell phone, her face twisted in fury. She looked out over the lake as she yelled at . . . Timberly?

  Thank you, babe.

  I opened my eyes and felt the full brunt of her fear, and her new-born hope. We were back in tune, like a couple of Stradivarius violins.

  Then I was running, straight up to the house, where I pressed my body against it. With my back to the weathered shingles, I turned the corner, hunched down. Duck-walking down the side of the building, I made my way to the edge of the wall of glass.

  I saw Maggie, her back to me—recognized her blue office suit, the one she’d worn the day we’d met. Like Doug, she too was gagged.

  I backed up a few feet and looked ahead, to where Krista was staring. The house sat atop a short bluff. A dock was already in place for the season. A gleaming white cruiser—maybe thirty feet in length—bobbed in a slip. It took big bucks to maintain a lifestyle like this. Richard’s guess that Timberly had been dipping into the Foundation’s coffers was probably on the mark.

  The boat could also be a great asset to a couple of would-be murderers. Weigh down your victims’ bodies, drive out a couple of miles, then dump them. Hadn’t I learned in school that parts of the lake were over eight hundred feet deep?

  I glanced at my watch: fifteen minutes since I’d left Richard and Brenda. Time to head back.

  I inched back the way I’d come but paused at the end of the building and closed my eyes, pictured myself holding Maggie in my arms, hoping to God I could transmit a message to her.

  Sit tight. I’ll be back for you, babe. I promise.

  Richard turned the key in the ignition, cutting the engine. Without a word, Jeff opened the passenger side door and got out. He opened the rear door and helped Brenda out, then she ducked into the front seat. Jeff closed the door and headed for the 24-hour diner’s entrance, standing out of the wind.

  “Well, this is it,” Brenda said, her voice strained.

  Richard reached for his wife’s hand. “Yeah.”

  “I’m scared to death.”

  “So am I,” he admitted. “Have you got the cell phone?”

  She patted her purse. “Right here.”

  “Okay. If you don’t hear from us in one hour from the time we drive off, call the police.”

  “One hour to the second,” she promised.

  Richard nodded and stared deeply into her eyes. How could he tell her everything he was feeling? All the things he’d wanted to say and never found the right time to do it.

  “I’m sorry, Brenda,” he began. “Sorry any of this happened. I’m—”

  She covered his mouth with her hand. “Shut up, you’re wasting time. Tell me how much you love me. That I’m the most beautiful woman you’ve ever made love to. Tell me where we’re going on our tenth wedding anniversary—anything but that you’re sorry.”

  “You’re the most beautiful woman I ever made love to. We’ll go back to Paris on our tenth wedding anniversary, and tomorrow, I’ll bring you breakfast in bed.”

  She laughed, throwing her arms around his neck. “Please, not that. You can’t even boil water.”

  “Okay, then . . . you can bring me breakfast in bed.”

  “I love you Richard Alpert,” she whispered in his ear. “I always will.”

  “I love you, Brenda Stanley. With all my heart.”

  She pulled back, tears rimming her dark brown eyes. “You bring back my Jeffy and girlfriend in one piece, you hear?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  Brenda kissed him. He held her in his arms, wishing he never had to let go.

  She pulled back again, and gathered her purse. “Get going,” she said, her voice under control once more. Brenda opened the car door and got out, heading for the diner’s door without looking back.

  Jeff waited for her. She held out her hands to him. He took them, spoke to her. Richard watched as his brother nodded, closed his eyes and hugged his wife—held onto her for an agonizingly long time. Then Brenda pulled back, kissed Jeff on the mouth, and went inside.

  They’d never be lovers, Richard knew, but still that thread of jealousy taunted him. Jeff said he touched Maggie’s soul when they made love. Could he touch Brenda’s without that physical link?

  Richard put such thoughts out of his mind as Jeff walked back to the car and got in.

  Jeff met his gaze. “Let’s do it.”

  Richard rang the doorbell and waited. Every muscle in his body screamed run, escape—save yourself! Instead, he rang the bell again. What the hell was Krista waiting for?

  He glanced behind him. No sign of Jeff. He’d given his brother five minutes to get into position before he’d driven the car up the gravel drive.

  Timberly had chosen the perfect place for mass murder. No doubt he intended to kill all of them . . . probably Krista, too. Gunshots wouldn’t be heard by neighbors. And, as Jeff had pointed out�
�after they’d let Brenda off—the boat out back could take them all out to a watery grave.

  The door opened a crack. The nose of a pistol poked out. Slowly the door swung wider, revealing Krista Marsh dressed in the same turquoise dress she’d worn to Paula Devlin’s all those weeks ago. “ It took you long enough.”

  Richard ignored the remark, holding his hands out in submission. “I’m unarmed.”

  Krista backed up to let him enter, and then shoved the gun into his neck, pushing him against the wall. “You don’t mind if I check?” She ran a hand across his body, no doubt taking great pleasure as she fondled his crotch before running her hand down his legs.

  “What took you so long to get here?”

  Richard clamped his jaws shut, unwilling to apologize to the bitch who’d done so much to hurt his brother.

  The gun traced a line down the center of his back, then nudged him to move to his left. “Take a walk.”

  Richard followed a dark hall, which opened to a glassed-in room filled with waning natural light. Maggie and Doug Mallon sat tied to twin dining room chairs flanking the fireplace. Silver duct tape kept them quiet.

  “Are you okay, Maggie?” Richard asked.

  She nodded, her face twisted in fear and worry, her eyes wild.

  “Sorry to meet again under these circumstances, Doug,” he said, trying to convey a sense of calm he didn’t feel.

  Mallon’s eyes were frantic.

  Krista circled around, holding her gun on all of them.

  “What happens now?” Richard asked.

  “We wait for Wes. He should be here any minute.”

  Rain began to pelt the wall of glass surrounding them. The sky over the lake had gone an ominous black.

  “Where’s Jeff?” Krista demanded.

  “Right now he’s a basket case in the Buffalo Psych Center. You knew he was connected to Grace. You had to know he’d try and kill himself when she did.”

  Krista regarded him with suspicion. “I don’t believe you.”

  “Ask Maggie. She knows everything he feels. She called to warn me he was going to try it. Isn’t that right?”

  Krista glanced askance at her hostage. Maggie nodded, her eyes so wide they looked dilated.

  “I don’t believe you,” Krista repeated.