by C. J. Lyons
The nurse’s eyes went wide. She jerked back, and Lucy thought maybe she was reaching for a phone, but the older man said, “First, I need to know if a dog is responsible for your ankle and foot injuries.”
Lucy nodded. “Forget the dog. Lives are at stake. I need to warn them.”
“How long ago did the dog attack you?”
Who the hell cared? She needed to get help to Nick and Megan, warn the FBI about the attack on their computers. “People will die if you don’t get me a phone. Now.”
Her voice was fading, but something in her face must have convinced the nurse, who said, “Let me grab my cell for you.”
“How long?” the man repeated.
Lucy shrugged, regretted the movement. Did they have any idea how painful lying on a slab of wood felt after being banged up? “Don’t know.”
She’d escaped the septic tank the first time a few hours after the man had taken her, but she’d been knocked out part of that time… The sun had been almost directly overhead—she remembered that—before the dog… She flinched at the memory of the pain. “Around noon. I think.”
She pivoted away from the doctors, ignoring the pain that lanced through her leg with the movement. Glanced at the clock. 6:49.
“Get me the phone. Or call the FBI office. Please, you don’t understand—time is running out.” Her voice faded before she could finish.
Didn’t matter, the doctors had turned their backs to her, eyeing the X-rays once again. “Damn. That’s way too long. Open fracture, contaminated, dog bite…”
The younger man moved back down to her foot, pressed one finger against it for a long moment, then released it. “Delayed cap refill, circulation’s compromised. She’ll probably lose it.”
“Still, we should let the surgeons decide,” the older man said.
“I’ll give them a call, see if they want to transfer her to Three Rivers.” Three Rivers Medical Center was one of Pittsburgh’s major trauma centers. Sounded like this small community hospital wasn’t equipped to deal with her injuries—least of her worries.
The second hand on the clock wouldn’t stop its relentless movement. 6:50.
“Forget the foot,” Lucy tried to shout. She pulled herself up to a sitting position and immediately wished she hadn’t. Her vision blurred with a wave of dizziness, but she had their attention again. Where the hell was the woman who’d promised the phone? “I need the FBI. Now.”
Before the men could answer, the woman returned—along with a sheriff’s deputy. Relief surged through Lucy. She just needed to hold on for another minute or two, long enough to get word out to her team. They’d take care of Nick and her family.
She turned to the deputy. His expression was dour. No surprise. Locals didn’t like messing with anything federal—and she knew right now she didn’t look like any FBI agent they’d seen before. Didn’t matter. As long as he listened and called Walden. Walden would take it from there.
“This the woman who crashed Lloyd Cramer’s Jeep?” he asked.
“She says she’s an FBI agent,” the nurse said.
“You see any ID?” Before anyone could answer, he handcuffed Lucy’s wrist to the bed rail.
Lucy jerked against the restraints in surprise. “Take these off.”
“Whoever she is, I’m not taking any chances,” the deputy said. “And there won’t be any phone calls until we get to the bottom of this.”
“Bottom of what?” the younger doctor asked.
“Bottom of whoever killed Lloyd. I just found his body back at his barn. Someone skewered his face on a combine blade.”
Then
2:31 p.m.
The man was silent, giving Lucy plenty of time to think. He wanted her to imagine all the myriad ways he could torture her before killing her, taking his time, keeping her alive until she begged for release.
Hell with that.
She wasn’t playing by his rules. Or his timeline. She knew how this would end.
She also knew how to save her family.
Who cared about the database of pedophiles and predators? She’d caught them before, she’d catch them again—or someone would.
She gave him the damn password.
Behind her, he stirred in surprise. She almost smiled. “What was that?”
She repeated the string of numbers and letters. They were easy to remember: the date and abbreviation of the city where Megan had been conceived. Something no one except her would know—and maybe Nick, but he was awful with dates. “It’s the passcode.”
His breath echoed through the dark chamber. Then silence.
Suddenly he was right behind her, his arms snaking through hers to pull her body upright, pressed against his. Her left foot hit the floor with the unexpected movement. She gasped in pain.
But not much fear. Now that he had what he wanted, he’d kill her. But her family would live. There was nothing for him to gain by hurting them—a sociopath like him, it was all about getting what he wanted. And she’d given it to him.
Time to die.
She waited, limp in his arms, balancing her weight on her good foot. Knife to the throat? Gunshot to the head? No, he was greedy, he’d take it slow. Didn’t really matter. He might have gotten what he wanted, but so had she. He thought she’d given up, that he’d won. Wrong. She’d won: her family was safe.
He slid one hand free, palm beneath her left breast, against her heart. Nothing sexual about his touch, more clinical. His arms were well muscled, not straining as he supported her weight. His breath came in slow, hot waves, brushing the top of her head as he effortlessly held her in place.
Then he dropped her. Pain screamed through her foot. She choked back her shriek, but couldn’t stop the whimper that emerged.
“You disappoint me, Lucy.” His voice was smooth, a stiletto that cut through her calm. “Don’t waste my time. We only have until seven.”
He’d mentioned that deadline earlier. What happened at seven?
“I gave you what you wanted,” she protested.
“I told you what would happen if you disappointed me. I told you I’m a man of my word.” He sounded betrayed.
She struggled to get beyond the pain reverberating through her body. Shifted her weight away from her injured foot. Then froze as he leveraged his booted foot against her bloody one. He didn’t press down. Just held it there, a silent threat.
“Do you think I’m stupid?” he demanded. “I study my subjects, know everything about them. I know the wrong passcode will lock the system down, send a security alert. And I know you, Lucy. The way you saved all those children from the hospital bombing. How you never give up on a victim, even tracking that serial killer years after everyone thought he was dead.”
He let up on her foot. She leaned away, bracing herself, knowing he was toying with her.
“You’re smarter than any serial killer,” she said, trying an appeal to his vanity. “I knew better than to resist. The password is the correct one. I would never try to trick you, not with my family’s lives at stake.”
He crouched behind her, his arms stroking her shoulders and arms, tracing the lines of her body in the darkness. She shivered, straining to anticipate his next tactic. How could she convince him that he had won?
“No,” he finally said, his hand caressing her injured foot. His touch was gentle, barely brushing the torn skin and mangled bones beneath it. Still more than enough to send a shock wave of pain through her body. “You would never give up this easily.”
He stood once more, stepping back, abandoning her on the floor. A bright light seared through the darkness—his phone a few feet in front of her. A slide show of images played across it. Her mother. Nick. Megan.
“No,” she gasped. “I gave you what you wanted. Please, no.”
“I told you what would happen if you disappointed me, Lucy.” His tone was fatherly, chiding a wayward child. “I’m a man of my word.”
The images rotated like a roulette wheel.
“Your cho
ice, Lucy. Which one will die?”
Now
6:56 p.m.
“I’ll need all her possessions and clothes bagged for evidence,” the deputy told the ER staff. Lucy rattled the handcuffs to get his attention.
“FBI,” she mouthed, cursing her stolen voice. But there was still hope. If she could get him to call the FBI, they’d verify who she was—it would take longer than calling Walden directly, but she’d have to risk it. What choice did she have?
“I’ll call them and get the detectives down here to do an interview,” he told her. His expression was strained: a simple MVA turned into a homicide investigation was less than routine for a weeknight’s patrol. It was clear he was trying to do everything by the book, but Lucy needed him to throw the book out.
She rattled the cuffs again. The deputy bent close. “The man?” she whispered. “Cramer?”
“If you are who you say you are, then you know I can’t question you until you’ve been read your rights and the doctors clear you. And if you aren’t, well, we’ll just wait for the detectives. Nothing’s getting thrown out on a technicality, not on my watch.”
Lucy shook her head, frustrated that he didn’t understand. She took a breath, trying to bolster her voice. Decided to go ahead and play the role of the victim, hoping he’d respond better than he had to her earlier demands. “He threatened my family. Please. Check them.”
The more she tried to talk, the more it felt like she was being choked all over again.
He gave her one of those single-jerk-of-the-chin cop nods that could mean yes or could mean no, turned to speak into his radio, then left to join the doctors just outside the open door to the room, beyond her hearing.
She lay back on the stretcher and closed her eyes, blocking out the light blaring down into her face, distancing herself from the pain.
She glanced at the clock. Panic ripped through her, twisting her gut.
7:00. Time was up.
If she was wrong and the man who’d kidnapped her hadn’t been working alone, then his partners could be anywhere. He’d left her to die in the pit hours ago. Plenty of time for his accomplices to find her family and infiltrate the FBI’s computer system with her passcode.
Nick could already be dead. Her stomach clenched, and for a moment she couldn’t breathe. Fear had a stranglehold on her chest. Her heart thudded so hard and fast it set off the alarm on the monitor behind her.
“Are you okay?” a nurse asked.
Lucy opened her eyes and nodded. The nurse didn’t see the lie; she was busy checking her vitals on the monitor.
How long since the man had left her to die in the tank? No, that wasn’t the right question. The right question was, Where had he gone first?
If what he’d told her was the truth, then he’d need a computer that was part of a law enforcement network, tied to the National Crime Information Center and with admin privileges. It didn’t have to be an FBI or DOJ computer, but it needed to be more than a mobile data terminal like what the deputy had in his vehicle. No way would the man be able to physically breach the FBI’s field office in Pittsburgh. But a computer at a police station would work.
Her gaze centered on the deputy. He still hovered near the door, frowning, one hand on his weapon, as he talked to her doctors. Why hadn’t he already called the FBI? Why hadn’t he asked more questions? Miranda be damned. She was a federal agent, and a man was dead. You’d think he’d want to know something here and now rather than waiting for a detective.
Maybe he was working with her captor. Or maybe her captor was law enforcement. He’d said he had a schedule to meet. Seven o’clock. Maybe it was a work schedule, starting a shift that would give him access to the computer and, through it, the DOJ database?
Or maybe the deputy was just an unimaginative cop, content to do his business without getting involved in federal messes best left to the brass and detectives. Her mind whirled with suspicions and second guesses.
It didn’t matter. She needed a phone—one call to Walden, to make sure her family was safe, and she could relax, let the doctors do their work, and let the rest sort itself out.
She glanced at the nurse. She’d been sympathetic, she’d come so close to giving Lucy a phone. A phone that Lucy saw was still in the pocket of the nurse’s lab coat. She just needed to get her alone for a minute.
Lucy tapped on the bed rail with the handcuff and nodded to the nurse when she turned around. “Need to pee,” she whispered.
“They’re talking to the surgeons at Three Rivers about Life Flighting you there—it’s the best hope for your leg. The deputy is trying to figure out what to do with you if they do. Either way, you need surgery. They’ll put a catheter in there.”
Lucy shook her head. “Can’t hold it.”
The nurse nodded, patted her shoulder, and went to join the men. One of the doctors left, and the other shrugged at the nurse before following him from the room. Lucy hoped that shrug didn’t mean they wanted the nurse to put the catheter in here, or worse, a bedpan—her best bet was if the nurse took her to use a restroom.
The nurse kept talking to the deputy, giving Lucy time to sit back up and assess her situation. Naked except for a hospital gown, her left foot swathed in bandages and an ACE wrap holding a splint in place, another splint on her left hand… not much in the way of assets. She didn’t even have Megan’s bracelet any longer—it, along with everything else she’d worn, was now in brown paper bags in the hands of the deputy.
She glanced at her left hand. Her wedding ring was gone—she vaguely recalled the younger doctor cutting it off during the frenzy of her arrival. Because of the way her hand and fingers had swollen. Boxer’s fracture, he’d said.
Her lucky charm. She couldn’t stop staring at her naked ring finger, barely visible beyond the edge of the splint. For some reason losing her ring made her even more fearful that something terrible had happened to Nick. Magical thinking, he often chided her—usually with a laugh that his uber-rational wife could be so superstitious.
Superstition or not, the panic was real enough. She needed to get out of here. Now.
The nurse left and returned a minute later with a wheelchair.
“It’s not like she’s going anywhere. Not with that foot,” she said to the deputy as she transferred the bag of IV fluids to a pole attached to the back of the wheelchair. Lucy couldn’t help but think that pole would make a good weapon. “And the bathroom is right there.” She nodded to a door on the opposite side of the room.
The deputy went to check it out himself, ensuring there were no weapons and no means for Lucy to escape. At least that’s what she’d be looking for if she were in his shoes.
“Okay, okay,” he told the nurse. “By the time you’re back, hopefully the supervisor will be here. I have a call in to the FBI about her. They’re going to call back.” The deputy sounded irritated that Lucy was still his burden to bear, but at least he had contacted the Bureau—or claimed he had. He unlocked Lucy’s handcuffs and returned them to his duty belt.
“My family?” she asked.
“The person I spoke with at the FBI said once they verified your identity, they’d send someone out.”
Lucy shook her head. That would take too long. Why couldn’t he understand that they were out of time? “Call Don Burroughs. Detective, Major Crimes, Pittsburgh Police. Ask him to send someone. Now.”
That earned her another scowl, but it seemed like he was thawing, actually beginning to believe. “You better not be yanking my chain, lady—”
“I’m not.”
“All right.” He turned to the nurse. “I’ll be right outside.” Glared at Lucy. “Making another call.”
The nurse lowered the bed rail and helped Lucy swing her legs over the side. Her left foot felt like a deadweight, tugging at her body as if trying to escape.
“You okay?” the nurse asked. Lucy nodded, and the nurse guided her into a standing position, braced against the bed, her injured foot off the floor. Then the nurse add
ed a second hospital gown, draping it from back to front, returning to Lucy a small amount of dignity, before sliding the wheelchair into place behind her.
Lucy slumped into the chair and let the nurse lift her leg onto the padded footrest. The exertion had left her drenched with sweat and feeling flushed. Hard to believe that a short while ago she’d been freezing.
The nurse pushed her into the small restroom. Before she could help Lucy up onto the toilet, Lucy made a grab for the nurse’s phone.
She snagged it from the nurse’s pocket, but her movement was clumsy, lacking the finesse she needed to hide it. The nurse whirled. “What do you think you’re doing?”
Then
3:12 p.m.
He stopped the slide show on Megan’s image. Lucy sat up straight, gaze lasered in on her daughter’s photo. She was not going to let this man hurt her family. Not an option.
She was going to kill him. Lucy had no idea how, but the thought brought with it a certainty that dulled all pain.
He sensed her shift in mood. His foot stomped down on hers. Her shriek echoed through the space for what felt like hours. By the time the sounds died, she was facedown on the floor, barely able to breathe, the cold concrete freezing her tears.
“I gave you what you wanted,” she pled. “Do whatever you want with me, leave my family alone.” Her words emerged in a fever-rush of anguish and fear.
Then she saw. Instead of focusing on the big picture of how to save her family, she needed to answer the smaller question: What did he want, right here, right now?
He wanted the pain to distract her. No. More than that, he wanted it to break her. Wanted her to surrender to it. To him.
He wanted to emerge from here the victor.
As much as she wanted the pain to stop, she realized she could use it.
“Please,” she begged, no longer fighting the tears. She watched his face in the dim light, trying to read his expression. His eyes widened slightly, just for a moment, and his lips curled in a genuine smile. Finally, a glimpse of the true monster—he enjoyed her pain, but even more, he relished her loss of control.