Wrath (The Lieutenant Harrington Series Book 1)

by E. H. Reinhard

  Chris left through the patio door and was halfway across the yard when he heard the dog bark. He hustled to the fence line and was almost over, then the dog was on him and crunched down onto his calf. Chris threw himself across, ripping his pants and flesh from the dog’s mouth.

  There in the bathroom, he winced as he poured peroxide over his leg. Chris wondered if Amy had been found yet. The liquid turned pink as it rolled off his calf and splashed down onto the white rug at the toilet’s base. Chris poured more peroxide across the wounds on his other leg and forearms. He continued to think. He wondered if the police had arrived at the scene and if her cop boyfriend had found her dead body. He also had a perplexing thought. Chris hadn’t even considered that she might have survived the attack. He never checked to see if she was dead. He contemplated what he’d do if she lived.

  Chris reached up into his short brown hair and ran his fingers along the puncture wounds and gashes from the dog’s teeth. He raised the bottle and doused his head in peroxide. He then splashed some on the back of his neck. He could hear the peroxide fizz. As it did, he kicked around his next move. He had no intentions of living life on the run. He’d taken out a few hundred bucks from his business bank account the day before. It was all the cash he’d have on hand. Chris was fairly certain his bank and credit cards would be tracked if they weren’t already. He decided he’d wait for the woman homeowner to return, then he’d incapacitate her and take her car. Then again, Chris didn’t even know where he’d go. The money he had wasn’t going to get him very far. The nagging thought of whether Amy had died returned to him out of nowhere. Chris’s eye twitched. He shook his head. He needed to know she was dead.

  Chris set the peroxide bottle on the back of the toilet. He scooped up the alcohol from the vanity and didn’t make a sound as he poured it over his head.

  CHAPTER 31

  I’d been at the hospital the entire day. Amy had been in and out of what the doctor had called a successful surgery. He’d thrown countless medical terms at me, but the only thing I heard was that the knife wound to her neck had missed everything vital and cut through only skin and muscle. The knife wound to her chest, the one the EMTs seemed most concerned about, had punctured her lung, but they’d surgically repaired the laceration. The doctor said that as with all knife wounds, the recovery time could be lengthy. He said Amy was lucky and he believed her chances for a full recovery were high. He said he’d let us know when we could see her.

  As I waited to hear news on Amy, information about the case trickled in via phone calls from my team. Wade in Tech had the most for me. They’d gotten into Laurie’s phone and found she’d actually recorded her entire encounter with Mercer in her driveway. The video included the point where she was attacked and killed. The footage would be waiting for me at the station, but the main thing was we had video proof that he was the killer. Tech had also gotten the search result from the police officer’s patrol laptop. The lone person Mercer had searched was Amy. Tech had even more news: the smashed phone in the truck was Mercer’s, though after they had it powered up and the history downloaded, they found it hadn’t been used since the night Nick Ludwig was killed. It didn’t provide much information.

  After talking with Wade, I spoke with Steve multiple times and the captain twice. The first time I spoke with Captain Halloway, he’d called to get an update on Amy. The second time, he wanted to know if there was anything he could do. I thanked him for his concern and told him I’d call later that evening. Steve, like the captain, had called multiple times to see how Amy was doing. He said we had no sightings of Mercer, and nothing at my house had indicated where he went.

  “Did you want a coffee or something, Nash?” Mary, Amy’s mother, sat in the waiting room along with me.

  I shook my head but didn’t make eye contact. I stared at the blank screen of my phone, hoping it would light up with a message that Mercer had been apprehended. In the half hour that I’d been looking at it, it hadn’t.

  “You’re sure?” she asked.

  I looked up. Amy’s mother was small and thin with shoulder-length gray hair. She looked back at me with pink eyes. Mary adjusted her glasses. She normally wore wire frames, but that day her frames were black. “I’m okay, Mary. Thanks.”

  “Babe?” she asked.

  Amy’s father, Keith, nodded. “Yeah, just a little cup.”

  “I’ll go with you, Mom,” Kelly said. Amy’s sister, Kelly, had the same small nose and high cheekbones as Amy. Her hair was a bit shorter and her eyes not quite as big. From what Amy had told me, her sister was having a hard time getting back out in the world and dating. Amy had mentioned that Kelly was still holding out hope that her ex-husband, Brad, would leave the woman he was with and come back to her. I’d met the guy when Amy and I started dating. I didn’t see him as too much of a prize, but apparently her sister carried a torch for him.

  Mary walked to the hospital’s cafeteria with Kelly in tow.

  I glanced at Keith. Amy’s father was short, stocky, and had longer hair than most sixty-some-year-old men. A scruffy white beard covered his chin and cheeks. He’d retired from a job in corporate finance a couple of years back. Amy had said that after thirty-some years of shaving, wearing a suit, and looking presentable each day, her dad wore longer hair and a beard as his way of letting loose. I could see the logic in that.

  “Any news?” Keith asked.

  “Unfortunately none that’s pointing to where this guy went,” I said. “Let me make a call here.” I already had my phone out. I clicked the call log and dialed Steve.

  “Hey,” he answered.

  “Anything?” I asked.

  “Nothing, really, aside from the fact that Colt thinks your dog got ahold of Mercer.”

  “Yeah?”

  “He says pretty damn good too from all of the blood left behind.”

  “Good,” I said.

  “We’re in the process of putting everything together for a press conference. We’re going to get the fact that he may be injured added to that.”

  “Did Colt say how bad he thinks Mercer was injured?”

  “He said it was not to the extent that Mercer was going to die from his wounds, but he’s damn well not having a good day, either.”

  “All right. Maybe we should check hospitals and all of that.”

  “We’re already on it.”

  “Okay,” I said.

  “Halloway wants Mercer’s face on every television in Miami. On the front page of every paper by morning. If he’s still around, hopefully we’ll get some call-ins.”

  “Do we have anything real time on his banking?” I asked.

  “Tech has alerts set on everything right now,” Steve said.

  “What about corporate accounts? I’d imagine he has to have some credit cards or bank accounts for whatever entity owns his franchises. That stuff can’t be personal.”

  “Yeah, you’re right. Tech said they had everything, but let me have them double-check on that.”

  “Did we get cars on his stores?” I asked.

  “They’re being watched by the local departments.”

  “All of them?” I asked.

  “Yes.”

  “What about friends and family? Did we find anything?”

  “No idea on friends. As far as family, his parents, both are deceased. No siblings and no children.”

  “Grandparents?” I asked. “Cousins, aunts, uncles?”

  “Nothing that we’ve found yet.”

  “We need to look into that angle further. We may get someone sympathetic to his cause. Maybe not even sympathetic, just willing to hide him out.”

  “Sure. I’ll get on that myself,” Steve said.

  “What about other properties he may own? Did we have anyone look into records?”

  “I had Garcia call records earlier. We have people looking into it. We’ve been on the phones all day and covering every damn thing we can think of. We’re on it.”

  “I know. I’m just trying to think o
f something that maybe we overlooked.”

  “Try to focus on Amy. What’s the latest?”

  “Nothing since we last spoke. Out of surgery and in recovery. We still haven’t been told that we can see her, so we’re sitting in the family waiting area. Waiting.”

  “Okay. Well, you let me know if there’s any changes. I’ll call you the second we get anything on my end. Right now the press conference is scheduled for six. I’d imagine that we’ll be hitting the airwaves shortly after that. Asking people to call in may help us weed through the whole friends-and-family thing.”

  I glanced at my watch. It was about a quarter after five. “All right. I’ll flip one of the televisions on and look at it when it gets closer. Thanks, Steve.”

  “You got it. She’s in all of our thoughts.”

  I clicked off from the call and looked at Amy’s father, who flipped an outdoor magazine closed. His face said that he was waiting for an update.

  “They’re doing everything they can to track this guy down. They’re putting on a press conference in about forty-five minutes. We should have this guy’s face everywhere shortly.”

  “Good,” Keith said. “Let’s get this son of a bitch found and locked up before he hurts someone else.”

  I agreed. I leaned back in my plastic chair and again went through my mental checklist. There had to be something that the guys weren’t looking into. Minutes passed. Everything that I came up with, we’d touched on. I kept circling around to where he could be hiding and how he could be traveling from point A to B. We had the lone vehicle registered to him. His wife’s was at his house and under watch of the Miramar PD. His businesses were being watched too from what I was told. As far as we knew, whatever money he was using was on his person. There’d been no hits on his personal banking account. I shook my head. He had to have help, or had to have been using his corporate accounts, or a combination of both. I fired a text off to Steve, saying as much. I looked up from my phone, and the doctor we’d spoken to earlier, Prentice, approached from down the hall. Amy’s father and I stood.

  “Gentlemen,” Dr. Prentice said. “Your wife and other daughter?”

  “They took a trip to the cafeteria. They should be back shortly. How is Amy?” I asked.

  “Still recovering, but we moved her to her own room on the second floor. Number two seventeen. She’s sedated at the moment, but you’ll be able to go in. She needs her rest, though, so try to keep the visit to just a few minutes.”

  “Okay,” I said.

  “We have another family waiting area on the second floor. You’re going to use the bank of elevators there.” He motioned down the hall. “Those elevators will let you out right across from the waiting area, and to your right will be a nurses’ station. They’ll be able to show you to her room if you need assistance. It’s pretty easy to spot, though. Just follow the numbers.”

  “Thank you,” Keith said.

  “Also, after hours, the area that she’s in will be secured. You’ll have to get family badges and phone the desk to be allowed in and out of the wing. The nurses can show you where to go to get that set.”

  “Appreciate it,” I said.

  “When do you think she’ll wake up?” Keith asked.

  “We’re going to let her come to on her own. A few hours, maybe.”

  “Thank you for everything,” I said.

  He gave us a nod, clasped his hands, and walked back the way that he came.

  “Let’s get Mary and Kelly and head down there,” I said.

  Keith and I walked the hall to the cafeteria.

  CHAPTER 32

  I stood on Bill’s front doorstep and waited. I had called him from the hospital right before I left to tell him I was going to stop by. I’d just hit the bell. A moment later, he pulled the door open.

  “Hey,” he said.

  “Bill.” Lucky spotted me from inside the house and came running. I knelt, and she jumped on me and licked. I gave her a good petting and looked her over. “Good girl,” I said. I looked up at Bill. “How has she been?”

  “She’s kind of been lying around. We washed her up. Like I said, she had blood all over her. A lot around her mouth.”

  “Her mouth, huh? Steve had said that Colt believed Lucky got ahold of Mercer. It seems like he may have been right.”

  “Hopefully she tore the guy to pieces. How’s Amy? You said she came to?”

  “Yeah, a few hours ago and just for a moment. She was groggy and kind of looked around before fading back off. She didn’t talk. They had her sedated pretty heavily. The doctors seem hopeful that she won’t be there for too long, though.”

  “I have to say that when I saw her, I didn’t think I’d be hearing news like that. Especially after the helicopter and shit.”

  “It’s a damn good thing you did what you did. Everything from going next door, to making the call, to waiting with her. Without it all, she wouldn’t have made it.”

  He nodded but said nothing.

  I stood from my crouched position. Lucky sat at my foot. “Thanks for watching her.”

  “No problem,” he said.

  I left Bill’s doorway. Lucky had run back to our house and sat at the front door. I stuck my key in the lock and flicked it to the left. Who’d locked the door in the first place, I didn’t know. I thought that maybe Steve locked it from inside and left through the garage.

  Lucky ran in and began sniffing. She moved from one room to the next. I stared at the living room. The couch was moved, the end tables were pushed away from where they should have been, and the lamp was on the floor. With a few more steps, I started to see blood, first on the back of the couch then behind it. I cocked my head and stared at it. I wondered what had actually happened. Lucky came running out from the hall toward the living room. She put her nose to some blood, just an inch or two away.

  “Lucky, no,” I said.

  She pulled her head back. I walked to the patio door and slid it open. A bloody handprint across the glass looked fresh out of a horror movie. “Outside, Lucky,” I said. She ran out, and I looked over the scene in the living room. On the floor in front of the couch was a large pool of blood. There appeared to be footprints from the dog in it as well as smears, shoe prints, and hand marks. They had to have been from Amy and Lucky—and from Bill trying to attend to her until the EMTs arrived.

  Blood covered the couch and cushions. My lamp was broken on the floor. Drink coasters, some candles that Amy had set out, a couple of magazines, and all of the normal things that would lie around a living room all had blood on them. My eyes went back to the big blood pool. I shook my head. I couldn’t even imagine what my girlfriend had gone through. I let out a long breath and called Colt. I wanted to hear his theory on what went down.

  “Harrington, how is everything?” he answered. “How is Amy?”

  “She’s recovering. Still sedated, but the doctors are hopeful all will be well.”

  “That’s great news,” he said. “We’re all keeping her in our thoughts.”

  “I appreciate that,” I said. “I’m actually in my house now. I was grabbing a few things and heading back to the hospital, but I wanted to give you a call while I was here.”

  “Sure, what’s up?”

  “I wasn’t able to get any kind of account of what happened from Amy. She’s been sedated pretty heavily, plus I don’t want to start hitting her up with questions the second she does wake up. I wanted to see what you thought happened. Steve said you came out here.”

  “Yeah, I wanted to have a look around. I have a fairly good idea, or at least an educated guess on what happened.”

  “All right. I’m all ears,” I said.

  “I think Amy was lying down on the couch when this happened, or at least when it started. Which would have meant that he got in unnoticed or was already inside. We didn’t have any forced entry anywhere, so I’m at a loss as to which.”

  “I leave the patio door open during the winter months. That way the dog can come in and out as s
he pleases. She likes to sit out there during the day and watch birds and lizards or whatever.”

  “That’s probably how he got in, then.”

  I looked at the couch, which had a clear path and line of sight to the patio door. Amy had to have been taking a nap or something when he came in. There was no other way that she wouldn’t have seen him and gotten off the couch. Yet we’d just had the conversation about her being careful, her going to stay at her sister’s, her watching her back. She had said she was going to pack a bag and go. I couldn’t imagine why she would have been lying on the couch. My eyes went back to the scene before me. “What’s going on with all this blood? Is this all from Amy?” I asked.

  “It is not. It would seem that your intruder, Mercer as we now know, got tore up pretty good by your dog.”

  A smile came over my face. I turned and looked at her through the patio door glass. The lights from the house lit her up. She wandered the backyard, sniffing around. “Steve said that you thought that.”

  “Yeah, she put some teeth to him. There’s got to be solace in that. As far as I could tell, the blood spatter and pooling behind the couch and all the blood leading out back came from Mercer. Wherever he is right now, he’s not doing so hot,” Colt said.

  “I hope he isn’t,” I said. “So we’re one hundred percent sure it was him? Not just an assumption due to the patrol car’s computer search?”

  “It was him. We lifted prints from your house, ran them, and they came back as Mercer.”

  “All right. What’s going on with anything else? The truck and phones?”

  “There’s not much there, unfortunately. The truck itself was a bust aside from the things we pulled from it. We’ve been through his phone, as well as that of Susanne Osborne, the prostitute. I can’t say there’s much of anything interesting on either of them. The big news was the Laurie Jillette phone with the video. Someone did tell you about that, right?”

  “Yeah,” I said. “You watched it?”