Heartless: a Derek Cole Mystery Suspense Thriller (Derek Cole Suspense Thriller Book 1)
Page 17
Once situated, he glanced at his watch.
“Six-thirty,” he said to himself. “Perfect.”
From his position, Straus could see the back end of a sedan, unfamiliar to him, parked in the stone driveway of his lodge. His angle of view did not allow him to see the plates nor the make, but he knew whose car it was.
Ten minutes after he arrived in his perch, Straus saw a car slowing, then turning into the lodge.
“Curtis and Adams,” he whispered.
He watched Jacob Curtis and Peter Adams enter the lodge after pausing to consider the strange car parked in the driveway. He knew they were planning on being in attendance when Straus told Alexander the good news, but he didn’t expect them till well after ten.
It was perfectly still and quiet for several minutes before Straus saw the main door of the lodge swing open. Standing in the doorway was a bloody Alexander Black. The morning sun was still struggling to ward off the dark shadows, but Straus could see, even from one hundred feet away, the blood dripping from Alexander’s hands.
“Shit!” he thought.
The decision to leave and to execute Plan B was made instantly, but he knew he had to remain unseen and unheard. He needed a distraction. And as he glanced further down the road, he saw his needed distraction headed straight towards Alexander.
He didn’t know the man, but Straus recognized him. He remembered having seen him walking by his lodge before. His name didn’t matter. All that mattered was the fact that he looked to be speaking with Alexander, which meant Alexander would be distracted.
As quietly as he could, Straus crawled backwards, keeping his gaze fixed on Alexander and the familiar stranger as they spoke in the middle of the road. When he was free of the bush and could stand, Straus began to quicken his pace. Before he turned his back on his lodge, Straus saw Alexander plunge a knife deep into the man’s neck.
He sprinted back to his car.
He made no attempt to keep quiet. He wheeled his car into the road, hastily made a two-and-a-half-point turn and gunned his engine towards his escape route.
Had he just followed the instructions he was given, Straus was sure that the blood dripping from Alexander’s hands would be his. If he had trusted Alexander’s assistant, he would have no ability to implement Plans B and C. No, if he had been a sheep like most others and had just done what he was told, he would be dead.
As he slowed his BMW to a speed less likely to raise suspicions, Straus grabbed his phone, removed the battery, and tossed it into his back seat. He then removed the Plan B driving directions from his center council and prepared to turn off State Route 8.
He had spent a considerable amount of time planning his alternate route, making certain that if Alexander and his accomplice were to try to follow him that they would be hard pressed to keep up with the frequent turns. Within an hour after leaving his lodge, Straus pointed his car south and headed towards New York City.
His first stop would be to see Brian Lucietta. He had to let Brian know what had happened.
“Brian,” he said while standing outside of his car in Mercy Hospital’s employee parking lot, “both you and I need to protect ourselves. If what O’Connell told me is true, he and Alexander are not planning on making everything public but in exacting revenge.”
“William,” Brian Lucietta said, “you’re running scared from two people who, unless I’ve missed something, are not career criminals. If what you believe you saw at your lodge actually happened, the police will have them in custody within a day. Two at the most. I’m staying right here and keeping things business as usual.”
“I’m going to Hilburn. Ward C is impenetrable. I’ll keep in touch with you and with the news and won’t come out until I know Alexander and O’Connell are either dead or behind bars.”
“You’re overreacting. What you should be more concerned about is explaining to the authorities why you kept Alexander hidden all these years.”
“I’ve already figured that out,” Straus replied.
“Shouldn’t you share your story with me so that we are on the same page?”
“As far as you know, Alexander was just another patient, and you had no idea of the circumstances behind his arrival to Hilburn or departure.”
“Keeping me safe, are you, Will?”
“Keeping things clean, Brian. My story is the only one that is ever heard, if things come to that point. The more you deny, the better.”
“And with Jacob and Peter out of the way, that only leaves the doctors from Chicago to deal with,” Brian said as he checked an incoming text message on his cell. “I have to get back. You keep in touch, and let me know if there’s anything else I need to know about your story.”
“I have a plan for the good doctors from Chicago.”
“Good enough,” Brian said as he extended his hand to Straus.
“I do think it unwise for you not to take precautions,” Straus said as he shook Brian’s hand.
“I still carry my Taser. Just in case.”
Doctor William Straus was now safe, hidden in a place that he knew better than anyone. A place where no one would look for him, but from where he could keep fully informed of Alexander and his accomplice’s doings. Behind the locked doors of Ward C on the second floor of the vacated Hilburn Psychiatric Institution, he sat surrounded by a month’s worth of supplies. He had everything he needed, and now only ventured out of the protective confines early in the morning and late at night.
The rooms in Ward C had no exterior windows. The steel and brick construction blocked the WiFi signal from the tech startup company that was housed in the old Hilburn supply building that stood fifty feet from the walls of the main Hilburn hospital building. Straus would carefully listen for any noise outside of the only door that led from the “hub” of Ward C to the hallway. After hearing nothing for at least three minutes, he would unlock the door and quietly make his way down the southern hall to a window that faced the old supply building. There, Straus was able to log on to the tech company’s WiFi signal on his iPad, access news streams, check emails, and respond to any that he considered to be “critically important.”
He was certain that no one knew that Ward C was no longer vacant and knew that the only time a visitor would enter the abandoned main hospital building would be if a possible tenant was interested in seeing the available space. Over the years, three of the four buildings of the Hilburn campus were converted. One building was occupied by the tech company, another was converted to a warehouse, and the third was converted to small offices for start-up companies looking for inexpensive office space. While there were many companies interested in the three story main hospital, no tenants had been found. Rumors of the hospital being haunted were well known in the area, and local police had to increase their watches to keep out amateur ghost hunters and teenagers looking for a thrilling night.
Straus didn’t believe in ghosts and was able to easily dismiss the occasional sounds he heard during the night as echoes from the nearby roads or kids, loitering in the parking lot. There were some sounds, however, that gave Straus pause. Sounds that sounded eerily familiar.
His first night back in Hilburn, Straus thought he heard a crackle of electricity coming from the first floor where doctors like Brian Lucietta would perform “therapeutic shock therapy.” Later that night, Straus was certain that he heard the voice of a particularly disturbed patient calling for him. The patient died on the second floor from asphyxiation, though the exact cause was never determined.
Though the sounds startled Straus, he passed them off as his nerves getting the better of him.
“I’ve never read an obituary that claimed ghosts as the cause of death,” he chuckled to himself. “Empty halls distort sounds, and a nervous mind can turn the wind into a blood curling scream.”
It was at the window where Straus read about the two doctors murdered in Chicago. He read about Rinaldo having been killed by “severe blunt force trauma to his skull” and about Zudak being st
rangled in a motel thirty miles west of Chicago. He also read the details of the murders at his lodge and of the police search for “Doctor William Straus, wanted for questioning.”
There were no emails worth his response and nothing from Brian Lucietta. The only email that he did find interesting enough to be saved and read several times, came from an unknown Gmail account. He assumed that someone, probably Alexander or O’Connell, had accessed the computer in his study at the lodge, had learned his email address and had contacted him. The message was simple, concise and well written;
“Your name still appears on my list. I’d like to remove it, soon.”
Part of his Plan B called for three stops. The first being to visit with Brian Lucietta, to both make Brian aware of the happenings at the lodge and also to instruct him to deny knowledge of Alexander Black. The second was to a grocery store, where, using cash, Straus bought a month’s worth of food, water, and supplies. The final stop he made was to his home on Long Island. There, Straus collected boxes of files, his Smith and Wesson .380, two boxes of tactical bullets, and several changes of clothes. He needed nothing else and felt confident that, if after his food and supplies ran out, he would be able to sneak out to gather more if the situation with Alexander Black had not been resolved.
Straus had thought of nearly everything to include into his Plan B to ensure his safety and protection. The one thing Straus had not planned for was the battery of his iPad running low. He kept a car charger adapter in his BMW that was concealed in one bay of the loading docks two floors below him. If the iPad’s battery died, Straus decided a trip to the loading dock might also give him the opportunity to drive to a nearby hotel, for a shower and to “borrow” a pillow, another missing item from his plan.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
“I have no idea how you got into my office, but I do suggest that you leave immediately.” Brian Lucietta was certainly startled when he walked into his office, turned on the overhead lights, and felt the hard shove that sent him sprawling onto the floor. But Brian didn’t believe in staying startled long. He quickly found his footing, and when he realized that he had no clean path to get out of his office, he stood to confront his unwelcomed guest.
“I will give you five seconds to turn around and walk out of my office before I take action.”
“And what action are you prepared to take?” his guest asked.
“Three, two...”
Brian’s countdown, though short, was made even shorted when he felt the probes dig into his body. He had only enough time to look up in terror before those two small, shiny barbs released an eruption of pain.
The electricity seized his muscles together in a tight, contracted, and painful way. His brain was scrambled with electrical impulses. As he fell to the floor, Brian felt his jaw tightening, clenching, and grinding his teeth together. Had he expected his jaw to clamp shut so tightly, he would have been certain to move his tongue back and away from the crushing power of his teeth. But he had no warning.
The contractions lasted only three seconds, and when they stopped, his pain evaporated. But not the pain of his severed tongue. He felt blood pouring from his tongue, into his mouth, and flowing down his throat. He coughed to move the blood from his airway and out of his mouth. Along with a disturbing amount of blood, his cough also caused a two-inch long strip of his tongue to launch from its home. Brian watched it land inches from the boots standing a few feet from his prone position.
“This is a remarkably effective tool,” his guest said. “I was pleasantly surprised to find it in your top desk drawer. Remarkably effective. And in case you were worried, I had the foresight to wear rubber gloves, in case the electricity travels through the handle.”
As Brian tried to stand, he heard the popping of the current again. He didn’t understand why he hadn’t noticed the popping when the first jolt of electricity was delivered and hoped that he would never have to hear it again.
Three seconds of searing, contracting, exhausting pain, then, nothing. Complete absence of pain. He felt his body soaked with sweat and could feel the blood still pouring from within his mouth. He raised his head and locked eyes with his attacker.
“Peeez, wha u wan?” he mumbled; his tongue screaming for no movement.
“I am sorry, Doctor Lucietta, but it seems that you are very poor at speaking with a shortened tongue. Please, try it again. I will listen more closely.”
“Wha u ewe wan rom e?”
“Sounds like you are asking about my intentions? Nod if I heard you correctly.”
Brian nodded his head as more blood was sprayed into the air by a painful cough.
“Fair question,” his attacker said. “All I want to know is where I will find William Straus?”
Brian raised his hand and pointed to a picture hanging on the far wall of his office.
“Here?” his attacker asked. “I will find him here?”
Brian nodded then heard the popping sound again.
When the current stopped, Brian’s body was convulsing. His legs and arms were uncomfortable, but the pain in his chest was what Brian was most concerned with.
“I’ve never used one of these Tasers. I had no idea that a cartridge was needed in order to deliver the voltage,” Brian’s attacker said. “I must commend you for your forward thinking. Having a cache of additional cartridges hidden in your bottom drawer: Brilliant.”
His attacker popped in another cartridge, squeezed the Taser’s trigger, and sent another round of shock treatment into the body of Doctor Lucietta. Without pause, he slammed in another cartridge, squeezed the trigger again but heard no report of the popping noises that signaled a passing current.
“Three successive doses,” the attacker said. “Your Taser is good for three doses. Not that you will need to know that information, but it is a good bit to have.”
Brian was unable to move. Though the only pain he was feeling was his severed tongue and the fading discomfort in his chest, his muscles were spent. He saw that his attacker had moved across the office and was carefully inspecting the photograph that contained the location that William Straus would be found. He knew this was his chance. He knew he had to reach the door and the safety that the hallway just beyond his office door would provide.
Brian summoned every last bit of his energy and forced himself onto all fours. His arms screamed and shook violently as he demanded that they pull him towards the door. His legs offered no assistance to his arms and were nothing but dead weight needing to be dragged across the office floor. His eyesight was spinning and his thoughts, muddled. But he felt himself moving. Moving towards the door and to safety. His closed one eye to better keep to his course.
His senses were muted except for his smell. As he struggled to reach safety, Brian’s stomach turned at the foul smell that was filling his nostrils.
Though he couldn’t be certain, he believed he has no more than four feet from the door. Four more feet before he could spill himself onto the hallway floor where someone would certainly see him and call for help.
His body was sending random signals to his brain so Brian wasn’t sure if the sharp, stabbing pain he felt when he was two feet from the door was something new or just his muscles continued reaction to the stun gun.
But when he saw the blood flowing down his arms and onto the floor, Brian knew that the pain in his neck wasn’t a side effect. The next thing he felt was a continuation of this new pain. But this continuation was deeper. Slowly reaching through his neck, into his throat and then, the long, thin knife finished its journey.
His arms went numb as they folded beneath his weight. He could feel nothing; no pain, no twitches, no blood running its way down his body.
“I made it,” he thought as his eyes clouded over, and he felt a shallowness in his chest.
“Thank you for the information,” he heard his unwelcomed guest say as if speaking from deep inside a tunnel. “Good night, Doctor, and, again, thank you.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
When Derek was no further than three miles away from the lodge, he pulled his car over to the side of State Route 8, pulled out his cell phone from his pocket, and redialed the last number called.