Love Inspired Suspense April 2015 #1

by Terri Reed

  Stephanie shook her head.

  “Get down behind the couch while I answer it.” She shoved the laundry basket aside and squatted down, not liking that she couldn’t see what was happening. She strained to hear, then peeked out around the bottom of the couch to watch.

  Rick looked through the peephole, then inched open the door. “Can I help you?”

  A voice Stephanie didn’t recognize answered. “Delivery for, uh…” The voice stalled, probably looking at an address. “Stephanie O’Brien. She live here?” It sounded like a man in his late teens, maybe early twenties, and his nervous tone also sounded like he wasn’t expecting a cop to answer the door. She wanted to get a look at him but she didn’t dare move out that far from behind the couch.

  “Who’s it from?” Rick asked him.

  “I’m just the delivery boy for the courier company. I don’t know anything about the packages or where they come from.”

  “You’re delivering on a Saturday?”

  “Twenty-four/seven. Keeps our company competitive with the big guys.” The poor kid sounded so nervous, Stephanie felt sorry for him.

  Rick grilled him a little bit more, asking for his name and the courier company’s name and address, until he finally let the poor guy off the hook.

  “What is it?” Stephanie asked, standing up as he closed the door.

  In his hand, Rick held a large manila envelope. He placed it down on her kitchen table just as his cell phone rang. “Hey, Gary. What’s up?”

  Stephanie fingered the envelope. What was it? Dread mixed with curiosity. Was it from Julian?

  She turned the envelope around in her hand, examining it. She found no return address, of course, only her name and her own address chicken-scratched out on the front in blue ink. The envelope looked harmless enough. She peeked at Rick. His back was turned toward her as he spoke to someone on his cell.

  Curiosity won out, and because she knew Rick would probably stop her from doing it, she sliced the top open and dumped the contents into her hand before he got off the phone and stopped her. She had to know what was inside.

  Rick ended his phone call. “Does the word anthrax mean nothing to you?”

  But Stephanie wasn’t listening to his words; she was too captivated by the stack of photos that had fallen out of the envelope. There were pictures of several of her students leaving school for the day; there was a picture of Joash wearing his backpack running into his school, another of Val and Haddie out shopping, and others of Terrell at work. There were shots of her church, of her pastor and of Stephanie standing outside talking with some of the women from her Bible study. There were photos taken from her sister’s Liberia blog showing Emily and Ty, and many of the kids from the orphanage that Stephanie loved. There was even a photo of her mother in front of the casino. Had he gone to Oregon to find her? Picture after picture revealed a location she frequented or a person connected to her.

  She reached the final photo. It was a shot taken outside of the Watkinses’ house fire earlier that day. In the picture, Rick was draping the blanket over her shoulders and the camera lens had zoomed in on the look of tender concern he had on his face. Scrawled across the corner of the picture in black permanent marker were the words, “Awww, how sweet.”

  Rick reached out his hand. “Let me see.”

  Stephanie handed him the stack. “Rick, if I care about someone, their picture is in there. He didn’t leave anyone out.” She could hear her own panic.

  Then she handed him the note that came with the photos in the envelope. In the same chicken-scratch handwriting, the sender had written: You can run, but can they hide?

  It had to be Julian Hale.

  Rick flipped the last photo over, examining the back. “These pictures came from the one-hour at Walmart. We can look into their security cameras, but we already know who they’re from. Let’s not touch them anymore, and I’ll send them to the lab to be fingerprinted. But for now, we’ve got another more pressing problem.”

  SEVEN

  Stephanie wondered what could possibly be bigger than this threat, but she asked, anyway, “What problem?”

  “That was Gary Shelton on the phone. He’s the head detective on this case, and he’s been going through all of the stuff we found at Hale’s house today.” Rick paused, turning in circles, searching for something. “Gary called to warn us that he can see us.”

  “What did he mean, he can see us?”

  “He meant what he said. Gary is on Hale’s personal computer right now, and…” Rick reached across the kitchen table and slammed her laptop closed. “We better hope Hale doesn’t have one of those with him with the same software as his home computer, because Gary was looking through this and seeing us.”

  She shook her head, refusing to believe it. “No way.” She backed away from the table. “No way.” She would not accept that Julian Hale had been spying on her in her own home. For how long? What had he seen?

  “How?”

  Rick pointed at her closed laptop. “Do you have a webcam on that?”

  “Yes. I video chat with my sister on it.” Nausea rolled. The violation she felt was indescribable. “I think I’m going to be sick.”

  “I know this is hard, but we don’t have time to deal with it. If he was monitoring your house remotely, he knows we are here. We need to move and somehow avoid being followed.”

  He’s been watching me. Where else? At school, too? He’s threatened everyone. Everyone. There had been too many blows today. She looked at her couch situated in front of the little gas fireplace. She wanted to quit, to wrap up in a quilt with a cup of tea on her couch and process all that had hit her in such a short time. But Rick was right. She needed to act, not think. Once they were in the safe house, there would be plenty of time to think.

  “Okay.”

  “There’s no way to know what other technology he has messed with. Don’t pack anything that he could trace. Leave your phone here. Don’t bring your laptop or a tablet.”

  “I can’t leave my phone.” She held up the stack of photos. “I need my contact list to call these people to warn them.”

  “Just leave it. We’re going to the police department. I can help you contact your friends from there.”

  Axle circled Rick’s feet, most likely assuming Rick’s agitation meant it was work time. It fascinated her how quickly Axle transformed from a playful puppy to an intense animal who seemed human in his desire to work with his partner. She was beginning to love that dog.

  “Stephanie?” Rick was pacing, and rubbing his palms together. She looked up from Axle to Rick, expecting more instructions. Instead, he waved a hand toward her bedroom door. “Hurry.”

  Five minutes later, Stephanie handed him a duffel bag.

  “That’s it?” Rick asked, sounding shocked.

  “I’ve got enough clothes and a toiletry bag. What else do I need?”

  “No complaints here,” he assured her. “My experience with women made me expect three rolling suitcases and a gigantic bathroom bag.”

  “I travel light,” she told him. His experience with women? A stab of jealousy hit her. She began to imagine his past girlfriends, wondering what they looked like and why he hadn’t ever been married. He must have a reason for still being single. Stop it, Stephanie. More important things to focus on at the moment.

  Rick’s hand found her back and guided her toward the front door. Before he opened it, he said, “Go for the car as quickly as possible.”

  They rushed down her front stoop to Rick’s waiting car. Stephanie ducked in while Rick kenneled Axle and tossed her bag into the back. The whole process from front door to pulling away from the curb had taken less than two minutes.

  Rick’s headlights reflected off the wet streets. Stephanie noted that the night sky had finally caught up with her sense of the length of this day. It felt so much later than only eight o’clock. Was constantly running her new reality? Would she forever be dodging the balls Julian threw at her, or was there hope of bei
ng free of him? Lord, please let them catch him. I don’t want to live like this forever.

  “Where are we going?” she asked Rick.

  “To the department to meet with Gary Shelton,” he said, looking into the rearview mirror. “I don’t want to risk Hale following us to the hotel. Gary wants to talk with you, and I need to go home to change and pack. Gary will transport you to the safe house, and I’ll meet you there.”

  Stephanie blinked. Rick was leaving her alone at the police department? She picked at a hangnail while he explained his plan. It made sense—the last thing she needed was Julian knowing where she was hiding—but the idea of separating from Rick made her nervous.

  Rick entered a security code, and a gate clicked open, allowing them to enter the department parking lot. Stephanie breathed easy for the first time since leaving her house. She had never seen so many police cars in one place. A fleet of vehicles backed into their parking spaces looked like an army ready to go when called. Julian couldn’t get in here. Where could she be safer than locked behind fences surrounded by cops? Maybe she should move in here to hide from Julian. She could find some unused storage room out of the way and hole up until he was arrested.

  That helps you, but what about your friends? She would love to forget, even if for only five minutes, how much was really at stake.

  Inside, Rick led her through a maze of cubicles until they came to a messy desk where an older man sat. He rose to greet them. “Aw, here’s our girl,” he said.

  His dark eyes and full brows contrasted dramatically with his receding salt-and-pepper hair. He appeared to be in his fifties, but he exuded an energy Stephanie didn’t usually see even in men much younger than him. The marathon race number and medal he had framed and hanging on his cubicle wall explained why.

  He extended his hand to Stephanie. “Gary Shelton. You have no idea how glad I am to see you safe, young lady.” The lines surrounding his sad eyes made her believe he had seen his share of unsafe young ladies. Goose bumps ran up her arms at the thought.

  “Thank you,” Stephanie said. She glanced at Rick and added, “I’m glad to be safe.”

  “Detective Shelton is leading our investigation on this case,” Rick explained to Stephanie and then asked the other man, “Anything new?”

  The detective handed Rick a folder. “This is the updated FBI profile report.”

  Rick’s eyebrows furrowed as he scanned the report he held in his hands. Stephanie hoped he would hand it to her next. She wanted to know everything she could about Julian, to understand why he had targeted her like this, but giving her access to an FBI report probably wasn’t going to happen.

  Rick looked up from the file and asked Shelton, “What about those other three photographs I saw in his attic?”

  “They were out-of-state victims that we didn’t know about,” Shelton told him. “I’ve been on the phone all day with other departments connecting the dots.”

  The detective pointed to a map he had pinned to his cubicle wall. “Lora Johnson, 35, Saint Paul, Minnesota.” Then he moved his finger to a different location and said, “Kelly Halloway, 32, and Naomi Folsom, 25, both from Milwaukee, Wisconsin.” He dropped his arm to his side as if it were suddenly too heavy. “Hale grew up in a suburb of Saint Paul and went to school with Johnson. Before moving to Seattle, he worked for a tech company in Milwaukee. There will be a solid case against him once we bring him in.”

  “Same MO?” Rick asked.

  Stephanie caught the questioning look the detective shot Rick. “It’s okay,” she assured him. “Don’t water it down for me. I need to know the truth.”

  Shelton gave a curt nod before he responded, “Final cause of death for all six was strangulation and…” His gaze flitted back to Stephanie before he added, “All six victims were educators of some form.”

  Stephanie stepped back, shocked. “Julian is killing teachers?”

  “Yes. Lora Johnson was a high school computer applications teacher in Saint Paul, and the other two taught together at a school in Milwaukee. The Seattle victims were a preschool teacher, another high school teacher and a tutor at a learning center.”

  Rick read out loud from the profile report in his hands, “The suspect is likely a white male in his late thirties, early forties. He is likely motivated by a need for power and dominance stemming from early childhood feelings of helplessness after suffering abuse at the hands of a male authority figure. The victimization of educators is most likely the result of a perceived failed romantic relationship or personal rejection from a member of that demographic.”

  He stopped reading and asked Shelton, “That first victim, Lora Johnson?”

  “It looks like she paid the ultimate price for spurning his love, and all the rest were guilty of reminding him of her,” Shelton said.

  “Why me?” Stephanie asked the detective. “I mean besides being a teacher like the other women, why did he choose me? I thought I was always kind to him. I can’t think of anything I did or said to make him hate me like this.”

  “It isn’t anything you did to him that motivates him, it is simply who you are.” Shelton nodded toward the file Rick held. “You fit his profile. You are young, and although you have friends, you are basically alone in the city with no immediate family connections in the area. He saw you as an easy target. Julian Hale is a systematic and patient killer. He targets people he thinks will be easy to capture, but then he takes his time getting to know them, knowing their routines and their friends. He becomes obsessed.”

  “Let me show you something.” The detective beckoned Stephanie and Rick over to a computer on his desk. “This is the computer we took from Hale’s property today.” He tapped the screen and asked Stephanie, “Recognize this place?”

  Both Rick and Stephanie leaned toward the screen, eager to get a look. Stephanie leaned in even farther, squinting at the grainy images, looking for clues that would tell her what was on the screen. She felt warmth radiating from Rick as he leaned across her back, straining to get a look at the computer over the top of her head.

  Stephanie grimaced. She knew exactly what place the camera was recording. “My classroom,” she spat out.

  She turned her back to the computer. She was done looking at it. First her home, now her classroom—how dare Julian desecrate her safe places? She rubbed her arms, trying to wipe away the thought of Julian’s eyes spying on her.

  The detective turned his chair to face her and then sat down. He leaned on his knees, looking at his feet instead of making eye contact with her. “Hale doesn’t strike until he is sure of his success,” Shelton said. “He hasn’t left room for error in the past.”

  He sat back up. “But you have one advantage the others don’t have.”

  “What’s that?” Stephanie asked him.

  “You are alive.”

  He reached up and touched her arm. “You are the one that got away. We know who he is now, and we got to you before he did.”

  Stephanie sat down in a chair by the cubicle wall. “But he’s threatened everyone I care about. I’m alive, but are the people I love safe?” She felt Rick’s reassuring hand on her shoulder and appreciated his strong grip.

  Detective Shelton crossed his arms and leaned back in his chair again. “I know you are worried about your friends, but for now I’m pretty sure you are Hale’s primary target. I’ve been studying this case for over a year, and my guess is he has fixated on you, not your friends. The threats today are just a way to scare you and prove to you once again that he is in control. For now, your safety has to be your top priority. And ours.”

  “My priority is seeing him caught. I want to be free, and I want the people I love safe. I’m not going to be content sitting around in hiding for long.” Stephanie leaned back in her chair and crossed her own arms, trying to appear bigger than her five-foot-three frame. Somehow she needed to get them to stop seeing her as a fragile thing about to break, and convince them to focus on the bigger picture. “I don’t know a lot about Julian,
but I know some. I’ve got to be able to help somehow. Can’t you use me as bait or something?”

  Gary Shelton smiled up at Rick. “I like this girl.” Then he patted Stephanie’s arm before rolling his chair away from her. “For now we focus on getting you two into hiding without Hale knowing your location. Rick will go home in a different car than he came in. We’ll put you in a disguise and take you out of here in a separate car. Once we’re sure there’s no tail, we’ll meet Rick at the marshals’ hotel suite.”

  “Thanks, Gary,” Rick said, shaking the detective’s hand. To Stephanie he said, “See you soon.”

  When Rick was out of earshot, the detective turned back to Stephanie. “Get a good night’s sleep. Lie low for a few days and let the dust settle.” He put a hand on her shoulder. “Then I just might take you up on that offer.”

  *

  Later that night, Rick tossed in the grip of a nightmare. Against the backdrop of a dark Seattle industrial complex, Stephanie begged him to help her as Julian Hale backed her into a corner, swinging a gigantic knife. Rain ran into Rick’s eyes, his mouth, choking him and drenching his clothing. He was frozen. He couldn’t move to help Stephanie. He could only stand and listen to her screams, watching as helplessness enveloped him.

  The clicking of the hotel heater turning on woke him up. He was soaked with sweat and his heart raced. It’s just the dream again. Different versions of the same nightmare had played out for over a year now. The dream’s setting never changed. It was always the same dark, rainy exterior of the warehouse where he and Axle had been attacked and stabbed, but somehow the old dream had adapted to his new reality by including Stephanie and Julian Hale. He breathed deeply, trying to slow his heart and orient himself with the unfamiliar room he had woken up in.

  He remembered he was in the hotel safe house, but beyond that there was something that was still off, something that didn’t feel right. What was it? The bed was so cold and empty. He patted around the sheets. Where was Axle?