Charlotte patted her niece’s arm. “Sure you can, honey.”
Once they were alone, she turned to him. “Tell me what happened.”
He nodded. “I lost it when I was video chatting with Ed today. He was gloating about how it felt to murder someone—”
Charlotte gasped.
“Yeah.” Dougal shook his head. “I was doing okay and then I just snapped. I told him I’d had it, that I was done. And wouldn’t you know it, he left the room then came back with Chester. I actually saw him, Charlotte. Alive and well.”
Charlotte put a hand on his knee and squeezed. Hard. “Are you sure he was okay?”
“Yes. He looked fine. He was really tired but he recognized me right away. He said my name and then he was asking me to help him when the screen just went…dark.”
“Oh, God...”
Dougal pulled her into his arms. “I’m sorry. I hate that my father has him. But at least we know he didn’t suffer an accident. Or get swept out to sea.”
Charlotte swiped away a few tears. “Yes. He’s alive. We have to hold onto that.”
Dougal swallowed and looked away. There was too much hope in Charlotte’s eyes for him to face right now.
Yes, Chester was fine now. But when had Ed Lachlan ever shown mercy to one of his victims?
* * *
It worried Charlotte that not once that evening did Dougal receive a summons from his father to resume working on the book. Had Ed Lachlan taken Dougal at face value when he’d said he’d had enough?
If so, what would that mean for Chester?
For the first time since her brother’s disappearance, Cory decided to go to sleep in her own room.
“Will you tuck me in?”
“Of course.” Charlotte got up from the sofa where they’d all just finished watching an episode of Big Bang Theory.
“You too?” Cory asked Dougal shyly.
Though clearly surprised, he jumped to his feet. “You bet.”
Cory chose the Tintin adventure, The Crab With The Golden Claws, for her bedtime story, and Charlotte read the Tintin parts, while Dougal covered all the other roles.
After thirty minutes, Cory’s eyelids finally fluttered closed.
With a gentle touch Charlotte stroked her niece’s hair, then brushed her hand lightly over the tiny crease on her forehead. “Sleep tight sweetheart.” As she glanced at Dougal she was touched to see a tear in his eye.
He blinked it away with a rueful shrug. “She’s a sweet kid.”
After leaving the door ajar and the hall light on, Charlotte and Dougal retired to her bedroom. Dougal undressed her slowly, and she felt the oddest combination of arousal and sadness.
They made love solemnly, and Charlotte only managed to forget her troubles in the final, trembling, ecstatic moments of climax.
Breathless she collapsed onto Dougal, loving how safe she felt as he wrapped his arms around her. Pressing her ear against his warm chest, she listened to the thudding of his heart, surely the most reassuring sound in the world, not unlike the lulling rhythm of the surf, which she could also hear through the open window.
She hoped she would drop off to sleep, and she did, only to be jolted awake a few hours later with a familiar feeling of dread. She rolled away from Dougal and glanced at the clock. Eight minutes after three.
The wind had picked up since they’d gone to bed and her curtains were dancing wildly in the breeze. A glance at Dougal confirmed he was still asleep.
Quietly she crept out of bed, pulled on a nightgown and then went to check on Cory. The little girl was deeply asleep, oblivious to the noise of the wind. Charlotte closed and latched her window and returned to her own bedroom.
She found Dougal reaching for his phone, which he’d left on the nightstand.
She read his disappointed expression with concern. “He hasn’t emailed?”
“No.”
The ball of dread in her gut grew bigger, but she crawled under the covers and when Dougal put his arm around her waist, allowed herself to be drawn back into him. How could his touch make her feel so warm and secure, even at a time like this?
She didn’t know the answer, but she was grateful for his presence.
And couldn’t help wondering about Chester. His nights had to be filled with loneliness and fear.
She listened to the sound of Dougal’s breath, waiting for the moment when he’d fallen back to sleep. Meanwhile she watched the minutes accumulate on the clock. When the display read 3:48 she whispered, “Awake?”
“Yeah.”
“I forgot to tell you something. On Friday Jamie and I went through our old photo albums. We were looking for clues as to who might have been Ed’s father.”
Dougal’s body tensed and she rolled over to face him.
“I’ve wondered about that too,” he said. “Did you find anything?”
“If Shirley dated, there weren’t any photos of her boyfriends. All we found was one picture of her with her prom date. But she’d had the baby years earlier, so that didn’t help much.”
“Who was her date?”
Charlotte told him about Sam Lemwick. “I wish he had been the father, but he laughed at the very idea. They only had the one date and I doubt if Sam did much more than hold Shirley’s hand while her father took their picture.”
“I asked Ed once about his biological father. He told me to be patient.”
“So you think he knows who it was?”
“Maybe. Or he could have been messing with me.”
“We could try questioning some of Shirley’s other classmates.”
“Yeah. I’m not sure it matters much at this point.” Dougal flopped onto his back. “I wish the bastard would email me. He’s probably delaying just to torture me.”
“But he will call eventually, right? I mean, he’s gone to a lot of trouble to get you to write this book. He won’t abandon the project easily.”
“That’s what I’m counting on...”
But his phone remained silent.
After staring at the ceiling for another twenty minutes, they gave up on the idea of sleep and went downstairs. Dougal made them hot tea with a generous addition of almond and orange liquors and they settled on the outdoor chaise lounge, sharing both the wide chair and a blanket. The salty air and crashing waves grounded Charlotte, reminding her that some things in this world could still be counted on.
They sipped at their tea until it was gone, then pointed out familiar constellations as they peeked out from the shifting clouds.
“I just realized, this is the longest I’ve ever gone without reading a novel.”
“You mean the four days Chester’s been missing?” Dougal asked sleepily.
“Yes. With so much empty time on my hands, I’ve tried several times to get into a book. But not even my favorite Jane Austens are working. I pick up a book and I can’t get past even one paragraph.”
“Tintin excepted.”
She jabbed her elbow lightly against his side. “That was for Cory.”
“I was teasing.” He sighed. “I know what you mean. The fear is too big. You can’t push it aside.”
“Exactly. Even when we were watching Big Bang, my stomach was twisting and churning so much I could hardly stand it.”
Dougal put his hand over her belly. “Does it hurt most right here?”
“Yes.” She took his other hand and placed it over her heart. “And here.”
And then, at just that moment, Dougal’s phone, resting on a nearby table, chimed.
Charlotte scooted to the edge of the seat, clutching the blanket tightly around her. “Is it him?”
“Yes.”
chapter nineteen
Wednesday April 7, 1976, Twisted Cedars Library, Oregon
The library basement smelled like sawdust and old books. Shirley was frightened, but also furious. The minute he removed his hand from her mouth, she spit out the words that had been screaming inside her head.
“You killed her!”
> Ed Lachlan smiled. “Which ‘her’ are you referring to Mother, dear?”
Fear became terror as the import hit her. She backed away from this man—she would never again think of him as a boy—until she was stopped by the new bookshelves Amos Ward had installed last week.
Not only had Ed killed Isabel—he was going to kill her, too, unless someone stopped him.
Amos sometimes popped in to work on his handyman projects in the evening. But would he do so tonight?
“You killed Isabel Fraser,” she said. “You strangled her with one of the red scarves you’ve been stealing from me.”
God help her, how many of those scarves had she replaced since Ed Lachlan barged into her life?
Shirley realized the answer was the same as the number of snow globes she’d been collecting in her curio cabinet: four.
She wished she had those cheap souvenirs now. She would love to hurl them at Ed’s face and wipe away his evil grin.
“It’s been such a fun little game, Mother. Waiting to see how long it would take you to catch on. Yes, I killed Isabel Fraser. Made a good, quick job of it, too. Unfortunately for Elva I wasn’t quite as effective with her.”
“Elva...?” Shirley couldn’t think of anyone she knew with that name.
He seemed to enjoy her puzzlement. He let her stew in it for several minutes before finally elaborating.
“Her full name was Elva Mae Ayer. She lived in Roseburg. She was a librarian, of course, around your age. Not nearly as attractive. But not bad, either. She had a protracted death, due to my inexperience. Lucky Mary Louise Beamish and Bernice Gilberg fared better.”
Elva. Mary. Bernice. None of these names were familiar to her.
“Why did you pick those particular women?”
“Pure chance. It was part of your punishment, you see. For every conference you attended, I would kill one librarian. I would hide in the basement of the main library just before closing hours and nab the first victim who stepped into my trap.”
“You actually killed these women. Strangled them. To get back at me?”
“Finally she gets it.” He rolled his eyes and chuckled, as if they were talking about a brainteaser.
“If you wanted to punish me—why not kill me?”
“And where would the fun be in that? One violent twist of the scarf, continued pressure for two full minutes, and then the game would have been over. You wouldn’t have even understood what had happened. Or why.”
Shirley held up her hands. “What is it you want from me? It’s too late. I can’t change what happened to you. Just as I couldn’t change what happened to me.”
Ed’s eyes narrowed. “You dare to compare what happened to you to what I went through? Lots of schoolgirls deal with unexpected pregnancy. It doesn’t wreck their lives. You had everything. Adoring parents, a beautiful home, lots of food, everything your heart desires. If you’d wanted, you could have kept me. Raised me as a Hammond.”
“But I didn’t. And I’m sorry. Is that what you’ve been waiting to hear me say?”
“Maybe it was. In the beginning. But it’s not nearly enough now.”
* * *
Wade spent most of Sunday meeting with the FBI. Now that they knew for certain Chester had been kidnapped, a mobile task force had been dispatched from Portland and the case was officially out of his control. But Wade and his team intended to keep looking for the boy as hard as ever.
The FBI had also agreed Dougal should continue working on his sessions with Ed. A warrant had been obtained that would allow them to record the video chats. And the experts were working on tracing the chat room connection. But given the dead end they’d hit trying to track down Ed’s emails, Wade didn’t hold out much hope that they’d be able to trace Ed that way either.
At quarter past six Wade paused outside the door to Dougal’s small office. He didn’t want to risk interrupting a video chat with Ed. But after several moments of silence he figured he was safe so he went inside.
Dougal was staring at the laptop, looking like hell. Unshaven, gaunt and exhausted. Judging by the number of dirty mugs on the table, he was surviving on pure caffeine.
Wade leaned against the door. “How’s it going?”
“You ever hear writers talk about killer deadlines? This one really is.”
“I’m glad you still have your sense of humor.”
“I get flashes of it now and then. Wish I could say the same for my sense of humanity.”
“You’ve written true-crime books your entire career. This is what you do.”
Dougal raised his eyebrows and Wade said nothing more. This case was different and they both knew it.
“You’ve been locked away in this room for twelve hours,” Wade said. “Let’s head over to the Buttermilk Café for one of their all-day breakfasts.”
Dougal shook his head. “I can’t stop for that long.”
“Correction. You need to stop for that long. Come on, it’s an order.”
“I wasn’t aware I was working for the sheriff’s office these days.”
“You may not be on the payroll. But you’re definitely on my turf.” Wade clasped a hand on Dougal’s shoulder and waited while he shut down the computer.
They paused on their way out the main door, both instinctively looking up to check out the changing weather. High wispy clouds and a persistent wind from the southwest signaled a low pressure system moving in.
At the Café they both ordered the Rogue Breakfast. Instead of coffee, Wade opted for water, while Dougal ordered both.
“Your gut must be a mess with all the java you’ve been drinking.”
“I’ll go on a health food cleanse when this is over,” Dougal promised.
Wade grimaced. Not for him, thanks. “I know you’re working on this book as fast as you can. I’d like to find Ed’s hideout before you finish.”
“That would be great,” Dougal agreed. “But you do realize he may not even be in Oregon.”
“Maybe not. But if he’s in my county, I want to be the one who finds him.”
“Is this a pissing match between you and the Feds?”
“Not at all. They’ve got their areas of expertise and I’ve got mine.”
“Well, I wish I could help you. But Ed’s given away nothing since he let me see Chester.”
“I was hoping maybe you’d seen something, or maybe even heard something in the background.”
“Christ!”
The server who was arriving with their plates of food, almost dropped the plates.
Dougal glanced at the woman and apologized. He waited until she’d set down the dishes and scurried away, before resuming more quietly.
“I can’t believe I forgot to tell you, but I did hear something. Sounded like a woman talking in the background when Ed went to get Chester.”
“A woman. So they’re not alone?”
“Could have been a voice on a TV program or something, but I don’t think so.”
“Could you tell if it was an older woman, or younger?”
“Didn’t sound too old. But not young either. Sorry I can’t be more helpful.”
“Do you think it’s possible Ed has a new girlfriend?”
Dougal grimaced. “I hope not, for her sake.”
They tucked into their food for a few minutes, but Dougal quickly lost his appetite.
“I keep thinking about the kid. Seeing me on the video feed probably raised his hopes about getting rescued.”
That had been over a day ago. For a young boy it must feel like an eternity. Wade pulled out his card to cover the meal. It was time they got back to work.
* * *
Dougal was in Wade’s office filling in some necessarily paperwork, when Marnie came to the door.
“Charlotte Hammond’s here to see Dougal.”
Dougal raised his eyebrows at Wade, wondering if he’d called her, but Wade just shrugged.
“Show her in.”
A moment later Charlotte appeared with her hair
in a messy bun. She was wearing skinny jeans and a baggy blue sweater with a wide neck that threatened to slide off one of her narrow shoulders. The librarian had no idea how sexy she was, which made her only more appealing. Dougal wanted to kiss every inch of her long, pale neck.
Which probably wouldn’t impress Wade very much.
So he kissed her on the lips, instead. “What’s up?”
“I had an idea how I could help. Before you ask, the house isn’t empty, Jamie agreed to hang out and work on one of her files.”
“It must be hard to sit and wait,” Wade said. “It may help to know that the FBI is working full throttle on this now too.”
“I’m not here to complain, Wade. I appreciate all that’s being done. I just want to do my part, especially now that we know for sure Ed has Chester and he won’t be coming home until this book is finished.”
“What is it you want to do, exactly?” Dougal asked.
Charlotte straightened purposefully. “I’m going to help you with the book.”
“Appreciate the offer. But I don’t see how you can do that.”
She pointed to a briefcase she’d left sitting outside the office door. “I brought my laptop. If you transfer over your rough pages, I can do the editing.”
Dougal did not like the idea of her reading his father’s story. “We don’t need to bother with editing. I’m not exactly shooting for a Pulitzer here. All I want is words on the page.”
“But your father might be pickier. He probably won’t be impressed with grammar mistakes, that sort of thing. With my help, a few minutes after you write your last scene, I’ll have the book ready...” She paused. “What does he expect you to do when it’s done?”
“He hasn’t told me that part yet.”
Wade, who’d been listening to the exchange with interest, held up his hand. “Well you better ask him, and find out.”
“I’ll ask. I can’t promise he’ll give me an answer.”
“In any case, I think Charlotte is right. It’s in Chester’s best interests if this book is polished and ready to go.”
Dougal scowled at him. “She’s already under enough stress. Last thing she needs is to read this horror story.”
exposed (Twisted Cedar Mysteries Book 3) Page 14