by Vakey, Jenn
When she was sure the alcohol had taken effect, she reached for a handful of iodine wipes. She cleaned the area thoroughly and held it together before she took the needle Ben had prepared.
“Are you sure you don’t want me to do it?” he asked again. Although he offered, she knew he wouldn’t have been pleased if she had changed her mind.
She shook her head and took a deep breath before pressing the curved needle into her skin. It pinched as it slid through, but she was pleased with the way it looked as she tied the first knot. Ben looked almost mesmerized as she clipped the thread so she could move to the next one. In no time at all, she had evenly placed all six stitches. Though her vision was slightly affected by the alcohol, Rilynne was satisfied with the results.
“Okay,” she said, dropping back onto her back. “I did the hard part. You can take care of the rest.”
He laughed as he started gently cleaning around the area. Although she could feel a mild discomfort, it wasn’t painful. Rilynne’s head was spinning. She stared up at the half completed ceiling and watched it dance above her. After a few minutes, she looked down and found Ben taping a bandage to her leg.
“I have to say I’m impressed,” he said. “I don’t think the scar will be very bad at all.”
She shrugged, not moving from where she lay on the floor. “It’s not like I don’t have plenty of scars already. What’s one more? Besides, this one will come with an exciting story to tell the grandkids.” She could see out of the corner of her eye the grin that appeared on Ben’s face, along with the distinctive pinkened ears, though she chose not to acknowledge them. Instead she just pushed herself up and started helping him clean the mess up.
“I still can’t believe you did that,” he said when they finished several minutes later.
Rilynne grinned as she leaned back against the half-wall, room still spinning around her. “Well I can’t believe we just outran a search dog by jumping into a river. I didn’t think that really happened outside of the movies.”
“Honestly, the first thing that came to mind was the difficulty the dogs had in picking Hartley’s trail up when he was in the river. I knew it wouldn’t keep them off our trail long, but all we needed to do was get back to the car,” he explained.
Her heart sank as a realization once again settled within her. “They know we’re still in town,” she said, feeling suddenly sobered. The look on his face told her he had been thinking the same thing.
“They couldn’t have known for sure,” he said in a reassuring tone. “I imagine Wilcome is just covering his bases. He wouldn’t want it to come out that you were hiding out in the woods and he didn’t make an effort to find you. With no confirmation that we are actually on the way to Wisconsin, he had to do something.”
“Well, if they didn’t know before, they do now,” she stated. “I can only imagine what they’re thinking now that they found a trail of blood leading toward the river.”
Ben chuckled and shook his head. If he was feeling even half as nervous as she was, it wasn’t showing.
“What are we supposed to do now?” she asked. “We could actually leave, but chances are they would have set up a road block as soon as they realized I’m still here.”
He shook his head and stood up. “We don’t need to do that,” he said as he held his hand down to help her up. “No one will look for us here. We just can’t risk leaving unless it’s necessary. We have enough food to get us through the next few days. After that, we’ll figure something else out. Hopefully you will have the case completely solved and wrapped up in a neat little bow for the department by then.”
“Well aren’t you the optimist,” she said.
His head bobbed animatedly as he pulled the case files out of the pack. “Always. Now let’s get this figured out.” He looked around for a moment before pulling open one of the doors off the living room. There was only a small window in the eight-foot room, so Rilynne assumed it was to be a large storage closet of some kind.
“Here,” he said, handing her the files as he pulled out a box of thumbtacks.
“You’re going to tack things into their newly installed walls?” she asked, genuinely shocked.
He shook his head. “No, we are,” he said, holding the box out for her. “Besides, the walls haven’t even been textured yet. While I’m sure they will be annoyed, it won’t be an inconvenience in any way.”
She looked at him skeptically before flipping the file open. “All right, so let’s start with what we know.”
“This guy,” Ben said, grabbing the picture of Marshal Teich and tacking it to the wall. “If I had to guess, I don’t think he has anything to do with why you were set up. He’s just the instrument used.”
“You don’t think that someone might have wanted him dead and used me to keep the investigation away from them?” She already knew the answer, but she wanted to hear his prospective.
“No,” he said after a few seconds thinking it over. “Not with the extremes that were taken. It would have been one thing to just have someone come forward as a witness, but this is different. Your house was broken into and your safe cracked with no evidence left behind. It doesn’t sound like a spur of the moment kind of thing. If I had to guess, I would say your gun was taken prior to your altercation with Teich, and whoever was setting you up just waited for a good victim to appear. If it hadn’t been Teich, it would have been someone else.”
Rilynne felt a sudden relief by the notion that it had been Teich instead of an innocent victim. The thought filled her with guilt, though, and she quickly pushed it out of her mind.
“His apartment does tell us a few things, though,” she said, tacking the photos from the scene next to the one Ben had put up. “We know there was one shooter. Do you have any paper?” Ben darted out of the room and returned moments later with a small notebook and the carpenter’s pencil that had been on the floor of the kitchen. He drew a large question mark and tacked it to the middle of the wall. “Did Summers ever determine the height of the shooter based on the spatter patterns?”
Judging by the look on his face, he had.
“Let me guess,” she said dryly. “The shooter was my size?”
“Well, he wasn’t able to give an exact height, but he estimated between 5’3” and 5’6”.”
She let out a sigh and pulled the notebook out of his hand. “So either a woman or a short man. We also know he or she is very adept at picking both locks and breaking into safes.”
“So what you are saying is you and I were in on it together,” he joked.
She chuckled, but stopped abruptly. “You can break into safes?”
Ben grinned and turned back to the wall. “You don’t know everything about me.”
“Apparently not,” she stated.
“Well,” he said, turning his attention back to the case. “We know Teich was killed between ten and midnight. Is it possible anyone could have seen you? Maybe that neighbor of yours?”
She could hear the annoyance in his voice, but didn’t acknowledge it. “No, I’m pretty sure he was out with Lori. She mentioned something that day about having a sitter staying at her place to watch both kids.”
“The one night he decided to do something other than walking around his yard half naked,” he said, shaking his head. Rilynne just grinned. “Did you happen to go out for one of those midnight runs that you like to take? You know, the ones you think I don’t know about.”
She was taken aback by his statement. Rilynne went for a run in the middle of the night at least once a week, and she really didn’t think he knew about them. “Wait, how did you know about those?” He answered with a raised eyebrow. “I’ve never said I didn’t go for late night runs,” she explained. “I just knew you would worry if I told you about them, and I already do enough stuff for you to worry about. Take my newly stitched leg, for instance.”
He seemed amused by her attempt to distract him. “Well, did you go for a run?” he asked with a chuckle.
“N
o,” she replied. “I really did just take a bath and climb into bed early. There was that knock on my door just after eleven, though.”
“Do you know who it could have been?” he asked.
She shook her head. “I really wish now that I had gotten up to answer it. It could have prevented all of this.”
“Wait,” he said, digging through the file. “I saw a note on the back of one of these pages from Matthews. Ah, here it is,” he said, holding up the back of one of the pages for her to see. Rilynne took it from him and found a hand written note.
“I didn’t see this,” she mumbled before reading over it. “The guy who lives across the street from me said he saw a man knocking on my door sometime between eleven and eleven-thirty. He didn’t get a good look at him, but saw him walk back down the street when I didn’t answer.”
“Well, that’s good, isn’t it? That shows that you were actually there at eleven,” he said.
Rilynne shook her head. “It doesn’t prove anything. They will try to say that either I sent someone to my house to knock, which would never actually hold up as a valid argument in court, or they’ll say I could have committed the murder either before or after the man knocked. There was a two hour window, and it was only about ten minutes from my house. The only thing we can do is add it to the list of reasonable doubt.”
He looked disappointed. He seemed to zone out, but she knew exactly what was going through his mind.
“What are we going to do if we can’t solve this?” she asked. He turned toward her, but he didn’t seem to have an answer. “It’s not like we can run forever. We only have a few more days before our story about getting away for a while becomes unbelievable. After that, we’ll be looking at charges even if we manage to get the murder case dropped.”
He didn’t appear at all surprised by her statement. It was obviously something he had given thought to as well. “I’m with you, no matter what you choose to do. If you want to turn yourself in, I’ll be by your side until the investigation clears you. If your decision is to run, then we’ll run. We could find some nice little island somewhere and start over. I’ve always wanted to live in a giant tree house.”
Although he had a joking tone, the look on his face told her he was completely serious. He shifted his gaze between her eyes before turning back to the wall. She tried to find words to express how she was feeling, but she couldn’t.
“Let’s just hope it doesn’t get that far, though,” he added. “It would be really hard to take my fish wish us, and I happen to be very fond of them.”
Rilynne laughed aloud and rolled her eyes. Though she wanted to continue the conversation, she decided to save it for another day.
“Even with a warrant out for you, the guys aren’t going to stop looking into your past cases and the list we gave Matthews, looking for anyone who might be behind this,” Ben said confidently. “Is there anywhere else we could start looking for someone?”
It was the same question Rilynne had been asking herself for days. While she had angered many people, she found it hard to believe that anyone who would commit murder just to get back at her.
When she didn’t respond, Ben started throwing out his own suggestions. “What about Sarah?” he asked.
She had actually considered the idea herself, but knew it was an unlikely possibility. “She’s still serving time for her role in everything that happened. While she undoubtedly blames me for Christopher’s death, I don’t think she would do anything that would keep her from her baby. She’s already missing six months. Besides, I doubt she could orchestrate such a perfect crime.”
“Nothing’s perfect,” he said abruptly. “We just need to find the right string to pull that will unravel the entire thing.”
Rilynne knew he was right. “You finish this. I’m going to go out for a little fresh air.” She half expected him to argue, but he didn’t. Instead, he just nodded and kissed her quickly on the cheek before turning back to the wall.
Her leg was aching as she walked out the back door. After adjusting her shorts carefully over the bandage to make sure it wouldn’t rub, she started walking through the large yard. She tried to picture how it would look when it was finished. Without any hint as to what would be put up on the exterior walls, it was too hard.
She circled around the entire house before sitting down on a slab just outside of what she assumed was the master bedroom.
The sun was starting to sink below the trees, leaving the sky a brilliant mix of pink and purple. She took in a deep breath of the warm air and closed her eyes.
Rilynne concentrated as hard as she could on everything she had learned so far. She pictured Teich’s face and the details as she knew they had played out. A slamming sound echoed toward her, causing her to jump. For a split second, she thought Ben had stepped out the backdoor. Before she could open her eyes, a scene started playing out in front of her.
She had been waiting behind the door when Teich walked in. She could feel the surprise by the appearance of the other man, but it didn’t change anything. With the gun firmly in both hands, she kicked out with her right foot and slammed the door shut.
Teich jumped as he turned toward her. He was yelling, though she couldn’t make out anything being said. The anger on his face was quickly replaced by fear as his focus shifted to the gun that was now pointed at his head.
He looked toward the door, but before he could try to reach it, she pulled the trigger.
Bang. Bang.
Baker must have been in shock, because he didn’t move as he watched his friend crumble to the ground, blood flowing from both his face and chest. He was still looking at the blood that had splattered across his shirt when she squeezed the trigger again.
Bang.
Rilynne opened her eyes. While she now knew exactly what had happened that night, it didn’t tell her anything that could be useful. She closed her eyes again, thinking this time of herself and trying to concentrate on a single feeling: hate.
She sat with her eyes closed for over five minutes before giving up. Too much had happened during the day. She knew with as tired as she was, it would be nearly impossible for her to see anything other than facts she already knew.
With a resigned sigh, she pushed herself up and walked back into the house.
When she walked back into the closet, she was stunned by what she had found. The entire back wall had been covered with pictures and papers from the file, along with notes Ben had added. The wall itself wasn’t what turned her stomach, though. It was the striking resemblance the room now had to the one she had seen in her vision. Her heart suddenly ached. The obsession she had felt during the vision had been overwhelming. Was that what Ben’s future held?
“Did the fresh air help?” he asked, glancing over his shoulder. With the sun sinking down, he had brought the lantern into the room. Its glow left the room with almost an eerie feeling.
“No,” she said as she struggled to keep her voice steady. She looked at him instead of the wall. Though he had been insisting on staying with her, she now knew what she needed to do. Although chances were great that she would not be able to get out of this, she had to turn herself in. If she didn’t, there were only two possible outcomes. Either they would both be arrested, or her vision would catch up with her. The only way for her to protect Ben would be to face what was coming.
Chapter Twelve
Rilynne watched him study the wall. She knew he wouldn’t let her just walk into the station without doing everything he could to clear her first. She was going to have to do it without him. As Ben concentrated on the wall, trying to find anything they had missed, Rilynne started to plan how she was going to sneak away.
By the time the sun had fully sunk below the horizon, she knew exactly what she was going to do. She would leave before he woke up the next morning. While she knew she would probably only have a fifteen minute head start, it would be all she needed.
“Are you all right?” he asked. She looked up to find him starting a
t her.
“Yeah,” she responded, wondering how long he had been watching her. “I’m just tired. It’s been a long couple of days.”
Ben walked behind her and wrapped his arms around her. She had to fight back the tears as his warmth spread over her. “We’re going to get through this,” he whispered just above her ear. “We’ve faced worse. At least this time I haven’t been shot.”
Rilynne laughed and gently shook her head before dropping it back against his chest. “You better knock on some wood,” she stated. “We are on the run, after all.”
“I’ve got my good luck charm with me,” he replied. “I’ll be fine.”
She twisted her head up to look him in the face. “You’re kidding, right?” she asked, raising her eyebrow at him. “Let’s make a list. You’ve been in three fights, been beaten into several broken bones, and have been shot. All of that was because of me. I would hardly call myself a good luck charm.”
“But I survived all of that,” he said with a stubborn grin. “I would call that some good luck.”
“You’re a nerd,” she replied.
He grinned down at her. It was a grin that warmed her from within, making everything around her seem unimportant. “That’s right,” he replied. “But you love me anyway.”
She felt the blood rising to her cheeks and she couldn’t keep the grin off of her face. “True.”
Ben rubbed his thumb over her cheeks, causing them to tingle. He always seemed pleased with himself every time he caused them to redden. He leaned down and gently kissed her forehead then walked back to the wall.
Rilynne feigned interest as he thought aloud about where they should start looking next. She sat back and watched, her mind still very much on what the morning would bring. After half an hour, she couldn’t take it anymore.
“I’m going to call it a night,” she said. She could feel the tears welling up in her eyes, despite her efforts to keep them away. “Are you coming?”
“I’m too wired to sleep right now,” he said, crossing toward her. “You should get some sleep, though. You look exhausted. I’m going to look over this for a little while longer.”