“And you may not.”
“Then maybe that will be for the best,” he said.
It was the scariest thing Julie had heard yet. He knew he was sick.
He wanted McCoy to catch him.
“Joe, please. You don’t want to do this to me,” she said desperately, trying a new tactic. “Look, the tea burned your face. You’re getting a blister on your cheek. Let me get something for it.”
“No good, Julie,” he said. His weight was holding her to the floor, his knee in her stomach now, his fingers wound around her wrists, holding them to the floor.
Nearby, Rusty barked and howled. Julie prayed that he might be heard.
Her mountain was quite remote.
He started to shift his weight, trying to grasp both her wrists with one hand. Julie took advantage of the moment, struggling fiercely once again. She tore at his shirt and ripped it from his shoulder.
She paused, gasping.
It was there. The scar that she had seen in her dream. It was just as she had envisioned it, there, cut into his flesh, near his collarbone.
“Yes, I heard that you described the scar,” he said distantly. “But I hadn’t been out with anyone without a shirt. Not in a long time. And no one was looking at me suspiciously anyway. You’re the only one who saw.”
Fear swamped her. The awful, dark terror of her dream. The fear that had haunted her ever since. The danger had come. The danger McCoy had tried to keep her from by keeping away from her himself.
You didn’t bring the danger, my love. It was there, facing both of us. But, please, come now. Come quickly. Keep me from it …
She lashed out, trying to kick him. She almost dislodged him from her, but he fell hard against her again. Before she could move, he caught her in the jaw with the back of his hand.
She tasted blood. Her head spun. She fought it because she knew she might die.
But Joe was shifting, reaching into his pocket. A handkerchief was stuffed over her face. There was an awful, sickly sweetness to the smell.
He was drugging her. She couldn’t be drugged. She had to pretend that she was docile. She couldn’t breathe in too much of the drug.
But it was powerful. Despite the strength of her will, a blackness descended over her.
The fight was over.
McCoy drove swiftly into Julie’s yard, one of the patrol cars directly behind him.
It hadn’t been necessary for him to lose contact with her to know that something was horribly wrong.
And while he had been sitting at the hospital with Brenda, the logic of it all had been building in his mind.
The man had to be someone close. Someone who knew him.
He wasn’t that close with anyone here anymore. He’d been away too long. He still had friends, yes, but not anyone who knew his every move.
But the kidnapper knew about him and Julie. And he knew about Brenda, and Tammy, and Taylor. He knew just about every damn thing McCoy did.
A psychic, like Julie?
No, because Julie didn’t know everything. What she had was a startling gift.
A gift … that gave life. They would have never reached Tammy without her. He knew that now, beyond the shadow of a doubt.
And it didn’t matter. Julie had swept away all of the past for him. She had never questioned the attraction.
She had never questioned him. She had given him her faith from the beginning. She had given him her love.
And thoughts of her were distracting him now. He sighed.
Who …
It had to be someone he knew.
Someone who could ride around easily. Someone with an airtight alibi. Someone who heard his words.
Someone involved with the investigation.
He sat up on the bench, stunned that he hadn’t seen it before.
Yes, someone at the station.
Who?
Eliminate the impossibilities …
He rose restlessly and walked to the nurse. “How’s my niece doing?”
“Fine, Lieutenant McCoy, just fine. She’s sleeping a very natural sleep, and her mother is right by her side. Shall I get her for you?”
“No, no, I’m sure she’s fine. If she asks for me, just tell her that I had to go out for a while. I have some things to do, and then I’ll be at Julie’s.”
The nurse nodded, promising to deliver the message.
McCoy left the hospital quickly, feeling as if there were some sort of urgency on him now. He drove to the station. It was open. There was no one in the front office.
There was someone in the chief’s office. McCoy looked in. Pettigrew was there, his head clutched between his hands. He looked at McCoy. “There’s got to be something we’re missing.”
McCoy nodded. “I’ll be in the outer office.”
He sat down at Joe Silver’s desk.
Eliminate …
And so he did. Petty—of course not. Patty—no, she was always with him when the kidnapper called. Timothy Riker? No, not Timothy. McCoy squinted, trying to remember. Had Timothy ever been there …
It wasn’t right. Timothy just wasn’t right.
Damn, I don’t work on intuition alone! he told himself. But it wasn’t Timothy. And if it wasn’t …
Joe Silver. He hadn’t been on duty the night they had gone to try to find Tracy Nicholson. But suddenly he had been there. He had been there, at the graveyard, helping him to dig up the little girl.
Then there was Julie’s description. A man of medium build, of medium height. Brown hair, probably.
A man with a scar on his left shoulder.
McCoy jerked the desk drawer open. Paper clips, file reports, pencils, pens. He jerked open a bottom drawer. More papers. McCoy rifled through them.
Then he found it. It must have been taken a couple of years ago. There was Joe Silver with a tube in his hand. He was standing near the spot where McCoy and Julie had gone tubing.
He wasn’t wearing a shirt, and there, on his left shoulder, was either an imperfection in the film—or a long, jagged scar.
McCoy stood abruptly. He needed proof. But more than that, he needed to know that Julie was safe. He shouldn’t have come here without her.
He stuck his head into Petty’s office. “Petty.”
“Yes.”
“You sent someone to the phone booth, right?”
“Of course. I sent Joe. But the phone never rang. Our fellow knew the little girl had been found.”
McCoy felt panic growing inside him. “He knew. Right.” Then he exploded. “Petty, damn it, it is Silver!”
“What?” To Petty, it was inconceivable.
McCoy didn’t have to the time to explain. “I’ve got to get hold of Julie. I’ve got to reach her. I’ll radio to Timothy for some backup.”
He picked up the phone on Silver’s desk.
He heard the sound as the phone began to ring at Julie’s house. Julie answered. Relief flooded him. Then she turned away from the phone. “It’s McCoy now,” he heard her say.
And then the line went dead.
He’d never driven so fast in all his life. The patrol car could scarcely keep up with him.
It was too late anyway. When he burst into the house, he knew that she was gone. The phone line was ripped out of the wall. Julie’s teacup was on the floor, shattered. Tea soaked the tile on the kitchen floor.
She had fought. Julie had fought. He hadn’t taken her by surprise. She had seen the face of her assailant.
She knew …
But she hadn’t known soon enough. If she had, Rusty would never be in the basement, barking in a frenzy. No, she had put the dog in the basement because she had assumed that the man was her friend.
He released Rusty. The dog came rushing out, barking, jumping, swirling his massive body around in circles. McCoy knelt by him, trying to calm him down.
It was hard. He didn’t feel very calm himself.
Steady, steady. The word echoed in his head. It had worked out before …
&n
bsp; But Julie had been there to help him before. Julie had seen. And now he was alone. She was depending on him, and him alone.
He groaned. “Okay, Rusty, we’ve got to think. We’ve got to think.”
Patty and Timothy Riker burst into the house behind him. “We’ve got an all-points bulletin out on Joe,” Patty said quickly. “He’s driving around in a station car.”
McCoy shook his head. “Not any more, he won’t be.”
“But where will he be able to get to?” Patty said, trying to reassure him.
It didn’t matter to McCoy where Joe Silver could get to—what mattered was Julie.
How much time had he given her?
“Damn, just think of it. You work with a guy every day of your life, and wham!” Timothy said. He cleared his throat. “Where do we begin, lieutenant? What do you want done? Should we start combing these woods?”
McCoy didn’t have a chance to answer. Julie’s phone began to ring. McCoy automatically began to answer it in the kitchen, then remembered that the cord had been ripped out. He shoved past Timothy, anxious to pick up the parlor extension.
“Hello?”
He knew instantly from the slow breathing that it was Joe Silver.
“Hello, McCoy.”
He fought frantically for control. “All right, Silver. We know it’s you. I want Julie back. I want her back right now. We can deal with this—”
“When did you know it was me?”
“Not too long ago,” McCoy said. He strained hard to listen to the background noise coming over the receiver. He heard a sound that he recognized.
Water. Running water.
He tried to keep talking. “It had to be someone who knew what I was doing all the time. Someone in the station. I thought it was you. Then I saw the picture. I saw your scar.”
“And Julie knew about the scar. She discovered it just as you were thinking of it, I imagine.”
A wave of fury and fear rose in McCoy. “What did you do to her?”
“What did I do to her? Why, I buried her, of course.”
“What do you want? The money—”
“No, it isn’t the money.”
“Then—”
“You haven’t much time to find her. Then you have to find me.”
The line went dead. McCoy sat, numbed, staring at the receiver. He gritted his teeth, fighting for reason. There were things that had to be set into motion. They had to start combing the woods. He had to act.
“Riker!” he barked. Timothy was standing before him in seconds, waiting. McCoy told him to get in some emergency help, to get patrol cars on all the main roads in all three states. He wanted more men out—they could be borrowed from any city in the region. Hell, they could borrow them from Texas, it didn’t matter, just so long as they got them out. He wanted the area by Brenda’s place covered, the area by his own house, and by Julie’s. He wanted someone up to the cemetery quickly.
But would any of it do any good? And where did he go himself?
Water. He had heard water. His only clue was water.
Rusty barked. McCoy looked at the dog. “You can find her, can’t you? If I can just get you to the right place to start looking!”
It was dark. Dark beyond any darkness she had ever imagined. Darker than any darkness she had touched through others.
And when the drug wore off, the panic was greater and more horrible than anything she had ever dreamed.
A scream rose in her throat, and madness seemed to race through her. She tried to slam against the coffin, she tried to fight the weight of the earth that had been planted over her. She knew what had happened. Exactly what had happened. She had come in and out of consciousness. She had seen, without the ability to do anything. Her eyes had opened, but her limbs had been weighted down. She hadn’t been able to move.
He had brought her through the trees, near the water. Briefly, as he carried her, she had been able to look through the trees to the very spot where she had warned McCoy that he would see the black snake—and where the snake had been.
Then she had seen the ground dug up through the trees. She had seen the coarse, makeshift wooden coffin—waiting for her. She had seen the hole in the ground.
McCoy!
She had cried out to him in her mind.
He could not hear her.
Thump, thud, thump. She had heard the dirt falling, falling on the coffin. Then blackness had descended, she had lost consciousness again.
And now …
Now the darkness.
Don’t cry out, don’t move too much. Breathe slowly, breathe shallowly, preserve your air.
But what good would it do? How would he ever find her? There was so much land to cover, and so little time. And Joe might have buried her anywhere.
McCoy! She thought again. Tears were welling in her eyes. He had finally come to believe in her. And he loved her. Oh, yes, she knew that he loved her. He’d even listen to her. It had all been there, beautiful and glorious. Little things wouldn’t have mattered because the love had been so strong. She wouldn’t have minded her children being McCoys at all.
Except that now she would never have any children. She would never see the silver sizzle in his eyes again. Feel his hands on her shoulders.
Never argue with him again. Never feud.
Never make up, never make love.
“McCoy!” she whispered the name. She couldn’t do it. She couldn’t waste her breath. But her mind raced on. Desperately, she reached out with it. McCoy, McCoy, I love you. I love you so very much. Please, you can’t let it be the end. You have to find me.
You have to believe …
In the unbelievable.
Think of me. Remember me. Remember the laughter, remember the longing. Remember the picnic on the rocks, and wanting to be home. Remember that you told me I had probably paid the snake to appear.
I love you, McCoy. Touch me.
Water.
He was halfway out of the house, determined that he’d lead Rusty around Julie’s house before trying the forest near his own house when he remembered the sound of the water.
McCoy …
He started. It was almost as if he had heard her whisper his name. God, his mind was playing tricks on him.
Julie! I love you. I can’t make it without you. Not this time. Julie …
Think! He commanded himself.
The picture! The picture of Joe Silver at the water, his shoulder bared, the scar visible.
Rusty was running around wildly. Julie hadn’t been buried anywhere on her own property.
The picture. Down by the water. Down near the place where they had gone in with their tubes.
His heart was sinking. There was so much ground to cover.
He blinked. He could almost hear her laughter. See her in that sexy black bathing suit that day, her hazel-gold eyes narrowed as she challenged him. There’d be a snake on a rock.
And he’d been amazed. Yes, she knew things.
I love you, McCoy.
He could have sworn that he heard the words. Perhaps he did. Perhaps they echoed in his heart.
“Let’s get going,” he told Patty and Timothy. “I want to try a place by the water.” He told Timothy exactly where. Timothy rolled his eyes, as if assuming that McCoy had lost his mind. “Shouldn’t we try his old haunts first, sir? Perhaps the cemetery—”
“No. I know where I’m going. I heard water. I heard the sound of water. And there’s a phone booth not twenty feet from the river there. I heard water,” he insisted.
But it was more than the sound of the water. Instinct was guiding him.
Instinct, or Julie.
And his love for her.
It didn’t matter. They were there at last. “Here!” he shouted to Timothy. “There’s the phone booth. Stop here. Rusty, come on, boy, get ready!” He turned to Patty. “I’ll take the dog. You get hold of Petty. Get more men out here. We’ll have to comb the whole area. Rusty can probably find her, but if not …”
&n
bsp; Her air was running out. It was becoming more and more difficult to breathe. She choked and coughed, and then she choked and coughed again because she couldn’t take in enough oxygen. The blackness was something imprinted on her mind then.
McCoy, please …
She couldn’t think anymore. She couldn’t think at all. There was only darkness, and the most horrible sorrow. Just when everything had been so beautiful. She had never imagined that she could love any man the way she loved McCoy. She had never imagined that there could be a man like McCoy.
I love you, she thought. Tears welled in her eyes. Tears that didn’t matter in the darkness.
Then she heard the barking.
Her eyes opened in the darkness. She strained for breath.
More and more, the darkness wrapped around her. The barking faded. She was suffocating.
“Rusty! Good boy! You’ve found her!” McCoy shouted.
He came tearing through the trees into the copse. Rusty was standing over a mound of freshly dug up dirt, barking and carrying on.
“Julie, hang on. Julie, hang on, hang on!” He started digging with his bare hands, shouting, hoping that Timothy could hear him. “Bring the shovel! Get help quickly. Come on!”
He had barely shouted the last words when suddenly a shot burst through the night.
Rusty let out a whimpering cry and fell atop the earth.
McCoy stared at him for a split second in astonishment, then, out of the corner of his eyes, he sensed movement. He fell to the earth. A second shot came bursting through the night—one intended for him.
He leaped to his feet then, slamming against the man behind him. He saw the silver nose of a pistol go flying over his head as the force of his blow dislodged the weapon from his opponent’s hand.
But the force of his impetus sent him flying to the ground while his opponent reeled to his feet. Again, McCoy sensed movement.
Then a shovel came slamming down on his shoulder. The blow had been meant for his head, but he had turned just in time to avoid it.
And Joe Silver was there. Still in his uniform. He was covered in dirt, but somehow, he was still the same man he had always been. And he was smiling. Smiling his usual, good-natured smile.
“Missed,” he said, raising the shovel to strike again.
McCoy rolled out of the way in the nick of time. He leaped to his feet, watching Joe carefully. “You fool! You can’t possibly beat me!”
Hatfield and McCoy Page 18