Preying Game (Decorah Security Series, Book #15): A Paranormal Romantic Suspense Novel

by Rebecca York

  The cop’s head snapped toward him. “What?”

  “Arthur Hayward may have killed some women.”

  “That was a long time ago.”

  “They’re still dead. Maybe you want to go through your cold cases.”

  Cooper’s eyes narrowed. “First you say you’re looking for a kidnap victim. Then you claim there are bodies buried here.”

  “I can’t change what we’ve been told,” Jonah said, but he figured he’d better not press his luck. He and Grant return to the helo.

  When they had taken off and put their headsets back on, Jonah looked out the window toward the house and snapped several pictures.

  Through his microphone, he said, “The fire was 1961, not 1955.”

  “But I guess the car was still being driven back then,” Grant said. “It’s still drivable, right?”

  “Because I worked on it.” Switching subjects, Jonah said, “She told me his name was Hayward.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Now we’ve got his first name. We can do some research when we get back.”

  “I want to be here!”

  “I know, but you came to the estate in the past while you were lying in your bed. That’s probably your best strategy.”

  “I don’t know. I lost contact with her before I left.”

  “You just need to relax and reach out to her—like you did before.”

  Jonah gave his friend a long look. He knew Grant was trying to reassure him, but he wasn’t going to be reassured until he got back here—in 1961. He swore again under his breath. To say this was weird would be the understatement of the century.

  “I’m coming back in the car,” he said.

  “What?”

  “I’m driving the car down here. The car radio was my first point of contact with Alice. I’ll park it in the woods and go from there.”

  “You’re not being rational.”

  “Were you rational when you thought you’d lost Jenny?”

  “You have a point.”

  “Plus, if I get her out of there, I can bring her back and drive home in the car.” He hated the word “if.” “No—when I get her out of there,” he corrected.

  Luckily Grant didn’t ask how he was going to bring Alice to this time period—because Jonah would have screamed that he didn’t know.

  As they flew, he got out his cell phone and looked up Arthur Hayward on the Web. Apparently the man had inherited wealth and had always felt entitled to live outside the rules of ordinary men. He had been a famous big game hunter in the fifties and had retired to his family estate where he led a reclusive life. The articles didn’t say he’d also become a very effective serial killer, although it did say his wife had died when she’d gone on a hunting trip to Africa with him. Yeah, sure. Probably he’d arranged her death—his first kill.

  “You find anything that can help Alice?” Grant asked.

  “No. Only confirmation that the house did burn down in 1961, and the guy was a first-class bastard.”

  Chapter 12

  “We’re having the hunt tonight,” Hayward said as he brought Alice her breakfast.

  She’d been expecting that news. Still she felt a chill sweep over her skin as the words echoed through her cell.

  There was more food on her breakfast tray than usual. The condemned woman eats a hearty breakfast, she thought as she stared at the greasy eggs and bacon, along with hashed browns and toast. Too bad she had very little appetite. But she forced herself to choke down some of the food because she knew she was going to need her strength for the ordeal to come.

  As she ate, she tried to contact Jonah, but he didn’t answer, and she felt like the two of them were suddenly living on different planets. And how could he help her anyway? He had barely been able to get Hayward’s attention, and the result was the opposite of what she’d hoped. He’d managed to scare her captor into moving up her execution date.

  When she’d finished eating, the slot in the door opened again, and a set of clothing came through the door. There was a pair of comfortable dark pants, a long-sleeved dark shirt, dark socks and dark tennis shoes. She’d been afraid he was going to make her wear white so that she would be more visible. These clothes would give her some protection—unless there were hidden glow-in-the-dark patches that she couldn’t see.

  “Get dressed,” he told her as he delivered the clothing. “Then we’re going upstairs.”

  Almost as soon as she was dressed, the door opened again.

  “Go up,” Hayward’s voice boomed from a hidden speaker.

  Wishing her pulse would stop pounding, she followed the corridor to the stairs, then up. The door to the dining room was closed, and her only option was a side passage, which she took with some trepidation.

  Suppose he was trying to fool her, and the hunt was going to begin now?

  She walked cautiously, but there were no tricks waiting in the corridor, which led her to a wood-paneled room that was designed to be a library or a den. Like the dining room, it was nicely furnished with polished wood antique pieces. There was a sofa, comfortable chairs and a desk. But she almost winced when she saw the gun cabinet against the wall. Hayward, who was watching carefully for her reaction, grinned.

  “The rifles are for later,” he said in a cheerful tone as he pulled a pistol from the middle desk drawer and put it near himself on the desktop. “Right now, it’s time for a picture-taking session.” He picked up what she recognized as a Polaroid camera. “Stand over there by the bookshelf,” he said.

  She moved near the shelves, her eyes darting to the side table where a rack of pipes sat. Her breath caught when she saw a pack of matches lying on the table beside the rack.

  Hayward looked down to fiddle with the camera. In that quick moment, she snaked out her hand, picked up the matches and thrust them into her pocket.

  When he looked up and scowled, she thought he’d seen the theft. But he was concerned with her stance.

  “Take your hand out of your pocket,” he snapped. “Stand up straight the way I taught you. And face me.”

  Her heart was drumming as she followed his directions, lifting her chin and trying to look defiant as he pushed the shutter.

  Again he looked at the camera and clicked the shutter. She wasn’t sure how long it took to develop the picture, but finally a square of photographic paper came out of the front of the camera. Hayward held it up. At first there was only a blur of black and white. Then the image began to emerge. As she watched, she saw herself standing by the shelves.

  “I like your spirit,” he said as he looked at the picture, then waved it in the air to dry it. “I do like to have a good record of my guests. Let’s have one more.”

  His guests. She supposed he meant the women he had killed.

  He snapped another photo and waited for the picture to reveal itself once more.

  “I think the first one is better,” he mused as he compared the two.

  She shrugged, wondering if this performance was designed to unnerve her. If so, it was working.

  “Have a seat,” he said, indicating the guest chair on her side of the desk.

  He sat as well, putting down the camera and the developed photos and picking up the gun.

  “Just a precaution,” he said as he pointed the revolver at her. “I don’t want you to get any ideas about attacking me.”

  In truth, she’d been wondering if she could lunge across the desk and knock him over. She was stronger now than she ever had been in her life, and maybe she could have inflicted some damage on him. Maybe she could even have gotten away, but not now with him holding a gun so close to her.

  A manila folder lay in the center of the desk blotter, and he pushed it toward her.

  “Inside are photographs of the grounds. Plus maps. You can take them back to your room and study them until it’s time for us to meet again.”

  She reached for the folder and started to open it.

  “Save it until you get downstairs. I don’t want to have to si
t here babysitting you.”

  She answered with a small nod as she clenched her fingers around the edge of the folder.

  “Everything you need is in there. Give yourself ample time to study the layout of the estate.”

  Yeah, sure, she thought. Everything she needed except what would make it a fair fight—like he’d have weapons and she wouldn’t. But he was setting the rules, and this was going to be as good as she got.

  “It’s all outdoors?”

  “Yes.”

  “What time are we doing it?” she asked.

  “Around seven. It will be fully dark by then.” It was obvious he was enjoying this conversation. He was the mastermind who was finally going to reap the fruits of all his hard work. Or rather, her hard work.

  She flipped quickly through the folder, just trying to get a general impression of the playing field. “And this is really what the grounds look like?”

  His eyes flashed. “I’m not going to trick you. Like you did with that ghost crap last night.”

  His anger and the words made her stomach knot. She wanted to say there might be a ghost to surprise him. But she couldn’t be sure Jonah would show up to help her.

  “It wasn’t crap,” she answered, like they were having a discussion about a sporting match. Well, for him it probably was. For her, it was life and death.

  “Where’s your ghost now?”

  She shrugged. “I don’t control him. Ghosts come and go as they please.”

  He laughed. “Right.”

  She gestured toward her outfit, with the matches in the pants pocket. “This is what I’m wearing?” She held her breath as she waited for the answer.

  “Yes.”

  “Why black?”

  “I like the challenge.”

  “What if I just lie down in the woods and don’t move?”

  “I’ll get you in the morning. And I’ll use a knife—not a gun.”

  She fought a zing of sickness.

  “You should go do your homework.”

  oOo

  While Jonah was looking up Hayward, Grant contacted Decorah and explained the situation. By the time they arrived back at headquarters, Frank and a group of agents were waiting for them.

  “So your rescue mission is complicated by time travel,” Frank said when they were all seated in the conference room.

  Apparently he’d filled everyone in on the situation because nobody looked shocked—only impressed that Jonah had made a connection with a kidnap victim across such a terrible divide.

  “I’m driving down there in the car,” Jonah said. “It was the initial link between us.”

  Frank nodded. “And you think of it as a good luck charm.”

  “Right.”

  “Then what?”

  “Then I don’t know. I hope I can get back to Alice again.”

  “When was the last time you contacted her?”

  “Last night. After that, some stuff happened with the kidnapper, and we didn’t hook up again.”

  “Have you tried since?”

  “Yes.”

  The admission hung in the air.

  “I’m hoping it will be easier once I get to Carvertown.”

  Grant told them about the hostile cop showing up. “Jonah won’t be able to drive onto the estate.”

  “I’ll park as close as possible. Or maybe if I come in a car instead of a helo, nobody will notice.”

  “Except that they may be on the lookout for you.”

  “Unfortunately.”

  “You could take a werewolf with you to keep the cop occupied,” Cole Marshall said.

  Jonah shook his head. “He’d probably shoot you.”

  When the meeting broke up, Frank asked Jonah to stay behind. “Are you emotionally involved with her?”

  “I don’t know her all that well.”

  “But how do you feel about her?” Frank pressed.

  “I want desperately to save her,” he admitted in a low voice.

  “Then focus on your emotions when you try to connect with her again,” he said.

  “Why?”

  “Just a hunch I have.”

  oOo

  Alice stood, goose bumps rising on her arms as she turned away from her captor. She knew he had been toying with her—deliberately stoking her fears. She felt hardly any better when she left the room, taking the side passage and making her way back downstairs to the familiar corridor that led to the cell where she’d lived for the past . . .” She stopped. Well, at least two months according to what Jonah had told her. Sometimes it felt like years and sometimes it felt like the last days of her life had gone by in a flash.

  She stepped into the cell but didn’t bother to close the door, sure that he had locked her back into the lower level of the house. As she stood in the center of the room, she wanted to thrust her hand into her pocket and make sure the matches were still there. But that might be a dead giveaway that she had stolen something useful. Instead, she sat down on the bed and opened the folder.

  The first thing she saw was a picture of a grand mansion house in the red brick Georgian style with a portico entrance held up by white Doric columns. The next photo pulled back from the house so she could see gravel paths that ran through formal gardens. Another picture must have been taken from the roof of the mansion. It showed more of the garden layout, plus a maze made of manicured hedges. There were additional pictures of woods and vast fields. Her heart leaped when she saw a river in the background. If she could get to it, could she dive in and swim to safety? It looked promising, but there must be a catch. Maybe he’d salted the shoreline with land mines—or sharp stakes. It couldn’t be easy to get away by water.

  If there were sharp stakes could she pull one up and use it to attack Hayward? Yeah, and how would she even get close to him?

  She knew that her captor was playing a psychological game with her. He wanted her on edge. He wanted her to make the wrong decisions tonight. Too bad she didn’t know what was best. Maybe she’d have a better idea when she could see the grounds in person.

  She focused on the material in the folder for as long as she could. Hayward brought a lunch tray. Weirdly, it was fried chicken and mashed potatoes, things he hadn’t permitted during her stay here. Under other circumstances, she might have enjoyed them, but that was impossible today. She ate a little because she knew she would need fuel.

  And she would also need to be rested, she told herself. Lying down, she closed her eyes and tried to relax. When she couldn’t turn her mind off, she tried to reach out to Jonah. She’d never contacted him during the day, and she had the feeling it wasn’t going to work, but she sent her mind out to him anyway.

  Jonah, Hayward is having the hunt tonight. I have a surprise for him, but I need your help. Where are you? Please come back to me.

  She repeated the message as she had done the first night she’d contacted him, praying that he would hear her. He didn’t answer, but she couldn’t stop clinging to the feeling that he was nearby. Maybe closer than he ever had been.

  Still he didn’t answer, and she decided that was just wishful thinking. Closing her eyes, she ordered herself to relax on the narrow bed. Somehow, against all odds, she did slip into sleep.

  Chapter 13

  Jonah had dressed in dark jeans, shirt, jacket and running shoes. His Sig was in a shoulder holster under his jacket. He probably couldn’t shoot Hayward, but having the weapon made him feel better.

  He arrived in Carvertown around 5:00pm wishing it weren’t still full daylight as he headed toward the Hayward estate in the bright turquoise boat of a Chevy that stuck out among all the modern cars. He passed the entrance, a weed-choked lane that had probably once been paved, and drove farther down the road, looking for a good place to park. He didn’t have to go far to find a small wooded area. Pulling the car under the trees, he cut the engine and sat for a minute with his hands clenching the steering wheel.

  Frank had told him to focus on his emotions, and that wasn’t going to be a pro
blem. All his hopes and fears for the evening churned inside him like an interior hurricane.

  He reached for the knob on the radio, then pulled his hand back. Alice might be busy getting ready, and he didn’t want to break her concentration as she prepared for her ordeal.

  Tension buzzed through him, partly because he had no idea whether he could actually get back to Alice. Finding out that she was living in an era before he was born had been a horrible shock. Had the shock been so great that it would keep him from traveling there again?

  It was hard to stay in the car. He wanted to get up and do something—if only it was to pace through the woods. But because he knew it was better to stay out of sight, he forced himself to sit still for another twenty minutes.

  Then his nerves simply wouldn’t let him remain idle. What if he waited too long and it was too late?

  When he couldn’t stand the tension any longer, he got out and stretched before heading across the fields toward the burned-out ruin of the mansion, his eyes alert for any sign of the cop who had questioned him and Grant that morning.

  He’d spent the afternoon looking at the aerial photos he’d taken of the estate. He was pretty sure he knew the layout of the place. And probably it hadn’t changed much, thanks to the family dispute that kept the property from being developed. The grounds were overgrown. Doubtless the exterior had been better taken care of in Hayward’s time. But he kept his eye out for places where Alice could hide if she needed to.

  It was getting dark when he found some cover in a small stand of saplings. Still he waited with his eyes closed, praying he could get back to Alice. It might be harder now because he understood the distance between them. But he wasn’t going to let that stop him.

  Instead, he pictured her and did what Frank had advised. He let his emotions bloom, let his longing to be with Alice guide him to her—past all the years between them.

  At first it didn’t work, and he felt panic start to swallow him whole. Then he ordered himself to calm down.

  “Steady,” he muttered. “Steady. You’ve done this before. You can do it again. You did it when you didn’t know the time difference. You can still do it.”