“Well, all right,” Jessie said. She sounded a bit perplexed. “I’m just not sure what hotel-”
Karen heard a beep, and checked the caller ID. She recognized the number: Amelia’s cell phone.
“Jessie, I have another call,” she said hurriedly. “Can you just get yourself and the children to a hotel? Any hotel, it doesn’t matter: the Westin, the Marriott off Lake Union, anyplace….”
“I hear you,” Jessie replied.
“Thanks, Jess. Just make sure no one’s following-”
“Yeah, I know,” she cut in. “Make sure no one’s following us. Will do. Take your call. I’ll phone you in a bit.” There was a click on the line.
Karen switched over to the other call. “Amelia? Is that you?”
“Hi, Karen,” she murmured. “You must be so mad at me right now. I just listened to all the messages from you and Uncle George and Shane. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to worry you. It was awful of me to run away this morning.”
Karen wasn’t certain she was really talking to Amelia. It certainly sounded like her; and the call was coming from her cell phone. “Well, you, um, you couldn’t have run very far,” she said. “I just got off the phone with Jessie, and she said you paid her an unexpected visit at my house about a half hour ago.”
“What?” she shot back, sounding stunned. “Karen, that’s impossible. Why would Jessie say that? I’m nowhere near your house-or Seattle, even. I’m calling from Grand Coulee Dam.”
The car engine was still running. Karen turned off the ignition, and listened to the motor die. “Grand Coulee Dam?” she repeated numbly.
“Yeah, I know, it’s pretty crazy, huh? But I woke up from this horrible nightmare last night. In the dream, I was-I was attacking you with a knife, and you were screaming….” She trailed off. “Anyway, I suddenly woke up, all sweaty. I was so scared that it might have really happened. I listened at your door, and heard you snoring. Did you know you snore?”
“No, I didn’t,” Karen said.
“Anyway, I figured you were okay. But I realized I had to get out of there before I hurt you, or somebody else. So I packed my things and snuck out of your house at around four o’clock this morning. I walked up to Fifteenth, and called a cab.”
“You didn’t take my car?” Karen asked.
“God, no. I’d never do that without asking you,” she replied. “I had the taxi drive me to Shane’s place. I borrowed his car, then drove to the house in Lake Wenatchee. I know it sounds nuts, but I just wanted to get as far away from everyone as I could. But when I went down to the house, I just couldn’t make myself go in. So I climbed back inside Shane’s car, and kept driving east.”
“What time was this?” Karen asked.
“Oh, around eight-thirty or nine,” she replied.
According to Helene Sumner, Amelia had been at the lake house at around just that same time. But she’d heard Amelia talking to someone, and laughing.
“Were you with anyone?” Karen asked.
“No, why?”
“Nothing, go ahead. You couldn’t step inside the house, so you went on driving.”
“That’s right, so I ended up here at the Grand Coulee Dam. I’ve been here for the last few hours, Karen.”
“What have you been doing there?” she asked.
“Well, I ate, I napped a little in the car, and I looked at the damn dam.” She let out a skittish laugh, but then her tone suddenly turned serious. “Anyway, I’ve been here. I swear to God. This can’t be another one of my blackouts. There’s no way Jessie could have seen me in Seattle this afternoon. I’m at least four hours away….”
Karen still couldn’t help wondering if she had Amelia on the line or her twin, being very clever. “Amelia, do you remember our session the week before last, when you accidentally broke that cheap vase on the coffee table in my office?”
She listened to the dead silence on the other end of the line. There hadn’t been a vase on her office coffee table. There had been no such occurrence. But Annabelle Schlessinger wouldn’t have known that.
“Remember that session, Amelia?” she pressed. “Do you recall what we were discussing at the time?”
More silence.
“Amelia, are you still there?”
“Karen, I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she replied, at last. “Did I break a vase of yours? Oh, my God, is this something I blacked out?”
Closing her eyes, Karen smiled. “You know what? My mistake. That was someone else entirely. Never mind. Listen, I’m in Wenatchee right now-”
“What?”
“I’ll explain when I see you,” Karen said. “I can probably get to Grand Coulee Dam in about ninety minutes.”
“Let me meet you there in Wenatchee instead, okay?” she asked. “I’ve kind of been-there-and-done-that here today, and I’d like to hit the road. I was about to head that way, anyway.”
Karen hesitated. It made sense. They’d save at least an hour and a half traveling time back to Seattle if Amelia came to her. “Okay,” she said finally. “Could you meet me at the Wenatchee Public Library on Douglas Street?”
“Sure, I know where that is,” she said. “See you there in about two hours. I’m leaving right now. Oh, and if it’s okay with you, I don’t want to hang around Wenatchee too long, Karen. I’d like to be back in Seattle before nine tonight, and get the car back to Shane. I think he’s kind of mad at me. He wasn’t answering his cell phone earlier. Anyway, you don’t mind if we meet up and then get a move on, do you?”
“No, that’s fine, Amelia,” she replied.
She couldn’t tell her anything more, not right now.
“Then I’ll see you soon, Karen.”
“Drive safe,” she said.
Before she headed out on the road again, Karen phoned Detective Jacqueline Peyton. After all the times she’d refused to pick up the policewoman’s calls, Karen figured it probably served her right that she got Detective Peyton’s voice mail. Karen waited for the beep.
“Hello, Detective, this is Karen Carlisle again,” she said into the phone. “My housekeeper called the police about forty minutes ago. Amelia Faraday-or rather, someone pretending to be Amelia-was just at my house. I’m sure she’s driving my Jetta. You have the plate number. I’m pretty sure she had something to do with Shane Mitchell’s death, too. I hear the police found Shane in a canoe on Lake Washington, and they believe he shot himself. But it was this woman who looks like Amelia. She’s dangerous. In fact, I think she killed Detective Koehler. I’m sorry I haven’t been very cooperative in your investigation up to this point, but I can explain later. If you-”
The answering machine let out another beep, cutting her off. The connection went dead.
Karen realized she’d used up all her time.
Rural Route 17 outside Salem wound around a slightly scrawny forest area with several well-spaced dirt road turnoffs to farms and ranches. Old-fashioned mailboxes with the addresses on them stood at the edge of the long driveways. George couldn’t see most of the farms and ranch houses from the car. They were too far down those winding private drives. The last vestige of daylight was fading. George switched on his headlights.
About three miles back, he’d passed a town of sorts. Sherry’s Corner Food amp; Deli had a gas pump over to one side-along with a sign: RING FOR SERVICE! The store also advertised DVD rentals, fresh coffee, beer, and live bait. Across the street from them was a squat, beige brick storefront that had UPPER MARION COUNTY POLICE stenciled on the window. There was a patrol car parked in front of the place, along with an army recruiting sandwich-board poster by the entrance.
George imagined what it must have been like for Annabelle Schlessinger, living out here, alone a good deal of the time, according to her teacher. Small wonder Annabelle hadn’t had any friends over to her father’s ranch. There was nothing out here. Sherry’s Corner was about as exciting as it got; even that was miles away.
George was beginning to think he’d passed the Schlessingers’ place; the las
t driveway had been at least a mile back. But then the car’s headlights swept across a driveway with a rusty, old, dented mailbox beside it. The address numbers and name on the mailbox were barely legible anymore: RR #17-14-SCHLESSINGER.
He turned down the bumpy, one-lane dirt road, which ceded to patches of crab grass and tree roots. There were also some fallen branches to navigate, along with old beer cans and other garbage. George figured the ranch must have attracted curious and bored high school kids who wanted to see where those two people had burned to death. So, maybe some of Annabelle’s classmates had been to her home after all.
Taking a curve in the road, George saw the ranch house ahead, just as Caroline Cadwell had described it: a two-story, burnt-out shell. Wood planks boarded up the front door and windows. He noticed even more garbage littered around the blackened edifice-faded fast-food bags and more rusty beer cans. Over to one side stood a dilapidated barn, its door boarded up. Between it and what remained of the house were a stone well, covered with graffiti, and a tall wind pump creaking in the breeze.
George parked the car and switched the motor off. That squeaky wind pump was the only sound he heard now. He walked around the charred structure, kicking at the occasional pop bottle or beer can in his path. He tugged at a plank that was nailed over one of the windows. It didn’t budge. In the backyard, he noticed sporadic patches of wildflowers between one side of the barn and a wooded area. They were the only bit of beauty and color on this drab, desolate place.
He wondered if the Schlessingers had buried some of their dead ranch animals there. Wildflowers were supposed to indicate a grave.
Or was something else buried out there?
The photocopies of the missing young women were folded up and tucked inside George’s sports jacket pocket. He automatically touched the square bulge over his breast to make sure they were still there.
Glancing toward the burnt house again, he saw the wood panel over the back door was askew. George stepped up to the door, and pulled at the plank. It moved easily. The lock and handle on the soot-stained back door had been broken off. He opened the door. From the threshold, he studied the kitchen. It took a few moments for his eyes to adjust to the darkness. But he could see the room had survived the fire. The green linoleum floor was filthy and littered with garbage from intruders. The only piece of furniture left was a broken chair, lying on its side. The old stove still stood against the grimy walls, but it had been stripped of the oven door and a few of the dials. All the windows-covered up by the planks outside-were broken. The curtains were in tatters. The place was cold, with a stale, stuffy, acrid odor.
George wondered what the hell he expected to find here. He touched that square bump in his sports jacket pocket again.
The local fire and police departments had already been through the place, along with a few scavengers. If they hadn’t uncovered anything, how did he expect to fare any better?
But those people had been looking for a cause of the fire, while others had been scrounging for a piece of furniture or a knickknack worth stealing. Still others had been seeking a cheap, morbid thrill, or a remote spot to get drunk.
George was pretty certain no one else had searched this place for evidence of the missing young women. He kept thinking about how it was just too much of a coincidence that they’d started to disappear when Lon Schlessinger had moved into this house, and that the last one had vanished a week before this place had turned to cinders.
George walked through the kitchen, and listened to the old, weakened floorboards groaning beneath him. The front hallway and living room hadn’t fared as well as the kitchen. The walls were blistered and blackened. A huge section of the charred floor had collapsed. George could tell there was a basement to the house, but it was too dark to see anything. The stairway to the second floor had been destroyed. Only the black skeleton of a newel post and two steps remained. He had no way of going up to the second floor, where they’d found Annabelle’s and Lon’s remains.
Every time George breathed in, he smelled the soot and grime. He could even taste it now. He retreated back to the kitchen, and he found the door to the Schlessingers’ basement. Opening it, he carefully started down the stairs. Halfway down, he heard a rustling noise that made him stop. A faint light seeped in from an uncovered small window that was broken. Below it was a shelf full of cheap planters holding brittle-looking vines of long-dead plants. Below that, there was a hose connection where a washer machine must have been. George listened again to the light rustling. He figured some rodents had made their home down there. He stopped and tucked his trouser cuffs inside his socks, and then continued down the stairs. Wire hangers dangled from an exposed pipe along the ceiling in what must have been the laundry room.
The next room was nearly pitch black, and had caught all the debris from the living room floor collapsing above it. George took out his cell phone and switched it on. He used the little blue light to navigate through the cobwebs and the rubble. He saw an old-fashioned furnace over to one side, and directly ahead, a big, heavy-looking door. It looked like one of those old bomb shelters. He gave the door a tug, but it barely moved. Putting the phone back in his pocket, he yanked at the door again, this time with both hands. It squeaked open just a few more inches. He tried one more time, but the door didn’t budge.
Switching on his cell phone again, he slipped it through the narrow opening and then glanced into the room. The blue light was just strong enough so he could see, past a haze of dust in the air, a cot and a bare metal bookcase against the wall. An old army blanket lay in a heap on the dirty floor. But he couldn’t see anything else from where he stood at the doorway. The light wasn’t strong enough. He couldn’t even tell how big the room was.
Turning around, George made his way back through the darkness and debris until he reached the basement stairs. He hurried up to the kitchen, and then out the door. It felt good to breathe fresh air again. But he still had that awful sooty taste in his mouth. He ran to the car, popped open the hood, and took out the jack.
He needed to get a better look inside that little room in the basement. As much as he didn’t want to think like someone who abducted and murdered young women, George could see that little room as a perfect dungeon. Maybe Lon liked to hold on to his toys for a while before he grew tired of them. What better place than that fallout shelter with the cot and a blanket?
Inside the house again, he headed back down the basement stairs with the jack. George switched on his cell phone once more as he weaved around the wreckage and maneuvered his way to the bomb shelter door. He had a tough time bracing the jack in a horizontal position, but finally got it to stick. He worked the lever, and listened to the heavy door creak open wider and wider. But then the lever started to resist and buckle, and no matter how hard George pushed, the door didn’t move another inch.
The gap was a little over a foot wide. Stepping over the jack, George squeezed through the narrow opening. He prayed the jack wouldn’t collapse on him. He imagined himself trapped in this tiny room, in this desolate house in the middle of nowhere.
He brushed against something with his foot, and heard a tinny, clanking noise. George directed the cell phone light toward the floor, and saw at least a dozen empty tin cans. He checked out the labels: most of them were for a cat food called Purrfect Kitty. There were a few empty cans of Del Monte brand sliced peaches, too. George also noticed a plastic bucket in the corner, tipped over on its side. There was nothing else in the tiny room, just the cot, the barren metal bookcase, and a discarded blanket. The only new discoveries he’d made were these lousy tin cans and a bucket, hardly worth all his painstaking effort to get inside the place for a better look
He seemed to be chasing after nothing. Hell, maybe it was indeed just a lousy coincidence those girls had started disappearing once the Schlessingers had moved here.
George poked at the blanket with his foot. Suddenly a rat scurried out from under the folds.
“Shit!” he hissed, dropping h
is cell phone. The light stayed on just long enough for him to see the rodent crawl out the gap in the doorway. Then everything went black.
George tried to catch his breath, but he couldn’t. A panic swept through him. He thought he’d be able to see a very faint light through the doorway opening, but no. He couldn’t see a damn thing, not even his hand in front of his face.
Standing there, paralyzed by the dark, he heard a strange buckling noise. It sounded like the jack ready to give out. The big, heavy door made another creaking sound.
“Oh, Jesus,” George whispered. He knew the phone had dropped somewhere near the bookcase. Blindly, he waved his hand around until he touched the metal shelf. He crouched down and started patting the floor. “Shit, where is it?” he muttered. “God, please…”
His hand brushed against the phone, and it slid across the floor. “Damn it,” he growled. He anxiously felt around under the bookcase. Then something stung his finger. George snapped his hand back. “What the hell….”
He wondered if it was another rat. But this was more like a pinprick.
Behind him, he heard the door giving out another yawn.
Shifting around, his knee touched something on the floor. George reached down and found the cell phone. He switched it off, and then on again. The light came on once more. “Thank God,” he murmured.
He looked at his wounded index finger. It was bleeding.
Crouching down close to the floor, he used the cell phone light to check under the metal bookcase. He saw the pin sticking out on the back of something that looked like a name tag. He reached for it, carefully, so he wouldn’t stab himself again. But he must have knocked it farther back against the wall. He had to squeeze most of his arm under the bookcase until his fingertips finally brushed against the badge, or whatever it was. Clasping it between his fingers, he slid his hand out from under the case.
He shined the light on it. “Oh, Jesus…”
It was the kind of name tag waitresses wear. This one was green with white indented lettering that said YOUR SERVER IS NANCY RAE.
One Last Scream Page 31