“I can’t, I haven’t time,” she panted. “I didn’t know where else to come, but Detective Jo told me you lived here so I ran all the way.” She sucked in a breath. “They’ve got her.”
“Who have they got?”
The answer spilled out in a long stream. “Jo. Detective Jo. She told me to wait and she would take me home but she never came back. I was standing in a shop doorway near her car when this man came out and took it away. At first I thought he was stealing it, but he had the keys. Then I thought, I’ll wait ’cause Jo wouldn’t forget me. She told me off for being on my own after dark and I was too frightened to go home but when they drove away in her car and the lights were out at Molly’s I had to tell someone.”
She stopped for breath and Rowan asked, “What man?”
“I don’t know. But Molly was in the car and the man was driving. I couldn’t see Jo.”
“You should have gone to the police.”
“No way. Have you seen that place, it’s terrible. I’ve been there twice and that Sergeant Bull scares me. But I knew you were Jo’s babe, so I came to you.”
Blinking at the description, Rowan grabbed his jacket from the end of the lounger, thrusting his arms into the sleeves.
“Did you see where they went?”
“Yes. They went up the hill heading out of town but they could have turned off anyplace. Do you think they’ve killed her, too?”
Out of the mouth of babes, and he wasn’t thinking of himself. Ginny had pushed the right button. “Get your coat on, Scott. You’re driving.”
“Me?”
“Yeah, I’ve been drinking, but luckily you haven’t, and as Ginny here can’t drive, it’s up to you,” he said, keeping the tone light to avoid scaring the kid any more than necessary.
On his way out, Rowan raked through the jumble of exhausted light sticks and ropes he’d dumped in the locker, and found the flashlight. Seconds later he strode along the marina, cell phone pressed to his ear, with Ginny and Scott hard on his heels.
“Harry, I need your help, Jo’s in trouble. Abducted.”
“Hell’s bells! I should never have let her go to the inn on her own. Rocky’s fingerprint was on that anonymous letter she got and the more I thought about it, the more peculiar it sounded.”
“Damn you, Harry! If anything happens to her, you’ll answer to me. But for now, get every man you can lay hands on and start searching for Jo’s car. Ginny saw it head west with Molly in the passenger seat with an unknown man driving.”
“What’s this all about?” asked Scott.
“Jo received a threatening letter a few days ago and it looks like they aim to make good on their promises.”
“I don’t see what I can do.”
“You can stop being more of a self-centered ass than usual, Scott. This is the woman I love and if I’m in time, the woman I’m going to marry. Got that?”
“Okay. I’ll come with you. The mood you’re in you could do something stupid…or worse…dangerous!”
The tape rubbed her skin raw. Still, she had to try. Maybe she wouldn’t go as far as chewing her hands off, like an animal caught in a trap, but old Mother Nature preprogrammed all her creatures pretty much the same way.
She gave a few more tugs. Did the stake securing her right hand seem looser? Or was she imagining things?
What happened now? Were they just going to leave her here to be discovered by Bull or Jake in the morning? Gross!
She’d almost rather die….
No, she wouldn’t…life had doubled back on itself and given her another chance with Rowan. Who was she to argue with gifts the gods were throwing her way? Love had sneaked under her guard before she’d perfected ducking. And if she got another chance with Rowan, she was going to grab it with both hands.
She hadn’t seen or heard either of her captors for a good five minutes. Maybe they had simply left her and made good on their escape in her car. Yet every time the plastic screen bellied out in the wind she tensed, expecting one of them to return.
A sudden flash of light dazzled her. It traveled her full length, producing an urge to draw her knees up and hide herself. Humiliation ripped at her soul and frustration tightened the knots round her ankles as Molly laughed at her struggles.
“You might as well give up. You won’t budge those knots.”
Jo clenched her fist, digging her nails into her palm. Instinct made her want to thrash around like a snagged salmon, but reason and pride told her to stay still.
“Bet you were hoping we’d gone.” Her “Well, you were wrong” was almost gleeful. The woman had gone mad.
Why else would she kill her husband?
Why else would she have done this?
“The beauty of it is, we won’t need to hide. No one will know it was us who left you here, because you’ll be dead…like Rocky. It’s quite funny really. Rocky setting up the scheme for his own murder…although his was really an accident. Yours on the other hand…”
Hers had been a foolhardy attempt to get one up on Bull and the others while her mind had been on Rowan and not the job.
“He only came up with the satanist idea to put you off the scent. Didn’t want you to know the fire was a warning from the local drug baron for dipping his hand in the till too often. In it up to his elbows in laundered money. Too clever for his own good, that was Rocky. But he got you lot good. Sent you chasing all over the countryside, searching for a gang of devil worshipers. And all the time Satan was doing business right under your nose.”
Jo caught a maniacal note in the laughter that followed. The eerie sound took over where the dampness left off and she couldn’t hide her shivering any longer.
“And do you know what’s really funny?”
A sly malevolence twisted Molly’s lips.
“It was you arriving in Nicks Landing that gave him the idea. The inn wasn’t making as much money as he’d hoped. ‘Molly,’ he said, ‘if Milo Jellic could make money out of cannabis, so can I.’ Of course he went too far. They always do, criminals. Rocky used to say that’s what caught them in the end. A pity he didn’t listen to his own advice.”
Jo closed her eyes, wishing she could do the same with her ears. Her father had never dealt in drugs.
Never!
She refused to believe Molly. To do so, would confirm her whole life had been based on a lie.
Molly began pacing, muttering under her breath, until Jeff Smale turned up. “Here you are,” he said to Molly, handing something over. “That’s your last from me. Rocky was an accident but this is cold-blooded murder and I’m not having any more to do with it. You’ve had your money’s worth.”
“Yeah, go on then, take the money and run. Who needs you?” she called after his retreating figure, the need for silence apparently forgotten in her madness. “Don’t know what you’re worried about. It’ll be a lot easier than that little bull calf.”
The widow started to laugh and the beam from the flashlight in her hand did a crazy dance among the trees. “I heard you found the heart, give you a start did it?”
Hope of discovery died as the light hit her from ground level. Molly set it to shine across Jo’s naked breasts.
Tensing, the cold-induced shudders paused as her mind perceived the reason for this new departure. Its conclusions weren’t happiness inducing. As she watched, Molly pulled the top off the black felt-tip pen Jeff had given her and knelt by Jo’s right-hand side.
The pen pressed into her skin, releasing a sharp inky tang, while Jo continued her gentle, yet persistent assault on the stake behind the artist’s back listening to Molly tsk under her breath as she worked. Knowing Molly’s need for perfection, was it perverse to feel delighted at the difficulty the widow was experiencing? Drawing a pentagram onto Jo’s breasts in the region of her heart was no easy task, despite the natural attempt of gravity to flatten them.
Take your time…take your time. The words ran like a litany in her brain as, with every tug on her bindings, Jo kept up the rhythm.<
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Sitting back on her heels Molly sighed, her frown made horrific by the cast of the light. “Don’t think I take any pleasure in this work, but you forced me into it.”
What? Molly developing a conscience? Funny, that fact had escaped Jo. Maybe it was the intent way the widow was going about her business. She squinted down the length of her nose, expelling a sharp burst of air. The pentagram still wasn’t finished.
“It all started as a way to frighten Rocky, first the calf then the letters. If I hadn’t caught your remark to Rowan in my kitchen, none of this might have happened. Hell, that rankled. All those fertility tests I suffered. All for nothing. Is it any wonder I wanted to pay him back?”
Molly began to laugh. “You should have seen his face when the letter arrived and then the house…boom! Huh, it wasn’t worth saving anyway. But it sure made Rocky think there was some sort of cult out to get him. Just for once, the worm turned.”
Pen poised, Molly bent over Jo’s recumbent body once more. “Hold your breath,” she ordered.
You must be joking. Jo started to pant, and kept it up for a while even though her head spun.
“C’mon, give in gracefully. You’re only prolonging the inevitable. And don’t think Jeff is likely to arrive with the cavalry. For all his belated bout of conscience he hated Rocky as much as I grew to. The Smales worked with him, growing cannabis, but when it came to getting his help…well, let’s say he lived up to his name. You can’t get blood out a stone.”
Molly burst into another fit of laughter.
A small reprieve. Jo sent up a prayer. Surely someone must hear Molly’s cackling.
“Yet, I managed it. There wasn’t that much blood, though. He just dropped where he stood, in the middle of the kitchen by Jeff’s feet. Huh, Jeff got his money, but I made him work for it.
“I hadn’t intended killing Rocky, but he made me so angry. Slapped me around and called me a hysterical slut when I asked him about the vasectomy. In a way he deserved it for killing all my babies.” Wiping her eyes on her apron Molly released a miniature snow storm of flour. Glistening in the beam of the flashlight the small white flecks floated onto Jo.
Was there a chance some might remain on her skin? Surely forensics would pounce on that as a clue. Moira could tell them she never baked…couldn’t bake.
Reaction to the wayward thought set in immediately and drained the fight out of her. Her optimism had sunk to an all-time low if she was calculating evidence that might lead to her killer.
Molly twisted the knife so the moonlight bounced off the blade. “Like your old man, you were too clever for your own good. Now I have to kill you…don’t worry, I won’t make a hash of it. You’ve no idea how easily this knife slides through flesh.”
And I don’t want to know!
Jo’s stomach churned. She swallowed hard. If she threw up behind this tape, Molly wouldn’t need the knife.
“Harry, we’ve found Jo’s car. It’s at the top end of the park near the crime scene. Let your people know, but warn them against using the sirens.”
“I’ll be with you in under five minutes. Don’t go in alone.”
“I’m not alone, I’ve got Scott with me, and five minutes might be too late. By the way, Ginny’s in my car, let her mother know she’s okay, but for God’s sake don’t frighten the kid when you arrive.”
Rowan closed his cell phone and told Ginny, “I want you to promise you’ll stay in the car. You remember Sergeant Jackson, he’ll get someone to take you home.”
“But I have to know if Jo’s okay.”
“She will be, don’t worry, you can see her tomorrow,” he said, praying he’d be able to make good on his promise, praying he wasn’t too late to save her this time. “Right, Scott. This is how we’ll do it.” Even as he told Scott what he expected of him, his mind drifted. He’d wondered about this moment. Wondered, knowing how it could end, if real danger awaited could he meet it head-on? Only time would tell and there wasn’t much of it left.
“There’s two of them up there. Molly’s a little woman. You tackle her, and I’ll take out the man.”
They had to fight their way through a tangle of rhododendrons. Good for keeping cover but hard on the hands and face. Most of the park was planted in English trees. An idea of one of his ancestors who’d still had sentimental ties with the old country and had called England back home.
A branch snapped and a curse singed his ears. Scott. “Listen,” Rowan hissed. “If you can’t keep quiet, go back. You’re putting Jo’s life in danger.”
“No way. I’m not leaving you to do this on your own.”
The noise lessened as Scott took more care. “I always wondered why you chose this life, Rowan, but it’s exciting in its own way. Like watching your stock rise on the trading index.”
Rowan shook his head. God help him, he’d never understand his brother. “C’mon, no more talking.”
He could see a beam of light through the trees farther down the slope and trod even more carefully, edging closer with Scott rustling lightly at the rear. Then he heard Molly’s high-pitched voice as he moved a branch out of his face and caught his first glimpse of Jo.
Hell!
His heart tumbled over at the sight of his woman spread-eagled naked on the ground in a weird parody of the vision he’d had in the witch’s circle. This time it brought no lustful thoughts to mind. Only terror. Molly, knife in hand, knelt beside Jo, side on to the slope where he and Scott hid.
Not only would she see him the moment he broke cover, she’d probably hear him break into the crime scene.
Everything happened at once.
In a crash of limbs, both tree and human, Scott blasted the stillness apart and set everything in motion. A host of impressions rather than clear-sighted action took over.
Scott: “Damn! I’ve broken my ankle.”
Molly’s small face twisted. A grimace etched with anger. Her once-pretty blue eyes burning with animalistic fear, knowing she was cornered.
Jo’s faith in him beaming from her eyes as he burst out of the shrubbery into an arena, where the game of the day was life or death.
There was no sighting of the man as Rowan ran, his legs like lead, dragging, holding him back. Seconds dragged into hours.
The knife lifted in Molly’s hand.
He threw himself across Jo’s supine body and caught Molly round the middle. She came down over his shoulder, thumping against his ribs, cracking one. The pain a dull heavy ache in his back.
He’d felt worse.
Jo’s arm curved in an arc pulling out the stake she was tied to and Molly slumped as the wooden point came down on her head.
A thunder of footsteps announced Harry’s arrival. The other police couldn’t be far behind. Rowan pushed Molly aside and braced himself on one hand, pushing up so his weight didn’t crush Jo. Her skin felt icy cold as he turned to reassure her with a smile. “Couldn’t wait to even the score, could you? You’re one helluva woman, Jo Jellic.”
He’d wanted to reassure her, but his words failed to wipe the dull bleakness from her eyes. “Somebody find me a blanket,” he called.
His voice sounded strange to his ears. Was it the shock of another near-death experience? Jo’s this time.
He could hear Molly crying as she came round and Harry wrestled her away from them into the arms of Seth McAllister. The widow deserved all Harry dished out, after what she’d done.
Nothing mattered now except Jo.
Scott’s cursing drew a shrug of annoyance that hurt his ribs. He wished he’d stop moaning and calling out to him. Why couldn’t his brother think of someone other than himself for once? He hated to think that all his brother’s money had leached away his humanity.
So what if a sprained ankle meant he missed a horse race? There was always next year. And all the years that came after.
That’s what he wanted now, year after year, for himself, for Jo. All the years ahead together.
“We’ll have to stop meeting like this,”
he said and began to laugh. Jo didn’t seem to see the funny side. Her gaze darted past his face to somewhere beyond him. He twisted his shoulders and caught an earful of Scott cursing. “Get this tape off Jo’s mouth,” he said as his brother gripped his shoulder.
The pain made him feel nauseous. “What the hell are you doing?” Then he noticed Jo bleeding. A bright red stream ran across her breast. “Call an ambulance, quick…Jo’s hurt. Molly must have nicked her with the knife.”
Her head lifted as a stream of tortured mumbling boiled up behind the tape. The world spun out of control as he reached out to free her. Then he heard Scott say, “I’ve got it.”
An ugly gurgling sound filled his ears, like someone sucking at the dregs in a glass through a straw. The noise took his breath away as his hand dropped onto Jo’s breast, blood spilling over his fingers. Someone ought to do something about it.
That was his last thought.
Frustration screamed in Jo’s head and with it the word, “Idiot!” But Scott Stanhope couldn’t hear her. No one could. She’d tried to signal with her eyes. It had made no difference and her heart had leaped under her ribs as he’d limped up behind Rowan and pulled the knife from his back.
How could two such different men be brothers?
Rowan’s weight was fully on her, his hand heavy on her breast. There was no tenderness in his touch now. No love. Only the mockery of what might have been. What they might have shared.
She wanted to scream, but all she could do was pray. Pray someone would realize what was wrong with Rowan.
He needed help badly. Scott had done the exact opposite of the recommended procedure. Puncture wounds should be dealt with by a professional. And Lord help him, the fool had collapsed beside Rowan, moaning about a broken ankle, instead of covering the sucking wound with plastic to seal it.
If it wasn’t so damn tragic it would be funny.
She’d never associated Rowan’s sophisticated brother with slapstick, but now she would never see him any other way.
She’d never forget the sight of blood frothing over Rowan’s lips while he tried to make light of the situation. It was just like him to think of her before himself. She sniffed.
Love Under Fire Page 23