“There are more ways of helping people than just sitting on school boards or library committees or shooting the breeze with the guys at the VFW.” Bernadine pointed toward the outbuildings. “Just look at what you’ve done here. So many animals saved. It’s exactly what we needed.”
Lynne impulsively reached to grasp Bernadine’s hand, giving it a tight squeeze. “Have I mentioned how much I’ve missed having you around?” Bernadine blushed, but before she could speak, Lynne nodded toward the house. “If you want to go inside and say hi to Monica, I want to run and check on a couple of puppies that were dropped off this morning.”
“I’ll go with you,” Bernadine swiftly offered.
“It’s only going to take a minute, I swear.” Lynne pointed toward the side of the barn. “I’ll leave the door open so you can see me the entire time.”
There was a pause before the older woman grudgingly nodded in agreement. “Very well.”
Lynne rolled her eyes. “I now understand the term ‘mother hen.’”
“You’ve always needed one.”
Not giving herself the opportunity to imagine her life with a mother who fussed over her, Lynne jumped out of the truck. “Save me a hot cup of coffee.”
After scurrying over the hard-packed snow, Lynne entered the barn, leaving the door open. There was an explosion of excited barks as she passed by the kennels, pausing at each one to greet the eager dog inside. Eventually she located the two recent additions to the sanctuary in the quarantined section at the end of the barn. She would come back later to do a full checkup and start the two puppies on their vaccinations. For now she just wanted to make sure they didn’t need any immediate medical care.
Less than half an hour later she was stepping into the kitchen of the farmhouse. It was like the rest of the property—old and a little shabby, but built with a solid durability that promised it would be standing long after many newer homes had tumbled into piles of cheap plywood.
She glanced around, surprised to find the room empty.
“Hello? Monica? Bernadine?” she called out.
No one answered, but she could hear the sound of the television coming from the living room at the back of the house.
She pulled off her heavy coat and draped it over a ladder-back chair. Ignoring the alluring scent of coffee that wafted from the pot on the stove she stepped into the hallway. She would say hi to Monica before she poured herself a mug and settled in to wait for Parker.
The area was shadowed, but Lynne easily caught sight of the large woman sprawled on the wooden floor. Bernadine. She came to an abrupt halt, terrified the older woman had a heart attack.
Dropping to her knees, she reached out her hand. She intended to check for a pulse. It wasn’t until she felt the sharp pain in the middle of her chest that she realized her mistake.
Bernadine hadn’t suffered a heart attack. She’d been tranqued.
Grabbing the silver dart that was stuck just above her heart, Lynne yanked it free and dropped it to the ground. But the damage had already been done. Even as she struggled to her feet the world was starting to fuzz as the drug spread through her body. She swayed heavily to the side, smacking her shoulder into the wall. Someone was approaching. She could make out a dark form at the end of the hallway, but her double vision was making it impossible to focus enough to make out the features.
“Crimson blood stains the pure white snow. Life spills from warm to frozen. Don’t look. The pain is gone,” a voice whispered.
* * *
Kir drove from the church to Rita King’s house. He still wanted to look for any clues that the woman might have found at his father’s grave. Especially now that the task force would be swooping in and keeping any evidence tightly locked away.
After parking down the street, he circled the small, cottage-style home and tried the back door. Locked. He muttered a curse. When he was a boy, no one locked their doors. These days, however, he didn’t blame people for doing whatever necessary to stay safe.
Tromping through the heavy snow, he made his way to the front porch and climbed the steps. It seemed unlikely that the front door would be unlocked if she’d bothered to secure the back one, but stranger things had happened.
And continued to happen.
He was just reaching for the knob when a voice brought him to a startled halt.
“Are you a friend of Rita’s?”
Kir turned his head, searching for the source of the voice. At first, he couldn’t see anyone. Just the small, tidy houses that lined the snow-packed street. In this residential section of town most of the people were at work at this hour. So where had the voice come from?
It was the sound of a television that drew his attention to the next-door neighbor. A closer look revealed an open side window where the face of an elderly woman was peering through the screen.
He stepped off the porch and crossed the short distance toward the house, which was even smaller than Rita’s, with faded aluminum siding and a weathered roof. He stood directly in front of the window, catching the scent of stale cigarettes and day-old cabbage.
He squashed the urge to grimace and pasted a smile on his face. “I’m Kir Jansen,” he said. “And you are?”
“Leah Meadows.” The woman tilted her head to the side, like a bird eyeing him with open curiosity. “You’re Rudolf’s boy, aren’t you?”
“Yep.”
The hard suspicion eased from Leah’s narrow, heavily wrinkled face. “I thought you might be one of those horrid reporters that have started to descend on the town. Like ghouls, taking our tragedy and trying to make a buck off it.”
Kir bit back a curse. He hadn’t realized the media had taken an interest in the murders. The last thing any of them needed was a horde of invaders spooking the killer into the shadows. What if he decided to lie low until the task force and reporters grew tired and moved on?
He clenched his teeth. The sheriff had called in the task force, but the reporters were there because of Parker Bowen and his ambitious desire to attract the attention of a national network. “I agree,” he muttered. “Our local ghoul is bad enough.”
“Local? Oh, you mean Parker Bowen?” The woman sucked in a loud breath, her hand patting the silvery curls that appeared to be shellacked by layers of spray. “I wasn’t talking about him. He’s such a lovely man.”
Kir resisted the urge to roll his eyes. Instead he concentrated on the reason he was there. “I don’t suppose you have a key to Rita’s house, do you?”
She narrowed her eyes. “Why?”
“Rita called me just before she was killed and said that she had something to give me,” Kir admitted with blunt honesty. He had no idea how well the two women had been acquainted. The last thing he wanted was to get caught in a lie. Not when Leah might have some information that might help him.
“What could she have for you?”
Kir shrugged. “I assume it belonged to my father.”
“Ah.” Leah nodded her head. “That makes sense. The two of them were thick as thieves over the past few years.”
“Do you have a key?”
“No.” Leah pursed her lips. “But I believe her daughter is coming back later today to plan the funeral. I’m sure she’ll be happy to help you.”
Kir squashed his flare of frustration. It was a long shot to think the woman had a key. Or, even if she did, that she would let him go in and search through Rita’s belongings.
About to return to his vehicle, Kir halted as he was struck by a sudden inspiration. “Did you happen to see Rita leave the house yesterday?”
“I did.” Leah jerked her thumb over her shoulder, indicating the room behind her. “I was sitting in my easy chair watching my favorite game show when I caught sight of her stepping off the porch. It was quite a surprise.”
“Why a surprise?”
“Rita never left her house during the day,” Leah said. “In fact, she used to joke she could be a vampire since she never saw the sun.”
Kir gl
anced toward the fading, empty house. It was sad to think of Rita in there alone, refusing to leave until the darkness could hide her from the world.
He shook his head, returning his attention to Leah. “Did you see what time she came back?”
“She didn’t, poor soul,” Leah said without hesitation. “She walked down the street and never came home. As if the daylight just swallowed her whole.” Leah turned and Kir heard the scratch of a lighter before a cloud of smoke drifted through the screen. “Maybe Rita was a prophet. Maybe she knew she was destined to die beneath the sun.”
He wrinkled his nose at the nasty smell of tobacco, but he remained standing next to the window. “You’re sure she didn’t come back?”
Leah nodded her head in an emphatic motion. “Yes. I was worried about her.”
“Did she appear afraid? Concerned?”
“Not really. But like I said, she never left the house that early, so I kept watch for her. I wanted to ask if she’d been sick and went to visit the doctor.”
Kir accepted the woman’s explanation. The citizens of Pike were nosy, but they possessed a genuine concern for each other. Anyone in trouble could count on their neighbors to step in and lend a hand.
“I was hoping . . .” He shook his head in defeat.
If Rita hadn’t returned to the house, that meant whatever she’d found at the grave was on her when she’d been run down. Which meant it was now in the hands of the killer.
Leah pressed her nose against the screen. “Hoping for what?”
“Never mind.” He forced a smile. “Thanks for chatting with me.”
“Do you want me to tell Rita’s daughter to give you a call when she gets here?”
“No. I’m afraid I’m too late. Again,” he said, turning away.
Once in his vehicle, Kir pulled out his phone to discover he’d missed a text from Lynne. Quickly replying that he was fine, he drummed his fingers on the steering wheel.
His instinct was to head to the clinic and discuss his morning with Lynne, but what did he really have to tell her? That a task force had been formed? That Pastor Bradshaw hadn’t been able to reveal anything about his father that they didn’t already know?
Kir frowned. That wasn’t quite true. He’d discovered where his father had been the morning he’d taken the list to the pastor.
He absently glanced at his phone. Lynne hadn’t answered. Which probably meant she was busy with a patient. Tucking the phone back in his pocket he started the engine and headed out of town. He would retrace his father’s journey that morning. Maybe there was something along the way that would give him a clue to where Rudolf had gotten the list. Or what had spooked him into seeking out the pastor to arrange his funeral.
It was probably a wild-goose chase, but anything was better than sitting around twiddling his thumbs.
Chapter 29
Lynne woke with a throbbing headache and her body stiff with cold. Even worse, she was shrouded in an impenetrable darkness.
Where was she? What’d happened?
Time ticked past as she struggled to clear the cobwebs from her mind. Something that would have been easier if her heart hadn’t been hammering and her breath coming in short, painful pants.
At last she managed to conjure up the fuzzy memory of driving to the sanctuary. Yes. Bernadine had been with her, and she’d gone to check on the puppies. Once she was done, she’d gone into her grandparents’ house and found the older woman lying in the hallway.
Then someone had shot a dart into her.
Forcing herself to a sitting position, Lynne pressed a hand to her aching head and tried to peer through the gloomy shadows. She couldn’t see anything, but she had a sense of a vast space around her. As if she was in a cavern. That would also explain the sharp chill in the air.
But where was there a cavern near Pike?
Unless they’d traveled away from the town. After all, she had no idea how much time had passed. She assumed she’d been hit with the tranquilizer that had been stolen from her clinic, but without knowing how much had been in the dart, she couldn’t begin to calculate whether she’d been out a couple minutes or half an hour.
Panic burst in the center of her being. Somehow the thought that she’d been driven far from her home was even more terrifying than the darkness.
“Hello,” she called out, wincing as her voice echoed through the shadows. She could sense someone was out there. . . watching. “Who’s there?”
“Did you know that fear has a smell?” a low, male voice whispered through the air. “It’s thick and rich, like an expensive spice.”
Lynne stiffened. She was too frightened to try to identify the speaker.
“Who are you?”
There was the sound of approaching footsteps. “The invisible man.”
She placed her hands on the cold floor. She knew she was too weak to try and stand, but she covertly felt around her, inanely hoping for something she could use as a weapon. There was nothing, but she did determine that there was cement beneath her.
Which meant she wasn’t in a cavern. So where?
“I don’t know what that means,” she managed to mutter.
“Invisible. Unseen.” A soft, rasping laugh. “A ghost from your memories.”
Memories? She was forced to clear a sudden lump from her throat. “We know each other?”
“Not as well as I’d once hoped.”
She shuddered at the mocking words. “Show yourself.”
“If you insist.”
There was a crunch of boots against the crumbling cement, then a loud click. Far overhead a single fluorescent bulb flickered to life and Lynne could see her surroundings.
She frowned, confused by the huge square of a room with a high ceiling lined with heavy steel beams. There were stacks of old steel desks and chairs shoved in a corner and the walls looked as if they’d been built out of concrete blocks. It wasn’t until she caught sight of the window that revealed a cramped inner room with dozens of old-fashioned computers and radar screens that she realized where she was.
This was the abandoned air base.
The knowledge hit her at the precise moment that someone stepped into the pool of light. A gasp of shock was wrenched from her throat as she allowed her gaze to take in the familiar man with dark hair and gray eyes.
“Parker?” she rasped. “Parker Bowen?”
He was wearing an expensive trench coat with a cashmere scarf and leather gloves. The elegant attire made him look like he was about to report the news, not create it.
He offered a mocking bow. “Surprised?”
Lynne blinked. She wasn’t just surprised. She was stunned. She’d made the stupid mistake of assuming the killer would be a ruthless lunatic, not an intelligent, successful man. A man who had shared countless hours with her at the animal sanctuary.
How was it possible?
“Why?” she eventually managed to choke out.
He flashed his white-toothed smile, pacing from one edge of the pool of light to the other. Like an actor on a stage. “Let me tell you a story.”
Lynne shuddered. Like she had a choice? There was no way anyone was going to find her. Not in this remote, abandoned building. And certainly no one suspected Parker was the killer, so even if someone noticed he was absent from the station, they would never connect him to her disappearance.
Her only hope was to pacify the man and wait for an opportunity to escape.
“Okay.” She forced an expression of interest on her face. “Tell me.”
Another charming smile. “There was once a little boy.” He paused, pretending to consider his words. “Let’s call him Carl. He was very shy. Very quiet. Like a mouse. Do you know why?”
Lynne swallowed. She’d always thought those mystery shows where the detective spent the last half hour of the movie revealing his brilliance were goofy. Now she understood. Parker didn’t care about sharing the details of his psychopathic mind. He wanted to be the center of attention.
Eve
n if she was his only audience.
Play along, Lynne. Just play along.
“Because he was scared?” she forced herself to question.
He clicked his tongue with disappointment. “Ah, you know the story.”
“Not really, but a puppy makes himself small when he’s scared.”
“Yes.” He nodded. “Invisible. Meaningless.”
“What happened to—” She bit off her words, well aware that her life depended on keeping Parker from snapping. “Carl?”
“He tried to make himself small. He even pretended he was a shadow, not a real person. That way nothing could touch him. That was a fantasy, of course. Nothing could help him avoid the blows.”
“Carl was abused?”
“Abused.” Parker spat out the word. Like it was a curse. “Such a pointless word. These days everyone is abused.” He waved his arm in a dramatic gesture. “You sneeze in a room and someone cries they’ve been abused.”
Lynne slid back an inch. The feeling was returning to her legs. It was a tingly, painful sensation that intensified the cold chills shivering through her body, but it meant she could stand. And eventually walk. Then run.
At some point, she was going to try. If she had to die, it wasn’t going to be sitting on her ass.
“Then what happened to Carl?”
Parker returned to his pacing. “He was tortured.”
Lynne dared another inch. “I’m sorry.”
He snorted. “Are you?”
“Yes.”
“You don’t even know what I mean by torture.” He sent her an accusing glance, thankfully unaware she’d moved. “Shall I describe the sound a forearm makes when it’s being snapped in two? Or the smell of burning flesh when you press a hot iron to the skin? Or the exact shades of color that surround a black eye?”
In spite of herself, Lynne made a sound of distress. Was he describing his childhood? Yes. She could see it in the empty gray of his eyes. The deadness that came with the inability to connect to the world after years of abuse. She’d seen it in animals. Why hadn’t she seen it in Parker?
Because he’d created a façade to fool the world, she silently realized.
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