by Laura Scott
“When did he get here? What did he look like? What was he driving?” The questions were rapid-fire and the guy cowered, ducking his head.
“Came in early, right at the start of my shift. He’s tall and brawny and has short blond hair. I don’t know what the dude’s driving.”
Shane nodded tersely. “Now tell me exactly what he said to you.”
“He gave me some sob story about being away from his family for a really long time and told me he wanted to surprise his niece. I said it was against the rules, but he slipped me a fifty so I let him know what room she was in. Afterward, I was surprised to see her here alone, eating breakfast. No uncle in sight. She left twenty minutes ago. That’s all, man, that’s all. I promise I didn’t do anything!”
Shane let go of his shirt, fighting a wave of anger. “You took fifty bucks from a killer and you better hope I find her before it’s too late, or I’ll be back to arrest you for being his accomplice.”
The clerk paled and patted his pockets. “I’ll give you the money back! It’s no big deal! You can have it back!”
Shane ignored him, jogging outside to find Nate, his heart pounding in his chest and his throat thick with fear.
Creighton had Gabby.
And a twenty-minute lead. Maybe less, depending on how long it took him to grab her. But not much less.
“Nate, where are you?” he shouted as he tried to peer through the fog.
“Back here. I found the maid.”
Shane followed the sound of Nate’s voice to the small alcove at the end of the row of rooms, near the stairway leading to the second floor. There was a vending machine tucked in the corner and Nate was kneeling beside a young woman slouched against it, her eyes closed and her skin pale.
“Is she alive?” Shane asked as he joined them.
“Yeah, she has a pulse,” Nate confirmed. “I think he just knocked her unconscious. I’ve called 911, there’s an ambulance on the way.”
Shane glanced helplessly around the area. “I’ll get the desk clerk to sit here with her. We have to go. Creighton has Gabby.”
“What?” Nate demanded.
“The clerk ratted her out for fifty bucks. We need to go find her!”
“Go where?” Nate asked logically. “We don’t know where he’s taking her.”
“Then we have to figure it out!” Shane wanted to rant and rave at the top of his lungs, panic and fear threatening to overwhelm him. “We have to be smarter than he is. Don’t you get it? Once he has what he needs, there’s no reason to keep Gabby alive.”
Nate nodded slowly. “I know, I hear you. Okay, so where do you think he’d take her?”
Shane raked his hands through his hair, wishing he had a good answer. “Maybe to her house. He prevented Ambrose from torching the place, so it could be that he believes what he wanted is still there.”
“All right, we’ll head there first,” Nate agreed. “I don’t hear the ambulance yet, so we’ll need the desk clerk to come out here to stay with the maid.”
“Gladly.” Shane ran back to the lobby, pinning the guy behind the counter with a hard gaze. “I need you outside, now.”
The guy cringed, hanging back. “No, leave me alone!”
“That guy who gave you the fifty so he could grab the redhead also knocked your maid unconscious,” Shane explained in a terse tone. Every second he wasted here seemed like a lifetime. “I need you to come outside and stay with her until the ambulance arrives. Understand?”
The guy blanched but then nodded. “All right,” he agreed, the seriousness of the situation finally getting through to him.
Shane led the way back to where Nate had remained with the injured maid. The desk clerk looked shocked to see her propped against the vending machine.
“I didn’t know,” he whispered. “I’m sorry, Carla, I didn’t know!”
Shane let go of his anger on a heavy breath, knowing that the clerk really hadn’t realized the consequences of his actions.
“Let’s go,” he said to Nate as his buddy rose to his feet.
“I’m with you.”
Shane ran back inside the motel room to get the keys. Seconds later, he and Nate were inside the police-issue vehicle. Nate took the wheel, leaving Shane feeling restless and anxious, needing to do something.
Anything.
“Better call for backup,” Nate advised, sending Shane a sidelong glance. “Griff needs to know about this turn of events.”
Shane nodded, knowing Nate was right. He reached for the radio, wishing he was wearing his SWAT gear. Not that he was going to let that stop him from going in to rescue Gabby.
“Dispatch, this is unit twelve requesting to speak with Lieutenant Vaughn.”
“Ten-four, unit twelve, hold the line.”
Shane waited impatiently for Griff to answer. “What’s going on, Hawk?”
“Dr. Fielding was taken from the motel,” Shane said bluntly. “I’m here with Nate... We believe Creighton has her.”
“What’s your twenty?” Griff asked.
“Heading east on the interstate but slow moving because of the fog. We’re checking out Dr. Fielding’s residence first.”
“Negative,” Griff snapped. “The area remains cordoned off as an active crime scene, and the techs are heading out there as soon as the fog lifts. I highly doubt Creighton will risk going there.”
Shane ground his teeth together in frustration, knowing that his boss was right. “Okay, then we’ll check out her stepfather’s place. I’m requesting backup—no lights and sirens—along with extra SWAT gear for me.”
There was a pause before Griff responded. “Ten-four. I’ll send two squads to meet you. Do you have a second destination in mind if she’s not there?”
Unfortunately, he didn’t. There was no reason for Creighton to take her to the hospital; after all, the place would be swarming with personnel, even at this early hour in the morning. And it wasn’t likely that Gabby would store personal, private information there anyway.
So where would Creighton go? Especially if her house was an active crime scene?
His heart sank to the bottom of his gut. Anywhere. Creighton could take Gabby just about anywhere. And he couldn’t bear to think that Creighton may attempt to torture the information out of her.
“I don’t know,” he admitted in a choked voice. “We’ll consider the possibilities once we verify she’s not being held at Strawn’s house.”
“Ten-four,” Griff agreed. “Stay in touch.”
Shane disconnected from the radio, every muscle in his body tense to the point he felt as if he might shatter.
He didn’t want to consider the possibility they may not find Gabby at Richard’s house, but forced himself to think through other options.
If Creighton was connected to her father’s death twenty-one years ago in Las Vegas, where could they be now? At a local casino? Not likely, the casinos here weren’t the same kind as in Vegas. And all of this had to be connected to Gabby’s father’s death. So where else could she be?
An abandoned warehouse? Isolated cabin in the woods? Maybe they needed to go back to the clearing off Highway 60? Did Creighton have a place out there?
“I’m sorry,” Nate said, breaking the strained silence.
Shane shook his head. “It’s not your fault Gabby was taken from the motel. Creighton paid the desk clerk fifty bucks to tell him what room Gabby was in.”
“But the only way Creighton could have possibly found the motel in the first place is because of me,” Nate said grimly. “He must have followed me last night. I didn’t think anyone was behind me, but somehow I must have missed him.”
Shane glanced at his friend, remembering how exhausted Nate had been when he arrived at the motel. Was it possible he missed a tail? Somehow, Shane doubted it.
“It’s not your fault, Nate. If anyone is to blame, it’s me. I thought about relocating last night, but I figured we should wait until morning.”
“Oh, man!” Nate abruptly pulle
d off the highway, bumping over the shoulder as he sharply braked. “What if he has a tracking device on the car?”
Shane was torn with indecision. Every instinct he possessed made him want to race to Richard’s house, to be sure Gabby wasn’t being held there. But if Nate was right, and he hadn’t missed a tail, then the tracking device was still on the vehicle.
And they’d only be announcing their arrival. Creighton could take Gabby and leave again, before they caught him.
“You’re right, we need to make sure. Do you have an extra flashlight?” Shane asked, rummaging through the glove box.
“Here,” Nate replied, pulling up the cover over the center console. He handed Shane the flashlight, taking the other off his uniform utility belt.
“I’ll take the front, you take the back.” Shane slid out of the car and then turned over to scoot under the vehicle on his back, using the flashlight to scan the undercarriage.
He forced himself to go slow so he wouldn’t miss anything, no easy feat when he desperately wanted to get back on the road.
After what seemed like hours, but was only ten minutes, he saw the tiny tracking device. “I found it,” he breathed.
Dislodging the device didn’t take long, and when he had it in his hand, he inched back out from beneath the car.
He showed it briefly to Nate, who stared at it in grim silence. “Not your fault,” Shane reassured him, before throwing the device as far into the field as possible.
Nate didn’t say anything as he climbed back into the driver’s seat. Shane knew his buddy was still kicking himself, but at this point, all they could do was to move forward from here.
He closed his eyes and prayed for Gabby’s safety as Nate started the car up and merged back onto the freeway.
He hoped and prayed they would find Gabby at Richard’s house. Because if they didn’t, the odds of them finding her alive dropped significantly.
And he couldn’t bear the idea of losing Gabby.
* * *
Gabby stared helplessly down at the metal handcuffs Creighton had slapped on her wrists one-handed, holding his gun steady with the other. She hadn’t dared try to escape the moving vehicle, convinced that he wouldn’t hesitate to shoot her in the leg to slow her down.
No, at this point she wasn’t going to win a physical fight against him. Creighton was younger than she’d thought, only mid-to-late forties by her estimation, with blond hair and narrow icy gray eyes. He looked as if he lifted weights on a regular basis—his arms were as thick as tree trunks. She imagined he’d left bruises around her neck from when he’d grabbed her.
She knew only too well that he’d kept her alive because she had something he wanted.
Knowledge was power, at least for the moment.
Creighton muttered a vile curse beneath his breath when he saw that there were police vehicles parked outside her home. She wanted to smile at the fact that his heinous crimes were now working against him.
She didn’t bother to point out that he shouldn’t have left Ambrose in her backyard. No sense in angering a cold-blooded killer.
What she needed was a way to outsmart him. But how?
“I know what you want,” she whispered.
He abruptly turned to glare at her. “You do? Then tell me where you have them?”
Them? Her first clue wasn’t very helpful. He was looking for more than one thing. Papers? Was that why he’d focused his search on her office and Richard’s office?
“In a safe place,” she hedged. “Where no one will find them.”
“You’ll take me to them, or I’ll start shooting you in places that will make you scream in pain but won’t kill you.”
The evil glint in his eye sent chills down her spine, but she kept ahold of herself. His goal was obviously to scare her, and she refused to allow him the satisfaction of knowing how close he was to succeeding.
“You don’t want me to have to hurt you, do you?” he sneered.
“N-no.” For a moment a horrible memory flashed in her mind, an image of being in her father’s study, listening to him pleading for his life.
But then the image was gone, vanishing on a wave of pain so terrible it twisted her stomach and stole her breath.
No! She needed to remember!
“Where are they?” Creighton demanded harshly.
She fought against the pain, keeping her voice even with an effort. “They’re hidden at Richard’s house,” she finally admitted, hoping, praying that Shane and Nate had figured out by now that she was gone. That they’d manage to find her at Richard’s house.
Before it was too late.
“I knew it,” Creighton said, slamming his fist on the steering wheel of the car. “The old man caught me searching his office so I knocked him out, but then the cops arrived before I could finish searching the place.”
“Didn’t you go back?” she asked.
“Not right away, but I did go to see your dear old stepfather in the hospital,” Creighton said in a snide tone. “Did you know that? I tried to get him to talk, but he wouldn’t cooperate.”
Gabby caught her breath. “You killed him,” she whispered.
Creighton let out an evil laugh that made her shiver. “Yeah, because I needed to make sure he wouldn’t wake up later and give me away. Anyone can push a syringe full of air into his veins and it was easy to slip away before anyone saw me.”
Grief and despair welled up inside her. Richard had died of an air embolus not from a blood clot. Her stepfather had been another of Creighton’s casualties.
Just like she would be, if she didn’t figure out what paperwork he was looking for.
“How did you find me after all these years?” she asked in a feeble attempt to keep him talking. Thankfully, the fog made driving tricky and Creighton couldn’t go as fast as he likely wanted to.
Although, that meant Shane and Nate had the same disadvantage.
“I got lucky,” Creighton said. “Saw you giving a news conference after that airport shooting. Have to say, I was surprised to find you were some hotshot surgeon. I might not have recognized you after twenty-one years, but your red hair and facial features were so much like your father’s, and having the same last name cinched it.”
Gabby’s pulse spiked at his words. Creighton had obviously been acquainted with her father, but knowing he’d seen her, maybe even had watched her, made her feel sick to her stomach.
She should have listened to Jake Walsh, the federal marshall who’d relocated her and her mother after her father’s death. She never should have changed her name back to Fielding the minute she turned eighteen. At the time, she’d done that in a rare flash of defiance. As a way to show Richard and her mother that she didn’t care if she wasn’t a part of their family.
But, in fact, that act of rebellion had led Creighton straight to her all these years later.
For what? What did he want from her?
Money. Of course, this had to be about greed and money.
But she didn’t have any money, not in the way he might have assumed a doctor would.
But her father may have had money, she realized with a sinking sensation. Her head throbbed, but she forced herself to ignore the pain. Her father had been an accountant for one of the largest casinos in Vegas. What if Shane and Nate had been right all along?
What if her father, the man she’d idolized growing up, had actually been a criminal? Embezzling money that didn’t belong to him?
Money that Creighton would continue to kill for, until he had it for his own.
SIXTEEN
Shane peered through the fog, relieved to note it wasn’t as thick as before. The sun was doing its job, burning away the remnants of moisture that clung to the air. “Take this next exit,” he directed. “We’ll come up on Richard’s house from the back way.”
Nate didn’t argue, hadn’t said much at all since Shane had found the GPS device planted beneath the car.
Shane used his radio to update Griff. “This is unit t
welve, our ETA to the Strawn residence is less than ten minutes,” he said.
“Ten-four,” Griff responded. “Unit seven is on scene, looking to get in sharpshooter position. Your extra SWAT gear is in the vehicle.”
Shane understood that unit seven was Jenna Reed, and he was glad to have her as backup. Once she had Creighton in the crosshairs, he was confident she’d make the shot to put him out of commission.
“Ten-four,” he said, acknowledging the information. “We’re not going to get too close, we’d rather go in on foot.”
There was only a brief hesitation before Griff answered. “Ten-four.”
“You should have told him about the tracking device,” Nate said grimly. “He deserves to know what happened.”
Shane shrugged. “Doesn’t matter now... There’s no threat since we got rid of it. Besides, there’ll be time for a full confession after we rescue Gabby.”
“I hope they’re at the house,” Nate muttered.
“They will be,” Shane said, infusing confidence in his tone. “Gabby’s smart...she’d find a way to lure him there, knowing it’s the most logical place for us to find her.”
“I didn’t trust her at first,” Nate confessed. “I thought you were too emotionally involved, so I was determined to consider every possible option. I obviously went too far the other way.”
Shane sighed. “You were right, I was—and still am—too emotionally involved with her. But we’re going to find Gabby, Nate. I’ve been praying a lot and I believe God is with us, guiding us.”
“I hope you’re right.” There was still a hint of doubt lacing Nate’s tone.
“I am. Pull over in that parking lot,” he said, indicating the strip mall that was located to the left. “Strawn’s place is roughly four blocks behind those buildings, right in the middle of a high-end subdivision.”
“Lots of people around, heading to work this time of the morning,” Nate observed as he parked at the end of the parking lot. “Do you think he’ll risk it?”
“Yeah, I do,” Shane said, hoping he was right. He desperately needed to believe Gabby and Creighton were there because the alternative was too painful to contemplate. “Let’s move.”