The Overnighter's Secrets

by J. L. Salter

  Anyone besides Shane or Beth making a fast exit would be the bad guy. And, one way or another, Jeff was certain he would encounter that villain so he studied everything intently.

  On the second floor landing, Jeff’s light flicked over something which startled him. At first it looked like a dead animal, but Jeff quickly realized it was a large shovel, possibly used to scrape crusty linoleum off the floorboards. He grabbed it. Certainly wouldn’t hurt to have some hefty implement in case he encountered Ricks or the pro who hired him.

  He hurried up the stairs to the third floor landing. Scarcely seconds later, Jeff heard running. No, more like stumbling along the hallway above him. Then mismatched, heavy steps approached the stairs. His intestines felt like ice and hair bristled all over his back and neck. Jeff had absolutely no experience dealing with bad guys, beyond a few playground scuffles in school. What would he do?

  No time to hatch complicated plots. Jeff left the flashlight burning and placed it on the banister... hoping it would shine in the eyes of whoever descended the stairs. He moved to the other side of the staircase and up a few steps from the landing. The wall had a slight recess... probably ornamental.

  One of the few situations when a black man had natural advantage was hiding in the dark and in that wall recess Jeff was basically invisible. He held the shovel over his right shoulder like an unwieldy baseball bat and waited for the light’s beam to reveal whoever was stumbling down the stairs.

  More faltering steps down the staircase, then a stocky man appeared in a bloody shirt and trousers. Nearly twice the bulk of the description for Ricks, so this had to be the ring leader. The wounded man didn’t even look in Jeff’s direction, which made it a lot easier for the librarian and ex-Little Leaguer to step out of the dark recess and unload a swing that Reggie Jackson would have envied.

  The heavy, rusty shovel caught the mercenary full in the face and made a sickening whunk sound. Quite literally, that fleeing criminal never saw what hit him. The blow had to have knocked him out, but his sturdy body continued down the stairs from its own momentum. The bad guy careened into Jeff and shoved him against the wall. Jeff’s hands partly broke his own fall, but he wrenched his right wrist as he landed. Incredible pain. He couldn’t move it—probably broken.

  The criminal’s inert body finally came to rest a few steps below the third floor landing.

  Jeff realized another flashlight beam shone from below somewhere, so he knew he finally had reinforcements.

  Corporal James, who had never been too far behind Jeff, saw the entire exchange from the turn landing in the second flight of stairs. He’d probably score it as an RBI. He waggled his own light, obviously borrowed, since his original was on the banister. “Hey, you... library guy.”

  Jeff peered over the banister and pointed to his own chest.

  “Yeah, you. Is that the bomber?”

  “Uh, yeah... probably.” Jeff realized he’d have some explaining to do.

  “Well, sit on him ‘til I get up there.”

  Jeff grimaced when he tried again to move his right wrist. “What if he tries something?”

  “Whack him again with that shovel.”

  At the very least his hit had been enough for a double. Jeff prodded the body with his foot. No reaction. He sighed heavily and shivered, both at the same time. He also realized he had a lump in his throat but wasn’t certain why. He looked at his injured wrist in the weakening beam of the banister flashlight. “Tanya’s gonna kill me.”

  Chapter Forty-Eight

  About 10:40 p.m.

  Beth had the brightest remaining lantern and Shane held Kaser’s pistol as they reached the turn landing between fourth and third floors. There, they saw Jeff partly illuminated by a large stationary flashlight and seated on the bottom step. Sprawled along the first few steps of the next flight down was Kaser’s inert body. Beth hurried down the remaining stairs and reached her friend about the time Corporal James approached Kaser.

  “Jeff?”

  “I’m okay. Hurt my wrist.” Jeff’s left hand pointed toward Kaser.

  “You fought that killer?” Beth gasped.

  “Shane said if anybody ran out that wasn’t you or him...” then his eyes went cloudy.

  Beth hugged his left side.

  With a pistol pointed at the criminal’s head and a knee firmly pinning the muscular shoulder blades, James roughly cuffed Kaser behind the back and then felt his neck for a pulse. Panting from the exertion, he also checked the felon’s pockets. The corporal flashed his borrowed light on all three faces and kept his service pistol pointed in their direction. His eyes widened when he saw the firearm in Shane’s hands. “Point that over yonder and release the hammer... real, real slow.” He waited while Shane did so. “Now put the safety on and set it on the highest step you can reach. Keep your hands up and you come down to the landing.”

  Shane held up one hand while he complied with the other. Then he descended.

  James pointed to Jeff. “Where’s the bomb?”

  “We’ve got a bomb, too?” Beth started to sob. Then she noticed that Jeff looked plaintively at Shane.

  “This guy’s a major league felon.” Shane indicated Kaser. “Kidnapping for certain and you’ll probably link him to a recent murder out of state.”

  “And that text message he sent with the threat.” Jeff seemed to be coaching.

  “Yeah, we got a message from Bethany’s phone that I knew wasn’t her wording.” Shane nodded.

  James looked suspiciously at each face in turn, before he focused the light beam on Beth’s partly exposed bosom.

  Having briefly forgotten her garments were ripped, she clutched them demurely.

  The corporal cleared his throat and trained the light on Shane again. “You’re the biker we had all afternoon for B an’ E.” The officer placed his borrowed light into the holder on his belt and retrieved his own implement from the banister.

  “True. I was at your station, but I did not break and enter. At least not by that point.” He looked at Jeff and continued. “And now you can see what I was trying to tell you guys that whole time. My girlfriend was kidnapped. If anybody had believed me enough to even check it out, maybe we could have gotten here before those creeps beat her up.”

  James trained the beam on Beth’s face. “You okay, honey?”

  As Beth nodded, she also teared up.

  They all heard approaching sirens in the distance. Seconds later they saw the flashing lights through the windows which, years ago, bathed that elegant staircase with daylight. Reinforcements had arrived.

  “So, do we have a bomb here... or not?”

  Shane’s eyes met Jeff’s for a long moment. “It might be a misunderstanding.”

  “Officer, I’m afraid that was a slight exaggeration on my part,” Jeff confessed. “Nobody believed my friend was in danger and I couldn’t sit there and keep answering the same questions over and over.”

  “False report... bad business. Big trouble from the Feds.” The corporal ascended a few stairs to retrieve the extra pistol and then holstered his own. He relaxed his grip on the flashlight and shifted the beam back to Jeff. “So what about this other guy you reported?”

  “Actually two more,” Shane interrupted. “Up in Room 415. The punk who robbed Bethany... plus another one who kidnapped her.”

  “What shape are they in?” James trained the light on Shane’s bloody face, neck, and arm.

  “One’s dead... shot as I was coming up the stairs. Probably by Kaser over there.” Shane pointed again.

  Jeff looked around. “Who’s Kaser?”

  “The creep whose face you bashed in.” Shane did the pantomime with his hand.

  “I never saw his face.”

  James shook his head. “Well, don’t look now ‘cause it’ll give you nightmares.” A coal shovel in the face usually had that effect.

  There was a brief lull while they listened to the noises from downstairs.

  “We’re the good folks, officer.” Shane
held out his hands. “What you might call victims.”

  “What about the other one upstairs?” James didn’t shift his flashlight aim.

  “I had to motivate him a little since he wouldn’t tell me where Bethany was.” Shane hugged her. “But he’s still alive.”

  The corporal looked like he was stymied. Standard academy training probably never covered situations like this. “Okay, let’s see some I.D.” Then he waved his hand. “Oh, never mind. I’ve already seen you all in the station at different times.” His slicker wet from the rain, James still breathed raggedly from climbing three flights of dark, rubble-filled stairs. Lights, voices, and other noise filtered up from the flights below. James shouted in their direction: “Cancel the Nashville bomb guys... that’s a negative on the bomb.”

  One of the policemen apparently acknowledged from below but it was indecipherable to Beth.

  Then James radioed headquarters to let them know the bomb alert was bogus. “Got one unconscious perp cuffed on the third floor landing and I’m heading up to four-one-five with the witnesses.” He continued speaking into his collar mic. “Two more perps up there... one’s supposedly out. Other one’s dead, so get the meat wagon over here.” Then he grumbled, “Why couldn’t any of this happen on the ground floor?”

  Nobody had an answer.

  “Any more weapons? Or do I have to frisk everybody?”

  “Not me,” said Beth. When she shrugged, her torn clothing opened again... and six male eyes widened.

  “I’m clean.” Shane held out his hands again.

  Jeff started to point to the coal shovel and James interrupted. “Yeah, I saw that. Nice solid hit, too.” The corporal grinned slightly and then nodded his head toward the floor above. “Let’s go see what’s what.” He pulled out his own pistol and holstered the one he’d gotten from the stairs, but it didn’t fit properly.

  Cautiously entering Room 415, James ascertained the man near the threshold had a pulse but the body by the wall did not. He banded Ricks’s wrists with a plastic lock-tie and handed Jeff the pistol originally taken from Kaser. “Hold this, finger off the trigger... and point it that way.” He indicated the window. Then the corporal holstered his service firearm, leaned against a wall where he could watch the door, and took a deep breath. “Now let’s hear a real quick and simple explanation of what all happened up here.”

  Shane shrugged and looked toward Beth, still holding a lantern.

  Jeff handed the pistol to Shane, grabbed one of the other lanterns in his left hand, and took his first look around the room.

  “That guy is Ricks.” Beth pointed. “Somebody we both know from Long Beach. He’s the one who followed, threatened, attacked, and kidnapped me. I’ve been here since late last night... a lot of the time in that filthy closet.” She shuddered. “I didn’t even know he was here,” she indicated the deceased, “but he’s the one in the hoody who broke into my house over two weeks ago.”

  “He won’t be robbing anybody else.” The corporal’s chin waggled as he nodded.

  From the sounds, other officers had reached fourth floor and were headed their direction.

  “That man downstairs, Kaser... I’d never seen before last night.” Beth’s voice got tight. “But he was ready to kill me.”

  Shane interrupted. “He was a spook. Ex-CIA, so he said... ‘course he could’ve been lying. And I’m pretty sure Kaser’s not his real name.”

  “Whoever he is, he’s out of commission now.”

  Jeff stepped forward, obviously monitoring the holes in the floor. “A lady was murdered in L.A. last week and we’re betting that guy did it.”

  “Different jurisdiction.” James rubbed his temple. “Anyhow, prosecutors and courts decide all that stuff.”

  Beth realized the officer was not yet aware of the deceased granddaughter’s indirect connection to the suitcase material. She looked to Jeff and Shane to see if they had anything to add. Neither spoke. “We still don’t know why all this happened,” Beth continued. “But we think it has something to do with the overnighter.”

  James stopped leaning on the wall when two one-striped officers entered the room with pistols drawn and flashlights shining. He explained enough to get them to check on the transports he’d requested and arrange for a medic to meet them at the station. “Overnighter?”

  “A small suitcase,” Jeff explained. “Has some belongings of an actress from silent movies.”

  “I got it in trade with some dumpster divers... about five years ago,” Shane said.

  “Okay, that’s detail, all right... but it doesn’t make any sense.” James rubbed the back of his neck with his free hand and nodded toward Beth. “I remember your break-in report. The first guy stole one of your books. And now you say he wanted somebody else’s little suitcase instead. Doesn’t make sense.”

  Beth patiently went through the entire business.

  James panned his light over to Shane. “You got anything to add that actually clears up anything?”

  Shane explained the rest of what he knew about Kaser, from the criminal’s own admissions.

  “Ooh, this’ll be a great collar.” James practically salivated. “We’ve got a special team that needs practice with renegade contractors like that.”

  Shane smiled, probably for the first time in about twelve hours.

  Chapter Forty-Nine

  About 10:55

  Beth was incredibly relieved to finally depart her terrifying prison of the past twenty-plus hours.

  The dead body remained in Room 415 with one patrolman, who waited on the part-time coroner to arrive. No one envied the officer left alone with a stiff in the middle of the night in an abandoned hotel. An ambulance took Ricks and Kaser to the police station to be booked and preliminarily examined for injuries.

  Corporal James sternly warned all parties to assemble immediately at the police station or risk serious charges and overnight jail stay, at a minimum.

  Mercifully, the driving rain ceased about the time everyone hurried to their respective vehicles. Ricks had left the keys in Beth’s Shadow, so she climbed in and Shane drove. Despite the knife wound on Shane’s right arm, Beth snuggled so closely that he could barely steer.

  The streets were eerily quiet after so many hours of heavy storms.

  By a bit after eleven o’clock, all had collected at the police station. Electric power had finally come back on shortly after the rain stopped.

  Arnie the medic was already examining Kaser and Ricks.

  Connie Bryan, seated nearby and intently watching the medic, jumped up when Beth, Shane, and Jeff entered the inner station. “You’re alive!” She hugged her rescued friend so tightly that Beth could barely breathe. Both sobbed noisily.

  “What on earth are you doing here?” Beth pulled away enough to look into Connie’s eyes.

  “Shane practically dragged me from my office... in the pouring rain. But that was hours and hours ago.” When Connie saw the cuts and bruises on her friend’s face, she wept even harder. She also covered Beth’s rather revealing torn garments with her own sweater. “Arnie, leave those punks alone for a minute and see to Beth. She’s been beat up.”

  Kaser and Ricks, both cuffed, were watched intently by a patrolman with his Taser poised. Both were still unconscious.

  “Hold on.” Arnie muttered as he examined wounds. “What happened to this guy’s face?” He pointed toward Kaser.

  “He probably fell going down the stairs,” replied Shane.

  Arnie looked skeptical. “Anybody know what was in his leg?” He peered more closely.

  “I thought I saw him tugging on a wood chisel,” offered Shane, “but it was dark in that room.”

  “Chisel? Wow!” The usually unperturbed Arnie shuddered slightly. “Looks deep, too.”

  After completing his quick preliminary examination, Arnie checked with his station supervisor and got formal permission to send both to the Greene County Hospital Emergency Room. There wasn’t much he could do for them until they came to. A
nd both probably needed x-rays, at the very least. Arnie followed both gurneys out to the ambulance.

  While the medic was outside briefly, Beth asked what was up between Connie and Arnie.

  Connie explained they’d had a date scheduled for that evening after she’d returned from Beth’s parents’ place, but she decided to remain in the police station instead. “I figured if any news was found out, it would come here first.” Then she whispered, “We’ve already had one date.”

  “When?” Beth slapped her arm lightly. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “Well, Jeff was there on Saturday and I didn’t want to talk about it in front of a guy.” Connie rolled her eyes.

  “So your second date has been at this police station all evening?”

  “Arnie was on call anyway. If he’s already here, it just saves some gas.”

  Not much of a date.

  At Desk Sergeant Travis’s central workspace, Corporal James was explaining some confusion about the flashlight he’d previously reported as “stolen by the library guy”. The new story was: he’d loaned it to Jeff McCabe because of the inclement weather.

  Arnie returned from getting the two prisoners settled and changed his gloves as he came over to examine Beth. It didn’t take much time to clean Beth’s bloody nose, split lip, and abrasions of the face and forehead. A few of the cuts were significant enough for Steri-Strips. He also tended miscellaneous cuts, gouges, and scrapes on her neck... and then gave her advice about the raw places on her wrists from the duct tape bindings. After Arnie learned how long she’d been captive, he warned her to get hydrated and stay that way for the next twenty-four hours.

  “As long as I have access to a bathroom.”

  Arnie felt behind her ears and around the rear of her head.

  She yelped.

  “What hit you back there?”

  “Kaser smacked me with his gun.”

  “Any other injuries?”

  “Ricks slapped me a lot on my, um, chest. It still stings.” She pointed through Connie’s sweater, but didn’t open it.