“We have to find out who that friend of his is. I’m starting to think he’s important in all this. But we’re not going to get a name from Nelson’s mother or the hospital. Nelson has used outside people before to send threatening letters to Rachel. Of course, his lawyer claimed he couldn’t have sent the letters because the mail he sends from the hospital is monitored by the staff. But the original prosecutor on the case proved that Nelson was giving letters to patients who were being discharged or going on leave, and paying them to drop the envelopes in the mail.”
“Breaking into Michelle’s office for Nelson is a lot different from mailing a letter for him,” Dennis said.
Tom nodded. “He’s been in a mental hospital for years. Sooner or later he had to come across somebody as twisted as he is. Or willing to do anything for money. If he’s got an accomplice, that could explain—” Tom broke off when Daniel Beecher appeared in the doorway.
In a barn jacket flecked with bits of straw and hay, Dan looked as if he’d come directly from work at the horse farm. Tom could smell the manure clinging to his boots.
Dennis stood and acknowledged Dan with a nod.
Before Tom could speak, Dan blurted, “When are you going to get around to charging Skeet Hadley for killing my daughter? What’s taking so damn long?”
Tom got to his feet before he answered. “I know you won’t like hearing this, but we don’t have any evidence that Skeet killed Shelley.”
Dan charged toward the desk so suddenly that Tom braced for an assault. Dennis raised a warning hand and said, “Whoa there.”
Dan stopped short, glaring at Tom. “How much evidence do you need, for god’s sake? He’s been threatening her since she started working on Vance Lankford’s case. Now I hear he tried to kill Jesse and Sonya Lankford. Why haven’t you—”
“I understand why you’re upset,” Tom said. “But we can’t talk about it unless you calm down a little.”
Dan stabbed a finger at Tom, and his voice rose to a shout. “Don’t you take that tone with me, Captain High-and-mighty. God damn it, does he have to murder somebody right in front of you before you’ll do something?”
“He’s in jail right now,” Tom said. “He’s being charged with the crimes against the Lankfords.”
“But you’re gonna turn him loose.”
“That’s not up to me. It’s up to the judge, and it depends on whether his family can raise the money for the bond.”
Dan snorted in disgust. “If Sheriff Willingham was still on the job, he wouldn’t be letting other people decide whether a killer goes loose. He wouldn’t let the Hadleys buy their boy’s way out of jail.”
“Sheriff Willingham would handle this situation exactly the same way I am. I’m recommending against release, and so is the prosecutor, but the final decision—”
“Well, you do that,” Dan said, “you recommend against it. Just remember, everybody’s watching you. You screw this up and you can forget about being elected sheriff.”
Although the office door hadn’t been closed before, Dan slammed it on his way out.
“Gotta feel for the guy,” Dennis said.
“I do. Believe me, I do.” Tom dropped heavily into his chair and swiveled around to glance out the window to the parking lot. He’d expected the news crews to drift away as the days passed, but instead their numbers had swelled, and now he counted two dozen reporters and camera operators out there, clustered around their vehicles. The TV trucks had satellite dishes on their roofs to provide live reports.
Swinging back around to his desk, Tom confronted a stack of callback memos impaled on a spike. Some from reporters, some from county supervisors. All boiled down to the same complaint: after almost a week, Tom hadn’t caught Shelley’s killer yet.
He yanked the message slips off the spike and dropped them into the plastic recycling bin next to his desk.
“Can’t say I blame you.” Grinning, Dennis took his seat again.
“They ought to try their luck catching this guy if they think it’s so damned easy,” Tom said.
“To get back to Rachel and Michelle’s stalker,” Dennis said, “I think we…”
Dennis continued speaking, but Tom wasn’t listening. He stared at the expanse of his desktop, now bare except for a head and shoulders photo of the deceptively boyish and innocent-looking Perry Nelson. A scenario was taking shape in Tom’s head as bits and pieces of information came together.
“Tom?” Dennis said. “What is it?”
It was crazy. Tom couldn’t see any obvious connections.
But maybe that was the point. No obvious connections meant no suspicions.
Yet it made sense. In the warped brains of psychopaths and killers, it would make perfect sense.
He was about to try his theory on Dennis when the phone rang. He was startled to learn that Rita Jankowski’s mother was on the line. “What can I do for you?”
She broke into sobs. Tom had to wait for her to calm down a little and draw a gulping breath. “I can’t find my daughter. She won’t answer her phone. She promised to be home by this time. Nobody answers the phone at the locksmith shop. But I know she’s with him. He’s got her.”
“Look,” Tom said, “Rita and Jordy are two adults. They have a right to—”
“You don’t understand!” she yelled. “He’s gonna hurt her, I know he is.”
Tom’s own suspicions about Jordy made him hesitate. This woman knew something Tom needed to hear. She’d been on the verge of telling him earlier. “I’ll make a bargain with you,” he said. “Tell me what you’re hiding, what you wanted to tell me when I was at your house, and I’ll go find Rita and bring her home.”
She keened as if she faced a choice between the devil and an abyss. “You’ll put Rita in jail,” she cried.
By this time, Tom wasn’t surprised at what he was hearing. “If you really believe Jordy might hurt her, I don’t think this is the time to worry about jail. Do you want me to find her or not?”
She stalled a little more, sobbed and snuffled. Then she blurted, “He came over here that night after the concert, came lookin’ for Rita. Woke us up in the middle of the night, beggin’ her to help him. And she did, like she always does. I saw them down in the basement. They didn’t know I was on the steps. watchin’ and listenin’. Rita was washin’ blood off that tire iron and tellin’ Jordy what he had to do with it so he wouldn’t get caught.”
***
The inside of Rachel’s nose burned, as if she’d breathed in pepper. She swallowed and tasted something musty, but familiar, at the back of her throat. When she opened her eyes, she saw only darkness. She felt a blanket, soft and light, covering her entire body, including her face.
Where am I? Her foggy brain took a moment to register the hum of a car engine and the bumps in the road beneath the vehicle’s tires.
He’s got me. Dear god, he’s got me.
She shivered violently and bile rose in her throat. She lay on her right side, and her arms seemed to be caught behind her, unmovable. She tried to shift her legs, push herself upright, but her ankles were bound together and something hard pressed against her stomach. The metal buckle of a seat belt, she guessed. Although she was lying down, she felt the belt running over and under her body, holding her in place. She wasn’t gagged. Thank god for that, at least, but the blanket was smothering her.
Focus, focus. Don’t panic.
Thrashing her head from side to side, Rachel worked the blanket off her face. As she’d suspected, she lay on the back seat of a car. Her movements hadn’t made much noise, but surely the unseen driver had heard, was aware she’d awakened. Yet he said nothing, didn’t look around.
Rachel gulped in air, swallowed, and tasted the familiar mustiness again. Isoflurane? An anesthesia gas she used on animals all the time. Now someone had used it on her.
Not someone. Him. Perry Nelson. It had to be him.
The faint glow from the dashboard, glimpsed between the front seats, provided the only light in t
he car. The high headrest blocked her view of the driver. Why hadn’t he spoken? Why hadn’t he reacted to her movements?
Rachel squirmed around, trying to reposition herself for a better look without drawing his attention. When she raised her head from the seat, nausea swept through her, made her gag. Laying her head down again, she closed her eyes until the sickness subsided. It was an aftereffect of the anesthetic and would go away.
That struck Rachel as funny—god only knew what Nelson would do to her, or how much longer she had to live, but she was thinking about waiting for her nausea to pass. She almost laughed, but caught herself before any sound could escape. She had no time to waste. She swallowed again, clenched her teeth, and raised her head.
Still fighting off nausea, she craned her neck until she caught a glimpse of the driver in the dim light. What she saw made her gape. She dropped her head to the seat again. How was this possible? What on earth was going on?
The side of the driver’s face was barely visible, hidden by a cascade of shoulder-length, wavy dark hair that gleamed in the dashboard light. She had expected to see Perry Nelson. But her silent kidnapper was a woman.
Chapter Thirty-nine
Dennis and Brandon, seated in front of Tom’s desk, exchanged doubtful looks.
“I’m having a little trouble wrapping my head around this,” Dennis told Tom. “Your instincts are usually right on target, though. We know Jordan Gale and Perry Nelson were in the same hospital at the same time, but what makes you think they cooked up a murder plot together?”
“Jordy had motive and opportunity to kill Brian Hadley six years ago,” Tom said. “He thought Brian was going to break Rita’s heart. And he was there, at the fairgrounds, at the concert, the night Brian was murdered. He never came under suspicion because all the evidence pointed at Vance Lankford from the word go. Nobody ever had any reason to question Jordy or check up on his movements.”
“Then why did Shelley suspect him?” Brandon asked.
“Because he tried to cover up something simple, something an innocent person wouldn’t lie about. We know Shelley found that picture and was trying to identify people who were present that night but were never questioned. She showed the picture to Vance and he recognized Jordy. Then she showed it to Rita and got a reaction that made her think Rita was lying when she said it wasn’t Jordy. Finally, she went to Jordy himself and he denied it was him, denied he was even in the county that night. If Jordy had nothing to do with Brian’s murder, why would he or Rita lie about him being around that night?”
“If all that’s true,” Dennis said, “and Jordy thought Shelley was onto him and wouldn’t quit until she proved he was guilty, then I can see him killing her to shut her up. But the trouble is, I just checked his alibi for the day Shelley went missing, and it’s solid. He was here in Mason County, and he can prove it with witnesses and work records.”
“I don’t think Jordy killed Shelley,” Tom said. “I’ll bet you anything I own that Jordy Gale is the friend Nelson made at the hospital during the winter.”
“But you said the hospital director wouldn’t verify it,” Dennis said.
“No, and he’s left for the day. Nobody’s in the admin offices right now, but I’ll call him again in the morning and fax Jordy’s driver’s license picture to him. I know I’m right.”
“So let’s assume Jordy killed Brian Hadley,” Dennis said, “and he’s been covering it up all these years. It would have been a hell of a scare when Shelley started poking around in the case.”
“He was so afraid Shelley was going to expose him,” Tom said, “that he started using again or started talking about killing himself, and he ended up back in the hospital, not long after Nelson was transferred there. Nelson’s always blamed Rachel for ruining his life. Both men had women in their lives they wanted to hurt. Suppose they decided to team up and help each other get even?”
Brandon leaned forward in his chair. “You think what happened to Michelle was really aimed at Rachel? Just to get under her skin and torment her for a while before Nelson focused on her?”
“That’s what Rachel believes,” Tom said, “and it’s starting to make sense to me too.”
“But Nelson was in the hospital while most of that stuff was happening to Michelle,” Dennis pointed out.
“He’s got an alibi for the times Michelle was harassed in Bethesda,” Tom said, “but he was out of the hospital on the night Shelley was snatched.”
“Yeah, that’s right,” Dennis said, the doubt beginning to fade from his eyes.
“And Jordy,” Brandon said, “was out of the hospital and living back here, so he was free to drive to Bethesda on the weekends and mess around in Michelle’s office.”
“Nobody would ever suspect Jordy because he had no history with Michelle, no reason to harass her. Nobody would suspect Nelson of killing Shelley because he had no history with her.” Tom stood. “We need to pick up Jordy right now. Rita’s probably with him. Her mother thinks he might hurt her, but I think it’s more likely they’ll take off together if we don’t get to them first. Bran, you come with me. Dennis, put a couple of our guys on alert in case I call for backup.”
By the time they hit the road, Brandon was excited about the connection Tom drew between the stalker and the Beecher murder. “Man, that is really slick. And sick. So you think they cooked it up together, before Jordy got out of the hospital?”
The cruiser’s headlights bored into the darkness as they left the lighted streets of Mountainview. Hills loomed on both sides of the road, their ridges rimmed with moonlight. Tom hoped to god he was right, that he wasn’t chasing the wildest goose that ever took flight. “I’m not sure Jordy’s smart enough. But from what Rachel’s told me about Perry Nelson, he’s got the brains to plan something like this. I don’t know where Nelson is, but Jordy’s weak, he might give Nelson up if we put on the pressure. You sure he’s living in the rooms above the locksmith shop?”
“Positive. I remember him telling me his folks didn’t want him to move back in with them. He acted kind of put out about it, but he said at least he’s got privacy and Rita can stay over if she wants to.”
Rita. Tom could understand why Mrs. Jankowski had kept quiet about what she’d seen and heard in order to protect her daughter, but why would Rita let an innocent man go to prison for life? Had she protected Jordy ever since because she loved him, or was she simply looking out for herself?
The small building containing the locksmith business, and apparently Jordy’s living quarters too, wasn’t far from town. As Tom swung the cruiser into the narrow parking strip in front of the shop, his headlights illuminated Rita’s old car, sitting next to the shop’s van. The shop downstairs was dark, but lights blazed in the second floor rooms.
“Let’s try to do this without anybody getting hurt,” Tom said. He and Brandon climbed out of the cruiser and closed their doors slowly, silently. Tom was reaching for his pistol when his cell phone rang. “Damn,” he muttered, angry at himself for not thinking to silence it. Afraid the shrill tone would cut through the quiet and alert Jordy, he yanked the phone from his shirt pocket and pressed the button to answer.
His uncle was calling, and it took Tom a minute to make sense of what he was saying. Paul had found Ben Hern bleeding and unconscious on the driveway at the farmhouse. “I called an ambulance, they’re on the way—”
“Where’s Rachel?” Tom demanded.
He heard his uncle let out a long, shaky breath. “I don’t know, Tommy. I found her cell phone on the driveway, but Rachel’s gone.”
***
They must be somewhere in Mason County, but this was countryside with no lights along the road, no landmarks to help Rachel orient herself, and the shadows of the surrounding hills blotted out most of the moonlight. When she twisted her head to look up and out the car’s side window, she saw only darkness.
The driver remained silent, a mysterious, malign presence who held Rachel’s fate in her hands.
The car tu
rned, swinging sharply to the right. It slowed as it bumped along, and she guessed they’d left the pavement for a dirt road.
With a spike of panic, Rachel realized they must be nearing their destination. What would happen when they stopped? The time was coming when she would have to act, do something to keep herself alive. Her head was clearing, she’d quelled the nausea. She didn’t know who her captor was, but she believed she had better odds of freeing herself from a woman than from a man.
She had to get the woman to talk to her so she could get some idea of what was happening and what her chances were. She ran her tongue over her dry lips and asked, “Where are you taking me?”
No answer.
“Are you a friend of Perry Nelson? His girlfriend? Is he waiting for you to bring me to him?”
“Shut up.”
Rachel gasped. A man’s voice. Oh, my god. It’s him. Her heart banged in her chest. Think. Focus. She knew she had the strength to save herself. “Perry? Where are you taking me?” she asked again.
“Shut the fuck up!” He snatched the wig off his head and flung it into the passenger seat.
They emerged from the shadows, and moonlight flooded the car. Rachel heard weeds scraping the undercarriage. The car stopped.
No, no. As long they were moving, she’d been safe.
Nelson shifted the car into park, turned off the engine, and unlocked his seat belt.
The impossibility of escape threatened to overwhelm her. One thing at a time, Rachel told herself. He was crazy, but she wasn’t, and that gave her an advantage as long as she could stay calm and focus.
Nelson slid out of the car, slammed his door.
Twisting on the back seat, Rachel searched with her bound hands for the seat belt latch. Her fingertips brushed over metal but couldn’t grasp it.
Nelson opened the back door closest to her feet. He rolled her forward on the seat a couple of inches, then leaned on her legs with one hand to steady himself so he could reach behind her and unsnap her seat belt.
Kick him. Kick him in the balls. If she could pull her knees up—But his hand, and the force behind it, pinned down her legs.
Bleeding Through: A Rachel Goddard Mystery (Rachel Goddard Mysteries) Page 27