When the Wolf Prowls

by Vanessa Prelatte

  A minute or two later, coffee cup in hand, Dawn returned to the car. As she seated herself and got herself comfortable, Rafe filled her in on what the clerk had told him about the perp and the frequent stops he’d had to make on the trip.

  “It’s another lead to follow,” he said. “If we can find which rest stops he stopped at, we can check the video surveillance. Maybe one of the cameras got a better shot of him.”

  “He might not have stopped at a rest area,” Dawn said dryly. “He could have just stopped by the side of the road to do his business behind some convenient trees and bushes.”

  “Yes. That’s a distinct possibility. But we should check out the rest areas anyway. Who knows, we may get lucky. Meanwhile, a call just came back from the Pueblo police. According to them, the owners of the car, the Wakelys, are snowbirds who spend every winter in Florida. According to their neighbors, they drove one car down there and left the other in the garage. Their son is supposed to stop in and check the house on a regular basis, but he hasn’t been seen around lately.

  “After they spoke with the neighbors, the police got a warrant to search the house and garage. When they entered, they confirmed that the car was gone. No surprise there. They think that there is a possibility that the perp might be the couple’s son. He loosely matches the description Jordan gave.”

  “What’s the son’s name?”

  “Lionel Wakely.”

  “I’ll pull up a picture of him from his driver’s license. We can get both the clerk and Jordan to take a look.”

  When they reentered the store and showed a picture of Lionel Wakely to the clerk, he said, “It could be him. I’m afraid I don’t have a good memory for faces. And I wasn’t very interested, you know? He was just another customer. There was nothing about him to make me pay attention.”

  They thanked the clerk and returned to the car. On the way back to the scene, Dawn glanced at Rafe and said, “Rafe, are you feeling okay? You seem a little off.”

  Rafe shrugged his shoulders. “I’ve been having some stomach problems lately. Just a little indigestion. Probably something I ate. Nothing to worry about.”

  When they returned to the point where the perp had abandoned his car and fled into the woods, they discovered that Jordan had finished working on the sketch of the suspect with Devlin, the police sketch artist. After filling Jordan in on their conversation with the convenience store clerk, they asked him to take a look at the driver’s license photo of Lionel Wakely.

  “I’m not sure,” Jordan confessed. “It could be him. I just got a glimpse of the guy, so I can’t be certain.”

  Rafe nodded. “We’ll contact the Pueblo police and ask them to check up on Lionel Wakely. If he’s down there in Pueblo, there’s no way he can be our perp. If the Pueblo police can’t locate him, that raises the probability that he’s our man. In the meantime, now that you’re done working with Devlin, go to the hospital and get yourself checked out, Snake. That’s an order.”

  After Jordan had left, Dawn contacted the Pueblo police while Rafe arranged for Devlin to meet with the convenience store clerk and work on creating a sketch based on the clerk’s recollections of the suspect. Next, Rafe checked in with the CBI team, but they had little of interest to report.

  When he returned to Dawn, Rafe said, “Give me some good news. Tell me that the Pueblo police can’t find Lionel Wakely.”

  “Okay. That’s just what I was going to tell you. When they contacted Lionel Wakely’s place of employment, his supervisor informed them that Lionel had been working out of the Denver branch of their offices all week. The Pueblo police followed up by making a phone call to the Denver offices, and guess what? Lionel never showed up for work this morning. The big boss in the Denver office also happens to be Lionel’s cousin, a guy named Godfrey Lozier. His assistant gave the Pueblo police the runaround when they asked to speak to him. It seems that Mr. Lozier is a big, important man who is very busy and does not have the time to speak to some lowly police officers. So I called myself, and guess what? According to his assistant, Mr. Lozier is also too busy to speak to the Mountpelier police. Made me sad, Rafe. Sad and itchy for a trip to Denver.”

  Rafe grinned. “I’m with you on that one, D.C. Let’s go and pay a call on the busy Mr. Lozier. And while we’re at it, maybe we can figure out how to ruin a certain snooty assistant’s self-important day.” He glanced over at the SWAT van and the Search and Rescue vehicles. “Maybe by the time we get back from Denver, we’ll get the good news that they’ve apprehended the perp. I’d hate to see him get the chance to hurt someone else.”

  Chapter 5

  The search was on by now, but they wouldn’t find him. He was too clever for that. And his father had taught him well. He knew just what to do to elude any trackers.

  He had run through the woods for what seemed like hours without a break before permitting himself to stop and rest. The trick to eluding searchers with tracking dogs was to outlast them, tire them out.

  After a brief rest, he continued along at a fast walk. The trees began thinning out, and he realized that there must be a road nearby.

  Emerging cautiously from the woods, he couldn’t believe his eyes. A car with a camping trailer hooked up to it stood there, pulled off to the side of a back country road. In a grove of trees on the opposite side of the road, he spotted a family, seated on a blanket and enjoying a picnic meal.

  Moving quickly and keeping the vehicle between him and the family, he approached the car. For a moment, he thought about stealing it, but then shook his head. He wasn’t far enough away. The police would be setting up road blocks, and the last thing he needed was to run into one of them. Besides that, the owners of the car and camper were armed. He had observed a shotgun lying between the two parents, and both looked as though they were capable of using it.

  Keeping his own gun in his hand, he stealthily approached the back of the trailer. He calculated that he could enter through the rear door without being seen. Silently, he turned the handle on the door and entered the trailer. Moving quickly, he grabbed some of the man’s clothes, a blanket, some food, several bottles of water, a packet of matches, a couple of plastic bags. Spotting a ball of twine, he pocketed that at well. Rummaging through the woman’s stuff, he found another thing he needed: a jar of petroleum jelly.

  He exited the camper as quietly as he had entered it and ducked back into the cover of the trees. After putting some distance between himself and the family, he stopped and stripped off his clothes. Next, he applied the petroleum jelly over every inch of his body – including his hair. No dead skin cells. Nothing for the dogs to track, he thought with satisfaction.

  When he had finished, he picked up his own clothes and began shoving them into one of the plastic bags. Picking up his jeans, he reached into the right-hand pocket to retrieve the talisman before discarding the garment. His probing fingers encountered nothing, however. His brow furrowed as he turned the pocket inside out. A sinking feeling settled in the pit of his stomach. The smooth gold medallion, his personal good luck charm and a memento of a happier era in his life, was gone. It must have fallen out of his pocket as he fled through the forest.

  It was a bad omen, but he could not afford to dwell upon it. He had no time to waste.

  After donning the unknown man’s clothes, he shinned up a nearby tree and hung the brown plastic bag amid its branches. Descending the tree, he paused at the bottom and looked up. There was no sign of the bag from that perspective. It was completely hidden among the tree’s foliage.

  That should confuse the dogs, he thought with some satisfaction.

  He proceeded to bundle up the other items he had confiscated inside the blanket. Then he placed the blanket inside the other plastic bag he had taken from the camper. It bore the name of a popular department store and was much larger than the other one. He tied a knot in the middle of the bag. Then, sliding his arms through the handle loops, he fashioned it into a makeshift backpack.

  Gritting his teeth, he p
roceeded once again to run. He needed to put many more miles between himself and the searchers he knew were after him before he could relax again. Once he’d put enough miles between himself and the scene, he could think about maybe stealing a car, he decided. Getting into his rhythm, he continued his journey south.

  *****

  Before heading to Denver to interview the busy Godfrey Lozier, Dawn and Rafe stopped at the hospital, both to check on the surviving victim from the crime scene and to get an update on Jillian Kaelar, the suspected poisoning victim.

  Arriving at the Mountpelier General, they decided to check on Jillian Kaelar first. However, they discovered that the tox results had not yet come back, and Jillian was still violently sick and not up for questioning. Dawn and Rafe looked at each other and shrugged. The poisoning case was important, but it was definitely on the back-burner at this point.

  They went down to Intensive Care next to get an update on the surviving victim in the murder case. There, after examining their credentials, a nurse ushered them into the victim’s room. Dawn and Rafe stood by the woman’s hospital bed, where she lay unmoving. A second later, the door opened, and a doctor walked in. He greeted both of them courteously and was more than willing to answer their questions.

  “What can you tell us about her?” Dawn asked.

  “She’s holding her own,” the doctor replied. “Her injuries were severe, but we are hopeful that they are survivable. We had to put her into an induced coma in order to help her recover from the trauma.”

  “Can you estimate her age?”

  “I’m not comfortable with that. It’s hard to tell, under the circumstances,” the doctor replied.

  “Best guess?”

  “Off the record? I’d guess about mid-thirties.”

  “Has she said anything?”

  “Just one word – Danny. She whispered it right before we put her under.” The doctor checked his watch and said, “Excuse me, I have to continue with my rounds now.”

  After the doctor left, Rafe said to Dawn, “Danny. Our perp’s name, perhaps?”

  “Could be. On the other hand, it could also be the name of a husband or a boyfriend.”

  As it turned out, they could not have been more wrong.

  Chapter 6

  Get a grip on yourself, Danny ordered himself sternly. He had sat motionless in shocked silence for long enough, he decided. He couldn’t afford to remain inactive with grief any longer. He had to move, and move now.

  They had been locked in the cellar for almost twenty-four hours. The monster had never kept them down here that long before. But it was different this time. Danny could still hear the sounds of their mother’s screams ringing in his ears. That had been bad enough. But the silence that followed was worse.

  It was now or never. Danny felt it in his gut. The mad light in the monster’s eyes had been growing. Now he’d done murder. The violence brewing within him had exploded, and his mother and at least one of the other girls – the redhead – had been killed. He was sure of it, and he knew who would be next.

  In the light of the battery-powered lamp that provided the only illumination in the cellar, Danny looked over at Sherri. His little sister was sitting quietly in the corner. She had been the chief target of the monster’s rage before he had kidnapped the two girls and brought them to the house.

  Danny made a decision. He might only be a boy, not even in his teens yet, but he was all that Sherri had. He could no longer afford to sit tight and wait for the cavalry to arrive. Sherri might not survive that long. It was time to implement Plan B.

  *****

  Unaware that their theories concerning the identity of Danny were dead wrong, Dawn and Rafe headed south toward Denver to question Godfrey Lozier. Rafe’s solution to bypassing Lozier’s interfering office assistant had been to place a call to a friend, a bigwig in the Denver Police Department. By gently reminding the assistant that the last thing in the world her boss would want was to get on the wrong side of the local police, Rafe’s contact had managed to clear the way for Dawn and Rafe to interview Godfrey Lozier.

  Traffic was fairly light for the first half of the forty-five minute drive to Denver. Rafe, however, was unusually silent. Sneaking sideways glances at him, Dawn noticed that he was tight-lipped. Which meant the pain in his stomach was worse than he was letting on, she decided.

  In an attempt to distract Rafe and rouse him from his lethargy, she said “Rafe – see that billboard up ahead?”

  “Which one?”

  “The telecommunications ad.”

  “What about it?”

  “Don’t you think the model looks a little like Desiree?”

  Desiree Hertmuir was her best friend. They had met when they were in junior high school and had been close ever since. Not even Desiree’s marriage and subsequent move to the state of Michigan had caused even a ripple in their relationship. They visited each other as frequently as possible and spoke on the phone with each other almost every day. In fact, Dawn had just returned from a visit to Michigan only a week before. Desiree had had a new baby girl, and Dawn had gone up both to admire the baby and to help her friend out.

  Rafe glanced at the billboard model and shook his head. “You really think it looks like Desiree?” he questioned. “I don’t see it.” He checked the time. “If we run into traffic when we get to the city, don’t hesitate to use the lights and the sirens. The assistant said that our man Godfrey will be boarding a plane soon for a business meeting in New York this afternoon.”

  Something about the way he said “our man Godfrey” struck Dawn, and she began to laugh.

  “What’s so funny?” Rafe inquired.

  “I was just thinking about nicknames. I’ve never met anyone named Godfrey before. I wonder what his nickname would be? God?”

  “Probably something more like Fry.”

  “Yeah, you’re probably right.”

  “What made you think about the sort of nickname Godfrey might have?” Rafe asked curiously.

  Dawn glanced at him. “When I was talking to Desiree last night, we got into a discussion about her first-born son.”

  “Ah, yes. The one she insisted upon naming Napoleon.”

  “Yeah. She was outraged that his little friends have started calling him ‘Boney’.”

  “Well, what did she expect? What did she think they’d call him?”

  “I don’t think she thought that far ahead. She just wanted him to have a unique name that set him apart from the other kids. It never occurred to her to think about nicknames.”

  “I fully expected her to call the new baby Josephine,” Rafe commented.

  “She thought about it,” Dawn admitted. “But her husband didn’t like it, so in the end they decided on Anastasia.”

  Rafe responded to that with a grunt and lapsed into silence again. His silence continued all the rest of the way into the city of Denver.

  Godfrey Lozier’s offices took up the entire fourth floor of the building. They were met by his assistant, a middle-aged woman with a long nose and a superior attitude. She was dressed in a discreet gray suit. Her platinum hair was pulled back severely into a bun on the back of her head. Settled on her nose was a pair of wire-rimmed glasses.

  She stared down her long nose at them haughtily for a second or two before greeting them with, “You are fortunate that Mr. Lozier is able to squeeze you in before he leaves for New York. He’s had a very busy morning.”

  Rafe just grinned. With a sidelong glance at Dawn, he replied, “Fortunate. Yes, that about describes my partner and me. Now, why don’t you get your rear in gear and escort us in to see Mr. Lozier. We don’t want to keep him waiting, what with him being so busy, do we?”

  The assistant deigned only to sniff in reply to this sally before turning and heading toward a door on the far side of the room.

  Dawn, meanwhile, had been taking in the reception area. The decorators had gone for a dramatic effect, she noted. The reception desk was a huge circular slab of black granite. A
silvery waterfall cascaded down the wall behind it. Geometric artwork in black, white, and silver dotted the walls. Black leather couches sat in front of white granite coffee tables.

  Dramatic, yes. But not very inviting, Dawn thought. She infinitely preferred her father-in-law’s office suite. He had recently had it redecorated, and tongues had wagged all over Mountpelier when he had engaged his ex-wife as his decorator.

  When the assistant showed them into Godfrey’s office, Dawn was surprised. Given the way the reception area was decorated, she had expected more of the same. But there were no black or silver elements in Godfrey’s office. His desk was a warm golden brown. Behind it sat a massive but comfortable-looking executive chair – white, not black. A window framed with peacock-blue curtains was at the far end of the office. The visitor’s chairs in front of the desk were also white, but the couches scattered around the office were done in a sage green. The golden-wood look was repeated in the paneling on the wall.

  The man behind the desk rose to greet them courteously when they entered. He shook hands and waved them into the visitors’ chairs, re-seating himself at the same time. Dawn knew he was in his late forties, but he looked younger. His face was all angles and planes, Dawn noted. Anyone who saw his profile would probably describe it as “chiseled”. His hair, meanwhile, was a dark brown, and she guessed that it had been styled by a master. His eyes were light, in an odd shade somewhere between blue and green.

  He fixed those eyes upon them now. “When I got the call from the local police informing me that two detectives from the Mountpelier Police Department wanted to interview me, I must confess that I was surprised,” he said. “The officer I spoke with told me that you have some questions concerning my cousin, but he didn’t go into any details. So before we even get started, I have a question for you: Is Lucky in some sort of trouble?”

  “Lucky?” Rafe said.