by R. J. Jagger
“Should have got a cab,” Teffinger said.
LEIGH CALLED AT FIVE O’CLOCK. “Okay,” she said. “I tapped my resources as far as I can without having to officially owe people blowjobs. We turned up lots of hits with unsolved cases involving men who had rules. I narrowed the search to written rules, an abduction lasting between one and seven days, rape, and most importantly of all, released alive. Guess how many names made that cut?”
Teffinger felt energetic.
“One,” he said.
“No, eighteen.”
“Eighteen? You got to be kidding me.”
“Check your email in ten minutes,” she said. “You’ll have names, faces, and more information than you want.”
“Thanks,” Teffinger said, and meant it. “You’re saving my life here.”
“Just find the woman.”
He dove into the new information. Outside, the day slipped away, the evening came and the office windows turned to mirrors. All the while something nagged at him but he couldn’t finger it.
Then his phone rang.
“I’ve been stood up before, but never on the first date,” someone said.
He recognized the voice but couldn’t place it.
Then he did.
Rain St. John.
He was supposed to pick her up for dinner at seven.
He looked at his watch.
Eight.
He stood up.
“I’m walking out the door right now,” he said. “I got tied up with something. I really apologize for being late, I should have called.”
HE DASHED DOWN TO THE LOCKER ROOM, showered, threw on a fresh pair of pants and a long-sleeve cotton shirt—a sea-foam green color—and dried his hair with a towel as he bounded down the stairwell. Ten minutes later he rang her doorbell, straightening his hair as best he could with his fingers.
She opened the door, grabbed him by the shirt, dragged him over to the couch, pushed him down and stood over him.
She wore a short black dress.
Sleeveless.
Lots of cleavage.
A tanned body.
Firm legs with no nylons.
Black high heels.
Her hair was now a uniform length, about two inches long, perfectly straight with a slight fluff. She looked like she just came from a photo shoot for the cover of a fashion magazine.
He tried to appear unaffected.
“I’m going to go with you, but only on one condition,” she said.
He raised an eyebrow.
“And what’s that?” he asked.
“This is a date, not dinner,” she said. “I’ve been thinking about what you said before, about how I’m a victim and all vulnerable and everything, and how it would be wrong for you to do anything other than take me out to dinner. But I’m fine and that’s the truth. I know what I’m doing. The only reason I wanted to have dinner in the first place was so that it would be a date. If I just wanted food I have plenty in the fridge. So, with that said, here’s the condition. We either leave here on a date—wherever that leads us—or we don’t leave at all.”
“A date, huh?”
“Right.” She paused, briefly looked vulnerable and said, “I don’t want to lose this chance with you just because the timing’s bad.”
“Well, I did promise you dinner, so I guess if I just left I’d be breaking my promise.”
“Yes you would. And you’re not the kind of guy to do that.”
“No, I guess I’m not.”
“So it’s a date then?”
He nodded.
She came close to him, hiked up her dress, straddled his lap and then brought her mouth to his. “This is how I like to start my dates,” she said.
Teffinger inhaled and blew out.
“Seems reasonable,” he said.
Then she kissed him.
He was just about to kiss her back when she hopped off and pulled him up. “I’m starved,” she said. “Feed me.”
THEY ATE LOBSTER AT SIMMS LANDING and then ended up in a cozy booth in the back of a packed bar on Larimer Street sipping white wine. They sat on the same side of the table, facing a trendy crowd.
She slipped her shoes off and put Teffinger’s hand on her leg.
“If that gets cold, feel free to move it up,” she said.
He inched it up as they talked.
Slowly.
Teasingly.
Until she grabbed it and put it between her legs.
When he started to massage her, she kept a straight face and spread her knees. His hand was hidden from view, behind the table, under her dress, barely under her dress, the way it had ridden up, but under it nonetheless.
No one could see.
She brought the wine to her lips, took a sip and then whispered in his ear.
“I’ll bet you can’t make me come.”
“I’ll bet I can.”
“You’re on,” she said.
“Loser pays for drinks,” he said.
“Done.”
They locked eyes the entire time.
He felt as if he was looking directly into her soul.
Ten minutes later she closed her eyes, bit her lower lip and trembled. Then she opened her eyes, kissed him deep and long, and pulled two twenties out of her purse. “Come on,” she said. “I got a place I want to take you.”
Chapter Forty-Five
Day Six—May 10
Saturday Night
______________
AFTER DARK, TARZAN slipped into his Dick Zipp suit and drove the Wrangler to the trailer. There he waited for more than an hour until he finally got four rings from Del Rae. A few minutes later he pushed through the shaky screen door, muscled his Tarzan frame into the Wrangler and headed for the hideaway.
Del Rae and the lawyer followed in his lane, four cars back.
He had to admit that if he hadn’t known to look for them, he would have never suspected they were there.
He stayed under the speed limit.
The last thing he needed was for either him or them to get pulled over.
The Jeep was like driving around in a tent. The knobby off-road tires whined and the ragtop flapped. The radio was a piece of tinny crap. The windshield, being flat, cracked in the shape of lightning bolts at three locations. In spite of all that, he liked it. There was something satisfying about the fact that he could pull off the pavement and keep going, or leave the vehicle out in the rain with the top off.
Maybe he’d add a new one to his stable when this was all over.
If nothing else, just to show he was still a normal guy in spite of his millions, his many millions.
THE MILES CLICKED OFF and the traffic waned. When he turned off Highway 85 and headed into the deeper sticks, Del Rae’s lights were the only ones left, hanging a half mile back. Then they disappeared too. She must have flicked them off.
Very clever.
Later he’d have to ask if that was her idea or the lawyer’s.
When he arrived at the weed-infested drive for the hideaway, he stopped the Wrangler on the gravel and got out to see if the twine that he’d laid across the vegetation was still in place.
It was, meaning no uninvited visitors.
He pulled it to the side, drove to the house with the headlights off and slipped the mask over his face before going in, just in case the woman was conscious. Thirty seconds later he discovered he didn’t need it. She was out cold. She’d been awake at some point, though, because she ripped the rules in half and threw them in the corner.
He chuckled.
Feisty.
Unfortunately, she needed to be raped to keep everything consistent. She also needed her hair chopped off.
To be doubly safe, he stuck a syringe in her ass and pushed the plunger before getting down to business.
He had to remember to take the rubber.
Take the rubber.
Take the rubber.
The cops would be here at some point, maybe in a week, maybe in a year. Either wa
y it was important that they not find his DNA hanging around.
The woman was tight.
He was smack dab in the middle of that tightness when he heard a rustling of some sort outside.
Chapter Forty-Six
Day Six—May 10
Saturday Night
______________
WHEN TARZAN FINALLY MADE A MOVE shortly after dark, Ta’Veya followed him west on the 6th Avenue freeway, hanging back as far as she could, driving the blue Nissan rental. Paige followed both of them more than a half mile behind in a brown Chevy, the second rental, the one from Avis.
The traffic was thick.
The rentals were fresh.
Trane wouldn’t suspect a thing.
Paige’s stomach had a knot in it. It was that same kind of feeling she got as a little girl when the roller coaster got snagged by the chain and started inching up that first hill. Trane was in his weird clothes and driving the Jeep, meaning he was on some kind of a mission. They might actually catch him at something and have their dirt.
“You still there?” Ta’Veya asked.
Paige pushed the cell phone closer to her ear. “Yeah, no problems.”
“Where are you?”
“Just passed the Kipling exit,” Paige said.
“Oops,” Ta’Veya said. “We’re getting off.”
“Where?”
“Union/Simms.”
“Got it.”
“He’s getting in the right lane; looks like we’re heading north.”
“Okay.”
“Come up behind me,” Ta’Veya said. “Then I’ll drop back and you can take the point.”
“Roger, that.”
“Roger, that?” Ta’Veya asked. “Is that what you just said?”
Paige knew she should laugh but couldn’t.
“Yeah, I think I did.”
“Roger, that,” Ta’Veya repeated. “You’re too much, girl.”
THEY ENDED UP FOLLOWING HIM to a place called the Mountain View Trailer Park. They parked up a gravel road that led to a junkyard and doubled back through the dark on foot. The Wrangler squatted in front of the last trailer in the row. They took a post in the open space behind a boulder and pulled out the binoculars.
“Weird,” Ta’Veya said.
“Very.”
They watched and time passed.
Nothing happened, other than Trane’s shadow occasionally moved around inside the trailer. They expected a car to pull up as some sort of secret rendezvous, but none did.
“I got a call from our collar friend today,” Paige said at one point.
“You did?”
“He’d been watching me because he knew what I was wearing,” she added. “He said I was a bad girl.”
Ta’Veya looked shocked.
“You’re just telling me this now?”
“Sorry,” Paige said. “I guess I wanted to spare you.”
“Spare me? Girlfriend, all you did was keep me in the dark. Don’t do that again. I need all the information all the time. So do you. That’s the only way we’re going to get through this alive.”
Paige nodded.
The woman was right.
Ignorance wasn’t their friend.
Knowledge was.
“So what’d you do?” Ta’Veya asked.
“Hung up,” she said. “Then went out and bought a gun.”
“You did?”
“Yes.”
“You got it with you?”
“No, there’s a waiting period. I get it tomorrow. I got the same kind as my old one, the one you used on that guy in the boxcar,” she added. “That way if anyone wants to know where it is then I’ll have something to show ’em. No one would know the difference unless they somehow checked the serial numbers.”
Ta’Veya was impressed and said so.
“The guy is probably calling from a public phone,” Ta’Veya said. “Next time he calls, after you hang up, call the incoming number a minute or so later. Maybe someone will answer. Then describe Mitch Mitchell and ask if they see him around.”
Paige cocked her head, seriously impressed.
“How’d you think of that?” she asked.
Ta’Veya chuckled. “It’s called motivation, sweetheart—motivation to not end up in a boxcar again; motivation to not spend the rest of my life in jail for blowing someone’s face off.”
Suddenly Trane came out of the trailer, hopped in the Wrangler and drove off.
Bad news.
They couldn’t follow him.
They’d never get to their cars in time.
“Now what?” Paige asked.
“I don’t know about you but I’m going to get my sweet little posterior into that trailer and see what’s what,” Ta’Veya said.
“Not without my posterior you’re not,” Paige said.
THEY WEREN’T WORRIED ABOUT POSTING A LOOKOUT. If Trane came back they’d see his headlights in plenty of time. Plus they’d be in and out in five minutes, ten max. Wherever he went he wouldn’t be back that fast.
The doorknob was locked but the door hadn’t been pulled shut all the way, allowing them to push it in with no problem.
Neither of them had a flashlight.
They made sure the curtains were closed, in case of nosy neighbors, and flicked on the lights.
The interior was seriously worn and just as seriously outdated.
They found pots, pans and silverware in the cabinets but no food in the fridge.
Very strange.
Clearly no one was actually living there on a day-to-day basis.
Overall the place had nothing of interest, not a single thing, until they came to the cabinet above the fridge.
There, under a box of salt, they found fifteen or twenty photographs, depicting two different women similarly posed. Each was naked, on a raggedy old mattress, chained by the ankle and unconscious. One was attractive and the other was absolutely stunning, in the same stratosphere as Ta’Veya if that was possible.
“Now we’re talking,” Ta’Veya said.
They chose a photo of each woman, the one that showed the face the clearest. Ta’Veya stuffed those in the back pocket of her jeans and then they put the rest back where they found them.
They turned off the lights and closed the door all the way shut. Before they could step to the ground headlights suddenly punched through the darkness, coming out of nowhere, and lit them up.
“Run!”
Chapter Forty-Seven
Day Seven—May 11
Sunday Morning
______________
TEFFINGER AWOKE IN A STRANGE BEDROOM next to an intoxicatingly beautiful naked woman who breathed deeply and rhythmically. It took him a few seconds to register where he was, and when he did the corner of his mouth turned up ever so slightly. The first rays of dawn washed the walls with a golden patina. He twisted to his side, laid his head on his arm and let his fingers lightly brush the woman’s hair.
Rain St. John.
So sensual.
So complicated.
So fragile.
In a perfect world he’d spend every minute of the day with her. Maybe take her for a ride in the 1967, put the top down, wind through Bear Creek Canyon and grab an ice-cold beer at the Little Bear. Or go for a hike in the mountains, at Elk Meadows or Lair O’ The Bear, a serious hike lasting hours, the kind where you work up a sweat and can’t wait to sit down again.
Unfortunately he didn’t live in a perfect world.
He lived in a world where people like Tracy Patterson disappeared. So he slipped out of bed without waking Rain, splashed water on his face, popped in his contacts and left a note on the kitchen table before heading for the front door.
Her black dress lay on the floor in front of the couch.
It still carried the scent of her perfume.
He replayed last night and saw it fall off her body.
He walked back into the bedroom, watched her sleep for a few moments and briefly considered finding out if she wakes up
horny. Instead he gave her an imperceptible kiss on the cheek and left.
HIS GOAL TODAY WAS TO FIND TRACY PATTERSON. Technically she didn’t fall under his jurisdiction since she was a “homicide in the making” instead of an actual homicide. Teffinger had used that concept before to justify throwing time at a case.
The chief—Forrest Tanker—didn’t buy it.
Teffinger pushed back and the chief learned a lesson.
Teffinger arrived at an empty headquarters shortly before 7:30 a.m. and kick-started the coffee machine. Breakfast turned out to be fruit from the bottom drawer of his desk; that and two stale donuts that softened to perfection when he dunked them.
He continued going through the eighteen files that Leigh had emailed but found nothing that helped.
None of the men had any apparent ties to Denver.
He was two hours into it and starting to tap his pencil on the desk when his cell phone rang.
A voice came through that he didn’t expect.
Ta’Veya’s.
He pulled up a picture of them together in his Tundra as a black thunderstorm pounded the earth. He saw her body, her incredible physique, once again. The memory was so real that he could smell her skin and taste her mouth.
“Nick,” she said, “I am so sorry for not getting back to you Friday night like I said. I ended up having a medical emergency that took me out of commission so bad that I couldn’t even call you to let you know.”
He didn’t expect that, not at all.
She hadn’t blown him off after all.
“What happened?”
“It’s a long story,” she said. “What I need now is for you to kiss my stitches and rub my shoulders. Are you free today?”
He almost said “Yes” but didn’t.
The hesitation confused him.
She was beautiful.
Passionate.
Warm.
And he’d already fallen in love with her in the back seat of the Tundra. So why didn’t he jump on it? Because of Rain St. John.
Also beautiful.
Also passionate.
Also warm.
Five years ago, even five months ago, he would have known exactly what to do, namely not deprive himself of the incredible charms of either of them. Juggle them both and see which one turned out to be the better fit. Why rush to judgment? But now, today, for some reason Leigh Sandt’s words rang strong. Women came too easy to him. It was always easier to move on. That’s why he was still single.