Never Kissed Goodnight

by Edie Claire

  He's taking Mathias across the creek, Leigh thought confidently, then he'll jog up the Shortline to his car. Staying on the Shortline was a good bet, since the thin line of trees on its far side shielded it at least somewhat from the nearby houses. It wasn't a bad plan on his part, but she had no intention of giving Mathias's abductor any credit. He had had to stake out the area pretty well, true, but he hadn't been quite as thorough as he thought he had.

  She turned and broke into a jog, moving behind the barn and back towards the woods at the north end of the farm. She was vaguely aware that there was something wrong with her head, but she didn't dwell on it. What she had to do now was find that bridge.

  It took her only a few moments, since Cara's rummaging about all summer had cut a half-decent trail through the appropriate place in the brush. She entered the woods and slammed quickly through, heedlessly pushing branches and brambles out of her way. When she reached the creek she halted only for a second, noting that the woods around her hadn't stopped moving the same time she did. But she could worry about that later. Now she had to get across the bridge.

  "I use the term 'bridge' loosely," Cara had said with a laugh the day she had first showed it to Leigh. "It's ancient. Built with two metal rails left over from the Shortline, and some kind of sheet metal. But it's stable enough. Come on!" Leigh had followed her insane cousin over the bridge that day, even though she'd thought better of it. Now would be no different.

  She stepped out onto the contraption without hesitation, determined not to think how far the bank was below, or how much higher the creek was than it had been on her last crossing. Far away now, she heard occasional cries from Mathias, one or two of which she could swear had been muffled before they ended. Go, her heart screamed at her. Go, go, go!

  She could hurry only so much. The sheet metal was rusted through in various places, and several planks were missing entirely. At two points she had to rest a foot directly on the rails, and just as she neared the far bank, one of the planks loosened beneath her and slid. She lost her footing completely, but thanks to a low-lying branch, she was able to steady herself and land safely on the muddy slope. As she climbed up the far bank it seemed like something was wrong with her eyes, but she wasn't sure what, and it didn't matter anyway. What she had to do now was find that car. And she had to find it before he did.

  She pushed through the brush on the other side of the creek, thankful that it obscured any view of the bridge from the Shortline. Stepping carefully out onto the trail, she assured herself that her prey was not yet in sight, then ran headlong toward the private road.

  As the blue Escort came into view, she felt giddy with relief. Gotcha, you bastard, she thought victoriously, closing the distance between her and the car with a sprint her body hadn't attempted in years. When she reached it she was breathless and dimly aware of a new cloudiness in her brain, but she merely took a deep breath and kept moving. The car seemed new, and the inside was spotless. A rental. It figured. She tested the driver door, and wasn't surprised to find it unlocked. Nothing to steal, after all—and perhaps no time to waste fumbling with keys later. She closed the door and walked around the back, staring hard at the license plate. Memorizing things had always come easily to her, but these numbers and letters were swimming a bit. She clenched her jaw to steady them, then committed the sequence to memory. NTZ-879. Got it.

  Now, the car. Logic told her the smartest thing to do would be to disable it, but the only thing she could think of was slashing the tires, and she had no knife. Beyond that, she hadn't a clue what to do. Lift the hood and start unplugging things?

  A shrill bark sounded from down the trail, and Leigh dodged quickly behind the rear fender. Maggie, she thought anxiously. Had the dog been following them all along? It wasn't unlikely. Maggie wasn't the type to molest strangers, particularly ones who patted her head, even if they were carrying crying toddlers. After all, to a good-natured dog's view, perfectly nice people carried screaming babies around all the time. She was probably giving the abductor a wary escort, in which case he could be within site of the car already.

  Damn. Forgetting the car-disabling option, she quickly searched her brain for another plan. Could she simply confront him? It would be difficult to pry Mathias from his arms, particularly if he was strong. And all he would have to do would be to push her down, get into the car, lock the doors…

  Another squeal from Mathias wafted to her ears, closer this time. The cry penetrated her head and wove its way straight through to her bone marrow, making her quiver with anger. Nobody messes with my nephew, she fumed, fists clenched. Not. Gonna. Happen.

  It occurred to her in a flash. He would approach the car on the driver side, toss the toddler onto the passenger seat, and take off. That would be her chance. Perhaps it was a good thing that she hadn't been able to scream or call for Mathias earlier. Now she had an unlocked car and the element of surprise, and that might be just what she needed.

  Positioning herself at the right end of the back bumper, she tried to calm her thumping heart and waited. She could hear footsteps now, and little interrupted grunts from Mathias.

  "Quiet!" a man's voice said quietly, but with unmistakable irritation. "For God's sake, cool it. You're going to be fine."

  Leigh tensed in horror as a soaking wet spaniel soared around the front corner of the car and ran headlong into her, almost knocking her over. Stifling her own cries, she sat up quickly and tried her best to ignore the dog. Maggie couldn't give her away now. She just couldn't. Leaning as far into and under the car as humanly possible, Leigh prayed the man wasn't paying any attention to the hyper dog and couldn't see her from where he was standing. Apparently her prayers were answered, because Maggie took off again as quickly as she had come, and the man's only response was to open the driver side door.

  Now.

  With a series of jerky and not at all seamless motions, Leigh shot out from behind the bumper, wrenched open the passenger door, reached inside, and found herself head to head with the man she had subconsciously expected to see. His pale blue eyes widened in shock as her arms circled the toddler he'd just let loose of—and started to pull.

  Mason Dublin sat, stunned, for only a second, then reached over and grabbed after the moving child, catching one flailing ankle as the rest of the little body disappeared out the door. Mathias screamed, most certainly in pain this time as his tiny leg was stretched between the two of them. Leigh fought the urge to slacken her hold, choosing instead to lift her right foot and throw a vicious kick at Mason's outstretched elbow. He howled and dropped the ankle, and Leigh and Mathias pitched backward.

  She kept to her feet, however, and as he struggled across the seat and out the passenger door, she scrambled around the Escort's front end, placing the car squarely between them. She was breathing like a freight train, and the toddler clamped tightly in her arms still hadn't stopped screaming in her ears, but such nuisances were only background. Her eyes were on Mason Dublin, and her brain was working just fine.

  He stood up on the other side of the car and glared at her maliciously, then made a dive around the front fender. But Leigh was just as quick, and no matter which way he headed, she kept the car between them. Eventually his body slumped and he exhaled slowly. "Just give him to me," he said slowly, as if talking to a petulant child.

  If her voice had been working, Leigh would have laughed.

  "I said, give him to me," he repeated. "I don't know how you got here, but you're not going to mess this up. I can take him from you whenever I want, you know."

  Her eyes narrowed, and a low gravely voice erupted from what she assumed was her throat. "Not with your genitals intact."

  Mason's pupils widened briefly, then his own eyes narrowed. "Why, you little—"

  Suddenly aware of the tool that was now back at her disposal, Leigh pressed Mathias's head against her chest, covered his exposed ear with her forearm, and screamed her guts out.

  Ignoring the occasional cries of a toddler was one thing
, but ignoring the prolonged, panicked screaming of a grown woman was downright inhuman, and there simply had to be somebody within earshot. Mason stepped back, his brow furrowed with irritation as he looked wildly from side to side. Throwing her one more icy glare, he broke into a string of curses and dove back into the passenger seat.

  Leigh quickly moved to the rear of the car, afraid that he was going to come straight through, but she needn't have worried. He merely scooted across into the driver's seat, fumbled with the keys, and started the engine.

  She backed up quickly, not knowing if he planned to run her down for sport, and was relieved to see a deep drainage ditch just a few yards behind her. He couldn’t pursue her there, not if he wanted to drive off afterwards. She watched the car carefully as she jumped down into the ditch, trying not to forget to keep screaming. Meanwhile her brain churned along steadily, trying to think of other scenarios he might try, and when the car started forward and drove away, she was temporarily flummoxed.

  What was he up to now? She stood ankle-deep in ditch water for several more seconds, with Mathias blubbering wildly in her face and an agitated Maggie pawing up and down her shins, before it occurred to her that he was gone. Really gone. As in, he wasn't coming back. He had given up and taken off. And Mathias, though not the happiest kid in the world, was perfectly safe, and stashed firmly in her own arms.

  Somehow, the revelation didn't seem to penetrate. "He's gone, sweetheart," she cooed to Mathias mechanically, her rusty voice almost blasé. "Let's go find Mommy."

  She started walking slowly down the Shortline, having no delusions about her ability to maneuver the rickety bridge. Her body was tired—or something. She trod steadily to the wide part of the creek, splashed through with Mathias in tow, then walked back up through the woods and across the field toward the farmhouse. She had just reached the play yard when Cara's car pulled up into the driveway, and her smiling cousin got out.

  "Well, hello!" Cara said cheerfully. "What are you doing here?" As she came closer, her eyes fixed on Leigh's wet pant legs, then Mathias's tear-stained cheeks. "What on earth happened?" she asked, alarmed. "Are you two okay?"

  Leigh held the toddler out to his mother, and her arms—which had been locked into their clasping position a little more tightly than she had realized—complained with the effort. "He's fine," she said calmly, watching as Mathias dove eagerly for Cara, nestling in rapidly and clinging to her neck for all he was worth. "Just fine."

  It occurred to her that the words sounded as though someone else had said them. Then everything went black again.

  Chapter 12

  Cara was slapping Leigh's cheeks and screaming into her ear. It was very annoying.

  "Stop it!" Leigh protested, lifting her head a little off whatever hard object it was lying on. A stab of pain shot through the back of her skull and down her neck, and she quickly let her head fall back down again. "Ouch," she said dully.

  Cara let out a quick sigh of relief, but her eyes were still anxious. "Leigh, please. Talk to me. What happened? Did you hit your head?"

  Leigh thought a moment, but she honestly had no idea. "Where are we?" she asked. She was lying out in the middle of her cousin's yard, which made no sense.

  "Lie still, all right?" Cara said comfortingly. "Don't try to move. I'm going to run to the car and get my cell phone."

  She was off like a shot, and Leigh was left alone with the cold November sun in her eyes and, in half a second, a frantic Brittany spaniel licking her face. "Maggie," she groaned, "please go away." Surprisingly, the dog complied, and in the moments before Cara reappeared, a brief glimpse of clarity returned to her painful brain.

  "Mathias?" she called out suddenly, thinking she should get up, but before she managed to move Cara had returned with a phone in one hand and Mathias on the opposite hip. He looked calm and content, and Leigh instantly relaxed, listening with detached indifference while Cara called for the paramedics. Then all at once, she remembered she had a mission.

  "You have to call Gil!" she insisted, tugging on her cousin's arm. "He's at the PI's office. Hurry!"

  Cara looked at her in confusion. "Don't you want me to call Warren? I don't know what happened, but you've obviously hit your head somehow. You've got a huge goose egg, and for all we know you've got a concussion to go along with it. Now what's his number? He has a cell phone, doesn't he?"

  Leigh considered this information, and realized that she had no idea what had happened to her head. But she did know that Mason had tried to take Mathias, and she knew that he had gotten away. "Did you call Gil yet?" she asked.

  Cara's brow wrinkled with worry. "Leigh, please listen to me. Do you remember Warren's number? I'm afraid I don't have it."

  Warren's cell phone number, Leigh thought wearily. She'd dialed it a million times. Whatever the heck it was. She started to shake her head, but another stab of pain stopped her. "I can't remember," she said, frustrated.

  "That's all right," Cara soothed. "I'll find him somehow. You just relax. The ambulance will be here any minute, and they'll give you something for that headache."

  But Leigh wasn't to be soothed. She knew she should be doing something. She just wished she could remember what and then keep it in her head for more than five seconds. "Call the police," she blurted out suddenly.

  Cara leaned down close to her in alarm. "The police? Why do you want the police?"

  A part of Leigh still wanted to protect her younger cousin from the grim truth, but a larger part knew that wasn't feasible—nor wise. Mason had tried to kidnap his grandson once, and he might try it again. Cara couldn't keep him safe if she didn't know.

  "Leigh," Cara coaxed anxiously. "If it doesn't hurt too much, can you tell me what happened?"

  "A man," she began, deciding a little vagueness would be all right, at least for now. "A man tried to take Mathias. Call Maura. I'll tell her."

  Cara's face drained of color. She reached out an arm and clasped her son, who had wandered a few steps away, back to her side. "What did you say?" she whispered.

  "Call her, please," Leigh pleaded. "And call Gil and tell him to come home right away."

  Cara sat rigidly for a moment, squeezing Mathias so tight he began to whimper. She relaxed her hold on him only a little, glanced warily about the farm, then spun into action.

  Leigh tried to relax and steady her thoughts as Cara fought her way through directory assistance and a long phone chain to reach Detective Maura Polanski. "Thank God, it's you Maura," she finally said with relief. She was attempting to explain what little she knew about the situation when Leigh motioned for the phone, and Cara held it down for her.

  "It was a blue Escort," Leigh said, her voice little more than a croak. "Probably a rental. The man was in his fifties, almost bald, gray hair, light blue eyes. Dingy clothes. He took off—" she thought a moment, realizing much to her chagrin that she had no idea how long ago he had departed. "Maybe twenty minutes ago? I don't know. I got the license number, though. It was—" she broke off again, panic overtaking her. She knew it. She had to know it.

  "Take your time, Koslow," Maura's deep voice said comfortingly.

  Leigh tried to picture the plate in her mind, but the numbers and letters in the image were all swirling about, and no matter how hard she tried to reorganize them, they kept spelling out the same horrible words: mason dublin. She closed her eyes and winced. It was no use.

  Cara pulled the phone away. "She's too fuzzy to remember now, Maura. I'm afraid she's going to pass out again." Cara responded to what were undoubtedly Maura's strict instructions with a few "yes's" and "all rights," then hung up the phone. "Leigh Koslow," she said softly, stroking her cousin's brow, "you're going to be just fine, you hear me? You have to be."

  Leigh wanted to open her eyes and tell her cousin to stop worrying, but having her eyes closed felt too darned good. She was drowsy, and she just wanted to sleep. Even though she was sure that the wailing of the ambulance siren was physically drilling a hole in her skull, she refused
to open her eyes. The drowsiness was nice, and she intended to hang on to it for awhile.

  ***

  "She's coming around, Warren."

  Maura Polanski's deep female voice somehow made its way through Leigh's brain without hurting, and she smiled with relief as the detective's chubby pink cheeks came into view, framed by her dark, short, forever-unstyled hair. There had been a lot of voices and a lot of faces clamoring around her, and she had been trying her darnedest to ignore them. But the pain in her head seemed finally to be gone, replaced with just a dull sense of pressure. She smiled as she noticed Warren's gorgeous brown eyes looking down at her, too. Her two best buddies. How nice.

  She knew she was in a hospital bed. The ambulance ride, the doctors, the big tunnel her head had been wheeled into, she'd been awake for all of it—sort of. She just hadn't been paying attention. But now everything seemed okay. Better than okay. It was probably some sort of narcotic-induced euphoria.

  Excellent.

  "Don't look at me like that," she protested. "I'm just peachy. Never been better. Turn up that opioid drip, man—I like it."

  Warren, whom she only now realized was holding her hand, sank down beside her with a heavy exhale. Maura laughed. "I don't think you're getting any of the heavy stuff, Koslow, but whatever it is, I'm glad it's working."

  Leigh looked at her husband with a sudden sense of remorse. "Oh, shoot. I didn't miss the quesadillas, did I?"

  Warren looked at her disbelievingly. His face was tight with worry, but his eyes smiled. "You know I'll make you quesadillas whenever you want," he said with attempted cheerfulness. "As long as you don't scare me to death like this ever again."

  "No problem," Leigh answered cheerfully. Damn, those drugs were good. Maybe they had her on steroids. Cool.

  "I don't want to hassle you too much too soon, Koslow," Maura began, pulling up a chair to the other side of the bed. "But the sooner you can tell me exactly what happened at Cara's place, the sooner we can get moving on it. We know that someone hit you on the head from behind, probably with a rock. We also know that a neighbor reported hearing a woman screaming a few minutes before Cara called me." She then repeated the information Leigh had given her over the phone, word for word. "Anything you can add to that now?"