by Tom Leveen
“Well?” he said as we leaned against the wall and went back to scanning for anyone who might be sneaking up on us.
I frowned. “How tall are you?”
“About six foot.”
“So then the wall is what?”
“Just a bit over that.”
“And the bushes go up another couple feet,” I said. “There’s a detached garage in that corner, but his car isn’t parked in it. It’s parked by the back door. He could drive back there and get someone into or out of the house without anyone seeing.”
“So he’s a private guy,” David said. And when I glared at him, he added, “Just playing devil’s advocate. A little while ago you were joking about breaking and entering.”
I hadn’t been joking. And thought the better of mentioning it. Instead I said, “I thought you were on my side.”
“I’m freezing my ass off in a dark alley in Canyon City to spy on an alleged kidnapper,” David said. He kicked my shoe. “Pretty sure I’m on your side.”
“Fair enough,” I said.
Also, he was right: it was getting colder. Snow still drifted down and piled up ever so gently against phone poles and sidewalk curbs. Not big drifts or anything, and it would probably be gone by morning, but still.
“So what now, Sherlock?” David said, rubbing his hands together.
I almost told him we should get back to his car, blast the heater, and go get some superhot coffee, because I didn’t have a single other idea in mind. The fact that we—that I—had even gotten this far seemed something just short of miraculous.
Yet all I had to show for our trouble today was that according to his church, Franklin Rebane didn’t have a daughter. A fact that by itself meant absolutely nothing. Maybe gathering more intelligence was the way to go, do more research on him. Or maybe we were best served just going home and seeing what the police came up with.
Instead of saying any of this, I shut my mouth and pressed my lips together as I heard the back door to Rebane’s house open and close.
David and I locked eyes.
I heard keys jingling, that same irritating pocket-jingle from the Hole in the Wall. A moment later I heard him get into the car, start it up, and then roll down the driveway.
He’d left.
I can only imagine what my face must’ve looked like, because David very quickly said, “Hold on, Pel.”
“No, come on,” I said. “I’ve got to go now.”
“Pelly, wait.”
“We won’t get another shot like this. David, please!”
“Then I’m coming with you.”
“I need you around the corner to watch for him, so you can call me when he comes back,” I said. “Just, come on! Boost me over, I want to look through the windows.”
“And then what?”
“Then I’ll run down to the street or find a way back over the wall. David, hurry!”
Shaking his head, David again boosted me up, only this time I swung one leg over the wall.
“Go,” I said.
“You’re sure?”
“Yes, go!”
David went quickly down the alley, swiveling his head at the surrounding houses, then took a right and headed up the street. I knew from our surveillance that he’d follow the curve until it became Rebane’s street.
Perfect.
Getting down off the wall wasn’t quite as tough as I’d suspected. I grabbed the top and let myself hang down, then dropped. I got a few scrapes along my arms but nothing major. I was now crouched in the bushes facing the back side of Rebane’s house.
I crawled carefully out from the foliage. Skittered over to the garage. The double doors faced the house and garden, padlocked with a length of heavy chain through the door handles. I gave the lock a tug just in case, but no dice. Then, like an idiot, I let the lock clatter against the doors, and winced. I looked all around, waiting for a dog to bark or lights to pop on around me. That’s when I realized the houses on either side of Rebane’s were likewise blocked by his tall bushes. No way for anyone to see into the yard without poking up over the wall like David and I had done. I doubted many people peeked over walls in this neighborhood.
I hurried over to the back door and peered inside. Rebane had left the light on.
I wrapped my scarf around my mouth to warm my breath, which came out like a dog on a hot day. I was used to panic, or as used to it as a person can get. That’s not what this was. This was . . .
Excitement.
Don’t get me wrong, I was terrified. But I wasn’t curled up in bed, or pacing and smoking and muttering, or in a stupid mental hospital. I was doing. I was acting.
And also clearly more insane than I’d ever really believed. I shouldn’t even be here, I’m going to get caught or worse, and—
“No, hang in there,” I whispered to myself. The scarf still tasted like the smell of Walmart. “You can do this. You can do this for her.”
The door led to a little portion of the kitchen, basically just a short hallway. A washer and dryer sat against the left wall next to a countertop and drawers. The right-hand wall consisted of several rows of shelving and a large pantry door, probably a walk-in.
Heart beating madly, I risked trying the doorknob. Just to tell myself later I’d done it. Just to know I’d had the guts.
It turned readily and silently in my hand.
I sucked in a breath. Did he live with anyone else? What about a dog—did he have a huge mastiff waiting to pounce? Where had he gone, how long did I have?
Tara, I told myself. Tara might be in here, you have to at least see, David will let you know if he’s coming back.
And come back he would. Probably soon, I figured, because nobody leaves their doors unlocked unless they’re coming home quickly. Actually, I didn’t know anyone who left their doors unlocked at all. But Canyon City wasn’t exactly a pirate cove of nefarious activity.
Why would a kidnapper leave his door open? Maybe because he wasn’t . . . ?
Everything in my mind and soul said to go in, to prove the truth, to find Tara. Everything in my body said to go home. Right the hell now, because I’d never been more wrong about anything in my life.
Except as I crouched there panting into my scarf, I realized that while my symptoms were the same as my trusty panic attacks, I wasn’t panicking.
I was . . . in control.
Screw it. May as well ride this pony while I could. I opened the door and put my head inside, listening.
Nothing. Just the natural hum of electricity from a house that’s lived in.
I crept inside and shut the door behind me. I couldn’t feel my limbs anymore, and my heart gave only one thunderous pound per minute.
The window in the door, divided into nine equal panes, had a rolling shade, which was open. The drawstring tapped against the glass as I closed the door, scaring me nearly to death. I stepped slowly across faded yellow linoleum flooring toward the kitchen.
The house smelled vaguely of something sweet. Some kind of vanilla. Kind of nice, really. The kitchen seemed fairly normal. Not to use a broad brush, but it was pretty clear right off that no woman was in charge here. Dishes lay unwashed in the sink, and the glass-doored cabinets revealed staples like ramen noodles, canned spaghetti sauce, and dry cereal and oatmeal.
I stepped carefully into the living room. Redbrick fireplace, small flat-screen TV in front of a recliner, and a couch with paleolithic upholstery. Empty mug on a TV tray beside the recliner. I got the feeling if I touched the TV, it would still be warm.
I slid farther into the room with every nerve on red alert. Impulsively I grabbed the remote off the TV tray and pressed the power button. The flatscreen popped to life.
The Discovery Channel. MythBusters.
Something rippled across the back of my neck, like little spider legs. I turned, expecti
ng Rebane to be standing there staring at me, but he wasn’t. Instead I saw a series of small, framed photos on the wall. Family photos, it looked. I didn’t see anyone who looked like a wife, but I saw several pictures of two boys. Nephews, maybe. Or sons from a marriage gone south . . .
My neck tickled again. One single word whispered through my brain.
Wrong.
I was so wrong.
Slowly I turned in a tight circle, scanning the whole room. White curtains closed over a large picture window beside the front door. A staircase led up to the second floor. I considered going up there to continue my investigation, but couldn’t. Because I was wrong.
I don’t know what I’d been looking for, but it wasn’t here. Not a single thing here said “girl.” Kidnapped or otherwise. Franklin Rebane was a bachelor. An old-school, semi-retired bachelor, and that was all.
I hadn’t actually seen Franklin Rebane yet today. The driver of the car could’ve been a friend. A friend who had a daughter who looked like Tara. Or it had been Rebane at the café, but the girl just went to his church or something.
Whatever. Didn’t matter. I’d made a horrible mistake. That’s what mattered.
I’d just turned the television off when I heard a car pulling into the driveway out back.
The oxygen in my lungs froze like the snowflakes falling outside. The freeze twirled down my legs and paralyzed me.
Rebane was back.
I moved on some bizarre autopilot. Shuffled my ice-block feet backward in the living room. Into a corner, so that the entrance from the kitchen was on my left. Once against the wall, I didn’t move another muscle except for those around my eyes. Sent them darting in every direction looking for another escape. I could dive through the picture window, but that probably only worked in the movies. The front door was farther away, but I could make it if I ran now, now, now . . .
The kitchen door opened. Closed.
Rebane cleared his throat. Hummed a foreign tune. Maybe a hymn.
Coming this way.
Of course he was coming this way. Where else was there to go?
Please don’t see me, I prayed as if to Rebane.
Please just don’t see me and I’ll go right back out the way I came and we’ll forget this ever happened okay just please don’t see me oh my God please don’t see me.
Rebane walked into the living room. Definitely the man from the café.
He jingled his keys. Jang, jang, jang.
Lots of people jingle their keys, I thought. Hundreds. Thousands. That was your evidence? Your proof? You’re going to go to prison over a noisy key ring?
Rebane turned left. Away from my corner.
He bounded up the stairs, carrying a white plastic drugstore bag. Pretty good shape for an old guy. From where I stood trembling, the stairs turned Rebane’s profile to me as he climbed. Surely he’d see the cowering girl in the corner of his living room, surely . . .
His head, chest, legs, feet—one step at a time he disappeared upstairs.
Thank you thank you thank you.
But I couldn’t run.
I wanted to. Knew it might make too much noise. Also, I just couldn’t. The adrenaline in my quads locked them in place, and it was a miracle I could even walk. My feet felt like they were being sucked down by playground sand. If he caught me, I would go to jail. Period. The end. I thought being on a school campus would be hard? Imagine me in prison . . .
I shuffled into the kitchen, unable to pick my feet up off the floor. I considered hiding in the pantry. Discarded it. The pantry door had a padlock on it, slipped through a hinged bracket lock. Probably kept his booze there.
My eyes offered only tunnel vision of the back kitchen door. They seemed to zoom in and focus on the window-shade drawstring. It swung faintly back and forth from Rebane’s entrance moments ago.
The door is unlocked, I told myself. Just open it and slip out and you’re safe—
Upstairs, Rebane cleared his throat again. I heard his full ring of keys land on a table. The sound triggered my muscles. I moved.
I quick-stepped back into the short hallway. Past the washer and dryer. Reached the kitchen door. Grabbed the doorknob. Twisted.
The knob didn’t move.
Footsteps on the staircase.
Oh God. Oh God. Please. Stop. No.
Pushed my fingers dumbly against the doorknob lock. Gloves still on. Slipping off the lock. Couldn’t get a grip.
The living room floor creaked behind me. A moment later I heard Adam and Jamie on MythBusters talking about blowing something up.
I peeled off my glove. Managed to get a grip on the lock. Tried the knob again. It turned easily.
I pulled the door open halfway. Pivoted through the doorway. Shut it behind me as carefully as I could.
Then I sprinted for the back wall, crashed through the bushes where I’d come out, and somehow managed to jam one foot in between a couple of thick branches and launch myself at the wall, the impact jarring my held breath out of me in a hack. I hadn’t breathed for several minutes.
I jumped down into the alley and took off at a run for the street, praying I wouldn’t throw up or wet my pants or die or all three, in any order. I followed the curve to Rosemont in no time at all, coming onto Rebane’s street just as David was about to knock on the front door.
“David!” I wheezed.
Somehow he heard me in the drifting snowfall and rushed toward me. I collapsed into his arms.
“You okay?” he said quickly.
I groaned into his chest, “Go.”
Without a word, David picked me up in his arms like a baby doll and practically skied down the street to the truck. He put me in the passenger seat, then ran around and climbed in beside me.
“What happened?” he said. His eyes were wide and wild.
Panic crawled up and down my spine with hypodermic legs, piercing each vertebrae. Comparing it to a heart attack wouldn’t do it justice. There were the day-to-day attacks I’d had for the last six years, ever since Tara was taken. This was not that. This was worse. So much for my big recovery.
My entire body shook as I curled up on the passenger seat. My eyelids froze open, staring senselessly at the dashboard but not seeing it. My jaw wrenched shut, my breath wheezing from between the spaces in my teeth. I may have been muttering, I may have been screaming—no way to know.
“Pelly?”
David’s voice came from a mile away. When he touched my arm, I screeched and shrank farther into myself, covering my head with both arms. After that I was paralyzed. Couldn’t move if my life depended on it.
“Okay,” David said. “Okay, we’re going home. Pelly? I’m gonna get us home, okay?”
I hated him. I hated David like fire consuming the snow.
“You were supposed to tell me he was coming,” I hissed at him, my teeth still tightly clenched together.
“I did!” David said. “I called twice.”
My muscles relaxed enough for me to pull out my phone to show him how wrong he was.
It wouldn’t turn on. I tried again and again, and even took the battery out and put it back. Nothing.
If he’d caught you, I thought, he’d have called the cops, and kept you there till they showed up, and you wouldn’t even have been able to call anyone. You stupid idiot. My rubber band wouldn’t be enough to change my intrusive thoughts this time. It wasn’t punishment enough. Maybe a good flogging would come closer. Maybe a tumble down a mountain.
David looked at my dead phone. He sighed, shut his eyes, and leaned against the seat. “Jesus, that was close. He could’ve caught you snooping around his yard.”
“He almost did,” I whispered. “He came in while I was in the living room—”
“Living room?” David squeaked. “You went inside the house?!”
“The kitchen do
or was unlocked.”
David stared hard at me. For a second I was reminded of my dad when he was pissed.
“Are you crazy?” David said.
“Yes. I tried to tell you that.”
David plowed ahead. I don’t think he’d heard me.
“You are absolutely freaking insane!” David said. “Dammit, Pelly! You want to get your ass thrown in jail, that’s fine, but I’m not coming with you. I cannot believe you broke into his house. Did you find Tara? Huh? Did you?”
That strange hate I’d just felt toward him disappeared. Replaced by guilt.
“No,” I said. “No, she’s not there, it’s not him—”
“Oh, it’s not?” David snapped. “The old man in that house isn’t a kidnapper? Really? Gee, ya think?”
“I’m sorry,” I whispered.
He looked like he wanted to say more. Instead he sat back in his seat and looked out his window. His right hand grabbed the steering wheel. Gripped it hard, relaxed. Gripped it again. Relaxed.
After a minute David said, “How did you not notice your cell was dead?”
“I’m sorry,” I said again, staring blankly at the dashboard. “I’m so dumb, I’m sorry, I didn’t think, I just wanted her back to make it all stop and instead it didn’t and look at me, David, look at how stupid I am—”
“Hey, hey,” David said, turning. When he touched my arm again, I didn’t flinch. “Stop. It’s all right, Pel. You’re safe. I shouldn’t have yelled at you.”
“Yes, you should,” I said. “Everyone should.”
“Pelly, don’t.”
“It’s my fault.”
“What’s your fault?”
“It’s my fault Tara’s gone. He should’ve taken me. It should’ve been me—”
“What are you talking about?”
I wanted my meds back. I wanted a pill, something to take to put me out, put me down. I’d hidden this part of the story so far away, for so very long, it had spoiled and turned rotten. It had burned a hole in me somewhere that nothing could ever fix.