by T. L. Hines
They went out the front door and saw her getting into the car. She squirmed inside, then looked out through the window; fresh jolts of terror contorted her face. She was on the edge of hysteria now, they could tell. And they rather enjoyed it. Perhaps they would have to consider stalking larger Quarry in the future. But not this one. This one would not be a plaything; she would have to learn a lesson for trying to ruin their quiet time with the new Quarry.
They reached the door of the car, bending to peer in the window. The door handle didn’t work, of course; she had locked the doors and was trying to start the car, her jittery hands flailing at the steering column. She thought she would be safe if she could just get the car started.
Slowly, methodically, they pulled the key fob from their pocket and held it up for the woman to see. Her reaction was delicious, much more so when they pressed the button that unlocked the doors. Her punch-drunk mind hadn’t processed that extra bit—the shock of seeing the keys had frozen her in place, not allowing her to consider they would be able to gain access to the car.
They opened the door in a flash, before her idling brain could put her body into motion again. They grabbed her by the hair, pulled her out of the car and onto the ground outside. Her preservation instinct kicked in again, and she struggled, trying to break free. But they already had the gun from beneath the front seat. She hadn’t known a gun was there, of course; if she had, it may have changed the complexion of this whole game.
They put the barrel at the back of her head, pulled the trigger, enjoyed the flash-bang-smoke smorgasbord for the senses. Her body went limp, and the game was over.
Sad, in a way. They would have enjoyed more squeezing.
They should have picked up the sound of her—the smell of her— coming down the basement steps, but those senses had been focused, so focused, on the Quarry. An understandable mistake, of course. They weren’t used to having other guests around while they worked in the basement, so they had made a mistake. Must fix that. A good session with the machine that evening. Maybe even more Extreme Measures.
They would take care of the woman’s body in a bit. For now, they had more work to do in the basement.
35
MISSING
Jude left work a bit early that day—it was easy enough to hand off things to Frank, who had finally rolled in around three o’clock, just in time for his beloved afternoon coffee break—and started to think about what to do next. He was feeling bad about being a jerk to Kristina that morning, and on his way home, a terrifying thought occurred to him:
She will tell.
Why hadn’t he thought of that? He had probably made her mad; he’d certainly upset her enough to chase her away. To strike back, she could simply let the world know where she had found the infamous Jude Allman: masquerading as a janitor in Red Lodge, Montana. Nathan would know. Rachel would know. Everyone would know. He would never again be Ron Gress; he would never again be normal in this town. Just a few weeks ago he would have easily solved the problem by packing up and heading on down the road. Every town needed janitors. But now he wanted to be a father to Nathan. And Rachel . . . well, best not think anything of the sort now, not when she was probably a few hours from finding out he had lied to her for the last six years.
So really, putting in a full day at work hadn’t been an option for him. And as Frank himself had said, he had a lot of vacation built up—hadn’t really taken any vacation before, that he could remember.
What to do about Kristina? Maybe he could apologize.
He locked the door to his home behind him, and he thought of setting the alarm system, more out of force of habit than any feeling that he was in danger.
He was still thinking about Kristina, wondering if he should maybe go over to the Stumble Inn, find her and apologize, when a knock came at the door. Well, she had saved him a trip. He sighed, got up from his chair, and walked to the front door. Yeah, he would apologize. That would be the best thing.
But when he opened the door, it wasn’t Kristina at all. It was Officer Grant from the Red Lodge Police Department, a pained look on his face. ‘‘Mr. Gress, I’m sorry to bother you,’’ he said. ‘‘But I think you’d better come down to the station with me again.’’
Fifteen minutes later, Jude sat in Odum’s office. The chief stared at him across the desk for a few moments before speaking. ‘‘I’m gonna give this to you straight, Mr. Gress. Mr. Burkhart. Whatever. Let’s just call you Gress.’’
Jude nodded.
‘‘Your son is missing.’’
A circuit breaker on Jude’s nervous system tripped, shutting down all power. ‘‘What?’’ he whispered, his voice a guttural croak.
‘‘Your boy’s missing, Mr. Gress.’’ Chief Odum let out a sigh and sat back in his chair. ‘‘Actually, it’s two of them: your boy and a friend. A Bradley Whittaker.’’
Jude sat, unable to move, unable to speak. Bradley, whom he had refused to touch and give a message to. Bradley, whom he had condemned. And now the ripple effect Kristina had spoken of was crashing down on him with the roar of a tidal wave: he had refused to act and had sacrificed two children—including his own son—because of it.
‘‘Now,’’ Odum continued, ‘‘I know you’re not part of it, Mr. Gress. I’ve had folks following you. And after our little letdown with Kenneth Sohler at the hospital, believe me, you haven’t been out of sight since.’’
Jude continued to sit, unable to move, unable to speak, unable to breathe.
‘‘A lot of cops like to tell the family to go home, get some rest, let us do our jobs. I say: you wanna try to help find your son, you go right ahead. So I’m gonna give you a rundown on the details.’’
The police chief didn’t seem to be as fidgety now; he was leaning forward over his desk, his eyes bright and clear.
‘‘Here’s what we know: Eight o’clock this morning Nicole Whit-taker— that’s Bradley’s mom—gets in the car with Bradley to go pick up your son. At 8:10, she shows up at your home—I mean, your son’s home. By 8:20 they’re back on the road. At 8:40, both boys are gone at the school’s second bell. Meanwhile, a guy over on Fourth Street notices a running car parked out in his alley. He goes out to check, but there’s no one in it.’’
Jude finally found his voice. ‘‘Nicole’s car?’’ he asked in a low whisper.
Odum nodded, then continued. ‘‘Then, about eleven this morning, a bum at the city dump is searching the Dumpsters for cans, and he finds Ms. Whittaker.’’
‘‘Dead?’’
‘‘Not quite. Had a bullet in her head. She’s alive, up at St. Vincent’s in Billings.’’
‘‘Has she been able to say anything?’’
‘‘We doubt she’ll be able to speak with anyone soon. There’s concern she may not make it through the night, to tell you the truth.’’
‘‘Rachel?’’ Jude wondered if Rachel already knew about Nathan. Of course she knew, she would be the first to know.
Odum stood and walked to the door behind Jude. He opened the door, then motioned to someone in the hall. A few moments later Rachel stood in the doorway, her eyes puffy and swollen, her hair wild, her face drawn and vacant.
He rushed across the room to her, pulled her in tight as he felt her starting to sob. He looked at Odum, who simply nodded and walked down the hallway. And now, yes, Jude liked Odum, felt himself actually liking the man.
Jude returned his attention to Rachel, let her crying subside a bit before gently pulling her face away from his shoulder. ‘‘We’re gonna find them,’’ he said, surprised at the authoritative tone in his own voice.
Rachel wiped away her tears, and he saw her expression changing. The game face, pithy football coaches liked to call it. She was putting on her game face. No more crying. ‘‘So,’’ she said, ‘‘any ideas?’’
Yes, he did, in fact, have a few ideas. ‘‘We need to get to Billings. See Nicole at the hospital.’’ More specifically, he himself needed this. If Nicole really was dying, he felt t
here might be a Kodachrome vision waiting for him—one that might show him something about Sohler, or where he was hiding the kids.
He turned to walk out of the police station but noticed Rachel holding back. ‘‘What? What is it?’’
‘‘My son’s been kidnapped,’’ she said. ‘‘Our son. And you want to just trot off to Billings? We need to find that guy—that Sohler guy, or whatever his name is, they’ve been talking about on TV.’’
‘‘We will,’’ he said. ‘‘If I can just reach . . . um . . . touch Nicole.’’
Her eyes became hard flint.
‘‘Sounds weird, I know,’’ he continued. ‘‘But remember? I talked about the visions before?’’
‘‘Yes,’’ she said. ‘‘I also remember we agreed it might be some kind of schizophrenia, or seizures.’’
‘‘But it’s not. It’s real.’’
She shook her head. ‘‘I’m staying. I can’t just leave, not when I can feel Nathan’s out—’’
‘‘I’m Jude Allman,’’ he interrupted. There. He’d said it. He’d told her.
She was stunned into silence for a few moments, then a disbelieving snort rose from her throat. ‘‘The dead guy?’’
‘‘Yes.’’
She stared at him, and he could see the thoughts piecing together in her mind. ‘‘You . . . you said you were from that little town in Nebraska.’’
‘‘Bingham.’’
‘‘Yeah, I knew I recognized the name of the town for some reason. I . . .’’ She shook her head.
‘‘Rachel, please. This is something I have to do. If I’m right, we’ll know where Nathan is, and Bradley, too. It’ll only take us a couple hours, and you think you’re going to get anything out of the police here in that time?’’ He paused. It was time to let it all out, let her know everything. ‘‘And I need to tell you a lot of stuff along the way.’’
‘‘About Nicole and the kids?’’
‘‘About everything.’’
After a few seconds he saw the decision flash in her eyes. ‘‘Okay, Ron. I’ll drive.’’ She reached into her coat pocket to retrieve her keys. He watched as she did this and realized he’d never really looked at her before, actually concentrated on her features. She was suddenly the most beautiful woman in the world, and he was about to reveal things that would make her hate him forever.
He sighed. ‘‘Not Ron. Jude.’’ She stopped and looked at him, then turned and headed for the door.
Odum noticed for the first time how golden the world around him had become. Autumn tended to sneak up slowly, making only slight changes to your surroundings each day, changes you wouldn’t notice. But after a month of those slight changes, the whole landscape was something entirely different: weeks of slight changes added up to one big change. And this was the day it all hit Odum. The aspens along Rock Creek had burnished into a deep, rich amber. Here and there in the stands of pine, larch trees offered spots of ochre. The sunlight, lower on the horizon now that the season had shifted, bathed everything in a warm, metallic glow. Gold. Odum was surrounded by the color of gold.
Odum sighed as he sat down for a briefing with the FBI and his officers in the field. He knew the Feds would descend on him after Sohler did his Texas Two-step out of the hospital. And now, two kids had disappeared this morning. But he’d been prepared, laying the groundwork. He knew this meeting was bound to happen at some point.
He had given a couple of press conferences, done some interviews with television stations, been an all-around cooperative good boy today. Yet he hated it. The cameras, the lights, the noise, the . . . self-importance . . . it all drained him.
Now he’d have to prepare for another round of draining. But he also knew he’d be able to find Sohler sooner or later, and that would tie all the seams together.
Soon the press corps would grow, claiming the side street beside the station as their own stomping grounds. Of course this was a big story: a new kidnapping. Hello Hard Copy and National Enquirer.
This recent kidnapping would raise so many questions.
Odum sat and half listened as the Feds briefed him on the investigation’s progress over the past several hours. They had done interviews, combed the Dumpster scene, and impounded Nicole Whittaker’s car for analysis. Yes, they were covering all the bases, but Odum knew they hadn’t turned up anything interesting. Nor would they.
He leaned back and looked out the window at the golden autumn landscape. Even though his department hadn’t made any big breaks, he also sensed this whole thing was about to detonate. It had reached his town.
Odum sighed again. The end of it all seemed near, very near. He could feel it in his bones.
And his bones hurt.
Behind the steering wheel of her Ford Explorer, Rachel piloted them toward Billings. Ron sat, finally mute, staring out the window. He had spilled everything; like a dam opening its floodgates he had hit her with a rushing torrent of past lives and lies. That familiar knot in her chest tried to tighten again, to take her breath away. After all, she had been standing directly below the dam when Ron decided to open up those floodgates, and getting hit with a million gallons of water from a cold, deep reservoir would take anyone’s breath away. How the Egyptian soldiers must have felt when Moses closed the Red Sea on them.
Still. Something about what he said made an odd sort of sense, put things in perspective. She could see the clarity of it, and in a way that made her see him more clearly as well. She breathed. The knot loosened.
As important as all this was, it wasn’t that important right now. Nathan was. And Bradley. And Nicole, of course, dear Nicole, who was probably her only true friend in the world.
As much as she loved Nicole, though, and as much as she wanted to visit her in the hospital, this drive to Billings was a struggle. Like climbing Everest without oxygen. Every mile traveled was a mile farther from Nathan, and each one became exponentially more difficult. She felt as if she were attached to a giant bungee cord, and she was now stretching it to its fullest extent. The cord wanted to whip her back to Red Lodge, but she refused to let go. If she went all the way to Billings, the cord might snap, and she might just snap herself. She’d lose that . . . connection with Nathan, who she felt was still in Red Lodge somewhere. Her maternal instinct told her this was so, and she knew better than to dismiss that instinct.
But Ron said they needed to go to Billings, and something told her that was right also. She had been forming silent prayers in her mind all morning, trying to push aside the never-ending screams of terror filling her consciousness.
A new voice had awakened inside her while she prayed.
The voice instantly quieted the screams of horror, and she knew it was a gift from God. Maybe it was even the voice of God himself. Go with him, the voice said.
And so she had. She felt the bungee cord tightening as she drove, but she also felt the voice (and that was the way it had happened: she felt the voice, rather than heard it) telling her she was doing the right thing.
Rachel finally turned to look at Ron. No, it wasn’t Ron, was it? He had just told her that. It was Jude. Jude Allman. The Jude Allman. ‘‘So,’’ she said, ‘‘you think going to see Nicole will help you find out something?’’ The voice inside her answered yes, but she waited for Jude.
‘‘Yeah. I think so. I hope so.’’
‘‘Jude Allman. You know, I halfway thought you never really existed. I thought he was just someone the media made up—’’
‘‘In lots of ways, he is.’’
‘‘—And then I end up having a child with him. You. Whatever.’’
She looked out her window, noticed the giant fields of grain stretching away from the road. It was late this year for the grain harvest. Usually it was gone in late August or early September. Here it was the end of September and the stalks of grain still swayed in the autumn breeze. They were close to the hospital now, passing through the farm fields just outside of Billings.
Rachel hoped she wasn’t heading to
a bitter harvest of her own.
She moved her lips, softly saying another prayer, and Jude turned to watch. She kept going, ignoring his stare.
He spoke when she had finished. ‘‘Remember that news story about seven years ago—the gunman at a little church in Nebraska? That was Bingham.’’
She did remember it. She hadn’t been a Christ follower then, hadn’t even met Jude yet. But the story had still disturbed her. ‘‘I remember,’’ she said. ‘‘The guy busted into the middle of the service and killed five or six people. But you can’t—’’
‘‘Eight people. My mother was one of them.’’
Rachel felt her lungs stop. Where was the voice of God inside her now? What could she say? ‘‘I . . . I’m sorry,’’ she stammered.
‘‘Your God killed my mother after she decided to start going back to church.’’ He turned and looked out the window again.
She sat in silence for a few moments, hoping for another prompting from the voice inside. None came. She didn’t want to talk about this now, not at all. She only wanted to find Nathan, wrap her arms around him, never let him go.
And yet she couldn’t do that, not on the road to Billings. And Jude had just opened a door for her to walk through. How could she just ignore it?
She sighed. ‘‘In the Bible, there’s a story about Joseph. His brothers, out of jealousy, sold him to merchants as a slave. But Joseph eventually became the governor of Egypt. When Joseph saw his brothers again, he said to them: ‘You meant evil against me, but God meant it for good.’ It might not make sense now, but I pray someday you’ll see that God can—and does—use evil to accomplish good.’’
After a few minutes of silence, Jude spoke again. The anger seemed to have melted away, because his voice was softer. ‘‘That doesn’t make me feel any better,’’ he said simply.
‘‘I didn’t say it to make you feel better,’’ she said. ‘‘I said it because you needed to hear it.’’