Make You Feel My Love: A Small Town Romantic Suspense (Wishing For A Hero Book 1)

by Kait Nolan

  “I wondered what it would be like for you, coming back here to the scene of the crime, as it were. You painted it so vividly in your book. Do you still see it? Can you smell the blood?”

  As if summoned by his words, red washed across the floor in a hideous flashback. Bodies blinked in and out of her vision. Judd. Her father. Her palms went slick with sweat and her chest began to tighten.

  Mark strode to a window. Overgrown bushes blocked any view of the sun. There was just enough light that she could tell it hadn’t gone down yet, but she had no idea how much time had passed.

  “The kitchen table would have been here, right? And your dad would’ve come in the backdoor there.” He gestured with the gun and continued to move, pacing with restless steps to the cased opening leading into the living room. “You and your precious Judd would have been in there on that old, broken down sofa. It’s gone now. I guess they got rid of about everything. But whatever. You two would’ve been holding hands and making goo goo eyes at each other. I could see it so clearly. How, even then, he wasn’t man enough for you. But you couldn’t see anything else. Still can’t.”

  Turning back to face her, Mark shook his head. “I did my best to show you the way, but you’re exactly the faithless whore Jebediah accused you of being.”

  The words were a familiar lash, one she’d never thought to hear from another soul, and Autumn couldn’t stop the instinct to curl in on herself. But with her hands lashed to the back of the chair, the motion was hampered.

  “Does he even know what a gift he has in you? How can he, when he’s wasted it all these years. He should have worshiped you all this time. It’s what you deserve. It’s what I wanted for you. For us. But you wouldn’t even look my way. You threw the gift of my affection back in my face, tried to run away!” His voice rose to a thunderous pitch, his face mottled with temper as he closed the space between them, the gun in his hand lifted, as if to strike her.

  Autumn tensed, barely holding in a whimper as she braced for the blow. In the sudden silence, she dared to look at Mark again. His shoulders heaved, the cruel twist of his mouth somewhere between fury and pain.

  “We can’t help who we love,” she whispered.

  He sniffed, nodding as he looked around the room. “Yeah. Yeah you’re right. So, I tell you what. Since you love Judd so damned much, I’m gonna give you what you want. I’m gonna bring him here so you two can be together.”

  Confused, Autumn stared up at him. “What?”

  “It seems only fair you should be together for the end. And make no mistake, there will be an end. I’m going to finish what your father started.”

  “No! Stay away from him!” She exploded into motion, struggling to pull her hands free.

  “Silence, bitch!” He pistol whipped her across the face.

  The explosion of pain in her temple stole her breath, even before the chair tipped and crashed, cracking her shoulder against the floor. Her vision went white, waves of agony rippling out from her face and shoulder. Of all the abuses she’d endured at her father’s hands, she’d never once been struck in the face. Jebediah hadn’t believed in leaving marks visible to anyone outside the family. The shock of it stunned her. The little girl she’d been wanted to cry out, but there was no air for screams.

  Mark yanked her back up. The movement jostled her shoulder and the stab of a thousand knives all but blinded her. Dislocated. The joint was dislocated. Her thoughts splintered as she realized he was dragging her, chair and all, through the house.

  She had to fight. Had to get free. He was going after Judd. But just breathing through the pain felt like more than she could manage.

  Then he pulled her through the door to her old room, and she found something worse than the pain. Because something here had changed since she was a child. A brand new hasp and lock had been drilled into the wood of her closet door. The closet of her nightmares.

  “No. No, please! Don’t!” Sobs boiled up from her throat. She jerked at the ropes, feeling them bite into the flesh of her wrists, even as fresh waves of nausea threatened to take her under. But nothing stopped him from shoving her, still bound, into the closet.

  “Don’t worry, pretty lady. I’ll be back with your lover soon, and then this will all be over.”

  He slammed the door, and Autumn began to scream.

  Judd pounded on Mark Caulfield’s door. “Police! Open up!”

  No one answered. Nothing moved.

  “Fan out,” he ordered.

  The group of men he’d brought with him broke apart to search the property. Set well back from the road, the house was small but neat, an older ranch style common in Wachoxee County. The landscaping was a bit overgrown but not truly unkempt. Blinds were drawn on all the windows, but Judd could just see through the gap into a living room with a wide screen TV mounted to one wall and the expected bachelor sofa. The community college reported he’d taken some time off today—sick leave. He’d made arrangements for his class load to be covered for several more days. But if he was sick, he wasn’t cruising the couch here. All in all, the place was as unprepossessing as its owner, with no real indicators where Mark had gone.

  Autumn wasn’t here. He felt it in his gut. But he needed inside to search the place. Maybe there’d be a clue where to look next. But that required the damned warrant and nobody had been able to pin down Judge Carpenter. Sheriff Riggs had his people working on obtaining one through a judge in Lawley. Judd needed to keep moving. Stopping meant too much time to think, to imagine all the things the son of a bitch could be doing to her, to review all the ways he’d failed her.

  A radio crackled.

  “Got a warrant!” Sheriff Riggs shouted.

  Judd didn’t wait for more. He kicked in the door, moving inside, gun drawn, aware of Ethan Greer quickly bringing up the rear. They cleared the entryway and living room, moving efficiently through the rest of the three-bedroom home as more deputies followed. As he’d expected, no one was there.

  “Holy shit.”

  Following Ethan’s exclamation, Judd poked his head into one of the bedrooms. His own mouth fell open. “Holy shit.”

  Photographs covered most of one wall. Every single one of Autumn. Autumn at work. Autumn walking around town. Autumn at the diner with friends. Autumn through her living room window, sitting at the desk where Judd assumed she used to write. All moments where she was clearly unaware of being observed.

  “I think we just found our smoking gun,” Ethan observed.

  Judd moved into the room, taking a closer look at the images. “These go back for months.”

  There were even several pictures of her with him. His image had been methodically destroyed in every one. Some scribbled out with Sharpie. Some sliced up with a knife. Some he’d been cut out of entirely.

  Ethan followed his gaze. “That whole theory that you’re the competition is starting to look pretty damned promising.”

  “Jesus. I met the guy, and I didn’t suspect a damned thing.” Hell, he’d seen the camera bag himself. He’d known Caulfield had a crush on Autumn and he’d even baited the guy. His gut roiled as that sank in. Guilt and a fresh terror. What was he planning to do to her?

  A hand settled on his shoulder. “Don’t go there, son,” Bill said. “Keep your head in the case.”

  He kept scanning the images. “Wait, he didn’t take all of these.” Judd reached forward and pulled one from the wall. “My mom took this. And this.” He grabbed another. “These were from Autumn’s photo albums. We thought they were destroyed when her apartment burned.”

  “Guess he felt the need to keep some trophies himself. Looks like the photo gallery isn’t everything.” Ethan nodded toward a box beneath the desk. It was full of more framed photos and mementos from her apartment. Even journals. Not everything, but a damned lot of it. Things she’d be grateful to get back.

  Pulling open the desk drawers, he found files. There were newspaper clippings of trial coverage from the local and county papers, as well as the Clarion Le
dger out of Jackson. Another folder held the full transcript of the trial, with pieces of Autumn’s testimony highlighted.

  “What the hell is all this?” Ethan asked.

  “It’s research. On us. On the trial that put Autumn’s father away.”

  But why? The pictures made sense for a stalker. She was the object of his obsession. Maybe he was some kind of true crime fanatic? Or was there something else? Did he think sifting through all this material was going to help him know and understand her better? As if a bunch of strangers’ documentation of events could get inside her head?

  Ethan lifted a printed stack of double-spaced pages bristling with post-its. “Looks like he dug pretty deep. Even did some interviews.”

  Something inside Judd went still at the words. “With who?”

  Without a word, the marshal passed over the papers. They were transcripts, dated nearly two years before, of an interview at Parchman Prison. With Jebediah.

  “The son of a bitch played me.” Judd’s hand crushed the pages. “I knew better. I knew he couldn’t change. But I bought into that whole song and dance about wanting to redeem himself and let him walk. I showed him Caulfield’s picture, and he said he couldn’t be sure that was the guy. All this time they fucking knew each other.” He slammed a fist down on the desk, making the contents jump.

  If he’d been thinking clearly, he’d have put a man on Jebediah, to follow him when he left the police station. But with most of his officers in Jackson, he hadn’t felt like he could justify it. Not when all signs pointed to Mark Caulfield. He’d needed as many trained bodies as he could get.

  “Slow it down,” Ethan urged. “All it proves is Caulfield went to see him. Doesn’t establish why. Buchanan may be in the wind, but we know with reasonable certainty that it’s Caulfield that has Autumn. So work it through. Where might he have taken her? What’s his end game?”

  Judd scrubbed both hands over his head. “I don’t know. To beat me? To possess her.” He didn’t want to think about what that could mean. “He couldn’t have known she’d be coming out of the library when she did. He couldn’t have known she’d be fired today. That makes the abduction a crime of opportunity.”

  “Okay, so he probably didn’t have somewhere ready and waiting for her. It seems a reasonable assumption that he’d know the authorities would get after him in short order, so it makes more sense that he’d go to ground somewhere close. The question is where? Does he own any other property in the area?”

  “Without doing a search of county records, I have no idea.”

  “I’ll get someone on it,” Sheriff Riggs promised, and moved away to put in the call.

  Judd turned back to the wall of photographs, continuing to scan the layered collection, as if the answer would simply jump out at him if he stared long enough.

  And in a way, it did.

  It was a fairly recent shot, which he knew only because the vegetation had grown so much it almost obscured the house. But he recognized the lines of it. Knew that dingy siding and the sagging eaves.

  “I think I know where he took her.”

  Chapter 19

  Fear destroyed Autumn’s sense of time. She had no idea whether Mark had been gone minutes or hours. Time passed in pulses of pain and ragged breaths as she struggled with the ropes. Her palms were slick—with sweat or blood, she didn’t know. But no matter how much she fought, there was no give in her bonds.

  Exhausted, she slumped in the chair. All her remaining energy went toward trying to level her breathing and get her blood pressure down. Panic wouldn’t help her. Panic wouldn’t help Judd.

  She focused on the feel of the chair beneath her. Hard and unforgiving. An anchor as much as a restraint. Letting it ground her, she focused on what she could hear. Nothing but the wheeze of her own breath and the pulse pounding in her ears. But gradually, the frantic gallop of it began to slow. The still, damp air in the closet weighed on her like a wet blanket. She opened her eyes. The enveloping blackness made her chest seize, but she fought her way through it, focused on the faint rim of light edging the door. It wasn’t full dark. Not yet. She stared at that sliver until her eyes ached.

  Judd was a highly trained cop. There was no way Mark could incapacitate and bring him here. No way he could carry out his threat.

  But what if he decides it’s not worth bringing him here? What if he just decides to eliminate the competition.

  Kevlar didn’t protect against a head shot.

  No. No, don’t go there.

  The fact was, Judd wouldn’t be alone. He’d be looking for her by now, commanding whatever army he’d managed to drum up in order to knock on every door, overturn every stone. He would find her. Somehow. And he’d stop Mark. They weren’t going to have their chance at happiness stolen by someone again.

  At first, she thought she’d imagined the shadow passing through the frame of light. Then she heard the scrape of the padlock being moved.

  The heart she’d finally managed to slow leapt into a frenetic rhythm. Oh God. He was back. If he was back, did that mean he’d captured Judd?

  Though she was terrified of the answer, she called out. “Hello?” Her voice rasped only just above a whisper, throat raw from all the screaming.

  She expected Mark to speak. To brag about what he’d done, what he planned to do. She expected the lock to be removed and the door opened wide, so he could gloat. But he said nothing.

  What did that mean?

  There’d been no sound of an engine, had there? How would she even know? She could barely hear anything over her own panic. What if it wasn’t Mark? What if it was someone who could help?

  “Hello?” she called, louder this time. “Can you hear me? I need help. Please let me out.”

  A throat cleared and a man’s strained voice answered. “Hold on.”

  Bang. Bang. Her rescuer swung some heavy object against the lock. Bang. Bang.

  It took a half dozen more blows before she heard the wood splinter. He wrenched the door open, and Autumn narrowed her eyes against the sudden flood of light. A tall, thin figure filled the doorway, backlit by the sunset shining through the window. Definitely not Mark.

  Autumn went weak with relief. She was saved. “Oh my God, thank you.”

  But the man in the doorway didn’t move.

  “You’re hurt.” His voice was low, barely above a whisper, but something in the tone sounded familiar.

  “My shoulder’s dislocated. If you could just untie me. Please. We need to get out of here before he comes back.”

  He ducked down, gripping both sides of the chair and dragging her into the light. She almost sobbed with relief, as her rescuer shifted behind her and began working at the knots. After what felt like an eternity, the ropes loosened. With gentle hands, he eased them off the rest of the way.

  Autumn couldn’t stop the cry of pain as her shoulders released and the dislocated arm fell limply to her side. With her free hand, she reached up, exploring the swollen tissue. It had been too long out of joint. The swelling was too bad to pop it back into place without medical intervention.

  As her silent rescuer removed the ropes from her feet, she looked up. The thanks died on her lips when she saw his face.

  Her father.

  “No,” she breathed, jerking back so hard, she nearly fell out of the chair. Only his quick motion saved her from crashing to the floor.

  “Stop it, girl.” There was the voice she remembered from her childhood.

  Old fear hooked its claws into her spine and dug deep. Memories of beatings layered one over another, stripes of scar tissue in her mind.

  But his hold on her wasn’t bruising.

  “I’m not here to hurt you. I’m here to help.” It was her father’s face, her father’s voice, but the words didn’t compute.

  “Why would you do that?”

  “You’re my daughter.”

  That was the most ludicrous excuse he could offer. “You never gave a damn about me.”

  Something that
might’ve been regret passed over his face. “I know I was hard on you. Harder than I should’ve been. You were a willful child.”

  “You did your best to beat that out of me.”

  “Didn’t succeed. You’re still willful. Still reckless. But you don’t deserve this. Let me get you out of here. Let me do something right.” The desperation in his tone was unfamiliar. She couldn’t believe in it.

  “How did you even know I was here?”

  “I made a guess. Took me a while to place the one in glasses. Knew I’d seen him somewhere before. He had a beard when he came to the prison.”

  “Mark visited you at Parchman?”

  “Yeah. Asked endless questions about what happened here. Claiming he wanted to tell my side of the story. Mostly he wanted to know about you.”

  “I’m sure you had plenty to say.”

  Jebediah narrowed his eyes. “You really want to be a chatterbox now? The point is, I’m here now. And if you want to get out of here before the other one comes back, you need to come with me now. I don’t know how much longer he’ll be gone.” He held out his hand.

  Could she really trust him? Had he really come to save her or was this all some kind of ruse?

  “Autumn, I was a shitty father, and I ain’t got much time to make up for that. Let me help you.”

  It came down to going with the devil she knew or staying with the devil she didn’t. When push came to shove, her father was old, ill, and didn’t seem to be armed. Even with her injuries, she could probably overpower him, if necessary. Right now she just needed out of this house.

  She put her hand in his. His fingers curled around hers, bony but still strong as they hauled her to her feet. Her legs were all pins and needles and nearly buckled, but her father’s arm snaked around her waist, keeping her upright.

  “Why didn’t you call the police?”

  “I didn’t much think that boy would believe a thing I had to say. But I went to them anyway. Told what I saw. He went haring off to the guy’s house and let me go. Once I figured out who he was, I remembered how obsessed he’d seemed with what happened and thought I’d come here to see.” They staggered down the hall together, toward the front door.