by J. V. Speyer
The ghost had one of the most ghastly appearances Luis had ever seen, hair growing from solid bone alternating with patches of burned and blasted skin. He grinned at Luis with his rotting teeth, held up a hand, and laughed. “Boom,” he said, and cackled.
“I canna get a word out of him, besides ‘Boom.’ ” Lightfoot pursed his lips and wrinkled his nose. “Nor can I convince him to cover himself. Even in the presence of a lady.”
“He’s been in solitary confinement for a century, and who knows how long before that.” Luis shook his head. “That kind of torture can do terrible things to the brain. For now, let’s just call him Boom-Boom.” He tried to meet Boom-Boom’s eyes, which were the same voids as all ghosts. “You okay with that, Boom-Boom?”
Boom-Boom tilted his head to the side the same way Millie did, so far he almost fell over. “Boom!”
“Right. Sounds like consent. For these purposes, at least.” Luis turned to the others.
He still couldn’t quite understand how Boom-Boom’s presence was supposed to help them escape. Mike and Millie hadn’t been able to do anything to affect the living world. Boom-Boom had managed to scorch a wall, but that wouldn’t help when it came down to dealing with Hyena Lady.
He wasn’t about to leave Boom-Boom down there in the dark. He had obviously been a danger to himself and others when he was alive, but back then, there hadn’t been any way to treat someone with Boom-Boom’s obvious problems. Now, Boom-Boom was as harmless as a fly. He’d suffered enough in life. He didn’t deserve to be tortured in the afterlife as well.
“All right. Let’s get out of here.” Luis headed toward the door.
“Boom.”
Luis almost didn’t notice the smell of damp, smoldering paper in their wake. The stink of decay produced by so many ghosts in one place overpowered it. And, of course, he couldn’t see the smoke. He could see the faint glow of paper getting ready to ignite.
His companions didn’t need to breathe. No wonder they’d thought a fire would be a fine distraction.
He sped up his pathetic attempts to get out of the room. He wasn’t in a position to complain. Hyena Lady could come and investigate. It was in Luis’ best interests to be elsewhere when she did.
“Boom.”
Donovan called Holcombe to update her with the details about Captain Power’s assistance. She still sounded twitchy about it, but Donovan understood. “Look, it’s a risk. I understand that. The way he was bleeding, I feel like the bigger risk is waiting.” He kept his voice calm and neutral, as if Luis was just another hostage.
His brain replayed images of Luis’ still form over and over again, in his mind’s eye so he couldn’t stop seeing it. But he stayed outwardly calm, at least. It was something he could pride himself on later.
Holcombe sighed. “I know. And I agree with you. I’m just worried she’s going to shoot him when she sees so many people coming at her, you know?”
“Me too.” Donovan swallowed hard. “But it isn’t like we’re going to trade for what’s his face anyway. It’s something we’d have to consider eventually.”
“Valid.” Donovan could hear the sad smile in her voice. “I feel like I’m running out of time here, and I don’t like that. There’s not much I can do about it, I suppose. Oh—Bianca’s still here. She never went back to Virginia.”
“That’s fantastic.” Donovan waited a beat. “Who’s Bianca?”
“She’s an image analyst from Quantico. Ordinarily, we’d have to wait for them to get to the office to do anything about the image—sure, we can wake someone up in an emergency and this is definitely an emergency, but they still have to physically get to the office. Bianca came to the Chelsea office as soon as we found out about Luis and hasn’t left. She’s got a soft spot for him. So we woke her up as soon as we got an image and she’s been working on it ever since.”
Donovan found new energy rising up from the ground. “That’s awesome. Seriously, that’s fantastic news. Thank you so much, Agent.”
“I’ll reach out to you or Agent Rourke as soon as she finds something to tell us. Be ready to run at a second’s notice, all right?”
“Absolutely.”
When they hung up, he turned to the others and explained the call.
Kevin chuckled a little when Donovan told them about Bianca. “Yeah, she does have a soft spot for him. Any requests he sends get moved to the top of the pile, no questions asked. I’d say I’m jealous except I’m his partner and it works out for me.” He shook his head. “I wonder how he got such an in.”
“It’s probably the abs.” Scott made a face.
Patricia swatted him. “Don’t be an ass, Scott. I’m sure he solved a case that disturbed her.” She paused. “The abs probably don’t hurt. All right. So we’ve got the image person working on the video. We’ve got state troopers going to two of the abandoned asylums. What else can we do?”
“Agent Holcombe said specifically to be ready to go at the drop of a hat.” Donovan put his shoes back on. “We should have been ready to go anyway, but it’s good to be reminded. We should maybe wake Alex.”
Patricia shook her head. “Absolutely not. That young man is in terrible shape. What’s he going to do, bleed on your suspect? Would Luis want you to kill his colleague to support his ego? I don’t think so. He’d tell you to leave the boy alone and make sure he’s comfortable.”
Donovan bit down on his lip. “You’re not wrong. Alex just wouldn’t be able to forgive himself if something happened and he wasn’t there to try to stop it. You are a cop, you’ve raised cops, you were raised by a cop. You know how this works.”
Patricia nodded. “I’ll stay here with him. We can coordinate information and details from here. That way he’ll know exactly what’s going on, and he’ll be able to help without making himself into a liability. Because we both know Luis would never forgive himself if anything happened to Alex while looking for him.”
“True enough.” Donovan bowed his head.
Alex wouldn’t like it, but Patricia was right. Alex wouldn’t be allowed into the field in his condition anyway, not under normal circumstances.
In an ideal world, Lightfoot would come back with some kind of report. Surely, they had to know where they were by now, right? There were limits to the whole ghost thing, but it had been hours. Hours in which Luis was conscious and had tried to escape. That meant he must have done some exploration.
Donovan pushed the thought out of his head. He didn’t need to be building resentment toward a dead man. He needed to focus.
The first report came in from the crew in Waltham, in the form of Donovan’s cousin Cecelia. Cecelia was more of a second or third cousin, Donovan was never quite sure which. He just knew she and Patricia were tighter than the warp and weft on most fabric, and Cecelia would do just about anything Patricia asked.
“I sent a handful of guys from the night shift up to where the Metropolitan State Hospital used to be and to the Gaebler Center. The buildings are pretty much demolished. There’s nothing left for the abductor to use to hold someone, not the way you described, Patti.” Cecelia was on speakerphone. “I went up there myself, because the demolition was relatively recent. The boys might have missed something, because the grounds on that place were huge. I mean the facility crossed into Belmont and Lexington, remember?”
Patricia sniffed. “I remember. What a sad place to be.”
“Well, yeah. They didn’t really treat people back in the day, you know? Didn’t know how. But that’s not here or there. We broke up three teenage parties, which is going to get some angry parents calling in the morning, but that’s about it. There’s no place for this sick person to be hiding our sweet Luis.”
“Thanks for checking it out, Cici.” Patricia sighed heavily. Waltham was relatively close by. It wouldn’t take long to get there. “I appreciate it.”
“Thanks, Aunt Cecelia.” Donovan made sure he spoke up before Patricia ended the call.
“We’ll find him, Donnie.” He could
hear the smile in Cecelia’s voice. “You can count on that.”
The call ended.
Kevin stood up, hands in his pockets. “Well, that’s one place eliminated. Down to the other three.” He headed up the stairs. “I’m going to wake Alex.”
Ten minutes later, as Kevin helped Alex down the stairs, Donovan’s phone rang. He didn’t recognize the number, but it had a Virginia area code.
“Lieutenant Carey.”
The voice on the other end of the line belonged to a woman, one who had a thick Queens accent and spoke almost too fast to be understood. “Lieutenant Carey? Donovan? My name’s Bianca Laterza. I’m a friend of Luis’, I work with him at the FBI. I do the image analysis. I’m looking at the video the kidnapper sent right now.”
Donovan blinked as he tried to make his exhausted brain catch up with someone clearly in a permanent state of fast-forward. “Hang on, let me put you on speaker. I think I’ve heard the name, Doctor—” He switched from the handset to speaker.
“Oh, just call me Bianca. I don’t stand on ceremony with Luis, and you’re his boyfriend, so whatever. Look, I’ve started my analysis of the video, and there’s a lot there, but it occurred to me to start with the basics. And I do mean really basic. We’re talking you-don’t-need-a-PhD-to-do-this-shit basic, which is kind of insulting because I have two. Anyway, not that it’s a big deal. So I did take a look at the most basic information and it turns out your lunatic is using her own personal, very own cell phone, under her very own personal name.”
“She shot the video with her phone.” Donovan translated more for himself. “I know that’s important, but I’m not exactly tech savvy. Why is that an issue for her?”
“Well, it’s important because it was easy to figure out where she was at the time. See, we’d normally have to get a warrant for that, and as it happens, we did get an emergency warrant once we knew who we were dealing with. But once I had everything, like the phone number, it was easy enough to trace the phone signal. I mean, I couldn’t pinpoint the exact location without being back in Quantico, but that would be kind of weird and I’m pretty sure you don’t want the satellite coordinates for air strikes—”
“Bianca, this is Kevin Rourke. I love you, you’re amazing at your job, no one else does it like you do. I’ve got four of us ready to head out the door right now, so maybe you could give us a general area without the air strike coordinates?”
Kevin sounded fine, but Donovan recognized the look of a man who was barely holding it together.
“Right. Sorry. She’s in Medfield. I don’t know where Medfield is. Is it made up? It sounds made up. I bet there are cows.”
“Oh my God, you’re a miracle worker. I’m sending you fifty fruit baskets. Thank you so much.”
“Go get ’em, tiger.” Bianca hung up.
Donovan grabbed his coat, hugged his mother, and ran out the door. He headed toward his car, already dialing Captain Power, when Kevin turned him around and directed him toward his giant “inconspicuous” FBI-issued SUV.
Scott and John were already in the back.
Donovan decided not to argue. He updated Power on their destination as Kevin peeled out of the driveway, lights on, and headed toward the highway.
It only took a few seconds to realize exactly why Luis had such a low opinion of Boston drivers. Driving with Kevin was a challenge to Donovan’s own agnosticism. Before they’d gone even one exit, Donovan remembered every prayer he’d learned in Sunday school. By the time they’d gone two, he remembered some of the Portuguese curses Luis muttered. He might not be able to give a literal translation, but he knew they were appropriate for the situation.
Even John and Scott were holding on for dear life in the back seat. John had a set of rosary beads in one hand. He clutched them so tight his knuckles were white.
Scott swatted him. “Don’t stiffen up your trigger fingers, dumbass. We might need them.”
“Who knows anything about Medfield?” Donovan asked, hoping no one noticed how tight he was gripping the passenger-assist bar.
“Medfield was built later than most of the other abandoned hospitals.” Kevin barely noticed as he passed a slow-moving gold-toned Buick on the right. “The biggest problem we’re going to have is that most of the buildings haven’t been demolished, just boarded up. And there are a lot of them.”
“Awesome.” Donovan covered his mouth for a moment, fighting down a wave of nausea. He didn’t know if it came from the prospect of searching through dozens of buildings in a race against the clock or if it came from Kevin’s oblivious approach to driving. “What are we looking at here?”
“Well, they decided when they built the place that ‘cottages’ were more conducive to healing than a big Kirkbride-type building. They do have a big creepy main building, but they also have a lot of buildings that would look like large single-family homes to an outside observer. And Luis could be in any one of them.”
Donovan shook his head. “They’ll be in the main building.”
“Why do you say that?” Scott leaned forward.
“She’s going to want to keep him secure. The smaller buildings might be easier to break into, but they’ll be easier to break out of too. She caught him trying to escape, so it’s not like he was able to just get out quick. That means it has to be the bigger space—the main building.”
“Plus, she had to get him in there on the gurney.” John scratched his chin, where his five o’clock shadow was threatening to eclipse his face. “I’d be surprised if the buildings designed to be ‘cottages’ had the facilities to accommodate that—especially for a woman working alone.”
“Good points.” Kevin sped up. Donovan hadn’t thought it possible.
Medfield, with its abandoned hospital, awaited.
Chapter Eleven
Luis could be patient, especially when he was on a case. He wasn’t used to being patient with himself, and right now he needed more patience than anyone. Every inch he moved took five times longer than he was used to, and hurt so much he had to bite his lip to keep from crying. The building could have been used for cold storage, but he’d sacrificed his shirt and jacket already. His pants were in shreds.
The shivers wracking his body weren’t entirely due to temperature either. If he didn’t get help soon, shock would set in. Or get worse. Luis wasn’t sure at this point, which he figured was a good argument in favor of shock already being a factor.
“You’re doing great.” Mike patted him on the back. “Just a few more feet and we’ll be at the next door. You can take a little rest there.”
“Is that a great idea?” Millie scratched the back of her neck. “Don’t you think he should maybe keep moving?”
“Aye. That hyena could be along at any minute, look you. We’d best keep moving.”
Luis forced a small smile. “If I stop, I won’t be able to start again. Let’s keep moving.”
“Boom!” Boom-Boom jogged back a few feet and tossed a fireball into a room marked as a women’s bathroom. “Boom!”
The resulting explosion rattled glass.
Luis hobbled as fast as his crutches would carry him. Maybe bringing Boom-Boom hadn’t been the best idea after all. There was no way Hyena Lady could possibly fail to notice that little gem. His arms trembled with the effort, even though Luis was a strong man. What was the point of staying fit and in shape if he couldn’t escape a burning abandoned asylum?
His mind drifted back to the last time he’d seen Donovan, the morning before he’d been taken. Was it only this morning? It felt like a thousand years ago. Donovan was sleep-deprived already, thanks to some jackass who’d decided to shoot up a bunch of cops. He probably wasn’t any better off now.
But he’d been there, and he’d been so Donovan about everything. He’d tried to take everything onto his own shoulders alone, answering questions from the families and trying to take care of Alex too.
Poor Alex—that injury had been awful. Luis had taken shots like that. They hurt like hell. Rehabbing co
uld be its own special misery, and then there was the guilt that came with surviving when others hadn’t.
How bad was Donovan’s guilt now, with one detective dead, another likely never working again, and now Luis gone?
He almost fell over as a wave of guilt hit him. How could Donovan even stand to be around him when all he did was cause him pain? Sure, Luis hadn’t meant to get kidnapped, but a basic awareness of his surroundings would have prevented all of this. He hadn’t asked for water. He shouldn’t have drunk the water. It was that simple.
Captain Lightfoot flicked his ear, but gently. “I recognize the look on yer face, lawman. Whatever’s going through that head of yours, squish it like a bug and get back in the game. We’re not near the exit yet.”
“Sorry.” Luis took a ragged breath and tried to focus on the space in front of him. He had to rely on the ghosts to provide light, which didn’t give him much to work with. It was better than nothing though. He didn’t want to see much more, not when the ghostly light reflected off tiny living beady orbs at ground level.
“It’s okay, lad. Your body’s having a rough go of it. There’s only so much ye can do. It’s good we’re here to snap ye out of it, that’s all.” He cackled, like a brisk wind through ancient trees. “It’s what we’re here for.”
Boom-Boom ignited a heap of what might have been bedsheets once. “Boom!”
“Well, and that.” Millie averted her eyes.
Luis hadn’t thought about paint as flammable. He supposed anything was possible, but he’d never given much thought to interior design or decor before. Whatever was in the paint used on these walls was enough to ignite, given their proximity to Boom-Boom’s flaming bedsheets. The fire spread right up the wall in a beautiful little line.
Skitters and squeaks filled the air as every rat in the institution sought a way out.
“Boom?” Boom-Boom stared, wide-eyed and smiling, at his handiwork.
“You got it, Boom-Boom.” Luis pushed himself to move faster, even as smoke filled the air. “Boom.”