“Anthony... And I’ve really got to go.” His hand pushed against the door.
“Hi, Anthony!” She stepped forward, practically wedging her knee in the door as it closed. “This is my...” She faltered for a moment as if her brain had stalled out on what word to say next. “Jacob. This is my Jacob. I saw a woman in the window. Why don’t you and...”
She let the word hang in the air.
“Kiki,” Anthony supplied, as if something in the way Grace had paused had tugged the name from him.
“Kiki,” Grace repeated. “How about you and Kiki come out and hang? Our cell phone is really dead, so if you could help us charge it, that would be great.”
Okay, so if these two were in danger, Grace was doing a spectacular job of trying to get them away from Driver, almost as good as some undercover detectives he’d known. He slid his hand away from Grace and put it into his front pocket, shielding his gun from view while inching his hand closer to the trigger.
“Yeah, man,” Jacob said. “I’ve gotta call my brother. It’s super important. He’s getting married tomorrow, and my buddy’s vehicle crashed, and now I’m stuck out here with no way to contact him.”
Anthony glanced back over his shoulder. His face paled. And Jacob’s suspicions deepened to certainties.
Help me, Lord. How do I get these two out of this camper and away from Driver without anyone getting hurt?
“Can we come in?” Grace practically leaped up onto the footboard. She hesitated for a second, then disappeared through the doorway. The door swung toward him. No! Grace! What was she thinking? If Driver really was holding two people hostage, then inside the camper was the last place he wanted her to be. “Stop! Grace!”
He stepped up into the camper, kicking the door open as he went. He yanked his gun from the holster.
The door swung closed behind him. He froze.
Both Driver and Cutter stood at the far end of the camper. Cutter’s gun was pointed at the blonde Jacob had seen in the window, who he guessed was Kiki. Driver’s gun was pointed down the camper in Jacob’s direction. He took a deep breath. Three hostages, Kiki, Grace and Anthony, stood between him and the escaped convicts.
“Police!” Jacob said, his gun raised at the two armed killers in the small narrow camper. “Drop your weapons and get down on the ground!”
For a long second, nothing happened. Then Driver began to laugh. It was an ugly laugh that seemed to fill the confined space.
Jacob took the opportunity to step forward, nudging Anthony out of his way until only Grace stood between him and the killers.
“You drop your weapon,” Cutter said. “We got two guns and three hostages.”
Cutter almost sounded tired, which wasn’t surprising, considering he and Driver had probably spent the better part of the day and night hiking through the woods. Both were every bit as bedraggled and mud-covered as Jacob felt. He couldn’t get a good enough look at either of their heads to see if one of them had been the person Grace had hit with her flashlight.
“Anthony! Run!” Kiki shouted. “Don’t wait for me!”
“Yeah, Anthony, go!” Jacob agreed. “I’ll save her! You get out of here!”
The door clattered behind him. Thank You, God! Sounded like Anthony had been smart enough to made a break for it when he had the opportunity. One less hostage made Jacob’s life easier.
The barrel of Cutter’s gun jerked toward the door, but before he could think to fire, Jacob’s good hand shot up in the air.
“Hey!” Jacob shouted. “If you’re just after hostages, how about you let the women go and just take me?”
Jacob took another step forward, pushing past Grace with his arm in the air. For a second, he worried she wouldn’t let him step between him and the killers, then he felt her brush against him as she slipped behind him.
Great. Now, just run out the door like Anthony did, Grace, and I’ll focus on getting Kiki.
But he didn’t hear the door move.
Driver leaned toward Cutter as if to say something he didn’t want them overhearing, turning his head just enough to let Jacob see the side of his smooth bald and tattooed head. No gash. Okay, so then Driver hadn’t been the one in the cabin. Then again, he hadn’t been their prime suspect.
“What’s the plan, guys?” Jacob called. “You made it through the woods, saw this camper van, decided to hijack it as a getaway vehicle and take two hostages with you for collateral? Problem is, three is a lot of hostages for two guys to handle. I’m thinking one is all you need. And who better than a cop?”
Please let them forget Grace is a journalist.
He took another step forward, passing the seat where Kiki sat. He felt his shoulders broaden, filling the aisle as he placed his bulk between the women and the escaped convicts. If they wanted to get their hands on Grace and Kiki now, they’d have to go through him.
“Come on, guys!” Jacob’s voice rose. “Let’s think logically. The sooner we settle this, the sooner you can drive out of here.”
He very much hoped the Emergency Response Team was on their way and would stop them on the road.
“Drop the gun!” Cutter snapped. “Now! Or I’ll shoot!”
“All right!” Jacob called. “I’ll toss it!”
He turned back, his eyes met Grace’s and she dropped to the floor as if reading his mind, pulling Kiki down after her. He tossed the weapon past her down to the front of the cab. It smacked against the dashboard. He turned back. “Better?”
“Come on!” Grace’s voice was low behind him. Not even a breath later, he heard Grace and Kiki crawling down along the floor behind him, as he shielded them from the killers with his bulk.
“Hey!” Driver shouted. His weapon waved. “Stop!”
Driver fired. Jacob threw himself flat against the wall. The bullet flew past Jacob and splintered the camper wall. The door clattered, and he heard someone tumbling through and a relieved Anthony calling Kiki’s name. He glanced back. The camper was empty. Thank You, God. Grace and Kiki were gone. And he was alone, trapped in a box with two killers, both of whom had guns trained on him.
“All right, guys!” Jacob said. “It’s just you and me!”
Unfortunately, his gun was now wedged against the dashboard at the front of the camper. Now, would he be fast enough to get the gun Grace had taken from Cutter out of his ankle holster before they fired? Probably not, but worth a try.
He started to crouch slowly.
“Get up!” Cutter snapped. “Hands behind your head! Now!”
Okay, Lord, now what?
Sudden sirens filled the air, wailing in the distance but growing closer. Cutter and Driver twitched toward the sound. A cacophony of swearing filled the RV. Then Jacob felt a furtive hand pull the weapon from his ankle holster. Well, guess I wasn’t alone after all. He glanced down into a pair of dark and fathomless eyes. Seemed Grace had taken advantage of the distraction earlier to roll under the table.
He gritted his teeth and whispered. “Go! Now!”
“I know.” She crouched up to her knees and pressed the gun into his outstretched hand. “Be safe!”
“You too.” He spun back and fired, his first bullet piercing Driver’s shoulder, forcing the gun to fall from his grasp. Then Jacob dropped instantly, feeling Cutter’s bullet flying past him through the camper. He rolled behind a cabinet, knelt up and returned fire.
“Grace!” Prayer for her safety moved through his breath, replaced by prayers of thanks as he heard the door clatter.
“I’m out!” Grace called. “I’m safe!”
Sirens grew louder. Voices clamored outside the camper now. Jacob fired again, this time catching Cutter in the leg. The killer swore and fell to the ground. Jacob leaped for him, yanking the weapon from his grasp. Then he grabbed Cutter’s head and turned it to the side. No gash. Cutter wasn’t the man who’d ambushed th
em in the cabin either.
“Police!” A chorus of voices seemed to fill the air outside at once. “Out now! Hands up! We have you surrounded!”
He glanced out the window. Cop cars poured into the parking lot. Officers fanned out around the camper. Jacob leaped to his feet and raised his weapon toward Cutter and Driver.
“Lie down on your stomachs!” Jacob ordered. “Hands on the back of your heads! You’re done!”
He watched as first Cutter and then Driver lay down and raised their hands. Thank You, God. It seemed these two would rather return to jail than die in a shoot-out.
“I need assistance!” he called, keeping his weapon trained on them. No way could he scoop up two guns and handcuff two killers one-handed. Seconds later, he heard Warren and two other officers entering the camper behind him. He patted Cutter down and found Grace’s wallet in his jacket pocket. Then he withdrew as Warren took charge of arresting Cutter and Driver. He glanced to the dash. His gun was gone.
Jacob stepped outside into the sunlight. Blue-and-red police lights danced through the myriad of police cars filing into the parking lot. Two of the escaped convicts had been captured. Only one remained.
Uniformed officers gathered around in groups, some he knew as friends, others he knew as colleagues and a few he just knew of. As his eyes scanned the crowd, he felt his chest tighten, searching to see one singular face.
“Grace!” He pushed his way through the people and cars. “Grace, where are you?”
Then his heart stopped. Her vehicle was gone. Grace had left without even saying goodbye.
“Hey!” He turned toward the sea of familiar and unfamiliar faces. “Anybody see where Grace Finch went?”
“Yo!” Anthony ran over to him, awkwardly keeping one arm wrapped around Kiki’s shoulders. “Yeah, she left.”
“Left,” Jacob repeated. “What do you mean left? Why didn’t anybody stop her?”
Anthony blinked. “We didn’t know we were supposed to stop her! Kiki and I were outside the camper. Then Grace ran out with a gun in one hand and our camper keys in the other.” Jacob almost chuckled. So she’d grabbed more than one thing on her way out the door. “Then this man was standing over by her car and he called her. She ran over to him, got in the car and drove off. And then this cop ran out of the trees and then all these cop cars flooded in.”
And nobody stopped her. His heart raced. No, no, he didn’t like the sound of this.
“What kind of man?” Jacob asked. “What did he look like? Where did they go?”
“I don’t know,” Anthony said. “Old and white, with a beard. Grace told us to run into the trees and not come out until the police arrived.”
Hal Turner.
Dread grew up his spine. “Did he have a gun?”
“I don’t know,” Kiki said. “I think so. And she said to tell you she really, really wanted coffee, like right now.”
* * *
“Just drive, kiddo.” Her father’s voice was low in the back seat. The muzzle of his gun pressed through the driver’s seat into the small of her back. “Don’t worry. I won’t hurt you.”
Yeah, she’d heard that from him before. When she’d seen him standing by her car and seen the telltale lump of a weapon, she’d known her choices were simple. Leave with him. Or risk him shooting Anthony and Kiki, before joining with Cutter and Driver and surrounding Jacob.
Had Jacob even made it out of the camper alive?
A cop car loomed ahead on her left.
“Don’t even think about it, kiddo.”
The gun dug deeper into her back. The cop car passed. They must’ve been passed by about eight or nine cop cars and emergency vehicles since leaving the lot. None had even so much as slowed as she passed, let alone noticed the escaped convict hiding in the back seat.
“Where did you get the gun?” she asked. “And how long have you had it? It’s quite the upgrade from the shiv you threatened me with this morning.”
“Don’t talk like that,” Turner said. “I didn’t threaten you. I warned you.”
“Like you didn’t blackmail me either, right?” she said. “You just kept asking me to deposit money in an account for you and told me you’d tell the world I was the daughter of a dirty cop and cop killer if I didn’t. Like you weren’t involved in bribery, money laundering or drugs. Like you didn’t kill two people. Because nothing is ever your fault.”
A siren sounded behind them. Seemed one of the cop cars was coming back this way. She looked up but saw nothing except empty road and trees.
“The Elders set me up.”
“Jacob says The Elders are a myth.”
“And you believe him?” Turner asked. “He’s a cop! You know better than anyone that you can’t trust cops. You’re a reporter, kiddo. You know the drill. Trust nobody, everybody lies!”
She could trust one cop. She could trust Jacob. And somehow she knew that no matter how hard she dug or where she looked, she’d discover that what Turner was saying about The Elders wasn’t true. The siren grew louder behind her. She looked up. A cop car was slowly advancing, growing larger in the rearview mirror. A strong broad-shouldered silhouette sat in the driver’s seat. Her heart leaped. She couldn’t see his face. The man’s left hand clutched the steering wheel.
Lord, do I even dare hope it could be him?
“What’s the plan, Dad?” Would she ever be able to call him that without feeling the taste of irony and anger on her tongue? Her voice rose, hoping he wouldn’t notice she was slowing her foot on the gas. “You going to help me write a big article, exposing The Elders? We’re going to camp out together, do a lot of research and take down this secret evil organization together?”
Her father cleared his throat. “Actually, I figured you could handle that. I’ve got to get out of the country and lay low for a while. A friend of mine has a place in the Caribbean that’s totally off the grid. You understand.”
She did. She understood all too well. “And you need my help to get out of the country? Lend you some money that you’ll promise to pay back some day? Smuggle you across the border? Use me to cover for you, like you tried to get me to mislead the cops and destroy evidence for you when I was a kid?”
Her father cleared his throat. “You make it sound so ugly.”
“That’s because it is.”
And she was done hiding the truth of that. Her mind flashed back to Jacob’s face, alone in the cabin as he told her what had happened to Faith. Some things, like it or not, were ugly. But like a patch of earth, filled with grubs, that was hiding under a rock, when somebody dug out the rock and exposed it to the sunlight, something could start to grow.
I don’t know what You want me to do with my story, Lord. But I’m done hiding it.
The cop vehicle grew closer. The lights flashed, the sirens roared and the driver’s side window opened. Jacob leaned out. Hope surged through her heart.
“Pull over!” Jacob yelled. “Now!”
“No,” her father snapped, swearwords slipping from his lips as she felt the pressure of the gun barrel release from the small of her back. Grace glanced up to the rearview mirror as her dad rolled the window down. He leaned out and fired at Jacob.
Jacob’s windshield exploded in a spray of glass. Help him, Lord! Please! His vehicle swerved, as Jacob struggled to keep it on the road. Turner fired again. Jacob couldn’t fire back, not while driving and not with a wounded arm. And she knew he would never fall back, not while she was in danger.
Grace pressed the brake and yanked the steering wheel. Her car spun. Her father swore, the words mingling with the sound of her tires screeching and the sirens growing louder. A blur of blue, green and brown filled her eyes. Then she felt the right side of the hood smack against something so hard the entire car shook. She fell back against her seat. They’d hit a tree. Not hard enough to deploy the air bags, but still lights danc
ed before her eyes. Her head swam.
Help me, Lord. I think I’m going to pass out.
“You crashed the car?” her father shouted. “What’s the matter with you!”
I had to. Because if I hadn’t, he’d have killed Jacob.
The door flew open behind her. She looked back in time to see her father stumble out of the back seat.
“Stop!” She shoved the car door open and tumbled out. She forced herself to her feet and ran, ignoring the dizziness in her head and jarring pain in her limbs. She yanked the weapon from her belt. “I said stop!”
Behind her, she could hear Jacob forcing his car to a stop and leaping out. “Grace! Wait!”
No, not this time. This time, she wasn’t letting her father get away.
“Stop!” she shouted. “Please! Or I’ll shoot!”
Her father didn’t even pause. She aimed for the air above her father’s head and fired. Her bullet split the leaves over his head. He stopped suddenly and looked back. His mouth gaped. “You shot at me?”
“Yeah,” she said. “I’m sorry. But I will shoot at you again if I have to.”
“No, you won’t.” Turner shook his head.
He turned to run. She gasped a deep breath, set him in her sites and fired. He shouted in pain and fell. She ran for him. Blood poured from his leg.
“You shot me! You actually shot me!” He swore. “You worthless, useless child! I expected better of you!”
She dropped to the ground beside him, yanked his gun from his grasp and stuffed it into her belt. Then she pulled off her jacket and pressed it against his bleeding leg.
“It was you in the cabin last night, wasn’t it?” she asked. “You fired at me and planted the locket.”
“It wasn’t.” Turner’s head shook. “I promise you it wasn’t.”
She leaned forward, grabbed his hat and yanked it off, knowing even as she looked that she’d see the dark red gash her flashlight had left. And there it was. “Stop lying, Dad. Just stop lying.”
She looked up. Jacob was running through the trees toward them, and every beat of her heart seemed to leap at the sight of him.
Cold Case Secrets Page 13