Stranded

“Noah, I’m Lieutenant Detective Lopez with the Riley County Police Department.”

Noah could hear a slight accent and he glanced at his father. The man was shorter than Noah’s dad. His face was lean, skin a bit weathered, his button-down shirt tight where his arm and chest muscles bulged.

“Do you know where you are, son?”

Noah’s eyes darted to his father again to see if he would object to this man addressing him as “son.” His father didn’t move, didn’t shift, just stared at him, waiting for Noah’s answer.

“Hospital,” Noah managed to say.

“Do you remember how you got here?”

Noah looked at his mother. She smiled but it was forced and nervous, a twitch at the corner of her lips.

He shook his head.

“Do you remember what happened last night?”

When Noah didn’t answer, Detective Lopez prompted, “At the rest area?”

He didn’t want to remember.

Don’t tell. Don’t tell. I promised I wouldn’t tell.

Noah shook his head again, but his heart started racing.

“Do you remember being on the road last night? Stopping at the rest area?”

He shook his head. This time too quickly. He could see the detective didn’t believe him.

“When they brought you here you were covered in blood.”

His eyes darted to his father to be met with a hard stare. His mother’s smile was gone for good now. Her hand covered her mouth. Brow furrowed. It wasn’t just concern. There was something else.

“It was a lot of blood,” Detective Lopez continued, “too much for the injuries you sustained.”

Noah heard it now plainly. Suspicion. Could the detective hear his heart banging against his rib cage?

So much blood. Ethan’s blood.

“Ethan,” he said, but it was barely a whisper.

“Your friend, Ethan. That’s right,” Detective Lopez said more gently now, coaxing Noah.

Can’t tell. Don’t tell.

But Noah slipped and said, “He’s still out there.”

By the look on his parents’ faces and Detective Lopez’s, Noah realized they thought he meant Ethan, when he really meant the madman. He was still out there and he’d know if Noah told. He’d know and he’d come back and do to Noah what he had done to Ethan.

CHAPTER 8

Maggie watched from behind the thick shrubs. Behind her, beyond the bushes and trees, was a freshly plowed field. The scent of lilacs and dirt surrounded her. At least it would be difficult for anyone to sneak up from the opposite direction. The afternoon shadows made it difficult to see inside the windows of the house.

She saw Tully stop to talk to the sheriff. Somehow he managed to keep the man from turning to look back at the farmhouse. In fact, even after Tully disappeared behind the barn, the group continued on as if nothing had changed.

She checked her watch and waited to give Tully enough time to get in place. Five minutes felt like twenty and the entire time she kept her eyes on the windows. There was no movement. Not even the hint of a curtain swaying. The fabric looked thin enough for someone to see through. But all Maggie could make out was a veil of gray and black.

She glanced at her watch.

Time’s up.

Maggie searched the ground and found a rock as big as her fist. She picked it up in her left hand. Her right already held her Smith & Wesson. It was the revolver she had trained on, opting out when the bureau went to Glocks. Only six bullets, but she had never needed more and her Smith & Wesson had never jammed. Now she clutched the grip. She kept the muzzle down, trigger finger ready. In three steps she was close enough. She pulled back and threw despite thinking how wrong it felt to shatter glass without provocation.

Then she hunched down. She shoved her back against the side of the house. Not directly beneath the broken window but close enough that glass crunched under her mud-caked shoes. She steadied her breath. Birds had quieted. Even the breeze paused.

Maggie’s pulse pounded and she strained to hear inside the house.

Something shuffled. Footsteps? There was a click. The hammer of a gun being pulled back? Or a door latch engaging? Had someone come into the room? Or left? It was killing her not to stand up and glance inside.

Come on, Tully, where are you?

Finally she heard the crack. Another crack followed by the sound of wood splintering. Then a crash.

“FBI. Step out where I can see you.”

Maggie shot up. Glanced through the broken window. A bedroom. Shattered glass on a paisley comforter. The window was too high for her to climb through. She hurried along the front of the house. She could hear Tully shouting again as he made his way inside.

Slouched down under the windows, she made her way to the other side of the house until she found the door Tully had kicked in.

She paused. Listened.

“Tully?”

No answer.

Damn it.

She stopped outside the doorway, her back against the house. Readjusted her grip on her gun. Then she ducked low and spun around into the house.

Sunlight filled the first room. Furniture covered with white drop cloths reminded her eerily of a crime scene, white covers over bloated bodies.

“Bathroom at the end of the hallway,” Tully called out.

“Are you okay?”

“I’m good. Check the front rooms. I didn’t get to those.”

She made a careful sweep, pulled off several of the larger covers. Dust filled the air but she was relieved no one was hiding underneath. After she examined every corner and closet she made her way back down the hall.

She found Tully standing in the doorway, his Glock at his side but his finger still ready at the trigger. He shifted just enough for Maggie to see the intruder. The woman looked about forty, long dirty-blond hair, mascara-smudged raccoon eyes. She was dressed only in pink panties and a tight midriff T-shirt that hugged her emaciated figure, highlighting the lines of her rib cage.

“Who the hell do you people think you are?” she asked, swiping greasy strands of hair out of her face.

The gesture provided a better look at her pale face, which was covered in acne and sores. Several were bleeding, as if she had just scratched them open moments ago.

“She was more concerned about flushing something down the toilet,” Tully said to Maggie without taking his eyes off the woman, “than she was about someone breaking in here.”

“Can’t a gal go to the bathroom without an audience?”

Then the woman laughed, a smoker’s dry rasp, and Maggie got a glimpse of blackened teeth, a couple of gaps with only rotted nibs. It was enough for Maggie to start examining the woman’s arms and legs. There were more sores on her forearms but Maggie couldn’t see any needle marks. She tried to remember what she knew about methamphetamine users. Were they dangerous? Psychotic? They didn’t always inject it. The crystals or “crank” were smoked. The powdered form could be snorted or eaten.

Maggie glanced across the hall into the bedroom behind her, the one with the paisley bedspread. She saw dirty white sneakers, a pair of jeans, and other clothes left in a pile on the floor where they had been taken off. Beside them was a huge leather shoulder bag surrounded by trash, mostly candy bar wrappers and soda cans.

On the dresser was an assortment of candles, melted down to different sizes. A hint of white powder blended with dust. An obvious swipe had been made quickly and recklessly through the middle. Also on the dresser top were dollar bills wadded up and discarded like trash. Maybe not dollars, Maggie realized when she noticed Benjamin Franklin on one not crushed as tightly.

“How ’bout you tell us who you are,” Tully said. “And what you’re doing here?”

“This is my place.”

“Of course, it’s your place,” Tully told her. “I really like the decor. White sheets go with everything.”