Текст книги "Fear the Dark"

Автор книги: Kay Hooper

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Текущая страница: 11 (всего у книги 15 страниц)

FOURTEEN

There was still no sense of time passing for Nessa. It might only have been a few hours, or a few days—or even longer than that—before she thought the black snake, that he was not here, at least for now. Not here. Not now. And he had not found her for all his searching, she was sure of that. Not yet.

But underneath the smooth, placid surface of her mind, where she hid from the dark snake, a clock was ticking away the minutes she had to try to escape, the minutes before he would surely come back, and she eventually realized that she did have a growing sense of her surroundings.

She kept telling herself that if she could only figure out where she was, or at least which way to go in order to escape, then when the time was right, she could get away. Run.

Go home.

She thought about the others she knew were around her, their breathing soft and even, and a part of her felt horrible that she was even thinking about escaping this prison without them. But a part of her knew that if she could escape, if she could only get away, then she could go for help. She could tell her parents and Chief Riggs where these other people were. And then they could be rescued.

Even her common sense told her that one little girl couldn’t help at least five other people, mostly grown-ups, to get away. All the time she’d been awake and aware, even hiding herself away beneath the surface of her mind, she knew none of the others had stirred.

At all.

That was scary. It was like they were alive enough to breathe, but not alive enough to . . . to really be alive.

Gathering her courage, Nessa opened her eyes and turned her head, trying her best to see something, anything, in the thick darkness around her. But she couldn’t. No window, no door, not even the sliver of light somewhere.

She also flexed her feet—she was barefoot, just as she had been when she’d gone downstairs at home to get a drink. Whenever that was. However long ago it had been. Beneath her feet just felt . . . cold and rough, uneven. Maybe ground without any grass. Or maybe something else. She didn’t know.

It wasn’t until she was slowly and carefully moving her fingers, and then her wrists, and then her arms that she realized there was tape on one arm, and tubing—and a needle stuck in her.

Nessa had been in the hospital once when she’d been thrown from a horse and badly injured. She could remember lying there mostly covered in bandages, but she also remembered getting the blood transfusion that had, the doctors told her, saved her life. She’d been extraordinarily lucky because her blood was rare and it had to be just the right donor.

She remembered that needle in her arm, and also the one in her other arm that had kept her arm from hurting too much.

She didn’t think this was that kind of needle. Or the kind that gave blood necessary to live.

When she felt around, she realized that the tubing was taped to her arm and then swung loosely upward, until it connected to a plastic bag attached to a thin metal pole.

Just like hospitals used.

She sat there for a while and thought about that, until another sudden thought, a dawning realization, made her consider what she was sitting on.

It was a chair, but not a normal chair. It had . . . it was . . . someone had changed it. Someone had turned it . . . into a potty chair.

As bad as everything else was, that embarrassed Nessa horribly. Someone had pulled her pajama bottoms down around her ankles, she could feel that now. Someone had pulled down her pajamas and sat her on a potty chair.

And he had done the same things to the others, she was sure of that. Because those were the smells she hadn’t really wanted to identify all this time. It was people, as helpless as she was, more helpless than she was, going to the bathroom in a pot or bowl beneath a chair like the one she was sitting on.

For some reason, that was the final catalyst Nessa needed. She moved slowly, as quietly as she could, and carefully removed the needle from her arm, pressing a fold of her pajama top against the place that bled when the needle was removed.

Then she sat there for a long time afterward, keeping the surface of her mind quiet, but underneath thinking so fast she could hardly keep up with herself. She shifted around a bit, silently, and then pushed herself to her feet, holding on to the chair a few moments until the dizziness passed. When she was as steady on her feet as she thought she was likely to be, she fumbled for her pajama bottoms and panties and slowly pulled them up.

Then came the scary part. The really scary part. Because she had to find her way out of here. She had to find her way in total darkness, by feel—and she knew only too well that she was bound to feel those other people breathing, to encounter them in the dark.

There was nothing she could do for them except escape and lead rescuers back here to save them.

But for now, she had to move very, very slowly, hands outstretched. She dared not bump into anyone—or anything—with any kind of force. Like those tall, delicate poles holding the IV bags. One of those, if tipped over, would fall with a crash, Nessa knew.

And all it would take to summon her captor was a sound.

Just a sound.

So Nessa held her hands out in the dark, dark place that held smells she could no longer bear, braced herself to touch whatever or whoever she touched without making a sound, and began to slowly, slowly make her way forward.

–

LUKE AND SAMANTHA were filled in on what the others had found, which was little enough, and what they had speculated, as per the notes Sarah had very neatly written.

Jonah pushed the pad across the table to them, then sipped his coffee and stared at the rather sparse evidence boards.

A picture of each of the victims. An unidentifiable shadow outline of the unsub. Beneath the picture of each victim was a list of their particular info: DOB, height, weight, hair and eye color, clothing when last seen. And below that, the scarce info of when and from where they had been taken, times approximate except for Luna Lang and Nessa, both of whom had appeared on time-stamped video.

“You’re frowning,” Luke said, sipping his own coffee. “Something bothering you?”

“Yeah . . . but I’m not sure what it is.”

“That seems to be going around,” Sam muttered.

“Go with it,” Luke told the chief. “Speak out loud. Stream of consciousness. Sometimes that’s where we find the things hiding from our conscious minds.”

Jonah was a little startled. “Hiding?”

Lucas hesitated, exchanged a glance with his silent wife, then said, “This is your town, Jonah. Your town. More than any other small town I’ve ever been in, the center of this place is you. Until this happened, there was no crime to speak of. You tended to stop trouble before it started, stepping in before things could get too tense. You talked, and the people of Serenity listened.”

“I’m chief of police, of course they listened,” Jonah said, more than a little uncomfortable.

“In most towns, that would be the reason. But not here.”

“Why not here?” Jonah asked warily.

Samantha spoke up, asking simply, “Were you aware you’re a latent psychic?”

“What? No. Me?”

Luke smiled faintly. “It’s not a fully functional ability, at least for now, but you’re definitely a latent. If I had to guess, probably an empath.”

Jonah had no idea what to do with that.

“You don’t sleep well, do you? I mean, you toss and turn even on a peaceful night when nothing disturbing has happened in your town. Even when you’re tired. Even when you need to sleep.”

“I’ve always been a restless sleeper,” Jonah muttered.

“But it got worse once you became chief of police, didn’t it?”

“Well . . . there was more to worry about once I did.”

Samantha said, “Don’t let it throw you, please. Right now, your latent ability is an asset. You deal well with other people, which is part of your job. You’re able to quickly judge the mood if the odd bit of trouble is getting started, and you know who to talk to and what to say to let the tensions ease.”

“I’m a trained cop, it is a part of my job.”

“Like the hunches you get that make you show up at a certain place at a certain time, just as trouble is about to start?”

Jonah frowned at her.

Luke let out a little laugh, rare for him. “Don’t be so worried about it. Latent means it isn’t a major part of your life. Right now it’s hunches and déjà vu and knowing how to talk to people. Chances are, that’s the way it’ll be for the rest of your life.”

“But?” Jonah asked with foreboding.

“But . . . cases like this one, with a powerful psychic playing games and using people as his pawns have a way of . . . ending badly.”

“You mean my missing people could all be dead?”

“That’s always been a possibility and you know it. But the point is, he took them. Your people are in his hands, stolen away by him, and that’s something that demands you use every bit of training and instinct you have in order to see them safe. Your latent abilities could be triggered, go active, for that reason alone.”

“Great,” Jonah said, hearing the uneasiness in his own voice.

Samantha said, “Our abilities tend to be triggered by trauma, remember? Depending on how you deal with this situation and whatever the outcome is, you could find yourself a functioning psychic when all is said and done.”

“But that isn’t definite,” Jonah said hopefully.

Luke shook his head. “No, not definite. Possible, though. Because even if they’re all alive, they’re in the hands of a monster. A monster you’ll probably have to face eventually. Sooner rather than later.”

“Yeah. So?”

“He has an enormous amount of negative energy, Jonah. So far as we know, he’s only used it to abduct six people and find a way into the mind and memories of Robbie. He probably tried with Sam, but she has good defenses, and he didn’t get in.”

Jonah looked at her. “Sure of that?”

“Reasonably. There aren’t really any absolutes in all this, but I tend to go out with no warning either because I’ve used my abilities longer than I should have—or I’m under some kind of psychic attack.”

“My life used to be so normal,” Jonah muttered.

“Kiss that good-bye,” Sam told him.

“She’s being dramatic,” Luke told him.

“Oh, yeah? Want to tell him about the time I was buried alive?”

“Not really,” her husband told her. “Besides, that bastard was out to punish me. Me, deliberately. With very few exceptions, that isn’t the kind of case we deal with.”

“Wait a minute,” Jonah said slowly. Then, almost immediately, “No, it couldn’t be that.”

“Couldn’t be what?” Luke asked politely.

Jonah ran the fingers of both hands through his hair, then rested his elbows on the conference table and stared straight again, frowning. “We’ve been looking for commonalities. One thing all six of these people have in common.”

“Yeah,” Sam said. “Have you thought of one?”

Jonah’s frowning gaze turned to the evidence boards. “But it’s ordinary. I mean, part of my job.”

“Want to clue us in?” Lucas asked.

Clearly reluctant, Jonah said, “I . . . saved them. Every person on that board is alive today because of me.”

–

NESSA HAD NEVER been so terrified in her life, and it was getting more and more difficult to keep that terror underneath the placid surface of her mind. One outstretched hand had already touched one person, whose clammy skin had made her stumble backward.

But the breathing, soft and even, remained the same.

All Nessa wanted to do was find a wall. It was weird but an exterminator had come to their house a few weeks back, just to spray for the summer bugs that would be coming. Nessa, ever curious, had asked him how he could be sure he sprayed his bug-off along every baseboard of the entire house.

“I just start following a wall,” he’d answered cheerfully. “Start in one direction and keep following a wall. And you end up back where you started.”

Nessa didn’t want to end up back where she started, but she knew if she could find a wall, then surely it would lead her, sooner or later, to a door.

So that was what she was doing. Hands outstretched, moving slowly, so slowly, so if she touched something or . . . someone . . . she’d be less likely to jerk away and maybe turn over something noisy.

At one point, she reached a section of wood, about up to her waist, and then she felt something that was familiar, but not. It took her several long seconds to realize that it was the lid of a toilet, fashioned from rough wood.

And once she acknowledged that to herself, she could smell the odors rising from a pit far below. This had to be where he dumped the pots or bowls or whatever he kept beneath his prisoners.

Nessa recoiled, only just stopping herself before she could collide with one of the silent, breathing prisoners around her.

She spared a moment to concentrate fiercely, to make the placid surface of her mind even calmer, undisturbed. But it was hard, and getting harder. There was a cry of terror swirling around beneath that placid surface, a scream she kept locked behind gritted teeth.

She had to get out of here. She had to.

No matter what their captor planned for them, he had already hurt them in ways Nessa could barely comprehend, ways she couldn’t even form words to describe, and she wanted out, wanted them all out, into the normal world again and safe from him.

So she stepped closer to the wooden box with its toilet lid, and reached carefully past it. Wall. It felt like dirt, but Nessa didn’t care, she kept one hand on the wall, just her fingertips trailing it, and the other out in front of her in case there were obstacles she still couldn’t see in the dark, dark place.

She walked slowly and carefully, vaguely aware that her bare feet were cold, but uncaring. Just keep walking, just one foot in front of the other, and don’t let go of the wall, never let go of the wall . . .

–

“IT’S MY JOB,” Jonah repeated. “I never thought anything about it before.”

“You literally saved these people from death?” Sam asked, her gaze intense. “Never mind modesty, we need the truth. Did you?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I did.”

“And you remember them all?” Luke asked.

“I don’t think you ever forget saving someone’s life,” Jonah retorted.

Sam got up and went over to the evidence board. She picked up a marker, and pointed. “Okay. Simon Church. How did you save his life?”

“Before the Jeep, he had a smaller car, a beater, pretty much. I was out patrolling one rainy night when he went past me like a bat out of hell. I called it in, then hit my lights and sirens and took off after him. I didn’t know the brakes had failed and he was trying desperately to stop the car. Just outside the town limits, there’s a mean curve with a solid drop. Straight down about four hundred feet and into an old granite quarry. There was no guardrail at the time.”

“He went over?” Luke asked, intent.

“Yeah. He’d managed to fishtail the car two or three times before he hit the edge, so it both slowed the car and sent him down at a slight angle. I got to the edge to see that part of a dead tree and part of a crumbling ledge were the only things holding that car in place, about thirty feet down. I yelled at him not to move, then went back to my Jeep and got the hook from my winch. I had to move carefully, because it was still raining and I could feel the mud moving underneath every step I took.”

He drew a breath. “There was no way in hell to stop that car from falling except for a minute or two. Not long enough to try to attach the hook to the car, to anything solid. So I hooked it around me, and when I got to the car, which thankfully had stopped with the driver’s side facing up, I was able to ease the door open.

“Simon hadn’t lost his head even though he looked terrified. He’d already unhooked his seat belt. I grabbed his wrist and held on as hard as he did. He started to slide out of the car—and that’s when the slope let go. We were both sitting on our asses in the mud, watching that car tumbling all the way to the floor of the quarry. There was barely enough left to put in a wheelbarrow.”

“Wow,” Sam said.

“It was close,” Jonah admitted. “I was just wondering if we were going to try to climb back up holding on to that slippery cable when Sarah got there. We held on, and she operated the winch to pull us slowly back to the top.” Jonah shook his head. “No question he’d be dead if I hadn’t been able to get down to him.”

Sam made a quick note under Simon Church’s name, simply SAVED FROM CAR CRASH.

“Okay,” she said. “Amy Grimes. What happened?”

Jonah shook his head. “One of those unthinking teenage things. It was about a year ago. Amy had a different boyfriend then, and they decided to have a nice, romantic little picnic. In a pasture. Normally, that time of the year, that pasture is empty because the farmer is about to cut hay.

“On that day, however, I got a frantic call from the farmer, whose place I had left as part of a regular, routine patrol no more than five minutes before. His meanest bull, one that would as soon trample you to death as look at you, had kicked its way out of the stable it was in and had taken off through the pasture. He was just going to let the animal run, burn off his temper, but he caught a glimpse of color at the far end of the pasture and realized somebody was inside the fence. He was too far away to do anything, but he knew I’d been headed in that direction, so he called me.”

Jonah paused. “Just as I got there, the boyfriend was bailing out over the fence. Amy was frozen, absolutely couldn’t move. And that bull was headed right for her. The farmer had told me to shoot him if I had to. I had to.”

“One shot put him down?” Lucas asked matter-of-factly.

“Two. Two quick rounds, which, luckily, I knew where to aim. He was moving so fast that he was dead in midgallop. Flipped over forward. One hoof grazed Amy’s arm. That’s how close it had been.”

Sam let out a low whistle, but all she wrote under Amy’s name was BULL ATTACK.

“Keep going,” Lucas said. “Judge Carson?”

“Few years back, when I was first appointed, we had something of a meth problem in the area, and that was a problem we definitely didn’t need. I didn’t want it to take hold, and that meant we had to stop it. My department was aggressive, and I called in outside help, experienced drug enforcement officers to work with my people in locating and taking out the labs. One meth lab blew up before we could get there, killing the three inside. But we were able to capture the lieutenant of the wannabe drug kingpin of the area.”

“And he was willing to talk,” Sam guessed.

“That was the plan. We kept him in protective custody right in the courthouse until Judge Carson could charge him and—Serenity being a small town with not much on the docket—hear his testimony at the same time. Judge was fine with it, lawyers were fine with it, even the dealer was fine with it.

“His boss, however, wasn’t. He must have gotten in through one of the windows, because he didn’t go through security downstairs. Had a silenced automatic and shot two of my officers outside the courtroom doors. Didn’t kill them, luckily. His lieutenant wasn’t so lucky. The first shot was to the head, second to the heart. He was rumored to be a crack shot. The rumors hadn’t lied. His next shot would have been the judge.”

“So you stopped him,” Lucas said.

Jonah nodded. “It took three shots to bring him down, and he still managed to wound the judge in the arm. But he didn’t kill him.”

Silent now, Samantha wrote underneath Judge Carson’s name ARMED DRUG DEALER.

“Next,” Lucas said. “Luna Lang.”

“She used to own a little cottage, couple of years before she met Dave. Hired a contractor for some electrical repairs. I honestly don’t know if he screwed it up or it was just an old house and something sparked the wrong way. I heard the town fire alarm go off, got the radio call, and I was closer than either the fire trucks or EMS. When I got there that night, the place was already an inferno. I could hear the fire engines, but I knew they wouldn’t get there in time. I went in. Luna had managed to make it as far as the downstairs hallway, so I didn’t have to go far. But just as I carried her out, the whole roof caved in. The house was a total loss.”

Sam stared at him. “I bet it’s hell for you to get life insurance.”

He managed a faint smile. “Luckily I have no dependents, and my pension would take care of cremation and any bills left.”

Sam looked as if she wanted to ask more questions but in the end just shook her head, wrote HOUSE FIRE under Luna’s name, and went on. “Sean Messina?”

“He was hiking up in the woods not too far from here. Hunting season, so he had his gun and his dog. Never actually figured out how it happened, but somehow he managed to shoot himself. I was also in the woods, about a quarter mile away, but I was looking for some illegal traps the hunting fairies set each season.”

Sam blinked, then smiled. “Ah. You’re not sure who’s doing it.”

“Oh, I’m sure. I just can’t catch the bastard. Anyway, I was hunting for traps, and springing and collecting those I found when I heard the shot. Sean’s dog deserves some of the credit; he came bursting out of the brush near me barking his head off. Led me back to Sean, who was bleeding like a stuck pig.”

“So you saved him,” Lucas said.

“Well, I was barely in range to use my radio and have them send our EMS unit. Until they came, I used basic first aid.” Jonah shrugged. “They said he would have bled to death if I hadn’t known what I was doing.”

Silently, Sam wrote HUNTING ACCIDENT under Sean Messina’s name.

“Okay,” Lucas said. “How did you save Nessa Tyler’s life?”