Fatal Intimacies (Romantic Suspense) (9 page)

20

Jessica felt the car come to a stop. For the past couple of hours, they had been traveling on a road surrounded by lush green trees. She tried to identify any markers that could help the police get back to this place, but she saw nothing except trees and boulders.

The car was stopped near a cabin.
Dark brown wood with two windows. The man got out of the driver’s seat and then opened her door. He wrapped his arms around her and lifted. She felt disgusted, every fiber of her being screaming to claw at his face and get away. But she managed to keep it under control enough to act limp as he dragged her toward the cabin. Her feet scraped against the dirt. She opened her eyes and glanced around. They were in the middle of a forest. So far from the road that she couldn’t hear any cars.

The man was dragging her by her waist with her back against his chest. She felt his cheek on the back of her head and it sickened her.

The door to the cabin opened and the man dragged her inside. This was the moment. There was no way she was going in there to be locked up.

Throwing everything she had at him, she swung her head back and nailed his cheek. She did it again and heard the crunch of his nose. His grip loosened. She tore away, and ran for the trees.
Throwing her pumps off.

“Fuck
ing bitch!” the man shouted behind her.

The trees tugged at her clothes and skin as she ran by. Her hands were bound with wire, almost like the electrical cord from a lamp or toaster. The wires were loose and she pulled them apart and let
it drop to the ground.

Every direction looked the same. The trees closed in around her and she had to push the branches away to get thro
ugh them.

The dirt began to sink and she could hear a stream. She ran for it. Where there was a stream, there might be people fishing. In a full sprint now, she ducked under some branches and saw a slope heading down to the stream too late. She slipped and fell on her side. As she slid down, the rocks tearing into her, she saw the man come up behind her, glaring down at her.

And she knew who it was.

She rose to her feet and took huge leaps down the slope until she reached the bank of the stream.
Mud caked onto her feet but the stream wasn’t deep or violent. She sprinted across, the stones slippery with moss. On the other side, she looked back. No one was there. Scanning the trees around her, she had no idea which direction to go. Every direction looked the same.

She decided to follow the stream. It had to lead somewhere.

The bank grew muddier and harder to traverse so she climbed away from it a bit and trekked through the forest. Her head pounded so hard she thought she might pass out. Jessica knew she’d taken a vicious blow to the skull. One that likely caused a concussion. The blow had been so hard that her eyes hurt. She needed to get to a hospital.

The shrubbery grew thick. It was still slick with rain though the sky had cleared enough that she caught glimpses of blue. The stream widened and then narrowed. She stuck by it, constantly glancing around. As far as she could tell, he wasn’t anywhere near.

Time seemed to pass slowly, but she didn’t have any way to verify that. All she could measure was her level of exhaustion. And without food or water, as sweat began to pour out of her, she decided she needed to rest.

Leaning against an Aspen tree, she sat in the dirt, he face in her hands. She inhaled deeply and pulled her hands onto her lap. The pain in her head was radiating down her neck now. She would have paid anything just for some
ibuprofen or painkillers.

The crunch of wood behind her, and then silence.

She inadvertently held her breath, her heart
pounding. The crunch led to rustling leaves, as though something were brushing past them.

Jessica searched in front of her and saw some stone
s gathered on the ground. Slowly, she extended her fingers and wrapped them around the largest one.

Terror bubbled up inside. But along with the terror was an anger that built with every passing second.
Pure anger that she was in this situation. That she left her children to be stuck in some forest. That a sister she should have been close to was gone. And that the man she should have been with, would be with someone else.

In a single movement, she leapt
to her feet and spun around. The man was behind her, a blade held low. No more than maybe three feet. She flung the stone, slamming it into his face as she sprinted away.

She could hear him right behind her.
His labored breathing. He sounded like a pig. Deep, guttural snorts.

The trees thinned and she was able to run at nearly a full sprint. Each step was more painful than the last as
twigs, fallen branches and rocks tore at her bare feet. But she didn’t slow. She could still hear him behind her, and then a sound she would never forget: laughter. He thought this was fun.

She glanced back once and saw his face. She had to confirm it was really
him, and it was. He wore large, heavy boots, which meant the trail didn’t hurt him, but also that he was slow and cumbersome.

The stream widened as she ran, panting for breath. The water emptied into a lake. She could see it just beyond the tree line. A pier jutted out into the water and she dashed across the wood, and dove feet first into the icy water.

Underneath the surface was a muddy brown world of motion and sound. She went deeper into the water, in case he had a gun with him or decided to follow, and then she circled back toward the pier.

Slowly, almost painfully so because she really needed to suck in
breath, she slipped up out of the surface underneath the wooden planks of the pier. She inhaled softly to keep the sound down, holding onto one of the wooden beams to stay afloat.

Directly above her, she heard a thump.

Through the spaces in between the beams, she could see him. He walked to the edge of the pier, the knife still in his hand, and glared at the water. He scanned from one side of the lake to the other. And then he looked into the water nearby.

He stared this way for a long time. Then he spit a glob into the water, and turned around. That was the most frightening part. When he stepped directly above. A single glance down, and he might see her.

She ducked her head below the water, and waited as long as she could, her lungs burning for air. When she felt she couldn’t hold her breath any longer, she came up.

Jessica couldn’t hear any movement on the pier or the shore, but decided to wait a while in the freezing water just the same.

21

Garcia had on his Kevlar vest with the words SEATTLE POLICE emblazoned across the back, a gold badge emblem over the heart. The SWAT team was point on this, but he had insisted he was going to be there, too. He had to see for himself. To know that someone he had been friends with for years was a monster.

The SWAT commander made a hand signal to his men and they swarmed around the home. Like an invading army of ants circling a crumb.
Another signal was given at some point, though Garcia didn’t see what it was, and the battering ram crashed through the front door. A backdoor in the kitchen was also broken down and the men stormed in.

Garcia was right there with them
. Gun first, he swept through the kitchen and into the rest of the house. He heard several shouts of “Clear!” and then the watch commander came into the living room where Garcia was standing.

“
Nothin’, Detective.”

He nodded. “Thanks, Hank. It was a shot in the dark anyway.”

SWAT began to clear out and the forensics team Garcia had requested came in, search warrants in hand. Garcia had informed them it was unlikely the man was home, but to search anywhere and everywhere for anything that could lead them to him.

As the team went to work, sifting through garbage and the laptop on a desk in the corner, Garcia paced slowly around the house. Taking in every detail. It still hadn’t sunk in. The shock
hadn’t worn off.

He ambled into the bedroom.
A single bed, dresser, television. Nothing out of the ordinary. His closet had clothes that Garcia had seen half a dozen times. He’d once been over here for a Fourth of July barbeque. And now, he was here with a search warrant.

Garcia
strolled through the rest of the house. Nothing out of place. Nothing that let on to what was inside the man. In fact, everything was too perfect. Too contrived. Like he wanted the entire home to seem normal but overshot it.

On the mantle was a photograph. Mark Curtis, the man he thought he knew, had his arm
around a young woman. Garcia picked up the photo. He wondered where the woman was, and if she was even alive anymore. He put the photo back, and continued searching the house.

Garcia spent most of the morning at the home, with no luck. They didn’t find any printouts, addresses of storage units, or incriminating emails. They came up with absolutely nothing.

He sat in a chair in Mark’s office as the forensic techs did another sweep of the home. His head was pounding. He went into the bathroom and found some ibuprofen in the medicine cabinet. The four tablets tumbled out of the bottle into his palm and he took them all at once and drank water out of the faucet. He looked at himself in the mirror. He saw a desperate man. A man that had lost something he didn’t even know he had or wanted, until it was gone. Even the thought of Jessica made his heart race. And the thought of her lying bloodied on some floor… it was too much to take.

“Detective,” K
iki, one of the techs, said.

“Yeah.”

“Sorry, nothing here.”

“I figured. Thanks for your help.”

“No problem. You want me to lock it up?”

“No, don’t worry about it. I’m going to have a couple units stationed nearby in case he comes back.”

He nodded. “Lemme know if you need anything else.”

Garcia followed the techs out to the porch. He sat on a wicker couch and watched them leave. There had to be something. Mark was a detective and knew how detectives thought. Knew what they would be looking for to retrace his steps. But there had to be something. Someone with arrogance like his had to have overlooked some link.

There were other cases Garcia could be working. This was technically now an Internal Affairs investigation since it involved an officer. But he was holding off on making the call to let them know. As soon as they knew, he would be taken off the investigation and would have no say in how it was conducted. A bureaucratic mess would ensue, and he knew Jessica didn’t have that kind of time.

He went through everything he knew
about this case. The house was immaculate. Nothing happened here. He was too smart to bring his victims to his own house. Like with Michelle, he probably killed them in their own homes. But Jessica didn’t have a home here, so he’d have to find somewhere else to take her. Somewhere secluded where he could take his time. An abandoned building maybe. The surrounding forests of Washington State. Maybe even one of the dozens of caves near Mt. Rainer…

A thought hit him just then. This couldn’t have been the first time this situation arose. He would have to have a regular place to take them. Garcia pulled out his phone and dialed the number for the District Attorney’s Office for King County.

“District Attorney’s Office, how may I direct your call?”

“Paul
Weiland, please.”

“Just a moment.”

A pause, and horrible hold music before a male voice came on the line. “This is Paul.”

“Paul, it’s Tommy Garcia. I need a subpoena as soon as possible.”

“For what?”

“Between us? No IAD yet?”

“Ew, this sounds juicy.”

“Mark Curtis, with MP. You know him?”

“Sure.”

“He’s the suspect in at least one homicide
and kidnapping.”

“Whoa. Seriously? Mark? He’s such a nerd.”

“I need his bank statements. I think he’s got a house or a cabin he’s paying rent on. And the subpoena should be sealed. If IAD takes over I’m gonna get pushed out.”

“So? I figure you’d want to hand this over.”

“The person that was kidnapped… was important to me.”

“Oh,
well. Alright, I’ll file it and keep it sealed for now.”

“Paul, the clock’s ticking.”

“I’ll do it right now. I promise.”

“Thanks.”

Garcia stood up and paced the length of the porch. He had to do something, anything. Just to keep in motion. But he couldn’t think of a single thing to do other than wait. And that was exactly what could end up getting Jessica killed.

22

Jessica came out of the water shivering. The lake was icy cold, but the water seemed clean. Untouched by pollution or contamination from too many people using it. She held her arms around herself as she hiked up the shore.

It was
mostly quiet. The chirp of birds and an occasional hoot of some animal she didn’t recognize. The wind rustling the trees.

She looked in every direction.
Green forest as far as she could see. One direction, as far as she was concerned, was as good as any other. She chose what she thought was east and began walking.

The pain in her feet, now cut and bleeding, and her wet clothes made her feel like she could pass out at any moment. The
discomfort was intense. She debated stripping down, but being nude in a forest with that man after her wasn’t something she was about to do. She’d rather be cold.

The walk was long and she had to stop several times.
Jessica would sit on grass, or just the trail if nothing else was available. She tried putting pressure on the cuts on her feet with leaves and the bleeding would stop for a while. But as soon as she started walking again, the pain and bleeding would start up.

As she came to a clearing, she saw something in the distance. A cabin. Despite the pain, she jogged to it. She was about fifty feet away when she realized to her horror it was the same cabin she had been brought to. She’d gone in a big circle.

“Trail doesn’t go anywhere but to the lake and back.”

She gasped and turned toward the voice. Mark Curtis stood with a
rifle hanging off his shoulder, his thumb tucked underneath the leather strap.

“What do you want?” she said.

“Well I wanna hear you scream. Isn’t that obvious?”

She
backed away, toward the cabin. “You killed Michelle.”

“Yeah, yeah, I did. Wish I could’ve made that one last a little bit longer. She was fun. I think she was actually into it until she saw the knife.”

“
Why
? What did she do to you to deserve that?”

“Nothing. I just saw
her and followed her home.” He chuckled. “And isn’t that just the shit that I was the detective that caught her attempted kidnapping case? I thought she’d gotten away from me and there she was, showing me her apartment.”

Jessica looked around for a weapon. As long as she kept him talking, it bought her time. “How many have there been?”

“Total? Oh, wow, um, maybe thirty. Thirty-five maybe. You lose track after the first few. It’s like an ice cream cone I guess. The first lick is the best and each one is downhill from there. But I gotta say, it is gonna be fun with you. You got fire in you.” He smiled. “Now I like that.”

Jessica turned and dashed for the cabin. She didn’t hear the cock of the
rifle. Glancing back, she saw he was casually strolling toward her. As though out on a leisurely walk.

She opened the door. It was unlocked. She closed it behind her and then pushed a sofa in front of it. She backed away until she hit a wall, and then listened. As her hands came up to move her hair out of her eyes, a boom echoed through the cabin that left her ears ringing. She screamed and fell to the floor. Another boom blew apart the window in the front room.

She crawled on her hands and knees to the bedroom and slammed the door. A closet, bathroom and a bed. She opened the closet door, quickly searching through it for anything she could use. Coat hangers were the only things even remotely useable.

Jessica untwisted one and then
looked from the bed to the bathroom. The bathroom was small with just a shower and toilet. She shut the door behind her and turned off the light. Crouching down, she squatted next to the door, and listened.

It was quiet a long time. And then she heard the scraping noise of the sofa being moved, and the clomp of boots on hardwood floors. The boots went through the front room. The door to the bedroom opened with a creak. A few steps inside, and the boots stopped.

The flimsy wood from the bathroom door rained splinters down on her as he broke through it with the butt of his rifle. He struck again and another shower of wood as she screamed. He reached his arm through the hole in the door and unlocked it.

The sharp point of the hanger between her fingers, Jessica held her breath as she shot up. Her arm moved seemingly by itself. She was only dimly aware of what she was doing. Fear had completely numbed her.

The tip went into his eye. He yelped in pain. His head snapped back and the rifle fell out of his hands. Blood was pouring out of his eye and he was screeching like a wounded animal.

She jumped past him. But she only got a few steps before she felt a tug on her hair that shot pain through her head. He yanked her back and to the ground.

“Cunt!”

He straddled her
and pulled out the knife.

“I’m
gonna take my time with you.”

His
stare suddenly went down to her right hand. Her finger was over the trigger of the rifle, the barrel lifted and pointing at him.

“No, don’t you—”

Jessica’s world went quiet except for a dull ringing in her ears. The rifle had jerked backward so hard, it felt like it tore her arm out of the shoulder socket. She was pretty sure her hand was broken, too.

Her vision was blurry and her nostrils burned with the smell of gunpowder.
The ringing in her ears wouldn’t stop, but it slowly subsided and her hearing came back. She heard something outside. A car pulling up.

She rose, having to lean to the side. The rifle had swung into her and her ribs felt bruised. Mark Curtis lay on the floor, a hole through his belly.
Black blood flowing out of him and pooling on the hardwood floors.

“You bitch,” he rasped. “You shot me. You fucking shot me.”

She limped past him and he reached for her, blood painted on his hands. He wrapped his fingers around her ankle. She pulled away violently, the pain in her ribs and arm firing through her like an electric current. Stumbling to the front door, she could see Garcia getting out of his car and running toward the cabin, gun drawn.

He ran to her and wrapped himself around her. She fell into his arms
, completely and utterly. As though jumping from a height into a warm pool. He engulfed her. His touch and scent, the way he breathed and the thump of his heart against her chest. Gripping him tightly, her voice hardly a whisper, she said, “What took you so long?”