Close to Home (22 page)

Jade was holding up her hands and waving, frantic to change the course of what was about to happen, backtracking like mad, no longer demanding the truth. “No!” she mouthed. “Mom!
No!
”

“Is something wrong?” Clint asked, the concern in his voice touching her.

“No,” she said, her voice softer than she'd hoped, and she cleared her throat. “Nothing's wrong,” Sarah insisted, as Jade continued to freak out, “but it really would be best if we talked in person.”

“I'll be there in fifteen.” He hung up, and Sarah, letting out her breath, finally fell into the old rocker.

H
er ponytail called to him.

Fiery red and swinging behind her, the thick, straight thatch of hair tempted and teased with each of her footsteps as she hurried down the sidewalk through the fog.

He eased up on the accelerator, ensuring that his hybrid was traveling slow enough to stay in the electric-power range so that the vehicle nearly made no sound as it rolled along the street. With the headlights off and the fog encroaching, the hybrid was virtually undetectable to human ears or eyes. Not that she would notice even if it was broad daylight and he was gunning the engine of a hot rod. She was either talking on her cell or texting, her mind anywhere but on the deserted street.

Still, he had to be careful. He didn't want to nab her when she could scream or text for help to whoever was on the other end of her connection. That wouldn't do. No. She would have to be disabled, and so would her phone. Immediately.

This would be tricky. Easing down the street, his foot barely on the accelerator, he felt every muscle in his body become tense. Using his own phone, he texted his partner again. The guy was a bit of a moron, but necessary if he wanted to finish this job. And he did. Badly.

Heading N on Claymore. X st. Dixon. B ready.

This would only work if his friend came through. Thankfully, there were no storefronts or cameras on this side street, and traffic was pretty much reduced to cars from the neighborhood.

God, she was a beauty. He knew. He'd found her picture in a yearbook left in a local coffee shop. He'd swiped it and used it to peruse more pictures and narrow his hunt, then with the names and personal information in the yearbook, he'd gone onto the social media Web sites and learned more. When he searched for a girl outside of the public high school, he used facial recognition software and applied it to Facebook and Twitter and Instagram until he found the girl he wanted and downloaded her information.

There were so many to choose from, but he had to pare down his list. He'd sworn to himself that he would wait another day or two, letting the heat from Rosalie's disappearance cool a bit. He'd also waited in order to pluck two or more at a time, but he believed in fate, and it was as if God had placed this perfect specimen in his path for a reason.

He needed more girls, and he felt the clock ticking, time running out.

This one, Candice, filled the bill in so many ways: long legs with great calves, thick hair, nipped-in waist, nice tits, high cheekbones, and a smile just recently released from braces. She was smart, a good student, but quiet and, more important, deeply religious—a nice balance to the wild, foul-mouthed Rosalie. Candice would be the meek one.

He craved a cigarette but made himself wait until afterward, when she was cuffed and shackled. Then he could relax a little. Enjoy a smoke. Maybe a drink.
After
she was tucked safely in her new home, a stall labeled Lucky because he thought he'd been lucky finding her.

In fact, he was surprised to find her alone.

Now that one girl had gone missing in Stewart's Crossing, the town had been warned and was taking note. He'd seen the posters tacked on bulletin boards and telephone poles, witnessed the AMBER Alert aired on the local news when he was watching his television, and heard the chatter in the local coffee shop.

Everyone in Stewart's Crossing was on edge and a little warier than they had been. Rosalie Jamison's disappearance had not gone unnoticed, and his hopes that people would think she was just another teenaged runaway had died. Even that buffoon of a sheriff had made a plea on television just this afternoon for information about her. And her parents, losers though they were, had come forth as well, the mother breaking down before the cameras, the father from Colorado looking shell-shocked as he'd tried to comfort his weeping ex-wife.

So he should lay low.

Wait it out.

Let the story die.

But he couldn't. He was quickly running out of time, and obviously the hype over Rosalie's disappearance wasn't dying down as rapidly as he'd hoped, so he'd have to risk another abduction. Then maybe he could take a few more on Halloween. After that, get the hell out of Dodge.

But for now, opportunity was knocking, and he was about to respond.

A reply text came in: See her.

His heartbeat increased, and he wrote: Let's do this.

In position.

Wait til she's off the phone then it's go time.

He inched the car closer and was amazed she didn't sense the vehicle.

Too wrapped up in her conversation.

As if God were on his side again, she suddenly pocketed her phone and started to cross the street, then realized for the first time that his car, with its lights off and making no sound, was within a few feet of her. She looked in his direction. Panic rose on her face, and she leaped back as he flashed on his lights, blinding her, just in time for his friend to grab her.

She started to scream, but it was too late as a big hand was suddenly over her mouth and squeezing her nostrils closed as she was pushed toward the car.

Perfect!

He rammed the Prius into park, threw himself out of the vehicle, and rounded the rear end within seconds. Opening a back door, he allowed his friend to wrestle her inside, where the handcuffs and gag were waiting. She struggled, fighting and kicking, but it was no use. His friend climbed into the back with her, subduing her and enjoying every second of it. He could see the light of anticipation, the thrill of overpowering the girl, register on the smaller man's face.

“Don't hurt her,” he warned as he slammed the door shut. Once behind the wheel again, he took off, keeping to the speed limit on the side streets, avoiding as many other vehicles as possible, and finding the road that led upward through the hills. “Did you hear me?” he snapped, glancing back. “You know the rules. No bruises.”

“But she's soooo nice,” the other man breathed, no doubt sporting a boner that wouldn't quit. He was still lying atop her, and he was grinding.

“Don't touch her.”

“But—” His voice was raw, breathless, and she was mewling, trying to scream despite the gag.

Shit. “Just don't!” He stopped the car on the hillside, set the emergency brake, and once again rounded the car to open the back door. Sure enough, his friend was on top of the girl, humping like crazy, sure to mess his jeans. “Get out!”

“But—”

“Now!”

“Oh, fuck!” As the traumatized girl quivered and cried, he climbed off her. “I was just—”

He kicked the door shut, and it locked automatically as he grabbed the lapel of his partner's dirty jean jacket in his fists and slammed him up against the car. “You were just gettin' your damned rocks off! Jerking off on her! That's
not
part of the deal.” He yanked hard on the lapels and tossed the idiot against the car. “Leave her alone. All of them. We've got a job to do.” Then, in disgust, he added, “Get in the car.”

“Jesus, man . . .”

“Do
not
use the Lord's name in vain again!” he hissed, then as the guy started for the door, kicked him hard in the ass.

“Hey! Watch it!” He stumbled forward but caught himself and had a wounded look on his face as he glanced over his shoulder.

“We don't have time for this shit!”

So angry he thought he could snap the half-wit's neck with his bare hands, he climbed behind the wheel. Fortunately, the girl was so traumatized she hadn't figured out that she could have crawled over the seats and sprinted away. He yanked the door closed and hit the gas while the damned seat belt alarm dinged. “Buckle the fuck up!” he yelled, and for once, thankfully, the idiot listened.

Sarah stared out the window. Jade, furious, had wound herself into a sleeping bag and was icing her out by taking up residence in the one bedroom on the first floor. For once, Sarah decided to give her daughter space. Jade had wanted the truth but wasn't ready to deal with it, and Sarah had been a little rash in picking up the phone and calling Clint. It was a relief that the burden of the secret would be off her back, but now she had other demons to deal with. She was certain anyone who'd ever taken Psychology 101 would tell her she'd blown it, big-time. But there it was. The biggest secret of Sarah's life, one she'd guarded for nearly eighteen years, out.

She'd been blindsided by Jade and reacted. Probably stupidly. Forcing a mammoth, emotional confrontation that would probably only make both Jade and Clint hate her, at least for a while, though time, she hoped, would be on her side.

She didn't want to have the same relationship with her oldest daughter as she did with her own mother.

She'd better get ready for Clint.

As if she ever would be.

Returning to the living room, she started putting firewood from the carrier into the cold fireplace, stacking the oak as her father had shown her years earlier. Before she lit the fire, Sarah rocked back on her heels and stared at the open grate, feeling the shadows in the house close in on her as they had so many times in the past. Though she loved it here, there was a melancholy to these ancient walls, a sadness that she'd told herself was all because of the tension and emotional drama that had played out here in her youth and probably long before.

With night having settled in, she was reminded of sitting in this very room in the dark, with only the fire as illumination, her father sleeping on the long couch, while her mother rocked in the chair nearest the flames, knitting as if by rote, never missing a stitch, her gaze glued to her work in the dim light, her needles clicking in an unending, staccato beat, the fire hissing. Red embers glowed. Hungry flames cast shifting, golden shadows. Her father's old hunting dog had usually been curled on the rug next to the couch and the discarded newspaper, and every now and again, Franklin, reading glasses still propped on his nose, would let his arm stretch down so that he could scratch Lady behind her ears.

Once when Sarah had been in grade school, she'd been walking from the kitchen to the stairs and heard her mother's voice, as clipped as the sounds of her knitting needles. “It's all your fault, you know,” Arlene had said, and though her back was turned, Sarah sensed that her mother's lips were tight, suppressing the fury that was radiating from her thin body.

Her father hadn't responded to his wife, which, of course, infuriated Arlene all the more.

“That they're gone. Theresa and Roger. Both of them,” she'd said tightly. “It's because you didn't love them enough, treated them differently. And it wasn't because they were older, like you always claim. It's because they weren't your blood and you had to punish me.”

Silence.

Through her anger, she'd managed to keep knitting.

Click, Click, Click,

“I never should have married you, because it was a lie,” she charged on. “You swore you'd take in my kids and love them like your own, but you didn't, did you? And . . . and . . .” Her voice had broken then, a quiet sob erupting. For a few long seconds all Sarah heard was the rapid click of the needles. Then, in a lower voice, Arlene added, “I hate you. You know that, don't you? For ruining my life and taking my children away from me.”

Barefoot, Sarah sneaked closer, her heart pounding. Surely her father had something to say to those ugly accusations.

But he didn't say a word, and Sarah knew she should just sneak away, pad silently up to her room, and pretend she hadn't heard a word. Instead she bit her lip, her hand sweating over the glass of milk she'd retrieved from the fridge. Hardly daring to breathe, she peeked around the corner, her vision slightly impaired by one of the two pillars guarding the entrance to the room.

Mother was in the rocker, slowly swaying, her back to Sarah, but other than that the room was empty. Her father wasn't stretched on the couch, and Lady wasn't curled up on the floor.

Just her mother.

Alone.

Sarah's blood turned to ice.

Slowly, silently, she backed away from the darkened room to the staircase, where she planned to make good her escape. Her heels hit the riser of the first step, and she turned to dash up the flight of stairs.

“I know you're there, Sarah Jane.”

Sarah froze.

“Don't you know it's impolite to eavesdrop?”

Sarah nearly dropped her glass.

“Get to bed before I get myself a switch!”

Sarah scurried up the stairs on her tiptoes, never making a sound, not taking so much as a sip from her glass, certain Arlene would follow after her and make good her threat.

Shivering under the covers, she'd waited.

Arlene hadn't followed.

The next morning, Sarah was convinced she hadn't slept a wink, but the full glass of milk that she'd set on the night table and left untouched was missing, and she didn't remember anyone removing it, so she must've dozed off. Or had her mother climbed up the old stairs to stand in the doorway, backlit by the hall fixture, her shadow long on the wall, a willow switch clenched in her hand? Had it been part of a distorted nightmare, or had Arlene stood in the doorway, eyes glowing like a demon, fingers twisting over the switch, rage contorting her beautiful features as she'd gazed down on her sleeping daughter?