MIND READER (11 page)

“And?”

Caron held off a sigh. So Parker knew there was more. Sandy had said Parker was sharp; that, at least, had been
the truth. “And there’s still no report of any abduction.”

“So we still have no hard evidence.”

“Ina saw Decker getting a girl’s bike out of his car trunk.
It was lavender...just like the bike I imaged.”

“Mmm.” Parker stretched out, rested his arm on the back of the seat. “We need more.”

They did. But at least he wasn’t disputing her images. That was progress. Only then did it occur to her just how
much she wanted him to believe her.

Her stomach rumbled.

“Didn’t you get enough to eat?” he asked.

Her hand felt cold without his covering it. She buried it
in her lap. “Too much.”

“Why’s your stomach still growling?”

His fingertip brushed her nape. Caron looked down to
his chest. “I’m not hungry.”

“You sound hungry to me.” One finger became four and
a thumb, kneading the knots from her muscles. “And you’re tense.”

She was tense. The images coming back. Worrying about
the little girl. Parker touching her. How could she not be
tense? But he was wrong about the rest. “I’m not hun
gry.” She gave him a flat look. “The girl is.”

He clamped his jaw shut and moved his hand. “Don’t
you think it’s time to play straight with me instead of pawning off this—”

“Caron interrupted him, squeezing his jean-clad thigh.
“Decker’s leaving.”

He swung his gaze to the front door, but then saw Decker
backing out of the garage in a raggedy Plymouth.

“You follow him in your car,” Caron said. “I’ll check the house.”

“
What
about the Doberman? He’ll swallow you whole.”

Caron grabbed the leftover burger from the dash and predicted, “He’ll welcome me with open arms.”

“No. What if someone else is there? You don’t know
what you might be walking into here.”

“I’m hoping
I’ll
walk in on the girl.” Caron swept her hair back from her face. “I feel her here, Parker. I have to
go in.”

He hesitated for a long moment. It would be better if he went up against Decker. Still, Parker hated the idea of her
entering that house alone. “All right.” He dropped his voice. “But be careful.”

When Decker was busy closing the garage door, Parker
cracked the door open and slid out, then leaned down to look back at her. “You will be here when I get back?”

“Yes.” Caron’s heart raced.

Parker shut the door.

Caron waited until Decker drove off and Parker fol
lowed him. Then she got out of the car. Killer met her at the
gate, growling and raising a ruckus. She broke off a bit of
the burger and tossed it to him, wishing she had a muzzle.
She’d always been afraid of large dogs. And Killer was
monstrously large.

He gobbled up the burger and returned for more. Caron opened the gate and stepped inside. When he didn’t lunge
for her, she broke off a second piece and dropped it beside
him, praising him for not biting her.

A third bite fed got her to the front door. It was un
locked, which surprised her—despite the Doberman—and she left the rest of the burger on the front stoop, then went
inside and closed the door behind her.

The living room was a disaster. The television was on and
tuned to a Saints-Redskins game. Beer cans littered the
coffee table and an end table beside a
worn-out recliner.
Caron stepped over a misshapen stack of newspapers
Decker hadn’t bothered to unroll and entered the kitchen.

Half a TV dinner that looked like it had been there for a week was on top of the stove. More beer cans were on the counter. And the only way to get another dish into the double sink would be with a wedge. The tile counter was greasy. So was the torn potato chip bag on it. She noticed some scribbling, and a pen set beside the bag, and looked closer. A phone number had been written there.

She copied the number, then walked through the kitchen
to the door. The garage. Dirty and messy, just like the rest of his house. She glimpsed color and swung her gaze. There, in the far corner, she saw the little lavender bike.

Her heart pounding hard, thudding against her chest
wall, Caron walked across the oil-stained concrete and looked closer at the bike. A name had been etched into a metal plate at the center of the handlebars.
Misty.

That was the child. Caron knew it. Tense, she reached over and traced the letters with a trembling fingertip. Betrayal flooded her. Fear joined it. A fear so cold, so chill
ing, that she had experienced it only once before. The night
Sarah James had been murdered.

Whimpering, Caron tried to pull back, but she couldn’t
move. Her fingers had gone stiff on the handlebars. She felt
frozen. Willing herself to calm down, she felt her wrists
begin to throb, her leg to burn like fire where before it had
only stung.

A car horn honked. Parker, warning her.

She spun around. Decker! Decker was back!

The garage door started to open. Caron ran inside. If she
hurried, she could make the front door
before
he made it
in through the back one.

She jerked the front door open. Killer growled, showing
her every sharp tooth in his head. Caron heard the garage
door going down, and slammed the front door. Where
could she go? How was she going to get out of here?

The door leading to the kitchen creaked open, then
slammed shut. Something heavy thunked down on the tile.
Caron rushed down the narrow hall and ducked into the first room. A bathroom? There was nowhere to hide in a
bathroom!

Fighting panic, she stepped inside the shower and drew
the curtain almost closed. The tub was caked with soap
scum. Black mold had taken over the tile grout and caulking. She couldn’t die in this pigsty. She couldn’t!

The bathroom door groaned open. The shower scene from the movie
Psycho
flashed into her mind. Sweating
profusely, her flesh crawling, Caron flattened herself
against the back wall of the shower, shaking with fear.

Decker stuck his hand in and cranked the faucet. Caron
glued her gaze to his beefy fingers, not daring to breathe. The pipes moaned and hissed, and then ice-cold water streamed out, soaking her from head to toe. She held her breath and didn’t move. She wanted to move. She tried to move. But, God help her, she couldn’t so much as bat an
eyelash.

Chapter 4

The water grew hot and steamy.

Caron stood in the shower beneath the stinging spray, her
clothes plastered to her body. Mesmerized, not daring to draw breath, she watched a distorted Decker through the frosted shower curtain. He was a big man, barrel-chested
and thick-muscled. Bullish. And she harbored no illusions; to hide his involvement in Misty’s kidnapping,
Decker would kill her. Pushed, he would kill both her and Misty. The hard-knocks Deckers of this world resented be
ing pushed, and they pushed back—hard.

He unbuttoned his shirt.

Shivering, Caron forced her numb mind to think. When
he dropped his pants, she’d push past him, and run. That
was her best hope of getting out of here alive, of finding
Misty.

Decker unbuckled his razor-thin belt. Through the curtain, it looked like a black snake. A potential weapon.
Grabbing one end to pull it from the loops, he stilled, as if
listening. Caron strained to hear, but the fear pounding through her veins, the splatter of the water against the fiberglass tub, drowned out all other sounds.

“Damn it,” Decker muttered, then left the bathroom.

What was going on? She stuck her head out and heard
the doorbell.

Parker! Imaging him pacing outside Decker’s front door,
she stumbled from the tub, her knees weak with relief.

Dripping water onto the threadbare carpet, she eased her
way along the wall to the mouth of the hallway, near the
living room. Her shoes hissed out water. She took them off,
her adrenaline pumping hard, her heart knocking against
her ribs.

A bare-backed Decker stood dead ahead, facing the front
door. With as little as a half turn, he would have her in plain sight. Parker’s voice rang out, and she caught a
glimpse of him over Decker’s shoulder. No one ever had
looked or sounded so good.

She slipped past Decker and inched to the back door.

On the other side of the screen, Killer was waiting.

Snarling, he hulked down, growled deep and throaty,
baring his teeth. In a cold sweat, Caron snapped the screen
door back. The dog reared, lost his balance, and toppled.
Scrambling to his feet, he barked wildly.

Caron shushed him, but the dog didn’t listen. From the
front door, Decker bellowed, “Come here, you damn mutt!”

As if she was no longer there, Killer took off through the
shrubs and weeds and mud, clipping the corner at the front of the house. Caron hurried out, shut the door behind her,
shoved on her shoes and ran straight to the back fence. She
hooked the toe of her best taupe flats into the hurricane
fencing and hoisted herself over. When she hit the ground,
she sank to her ankles in a bed of soft mud.

“Psst!”

Shoving her dripping hair out of her eyes, Caron looked up at the clapboard house, toward the sound. Wearing a
faded pink chenille robe and a purple satin turban, Ina was
watching through the curtains.

She shoved them back and bent low to the small open
ing in the window. “What are you doing out there?”

  
“It’s Caron.” She rubbed the gooseflesh from her arms.

“I figured that, child. You just stomped my irises.”

“I’m sorry.” Caron stepped closer to the window. “Decker came home.”

Curiosity turned to worry, pitting deep wrinkles around
Ina’s mouth. “Best you come inside, then.”

“I can’t.” Her heavy breathing fogging the chilly air,
Caron looked back over her shoulder. Killer was still bark
ing at the front of the house, and there was no sign of Decker. “Parker will wonder what’s happened to me.”

“You dry off right away, then, you hear? A body can catch pneumonia just like that—” Ina snapped her fingers
“—on a night like this.”

“I will.” Pneumonia. Was that what was wrong with
Misty?

Ina shut the window, then moved away. Caron turned
down the shell driveway. Between the lights, shadows sliced
thick, dark wedges into the pavement. Concealed by them,
she crossed to the opposite sidewalk, made her way around
the corner, then down the block to her car.

Nearly giddy with relief, she opened the door and slid bonelessly onto the seat. Even as she swung the door shut behind her, she closed her eyes and began to hum, starting
the relaxation exercises Dr. Z. had taught her years ago. A long minute later, her heart had slowed to a mere canter.

“Quit shaking, will you?” The deep voice came from the
backseat. “You’re slinging water.”

Caron gasped and whipped around. A wet clump of hair
stung her cheek and clung. “Blast it, Parker, you scared
ten years off me!”

“Sorry.” He studied her face, frowned, then passed her a crisp white handkerchief. “How did you get wet?”

It smelled like his cologne. Her throat tight, she patted
her face dry. “Decker turned on the shower. From the looks
of him, I figured that was the one place I’d be safe. I was
wrong.”

Parker chuckled.

“It’s not funny.”

“Sure it is.”

“It’s not, Parker,” she said from between her teeth. “He
would’ve—”

“He didn’t.” Parker’s eyes sobered. “Let it go, Caron. You’ve got no time to waste on what could have happened.”