Pushed Too Far: A Thriller (28 page)

“And Valerie?” Hess said.

She turned her attention back to him.

“Do you know what you’ll be doing?”

“Planning how I’m going to take that knife and gut you?”

He smiled, showing teeth so straight and white that even with her vision problems she had little trouble seeing them. “Maybe, maybe. But you’re also going to stand there and know that this never would have happened to our little Grace if it weren’t for you.”

He pressed the blade into the skin of her cheek.

Grace screamed and struggled to jolt away, but his grip prevented it.

A sob stuck in Val’s throat. The pair of cuffs still dangling around her left wrist rattled and hit the wall, but she didn’t move. Not this time.

“That’s better.”

“Then what will you do next?” Lund’s voice sounded even, strong.

Val forced herself to breathe, to think. Yes. Keep him talking. Look for an out. Lund was obviously thinking along the same lines she was, at least as she had been before fear for Grace had wiped her mind utterly clean.

“After our pretty little Grace is dead, then it’s your turn, hero.”

“Lund never did anything to you,” Val said, somehow finding a remnant of strength in her voice. “The only thing he testified to was your affair with Kelly.”

“True. And I’ve caused him a good deal of pain. But his death is really about you, Valerie. All this has really been about you. And from what Rebecca has told me, you have a little crush on the firefighter here. So you get to see him die, too.”

His words didn’t shock her anymore. Nor did the depth of Becca’s betrayal. Now she could feel all of it gather into a toxic ball and harden in the pit of her stomach.

“And then you kill me,” she said.

“You don’t get off that easy.”

“You don’t kill her?” Becca’s voice squeaked. Finished with Lund, she straightened and rested her hand on her holster.

“He wants me to live on, to know what I’ve lost, to know he’s taken everything I loved.”

“You
were
listening.”

“I was.”

“Then let’s get started, shall we?”

Val lurched away from the wall. She needed something more to stall him. Anything. But her mind was nothing but a scream.

She would do anything to save Grace. Anything. She would willingly lay down her life, not even hesitate.

That was it.

She turned her head to look at Becca.

That was how Becca killed Kelly. How she convinced her to walk out on thin ice. “You threatened her baby.”

“For God’s sake, what baby?” Lund said.

She should have told him. Fuck her job, her duty, her case, and her damn insecurities. She should have told him everything and let the rest fall as it may. “Kelly’s baby.”

“My baby,”
Hess said.
“My son.”

She turned to Hess, talking to him now. “Did you ever ask her how she convinced Kelly to go with her? How she forced her to step out onto the ice?”

He lowered the knife from Grace’s throat and stared at Becca. “Where is he?”

She shook her head. Glancing from Val to Hess, she took a step backward. “I don’t know. I never knew.”

“Then why did she willingly go with you?” Val asked.

“I had a gun on her. I was going to kill her if she didn’t. Drowning or shooting, it didn’t matter how she died, just that she did. Just that someone found her.”

Val didn’t believe her. It mattered. A lot. Becca had gone to great lengths to stage Kelly’s drowning death, to make it public, to make sure she was found, to make sure Lund took the fall.

“The DNA test. You took that tissue from Lund’s house, didn’t you? You broke in when he was at the fire station.”

“So?”

“No, shooting her wouldn’t fit. You made sure Lund would be the one who pulled her out of the water, that his DNA would be discovered on that tissue, that I would arrest him for murder. The ice storm made all of this work out differently, but that was the original justice he was supposed to face.”

It was half a guess, but it must have been a good one, because Becca said nothing.

Val turned on Hess. “What would make Kelly walk out on the ice? She’s lived in Lake Loyal all her life. She knew it wouldn’t hold her weight. She knew if she stepped out there, she was marching to her death. Why would she be willing to die without fighting back?”

“Where is he?” he repeated, louder this time.

The tension he’d been keeping on Grace’s hair slackened, all his focus now drilling into his daughter.

“I was the one who got you out.” Becca’s voice was soft, pleading.

The lights flickered again, then went out. A second passed before the generator kicked in, bringing back the emergency lights and instruments in dispatch.

Becca took a step toward her father. “I killed her for you. I did everything for you.”

Behind the rookie cop, Val noticed Lund moving his hands behind his back.

She returned her focus to Hess, but neither he nor Becca seemed aware of Lund at all, every ounce of their energy focused on the other.

“What did you do with my son?” Hess took a step forward, dragging Grace along.

She tripped on Oneida, bobbled and fell to her knees.

Val was off the wall, moving forward when Hess released her hair, letting her tumble on top of the injured dispatcher.

He raised the knife and stared at Val. “Don’t move.”

She took two steps back and raised her hands, palms out. She couldn’t let him focus on Grace or pay too close attention to Oneida. “Ask her if the baby’s still alive.”

He looked back to Becca, again focused on what he wanted, what was his, what his own daughter had kept from him.

“I’m the one who loves you,” she said, her voice high-pitched like a little girl’s. “I would do anything for you. I have done everything. Where the baby is doesn’t matter.”

“My son is
all
that matters.”

“I matter.”

“What did you do with him?”

Becca rolled her lips toward her teeth. Even in the dim light, Val could see the sheen of tears in her eyes.

Val risked a glance in Lund’s direction. Smoke curled from behind his chair, just a wisp.

The lighter he’d had in her office, the one he’d used to demonstrate flame and smolder. He was setting fire to one of the old, fabric cubicle walls.

Even with the power out, the alarms would go off. Help would come.

“She killed him,” Val blurted out.” She killed your baby.”

Hess stared at her, those cold eyes burning. He started toward Becca. “You killed him?”

“I did not.”

“After we noticed Kelly’s caesarean scar, I had divers search the lake. We found his body.”

“You didn’t!”

Val didn’t want to think too hard about what she was doing. She needed to distract Hess, she needed to give Lund a chance. “You’re a rookie, Becca, and a part-timer. There are a lot of things that go on around here that you don’t know.”

“You took my son? You?” Hess stepped toward her.

Becca raised her weapon, first pointing at Val then at Hess. Her hands shook, tears now streaming down her cheeks.

Smoke built and spilled into the room. Becca had to have smelled it. From where he was standing, Hess could see it.

The alarm shattered the air. Water showered down from ceiling sprinklers.

Val dashed for Grace.

She could see Lund move, Becca move, and Hess too, but the water spray, the smoke, and the fact that her eyesight wasn’t good in the first place, made it impossible to see much more.

She slid inside the dispatch center, reached Grace and Oneida, grabbed her niece’s arm, and struggled to get her on her feet.

Behind her, Becca’s gun went off.

H
eat surged from behind Lund, smoke roiling over him, blotting out the light. He stood from the chair, took a hop forward, and fell face first to the floor.

Wriggling his body, he dragged himself forward. Becca had tightened the chains over his boots. If he could just manage to get his turnout overalls off, he could shuck the whole damn thing, boots and all.

A trick, seeing his hands were cuffed behind his back.

A scream erupted over his head. The rookie cop, he thought. Or Grace. Or Val. He couldn’t tell over the blaring alarm.

Heat licked at his boots, his legs. He wasn’t on fire, he knew that, just too close to it. It was a hot fire, those old separating walls burning with the ferocity he expected. Eventually the water would put it out, but he had to get far enough away that he didn’t get cooked before that happened.

The smoke was a bigger problem.

He’d seen Val make a dash for it. But now he could no longer spot her. As long as she got out, saved Grace, this would work out all right.

The crack of gunfire stabbed the air.

Val?

Grace?

He pulled forward rolling his chest side to side, trying to push with his legs, but they wouldn’t move. They wouldn’t work.

Something was wrong.

It took a few more seconds to realize why.

He’d been shot.

Val’s niece clung to her like a scared kitten. Her body trembled, breath coming hard and fast, and although Val couldn’t hear anything over the fire alarm’s din, she could feel sobs wracking Grace’s body.

She brought her lips close to the teen’s ear. “Come on, Gracie. We have to get up. You have to get up.”

Smoke blotted out the emergency lights in most of the station now. Water splattered her face, her hair, and soaked into her coat. The sprinkler system should put the fire out. Maybe it already had, but it seemed like the smoke just kept coming.

“Come on, Baby. Walk with me. I need you to be strong Grace. I need your help getting Oneida out of here. She’s still alive, but I can’t move her without you.”

The girl nodded, her hair moving against Val’s cheek.

Val checked the dispatcher’s pulse to make sure she was still with them. The beat was steady and sure.

She looped one of Oneida’s arms around her neck and shoulder and Grace took the other.

“Good girl. Now out the front door.” She wasn’t sure Grace heard her, probably not. But she responded by moving forward, carrying her part of Oneida’s weight.

The exit wasn’t far, just around the corner. Val knew the station well. She didn’t have to see.

Good thing.

The going was slow, but they got around the corner.

The alarm was even louder here, making her head throb, ears hurt. She located the door handle and placed Grace’s hand on it, hoping the girl would feel the vibration of the lock release and figure out what she was asking her to do.

Feeling her way with her left hand, she found the lock release beside the door and hit the button.

She couldn’t hear the door buzz, but she felt Grace pull it wide.

“Good girl.”

She held her breath, half expecting Hess to grab them from behind. The three of them sidled into the vestibule, Val taking up the rear. She dipped her hand in her pockets. Finding her gloves, she stuck one in the door lock, bracing it open. She used the same trick on the outer door.

They laid Oneida under the building’s overhang.

Now came the hard part.

“I have to go back for Lund. He saved us. I can’t leave him in there to die.” Her throat felt thick, burning, clogged by more than smoke. She shivered in the sudden cold.

Ears still ringing from the alarm, Val couldn’t hear Grace’s whimper, but she felt it in the grasp of her hands, the shudder wracking her shoulders.

Of course Grace wouldn’t leave her. Not as easily as that. “You have to do this for me, sweetie. I need you to do this. If Oneida doesn’t get help, she’s not going to make it.”

Grace said nothing, just clutched Val’s arm hard enough to leave bruises.