Tales of Chills and Thrills: The Mystery Thriller Horror Box Set (7 Mystery Thriller Horror Novels) (89 page)

“She’s in ICU. Down a floor and to the right.”

Tara wiped the tears away with her tattered, red sleeve and
started to laugh.

“What?”

“Look at us.” Tara motioned to her torn clothes and the way
Bowden’s leg was wrapped up, and started crying again. “I’m sorry. I don’t know
what’s wrong.”

“It’s stress. It’ll get to you like that sometimes,” he
explained as he led her to the elevator.

They walked into ICU and inquired about Kay Miller. Her nurse
came out to talk to them and led them into a quiet room.

“Kay went through two hours of surgeries to repair the veins.
Those were successful operations. She’s still listed as critical. She’s getting
platelets right now and soon we’ll try to wake her up. That’s the critical
point. If she wakes up, she’ll be on her way to recovery. If not, she could
slip into a coma.”

Tara sat silently and stared at the nurse whose gaze kept
jumping from Tara to Bowden.

“Any questions?” the nurse asked.

Bowden glanced at Tara and saw that she was unable to speak.
“Not right now,” he answered.

“Would you like to see her?” the nurse asked.

Tara nodded, and the nurse led them to a room full of buzzing
and beeping equipment. The quietest thing in the room was the still form of Kay
Miller.

Tara looked down at her, and Bowden placed a hand gently on her
shoulder. She leaned against him and then turned and buried her head against
his shoulder. Her tears soaked his shirt as he held her gently. He peered over
her shoulder and saw Kay Miller… thinner, whiter.

“I don’t want to stay here,” Tara whispered.

“What?”

“I don’t want to stay here. Let’s go away. I need… I want to
go.” Tara pushed away from him and looked into his eyes.

He read confusion in them and something else. He saw fear and
pain. He took Tara gently by the arm and led her out of the room. The nurse was
waiting for them. He took a pen and wrote down his cell phone number and handed
it to the nurse, and they left without saying a word.

They found a cab at the hospital and climbed into the back and
he told the driver to take him to the Sheraton. The ride only took a few
minutes and they walked up to his room. He opened the door and let Tara go in
first.

She took one step across the threshold before he realized that
the room wasn’t right. He grabbed her shoulder and jerked her back into the
hallway, slamming her up against the wall.

“Someone’s in there, or was. Let me check it out,” he whispered
into her ear.

He slid his hand up his side, searching for the Glock. It wasn’t
there. He shook his head and let out his breath.

“Let’s hope they’re gone,” he muttered as he stepped into the
room barehanded.

14

Bowden crouched and tested his right leg. There wasn’t much
feeling in it but it was responding better as the drugs wore off. He raised his
hands and stepped through the door flattening himself up against the wall
inside.

He stood near the bathroom door and listened intently, trying to
hear beyond the sound of his heart as it pounded madly in his chest. He stepped
into the bathroom and took it all in, spinning to check behind the door and
then crossing the room to look into the shower. It was done in one fluid
movement and took less than a second.

He spotted the shadow as he turned away from the shower, just a
fleeting glimpse of a movement across the door. Tara screamed and he ran out of
the room, bursting into the hallway. She stood there trembling with one hand on
her chest, her face white. 

The fleeing intruder was already several yards down the hall,
and the distance increased rapidly as he took off after him. The exertion
applied to the wounded leg shot a blast of pain through his right side and into
his brain. His body was telling him to stop, and he heeded the warning. He
turned slowly and limped back to his room.

He turned the light on and Tara followed him in.

“Do you think there was only one?” she asked as she stepped
cautiously past the bathroom door.

“Yeah. He was looking for something, not laying for me.”

With the lights on, Bowden could see what had originally tipped
him off. His clothes had been dumped on the floor as the intruder searched the
drawers. A pair of pants lay on the floor beyond the edge of the wall and
appeared as only a shadow in the darkness. Bowden realized that the awareness
of something being out of place had probably saved him from a thumping. The
intruder was too young and athletic for him to deal with at the moment. He was
glad the guy chose to run and not to fight.

“Did you see what he looked like?” Bowden asked as he picked up
the pants and tossed them onto the bed.

“I… I thought it was Adam. I’m not sure that it wasn’t.”

“Adam’s dead.”

“So is Riley.”

Bowden felt his leg start to collapse. He took a half step
backward and sat down on the edge of the bed. He didn’t want to think about ghosts.
Not another ghost anyway. Another murdered person running around looking for
his killer? Looking at him? Bowden felt a shiver travel up his spine and he
shook it off.

“No,” he said aloud, shaking his head. “It wasn’t Adam. It
wasn’t a ghost. His form didn’t weaken when he hit the lights in the hallway.
It was a real person.” He glanced up at Tara and saw her nod, but realized she
wasn’t convinced.

“It looked so much like Adam.”

Bowden glanced down at the floor and flicked a shirt out from
under his foot and another thought hit him. “A ghost can’t move things. Riley
can’t. He wouldn’t be able to dump my clothes out like this.”

Tara’s eyes brightened. “Yeah. You’re right.” She collapsed on
the bed, arms flailed out, and looked up at the ceiling.

Bowden turned and looked down at her. Her blond hair was crushed
behind her head and her face looked drawn, tired, and smudged with mud under
her chin, but she was beautiful. The red shirt that she wore was stretched tight.
He leaned towards her, putting weight onto his arms, wondering what to say.

She rolled her head and looked up into his eyes. He pushed
himself off the bed and grabbed a pair of pants and a shirt.

“I need to get into some better clothes,” he stammered,
embarrassed at the thoughts that had briefly entered his mind.

Tara sat up and looked at the repair job she had hastily done on
his pants and laughed. “That’s a good idea.”

He disappeared into the bathroom and changed to a new pair. His
shirt stunk and he peeled it off. He threw it onto the bathroom floor and
walked back into the other room to get a clean one.

Tara stood with her back to him, topless. Bowden froze, his
heart pounding as he watched her pick up a shirt from the bed and pull it over
her head. He realized it was one of his sweatshirts and as she started to turn
around, he stepped further into the room.

“Oh,” Tara gasped when she saw him. “I hope you don’t mind.” She
tugged at the shirt she had just put on.

“Not at all. I had the same idea,” he answered as he found
another shirt on the floor.

He put it on and looked at Tara. “You ready to go?” he asked.

“Unh-huh. Where are we going?”

“To the airport. I’ve got
to rent another car.”

Riley sat on the edge of the desk and stared at the blood on the
carpet. The house was quiet now. The police were gone. The body of Barry Miller
had been removed and Kay had been rushed to the hospital. She had used the same
knife that Barry had attacked Bowden with. She had walked into the room and
picked it up only moments after Tara was kidnapped.

Riley tried to stop her from slashing her wrists. He tried to
talk her out of it. He even pulled his gun and threatened her. She’d laughed at
him. He stood helpless as the knife sliced through her skin searching for a
vein. He stood helpless as the blood flowed from her body. He couldn’t pick up
the phone to dial 911. He couldn’t summon help, only stand silently and watch
her bleed out. He’d never felt so helpless.

Then the police arrived. Two patrol vehicles pulled up out front
and the officers sat in the car waiting for something or somebody. He could see
them talking and then one of them realized that the front door was open. They
approached with guns drawn and entered the house, then found the two bodies in
the study.

Riley shook his head to clear his thoughts. It didn’t do any
good for him to think about it. He looked down the driveway and wondered how
Bowden had done. Had he caught up with Tara’s abductor? Was she safe? Riley
stood up and stepped around the pool of blood. His head dropped until his chin
almost touched his chest.

He was useless. Completely, utterly useless. He smashed his hand
into the wall and it went right through. He kicked at it. He pounded his fists.
He could not feel a thing. Then why did his heart ache? Why was there such a
cold, heavy drain on his soul? How could he feel such loss and not feel the
wall?

He sighed and shook his head. In anguish, he stared up at the
ceiling but his gaze didn’t stop there. His tortured soul looked through it,
bursting out of the house and into the universe. Blinding flashes of light
cascaded through his senses. Brilliant, flaming stars crashed into his soul.

He shut his eyes and fell to the floor burying his face in the
carpet. His body shook uncontrollably in reaction to an experience beyond his
understanding. Putting his hands over his eyes, he fought to regain control.
After sucking in several deep breaths and exhaling each one slowly, the shaking
diminished, then left him.

Riley opened his eyes and saw his hands. He sat up, pulling his
knees to his chest. Slowly he lifted his gaze to the ceiling. It was still there.
He looked at each textured bump on the sheetrock and wondered what had just
happened to him. A term came to mind. He had “spaced out.” He chuckled and
brought his gaze down.

He was still sitting in the hallway, when a car turned up the
driveway. He heard it and glanced in the direction of the sound. The wall was
in front of him and then through him and the ground was a brown blur under him
and drops of rain slashed like blades of steel. Then he was looking in the car,
staring at Tara’s sad face, and Bowden beside her at the wheel.

Riley sprang to his feet. He was in the hallway again,
surrounded by the walls. The carpet was under his feet. He hadn’t moved but he
had been able to see beyond them. In seventy years he had never experienced
anything like that. He was afraid and… he searched for a word to describe his
feelings to himself… awed. He wondered why now, after all these years, he was
able to do this. His emotions were on edge. Everything appeared crisp, vibrant,
like when color was introduced to television.

Riley stood in the foyer when Bowden opened the door. Tara
walked into the house first. She was wearing a different shirt. One that was
much too big for her. It was a man’s shirt and Riley suddenly realized that it
belonged to Bowden. He didn’t know how he knew, he just did, and a sudden
jealousy flooded him with heat.

He looked into Tara’s eyes and saw innocence, pain and… love. He
glanced at Bowden who seemed distracted. The jealousy vanished.  He looked
back at Tara and saw a smile, faintly and briefly flash from her lips and then
it turned to a frown as tears spilled from her eyes. She stretched her arms
out, took a step, and fell forward.

Riley felt her pain and reached out instinctively to catch her.
He felt the weight of her spirit against him as he encircled her with his arms.
Her weight rested against his heart and was heavy. He stood holding Tara as she
cried, her face buried against his shoulder.

“Huh?”

Riley opened his eyes and saw Bowden pointing at him and
staring. Riley glanced down at Tara, felt her slipping off his heart and then
falling through him. He grasped desperately at her arms as she fell forward,
but he had nothing to clutch her with, and she dropped onto the floor.

The frustration and confusion erupted from Riley’s lips as a
haunting scream, piercing the air around them. It escaped from his tortured
soul, rising into the wind, long and loud, as his faced turned to the heavens
and the world spun like a cyclone around him.

He staggered, dizzy from the effects of his scream. Bowden
stepped around Riley and gently lifted Tara to her feet. He walked her to the
stairs and sat her down.

Riley held both hands over his face and asked from between his
fingers, “What is happening?”

Bowden shook his head, looking sideways a Riley. “I don’t know.
You touched her though… for a second.”

“Thank you. Thank you for bringing her back.”

Bowden shrugged his shoulders as if it were no big deal.

“Is she the only one left?” Riley asked.

“Kay might still make it.”

“Is she alive?”

“She’s in ICU. What’s been going on with you?”

Riley bowed his head and gripped the fedora with one hand. “I
don’t know. I’m like… adrift. I can’t explain it; my spirit is… like a boat
tossed on the sea with no direction. I have a hard time now controlling things
that are happening to me. No. That’s not it. I’m doing things I can’t control.
I’m no longer the pilot.”

Bowden stared at him for a second, and then sprang for the
stairs. He stepped around Tara, ran to Flavio’s room, and pulled the painting
out of the closet. Carrying it in one hand, he used the other to lift Tara to
her feet.

“Come on,” he said, lights dancing in his eyes. “I think I’ve
got something.”

Tara walked slowly behind him as he pulled her down the hallway to
the office. Riley followed after them, aware that Bowden may have suddenly
broken secret of the painting. When Bowden entered the office, he released his
grip on Tara and laid the painting on the desk. He opened the desk drawers
until he found the charts and he took them out. He tossed the maps aside and
focused on the charts that were in book form.

The page number on the chart in the painting was 34 and Bowden
opened the first book to that page. He laid it next to the painting, matching
up the top corners. The contours didn’t match and the number was printed
differently. He tossed the book aside and opened the next one.

Riley suddenly understood what the detective was doing. If they
could find the map that matched, it might have a route laid out on it, or a
marking of some kind to indicate the location.

Bowden compared the next map to the painting. It was an exact
match. He laid the book onto the painting, lining up the painted map with the
one he held in his hand. A route had been charted to an island in the San
Juan’s.

Bowden whispered, “Gotcha,” and glanced up at Riley, his smile
contagious.

Riley smiled and nodded back as Tara walked up to the table to
look.

“It was that easy?” she asked.

Riley grinned. “Well, we have a map. Now we have to follow it.”

Bowden straightened up. “Let’s get started.” He closed the
soft-covered book and tucked it under his arm.

Riley glanced outside. It would soon be light. He wasn’t going.
He knew it and it hurt him deeply.

“What?” Bowden asked, looking at Riley’s downcast eyes.

“I’ll stay here.”

“Nonsense.”

“It’ll be light in an hour. Then I’ll be useless again.”

Tara stepped close to Riley and looked up into his eyes. “You’ve
never been useless. You’ve… you’ve always been my friend.”

Riley smiled as his heart melted inside him. He wanted to take
her and hold her close and smell her hair, feel the smoothness of her skin and
the warmth of her body next to his. He pursed his lips as he tried to think of
something to say, but a sadness enveloped him and he turned away, unable to
find any words.

Bowden called after him. “We’ll be renting a boat and going out
to the island. You can come with us. We can wait until light, and you can
come.”