Blood Stained (25 page)

He wished Bob hadn't told him his name. It was always worse when you knew their names. 

"Of course." The deputy squatted to the girl's level. "Where's she at, honey? Tell me what—"

He made a sucking noise. A fish drowning in air. Adam winced at the sound; he'd heard it before. 

The deputy rocked back, then fell over onto his side. Both hands clutched at his chest, blood spurting through them. Fast at first, then slower, arching into graceful streams of scarlet.

"Hi there, big brother." Morgan smiled over the deputy's body, still holding her bloody blade. "Daddy sent me to get you."

Adam's blood turned to ice, leaving him breathless and dizzy as he watched the deputy die. The man had been kind. Didn't deserve to die. Not like that.

Nonsense, Dad's voice filled his mind.
He was only a fish. And now he's gutted like one.
Dad's laughter sounded so real Adam, rocked in his chair, looking over both shoulders, expecting Dad to appear.

Morgan was dressed in sky-blue ski bibs and jacket, yellow snow boots, and a jaunty red knit cap with pompoms, making her look younger than she was. She was short enough that she had to make a little leap to clear the still twitching body. She made it look graceful, like something a ballerina would do. Then she spun, bent over, and took the deputy's gun.

"Fleeing felon, you want a gun, right?" she asked, aiming it at him.

Adam scooted his chair back. "I don't want it."

"Sure you do." She pocketed the weapon, grabbed the handcuff keys, and stood. Her eyes widened in a smile that didn't make it down to her lips when she spotted Adam's knife on the counter with his other possessions. She took his cash and keys.

Then she approached Adam, the bloody knife in one hand. He pushed back in his chair as far as he could go. That made her smile.

She stayed just beyond his reach, taking the box of tissues from the desk and wiping her blade clean. The soiled tissues went into her coat pocket along with the now clean knife. She turned to grab Adam's knife.

He wanted to scream, to fight, but what good would it do? He was powerless. And Morgan knew it.

"Just so there's no going back," she aimed her dagger-sharp smile at Adam as she plunged his blade into the deputy's right side and left it there. 

She tossed Adam the handcuff keys. He fumbled them, fingers numb, but managed to hang on. 

"Okie-dokie. Let's get going. Daddy's waiting."

Chapter 26

They got back into the Taurus, Jenna driving this time. Lucy sat in silence, her jaw making a clicking noise that had Jenna wincing. "Sorry. Guess that was a waste of time."

"Don't worry about it," Lucy said. "Nature of the business. Talk to twenty people to find the one who has the missing piece of the puzzle."

"Weird though. The Caine boy being with the boys yesterday morning." 

"Yeah." Lucy's voice sagged in resignation. "We're going to have to have a talk about that."

They reached the blinking light at the base of the mountain. Up at Mathis' place the sunrise made the open meadow look golden, but down here it was all shadows and gloom. As if the clouds conspired with the mountains on either side of the valley to keep it shrouded in darkness.

They pulled into the sheriff's substation and parked beside Bob's patrol car. Lights blazed inside the station. Jenna opened the car door and had no choice but to plant her feet into the unplowed snow. Icy cold ran into her sneakers once again and she wished she'd packed boots like Lucy had.

She danced through the snow trying to minimize the number of footsteps she took. Lucy was already at the door, watching her with a shake of her head that reminded Jenna of her mom.

"What? These are Coach. Probably ruined anyway."

"I was just thinking of the Postal Service's creed. Neither wind nor rain…"

"Oh, shut up. Let's get Caine and get out of here. I'm tired of the country."

Lucy stopped with her hand on the door. "I might stay. Help Zeller."

After the disappointments of the past two days, Jenna merely sighed. She came here thinking she'd learn something from Lucy, maybe even return to Pittsburgh a hero. Instead she'd killed a man, panicked in a cave, and stayed up all night crossing out squares on a map. "Whatever." 

She reached past Lucy to pull the door open, anxious to get inside where it was warm, hoping for some of Bob's coffee before they hit the road. Maybe even more of Bob himself if he could get away for a few minutes. She stomped over the threshold, Lucy right behind her, and made it halfway across the reception area before she realized she was mistaken.

It wasn't warm inside the sheriff's station. It was cold. Very cold.

No scent of coffee in the air. Only the smell of feces and blood. 

Jenna stopped. Tried to ask Lucy if Lucy saw what she did but the only sound she could make was a gagging noise as if she was strangling.

Lucy carefully skirted the pool of blood. Squatted and touched Bob's body. Then she backed away, stepping in her own slushy footprints on the linoleum.

"He's dead."

Jenna nodded, still unable to talk. Saw the knife planted in Bob's chest like a flag on top of a mountain. "That knife. It's Caine's."

Suddenly her frozen body felt as if it was being pulled apart, caught in a whirlwind of emotion. Jenna lurched a half step towards Bob's body, then twisted towards the door, then back to face Lucy. "Adam Caine killed him. Sonofabitch! If you hadn't let him go yesterday none of this would have happened. God. This is all our fault."

Lucy ignored her tirade. She held one finger up for quiet as she spoke into her cell phone. Which made Jenna all the more furious. She darted towards the door. "He couldn't have gotten far."

She ran outside, no longer caring about the snow sloshing into her shoes. She unzipped her coat and put her hand on her gun. Until she remembered the holster was empty. And she'd returned Lucy's Baby Glock to her.

The parking lot and street beyond was quiet. Everything was quiet. No motion as far as she could see. Unless you counted the thick white clouds scudding across the sky and a flock of black birds that followed them. Damn country.

Only nice thing about it had been Bob. And now he was gone.

As much as she blamed Lucy, Jenna remembered she'd been the one who pushed to detour and question Mathis. Adam Caine might have never had the chance to kill Bob if they'd gotten here sooner.

Just like Rachel Strohmeyer might still be alive if Jenna hadn't been so ready to try to prove herself to Lucy and get the girl to open up about what really happened in those caves four years ago.

All her fault.

She spotted the footprints in the snow. "There were two of them," she shouted to Lucy who'd hung up her phone and was coming through the door. "Headed that way. Into town."

Jenna tracked the footprints, already disappearing beneath the new snow, across the parking lot. She reached the road as the sirens of the first patrol car roared through the air, shattering the winter silence.

<><><>

The heater died out sometime during the night but it was toasty warm in the down sleeping bags. Until Darrin had to get up and pee. The cold air hit him when he climbed out of his sleeping bag. He used the toilet seat in the corner, glad Sally and Marty weren't awake to watch him.

He returned to his bag, snuggling inside. Then he realized. It was dry. He'd gone the whole night without wetting the bed.

Too bad Dad wasn't here to see. He'd never take Darrin's word for it, so it wouldn't count. 

Marty sat up, rubbing his eyes. He looked like he'd been crying. "I'm hungry. I want to go home."

"Adam," Darrin called, the cave walls pitching the name back at him. No answer. He tried again. "We're ready for breakfast." Silence. 

Sally woke up and jumped onto Darrin's lap. "Do you think he's okay?" she asked, hugging Miss Priss. "Mommy sometimes is hard to wake up. But," she frowned, "sometimes she isn't even there." She let out a little sigh. "I don't like it when the strangers are there instead of Mommy." She raised her face to the top of the pit. "Adam," she sang out. "C'mon, we're ready to do more 'sploring!"

No answer.

"He left us." Marty's voice sounded like he was about to cry. "We're gonna die down here. Mommy! Mommy!" He shouted over and over, running from one side of the pit to the other, until Sally began to cry.

"Stop it," Darrin said. "You're scaring her." He hugged Sally and wrapped his sleeping bag around her. Then he looked through the Walmart bags scattered around the cave. 

"Sally, do you want strawberry Pop Tarts or cinnamon?" he asked as he handed her a juice box. It was a bit gloomy down here but no more than the gray skies visible through the smoke hole overhead. He didn't even need the flashlight but it still made him feel better when Sally cranked it up and began to spin it around.

"Cinmon, please," she said sweetly.

Marty kicked at the stones around the fire pit. "I'm not eating. Not until I get back home." He grabbed a rock and carried it over to the wall. "Maybe we could build some steps. Climb out."

"It's pretty high." Darrin munched his Pop Tart. "Don't worry. Adam will come and get us."

"You're so stupid. Adam's not going to help us. No one is."

Darrin flinched at Marty's words. Watched as the boy built a tower of rocks, then hauled the kerosene heater over to them. 

"Aren't you going to help?" Marty asked.

"That's not going to work. Too unsteady." But Darrin got up and helped Marty shove the heater on top of the unstable pile of stones. "It's not high enough."

"Maybe I can jump. Grab the top and climb up."

"That's what Boots would do," Sally said, looking up from her coloring.

"This is real life, Sally," Darrin reminded her. And Marty. No way was he going to jump that high.

But Marty was determined to save them. "I'm going to do it," he muttered. "You'll see. My dad said I could do anything."

Darrin's dad never said stuff like that. 

Before he could stop him, Marty scampered up the pile of rocks and climbed onto the heater. Darrin rushed to steady it as it wobbled. "Marty, get down. It's going to fall."

Instead of climbing down, Marty stood up on his tiptoes, arms stretched up, reaching for the top of the cliff way over his head. Then he jumped.

And came crashing down. Kicked the heater, which knocked Darrin off his feet, skidded over the pile of rocks that scattered in every direction, and landed with a thud on the rock floor.

Darrin pushed the heater off him and climbed to his feet. Marty hadn't moved.

"Is he dead?" Sally asked, clutching Miss Priss.

Marty's sobs proved otherwise. "My leg, my leg. I think I broke my leg."

<><><>

Morgan wrapped Adam's arm around her, clutching it as if she'd forgotten how to walk. She pressed her body against his as they left the sheriff's station and marched across the snow covered parking lot. It wasn't until they were halfway up the hill to the blinking light that she twirled free, still holding his hand, swinging it between them.

"We've been having so much fun," she said in a singsong tone. "You've missed it all, Adam."

She was just trying to make him feel bad. Morgan's specialty. Getting Dad to smile at her and making Adam feel lousy. 

Adam yanked his hand free and shoved it into his pocket. "Where's Dad?"

"Did you really take those kids? Clint's kids?" She stopped, waited until his full attention was on her. "You're either a fool or you have a death wish." Her hat bobbed with her words, the silly pompoms flapping back and forth. "Maybe both."

"I saved them." He said the words to feel better but instead all he saw was Bob's bloody body. Fear kicked him in the throat and he couldn't swallow. 

He'd done the right thing. He had.

Now he just had to convince Dad of that. And keep the kids far away from Morgan.

She twisted her fingers in his shirt, forcing him to bend down to her level. Her other hand was in her pocket—the pocket with her knife. He sucked in his breath as panic and anger tangled. He could kill her. He was bigger, stronger.

He didn't want to. But her eyes said that she did. Want to kill. Love to kill. Which gave her the upper hand. As always.

"You saved them. I saved you." Her words came with a bright smile. "Don't forget that, big brother. Don't you ever forget what I did here this morning." She laughed and pushed him away so fast he stumbled back and fell into the snow bank. "I don't care what Clint says. You're just another fish."

"Children, children," came a booming voice from a van that had pulled up beside them. Adam glanced up at the white Econoline.
Guardian Locksmiths
, read the demur gray lettering on the side.
We're there for you when you need us. Day or night.

"Hop inside," Dad called. "We've miles to go and work to do!"

Morgan leapt over the snow bank, scrambling for the front seat before Adam could get his legs untangled from the cinder-covered snow. He finally made it upright and opened the side door, half anticipating to find a fish inside, naked and bloody.

Instead the rear of the van held two narrow bench seats arranged lengthwise on each side, a small refrigerator and cook top, and neatly stacked plastic containers. The van pulled away from the curb, knocking him onto the seat nearest.

"Pretty sweet, isn't it?" Dad sang out. "All the comforts of home."

"What happened to the truck?"

"Gave it up. Didn't like leaving your sister alone. The new regulations and GPS monitoring cramped my style. Not enough free time for family fun." He and Morgan exchanged a glance and chuckled in unison.

Adam shivered, alone in the back. Realized that's how it had always been. Ever since Dad rescued Morgan from her home in Kansas.

Maybe even before. No, that wasn't true. Dad would take care of him. Family first. He always said.

His vision blurred and he rubbed his thumbs against his eyes, producing red flashes of fatigue. There was no room for doubt, no going back. He had to think about the kids and what was best for them.