Elly's Ghost (19 page)

“Turn this car around
now!” Elly’s fist hit with every word. “Stop the car and let me out!”

Ignoring Elly,
Officer Nelson continued to accelerate and then pushed the button on her mic,
“I’ve got her!”

* * *

Jay sped down
the highway and spotted a dot above the horizon he knew must be a helicopter. He
brought the motorcycle to a stop and left it on its side in the middle of the
road. He wanted the helicopter to see it and stop there instead of continuing
east toward Elly.

Jay ran to the
trees and hid as he removed the shotgun, his rifle, and the handgun from his
bag. He reassembled the rifle and reloaded it, then reloaded the shotgun. He
pointed the rifle to the west down the highway and waited.

His plan worked
as the helicopter slowed and circled the area around the motorcycle.

A white Chevy
Lumina skidded to a stop next to it. Both doors opened and two men stepped out.

Jay aimed at the
driver and pulled the trigger.

* * *

Cy crouched by
the front right tire of the car at the sound of the shot. Hammer collapsed onto
the ground.

“Shit! Hammer is
hit,” Cy said into his radio. He saw a pool of blood forming under Hammer’s
body. “He’s not moving. I think he’s dead. Where are they?” he shouted.

“We’ll circle
around and try to find them,” Bull said over the radio.

The helicopter
circled twice. “They must be on the run—we can’t see them,” Bull said. “Go in
after them.”

“Not without
backup,” Cy said. “I’m not going anywhere. Get down here and help me.”

The helicopter
landed on the highway, and Bull ran to the ditch. He took out his binoculars
and searched for the shooter. After a minute, he signaled to Cy, who joined him
in the woods.

“I’ve got the
right side. You take the left,” Bull said.

For five minutes
they followed tracks and broken branches into the forest. The tracks were far
apart, meaning the man they were chasing was moving fast.

Cy paused and
grabbed the radio. “Logan, break off and search up ahead. We can’t hear
anything with you above us.”

“Roger that.”

Cy put his radio
away. A shotgun blast boomed behind him, and he turned in time to see Bull
fall. He had only a split second to see out of the corner of his eye the dark
outline standing next to him. He turned but it was too late. The ghost delivered
a crushing blow to his skull and everything went black.

* * *

“Bull, this is Logan, do you copy?” Logan circled the area he last had contact with them. “Cy, this is Logan, do you copy?”

His fuel gauge told
him he’d have to leave soon.

“Bull, do you
copy?”

Logan scanned the sky for any approaching aircraft and saw none. He scanned the area one
last time and saw two bodies lying near each other. His fuel gauge told him he
had just enough to make it across the Canadian border.

Elly wouldn’t
even look at Officer Nelson when she pulled into a police station garage stall.
Repeated attempts to get the officer to do anything that might help Jay had
been met with silence. She had listened intently to the radio as reports came
in about finding dead men near a motorcycle lying in the middle of the road.
Elly wouldn’t allow herself to believe any of those men were Jay. She fought
back tears of frustration, fear, and exhaustion, resolving to remain focused on
helping Jay.

Officer Nelson
escorted Elly to a room where two emergency medical technicians began asking
her questions. The questions went on and on.

“Look,” Elly
shouted, “I’m fine. I need to talk to the sheriff or whoever is in charge—right
now!”

Elly was
escorted to an interview room with beige block walls and told to wait. She
paced the room, growing angrier with every passing moment. She thought about
Jay leaving her and was furious that he hadn’t come with her. Jay had told her
he was going to slow those men down, but that didn’t make any sense to Elly. She
wondered why he didn’t get in the police car with her. If he had, they’d both
be safe right now.

After twenty
minutes the door finally opened. Elly turned, ready to chew out whoever walked
in. When Nick appeared in the doorway, her will to fight dissolved. Elly stared
in disbelief. “Nick?”

Nick looked
exhausted and took a deep breath. He held out his arms, and Elly ran to him.

When they’d been
teenagers, the family’s golden retriever, Lady, had run away from home. Elly
remembered the look on his face when she was found four days later. Now, Nick’s
relief took on a whole new level and he appeared to be on the verge of tears.

A lump formed in
Elly’s throat as she hugged him.

Nick held her
and said, “Hey. I’m so happy to see you.”

Hugging Nick,
the same brother who Elly figured would never talk to her again, completely
overwhelmed her. Any emotion she was hiding surfaced. She couldn’t contain her
tears.

Nick let her cry
for a few minutes, then asked her, “Are you okay?”

“Yeah.” Elly’s
voice was muffled by his shirt.

“It’s so good to
see you.” Nick repeated.

They slowly let
go of each other. Elly wiped her eyes. “How did you know to find me here?”

“It’s a long
story.” Nick glanced at Beckholm, who’d followed him into the room. “Look,
these men are here to help you.”

“My friend is
still out there,” Elly said to Nick. “He may need help.”

“Then tell these
men what happened, and they’ll help find your friend.”

Elly nodded, and
Nick helped her into a chair.

“My name is
Agent Aaron Beckholm. I’m with the FBI.” He showed his badge and sat across
from Elly with his notepad open. “I need you to start with what happened when
your plane landed at the airport. Talk me through it. Tell me everything.”

* * *

Jay walked away
from the highway, but his brain pulled him in different directions. He thought
about turning around and going back.

Jay knew Elly
was safe in police custody, and he was happy he completed his mission of
getting her out alive. Part of him knew he was leaving Elly to deal with what
he’d done and that wasn’t right. On the other hand, he didn’t want any
headlines to read “Marine Wanted for Murder.” The police would want to talk to
him, but he wasn’t ready to answer any questions just yet. More than anything, Jay
wanted time alone. It was the single thing he desired when he came home from Afghanistan, and now he wanted it even more.

“What am I
doing?” he mumbled to himself.

He questioned
whether he was justified in walking away or if he was just being a coward. The
urge to escape won.

Jay headed
deeper into the forest, away from the highway. He wondered if Elly would ever
forgive him.

* * *

Elly’s mind was
racing. She spoke as fast as she could so they would leave to help Jay. “He
drove so fast, it hurt my eyes. He knew the helicopter was looking for us. When
he spotted the police car he stopped and told me to run to it. He told me he
was going back to slow them down. That was the last time I saw him. Did you see
the motorcycle?”

“We saw it
abandoned on the road,” Beckholm said. “We’ll find him. Elly, you’ve referred
to this person as ‘he,’ but you’ve never said his name. What is his name?”

Elly stared at
the table as the room went quiet. She could feel them looking at her,
bewildered by her silence. She thought of how Jay asked her not to say his
name. She’d been lying next to him in the tent when she promised she’d keep his
name a secret.

Beckholm glanced
at Nick and then over at the sheriff. Both men shrugged. “Elly, did he tell you
his name?”

She stared at
the table. “I can’t tell you.”

Beckholm looked
at Nick. “Elly, we need to know. When we find him, we need to know he’s the one
who helped you.”

“No,” Elly said
sharply. “He saved my life and he asked me not to …”

Beckholm set down
his pencil. “He asked you not to give us his name?”

Nick stepped
from the corner and put his hand on Elly’s shoulder. “We’re all here to help
you. These men want to help your friend. To do that, they need to know who they’re
looking for. Please tell us.”

“I can’t.” Elly
put her head down on the table. It was the one thing Jay had asked her to keep
to herself. She had been careful not to mention he was a Marine, but she felt
like she was failing him no matter what she did. She wanted him found more than
anything. She wanted to know he was okay.

“We’re sending
in a search team,” Sheriff Neuhaus said, “but if we don’t know who we’re
searching for, somebody might get hurt. It might be one of my men or your friend.
I can’t let that happen.”

Elly was
nauseous as she pressed her forehead on the table.

“Elly,” Nick
said.

“He told me his name
is Ben Chase,” Elly said. The guilt crawled from her stomach through her chest
and settled behind her forehead in the form of a headache. She wondered if Jay
would ever forgive her.

Nick put his arm
around her.

The sheriff
scowled, stroking the stubble on his chin. “He told you his name is Ben Chase?
Benjamin Chase?”

Elly spoke into
her arms. “Yes.”

“Did he say he
was from around here?” he asked.

“He did.” Elly
lifted her head. “Why? Do you know him?” Elly saw the sheriff exchange looks
with the other officers. “What’s wrong?”

“Benjamin Chase
died in a hunting accident a few years ago,” the sheriff said. “Whoever told
you his name was Ben Chase was lying to you.”

Elly was dazed.
She remembered Jay saying his friend had died in the forest. Jay had lied to
her. Her heart ached at the realization that he didn’t want her to know his
real name. Why did he lie? Was it his way of telling her he didn’t want her in
his life? Did he plan this all along? Elly’s headache worsened.

Another officer
entered the room and handed Sheriff Neuhaus a sheet of paper and whispered
something to him.

The sheriff let
out a large sigh. “The search group looking for your friend just found two more
bodies.”

“Oh, God.” Elly
covered her mouth. “No.”

“I know this is
hard, but I need you to come with me to the morgue to ID the men who tried to
kidnap you,” Sheriff Neuhaus said. “We have several bodies there already, and
the two new ones will be coming as soon as forensics is through at the scene.
Can you do that?”

Elly nodded, but
she had trouble standing. “It can’t be him.”

* * *

Sheriff Neuhaus
led the way as Elly, Beckholm, and Nick followed him into the morgue. The white
concrete block walls reminded Elly of the halls of her high school. Her nose
was attacked by the smell of rubbing alcohol and formaldehyde.

Elly saw the
first body covered with a sheet and stopped. She closed her eyes and thought of
Jay.

“Elly,” Neuhaus
said, “I need you to tell me if you recognize any of these people.”

Nick walked with
her to the first body. The coroner removed the sheet. The face was that of an
older man with a mustache and massive amounts of bruising around his neck.

“This one was
found Tuesday night at a small camp,” Sheriff Neuhaus said. “He died from a
broken neck.”

Elly knew it
must be one of the men Jay had killed the night he went to see who was
following them. Elly’s stomach started doing flips at the sight of the body.

“No, I’ve never
seen him.” She turned away.

The coroner
pulled the sheet back from the next body. “How about this one?” The man had
been shot in the chest and was much younger than the previous man.

Elly shook her
head. The pain in her stomach grew.

After more
bodies she didn’t recognize, they pulled back the sheet on Belgrade’s body.

“That’s the
pilot,” Elly said.

The next sheet made
Elly pause. This was the body of the man who almost found her and Jay while
they hid under the downed elm tree. She remembered his searching eyes and how
he held his shotgun.

Elly turned to the
sheriff. “This man was searching for us. He walked right by where we were
hiding.”

Beckholm nodded.

“How about this
one?” the coroner asked.

Elly immediately
recognized the man who’d been searching with the other man. “He was also trying
to find us. These two were together.”

“You said you
never saw a young woman, is that right?” Beckholm asked.

“That’s right.”

“Then we don’t
need to see the girl or the young man found with her.”

The side doors
opened and two bodies, still in body bags, were wheeled in. Elly’s hands
started to tremble, and she began to cry. She knew these were the two Beckholm
had talked about. The pain in her stomach was almost unbearable. Her hands were
shaking.

The coroner
unzipped them as Elly clung to Nick’s arm. Slowly, Elly let go and walked to
the two bodies. The first was an older man, so she moved on to the other.

“Are either of
these two the man who helped you?” the sheriff asked.

The second body
was also an older man. Elly shook her head. “No.” She realized she’d been
holding her breath.

“Are you sure?”
Beckholm asked.

“I’m sure.” She walked
back to Nick, “Neither of these two is him.”

Her stomach was
bloated, and a pain developed in her throat. She ran to a garbage can and threw
up. Nick helped hold her as what little was in her stomach exited.

Nick and Agent
Beckholm escorted her out of the building.

Elly’s headache
hit so hard that Nick had to help her walk to Agent Beckholm’s car. Overwhelmed
by exhaustion, she didn’t put up a fight when they told her they were going to take
her to the county hospital for observation. Once there, Elly managed to take a long
hot shower before being helped into a hospital gown and into a bed with clean
sheets. She refused a sedative, not wanting drugs of any kind in her system,
and begged everyone to leave her alone so she could sleep.