Fear the Dark (16 page)

She walked slowly and carefully, vaguely aware that her bare feet were cold, but uncaring.
Just keep walking, just one foot in front of the other, and don't let go of the wall, never let go of the wall . . .

—

“IT'S MY JOB,”
Jonah repeated. “I never thought anything about it before.”

“You literally saved these people from death?” Sam asked, her gaze intense. “Never mind modesty, we need the truth. Did you?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I did.”

“And you remember them all?” Luke asked.

“I don't think you ever forget saving someone's life,” Jonah retorted.

Sam got up and went over to the evidence board. She picked up a marker, and pointed. “Okay. Simon Church. How did you save his life?”

“Before the Jeep, he had a smaller car, a beater, pretty much. I was out patrolling one rainy night when he went past me like a bat out of hell. I called it in, then hit my lights and sirens and took off after him. I didn't know the brakes had failed and he was trying desperately to stop the car. Just outside the town limits, there's a mean curve with a solid drop. Straight down about four hundred feet and into an old granite quarry. There was no guardrail at the time.”

“He went over?” Luke asked, intent.

“Yeah. He'd managed to fishtail the car two or three times before he hit the edge, so it both slowed the car and sent him down at a slight angle. I got to the edge to see that part of a dead tree and part of a
crumbling ledge were the only things holding that car in place, about thirty feet down. I yelled at him not to move, then went back to my Jeep and got the hook from my winch. I had to move carefully, because it was still raining and I could feel the mud moving underneath every step I took.”

He drew a breath. “There was no way in hell to stop that car from falling except for a minute or two. Not long enough to try to attach the hook to the car, to anything solid. So I hooked it around me, and when I got to the car, which thankfully had stopped with the driver's side facing up, I was able to ease the door open.

“Simon hadn't lost his head even though he looked terrified. He'd already unhooked his seat belt. I grabbed his wrist and held on as hard as he did. He started to slide out of the car—and that's when the slope let go. We were both sitting on our asses in the mud, watching that car tumbling all the way to the floor of the quarry. There was barely enough left to put in a wheelbarrow.”

“Wow,” Sam said.

“It was close,” Jonah admitted. “I was just wondering if we were going to try to climb back up holding on to that slippery cable when Sarah got there. We held on, and she operated the winch to pull us slowly back to the top.” Jonah shook his head. “No question he'd be dead if I hadn't been able to get down to him.”

Sam made a quick note under Simon Church's name, simply
SAVED FROM CAR CRASH.

“Okay,” she said. “Amy Grimes. What happened?”

Jonah shook his head. “One of those unthinking teenage things. It was about a year ago. Amy had a different boyfriend then, and they decided to have a nice, romantic little picnic. In a pasture. Normally,
that time of the year, that pasture is empty because the farmer is about to cut hay.

“On that day, however, I got a frantic call from the farmer, whose place I had left as part of a regular, routine patrol no more than five minutes before. His meanest bull, one that would as soon trample you to death as look at you, had kicked its way out of the stable it was in and had taken off through the pasture. He was just going to let the animal run, burn off his temper, but he caught a glimpse of color at the far end of the pasture and realized somebody was inside the fence. He was too far away to do anything, but he knew I'd been headed in that direction, so he called me.”

Jonah paused. “Just as I got there, the boyfriend was bailing out over the fence. Amy was frozen, absolutely couldn't move. And that bull was headed right for her. The farmer had told me to shoot him if I had to. I had to.”

“One shot put him down?” Lucas asked matter-of-factly.

“Two. Two quick rounds, which, luckily, I knew where to aim. He was moving so fast that he was dead in midgallop. Flipped over forward. One hoof grazed Amy's arm. That's how close it had been.”

Sam let out a low whistle, but all she wrote under Amy's name was
BULL ATTACK.

“Keep going,” Lucas said. “Judge Carson?”

“Few years back, when I was first appointed, we had something of a meth problem in the area, and that was a problem we definitely didn't need. I didn't want it to take hold, and that meant we had to stop it. My department was aggressive, and I called in outside help, experienced drug enforcement officers to work with my people in locating and taking out the labs. One meth lab blew up before we could get
there, killing the three inside. But we were able to capture the lieutenant of the wannabe drug kingpin of the area.”

“And he was willing to talk,” Sam guessed.

“That was the plan. We kept him in protective custody right in the courthouse until Judge Carson could charge him and—Serenity being a small town with not much on the docket—hear his testimony at the same time. Judge was fine with it, lawyers were fine with it, even the dealer was fine with it.

“His boss, however, wasn't. He must have gotten in through one of the windows, because he didn't go through security downstairs. Had a silenced automatic and shot two of my officers outside the courtroom doors. Didn't kill them, luckily. His lieutenant wasn't so lucky. The first shot was to the head, second to the heart. He was rumored to be a crack shot. The rumors hadn't lied. His next shot would have been the judge.”

“So you stopped him,” Lucas said.

Jonah nodded. “It took three shots to bring him down, and he still managed to wound the judge in the arm. But he didn't kill him.”

Silent now, Samantha wrote underneath Judge Carson's name
ARMED DRUG DEALER.

“Next,” Lucas said. “Luna Lang.”

“She used to own a little cottage, couple of years before she met Dave. Hired a contractor for some electrical repairs. I honestly don't know if he screwed it up or it was just an old house and something sparked the wrong way. I heard the town fire alarm go off, got the radio call, and I was closer than either the fire trucks or EMS. When I got there that night, the place was already an inferno. I could hear the fire engines, but I knew they wouldn't get there in time. I went
in. Luna had managed to make it as far as the downstairs hallway, so I didn't have to go far. But just as I carried her out, the whole roof caved in. The house was a total loss.”

Sam stared at him. “I bet it's hell for you to get life insurance.”

He managed a faint smile. “Luckily I have no dependents, and my pension would take care of cremation and any bills left.”

Sam looked as if she wanted to ask more questions but in the end just shook her head, wrote
HOUSE FIRE
under Luna's name, and went on. “Sean Messina?”

“He was hiking up in the woods not too far from here. Hunting season, so he had his gun and his dog. Never actually figured out how it happened, but somehow he managed to shoot himself. I was also in the woods, about a quarter mile away, but I was looking for some illegal traps the hunting fairies set each season.”

Sam blinked, then smiled. “Ah. You're not sure who's doing it.”

“Oh, I'm sure. I just can't catch the bastard. Anyway, I was hunting for traps, and springing and collecting those I found when I heard the shot. Sean's dog deserves some of the credit; he came bursting out of the brush near me barking his head off. Led me back to Sean, who was bleeding like a stuck pig.”

“So you saved him,” Lucas said.

“Well, I was barely in range to use my radio and have them send our EMS unit. Until they came, I used basic first aid.” Jonah shrugged. “They said he would have bled to death if I hadn't known what I was doing.”

Silently, Sam wrote
HUNTING ACCIDENT
under Sean Messina's name.

“Okay,” Lucas said. “How did you save Nessa Tyler's life?”

Nessa was beginning to think the dirt wall she followed was never going to end. When she paused to rest, which seemed often to her, she could no longer hear the breathing of the other people. She'd thought that was scary enough, but the absence of it, the sheer
aloneness
she felt in that damp, so-dark place, was more terrifying than anything she'd ever known before.

She felt like she'd walked miles. Her feet had gone so cold they were numb, but she had a pretty good idea how scratched up they must be by now, even as careful as she'd been.

But then Nessa realized that the wall she'd been following had been straight for a long time, much longer than any room would need. For the first time, she had a sense of something above her head, as if she could reach up and touch more dirt if only she were a few inches taller. A few more yards, and she could have sworn she could
make out a faint light ahead. Very faint, not like daylight exactly—more like dusk.

The final few yards were a climb, or felt like it, though she didn't realize until she at last reached the mouth of the shaft that she had climbed from God only knew how deeply underground.

She stood there, and for a moment closed her eyes to make sure the surface of her mind was still calm and without ripples. Remarkably, it was. She opened her eyes then, looked around to get her bearings—and wanted to burst into tears.

Nothing looked familiar. Absolutely nothing. There was no sign of a cabin, much less a house. No sign of a
shed
. Trails crisscrossed through the woods all around her, but she couldn't see anything wide enough to show that a car had passed this way, or a horse, or a bike.

Even worse, there were evergreen trees all around, filling in for the hardwood trees only now beginning to green out, and because of them, Nessa could only catch glimpses of the sky. The darkening sky.

And, faintly, she could hear thunder rumble.

Damn.
She didn't dare say it out loud, and not only because that black snake of a
him
was still back there, and maybe by now knew she was gone.

There was a lot of forest around Serenity. Back when she'd really liked to ride her pony, her father had taken her along a lot of the old trails that wound all through the forest, and Chief Riggs had made sure they were clearly marked, especially for Sunday riders.

But she hadn't ridden in a long time, and nothing she was looking at looked familiar.

Worse, it was getting darker. And if it stormed . . . even if she
found some kind of shelter, what if he came after her? What if he found her?

With a choked-back sob, Nessa picked a direction and struck out, trying to listen in case he was behind her, scanning in front of her to see where she was going as long as she
could
see. And wishing she could just stand and scream and scream and scream until somebody heard her and came to save
her.

“Well?” Sam asked.

“It was nothing heroic,” he told them. “Nessa used to ride all the time, first ponies and then the bigger horse her dad, Matt, got for her. She was a really good rider, so more than ready for a well-trained horse. That one was. They don't have pasture, so he boarded the horse at one of the outlying farms. She wasn't allowed to ride alone, none of the kids were, but they'd form groups just about every Sunday and ride most of the day exploring the trails through the woods.

“I got the ranger service out here to clearly mark the trails that were suitable for riding, made sure every rider had a map and a compass in their saddlebags, and put the fear of God into them about not leaving the marked trails. The forest can get dense as hell, and we've lost hikers in years past. I wasn't about to lose any of those kids in those woods.”

Sam said, “What happened?”

“The kind of freak thing that can happen whenever you're riding
a horse in the woods. They weren't going faster than a trot; that's what the kids swore, and I believed them. Nessa's horse somehow got his hoof wedged in under one of those big roots and fell. Maybe if Nessa had been older or more experienced, she would have had the quick reactions to push herself clear of the horse. But she didn't. And when he fell, he came down on top of her.”

“Jesus,” Sam muttered.

“Yeah. I counted it lucky she was riding with an English saddle that day and not Western like the others; the saddle horn probably would have killed her. As it was, she had a broken arm and a couple of broken ribs. Worse, she also had internal injuries.

“The oldest boy knew enough first aid that he was able to splint the broken arm, and two of the others set off for town to get help.” Jonah shook his head. “She was out cold, and he had sense enough to know both that she shouldn't be jostled and that he needed to at least start heading back for town. So he and one of the other boys fashioned a litter they could carry on foot between them, holding her as level as possible.”

“Smart kid.”

“The real hero.” Jonah smiled. “He's in college now. Pre-med.”

Lucas smiled, but his eyes were still intent. “What happened?”

“They managed to get her nearly to the road, where the EMS unit met them. The unit got her to the hospital.”

“And?” Luke prompted.

Jonah sighed. “Most people think they know what the rarest blood types are, but scientists are discovering new variations all the time. The rarest blood type, one most people have never heard of, is Rh-null. A patient with that blood type can give to some other Rh
patients, but if you've got it, that's what you have to get if you need a transfusion. Nessa has Rh-null blood.”

“And so do you,” Sam said.

Jonah nodded. “There was none in the clinic's blood bank, and even with a chopper it'd be a good two hours or more getting some here. Doc knew I had it, so he called me. And I came.”

After a moment, Jonah said, “I give blood at the clinic as often as Doc will let me. Nessa gives about once a year. With a little luck, we've got enough stockpiled for both of us in case of any future need. Now.”

Sam looked at the evidence board, and then under Nessa's name slowly wrote:
BLOOD TRANSFUSION
.

“Nothing heroic,” Jonah repeated. “I happened to have the right blood and I was here. So Nessa survived.”

“She would have died without your blood,” Luke said, and it wasn't a question.

Jonah half shrugged. “Doc said so later. I asked him to downplay what the risk had been to Nessa, but her dad, Matt, can be a persistent bastard, and he found out. Honestly, I think that's one of the reasons he isn't totally batshit crazy about Nessa missing. He's convinced I can find her and bring her home. Thinks of me as her guardian angel.”

Samantha looked at him steadily for a moment, then said, “And can you?”

Jonah gave her a look. “Why, because we have the same blood type? Jesus.”

“No. Because you're a latent empath—and you gave her some of your blood.”

Lucas said to his wife, “It's a stretch.”

“Maybe not. Maybe not if I help.”

Jonah could see Lucas stiffen a bit, but the other man's voice was calm. “You've never tried that before. As far as I know, no one has tried that before.”

“That's why we practice in the field, according to Bishop. Trying things we've never done before. And the blood type being so rare, plus Jonah's latent abilities, makes this something unique.”

Lucas was silent, frowning.

“Have you been able to sense any of them?” Samantha asked, clearly knowing the answer.

“No,” Luke replied, still frowning. “I don't know if it's the energy he doesn't really control or what, but every time I've tried, all I've heard in my head was something like static. And I haven't felt anything at all.”

“Then we need to try something else.” Samantha sighed. “Look, we've still got a day's work or more going through files trying to figure out why these people, indebted to Jonah for their lives, are now targets apparently because of it, since that's the only similarity we've found. We don't have any clues. We don't have
anything
to send us in the right direction, unless we can somehow find out where Nessa's being held.”

“The
somehow
meaning me?” Jonah asked warily.

Sam gestured over her shoulder to a table against the wall, where boxes held the personal effects of some of the missing people. “I can touch that. All of it, probably. And maybe,
maybe
I'll catch a glimpse of something useful. But as far as we know, he didn't touch any of the missing people then. Not when and where he abducted them.”

“The energy bubbles,” Jonah protested.

“Were probably excess energy from when he was initially
establishing control over them psychically. That's why there was so much of it, why so much of it was diffused. Even why it seems to be blocking Luke. Whoever this guy is, he's powerful, but I think we're right in believing he isn't in control of his abilities. He's leaving too much around him whenever he uses them. For now, at least. But the more time that passes, the more likely it is that he'll learn better control, better focus. And once that happens, we might end up facing a weapon we can't fight.”

“Which makes it even more dangerous, Sam. He's touched Nessa's mind, controlled her. If he senses you're trying to make contact through Jonah, he could try to kill you both.”

“Then what, Luke? Spend the day trying to figure out why it's important that
these
particular people whose lives Jonah saved are so important? I'm willing to bet he could add others to that list, other lives he's saved.” She looked at Jonah fiercely. “Couldn't you?”

“I guess. Probably. I'm a cop.” It was, really, the first time Jonah had seen the intensity lurking beneath Samantha's seemingly quiet, urchinlike exterior, and now he had a fair idea of how these two matched so well.

“Then there are more potential victims, Luke. He abducted Nessa
yesterday
. He murdered Annie Duncan last night. He has five other people he's probably holding captive. I say any shortcut we can try that might lead us to this bastard is worth taking.” She looked at Jonah, again fiercely. “How about you?”

“Yeah. Of course.” He had no idea what he'd just agreed to but had a hunch it was not going to be pleasant.

Thunder rumbled distantly.

“Shit,” Jonah said. “If we get another gully washer, even knowing
which way to head in looking for them might leave us with nothing but a simple direction.”

“Then we don't have any time to waste.” Sam got up and came to stand behind Jonah—who felt profoundly uneasy.

“Uh—”

“Don't worry,” Luke said as he got up and stood near his wife, presumably to catch her if she collapsed again. “If this thing works at all, you'll be a conduit. Best case, you might get some idea of where Nessa is being held, and maybe a mild headache.”

“And worst case?”

“You'll feel at least some of what she's feeling.”

“Oh, great,” he muttered.

Sam was briskly matter-of-fact. “Close your eyes, Jonah. And think about Nessa.”

“Think about her how?”

“Think of her riding horses, carrying her schoolbooks, standing in that kitchen while some monster took hold of her mind. Make her come alive in
your
mind.”

Jonah had no idea if he could do it, but he closed his eyes and thought about Nessa. He had a lot of memories of her, now that he allowed himself to think of them.

Nessa on a pony and then a horse. Nessa grinning at him and waving when he passed by in his Jeep. Lying so still and white and silent in the hospital bed while his blood helped her hold on to life. That chilling video of her in her kitchen, moving like some remote-controlled doll to do the bidding of another.

Nessa . . .

“My feet are cold,” Jonah said.

—

HER FEET WERE
cold. She was a little surprised she could feel anything, because she thought they were numb. She'd looked down at them once only to look hastily away, because there were scratches from thorns and sticks, most of them bleeding, and one split toenail where she'd tripped on a root.

A
root
. They always gave her trouble. Always.

She knew the only reason her feet weren't hurting horribly was because they were cold and mostly numb. But the coldness made it harder for her to feel the sharp edge of a stone, or briars, or everything else that could injure the bare feet of a little girl.

It was growing darker as the storm neared, but Nessa was doing her best. She had a sharp stone in her hand, and every few yards, she dug a short scratch in a tree trunk, just barely visible. She did it for two reasons: because she hoped it would keep her from walking in a circle as she'd read lost people often did, and because she hoped it would help Chief Riggs and his people find where the others were being held.

She knew it was a risk. If that snake thing, if
he
followed her and saw the marks, then he could catch up to her. She was sure he could travel faster than she could. So she tried to move faster, but paused to dig into a tree with the rock, her fingers hurting, her feet cold and stinging from the thorns and sticks and hard, cold ground . . .

—

“WHERE IS SHE,
Jonah?” Sam asked calmly. She was holding one hand on each side of his head, a few inches from him, and her eyes were closed.

“Don't know. Woods. Woods all around. My feet are cold. I can hear it thundering, louder now. I'm afraid . . . he might be somewhere behind me . . . but I have to . . . mark the trees. Like Chief Riggs taught us to do. A sharp stone. A slash across the bark. Not deep enough to hurt the tree. Just deep enough to see so we don't get lost.”

“Nessa, did you escape?”

“I knew I could.” Jonah's voice was oddly his own, and yet there was a musing quality to it. “I don't know why I didn't sleep like the others. They're still back there. In that place that smells of dirt and mushrooms and . . .”

“And what, Nessa?”

“. . . and he has needles in their arms, with IV bags. I remember those from the hospital. There was one in my arm too, but I pulled it out. So I could get away. And then . . . I had to be so careful. So
quiet
. Because I knew he would look for me if he knew I was gone. I found the wall, and kept one hand on it, because I knew I could find my way out like that.”

“Did you see anything, Nessa?”

“It's dark. It's so dark. I can't see anything. I can hear the others breathing sometimes, but . . . I can't see. I can't help them. Unless I get out. Get away. If I get away, then I can help them. Then I can show people where he kept us.”

“Nessa—”

“I'm outside again.”

“How did you come out? What did the doorway look like?”

“Not a doorway. Just . . . a hole in the ground. I think I've walked for miles and miles. But I haven't, of course, I know that. Only I'm
so tired. And the storm is coming. I still don't see anything that looks familiar. Except . . . there's a rock, taller than I am. And I remember people talking about it. Because it looks like it should fall over and it never does.”

“Nessa,” Jonah said suddenly. “Can you hear me?”

“I can hear you in my head. Why can I do that, Chief Riggs?”

“We'll talk about it later. Nessa, just beyond the funny rock there are two different paths. Do you see them?”

“Um . . . yeah. One's clearer than the other. I can hardly see the other.”

“That's the trail you have to take.”

“Are you sure?”

“Just get on that trail and keep walking, Nessa. I'll be there as soon as I can.”

“Oh—okay, Chief Riggs.”

Lucas had heard only one side of that last bit of conversation, when Jonah spoke. But he watched Sam's lips move whenever Nessa answered.

Sam stepped to one side as Jonah rose, and she seemed more grateful than anything else that Luke's arm was around her.

“Wow,” she said. “That was different.”

Jonah shook his head the way a man did when he was dismissing something for the moment. “It's not a
mild
headache, just so you know. I have to go after Nessa. If she's where I hope she is, I can get there in less than thirty minutes. I'll grab a couple of my officers who ride; Clyde stables a few horses several blocks back from his diner. You two stay here.”

“What about the captor?” Lucas asked.

“Nessa may be able to help us find him. If not, the marks I taught
her to make on trees should at least get us near there. No matter how hard it rains, it won't wash away
those
marks.”