In The Bleak Midwinter: A Special Agent Constance Mandalay Novel (32 page)

How many times had Merrie heard that sound
and tried to hide from the pain and horror she knew it was
bringing?
She wondered silently.

A moment later she was bathed in a yellowish
swath as Skip crouched down with a grunt and shone his light
between the uprights of the wobbly handrail.

“Find something?” he asked.

“No,” Constance replied, shaking her head and
squinting against the light. “It’s all clear.”

“Same thing up on the main floor,” he
replied, quickly shifting the beam so that it was no longer aimed
into their faces. “Johnson’s checking the attic like you
asked.”

“Go ahead and turn your flashlight back on,”
Constance said to the deputy next to her.

The business end of the cylinder in the
woman’s hand blazed to life before the last syllable had tumbled
from the FBI agent’s mouth. Slozar’s thumb had probably been
pressed tightly against the button the entire time.

“Done down here?” Skip asked.

“Yeah, we’re coming up,” Constance
replied.

He swung his own flashlight’s beam toward the
bottom of the staircase. “Watch that first one.”

Constance felt a sharp twinge in her bruised
shin and said, “Yeah. I remember…”

CONSTANCE
aimed her gaze down the
hallway, staring along the flashlight’s yellow beam to check the
scope of her view. The corridor emptied into a room at the far end
of the structure, and the light splashed an amoeba-like puddle on
the moderately distant wall. Even through the streaked, multi-year
patina of dirt, the glass panes of the old wooden sash window
bloomed with shiny glare points as the light struck them. On just
the other side of the glass she could make out the wide grain of
age-grayed plywood boarding it over from the outside, just like
every other window in the house.

Sheriff Carmichael panned the beam back along
the hallway. There were two doors on the right side and one on the
left. The latter was the one that most concerned Constance, because
it opened onto the stairs that took you down into the basement
where everything was supposed to happen.

As the sheriff turned his hand, dragging the
shaft of light along the wall, an archway was revealed on the right
hand side as well. It was much closer to them and led into the
front room. The only other way into the house was through the back
door, which was here in the kitchen with them.

Unless the killer was a certified genius that
had figured out the secret to matter teleportation, he—or she—had
no way in or out of the basement without crossing through
Constance’s line of sight. That was exactly how she wanted it.

Skip shone the beam around the kitchen then
held it so that its glow dimly illuminated them both. With a shake
of his head he harrumphed. “Best seat in the house, I guess.”

“Seems to be,” Constance replied.

“You sure you don’t want company? I’m happy
to stay, or I can pull Slozar back in with you.”

Constance replied. “No offense, but I don’t
think Deputy Slozar has the constitution for this.”

“Yeah,” he grunted. “She’s a good kid, but
you’re right. Like I said though, I can stay.”

“I’ll be fine,” she told him.

“You’re sure?” He pressed.

Constance wondered why he seemed so intent on
her not being alone in the house but decided not to ask. She had a
sneaking suspicion she wouldn’t get a straight answer even if she
did pose the question.

“Positive,” she expressed, adding a bit of
sternness to her voice. “I’d really prefer you and your deputies
keep everything covered from the outside.”

He waited a beat before saying anything, as
if he were calculating a different approach. But when he finally
spoke—though reluctance was still apparent in his tone—he stopped
pushing.

“We always do,” he said. “And we always see
the same thing, which is a whole lot of nothing.”

“The killer has to get in here somehow, Skip.
So does the victim for that matter.”

“Yeah, that’s true. But I’ve said it before,
I’ll be damned if I know how.”

“Hopefully I can figure that out,” she
replied.

“Good luck with that,” he grunted. “No
offense, but you aren’t the first Fed to say that to me.”

“Well, maybe I’ll be the last.”

He let out a patronizing half-chuckle. “Heard
that one before too.”

“You have a better idea?” she snipped.

Skip shook his head. “No, Constance, I don’t.
And don’t take what I said personally. I’m just not getting my
hopes up. I’ve been let down too many times.”

She softened a bit. “Okay… Well then, it
looks like I’m all set. I suppose everyone should get into
position.”

“You realize it’s probably not even nine
o’clock yet, right?”

Constance pushed back her coat sleeve and
checked her watch. “You’re correct, it’s eight thirty-two.”

He snorted. “Okay, have it your way, sugar.
But I’ll tell you the same thing I told all the other G-men. You’ve
got a long damn night ahead of you. I speak from experience.”

“I’m sure you do.”

“I’m trying to tell you that this is gonna
happen whether you sit here all night, or you walk in ten minutes
before. Whether you’re quiet as a church mouse, or having a party.
It always does.”

“I understood what you meant, Skip.”

He looked at her and absently combed his
mustache before giving his head a shake. “Yep. Stubborn as all
hell, just like my oldest.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment.”

“Yeah… I kind of meant it that way…” he
replied. “Okay… So, you’ve got your radio?”

“Yes,” she said, holding the device up in the
light between them. “Already tested. We’ll do an hourly check-in
unless something crops up in between. Sound good?”

“Yeah, it might keep you from getting too
bored,” he said with a nod. Tilting his hand, he aimed the
flashlight beam at the counter beside them and dipped his head
toward it. The shaft of illumination fell across a brown paper bag
and a gray metal thermos. “It’s not exactly catfish,
Nehi
,
and
RC
, but there you go.”

“Excuse me… Not exactly what?”

“Yeah, I guess
Brother Dave
was a
little before your time wasn’t he…” Skip said.

“I still don’t follow.”

“Forget it. Bad joke. Either way, what I was
trying to say is there are a couple of egg salad sandwiches in the
bag, and you’ve got coffee. Should hold you for a while.”

Constance reached over and snatched up the
thermos bottle by its handle then held it out to him. “I appreciate
the thought, but you’d better just go ahead and take the coffee
with you.”

“You don’t want it?”

“Want it, yes, but it’s probably not a good
idea,” she told him. “Like you said, it’s going to be a long night,
and contrary to your metaphorical observations about me when we
first met, I’m not really capable of writing my name in the
snow.”

C
HAPTER
24

12:04 A.M. – December 25, 2010

632 Evergreen Lane

Hulis Township – Northern Missouri

“CHECKING
in,” Constance whispered.
“All clear.”

She was holding the two-way close, with the
microphone pickup just inches from her mouth. She knew she was
probably being overly cautious, but so be it. There was an old
saying about discretion, and while valor might not necessarily play
a part in her current situation, in her mind stealth most certainly
did.

She released the talk button and heard a
quiet chirp, followed by a quick hiss of muted static. She had the
volume on the device tweaked barely into the audible range, so she
pushed it up closer to her ear and just listened since she was
number one on this Hit Parade.

The ordered cascade for the hourly check-in
began, and the reports burped from the speaker, just as they had
three times before. Status was announced starting with her, then
Deputy Johnson, then Deputy Broderick, and ending finally with
Sheriff Carmichael. Each of the men outside relayed a message that
echoed hers: “All clear.”

Although it was horribly dark, it wasn’t
completely pitch-black on the main floor of the house. Not like it
seemed in the basement. There were several now noticeable gaps in
the boards covering the windows, so a small amount of light was
seeping in here and there, coming from the not-too-distant
streetlamps positioned along the lane outside. It wasn’t much light
at all, but once her eyes had adjusted, it was enough that it
allowed Constance to make out shadows and shapes. That was all she
really needed to see for the moment. Of course, a pair of night
vision goggles would have been nice under the circumstances, but
you made do with what you had.

She gently settled the radio onto the counter
next to her, close enough that she didn’t have to fumble for it.
Then she folded her arms across her chest and cupped her hands
around her elbows. Twisting slowly at the waist, first right, then
left, she proceeded to tense her muscles then relax them through
several slow repetitions as a way of stretching with an economy of
movement. The last thing she needed was to stiffen up and get a
muscle cramp.

Not quite four hours had passed since Skip
had reluctantly left her alone here in the house. She still wasn’t
exactly sure why he had seemed so nonplussed about the arrangement,
but at least he had finally dropped the subject without too many
objections. His pushing had certainly been enough to make her
suspicious of his motive at the time, but the more she thought
about it, the less she felt it was enough to elevate him to suspect
status.

Especially after enduring those first two
hours alone.

They had been the worst so far, at least
where her nerves were concerned. Sitting by herself in the cold and
dark wasn’t a completely new experience. She had worked
surveillance under disagreeable conditions before, but the history
behind this house wasn’t exactly your garden variety unpleasant.
She knew her own imagination was responsible for the majority of
the uneasiness, but she couldn’t help the feeling that Merrie had
never really left this place. Maybe that was why Skip had wanted
her to have company. He had to know those feelings and thoughts
himself. After all, he had been dealing with this for far longer
than she.

Constance felt a sudden involuntary
contraction in the muscles of her jaw and knew immediately what was
coming. She reached up with her hand and stifled the wide yawn as
it began. While that first two hours might have been the worst on
her nerves, each subsequent minute since then had been a bolus of
pure boredom injected straight into her veins. Unfortunately, the
tedium was building in her system, and that could easily allow her
exhaustion to take over. She knew from all-too-recent experience
where that could lead.

Shoving her hand into her coat pocket she dug
around then pulled out a small plastic bottle of caffeine pills she
had tucked in there earlier. She had forgotten about having them
until she had set about digging her flashlight from out of the
glove compartment of her car and come across the container.
Although she kept the stimulant on hand for emergencies, she tended
to put it out of her mind because she actually hated using it.
Unfortunately, sometimes it was the only option available, and
right now seemed to qualify as one of those “sometimes.” She
carefully popped the cap on the bottle and held her palm over the
opening as she tilted it. If she remembered the directions
correctly, one of the caplets should be approximately the same as a
strong cup of coffee. Considering how little sleep she’d had, that
probably wasn’t enough. By feel, she used her thumb to work two of
them into her hand, then went ahead and swallowed both of them just
to be safe.

After recapping and stowing the bottle, she
pulled out her cell phone. Christmas Eve had come and gone in a
town where the holiday was avoided like the plague. That was just
one more thing about all of this that didn’t feel right to her,
even though she knew it was just her emotions talking. Still, she
didn’t have to allow their disdain for the day to stop her from at
least acknowledging it.

Cupping one hand over the display, she
thumbed the keypad, sparking it to life. It seemed incredibly
bright to her under the circumstances, so for a second she found
herself almost squinting. She selected Text Message, and then Ben’s
cell number. She was keeping her right hand ungloved, just in case
she needed to draw her weapon, so with practiced dexterity, by the
glow of the display, she rapidly keyed in, “MERRY CHRISTMAS. LOVE
YOU, C.”

She chewed on her lip for a moment, staring
down at the seemingly brilliant screen while still keeping an ear
out for any noises other than the occasional moan of the wind
outside, which had been prevalent all along. Her thumb hovered over
the send button, gently caressing it then drawing back hesitantly
before brushing against it again. After a moment, she shifted the
digit over and tapped the back button to erase the words of
affection, effectively reducing the message to a simple Christmas
greeting with no expectations or strings. Only then did she finally
hit SEND.