Magic Moment (3 page)

Visions blurred in her head.

Earlier events all rushed back. Returning to the warehouse precisely at 5:30. No one there but Dick Donovan. Leisure Limo, the car service the Donovans used, both professionally and personally, arrived. Dick’s insistence that he wasn’t ready to leave, more paperwork to be done, and his offer of the car and driver to take her home. The avenue’s dark, deserted stretch. The misplaced cell phone. A rank smell, then darkness.

“Damn, man,” the man said. “You gave her too much.”

She recognized the male voice, a soft, southern drawl. It belonged to Ron Caldwell, the Leisure Limo driver. The Donovans always requested the same driver.

Laura lay motionless, unmoving, barely breathing. Her heart thumped so loudly she was certain the entire universe heard the rapid beat. She willed it to be silent, but her nervous nucleus refused. Her eyes were closed, her body numb, the foul odor still clogged her nose.

“I hardly gave her any,” another man said. “Should’a been out two, three hours at the most. I can’t believe she ain’t comin’ around.”

This voice, its tone hard, belonged to the second man. The one who had jumped into the car when Ron had pulled over to the side, insisting he needed to search the trunk for his cell phone.

“We’re lucky these boats are only used in the summer.” Ron’s voice was jittery. “The order said quick. Let’s forget doin’ her, and get rid of her.”

The other man grunted. “I ain’t leavin’ until I get my shot between her legs.”

“What if she doesn’t wake up ’til morning?” Ron asked. “We can’t toss her in the daytime. People work in the office. They’ll see.”

“She can’t be out much longer,” the second man said.

“Let’s do her now, and get it over with.”

“I don’t like bangin’ a comatose broad. No fun. I like some fight.” The second man laughed, a sinister, echoing sound. “You know, all that twistin’ and wrigglin’ as they try and throw you off. Then they realize they ain’t gonna win, and give up, whimperin’ while you do ’em.”

Laura maintained her sedate position, eyes closed, her body not moving a muscle, not even a twitch. She grew faint, fear mixed with the lingering effects of the drug they had used. She prayed to remain aware. They were bastards, sick, perverted bastards.

Her stomach churned, her head pounded, but she managed her struggle with consciousness. She was on her side, feeling the softness beneath her. They had her on a bed. Her arms were in front, tied at the wrist with what felt like string or yarn. Her feet were bound together at the ankles. She wasn’t wearing her pumps. Since they had rendered her unconscious, she wasn’t gagged. Their oversight could be her advantage.

Her right side, the side they had dropped her on, was sore as if she’d been poked with pins and needles. She wanted badly to roll over on her back, but that comfort wasn’t feasible. Her parched throat burned. How long could she pretend to be sedated?

A hand grasped her shoulder and shook her roughly. She concentrated on keeping her eyes closed, her breathing even.

“She’s still out,” Ron said.

Dear God, she was so scared. Laura didn’t know what she expected to accomplish by imaginary lifelessness, except to buy time before the inevitable. They had kidnapped her, planned to rape her, and had no intention of letting her live to tell the tale. Thoughts of her mother, how much she loved her and missed her passed through her mind. In death, she would be with her mother.

But she wasn’t ready. Laura wasn’t ready to die, and not like this, not after being brutalized.

Where was the FBI now? When she needed them? When there was a real crime in progress?

“I’m getting damn tired of waitin’,” the nameless brute snapped. “She can’t be out all this time. She’s fakin’.”

Laura’s heart pounded so fiercely she heard the hammering in her ears. Cold, sharp metal pressed against her cheek. Her stomach tangled with fright, and it took every ounce of willpower she possessed to remain passive. This creature didn’t enjoy violating an unconscious woman, and his enjoyment was his priority. As long as she convinced him she was still unconscious, perhaps she could seize an opportunity.

The brute laughed, a crude taunt shading his voice. “Maybe if I cut her a little, that’ll bring the bitch around.”

The mattress dipped and he cupped her chin with one hand. She remained frozen. His other hand stroked her neck. Fear latched onto Laura like a shark’s jaw.

A sudden twitch, and the thorny, prickly point slashed along her jaw line. Her heart’s panicked beating increased. A light, sticky stream trickled down her neck. Blood, her blood.

With a curdling scream, Laura’s eyes flew open and her bound fists came up, smacking her attacker square in the mouth. The unexpected and swift move threw him off her, and he fell to the floor with a hard thud.

She scanned her surroundings. She was in a cramped, tiny, knotty-pine paneled room. The mattress was on some kind of contraption — a bed — secured to the wall. Fluorescent light beamed from the nightstand lamp. She focused on three small, round windows; none were opened. She heard water sloshing from outside. Ron stood by the bottom of the bed.

Laura tried scampering off the bed, but was yanked back by her hair. A knee slammed between her shoulder blades, whacking the air from her lungs. A sharp pain tore through her body.

Flipping her over on her back, Ron straddled her waist. She saw wickedness in his dark, cold eyes. He pulled her arms up over her head and tied them to a knob in the middle of the headboard. The throbbing in her back and chest ran full force. She squirmed and twisted, fighting to throw Ron off her body.

“Stop it. You can’t win,” he said.

Laura halted her struggles. Her breathing came in heavy spurts.

“That’s better.” In his white shirt and black pants, typical driver’s uniform, dark hair, average built, regular height and weight, Ron looked like a standard average guy.

Solidarity wasn’t her intention. Staring hard into his murky eyes, she spat in his face.

Ron flinched. “Bitch.”

Brief satisfaction passed through Laura, watching the wet spittle drip from the tip of his nose. She wriggled, trying to slide from beneath him.

Laughing, the other man moved and stood alongside the bed. He was short and lanky, his eyes sunken and hollow. His black turtleneck and pants hung on his skeleton frame like an oversized suit on a hanger. He was all skin, black wool, and bones.

“She’s a wild one,” Bones said. His tone was jolly, despite the blood pooling in the corner of his mouth. “I’m gonna like hurtin’ her.”

“Me, too. What I’ll like even more is her begging me to stop.” Ron’s black eyes hardened, and his lips twisted.

Panic overwhelmed Laura. She opened her mouth to scream, but Ron’s fist smashed brutally into her cheek, cutting off the sound. Paralyzing pain shot along the side of her face, traveling up through her eye, and settling in her head.

He balled a washcloth and stuffed the rag in her mouth. “That ought’a hold you.”

“Get her legs,” Bones grunted.

The knife sliced through the restraints wrapped around her ankles. Each man grabbed a foot, yanking her legs apart. Her ankles were quickly re-tied separately, secured to the bed’s bottom posts.

Running his skinny, calloused hand along the inside of her left thigh, Bones grabbed her soft flesh, pinching hard. The gag muted Laura’s agonizing scream.

“Oh, you like that?” Aiming higher, Bones squeezed harder.

Her eyes shimmered with tears, and she bit down on the washrag, curbing her scream. Bones’s hard, cruel features twisted, enjoying her anguish.

“Oh, yeah. She’ll be fun.” He laughed, the sound a revolting grunt.

Bones sliced the dress, leaving her in a thin beige slip. The room’s cold dankness added to her quivering fear, and for a crazy instant, she wondered what the two men had done with her coat.

Bones’s skeletal hands moved up her body, stopping at her slip-covered breasts. He squeezed them hard. Laura cringed and clamped her eyes shut against the hands kneading her flesh. Her head pounded. Breathing was difficult. The cloth fixed firmly in her mouth choked her. The soft sobs she failed to contain didn’t help.

They were going to rape her. They were going to kill her. Ready or not, she was going to die.

• • •

The silver BMW’s headlights illuminated the Garden State Parkway. Chase turned off at the exit and slowed for the upcoming traffic light. Magic Lake Island was the New Jersey shore’s greatest secret. Located north of the more popular Atlantic City and south of the more exclusive Long Beach Island, the tiny seaside resort had a total population of less than five thousand people, perhaps twelve thousand at the height of the summer season. Most tourists were discouraged from choosing Magic as a vacation spot because the town had an extremely high insect-to-people ratio. Those damn green-headed flies virtually ate grown men alive.

The community did have a charming, laid back appeal and its lack of popularity attracted Chase. If being a sociable party animal was his mood, he drove to Atlantic City where raunchy bars, casinos, and women were plentiful. When he wanted calm solitude, he drove to Magic Lake and,
Madre
, the boat he docked at the marina.

Chase was the only tenant who visited his boat during the “off season,” the months of October through May. With the exception of Mac, the night security guard who made rounds only if inclined, the area was pretty much deserted. A retired Magic Lake Island police officer, Mac stayed in the office, watched television, drank coffee, ate cookies and collected his pay. Nothing out of the ordinary ever happened in Magic.

The traffic light flashed green, and Chase turned the BMW right. He rolled down the window, inhaling the seashore’s stale, salty scent. All was quiet. The air was cool, the breeze blowing a mist against his unshaven face. He loved being in Magic.

The parking lot’s gate was open. The overhead lights changed to a lesser wattage after Labor Day. Chase pulled the BMW into his assigned parking space. The only other parked vehicles were the pea green van he knew was Mac’s, and a dark Lincoln limo parked in the spot assigned to Ben and Lily Rollins, nice senior citizens who headed to Florida around October first and didn’t return North until Memorial Day weekend. Chase was surprised the Rollins were in Magic Lake on a dreary night in March.

He stepped out of the car, eager to take his boat out on the open sea. There was nothing more peaceful than the lull of waves beneath you. He had christened his boat,
Madre
, not only for his late mother, who, like Chase, had been comforted by the ocean, but also for his four years of Spanish, a beautiful language, and the only college course he had enjoyed.
Madre
wasn’t a big vessel, but she was comfortable. Seating accommodations for up to eight passengers, a heated cabin and wheelhouse, and cooking and bath facilities.

He locked the BMW’s door and glanced at the Rollins’s boat docked three spaces from his. The cruiser was dark and appeared unoccupied. He blinked, shook his head as if to clear a few whiskey-laced cobwebs, and blinked again. A faint light gleamed from a boat …

Chase’s eyes widened. Damn, the light came from
his
boat. Someone had broken into his boat!
Damn!
His lips tightening, he considered storming the office and rousing Mac. Little good that would do. It was unlikely the old man would investigate, his only assistance a telephone call to the cops. Another seven to ten minutes before they arrived. The intruders would be gone — likely with Chase’s boat.

He reopened the driver’s door and leaned inside. Not knowing what or who he’d find on the boat, Chase reached into the glove compartment. He groped until his fingers gripped the butt of a handgun. Although he had a permit to carry the weapon, he had never needed to use it. He barely remembered the last time he took target practice.

His fingers wrapped tightly around the gun. Since when did people break into boats on Magic Lake Island? Crime on Magic Lake was a driver ignoring a stop sign or a couple of underage kids trying to steal a six-pack. Anger seeped in Chase’s veins. And why the hell did these assholes have to pick his boat? The star-studded sky guided Chase toward
Madre
. He moved panther-like on the wooden dock, throwing first one leg, then the other over
Madre’s
side.

He stalked the deck, finding the eerie silence disturbing. A faint light streamed from the bottom of the cabin door, and he followed it. Holding his breath, he pressed his ear against the closed door. Voices were muffled. He raised the gun. With his free hand, he cracked opened the door enough to scope the cabin.

It wasn’t what he saw that pulled at his gut, but what he heard. A woman sobbing. Chase winced. He had heard that familiar whimper too many times while growing up. From his mother. These particular muted cries ripped his heart.

He nudged open the door a splinter more. A man wearing dark pants and a white shirt stood with his back to the door. Chase looked beyond him. Another man, dressed in black pants and a black turtleneck sweater, sat at the bed’s bottom edge. Chase couldn’t distinguish what the man held in his hand.

Both men laughed, a callous, malicious sound that made Chase grimace. Even above their merriment, he still heard the woman weeping.

He saw the bare, shapely legs from the knees on down and realized what the man held. In one hand was a dagger-type knife; in the other, beige lace panties he had cut off the woman.

Damn the bastards!
Chase swallowed hard. His insides twisted and he battled to control his anger. He needed to keep a level head. No way was he allowing a woman’s assault.

She was on her back, legs tied spread-eagle. Chase concentrated on the two degenerates. They happily recited the cruel acts they had in store. Nausea cramped his stomach. He heard her stifled pleas. She ignored her restraints, twisting in useless efforts to jerk away. Her fruitless attempts only made her captors laugh harder and probably turned them on even more.

Gun cocked, he slithered into the room. He saw the woman’s body to her waist. She wore a flimsy slip. The man on the bed slid the knife beneath the garment, and a sharp but barely audible scream stopped Chase in his tracks. A hearty cackle echoed the man’s laugh as he stood and unzipped his baggy black pants. They fell around his ankles.