Midnight Fear (13 page)

S
he struggled against the cords binding her wrists and ankles, tried to scream through the thick cloth gag shoved into her mouth. The movement of shadows in the darkness told her Joshua was here. Hiding. Watching her. He moved slowly forward, moonlight falling onto his slim form.

“I brought you a gift, Caity.” He held the mutilated Barbie doll, swinging it in front of her face by its long, blond hair. The straight pins inserted into its anatomy glimmered dully. “Don’t you think she looks like you?”

She felt the dip of the mattress as he sat on its edge, his hands sinking roughly into her hair. “I do.”

Caitlyn awoke, her chest heaving and her body slick with perspiration. The bedroom was quiet except for her own labored breathing. She pressed her hands over her face.

It was a dream, she told herself. Another one of her nightmares, brought on by seeing Joshua again and witnessing Donna Faust’s remains being dug up from the
ground. Still, Caitlyn pushed back the sheets and got out of bed, certain she wouldn’t be able to reclaim sleep, at least not for a while.

Downstairs, she made a cup of herbal tea in the kitchen, turning on the small counter television set to keep her company and distract her thoughts. But Joshua loomed in her mind like a thug on a darkened street corner, waiting for her.

She couldn’t help it, Caitlyn wanted to talk to Reid—she craved hearing his voice telling her things would be all right. She had nearly asked to speak to him in private at the diner, but Agent Tierney’s intimidating presence had discouraged her, as did Reid’s aloofness throughout most of the day. Returning to D.C. with Agent Morehouse, Caitlyn had engaged in small talk although she’d felt anything but social. Once they reached the VCU offices in Judiciary Square, he had dutifully accompanied her to her car, then stood watching until she pulled from the parking garage. On the drive back to Middleburg, Caitlyn had half expected Reid to call her cell and check on her, but the device sat mutely in her purse all the way home.

She jumped, spilling some of her tea into the saucer as the phone in the kitchen rang. Caitlyn looked at the wall clock, a black cat in silhouette with a swinging tail beating out the seconds. It was a little after 3:00 a.m. Steeling herself, she rose to answer it, her intuition telling her a call at this late hour could only be bad news.

“Hello?” No one responded, so she repeated the salutation. “Hello?”

“Ms. Cahill?” A woman’s voice sounded hesitant. “This is Nurse Hillary at the Vinings Care Facility…”

Caitlyn’s stomach sank.

“I’m calling about your mother, Caroline. I’m sorry to tell you this, but there’s been an accident.”

“What happened? Is she all right?”

“She got out of her room—we’re really not sure how. The last time anyone checked on her was just after eleven when the night shift took over,” the nurse explained in a nervous rush. “We started looking for her as soon as we realized she was missing—”

“Just tell me what happened.”

“She fell down a flight of stairs in the emergency exit. We think she might’ve been there for several hours—”

“Oh, my God.” Caitlyn closed her eyes, fear tightening her chest. “How badly is she hurt?”

“She’s been taken to the E.R. at George Washington University Medical Center. I think you should go there.” She hesitated again. “As soon as possible.”

“Is she conscious?”

“I’m sorry…I’m not really sure.”

Caitlyn hung up the phone, paralyzed by images of her mother and the vital woman she had been before the heartbreak and scandal of Joshua’s arrest. Before her husband’s fatal stroke.

Her mother was all she had left.

When she arrived in D.C., it was nearly four-thirty in the morning, dark outside and well before the business
rush hour. As Caitlyn’s car made the voyage over the Francis Scott Key Bridge heading into Georgetown, she barely noticed the stately, spired buildings of George Washington University rising up over the dark Potomac, or the iron moon that hung low in the sky. Her eyes burned from lack of sleep, but she felt wired and jittery, her only thought to talk to the medical staff and find out the severity of her mother’s injuries.

She’s going to be okay.

The affirmation repeated inside her head as she pulled into the hospital parking garage, her fingers tight on the steering wheel. She drove up three levels before finding a few vacant spots, then pulled the BMW into the first space and got out. Pressing the key fob to activate the car’s security system, she heard its electronic chirp echo inside the concrete-and-steel structure. Caitlyn walked toward the elevators on the far side of the garage. She had dressed hastily in jeans, a loose sweater and jacket, and her boots thudded on the concrete floor. Although her path so far had been illuminated by fluorescent light panels in the garage’s low ceiling, the elevator bay was dark, as if the lighting there had burned out. She stepped into the shadows, leaning forward to press the button.

Sudden awareness chilled her skin. She wasn’t alone.

A male figure loomed in her peripheral vision. Caitlyn gasped, turning just in time to catch the blow across the side of her head. Stars exploded in front of her as she fell onto the hard concrete deck. She tried to scream, but the breath had been knocked from her and what
emerged from her mouth sounded more like a mewling cry.

Caitlyn fought the pain inside her skull, trying to get a look at her attacker. But her vision was hazy, clouded and the man wore a ski mask. He made a grab for her, dragging her by her arms several feet across the garage floor. Caitlyn broke one hand free, closing it around her key chain that had fallen nearby and attempting to set off the panic button on its fob. She screamed in pain as the man stomped her hand under his heel, forcing her to let go.

She writhed in agony, crying out for help. He began dragging her again toward a white van parked nearby, its back door hanging open to reveal its darkened interior. The realization that he planned to abduct her was like a shot of adrenaline to her system. Caitlyn screamed louder and began kicking wildly, trying to tear free from her attacker’s viselike grip. She cringed as the man drew his right hand into a fist and pulled it back, preparing to slug her again.

The elevator chime rang, the sound breaking through the madness. The man froze. He let go of Caitlyn, causing the back of her head to bounce against the concrete floor. The area around her tilted and spun as another white-hot flare shot through her skull.

She heard the elevator doors slide open, as well as the man’s heavy footfalls as he made a run for the van. Caitlyn tried to sit up, wanting to call out for help to the couple who had emerged from the elevator, but a wave of dizziness washed over her. Her voice when it
finally croaked out of her sounded as if she were at the far end of a tunnel.

“Help me…please.”

The van’s engine roared to life, its tires screeching as it sped away.

“Just lie still, miss.” One of the two people, an elderly man with thick spectacles and gray hair, reached her. He squatted as best he could on the ground next to her, tentatively patting her shoulder. “My wife’s calling the campus police.”

Behind him, the woman talked excitedly into her cell phone. Caitlyn wanted to ask if they had gotten a license plate, but the words bouncing inside her head never quite formed on her lips. The side of her head felt sticky and warm, and her left hand had gone numb. The man dug into his coat pocket and removed a white handkerchief, folded into a neat square. She heard her own feeble groan as he pressed it against her temple.

“You’re going to be fine, miss.” He didn’t sound all that convincing. His concerned expression wavered in front of her.

Caitlyn’s world slowly faded to black.

R
eid walked briskly across parking level three. Around him, evidence techs snapped photos of tire marks and splotches of dried blood.
Caitlyn’s blood.
He’d received the call from Mitch a half hour ago.

He had broken every speed limit to get there.

“I don’t understand,” Morehouse said as he approached. He looked like a schoolboy expecting a reprimand from his teacher. “I walked her all the way to her car. I watched her get in, just like you said. I
saw
her drive off. She said she was going straight back to Middleburg.”

Reid’s mouth formed a grim line. “What time did you see her last?”

“About seven-thirty.”

Through the open side of the garage, morning sunlight dappled the floor of the parking deck. He’d wanted to call her last night—in fact, he’d opened his cell phone on more than one occasion only to stare at its LCD panel before closing it again.

He thought he’d been doing the right thing. Taking a step back from Caitlyn. If he’d been the one to drive her back from Deep Creek Lake last night, would this have happened?

“Why would she lie to me about going home?” Morehouse asked.

“I don’t know.”

Reid turned upon hearing Mitch’s low drawl. He’d entered the parking deck from the stairwell, where he was conversing with two policemen assigned to keep out civilians. He gave Reid a wave, motioning him over.

“She got a call, supposedly from a Nurse Hillary at the Vinings adult care facility where Caroline Cahill resides,” Mitch said once Reid reached him. He dismissed the cops to go about their duties.

“You’ve talked to Caitlyn?”

“Yeah. She’s pretty shaken up, understandably.” Mitch scratched the side of his face. “The E.R. doc admitted her around five this morning. She’s got a concussion and a messed up hand. They’re still waiting on X-rays. She’s a little dopey from the pain meds, but she did say the nurse told her that her mother had been hurt and was taken here for treatment. She drove back to D.C. in the middle of the night.”

Reid frowned. “How’s her mother?”

“That’s the hell of it. I just called the Vinings facility—Caroline Cahill is fine. There was no accident involving her mother. Not to mention, there’s no one on staff named Hillary.”

Anger welled inside Reid. “She was lured here?”

“Looks that way.”

“You should’ve called me sooner.”

“I called you less than an hour after I found out. You’re not officially on the case yet anyway,” Mitch reminded.

It occurred to Reid that Caitlyn hadn’t tried to get in touch with him. He wished she had. He could have been with her in the E.R. “Who contacted the police?”

“An elderly couple. They must’ve spooked the perp when they got off the elevator.”

“Can they give a description?”

“Unfortunately, no. The assailant had already gotten into his vehicle by the time they noticed Ms. Cahill on the ground. He took off like a bat out of hell in a nondescript white van with dark windows parked right about there.” Mitch pointed out a nearby space. “No lettering or signage on the vehicle. They didn’t get even a partial number off the plate. If you want to talk to them, they’re still in the E.R. waiting room. I had to get them to some chairs.”

Reid looked at the metal elevator doors, about twenty yards away. Unlike the other fluorescent lights in the shadowy garage, the one that lit the elevator bay appeared to be out of operation.

“He took out the lights,” he noted. “What about security cameras?”

“I’m going downstairs to look at the tape now. Want to come?”

What he wanted was to see Caitlyn. But instead, Reid gave a small nod.

The poor lighting made the digital recording dark and grainy, but what Reid
could
see sickened him. He sat forward in his chair, watching as the slender form he knew to be Caitlyn was attacked. The man was large, but other than that he appeared as only a darkened mass coming at her out of the shadows. He wore a black bomber-style jacket and black pants, and a ski mask concealed his face.

Reid’s gut wrenched. Even after Caitlyn was dragged out of camera range, he could still hear her cries. When the tape showed the elderly couple emerging from the elevator, he got up and paced the small room.

“Do you want me to back it up?” A member of the hospital security staff held the remote. He looked at the two agents expectantly.

“Yeah,” Mitch said, studying the freeze-frame of the screen. “And we’re going to need you to make us a copy.”

Reid looked away as the scene restarted. Despite his training telling him that he needed to view and review the footage, he didn’t think he could take it again. Besides, the video appeared to be useless. Other than the size of the attacker, not much else was discernible. Not even his race. Reid doubted the lab techs would be able to increase the video resolution enough to make any real difference.

“How often do you patrol the parking garage?” Reid asked the hospital guard.

“We have a golf cart that goes through on the half hour.”

“Which means the guy either planned well or got lucky,” Mitch commented. “Do you have a camera on the garage exit?”

Reid knew what he was thinking—that maybe they’d be able to get a license plate off the van. He waited tensely as the guard fiddled with the remote again, shuffling through digital images of the garage until he got to the ones on the main floor. He rewound until the white van approached the steel arm of the automated attendant’s booth. Reid’s stomach sank as the van’s rear came into view. The license plate had been removed.

The door to the private hospital room was half-closed. Reid knocked tentatively and went inside. Caitlyn appeared pale against the blue hospital linens, her blond hair spread across her pillow. Already he could see the shadowed bruise on her temple where the man had struck her.

Although she didn’t speak, her reddened eyes met his as he came closer. Her left hand was pillowed in an inflatable cast, and the normally slender fingers that peeked out of it appeared puffy and bluish.

“Is it broken?” he asked hoarsely.

“Severe bruise.” Her lips were dry, and Reid could see the dilation in her pupils that nearly overtook the vivid green of her irises. Whether it was from the pain medication she’d been given or the concussion, he wasn’t sure.

“I got a suture, too.” Weakly, she pointed to her hairline with her good hand. Reid flinched inwardly at the dried blood still matting her hair around the wound.

Sitting in the chair beside her, Reid shook his head. “Caitlyn…”

“I should’ve been more careful. My caller ID said ‘unknown,’ not Vinings Care Facility.” Her voice thickened. “I just got so scared about Mom—I wasn’t thinking.”

The fact that a woman had lured Caitlyn to the parking garage meant
someone
knew who the unsub was, Reid thought. It also meant there was a possibility he had an accomplice.

“Agent Tierney already checked,” he told her. “The call was made from a disposable cell phone. It’s untraceable.”

Reid laid his hand on Caitlyn’s forearm. He could feel her pulse under her skin, and he thanked God for the elderly couple that for some reason had been leaving the hospital in the very early morning hours. If they hadn’t been there—if they’d arrived even a minute later—it could have been too late.

“Caitlyn,” Reid said gently. “The man who tried to abduct you…he’s probably our copycat.”

And he intended for you to be his next victim.
Reid couldn’t bring himself to say it aloud, but he could tell by Caitlyn’s unsurprised expression she’d already made the realization, as well.

“I’m going to see about getting a security detail at your house.”

He half expected Caitlyn to argue with him, but she gave a faint nod of agreement. This had all gone too far. But things would have to change now—Caitlyn’s connection to the case was no longer some vague hunch he had based on a piece of jewelry found at a crime scene. The killer had lured her to the parking garage with the intent of taking her.

“I wanted to call you last night,” Caitlyn said quietly. “After seeing Joshua yesterday…after digging up that poor woman…”

And yet she hadn’t. He cursed himself for not being there for her.

“I want to see my mother,” she whispered.

“I’ll take you as soon as you’re discharged. For now you just need to rest.”

After a short while, her eyelids drifted closed and her breathing slowed. Rubbing a hand over his face, Reid tried to get control over his own careening emotions. He remained there, struggling not to drown in the heavy tide of his thoughts, until a nurse rolled a blood pressure cart into the room. Reid rose from the chair and went into the hallway just as Mitch walked into the corridor.

“You want to tell me this was just coincidence?” he asked sharply, pointing to Caitlyn’s room. “You think the intention wasn’t for her to have ended up as victim number three?”

Mitch raised a hand to stop him. “I’m not arguing with you. But I need to make a correction. Ms. Cahill would have been victim number
four
.”

Reid felt a spiraling dread.

“I just got a call, which is why I came looking for you. Two calls, actually. First off, we’ve got another body.”

He’d barely had time to absorb the information when Mitch made his second announcement. “The second call was from the psych ward at Washington Hospital. David Hunter escaped last night.”