The Abduction of Mary Rose (30 page)

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Retired Sergeant Graham Nelson was listening to his police-band radio when the call came in about an intruder at 233 Elizabeth Avenue. Apparently, the resident of the home had him trapped in one of the rooms and he jumped out of the window, but they ran him down. There were a few chuckles amidst the crackling, broken up by static. They'd nailed the son-of-a-bitch and that was what really mattered. He could stop worrying about Naomi Waters.

He was watching CNN when the phone rang. It was Eric Grant, looking for details and Graham's were sparse, except that it was pretty clear they'd got the guy. Eric had dropped by earlier to see him. Graham was always glad to see the reporter, he was good company, and it was clear he was pretty gone on Naomi Waters, despite having seen her only a couple of times.

"I got an email from Lisa Boyce," he said, "formerly Lisa Cameron…."

"…the school friend Mary Rose was visiting that night." Graham filled in.

"Yeah, she's pretty worried about Naomi. I could call her, her phone number
is
in the book," Eric said, "But it's pretty late. Especially considering the crisis is over. I replied to her email."

They talked a few minutes longer then bid each other a good night. But something didn't quite sit right with the retired policeman. For nearly thirty years the guy evades capture, and suddenly it's all wrapped up, tied with a bow? Well, okay, it happened from time to time. But it was rare. Rarer than rare.

"God Nelse, you still up?" Angie said, crossing from the bedroom to the bathroom, which was off the hallway. She wore striped pajamas and a ponytail, and looked twelve. And she was telling
him
what time to go to bed.

Chapter Forty-Eight

Terror-stricken, Naomi watched as the door slowly opened. A cool draft brushed her ankles, freezing her in place, drowning her in panic. He's here. Her legs had liquefied and she knew if she tried to run, she would fall.

And then he was standing in her doorway, filling it, his face bloodied and contorted with controlled rage. His smile was the smile of a demon. "Hello, little girl."

He does have supernatural powers, she thought. I was wrong to doubt it. Otherwise, how could be he here now? Why wasn't he in jail?

It was a good plan. It worked; I locked him in. But he was here now. He's an evil entity no one can stop. No, no, Naomi, the voice in her head argued. He's clever, is all. He's had years of practice.

Savouring her terror, her shock at seeing him, he made no move toward her.

Stay calm. Think. The stairs were behind her. Her knees would not betray her. She needed to get him talking. Get him off-guard. Maybe there was a chance.

"The cops know who you are, Marcus. They know you killed Mary Rose." In spite of her constricted vocal chords, her voice was surprisingly even, strong.

"Marcus," he said with a smirk. "No one calls me that anymore. My mother was in some dumb Shakespeare play in school and liked the name, so she saddled me with it. You can call me Mac. For as long as you're going to be around. No, they don't know I killed Mary Rose. They only know what you told them. And if you're not here…."

"They know you killed Marie Davis, too. And your old friend, Norman Banks. You slit his throat. What kind of a man—"

He took a step toward her, cutting off her words. She backed up. She didn't stumble. Almost.

"They got nothin'," he sneered, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, smearing more blood across his face. Broken glass gleamed in his hair, and his hands were bleeding. She could smell the sourness off him, the blood.

"You're the only one giving me trouble, Missy. The only one who can tie me to anything. But that's just about to end."

He took another step, and the floor creaked the way it always did when you stepped on that spot. The sound acted as a spur to Naomi and she whirled round and raced toward the stairs. He lunged after her. His hand caught the back of her shirt, and for one heart-stopping second she was sure he was going to pull her backwards, but she managed to grab hold of the railing and yank herself free of him. She flew up stairs, taking them two at a time.

Behind her, he yelled, "It won't do you any good to run. You can't get away."

She could hear his footsteps on the stairs behind her, soft and terrifying. But there was a hesitation in his step
thump … drop … thump … drop.
He was limping. Enough to slow him down. Otherwise, he'd have had her. He must have done himself some injury when he jumped out that window, aside from the cuts and bruises.

She was on the landing now, heart racing, her hand slippery on the rail. Behind her, his step was faltering, pained, his own breathing harsh. Like something dead brought back to life, impossible to stop. Coming after her. Not satisfied until she was beneath the ground too. She looked over her shoulder, unable not to.

"You know you brought this on yourself, don't you," he called up to her. "I gave you a chance to save yourself, but you couldn't leave it alone. Think you're pretty clever, don't you, showing up at my work. Laughing at me. Playing your games. Baiting me. Well, here I am, little girl, your catch of the day."

Spittle had formed at the corner of his mouth and his laugh was a mad sound that raised the hairs on the back of her neck. As she ran toward her room, his words followed after her.

"You should never have been born. You were a mistake. My mistake because I didn't make sure the bitch was dead. And now you have to disappear forever."

Before ducking into her bedroom, she took a last look behind her, just long enough to see his enormous shadow climbing the staircase wall, and then she was inside her room, slamming and bolting her door. But she knew it wouldn't keep him out, not for long. She sprinted across the room to the dresser. She would use it to bar the door. But could she move it by herself? It was antique, a heavy old thing, but she'd always loved it. Her mother used to help her to move it when it came time for a thorough cleaning, or to paint the walls. But adrenalin born of terror coursed through her body, giving her strength to do what she needed to do.

She quickly took everything from the top of the dresser and she set them on the floor. She jerked the dresser out from the wall, first one side and then the other. Inch by inch. Behind her, the doorknob rattled violently in its casing, travelling along her nerve endings.

Having pushed the dresser a good foot out from the wall, now she around ran to the other side, pushing and straining with everything in her. It moved. Then moved again. At last it was out far enough so that she could get behind it. Putting all her weight into it, she shoved as hard as she could, praying the dresser would keep moving, at the same time terrified it would topple over, crash to the floor and break into pieces.

He was pounding so hard on the door it appeared in her mind to bulge in its casing, causing the very walls in the room to vibrate. She took her hands from the dresser and clamped them over her ears to shut out the madness.

The doorknob blurred through her tears as it twisted back and forth, rattling wildly, with the mindless rage of some kind of poltergeist.

She was doing it again. Crediting him with supernatural powers, when in reality he was just a man, albeit a sick, vile man. She swiped at her tears with her shirt cuff, pushing again at the mountainous dresser in front of her. Finally, it moved almost smoothly across the hardwood floor. Keeping her feet solidly under her, she willed the thing to keep going. At one point, when she was nearly at the door, it simply stopped, and all her straining and grunting couldn't jar it another inch. Her arms and shoulders ached with the effort of pushing. There must be a bump in the floor, she thought, and went back to moving it little by little, first on one side, then the other. It worked. Once more, the dresser began to slide across the floor.

Ignoring the throbbing ache in her arms and shoulders, and the insane pounding on the door, using every ounce of muscle and will she possessed, she gave a final push. Finally, bathed in a lather of perspiration, breathless, mouth and throat dry as sandpaper, she had barricaded the door.

She heard him give a frustrated thump against it as if he knew, could see through the door, and Naomi took a couple of backward steps on trembling legs and sagged down on the bed. She could see herself in the vanity mirror. Her hair had come out of its coil and lay like a warm, wet washcloth on the nape of her neck. Her shirt was glued to her body. Through dry lips, she called out, "I'm phoning the police."

He laughed. "I've been in your room, remember? Remember poor kitty?" he mocked. "You don't have a phone in there. And we both heard your cell phone ringing. It was in your purse, in the kitchen. You don't have it. Good try.

"Just plug this into any electrical outlet," Lisa had said. "It'll stay charged. Keep it close to you."

She envisioned her purse with the cell phone inside, stuffed behind the cereal in the cupboard. How could she have been so stupid? But she hadn't thought she would need the phone. She'd believed they had him.

"Naomi," he said through the door, his voice soft now, confident, "you can't get away. I have to give you credit, though, that was a pretty good trick making me think you were in there recording one of those books. But that was your one shot, and it didn't quite work, did it?"

The bastard loved the sound of his own voice. She didn't answer.

There was silence from the other side of the door. Then, "You need to open the door. I won't hurt you, I promise. I just want to talk … you'll at least talk to me, won't you? After all, I am your father."

"No, you're not," she said coldly. "Sperm doesn't make you a father."

He laughed. "Yeah, you're right. You're a smart girl, I can't fool you with that kind of slippery talk, can I? So you can see that I have no choice but to kill you. I could just burn the house down, but you've put the cops onto me now and the fire engines would be here at the first puff of smoke. I've already thought of that so I drove the van up close to the back door. I'll just take your body somewhere and bury it. You are a freak accident, you know that, don't you? It's only a fluke that you're on the planet."

"Go to hell," she called through the door. The words came of their own volition, out of rage at all the pain this man had perpetrated. "That's where you belong. The police know by now that they have the wrong person. They'll be back, you bastard."

"Oh, aren't you a little terror. Like your mom. She was a scrapper too, you know. Oh, yeah, fought me good. Hands clawin' and feet kickin'. Screamed like a bloody banshee. Ah, didn't do her any good though. Just like it won't do you any good. You can't escape. Oh, I suppose you could jump out your window, maybe just break a few bones. Or maybe your neck." He laughed again, a chilling, mad sound.

His cruel words describing Mary Rose's last moments on earth had brought tears to her eyes, anger flooding through her veins.

"Open the door, now, Missy. Talk to Daddy."

At his chilling voice, filled with his madness, her courage was momentarily shaken. He was the devil incarnate. How could she fight him?

He was rattling the door again. Banging on it, every thump of his fist more terrifying then the last. She could feel the rage growing in him like a giant forest fire, threatening to devour her and everything in its path. He cursed her through the door, curses so vile, Naomi's flesh crawled and she looked to the photo of Thomas on her night table, for help. Thomas had been there for her so many times throughout her young life, or at least so she had believed. But perhaps it was that belief had given him the magic.

Leeland was right about one thing: there was nowhere to go but out the window. And she probably would break her neck.

It had gone totally silent again on his side of the door. She wondered if he was still out there. What he was up to?