The Haunted (Sarah Roberts 12) (5 page)

“You’re not answering my question about that car out there.”

“Are you afraid of the car or its owner?”

“Not much scares me, really.” She hesitated a moment, then continued. “Yesterday, Aaron and I drove out to my sister’s grave. A car like that one,” she pointed again, “was in the cemetery.”

“I’m sure they too had lost a loved one.”

“We saw them again when we left. Then someone was snooping around my residence last night.”

“I’m not sure I can help you,” Williams said. He set the pad aside and got up from his chair. “This kind of matter is one for the police.”

Something about his demeanor offended her. How could he deduce such a thing in such a small amount of time? “Why’s that?” she asked.

He walked around his desk. “Because the load of guilt you must carry on your shoulders, the years of toil and trouble, as Shakespeare would say, amount to something I’m not interested in discussing. As clients get to interview their doctors, so do doctors get the same privilege.”

She frowned, then smiled. “So we’re done here?”

“Not exactly.”

She moved to the other side of his desk and faced him, trying to figure out what was happening. Earlier, he had acted strange. Now his demeanor was more aggressive, like he knew her and was upset about something. She didn’t understand it nor could she put a finger on it.

Vivian? You there? Watching this?
 

“How are we not done yet? You just dismissed me as a client.”

“No, I didn’t. I said I’m not sure I can help you.”

“My point exactly.” She crossed her arms.

“But a team of doctors could.”

That surprised her. “What?”

A presence materialized behind her. She spun around, ducked low and prepared to strike. There were two burly men, Russian-like faces, who flanked her. Each one stepped back, their hands raised.

Her right thigh stung with the quick movement.

She pointed at the men, sure they were the same two from yesterday.

“Step back more. Both of you. We need to discuss a few things.” She turned back to Dr. Williams while keeping her eyes on the newcomers. “These two work for you?”

“Not exactly.”

“You were spying on me?”

“No, I wasn’t.”

“What’s going on here?” She moved to the side where she could keep an eye on the doctor and the two men who were now a safe distance away.

“Who are you two? Why did you follow me yesterday? Were you at my cabin last night?”

She felt light-headed. The room spun for a moment. When she looked back at the doctor, he was leaning back in his large leather office chair, a smug look on his face.

“I fucking well want answers! What is this? Who are you? Do I know you?”

She faltered, catching the edge of the desk before she fell to the floor. Her thigh stung again.

When she looked down at it, she saw the needle still embedded, all the way in, plunger depressed.

How did they …?

A raging fury surged through her as she tried to block whatever was in the needle from working on her.

“You’ll pay for this,” she said to the doctor.

Then she turned to the pair of large men as she yanked the needle out of her leg. Holding it above her, she advanced on them.

They had the audacity to smile, as if the little girl with the empty needle could really do any harm.

Bones break on men so easily. Soon, no more smiling …

She didn’t make it halfway across the office floor before she collapsed.

Through the muddled fog in her head, she heard them talking, discussing plans.

“Go now,” the doctor said. “Trash the cabin. Find anything you can that’ll link back to us and destroy it. I’ll take care of the stupid girl. Go!”

As hard as she tried to push up off the floor, it felt like she weighed a thousand pounds. Nothing would respond or move.

Not even her eyelids once they’d closed.

Being awake even seemed too heavy to contemplate.

And Sarah was out.

Chapter 8

Aaron skidded to a halt in front of the cabin. There was no sign of Sarah’s car.

Of course not.

She would still be at her doctor’s appointment. He didn’t have a key for the cabin and didn’t want to wait in the car until she returned. He got out and did a perimeter check of the area. He saw the footprints Sarah talked about in her message. He also saw animal paw prints.

Back at the front of the cabin with the distant sound of traffic on the highway a mile away, Aaron tried the front door.

Locked.

Then he walked around the cabin again, this time trying each window. They were all upgraded within recent years. Nothing budged. Short of taking a crowbar and breaking a window or picking a lock, there was no way he was getting inside the cabin.

He walked back to his car and leaned his forearms on the roof.

What now?

He grabbed his cell phone and tried Sarah’s number again.

No answer.

He called Parkman.

“Parkman here.”

“I’m at the cabin.”

“And?”

“Sarah’s not here. I see the prints she referred to in her message, but nobody’s here and the place is locked up solid. I couldn’t tell from outside, but as far as I know, this place has an alarm. Sarah would’ve set it when she left.”

“And no one else is around? You didn’t see any indication of someone watching the place?”

“I didn’t look for that.”

“Aaron. If someone is hunting Sarah—I mean, she has created a lot of friends over the past seven years, but a lot of enemies, too—you could be a sitting duck right now.”

“I’m fine. No one’s here.”

The sound of wind came through the phone. Parkman was in his car, on his way.

“Today was Sarah’s doctor’s meeting, right?” Parkman asked.

“Yes.”

“Where?”

“No idea. She kept that to herself.”

“I don’t like this.”

“Me neither.”

“Get inside.”

“What?”

“Get inside the cabin.”

“How?”

“Figure it out. Just get inside. Look around. Find the doctor’s address. As soon as you have it, text it to me. I’ll have someone look into this guy.”

Aaron was on the move.

“Also, Aaron.”

“Yeah?”

“See if there’s anything else you can discover. Is she working on something? Has Vivian tasked her to do something important? Maybe get into her computer. Do you know her passwords?”

“Some of them. Not all. But she’s going to be pissed.” He stopped at the front door and gripped the handle.

“Yes, she’s going to be pissed, but we’ll survive this. If she’s in trouble, then she needs us. If there’s no trouble, we’ll treat her to dinner and drill into her head that we love her. One day she’ll get it.”

Aaron almost laughed. “Yeah, one day. Which day? Could you predict one in particular?”

Parkman ignored his sarcasm. “I’m just over an hour away. Text me when you have something.”

“Done.”

Aaron hung up, slipped the phone in his back pocket, and stepped closer to examine the door, looking for its weak spot.

Directly above the handle looked like the best place.

He turned until his left side faced the door. Then, in a quick snap, he lifted his right leg, folded at the waist, and spun his right foot back and around to connect with the door at the exact spot above the knob. The wood cracked, a vertical line forming in the wood.

He brought his foot back, lifted it high, and swung it again, connecting with the same spot.

The door popped, wood moaning in protest. He looked inside, then crossed the threshold. The alarm sounded, a shrill cry from a loudspeaker somewhere inside and outside.

He scanned the alarm panel beside the door, but it was new. None of the buttons showed wear.

“Dammit.”

He ran for the back of the cabin, looking for a utility room of some sort. Finally, the ear-splitting sharp noise from the alarm ceased. His ears rang in the aftermath.

The alarm panel on the wall by the front door continued to beep from the violation.

In the bathroom, he found the alarm’s box and the speaker.

It was locked.

He punched it twice until the small metal door buckled enough to pop it open. As he did this, the piercing alarm sounded again, but now the speaker was one foot from his head.

He tore at the wires and their connections and continued to do this until the last one killed the speaker’s horrendous noise. He sat back to collect himself. Then the phone rang.

It had to be the monitoring station calling to get a code or something. When they didn’t get someone on the phone, police would be dispatched.

“Shit, this was a stupid idea. Thanks, Parkman. I owe you one for this.”

He ripped the phone cord out of the wall.

The ringing in the main part of the cabin died.

“Sarah’s going to be more than pissed.”

He stepped out of the bathroom and took in the cabin. Everything looked as normal as could be. Her Stephen King novel,
Mr. Mercedes
, was on the coffee table. Her MacBook Pro was on the kitchen table. An empty bottle of wine sat on the counter beside one used wine glass.

Inside the bedroom, the bed was made with no clothes scattered about. Other than the wine glass, the cabin was spotless, just as he would’ve expected from Sarah.

He sat at the kitchen table and opened her laptop computer’s screen. It lit and the password icon popped up.

He tried Sarah’s name with no success. Then he tried his own. Then combinations of their names. He tried her birthdate, her parents’ names and finally Vivian’s birthdate, but nothing was successful.

Tapping his fingers on the table, he tried to imagine what she would use as a password.

Then it occurred to him.

Vivian’s name.

Short and simple. It meant something to Sarah but hardly anyone else would ever know that name except family and her few friends.

Vivian’s name worked.

Her desktop popped up.

Something made a rustling sound in the room behind him. He stopped what he was doing and looked over his shoulder. He knew he was alone in the cabin. As long as he had been here, no one had pulled up the driveway. He would’ve heard them. Unless they pulled in when the alarm was blaring, but how would anyone get past him and into the bedroom?

It was nothing
, he thought, dismissing the sound.

The front door hung wide open. He could see out to his car. He was alone.

His attention drawn back to her computer, he brought up her browser and searched through its history. Research on Cole Lincoln, page after page.

Then he brought up her email program. She had four new emails.

One from Apple announcing a new, thinner MacBook Air. Two from writing websites as she had taken to writing her memoirs more seriously lately. And the fourth was from a woman named Rebecca Lincoln.

“Rebecca Lincoln,” Aaron said out loud.

Related to Cole?

He opened the email and scanned the long letter. The beginning spoke of things going wrong for her brother.

Cole’s her brother?

He lost his job. Suspected of crimes committed while on duty. A police officer was murdered. No one knows who did it. Case remains unsolved. Other horrible things happened. Underage girls were molested after an illegal brothel was raided.

Holy shit!

Her brother ended up in—

There was the distinctive sound of a footstep behind him.

Impossible.

He moved his eyes, nothing else. The outside, through the broken-in door, was still clear. Only his car sat out front.

A rustle of clothes.

Definitely someone was behind him.

Sarah? Couldn’t be.

She wouldn’t sneak up on him like that. Too risky for both of them.

He kicked his chair backwards violently and dropped to the floor sideways. Landing on his shoulder, he spun around and looked to see who had snuck up on him.