The Heart Has Reasons (5 page)

As
she feebly tried to struggle from his grasp, a shroud of darkness enveloped her
in its comforting embrace.

CHAPTER
4

Chase caught his target as she started to
collapse and carried her to the living room where he deposited her on the sofa.
 Plucking the unbroken wineglass from the carpet, he returned to the
kitchen.  The contents of the wine bottle and the tea pitcher went down
the sink.  He washed the wine glass and pitcher and set them in the dish
drainer.  The wine bottle went into the trash.

Returning
to the living room with a generous handful of paper towels, he blotted the
spilled wine from the carpet.  After discarding the towels, he removed the
garbage bag and set it by the back door.

He
reloaded the Browning and the little Smith & Wesson, and stowed both in the
kitchen drawer.  Locating a box of garbage bags under the sink, he removed
three, and used one to reline the kitchen trashcan.  The other two bags he
took to the bathroom, where he filled one with toiletries.  There were no
prescription bottles in the medicine chest, although there was an asthma
inhaler.  He dropped that in the bag as well.

From
there, he headed to the bedroom and filled the second bag with clothing. 
After removing the cell phone, he set her handbag on top of the clothes, and
pulled the drawstring closed.

In
the living room, she was still on the sofa, exactly as he’d left her.  He
paused to take her pulse, pleased to find it steady and strong.

Her
cell phone joined the two weapons in the kitchen drawer.  The sun was now
below the horizon.  Spotting no one at any of the neighboring houses, he
hurried through the dark yard to the alley.  The bag of trash went into a
trashcan five houses down, her belongings into the panel truck.

He
made one last tour of the house, turning off lights and ensuring he hadn’t
overlooked anything.  He sprinkled a pinch of fish flakes into the
aquarium, hoping that when someone eventually arrived here to look for his
target, they’d feed the fish again.

With
one last look around, he hoisted her onto his shoulder, grabbed her keys off
the kitchen counter, and eased out the back door, being careful not to bump her
against the doorframe.  After locking the door, he hurried through the
backyard and down the alley.  He eased her down onto the floor of the
cargo compartment, slid the panel door closed, and locked it.

At
the end of the alley, he tugged off the ski mask and turned on the
headlights.  Several miles away, he stopped on a quiet residential street
and killed the engine.  Climbing awkwardly between the seats into the
back, he slipped a ball gag between her teeth and fastened the Velcro straps
behind her neck.  After blindfolding her, he rolled her onto her stomach
and fastened her hands and feet to the eyebolts he’d installed in the
floor.  Once she was secure, he climbed back into the front and drove off.

CHAPTER
5

Larissa floated a thousand fathoms deep,
drifting wherever the current carried her through a pleasant but impenetrable
sea of blackness.

Eventually,
the muffled hum of wheels on blacktop began slowly drawing her upwards but,
when she finally surfaced, her eyes refused to open.  Conversely, her
mouth refused to close and the blanket below her face was wet with
saliva.  Unable to solve the mystery, she surrendered herself once more to
the sweet solace of oblivion where all was still and safe and quiet.

The
next time she surfaced, she drifted through a haze of pleasant somnolence
before again trying to open her eyes.   After the passage of a
considerable amount of time, during which she continually dozed on and off, she
finally determined that she was wearing a blindfold.

Was
this a dream?

Using
her tongue to explore the blockage in her mouth, she discovered a ball-shaped
object wedged behind her teeth.  What the hell?  No matter how hard
she tried, she couldn’t spit it out.

She
fought to sit up, and failed.  Her arms were stretched forward, and an
unholy chill seized her with icy fingers of dread as she realized her wrists were
somehow fastened to the floor.  Her ankles seemed likewise secured. 
Now fully conscious, her mind frantically sought for some iota of logic and
understanding.  How had she come to be in this position?  She was
clearly in a moving vehicle.  But whose?  Where were they heading?

Broken
bits of recollection began to filter in, slowly constructing a vague and
dreamlike memory of a masked man in her kitchen.  The sick premonition
that it had been Sparrow sent a jittering terror racing up and down her
spine.  However, judging by what foggy memory she was able to retrieve,
the man in her kitchen had seemed too tall to be Sparrow.  She prayed it
wasn’t him but, if not, who was the ski-masked man and why had he taken
her? 
And hadn’t she shot him?

If
his intention was to rape — and possibly kill her — why hadn’t he simply done
so in her house?  Concern over leaving his DNA there?  Or was he was
taking her somewhere that he could take his time with her.  This horrid
notion caused an icy fist to clamp her heart and squeeze it with painful
force.  Chills shivered through her bowels and stomach.

Still
groggy and disoriented, she lay there for what seemed like ages, the arms
stretched over her head going numb.  Her mouth had long since gone dry and
her tongue scraped around, searching for a trace of moisture.  Despite her
overwhelming fear, the drug in her system soon had her drifting back into an
uneasy, disjointed slumber.

The
next time she awoke, she swallowed the bitter taste of panic and grunted,
“Mmmph,” in frustration around the ball gag.  “Mmmph! 
Mmmph!
”

At
the sound of a deep, masculine voice from somewhere ahead of her, her heart
knocked against her ribs.  “Just relax,” the voice said.  “We’ll be
there in a little while.”

Be
where
in a little while?  And what was going to happen once they
arrived?

The
vehicle slowed and turned sharply right, inertia shifting her body to the left,
making cold steel bite painfully into her wrists.  Wheels crunched over a
rough and uneven surface she assumed was gravel, and then the vehicle braked to
a stop.  The engine shut off and, in the sudden silence, the pounding of
her heart echoed in her ears.

Loud
music began blaring, there was movement and shifting somewhere ahead of her,
and then a hand was touching the gag, evidently checking to make sure it was
still secure.  His mouth close to her ear, he said, “I'll be back
shortly.”  There was the sound of a car door opening, then it thumped
closed again, and she was alone.

While
frantically struggling to free her hands from the cuffs, she screamed
repeatedly.  The gag, however, muted the sound to the point that, even if
someone were standing directly beside the vehicle, they’d never hear her over
the blaring music.

* * * * *

Chase pulled into a motor court with a
flashing neon sign that boasted kitchenettes.  A dozen run-down cabins
that had seen better days squatted back off the highway among a grove of
bedraggled trees.  The dearth of cars in the lot made him feel somewhat
better about leaving his target in the vehicle unattended while he checked in.

In
the office, the red-haired clerk could have been anywhere from thirty to
fifty.  She looked used-up, your basic white trash with makeup that
appeared to have been applied with a trowel.  As he strode to the counter,
she eyed him appreciatively.  He gave her a friendly smile while resisting
the urge to fan his hands at the thick miasma of cigarette smoke and perfume
that hung between them.  “Do you have a vacancy at the far end?”

She
leaned over the counter, flashing him a generous view of heart-tattooed
cleavage and, in a two-pack-a-day voice, drawled, “Darlin’, all we got is
vacancies.  Will it be just you?”

He
handed over his fake ID.  “My wife’s with me.”

The
smile ratcheted down several notches.  “Oh.  Well, that’s too bad.”

After
he’d filled out the necessary paperwork, she handed him a room key.  “My
name’s Louella.  If you need anything,
anything at all,
you just
let me know.”

“Thanks,
Louella.  I’ll do that.”

He
moved the vehicle to the cabin at the very end, just beyond the neon’s ruby
glow.  Ignoring his target for the moment, he quickly unloaded the two
coolers, the cardboard box full of non-perishables, his duffle bag, and the two
trash bags containing her belongings, and carried them inside.

* * * * *

From the sounds and movements around her,
Larissa could tell her kidnapper was unloading the vehicle, but unloading
what
? 
The vehicle shifted beneath his weight as he climbed inside, and then he was
fumbling with the rope securing her ankles.  When her feet were free, he shifted
position and removed the handcuffs from her wrists.

Pain
flamed down her arms when she lowered them.  Pulse thundering in her head,
she rolled onto her back and reached up to uncover her eyes.  He grabbed
her wrists.  “Don’t touch the blindfold.  I’m going to help you out
of the vehicle.  There’s no one around, but if you do anything stupid like
struggling with me, I’m going to hurt you.  If you understand, nod your
head.”

She
nodded.  Following his lead, she scooted to the door.  He swung her
legs out and pulled her to her feet.  Cinching an arm about her shoulders,
he escorted her inside a building.

She
heard the door close behind them, and then he led her to sit on the side of
what felt like a bed.  The room was hot and the musty odor threatened to
choke her.  Mindful of his threat to hurt her, she sat unmoving, terror
sharp and acrid in her mouth.  He moved away from her and then what was
clearly an air conditioner coughed to life.  A moment later, a television
blared, presumably to muffle their sounds to anyone passing by.

The
mattress depressed as he took a seat at her side, and then he was removing the
blindfold.  She blinked and squinted against the sudden light.  As
soon as her eyes adjusted, she could see he was the masked man she’d shot — had
tried
to shoot — in her kitchen.  The sight of the ski mask sent a
measure of relief trickling through her.  If he were taking pains to keep
her from seeing his face, maybe he wasn’t planning to kill her.  She might
actually survive this ordeal.

When
she tried to shift away from him, he circled an arm around her shoulders. 
Piercing blue eyes gazed impassively through the ski mask’s eyeholes.  “As
you can see, we’re in a motel.  The other rooms are unoccupied and we’re
too far from the office for the clerk to hear anything.  The rules are
very simple.  Do as I say, and I won’t hurt you.  Do something
stupid, and I will.  Do you understand?”

She
could read plainly in the eyes behind the ski mask that he was a man who could
be ruthless and that a person would have to be either an idiot or suicidal to
cross him.  Since she was neither, she nodded.

“You
should know that I’m an expert in administering pain.  Shall I explain in
detail what I could do to you?”  As tears welled up in her eyes, she
shuddered and shook her head.  “I’m going to remove the gag.  Scream
and it goes back on, and then I’ll hurt you.”

She
quickly shook her head.  He reached behind her neck, there was the sound
of Velcro ripping apart, and he eased the ball from her mouth.  She
groaned as she closed her aching jaws.  Hearing the slur in her voice, she
croaked, “Who are you?  Why have you brought me here?”

“All
you need to know is that as long as you do
exactly
as I say, you have
nothing to fear from me.  Are you thirsty?”

Thirsty
didn’t even begin to describe it.  Her throat was so parched it felt as if
she’d been eating sand.  At her nod, he fished a bottled water from one of
two coolers, screwed off the cap, and held it out to her.  Accepting it,
she held it up to the light.  No obvious residue floated on the
bottom.  Sniffing revealed no suspicious odor, but then, there’d been
nothing suspect about her wine, either.

When
she continued to hesitate, he took the bottle from her and took several
swallows from it.  “See?  Not drugged.”  Reassured, she took the
bottle back from him and guzzled so greedily that water dribbled from the
corners of her mouth.

* * * * *

Chase watched her as she drained the
bottle.  So far, things were going well.  She wasn’t crying or
hysterical, and hadn’t yet attempted to scream.

He
exchanged the empty bottle for a full one.  “Go over and sit at the
table.”  She obediently complied, with him following close behind. 
Once seated at the small, fifties-vintage table, hands tightly clenched in her
lap, she gazed at the water bottle, entranced by a rivulet of condensation that
rolled down the plastic’s smooth surface to puddle on the Formica-covered
tabletop.
 
He armored his heart against the despondence clouding
her eyes.

The
kitchenette boasted a battered two-burner stove and a three-foot-tall
refrigerator.  He scrounged until he found some cheap, mismatched
silverware in a drawer next to the sink.  While the television blared in
the background, he selected a steak knife, cut two generous chunks from a loaf
of French bread, split them lengthwise, arranged slices of ham on two halves,
then topped the ham with Swiss cheese.  Placing one sandwich on a chipped
plate, he sat it before her.