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Authors: Joanie Bruce

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BOOK: Alana Candler, Marked for Murder
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The paramedic driving the ambulance told him quickly. “Sir, you’ll need to come with us to the hospital so they can get your information. Can you meet us at Landeville Memorial?”

Jaydn nodded and walked over to his car. He stood staring as the ambulance pulled out into the road.

“Are you all right, sir?” The policeman beside him handed him a towel.

“Yes,” he nodded unsteadily as he rubbed the towel through his hair.

“Do you know who she is?”

Jaydn shook his head. “No. I’ve never seen her before.”

It seemed odd when he said it—even to himself. She was a stranger, and yet he’d been consumed with an earnest desire to see breath return to her lifeless body. Something melted inside his heart as he thought about saving her life.

A red and white wrecker pulled up beside the bridge, and the policeman spoke to Jaydn. “I have to stay here a little longer. Okay if I get your statement at the hospital?”

Jaydn nodded and got into his car.

When he reached the hospital, the nurse at the information desk asked Jaydn to have a seat in the waiting room. He sat down slowly on one of the orange hard-back seats.

He was sitting in the same position ten minutes later when the same policeman pushed through the double doors and walked up to the desk. The nurse listened carefully and then pointed to Jaydn sitting slumped in the uncomfortable chair. Jaydn tried to gather his rickety thoughts as the officer stepped over to him and nodded.

“Evening, sir. Are you okay?”

Jaydn nodded but stared at the officer’s uniform, wondering what he could tell the man.

“They said you saved her life. That’s a miracle. The nurse says she’s waking up now, and she’ll be fine.”

Jaydn noted the man’s look of satisfied approval, and it sank in what he did.

In the two years since he was trained how to perform CPR, he’d never used what he learned. Knowing that he saved a life because of the four-hour class filled him with awe. The relief he felt in knowing this woman would live because of his actions caused his legs to shake, and he smiled weakly up at the officer.

“Can I get your name, sir?”

Jaydn’s lips felt numb, but he mumbled, “Jaydn Holbrook.”

The officer looked stunned. “
The
Jaydn Holbrook? Jaydn Ross Holbrook of International Enterprises?”

Jaydn felt his face flush hot as he looked at the officer. “No, that was my dad, but he’s gone now. I’m Jaydn
Dean
Holbrook. Can we please
not
make a big deal out of this?”

The officer tried to hide his surprise by lowering his head to study his pad of paper. “Okay, sir. If that’s the way you want it, that’s the way I’ll handle it.”

“Thank you,” Jaydn said gratefully.

“Can you tell me her name, Mr. Holbrook, or how her car got into the lake?” the officer asked in a business-like manner.

“No. I’m sorry. I don’t know her name. When I was crossing the bridge, I noticed a car in the lake and . . .” He paused and gazed off into space. His thoughts were muddled. Was he even making sense?

“I understand, sir. Could I get a number where I can reach you if I have any more questions?”

Jaydn tried to recall his cell phone number and watched the man’s pencil as he scribbled it down.

After the policeman left, Jaydn walked over to the reception desk and asked the nurse to contact him if there was a change in the patient’s condition. She scribbled down his number and agreed.

Jaydn picked up his wet shoes, and walked toward the door. For some reason, making sure the woman survived was all he could think about.

FOUR

 

THE BLACK FORD EXPLORER SAT
along the deserted highway. Anxiety bounced back and forth between the two men in the front seat. The driver leaned back in the seat.

“Do you think it’s over yet?”

Sweat appeared on the passenger’s upper lip. “I don’t know . . . they got here so fast—”

“The boss ain’t gonna like this.”

“Maybe he doesn’t have to know.”

They looked at each other for a minute. Then, the driver sighed.

“I gotta call ’im—one way or the other. Do you want me to tell him or not?”

“He’ll find out anyway . . . if . . . you know . . .”

The cell phone on the leather console began playing
Take Me Out to the Ballgame
—injecting more tension into the already tight atmosphere.

The driver stared at the phone vibrating across the console as if it were a snake about to strike. The boss’s number flashed across the screen. He blew out a quick breath of air and rubbed his mouth with his hand. Finally, he reached over and picked up the phone.

“May as well get it over with. Boss?”

“Is it done?”

“Yep.”

“Any problems?”

“Nope. Went like clockwork, boss.”

Silence. “You know I can always tell when you’re lying—even over the phone.”

The driver frowned—pinching his nose. “Well, boss . . . a car drove up afterwards, and—”

“You idiot! Did they see you?”

“No, boss.” He hurried to appease the fury burning through the connection. “It was dark, and he couldn’t see anything. Some man got out. We got away before he even knew we were there.”

The silence on the other end made his chest burn until his boss spoke in a quieter tone. “Get rid of that SUV, anyway. Sell it . . . trade it . . . burn it if you have to, but get rid of it. Is that clear?”

“Yes, boss. There’s somethin’ else you should know.” The driver looked at the man sitting beside him and dread filled his voice as he whispered into the phone. “We parked the car and walked back to see what was happening. There was an ambulance and a couple of police cars.”

The voice on the phone was low, controlled, and infused with fury. “And?”

“And, they put her in the ambulance.”

“Was she breathing?”

A pregnant pause.

“We’re not sure. They had an IV and a breathing thing on her face . . . but they weren’t doing CPR.”

Curses from the phone filled the air and bounced off the leather interior—making the two men in the car cringe.

“What do you want us to do now, boss? Take care of it at the hospital?”

“No! There’ll be too many people there. If she hasn’t talked by now, it means she hasn’t figured it out. Just wait. See if you can search her apartment, and I’ll do what I can. Tell Charlie to get that bomb he’s been working on ready. We might need to put it in her apartment. Then go back home until I call you again. And, Gene . . . don’t make another mistake. Cleaning up after mistakes is messy. None of this would have been necessary if you hadn’t flubbed up in the first place.”

“Yes, boss,” he said simply. If he said more, he’d just add fuel to the fire and get himself in deeper trouble. The boss hated arguing, and he hated mistakes.

FIVE

 

POLICE CHIEF BRAD CANDLER LEANED
back in his desk chair across from Criminal Investigator Bo Watson and pursed his lips. Patience was not one of his virtues. Getting Bo to fill him in on the facts he gathered from the hotel where Alana was abducted was like pushing wet noodles down a hot stretch of asphalt.

Trying to be patient, he reminded himself of their training at the police academy—the drills, the exercises, pushing their bodies to the limit. Bo possessed a tremendous amount of stamina and was always there to encourage and prod Brad further. That bond forged a lasting friendship that ignored their differences.

Even though their personalities were as different as the black and white cars they drove at the academy, Brad still compared their friendship to the comfortable fit of a broken-in pair of tennis shoes. In spite of the fact that they were good friends, he admitted Bo sometimes pushed his buttons.

Bo, redheaded and hot tempered, enjoyed life to the fullest and made impulsive decisions that were a little on the daring side. Because his personality was so laid back, he never advanced far in the ranks and was always left behind when it came time for promotions.

Brad worked hard at being conscientious, reliable, and systematic in his investigations. He tried to overlook much of Bo’s impulsive behavior, and when Brad became chief of the Landeville City Police Department, he was happy to promote Bo to primary crime scene investigator.

Finally, Brad’s irritation spewed out of his mouth.

“Are you telling me the manager said she wasn’t even there?”

Bo nodded. “Yep. He said no single women checked into the hotel at all yesterday, and he didn’t seem interested in letting us check out the hotel room Alana said she stayed in. He said it was
occupied
.”

Brad stood up and paced the floor. “That’s unbelievable!” He couldn’t think—couldn’t even imagine what that revelation might be telling them.

Kent McDaniels, Bo’s partner, knocked on the door and stuck his head in. Brad waved him into the room.

Brad stopped pacing and tightened his lips. “Get a search warrant, Bo. Check out that room. See if it’s like Alana described.”

As Bo stood up, Brad nodded at Kent and added, “Kent, go with him. I want every inch of that place searched, fingerprinted, and checked for DNA evidence. Take plenty of pictures. Get addresses and phone numbers of the hotel manager and anyone working last night, and get a list of the customers who slept there and their contact information.”

Kent McDaniels, the computer genius of the department, was the thinnest and tallest of all the policemen. His personality was unassuming and shy, but his smoky gray eyes let Brad know he was calm, careful, and deliberate—a man after Brad’s own heart. He nodded at Brad and headed out the door behind Bo.

Brad paired hotheaded Bo with level-headed Kent to keep Bo grounded and out of trouble. In turn, Bo was teaching Kent his unfathomable, canny way of solving mysteries. Bo’s tendency to slide around the usual way of doing things helped him think outside the box when solving the puzzles that complicated crime scene investigating. As partners, they made a great team.

Scooping up his car keys from the desk, Brad closed the file he was working on, filed it and locked the cabinet, and headed out the door to check on Alana.

Around the corner, Bo was flirting with Brad’s secretary at her desk while Kent leaned against the wall—a patient resolve reflected in his eyes.

Brad cleared his throat and pasted an annoyed look on his face.

Looking sheepish, Bo said, “I’m going, I’m going.” He grabbed the search warrant request and gave the secretary one last wink before leaving.

Brad turned to his red-faced secretary. “I’m headed to the hospital to check on Alana. I’ll be back sometime around lunch.”

“Yes, sir.”

After obtaining the search warrant for the hotel from Judge Collins, Kent settled into his unmarked police car and waited while Bo made a phone call.

Bo nodded at Kent as he slid into the passenger seat and paused as the radio sounded a tone from the dispatch.

“Dispatch to any available unit near Pine Road—cross street . . . Sunset Circle. We have a report of a four-acre brush fire. Possible arson. Witnesses say several juveniles were seen running from the area.”

“Maybe you should take that, Kent, since Brad’s short-handed. I’ll head over to the hotel, and you can join me later.”

Kent nodded and reached for the radio. After acknowledging he was ten-seventy-six to the scene, he headed for Pine Road—several miles out in the country.

Bo got into his car parked on the curb, placed the portable strobe light on top of the car, and drove toward the hotel between Landeville and Ross.

SIX

 

THE CHARACTERISTIC SMELL OF ALCOHOL
tickled Alana’s nose. Her mouth turned down in a frown, and her head turned into the pillow.

Sounds of movement rustled around her, and she tugged her heavy lids open. Through tiny slits, she saw a white uniform and a man’s smiling face.

A warm tenor voice boomed across the foot of her bed. “Hello, young lady. How’re you feeling this afternoon?”

The owner of the voice came around to her other side, pulled the thick curtains open, and let the sunshine fill the room. He frowned at her reaction to the bright sunlight. “Still have a headache from the concussion?”

“A little,” she said with a squint.

“That’ll probably stay with you a while yet. I tried to let you sleep as long as I could.” He put one hand on her forehead and smiled.

She glanced at the clock under his arm and was shocked to find she’d slept through lunch. Closing her eyes for sleep the night before only brought back terrifying memories of choking in the shadowy lake water. How could she rest with that memory tugging at her subconscious? As soon as she relaxed enough to sleep, the fastidious nurse came around and flashed a bright light in her eyes until she was convinced her concussion hadn’t caused serious problems.

After several miserable hours of restlessness, she finally dozed off only to wake up with a headache that would not go away and a persistent drugged feeling that made her body feel sluggish
and feeble.

BOOK: Alana Candler, Marked for Murder
3.65Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
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