Hunted (Reeve Leclaire 2) (37 page)

With effort, she gets the boat under control, slows its speed, and then finds the flashlight. Grasping it in her bound hands, she begins scanning the water’s surface in all directions. She sweeps the beam across the choppy water until—
there!
—something catches her eye. She loses it, then finds it again, but has to set down the flashlight in order to steer the boat toward the spot.

It’s hard to judge distance. When the boat seems near where she last spotted him, Reeve leaves the helm and again grabs the flashlight. Its beam barely cuts the darkness. She sweeps the beam left and right, seeing nothing but whitecaps, until . . . She catches another glimpse, sure that it’s him. It must be him. She struggles to keep the beam fixed on that spot, but it wobbles and sways as the boat rolls underfoot.

She has to set the flashlight down to steer closer. Gripping the steering wheel, she closes the distance, but he seems to have disappeared. She grasps the flashlight, playing the beam across the surface.

The black water suddenly lifts him, and the flashlight’s beam seems to intensify until it’s bright as a spotlight, illuminating him. As the boat approaches, she expects him to shout and curse, but abruptly sees that he’s floating face down.

She peers over the side at his floating body but cannot trust her eyes. An incomprehensible pattern of slashes runs across his back. With a hard shudder, she realizes these must be propeller wounds.

As the boat glides past, a flap of scalp floats beside his head, still attached and tipping like a cap. Tipping, tipping . . . and then his body is claimed by the waves.

Her mind is reeling. The flashlight slips from her grasp, and she’s overcome with a strange sensation, as if she has left her body and is rising up and up into the night air. She feels untethered, weightless. For one sublime moment, she is free of gravity, free of time and cold and pain.

But then her stomach clenches and she’s snatched back to the boat, where she’s bent over the side, vomiting.

When her stomach empties and the spasms cease, she straightens, wipes her mouth, and approaches the helm feeling shaky. The display panel swims before her eyes. She knows she cannot think about Flint. She must force all else from her mind and focus instead on the switches, dials, and gauges. She tries to get her bearings using the electronic map, but it’s unfathomable. The throttle and the wheel are the only things that make sense.

When she looks ahead, the shoreline is approaching fast. She grabs for the throttle and quickly shifts to neutral. The boat wallows in its own wake, decelerating so sharply that she nearly falls. She fumbles with the controls, shifts back into gear, and spins the wheel, swerving and overcorrecting as she executes a U-turn.

She has no idea how to get her bearings, but steers toward what seems as good a direction as any, searching the horizon for signs of life. The only lights seem to waver many miles away.

Is that mist? Is she seeing clearly?

It occurs to her that it might be smart to go below and look for something to keep her warm, but somehow she cannot pry her hands from the wheel.

After what seems a long while, a small light twinkles ahead. She steers toward it, and gradually the light draws nearer, brightening until she can make out a boat dock. The light tops a post. A single boat is tied beside it. She searches the shore and hillsides for signs of a house, but sees only trees and darkness.

Moonlight shines on the approaching shoreline. Steering parallel to the dock, she eases back on the boat’s speed. She knows from riding ferryboats that you have to reverse engines to stop a boat, so several yards from shore, she shifts the throttle into reverse, but she’s too late. The boat grinds on the bottom and slams to a halt, knocking her off her feet.

A
nnie Swann’s dog occasionally barks at bears or raccoons or other nocturnal creatures, but he has never sounded like this, with such urgent baying. And he has never behaved like this, up on his hind legs, pawing at the back door.

“Moose! You stop that!” Annie Swann commands, but the big hound just looks over his shoulder and barks sharply, as if throwing her words back at her, and continues scratching at the door.

She peers out the window. The sky is barely beginning to brighten, and her night-adapted eyes see nothing but the familiar blue-black shapes of the patio furniture. She snaps on the light. The back deck glares empty.

“There’s nothing out there,” she says to the dog, but her words only encourage him to drop to all fours and bark louder. She has never seen him this insistent.

She takes a breath. She had always feared it would come to this—a woman alone in this remote old house—but has prepared for danger since her husband died last year. She puts her shoulders back and quickly pulls on some warm clothes, steps into her galoshes, and fetches the rifle. She makes sure it’s loaded. Then she grabs the big flashlight and debates whether or not to step into the glare outside the door.

No. She switches off the light.

Moose whines at her, dancing anxiously.

She puts her hand on the knob, steels herself, and says, “Go get em,” opening the door.

Moose charges out to gallop across the deck, down the steps and away. Annie cautiously follows, scanning the lawn, the garden, the surrounding woods. The beam of the flashlight pierces the darkness, but Moose has already run well beyond its reach. She sees nothing unusual as she moves away from the house and down the path.

Following his noise into the dark, she is surprised that the dog is racing downhill to the boat dock. She hurries across the dewy grass and down the slope, wondering what kind of creature could have excited him like this.

Please god, not a bear.
Annie Swann hurries forward, ready for some kind of fight with an animal, fearing rabies, wounds, and veterinary bills.

T
he boat lists on its side, pitched at an angle. Reeve rests where she fell, eyes closed. The pain in her side only flares when she tries to rise. But that doesn’t matter, because now she can think of nothing other than sleep. All urgency has drained away, replaced by a numb indifference. Her thoughts drift.

Somewhere far away, she hears—what? A dog? Not the same dog as before, she reasons dimly. This is a baying dog, with a deep-throated voice.

The dog falls silent, and the night folds over her. Waves slap against the hull. Wind churns the sky.

The dog’s baying resumes, louder, closer, rising half a tone.

A woman’s voice calls, “Hello! Who’s there?”

Reeve’s eyes flutter.

“Is someone aboard? Are you all right?”

A bright light pierces the darkness, waving back and forth.

Reeve opens her mouth and tries to speak, but the sound she makes isn’t quite human. The dog
woofs
in response.

She rises painfully onto her elbows and stares into the blinding light.

“Oh, dear god!” she hears, followed by running, splashing, a scrambling noise. In half a minute, the woman is kneeling beside her, whispering, “Oh god, oh god, oh god.”

The woman’s face hovers. She wears a halo of white hair. Pressing warm fingertips to Reeve’s cheeks, to her neck, she asks, “Can you speak? What’s your name?”

Reeve mumbles and manages to sit up.

The woman gasps. “Your wrists! We need to get you to a doctor. We’ll do this together, okay? Can you stand? Can you? Let me help you up.”

Her legs wobble, and the woman helps her to her feet, saying, “We’re just going a short way, just to my boat. That’ll be easier that getting you up to the house. That’s it, that’s good, come along now.”

The woman keeps talking as they make their way ashore. She steers Reeve along the dock, the dog dancing at their heels. A minute later, they are stepping over the gunnel and boarding her boat. She settles Reeve on a cushioned bench, and then finds some scissors to cut the tie, freeing Reeve’s wrists.

The relief is exquisite.

While the woman cleans and bandages her wrists, Reeve tries saying, “Thank you,” but her tongue feels thick and foreign.

The woman peers into Reeve’s eyes, saying, “You must rest, understand? My name is Annie. We’re going to the hospital. It’s faster by boat, anyway.”

Annie grabs some blankets and tucks them around Reeve. “Moose, up!” she says to the dog, patting the cushions. He jumps up, and she tells him, “Settle down right here. That’s a good boy.”

The dog’s breath is hot on Reeve’s face.

“He smells, I know, but he’s a furnace. And you can’t beat a dog for warmth.” Annie climbs out onto the dock to quickly untie the lines, then hurries back aboard. She takes the helm, starts the engines, and throttles forward. The boat’s hull cuts through the black water, trailing a fat wake.

Reeve swallows, coughs, and settles back on the cushions. The stink of dog wafts around her as the engines roar and the boat gains speed. She looks up, hoping to see the moon, but it has slipped out of sight. Dawn begins to blush, and the big dog stays warm at her side as she surrenders to exhaustion.

R
eeve can’t help feeling sorry for Case Agent Pete Blankenship. He wears a stricken expression as he sits at her bedside, appearing much paler and older than the first time they met, just days ago.

After he has dutifully taken her official statement, he sets down his pen and says to her, “Okay, now it’s your turn. Any questions?”

She goes rigid. “Did you find Flint’s body?”

“A local fisherman found him. No need to wait for the official autopsy. Propeller wounds are pretty distinct.”

She closes her eyes, clamps her palms together, and searches her feelings, expecting something heavy and profound. What rises instead is a relief so powerful she can scarcely catch her breath.

Opening her eyes, she asks, “How’s Milo Bender doing?”

“Uh, still in the hospital, recovering, last I heard.”

Before she can ask for more details, Blankenship says, “He sure opened up a can of worms. Did you hear about Walter Wertz?”

“No, not much.”

“That fishing cabin wasn’t his only property. Wertz’s family owned acreage all over the Pacific Northwest, plus a house in Olympia that Bender tracked down about ten years ago.”

“Ten years ago? You mean, Milo Bender was investigating Wertz while I was locked in Flint’s basement?”

“Right. Bender checked his old records and acted on a hunch, then went to Olympia to search the house. Looks like Bender did a little B and E, and—”

“What’s B and E?”

“Breaking and entering. Pretty illegal, but I doubt that anyone’s going to press charges.”

“Why? What happened?”

“Well, everyone seems to believe that Walter Wertz is dead.”

“Dead? Flint killed him?”

“Everyone thinks he died of renal disease. Kidney failure. Because according to medical records, the man was on dialysis and in serious need of a transplant. And here’s the interesting part: Wertz stopped getting treatment and disappeared a few months ago, but his neighbors saw him return to the house a few days after Flint escaped.”

“Meaning what, exactly?”

“Seems that Flint was in disguise.”

“What? So Flint was pretending to be Wertz, a man who is actually dead?”

“That’s what everyone seems to believe.”

“You keep saying that. You don’t believe it?”

“Let’s just say our investigation remains open, and I’m reserving judgment. This guy Wertz was pretty smart. Plus, he’s wealthy, and he has connections. Seems to me, a man like that could arrange a kidney transplant if he wanted one.”

“Oh, man. This is making my head hurt.”

“I know, it’s crazy. But what’s unequivocal is that Flint’s fingerprints were all over Wertz’s place, plus we found wigs, IDs.”

“And yearbooks, right?” She suffers a sharp memory of her conversation with Nikki Keswick.

“Yeah, Flint and Wertz had a photography business. We always wondered how Flint made his living. But he mostly mooched off Wertz, who had a whale of an inheritance.”

“Psychopaths tend to be parasitic.”

He gives her a half smile. “Yes, they do.”

“And speaking of psychopaths, what about Flint’s mother?”

“What about her?”

“Is she under arrest?”

“No. Why?”

Blankenship takes notes, mouth crimped shut, while Reeve explains her theory that Dr. Moody’s former assistant, the blond woman named Cybil, didn’t commit suicide. Reeve says she’s sure that Mrs. Pratt killed her.

Blankenship scarcely responds, and when she runs out of words, he gives her a quick nod, glances at his watch, and closes his notebook. “Your father ordered me to keep it short. As did Dr. Lerner. He says you’ve got a lot of people waiting for you down in California. Pretty nice that he brought his private plane to take you home.”

“Yeah, I never expected that.” She takes a breath. “Before you go, I wanted to tell you that I’m really sorry I won’t be here for Nikki Keswick’s funeral.”

She watches his Adam’s apple slide up and down, his eyes water.

“Are you okay?”

“Not really.” He sighs heavily. “I feel like . . . I don’t know . . . like somebody took a sledgehammer to my chest.”

“You liked her a lot.”

“I loved her. Everybody loved her. Nikki was so . . . filled with promise, so . . .” He looks down at his knuckles, shakes his head, then opens his empty palms.

“I know how terrible it is to lose someone you love,” Reeve says, thinking of her mother.

He clears his throat and changes the subject. “So, anyway, I hear that your prognosis is not too bad.”

She gives a small twitch of the shoulder. “Hypothermia, lacerations, some spectacular bruises.”

He frowns at her. “Yeah, plus a couple of broken ribs.”

“Could be worse.”

He gets to his feet, saying, “Well, it hasn’t exactly been a pleasure, has it? But you sure surprised the heck out of everybody.”