Night Eyes (The Detective Temeke Crime Series Book 2) (5 page)

Murphy craned his head between the front seats, snout only inches from Temeke’s nose. He panted for a time, tongue lolling through a pink set of gums. When he closed his mouth, he let out a pleading whine. 

“This is it,” Temeke said, pointing at a rest stop, trees aglow under two streetlamps. “Leave the headlights on.”

Malin turned into the narrow road and parked about fifteen feet behind the Peterbilt. A man jumped down from the cab, gray hair in a ponytail and a tattoo on the arm he waved.

“Before you show him this photograph,” Temeke said, sliding it out of his jacket pocket, “find out if he remembers what Adam was wearing.”

Temeke took the tee shirt from the brown bag and let the dog take a good long sniff. Murphy nudged his way onto the front seat and launched a solid ninety pound mass into the dirt. He tore off behind a portable storage building before breaking into a cornfield.

Temeke watched corn tassels bobbing to and fro as Murphy ran beneath them flattening the grass and chuffing. And then he came back, circling an area a few feet from where Temeke stood, nose stuck down a crevice where the tarmac met the trunk of a small piñon tree. The dog whined and then barked.

Temeke pulled out his flashlight and trained the beam at the base of the tree. He crouched, let his fingers brush over bark and grass, feeling nothing but dog drool. Wind whispered through the corn stalks, a hollow sound that reminded him of a seashell against his ear, and there was something in the dog’s persistent grunting that gave him hope.

The wind tugged gently at the collar of his ski jacket as he scanned the ground, back and forth, back and forth. There had to be something. No matter how small. He wondered if it was a trick of the light or wishful thinking when he saw a small yellow ball nesting between two blades of grass. He pulled on a pair of black leather gloves, snatching the paper before the dog did, warding off the leap with his forearm. It was a bible tract all right, verse printed in black ink and he couldn’t make head or tail of it. He looked at his watch and then at the horizon. Four more hours before daybreak.

He glanced up the road at Malin still talking to the driver of the Peterbilt, arms crossed, jaw set just enough to get the man’s attention. Coaxing the dog into the back seat of the car, he couldn’t help thinking of the Monday morning news, the hype, the drama.

Troops of grieving boy scouts trample the Bosque for any sign of Adam Oliver…

Malin jogged back. “Mr. Delaney thinks he saw them well over forty-five minutes ago,” she said, climbing back into the front seat. “He watched the kid through his wing mirror, saw him in the beam of the headlights. Said he was standing somewhere around that tree. He was wearing a scout uniform. It’s him alright.”

“And the man he was with?”

“Tall, six foot, he said, well-built, shoulder-length hair. Had something in his right hand, held it down along the length of his thigh like he was hiding it. Could have been a gun, could have been two fingers. It wasn’t until the man motioned with it a couple of times Mr. Delany assumed it was a handgun. He confirmed the truck was a black Chevy Silverado Z71. Used to have one himself.”

Temeke wondered how the trucker could have seen the gun unless the man turned sideways to the fender and flapped the damn thing about.

The cell phone buzzed in his pocket. It was Hackett again. Adam’s phone had been traced to a cell tower in Belen. Seemed like every unit on I-25 had been alerted. Fortunately, the press still thought the official search was on Riverfront Drive and the surrounding area because some daft old git tipped off Jennifer Danes at the Journal. She had too much in the way of guts and stamina, thrived in twenty degree weather and loved talking to worst of them. She was probably standing in front of a camera crew right now waiting for a hostage situation to break.

Only he’s not there, Temeke thought. Not if the poor kid’s headed south on I-25 towards Socorro. Hackett had likely kept that away from the press.

He looked down at the tract in his hand and read it aloud this time. “So also the tongue is a small part of the body, and yet it boasts of great things. See how great a forest is set aflame by such a small fire! James 3:5. Where was the most recent forest fire?”

“Carson National Forest,” Malin said. “One of their rangers claimed the fire was the largest in history. He said they lost over one hundred and twenty square miles of forestland.”

“There’s your boasting tongue. It was Gila that won the gold. Two hundred and sixty-five square miles burned to the ground. All black and scorched and full of dead animals… all because some idiot lit a cigarette and hurled a lighted match out of his bloody tent!”

“Better call Hackett,” she said.

“And tell him what? To toss a bleeding coin? Just head for Gila, will you?”

It was another twenty minutes before they reached Los Lunas, tripped the siren in heavy traffic and shot out the other side. Temeke heard the chirping of his phone. “Temeke,” he snapped.

It was Hackett again. Temeke sat up a little straighter.

“Want the good news first or the bad?”

“Good.”

“Our man just called Madam Mayor. Seems he wants to make an exchange.”

Temeke gave Malin a sideways nod. “How much?”

“Three hundred grand, half in hundreds, half in smaller denominations and none of it must be sequenced. Had to wake up Oily Streuli and ask him to open the vault. Making copies now. It could take a few hours.”

“You got an address?”

“3265 Forest Road, Gila National Forest. Kidnapper says he wants the bag dropped in the driveway at five thirty in the morning. No police or he’ll shoot the boy.”

Lucky they were going the right way, Temeke thought. It would be a right sod if they had to head back through all that traffic. “So, who does the house belong to?”

“Sandoval Properties. A two week rental in the name of―”

“Don’t tell me. A Mr. S. Marner.” Temeke sensed a disabling feeling of dread. This was the work of someone highly organized, someone who knew a thing or two about keeping a low profile. And how many times had a kidnapper failed to keep his promise? “Who’s doing the drop?”

“DCPD Air 1. Make sure you’re in the vicinity before they get there. I’m right behind with the follow team.”

Temeke knew kidnappers got skittish when they heard helicopters, especially the smart ones that knew about the infra-red heat detectors and snipers leaning out over the skids. He just hoped this one had the sense to wait until he got the money before topping the kid.

“And the bad news?”

“Media’s got hold of it. They think it’s the Ringmaster. Hundreds of them are demanding a story or they go on the air and make one up. I’ve asked Sarge to call all media reps, get their ID and ask to speak to the Editors in Chief. If they run the story they’ll be risking Adam’s life.”

Temeke heard the click of Hackett’s phone as the line went dead. “I’ll kill the bastard who told the press. I’ll kill the press too.”

The car sped towards signs to Socorro before Malin said anything. “Hopefully, Adam won’t run out in the woods and get hypothermia and exhaustion.”

Temeke knew what she was really thinking. The woods were littered with hungry wildlife and a killer they had never managed to catch, and any chance of finding the boy seemed to flit away. “Of course he won’t run out in the woods. He’s a bloody scout for crying out loud.”

The sharp screech of an eagle pierced the silence and jolted Adam awake. He lifted his head from the pillow and squinted at a shaft of moonlight through a man-sized window. It was still night, gray clouds rolling in from the west. He hadn’t slept for long. Ten, fifteen minutes tops.

Through a veil of tears, his mind wandered to the last few hours, mind diving further into a tunnel of fear. Things Ramsey said. Things he did. So many memories seemed to spool around Adam’s head and he couldn’t rid himself of the image of his father lying on the floor.

Adam wiped his eyes, chest tightening with each sob. He was hungry again, but not hungry enough to shout for the killer downstairs, one that would reel him in like a fish on a pole and then gut him down the middle.

Lifting his legs over the side of the bed, he struggled to stand, felt nauseous, tongue sticking to the roof of his mouth. He had to pee.

The ensuite bathroom was small and dark with a shower that stank of mold. He sat on the toilet for a time, staring at his face in a mirror that hung over the sink. He looked different. Hair all mussed and creeping over one eye. There was an odd pallor to his skin like he’d aged a few years in a couple of hours and his eyes were shiny with fresh tears. He didn’t dare flush the toilet. Didn’t want Ramsey knowing his personal business.

There was a musical box on the chest of drawers, key projecting from a blue painted case. Gold stars were etched around the edge and there was a figure of a man in the moon on the lid. Adam walked over and stared at it for a moment, turned the key a few times and heard it sputter into life. A well-known melody he couldn’t place lasted for about seven seconds before running out of steam.

He had no idea why he did it. He was just lonely that was all. When he reached inside his pocket, fingers fumbling for those little slips of paper, he felt nothing but the lining of his pants against the warmth of his body. Beads of sweat trickled down the sides of his face and he brushed them away with both hands. It was his one and only chance to get out. Ramsey was downstairs with a gun in his hand, likely circling the living room and deciding how much longer he could wait.

Adam couldn't wait.

He opened the small casement window and was met with a shiver of cold air and the smell of pine trees. Taking off his belt, he wound it into a ball and tucked it in his top pocket. Easing himself out onto the ledge, he pushed forward a foot at a time. The tiles felt cold beneath his hands and some began to move.

Dropping onto the ridge of the gabled roof, he slid down a narrow valley to the eaves. He knew the gutter wouldn't hold his weight and shuffling forward on his butt, he peered over the edge. Taking a deep breath, he laced his hands behind his head and jumped onto the grass below. There was a dull thud as his feet took the impact and he rolled forward on the ground, arms breaking his fall.

He lay stunned for a few seconds, legs tingling as if they would suddenly snap. Three tiles rained down onto the grass beside him, first a dull thud and then an echoing shatter. He struggled to stand as the noise diminished, limping for the edge of the trees. It would be too obvious to take the track back down to the service road where the trees stood further apart and left no hiding place. So he chose instead to head for the woods.

It was the sound of a loud groan that made him freeze. Peering around the east side of the house, he saw a blaze of light from the back porch. It was the musculature of a man’s back he saw, muscles contracting with every move. Ramsey was sitting on a tree stump lifting weights. Only he paused when he heard that sound, face turned slightly to one side.

It was now or never. Burrowing under the canopy of fir branches ahead, Adam hurdled over a low fence of railroad ties and down the slope into the darkness. Each breath burning in his lungs, he set off towards a pathway half-buried under a pile of pine needles. He didn’t look back, didn’t want to know if Ramsey had seen him. All he could hear was the crunch of detritus under his feet and as long as he could still hear it, he knew he was alone.

He picked up speed under dense branches that appeared black in the meager light and headed southwest, keeping the dirt track to his right. A rabbit startled him as it bounded across his path, darting between a skirt of gnarly brown branches and dead leaves. Adam paused, held his breath and listened.

Only the whisper of a breeze through the fir trees and the screech of an eagle. The air was pungent with the scent of sap and piney woods and in the distance, he could just make out a large lake shimmering black like a puddle of oil.

Scanning the underbrush, his eyes became accustomed to the gloom. He pelted down the slope towards a stream, crossing over a group of flat rocks to the other side. Continuing up the opposite slope at a steady jog, he headed towards a knot of box elders and sagebrush, realizing he had no container for water or iodine crystals to purify it. He wouldn't last long out in the woods without a drink and the next water source was likely to be the lake he had seen well over a mile away.

It was here the predators came; wolf, bear and mountain lion. None of them scared him, not like Ramsey did. It was another rabbit that made him jump, scampering over a tree root, pausing for a moment to sniff the scent off a bleak wind. Something had disturbed it, something bigger. The air was chilled as the night wore on, made him shiver, made his teeth chatter. Lucky the moon was hanging just above the treetops, full enough to provide light. He found the hills and valleys a struggle, footfalls punctuated with labored breaths.

And then he froze, hand pressed against his chest. He could hear panting and branches snapping back in the wake of a runner. A flash of movement to his right. Ramsey was fast, angling sideways to gain purchase on the slope, arms out by his sides. His mouth was set in a clenched grin, breath misting beneath his nose.    

Adam dropped to a crouch, blending with a stand of young Douglas-firs. He watched the dark figure some fifteen feet ahead, pausing suddenly as if getting his bearings. One hand seemed to hover over his belt, the other hung in the air, fingers spread. He was gauging the wind. It was something big-eared bats did when they spread their wings, as sensitive as a human fingertip.

Ramsey began to head east and then quite suddenly north as if he traveled an arc around Adam, plotting his course with the accuracy of a sniffer-dog. He stopped once or twice, glancing up at a small helicopter humming in the sky, lights flickering in the darkness. Then he disappeared around the base of a large boulder.

Adam tried to think. He could turn back and run towards the house. It was the last thing Ramsey would expect. He could even try driving that big old truck. It wouldn’t matter if he didn’t have a license. The police were looking for him anyway.

The more he thought about it the more he liked it. Teeth rattling, he took a mental inventory of his surroundings, the slope back up to the lodge behind him and the service road beyond. It wasn’t like he was equipped with a thermal blanket and a few energy bars to go hiking off into the unknown, and there wasn’t enough light to get safely down to the lake.

Turning back towards the slope, he pushed on through the trees, boots clawing at dead leaves. Branches sprang back into his face, cutting across his cheeks as he blinked the tears away. Sometimes he ran, sometimes he stopped to listen. He was ten minutes away from the lodge, ten minutes away from safety.

Shadows were creeping at the base of the trees and an owl hooted nearby. Just as he came to a standstill behind a shaggy spruce, his foot caught on a root and he came down with a thump, sliding half-way beneath its spiny skirt. He was rewarded with the bitter smell of dead leaves and the echo of breaking twigs. He tried to crawl closer to the tree trunk, but the root had somehow caught on the rubber sole of his boot and the only way he could free it was to crawl back out.

He heard footfalls beating up the slope. There was no way he could move, not with Ramsey standing a few feet away, eyes darting back and forth like a school of fish. He must have sensed something, heard something. If Adam let out that big breath he was holding, Ramsey would hear that too.

“I’m the falcon, you’re the prey,” the harsh voice crooned. “Wouldn’t want anyone to come between us now would you?”

Ramsey’s head turned first to the right and then to the left. “If you don’t come out soon, you’ll smell gunshot. You’re upwind of it. And it’ll blow right in your face.”

Adam refrained from letting out a whimper of pain. He knew Ramsey couldn’t see him. It was just a lame trick. 

“You want to go home, right. Or maybe you’ve changed your mind. Me, I’d bet my ass on it.”

Of course Adam wanted to go home, but thinking about it didn’t bother him as much as the pain that shot up and down his shins and the spiny bed beneath his elbows.

Just as the wind wheezed its way between the trees and a steel-gray cloud covered the moon, he let out that breath. It went dark then and there was an ashen hue in the shadows as if he had suddenly found himself in a winter wonderland. He had to move, he couldn’t feel his leg.

A second gust brushed the ground, whipping shards of bark and pine needles, and filling the air with a thin brown dust. Adam saw his chance. He inched forward on his elbows and it was then he heard the scrape of leather on wood and a loud pop as his foot slipped free.  

Ramsey crouched.

Adam froze.

He imagined eyes that stared bone deep, gazing over his right shoulder to the trees beyond. Then they twitched to the left, stayed there for a time before sweeping again to the right.

Adam’s dad had once told him how Shadow Wolf officers could see in the dark, not with infra-red lenses, but with their own eyes. They could even sniff out a black beetle in a storm drain. They were that smart.

“I hope you have a Bowie on you, little scout! Because you’re sure going to need it.”

Adam almost jumped at the sound of that voice.
What use is a knife against a gun?
he thought, avoiding eye contact in case Ramsey felt it and came tumbling in beneath that tree. The voice had an odd pitch to it similar to the one his dad used when they played hide-and-go-seek. The one where he had no idea where Adam was.

“Must be frightening to be lost out in the wilderness with a cold-blooded killer. But killers can be kind, little scout. They can be cruel. Which one am I?”

Adam could taste pine dust in the back of his throat and if he didn’t find water soon, he’d be coughing his guts up before long. There was nothing to do but watch those roving eyes, just enough to take in every grain of detail in their periphery.

“I know what your nickname is. Night Eyes. That’s what they call you.”

Adam almost jumped when he heard the name, stared at the ground on which Ramsey crouched, saw the bluish tinge on each stem of grass. And then something dawned on him.

Ramsey could make out a shape against a gunmetal sky and a silver-gray moon. But he couldn’t see anything against the darkness of the tree trunk. He couldn’t see anything among the leaves. He couldn’t see Adam at all.