Nowhere to Hide (26 page)

"No. No, you’re not, sweetheart. You’re sure not a baby."

"Well, then. So go already. I’ll be fine."

"I’m sure you’re right, Angela. It’s your dad who’d have a problem with that." He dialed the station again. "I think I’ll just make sure they go up to the house and check on her as soon as they get there. I’ll wait for Mrs. Balena."

Hands propped on her boyish hips, Angela rolled her eyes in mock exasperation.

Thirty-four

He was straddling her, pinning her beneath him. She tried to fight him, to push him off, but he was too strong. His mouth mashed down on hers. She jerked her head away, but he gripped a handful of hair and forced her head still.

She was totally helpless now, unable to move. She could smell the wave of sourness coming off him, mingling with the odor of stale beer. He brought his mouth down again.

No!
No, you bastard.
I’ll die first!

The instant his mouth touched hers, Ellen clamped her teeth down on his lower lip, bit down until she tasted blood. She fought the urge to gag.

Frantic as a speared fish, his hand wound tighter in her hair and he smashed her head against the floor in an effort to make her let go. With their mouths joined,
his own
head could only follow up and down with hers, teeth and noses striking together.

Pain exploded in Ellen’s skull. Still, she hung on. And then his hands were around her throat, his fingers digging into the soft flesh, squeezing the breath from her. There was a roaring in her ears, a burst of color behind her eyelids. Her lungs on fire, she released his lip, noisily gulped in air, her chest heaving.

Looking up into his face, so twisted with hate and savagery, so utterly devoid of humanity, Ellen knew she was going to die. She waited helplessly for the final violation before he killed her.

And then she remembered him dropping the gun into his pocket. Maybe if he was distracted, she could—But Alvin had lost all interest in raping her. Now his rage demanded a more immediate satisfaction. He began to beat her, pummeling her face and body with his fists as he vented his fury. Ellen tried vainly to protect herself, but in the face of such a brutal onslaught, her own small fists were as pesky moths flying against a screen door.

One of the blows smashed into her cheek, and she heard the bone crack and echo inside her head.

After that, she heard nothing at all.

Thirty-five

Myra hung up from talking to the kids. It was 9:30 p.m. She didn’t like Joey being up an hour past his bedtime, but she didn’t voice her opinion. They were having a good time at Grandma Thompson’s, and she guessed once in a while wouldn’t hurt. They’d be home on Sunday.

She was about to dial Ellen’s number again, thought better of it. She might just be put off at the interference. Maybe she was deliberately not answering her phone. Myra’d made the mistake of respecting her wishes and leaving her on her own after Ed died, and now she was doing it again.
To hell with that.
Let’s just drive on down there.
Ellen was the first person to put a hand out to someone else, but when it came to herself, she had too damn much pride, and a stubborn streak a mile wide.

Carl was warming up the car. Myra did a quick trip to the bathroom, and grabbed her coat.

~ * ~

Under darkness of night, unobserved but for a crescent of moon slipping in and out of raggedy clouds, Alvin made his way across the frozen field, his prey draped over his shoulder. He aimed the flashlight low.

Even dead weight, she was much lighter than he’d expected. No trouble for him.

Nevertheless, when two minutes later he reached the small clearing in the woods where he’d parked the van, he was panting heavily.
Sweating despite the cold.

His head hurt where the bitch had struck him with the blow dryer. His tongue probed his torn lower lip. He spat blood.

As he dropped her limp body to the ground, her arms flung outward as if in supplication to the heavens. He was looking down at her when he heard the mournful call of a loon in the distance, mingling with the sighing of the wind in the trees.

Alvin looked nervously around him. Again, the loon’s cry echoed on the night, causing his skin to crawl inside his clothes. Had the wind grown stronger? Despite the cold, he was now sweating profusely. Was it possible she could summon Satan’s forces to save her?
To destroy her enemies?
She was a witch, after all. Hadn’t her voice come to him in the night, wakened him?

No! No, I am the powerful one!

Hearing a car motor, panic gripped him. Picking her up off the ground, he threw her roughly into the back of the van. Her body struck the metal floor with a heavy thud.

Closing the door, he jumped into the van and sped off.

~ * ~

Where Cutter’s Road met the main road, Officer Gabe Levine, sitting in the passenger side of the unmarked car that had been dispatched to Ellen Harris’ house, barely noticed the dark Ford van going in the opposite direction.

Thirty-six

Standing on the front step, Myra pressed the doorbell a second time. She could hear it ringing inside her house.
Still, no answer.

"I don’t get it," she half-whispered to Carl. "She’s got to be home. Her car’s in the drive."

"Maybe she’s asleep."

"You don’t think the bell would wake her?" she said, almost angrily.

"She could have taken a sleeping pill."

Yeah, Myra thought. And she just might be passed out drunk in there. "I developed a bit of a problem after Ed died."
Damn, why did I listen to her?

"Let’s try the back door," she said finally.

"Maybe we should just let—"

But Myra was already racing around to the back.

She was about to knock on the door. Seeing it slightly open, an alarm went off inside her head. She opened it the rest of the way. "Ellen?" she said softly, stepping into the brightly lit kitchen. She froze.

"Oh, my God!
Oh, my God, Carl!" she breathed.

Stepping past her, Carl took in the macabre scene—the knife drawer on the floor, knives scattered everywhere, the bloody handprint on the white enameled, lower cupboard door, all the more horrible in the stark light of the room. "Don’t touch anything," he said hoarsely. "I’ll call the police."

The words were no sooner said when the doorbell rang sharply, followed by an urgent pounding on the front door. "Mrs. Harris? Police! Are you all right in there?"

9:55 p.m.

Mike had just pulled in behind the dark green unmarked police Chevy, was getting out of his car when a wild-eyed Myra Thompson flung the door open,
screamed
hysterically at him, "She’s dead. He’s killed her.
In-in the-the kitchen."

Ignoring Carl Thompson’s attempt to clarify his wife’s statement while at the same time trying to calm her, Mike burst past Officer Gabe Levine and the Thompsons into the house, the small entourage at his heels.

He stopped at the kitchen door, braced for whatever horror might confront him. After a moment, he turned to look at Myra.
"Where?"
His voice was hard.

"I didn’t mean Ellen was here," she said, while valiantly trying to get herself under control. "But—look..."

She was pointing to the bloody handprint on the door. "It’s not hers," he said, his voice softening a little. "It’s too large to be Ellen’s." He didn’t want to ponder what that might mean.

He noted the two bags of groceries on the table, her kid gloves on the counter, the small pile of mail on the table, the untouched cup of tea. He stepped into the room, bent and picked up a Polaroid snapshot lying on the floor by the table leg. He already knew what its subject would be. It was the sort of thing those bastards did—part of the buzz.

But it was himself he was really blaming. He should have told her sooner. He’d had his reasons, of course. Unfortunately, they weren’t working for him right now.

He gazed down at the girl in the photo, felt sick at heart. No wonder she’d sounded so cool when she phoned him. He knew now it was hurt and anger he’d heard in her voice. She’d trusted him, and he’d betrayed her by not giving her the full truth.

He prayed it hadn’t cost Ellen her life.

Handing the photograph to Levine, who slipped it into a clear envelope and sealed it, Mike said to Carl and an equally ashen-faced Myra, "Did you two go anywhere else in the house?"

"Only to answer your knock," Myra said in a high, tremulous voice. "We came in the back way. The door was open."

"He must have left just minutes before
we
all got here," Gabe put in. "It’s a damn cold night out, and the kitchen’s still warm." With that, he headed into the living room, gun drawn, just in case he was wrong and the killer was still in the house.

Mike glanced down at the manila envelope on the table, at Ellen’s name printed in the same red-inked block lettering as on the note she’d shown him. Noting the lack of a postmark, he took a last quick look around the
kitchen,
saw what he’d missed on first scan. Two bowls on the floor by the refrigerator, one filled with dog food, the other with water. A leash lay on top of the fridge, blue loop handle hanging down. Something else began to dawn on him then, something that made him silently curse his own stupidity. Motioning to the other officer to remain with the Thompsons, Mike headed into the hallway and up the stairs, his own gun drawn.

Reaching the top of the stairs, he saw the small pool of blood by the bathroom door—followed its trail with his eyes to what he assumed was Ellen’s bedroom—the door was partly open. Horrible visions flooding his mind, he closed his eyes and gripped the banister.

"You okay, Lieutenant?" Gabe whispered, coming up soundlessly beside him, touching his shoulder.

Mike nodded, mentally shook himself.
Get a grip on it, Oldfield! You’re a cop, dammit! Do your job!
So far he’d been a royal screw-up. Slamming a door on his personal feelings, leaving Gabe to check out the rest of the upstairs, Mike went into the bedroom.

He saw the contents of her bag spilled onto the bed, noticed the pack of cigarettes. He’d never seen her smoke. The gun was gone.
No surprise.
There was another bloody handprint on the bedspread on the side of the bed closest to the dresser. The blood-spattered blow dryer was on the floor.

The trail of blood leading from the puddle in the hallway disappeared under the bed. Mike got down on his hands and knees and peered into the dark, narrow space. Glazed eyes flickered open to look pitifully out at him.

"Sam?" he said softly.

The dog lay unmoving, but managed a faint whimper in response.

By lying flat on the floor on his stomach and inching forward, Mike was able to reach in far enough to get his hands behind the dog and ease him out from under the bed. He could feel the small body growing cooler as the life ebbed from it. The dog’s fur was matted with blood; he was trembling, starting to convulse.

"He’s in shock," Mike said to Levine, who’d just returned from checking out the closet. Both men had put their guns away. "He’s lost a lot of blood. We’ve got to get him some help."

"A little late," Gabe said, staring down at the limp form, wondering why in hell the lieutenant was worried about a damned mutt. Clearly the dog was history. "He’s dying," he said. "He knows it, too. It’s why he dragged himself under the bed."

"Have someone rush him to a vet, anyway," Mike said sharply, getting to his feet and looking around for something warm to wrap the dog in. "And get on the phone and have them set up roadblocks. Tell them to get some back-up out here."

Levine wasted no time executing Mike’s orders. "No way of knowing, Captain," he said into the mouthpiece. "The back door was open. He could have chased her out into the woods; maybe she’s out there now, hiding, hurt. Or he could have taken her with him. We don’t know at this point." It was at that moment that Gabe remembered the van he and Olsen had passed on their way out here.