Tahoe Ghost Boat (An Owen McKenna Mystery Thriller) (29 page)

“Is that all he did?”

She paused. “Pretty much all. The two guys always came together. The other guy didn’t seem as mean. But Max, he said things that made me think that if he ever came alone, I’d be in real trouble.”

I felt my blood pressure rising as she said it. “Did he make a specific threat?” I asked.

“Not specific. But they were still threats. Like, ‘I bet you’ve got a soft little body under all those clothes.’ And, ‘Some day I’m going to come and show you what a man can do with you.’ Stuff like that. It made me sick. And they were both rough with me, pushing me whenever they wanted me to move.”

“What does Max look like?”

“Dark hair, cut real short. Tall. Not as tall as you, but real big. Lots of muscles. He always smelled of cologne. He’s one of those guys who puts on way too much, but they don’t have a clue how gross that is.”

From her description, I thought that the man who’d picked me up and carried me on his shoulder was Max. He was probably the man that Agent Ramos said was born Mikhailo and emigrated from Russia as a child.

“What did the other guy look like?”

“Shorter and softer. Messy blond hair. He wasn’t so scary, like, physically. But he’s scary in a twisted way. Like I bet he still lives with his mother. She probably calls him her baby. I don’t think he’d rape. Or fight. But he’s a kind of sicko, for sure. Probably tortures people.”

“He didn’t touch you?”

“No.”

“Did you get his name?”

“No. Remember the Anthony Perkins character in “Psycho?” Well, that’s what this guy reminds me of. So I thought of him as Norman Bates. Neither Norman or Max ever used a name. I guess they were careful even though they were rough and weird.”

“When I drove my Jeep into their van, Max and Norman were outside of the van. There was a third guy inside the van with you.”

“Yeah. He’s the guard. He doesn’t speak, just plays with his gun. He takes the bullets out, looks into the barrel and stuff. Max always told him to guard me, to stay in the bedroom on the other side of the bathroom door.”

I thought about what she’d said.

“They kept you locked up for five days. Then they came and took you off in the van.”

“They were going to kill me,” Gertie said.

“Do you know why?”

“I think so. The day they took me out to kill me, they were gone for a few hours. I thought I was alone. But the other door into the bathroom opened. It didn’t open much, just six inches or so. I wasn’t in the bathroom. I was sitting on the mattress in the storeroom, so I wasn’t very close. But I heard a man inhale and then swear like he was surprised to see me. I turned to look, but it was dark in the bedroom, and I couldn’t see anything through the door. Then the door shut. I think whoever it was thinks that I saw him. If whoever is in charge didn’t like that I supposedly saw that guy, then they might have ordered me killed. It’s the only thing that makes sense.”

Gertie was gripping the arms of the big upholstered chair, her fingertips making impressions in the leather.

“That night, the silent guard came and got me. He put the bag over my head. But when Max and Norman arrived, and they all took me out to the van, they told the silent guy that he didn’t need to use the bag. That told me that they didn’t care what I saw because they were going to kill me.”

“Did you see anything of where you were?”

“No. Once the silent guy put the bag on my head, the others just left it on until they were going to kill me.”

We sat in silence for awhile.

“Did they ever say anything that would indicate why they kidnapped you?”

She shook her head.

“What about anything that would suggest their business?”

Another head shake.

“What did the man in the dark want?” I asked.

“I don’t know.”

I stood up. “Okay with you if I find some food for us?”

“At home, I’m always hungry,” Gertie said, “but I’m not hungry now.”

“You need fuel. Trauma can make you lose your appetite.”

She made a small nod.

I stood up and walked over to the kitchen. I opened some cupboards, found the ones with food. The fridge was cold but empty of all fresh food, and the freezer was mostly empty. It looked like the homeowners did not plan to be back before spring.

  “I could make spaghetti with tomato sauce.”

Gertie nodded.

Twenty minutes later, I served up two large bowls on the island counter. We sat on tall stools and ate without talking. When we were done, I rinsed the dishes.

“Are we going to sleep here?” Gertie asked.

“Yeah. It’s almost dark. We should go to bed early and get up early so we can paddle before dawn. That way we can’t be seen.”

“Do you think it would be okay if I took a shower here?” Gertie asked. “I haven’t showered in days.”

“I think it would be fine. We broke into this house because this is an emergency. That makes the rules different. We’ll pay whatever they charge.”

“You mean you will,” Gertie said. “That doesn’t seem right.”

“Your mother hired me. She’ll pay.”

Gertie made a slow nod. “What if I looked for some clean clothes? Mine are filthy.”

“I think you should do that.”

 “Then I’ll go look.” Gertie got up and turned toward the bedrooms when we heard a noise outside.

FORTY-TWO

I jumped up and ran to the slider wall to turn off the lights. Back in the kitchen, I turned off those lights. I picked up the remote and killed the gas fire.

“What’s wrong?” Gertie said.

“Sssh,” I whispered.

I walked over to the window that was near the slider but faced south, the direction I thought the sound came from. I gave a tiny twist to the control rod for the blinds, and peeked out, looking through the forest, down the shore.

 It was twilight, and the shadowed, snowy woods were deep blue. Combined with the black lake, there was barely enough light to see anything. A fine mist of falling snowflakes put a gray haze over the view. It looked as cold as it was. I saw no lights, no movement.

I moved to a kitchen window that faced west, toward the rising mountain. Because of the thick forest and the slope blocking the twilight from the west, the view was darker. I stared longer. Again, no light, no movement. Half of the possible view was obscured by the house’s garage, which projected out from the house. The garage wall was near the kitchen window, and it went out maybe twenty-six feet. If I found a window to that side of the house, I could see more. I trotted into a study. Its window was farther from the garage wall. I could see more of the mountain that rose up. But still, I saw nothing.

To look in the third direction, to the north, I went into a hallway that led to the bedrooms. It was too dark inside to see. I held one hand in front of me, ran the other lightly along the wall. I went past several doors and turned into the one that faced most directly north. There was just enough light to see the master bed and the door over to the bath. This room had a type of blind that pulled up. I didn’t dare raise it, as the movement would be obvious to anyone who might be outside. I got my fingers around the edge and bent the material just enough to see out.

The snow in the forest was deep blue and so thick and deep, it blocked the view of nearly everything.

But just 20 or 25 yards out, I saw the top of the white cargo van. It was obviously sitting on a plowed road, a nearly invisible white canal in a white landscape. The road had been plowed to within a short distance of the house we were in, and we’d never seen it as we approached the house by kayak from the other direction.

Wearing snowshoes, and trudging through the deep toward the house was a big man. Behind him was the third man, the silent guard I’d bloodied in the collision. Even though I was looking through the fine mist of falling snow, I saw the rage on his face and the big gun in his hand. He held the gun up, ready and eager to fire at the first opportunity.

I let go of the window blind and sprinted back to Gertie.

“We have to go!” I said in a whispered shout.

She looked stunned and didn’t move.

“Now!”

I grabbed my gloves, handed them to her, and pushed her as she trotted, stumbling, toward the slider. The slider slid open without a sound. We stepped out, and I gave the door a thoughtless push behind me. The door slid closed fast and hit the stop with a loud thud. Unless the men were making some significant noise at the same moment, they would have heard it. I’d betrayed our presence.

The only reasonable way back through the snow to the kayak was to retrace the way we’d come. Unfortunately, as soon as we stepped down off the deck at the corner of the house, we’d be visible. But we had no other option. Trying to take a roundabout path from the far side of the house would take a week of burrowing through six feet of powder. Our only hope was to move fast and hope that the men had lousy accuracy at this light level and this distance.

“Stay bent low,” I whispered to Gertie. “I’ll go first.”

I took her gloved hand and stepped into the track we’d made coming in. I marched fast, moving sideways so that I could pull Gertie by the hand. We’d gone less than ten feet when I heard a shout.

“There they are!” a big, thundering voice shouted. It sounded like the voice of the man who dropped me overboard to my intended death. “Send in our coordinates!” he shouted.

A loud shot cracked the air. Then another. Gertie made a soft scream.

“Concentrate on running!” I whispered.

Another gunshot.

Gertie whimpered. Her drag on my hand increased.

“Pay no attention!” I pulled harder.

Our path made a curve as we approached the shore. I slipped and fell in the gathering darkness, jumped back up, jerked on Gertie’s arm. She cried out.

We got to the kayak. I pulled it out of the snow. Slid it into the water. We were bent down, possibly out of view from the men.

“Get in! Hurry!”

 Gertie jumped in. The kayak tipped. I grabbed the paddle in one hand and held it as I put both hands on either side of the rear seat. In a jerky, running motion, I stepped into the water with my right foot as I pushed the kayak out with my hands. The kayak swerved in a big arc to the left. I swung my left foot into the rear leg compartment. Then it swung back to the right as I lifted my water-logged right foot out of the water and snaked it into the kayak.

We were still coasting as I took my first stroke with my right hand. I pulled too hard. The kayak’s stern went down into the water, and the bow arced to the left. Gertie gasped as we began to flip over.

I stopped pulling just in time, jammed the left paddle into the water, and pulled with my left hand.

The kayak arced back the other way. Levelled out.

A shot thundered. Then another. I began paddling in smooth, regular strokes, strong pulls, but no longer the desperate tugs that threatened to capsize us.

There was more shouting from behind. The voices were hard to understand. I heard the words ‘green kayak’ and ‘find a boat.’

I paddled harder. We were moving at high speed. Faster than a person could walk. When I glanced back I couldn’t see anything specific on the shore, just a general sense of forest. The sky was a dull gray twilight of clouds and falling snow. I couldn’t see the men, which hopefully meant they couldn’t see us. I pulled harder on my paddle, wanting to get as far away as possible. Gertie paddled too, her strokes weak but regular. Then I had a frightening thought.

If we got too far out, we’d be lost on the vast expanse of lake, unable to see anything. If I lost our bearings and began paddling toward the center of the lake, we’d die on the water.

I thought I could get a sense of the wave direction and use that as a kind of compass. But it was too dark. The kayak seemed to have a regular agitation from the waves, but it didn’t give me a sense of direction in the near dark.

We had to go back closer to land. If we could at least sense the shore, we wouldn’t get lost. I worried about Mikhailo and his comrades. But they wouldn’t be able to see us in the dark unless they had infrared sights. As I had the thought, I accidentally bumped my paddle on the kayak. It made a loud, resonant thump as if I’d struck a bass drum. If I did that more, they’d be able to track us by sound alone.

I turned toward where I thought the land was and stroked hard. I thought the dark sense of shore would appear in a few moments, but it didn’t. I kept making strong strokes through the water, even as I tried to slip my paddle blades in and out of the water so they didn’t make a splashing noise. Instead of worrying about them hearing me, maybe we could hear them.

“Hold up,” I whispered. We stopped paddling and coasted.

 I heard nothing except a soft, distant hum, like the hum of old-fashioned electronic equipment.

“What’s wrong?” Gertie said in a low voice.

“Sssh,” I whispered. “I’m listening for shore noises.”

“What do you mean?” she whispered.

“Men talking. Waves hitting rocks. Night animals.”

“Are we lost? Oh my God. We could be lost at sea.”

“No. We’re fine. I can always slap my paddle and listen for the echo, but I’d rather not.”

I heard nothing. I slipped my right paddle blade into the water and took a soft stroke. Paused and listened. Pulled my paddle out and made a stroke with my left blade. I tried to make the strokes equal in effort. Like most kayaks, this one had no rudder. The only way to keep it going straight was to alternate left side and right side strokes and give them the same power. But I’d been in kayaks enough to realize that, without vision, it would be nearly impossible to make a rudder-less kayak go straight for any length of time.

I stopped again to listen. There was no sound that indicated the shore. Was there a breeze? Yes, a light breeze that brought the tiny snowflakes onto my left cheek more than my right. Which way did they come down on the land? I couldn’t remember. How stupid could I be? At a time when I should have been hyper-vigilant, I didn’t pay attention to my surroundings.

Again, I heard no sound except the low hum. It sounded like it was everywhere. Maybe it was just ringing in my ears. “Do you hear that low hum?” I whispered.