Bleeding Through: A Rachel Goddard Mystery (Rachel Goddard Mysteries) (37 page)

The inside of Rachel’s nose burned, as if she’d breathed in pepper. She swallowed and tasted something musty, but familiar, at the back of her throat. When she opened her eyes, she saw only darkness. She felt a blanket, soft and light, covering her entire body, including her face.

Where am I?
Her foggy brain took a moment to register the hum of a car engine and the bumps in the road beneath the vehicle’s tires.

He’s got me. Dear god, he’s got me.

She shivered violently and bile rose in her throat. She lay on her right side, and her arms seemed to be caught behind her, unmovable. She tried to shift her legs, push herself upright, but her ankles were bound together and something hard pressed against her stomach. The metal buckle of a seat belt, she guessed. Although she was lying down, she felt the belt running over and under her body, holding her in place. She wasn’t gagged. Thank god for that, at least, but the blanket was smothering her.

Focus, focus. Don’t panic.

Thrashing her head from side to side, Rachel worked the blanket off her face. As she’d suspected, she lay on the back seat of a car. Her movements hadn’t made much noise, but surely the unseen driver had heard, was aware she’d awakened. Yet he said nothing, didn’t look around.

Rachel gulped in air, swallowed, and tasted the familiar mustiness again. Isoflurane? An anesthesia gas she used on animals all the time. Now someone had used it on her.

Not
someone.
Him. Perry Nelson. It had to be him.

The faint glow from the dashboard, glimpsed between the front seats, provided the only light in the car. The high headrest blocked her view of the driver. Why hadn’t he spoken? Why hadn’t he reacted to her movements?

Rachel squirmed around, trying to reposition herself for a better look without drawing his attention. When she raised her head from the seat, nausea swept through her, made her gag. Laying her head down again, she closed her eyes until the sickness subsided. It was an aftereffect of the anesthetic and would go away.

That struck Rachel as funny—god only knew what Nelson would do to her, or how much longer she had to live, but she was thinking about waiting for her nausea to pass. She almost laughed, but caught herself before any sound could escape. She had no time to waste. She swallowed again, clenched her teeth, and raised her head.

Still fighting off nausea, she craned her neck until she caught a glimpse of the driver in the dim light. What she saw made her gape. She dropped her head to the seat again. How was this possible? What on earth was going on?

The side of the driver’s face was barely visible, hidden by a cascade of shoulder-length, wavy dark hair that gleamed in the dashboard light. She had expected to see Perry Nelson. But her silent kidnapper was a woman.

Chapter Thirty-nine

Dennis and Brandon, seated in front of Tom’s desk, exchanged doubtful looks.

“I’m having a little trouble wrapping my head around this,” Dennis told Tom. “Your instincts are usually right on target, though. We know Jordan Gale and Perry Nelson were in the same hospital at the same time, but what makes you think they cooked up a murder plot together?”

“Jordy had motive and opportunity to kill Brian Hadley six years ago,” Tom said. “He thought Brian was going to break Rita’s heart. And he was there, at the fairgrounds, at the concert, the night Brian was murdered. He never came under suspicion because all the evidence pointed at Vance Lankford from the word go. Nobody ever had any reason to question Jordy or check up on his movements.”

“Then why did Shelley suspect him?” Brandon asked.

“Because he tried to cover up something simple, something an innocent person wouldn’t lie about. We know Shelley found that picture and was trying to identify people who were present that night but were never questioned. She showed the picture to Vance and he recognized Jordy. Then she showed it to Rita and got a reaction that made her think Rita was lying when she said it wasn’t Jordy. Finally, she went to Jordy himself and he denied it was him, denied he was even in the county that night. If Jordy had nothing to do with Brian’s murder, why would he or Rita lie about him being around that night?”

“If all that’s true,” Dennis said, “and Jordy thought Shelley was onto him and wouldn’t quit until she proved he was guilty, then I can see him killing her to shut her up. But the trouble is, I just checked his alibi for the day Shelley went missing, and it’s solid. He was here in Mason County, and he can prove it with witnesses and work records.”

“I don’t think Jordy killed Shelley,” Tom said. “I’ll bet you anything I own that Jordy Gale is the friend Nelson made at the hospital during the winter.”

“But you said the hospital director wouldn’t verify it,” Dennis said.

“No, and he’s left for the day. Nobody’s in the admin offices right now, but I’ll call him again in the morning and fax Jordy’s driver’s license picture to him. I know I’m right.”

“So let’s assume Jordy killed Brian Hadley,” Dennis said, “and he’s been covering it up all these years. It would have been a hell of a scare when Shelley started poking around in the case.”

“He was so afraid Shelley was going to expose him,” Tom said, “that he started using again or started talking about killing himself, and he ended up back in the hospital, not long after Nelson was transferred there. Nelson’s always blamed Rachel for ruining his life. Both men had women in their lives they wanted to hurt. Suppose they decided to team up and help each other get even?”

Brandon leaned forward in his chair. “You think what happened to Michelle was really aimed at Rachel? Just to get under her skin and torment her for a while before Nelson focused on her?”

“That’s what Rachel believes,” Tom said, “and it’s starting to make sense to me too.”

“But Nelson was in the hospital while most of that stuff was happening to Michelle,” Dennis pointed out.

“He’s got an alibi for the times Michelle was harassed in Bethesda,” Tom said, “but he was out of the hospital on the night Shelley was snatched.”

“Yeah, that’s right,” Dennis said, the doubt beginning to fade from his eyes.

“And Jordy,” Brandon said, “was out of the hospital and living back here, so he was free to drive to Bethesda on the weekends and mess around in Michelle’s office.”

“Nobody would ever suspect Jordy because he had no history with Michelle, no reason to harass her. Nobody would suspect Nelson of killing Shelley because he had no history with her.” Tom stood. “We need to pick up Jordy right now. Rita’s probably with him. Her mother thinks he might hurt her, but I think it’s more likely they’ll take off together if we don’t get to them first. Bran, you come with me. Dennis, put a couple of our guys on alert in case I call for backup.”

By the time they hit the road, Brandon was excited about the connection Tom drew between the stalker and the Beecher murder. “Man, that is really slick. And
sick.
So you think they cooked it up together, before Jordy got out of the hospital?”

The cruiser’s headlights bored into the darkness as they left the lighted streets of Mountainview. Hills loomed on both sides of the road, their ridges rimmed with moonlight. Tom hoped to god he was right, that he wasn’t chasing the wildest goose that ever took flight. “I’m not sure Jordy’s smart enough. But from what Rachel’s told me about Perry Nelson, he’s got the brains to plan something like this. I don’t know where Nelson is, but Jordy’s weak, he might give Nelson up if we put on the pressure. You sure he’s living in the rooms above the locksmith shop?”

“Positive. I remember him telling me his folks didn’t want him to move back in with them. He acted kind of put out about it, but he said at least he’s got privacy and Rita can stay over if she wants to.”

Rita. Tom could understand why Mrs. Jankowski had kept quiet about what she’d seen and heard in order to protect her daughter, but why would Rita let an innocent man go to prison for life? Had she protected Jordy ever since because she loved him, or was she simply looking out for herself?

The small building containing the locksmith business, and apparently Jordy’s living quarters too, wasn’t far from town. As Tom swung the cruiser into the narrow parking strip in front of the shop, his headlights illuminated Rita’s old car, sitting next to the shop’s van. The shop downstairs was dark, but lights blazed in the second floor rooms.

“Let’s try to do this without anybody getting hurt,” Tom said. He and Brandon climbed out of the cruiser and closed their doors slowly, silently. Tom was reaching for his pistol when his cell phone rang. “Damn,” he muttered, angry at himself for not thinking to silence it. Afraid the shrill tone would cut through the quiet and alert Jordy, he yanked the phone from his shirt pocket and pressed the button to answer.

His uncle was calling, and it took Tom a minute to make sense of what he was saying. Paul had found Ben Hern bleeding and unconscious on the driveway at the farmhouse. “I called an ambulance, they’re on the way—”

“Where’s Rachel?” Tom demanded.

He heard his uncle let out a long, shaky breath. “I don’t know, Tommy. I found her cell phone on the driveway, but Rachel’s gone.”

***

They must be somewhere in Mason County, but this was countryside with no lights along the road, no landmarks to help Rachel orient herself, and the shadows of the surrounding hills blotted out most of the moonlight. When she twisted her head to look up and out the car’s side window, she saw only darkness.

The driver remained silent, a mysterious, malign presence who held Rachel’s fate in her hands.

The car turned, swinging sharply to the right. It slowed as it bumped along, and she guessed they’d left the pavement for a dirt road.

With a spike of panic, Rachel realized they must be nearing their destination. What would happen when they stopped? The time was coming when she would have to act, do something to keep herself alive. Her head was clearing, she’d quelled the nausea. She didn’t know who her captor was, but she believed she had better odds of freeing herself from a woman than from a man.

She had to get the woman to talk to her so she could get some idea of what was happening and what her chances were. She ran her tongue over her dry lips and asked, “Where are you taking me?”

No answer.

“Are you a friend of Perry Nelson? His girlfriend? Is he waiting for you to bring me to him?”

“Shut up.”

Rachel gasped. A man’s voice.
Oh, my god. It’s him.
Her heart banged in her chest.
Think. Focus.
She knew she had the strength to save herself. “Perry? Where are you taking me?” she asked again.

“Shut the fuck up!” He snatched the wig off his head and flung it into the passenger seat.

They emerged from the shadows, and moonlight flooded the car. Rachel heard weeds scraping the undercarriage. The car stopped.

No, no.
As long they were moving, she’d been safe.

Nelson shifted the car into park, turned off the engine, and unlocked his seat belt.

The impossibility of escape threatened to overwhelm her.
One thing at a time,
Rachel told herself.
He was crazy, but she wasn’t, and that gave her an advantage as long as she could stay calm and focus.

Nelson slid out of the car, slammed his door.

Twisting on the back seat, Rachel searched with her bound hands for the seat belt latch. Her fingertips brushed over metal but couldn’t grasp it.

Nelson opened the back door closest to her feet. He rolled her forward on the seat a couple of inches, then leaned on her legs with one hand to steady himself so he could reach behind her and unsnap her seat belt.

Kick him.
Kick him in the balls.
If she could pull her knees up—But his hand, and the force behind it, pinned down her legs.

Then he was hauling her out of the car feet-first, so roughly that she banged her head on the door frame. He seemed to expect her to stand on her own, but with her ankles bound she couldn’t get herself upright and balanced. She toppled against Nelson, then crumpled to her knees. He swore, hoisted her to her feet, and shoved her against the car.

Her breath coming in gasps, Rachel shot a look around. They were on a dirt road in a deserted area. Under silvery moonlight she saw an old farmhouse thirty feet off the road. Small and dark, it listed to one side. Abandoned. A place no one was likely to come to anytime soon. Dead, dry weeds from years past covered the ground between the house and the road. Rachel saw nothing that resembled a driveway. From somewhere in the distance came the raspy bark of a fox.

Nelson hadn’t gagged her, which probably meant no one was close enough to hear her scream. Did he have a gun? Where was it? If he didn’t have a gun, she stood a chance of escaping. He wasn’t much bigger than Rachel, and she was strong, in good shape. Her heart raced with excitement.

He took away that hope when he leaned into the car and removed a pistol from the glove compartment. He stuck the gun into his waistband.

She had to get Nelson to talk, keep him talking until she figured out how to free herself. “What is this place?”