Buried (A Bone Secrets Novel 03) (34 page)

Relief, amusement, anger, and disbelief shot through Gerald. “Seriously? The call didn’t even go through.”

The trooper’s lips twitched. “Well sir, the law doesn’t care if you didn’t get connected or if someone hung up on you. I saw your phone at your ear. I’ll be right back.” He paused, taking a sharper look at Gerald. “You alright, sir?”

Gerald touched his cheekbone where the Mexican had whacked him with the rebar. “Pretty nasty, isn’t it? Dropped my
bar and weights on my face while bench-pressing today. That’s the last time I don’t use a spotter.”

Disbelief crossed the trooper’s face. “No spotter? Seriously? What were you thinking?”

Gerald tried to look ashamed. “I know. It was stupid. I figured since the weight wasn’t too bad, I wouldn’t ask anyone, but then my hand slipped.”

The trooper shook his head and went back to his vehicle with Gerald’s ID.

Gerald rested his head against his steering wheel. That could have gone far worse.

And a cell phone violation? He was being pulled over for using his cell phone?
He gave a strangled laugh, suddenly lightheaded.
Holy fuck.

If only the trooper knew what he’d left behind in Demming. And what he had in his trunk.

The trooper reappeared at his window and handed back his ID and paperwork. “I’m going to have to issue you a citation for the cell phone use. We’re in the middle of a statewide crackdown because people aren’t taking the law seriously. Get yourself a hands-free unit. Those are currently legal.”

Gerald silently took the paperwork.
Don’t say a word.
What he wanted to do was cram the ticket in the trooper’s face. But he was getting a free pass. Take the ticket and get to the other side of the state. “I’ll look into it.”

The trooper touched the brim of his hat. “Drive safely, sir.”

Gerald watched the trooper walk back to his car. He put on his blinker and pulled out onto the open highway.
How had the trooper seen his phone? The sun had been down for an hour.

Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth.

He kept an eye on the rearview mirror. The trooper’s patrol car hadn’t budged. It got smaller and smaller as Gerald increased
his speed. Just before he couldn’t see it anymore, it did an abrupt turn and headed in the opposite direction.

He looked at his ticket. One hundred forty-two dollars for talking on a cell phone?

Pissed and steaming about the fine, two miles later, Gerald took the rest stop exit.

Deserted.

He parked as far away as possible from the little bathroom buildings. He sat in the driver’s seat, scanning the rest stop for a few minutes. Even though he’d watched the trooper head in the opposite direction, he half expected him to reappear. And not be alone. After the rest stop stayed quiet, he stepped out of the car and stretched. Every joint hurt. It’d been a hell of a long day.

First, the empty Jacobs house, then the old Mexican, the kid from the gas station, Jamie Jacobs, and then a fucking traffic ticket.

He stood behind his car, eyeing the trunk. He examined the taillights. Both looked intact. If she’d been kicking at them, it didn’t show. He snorted, remembering his fear of a foot hanging out, visible to the trooper. He bent over the trunk, feeling the heat radiate from the metal against his face, listening.

All silent.

Ax in hand, he pushed the trunk release button on his key fob.

Jamie lay motionless. Her hair and shirt were soaked with sweat. He shoved at her legs with the ax handle, and her eyes opened.
Thank God, the bitch is still breathing.
She stared at him, her gaze studying his face and taking mental notes. She didn’t move.

“You hot?” he asked.

Her eyebrows narrowed.

Probably a stupid question.

“I’ll make you a deal.”

The eyebrows rose a bit.

“Knock off the goddamned kicking, and I’ll open the center console area. That’ll let some of the air-conditioning into the trunk. Deal?”

Jamie blinked and gave one short nod.

“Yeah, I didn’t think you were too stupid. You’re no good to me barbecued or roasted.”

She was silent.

He considered giving her some water, but that’d mean taking the tape off her mouth, and he didn’t feel like acting like a nursemaid. She’d be okay without water for a few more hours. The air-conditioning should make a difference.

He poked at the inside of the trunk where the lights connected. All solid and covered up. She wasn’t going to be able to damage them, no matter how hard she kicked.

Gerald slammed the trunk, opened the rear driver-side door, and yanked at the console that was tucked into the backseat. It moved forward. He could feel hot air from the trunk move into the cooler air of the car. He pointed the two wimpy rear vents at the center of the backseat.

He got back in the driver’s seat and headed back to the highway. He hadn’t seen a single vehicle in fifteen minutes. He took a long swallow from his bottle of water, sighed, and wiped at his mouth. He was gonna be driving most of the night.

It was a long drive back to the other side of the Cascade Mountains. Gerald was aiming a little farther south this time. He wasn’t going back to Portland. He was headed toward home. Salem, the state’s capital. Salem was his comfort zone.
The bunker had been closer to Salem, and his job was primarily in that city.

He took the highway turnoff toward a mountain range pass. Hopefully, he’d hear from his boss soon. He wasn’t going to try calling while driving this time.

To Michael’s relief, Spencer stepped out of the Luna County car. Nothing against the deputies of Luna County, but Spencer was the one with the brains. The rest seemed to be a bunch of local recruits who stood around a lot. One deputy tailed his boss. Hove opened his cruiser door but sat in the driver’s seat, talking on his cell.

“Whatcha got?” Spencer asked as he strode up the walk. He nodded at Chris. “Jacobs. ’Bout time you turned up. I’ve got a couple of questions for you about Juan’s place.”

“Right now we’ve got to find Jamie. I know the Ghostman grabbed her,” Chris said.

“Who?” Spencer scowled.

“I called him the Ghostman. Same guy who held me captive as a kid. Freaking ghostly, white-skin-colored asshole.”

“Covered in ink now,” Michael added.

“Mr. Tattoo is the Ghostman. Got it.” Spencer’s expression said he thought both of them were slightly nuts. “Who the fuck is he really?”

Michael shook his head. “Dunno.”

Hove stepped forward. “According to your Detective Callahan, he’s a former sexual predator known as Gary Hinkes. But the guy has vanished from the face of the earth. There’s
no driver’s license, no tax records, nothing. He was arrested in the late eighties for some sex crimes, but no one can find any records. He was also arrested in conjunction with a murder of a Portland woman but went to prison on a lesser charge. There hasn’t been a peep from him since he got out.”

“Where are the records from the trial?” Spencer asked.

“Gone.”

“And from his time in prison?”

“He was there for two months. Any scrap of paper relating to it has vanished.”

Chris looked at Michael. “How does that happen?”

Michael’s stomach thrummed. “Someone knows someone with the right connections.”

“Well, the people who interacted with him shouldn’t have disappeared…I hope. What about the warden from when he was in prison? He remember him?” Spencer crossed his arms on his chest.

Hove shook his head. “Retired. And he was only there two months. No one can tell us shit.”

“How about the judge at his trial? Or his lawyer or prosecutor? Someone has to remember something besides Fielding. It was a fucking murder trial.”

“The detectives in Portland are looking into that and some other possibilities. They’ll find someone who knows what he’s doing these days. Now, what do you got inside?” asked Hove.

“Absolutely nothing,” Michael answered, but he waved the cops into the bed-and-breakfast. Michael was ready to crawl out of his skin. Standing around and waiting for the police wasn’t how he operated. He liked action. He craved action.
He needed to DO something.

But right now he had no fucking information to move on.

Chuck greeted the group of men and then watched them pound up the stairs. Spencer’s deputy stayed back to question Chuck. Hove and Spencer made a quick survey of the bedroom and bathroom, identical to Michael’s sweep. Hove scanned the backyard.

“Where’s the gate go?” he asked Michael.

“Alley behind the property.”

“Look in the alley?”

“No.” Michael’s mouth dried up.
Shit.
He started to dash out of the room.

“Hold up. We’ll all go.”

The three men marched through the bed-and-breakfast as Michael fought the urge to sprint ahead.
Why hadn’t he checked the alley?

Spencer pointed at the back door to the yard. “That been unlocked all day?” He directed the question to Chuck, who nodded.

If it hadn’t been in the high nineties still, the backyard would have been inviting. The sun had nearly set, but the sky was still very light. Michael focused on the wood gate. It was open slightly into the alley. The hedge on either side had to be close to ten feet tall.

“Sucker is tall,” muttered Hove, eyeing the hedge.

Spencer pushed the gate open, and the three men stepped into the empty alley.

Michael’s heart plummeted.
What had he been expecting?

The cops split up, one heading left and one to the right. Michael tailed Spencer. The alley was surprisingly clean. The other properties bordered the alley with wooden fences, hedges, or nothing. A few garbage cans stood in the alley but nothing else. Spencer peeked through a few gates and then turned around
to head back to the bed-and-breakfast. Hove was doing the same from the opposite end.

“Pretty clean for an alley,” said Spencer. “Won’t find this in a big city.”

Chris stepped through the gate into the alley. He nodded at Michael and scanned the alley both ways.

“Where’s Brian?” Michael asked as the men regrouped at the gate.

“Got distracted by the bird feeders.” Chris gestured behind him.

“There’s some trash down that way.” Hove gestured behind him. “But nothing else caught my eye.”

“Trash?” Michael frowned. “Our end of the alley was clean enough to eat from.” His legs started moving toward Hove’s end. Up ahead, he could see some plastic cellophane litter next to the hedge. He drew closer and couldn’t help but smile.

Some kid somewhere is gonna be upset.

The packages hadn’t even been opened. At least a dozen Twinkies littered the concrete. He snorted. As a kid, that would have killed him to see all those go to waste. Too bad—

Michael whirled around when Chris violently retched into the hedge.

Mason barreled into the office. The traffic had finally let up. He’d passed a nasty-looking accident between a semi and one of those tiny Smart cars. The site had been crawling with cops and emergency personnel, so he hadn’t stopped, but he’d done as much rubber-necking as all the other vehicles, adding to the slowdown. It was one thing to rubberneck at a simple fender-bender
on the side of the freeway, but this was a sight he hadn’t seen before.

The damned fairy-sized car was under the semi.

It appeared the truck had jackknifed, and the car had zoomed directly into the side of the trailer. And stuck underneath. It was about half of its original height now.

Mason didn’t want to think about the driver.

He took off his hat, hooked it on its knob, and nodded at Ray, who was flipping through a stack of paperwork on his desk. Ray wore one of his two hundred polo shirts—his summer uniform. This one was a girly colored lavender. Mason didn’t bother teasing him. Ray didn’t give a shit about the color, and he easily pulled off the look. Mason didn’t know crap about fashion, but somehow, Ray always looked like he’d stepped out of a men’s health magazine.

Mason always felt like he’d stepped out of
AARP
magazine.

“Took you long enough,” Ray greeted.

“Would you believe it was an accident like we’d never seen before?”