“Just awhile?”
“A few years, and then…” She stared out the windshield, squinting against the snow piling on the glass. “…then I guess they did that old drifting apart thing. Shane was really into his work and Carolyn was bored and…well, to make a long story short, she had an affair with my brother.”
“Wes?”
“Um-hmm. I think it about killed Shane. Worse yet, after a huge fight one night—a really cold, nasty night, kind of like this—Carolyn took off and lost control of her car and died.” She stopped for a darkened traffic light, then eased through the empty streets. “If you ask me, Shane never forgave himself. Not only for David’s death but Carolyn’s as well.”
Which explained a lot.
“You sure you want to get involved with him?” Rinda asked.
“I’m not sure of anything right now.”
“You’re hedging. Something big’s going on between you two. I can tell. Shane isn’t one for public shows of affection. In fact, I don’t think I’ve ever seen him kiss a woman, except like, maybe on New Year’s Eve.”
She tapped her fingers on the steering wheel as her Subaru plowed on through the snowfall. “In fact, he really hasn’t dated much since Carolyn’s death. Believe me, I know. I’ve been trying to set him up for years, but, no, I don’t think it’s a torch he carries around for her, it’s just plain old guilt.”
They passed an abandoned car on the side of the road, snow piling over it, and Rinda turned on the radio. The weather report was grim—more of the same, with temperatures dropping. “I don’t see how that’s possible,” Rinda said, and turned to a station playing Christmas music.
None of the houses they drove by had any lamps glowing in the windows. The dim illumination that escaped through blinds or cracks in the curtains seemed to come from candles, or a fire, or flashlights.
They met one snowplow, amber light flashing, fighting the onslaught from the heavens, pushing piles of snow onto the shoulder, and a dump truck spreading sand in the plow’s wake. The road was treacherous, and they were held up nearly forty-five minutes by another accident on the main road—a farmer’s truck had collided with a sedan and there was no way to drive around the accident. Jenna tried to reach the house and realized that the phones, all electricity-based, wouldn’t work. She then called Turnquist, Cassie, and Allie, but no one answered.
“Why wouldn’t they be picking up their cells?” she asked, worry creeping into her heart.
“That is weird. Weren’t they staying home?”
“Supposed to.”
“Maybe a cell tower’s failed. That happens sometimes in remote areas. I was at the beach once, and I couldn’t get through to anyone for two days—had to use a land line to get to the cell phone company.”
“Or all the circuits are busy because of the storm.”
“Oh, yeah, that’s probably what it is. At least try to call Shane. Or the station,” Rinda suggested, adjusting the heater. She had to keep the car running most of the time, as the minute she turned it off, the temperature inside the little Subaru plummeted.
“I will. If this doesn’t clear up soon.” She held onto her cell phone and tried to tamp down her worries.
“Good thing I have a big bladder,” Rinda observed as a tow truck finally pulled the car blocking the road to one side and an officer from State Police waved traffic through. “And an excellent selection of CDs.” They listened to Christmas songs while they waited and now, finally, drove past the weary officer. Rinda’s little car crept along the icy road. The storm hadn’t let up a bit and highway crews couldn’t keep up with the snowfall. She flipped out the CD and turned on the radio and heard reports that most of the roads in Lewis County had been closed.
“Worst storm of the century,” Rinda said, flipping off the radio. “Isn’t that just the icing on the cake?”
“It has to let up,” Jenna said, but wasn’t as worried about the weather as she was about her family. Again she tried to call them, again she failed. She even punched out Carter’s cell phone number, but he didn’t pick up and she didn’t leave a message. They were almost home, inching their way through the blizzard.
“This is pretty damned creepy,” Rinda said, her lips folding over themselves as she nosed her car along the road that ran parallel to the river, the tires sliding, only to grab the frozen asphalt again. “I just hope Scott is at home and not out in this mess.”
“Can’t you call?”
“All of my phones are remotes, you know, with hand-held receivers. They need electricity to work, so I can’t get through to the house. I’ve been meaning to get one that is just a regular, old-fashioned cord-to-the-handset type, but never think about it. Until the middle of the coldest friggin’ storm in fifty years.”
“What about his cell?”
“I’ve tried—three or four times. All I get is his voice mail, with a promise that he’ll call me back. Yeah, right.”
Fifteen minutes later, as the final notes of “Jingle Bell Rock” faded away, Rinda nosed her Subaru into the drive of Jenna’s house.
The gate was open.
No lights visible.
A huge knot of dread tied up all of Jenna’s insides. “This isn’t right,” she said as the little wagon slid to a stop near the garage. “Not at all.” Jenna was out of the car in a second. Her boots slid as she ran to the back door and told herself to remain calm. Of course it looked dark. The power was out. No big deal. Everyone along the river was dealing with the same emergency.
So why hadn’t her daughters answered their cells? Why hadn’t Turnquist?
She tried to push her key into the lock but the door swung open and the dark house was cold. Lifeless. “Cassie!” she yelled, trying to keep the panic from her voice. “Allie! Hey, I’m home. Cassie! Jake!”
“What’s going on?” Rinda asked, one step behind her.
“I don’t know. Probably nothing.” But Jenna’s heart was pounding fearfully, the hairs on the back of her neck at attention. Something was wrong. Very wrong. She smelled it in the cold air, heard it in the silence.
A fire burned low in the grate and she fumbled in a kitchen drawer for a flashlight, flicked it on, and yelled again. “Cassie! Where are you? Allie!”
But the house was silent, aside from the sound of wind gusts buffeting the gables, the rattle of windows high in the attic. Only her own voice seeming to echo back to her. The interior was more than cold. It felt lifeless. As if no one were home.
A chill as frigid as death hissed down her spine. “He’s got them,” she whispered, a brutal fear grabbing hold of her throat. “He’s got them.”
“Who?”
Her cell phone jangled in her pocket.
“Thank God.” For a second, her worries scurried back into the dark corners of her mind. Jake had probably taken the girls into town or somewhere safe when the power had failed, and he, too, was held up by impassable roads. That was it. That had to be it. “Hello?” she called into the phone, but no one answered. “Hello? Who is this? Jake? Carter?” She was nearly screaming when she heard something, not a voice, but the haunting notes from a movie…her first starring role, the theme song from Innocence Lost.
She nearly collapsed.
Him! He was taunting her. She looked wildly around, the yellowish beam of her flashlight sweeping over the chairs and counters in the kitchen. “Who is this?” she demanded. “Who the hell is this?” But the phone went dead in her hands. She sank against the kitchen counter because she knew it was true. Her worst fears were now reality: the madman, whoever the son of a bitch was, had her daughters.
CHAPTER 44
“Don’t panic,” Rinda said as Jenna tore the house apart. Searching, looking, calling for her kids. Denying what she knew in her heart.
“Where the hell are they? And the dog? Where’s the damned dog?” she demanded. “Where did he take them?”
“I don’t know, Jenna. But they’re not here, and if you mess things up, clues or evidence for the police, it
’ll only make things worse.”
Panic was shredding her insides and she was rambling, but she didn’t care. “I have to do something!” She’d called Shane again, and couldn’t get through.
“Then let’s do this methodically, okay?” Rinda said. “Maybe then we’ll figure out what happened here.”
“Fine. Let’s start at the top level and work our way down.” They both had flashlights, but the house was big, a rambling behemoth that was dark as death.
Every muscle in her body tight, her nerves fraying, a headache beginning to form behind her eyes, Jenna worked her way down from the top story. With Rinda at her side, she searched through all the bedrooms and closets, the sauna, the bathrooms, checking every nook and cranny.
Nothing.
No sign of anyone, not even the damned dog.
With each step, dread tightened its grip on her lungs and she could hardly catch a breath.
Please let them be safe. Let me find them. Please—oh, God, let them be safe! “Allie,” she called vainly. “Cassie! Girls!” Tears burned behind her eyes and her throat was thick and clogged. They weren’t inside. Not anywhere.
Don’t give up. You have to find them. You have to!
But her daughters weren’t in the house. It was as if they’d vanished into the blizzard. Along with their bodyguard.
“I’m going to check the garage,” she said, once the house had been searched. She tried and failed to keep the sheer panic from her voice. “Maybe Turnquist took them away. To somewhere safe. Used my car.”
“Wouldn’t he have called?”
“You’d think,” she said, but the bodyguard had been marginal at best these past few days, his skills and judgment, in Jenna’s opinion, sorely lacking. She headed outside where the wind lashed violently, slanting so that snow blew beneath the cover of the breezeway and caused the windmill to creak and moan as it spun.
“Cassie!” Jenna screamed over the rush of the wind. “Allie!”
Dear God, let them be safe!
How had he gotten in?
No sign of forced entry.
Why would they let a madman into the house?
What the hell had happened?
Don’t go there. Do not let your worst nightmares get the better of you.
She searched the garage, inside and out. None of the vehicles were missing. Her Jeep, the old truck, and Jake Turnquist’s pickup were parked in their usual spots, tools hanging from the walls, the lawn mower idle and dusty in its corner.
As if nothing was wrong. As if no dreadful acts had befallen her family.
Cassie’s heart nose-dived, but she refused to give up. She spied a sickle hanging on the wall and grabbed it. Just in case. Then hurried outside to the exterior stairs leading to the loft over the garage, the quarters Jake Turnquist had claimed for his own. At the landing, she found the door unlocked. Just like all the others. Inside, Turnquist’s suite of rooms were dark and cold and appeared just as she assumed he’d left them. She swung the flashlight’s beam over the living quarters. Two soda cans, an empty beer bottle, and a couple of microwave dinner boxes littered the counter. Flannel pajama bottoms hung on a hook by his bedroom door. Beyond the door, his bed was unmade, the closet empty, a disposable razor lying by the bathroom sink.
In the living room his equipment—cameras, night goggles, and handgun—had been left behind on the coffee table. He didn’t have his gun with him?
Something was very wrong here.
The more she saw, the more she was convinced that her children were unsafe. In danger. Who would do this? And why?
And how? How did someone—a single person, presumably—come in, overpower Turnquist, silence the dog, and kidnap the girls? Or was Turnquist in on the abduction?
Fear feeding her headache, she returned to the house where Rinda, back to the fire, was talking rapidly on her cell phone, her free hand gesturing wildly, as if whoever she was speaking to could see her actions. Spying Jenna, she cut herself short. “Just a minute. She’s here now. Nothing, huh?”
“No.”
“Damn.” Rinda’s face fell as she handed her phone to Jenna. “I finally got through to Shane. Talk to him.”
Jenna nearly cried out in relief. As ridiculous as it seemed, just a connection to Carter gave her strength. “Hi.”
“Rinda filled me in,” he said, and his voice washed over her like balm. Tears sprang to her eyes. “Sorry I didn’t answer earlier—too many calls at once. Some didn’t get through. The circuits are on overload. Any sign of Turnquist?”
“No. There’s no one here. No kids. No friggin’ bodyguard no dog, no one,” she said, her panic galloping unleashed, her voice cracking. It was all she could do to hang on to a thread of self-control.
“Okay. Listen. I want you to lock all the doors now. Keep Rinda there with you. Hole up in a room with only one entrance and lock and block the damned door. I’m sending someone over, an OSP unit that’s not too far from you, and I’ll be there in half an hour. Sit tight. Keep me on the phone if you want.”
“I’m going out to check the stable and the barn.”
“Wait until an officer gets there.”
“I can’t, Shane. I have to find them.”
“A few more minutes won’t make any difference.”
“A few more minutes might make all the difference in the world. They could be outside in this damned blizzard, freezing to death. Every minute counts.” She stared out the window to the snowy landscape, the drifts, the looming, dark buildings with their icy, black windows. “Or he could have them. Right now. I already got a weird phone call, so he’s around.”
“A call?”
“On my cell. He’s taunting me, Shane.”
“Stay put!”
“I’ll be okay. I’ve got the shotgun.”
“Keep it with you. In the house.”
“I gotta go,” she said.
“I’ll be there soon.”
Hanging up, she handed Rinda the phone.
“You’re not going out again.”
“Of course I am. You would, too. If it was Scott.”
Since the cells were working again, she found her phone in her pocket and hit a speed-dial button.
Her first call was to Cassie’s cell. No answer. Four rings and a quick transfer to voice mail, where Jenna left a quick message instructing Cassie to call home. Her second phone call was to Allie’s cell. As she listened, she heard Allie’s phone ringing and found it stuffed in the cushions of the couch in the den.
“Damn.”
She met Rinda’s eyes and then dialed Josh Sykes’s cell phone. Once again, nothing. “Oh, pick up,” she ordered, as if the kid could hear her. She was shaking inside, scared to death. When Josh’s disembodied voice asked her to leave a message, she did. “Hi, this is Jenna, Cassie’s mom. I’m worried about her. She’s not here at the house and I thought, make that I hoped, she was with you. Please call me back as soon as you can.” She rattled off her phone number before hanging up and dialing a final number.
A woman’s rough voice answered. She sounded as if she’d just woken up. “Hello?”
“Mrs. Sykes? This is Jenna Hughes. I’m looking for my daughter. I was hoping to talk to Josh.”
“He ain’t here right now. Don’t know when he’ll be back, neither.” She paused, and Jenna heard the click of a lighter, then the deep intake of breath. “I figured he was with your daughter,” Wanda Sykes said, and the tone of her voice hinted that Cassie was the bad influence of the pair.
“I don’t know where either one of them is.”
“Don’t that just figure.” Another long drag of her cigarette. “You know, I been tryin’ to rein him in, but he don’t listen to me, ’specially when it comes to your daughter. I told him to keep his distance, that she ain’t his kind, but would he listen? Hell, no. Never did have a lick of sense. Too much like his old man. Only interested in drinkin’, smokin’, and gettin’ himself some.”
Jenna was stunned. She’d never met this woman
, and yet Wanda was more than willing to spill her guts. “Listen, when Josh comes in, or calls, would you have him phone me?”
A cackling, sarcastic laugh that ended with a coughing fit. “Oh, I’ll tell him, if it’ll do any good and if I’m awake. Sure, I’ll tell him.”
“Please, leave him a note if you’re going to go to bed.” How could Wanda not be worried sick?
“Didn’t you say you left him a message on his cell phone? He’ll get back to you.” She hung up as if Cassie’s whereabouts was of no concern.
“Idiot woman. Doesn’t she know there’s a madman running around abducting women?” Jenna muttered. Without waiting for Rinda’s response, Jenna raced up the stairs, taking the steps two at a time, the feeble light of her flashlight bobbing in front of her. She found the shotgun beneath her bed, the shells in her nightstand. She loaded the gun, clicked on the safety, and headed back to ground level where Rinda was adding wood to the dying fire. Red embers glowed and a few flames began to lick at the new chunks of fir.
“I’ll come with you.”
“No.” Jenna glared at her friend. “Absolutely not. Stay here. I’ve got my cell. If I need you, I’ll call.”
“If it works.”
“Yeah.”
“Tell me you’re not going to do anything foolish,” Rinda said, spying the shotgun. She was sitting on the edge of the hearth, the embers in the fireplace behind her finally catching fire to crackle, hiss, and cast shifting golden shadows through the room. “Tell me you’re going to take Shane’s advice.”
“I’m going to find my kids,” Jenna said. “That’s what I’m going to do.”
Rinda’s gaze slid to the shotgun. “With a gun?”
“For protection. Or if some creep’s got the girls.”
Rinda snorted. “Do you even know how to use that thing?”
“Well enough,” Jenna said, and headed outside to the night where the wind blasted, the snow and sleet slanted from the sky, and somewhere, oh, God, somewhere, her children were.