“Why are you crying?” Lisa asked him breathlessly as they fought the vines and bushes in their way. “Aren’t you happy we got away?”
Jimmy wiped his face. “Yeah, I’m happy. I was just thinking about the cop and that lady in the street.” He couldn’t tell her the lady had been her mother. Not yet. Maybe someday.
Brad was panting and wheezing, and Jimmy wondered if he was going to make it through the woods. He needed to get Brad to a hospital; they couldn’t just hide someplace. Somehow, he needed to find help. Besides, they had to get help for Beth. They were the only ones who knew that Bill had taken her.
And he had to get help for all those children back at the home, who wouldn’t know what to do or what was going to happen to them next.
The trees thinned, and suddenly they came to the road. Not far away was a gas station with a convenience store attached. Jimmy reached into his pocket for the change that Jake had let him keep when they’d gone for a Coke earlier. He fished out a quarter. “Come on, let’s go call for help.”
“Who are we gonna call?” Lisa asked.
He thought about it for a moment. “Jake,” he said. “We’ll call Jake.”
Lynda answered on the first ring. “Lynda Barrett,” she said.
“Lynda, it’s me. Jimmy.”
“Jimmy! Where are you? We’ve been worried sick—”
Jimmy cleared the emotion from his throat and tried to speak clearly. “I need to speak to Jake,” he said.
“Oh . . . okay.” Lynda gave the phone to Jake.
“Jimmy, are you all right?” he asked.
“I’m okay,” he said. “But Bill’s got Beth.”
“What do you mean he’s got Beth? Beth’s here,” Jake said. “She’s asleep in the guest room.”
“No. She came here. Bill’s got her in a car, and he’s taking her away. I think he’s gonna kill her! Jake, you’ve got to stop him!”
“Jimmy, where are you?”
Jimmy was crying again. He stopped and wiped his eyes. “At the gas station about a mile from the home. I think it’s called Quik Stop. It’s on—” He checked the street signs near the phone booth. “The corner of Jefferson and Third Street.”
“Jimmy, we’re coming after you. You stay there. We’ll be there in ten minutes.”
“No! Don’t worry about us! Lisa and Brad and me will be okay. You gotta worry about Beth. He’ll kill her. And there’s something else.”
“Yeah? What?”
“My . . . my . . .” Jimmy lowered his voice to keep Brad or Lisa from hearing.
“What? I can’t hear you.”
“My m—” He choked on the word, then tried again. “Tracy.She needs an ambulance. And so does that cop—Larry, I think it was. He was shot.”
“Shot? Are you sure?”
“Hurry, Jake! They may not be dead yet.”
“But Tracy’s in the hospital, Jimmy. You’re confused—”
“No!” he shouted. “She came here, too. We’d still be in the car with Bill if she hadn’t. But first he shot Larry, and then he ran over her, and she’s lying in the road . . .” His voice broke off, and he couldn’t go on.
“Jimmy, stay right where you are. We’ll be there in ten minutes.”
J ake drove faster than he’d ever driven in his life. In the passenger seat, Lynda was on the cellular phone, trying to locate Tony or Nick.She heard sirens, but they were coming from the opposite direction.
She found Nick in his office. “Nick, it’s Lynda.”
“Hi. I’ve been working on what to do with all the children.
It’s not going to be easy, but I think—” “Nick, listen to me,” Lynda said. “Jimmy just called.”
“Oh, that’s great! You’ve found him?”
“Yes. He went to the home, and something went wrong.We’re headed to get him. He says that Bill’s got Beth.”
She heard something crash on Nick’s end. “He can’t. She’s at your house! She was asleep—”
“No, she snuck out to go to the home to rescue the children.But apparently it backfired, and he’s got her now.”
“Oh, no.”
“Nick, you’ve got to—” Her voice stopped as Jake slammed on the brakes and skidded to a halt. Lynda dropped the phone and looked through the windshield.
The headlights shone on something in the road, and Jake whispered, “Oh, God, please don’t let this be.”
“Tracy,” Lynda whispered.
CHAPTER SIXTY-SEVEN
The police radio report of an officer down at the St. Clair Children’s Home stunned Tony, but before he could call in to ask for details, his cellular phone rang. He grabbed it as he turned a corner on two wheels, on his way to SCCH. “Larry?” he asked. “No, Tony, it’s Lynda!” She was choked and could hardly speak. “I’m sitting on Tenth about a mile from the children’s home. Tracy Westin is lying in the middle of the road—she was thrown from her car. I checked her pulse, but there isn’t one—she’s dead, Tony. Bill Brandon ran her down. And Jimmy said he shot Larry!”
Tony went cold. “Larry?”
“Yeah. I don’t have details, but I hear sirens. They may have gotten to him by now, but they’re coming from the other direction and they don’t know about Tracy. Jake’s gone to get Jimmy. Apparently Bill had him, but Jimmy escaped. Bill’s still got Beth, though! Jimmy said he’s in the Buick. Tony, he’s holding her hostage!”
Tony’s heart lurched. He longed to check on Larry, but he knew that Beth’s safety had to come first. “Lynda, I’m on my way.”
I t took only a few minutes to put an all-points bulletin out on the Buick, and soon roadblocks had been set up on the outskirts of town, and the policemen in other parts of the county were alerted. Additional ambulances and squad cars were dispatched to the children’s home. As soon as the prosecutor had been informed of the circumstances, officers were sent to check out the warehouse. When they tallied over a hundred thousand dollars’ worth of stolen goods, the prosecutor issued warrants for the arrest of Judge Wyatt, Sheila Axelrod, and her husband—in whose names the warehouse was listed—and all of the employees of the children’s home, who had fled.
At the home, Nick paced the lawn in front of the cottages as they loaded Larry into an ambulance. He was still alive, thank God; Nick had no idea how badly he was injured. All he knew was that Beth was in danger of the same fate. In a few moments, when he saw Tony’s car barreling into the parking lot, he bolted toward him.
Tony got out of the car and met him halfway. “How’s Larry?”
“Alive,” Nick said. “But unconscious. He’s lost a lot of blood.It doesn’t look good.”
Tony fought the panicked rage and the furious despair threatening to smother him, and looked toward the ambulance, on its way off the property with its lights flashing. He was halfway back to his car, intending to follow it, when a cop shouted, “They’ve spotted Brandon’s car! It’s heading up Highway 18 toward St. Pete. There’s a high-speed chase underway.” Tony hopped behind the wheel and cranked the engine, knowing there was nothing more he could do for Larry, but maybe he could help save Beth.
“He’s going to kill her!” Nick shouted. “Please, Tony, let me come with you.”
“Who’ll take care of placing these children for the night?”
“My colleagues,” Nick answered. “I’ve already called in every social worker in the county. They’re on their way. They can handle it.”
“Nick, listen—we just learned that Sheila Axelrod is involved. She’s probably being arrested as we speak. That leaves you. You’re the only one who can take care of these kids right now.
We’re counting on you.”
“Sheila?” he asked, then backed away, trying to sort it all out.
He shook the information from his head and decided he could only deal with one thing at a time. “But what about Beth?”
“We’ll take care of Beth. That’s our job.”
Nick kicked at some invisible wall in the air. “How could she do this
? How could she confront him? She’s terrified of him—and she knew he would kill her!”
“She did it for the kids,” Tony said. “And right now she would want you to think of the kids, too.”
Nick hesitated. “All right,” he said. “I’ll stay. But call me the minute you hear anything!”
CHAPTER SIXTY-EIGHT
In the Buick, Bill cursed as the flashing lights grew closer behind him. He turned off onto a little country road, then slammed his accelerator to the floor, flying around corners and curves. But the police stayed close behind him.
He kept one arm clamped around Beth’s neck, with the cold barrel of the gun pressed against her cheek. Beth sat as still as she could, frightened that the slightest provocation might cause him to pull the trigger. He had nothing to lose. Nothing except his hostage.
As he drove, she prayed. Prayed that he wouldn’t lose the police. Prayed that they would manage to set up a roadblock ahead of him. Prayed that she would find an opportunity to escape. Tears streamed down her face, born of all the confusing emotions whirling through her heart.
“You’ve sure caused a lot of trouble,” Bill said through his teeth, clamping his arm tighter. “Unbelievable.”
Beth tried to lift her head enough to see the squad cars in the rearview mirror, but Bill let go of the wheel, grabbed a handful of hair, and jerked her head back against the seat. “Be still,” he said. “I didn’t tell you to move. I’m not ready to kill you yet.”
Only then did he notice the tears running down her face. “I’ve never seen you cry, Beth, darlin’,” he mocked, his eyes back on the twisting road again. “Tears become you.”
She stiffened her lips, determined not to shed another tear in front of him.
“Funny how scared you are now,” he said. “You weren’t scared at all when you were coming after me with both barrels for that newspaper of yours, hiding Jimmy from me, putting the police on my tail, turning HRS against me. But you know what? It didn’t matter. I have friends in high places. Nothing you did could have gotten me. Even now, I’ll probably get out of this scot-free.”
“If they don’t kill you first,” she muttered.
“They can’t kill me,” he said. “They won’t even aim a gun at me as long as I’ve got this one pointed at your head. You’re my ticket out of here.”
She didn’t respond. And as the road emerged from the woodland and led them through a complex of industrial buildings, she watched his eyes dart, searching for something. “We’re gonna find us a building,” he said, glancing at the rearview mirror to gauge the distance between himself and the nearest cop behind them. “If I drive up to the front door, we’ll have just enough time to get inside before they catch up.”
“And then what?”
“Then I can negotiate.”
“For what?”
“For a plane. I’m leaving the country, and you’re coming with me.”
“I’m not going anywhere.”
“Yes, you are,” he chuckled. “If I have to drag your dead body with me, you’re going. Like I said, you’re my ticket, and I’m not letting you go.”
He swerved into a gravel parking lot in front of a building with light coming through the windows. Through the glass, they could see a man heading for the front window, probably alerted by the sirens. Bill skidded to a stop in front of the door. Grabbing Beth’s hair, he pulled her behind him as he bolted from the car and, putting his shoulder to the door, broke through into the building.
The man who’d been working there backed into a stack of boxes, knocking them over. “What the—”
“Get out!” Bill screamed. “Get out or I’ll kill you!”
The man stumbled to the door and ran out into the night. By now the parking lot was filling with police cars—skidding in the gravel, sirens blaring, their doors flying open as the officers leaped out to crouch next to the cars, guns drawn.
Bill threw Beth down on the floor behind a desk, reached to the wall behind him to turn off all the lights in the room, and grabbed the phone.
Wincing in pain, Beth looked down. The front of her shirt was spotted with blood where her wound was bleeding through the bandages. She tried to push back the pain and concentrate, instead, on finding some means of escape.
“Now we wait for them to call,” he said. “Should be just a matter of minutes.”
Beth jumped when the telephone rang almost on cue. He picked it up confidently, wiping sweat out of his eyes with the back of his gun hand. “One wrong move and she’s dead,” he said.
“What do you want, Brandon?” Beth could hear the voice from the phone’s ear piece.
“A plane,” Bill said. “I want a plane to take me to Cozumel.”
“We’re not going to get you a plane, Brandon.”
“Then you’d better start calling her next of kin.” He chuckled and glanced down at her. “Not that she has any.”
“If you let her go, we’ll talk about a plane.”
Bill laughed. “You think I’m stupid? She’s the only reason you haven’t killed me yet. I’m not letting her go.”
Bill hung up, sat down, and tried to catch his breath. Beth leaned back against a file cabinet. He kept the gun leveled at her, just inches from her face. Desperately, her eyes searched the darkened room, lit only by the flashing lights coming through the windows. This appeared to be a small accounting office. She looked for a knife, a letter opener, anything she could use as a weapon if she needed one. She saw nothing.
Bill got down onto the floor next to her and dragged her face close to his. His breath smelled stale, and she turned her face. “You know, Beth, I always liked you. Sure will be a shame when I have to kill you.”
She glared back into his eyes. “Go ahead, Bill. Kill me.” But she knew he wouldn’t. Not yet.
Bill chuckled. “In good time, darlin’. In good time. How do you feel about being buried in Cozumel? ’Course, we could work out a burial at sea, if you’d prefer that. I could rent a boat and take you out over the Caribbean.”
The phone rang again, and he jerked it up. “You got the plane?”
“This is Tony Danks,” Beth heard the voice say. “I’m a detective with the St. Clair Police Department. I’m on my way over, and I think we can work something out.”
“A plane is all I want worked out,” Bill said. “I want a plane to get me out of the country. You have one hour, and then I’m gonna kill her.”
“The minute you pull the trigger, we’ll be on you like fleas on a mutt. I’d think twice before I tried that,” Tony said.
“Get me the plane,” Bill said, “and nobody else has to die.”
Tony punched “end” on his cell phone, then punched in the number of the hospital emergency room. Concentrating on high-speed, one-handed steering down this curving road through the woods, he asked the nurse about Larry’s condition. He was put on hold for what seemed an eternity, and finally, the nurse came back on the line and told him that they weren’t allowed to give out any information until Larry’s family was contacted. Tony slammed the phone down on the seat next to him and kept driving. Was Larry dead? Was that why they couldn’t give him any information? He breathed a prayer that it wasn’t so, rubbed the mist stinging his eyes, and pushed his car even faster.
Moments later, he skidded into the parking lot of the building where Bill was holding Beth. He grabbed his cell phone, made a quick call to the airport, then called the children’s home and asked for Jake, who was still waiting there with Lynda and all the children.
“Jake, I need a favor,” he shouted into the phone. “We’ve found Brandon. He’s holed up in a building, holding Beth hostage.He wants a plane and a pilot. We’re running out of time, Jake. We’ve got a plane, but we need a pilot. Do you have your license back yet?”
“You bet I do,” Jake said.
“All right, get to the airport as fast as you can. We’re trying to come up with a plan.”
Suddenly Tony heard Nick’s voice on the line. “Tony, where??
?s Beth?”
“He’s holding her hostage, Nick. He’s demanding a plane.”
“Don’t let him take her out of the country!” Nick cried.
“You’ve got to stop him!”
“We’re going to.”
“I’m coming over there right now,” Nick said.
Tony thought about that for a second. “The other social workers are there to take care of the kids?”
“They are.”
“All right. If you promise to stay out of the way and not do anything stupid, I’ll give you the address.”
CHAPTER SIXTY-NINE
Less than fifteen minutes later, Nick found himself crouching with Tony behind the squad cars in front of the building where Bill held Beth. Beside him, Tony dialed the number of the phone inside.
“We got you a plane,” Tony said when Brandon L answered. “And a pilot. How do you want to be transported to the airport?”
Bill hesitated. “My car,” he said.
“You know we’re not gonna let you drive off without an escort.”
“Fine,” Bill said. “Escort me. But once I hit the airport tarmac you stay back. I’m getting on that plane and out of here, and if anybody tries to stop me, Beth will be history.”
Nick held his breath as the building’s front door opened and Bill Brandon stepped out with an arm around Beth’s neck. He opened the car’s passenger door and climbed in, pulling her with him, then slid across to the steering wheel. He was obviously trying to keep Beth between him and the police, so that they wouldn’t be able to get a clear shot at him without endangering Beth, too.
Nick watched as Bill’s car started and pulled out on the street.The police jumped into their cars and Nick into his, following at the end of the procession.
“Lord, you’ve got to save her,” he said as he drove. “I don’t know why you brought her into my life, but I haven’t felt like this about a woman in a long time, maybe never.” His voice cracked as he drove at breakneck speed behind the procession of police cars,with a killer at the front of the caravan who seemed to be in control of it all.
When they reached the airport, the squad cars stayed back as Bill headed for the waiting plane. Nick stopped his car back beyond the fence and got out, standing with the cops to watch.