The Pawn

  “Let her go,” I said.

  “It’s another trick,” said Ralph. “She’ll kill herself just like the others.”

  “I believe her,” said Lien-hua. “I believe you, Marcie.”

  So her name was Marcie. I looked at her. Tried to read her eyes. Couldn’t. “Why would you help us?”

  “The children,” she said, “my daughter.” Mists began to form in her eyes. “No more children need to die.”

  “She could be lying,” said Ralph.

  “She’s not lying,” said Lien-hua softly.

  Marcie’s eyes found me. Searched me. “Do you have any children?”

  A rush of emotion overwhelmed me. “Yes. I do,” I said. “A daughter. She’s seventeen.”

  The woman nodded, smiled. “My daughter was seven. I loved her.” She looked directly at me. “I killed her,” she said, her voice as fragile as glass, “because I loved her.”

  Fear and love, the two missing motives that drive all the others. Set free in some hearts. Twisted in others.

  Then Marcie began to weep, and Lien-hua reached out for her, cut off her restraints, took her in her arms. Ralph’s cell phone sprang to life and he flipped it open. “It’s the CDC,” he said. He told them about Marcie and then grudgingly he handed the phone to her. “They want to know what you know.” Then he glowered at her. “No games, you understand?”

  She nodded and stepped aside with him to a quieter corner of the courtyard.

  Just then Margaret came hurrying over to us. I didn’t even know she was here. Probably just came when she heard about all the media people present. “Sit down, Pat.” It didn’t sound like anger in her voice. Something else. Fear? Concern?

  “What is it?”

  “Sit down.”

  “Tell me.”

  “A few minutes ago there was a 911 call from the safe house.” “What?”

  “Listen, Tessa’s OK. An officer was shot, though. Officer Muncey.”

  “Where’s Tessa?”

  “She’s still there. Don’t worry—”

  “Jason Stilton has always been a good friend,” Trembley said. “Do anything for a buck.”

  “Where’s Stilton?”

  “Officer Stilton?” She looked at me curiously. “He’s there, Pat. They called an ambulance. Brent Tucker’s there too. I just talked to him. He told me he’s with Tessa. He wanted you to know.”

  Oh no.

  Suddenly, everything began to spin and click. The pieces of the puzzle slid together with grim accuracy, shattering my mind, my world. “He knew we were leaving for Denver,” I muttered. “That’s why he called me this morning. He wanted me here. That’s why he gave me Kincaid . . .”

  “What?” said Margaret.

  “The first murder,” I whispered, “was two days after Grolin’s girlfriend moved out, after he beat her up . . . Right?”

  Lien-hua nodded but looked confused.

  “She was treated for her injuries, wasn’t she?”

  “Yes,” she said. “What are you thinking? What is it?”

  “He knew,” I said. The world was getting bleary. Whatever was in that capsule was starting to affect me. How does the killer get away? He always slips away. At the mall . . . at the golf course . . . Alice’s house . . .

  “He knows how to cut them . . .” I said, “to keep them alive . . .” “What are you talking about?” asked Margaret.

  “It’s the drugs,” said Lien-hua, eyeing the half-dissolved capsule on the floor. “Get a doctor over here!” And then to me, “Take it easy, Pat. Sit down.”

  Only the most foolish of mice would hide in a cat’s ear, but only the wisest of cats would look there. I felt weak. “The Illusionist,” I whispered. “He’s been hiding in my ear the whole time.”

  And that’s when I saw that Kincaid, before he died, had pulled something out of his pocket. It lay hidden in the grip of his left hand.

  “I have something to give you,” he’d said to Taylor and me.

  He had something to give me.

  And I knew who it was from.

  82

  Tessa was on the couch, trying to relax, trying to catch her breath. Agent Tucker sat beside her. The house was a little quieter; a bunch of the cops had left when they wheeled that woman away.

  Agent Tucker placed his hand on her shoulder. “You OK?”

  She nodded. “I’m shaking, though.”

  “It’s shock,” he said. “We need to get you out of here.”

  “Is she dead?” asked Tessa softly. “That police officer?”

  Agent Tucker nodded slowly. “I’m afraid so.”

  A paramedic appeared in the doorway. “Is everyone in here OK?”

  Agent Tucker slipped his hand around Tessa’s shoulder. “I’m taking her with me.”

  “The CDC team is on its way,” announced Ralph. He had left Marcie with Mr. Williamson’s security personnel.

  “Good,” I mumbled. I was walking over to Kincaid’s body.

  Ralph pointed to Marcie. “They think they can control this thing with her help. Treat it.” He looked at the gruesome scene around us. The bodies of Kincaid’s group lay scattered around the courtyard. Only the big guy and Marcie had survived. “With a little luck, no one else is going to die today.”

  I heard his words but only faintly. They were fading into the distance of space and time.

  It couldn’t really be what I thought it was in his hand. It couldn’t be.

  Showing us the board . . . he’s been showing us the board . . .

  I reached Kincaid’s body.

  The paramedic looked confused. “The guys outside told me to come in and take a look at her.”

  Agent Tucker stood up. Stood toe to toe with the paramedic. “C’mere for a second,” he said.

  Then Tessa watched him lead the paramedic into the hallway and around the corner out of sight.

  Brent Tucker is with Tessa . . .

  I knelt down, noticed a ragged scar across the inside of Kincaid’s wrist, probably from a suicide attempt a long time ago.

  He shot the man in the neck but didn’t kill him . . . made sure he didn’t kill him . . . he knew where to shoot them . . .

  I reached out to open Kincaid’s hand. My heart was screaming. No, no, no!

  My fingers began to tremble.

  He reaches across the board, touches a piece, then he takes her.

  Tessa heard a muffled gasp and a soft thud.

  I uncurled Kincaid’s fingers.

  Saw the item.

  Tessa’s necklace.

  “Agent Tucker?” called Tessa.

  I spun around, yelled to Margaret. “Get Tucker on the phone! Now!”

  Tessa strained to see around the corner. “Are you OK, Agent Tucker?” Her heart began to slam against the inside of her chest.

  A voice inside of her told her to get up. To get out. Something was wrong.

  She tried to stand but was still dizzy from shock.

  Her legs felt wobbly.

  “Agent Tucker?”

  Margaret put her hand on my elbow to calm me down. “Don’t worry, Pat, Tessa’s all ri—”

  “I know who it is!” I yelled.

  “Hello, Tessa,” said the killer, the Illusionist, the boy who had snuggled up to the corpse of his mother, the man who was at home in the dark. He stepped around the corner, holding a dripping blade, and grabbed Tessa, shoving a cloth over her mouth, quickly, so quickly that it swallowed her scream and sent her reeling into a terrible, terrible sleep. Terrible and dark.

  But before the shadows closed around her she saw one last thing—one last grisly thing—a man trying to crawl around the corner of the hallway, trying to get to her. To help her. Failing. Falling. Collapsing onto the carpet, his throat slashed.

  A man.

  A dead man.

  Special Agent Brent Tucker.

  83

  “Don’t worry, Pat,” said Margaret. “She’s OK. The paramedics are looking after her.” But her words were barely audibl
e, floating somewhere beside me. They meant nothing. Because I was holding Tessa’s necklace in my hand, and nothing else mattered.

  He leaves an item from the next victim.

  My daughter is next.

  “Phone!” I yelled, pocketing the necklace. “Give me a phone!” Lien-hua handed me hers. I dialed Tessa’s cell phone number. Please answer. Please, please. The room was twirling; I was about to collapse, dizzy from the drugs.

  It rang.

  Someone answered. “Hello, Patrick.” I knew that voice: it was the paramedic who’d treated my shoulder. The paramedic who’d waited patiently for us to finish examining Mindy’s body, the one who helped the injured officer to the ambulance outside of Alice’s house last night. But no one noticed him because he was supposed to be there. Because paramedics are always supposed to be there. Even in Charlotte, in another city, he could blend in and disappear in the chaos following the shooting in the parking garage by just wearing his uniform. It was the perfect disguise because it wasn’t a disguise at all. He became invisible by the cleverest misdirection of all—by fitting in.

  By hiding in my ear.

  “Checkmate,” he said.

  Dizzy . . . dizzy . . . swaying . . . I handed the phone to Lien-hua and mumbled, “GPS . . .” The world was closing in. “Track her cell location with GPS . . . It’s the param—” I started to say, but before I could tell them who the Illusionist was, everything went black.

  84

  Tessa opened her eyes.

  She had no idea how long she’d been unconscious.

  Something was stuffed in her mouth. Some kind of gag. It made her want to retch, but she was afraid that if she threw up she’d choke on the vomit and die like that kid from school did last year at that party when he got so drunk he passed out and never woke up.

  Never woke up.

  Calm down, Tessa. Calm down.

  Never woke up.

  Calm down.

  She was on her side. Her hands stretched behind her back, tied together. It felt like duct tape. When she tried to move her legs, she couldn’t. Her ankles were tightly bound too. At least she still had her clothes on—thank God.

  Her mind felt fuzzy, unclear. She looked around.

  Where was she?

  An ambulance. She was in the back of an ambulance, and they were driving up a curving road, into the mountains.

  Drifting. Drifting. She blinked, tried to focus.

  Slipped into unconsciousness again.

  I woke up, looked around. A huddle of faces surrounded me.

  “The guy tossed the phone,” someone was saying.

  “The paramedic,” I managed to say.

  “He’s back!” Ralph’s face loomed into view. “You OK?”

  I nodded feebly. “It’s the paramedic.” I tried to speak, hardly made a sound. “The Illusionist. It’s him.”

  “Put out an APB on the ambulance!” Ralph shouted. I saw Margaret calling it in.

  “If it’s a paramedic, where’s his partner?” asked Lien-hua.

  I knew the answer from my days as a wilderness guide, and I wanted to tell her that in isolated mountainous regions, EMTs and paramedics drive their ambulances home, so that when a call comes in they don’t have to drive back to town first, but can respond faster. And they don’t always arrive on the scene with their partner. I wanted to explain it all, tried to, but voices and visions whispered to me, blurred my thoughts, curved reality around me.

  What kind of drug was that?

  “Where’s that doctor!” yelled Ralph. Then he looked at me. “That was a good idea to track her phone, but he discarded it.”

  “Where?” I managed to say. “Where did he toss it?”

  “240 West.”

  Location and timing . . .

  “How long ago?”

  Location and timing . . .

  “’Bout two minutes.”

  What was that paramedic’s name? I tried to think, tried to remember.

  He never told me his name. Just told me it might leave a scar. “Find out who responded to the 911 call at the safe house,” I said.

  “I’m on it,” said Ralph.

  “He’ll probably switch vehicles, Ralph.” I felt so weak. “We can’t chase him . . . gotta get out ahead of him . . .” I felt weak and nauseous. I must have looked it too.

  “We need to get you to the hospital,” said Lien-hua.

  I slapped myself in the face to wake up. Some of my thoughts were positioning themselves in a straight line again, but not all of them. “Not before I find my daughter,” I said. “Get my computer. It’s still in the security room.”

  “Pat—” she said.

  “Please,” I begged. “Please. Hurry.”

  She left for it.

  “His name’s Sevren Adkins,” Ralph announced. He asked them where Sevren lived and then scribbled down an address. “We can’t track the vehicle, though. It’s an older model. No GPS.” Then he said something into the phone and turned back to me. “I’ve got Asheville EMS on the phone, Pat. Anything else you need to know?”

  “Is he on their high angle rescue unit?”

  He asked them.

  “Yes!” he yelled.

  That explains the cave connection.

  “Find out if he used to work in Spartanburg, if he was the one who responded to the domestic abuse call from Grolin’s girlfriend. I want to know how long he’s been playing this game.”

  A minute later Lien-hua returned with my computer. I fired up F.A.L.C.O.N. “Showtime,” I said. I typed in the address Ralph had given me. The image focused, zoomed.

  Onto clouds.

  Useless.

  We haven’t found a way yet to see through the clouds.

  Tessa was dreaming, dreaming, dreaming. The world was a blur. A blood-drenched dream. She remembered arguing with Patrick . . . the necklace . . . her knapsack . . . seeing that cop get shot . . . Agent Tucker trying to help her . . . the paramedic.

  And then everything was swallowed by the clouds.

  She shook her head to clear her thoughts. Her mind was filled with visions of puffy clouds floating overhead, forming into fairies and unicorns and dragons with wispy, bristling teeth, and she could hear her mother’s laughter from somewhere nearby and then she was coming home from her mother’s funeral and she could see her reflection in the bathroom mirror where she was pressing a razor blade against her arm and the blood was dripping, falling, spreading out across her arm and then down the hall and onto a treadmill and across the carpet, and then it was flowing from Agent Tucker’s neck, forming into shapes on the floor, clouds on the carpet, coloring the world red with crimson tears.

  Bloody rain.

  Calm down, Tessa. Calm down.

  A terror still and deep settled over her, descended into her. She was tied up. She was with a killer. She was going to die.

  She was afraid to make a sound, afraid of what he might do if he found out she was awake, but despite herself, she let out a muffled gasp.

  The man driving the ambulance turned around and smiled. “Tessa,” he said. “So glad you could join me.”

  Ah, so she was awake. Good.

  It was more fun when they woke up early and had more time to contemplate what was about to happen to them.

  He heard a cell phone ring.

  What? He’d tossed the kid’s phone earlier. Whose phone was that?

  Another ring.

  He hadn’t checked both of her pockets, just the one.

  She was carrying a second phone.

  “Sevren lived in Spartanburg,” announced Ralph, hanging up his phone.

  I tried to pull together everything: Grolin had been set up from the start. He was Sevren’s perfect little pawn, writing about locations in MountainQuest magazine that Sevren could later drop bodies into to make all the evidence point away from himself. And as a paramedic, Sevren would have known Vanessa from working at the hospital, could have convinced her to come to the golf course.

  He’s showing us the bo
ard.

  I thought of Tucker’s longitude and latitude theory and pulled up the geo profile and the computer’s chess game, grabbed the image of the chessboard, overlaid it onto the geo profile, resized it to fit. Locations, abduction sites, crime scenes. I added the golf course. The safe house.

  Patterns . . . patterns . . . patterns . . .

  I had to find him. I had to predict where he was going to go.

  You don’t predict the future, Pat. You can’t.

  But I had to.

  Sevren stopped the ambulance by the side of the road. They hadn’t quite made it to his destination yet, just a little farther before he could switch vehicles, but he needed to get rid of that phone. He climbed into the back with the girl.

  He fished the phone out of her pocket, stepped outside the ambulance, and hurled it into the gorge through the swirl of damp snow that had started descending on the mountains. Then he returned to her side.

  Yes.

  Maybe he could have a little fun with Tessa now that she was awake. Why not? He’d earned it. He watched her squirm for a few moments and then removed her gag.

  85

  “We got him,” announced Ralph.

  “What?” I said.

  “Sheriff Wallace just called in. State troopers are at his house. He probably switched vehicles like you said; his van is parked out front. They’re going in.”

  “No!” I hollered. “Tell them to stand down. Remember the bomb in Grolin’s place? If they breach the door, that house might blow. He might have Tessa inside. It would be the perfect ending to his game. Stand down!”

  As soon as the paramedic took off her gag Tessa spit in his face.

  For a moment he looked like he might slap her, but then he just grinned and wiped off the saliva. “Tessa, do you know who Boethius is?”