After rummaging through two years accumulation of coats, gloves, backpacks, and shoes, he found what he was looking for. He pulled out the Louisville Slugger aluminum baseball bat and shoved everything else back deep into the closet. He gripped the bat with both hands and took a few slow motion swings wondering how much damage a full swing would do to a human body. He didn’t want to kill anyone, just stop them in their tracks. A long, painful recovery time would be good too. He used to tip of the bat to push the closet door shut.
As it closed, it revealed a body in the hallway, right behind where the door had been.
Jack gasped and raised the bat to his shoulder.
“Jesus, Jack. It’s just me,” Lauren said.
“God, you scared me. What are you doing creeping around?”
“I wasn’t creeping around. I just came down to see what you were doing.” She nodded to the bat. “Is that the secret weapon?”
Jack shrugged. “Can’t hurt.”
“Come on. The kids are all tucked in. Let’s try to get some sleep.”
“I’m a little wired for sleep.”
“Yeah, me too. I just want to be upstairs. Close to the girls, you know?”
Jack put his arm around her and kissed her forehead. “Did they go down all right? I thought maybe we’d have them sleep with us tonight.”
“If they asked I would have let them, but they were O.K. staying in their own rooms. They’re on the second floor and their windows are locked. I figured if they’re not freaked out, let it alone.”
“Fair enough.” They walked into the family room. “Now that we’re alone, what do you think about the numbers Sarah wrote?”
“There’s got to be a simple explanation. Maybe she heard the room number at the hospital.”
“But the way she wrote them. She’s not capable of that.”
“I don’t know. The stress of the accident…”
“Made her smarter? C’mon Lauren. Something weird is going on here.”
“O.K. So what do you think?”
Jack rubbed his chin with the palm of his hand. He knew he had to be careful. After his scene at the hospital he noticed Lauren watching him closely, almost clinically. “I’m not sure. But something unusual is going on. And it’s not just from the stress of the crash. I think it’s more than that. There’s something I haven’t told you about that night. Something about Sarah. When Huckley was outside, trying to get into the Jeep, I looked in the back seat and saw Sarah talking. I couldn’t hear her so I told her to speak up. But she kept talking to the window. Finally, she stopped and said she wasn’t talking to me. She was talking to the bad man outside. It was what she told us about today.”
“She was scared. She’s a little girl. It was just her way of telling us what she was scared of. You can’t take it literally.”
“You weren’t there. She was having a conversation. Answering questions. Shaking her head yes and no to questions I couldn’t hear.”
“Maybe she could hear him through the window?”
“No way. With the rain and thunder, Huckley could have been screaming right at the window and she couldn’t have heard it. It was like she heard a voice that Becky and I couldn’t hear.”
“You think she heard voices in her head? Like she’s some kind of psychic? Give me a break.”
“I don’t know what it is, but something is happening, something very strange. I haven’t told you everything about Albert James either.” He made her sit down at the table and went through everything Albert James said, both before he went into the bar and as he lay dying in his arms.
When he was done, the color was drained out of Lauren’s face.
“Why didn’t you tell me any of this before?”
“Because it sounds nuts. I can’t explain how Albert James knew someone was after Sarah. I can’t explain how Sarah was talking to Huckley that night. I didn’t say anything because there is no explanation for it.”
“Of course there is. There has to be,” Lauren said, her voice less sure than her words.
“There’s another thing too. That night, when I asked her what the man had said, she asked me who Melissa was. She told me Huckley said she would end up like Melissa if she didn’t open the door.”
Lauren’s shoulders caved forward. Just the mention of the name was like a weight on both of them. “But she didn’t mention it tonight. Are you sure…”
“Jesus, will you stop asking that,” Jack said, his voice rising. “I’m not making this stuff up. You heard her today. She told us what he said. He said he was going to kill us. Do you think Sarah would just come up with that herself? And somehow she wrote those numbers down. Don’t forget that.”
“Settle down. I’m sure there’s a rational explanation for everything.”
“You think so? You want to know what I think?” He jabbed his finger into the table. “Something’s happening. Something bad. Whatever it is, we have to figure it out before they come after Sarah. For what ever fucked up reason, I really believe someone is trying to get her. And I think they want to hurt her, maybe even kill her.”
“Mommy?” The soft voice came from the top of the stairs.
Jack and Lauren looked up to see Sarah standing on the landing above them, clutching a stuffed elephant against her chest. Jack forced a smile as if that would make her forget everything he’d just said. It didn’t work. Sarah spun around and ran back to her room.
“Great. Just great.” Lauren ran up the stairs after her daughter.
Jack was about to follow her up but decided against it. Better to let Lauren calm her down, then he’d go and make his peace. He only hoped she hadn’t heard much of their conversation. He made sure Buddy was on guard at the front door, did another check of the windows then headed upstairs, dragging his baseball bat with him.
TWENTY-EIGHT
The stretch of I-70 between Prescott City and Midland was empty. Sheriff Janney always found the drive peaceful at night. He drove with the radio off and the car windows lowered a few inches. It was a cold night but that didn’t stop him from enjoying it. The car heater was on high and pumped out air hot enough that he felt it through his thick leather boots. He stuck a hand out the window and diverted a burst of wind toward his face. It felt good and calmed his nerves. It was exactly what he needed.
Janney had avoided this meeting all day, hoping for some late break through to save his skin, but it hadn’t come. Now it was time to face the Boss. Face him with nothing but a shitpile of excuses for why he couldn’t tie up Huckley’s loose ends. And if there was one thing that put the Boss in a bad mood, it was excuses for not getting a job done.
Janney had cleaned up Huckley’s messes before, but this one was different. Tremont was more credible than the usual backcountry folks he dealt with. A few tough words and most people backtracked whatever story they were spilling. But Jack Tremont was going to be more of a challenge.
At first it seemed all the breaks were going Janney’s way. His wife waving off the blood alcohol test helped fuel the booze rumors. Tremont’s past was a dream come true. The little girl’s death in the crash back in California had made Janney giggle whenever he thought about it. It was just perfect. Deputy Sorenson had played it perfect during their visit, goading Jack just like he’d instructed. That crash combined with Tremont’s episode in Huckley’s hospital room was making it easy for Janney to chip away Tremont’s credibility. But there was one important piece of the puzzle missing and it was driving him crazy.
He opened the glove compartment and pulled out a single page fax. It was the latest missing persons database. None of the new entries on the Internet matched Tremont’s description of the girl. At least Huckley had always done his hunting out of state like they had all agreed; tracking down runaways, girls already reported missing, years ago by parents who hardly cared. Huckley was a pain in the ass but he wasn’t sloppy when it came to the abductions. Not usually anyway. Trying for the Tremont girl wasn’t like him at all. Taking such a risk didn’t make any sense.