THIRTY-NINE
The area around Ned’s house felt different from when Mercy had first visited last Monday. Today it was sunny; no clouds anywhere. The puddles had dried, and leaves rustled in the light breeze. A far cry from the wet, dreary weather that’d been present on her first day.
Stepping out of Truman’s Tahoe, she had a moment of anger with the perfect weather. The world had the nerve to move on as usual. Sunshine, birds, warmth. Doesn’t it know Rose could be dead?
The sun highlighted the disrepair of Ned’s home. Warped boards, curling shingles, weeds. But Mercy knew its looks were deceiving. It was a fortress, designed to project an image of disarray and poverty: Move along, there’s nothing of value here.
Mercy studied the familiar front yard of junk piles and hedges, remembering how she’d corrected Eddie’s comment about its seemingly chaotic structure. The house was quiet, and she wondered if Toby’s ghost had been a feral cat.
“The front door is closed,” Truman pointed out as he walked around to the passenger side. “Toby said he left it open when he ran out.”
True. The hair on her arms lifted, her senses shifting to a higher level of alertness. “Let’s stay on this side of the vehicle for now.”
Truman cupped his hands around his mouth. “Hello! Anyone home?”
Silence.
“Your thoughts?” she asked.
“I think Toby may have been hearing things,” he admitted. “He hasn’t gotten over finding Ned’s body.”
He yelled at the house again with no results.
“Let’s try the front door,” Mercy suggested.
Truman paused, and she could see him weighing the idea. “I’ll let Lucas know we’ve arrived and are going in.”
“If we can get in,” she added as he made the call. “Ned had an impressive number of locks on a very heavy door.”
He led the way, his hand near the weapon at his side. Mercy followed, unzipping her thin jacket for access to hers. “I feel like I’m being herded to slaughter,” Truman muttered as they rounded the second pile of junk along the path.
Mercy kept a careful eye on the windows of the home, searching for any sign of movement.
Something shifted at an upper boarded-up window, and Truman jerked backward, crying out.
Then she heard the crack of the shot.
Truman dropped and Mercy dived behind a pile of rusting metal. Her training took over and she stretched out, dragging Truman through the dirt to cover, and then spun around to aim at the window where she’d seen the movement, her vision laser-focused on locating the threat. Where’d he go?
Nothing.
Her heartbeat pounded in her ears and sweat ran down her back as she scanned the house. Behind her, Truman gasped for breath, swearing like an angry redneck. She whirled back to him, ripping off her jacket, ready to apply pressure where he was bleeding. Oh shit! Oh shit! Oh shit! His head was tilted back, his heels digging into the ground, his teeth clenched in pain.
She couldn’t see blood. “Where is it?” Her hands scrambled across his chest and neck, searching for the bullet hole.
I won’t let him die.
He ripped open his buttoned-up shirt, exposing his vest, and dug at its right side with frantic fingers, struggling to catch his breath.
Mercy spotted the flattened slug and elation ripped through her.
“Your vest caught it!”
“I know,” he spit out, and then sucked in a deep, ragged breath. “But holy fuck that hurts!”
“You’re going to hurt like a son of a bitch for a few days, but you’ll be okay.” Tears blurred her eyes as the violence of the last twenty seconds rushed through her. Thank goodness I’m already on the ground. “I’m calling for backup.” Her fingers shook as she dialed.
“Looks like we found Craig,” Truman gasped.
He was right. In her bones, Mercy knew Craig had taken the shot.
Eddie answered her call. Mercy relayed their location and Truman’s situation. “Sit tight,” Eddie ordered. “We’ll get a county car over there ASAP, but we’re all on our way.”
She ended the call as Truman struggled to sit up, leaning against a rusted fender cemented to a pile of bricks. Relief swept over her as he moved on his own.
“Fuck me,” he muttered, wiping his forehead. “I don’t ever want to do that again.”
“I’ve never heard you swear so much, Chief Daly.”
He laughed and then moaned at the stab of pain in his chest. “I try to keep it clean. Did you see him?”
“No.” Mercy took another glance at the house. “But it’s got to be Craig. I saw something move at that boarded-up window. Exactly where I’d shown Eddie how a person had a perfect view if a stranger walked up to this house,” she admitted. The conversation seemed ancient. “We’re lucky he only took one shot.” She’d put on a vest before starting their hunt for Craig Rafferty. It was heavy and uncomfortable, something she rarely wore in her job, but searching for a killer had dictated it be worn.
She’d noticed Truman almost always wore one under his shirt.
This could have ended in a very different situation.
“Now what?” she asked. Can he walk out of here?
“Wait for the cavalry,” Truman said. “Is this as good of cover as we can get?”
“I’d say so. I’d rather be on the other side of the Tahoe, but no one shooting from the house can get us here.” She scanned the pile of junk behind them. “It’s mostly bricks and car parts, but it’s something. How are you feeling?”
“Like my chest is on fire,” he said. “Probably broke some ribs.”
“Can you run if we have to?”
“If we have to.”
The gunshot woke Rose.
I’m still alive.
Loud footsteps pounded down the hallway, and she scooted to the far corner of the bed, as far away from the door as possible. Locks slid and the door flung open. “Get up!”
“What’s happening?” she shrieked. Who’d he shoot? The smell of the fired gun reached her nose.
“Get up!” Craig grabbed her upper arm and lifted her completely off the bed. Her legs scrambled for purchase, and she flung out her arms to keep her balance. He hurled her through the doorway and she fell to her knees.
The air in the hallway smelled heavenly compared to the bedroom.
He hauled her to her feet and dragged her down the hall, her bare feet feeling warped wood floors. They turned into another room and he shoved her against the far wall. “On your knees.”
She collapsed against the wall, feeling old plaster and rough boards under her fingertips. She knelt, her forehead pressed against the plaster. One of his legs was firm against her back, but his attention was higher. Metal scraped against wood and he cursed. “Where’d they go?” he muttered.
Who?
Nervous energy rolled off him, and the odor of his sweat filled the room. A second scent emanated from him: her.
Her stomach turned over.
Then she felt his blade press against her cheek.
Truman breathed shallowly, the pain from the shot stabbing him with every inhalation.
At least I’m still breathing.
“Think Rose is in there?” Mercy whispered as they crouched behind their temporary cover.
Truman’s gut told him she was. But is Rose alive?
A woman’s screams sounded from the house and Mercy jumped to her feet. Truman lunged and grabbed her elbow before she dashed to the house. “Sit down!” he ordered as blinding pain radiated from his chest.
Mercy whirled on him, her eyes wide and her chest heaving. “That’s Rose!”
The screams intensified.
Mercy dropped to her knees and crushed her hands over her ears, pressing her gun against her temple. “He’s killing her,” she whispered.
Truman grabbed her other arm, holding her down, knowing she was seconds away from bolting toward the house again.
“We can’t wait,” she hissed, staring him in the eyes. “We’ve got to go in. I’ll go in.”
He shifted up to one knee with a low moan and gritted his teeth against the pain. “No one’s going in there.”
“If we wait for the others, it’ll be too late! Craig has to know we called for reinforcements.”
“We can’t go through the front door,” Truman said between clenched teeth. “He’ll kill us before we get there. Where’s the tunnel?”
With Mercy’s help, Truman made it to the Tahoe and backed it up the driveway to the road, out of sight of the house, hoping the shooter would think they’d left. Then they cut back through the woods on foot to where Mercy remembered Ned’s woodshed stood. Every step shook Truman’s chest, creating shooting pains that radiated up to his brain. Mercy glanced at him with concern a few times, but kept her mouth shut. He’d push on until it was physically impossible, and she knew it. A hundred feet of ground stood between the back door of the home and the woodshed. The woodshed’s door was out of view of any windows.
“Think Craig knows about the tunnel?” Truman asked as Mercy peered inside the shed.
“I think he would have locked this door,” she replied. She pulled out a tiny flashlight and lit up the space. Chopped wood was stacked from the concrete floor almost to the ceiling. Maneuvering room was tight. She squeezed through a narrow aisle, the wood catching her jacket and hair.
Spiders.
Mercy didn’t seem to care, so Truman firmly put all thoughts of hairy spider legs out of his brain and followed. A piece of wood jabbed his chest and he winced, catching his breath.
“I found it!”
He squeezed between a few more feet of wood and found her kneeling in a wider area, peering down into a large hole. A ladder stuck up out of the opening and vanished down into the darkness.
Good Lord. Pushing between the woodpiles had been claustrophobic enough. The sight of the black tunnel made him light-headed, and he looked away.
She shone her flashlight in the hole and cocked her head, listening carefully. “It’s quiet. I doubt he knows it exists.”
“Where do you think it opens up in the house?”
“I’ll guess in the basement. I can’t believe none of the crime scene techs or deputies reported a tunnel. It must be hidden well.” She tucked her flashlight under her arm and started down the ladder. She dropped the last two feet and squatted, pointing her flashlight down the shaft. “I’m impressed,” she said. “He’s supported it with wood beams. I’ll have to crawl, but it’s not the crumbling mess I expected.”
She eagerly looked up at Truman, but then her eyebrows narrowed. “You look ready to vomit.”
I feel ready to vomit.
“I’ll go,” she said, looking down the shaft again. “You can wait for backup. Let them know what we’re doing. You won’t be able to crawl if you’ve got broken ribs.”
“I’m coming.”