Authors: Terri Reid
“How long does it take them to order a test?” Mary asked,
laying on the bed in the emergency room. “I need to get home and make sure
Clarissa knows I’m okay.”
“Don’t worry about Clarissa,” Bradley said. “She and Rosie
are probably baking you some get-well cookies.”
Mary smiled. “You’re probably right,” she said. “I’m just a
worry wart.”
Bradley leaned over and kissed her forehead. “No, you’re a
mom,” he said.
She smiled up at him. “Yes. Yes I am,” she agreed. “So, tell
me about the kidnapping case. Was Nick Sears the perp?”
Bradley sat down on a chair next to the bed and shook his
head. “No, he’s not,” he said, “Chris, the coroner, found enough evidence to
prove it was a homicide, not a suicide.”
“So the kidnapper set him up?” Mary asked, amazed. “You must
have been getting pretty close for him to do that.”
“Yeah, that’s what I’m afraid of,” he said. “But we’re not
finding anything
that points
to a suspect.”
“Last phone calls?”
Mary asked.
Bradley smiled. “Yeah, even though his cell phone was
missing, we were able to get a print out,” he said. “The last calls were from
Ray Giles and Julie said that it was routine for Giles to call him at the end
of the day.”
“Ray Giles,” Mary said slowly. “You know, when I was Celia
today she mentioned him. She said he was a friend of the family.
That she wished she had thought of the
absences angle because he would have helped her.”
“So, he’s someone Courtney knew too,” he surmised. “Someone
she might have taken a ride from.”
Mary nodded. “He had access to the records. Heck, he’s
driving around all day looking for kids as his job. He’s got the perfect cover.
Where does he live?”
Bradley reached for his phone and placed a call to Dorothy.
After a few moments, he turned to Mary. “He lives on Woodside Drive, right
behind the park.”
“Bingo,” Mary said.
“Yeah, I think you’re right,” he said. “As soon as we get
you home, I’ll get a search warrant and we’ll pay a little visit to Mr. Giles.”
The emergency room waiting room was fairly empty when Rosie
walked through the entrance.
The glass
sliding doors slid closed behind her.
She looked and saw Stanley snoozing in a corner chair and hurried over
to sit next to him.
“Stanley,” she said,
shaking his arm and waking him up. “How’s Mary?”
Waking up with a start, he stared at her for a moment. “Why
ain’t
you home with Clarissa?” he asked.
“The Brennans called and told Clarissa to come over to their
place, so I could be here with you and Mary,” she said.
“Well, that was nice of them,” he said. “Bradley arrived at
the hospital at the same time we did.
He
came out a little while ago and told me they were going to do a CT scan on her,
just to make sure there’s no internal damage. I’m thinking
iffen
she was in bad shape, there’s no way he
woulda
left
her side, even for a couple of minutes. So, I think she’s
gonna
be just fine.”
Rosie collapsed back against the chair. “Well, that’s a
blessing isn’t it?” she said with relief. “After all that blood, and then she
wouldn’t wake up, I was so worried.”
“Yeah, scared the heck out of me too,” Stanley agreed. “And
maybe it
learnt
Clarissa a lesson.”
“Well, just before she left she asked me to tell Mary she
loved her,” Rosie said, “so I think maybe things are on the mend.”
“That’s fine then,” he said. “That’s just fine.”
The glass sliding doors opened again and Katie Brennan
walked through them.
She looked quickly
around the room, saw Rosie and Stanley and hurried to them. “How’s Mary doing?”
she asked, sitting next to them.
Stanley told her what he’d told Rosie and she sighed with
relief.
“So, how did it happen?” she asked.
“There were some papers on the floor in the kitchen,” Rosie
said. “Mary didn’t see them and she stepped on one and slipped backwards. She
caught her head on the corner of the butcher-block counter.”
“Ouch,” Katie said, wincing. “I bet that hurt.”
“She cut her head, so there was blood everywhere,” Stanley
added.
“Knocked her out for a while too.”
“She lost consciousness?” Katie asked. “Well, that makes it
a little more serious. I’m glad they’re doing the CT scan.”
They sat in silence for a few moments, the television
running a cable news channel in the background. Finally, Katie turned to Rosie
and Stanley and asked, “So, who’s watching Clarissa?”
Rosie started. “Why you are, aren’t you?”
“What?” Katie exclaimed.
“Clarissa came downstairs after Mary went to the hospital
and told me you called and asked her to come over to your house, so I could
come to the hospital,” Rosie said, her voice filled with concern.
Katie shook her head. “I never called,” she said. “I just
found out about Mary because Maggie came into the house and told me she was in
the hospital.”
“Could Maggie have invited her?” Stanley suggested. “Could
she be there and you just didn’t know?”
Katie pulled out her cell phone and called her house. “Andy,
it’s Mom,” she said. “Please ask Maggie to come to the phone.”
They all waited, their hearts in their throats, until Maggie
answered. “Hi. Mom,” she said.
“
Maggie,
is Clarissa there with
you?” she asked.
“No, Mom,” Maggie said. “She’s not here.”
“Thank you,” Katie said, shaking her head at Rosie and
Stanley. “I want you to get your brothers and start looking around the
neighborhood for her.
I’ll be home
soon.”
Stanley stood up and walked to the doors that separated the
waiting room from the exam rooms.
The
nurse at the entrance looked up from her computer screen. “Can I help you?”
“I
gotta
talk to Police Chief
Alden right away,” he said. “There’s another emergency at his home.”
She nodded. “Just push the button on the wall for access,”
she said. “He’s waiting in exam room three.”
Stanley did as she said and the doors opened
automatically.
He rushed down the wide
corridor and quickly found the room. Pausing outside the door, he knocked
sharply.
“Come in,” Bradley called.
Stanley pushed open the door and saw Bradley sitting alone
in the room. “Where’s Mary?” Stanley asked.
“Getting her CT scan,” Bradley replied.
“We got another problem,” Stanley said. “Clarissa’s run
away.”
Standing and dropping the magazine he’s been leafing
through, Bradley stared at Stanley as though he couldn’t believe what he’d just
said. “Run away?”
“Yeah, she told Rosie the Brennans had invited her over,” he
explained. “But Katie Brennan just arrived to check on Mary and she never
called Clarissa.
She called her house,
just to see if Clarissa was playing with Maggie. But Maggie told her Clarissa
wasn’t there.
She’s got her boys
searching the neighborhood.”
“Mike,” Bradley said, looking over at the guardian angel
who
had jumped up as soon as Stanley came in. “Can you check
on her?”
Mike shook his head, sadly. “She’s made a decision she knows
is wrong,” he said. “At this point, I can’t see or do anything unless she prays
for help.”
“Well, damn,” Bradley muttered. “Mike, you stay with Mary.
I’ve got to go find Clarissa. Make Mary stay put. We’ll find her.”
Mike nodded. “I’ll keep her here,” he said.
Grabbing his coat, he nodded, “Thanks Mike. Stanley, let’s
go.”
Ray dropped the newspaper in his lap and looked over at the
GPS tracking screen, the alert alarm was going off.
The Alden kid was moving. He pulled out of the
parking lot at Reed Park and headed down American Street toward his
target.
She’s moving pretty quickly
, he thought,
she’s not walking.
He drove slowly, staying a couple blocks away from the
moving target.
Don’t be too eager,
he
cautioned himself
, you don’t want to have
to deal with her dad.
He watched the indicator move across the screen into a
neighborhood behind the Lincoln Mall.
What
the hell is she doing back there?
The streets behind the Lincoln Mall were circular, one
leading into the other.
They were not
often traveled and it was fairly difficult to remain anonymous once you pulled
onto the street. Ray knew that he would have to wait until she reached her
destination before he could follow.
Pulling into the far end of the Lincoln Mall, in front of
the now empty supermarket, he found a parking spot that was hidden from the
street and placed his car in park.
He
pulled out the plastic bag he’d placed under the passenger seat and put it on
top of the seat.
The washcloth soaked in
chloroform was still damp.
Closing his eyes for a moment, he fantasized about her
capture. He would simply walk up behind her and placed the washcloth over her
nose and mouth.
She would struggle. His
smile widened, he loved when they struggled. He would pull her closer to him,
so he could feel her struggles against his body.
Then, when it was almost too much to bear,
when he was almost ready for release, she would lay limp in his arms.
Taking a deep breath, he allowed the erotic tension to seep
from his body. He couldn’t think of the pleasure yet; he had to have a clear
head to catch her.
She would be his last
for a while.
He would spend the entire
night enjoying her and, in the morning, he would tend to his garden one last
time before leaving town.
He watched the indicator slow and then finally
stop
in front of an address on Winter Drive. He waited a few
moments, then put his car into drive and smiled to himself.
She was nearly his.
Clarissa slowed down as she got closer to her old
house.
The surrounding houses had
changed since her mom and she had run away two years ago.
She slid to a stop and straddled the bike,
just looking at her home from a house away.
Someone had painted it.
Her mom’s
flower pots weren’t on the front porch.
The curtains over the big window in the front room were different. Would
her dad still be in a house that wasn’t theirs anymore?
She slid one leg over the center bar and walked the bike
closer to the house. “Dad?” she whispered, not quite sure how she should be
doing this. “Dad, can you hear me?”
She wheeled the bike closer, up the front path and to the
porch. “Dad, it’s Clarissa, I need you,” she whispered urgently. “Please show
me that you’re here.”
She looked
around,
studying any
little detail that might prove her dad was nearby.
The leaves on the lilac bush rustled and she
moved closer, but then a small bird flew out of the branches.
The gutters on the porch clattered, but when
she looked up, she saw a squirrel running along the roof with a nut in its
mouth. “Dad, you have to be here,” she repeated. “I need to talk to you. I need
to see you.”
She waited, looking all around, but nothing happened.
Then front door opened behind her, she twirled around,
expectation and a little fear, filling her heart. “Da…,” she froze.
Her dad wasn’t at the door, instead a young girl about her
age stood on the porch. “Hi,” the girl said. “Are you lost?”
Clarissa shook her head. “No, I’m not,” she replied. “I used
to live here and I was…looking for something.”
“Oh,” the girl replied brightly. “We’ve lived here for a
month now. It’s a very nice house. But we didn’t find anything.
What are you looking for?”
“Um, it’s not important,” Clarissa said. “I just was passing
by and I thought I’d check.”
“Where’s your mom?”
“She’s in the…,” Clarissa stopped. She was going to tell her
where Mary was; why hadn’t she thought about her mother first. “She’s dead. She
died a few months ago.”
“Oh, I’m so sorry,” the girl exclaimed. “That would be
awful. Where’s your dad?”
An image of Bradley flashed into her mind, but she shook her
head to clear it. “My dad died two years ago,” she said firmly, trying to block
Mary and Bradley from her thoughts.
“So you’re an orphan, just like Annie,” the girl said.
“No…I mean, yes. I mean…it’s complicated.”
“Are you all by yourself?”
Tears pricked at the back of Clarissa’s eyes.
Yes
, she thought,
I am all by myself
.
She nodded.
“Sort of.”
“Lydia, why are standing there with the door open?” a
woman’s voice called from inside the house.
The little girl turned her head and shouted. “Mom, there’s
an orphan girl outside who used to live here.”
“No, please,” Clarissa said.
But it was too late; the mother was already standing behind
her daughter on the porch. “Who are you?” she asked.
“I’m Clarissa,” she replied, deciding not to add her last
name.
“Well, Clarissa, do you want to come inside?” she asked.
“It’s getting dark. I could call someone for you.”
Clarissa shook her head. “No, that’s okay,” she replied. “I
should get going anyway.”
“Where are you going?” the woman insisted.
“Um, probably back home,” she lied.
“Young lady, I can tell when someone is not telling me the
truth,” she said. “I insist you come in, so we can call your folks.”
Slipping her leg back over the center bar, she backed the
bike up. “Really, I’ll be fine,” she said.
“I can drive you somewhere,” the woman insisted, stepping
forward on the porch.
“No thank you,” Clarissa called as she pushed the bike back
to the sidewalk and turned it away from the house. She jumped on the bike and
pedaled quickly down the street.
The woman stood on the porch and watched her, shaking her
head.
That little girl is frightened of something,
she thought,
I wonder if there’s an Amber Alert out for
her?
She started to turn into the house when a movement caught
her eye.
She turned and watched a car
moving slowly down the street, the driver’s eyes on the departing little
girl.
She pulled out her cell phone and
took a photo of the license plate. She’d save that just in case there was an
Amber Alert about the child.