Forbidden (Southern Comfort) (30 page)

The place would be empty, but they’d find Billy Wayne’s blood on the floor and the walls, and inevitably they’d start a search for sweet little Alma’s grandson.

Of course, by that time he’d be long gone, with a completely new identity. Maybe this time he’d make his transformation a little more fi
nal with plastic surgery.   

JR Walker, no more.

He’d move around for a while, lose himself in city after city. After the trail had gone cold and the search died off, he’d pick a nice spot and settle down.

Maybe get a dog.

Kids liked dogs.

He laughed lightly, thinking how perfect this whole thing had turned out.  He’d jettisoned Billy Wayne, whom he’d been carrying like excess baggage for too many years, and he finally had the opportunity to mete out a little justice to Tate Hennessey.

He wondered how long it would take for her to figure it out.

She’d stood there, shaken
his hand, and hadn’t had an inkling of who he was.

He had to admit there was a little thrill in that.

He unlocked the latches on the old piece of Samsonite, and studied the size of the space within the hard walls.  She’d come awfully damn close to picking up the suitcase, and then the little bitch might have realized it was empty.  And wouldn’t that have been an interesting situation?  He could have played the crazy old lady card, but why make anyone suspicious before he had to?

He ran his hand around the inside of the case.  It was solid, and air might be a problem after a
while, but he wouldn’t allow enough time to pass for suffocation.  He’d only gotten one brief glimpse of the kid, as he was being shepherded upstairs for bedtime, because Tate hovered over him like a mother hen.  Not encouraged to mingle with the guests.  Blah, blah, blah. Paranoid bitch, wasn’t she? 

The boy looked like the mother, all dark hair and big green eyes.

And he was small enough to fit in the suitcase.

After milking the old lady – who was like most normal grandmas, and couldn’t pass up a chance to talk about her progeny – he’d discovered the kid’s name was Max.

Of course, it wouldn’t be Max for long.

Like JR, he’d have to undergo an identity change.  And while it might be tricky at first, after a
while he’d have the kid believing whatever he wanted him to.  Kids his age were malleable.  Vulnerable. 

Naïve.

Soon, his mother would be no more than a bad memory.  Especially after he told the kid she’d wanted him to be taken.

Oh yeah, he was familiar with the tactics. 

A little brainwashing, a little love, a nifty little system of reward and punishment.  A few months, maybe less, and the kid would be totally his. 

He laughed again, this time a little louder.  Whoever said revenge was sweet didn’t know the half of it.

C
LAY
fought a stomachache the entire way home.

It could have been the pound of grease he’d choked down several hours ago, in the form of a fried fish sandwich and homemade chips, dutifully chased by at least a gallon of sweet tea.  It could have been the fact that Kim volunteered to drive, and her Mario Andretti-blindfolded-and-hopped-up-on-speed style of piloting brought an entirely new dimension to motion sickness.

Of course, more likely, it was the fact that he’d just spent the past three or four hours watching tape after tape of scared, young girls being assaulted in the worst possible way.

It wasn’t like he hadn’t seen that kind of thing before.  But for some reason, watching William Wayne on tape – knowing that he’d seen the man with his own eyes, suspected that he was a predator, and hadn’t done a thing to stop Casey’s abduction from happening – made him feel like throwing up.

Oh sure, he understood, logically, that there was almost nothing he could have done.  He had no reason to approach the man, no evidence to suggest he was anything more than your run-of-the-mill pervert.  No possible way to foretell that he was going to all but snatch a girl from under his nose.

Almost literally under his nose.

Clay had been on the Ferris wheel with Max when that girl was taken.

It was like compounding what had happened in Topeka.

What the hell good was his degree, his extensive Bureau training, if kids continued to be victimized virtually in front of him and he couldn’t do a damn thing?

“You’re beating yourself up.”

Turning away from the darkened scenery flashing past his window, he slid a frown toward Kim.

“God, Clay, give yourself a break.  You’re a damn good
agent, but contrary to popular belief, you’re not exactly a psychic.”

He winced.  She’d obviously been talking to Deputy Harding.

“There’s no way you could have known,” she continued, “that the man you saw at that carnival was involved in what we just watched.  You
did not fail.
In fact, we’re damn lucky that you noticed his fishy behavior in the first place.  If not, you wouldn’t have placed so much importance on Casey Rodriguez’s disappearance, and we wouldn’t be where we are now.”

“And where are we, exactly?” he asked mildly.  “Our main suspect is dead, there’s no sign of the girl, and I still don’t have enough to go on to get a firm handle on his partner.  I know he’s undergone a psychic break, and is more prone to taking chances, but I can’t say for sure whether he’s already fled the area.  Obviously, the area near the Collier crime scene needs to be canvassed, since Wayne was probably taking her to some sort of holding spot when he accidentally killed her.  But even if we find that place, it will probably be too little, too late.  He’ll be gone, the girl will be gone – either sold or killed because she’s been so much trouble.  That’s a very real possibility, you know.  He’s going to want to punish everyone he holds responsible.  He’s a big fan of passing the buck.”

“So we take what evidence we can gather, and follow the bastard’s trail.” 

“A lot of good that does Casey Rodriguez.”

Kim’s deep blue eyes shone hot in the darkness.  “This is one of the main reasons I wanted to come down here.  I shouldn’t have to say this to you Clay, but you’ve been taking things way too personally.  I know you feel bad about this girl, feel a certain amount of responsibility because you were
there
, but she’s only part of the big picture.  William Wayne is dead, which means he won’t be hurting young girls any more.  And I need you to stay in the game here, friend, because you’re one of the best agents I’ve ever worked with.  I thought, at first, that you’d benefit from time away, but now I wonder if this case isn’t exactly what you needed.  It’s hard, and it sucks, but
you will get through it,
and you’ll realize that life goes on.  You’ll do the best you can, help rid society of another lowlife, and accept that it’s not up to you to singlehandedly save the world.”  She pulled into the parking lot of her hotel.  “Now please go home to your woman.  Remind yourself of what you’ve done right.  And tomorrow morning put your game face on, because we’re going to catch this bastard.”     

Clay turned away from her to stare out at the parking lot.  Kim was right. He
knew
she was right, and there was no doubt he deserved the verbal face-slap.  There was no room in his line of work for this useless, pitiful moping.

And like she said, he should just go home to Tate, and remind himself of the goodness life had to offer.

“So I’ll pick you up same time tomorrow?” he asked, shifting back to face her.

“Sounds good.”  She dropped a quick kiss on his cheek, and slipped out the driver’s side door.  Tucking her jacket over her head to avoid the steadily increasing rain, she waggled her fingers and then disappeared into the hotel.

Clay played their conversation over in his mind as he drove through the rain-slicked streets.   Kim had all but accused him of having a hero complex, which might have some basis in truth.  He’d been a lifeguard through high school and on summer breaks during college, and had chosen both mental health and law enforcement as a profession. 

And while helping one’s fellow man was a noteworthy aspiration, striving for superhero status was both unrealistic and self-defeating.  No one was perfect, and no one could do it all.  He’d just have to do his job to the utmost of his abilities, and rely on
a force greater than himself to handle the rest.

And boy, the
Man Upstairs must be having quite a laugh right now, he thought as he pulled in beside Tate’s car.  He’d not only shown Clay a thing or two about humility and failure, but he’d also thrown love and hope into the mix.  There was an old saying about doors closing and windows opening that pretty much summed up the situation.  He felt like he was hitting an all-time professional low and an all-time personal high at exactly the same time.

Climbing out of his SUV, he started to run in out of the rain, but instead took a moment to look at the car seat strapped into the back of Tate’s Honda.

He’d been having some pretty mixed up feelings about the scope of the situation he was taking on, but as he stood there, rain flattening his hair against his head, he realized that at least part of his pleasure in coming back here tonight had as much to do with Max as with Max’s mama.  He looked toward his own vehicle.  Tried to picture that car seat there.

Thought it might look pretty nice.

Maybe even with another one beside it.

And when
that
thought didn’t make him turn and run, he knew that as Kim said, this was something he’d done right.  He might not be a perfect father figure to this little boy, but he’d damn sure try to do his best.  Just do his best with the hand he’d been given, and let the cards fall where they may.

Right now, his deck was firmly stacked right here at the Inn at Calhoun. 

So slipping his handy-dandy lock pick out of his pocket, he trotted up the steps to the back door, pulling up short when he saw Tate’s note.

Please don’t get any chicken blood on the door

For a moment, he thought the woman he loved had gone crazy, until he made the association to her earlier comment about voodoo.  And then couldn’t stop the laugh that ripped out of his throat.  You had to love a woman with a good sense of humor.

Especially when it came packaged with such a killer set of legs.

And speaking of legs, he hoped she wasn’t sleeping, because he sure wouldn’t take exception if she wanted to wrap them around his waist.

He slipped the lock, dealt with the alarm, and considered the myriad ways he could improve the Inn’s security.  It was a difficult balance, wanting to secure your home and yet opening it up to paying guests.  Overall, it wasn’t a choice he would have made, but he guessed he’d have to learn to live with it.  Worry about it, but live with it.  Which was going to make all the time spent away just that much more difficult to handle.

Shaking the water from his hair like a dog, Clay headed toward the back set of stairs, ascended two at a time, and coming out on the second floor landing, discovered he wasn’t alone in the hall.

Watery light from an antique sconce illuminated an elderly woman several doors down, hovering near the stairs leading to the
third floor and the owner’s bedrooms.  As Clay watched she put her hand on the doorknob, and began twisting it open.

“Ma’am?”

The woman stiffened, seemed to tense, then turned slightly toward the sound of his voice. Cautious smile in place, Clay moved forward, doing his best to appear nonthreatening.  No need to give the old lady a heart attack, since she seemed to be pretty confused.  Drawing closer he watched her eyes dart around, her hands stab into her pockets.

“Are you having trouble finding your room?” he asked, using his most honeyed Boy Scout inflection.  “That door leads to the third floor, and there are no guest rooms on that level.”

She was tall, very tall, though bent as an old oak.  Clay guessed that before osteoporosis struck she’d been only a couple inches shorter than him.

She wore soft-soled shoes, rather than slippers.

“Oh.  I’m sorry.”  She eased back into the shadows.  “I’m afraid these eyes aren’t what they used to be.”

“That’s no problem, ma’am.  Can I offer you some assistance?”

“Oh, goodness no.”  She laughed, but her blue eyes narrowed.  “I’ll be fine.  You run along to bed.  You’ve done more than enough for one night.”

As Clay watched, she turned and shuffled off. 

Two doors down, she slipped her hand into her pocket, pulled out a key and attempted to turn it in the lock.  On the third try, her hand stopped shaking enough to make it work.  Then she disappeared into her room and shut the door.

Clay stood there for a moment, waiting for what he wasn’t entirely sure.  But there was something…

He shook it off, wanting to set everything to do with work or profiling or his all-around general professional paranoia aside.  So he opened the door, turned the lock, and tiptoed up the stairs.  He found himself drawn to Max’s room, where a weak stream of light filtered out from beneath his door.

And pushing it open with only the lightest squeak of hinges, peeked his head in to find the little guy sprawled with one arm and leg off the bed, blankets bunched at his feet, and that goofy purple bear tucked beside him.