Authors: Carolyn Arnold
Chad wanted to watch the cops pull away and leave. Cops, feds, they were all the same to him. Either could put him away for life and take away his freedom. He resisted the urge to make sure they were gone, to confirm they’d left him in their rearview mirror.
His heart raced, and he was lightheaded. What if they called in for backup?
He ran up the stairs, taking two at a time. Opening the bathroom door, he crossed to the tub where he had secured His Angel. He couldn’t risk her freeing herself and exposing them. He had done too much, come too far.
No, they would finally be together, for good this time.
He pulled the shower curtain back. The water poured over her flesh, as a cleansing rain. Beads of moisture kissed her skin. He followed the path of the water as it streamed down her chest, over a breast and off the nipple. She was perfect.
His eyes traced her form. She sat in the tub with her back against the end, opposite the faucet—he was too smart to let her drown. Her arms were secured behind her back with a necktie. He had wrapped another around her head and over her mouth to serve as a gag. He didn’t think it was necessary, based on the drug he had also put in her system when he heard the doorbell, but it was a precaution. He didn’t need an off-chance ruining this moment.
Her eyes were shut, and she was in a deep sleep, evidenced by the rapid eye movement beneath her lids.
Kill her!
He squeezed his eyes shut.
The voice that would never completely disappear—it would haunt him until the day he closed his eyes for the final time. But he would learn to live with it, to ignore it. Things were finally the way they were meant to be.
He reached for the soap and lathered it over her body. Despite the warm water and the heat of his touch, her body shivered in response.
She would come to realize they were meant to be together, and there was nothing she should fear.
When she was bathed, he shut off the water and left the bathroom. He returned with the perfect outfit for her. As he re-entered, her eyes flickered open, squinting at first, likely in objection to the bright light in the room, but he left it on. He had something for her to see, something for her to wear, before they headed out. This was the reason he had to bring her here, and it would be worth it.
Chapter 44
Paige and Zachery were going to get what they could together on Monica Rice while Jack and I headed to talk to Brad Keyes again. We were hoping, by this point, he had put his hands on Chad’s resume, and we would have more to go on then his job history consisting of brief stints.
On the way, he contacted Nadia at headquarters, gave her a push on the employment and financial records, and asked her to dig up anything she could find on Chad Holmes. We waited on the phone while she gave us the basic scoop on him.
“No criminal record,” she said.
“We know that. Give us something we don’t have. Does he have a gun registered? Does he have any other properties?” Jack flicked the butt of his cigarette out the window into passing traffic.
“There’s nothing showing on record. Again, it could just be that—”
“It’s not registered in his name.”
“Yeah.” Nadia let out a rush of air that came across the onboard phone system.
Jack passed me a glance. “Well, keep digging. There’s something there.”
I held back the impulse to smile at this small victory. Jack and the team had been onto Chad Holmes before me, but I was the one convinced, after speaking with him, that he was our guy. Jack was showing faith in my hunches by having Nadia investigate him further. I turned to look out the passenger window before allowing the smile to give birth.
There were two sides to pushing Keyes about Chad, but the risk of damaging a potentially innocent man’s reputation was trumped by the fact that, as of right now, we considered Sydney Poole and Monica Rice to be alive. We needed to find them before that status changed.
Two girls, both different than the one before, and a guy stood at the front desk of Fitness Guru. One of the girls smiled at us as we approached, and the other two employees turned to talk to each other.
The smiling girl’s eyes went to our hands, as if expecting us to pull out a slide key that would give us access to the gym. Jack and I both wore dress pants with collared shirts. We didn’t have a bag strapped over a shoulder. We certainly didn’t appear as if we were here for a workout.
What was it with people who worked in gyms? I had belonged to a few before I decided it was easier, and more convenient, to set things up in my home, but, in my life, I had belonged to a few fitness centers. The employees were usually beautiful and fit, but their brains could have occupied a thimble.
Jack pulled his creds and flashed them to the girl. Her mouth formed an O.
“We’re here to see Brad Keyes.”
She nodded and walked away.
Seconds later, Brad was at the front desk. “I found what you were looking for.” He extended a file folder to Jack.
“We’d like to talk to you as well,” Jack said, passing the folder to me.
Brad glanced at the three employees occupying the front area, but the fact they stood around, mostly socializing, didn’t seem to faze him. “Sure.”
The girl who had retrieved Keyes smiled at us again and gestured for us to come through the entrance.
Brad led us to an office past the area where they signed up new members. Boxes and trays lined shelving behind his desk. A desk calendar and laptop were on the surface of his work space. Two chairs sat tucked in opposite corners of the room. Neither Jack nor I made a move to either one of them. This wouldn’t be a long visit.
Brad dropped into the leather swivel chair and rubbed his hands together. “I’m not sure how else I can help. I just don’t know how much longer I can afford to be a part of this. I can tell by the way you’re looking at me you don’t understand, and that’s fine. But when something horrible like this happens to you, that rips apart your life, as you know it, at some point you have to move forward or risk being paralyzed by it. I chose, a long time ago, to move on.”
He sounded a lot like he had when we first met.
“Did you ever suspect Chad Holmes as being involved with your wife’s disappearance?” Jack asked.
Brad blinked a few times, passed a glance at me, and I read his eyes, asking the question,
did he hear anything I said?
“We’re asking because he seems to think you were suspicious of him,” I said. I remembered Chad’s words at his house clearly.
He kept me close by to watch me.
Seconds went by in silence. All that could be heard was the soft hum of the fitness equipment. Brad stood up and shut the door.
“I never thought he took her. He didn’t seem like a real threat.” Brad took a deep breath. “I thought he might have been sleeping with her.”
I turned to Jack only to meet with his profile. His attention stayed fixed on Brad.
“Maybe I should have mentioned this, but I didn’t think it mattered. Leslie was a pretty woman, not beautiful outwardly, but pretty enough. Her inner beauty more than compensated for any default in her physical appearance.”
I noticed the contrasting statements between what he was sharing now and what he had said previously. When we talked at his house, he mentioned he didn’t think his wife was cheating on him, that she never would. Now he was voicing his suspicions. We needed to figure out the reasoning for the conflict, to expose the truth. “Before you—”
“I know what I said. I said that she would never do that to me. Well, I’ve since come to grips with the fact she could have. You have alluded to it, maybe even said it directly. I don’t know anymore.” He paused a second, his tongue touching his bottom lip. “Yes, at the time, I wondered about their relationship. I was mostly jealous of Chad though. I never thought she was capable of it, but, with Chad, I wasn’t so sure. Women always liked him. Leslie liked him. That much was obvious.” His eyes fell to his desk. When we didn’t say anything, he continued. “It’s embarrassing to think your wife, the mother of your newborn child, could have sex with someone else. Shit, we just had a kid together. Were things that bad? It makes you feel like a failure.”
I could relate more than I cared to admit. I swallowed the emotion in a thick wad of salvia. “We can’t control other people and their choices.”
Brad nodded absentmindedly. My words didn’t seem to bring him any comfort.
Chapter 45
Outside Fitness Guru, Jack slid behind the wheel, and I got into the passenger seat.
“That guy doesn’t know what the hell he’s talking about,” Jack said.
“He’s going through a lot. His past has resurfaced, and he’s forced to face it.”
Jack looked over at me. His eyes were harder to read than his energy. He thought I was weak for disclosing some empathy. So, convict me for being human. “He’s gone through a lot. He lost the love of his life, he’s a single father, he—”
Jack laughed.
“What’s so funny?” The man hardly ever expressed amusement, and I hadn’t told a joke.
“Love of his life? That’s a little drastic, don’t you think? People fall in love every day. What’s the big deal?”
I studied his eyes, and, while I wanted to hold back my thoughts from becoming audible, I wasn’t sure I could. There was something I needed answered. “Are you speaking from experience?”
Jack’s facial features went back to stone.
“When we first interrogated Keyes he asked what you would know about raising a kid alone at his age. You said you knew.” I let the statement sit there.
He lit
a cigarette and put the SUV into gear.
“You think that you can avoid this conversation forever? I’m pretty persistent you know.”
“Hmm.” A wisp of white expelled from Jack’s mouth.
“What’s the big deal? You have a kid. Is it a girl? A boy? How old are they? Where do they live?”
Jack slammed the brakes at a red light, and the SUV lurched forward from momentum. He inhaled on the cigarette and let the smoke ride out on a slow exhale. “If it’s not a big deal, maybe you should focus more on the case, less on my life.”
My fists balled in my lap, and I had the urge to punch something. The way he established eye contact with me I knew this conversation was over. He still didn’t “win” though. I would revisit the topic. I was too stubborn to let it go.
Chapter 46
Hours had turned into days. She shivered in the darkness of the pit where she had been banished, surviving, somehow, in her own filth. Her stomach ached from starvation. Her bladder and bowels had excreted their matter repeatedly. The smell of feces had lodged up her nose and disarmed her sinuses. It was no longer detectable or noticeable beyond the feeling of it beneath her, against her.
The thought made her gut heave and spin, but with no contents, the gag reflex came up wanting. She pulled on her restraints. The chains that bit into her wrists were no longer daunting. She would not die in here. She couldn’t allow herself to be found this way.
Surely, she would be rescued.
Reality extinguished the spark of hope before it set aflame, and tears fell down her cheeks. She remembered the drive out here, how remote it was. No one would find her.
If only she could break free.
She pulled on her bonds with more force, letting out a scream as the metal tore flesh. Succumbing to the realization she would not be leaving this room without him releasing her, she let her body fall limp and welcomed death.
Her head had fallen to the side when she heard the noise—a distinct moaning in the floorboards above her. He was coming.
She strained to listen closely, trying to discern where he was on his path to her. The top of the stairs. When his boots hit the wood, she heard something else—another set of footsteps. He was not alone.
The light turned on, nearly blinding her. She turned her head to face who was coming. Her heart raced. Her nightmare was that he had brought another man to rape her. He had always talked about a three-way—when they were mutual lovers—and she had shot the idea down.
Tremors ran through her, and she willed herself to die.
“I have someone I want you to meet,” he said. There was a woman beside him in a white dress.
“You two will get on fine, for now. This is my angel Leslie.” He kissed the lady’s forehead as if a doting lover. “And this, Leslie, is Sydney. You may recognize her from the news. She is famous now. I made her—”
Leslie lurched forward, bent in half, and vomited on the floor. Her eyes were wide when she resumed full height.
His eyes were on her filth. “What have you done?” He gripped Leslie’s wrist and said, “You stay right there, or I will come after you.”
He went to the corner of the room and pulled out a hose. “We’ll have to get you cleaned up, won’t we? Crap everywhere.”
Cold water hit Sydney’s flesh, each droplet as a plunging needle.
He put down the hose and moved to a ratcheting system above the end of the table.
“No! Please! No!”
He turned the crank until Sydney was suspended upside down, her legs splayed open. He picked it up again and blasted water, first on the table to clear off the rest of the visible excrement, and then back on her.
He ran the hose water down her torso. She bucked against the chains, but they didn’t give much. He moved closer to her and sprayed her inner thighs.
What he did next had her wishing for death.