Chapter Seventeen
Declan cursed when he heard what Alice said, and he hoped this wasn’t real. That maybe she was having some kind of episode where reality was being blurred.
“Alice, where are you?” Declan blurted, sitting down on the bed so he could yank on his boots.
There was a sound on the other end of the line. Something muffled that he couldn’t make out. And then the call ended.
“Oh, God,” Cully muttered, putting on her shoes as well and trying to run for the door at the same time.
Declan hurried to step in front of her to stop her from bolting out into the hall. “This could be a trap,” he reminded her. “That might not have even been your mother. AI’s damn good at replicating voices and making them sound very real,” he added and then took the call from Hayes.
“What’s going on?” he asked his brother the moment he had him on the line. He went ahead and put the call on speaker for Cully.
“I’m not sure,” Hayes replied, and judging from the background sounds, he was running. “I got a call from Tansy saying that someone hit her with a stun gun, and she thinks the person took Alice.”
Hell. So, it might be true after all.
“The exterior door was locked, and when I tried to get in, no one answered,” Hayes went on. “So, I’m making my way inside the hospital now…shit,” he snarled. “Tansy’s on the floor, hurt. So is the psychiatrist. He might even be dead. And Alice is nowhere in sight.”
Every muscle in Declan’s body went tight. He figured Cully was having a similar reaction, but she was trying to shove him aside so she could open the door.
“Try to call your mother back,” Declan told her. It wasn’t busy work, but he hoped it would get her focused on something else until he was sure it was safe for them to leave.
Cully pressed her mother’s number, and the call didn’t go through. Not a good sign because it could mean the SIM card had been removed from it. If so, they wouldn’t be able to use it to locate her.
“Call Owen,” Declan instructed Cully. “Tell him what happened and ask him to try to track Alice’s phone.”
Cully stared at him a couple of moments, and her breath shattered, coming out in a hoarse sob. Thankfully, that didn’t stop her from making the call to Owen.
“The killer has my mother,” Cully blurted the moment Owen answered. “She was taken from the hospital.”
Owen pretty much had the same reaction as Declan. He spat out some ripe profanity. “Who told you she was taken?”
Cully opened her mouth to say something but then seemed to change her mind. “I got a call, maybe from her, but it was definitely from her phone.”
“Putting a trace on the phone now,” Owen assured her. “Are Hayes and Tansy hurt? Did they see anything?”
“To be determined,” Declan spoke up. “I’m on the line with Hayes now. We need footage from the hospital,” he added.
“On it,” Owen said. “Let me know as soon as you have a report from Hayes. I’m on my way to the hospital now.”
“So are we,” Cully insisted.
Declan knew there would be no stopping her, but he needed to hold her off just a little longer. He ended the call with Owen so he could speak to Hayes. Again, there was some background noise, but Declan couldn’t make out what.
“Hayes?” he pressed, hoping his brother hadn’t been attacked as well. After all, the killer could still be right there, lying in wait.
Several long, snail-crawling moments later, Hayes finally answered. “I’m here. The doc’s alive, barely. Looks like he was hit on the head with something. There’s blood, but I think it might all be his. No sign of Alice. I’m heading back outside now.”
Declan could hear a lot of emotions in his brother’s voice, including some serious anger. Hayes was no doubt kicking himself for not being able to stop this. But since he’d been outside, he wouldn’t have had a clue what had been going on in the exam room.
“All right,” Declan said to him. “Owen will be there soon. Cully and me, too.”
“Not a good idea for Cully and you,” Hayes was quick to say. “This scene’s not secure.”
Yeah, Declan knew that. So did Cully. That wasn’t going to stop them.
“We’ll be there in about five minutes,” Declan added to Hayes, and he ended the call.
He immediately took hold of Cully’s shoulders so he could look her straight in the eyes. “Someone wants us dead, and that person is likely using your mom to lure us out.”
“Or kill her.” The words rushed out with her breath.
Declan shook his head. “She’s bait.” Probably. “And that means the killer will keep her alive.”
“But for how long?” she murmured.
Good question, but he couldn’t give her a good answer. He could only spell out the rules and hoped it would be enough to keep Cully safe.
“We move fast to my SUV. Keep watch around us,” he tacked onto that, and Declan took out his backup gun to hand to her. “Once we’re in the SUV, we’ll gear up with Kevlar vests. And finally, don’t take any unnecessary chances.”
She nodded. “You don’t take any either.”
That wasn’t a promise he could give her because his top priority was keeping Cully and her mom alive.
“Stay close to me and move fast,” he reminded her.
Getting his own gun ready, Declan disengaged the security on the door, opened it a crack and peered out. There was no one waiting for them in the hall. Well, no one that he could see anyway, but the trouble with the inn was there were plenty of places to hide.
But that would only happen if the killer was working with an accomplice.
The killer likely hadn’t had enough time to have taken Alice, sneaked out of the hospital with her and gotten her here to the inn. All of that would have eaten up at least ten to fifteen minutes. So, it was possible that Cully and he would run right into this SOB on their way to his vehicle.
If that was the killer’s plan, that is.
It was entirely possible that the killer would take Alice somewhere else. A place he or she had already set up, and then Alice could be used as the lure.
Declan tried not to dwell on that too much but instead focused on getting Cully and him out of there. That meant with each step, they had to keep an eye out to make sure they weren’t about to be ambushed.
They made it down to the stairs and into reception, where the young brown-haired man let out a squeak when he saw they had guns in their hands.
“Has anyone come inside in the last couple of minutes?” Declan asked, and he got an immediate headshake from the clerk.
Declan had expected that response since the security system had been set to alert him of any visitors. But systems could be and were often hacked. It wouldn’t have been easy to do that with this particular one since it was a Strike Force system.
Still, the killer could have the right skillset to do that sort of thing.
That’s why Declan continued to keep watch and move with caution as Cully and he made their way out the front. As he’d done with the door to the upstairs room, he opened it just a little and looked out.
And cursed.
The weather had taken a bad turn, and the rain was coming down hard. Not only did that cut visibility, the dark skies would make it harder for them to see someone who might be hiding.
Taking hold of Cully’s arm, they ran out, the rain immediately slapping at them. Thankfully, the SUV wasn’t that far from the door, and once they reached it, he got her inside as fast as he could. Still, they had gotten pretty much soaked in just that couple of seconds.
He started the engine so he could engage the security and reached into the backseat for the gear bag. Declan yanked out two Kevlar vests and filled his pockets with extra ammo before he put it on. The moment Cully had her vest on and was strapped in her seatbelt, he hit the accelerator and got them out of there.
“Take out the communications earbuds from the glove compartment,” he instructed Cully.
He wanted his hands free in case this turned into a fight, but he still needed to be able to communicate with Owen and Hayes. Maybe the killer, too, if the plan was to lure Cully and he elsewhere.
“Shit,” he spat out.
That caused Cully to snap toward him. “What?” She fired glances around them as if she expected to come face-to-face with a killer.
“Your house,” he said. “Or rather what’s left of it. Alice’s captor might take her there.”
Cully considered that a moment and nodded. And that meant Declan had a decision to make. He could go to the hospital and help Hayes look for Alice there. Or he could go straight to the house with the hopes of surprising the killer before he or she had time to set up.
“Go to the house,” Cully insisted.
They were obviously of a like mind on this, and he thought it was a solid possibility that Alice would be there. But since so would her captor, Declan didn’t want to go in there solo with Cully.
“Simon, call Owen,” Declan instructed the security app on his phone.
Owen answered on the very first ring. “I just made it to the hospital and should have security feed any minute now,” he said, his words rushed and running together. “I have two deputies with me and two more in route to look for Alice and figure out what the hell happened here. What’s your ETA?” he added, in that mile-a-minute pace.
Knowing his boss wasn’t going to like this, Declan dragged in a deep breath and took the turn away from the hospital. “Cully and I are going to the burned-out house. We think that’s where Alice will be.”
As expected, that caused Owen to curse. “I’m guessing your gut’s telling you to do this?”
“It is,” Declan verified. “And I don’t think we have a lot of time. Once the killer’s in place, they’ll have the advantage. I want to take that advantage away from this asshole.”
Owen did some more cursing. “Then, I’m on my way to you. I’ll leave the deputies here in case you’re wrong. Oh, and try to talk Cully into staying in the vehicle when you get to the house.”
“Will do,” Declan assured him and ended the call.
“I’m not staying in the SUV,” Cully insisted before Declan could say another word.
Yeah, he’d expected that as well. And he couldn’t blame her. If their situations had been reversed, he wouldn’t want to stay tucked away either. But Declan needed Cully to understand something.
“If we both go out there, then I have to worry about you,” he spelled out as he drove through the curtain of rain toward the Satan Shack. “It could cause me to lose focus. If you stay put, you can be my eyes and ears.” He tapped the bud, engaging the small button that would pair the devices. “I’ll be able to hear you through this.”
Cully had started shaking her head before he was even finished, but he could tell that what he’d said had gotten through to her. She didn’t want to be a distraction, and if she’d heard anything about his time as a Strike Force operative, then she knew that he was damn good at this sort of thing.
She stayed quiet for about a quarter of a mile and then repeated some of the same curse words that Owen had used. “Okay, I’ll stay in the SUV until you’ve assessed the situation. With the house burned down, I can’t imagine there’d be many places for a killer to hide.”
Oh, yeah, there were. Plenty of them. He’d seen the piles of rubble that the rain had no doubt now cooled. Added to that, there were the trees and the woods. If he was killer, he’d set up there and then attack once the bait had been taken.
Declan took the turn to the house, the SUV immediately sliding on the now slick narrow road. He quickly righted the vehicle and slowed. Not just because of the rain but because he was trying to see any tracks. Of course, thanks to the rain, there weren’t any.
He cranked up the windshield wipers as fast as they would go, which wasn’t nearly fast enough, and he slowed even more when the house came into view.
“I don’t see a vehicle,” Cully muttered.
Neither did he. That didn’t mean there wasn’t one though. It would have been easy enough to park a car behind the cluster of trees.
Declan stopped the SUV and continued to look around. Those heaps of rubble from the fire were still there, and some of them were damn high. At least ten feet. A half dozen people could be hiding behind there, and he wouldn’t be able to see them from this position.
His phone rang, knifing through the silence, and Owen’s name flashed on the dash screen. Declan tapped his earpiece to answer.
“We’re at the house,” he let Owen know. “Can’t see anyone—”
“It’s a man on the camera feed from the hospital,” Owen interrupted. “He’s wearing a ski mask, and he’s the one who took Alice.”
“Oh, God,” Cully said under her breath. She squeezed her eyes shut a moment. “Noah, Harley or Roscoe could have done this.”
“Yes,” Owen agreed. “Whoever it is came straight into the hospital, keeping his head down from the cameras, and when he reached the area where Alice was, he pulled on the ski mask. He then hit Tansy with a stun gun that he took from his raincoat and then clubbed her on the head with it.”
Declan could mentally see that all playing out. Both Roscoe and Harley would have known the position of those cameras, but it was something Noah could have easily figured out as well since the cameras were mounted to the walls and were in plain sight.
“After Tansy was down,” Owen continued, “the man knocked on the door to the clinic, and when Larson answered, he used the stun gun on him and then took Alice. I don’t know where he went with her after that, but I’ve got techs reviewing the footage.”
There were several dozen exits in the hospital, and the killer could have gotten her out through any one of them.
“I’ve already put out an APB on Noah, Harley, and Roscoe,” Owen continued. “And I’m on my way to you. ETA about twelve minutes.” And he cursed the rain as he ended the call.
“We have to find him,” Cully blurted out like a plea. “We have to find my mother.”
“Yeah,” Declan agreed, already reaching for the door handle.
Lightning zigzagged through the dark sky, and for a blink it was as if someone had turned on a whole bunch of lights. Everything got bright. And that’s when Declan saw it.
The body lying on the ground.