Chapter Fourteen
Ruston finished his latest phone call, this one an update from Slater. A call he purposely hadn’t put on speaker since Gracelyn was talking with one of the ER nurses, Eileen Parsons, and he hadn’t wanted Eileen to hear anything that might then end up as gossip. Added to that, if Slater had doled out some bad news, Ruston had wanted the chance to soften that news before passing it along to Gracelyn.
Gracelyn didn’t look on the verge of falling apart, but he didn’t want to add anything else to this already bad situation. Allie was now out of nearly seven hours of surgery, but she was critical. The surgeon had already told Gracelyn and him that Allie’s chances of survival weren’t good.
Ruston hadn’t actually seen Allie since she’d bolted into the road and been hit by a rancher who just happened to be driving by at the time. But he’d heard the sound of the impact. He’d heard the urgency in Hank’s voice, too, when he’d shouted for Devin to call an ambulance.
And Ruston had seen the blood on the road.
Gracelyn had seen it as well. No way to avoid it since Duncan, Ruston and she had left the ranch in a cruiser to come to the hospital, and they’d had to drive right past the spot where Allie had been hit.
Ruston had dreaded that drive for a lot of reasons, but it hadn’t been optional. Not after the hospital had called Gracelyn to ask her to come in and donate the rare AB negative blood that Allie and she shared. Gracelyn had done that, and now, ten hours later, they were waiting to see if it would save her sister’s life.
Even though Allie’s last words to Gracelyn had been to wish her dead, Gracelyn clearly didn’t feel the same way about Allie. No way was she pleased with pretty much anything Allie had done, but Ruston understood her need to be here. Her need to do whatever she could to keep Allie alive.
Later, if Allie made it, she’d have to answer for the horrible crimes she’d committed. But later would have to wait.
Eileen looked over at him when Ruston put his phone away and made his way back toward Gracelyn and her. Not that he had gone far. For one thing, he wouldn’t have let Gracelyn out of his sight, and for another, this particular waiting room was small, not much larger than a normal-sized kitchen.
Not many places to have a private conversation.
It was at the other end of the hospital from the much larger ER waiting room, which not only had way too many windows for Ruston’s liking but also multiple points of entry. That was why Duncan and he had insisted on using this area, which had been set up for families to wait for surgical patients. No windows. Only one way in and out, and Duncan was guarding that.
Literally.
Duncan was pacing up and down the hall in front of the open archway entrance while he was on the phone, dealing with all the various moving parts of multiple investigations. That included making sure the hospital itself was secure. Duncan had brought in reserve deputies for that as well, but there was always the concern that someone could slip in.
Or had already slipped in.
There had been well over a two-hour gap between the time that Gracelyn had gotten the call to ask if she’d donate blood and their arrival here at the hospital. There’d been no reserve deputies on the doors during that gap, so someone could have gotten in then.
“Any news about Allie?” Ruston asked Eileen.
The nurse had come in just as Ruston had gotten the call from Slater, so he hadn’t heard anything of what she’d come to tell Gracelyn. But Ruston figured Eileen wasn’t there to deliver the news that Allie was dead. That would almost certainly come from a doctor.
Eileen nodded. “They had to take her back into surgery to try to stop some internal bleeding. We’re not sure how long the procedure will take.” She sighed, checked her watch. “You guys have been here a long time, and I just wanted to check on the two of you and see if you needed anything.”
Yeah, he needed a safe place for Gracelyn. Safer than here, anyway. But that wasn’t something Eileen could fix.
Ruston looked at Gracelyn to see if she intended to take Eileen up on her offer, but she shook her head. “We’re fine for now, but thanks,” Ruston told the nurse, and he went to Gracelyn to pull her into his arms.
“What did Slater tell you?” she immediately asked. “Is Abigail all right?”
“She’s fine. All the security measures are still in place.”
All was a lot. Joelle, Slater and Luca were inside the locked-down ranch house with Abigail, and Slater had brought in his ranch hands to patrol the grounds with the other hands already keeping watch. A reserve deputy was at the end of the road to stop anyone from driving up to the house.
That included Tony or Devin. Ruston hadn’t wanted them hanging around, so he’d sent them both on their way, though Devin would have to come in and give a statement about why he’d brought Allie to the ranch in the first place. But that would have to wait.
Part of Ruston had wanted to haul Devin in if only so he could keep him under a careful watch for a while, but the deputies and Duncan were already stretched thin. Added to that, the sheriff’s office was still shut down, and with Duncan on guard duty, it would have meant bringing Devin to the hospital. Since that wouldn’t have pleased anyone, Duncan had sent Devin home.
Hopefully that wouldn’t turn out to be a fatal mistake.
“Slater said no one has gotten onto the ranch,” Ruston emphasized before he told her the rest. “But one of the hands did see a vehicle driving slowly on the road that leads to the turnoff to the ranch. He didn’t recognize the car, so he got the license plate and phoned Slater. When Slater ran it, he learned the vehicle belongs to Charla.”
Gracelyn huffed. “What was she doing there?”
“I’m not sure. And it might not have been her behind the wheel. The hand thought the driver was a man.”
“A hired gun?” But she immediately dismissed that with a head shake. “No, Charla wouldn’t have let a hired gun use her car.”
“Probably not,” he agreed. “If she’s not behind the attacks, someone could have stolen her car to make it look as if she was in the area.”
He thought of another possibility, though. That Charla had hoped this mystery driver would be mistaken for her and therefore give her some kind of alibi.
“Slater did try to call her,” Ruston added, “but it went straight to voicemail, so he left a message for Charla to contact either him or me.”
Whether or not Charla would call back was anyone’s guess. Ditto for her revealing what she was actually doing there. She could have been setting up another attack. Or she could have simply been looking for Tony. Ruston had no idea where he was. Then again, he could say that about all of their suspects except for Allie.
“You’re thinking how vulnerable we are here at the hospital,” Gracelyn muttered, and when he pulled himself out of his own thoughts, he realized she was staring up at him.
Ruston nodded. “Vulnerable here and anywhere else we happen to go,” he admitted.
Gracelyn matched his nod. “Once Allie’s out of surgery and we’re back at the ranch, we should talk about that plan for us as bait. And, no, I don’t like it any more than you do,” she was quick to add. “But the truth is, we’re no closer to catching this killer than we were two days ago. You and I are what he or she wants. We’re what could cause the killer to slip up and get caught.”
Every word of that was true, but it didn’t minimize the risks they’d be taking. That was why he tried again to offer her a plan B. “I can be the bait, and you can be part of the security setup. You can be the one to help pen in the killer.”
Ruston could tell from the look in her eyes that she was going to argue with that. She didn’t want to be tucked away somewhere while he was basically dealing with a serial killer. But she didn’t get a chance to voice that because of the sound of footsteps.
Both Gracelyn and he put their hands over their guns, proof of just how on edge they were, but it was Duncan who stepped into the doorway.
“Anything on Allie?” he immediately asked.
“She’s back in surgery,” Gracelyn answered. “Internal bleeding. It doesn’t sound good.”
Duncan muttered an “I’m sorry” and then paused. “The medical examiner found something on Zimmer’s body.”
That got their attention, and they pinned their gazes on Duncan.
“Zimmer had homemade tats between his toes,” Duncan explained. “Recent ones. It appears to be a username and password. For what, we don’t know, but I just got off the phone with the tech guys who are going to try to find out what they could mean.”
Ruston thought back through all the things Zimmer had told Gracelyn and him in that phone conversation. “If Zimmer wasn’t lying about investigating the baby farm, this could be his notes or something. Heck, it could give us the name of the killer.”
“Yeah,” Duncan muttered, not sounding overly hopeful, yet there was some hope there. Maybe because they didn’t have any other leads.
“Did Slater tell you about Charla’s vehicle being spotted near the ranch?” Ruston asked him.
“He did,” Duncan verified. “Any chance your pal Noah Ryland can locate her and ask her about that?”
“I’ll check,” Ruston said, taking out his phone. “While I’m at it, I’ll see if he can get any feed from security cameras near Devin’s. It’d be interesting to see if his story about Allie trying to break in meshes with what shows up on the cameras.”
Ruston started the text but then glanced up when the lights flickered. He frowned because there wasn’t a storm to cause any interference. Frowned, too, because any and everything that wasn’t normal was suspicious.
His suspicions skyrocketed.
The lights went out, and the room was plunged into total darkness.
G RACELYN HEARD HERSELF GASP , and she thought maybe her heart had skipped a beat or two. She immediately fumbled for her phone, but before she could take it out, a light came on. Not the overhead ones. This was a much dimmer one that was fixed on the wall.
“The generator kicked in,” she heard Ruston say.
Obviously, he didn’t think the loss of power was a fluke, because he’d stepped into the doorway next to Duncan and had already drawn his gun. Duncan and she did the same.
And they waited.
Her heartbeat started to race and thud as she thought of all the things that could go wrong. The killer could be coming after them. Right now. He could be using the dim lights as a way to get closer. But Ruston, Duncan and she were ready for that.
She hoped.
Gracelyn prayed the killer hadn’t come up with a way to get to them that they couldn’t stop. Or a way to crush her without even being near her.
“Abigail,” she muttered, and the fear came, soaring.
Because if the killer had arranged for this, there could be an attack at the ranch. Her hands were far from being steady when she took out her phone and made a call to Joelle.
More waiting. Each fraction of a second seemed to take an eternity, but Joelle finally answered.
“Is everything okay?” Joelle and Gracelyn blurted out at the same time.
Apparently, Joelle was just as much on edge as she was. “The power went out at the hospital,” Gracelyn explained. “We’re okay, though,” she quickly added when Duncan shot her a pleading glance. He obviously didn’t want his pregnant wife to worry about him. “I just wanted to make sure everything was all right there.”
“We’re okay here, too,” Joelle assured her. “No power outages. No signs of anyone trying to get near the house. Abigail just had a bottle and is asleep.” She paused a moment. “Is Allie out of surgery?”
“Not yet.”
“Okay, keep me posted,” Joelle said, and she paused again. “You think the killer messed with the power, don’t you?”
Gracelyn considered lying, but Joelle was a cop and would likely see right through that. “It’s something we’re considering. But the three of us are together, and we’ll stay that way to give each other plenty of backup.”
“All right.” Joelle’s voice was more than a little shaky now. “Just be careful, and tell Duncan I love him. Wait, don’t do that,” she quickly amended. “Because that sounds like a goodbye. Tell him to come home when he can.”
“I will,” Gracelyn assured her. She ended the call and relayed the message. “Joelle says to come home when you can.”
Duncan made a sound of agreement, but heaven knew when that would be. For the moment, though, they weren’t going anywhere. If the killer was indeed in the building, then it was best to stay put and have him or her come to them. Three against one. Well, three against an army, if the killer had backup.
But Gracelyn had to pray that wouldn’t happen.
Duncan was looking to the left of the hall while Ruston was keeping an eye on the right. Gracelyn was between them and volleyed glances in both directions and at a stained glass window high on the wall across from them. She seriously doubted it would open, but it was possible someone could shoot their way through it. If that happened, she’d have a fairly good shot to stop anyone coming in that way.
A phone rang, the sound slicing through the silence, and Gracelyn saw the screen of Duncan’s cell light up. “It’s Anita Denny,” he said, referring to one of the reserve deputies he’d posted around the hospital.
Duncan answered it, sandwiching the phone between his ear and shoulder while he continued to keep watch in the hall. He hadn’t put the call on speaker, probably because he didn’t want the sound of the deputy’s voice to interfere with the sound of any approaching footsteps. That, and he likely didn’t want Anita to give away anything that might help a killer pinpoint their location.
“Are you okay?” Duncan asked, and there was plenty of alarm in his voice.
Oh, mercy. Something had happened.
“Describe him,” Duncan insisted a moment later, and then he paused, no doubt to listen to what Anita was telling him. “And you’re sure it was a man?” Another pause, followed by some muttered profanity. “All right. Stay put, and I’ll get someone to you,” he said, ending the call.
“Who do you need me to call or text?” Ruston immediately wanted to know.
“Text Woodrow,” Duncan was quick to say. “He’s with the medical examiner and can be here in about fifteen minutes. I want him to go to the east side of the hospital to check on Anita. She says she’s okay, but I’m not convinced.”
“What happened to her?” Ruston asked Duncan while he sent the message to Woodrow.
“Someone tossed some rocks from the roof of the hospital. A few of them hit her, and when Anita looked up, she saw a man looming over the side. Just the top of his head, though, not his actual face. Anita called out to him, but he disappeared from sight.”
So, it could be either Devin or Tony. Or someone that Charla had hired.
Or none of the above.
Gracelyn wanted to believe this was some kind of prank. But it didn’t feel like one at all.
“Who can I call to get someone onto the roof?” Gracelyn wanted to know.
“Anita’s already done it,” Duncan explained. “Two hospital security guards are headed up there now. I’m contacting Dispatch to see who they can get up there to help them.”
Gracelyn had no idea if the guards could handle something like confronting a killer, but she suspected the confrontation wouldn’t happen. The killer wanted Ruston and her, not the guards. So, maybe this was some kind of distraction? Certainly, the killer wasn’t hoping to lure them up to the roof, too?
But maybe that would work.
Partially, anyway.
If the killer managed to hold the security guards hostage, Duncan might go up there. Might. And that would leave Ruston and her alone. But even then, they certainly weren’t defenseless.
Duncan had just made his call to the dispatcher when Gracelyn heard something that had them all stopping cold.
A gasp.
It had come from the direction of the nurses’ station just up the hall, and they all turned in that direction, each of them bringing up their guns. The light was dim in that area, too, but not so dim that Gracelyn didn’t see the nurse lying face down on the floor. For a horrifying moment, Gracelyn thought she was dead, but the woman lifted her head and then tried to scramble away from something.
Or rather someone.
There, in the shadows, Gracelyn saw a figure wearing all black who was crouched down behind the nurse. Gracelyn couldn’t see his face. Heck, couldn’t even tell if it was a man.
Like Ruston and Duncan, Gracelyn took aim at him, but none of them had a clean shot because the person grabbed the nurse, hooked an arm around her neck and used her as a shield. That was when Gracelyn realized why she couldn’t see the person’s face.
Because there was a gas mask covering it.
A split second later, there was the thudding sound of something hitting the floor. A small canister, and white smoke immediately spewed from it. One whiff, though, and Gracelyn knew it wasn’t smoke.
It was tear gas.
Her eyes started to burn like fire, and she began to cough. She tried to bat the gas away from her face but couldn’t. It was everywhere, engulfing them in the thick cloud, and it was having the same effect on Ruston and Duncan, too, because they were coughing as well.
Not the killer, though.
That thought was loud and clear in her head. The killer had on that mask, which meant he could walk right through the gas and get to them.
Gracelyn tried to run. Tried to get to some fresh air so she’d have enough breath to fight back. To protect anyone who was now in this killer’s path. But the coughing overtook everything, and she couldn’t see. She had no choice but to drop to her knees.
Gracelyn felt someone take hold of her arm. Not a gentle grip. A hard, wrenching one that dragged her to her feet and ripped the gun from her hand.
“Move,” the voice snarled.
The person’s crushing grip made sure she did that. Moving her away from the waiting room. And toward the exit. That was when Gracelyn realized what was happening.
She was being kidnapped.