Loe raamatut: «Night Stalker»

ONE

Charlotte Murray hated the lake.

She hated the blue-green water that gleamed like black ink in the moonlight, the quiet lap of waves against the shore, the whisper of damp air rustling through the tall reeds that bordered her yard. She hated it, but she couldn’t make herself leave.

Six years after her four-year-old son, Daniel, had wandered outside and drowned, five and a half years after her husband, Adam, left, five years after the divorce was finalized, and here she sat, the old swing creaking as she rocked in the early-morning darkness. How many sleepless nights had she spent staring out at Whisper Lake, wondering what she could have done to change things?

Too many.

Her friends said she needed to move on. Her therapist had encouraged her to rent out the cottage, move into town and create a new life for herself. One not defined by the tragedy of losing her son. It’s time to join the living again, he’d said as if there were some limit to grief and some timeline for recovery that she should be following.

She hadn’t been back to see him since.

Grief eased. It didn’t go away. Not even as time passed or environments changed.

“Besides,” she murmured, “I’ve got a job, friends, volunteer work. It’s not like I spend all of my time staring at the lake and dwelling on what I can’t change.”

Clover whined and dropped his boxy head on her knee, the added weight stopping the swaying motion of the swing. At seventy pounds, the poodle mix was double the size the county animal shelter had said he would be. Charlotte didn’t mind. He filled up more of the house, took up a little of the extra space that had been left when Daniel died and Adam walked out.

She scratched behind Clover’s floppy ears, kissed his velvety muzzle. “Ready to go inside?”

He was on his feet before she finished speaking, trotting to the back door, doing his goofy little poodle prance. She’d chosen him out of desperation, wanting something to keep the silence from smothering her. Before Daniel’s death, she and Adam had talked about getting a therapy dog, one that would bond with their son and maybe enter his solitary world. They’d planned it as a Christmas surprise.

Daniel had died in the summer. She didn’t remember the Christmas following his death. She only remembered the emptiness of the house after Adam packed his bags and walked out. She remembered the heaviness of the air and of her sorrow. She remembered the anger that had simmered beneath the surface of that.

She had thought their relationship was strong enough to weather anything.

But anything had not included the death of their son.

She stepped into the mudroom, old linoleum crackling beneath her feet. A wide doorway led into the 1920s-style kitchen, the farmhouse sink and yellow subway tile just quaint enough to be chic. She and Adam had painted the walls ivory and the old pine cabinets bright white. Adam’s job as deputy sheriff of Whisper Lake, Maine, hadn’t paid much, but they’d managed to make the cottage their home. They’d been a team back then. Daniel’s autism diagnosis had tossed them into the deep water of parenting, and they’d clung to each other to keep from going under.

That had changed after Daniel’s death. Somehow, rather than mourning together, they’d mourned apart, their grief a raw wound between them, a deep chasm that neither had been able to cross.

Even after so many years, Charlotte sometimes wondered if she could have changed things. A word spoken into the silence. A hug offered at just the right time. Tears shared rather than hidden. Maybe they’d still be together.

But maybe not.

Probably not.

They’d been middle school kids when they’d met. Best friends. Allies. High school sweethearts. Too young to understand how challenging and heartbreaking life could be.

Floorboards creaked as she stepped into the small living room. Cozy was the word her grandmother had always used. Tiny was a more accurate description. When Daniel died, Charlotte and Adam had been saving money to build an addition. Instead, they’d purchased a burial plot and a casket.

Charlotte frowned. It had been years since she’d thought about that. So many dreams had died with Daniel. She’d created new dreams, crafted a new life, imagined herself leaving Whisper Lake dozens of times. Stayed through summers and autumns and long winters. Into springs and back through summers again. Seasons passing—life passing—while she sat on the swing on the back porch.

Would she still be there five years from now? Ten? Twenty-five? That was the question she’d been asking herself recently. The cottage had been standing in this spot for nearly a hundred years, the Sears Roebuck bungalow built by her great-grandfather and passed down from one family member to another. Her grandmother had deeded it to her a year before Daniel’s death—a twenty-first birthday gift and a celebration of the fact that Charlotte had made it through high school and college despite the challenges of teen pregnancy and a special-needs child.

Pregnant at seventeen. Married at eighteen. Grieving parent at twenty-two. Divorced at twenty-three. And now, at twenty-eight, alone and mostly happy about it. It was hard to be hurt when there was no one around to hurt you. The cottage held memories and sorrows, but being there was solitary and safe, and she craved that as much as she craved anything.

Clover loped through the living room, stopping near the front window, his head cocked to the side, his attention on the floor-length curtains. The lights were off, but she could see him there, a dark shadow in the gloom, his body stiff, his tail high and still. He growled, the sound making the hair on the back of her neck stand on end.

Clover didn’t growl.

He rarely barked.

His happy-go-lucky, calm personality made him the perfect therapy dog.

“What’s wrong, boy?” she asked, creeping to the window and easing the curtains back.

It was still dark, the first rays of sun hours away. The motion-sensor porch lights hadn’t been tripped, and the yard looked empty, the old maple tree a hulking shadow against the blue-black sky.

Clover growled again, pressing his nose against the windowpane.

Beyond the yard, a narrow dirt road separated her property from state land. Out here, there were more animals than people, more trees than houses and more hiking trails than roads. The only other house on Charlotte’s street belonged to Bubbles, her elderly neighbor. The octogenarian wandered the lake shore and the woods at all times of the day and night, collecting leaves and flowers, mushrooms and wild herbs. Charlotte had cautioned her to be careful. She wasn’t as young as she used to be, and it was very easy to get lost and hurt in the Maine wilderness. People died there. People disappeared. But Bubbles had grown up on the lake. She’d learned the land before she’d learned to read.

At least, that was what she’d told Charlotte.

Still, Charlotte worried, and Clover’s behavior made her worry more.

“Stay,” Charlotte commanded as she walked to the front door and opened it. Clover whined but dropped down onto his belly.

Good. The last thing she wanted was her dog getting in a tussle with a bear or a bobcat. More than likely, that was what he’d been growling at. On the off chance that Bubbles was outside, hurt or in trouble, Charlotte would take a quick walk to her property and make certain the old house was locked up tight. She grabbed her cell phone and tucked it into her pocket but didn’t bother grabbing the bowie knife she carried when she hiked. Whatever had been outside was probably long gone by now.

She stepped onto the porch, the security light turning on immediately. Somewhere in the distance an engine was rumbling. Surprised, Charlotte stood still and listened. The nearest paved road was a quarter mile away and stretched from the small town of Whisper Lake to its closest neighbor twenty miles away. During the day, the road got some traffic, but at night it was usually quiet.

A soft cry drifted through the darkness.

An animal?

She told herself it was, but her heart was racing, her pulse thrumming. Winter-dry grass snapped beneath her feet, the cold spring air seeping through her jeans and sweater. She reached the old fence that marked the beginning of Bubble’s property and stepped onto the road to get around it. A few hundred yards away, the house jutted up from the grassy landscape. Victorian and ornate, it had been on the bluff overlooking Whisper Lake for more than a century. Bubble’s family had owned it for most of that time.

It didn’t take long to reach the driveway. Bubble’s Oldsmobile was parked there, its glossy paint gleaming. The house was quiet, curtains pulled across the windows, the lights off. Charlotte tried the front door. Locked. Just like she’d hoped. The back door was locked, too.

Everything looked just as it should, but the air crackled with electricity and the engine still hummed in the distance. She went back to the road, told herself that she should go home, but something made her turn left instead of right. Toward the crossroad. Away from the cottage. Heading toward the stop sign and the paved road beyond it. She’d just reached it when something crashed through the trees a dozen yards away.

She jumped, her hand reaching for the bowie knife she hadn’t bothered bringing. A stupid mistake. One she vowed to never make again. There were predators out here. Usually, they didn’t bother people. Sometimes, though, food was scarce, they were hungry and they went after anything weaker than them.

Just head, asphalt marked the end of the private road she lived on. Headlights illuminated the dark pavement and a purse that lay abandoned there. Its contents had spilled out. Wallet. Lipstick. Keys. Phone. A few other odds and ends. None of them belonged in the middle of a country road in the darkest hours of the morning.

She pulled out her cell phone and dialed 911, staying out of the vehicle’s headlights. A truck. She could see that. Passenger door open. She couldn’t see the driver’s door.

That made her nervous.

The entire situation made her nervous.

She took a step back, the 911 operator’s voice ringing hollowly in her ear.

“Nine-one-one. What’s the nature of your emergency?”

“I need the police,” Charlotte responded, her focus on the truck, the open door, the purse.

“What—”

A woman screamed, the sound breaking the early-morning quiet and masking whatever else the operator said.

Charlotte whirled toward the sound, scanning the trees and the darkness, her heart pounding so frantically, she thought it might fly from her chest.

“Ma’am? Are you still there?” the 911 operator asked.

“I need the police,” she repeated, rattling off the address.

She could hear the heavy pant of someone’s breath, the thud of feet on dead leaves. A man stepped onto the road, his back to Charlotte, his body oddly misshapen.

She almost called out to him, but something kept her silent. A warning of danger that she heeded.

“Ma’am? Can you tell me what’s happening? Are you in danger?” the 911 operator asked.

As if he’d heard the words, the man swung around.

She realized the truth about two seconds too late.

He wasn’t misshapen.

He was carrying someone—a woman slung over his shoulders in a fireman’s carry.

Charlotte could think of a lot of reasons he might be doing that. Most of them weren’t good. Kidnapping came to mind. Carjacking. Murder.

Her instincts were telling her to run, but her conscience insisted she stay.

“What’s going on?” she called out, and the man took a step in her direction. Seemed to change his mind and turned toward the truck again.

The 911 operator was speaking, but Charlotte couldn’t make sense of the words. She was focused on the man. The open truck door. The escape that would be at hand once he got his victim into the vehicle.

“Put her down,” she demanded, and he swung around again.

He didn’t speak.

He didn’t warn her.

One minute, he was holding the woman. The next, he dropped her like she was a bag of garbage he’d brought to the dump.

“If you leave—” Charlotte began, planning to tell him that he could escape before the police arrived, that he could disappear and never be found.

But he moved quickly, his body silhouetted by headlights, his face hidden as he lifted his arm, pointed at her.

The world exploded, and she was flying, landing in soft grass and scratchy pine needles, her breath gone, the world spinning. Sky. Trees. Ground. Lake. The man. Moving toward her, a dark blur spinning like everything else.

She should be scared. She knew that, but her thoughts were sluggish, her limbs leaden. She couldn’t run if she wanted to. Couldn’t get up.

She heard sirens, feet on pavement, an engine roaring to life. Felt blood oozing from her chest, blood slushing in her ears.

Someone knelt beside her. Not the man. A woman. Hair in her face, hands pressing against the wound in Charlotte’s chest.

“Don’t die,” the woman murmured.

She said something else, but the words were drowned out by the starless sky, the cool spring morning, the screaming sirens and the velvety darkness that swallowed them all.

* * *

Charlotte had changed.

That shouldn’t have surprised Special Agent Adam Whitfield. He hadn’t seen his ex-wife in five years. A lot had happened since then. He’d completed his master’s in criminal profiling and had joined the FBI. He’d rented an apartment in the suburbs of Boston, created an entirely new life for himself.

He was nothing like the twenty-four-year-old kid who’d driven away from Whisper Lake. He shouldn’t have expected that Charlotte would be the same person he’d left behind. He hadn’t expected it.

But he’d still been shocked when he’d seen her. Not because she was connected to machines, tubes running from her chest and her arms. He’d been prepared for that. He hadn’t been prepared to see how thin she’d become, how frail. Her cheekbones were chiseled, her jawline defined. Even her hands were thinner, her fingers longer and leaner.

In the seventy-two hours since he’d arrived, he’d gotten used to the tubes, to the hushed whisper of her breathing and the soft hiss of oxygen. He hadn’t gotten used to the newer, frailer version of his ex-wife.

The woman he’d been friends with, fallen in love with, married.

The one he’d had a son with.

Lost a son with.

Abandoned.

He frowned.

Abandoned was a harsh word, but an accurate one. He’d walked out on Charlotte because he hadn’t been able to bear walking past Daniel’s empty bedroom every morning. He’d wanted a fresh start in a new place, and he’d thought that Charlotte would want the same. When she’d refused to move away with him, he’d left the cottage, the town and the lake with his head high and his heart shattered.

He hadn’t looked back, hadn’t returned for even a visit. Hadn’t called to see how she was, hadn’t checked in on her to see if she needed anything. They’d split their marital assets, washed their hands of one another and moved on.

Or that was what they were supposed to have done.

Moving on from the person who held your heart wasn’t easy.

Now he was there, noticing the deep hollows beneath Charlotte’s cheekbones and the dark circles beneath her eyes. She’d cut her hair short and lost too much weight, but if he let himself, he knew he could still see the girl she’d been when she’d walked into his seventh-grade classroom all those years ago.

He brushed a strand of straight black hair from her cheek.

“Are you in there, Charlotte?” he asked.

She didn’t respond. Not with a twitch or a flutter of her eyelids. If they’d still been married, he’d have touched her cheek, lifted her limp hand and squeezed it gently. He’d have leaned close and whispered that he was there and that everything was going to be okay.

Instead, he let his hand drop away, settled back into his chair. He was tired, his muscles stiff from too many hours sitting. When he wasn’t working, he liked to keep active—running, hiking, rock climbing, kayaking. Being still and quiet wasn’t his thing and never had been.

“You should go for a walk,” his boss, Wren Santino, said, breaking the silence.

“You’ve made that suggestion a dozen times in the past couple of hours,” he responded, meeting her dark eyes.

“And?”

“I haven’t done it yet.”

“If you had, I wouldn’t have to keep suggesting it,” she replied reasonably.

“I want to be here when she wakes up.”

“Because you’re hoping to question her?” It was a legitimate question. Adam had planned to travel to Whisper Lake after he’d received a call from the Maine State Police saying that they might have another victim of the Night Stalker. One that had survived.

At the time, he’d had no idea that Charlotte was involved. All he’d known was that a young nurse had been abducted from the Whisper Lake Medical Center, that she’d escaped thanks to a Good Samaritan who’d been shot while intervening. That she fit the profile of the victims of a serial killer Adam and the FBI’s Special Crimes Unit had been pursuing for years. The Maine State Police thought it was possible—even probable—that her abductor was the Night Stalker.

Adam had been ready to travel to Whisper Lake to speak with the local police, interview the nurse and decide for himself whether the case fit the Night Stalker’s MO. He’d shoved aside thoughts of Daniel and Charlotte. He’d reminded himself that he had a job to do. He’d already had his vehicle packed for the trip when Wren had called him into her office and shown him the case file she’d received from the state PD. That was when he’d seen Charlotte’s name. That was when he’d understood just how personal the Night Stalker case had become.

It was also when Wren had informed him that he wouldn’t be part of the FBI team traveling to Maine. She planned to keep him in the loop but felt that it would be better for him and for Charlotte if he kept his distance.

He’d argued.

She’d insisted, so he’d taken personal leave and headed to Whisper Lake against her wishes.

Because he couldn’t not be there.

It didn’t matter that he and Charlotte were divorced. It didn’t matter that they hadn’t seen each other for five years. He wouldn’t let her lie in a hospital bed without family to advocate for her. He’d known that with her grandparents gone, she’d have no one.

Now she had him.

“I take it you’re not going to answer?” Wren said, taking a sip from a carryout cup of coffee.

“She may have seen his face,” he responded, sidestepping the question.

“I suppose this would be a good time to remind you that you’re on leave.”

“You’ve reminded me every hour on the hour since we arrived.”

“That’s an exaggeration,” she said with a half smile.

“Not much of one.”

“You know this guy’s MO better than anyone. You should be lead on this case,” she responded. No judgment. Just a statement of the facts as she saw them.

“Charlotte has no family. She needs someone in her corner.”

“She has our team. We’re not going to let anything happen to her. And not just because she’s a possible witness.”

“She needs someone she’s familiar with. Someone who knows her.”

“I could argue that she has people she’s familiar with and who know her. This is a small town. If we let news of her injury leak out, she’ll have plenty of friends standing in her corner.”

“If her identity leaks out—” he began.

“You don’t have to explain, Adam. We’re all aware of how dangerous that could be.”

Law enforcement had kept Charlotte’s identity quiet. Aside from her neighbor, Bubbles, only medical personnel knew she was the person who’d intervened in the attempted abduction. The less information available to the public, the less information available to the Night Stalker and the easier it would be to ensure Charlotte’s safety.

“Just so you know,” he said, “I’m not planning to leave Whisper Lake until she’s recovered enough to know what’s going on and what her options are.”

“Which options are we talking about? Because the way I see things, the only option she has is to cooperate with the investigation.”

“You gave Bethany Andrews the choice of staying in town with police protection or going into witness protection until the Night Stalker is apprehended.” The young nurse had chosen to enter witness protection. She’d been terrified that the man who’d abducted her after her shift at Whisper Lake Medical Center would come after her again.

“She and her fiancé are entering the program together. Currently, Bethany is in a secure location while she waits for medical clearance to travel. She did sustain a concussion and some memory loss from the attack. Charlotte’s situation is different.”

“How so?”

“She was never the Night Stalker’s intended victim.”

“She was the person who stopped him from getting what he wanted,” he pointed out.

Wren nodded her agreement. “True, and if she saw the shooter, we may be able to close this case quickly.”

“Quickly? We’ve put a lot of time and manpower into stopping the Night Stalker.” Five years. Four states. Nine victims. All emergency room nurses who had been abducted after late-night shifts. All killed by single gunshot wounds to their heads, their bodies discovered weeks to months after they’d disappeared. Ballistic testing had proved that the weapon used had been the same with each victim. A savvy Boston police detective had noticed the link. He’d contacted the FBI to help the investigation into what was obviously a serial killer. The case had been handed over to the Special Crimes Unit, and Wren had chosen Adam to put together the Night Stalker’s profile—white male working in a sales field, a loner in his mid to late twenties who lived somewhere in New England. Someone without connections who could come and go without suspicion.

The criminal profile had been circulated to every law enforcement agency in the northeast, but the Night Stalker remained at large. Bethany would have been his tenth victim. She fit the profile of his victims perfectly—emergency room nurse with dark hair and blue eyes, slight build, outgoing personality.

There was a difference, though.

Unlike the Night Stalker’s other victims, Bethany worked at a small-town hospital. The other nurses had worked in city hospitals—Massachusetts General, Rhode Island Hospital, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Yale New Haven Hospital.