Blood Orchard Part 5

She rubbed her pounding head, and then looked at her hand. She was glad it was clean. The last thing she wanted to worry about was a flesh wound. She had ten minutes until the bell rang for homeroom. At that thought, she looked up. The backpack straps fluttered with the rustling field, as if they had adapted to their new surroundings.

Francine stood and eyed the barbed wire. She wondered how she was going to bypa.s.s it. She needed her backpack. It not only contained her science project worth half of her grade, but also three-fourths of her textbooks.

She looked up the road. Walking around Mr. Adler's property for two blocks to his front door was out of the question. She had seen him numerous times on her way to school patrolling the premises with a shotgun. She guessed he was paranoid that the Blondies might vandalize his brand-new barn.

She knew there was only one way to retrieve the backpack. She had to scale the barbed wire.

Jay stopped and caught his breath. The last time he ran was a year ago when he had done the story on pit bull fighting. One of the snarling prizefighters had broken loose and chased him out of the pen, nipping at his heels all the way to the door. He felt as if he was reliving that day. Here he was doing the hundred-yard dash from a homicide detective.

"Shoot."

He stood at a dead end. A cedar privacy fence towered a foot above him. He knew he had to climb over it. He was not about to turn around and walk across Woolridge's front yard with a friendly wave to Barter. He reached up and grabbed the top of the fence. Splinters poked his hands as he raised himself. He held his breath as he wriggled his midsection over the top.

I feel like I'm in boot camp.

He dropped down on the other side. The dirt sank beneath his feet, swallowing his ankles. He stumbled out of the muddy ground with a squelch, looked over his shoulder. He a.s.sumed that he had trampled Woolridge's garden, but it sure had seemed like a fresh grave. He shook off the thought and glanced at his dark surroundings.

A clothesline draped with undergarments swayed amidst silhouetted sycamores. There was a puddled birdbath, a leaning feeder, and a scattering of pinwheels that spun in the breeze.

A strange scent stirred Jay's memory. There was a hint of apples on the wind that sparked reflections of the Texaco's pantry. He guessed that there was an orchard nearby, which would explain the gas station's surplus.

Pounding snapped Jay back into action. He envisioned Barter rapping at Woolridge's front door. He scanned the cluttered yard. The privacy fence lacked a gate. There was one way out, and that meant scaling the slats again. He hoped that his next climb would yield a solid landing. The last thing he wanted to do was dig himself out of an even deeper hole.

CHAPTER SIX.

"I don't want any bibles, Mister! Now scoot off back to the mission!"

"Ms. h.e.l.ler, I'm not a salesman, I'm Detective Barter. We spoke on the phone."

Francine's haggard face flushed like a skin sc.r.a.pe. Her lip curled until the cigarette b.u.t.t fell to the porch. She stomped on the sparks as if they were c.o.c.kroaches.

"What did you say?"

"I'm Detective Barter, Chicago Homicide." He thrust his credentials in her face.

"I'll be G.o.dd.a.m.ned. Who the h.e.l.l was in my house then?"

"Sorry?"

"Some guy just interrogated me a few minutes ago."

Barter concealed his ID and flipped out a memo pad. "Did he claim to be me?"

"Well," Francine stammered as she glanced up and down Sangralea. "No, not exactly. I a.s.sumed it was you. Who else would be knocking on my door at this hour?"

"What did he look like?"

"He was a ginger, looked like a grown up Opie. Wore a dirty leather jacket and jeans."

Barter stroked his mustache. "That sounds like Mr. Woolridge."

Francine's eyes widened and her brows raised. "Woolridge? That old coot's bedridden. Hasn't left his house in weeks. And he's bald as an eagle."

"No kidding. If you don't mind, Ms. h.e.l.ler, I do have some questions for you. I'll keep them brief."

"I've had enough questions tonight."

The door slammed in Barter's face. He broke out his pad and scribbled a footnote: Follow up.

After a moment of squirming, Coren managed to sit up against the wall. He felt like a gigantic pinched nerve. His head, jaw, shoulders, chest, ribs, and wrists throbbed in harmony.

He stared out through the front door frame as the sound of crunching gravel faded into the night. He had expected to hear an engine rumble to life. Pritchard's footfalls confirmed that the psychopath had been staking him out.

"Christ."

Coren groaned as he stood, spine straight along the wall. He thought about the confiscated evidence. Dread roiled in his gut. He was unconcerned about the b.l.o.o.d.y steak knife and Minute Maid carton. Sure the knife handle was covered with his fingerprints, but the blade was thick with cow DNA. And the orange juice carton was superfluous, a mere sticky sc.r.a.p of cardboard that needed to be trashed. The barbed wire, on the other hand, was a different story. His fingerprints were all over it, as were bits and pieces of a missing girl's flesh. Pritchard had made a good point. "Exhibit C" would be the nail in his coffin, regardless if he was innocent.

He staggered through the living room, stepped over the orange pool on the linoleum. He was relieved that Pritchard had left his gin alone, besides draining his tumbler without a chaser. He grabbed the bottle of Seagram's, uncapped it, and took a swig. He closed his eyes as the alcohol warmed his stomach. He took two more gulps and felt his pain subside.

He looked down at the mess. Ants emerged from the shadows of the refrigerator, drawn to the scent like vultures to carrion. He lacked the motivation to get down on his hands and knees and scrub the floor. Any other time - say when a crazy cop hadn't kicked his a.s.s - he would have mopped it up like the clean freak that he was.

The telephone rang. Coren jumped, and then winced. Who would be calling at such a late hour? Didn't they know that he was busy hiding a runaway while striving to look innocent? He had two guesses as to the caller. It was either Pritchard or his boss Garrison, neither one of whom he wished to speak to. He picked up the receiver and listened, waiting for the caller to speak.

"h.e.l.lo? Coren?"

"Deb." He sighed and sat at the table. "Can I call you back? I have -"

"No, you're not calling me back! You don't call back when you drop me that line! Where's my box of photos?"

The panic room flashed in Coren's mind. "Huh? You woke me up for this?"

"I'm coming over to get them tomorrow."

"Wait a second!" The receiver slipped in his clammy hand. "I'll bring you the box! What time do you want me to stop by?"

"You're not stopping by. Roger will knock you out."

Roger. The name sparked his anger like dynamite. He hated everything about it. It was a happy name, like Jolly Roger or Roger Rabbit, and that made him spit nails.

"Well you can't come over here! I haven't even unpacked yet!"

"See you at seven, Coren."

"I told you I haven't -"

The click killed his retort. He ripped out the telephone cord and threw the receiver.

"d.a.m.n!"

He growled, shook his head. His house was trashed and he had a girl locked in the spare bedroom. He needed to dig out the box of photos and set it on the doorstep. Knowing Deb, she would want a tour. Maybe he could head her off and tell her he had company. Then again, if he did that, she would definitely want to enter. He rubbed his eyes and looked at the clock. He had eight hours to clean Pritchard's mess.

He pushed back from the table. It's going to be a long night.

Jay's jacket snagged on the fence and he toppled over, landing in a sandbur patch. He cursed and hoped the commotion went unheard. He trampled the burs and looked ahead. An open field rustled in the breeze. In the distance, there was a barn with an attached silo and a dark three-story house. Barbed wire encircled the property from the line of privacy fences to the curbs of East Walnut and Railroad Street. Jay wondered if it was the only farm in town. He failed to recall pa.s.sing any others on his mad dash through the checkpoint.

He crouched, pulled the sandburs off his shoes. He considered heading for the barn. Maybe it was abandoned and he could hide there for the night. It seemed risky to return to the gas station. The town was crawling with cops and there was probably an APB out on him. The barn, if it was vacant, sounded like his best bet.

He thought of Jeanette, Karley, and Keira as he stood and hurried across the field. He had yet to call and tell them that he was in a tight spot. They had to be worried sick. Jeanette would think something terrible happened to him, since he was typically home from work by 6:00pm. It was five or six hours past by now. Add another eighteen hours and there would be a missing person report filed and his face would be smiling on WNDY and every other TV station across the country. Once Barter and Pritchard caught wind of it, he would have a warrant issued for his arrest.

Jeanette's going to kill me.

He sprinted to the side of the barn. It was a weathered structure with clouded windows and a storm-tossed roof that sheltered half of the interior. Jay was certain it was deserted. Only a mad farmer would pen his livestock in a barn that was on the verge of collapsing.

He walked along the wall, peered around the corner. The Victorian house loomed a hundred yards from the barn and was still dark. A porch swing creaked like rotted floorboards.

Something moved near the front steps.

Jay squinted at the dark shape that bobbed in a nearby bush. The pit bull turned and stepped from the shadows. Its teeth glinted like meat cleavers as it growled, sensing danger. Within seconds it spotted Jay. He ran for the doors and the dog charged at him, barking and snarling.

A light illuminated the third story of the house. Jay grabbed the rusted handle and threw open the door. The pit bull yelped as it reached the end of its chain, yanked back like a yo-yo five feet from its prey. Jay slipped inside the barn and shut the door. He ducked into a stall and crouched behind a hay bale.

"Shut your stink hole, Collie! What's all this ruckus about, huh? I swear I'll lock you in that silo!"

Jay's body went rigid. He held his breath. The pit bull began barking again.

"Shut your stink hole!" The raspy voice paused. Jay heard a clack. "What? What's so threatening in there? Huh? Do we got us a trespa.s.ser? Well, let's just see if we got us a trespa.s.ser."

The pit bull growled. Jay peeked around the hay bale. The door creaked and a shotgun barrel poked inside. Jay's eyes widened. A stocky man in green long johns and cowboy boots pa.s.sed the stall. His finger twitched on the trigger.

"If somebody's hiding in here, I'll blow off your G.o.dd.a.m.n head! I don't harbor no babynappers! You hear me?"

Jay's legs trembled beneath his weight. He prayed the farmer was too tired to inspect each stall. His ankle cracked above the crunch of straw. The farmer's footsteps faltered.

What happened next nearly gave Jay a heart attack. A shotgun blast rang out. Gla.s.s shattered. Seconds later, there was a second bang. Another window exploded. Jay rocked back against the wall, clenching his teeth. He was on the verge of wetting himself.

His mind ran rampant. Should he attempt to heave the hay bale at the farmer and then grab his shotgun? But what if they struggled and the gun went off? He pictured the news headline: ONWARD FARMER KILLED BY WNDY REPORTER. Maybe hiding was a better idea. If he accidentally shot the farmer, everyone would be convinced that he was the madman who kidnapped the Trammell triplets.

The shotgun fired. Gla.s.s rained down on Jay as he ducked his head and covered his ears. Another blast and a window reduced to shards.

"Well, Collie, you think I scared him off?" Jay looked up and saw the farmer walk by, and then pause at the door. "If there's anybody out here still, they best get off my land!"

The door slammed and Jay swore he heard the click of a lock. He took deep breaths, trying to slow his heartbeat, though the air was stuffy and thick with gun smoke. The pit bull barked outside, unconvinced that the trespa.s.ser was gone.

"Shut your stink hole!"

The dog yelped and stopped barking. Jay listened to the farmer's footsteps echo on the porch. He sat down and sighed. It was only a matter of time before the authorities received a call that shots were fired. Suddenly the barn seemed more like a crime scene than a haven.

Jay shook the gla.s.s out of his hair, stood, and furrowed his brow. Save for the straw and stalls, his surroundings looked nothing like a barn. Instead, it had the eerie resemblance of a medieval torture chamber.

CHAPTER SEVEN.

Coren awoke with a start. A rolled up Tribune shivered in his lap. The paperboy had delivered his wake-up call, straight through the open doorway, and smacked him square in the chest.

He gazed bleary-eyed at the day beyond. It was bright, promising. But promising what? Another visit from Pritchard? A pit stop by his adulterous ex-wife who was dying for her faded photographs?

On that thought, he grabbed the newspaper, jumped up, and looked at the clock. 6:30am. He had pa.s.sed out against the living room wall, exhausted from cleaning house until the wee hours. He had mopped up the orange juice in the kitchen, vacuumed the gla.s.s in the living room, and tossed the remnants of the coffee table into the panic room. His last task had been to hinge the front door, but he had instead succ.u.mbed to his drunken stupor.

He removed the rubber band and slapped the Tribune on the counter beside the Seagram's bottle. The bold headline snagged him like a meat hook. Shots Fired at Four in Onward.

Last night swirled in Coren's head. Had Pritchard gone on a shooting rampage after he left the house? He scanned the story. It stated that four different townies had been shot at around 11:00pm. The Trammell's, of all people, were awaken by the shattering of their picture window. Harold Jeter, the janitor at J. Edgar High, nearly had a stroke when the princ.i.p.al's office window imploded. Ray Ratner discovered a bullet hole in the side of a Main Street mailbox. Homicide Detective Frank Barter made the "shots fired" call when a slug pierced the windshield of his LeSabre.

Coren paled at the fourth account. There was a detective in town, more than likely working with Pritchard to crack the case. That meant he would soon have another cop ransacking his house for evidence.

He tossed the newspaper into the trash. He had more important things to worry about at the moment. His ex-wife would arrive in a half-hour and he had yet to dig out the box of photographs.

His mind wandered back to the well girl. He had kept her in the panic room all night. When he had disposed of the coffee table she had been leaning against the wall, her eyes a blank stare and her mouth agape. He had tried talking to her, but she was stiff and unresponsive. He wondered if she was malnourished or dehydrated. He opened the refrigerator and grabbed an apple out of the crisper, then headed for the hallway.

He paused and pressed his ear against the pocket door. The room was silent.

Of course it's silent, you idiot. It's soundproof.

He mentally kicked himself, and then opened the door. The girl sat against the wall, as she had hours earlier, slack and catatonic.

Coren crouched before her. "Hey. Are you hungry? Do you want something to eat? I have an apple."

He offered the fruit. The girl's eyes rolled into her head. She seized her curly hair and tugged at it. Her eyes shut, then sprang open.