Dead Cold Mysteries Box Set #1: Books 1-4 (A Dead Cold Box Set), Blake Banner [classic children's novels txt] 📗

captain was showing him the warrant as I pushed past him and ran up the stairs. I could hear Newman asking him, “Where were you this afternoon at three p.m.?”

I went into the master bedroom. I could hear Sanchez and his partner coming up behind me. I went onto the landing, pointing back into the bedroom. “Every drawer, under the bed, every inch for any trace of her.”

I checked the other bedrooms and shouted, “When you’re done in there, check the other rooms. Every damned inch!”

I ran down the stairs. The captain was still talking to Peter. Peter was saying, “I have been here all afternoon. My wife will attest to that!”

I butted in. “Is there a cellar?”

He still looked scandalized. “What?”

“Is there a cellar?” My voice rang out loud and ugly. I grabbed him by the scruff of the neck. “Is there a goddamn cellar?”

He looked terrified. Jennifer had her hands over her mouth. He said, “Yes,” and led me to the kitchen. The cellar door was not locked. I switched on the light and ran down. Peter and the captain followed. As with the other house, it was one large room. There was a boiler against one wall. There was a washing machine and a dryer. There were boxes stacked here and there. I went to each wall, tapping, listening for a hollow echo. I felt sick. My heart was racing. I checked my phone. I had two minutes.

Suddenly, something snapped, and I lunged at him and grabbed him by the throat with my left hand. I had my automatic in my right, and I thrust it in his face and screamed at him, “Where is she? Tell me where you have her or I swear I’ll blow your fucking brains all over the walls!”

The captain was shouting at me, “John! John! Get a grip!”

Peter had his eyes closed and was repeating, “Oh God! Oh God! Oh God!”

Then there was a noise. It was loud and jarring, and we all stopped and stared at each other. My skin went cold and pasty, and I felt my hair prickle. It was an electronic beeping, like an alarm clock on a cell phone.

I heard myself say, “No…”

I pulled Dehan’s phone from my pocket. The time was up.

And in that instant it hit me.

I ran.

I ran scrambling up the stairs. I could hear the captain shouting after me. I ignored him and bolted through the house. Jennifer was there, still with her hands over her mouth. I leapt down the steps and sprinted along the wet pavement toward Barkley Avenue, with the rain drenching my hair and my face. It must have taken me twenty seconds, no more, but each stride was an eternity. I skidded and fell on the corner. Scrambled to my feet and ran for the alley.

Another agonizing twenty seconds. My lungs were screaming. My heart was pounding so hard I felt my head was going to explode. I was screaming her name through the rain. I stared at the lockups. Which one?

“Which one?”

I blew the lock off Peter’s and hauled up the roller blind. It was empty. I ran across to the GCS units. I blew off the lock on the first and dragged up the blind. There were only computers. I went to the next, took aim, and that was when I smelled it. I froze. Then I put on the safety and hammered the padlock with the butt of my gun. It sprang and I dragged the door open.

There was a canister of butane gas. There was a valve with a timer attached. It was hissing loudly. Dehan was lying on the floor. Her wrists and ankles were tightly bound with duct tape. She had tape across her mouth. Her eyes were closed, and her skin was cold and pale like marble.

I bit back the tears and whispered, “No… Oh no…”

I turned off the gas and picked her up in my arms. I carried her out into the rain and laid her on the ground. I pulled the tape from her mouth and felt for a pulse in her neck. There was nothing. She was dead. I pumped her chest, pinched her nose, and blew hard into her mouth. Pumped again on her chest. Blew hard into her mouth. Pumped.

I pulled my penknife from my pocket and cut the tape from her wrists, spreading her arms out to open up her lungs. I shouted at her, “Come on, goddamn it, Dehan! Don’t do this to me!”

I pounded hard on her chest again, pumped up and down, put my mouth over hers, and blew hard and steady.

She made a horrible noise, like a car that won’t start. Her eyes snapped open, and she gasped in great gulps of air. Then she rolled on her side and vomited, copiously. I stood and looked away, clenching my teeth and blessing the rain for hiding my tears, mixed with laughter and sobs of relief.

A figure was moving up the alley at a run. It was the captain. I shouted to him in a strangled voice. “She’s alive. But we need an ambulance!”

He stopped running and pulled his cell from his pocket, striding toward us as he dialed. I turned back to Dehan and knelt by her side. She looked yellow in the limpid light. She tried a smile but didn’t quite make it.

“I knew you’d come.”

I picked her up in my arms and carried her back toward Barkley Avenue. I said softly, “Who was it, Dehan? Who did this to you?”

She looked up into my face and touched my cheek with her fingers. “I don’t remember anything, Stone. Except I knew you’d come.”

Twenty-One

I had my ass on my desk, and the captain was sitting in Dehan’s chair. It was nine p.m. and I had just