Chasing the Lost (3 page)

There was another muzzle flash directly ahead. Chase sensed the bullet flying by overhead, and heard the dull smack as it hit the house. He fired, four quick shots in the direction of the flash, the sharp crack of his pistol splitting the night’s quiet.

There was a muffled curse, harsh whispers. Whatever was to Chase’s left front was coming closer, and he aimed that way, almost firing, then relaxing his finger when he realized it was Chelsea, dragging herself back. He felt a brief rush of relief that she was alive. He shifted back toward the front. He heard a car door open, and saw the interior lights of an SUV parked on the street, and a dark figure helping another one in.

Chase got to one knee and steadied the pistol in a sure, two-handed grip. As he was about to fire, Chelsea was at his side, panting in pain. And someone was right behind him.

He rolled, bringing the gun up, and once more relaxed his finger when he saw Sarah standing there.

“Don’t sneak up—” Chase began, but Sarah knelt next to Chelsea and cradled her as she whimpered in pain. The SUV’s engine started and it raced away, peeling rubber.

Chase slowly got to his feet, the adrenaline rush of the action still jazzing his nerves.
Welcome to Spanish Wells
, he thought.

“Oh, my God,” Sarah said and Chase could see the blood covering her front.

“You hit?” Chase asked.

“No,” Sarah replied.

Chase knelt next to Chelsea, and saw the blood bubbling out of her chest amidst the thick fur.

“Damn it,” he cursed, bringing the gun up in the direction of the vehicle speeding away. He almost fired, but at the last second remembered all the homes lining the street, and what a ricochet round might do.

Chase put a fresh, full magazine in the gun, and shoved the pistol back in the holster. He probed the wound with his fingers. The blood was frothy, meaning it was mixed with air. Sucking chest wound—the round had gone through one, if not both, lungs.

Chase scooped up Chelsea in both arms. “Open the door,” he ordered as he carried her into the house. He laid her down next to the footlocker and threw open the lid. He pulled out his combat vest, and ripped open one of the pockets containing a HALO chest seal. He slapped it on the wound, then took out a packet of QuickClot Combat Gauze. He tore it open and pressed that over the chest seal, maintaining the pressure with one hand as he checked for an exit wound with the other.

None that he could find, but he couldn’t be certain.

Then he realized Sarah was standing there, her shirt soaked in Chelsea’s blood. She was staring down at the both of them in a daze.

“What about your son?” he asked Sarah, remembering the boy on the bike.

She blinked, as if coming back into the nightmare of the evening. Her eyes went wide. “They grabbed him. They’ve got Cole.”

“What the hell is going on?” Chase demanded as he checked Chelsea once more. The bandage and seal were working; bleeding and losing air through the wound was stopped. That was good. Still no sign of an exit wound. That was bad.

“They kidnapped Cole,” Sarah said once more. She had her arms wrapped around her body, shaking. “I couldn’t stop them.”

“Who kidnapped him?”

“I don’t know.”

“Call the cops,” Chase ordered. On Sarah’s face, he could see shock setting in.

“They’ve got Cole.” She said it as if she didn’t believe it. She blinked. “We need to get your dog to a vet.”

Chase looked up from checking Chelsea’s wound and spoke distinctly, combat mode when trying to get through to someone in shock. “Call. Nine. One. One.”

She shook her head slowly. “We can’t go to the police, and we especially can’t go to Spanish Wells Security. You saw them today.”

“This is kidnapping. Not some dispute over a dog.”

She seemed adamant. “We can’t call the police.”

“The guys in the SUV have him?” Chase asked.

Sarah had not stopped shaking her head. “Two men in a boat snatched him off the dock where he was crabbing.” She nodded over her shoulder. “The house is on the other side of the street. Backs onto Broad Creek.”

Chase knew that boat was gone into the dark, up Broad Creek, into the Intracoastal and gone among the thousands of barrier islands and miles of wetlands. “I still think you should call the police and—” He stopped as Chelsea whined loudly, struggling in his arms. He grabbed some disinfectant, and gingerly poured it into Chelsea’s wound as he pulled back the bandage. She whined once more, but didn’t fight him as he pressed the bandage back on the wound.

With a shaking hand, Sarah pulled her cell phone out of her pocket. Using an ACE wrap, Chase secured the bandage and seal to Chelsea. She whined in pain, but didn’t try to pull away.

“Good girl.”

“Closest veterinarian!” Sarah shouted into the phone.

“Searching your location,”
the phone replied. There was a pause, then the mechanical female voice continued.
“I found three veterinarians. One of them is fairly close to you.”

Sarah did something on the screen of her phone and put it to her ear. There was a pause, then Sarah spoke rapidly. “We have a dog that’s been shot. She’s hurt badly.”

Another pause, then Sarah looked at Chase. “The vet will meet us at her office. Twelve-forty Palmetto Road. Do you know where that is?”

“Yeah.”

Once more, Chase scooped Chelsea up and carried her out to the Jeep, Sarah following. He laid the dog down in the back, then jumped in the driver’s seat as he tugged on a black pullover that had been draped over the steering wheel. As soon as Sarah slid into the passenger seat, he threw the Jeep in gear and raced down the driveway, spitting out gravel and taking the turn onto the hardtop too fast.

With the wind whistling past them and his focus on the road, there was no more conversation as Chase raced out of Brams Point and onto the Island’s main drag. He tried to remember if he’d seen a Vet’s office on his way to his new home in the morning, an event that seemed very long ago now.

“Eleven-ten,” Sarah called out, pointing to the right as she spotted an address. “It will be on that side. Soon.”

Chase saw a light go on in a window ahead and turned the wheel, skidding to a halt in front of the building. It was an old service station, painted bright green. Chase jumped out, picking up Chelsea and carrying her to the door. Sarah was ahead, opening it.

Chase came to an abrupt halt as he spotted a woman wearing jeans and a green smock waiting for him. Her red hair was fiery as he remembered, but cut short now, tight and efficient. “Erin?”

The veterinarian smiled. “Horace Chase. Been a long time. I got your message, but you didn’t leave a callback number and it just said private line.” The smile faded as she saw the blood on his and Sarah’s clothes. “Bring your dog in here.” She pointed toward a swinging door and led the way.

Chase carried Chelsea in, and gently set her down on an operating table. Erin already had a needle out, and expertly stuck it in Chelsea’s right front leg.

She looked at the ACE wrap, bandage, and seal. “You know what you’re doing. QuickClot. That’s good. And the seal.” She glanced up at him. “But that’s Army gear and Army training, isn’t it?”

“Yeah.”

“All right. West Point, and all that good stuff. Never saw you again after you left for the Academy. Tried to call you, and you never called back. Tried to write, and you never wrote back.” Erin shifted her focus back to the dog. “She’s stable. You can go back out now. I’ll take care of her.”

Chase nodded and slowly backed up.

Erin smiled. “Good to see you again, Chase.”

Chase could only nod, then his back was against the door and he almost stumbled out into the front room. Sarah had collapsed on a rumpled old bean-bag couch at one end of the room. He half-smiled, thinking the couch and the rest of the waiting area fit Erin Brannigan as he spotted a large rocking unicorn in the corner. At least the seventeen year-old Erin Brannigan he remembered with surprising clarity from his teenage years. Weeks, Chase reminded himself. He’d only known her weeks.

“You need to call nine-one-one,” he said.

Sarah was about to answer when the door to the operating room flew open, and Erin stuck her head out. Her red hair was covered with a surgical cap and her smock had a splatter of blood on it, and Chase felt a moment’s déjà vu, remembering the Evac Center in Kandahar, waiting on the doc to tell him about one of his men.

“Get in here, Chase. I need help to get the bullet out.”

Chase ran to the door, following Erin to the large, blood-stained table where Chelsea lay on her side. An IV ran into one leg above the wrist and a large mask covered her muzzle, a pump rhythmically working.

“She has a pneumothorax on the left side,” Erin said as she took a position on one end of the table, pointing for Chase to get on the other. “The bullet hit the chest obliquely before penetrating, or else she’d be dead. It cracked a rib before piercing the lung.”

“Where’s the bullet now?” Chase asked.

Erin shook her head. “In the lung. I need you to hold the outer wound open so I can go in and line up the pleural wound, remove the bullet, then suture it.”

Chase nodded and grabbed a pair of surgical gloves.

“Here.” Erin pointed. “Push the skin forward.”

Chase did as instructed. He looked up as Sarah stuck her head in the door. “Do you need my help?”

“No,” Erin snapped without looking at her. “Hold it there,” Erin ordered Chase. He watched as she used a scalpel to cut into the wound, widening the narrow opening so she could work. Then she dropped the scalpel and picked up a pair of forceps and forced them in. Chase glanced at the swinging door. There was no sign of Sarah.

“Steady,” Erin whispered, as much to herself, Chase figured, as to him, as she maneuvered the forceps inside of Chelsea’s chest. She clamped down, and then carefully pulled the forceps out. She dropped a disfigured bullet into a tray along with the forceps.

“Keep holding,” she ordered. She grabbed a tube and placed it in the wound. “I’m tunneling under the skin following the entry pattern of the bullet.”

Chase maintained his hold on Chelsea’s chest. He could see it rising and falling, but knew that could be the machine working, and had to wonder if she would be capable of breathing on her own.

Erin got the tube in, then grabbed a suture. “This is going to take a little time. I’ve got to do three layers of closure. The pleura, the subcutaneous, then the skin.”

Chase nodded, wondering why there was no sound of sirens. He watched as Erin worked quickly and efficiently, her long fingers tying off the sutures. As she worked her way outward to the skin, she began speaking again.

“OK, Chase. As soon as I get this last in place, we’ve got to immediately re-establish negative pressure in the chest so she can breathe on her own. Go to that cabinet and grab a three-way stopcock, and attach it to the end of the chest tube. Then get a thirty-five-cc syringe, and attach it to the stopcock.”

Chase did as she instructed.
Where were the police?
He had the syringe on the stopcock just as Erin finished the last suture. She reached up and turned the stopcock. She pulled on the syringe, extracting air from Chelsea’s chest cavity, and then closed the stopcock. She expelled the air in the syringe. She repeated it several more times, and then suddenly Chelsea twitched, coughed into the mask, and began breathing on her own.

Erin immediately stopped what she doing, reached up, and pulled the mask off Chelsea’s muzzle. She smiled at Chase. “I think she’ll be all right.”

“Thank you.” Chase looked toward the door and saw it was cracked open, and Sarah was peeking in once more. “Did you call the police?” Chase called to her.

She disappeared without answering, and Erin gave him a quizzical look. “Wife?”

Chase shook his head.

“Girlfriend?”

Chase indicated negatively once more. “I just met her today.”

Erin laughed. “Horace Chase. Always the bad boy.”

Chase bit off telling her about the kidnapping. “I need to talk to her.”

“I’ll clean up in here,” Erin said, sensing the mood.

Chase went into the waiting area. He saw that Sarah had her cell phone out, and he assumed she was finally calling the police.

As soon as she started talking, he knew he had assumed wrong.

“Walter!” she cried out. “They’ve kidnapped our boy.”

Chase couldn’t make out what was being said on the other end. Sarah listened for a few moments, then cut in, voice shrill. “Damn it, Walter. What the hell is going on?”

Again, a pause.

“Who? Who is doing this?”

She listened, her eyes shifting to Chase, tears beginning to fill them.

“You think? You don’t know?”

Another pause, this time longer. Chase wished he could hear the other end of the conversation.

“What should I do?” she finally asked.

Obviously, she didn’t like the answer.

“Just sit here and do nothing? They came after me too, Walter. They wanted both of us. They came with guns.”

The other voice was speaking fast, that much Chase could make out.

“The house isn’t safe,” Sarah finally said, her voice getting firmer. “That’s where they found us. I can’t go back there.” She waited a few seconds, then locked eyes with Chase. “I think I have someplace safe.” She cocked her head in question, and Chase nodded. “Yes. For a little while, at least. Find out who’s behind this, Walter. We’ve got to get Cole back.” Then she clicked off the phone. She stared at it for a moment, then put it in her pocket and looked at Chase. “We can’t call the police.”

Chase folded his arms over his chest. “Why not?”

Sarah began crying, and Chase paused for a second, knowing this was one of those junctures where things were going to travel down one path or the other. He went over and wrapped her slender form into his arms, absorbing her sobs into his own body.

His arms were one place, but his thoughts were back at the firefight. He knew he’d hit one of the intruders. He was a little surprised the police or security hadn’t come screaming down the road right away, given the gunfire. Curious, thought Chase. It was as if gun battles happened every night on the street. His new neighborhood was definitely not an inner city with daily drive-bys. Multi-million dollar houses dotted both sides of the dead-end road that ended at Brams Point. The ones to the east faced Broad Creek, the ones to the west faced the Intracoastal Waterway. Prime real estate, on an island that was prime real estate. And he had a house with tree limbs poking through the roof into his living room. On prime real estate.

“Why can’t we call the police?” he pressed as he gingerly let go of her and stepped back.

Sarah ran her long fingers through her short, blond hair, and took a deep breath before speaking. “Walter’s job. What he does.”

Chase waited.

“Walter programs and runs the main-frame computer for an off-shore on-line gambling site called SAS,” she finally said. “It’s a very unique one that caters to a handful of high-rollers all over the country, but primarily here and in Savannah. And the Super Bowl is this weekend. The biggest event of the year for gambling. He received a call a little while ago. Someone wants him to shift all the money on bets in the twelve hours leading up to the game to an off-shore account. We’re talking at least fifty million dollars. Maybe more. They’re using Cole—and wanted me—as leverage to get him to do this.”

“Tell me exactly what happened earlier,” Chase said, already doing the ticking clock. It was late Friday night. The Super Bowl was Sunday evening. So the kidnappers deadline was Sunday morning.

“Cole was in the back, on the floating dock at the end of the pier. Crabbing.” She took a deep breath. “Too far away. But he likes going out there at night. I looked out the kitchen window when I heard an engine, and I saw a boat pull up to the dock. Two men got off. It was dark, and I couldn’t get a good look at them. They grabbed him, hauling him onto the boat. I started to run to the back door to go after them, but then those two guys you saw came smashing through the front door. I ran out a side door and down the street here, because I knew you would know what to do.”

“Where’s your husband?”

“In Antigua, with the main-frame at SAS’s headquarters.”

“He knew Cole had been kidnapped?”

“He said he’d just gotten a call, threatening to kill Cole if he didn’t do as instructed. And to not go to the police, or else they would kill Cole.”

“A call from who?”

Sarah wiped tears off her cheeks. “Walter didn’t know, but he guesses it’s the Russian mob. They’ve been crashing on-line gambling sites and extorting them over the past couple of years. Pay up or your system goes down. Walter said they had trouble with the Russians a couple of weeks ago during the Conference Championship games. Got shut down for six hours the night before. Cost them a couple of million in lost bets. So they paid out to a bank account in the Caymans, and got the system back running.”