Desperate Rescue (12 page)

N
oah had been here? Right in Kaylee’s backyard? Toying with her, just as Eli knew his brother would. He pushed himself to his feet, anger fueling his movements. “Are you sure about that?”

“Yes. I went out on the deck a couple of nights ago and he was down on the lawn. It was nearly dark, and I—I thought he was you and he let me believe that.”

“What were you doing out there?”

“I saw the leash.”

“Leash?”

“Pepe’s leash. I saw it tangled around the deck railing and went out to see what it was. Then I saw someone standing underneath and…I said something. He stepped out from under the deck and started to talk to me. He let me think that he was you.”

Eli dug his fingers through his short hair. Noah knew his younger brother was here, glancing over his shoulder at every opportunity, being everywhere as much as possible. Eli hadn’t slept much since he came, choosing instead to learn every trail, every teenage hangout, every inch of this small town.

Only a matter of time before he found Noah. A short time if he knew that Noah was coming around here.

In front of him, Kaylee was rubbing her arms. He wanted to warm her up, hold her tight and tell her that everything would be fine. But first he needed some information. “What else did he say? What did he do? Did you see which way he went?”

She shook her head. “No. It was as if he went poof and was gone, like in those scary movies when you turn around and the person has disappeared. How did he learn I was here?”

“Probably the same way I learned. I hired someone to find you.” Eli stilled. Noah and he not only looked alike, they could easily be mistaken for each other on the phone. A man as crafty as Noah might find out who Eli had hired—

Or he could have done his own legwork, pretending to be Eli.

No time to waste with speculation. “Did he look wet, as if he’d been standing outside for a while? Did he look in any way cold?”

With a quick lick of her lips, she shook her head again. “It hadn’t begun to rain yet. Well, if anything, he looked a bit too smug.” She shivered. “I can’t believe I was fooled. This is insane. Noah’s insane!”

Her words sobered him and he frowned, absorbing the full impact of what she meant. “I know it wasn’t me, but what made you realize it was him?”

“I didn’t until just now. He used his right hand to untangle Pepe’s leash. I didn’t realize it at the time, but just now watching you write made me remember.” As if charged with strong insight, she stood. “And I’ve been finding candy wrappers on the floor at the rec center. I thought it was the kids, but lately, most have been stuck on some new cartoon’s candy—marshmallow stuff made into different faces. These wrappers belonged to the hard candies made in the store next to the gym.”

He wasn’t following her thoughts. “But what’s these candies got to do with Noah?”

“I smelled them on him, along with some other yucky smell.”

He lifted his eyebrows. “Yucky?”

“Bad is more like it. It smelled like rotten eggs. I only got a short whiff, but it was the sweet, minty scent that stood out. I remembered it because I smelled it at the center.”

“Which is beside the candy store.”

“Yes, which must…” As her voice died away, he stood, pivoting slowly as he straightened. All the while, he said nothing. His shoulders ached, his head was beginning to pound and he fought the urge to grab Kaylee and tell her to throw stuff into a suitcase. Despite his cool, calm actions, his thoughts were churning. Take her far away, at top speed, as if the world were on fire.

But did God want him to go? He shut his eyes.
What should I do, Lord? I want to do Your will.

When he opened his eyes, he found Kaylee studying him. The urge to explain swelled. “I’m trying to figure out what to do.”

“Were you praying?”

“Saying a short one, yes. But often, when God wants me to do something, I get a strong urge to do that. It’s immediate and I often say yes without really thinking of what I’m saying.” He offered a half smile. “It’s hard to explain. I just get a good feeling that what I’m doing is the right thing to do.”

“Are you getting that sense now? What do you think we should do? Call the police?”

He lifted his eyebrows. “Yes, I’ll call Reading. He’ll want to know this has happened. But as for what we should do, I don’t know.” He hated that he sounded so defeated. “I mean, not yet, anyway.”

Her expression closed, turning critical. “Is it fair for us to have to wait at such a crucial time? Would God be so cruel to do that to us?”

“No, He wouldn’t. But sometimes He lets us work on our own, even to the point of allowing us to make mistakes. I want to take you away from here, right now. But I don’t know if that’s the right thing to do.”

“Lois has a Christian CD of a group that sings about whether it’s God or Satan talking.”

“Exactly. I don’t know if I should take you somewhere safe or stay to find Noah.”

“Take me somewhere? I’m not a child, Eli. Don’t treat me like one.”

He flicked up his eyebrows. “You’re right, of course.”

Her expression softened immediately. Her mouth parted as though she wanted to say something, but no words came. With her dark hair and that wide-eyed expression of half fear and half trust, she bore such heart-wrenching innocence. He shouldn’t be talking about the evil one, and not knowing what to do. These thoughts were his personal ones, part of his own journey. They were too intimate for sharing.

Yet he wanted to share them with her. And with her so close, so needing the warm comfort of someone she trusted, he also wanted badly to take hold of her.

To kiss her, help her forget their danger.

She blinked and the beguiling expression vanished. “What I don’t understand is why Noah declined my invitation to come inside? I mean, I thought he was you and asked him in for coffee. He had the perfect opportunity to kill me, or at least destroy my faith in you.”

She had faith in him? He felt the start of a smile at the comment. “What did he say? Just no?”

She shook her head. “Not quite. He said that men couldn’t be trusted. That he was just like Noah. I mean, he was talking as though he were you, letting me think that, and said that he—you, I mean—were just like him.” She rubbed her forehead, obviously struggling with the situation. “I kept disagreeing with him.”

Before he could answer, she groaned and threw back her head. “He said that all men were alike and that he couldn’t be trusted any more than anyone else. To be alone with a woman, that is. He sounded as though he really cared for my honor or something.”

“He didn’t have your honor in mind.”

She tilted her head forward again. “I don’t know what he was thinking. All those months in the compound and he never laid a hand on me. I always expected that. At first, I kept thinking of how I could overpower him if he tried to molest me. I knew I couldn’t because of my size, but the thoughts kept me going for a while.” She swallowed. “Then when I gave up, when I realized that Noah would really hurt Trisha if I tried to leave, and me if he ever caught me, I expected I would just let him…you know…get it over and done with.”

Her chin wrinkled and she shut her eyes. And in that moment, he wanted nothing more than to kill his brother. For the torture, for the stress, for everything he’d done to Kaylee.

Lord, what should I do?

She blew out a sigh. “I guess I should be grateful he never touched me, but just standing out there under the deck, he made you sound like you were some evil monster, ready to do exactly as he might do.” She gasped, as if hearing her words for the first time. “He made it sound as if you were just like him and he agreed that he was evil!”

“He is.”

“But he could have easily killed me that night.” She looked queasy. “So why didn’t he? Why did he go on like he was you?”

“Noah is an excellent strategist. He’s planning something, you can count on it. And part of it includes discrediting me.”

Eli shouldn’t have spoken. Kaylee paled, looking definitely as if she might throw up. “What could he be planning? To come here pretending to be you? He didn’t know I was going to go out on the deck! It was strictly by chance I went out there.”

“You went to look at the leash.”

“Yes, to see what it was. The wind must have blown it up there.”

“Noah put it there to lure you out.”

“But he didn’t do anything! Eli, I know he’s cunning and manipulative, but he could have killed me that night and no one would have known anything until the next day. He lured me out only to tell me that you are as bad as he is. That you’re cut from the same cloth.”

Cold rippled over him. “He said that?”

“Yes.” She frowned. “I think they were the words he used.”

Eli pursed his lips. The same words his grandmother used to say when they were playing in her house. He and Noah would get into mischief, mostly of Noah’s invention, with him tagging along behind his older brother. But they were both found guilty when the trouble was discovered. Phoebe was just a baby back then and if she was there at the time, she’d have pulled herself up on the playpen slats and watched everything with keen, pale eyes. All Eli’s protests of innocence, all Noah’s smugness, Phoebe would see them all. Then she’d let out a cry and Noah would go to her, pick her up and tell her it was all Eli’s fault.

The words still hurt, he decided after a few moments of thought. His grandmother’s complaints were sharp, disapproving and meant to warn his mother to watch both of them. Grandma knew boys. She’d had seven of them, buried three before they could enter school thanks to a fire set by one of them in the old barn, some fifty-odd years ago. She knew boys, all right, and she knew troublesome boys best of all.

Now Noah wasn’t just tormenting Kaylee, he was deliberately seeding suspicion in Kaylee. Suspicions that were true.

“Eli?”

He looked at her.

“You’re frowning and muttering. What are you thinking?”

“Our grandma used to tell my mother that we were cut from the same cloth. She was very critical of our antics. Of course, Noah was the instigator. It never bothered me when we were young, except when I got into trouble.”

“And it hurts now?”

It did, but not because he was remembering his grandmother’s criticism. It hurt because it was true. He was as driven as Noah, as callous and pushy, even, determined to have his own way, at any cost. The only difference was that he covered his manipulative nature with a thin veneer of civility. Of Christianity, too.

Lord, why haven’t You changed me, like You promised You would in Your Word?

“Eli,
cut from the same cloth
is just an expression and Noah used it to get your goat, as
my
grandmother used to say.” She tipped her head to one side to study him. “And Noah knew you would connect the phrase to her and how critical she was. I’m sure Noah let you take the blame for all the mischief.”

He smiled softly. “How did you know?”

She grinned. “I was a kid once. This sort of thing isn’t just for boys, or even brothers, for that matter. Being accused of doing something you didn’t do and getting into trouble for it can scar a kid for life. Just like not owning up to something can haunt a person for life, too. I know that from experience, believe me.”

She was trying to make him feel better. It would have worked, too, if the question of what Noah was doing here didn’t still linger. He’d had the opportunity to walk right into Kaylee’s home. Yes, he toyed with people, planted evil whenever possible. So why suddenly turn pious when the opportunity to hurt her was handed to him on a platter?

Noah was up to something. Out there on that deck. What was it?

Eli spun on his heel and strode out the sliding door. The tiny deck was much like any other found on a house. Kaylee’s bungalow was small and the land behind her house dipped sharply. The basement had a walkout door, giving the appearance of a larger, two-story home from the back.

Eli trotted down the deck stairs. As he surveyed the short yard, Kaylee stepped onto the deck.

“What are you doing?” she called down.

“I’m looking for what he might have been up to.” He pointed to the back door that led into her basement. “Do you ever use that door?”

She shook her head. “No. The landlord is storing a bunch of old furniture down there. I don’t need the basement, so he gave me a cut on the rent, if he uses it as storage. He’s actually blocked that door with a huge wardrobe. He said it’ll help keep the heat in during the winter.”

Eli moved under the deck. He could see some scuffing in the dirt, but nothing clear. One or two marks looked deep, and in front of them, the ground was spotted and the sparse, dormant grass appeared bleached.

He knelt, studying the grass. It was burned. He pulled out a small pocketknife and dug into the soil, then drew the stick up to his nose. The faint smell of rotten eggs.

“What do you see?”

He looked up through the planks of the deck at Kaylee. “I don’t know yet. Can you get me some water and baking soda?”

“Baking—Okay.” She disappeared into the house and returned with a two-pound box of soda and a plastic squirt bottle of water. “With Jenn being sensitive to so many chemicals, I’ve grown used to cleaning with this stuff.” She walked down the steps and under the deck.

Eli sprinkled some of the soda onto the patch, and dribbled water on it. The soda fizzled and bubbled slightly.

“What is it?”

“I think it’s battery acid. Sulfuric acid, to be precise. Baking soda neutralizes it.”

“How did you know what it was?”

“It smelled like rotten eggs. It’s a sure sign.”

“But how did it get here?” Kaylee looked up and Eli followed her gaze. It was dim under the deck, hard to see, but directly above the patch was the evidence he was looking for.

A section of rotting wood. Straightening, he reached up to nick the soft wood with his knife. It crumbled and danced down to their feet. Taking the soda box again, he sprinkled the white powder onto the flakes. He added water and like the patch of dead ground, it fizzled.