Hidden Threat (43 page)

His world began to fade as weakness overcame him. He was cold. His mind spiraled, registering that there were several places on his body that hurt worse than his broken leg.

CHAPTER 5
8

Spartanburg, SOUTH CAROLINA

Wednesday Morning (Eastern Time)

Amanda awoke with the single-minded purpose of talking to the one man she felt she could trust aside from Jake. While talking to Riley Dwyer had been helpful, she needed an objective, neutral opinion. After all, Riley was an advocate of her father. And Jake’s parents had kindly asked her to refrain from talking to him until the legal matters were resolved. So that left Mr. Dagus. She decided to approach him. At school, though, she was informed that he had taken the day off.

Instead, she spent the day cleaning out her locker and school supplies. She accepted a few sympathy greetings from friends and then went home. She was thankful, too, that she had not seen Rugsdale today. He was beginning to creep her out. Coming and going, she had not seen his car in the parking lot.

The day seemed to pass quickly as she loaded her things into her car. As she looked at the growing pile in her backseat, she wondered how the heck all of that had fit into the skinny wall locker. There were five sets of swim goggles she had forgotten about.

As she arrived back home, she caught her mother in the driveway returning from work. She was dressed in a taupe pantsuit with a silk white blouse. Not her best color, but Amanda remembered her saying something about seeing a “conservative” client today.

“
Hey, Mom.” She saw her mother wait for her to park. She was growing anxious and wished to avoid a conversation with her mother. At the same time, she didn’t want to alarm her either.

“
How was school? Getting wrapped up?”

“
Good. You know, just cleaning things out. I wanted to talk to Mr. Dagus today, but he wasn’t in.” They walked onto the porch together.

“
About what?”

“
You know, stuff. Sometimes it just helps me to talk to him.”

“
Well, just give him a call, why don’t you? Or maybe talk to Gus, if you’re looking for a man’s opinion.”

Amanda looked at her mother. Why was she suddenly being reasonable? “Okay. I might do that.”

“
They’re both pretty level-headed about things.”

She was right about that.

“
By the way, have you seen him today?” her mother asked.

“
Gus? Not my day to keep up with him. Why?”

“
We were supposed to have lunch. I called his office at the magazine, and they said he wasn’t in. Strange.”

“
Ain’t seen him.”

As the day wore on, Amanda became more anxious. A feeling of intense loneliness encapsulated her. She was emotionally isolated. While she was deciding what to do, she ate a quick dinner of frozen pizza and diet Coke and then spent an hour in her room. She made a couple of phone calls to Dagus, but to no avail. She thought about calling Jake, but decided to respect his parents’ request. She liked them and didn’t want to lose their trust.

Finally, growing impatient, she jumped into her car and drove toward the town of Alpharetta. She had been to Dagus’s house twice before for journalism class parties, which he held annually. Her nerves were overwhelming her. They were moving into a million-dollar house. Her life as she knew it was a charade. Finally, loneliness gave way to fear.

She called his home phone twice more, but both times got the answering machine. Undeterred, she pressed on, taking all the shortcuts she knew. She whipped through residential neighborhoods, rolled through stop signs and generally broke every driving law in the code.

She found a parking spot about four houses down from Dagus’s townhouse, which was an end unit. She walked through the mild night air toward the home with a brick veneer Victorian elevation. It was a bit too Norman Bates-ish for her; nonetheless, she remembered from the journalism parties that it was a spacious home. She pressed the dimly lit button and listened to the chime.

She rang it again.

She crossed her arms as if to hug herself, wondering if Norman was peering down on her from the third-floor dormer. But then she found herself ignoring that notion and nearly praying that she would hear the telltale sound of footsteps moving in the house.

One more ring.

Nothing.

Please, please, I need to talk to you.

Chewing on her fingernail, she remembered that his backyard was easily accessible from the street. He had a screened porch where she might be able to wait.

She opened the back gate by reaching over the picket fence and lifting the latch. As if she lived there, she continued with purpose toward the porch. This time, luck was on her side. It was unlocked. She went inside and walked deliberately past the hunter-green patio furniture and a few sprawling palms toward the back door to the house. She knocked several times, each time calling out, “Mr. Dagus?”

She checked the doorknob out of curiosity. Fortune failed her this time, as the door was locked, but a moment later she was back outside kneeling in the garden where the fake rock with the key was located. She had seen Dagus open the house using this key when, during the backyard party, someone using the restroom had accidentally locked them out. He had vowed in front of her to find a new hiding spot, but old habits were apparently hard to break.

“
I must be crazy,” she whispered to herself. She extracted the key, unlocked the door, replaced the key in the rock, returned the rock to its garden spot, and then entered the house. She moved in fluid motions so that her courage could not wane with inaction.

She stood in the dark kitchen for a few moments gaining acuity.

“
Mr. Dagus?”

Her voice echoed eerily.

“
Mr. Dagus!” This time louder. She didn’t know why she was suddenly frightened.

She remembered her father had always taught her to remain motionless for a short while when she was entering an animal’s domain.
Listen, watch, get your senses on a par with the animal. In the forest, you are in their living room. They probably know when you’re there, so get your instincts in tune with them.

She was about to be, literally, in Dagus’s living room. She jumped as she felt her cell phone vibrate in her pocket. Lifting it, she saw that it was Dagus’s cell phone number.

“
Amanda, it’s Len Dagus. I see you called a few times. What’s up?”

She felt a huge sigh of relief and physically sagged, leaning against the kitchen counter. “I’m at your house, actually. Outside,” she lied. “I just needed to talk.”

His pause made her feel as though she had been too collegial with him. He was, after all, still a teacher.

“
Okay, I can’t be there for an hour, but if you can hang around, I’m happy to listen. I’m sort of pursuing something here.”

“
Okay, I can hang.”

“
Listen. If you remember where the key is in the back, just use it and let yourself in. Turn on the tube and make yourself at home.”

Well, actually . . .

“
I think I can find it. Out back by the screen porch, right?”

“
That’s it. Make yourself at home. Just relax.”

“
You’re awesome, Mr. Dagus.”

“
Don’t mention it. As Shakespeare had Claudio say, ‘Friendship is constant in all things. . . .’”

CHAPTER 59

Spartanburg, SOUTH CAROLINA

Wednesday Evening (Eastern Time)

She hung up the phone and swallowed hard. “. . . save in the office and affairs of love,” she murmured, recalling the quote from
Much Ado About Nothing
.

She stood still in the kitchen. Why did she hesitate? Her instincts were telling her to leave. Yet, she stood fast. She trusted this man as much as any other, save Jake.

She took a tentative step. Another step, she was passing the kitchen island now, and moving into the dining room to her right. The dining room had a dark wood table with a matching hutch and buffet. She peeked around the corner into the living room, which connected on the far side, and saw a sofa, plasma television, and two chairs. A coffee-table and end tables were situated between the sofa and the fireplace. She backed out of there and retraced her route through the dining room, into the kitchen, and then into the foyer hallway that led to the front door. Still, no lights were on anywhere on the bottom floor, and she thought to compliment Dagus on his energy-conservation measures.

From the foyer, she noticed a light blue light flickering at the top of the stairs. She heard voices from the second floor.

“
Mr. Dagus?”

She placed her hand lightly on the oak banister that guarded the stairway, and began ascending toward the upper floor. She stopped when she heard a scratching sound that sounded like it might be coming from a window to her rear, perhaps the front door. Frozen, she checked over her shoulder to determine whether she was high enough that someone could not look in the small windows on either side of the door. To be sure, she moved two steps higher, silently. Again, she waited, her instincts sharpening and pulling in the specific sounds of this lion’s den. A scratch here, a creak there; what did they mean? House noises, she comforted herself, and continued up.

The voices grew louder as she crested the last step. To her immediate right on the landing was a closed door. To her left front was an open door to the bathroom. To the left were two doors, both open. Okay, she thought, master bedroom on the right, guest bedroom and computer room to the far left. She looked into the computer room, where the blue light was shining.

She could see the large plasma computer screen emanating its blue background. She noticed a media player was playing a continuous loop of Lenard Dagus appearing on CNN discussing the need for verifiable sources.

“
. . . but don’t you think that would unnecessarily restrict journalists in pursuing the truth?” A blonde-haired reporter was seated on a barstool in a CNN studio asking him questions. He was sitting across from her on a matching stool and wearing a button-down polo shirt open at the neck with his sleeves rolled up just beneath his elbow. It was a classic reporter’s pose she guessed he was attempting to emulate. She could see the dark hair on his arms and even some on his chest protruding at the
V
in the neck.

“
No. What has been proven is that verified sources provide the most accurate and compelling stories. It is when you don’t hold journalists accountable that we get into trouble. Just look at—”

She reached up with her hand and paused the media player, which served to mute the voices and freeze Dagus’ image on the screen. She had heard it all before.

Then she stopped as a detail that had been nagging at her suddenly re-surfaced. She quickly maximized the screen again, focusing on the hair. She thought back to running into him as she had fled the classroom, embarrassed over Jake’s confinement. His chest had been bare, and his arms. Not a single hair, for the first time since she had known him. What she had assumed was bad sunburn, though she had never seen him with it before . . .

She could barely believe that she was thinking it—but were these signs of a badly managed arson job?

Has Dagus been following me? Dad’s house? Riley?
She placed her hand to her mouth, holding back a scream. Her first instinct was to run.

She minimized the YouTube display again, irrationally believing that if she hid the image the reality would also vanish.

As she minimized the window, his Comcast homepage began blinking at her with scrolling images of the day’s latest news, each accompanied by a photo of some sort:
Julia Roberts Gets More Collagen . . . Brangelina have another child . . . Stock market bubble again? . . . Colonel in Afghanistan leaves dubious legacy . . . President vows to remove troops from Iraq . . .

Grabbing the mouse, she scrolled back to the Afghanistan story, fear already boiling in her stomach. She looked over her shoulder as she clicked on the link to the article.

The Web site appeared along with a full facial photo of her father looking very handsome. His hair was cropped closely to the sides of his scalp while a thick tuft was present on top. He looked simultaneously mean and compassionate, with deep-set green eyes, high cheekbones, and an unsmiling face. But the eyes, she thought, they were hers. Or hers were his. It didn’t matter. And with those eyes staring at her, she heard his voice. It was a whisper creasing the stagnant air of the house.
It’s okay, baby girl. Just follow your instincts. I’m so proud of you.

That’s all she had ever wanted, she thought to herself, her father’s pride. “I love you, Daddy,” she whispered aloud, then refocused on her new mission.

Her mind was moving quickly now. She forged ahead. If Dagus was the one responsible for the horrible events of the last week, then surely there would be evidence on his computer. An hour. He had said he would be there in an hour. Looking at her watch, she figured ten minutes had already passed.