Vineyard Prey (23 page)

I took a look at his father's Civil War collection. Had Buford Oakland named his daughter Melanie after the character in
Gone with the Wind
? Had Melanie been raised as a delicate Southern belle? Was that why she'd become so unbalanced that she'd thought she could fly?

The LeMat pistol was in a slightly different position than before. I opened the glass cover of the table and sniffed the weapon, detecting a hint of detonated black powder.

As I sniffed again, I heard a muffled sound like tapping on a water pipe. I put the gun back on the table, closed the glass cover, and listened again. Sure enough, there was a tapping sound. Cold water pipes in the basement? I went to the stairs, flipped on the light, and walked down. At first everything seemed normal to me, then the sound came again. From a storage room on the far side of the basement.

I crossed over to the door and found it locked. The sound was from the other side. I went to Buford Oakland's workbench, found a pry bar, went back, and popped the padlock from the hasp.

Beyond the door, the room was black as a pit. I groped for a switch, found it, and flicked on the light. The room was full of dusty boxes, odd pieces of furniture, rusty tools, and other items not ever used but too good to throw away. Kate, naked, tied, and gagged, lay against the opposite wall, with her bound, bloody feet raised against a water pipe. She looked at me with gigantic eyes. As I stepped toward her I heard the sound of a door closing and footsteps on the floor above.

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I was opening my pocketknife as I crossed the room.

Kate was bound tightly with what looked like clothesline, and was gagged with duct tape. I rolled her onto her belly and cut the ropes, glad that I hated dull knives and never carried one. Under my hands she was shivering from pain and the winter chill that had seeped into the basement. I saw that she was missing toe- and fingernails.

I pulled the tape from her face as gently as I could, wrapped her in my coat, and whispered, “Can you walk?”

She gritted her teeth to keep them from chattering. “I don't know. I'm so cold.”

I pulled her to her feet and she swayed against me. “We've got to get out of here,” I said.

“Yes. I hear him. He's got a gun.”

I, too, could hear the footsteps on the floor above. Kate took a step toward the door and then collapsed against me.

“I can't feel my feet,” she said hoarsely “Leave me here and get away if you can.”

I picked her up in my arms and went into the main room of the basement.

The footsteps moved toward the door leading to the basement stairs. There was no escape for us in that direction.

But I had been caring for this house for years and knew every inch of it. I crossed the room to the bulkhead door, let Kate's feet fall to the floor, and with one hand quietly opened both the door and the metal bulkhead above. Behind us, I heard footsteps carefully descending the basement stairs. Glad for the time I gained because Oakland was being wary, I swung Kate back into my arms and hurried up the stairs and out into the yard beside the house.

I didn't bother closing the bulkhead door but instead trotted around the house to the circular driveway where the Mercedes SUV was parked behind my old Land Cruiser. I opened the driver's door to my truck and literally threw Kate over into the passenger seat. Then I was behind the wheel, starting the truck and spinning gravel behind me.

The roar of my engine drowned all other sounds as a small hole appeared in my windshield. A glance in my rearview mirror showed a shattered rear window and Stuart Oakland taking aim for another shot. I ducked low and floored the gas pedal as another hole appeared beside the first and cracks like lightning bolts spread across the glass.

Then I was swerving out of the driveway and racing toward County Road, where a left turn would take me toward safety at either the state police station or the Oak Bluffs police station. But fate chose that moment to have a string of cars, headed by a slow-moving lady with gray hair and glasses, clog the far lane of the road, making a left turn impossible.

So I careened to the right and headed for the Vineyard Haven-Edgartown Road as fast as the old Land Cruiser would take me.

Beside me, Kate hugged herself and shivered, and I turned my heater as high as it would go, which wasn't much. I wished for the cell phone, but it was with Zee, so I concentrated on driving.

Our speed wasn't much, either, when compared with what Oakland's Mercedes could surely do, and it seemed certain that he would overtake us before I could reach either the Edgartown or Vineyard Haven police stations.

I squinted through my cracked windshield and kept flicking glances at my rearview mirror.

“Massage your wrists and ankles,” I said to Kate. “Get the blood circulating again. Besides your nails, are you badly hurt?”

She began to rub the red rope burns on her wrists. Her voice was faint and filled with sorrow. “I'm hurt. I don't know how badly. I'm not as tough as I thought. I told him everything he wanted to know. Jesus.”

“What did he want to know?”

“He wanted to know where to find Joe Begay.”

“And you told him.”

“Yes. I'd have told him anything. I'd have made up things. I'm a coward. I didn't know anyone could hurt as much as I did. I'd read about torture but I never knew what it's really like. I wanted to die but he wouldn't let me.”

“Don't be hard on yourself,” I said. “No one can stand up to torture.” I was full of fear for Joe Begay. “Is that where he was when I found you? Out after Joe?”

“Yes. I think he only left me alive in case I'd lied to him, so he could come back and get the truth. If he found Joe, he'd come back to kill me, too.”

Topping a small hill behind me was what looked like the Mercedes. It was coming fast. I slowed but didn't stop at the intersection with the Vineyard Haven-Edgartown Road, then took a left, cutting off a pickup that was trying a left turn of its own onto County Road. The honking of the pickup's angry horn faded as I fled along the highway.

“Listen,” I said. “I don't think we can outrun him all the way to Edgartown, so I'm going to go to my house. When we get there, we'll go inside as quick as we can. I've got guns there, and a phone. I don't know how he'll come at us, but I know he'll come.”

Her small, shaky voice said, “Give me a gun. I can shoot without fingernails.”

“Let's hope you won't have to.”

As we passed the entrance to the Felix Neck Wildlife Sanctuary I could see the Mercedes closing on us. My old Land Cruiser was no match for it, but we still had a lead when I slammed on the brakes and swerved into my driveway. The Mercedes was already in view behind us when I skidded to a stop in front of the house, jumped out, yanked Kate over the driver's seat, and ran with her through the screened porch and on into the living room.

I kicked the door shut behind me, half threw Kate onto the couch, and ran to the gun cabinet. As I fumbled for the key, I heard the roar of the Mercedes as it came into the yard. Oliver Underfoot and Velcro came out of the guest room, yawned, and asked what was going on. I told them to go hide, but they ignored me.

I found the key, opened the cabinet, and snatched
my father's twelve-gauge Remington. Its shells were in a box on the ammunition shelf. I dumped the box, slammed three shells into the magazine, and whirled toward the door, pumping a shell into the firing chamber as I turned.

Outside, I heard the sound of the Mercedes changing gears and moving. I peeked out the living room window and saw that Oakland had turned around and had parked in the driveway itself, blocking the only automobile exit. As I looked, he cut his ignition, opened the driver's side door, and slipped out of my sight beyond his car.

I shut the bolt lock on my front door, ran to the back door that led from the kitchen and closed that bolt as well, then trotted back to the living room, where Kate, wrapped in my coat, was gingerly limping toward the gun cabinet.

I pointed toward our bedroom and said, “I'll get you a gun; you go in there and get into some of Zee's clothes. Make sure you get boots and a coat. Keep an eye out the windows in case he circles the house.”

She didn't argue. As I went to the cabinet she hobbled toward the bedroom. I ducked as Oakland fired a shot and one of our two living room windows shattered.

“The next thing that comes through will be a grenade,” he shouted. “Just thought you'd like to know.”

I yanked opened the cabinet, stuffed shotgun shells inside my shirt, grabbed Zee's competition Colt .45, found a loaded clip for the pistol, jammed
it home, jacked a bullet into the firing chamber, flicked on the safety, and shoved the pistol in my belt.

Then, crouching, I ran to the front of the house, where I bobbed up and back down, snapping a look out the shattered window.

Nothing.

Where was Oakland?

I hurried to our other front window and peeked again.

Where was he, anyway?

Time to call the cops. I ran, bent, into the kitchen and picked up the phone. No dial tone. Oakland had cut the line. Even as this fact registered in my brain, the clock light on the microwave went out. He'd cut the power, too.

Kate limped out of the bedroom wearing Zee's clothes and winter boots under a quilted coat.

I handed her the pistol. “There's a full clip and one in the chamber. All you have to do is slip the safety.”

She took the gun in her bloody hands and gave it the quick look of a person who's handled such a weapon before.

“He says he's got grenades,” I said. “He's cut the phone and electricity. He's already set a bomb in one car, so he may really have grenades, too. He knows where we are, and we don't know where he is, so he's got that edge. Ours is that we can be in two places at once.”

“My brain isn't working too well,” she said, holding the pistol in one bloody hand and rubbing her
forehead with the other. “I haven't eaten since yesterday. I need food.”

I pointed at the refrigerator. “Help yourself, but keep a watch out the windows here while you're at it. If you see him, shoot him if you can. I'm going to circle through all the other rooms. Maybe I'll spot him from one of them.”

But I didn't spot him until I was back in the living room again. There, through the broken windowpane, I saw him look quickly over the hood of the Land Cruiser then rear back as if to throw something. Without time to take real aim, I jerked the shotgun to my shoulder and fired. The shot spattered the hood of the truck but caused Oakland to spin away and throw wildly. Instead of hitting the house, his grenade arced into trees and detonated, sending branches flying.

There was a skittering of cat feet behind me as Oliver and Velcro scrambled for shelter under a bed. That would teach them to ignore my advice to hide. I pumped a new shell into the firing chamber and reloaded the magazine.

“No damage done here or there,” called Oakland's voice from behind the Land Cruiser, “but I've got another grenade and this time it won't miss.”

I suspected he was right.

“I'm not interested in you, Jackson,” said the voice. “It's the woman I'm after. She's caused my family too much grief to live. Send her out and you get to keep your house and your life.”

He was lying, of course, and I lied in return. “I've
seen what you did to her. She can't even walk.” I peeked over the sill and flicked my eyes this way and that, hoping to spot him long enough to get a shot.

“Carry her out, then, and save your own life. I won't shoot you, but I'll not wait long.”

“Just hold your horses,” I shouted, having no trouble putting fear in my voice.

I turned and ran back into the kitchen.

Kate was gone.

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