Ridley Pearson - The Angel Maker

When the furnace kicked off, she looked up and realized there was.

Tegg knew the exact location where his cellular came back into range, a small rise in the road just prior to Maud Lake. He pulled over, leaving the Trooper running, and dialed Wong Kei's cellular number, which was now routed through the Vancouver telephone system. Wong Kei answered coldly, "Speak." Tegg said, "This is me." He looked down at the hand trembling in his lap and wondered if it really belonged to him, if anything was really as it seemed.

Felix had massacred Pamela, one of the few persons he had seen as a part of his future-his budding young protege. Had turned her into a bloody pulp. She was now inside the first pen, contained in two black garbage bags. Pamela. Witnessing the slaughter, attempting to stop it, had drained him. "Our plans are moved forward," Tegg advised. "What? Impossible!" the man protested. "Tomorrow morning. Tomorrow morning!"

"Tonight.

Now," Tegg declared. "I'll call from the airport. Expect me around," he checked his watch, "midnight, maybe a little after. You'll have to move quickly: It will be two hours and counting by the time I reach you. We will have used up half our time." "Impossible!" the tight voice complained. "Make it happen. I'm on my way." He pushed: END. He stared at the button's simple message.

He could find ice in Snoqualmie Falls. He would chain and lock the main gate, use the old fire trail at the back of the property as his escape route. If he got into a panic about time, he could put the harvest off until later; sedate Sharon, hide her in the back seat under a blanket. in the far back of the Trooper he carried everything necessary for field surgery.

Why not? Head north-enter Canada through the logging trails, do the harvest somewhere out there. Get the money from Wong Kei-he needed that money now more than ever. Stick with the plan.

The old saying was right: There was more than one way to skin a cat.

A human, too, if it came to that.

With the gun returned to its holster and the flashlight protruding awkwardly from her pocket, Daphne used a planter box stood on end as a ladder and scaled the Quonset hut's wall to the roof. The constant howling of the dogs served to remind her what awaited her inside. Optimism fueled her: Sharon was alive!

When she reached the lower lip of the curved roof, she hooked one leg up and over the edge and slid herself carefully onto it. It was cold and wet, and her clothes were immediately soaked through.

Her cheek pressed to the galvanized roof, her fingers groping for purchase, she inched her way up to the ridge, where she pulled herself up to a straddle. With her hands now free, she trained the flashlight onto the vent stack and inspected it, finding her first bit of encouragement: It was surrounded by a poor patchwork of rubber, sheet metal and caulk, all applied haphazardly.

Through the hole, the barking grew louder.

She stuffed the light under her knee, leaned down and pulled on the stack. It popped loose almost effortlessly. She tore at the materials, bending the stack to one side, prying open a hole large enough to stuff herself into. She poked her head into the hole and gasped with the smell, coming up immediately for air. She aimed the flashlight inside, locating the steel frame of the propane furnace suspended from the ceiling. The furnace itself was about the size of a dishwasher. Beneath it she saw the cyclone-wire cage of a dog kennel, the dog's red eyes trained up at her. The furnace's superstructure offered her a platform for her descent.

She lowered herself inside. Her gun snagged on one of the furnace's angle-iron struts and threw her off balance. The gun ejected from the holster and disappeared into the dark, banging somewhere below her. Instinctively, she reached out to try to catch it, but hit the hot face of the furnace instead and burned herself. She let go and fell, crashing onto the top of the dog cage.

Directly below her the dog leapt up, snapping viciously at her through the wire. She moved and heard the flashlight rolling away from her. She pounced for it, but only managed to knock it off the cage. When it hit the cement floor it flickered off and then back on as it bounced and rolled.

There, across the room, the light found a woman, stark naked. A bandaged eye. Another bandage on her side. Leather straps around her head holding a gag in her mouth, a heavy collar around her neck. Sharon was up on her knees, her one good eye staring hopefully at Daphne, an I.V. running from a bag overhead. A large bloodstain was smeared in front of the cage. "Sharon?" Daphne called out in horror. Could it be?

Sharon Shaffer cried with joy.

Daphne saw the other dog then; he was not in a cage but loose in the aisle. And he was coming right at her, teeth bared.

Unable to stomach these speeds, Boldt chose to look over at Lamoia instead. The blue police light, stuck haphazardly to the dash, pulsed a sterile wash across the car's hood, reflected back onto their faces. The siren wailed loudly but did little to part the traffic ahead of them; people ignored sirens for the most part.

Boldt jerked to one side as Lamoia cut the wheel sharply and passed another slow-moving vehicle. "Asshole," he cursed under his breath. This car honked angrily at them, as if they were in the wrong. Lamoia honked back and flipped the guy the bird.

They had made two stops prior to this: Pamela Chase's apartment and Elden Tegg's home. The former was deserted, the latter in the midst of a dinner party, though the front lawn looked as if some teenager had driven across it.

Tegg's wife had been evasive but under pressure from Boldt had admitted that her husband was not at home, having left about an hour earlier. When Lamoia asked about use of their property in Snoqualmie, the woman said she wanted to phone her lawyer. "Let me guess," Boldt said. "Howard Chamberland."

"Why, yes," she admitted, her face reddening.

Boldt, worried about Daphne, called a patrol car to check the clinic as he and Lamoia headed for 1-90 and Snoqualmie Falls. When it came back to them that no cars were parked in the back lot and that the clinic was locked up tight and dark, he telephoned the King County Police to alert them that SPD Homicide had a possible hostage situation north of Snoqualmie Falls and would appreciate cooperation. Five minutes later a call came back saying that two four-wheel-drive cruisers would rendezvous with them at the intersection of the Burlington Northern tracks and state highway 202. An Air Rescue helicopter, an ambulance, and the local hospital were all oncall. Boldt requested that the ambulance join the cruisers at the rendezvous. "Done," said the dispatcher. "Not quite," mumbled Lamoia as he cut the car across three lanes and just barely caught the exit for 203 north.

Boldt shut his eyes and said, "Tell me when it's over."

Daphne jumped back, avoiding the jaws of the dog. His ear was cut, his face covered in dried blood. Her gun was lost, having fallen inside the dog pen through a gap between the two cross supports onto which she had dropped.

From across the room, Sharon attempted to shout at her through the gag. It filled Daphne with a sickening pity. Sharon inched forward on stiff legs and seized hold of the chain-link cyclone fence with both hands. A loud buzzer sounded. Her entire body shook with the jolt of electricity.

She let go and smiled. Numb to the current? Daphne wondered.

Conditioned to the pain?

Sharon nodded proudly. Daphne wondered: Insane? Could she get her out of here? Could this woman be expected to climb through the hole in the roof?

One thing at a time! she resolved. Her problem at the moment was making it over to Sharon's cage while staying out of the jaws of this guard dog.

She studied her situation thoughtfully, recalling from her training so ingrained in her: Assess the situation.