Erica Spindler - Dead Run

From the recesses of the bar, he heard Rick talking.

He was on the phone; he hadn’t heard.

Guilt swamped him. As did a feeling of falling, of spiraling down to the devil’s dark pit.

He had to do this. For Tara. For their baby.

Tonight he and Tara were running away together. They had planned to meet in the garden of Paradise Christian at 2:00 a.m. Everything was set. About an hour before closing, Mark was going to claim illness and leave early. He would be long gone before Rick closed-and discovered what Mark had done.

Quickly, Mark scrawled an IOU to Rick, lifted the cash drawer, slid the IOU under some checks, then extracted six hundred dollars.

Hands shaking, he pocketed the money and closed the drawer. He was scared senseless. How was he going to support a wife and child? He could hardly support himself.

This decision would be easier if Tara hadn’t been acting so funny. Distant and…unhappy. He had wondered if she was having second thoughts about him, about the prospect of spending her life with a humble preacher. He had wondered, God help him, if the baby wasn’t his.

How could they begin their lives together with that hanging over their relationship?

Let it go, Mark. That’s over. That part of her life is over.

He fisted his fingers. Tara was frightened. And not just of what their future would hold. Of her friends. They had threatened her. If she tried to leave their group, they had promised they would hurt her.

Tara feared they would kill her or the baby.

Mark didn’t believe that. These were a group of spoiled rich kids, not inner-city gangbangers. They were angry and not above using intimidation to terrorize Tara.

Mark couldn’t have that. He wouldn’t. Lord help him, he would do whatever it took to protect his own.

He figured they’d head to Texas, back home to Humble. His parents wouldn’t be happy, but they would support his decision because of the baby.

Mark sidled back down the bar and resumed his work. Rick appeared at the same moment a group of tourists entered the place, their raucous laughter the signal that Friday night had officially begun.

Rick smiled at Mark. Mark returned the smile, feeling lower than a snake’s belly. He wasn’t stealing, he reminded himself. He was only borrowing the money. He would pay Rick back someday, when he and Tara were settled, far away from Key West.

Saturday, November 10

3:00 a.m.

Liz paced, her mind racing, sleep a million miles away. Thoughts of Tara and the note that had been slipped under her office door had stolen both her peace of mind and any hope of rest.

Rest? How could she rest when she was a hairsbreadth from a full-fledged panic attack?

Liz stopped pacing, closed her eyes and breathed deeply through her nose, focusing on the oxygen flowing into her, filling her lungs, then being expelled. When her heart rate slowed and the pressure in her chest lessened, she opened her eyes.

And found that she stood before her shuttered window. Light from the full moon slipped through the spaces between the slats. She unlatched the shutter and folded it open. The moonlight washed the night milky black. Below, Duval Street slept. A lone figure darted across the street.

Liz rested her forehead against the window frame. She had gone over her session with Tara a hundred times. Each time she had come to the same conclusion: the girl was frightened. Because, Liz believed, she knew what had happened to Rachel.

Liz had even wondered if perhaps her sister had been killed because of Tara. And if that was true, then by treating the teenager, she had placed herself in harm’s way.

The tickle of panic returned and again Liz fought it off. She could not succumb to panic at every turn. She would not. She had come to Key West to discover what had happened to her sister and nothing would sway her from that mission.

Not even a threat from some creep too chicken to face her in person.

Liz had reread the note, its eleven typed words, more times than she could count.

They know. You’re in danger here. Go before it’s too late.

Who knew? The people who had killed her sister, obviously. And what did they know? That she was Rachel’s sister and that she had come to Key West to uncover what had happened to her.

So, was the note a warning? Or a threat?

Or simply a sick joke by someone who had figured out who she was?

No, not that. She didn’t think it was a coincidence that it had been left while she had been in session with Tara.

The teenager held the key, to the who and why her sister had been killed. She had no proof to back up her conviction, she just knew it to be true.

She glanced over her shoulder. The note lay on her bedstand, beside her phone. She could take it to the police, lay it all out for them. All what? That she was counseling a troubled teen? One who seemed frightened. A teenager who, Liz believed without proof, knew what had happened to her sister?

Right. Lieutenant Lopez would laugh her out the door. He would trivialize the note and attempt to dissuade her from digging any further into Rachel’s disappearance.

Liz brought her hands to her face. Rachel…Rachel, what happened to you?

Sudden anxiety took her breath. Her heart rate accelerated, her skin went hot, then cold with sweat. Fight or flight, she thought quickly. Not anxiety. Not a panic attack.

Do something. Now. Fast. Before it really was too late.

Liz turned and ran to the closet. She rummaged for her running shoes, grabbed them, then raced to her bureau for a pair of thick socks. She put them on, pulled her hair into a ponytail, thundered down the stairs and out into the blessedly mild night.

She started to run, sucking in one deep breath after another, realizing that she felt great. Free. Unencumbered. It was as if the debilitating anxiety had never existed. Was that all she had needed? she wondered. All this time, had she only needed to take a positive action with that moment? With her life?

Liz laughed out loud, looked to her left, then right. The street was deserted, a rare occurrence for Duval. Apparently, even the most confirmed party animals had gone home to sleep it off.

She passed Rick’s Island Hideaway, then Paradise Christian. She ran on, one block, then two.

She stopped suddenly. Heart in her throat, she turned around slowly. The street behind her was empty. She frowned and took a step backward.

It was as if her sister had called her name.

“Rachel?” she whispered.

Liz shifted her gaze to the church, ghostly white against the night sky.

Not Rachel. Her church.

Without pausing to consider how crazy that thought was, Liz started back, her feet moving slowly at first, then quickening until her breath came in ragged gasps and it felt as if her heart was going to burst through the wall of her chest.

She reached the church, shuddered to a halt and stared up at the structure, waiting. The stained-glass windows glowed subtly, as if illuminated from within. She shifted her gaze to the massive wooden doors then up to the towering spire and bell tower.

Why was she here? What had propelled her to this spot?

Maybe she really was crazy.

She heard a sound and shifted her gaze once more. To the door to the walled garden.

The sound came again. The breeze kicked up, rustling the leaves in the branches above her head. Some creature stirred, then scurried from its resting place. The clawing came again, this time accompanied by an anguished cry.

Liz ran forward, toward the garden door. It was locked at night. The tour guide had said so, to keep runaways and indigents from using the garden as a flophouse and because the garden statuary had been vandalized.