Jan Burke - Bloodlines

I watched with irritation as Ian locked up the Jeep and set the alarm on it. He had kidnapped us, used my own car to drive us around, and he was already acting as if it were his to protect? From what, a criminal?

Eric’s cell phone rang. He listened for a moment, then said, “Have the chopper ready. We’ll call again.”

“The chopper?” I asked.

“Nothing for you to worry about,” Mitch said.

The look Ethan gave me then made my stomach drop. I supposed we were thinking the same thing. If the Yeagers left in a helicopter, they might be able to get to a plane and perhaps out of the country before anyone knew what had happened to us. And if the people on the helicopter were armed or used a spotlight, we would have difficulty hiding among the tombstones until we were free.

I watched Ethan. For the next few minutes at least, my life was going to be in his hands. Everything would be decided by his ability to stall them without being obvious about it and to convince them that he had hidden something here.

“Do you have flashlights?” he asked.

Eric looked at him suspiciously, perhaps suspecting a joke at his expense, given their previous problems with fingerprints on flashlights.

“There’s only a little moonlight,” Ethan said. “The cemetery is torn up. We’ll need flashlights.”

“You have any in your car?” Mitch asked me with exasperation.

I considered a lie, decided against it, and told him where to find the flashlights in the Jeep-one in the glove compartment, the other in the back storage compartment. Ian got back in the Jeep, found them, and reset the alarm.

“Okay,” Ethan said, “untie our hands.”

“Giving a lot of orders, aren’t you?” Mitch said. “Not going to happen.”

Ethan shrugged. “That’s going to cause problems, but suit yourself.”

The first problem became evident as soon as the flashlights were distributed. Eric and Ian had to hold both a flashlight and a gun or risk not having a light to use to reveal their target. I could see Mitch didn’t like it, but he was too proud to back down.

Ian stayed with Ethan. Eric stayed with me. Mitch walked between us.

We followed Ethan as he walked slowly along a brick fence that had occasional panels of wrought iron. The view into the cemetery was again blocked by plywood panels temporarily in place over the wrought iron. There was already some graffiti on them.

I was glad for the slow pace, not only because we needed to stall but because I was feeling the effects of their earlier blows and the fall I had taken in the garage. Ian, impatient, told Ethan to move faster.

“If you hadn’t kicked the shit out of me, I could,” Ethan said, one hand on his ribs.

He led us toward the back of the cemetery. I wondered whether this was mere stalling on his part. If so, I hoped he walked us all around the perimeter.

As we moved from the street into the knee-high grasses of the field, the scenery changed a bit. The field was owned by the city, but was undeveloped. We were nearer some of the pumping units now, and could see their horse-heads bobbing up and down eerily in moonlight, their beams seesawing as the counterweights rolled.

The barrier along the back of the cemetery was a rusting chain-link fence-about seven feet high. It was not in good repair. Before the cemetery was closed for the investigations, visitors were spared a view of this ratty fence by the trees and the tall, thick oleanders that now blocked our view of the cemetery. I wondered if Ethan planned to have us crawl through one of the gaps near the foot of it, but he kept walking.

Eventually, we came to an asphalt driveway that led from the road on the western side of the cemetery to a pair of rolling chain-link gates near some large metal sheds. A heavy chain and thick padlock held them shut. As we came to a halt by the gates, Eric pocketed his gun and took hold of my elbow, apparently afraid I’d run off and leave Ethan behind.

“Why the hell didn’t we come in this way?” Mitch asked angrily. “We could have parked on that other street and saved time.”

“And have everyone in the world see a car parked here? That street isn’t a busy one, but it gets traffic.”

“Maybe I’ll tape your smart mouth shut next,” Mitch said.

Ethan stood silent.

Mitch smiled. “Hell, scream if you want to. Nobody inside that boneyard is going to come to your rescue. And you were stupid enough to bring us all the way out here. So now what?”

“We go in. As I said before, you’ll need to untie our hands.”

“Why?”

“I won’t be able to squeeze through the gate if they’re tied behind my back.”

“I don’t trust you.”

“Okay, let Ian squeeze through. Once he’s in, I’ll tell him where to find the gate key.”

Mitch took Ian’s gun and told him to go in.

Ian, looking dubious, stepped up to the gates and pulled them apart. He got a leg through, then said, “I can’t fit, Uncle Mitch. It’ll take my balls off, trying to get through.”

Mitch glanced at Ian’s older brother and obviously realized there was no hope there, either.

“Get your lard ass back here, then. You two have turned into a couple of butterballs, lying on your big bellies on the beach all day. I still have to take care of things myself if I want them done right, don’t I? Never know how much you two will fuck things up on your own.” He eyed me briefly, then asked Eric what the fuck was wrong with him, standing there with nothing but his flashlight in his hand? Eric turned red, then switched off the light and exchanged it for his gun.

“Now grab on to her,” Mitch ordered, “and put that gun right up against her head… Good.”He turned to Ethan. “Okay, smart boy, I’m going to promise you that once you are through that gate, you had better return in five minutes, or she’s dead.”

“That’s not long enough!”

“That’s how long you have. So Ian will cut you loose and give you a flashlight, and I had better be able to see where you are with that light every one of those five minutes-”

“Then we’ve come out here for nothing,” Ethan said. “The spare key isn’t hidden within sight of the gate, for God’s sake. It’s around the corner, on the other side of that maintenance shed. You won’t see me the whole time and I can’t do it in five minutes.”

Held by a beefy arm around my throat, feeling the painful press of cold metal on my temple, I couldn’t think very clearly, but I still managed to wonder if it was smart for him to be challenging Mitch in this way.

Then I saw Ian’s face, and the hint of amusement on it. Maybe Ethan was trying to undermine Mitch’s authority as much as he could.

“And why shouldn’t I just save myself a whole lot of time and kill you both? I’m trying to remember…”

“You think we did this not knowing who we were up against?” I said. “We made sure that if we were to vanish or to be found dead, the truth would come out.”

“Miss Kelly, I think you’ve watched too much television.”

“I haven’t had time for TV. I’ve been busy studying you for twenty years, you selfish old man. People have a habit of disappearing around you. Ian and Eric are too young to remember Gus Ronden or Betty Bradford, but-”

“I remember them,” Eric said. “What happened to them, Uncle Mitch?”

“We’re wasting time!” Mitch said. “Cut the smart aleck loose and let him get in there. And Eric, damn it, if she doesn’t keep her yap shut, shut it for her.”

Ian cut Ethan loose, and I watched Ethan wince as the circulation returned to his hands. Another moment passed before he had enough feeling in them to be able to hold the flashlight. Ethan walked to the gate, then held the flashlight out and said, “I’m going to tuck this inside my jacket. I won’t fit through the gates myself if I put it in my hip pocket. I just don’t want any misunderstandings.” He slowly tucked it in the pocket, making sure his hands stayed visible as he did it.