Geri Krotow - The Pregnant Colton Witness

Before she could yell to let them know they were being watched and should cease whatever they were doing, the man dropped the woman over the side of the boat. There was no struggle, nothing but the soft splash as the body disappeared from sight. As if it’d never been there.

Patience couldn’t stop the gasping cry that escaped her lips. Her exclamation, while not at top volume, carried across the eerie stillness. Frozen in place, she kept the binoculars focused, noting whatever details she could.

Icy shock crept over her as the man turned toward the clinic, searching for the source of the sound. She saw the moment he spotted her on the shore, his ice-blue eyes clear and sinister in the moonlight, through the binocular lenses. She didn’t recognize him, but knew that he saw her, and his frown was the only warning she had before he leaned over and started a high-power motor she hadn’t noticed before. Patience dropped the binoculars to her chest and scooped up Fred, adrenaline lending her strength. She’d lifted heavier dogs before, but she never had to move this quickly with them.

“Hang in there with me, Fred.” She ran back into the clinic and quickly put him in his kennel. Her phone was on her desk where she’d left it, but she had to lock the back door before running for it. When she turned the standard lock, she looked through the window and noted that the boat had carved through the thin layer of lake ice and the hulking man was close to the shore behind the clinic. He was clearly aiming for the small pier that the RRPD used for its launches and when training the K9 divers.

Patience went into alert mode, following the protocol practiced in drills with the RRPD. She locked herself in her office, grabbed her phone and went to the gun safe as she called the dispatcher.

“Nine-one-one. What’s your emergency?” Frank Lanelli’s familiar, confident voice eased her nerves as she rattled off her circumstances. All the while she unlocked her gun safe, took possession of her weapon, ensured it was loaded and then climbed under her desk, her designated safe spot.

A shot rang out and she couldn’t keep from flinching. She knew the killer must have gotten through the outside security fence by now, which she told Frank.

“The shot I heard had to be him breaking through the outer gate.”

“Good action, Patience. You locked the back door up tight. That will slow him down, too.” Frank had known her since she was a kid and had five children of his own, whom she’d gone to school with. He was an anchor for the Red Ridge County emergency dispatch system. “Where are you now?”

“I’m in my office—the room closest to the kennel, farthest from the clinic’s back entrance. I’m under my desk with my .45.” She heard a crash and instinctively tightened her hold on her weapon. “I think he just broke a window.” She couldn’t help gasping for breath.

“Where are you, you bitch?” The man’s roar reverberated through the walls.

“Oh, no. He’s coming for me, Frank.” Frantic, she tried to focus, figure out what to do next.

“Hang on, Patience. Was that the intruder yelling?”

She clung to Frank’s voice. “Yes. That was him. He’s angry and calling me a b-b-bitch.” She could barely breathe as fear’s noose tightened the muscles around her chest, where her heart raced. She felt its beats on her thighs, pressed up against her as she was folded under the desk. And against her baby bump. Her baby . Please, please let her make it through this. For the baby if nothing else.

“You’re good, Patience. You locked your office door?”

“Yes.”

“And turned off the lights?”

“Yes, but he has a weapon—”

“Tell me what you hear, Patience.” Frank’s voice remained steady and clear.

“He’s calling for me. He’s going to kill me, Frank.” And the baby. The baby no one but she knew about.

“No one’s going to hurt you, Patience. You’re doing great. You have your weapon ready to go. Keep me on the line. Keep talking if you can. If you have to put your phone down, keep it on, okay? Two units are en route. You’re certain you saw a body go into the lake?”

“Yes, positive.” She repeated the details of what she’d seen. “Even if she was alive, there’s little chance she still is. She looked unconscious, or dead, and the water is too cold.”

“Okay, we’re dispatching one K9 team now. That will be Sergeant Maddox with Greta. They’ll go straight to the lake. You stay put until the other RRPD units arrive.”

All she heard was Nash’s name. Nash would make it okay. He was an accomplished, practiced, proficient K9 officer.

Frank continued with the running commentary, but even his professional expertise, his years of calming traumatized citizens, couldn’t soothe her. There was an intruder in her clinic, most likely a murderer. The doom that shrouded Red Ridge over the Groom Killer had nothing on the dread that choked her. Had she found out she was going to have a baby today only to lose everything at the hands of some evil stranger?

A loud crash, followed by the sound of splintering glass hitting the clinic’s floor, sharpened her senses. He was breaking the kennel windows that lined the corridor. The dogs started barking and Gabby shrieked in outrage. Please don’t let him hurt the patients.

“Where are you? Come out now or I’ll take out your precious animals!” And he had a weapon to make good on his promise.

He was closer, too close. Patience tightly hugged her knees, weapon ready in her right hand. She’d do whatever she had to do to stay alive and protect her baby.

“One minute out, Frank.” Nash spoke to dispatch, his siren blaring as he raced through town in his RRPD K9 SUV, Greta secured on the back seat. His entire shift had been routine until Patience’s call came in from the clinic. He had to help her, to reach her before the suspect did. He kicked himself for not calling her, asking her out again. And then immediately shoved that thought aside. There’d be time for self-reflection later, after Patience and the clinic were secure.

“Go ahead to the lake, Nash. We’ve got two units approaching the clinic.”

“How far out?”

“Three and four minutes.” Frank’s concern was audible. “Repeat, K9 officer is to go to the lake. Victim in the water.”

“I hear you. But I’m going into the clinic first if no other unit is there yet.” Nash was only a minute out, and seconds could mean the difference between life and death. He’d be damned if he let anyone harm Patience. He strained to see up the road, willing the clinic to appear.

“You’re right, Nash—we need you to go to the clinic first. We’ve now got a crazy man in the kennels, threatening Dr. Colton. She’s armed.”

“Copy that. Clinic first.” Like it was going to be anything else. A victim in the cold depths of the lake, even with his and Greta’s expert abilities, stood a slim chance of making it, if any. There was still hope for Patience.

Damn it. Why hadn’t he called her, reached out to her after their night together? If he got them through this, he’d make it up to her.

Greta whined in the back seat.

“It’s okay, gal. We’re going to get there.” Greta never made a sound unless reacting to her instinct that something was wrong. That made two of them. It was constant these days in Red Ridge, from the Groom Killer case to the incessant pace of drug crime.

The clinic buildings came into sight, and as they appeared on the horizon Nash expelled a harsh breath. He willed the vehicle to go faster, faster as he navigated the familiar road. The security lights were blazing, but no inside lights were visible. He also noted no sign of RRPD units, confirming Frank’s reported ETA for them, so Nash pulled around to the back, next to the fenced area for the dogs and K9 training.