J. Black - The Survivors Club

Tess thought that was probably true.

Whatever had happened, Jaimie and her kidnapper were gone.

It sounded like a crime scene to Tess. She spoke to the head of the team, a neighbor and a former cop himself, James Tarbel. They agreed that since it was dark, they could easily trample whatever evidence there was. The next day they would send a detective and crime scene techs.

She sat there in the dark, thinking. She was sure it was Wade Poole, sure he had Jaimie. But where were they now? Why did he take her up here?

It had been a temporary hiding place, but it could have been more than that, from the description. She guessed—and she could be wrong about this—he had photographed her to scare her family.

Now she thought she knew why Poole had kidnapped Jaimie.

Poole knew about the family—he knew what they were doing. He’d killed George Hanley because of it. Because they’d disagreed on what to do with the evidence. Hanley wanted to turn it over to the authorities. But he’d made the mistake of letting his old partner, his son-in-law, in on the deal.

Poole didn’t care about bringing the DeKovens to justice.

Tess was pretty sure that all Wade Poole cared about was money.

She got ready for bed, but couldn’t sleep. Finally, she decided to go back to Jaimie’s one more time and see if there was anything to point to where Wade Poole might go next.

It was full dark now, and cold. When Tess drove onto the ranch, she saw immediately that something was different.

Should have secured this as a secondary crime scene, she thought.

Tired. Too much going on.

Tess stared at the spot where the ranch truck had been—the old, root beer—colored GMC.

It was gone.

She stood there, arms crossed, feeling the chill down to her bone. Cold at night in the desert, especially in the spring. The heat was absorbed by the earth and the atmosphere felt thin and chilly. And dark. She heard horses stirring in their stalls, here a grunt and neigh. She had her Maglite and her service weapon, and that was it.

The barn door was closed. It had been open before.

Tess held the Maglite in her left hand and drew her weapon. She felt the familiar adrenaline rush. Where she’d been tired and sleepy a moment ago, she was all nerve now. Every sense bristling.

Maybe he’d taken the truck.

Or maybe not.

She made her way around the barn. The couple of windows were too high, and no way to get up to them. She heard a snort. It wasn’t a frightened sound, more like a horse just…sighing. She listened through the wall and heard a rhythmic munching.

A horseman, though, wouldn’t scare these horses. A ranch guy—and Wade certainly looked as if he’d spent time on a ranch somewhere—would not raise any alarms.

Tess decided not to take any chances. She called for backup, and within ten minutes a couple of deputies arrived from the substation in town.

They took it slow. They were careful. Weapons drawn, one going low—Deputy Walsh—and one going high–Tess. And one standing on the other side of the double doors, Deputy Agel.

Tess pulled the right hand door to the side—it slid on a groove.

Agel, from the left, covered them. Yelled, “Police! Don’t move!”

One single lightbulb cast light from the rafters. No hayloft—Tess had seen the separate feed shed away from the barn.

The horses looked over their stalls. Four on one side and three on the other. The last stall empty. Or someone hiding in it.

Walsh duckwalked out from under Tess, aiming to the right. Tess to the left, along with Agel. Checking each stall.

“Clear!”

“Clear!”

“Clear!”

The last stall was empty.

But they had something—confirmation.

Backed in to the far wall at the end of the aisle was Wade Poole’s stolen Ford truck—the front bumper mashed against the wheel well.

“Looks like he’s been in a fender-bender,” Tess said.

She called it in. “No license plate,” Tess told her detective sergeant. “He must have put it on the farm truck.”

She gave him the VIN number and waited.

Twenty minutes later it was confirmed. The white Ford F-350 belonged to a construction site in Nogales, Arizona—Redline Construction. The truck had been stolen eleven days earlier.

“They didn’t lock it up?” Usually construction sites, even out in the boonies, set up chain-link fence enclosures for temporary parking lots.

“Apparently not. Where do you think he’s headed?”

Tess didn’t know. But she could guess. “Wade Poole is after the DeKoven family. I think he’s planning to shake them down. So I would send a TPD unit to Brayden DeKoven’s address, and Pima County should check out Michael DeKoven’s place out on the Spanish Trail.” She rattled off both addresses.

“You remember them?” Messina said. Added, “I guess you would, huh? That’s handy.”

He still wasn’t used to her, still saw her as a freak. But she was a useful freak.

“I would set up surveillance if he’s not there yet,” Tess added. She made a mental note to call Cheryl Tedesco. Cheryl would want to know what was going on, and might even be able to move things along at TPD.

“We have an Attempt to Locate in both counties now for a brown 1978 GMC pickup.” He read off the license plate belonging to the white Ford.

“Sounds good. I’m on my way.”

“What address?”

“Michael DeKoven’s.”

Tess thought, if she were Wade Poole, that was where she’d go.

Tess was almost to the Vail exit outside Tucson when her detective sergeant contacted her again.

“We have a description of the truck, but the license plate isn’t the same.”

He’d switched plates again? The license plate didn’t come back to the ranch truck or the stolen Ford. Somewhere along the line, he’d stolen another plate.

One jump ahead.

“Where is he?”

“He’s on Spanish Trail. Pima County Sheriff’s unit is following.”

“Ask them not to alert him.”

“Will do. I’ll tell him to turn off.”

Tess’s heart was beating so hard she wondered if it would burst through her chest cavity. Wade Poole was armed and dangerous. If he was cornered, he would not hesitate to kill.

He was a killing machine.

Wade saw the Pima County Sheriff’s car coming in his direction. He saw the body of the car feint slightly—a reflex action—and continue on smoothly. He guessed that someone had put out a BOLO on the ranch truck. He watched in his rearview as the radio car slowed and pulled off onto the verge. Knew it would turn around and pursue. There was no place to go to ground. But he was close to Michael DeKoven’s castle on a hill—probably not three miles overland. He could see the lights up on the hill. He thought about ditching the truck, but he wanted Jaimie as a hostage. He kept his gaze glued to the rearview mirror. The curve in the road hid the sheriff’s car. Any minute he expected headlights to appear. But they didn’t.

Maybe he was hypersensitive. He kept driving. The turnoff was up ahead, and he wanted to keep Jaimie with him. He glanced at her. She leaned as far as she could away from him, up against the passenger side. From her posture you’d think she was cowed, but he saw the hatred in her eyes. Even in the dark of the night, he could see it. He would not take her for granted. Hatred like that could overcome a lot.