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“Hurt. One of them bad. But alive. The other cruiser hit a tree. Knocked out both officers, but they’ll be okay too.”
The young woman with the big trauma kit sank to her knees next to him. “Let me take a look.”
“Fine, but no painkillers.”
“Can I numb the area?”
“Absolutely.” He lay back on the gravel and let her work while his brain scrambled to figure out a plan to find Lainie.
Cole’s phone rang. “I’m going to get this while they work on you.” He snagged it. “Garrison here.” He stood and walked to the edge of the road and looked down. James tried to hear his partner’s side of the conversation but couldn’t make out the words. However, concentrating on trying kept his mind off the fact that he was getting stitched up on the scene.
Cole talked for thirty seconds, then hung up and returned to squat next to him again. “That was Myles Williams. When I missed Victoria at the morgue, I called him. He said Victoria still wasn’t home—and wasn’t sure when she’d be back—but he’d meet me there and let me see whatever it is I wanted to see.”
“Smart thinking.”
Cole shrugged. “When you can’t get the one you need, go with the one next in line. Hang in there. We’ll find her.”
An officer ran up to them. “There’s a gas station about half a mile up the road. The owner said he saw everything go down and tried to call 911. When he didn’t have a signal, he hightailed it to his station to use the landline. Anyway, he said there was a van that drove up and stopped just as he was backing up to do a U-turn. I got the license plate on the van heading north.”
“And it’s registered to?” James spat the words through his pain.
“Adam Williams.”
Twenty-Five
Lainie had no idea how long she’d been asleep, but right now, she was cold and wanted some hot coffee and a sherpa blanket. And where had the headache come from? And why was her neck sostiff? She groaned and tried to move, only to freeze.
She was sitting in a chair, her hands tied to each arm, feet bound.Wait ... what?
Nausea churned and she dry-heaved before gaining control of her stomach. Once everything finally settled, she focused on the details—dragging through her spotty memories until she came to the part of the wreck. Someone shooting at them. Sending them over the side of the road and down the embankment. Now she remembered.
James. “Oh, James,” she whispered. “I’m sorry.” She was in a home in the main room, with the kitchen to her left and bedrooms to her right. She sat in front of a stone fireplace she would have admired under other circumstances. Instead, she tugged at the zip ties binding her to the chair.
No go, of course.
Could she stand and walk to the kitchen with the chair on her back to get a knife?
She had no idea who’d taken her, nor where he was at the moment,but she had no doubt he’d be back. All she could do was try. She pressed her feet to the floor and hunched forward, wobbled like she was going to fall over, and slammed back to the floor with a thud. Breaths now coming in pants, she started to try again when the door opposite her swung open.
And Adam stepped inside, a gun in his right hand, held at his side. “Hello, Lainie. Glad to see you’re awake.”
He walked closer, and while her heart beat a thunderous rhythm in her chest, she held her tongue and simply watched him, taking in every detail of his appearance, and finally laughed.
He froze. Frowned. Scowled. And stepped back. “What’s so funny?”
“I’m not crazy. You’re not Adam.”
“No, I’m not. I’m Adam’s half brother, Michael.”
“The resemblance is uncanny, but I’m sure you worked to make it so.”
He shrugged. “At a distance it worked for me. Of course, if you’d just had the decency to die in the car wreck, none of this would have been necessary.”
“So you put the bald tires on my car.”
“I did.”
“Why are you doing all of this?”
