Leo recoiled from him. He shook his head. “Jesus, Jordan I can’t believe it. You were going to shoot him.”
His friend frowned at him. “No, I wasn’t—”
“Yes, you were,” Leo argued. “I saw you start to reach for your gun.”
“It was just a reflex. I wasn’t going to shoot anybody.” Jordan turned and hurried back into the house.
Leo trailed after him. “If that cop tried to go down to the basement, you would have stopped him. You were ready to pull that gun on him. Don’t deny it.”
He followed Jordan inside the cabin. He heard another loud crack from down in the basement.
“Listen to that!” Jordan barked, stomping toward the kitchen. “If you’d have stayed down there with him like I asked you—”
“What were you talking about with that cop about spending time in an institution?” Leo interrupted. He kept on Jordan’s heels. “What’s this Patrick-Hannah Clinic? Were you ever going to tell me about that?”
Jordan ignored the question and tromped down the cellar steps. “The cop’s gone, asshole!” he yelled at Meeker. “You can cut that shit out now!”
Their captive had managed to free one of his legs. And he was using his foot as leverage to raise the front of the worktable and then drop it on the basement floor. Jordan almost tripped over the fallen shovel as he bolted toward the worktable. “Damn it!” he growled. He grabbed the shovel and swung it at Meeker, whacking the flat blade against the backs of his thighs.
Past the blanket-gag in his mouth, Meeker let out a muted howl of pain.
“Jordan, stop it!” Leo yelled. It looked like his friend was about to hit Meeker with the shovel again. Leo lunged toward him and wrestled the shovel from Jordan’s grasp. Jordan tried to push him away. Before Leo knew what was happening, he threw the shovel aside and hit his friend in the face.
“Jesus!” Jordan cried, shrinking back. A hand over his mouth, he bumped into Meeker.
Leo backed away, too. He unclenched his fist. “This ends now,” he whispered.
Jordan stared at him for a moment. He took his hand away from his mouth, and Leo could see his lower lip was bleeding.
Silent, Jordan turned toward a storage rack against the wall and took a roll of duct tape off the shelf. He tore off a long strip. The ripping sound seemed to echo in the cellar. He squatted down in back of Meeker and grabbed his ankle. Meeker didn’t resist as Jordan taped his ankle to the table leg. Jordan pulled another long strip from the tape roll and wrapped several loops around his captive’s ankle and the table leg.
Leo gazed at the bright red mark on the back of Meeker’s thighs. Slumped over the table, the man sobbed. Only a muffled whimpering could be heard past the makeshift gag in his mouth.
Leo turned toward his friend. “Jordan?”
Without looking at him, Jordan straightened up and then returned the roll of duct tape to the shelf. Touching his lip, he glanced at the blood on his fingertips and then brushed past Leo as he headed up the stairs.
Leo moved to the worktable, where he pulled the corner of the old blanket out of Meeker’s mouth. “Thank you,” Meeker gasped. Then he started coughing.
Leo went to the laundry sink and filled the measuring cup with cold water. He brought it to Meeker and put the cup to his lips. Meeker drank greedily. He pulled away and caught his breath. “Thanks,” he said again, with another gasp. “Listen, you need to stop him. He’s crazy. He’s not going to—”
“Shut up,” Leo whispered. He put the cup to Meeker’s lips once more. “Please, don’t say another word. Don’t say another goddamn thing.”
He found Jordan in the bathroom off the kitchen. The door was open. His friend stood in front of the sink, staring at himself in the mirror. He dabbed at his bloody lip with a wadded-up Kleenex.
Leo leaned against the doorway. Jordan eyed his reflection in the mirror for a moment and then went back to nursing his lip.
“I’m sorry I hit you,” Leo murmured.
“Well, I hit you earlier,” Jordan said with a limp smile. “Guess we’re even.”
“It scared the crap out of me when I saw you check your gun before going upstairs to meet that policeman at the door,” Leo admitted.
“It’s not my gun; it’s Meeker’s.”
“Whatever, you still started to reach for it when the cop asked about the noise. Conscious or un, you started to reach for it, Jordan. You came that close to drawing a gun on a police officer. Do you know how screwed up that is?”
Jordan eyed him in the mirror. “Pretty screwed up, I guess,” he muttered. “Maybe you think I belong back in Patrick-Hannah….”
“What’s it going to take for you to be satisfied?” Leo asked quietly. “What does he have to say for you to end this and turn him over to the police?”
Jordan winced, and Leo thought it was because his lip hurt. But then he saw the tear sliding down his cheek. “I really don’t know, Leo,” he admitted in a shaky voice. “I just want him to confess—and know it’s genuine. I want it to be over, too. I hate this.” He lowered the toilet lid, then sat down and started sobbing. “I’m sorry, Leo,” he cried, rubbing his eyes. “I didn’t mean to do this to you. You shouldn’t be involved in this mess. I’m so ashamed.” He tore off some toilet paper and blew his nose. Then he took a deep breath. His face was red, and his eyes were bloodshot. “You asked about that—that clinic. He’s the reason I had a breakdown and had to go to that place. He’s the reason I’m so screwed up. He took my mom away right in front of me. I couldn’t save her, Leo. I couldn’t get to her in time.”
Leo sighed. “You could have told me, you know—about your mom, about the clinic, all of it. I wish you hadn’t kept it a secret. It wouldn’t have made any difference to me, Jordan. I mean, you’re still my best friend. Even after all this shit, you’re still my best friend.”
“Well, it ain’t over yet,” Jordan murmured.
Leo worked up a smile. “C’mon, let’s take this into the kitchen,” he said. “I feel like I’m talking to you while you’re taking a dump in here.”
Jordan let out a weak laugh; then he got to his feet.
Leo led the way into the kitchen. He stopped at the refrigerator. He took out Jordan’s citrus-flavored Vitaminwater and a Coke for himself.
Jordan sat down at the breakfast table. “I’m sorry you got sucked into this, buddy. Some happy birthday, huh?”
Leo just shrugged, and then he reopened the Vitaminwater and set it in front of his friend.
“I got you the jacket,” Jordan said, with a sad little smile. “You know the one from Nordstrom, the one you had your eye on? You look cool in that thing. Anyway, it’s out in the car.”
Leo felt a tightness creeping into his throat. He swallowed hard. “Thanks,” he whispered. He mussed Jordan’s hair. “Thank you….”
Leo’s heart ached as he sat down at the table with Jordan. He raised his Coke can and nodded at the Vitaminwater. “C’mon, Jordan, drink up.”
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Her hand was bleeding, but she couldn’t see it.
The little cell had become pitch black—except for faint traces of moonlight through the slats of the box fan. Moira had been working in the dark for an hour now.
She’d managed to move the moldy, fetid mattress aside. Then she’d felt her way back to the metal shelving unit and dragged it over to the wall that had a built-in fan up near the ceiling. The metal bookcase had made a loud scraping noise against the cement floor. Every few moments, Moira would stop, catch her breath, and listen for his footsteps. But she didn’t hear him. She didn’t hear anything except that constant flapping noise outside.
Moira wondered if the slime bucket was even around. Maybe he had another motion detector going off in another location, or perhaps another girl in another little room somewhere.
Her ankle hurt like hell every time she put weight on it. But Moira managed to climb up three shelves of the
