“But John’s not a killer, is he?” When he didn’t answer, she looked up.
Michael was standing in front of a closed door that she assumed led to a closet. He reached up, feeling along the sill at the top, and pulled down a key.
She saw the dead bolt. Her heart stopped mid-beat. “What are you doing?”
“Enough talking,” he said, slipping the key into the lock.
Angle’s leg muscles trembled as she forced herself to stand. She backed away from him, pushing toward the couch.
Michael read her mind. He scooped up the gun. “Move.” He used the muzzle to nudge her toward the closet. “Go on.”
Angie took small steps, the closet coming into view. It wasn’t a closet at all. Stairs led down to what must be a cellar.
“You fucked it all up,” Michael told her. “That little girl and me, we were having a real good time.”
The stairs got closer. If he put her in that cellar, Angie knew she would be dead.
“Move.”
She stopped walking and he bumped into her from behind. “Don’t do this.”
His breath was hot in her ear. “I’m gonna fuck you, Angie. I’m going to fuck every hole you’ve got.” He kept forcing her toward the cellar. “You sit down there and wait for me. Think about what I’m gonna do to you.
“No!” She dug her bare feet into the floor, pushed back against him. Her soles skidded across the wood. She tried to twist away, but he grabbed her by the waist, lifting her, closing the distance in two steps. She screamed “No!” bracing her feet against the doorjamb, fighting as hard as she could.
“Stop it!” he yelled, jerking her up again. Her legs swung wild as he threw her down the stairs. Angie careened against the walls as she fell. She landed in a heap at the bottom of the stairs, weeping from pain.
The overhead light flicked on, a single bulb illuminating what must have been a root cellar at one point. Jasmine was in a corner, curled up into a lifeless ball. Angie tried to go to the girl, but something held her back. She looked down, saw the shard of glass that impaled her upper arm. More glass stuck up like shark’s teeth where broken bottles had been cemented into the bottom stair.
The glass made a sucking noise as she tried to move.
“Think about it,” Michael called from the open doorway above. “Think about what’s going to happen to you.”
The light went out. The door closed. The bolt slid home.
She was going to die.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
Will kept his cell phone to his ear as he drove, praying that Amanda would be in her office. He had brought John with him because he needed to hear his story, wanted to know what kind of animal he would be dealing with when he reached Tennessee. For his part, John was more than willing to oblige. All of the man’s recalcitrance had disappeared, and Will’s head was spinning from his theories.
Caroline finally answered the phone, saying, “Amanda Wagner’s office.”
“I need Amanda now. It’s urgent.”
She put him on hold. Will kept his eyes on the road, speeding up Interstate 75 in the HOV lane thirty miles over the posted speed limit.
“Will?” Amanda said. “What’s going on?”
“I’m on my way to Tennessee.”
“I don’t recall signing off on a vacation request.”
“I think Michael Ormewood is the killer.”
“All right,” Amanda drawled. “Break it down for me, Will.”
Will told her John’s story, how Michael had tried to lean on the parole officer, how John’s sister had told him about the cabin in Tennessee. He finished with the oil stains in Michael’s driveway and what the neighbor had told Leo Donnelly.
“You checked Polaski’s house?”
“I had a cruiser go by. She’s not there. Her car’s not in the driveway.”
Amanda was silent. Will had introduced her to Angie once-not by choice. She had taken him to the hospital when Amanda had shot him with the nail gun. Inconceivably, the two women had gotten along.
Finally, she spoke. “So, what you’re saying is, based on some unanswered phone calls and a few spots on a driveway, you’re taking a convicted felon over state lines to look for an Atlanta police detective who may or may not have snatched another detective in broad daylight?”
“You need to search his house.”
“This is the house in DeKalb County’s jurisdiction? How do you propose I get a warrant, Dr. Trent? Not that your mysterious oil stains in the drive aren’t compelling, but I doubt there’s a judge alive who would sign off on it.”
“Amanda,” Will said, trying to control his voice. “You are a nasty, horrible person, but you have always had my back every time I worked a case. Don’t do this to me now.”
“Well, Will,” she countered. “You are a high-functioning dyslexic who reads on a second-grade level, but let’s not throw stones.”
Will felt all the saliva in his mouth dry up. When had she found out?
Amanda said, “I don’t have many friends in Tennessee, Will. I can’t reach out to them to help you with nothing more to go on than the bad feeling in your gut and we both know Yip Gomez would rather eat his own shit than give you a hand.” Yip was Will’s old boss in the northwest field office. She added, “This is why I keep telling you not to burn bridges,” as if now was the time for one of her lessons.
“I don’t know what you want me to say,” he admitted. “You’re right. This could be nothing. I could get there and it could be just a waste of time, but I can’t stand around not doing anything, Amanda.”
“You put out an APB on Polaski’s car?” Yes.
She was silent for a few seconds, then asked, “Tell me, this Detective Donnelly, he was the last person to leave Ormewood’s house?” Yes.
“Well, look at this,” Amanda exclaimed, her voice raised in mock surprise. “Caroline just handed me a message. It’s an anonymous tip. A concerned citizen has noticed that Detective Ormewood’s back door has been busted open. I think I should check on it myself, don’t you?”
Will felt a wave of relief. Amanda was going to help him. He could almost hear her thinking it through over the phone.
“Thank you,” he breathed. “Thank you.”
“I’ll let you know when I get there.”
Will ended the call. He kept the phone in his hand as he drove, taking the exit onto 575 with an abrupt jerk of the wheel that made John Shelley grab the side of the door like he was afraid they were going to roll. Will had been in such a hurry that he hadn’t even considered how he was going to find the cabin until John had asked for a map. The five-minute detour to the gas station had seemed like a lifetime. If what the neighbor had told Donnelly was right, Michael had about an hour on them. But, then, Michael was probably driving the speed limit, staying under the radar. Will wasn’t being so careful.
John asked, “What did she say?”
“You could have prevented this,” Will told him. “You could have stopped this four days ago.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Michael was with me when Cynthia Barrett died.”
John looked down at the map he had spread across his lap. “I heard she was running across the yard and tripped. Hit her head on a rock and died.”
“Then cut out her own tongue?”
John didn’t offer an answer.
“You should have done something then.”
