An Unlawful Order (The Chase Anderson Series) (33 page)

“My shoulder …” He pressed a hand to his right shoulder, shrugged several times, and rotated his arm.

“North didn’t mean …”

“Of course he did.” Figueredo lumbered to his feet, determined to do so without her help. “North’s just been waiting for an excuse. Haven’t you, North?”

Whatever North was about to say, he stopped when Chase shook her head. Figueredo added, “You think I’m blind? You don’t think everyone on this base knows how he feels about you?”

“Oh my god, you’ve got it all wrong, Colonel.” She was pinned between them now, a hand on each man’s chest.

North shouted, “You’re such an idiot, sir. Captain Anderson saved my life over there.”

“Stop it, North,” Chase ordered. “That’s enough.”

She felt North’s chest muscles relax beneath her hand. “I’m sorry, ma’am. I snapped when I saw him—I just came to help you find Molly. I checked out the backyard, just like you asked.”

“Nothing?”

“Nothing out of the ordinary, but you were right about that back gate. It’s open. I closed it.”

Paige was sliding open her patio glass door. “Chase,” she called out, “everything okay? Is Molly home?”

“I haven’t found her yet, Paige. She’s probably with Samantha by now.”

“Let me know if there’s anything I can do to help.”

Chase bolted toward her house, leaving the two men behind.

She ran around the side of the house to the front door. Samantha was there, the front door open. “Didn’t you find her?”

The realization that Molly hadn’t made it home after all caused Chase to burst into tears. “No. I thought she’d be home by now. I’ve got to do something.” She reached into her pocket, pulled out her cell phone, but there was still no service. “Damn this phone,” she shouted. “Sam, please call Major Sims at MP headquarters. Tell him Molly’s missing. If you’ll stay here, I’m going back out to look.”

“Shouldn’t you stay here?”

But Chase was already gone. This time she’d find Molly. She’d knock on every door of every house between hers and the Sims’ house, and if she didn’t find Molly, she’d keep knocking on doors until she did. The child knew better than to go inside anyone’s home—how many times had Chase preached this? But it was Halloween, and in all the excitement, maybe Molly had accepted an invitation to venture in for a party or for a ‘haunted house’ thrill. There had to be a logical explanation.

She’d knocked on three doors already. No one had seen Molly. She was crossing the street toward the fourth house when she heard a car rolling up behind her. It was Major Sims in his military sedan.

“Hop in,” he said.

“You found her?” Chase slid in and reached over her shoulder for a seatbelt. “I swear, when I get my hands on that little girl. Where on earth has she been?”

Sims whipped the car into a u-turn.

“Where are we going?” she asked, looking over her shoulder in the direction of home. “Where is she?” A sputtering of chatter came through on the police scanner, and Sims reached down and switched off the radio.

But he couldn’t switch off Chase. “Damn it, sir. Where are we going? Where’s my daughter?”

“I warned you about using up all your luck,” he said. “Remember?” He glanced over at her. His expression was blank, as if he’d been sedated, but of course, he hadn’t been or he wouldn’t have been able to grip the steering wheel as tightly as he was, so tightly, the veins in his hands were threatening to break through the skin. “What is it with you women? First Dr. Appleton. Now you….”

Oh my God!
she thought.
Not the base provost marshal!
Was there no one left on this base she could trust? “Major Sims,” she said and deftly slid her left hand down to unclip the seatbelt, “I just want to find my daughter, sir.”

Sims was staring at the road and traffic ahead—they were close to the front gate now. She’d wait until they got within a few feet of the gate, and when he slowed the car for the MP, she’d bolt out the door. A little over a half mile from the gate, she unbuckled the seat belt. Soon as she did, however, a red light flashed up on the dash screen and a warning bell chimed. She couldn’t wait for Sims to slow down now. She grabbed the door handle. It was locked. She pulled and pulled.

A matter-of-fact Sims said, “I control the door locks from here,” and nodded toward the row of buttons on his door. He was slowing the car on approach of the main gate but suddenly whipped sharply in the middle of the road. He turned on his blue lights as if they were about to go in pursuit of a speeder. A few seconds later, he was pulling into the dark parking lot of the base chapel, driving as far back as the lot would allow. They were cloaked in darkness under the banyan tree.

Sims unsnapped his holster and withdrew the pistol. He unlocked the car doors. “Get out.”

Outside the car, Chase stared up at the tall man, the top of her head level with his chest. He was in civilian attire, a dark windbreaker and jeans. “Major, you’re the provost marshal,” she pleaded. “Please don’t do this. You have too much to lose. Think of your wife, your boys….”

Sims had unlocked the trunk. Inside, a roll of duct tape, a shovel with a wooden handle, a military blanket, and a child’s Halloween bucket like the one Molly had been carrying. Chase gasped when she saw it. Instinctively, she reached out for the bucket. “Stand back,” Sims ordered. He pushed everything but the duct tape toward the back of the trunk. “Get in.” He gestured with the pistol toward the trunk. “If you ever want to see your daughter again, you’ll get in.”

Chase’s body was coursing with adrenaline. Should she fight him or run? Which would ensure the best outcome for Molly? She stared down into the trunk at the ridiculously cheerful bright orange bucket that was shaped like a pumpkin.

Then her head was struck with a sudden burst of sharpness a hundred times worse than any migraine she’d ever experienced.

When she awoke, it was dark and anything but quiet. She knew immediately she was in the trunk. Her head was throbbing, and a trickle of wetness was oozing down the side of her neck, stopping just behind her right ear. Blood, she guessed. The car was bumping roughly along on uneven pavement. At times, the dips were so that her entire body jolted off the trunk floor and back again. She wiggled her fingers. They were numb. Her hands were tied behind her back. Her ankles were also confined. And this was when she remembered the shovel, remembered that Molly had gone missing, remembered that Sims had mentioned Melanie Appleton, and this was when Chase panicked. Panicked so much, she thought she might die of a heart attack right there in the trunk from the excess rush of adrenaline long before Sims ever reached his destination.

The car came to a violent stop, and Chase groaned. Her entire body was now wracked with pain.
Stay calm,
she kept telling herself,
Stay calm
.

The first thing she saw when Sims lifted the trunk lid was the full moon and the stars. So her luck hadn’t completely run out, she thought. “Where’s Molly?” she said immediately.

“I knew I should have taped your mouth.” He lifted her out and leaned her against the side of the car. She tried to make out her surroundings. He’d parked on a path that looked as if it had been a road at one point but was now thickly overgrown with weeds. She felt the broken asphalt under her feet. She looked right and left: they were surrounded by trees.

“Major, I don’t care what you do to me. Just tell me my daughter is okay.”

He removed the shovel and set it on the ground beside the car. Chase was gazing longingly at the Halloween pumpkin, the face no longer visible, until Sims shut the trunk lid. He’d pulled a knife from a pocket and reached down in front of her to cut the tape from her ankles. Instinct said to kick him and to run. Sense ruled out, however. With her arms still pinned behind her, she couldn’t have gotten far. She would find the right moment, but she’d first have to get him to lead her to Molly.

Sims walked around the car to the glove box and removed a flashlight. He clicked it on, and gestured up the path. “Let’s go.”

Over a shoulder, she said, “So, Hickman got to you, too?”

Sims didn’t answer.

“Did he offer you a job like he did Farris, or are they blackmailing you the way they did Stone?”

“Best thing ever happened for us was your husband’s helicopter crash,” he said.

A stunned Chase stubbed her toe on uneven asphalt and fell. Her knee stung, and she was certain she’d wrenched her right ankle. Sims flashed the light into her face, and she squinted against the sudden blinding brightness.

“Get up,” he said.

She shook her head. “Not until you tell me where my daughter is.”

He tossed the shovel to the ground, withdrew his pistol and pointed it at her. “I should have brought the fucking duct tape. Now get up.”

“No!” she screamed this time, “You’ll just have to kill me here!” For a moment, she could tell from the way he was sizing up the area around them that Sims was weighing his options. Maybe she’d pushed him too far. “Major Sims,” she said, willing herself into a steely calm and squinting again into the bright white light of the flashlight he was shining at her, “I’ll go wherever you want, do whatever you want. Just tell me where Molly is.”

Everything went black, and it took several seconds for her eyes to adjust. By then, he’d walked over and reached a hand into her underarm, and roughly yanked her to her feet. “Let’s go.”

Her eyes stung with tears. His refusal to tell her anything about Molly could only mean one thing. She pushed the thought from her mind.
Focus,
she told herself. Then,
Stone,
she prayed
, if you can hear me, please protect our child
.

The asphalt path, broken up as it was, eventually turned into a rocky trail. They’d reached a gate across the path and a
Keep Out
trespassing notice. She turned to face Sims. “Road runs out here, Major. Now what?”

“Climb over,” he said, and this time he went ahead of her, swinging his long, spindly legs over the gate. As he climbed over, the beam from his flashlight highlighted a large, faded wooden sign, and Chase just managed to make out
Sacred Falls National Park
before the light went back to the path ahead.

The path was steep and rocky and littered with boulders, and many times she stumbled. So did Major Sims. “Are you okay?” she asked the first time he fell, and she realized how utterly ridiculous her concern sounded. He picked himself up but was bent over at the waist, trying to catch his breath. When he didn’t answer, she said, “Right now, you’re only facing kidnapping, Major Sims, and conspiracy. We can leave it there. We can turn around, go back, and face this together. I’ll go to bat for you, Sir. Colonel Figueredo—”

“Fig?” he interrupted. “What’s Colonel Fig got to do with any of this?”

So Joe was really one of the good guys, after all. Sims looked confused, dazed. “Colonel Figueredo was sent here by General Armstrong,” she said. “O’Donnell discovered what was going on between Hickman and Farris. O’Donnell contacted Armstrong for help and told him about how Hickman and Farris were blackmailing Stone.”

“Fuck!” he yelled, and straightened his body. He began to make a slow 180, counterclockwise, the shovel extended in his right hand. “Fuck, fuck, fuck,” he said each time his left foot touched down.

Chase knew this was the pivotal moment. “You take me back right now, Major Sims, and we’ll call N.I.S. together. You’ll get off light because you’ll testify against Hickman and Farris.”

He’d stopped turning and let the shovel fall to his side. He directed the flashlight into her face, and again, she had to squint. She couldn’t see him now, and this was terrifying. She couldn’t tell whether his shovel was about to come down on her head or whether he’d withdrawn his pistol and was about to shoot her right there.

“Get up,” he said. She heard him rushing down the path toward her. He yanked her to her feet. “I’m sorry, Chase. I’m really sorry. First your husband, now you. Damn you Andersons. But there’s just no other way.”

“Of course, there is,” she said, and pressed herself close enough to look up into his face. If she could somehow win him over, make him see that they both had so much to live for…. “This isn’t you, sir. Hickman and Farris, sure. You’ve got two wonderful boys. I know. I drove them to school this morning. They’re good boys. And I’ve got a little girl.” She was sobbing now. “Major Sims, I’m all Molly’s got left now that Stone’s gone.”

She read the flash of humanity that appeared in his eyes. He stared down at her, and she felt the energy in his body shift into resignation. Then, just as quickly, he huffed himself back into aggression.

“Let’s go,” he said, and muttered, “God help me.”

They walked in silence for what Chase guessed to be another ten minutes. The path was getting steeper and rockier, and they were close enough now that the roar of the Falls had drowned all other night noises. She hadn’t seen the Falls in almost a year, not since the media flight she’d been on with Tony White—the flight Stone had begged her not to take.

Several times, Sims had reached out to steady her wobbling gait, and each time his grip was unusually sensitive, helpful. She might yet emotionally reach him. Physically, with her hands still behind her back, her shoulders aching, her arms totally numb, she was helpless. Her fingers were so swollen she could no longer even wiggle them. She was breathing hard. She pushed out between breaths, “Can I just ask, why kill Melanie Appleton?”

Sims didn’t answer for a few moments. He was guiding her around boulders and helping her through the muddiest parts of the trail that was snaking toward the falls. “I didn’t kill her,” he finally said. “It was an accident. I started getting suspicious of Colonel Fig when I saw him coming out of your place that night, so I followed him. He led me to her. He gave her a folder, and after he drove away, I tried to get the folder from her, but she panicked and slipped.”

“What about my Jeep? Was it an accident that my brakes went out?”

“We’ve been listening to your office phone calls for months. When you agreed to meet Shapiro that afternoon—”