South Of Hell

Chapter Forty-one

Louis saw the blue pulse of the lights ahead. The fog had almost burned off, leaving the sun a pale smudge in the eastern sky, and as they rounded the bend on Lethe Creek Road, the farmhouse came into view.

Two Livingston County sheriff cruisers were parked at the gate. Joe had called them from the hotel in Ann Arbor, knowing they could get to the farm faster. A report of a runaway girl wasn’t high priority, but when Joe told them that Amy could be a target of Owen Brandt, the response was swift.

There were three deputies standing in the yard. But they were alone.

“Where is she?” Joe said, leaning forward in the passenger seat.

“Take it easy, Joe. Let me get the car stopped,” Louis said.

But Joe was out of the Bronco before he got it into park.

Louis followed as fast as he could, his chest aching and his brain still fogged with painkillers. He had insisted on driving, because for the first time since he’d known her, Joe was incapable of a single rational thought. By the time they had turned onto Lethe Creek Road, she had managed to calm down some, making the transition back into cop mode, as he called it, but she still was not herself.

He came up behind Joe, recognizing the shortest man in the group as Sheriff Travis Horne.

“Look, we’ve been here almost an hour already,” Horne was saying to Joe. “We’ve searched the house and the barn and every other damn building out here.”

“Did you search the attic?” Joe asked.

The sheriff sighed. “Yes, ma’am, we did.”

Joe spun and looked out at the fields. “Then we do a grid search,” she said.

“With three men?” Horne asked. “Are you nuts?”

“There’s five of us here,” Joe said.

“And sixty-some acres out there, plus two or three miles of nothing beyond that,” he said, gesturing toward the barn. “It’ll take days.”

“For God’s sake,” Joe said. “She’s only a child.”

The sheriff tipped back his hat. “A child who made her way out here twice now all by herself. She sounds a mite more capable of taking care of herself than you’re giving her credit for.”

Joe glared at him, then spun away from the group and walked away. Arms crossed, she stared out at the cornfields. Her shoulders jerked with a smothered sob.

Louis looked at Horne. “Sheriff,” he said, “we’re sure Amy will come back here, and we’re going to stay. I would appreciate it if you’d leave us one of your deputies to help.”

Horne cut his eyes to Joe, chewing at his lip as he considered the request. “I still have men on overtime patrolling the back roads for Owen Brandt,” he said. “Who you also told us would come back here, and he hasn’t showed, either. I’m sorry, I can’t use what little manpower I have to keep looking for your ghosts.”

“Would you at least call Detective Bloom and let him know Amy’s missing and ask him if he can spare a few men?” Louis asked.

Horne nodded. “That I can do,” he said.

Louis stuffed his hands into his pockets and looked to Joe. She was walking toward the barn, already anxious to start searching. He knew it would be hours before Bloom could dispatch anyone to help them. If he sent anyone at all.

“Kincaid?”

Louis looked back at the sheriff.

“I’ll send Sam here back with some coffee and doughnuts in about an hour for you.”

Horne started toward his cruiser. His deputies followed him, and in less than a minute, the two cruisers headed away, down Lethe Creek Road.

Joe had disappeared. Then Louis saw her coming around the north side of the barn. She was stopping to look under every piece of rusted machine, inside every metal drum, and through every bramble and bush.

Louis squinted into the pale sun, then did a slow turn in a circle, surveying the land.

He had never believed in ESP or telepathy, but he did believe in instincts. Especially his own. And he had the feeling Amy was here somewhere.

Maybe she had seen the cops and, thinking they would take her back before she found her mother, found a place to hide. Maybe she had simply curled up somewhere and fallen asleep.

He knew one thing for sure. Amy wouldn’t hide from Joe.

He cupped his hands around his mouth and shouted as loudly as he could. “Amy!”

Joe’s eyes shot to him from her position by a coil of barbed wire.

“Joe, call to her,” he said.

Joe hesitated, then called Amy’s name. She called again and again, her voice growing hoarse.

Louis strained to hear anything, any response. But there was nothing but the empty echo of Joe’s voice floating on the wind.

Amy…

Brandt spun around, his ears perked at the sound of the voice. He raised a hand to shield his eyes from the sun, trying to see who was back there calling to the girl.

“It’s Miss Joe,” Amy whispered.

Brandt’s hand shot out and clipped her by the ear. “Shut up.”

He grabbed the sleeve of her parka and manhandled her the rest of the way up the slope and into the cemetery. She tripped on a headstone and fell to the grass.

Brandt yanked her by the collar to her feet. “Keep walking,” he said. “We got a long way to the car.”

“You’re going the wrong way,” Amy said.

“What?”

“She’s back there.” Amy pointed south.

“No one’s coming to get you, girl.”

“She’s back there. If you leave now, you’ll never find her.”

Brandt stopped and stared at her.

“Momma’s back there,” Amy whispered.

Brandt twisted to look over his shoulder. But he saw nothing. What the hell had he expected to see? Jean standing there and looking back at him?

The bitch is lying to me. Like they all lie.

He jerked her arm so hard she cried out. “Don’t you lie to me, girl,” he said. “Don’t you ever lie to me about your god damn momma, you hear me?”

The girl’s eyes welled with tears, but for the first time, he didn’t see any fear in them. Suddenly, she didn’t seem to be afraid of him at all.

Damn it, he’d make her afraid.

He hit her in the side of the head. The blow knocked her to her knees. He yanked her back up and pressed the broken blade of the knife to her cheek. But still, he saw no fear.

He smacked her again. This time, the blade glanced off her chin, ripping skin and drawing blood. She started to cry, hands at her face.

“Where is she, then?” he asked, leaning into her. “Where is your momma?”

“In the hiding place.”

“What fucking hiding place?”

“The root cellar.”

The root cellar?

No. He’d been in the root cellar. Been there for two days. There had been no one else in there with him.

Suddenly, the girl twisted away from him. He groped for her sleeve, but she was gone, stumbling down the hill, arms flailing, trying to keep her balance.

He broke into a run after her, letting his momentum propel him down the slope. He caught her on the muddy bank of Lethe Creek, but she spun away from him and plunged into the water.

He trudged into the stream, clawing at her parka. But she was fast, flying through the water. He couldn’t keep up, slowed by the icy rush against his thighs and the sucking of mud at his shoes.

“Stop, you little bitch!”

She stumbled onto the rocks on the other side, gasping and trying to get her balance. He lunged at her. All he could catch was her ankle. With a jerk, he pulled her backward. She slammed face-first to the bank, her screams smothered in the mud.

He flipped her over so he could see her face. Now he could see the terror burning in her eyes, feel the hot pulse of panicked air from her lips. This was the way it was supposed to be.

He plunged the knife into the soft flesh of her belly.

Her small hands flew up, groping for something to grab, but he ripped them off his shirt and shoved her away from him.

She fell back into the water.

He was going to go after her and cut her up good, but it didn’t look like he had to. The bitch was motionless. One arm wedged between the muddy rocks, the other floating limply in the rippling water that rocked her thin body.

Her eyes were open, looking at him. But there was nothing in them now.

Brandt sucked in some cold air to steady himself. His knees felt like rubber.

She’s back there.

He turned slowly to the south, toward the farm.

The bitch had been lying to him. They all lied.

But he couldn’t stop himself.

He slogged back through the stream and up the rise on the other side. When he got to the cemetery, he paused. There to the south, through the bare black trees, he could see the barn.

He started toward it.