Читать книгу Familiar Escape - Caroline Burnes - Страница 8

The only good thing about being back in his cell was that they removed the handcuffs. Thomas sat on the thin bunk mattress and tried not to hear the sounds of the other incarcerated men or to think about the future. For just one second, he’d thought he might have connected with Molly Harper. That had given him hope—and hope was the only thing he couldn’t afford.

Someone had framed him, and done a professional job of it. Someone who knew of his friendship with Anna Goodman. Someone who knew she had a key to his home and access to his gun.

Since the terrible morning when the deputies had come to the park and arrested him, Thomas’s life had become a nightmare. He’d gleaned enough details about Anna’s murder to be able to imagine what had occurred. He could only hope that his imagination was worse than the reality.

In his mind he saw Anna running across his lawn, using her key to unlock his door. She had Kate in her arms, and they were both crying. Anna kept looking back over her shoulder, terrified that someone had followed her. Her fingers fumbled the key as she tried to open the door.

Thomas stopped his thoughts. He couldn’t bear to see Anna so afraid, and the one person she was most afraid of was her husband, Darwin. He paced the small cell. The worst curse in the world would be to love the person you feared the most. Anna’s relationship with Darwin had been pure hell. Yet she had acted as if she were powerless to change it.

Unless on the night of her murder, she’d intended to take the baby and leave.

He saw her again, putting Kate on his bed as she got the gun from the drawer. She turned and faced the doorway, determined to defend herself against whoever was after her. The bedroom door flew open and—

Thomas grasped the bars and bit back the curse that wanted to escape. Someone had hurt Anna while he was sitting around a campfire drinking coffee and playing cards. And then that someone had framed him.

Now he was helpless to hunt for Kate or even try to clear his own name. He’d been jailed with bail set so high he could never make it—not even if every friend he had chipped in. The only way he was going to get out of the cell he was in would be a transfer to the state prison in Huntsville. He flopped back on his bed in defeat.

In a moment he sat up. Instead of moping around, he needed to call his lawyer and arrange for the sale of his home—that was the only way he’d generate enough funds to make bail. Thank goodness Bradley Alain, the topmost criminal lawyer in east Texas, had volunteered to defend him. Otherwise he’d have to sell his house for legal fees alone.

If Molly Harper had done nothing else, she’d inspired him to quit wallowing around and imagining the awfulness of Anna’s last moments and do something to help himself. She’d walked into the jail and brought his hopes back to life. “Damn,” he muttered.

The man in the cell next to him spoke. “Hey, Lakeman, I hear you’re going to get the chair.”

“Shut up,” Thomas said.

“My lawyer tells me that Texas executes more people than any other state.”

“Shut up!” Thomas grasped the bars as if he intended to pull them apart. “Just shut up!” But now he was speaking to himself, to the part of him that, once again, had begun to imagine Anna’s last moments.

IT WAS MIDDAY, the February sun warm as Molly stepped out of the Jeep in the midst of huge trees and the chirping of birds. Spring was still several weeks away, but the forest was waking up from the sleep of winter.

Familiar hopped out of the vehicle and started immediately to the abandoned tent that remained at the campsite where Thomas had spent Saturday night. Molly approached slowly, taking in the evidence that told of a hurried departure.

There were the cold embers of a fire and a camp coffeepot sitting beside it. She touched the pot with her toe. Coffee sloshed in it. About ten yards away, Familiar was entering the tent.

Beside the fire she found a Coleman lantern and a tin cup. Closer to the tent was a flashlight lying on a bed of pine needles and beside that a battered ice chest. The police hadn’t bothered to pick up any of Thomas’s gear. She lifted the lid of the chest and found three unopened beers, water, coffee, some apples and bologna. It certainly looked as if Thomas had been camping in earnest.

So far, everything he’d said had checked out, but if he’d set up the campsite as an alibi, of course it would. She was reluctant to enter the tent, and that emotion surprised her. For some reason she felt as if she were invading Thomas’s privacy. Even though he’d requested as much.

“Familiar!” She went to the tent flap. The cat had found plenty to explore. He’d been inside the tent for more than fifteen minutes. “Kitty, kitty.”

The cat sauntered outside with what looked to be part of a newspaper. She knelt to take it and the cat used his paw to point out the date. February 17. It was the Saturday evening that Anna had been killed.

“This doesn’t prove anything.” She folded the paper and put it in her pocket. “Thomas Lakeman could have planted that newspaper. He could have bought it and left it just to attempt to show he was here.” The newspaper didn’t prove a thing, but it was good to have.

The cat gave one cry and began to walk the area. Molly watched him in awe as he created a spiral and worked his way from the inside out, examining the ground, sniffing the grass. She’d never seen a detective, much less a cat, conduct such an intense investigation.

When he paused about twenty yards away, she went to see what he’d found. “A clue?”

Familiar pointed to a hole in the ground. “Snake?” she asked, remembering that her father had always told her that snakes lived in holes. Though she enjoyed the woods, she was wary of the wild creatures, particularly snakes. The motto in Texas was that everything was bigger, and that certainly applied to the rattlers. A timber rattler could grow up to six feet long and as big around as a man’s muscular arm.

The cat left his find and walked to another place. He stared at her until she followed him. Another hole. She frowned, realizing the cat was showing her a pattern.

There were four holes on each side of the square and two larger ones in between. She understood. “A tent. So Thomas wasn’t lying about that. Someone else was camping here.” Why was the cat trying so hard to convince her of Thomas’s innocence? The answer was obvious—because he believed Thomas wasn’t guilty.

“Why would someone kill my sister, steal her baby and set Thomas Lakeman up to take the fall? Why him? If he’s telling the truth, he was just my sister’s friend.”

The cat didn’t have an answer, or if he did he wasn’t saying. But the question throbbed in Molly’s brain. Ever since she’d heard the awful news, she’d asked herself who would hurt her sweet sister. The name that always came up was Darwin Goodman. She didn’t say it, but in her opinion he was awful enough to sell his own child. And if a lot of money were involved, he’d even kill.

“We have to get back to the jail,” she said. “I have another question for Thomas.”

MY PRELIMINARY INVESTIGATION supports everything Thomas said at the jail. There is a second campsite where two people slept. And whoever they were, they left in a big hurry. At night. I found some of their gear scattered at the edge of the clearing, which leads me to believe they left before first light. That makes me wonder if they had a reason to be gone. Sure, I have a suspicious mind, but that’s why I’m such a good detective. I don’t let a motive sneak up on me— I like to see it coming.

Call me a trained observer, but I detect a bit of chemistry between Molly and Thomas. She doesn’t trust him, not by a long shot, but she felt something for him. If she hadn’t, she’d never have gone to check out his campsite. One thing I’ve learned as a private dick is to always suspect the worst of human nature. Thomas, though, strikes me as a good man. Molly asked the right question—if Thomas is innocent, why was he set up? I think that’s how we’re going to have to approach this. Thomas is the key.

With that in mind, I hope Miss Molly Marvel doesn’t blow a gasket when she realizes what I have planned.

We’re back at the county lockup. It isn’t the most sophisticated jail I’ve ever seen. In fact, it’s pretty minimum security. They’re treating Thomas like he’s some kind of hardcore felon, but I suspect they leave him pretty much to himself once he’s back in his cell.

It’s a simple lock and key system and I didn’t notice any security monitors. Should be a piece of cake. I just hope Molly can handle it.

“MR. LAKEMAN, why would someone frame you?” Molly asked him.

Thomas found himself sitting in the interview room yet again, with the beautiful brunette seated across from him. A week ago he would have been planning a way to ask her for a date. Now he was hoping not to frighten her so badly she wouldn’t listen to what he had to say.

“I think I was convenient. Anna always turned to me when she was in trouble. There were a few times when she spent the night at my house with Kate. Darwin was drunk and she didn’t want to go home.”

He could see what she was thinking and he shook his head. “Nothing like that happened. Anna and I were friends. Nothing more. You don’t know me at all, but you should know your sister took her marriage vows seriously.”

“And how do you know that?” Molly’s question sounded angry.

“She could have left Darwin and started a new life, but she wouldn’t. She never gave up on her marriage. She was committed to it.” He watched her expression change. Something he’d said wounded her, but he couldn’t figure out what.

“It’s too bad she couldn’t commit to a man who didn’t slap her around.” Molly’s voice was hard.

Thomas swallowed and looked down at his hands. He knew for a fact that Darwin had beaten—not just slapped— Anna. But it would only hurt Molly to think of her sister’s abuse. Better to keep the ugly details to himself.

“So you believe you were just a convenient scapegoat?” Molly asked him.

“What else can I believe? I don’t have a lot of money. I write software for computers. That isn’t the most controversial career.” He saw her look at his hands, the rough callused palms. His face, too, had seen sun and weather. Even though he’d been working indoors for the past two years, he knew he still carried the look of the open range in his features. “Before I got this job I worked as a cowboy on one of the large spreads.” That was as much as he intended to tell her.

“That’s a jump in career choices.”

He thought he detected amusement in her tone, and it burned him. “If I’ve answered all your questions, I’d like to go back to my cell.”

When he stood, the guard was instantly at his side, almost as if he feared Thomas might get a second victim. “I’m done here,” Thomas said, and walked to the door so he wouldn’t have to see the guard and Molly exchange glances.

“Mr. Lakeman, I’m not finished.”

“Lakeman!” The guard stepped in front of him.

Thomas turned back to face Molly, a dare in his eyes. If he hadn’t realized before how much of his rights had been taken, he knew now. He didn’t even have the right to terminate a conversation with a condescending woman. They might make him stay in the room, but he wasn’t going to talk.

To his surprise he saw Molly look down at the table. She understood what had been taken from him. “Guard, Mr. Lakeman doesn’t have to talk to me.” She stood up. “Thank you for your time, Mr. Lakeman.”

MOLLY STOOD in the reception area of the lockup waiting for Familiar. The cat had disappeared the moment she entered the building. Now there was no trace of him. She tried not to appear impatient. What would she answer if someone asked who she was waiting for?

She sat on one of the hard benches set against the wall and tried to gather her thoughts. The bottom line was that she was no closer to finding baby Kate than she had been five hours before. The clock was ticking away and she was useless.

She waited twenty minutes before she stood and walked to the door that led to the cells. It was shut, and above it in large black letters were the words: Authorized Personnel Only. She opened it a crack to see if she could catch a glimpse of Familiar. He’d darted to the left, toward the cells, when the guard had taken her to the interview room on the right.

She thought an alarm might sound when she opened the door, but to her surprise nothing happened. It was going on five o’clock, and the few office workers were preparing to leave. No one seemed particularly interested in what she was doing.

But where was that darn cat?

The door was painfully wrenched out of her hand and she was pushed back into the waiting room by a large man.

“What—”

“Give me your keys!”

At first she didn’t recognize Thomas Lakeman, but when she did, she froze. He was out of his handcuffs and out of his cell.

“Molly, give me your keys!” He increased his grip on her arm enough to startle her out of her shock.

“What’s going on?”

Before Thomas could answer, Familiar appeared from around the corner, jumped onto her purse, and tugged it from her arm. In a flash he’d dug out her car keys and scooted them across the floor to Thomas.

Without ever letting go of her arm, Thomas scooped up the purse, the keys and the cat. Dragging her behind him he ran out the front door of the building.

“I’m sorry,” he said as he pushed her into the passenger seat of her car. In five seconds he was behind the wheel with Familiar right behind him.

Thomas burned rubber as he put the eight-cylinder SUV in reverse and pulled out in front of oncoming traffic. Without a second’s hesitation, he jammed the gas pedal to the floor and the car shot forward as several police officers swarmed out of the building.

“Stop!” an officer cried as he drew his weapon.

Molly felt Thomas’s hand on her neck as he pressed her down. The passenger window exploded and then they were gone. Behind them several panicked drivers had collided, effectively blocking the street.

Molly sat up. She didn’t really believe what had happened. Thomas had escaped from jail. In her vehicle. With her as a hostage. She felt as if adrenaline had been mainlined into her heart.

“It’s going to be okay,” Thomas said, his gaze on the road.

“Are you insane?” she asked.

“Technically, no.” Thomas glanced at her for a second, then turned his gaze back to the road. “I’m not insane, but I am desperate. I just wanted to thank you.”

“Thank me?” She couldn’t believe this. She was his hostage and he was thanking her. She’d almost been hit by a police bullet because of him, and he was thanking her. He was insane.

“I still don’t know how you trained that cat, but I have to hand it to you. I’ve never seen anything like it.”

Molly had a sick feeling. Familiar sat between them, his attention totally on the road. She remembered the way he’d pawed the map, insisting that she go to the state park to check out Thomas’s story. The way he’d shown her the tent stake holes. What had he done?

“Any fool knows you can’t train a cat.” She glared at Familiar.

“Somebody trained this one, and whoever it was did one hell of a job.”

“What did Familiar do?” She’d fire him on the spot. She’d buy a cat carrier, stuff him in it and put him on the first plane back to Washington, D.C.

“He was in my cell when I came back from the interview room. I’d seen him around earlier, but I didn’t realize he was your cat until he started to act strange.”

One thing about Familiar—he could certainly act strange when he chose to. “Go on,” she said.

“He walked right out of my cell and went down to where the guard sits. I was watching, just amazed. The cat reached up and snagged the cell key. That quick.” Thomas snapped his fingers. “Then he brought it to me. Thank goodness they haven’t modernized the jail or it would be a different story. As it was, it was just like one of those Wild West shows. I unlocked the cell and walked right out.”

Molly knew better. “It was just that easy until what?”

“Until I had to knock the deputy out.”

“Good grief,” she muttered. “You struck a deputy?”

“He was about to yell and alert the others. I didn’t have a choice.”

She wanted to punch him. “Of course you had a choice. You could have stayed in the cell.”

“Now why would I do that when you went to all that trouble to spring me?”

Thomas took a hard right and headed up into what looked to be high hills or small mountains.

“Where are we going?” For a moment Molly was distracted from her plight by a bigger worry. What did Thomas intend to do with her?

“These are the foothills of the Ozark Mountains. I know some good places to hide out.”

She sighed. “We need to get a couple of things straight right now. I didn’t train the cat to help you escape.” She picked Familiar up and held him so she could stare into his green eyes. “That was his idea all by himself.”

Thomas laughed. “Try telling that to the deputies. I’m sure they’ll get a big laugh as they lock you up.”

“It’s the truth.” She put Familiar down on the seat, suddenly feeling how deep her troubles were. She’d been involved in a felony jailbreak. It didn’t matter that she was an innocent victim. It was her vehicle that had been used for the getaway. No one would ever believe she was innocent.

“The truth doesn’t matter, Miss Harper.”

“I didn’t plan this or help you. I’m innocent.”

He slowed long enough to look directly into her eyes. “Welcome to my world.”