She scribbled a note to Colin: Had to get out and breathe for a minute. Went to the bar to have a drink and will be back soon. She hesitated just a beat before adding Love, A. The uniformed cop she found waiting for her in the hall was a baby-faced guy with a tight, faded Afro and a thin mustache. He sat in a chair by the elevator and stood up at the sight of her. “Is there a problem, ma’am?”
“No problem. I’m just going to go downstairs for a drink.”
“Ma’am?”
“At the bar. One beer. Right downstairs in this hotel.”
He looked uncomfortable. “I don’t think that’s a very good idea. You and Mr. Duffy are supposed to stay in the room. I can arrange to have a beer brought up to you.”
“I don’t want a beer brought up to me. I want to go have it at the bar. I’m not staging a rebellion here … what’s your name?”
“Derek Sylvestry, ma’am.”
“Sylvestry, I just want to stretch my legs. Get a change of scenery. Surely you get that.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he replied with the enthusiasm of a man who had been watching the hotel’s pale green walls for the past few hours. “But it’s not safe, is the thing. We haven’t cleared the bar.”
“So clear it.” She put her hands on her hips. He looked pained.
“Ma’am—”
“Quit calling me ma’am. It’s Detective Vega to you.”
“Yes, ma’am. Detective. I’m just following orders from the commander here.”
“And what are those orders? That I’m a prisoner in that room for as long as she says so?” She reached around him to hit the call button on the elevator.
“No, nothing like that. It’s just—”
“Just what?”
“I’m not supposed to leave this spot.”
“Who’s asking you to?”
He took a deep breath. “Let me call downstairs, okay? Kwan is in the lobby.”
“Great, tell him I’m on my way.” The doors slid open and she ducked inside before Sylvestry could register further complaint. Her heart hammered in her chest, and she looked at her phone. It read 9:16. When the doors dinged open, she was met by a frowning man about her age. He wore plain clothes, blue jeans, and a windbreaker that she knew obscured the gun at his back. “You must be Kwan,” she said, striding purposefully across the lobby toward the bar.
“Detective Vega, please understand, we’re trying to keep you safe.”
She didn’t slow down. “I understand. And I need you to understand that if I stay locked up in that room another minute, I will eat my gun and then you won’t have to worry about it. You feel me?”
“I hear you,” he replied, dismayed. “But it’s just me down here. Sylvestry has to stay with your— With Mr. Duffy upstairs. I’m supposed to be keeping a watch on the front door.”
They reached the bar and she looked around for the best-positioned stool. “What are you watching for, exactly?” They had no idea what the killer looked like.
“Anything suspicious.”
“Great. Right now, you can watch me drink a beer. But not too close, okay? You’ll ruin my vibe.”
His frown deepened. “I don’t like this. Anyone could come in here.”
She turned and met his eyes, stared hard at him for a long moment. “Kwan. You know why you’re on duty here tonight, yeah?”
“Yes. The Lovelorn Killer has made direct threats against you.”
“He’s said he’s coming for me, and I gotta tell you, based on my day so far, I think he means it. You want to catch him? Sit there and watch my back. It’s far more likely to pay off than watching the bellhops run around the lobby.” She stalked across the bar to take a seat close to the restrooms. Kwan took a seat at the other end of the bar and kept her directly in his sight line. She ordered a beer from the female bartender, an older woman with a dark ponytail, Italian-looking, who could have been her sister from another mister. Kwan had a seltzer with lemon.
She felt his eyes on her as she sipped her beer. She pretended to be interested in the basketball game playing on the TV, but inwardly, her racing heart beat out the precious passing seconds. There was a red-lit EXIT sign back by the restrooms, but she knew Kwan would follow her back there if she just got up and tried it. The bartender sauntered over. “How you doing, honey? Need anything else?”
Annalisa played the only card she could summon. “There’s a guy at the other end of the bar.”
The woman didn’t have to turn around to look. Her lips jerked up in a smile. “The one who won’t take his eyes off you? Yeah, I saw him. You want an introduction or what?”
“No, he’s my ex. He followed me in here.”
The bartender grew concerned. “He’s dangerous?”
“No, I don’t think so. Just persistent. I broke up with him last week and he’s not taking the hint.”
“You want me to call the cops?” The bartender reached in her pocket for her cell phone.
“No, no. I was hoping you could maybe talk to him, create a diversion. I’ll just slip out the back when he’s not looking.” Annalisa surreptitiously slid a twenty toward her. “Would you help me?”
The bartender eyed the money and waved it off. “Keep it. I got two ex-husbands who won’t mind their own damn business. Just leave him to me.”
Annalisa had to give it to her—the woman played it cool, talking first to a pair of young men in ball caps, giving one a second beer. Then she headed casually in Kwan’s direction. Annalisa held her breath, waiting for the slightest opportunity. Kwan could easily see around the woman, as she wasn’t that big. Suddenly, she cried out and went down, disappearing under the bar. “Ah, my ankle! Jesus, who left this trash can down here?”
Kwan came around the bar to help her, and Annalisa slapped her money on the bar and disappeared out the back. She retrieved her car and gunned it out of the garage into the night, heading south as fast as she dared. She had mere minutes before Kwan and Sylvestry discovered she’d flown the coop and called in the authorities. She needed to put enough distance between them that they couldn’t easily follow. She switched off her cell phones and left them sitting on the passenger seat.
With the late hour, traffic was light and she barreled toward the highway, cutting around the intermittent cars like she was in a teenage boy’s video game. She escaped the city, its skyscrapers becoming smaller in her rearview mirror. As she drove farther, the exits came spaced farther apart, and the terrain became more rural. Her surroundings grew darker. She kept one eye on the mirrors for any signs of blue lights on her tail, but none appeared. She drove it like she stole it, her tires practically levitating from the asphalt, until she found the exit and the gas station with three minutes to spare. The place was small and quiet—just a tiny convenience store that was closed up tight and only four pumps. She pulled around to the side and located the lone pay phone by the air pump. It had ugly weeds to the left and a crude bit of graffiti sprayed on the side. Annalisa waited in her car until the phone began to ring.
The loud trill jangled her taut nerves, and she jerked the receiver from the hook. She didn’t say anything, so he spoke first. “I knew you would make it. You want me as much as I want you.”
“I want your head on my wall.”
He laughed. “All in good time. First, I have to make sure you’re not wearing a wire.”
“I’m not.”
“You wouldn’t lie to me, I’m sure. All the same, I’d like to see for myself. Lift up that blue T-shirt you have on and let’s take a look.”
Her skin broke out in a hot prickle as she realized he could see her. She whirled around but the place appeared deserted. There was a chain-link fence bounding the parking lot behind her, and trees on the other side of it from which frogs and bugs sang a buzzing, chirping night song.
“That’s right,” he said with satisfaction as she scrutinized the branches. “I can see you. Look up under the overhang.”
She did as he asked and saw the eye of a tiny camera nestled by the roof.
“Wave hello,” he told her. She scowled instead. “Now to business,” he continued. “Show me what you’ve got.”
She hesitated before lifting up her shirt to show him she had no wire. “Happy now?”
“I will be when I see the other side.”
She turned around and showed him her back.
“Excellent,” he said. “We can go on now.”
“No, I want to speak to Barnes.”
“That isn’t possible.”
She tightened her hold on the phone, her breathing unsteady. “Then I’m getting back in my car and going home.” Proof of life or she wasn’t going to play this game.
She heard some footsteps, the sound of tape tearing, and then a soft moan. “Say hello,” the voice ordered.
“Hello,” Barnes repeated weakly.
“Barnes. Are you hurt? What’s happening?”
The kidnapper took over again. “You can ask him when you get here.”
“Where is ‘here’?”
“Bellmore Hospital. Do you know it?”
“Bullshit. That place has been closed for years.” Bellmore Hospital for the Incurably Insane had housed patients until the early 1970s, at which point the grounds had been shuttered for good. Now it only showed up in headlines around Halloween when journalists needed a good spook story.
“I’ve found a way in. If you want to see Barnes alive again, then you’ll do the same.”
“Tell me how to get there,” she said, and he gave her a few directions, indicating a road to the north.
“Remember,” he said, “I can see for miles. I have other cameras. If you aren’t alone, then our little friend here gets a knife to the ribs. I have an escape hatch, Annalisa, but Barnes does not.” She gritted her teeth but said nothing. He took her silence for agreement. She could almost hear his smile when he signed off. “See you soon.”
She got back in her car and turned on her personal cell to use the GPS. The small town was pitch-dark once you got past the few buildings on the main roads, and she didn’t trust that any of the turns would be marked. There was a text message from Colin: Went to the bar but you’re not here. Police are looking for you. Where are you?? She did not answer.
She eased back out onto the road and tried to think through a plan. The Lovelorn Killer was practically a one-man executioner. They knew he had a knife, a gun, and of course, a varied collection of ropes. All he needs is the candlestick in the conservatory to round out his collection, she thought darkly.
He had tried to get to her twice but kept running into her protection detail, so he’d devised a different plan: lure her to him. He didn’t want anything to do with Barnes. Barnes was just bait. She could hear Nick’s admonition in her head, crying out that she was giving the Lovelorn killer exactly what he wanted, but she didn’t see another option. Multiple law enforcement agencies had tried valiantly to pin this guy down for decades now, and he was volunteering to meet with her. He had a hostage and had already made clear he’d dispense with interference quickly if he didn’t get his way. She didn’t believe he’d just shoot her in the back like Brewster or shiv her in the ribs like Nick. He’d had those ropes laid out for her, and she bet her life that he still intended to use them. The fantasy wouldn’t be fulfilled any other way. This meant he would have to come in close.
The road grew dark, then darker still as she left the main drag and turned down the deserted access road to the old psychiatric asylum. Tall weeds and young trees blocked her line of vision on either side while her headlights illuminated the gravel road in front of her. The ping, ping of the tiny stones against her car rapped out a warning and gave away any hope she had of approaching quietly. The hulking shadow of the abandoned hospital came into sight ahead of her, and she stopped her car outside the main entrance. It was a massive brick building, bigger than a castle and Gothic in appearance with its many arches and peaks. It stood six stories high with a square tower in the center and multiple gabled peaks on each side. The iron spikes on the roof glinted in the moonlight.
Annalisa left her headlights on, their beams slicing through the darkness and providing a detailed look at the bright-red brick and the contrasting ivy climbing up the side of the hospital. The ground was muddy under her feet from all the recent rain. She took her flashlight in one hand and her gun in the other as she searched for a way in. All the windows and doors had been boarded up for years. She inspected a few doors at the front of the building, but none of them seemed accessible. Reluctantly, she abandoned the light from her car and went around to the side of the hospital. The weeds were knee-high and filled with night critters. She pressed onward past one door and then another. The third one had a board loose. She pulled it aside and squeezed in, keeping her back close to the wall and her gun at the ready.
She halted immediately for a look around. Part of her doubted her own logic and wondered if he could be waiting to shoot her dead between the eyes. She paired the gun with the flashlight, pointing them first in one direction down the hallway and then the other. She saw only peeling paint, fallen ceiling tiles, and abandoned and rusting medical equipment not valuable enough to sell. The hallway was pitch-dark except for her flashlight, with all outside illumination having been blocked by the boards. She listened and heard nothing but her own breathing. Cautiously, she stepped deeper into the building.
She passed the remains of an office, with a rotting desk and overturned file cabinets. A hand-lettered sign on the wall displayed the visiting hours. She searched over the rubble with her flashlight beam and gasped when she saw a skull looking back at her. Animal, she told her pounding heart as she flickered the light over the other nearby bones. A cat or dog. A coyote that came here to die. Or died trapped in here. Cobwebs on the wall tangled in her hair, and she fought the urge to scrape them off.
She crept farther down the hallway, passing other signs of long-ago life. Lumpy couches pointed at a boxy TV with its screen shattered. Multiple twin-size beds with rusted springs. A dentist’s chair made gooseflesh rise up on her skin. She saw no trace of Barnes or anyone else. The hospital looked like no one had been inside for years.
She reached an intersection in the hall, hesitated, and then turned left, going deeper into the belly of the beast. She passed what looked like a broken-down laboratory, with shattered glassware and a rusted sink. Exam rooms. She heard water dripping from someplace above her and cold drops splashed down onto her cheek. She made another few turns and marveled at how the place kept going. The hallway smelled like animal feces, decaying leaves, and rust. She was no longer sure how to find the exit.
A creaking noise from far ahead made her stop short and listen. She waited but heard only the skittering of rodent feet above her head. Swallowing hard, she advanced in the direction she’d heard the noise. It came from beyond the double doors at the end of the hall. She trained her flashlight and gun at them as she grew closer. At the threshold, she paused to listen. She heard the creak again, almost like a porch swing in the summer, and she pushed through one of the doors.
She found herself in a large room, a gymnasium or auditorium, with a dilapidated wooden stage at one end and a circle of perhaps twenty chairs at the other, like a group therapy session for ghosts was just about to begin. Hanging upside down over the circle, bound and gagged, was Barnes.