Twice Dead - Catherine Coulter [105]
“Get over it, Adam,” she said, and went to get her small address book.
“Use my private line,” Thomas said. “It’s untraceable. Adam, your gun looks good.”
“You’ll like my house,” Adam called after her. “It’s a showcase, it’s the prettiest place you’ve ever seen. Plants don’t like me, but everything else does. I have a housekeeper come in twice a week and she even makes me casseroles.”
Becca turned to face him. “What kind?”
“Tuna, ham and sweet potato, whatever. Do you like casseroles?”
“You bet,” she said.
He heard her laugh as she walked away.
He wanted to hear what she said to Tyler McBride, he really did, but he didn’t move. Neither did Thomas, who stood there leaning against the refrigerator, his arms crossed over his chest.
“I’m giving her privacy,” Adam said. “It’s tough.”
“Yeah, and you want her to think about your house, don’t you?”
“It’s a very nice house—an old Georgian brick two-story, lovely yard that I pay a big chunk to keep looking good. Remember I told you how my mom talked me into buying the property some four years ago, told me it was a good investment. She was right.”
Thomas said, “Parents usually are.”
Adam grunted and looked at his reflection in the gun barrel. “McBride wants her, that’s why he’s called. He wants her to know that he’s still laying claim. I don’t trust him, Thomas. He’ll use Sam if he has to. He can’t have her.”
Thomas said, grinning now, “I can see the scowl on your face in the barrel of the gun. No, more than a scowl.”
Adam grunted. “How about seriously pissed off?”
What was she saying to Tyler McBride? Worse, what was he saying to her?
TWENTY-FOUR
In her father’s study, the door closed, Becca was leaning on the big mahogany desk, so pale, so off balance she felt transparent. She knew that if she looked in a mirror, she wouldn’t see anything at all. “No, Tyler,” she said again. “I can’t believe this.”
“Becca, it’s happened. Sam is gone. Gone from his bed when I looked in on him this morning. There was this note pinned to his blanket that said I had to call you, that I could get to you by calling the office of the CIA director. So I did. And now you’ve called.”
“Sam can’t be gone,” Becca said, but she knew that he was, she knew it.
“He wrote in the note that I wasn’t to say a word to anyone, not the local cops, not anyone, only you. He wrote that he’d kill Sam if I said anything.”
She heard his breathing hitch before he said, “Thank God you called, Becca. What am I going to do?”
Becca heard the awful deadening fear in his voice, the anger, the helplessness.
“Don’t call Sheriff Gaffney, Tyler. Don’t. Let me think.”
He nearly yelled, “Of course I won’t call Sheriff Gaffney. Do you think I’m nuts?” Then he added, more calmly now, “He wrote that you had to come to Riptide.”
She felt a leap of fear, then said, “Wait a second, Tyler, let me get Adam.”
“No!” She nearly dropped the phone he’d yelled so loud. Then she heard him draw a deep breath. “No, Becca, please, not yet. He says if you tell anyone—including your father—he’ll kill Sam. I didn’t even know you had a father until the media went nuts over you and him. Becca, the guy’s murdered four more people. He’s got Sam. Do you hear me? That maniac’s got Sam!”
“I know, I know. Read me the entire note, Tyler.”
He was breathing hard, and she knew he was trying to get control. Finally, his voice more steady, he read: “‘Mr. McBride, you will speak as soon as possible to Rebecca Matlock. To find her, call the office of the director of the CIA. Tell them to inform her that she is to call you immediately, that a life is at stake. Then you will tell her to come to Riptide. You will tell her not to tell anyone, including her father, or else your son is dead. You don’t want him to end up like Linda Cartwright. You have twenty-four hours.’ ”
“How did he sign it?”
“He didn’t sign any name at all. What I read to you, that’s it. Becca, what am I to do? You know what he did to Linda Cartwright, what he’s done to all those other people. Look at what he did to you.