[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

warm and as comfortable as possible, then wait for the professionals.
It didn't take them long. It seemed as if no sooner had I crawled back into
that bathtub than the wails from a half dozen sirens filled the night air.
Seconds later, red lights were swirling across the inside walls of the house,
like a lava lamp at a party, and voices could be heard outside. Deputy Mullins
excused himself and went outside to show the EMT guys the way.
"Hear that, Heather?" I asked her, holding the hand on her unbroken arm.
"That's the cops. Things are going to be okay now."
Heather only moaned. She obviously didn't believe me. It was almost as if she
thought things were never going to be okay again.
Maybe she was right. At least, that's what I started to think as Rob and I,
banished by the EMTs, who needed all the room to work on Heather that they
could get in that cramped space, came down the stairs and onto the front
Page 72
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
porch. No, things weren't going to be okay. Not for a good long while, anyway.
Because Special Agents Johnson and Smith were coming toward us, their badges
out and ready.
"Jessica," Special Agent Johnson said. "Mr. Wilkins. Will you two come with
us, please?"
C H A P T E R
13
"Itold you," I said, for what had to have been the thirtieth time. "We were
looking for a place to make out."
Special Agent Smith smiled at me. She was a very pretty lady, even when
roused from her bed in the middle of the night. She had on pearl stud
earrings, a crisply starched blue blouse, and black trousers. With her blonde
bob and turned-up little nose, she looked perky enough to be a stewardess, or
even a real-estate agent.
Except, of course, for the Clock 9 mm strapped to her side. That sort of
detracted from the overall image of perkiness.
"Jess," she said, "Rob already told us that isn't true."
"Yeah," I said. "Well, of course he would say that, being a gentleman and
all. But believe me, that's how it happened. We went in there to make out, and
we found Heather. And that's it."
"I see." Special Agent Smith looked down at the steaming cup of coffee she
was holding between her hands. They'd offered me a cup, too, but I had
declined. I didn't need my growth stunted anymore than it already had been
thanks to my DNA.
"And do you and Rob," she went on, "always drive fifteen miles out of town
just to make out?"
"Oh, yeah," I said. "It's more exciting that way."
"I see," Special Agent Smith said, again. "And the fact that Rob has the keys
to his uncle's garage, where he works, and the two of you could have gone
there, a place that is significantly closer and quite a bit cleaner than that
house on the pit road . . . you still expect me to believe you?"
"Yes," I said, with some indignation. "We can't go to his uncle's garage to
make out. Somebody might find out, and then Rob'd get fired."
Special Agent Smith propped her elbow up onto the table where we sat in the
police station, then dropped her forehead into her hand.
"Jessica," she said, sounding tired. "You declined an invitation to your own
best friend's lakehouse because you heard it didn't have cable television. Do
you honestly expect me to believe that you would so much as enter a house like
the one on the pit road if you didn't absolutely have to?"
I narrowed my eyes at her. "Hey," I said. "How'd you know about the cable
thing?"
"We are the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Jess. We know everything."
Page 73
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
This was distressing. I wondered if they knew about Mrs. Hankey's lawsuit. I
figured they probably did.
"Well," I said. "Okay. I admit it's a little gross in there. But "
"A little gross?" Special Agent Smith sat up straight. "I'm sorry, Jessica,
but I think I'm well enough acquainted with you to know that if any boy but
especially, I suspect, Rob Wilkins took you into a house like that to be
intimate, we'd have a homicide on our hands. Namely, his."
I tried to take umbrage at this assessment of my personality, but the fact
was, Jill was right. I could not understand how any girl would let a boy take
her to such a place. Better to get down and dirty in hiscar than in that
disgusting frat house.
Frat house?Rat house was more like it.
I am certainly not saying that if a girl is going to lose her virginity, it
has to be on satin sheets or something. I am notthat big of a prude. But there
should at leastbe sheets. Clean ones. And no refuse from trysts past lying
around on the floor. And a person should at least take his empty beer bottles
to the recycling plant before even thinking of entertaining....
Oh, what was the point? She had me, and she knew it.
"So can we please," Special Agent Smith said, "drop this ridiculous story
that you and Mr. Wilkins went to that house in order to get hot and heavy? We
know better, Jessica. Why won't you just admit it? You knew Heather was in
that house, and that's why you and Rob went there."
"I swear "
"Admit it, Jessica," Jill said. "You had a vision you'd find her there,
didn't you?"
"I did not," I said. "You can ask Rob. We went to "
"We did ask Rob," Special Agent Smith said. "He said that the two of you went
to the quarry to look for Heather and just happened to stumble across the
house."
"And that's exactly how it did happen," I said, proud that Rob had thought up
such a good story. It was far better, I realized, than my make out story.
Though I certainlywished my make-out story was true.
"Jessica, I sincerely hope, for your sake, that that isn't true. The whole
idea of you two just stumbling over a kidnapping victimaccidentally strikes us
as & well, as a little suspicious, to say the least."
I narrowed my eyes at her. I still had Rob's watch with me it wasn't like we
were under arrest or anything, and they'd taken all of our valuables to hold
for safekeeping. Oh, no. We were just being held forquestioning . [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]