Page 61 of Run to Ground
Turning away, she moved quietly into the hall. The house had its own dark corners and frightening, shadowy pockets, and she realized she was tiptoeing as she reached the stairs. It was silly. She was in her own house—her own creaky, noisy, possibly haunted house—and there was no one there who shouldn’t be. Although she drew her shoulders back, determined to believe there was nothing to fear, her feet still touched each stair tread softly, and she cringed at each creaky step.
On the second floor, she slipped down the hall, telling herself she was being quiet so as not to wake the kids, but knowing in her heart she was a chicken and a liar. The room right above the kitchen was at the end of the hall, one of two unoccupied bedrooms. Jules reached for the doorknob. Even in the dim light, she could see her hand was shaking.
Biting her lip, she turned the knob and pushed open the door.
The room was empty. Empty and cold. A night breeze blew chilly air through the open window, making the normally limp, old curtains billow and cast dancing shadows across the wall. Why was the window open? Her heartbeat hiccupped, and she told herself firmly that there were four other people in the house, any of whom could’ve opened the window earlier that day.
Sending a nervous glance at the half-open closet door, Jules took a step toward the window, but decided to check out the closet first. As overcautious as it was, she didn’t want to turn her back on a possible hiding spot.
The closet door resisted sliding open but finally yielded, squeaking as it moved along its track. Moonlight filled the space, revealing nothing but an empty closet. Jules’s heartbeat settled slightly. She crossed to the window quickly. Now that she knew the room was empty, she wanted to shut it, to have that barrier between her and whatever was moving in the trees.
As she closed the window and wrestled the rusty latch back into the locked position, she looked out into the backyard. The roof of the small porch was right below her, and she bit her cheek, trying not to think about how easy it would be to climb from the porch railing to the roof to the open window—
“J-J-JuJu?”
She jumped and spun to see Sam in the doorway. Pressing a hand to her thundering heart, Jules glared at him. “What are you doing up?”
He frowned right back at her. “You w-were b-b-being k-kind of loud.”
“Sorry.” Jules took a deep breath and let it out again before forcing a smile. “I’m just being a nervous Nellie. You should go back to bed.”
Instead of responding, he just crossed the room to look over her head out the window. “Is someone out there?”
“No.” The answer came too quickly to be believable, and she grimaced at his skeptical expression. “Really, truly, there’s no one out there. I’m just letting the night worries get to me. Let’s go to bed.”
After studying her for a long moment, he nodded, but he didn’t head for the third-floor stairs.
“Where are you going?” she asked.
“Wh-where areyoug-going?” he shot back.
“I figured I’d sleep with Dee.”
“I’ll s-sleep in T-Tio’s b-b-bed. You know h-he’s in T-T-Ty’s r-room.”
Something inside Jules finally relaxed. They’d all be together. “Let’s leave the doors between the rooms open.”
“Of c-course.”
* * *
It was hard to return to the drudgery of reports after talking to Jules, listening to her sexy sleep-roughened laugh and the warm note in her voice as she’d told him good night. He wondered if she’d made up the possible Viggy sighting to have an excuse to call him, and then Theo frowned. If she hadn’t, if Jules really had seen something moving in the woods, what had it been? Just a mule deer or a coyote, or could it have been something more dangerous, like a mountain lion or a bear or a person skulking through the trees? Although Monroe was a fairly quiet town, it did have its share of troublemakers and criminals. He should stop by, check things out.
“Better look around, just in case,” he said out loud, making Viggy raise his head. Although the dog wasn’t plastered against the seat like the first few times Theo had taken him out, his body language was still screaming that he was unhappy.
“Want to go see Jules?” he asked, feeling like an idiot. Viggy wouldn’t understand him. For some reason, though, Viggy thumped his tail weakly against the seat. Despite knowing Viggy couldn’t understand English, and that the dog had responded to something in Theo’s tone, rather than the words, he chose to take Viggy’s reaction as affirmation that he was doing the right thing. “Okay, then.”
Ignoring the little voice in his brain that was mocking him for his pathetic attempt at finding any excuse to visit Jules, he shifted into drive. He’d just pulled out of the car wash parking lot when his radio came to life.
“Unit 5449 requesting assistance on a traffic stop in the three-hundred block of Timson Street.”
Theo was less than a mile away. As he picked up the mic to tell dispatch to put him on the call, he resigned himself to waiting to see Jules. At least he knew she’d be at the diner later. Dispatch copied his transmission, and Theo flicked on his overhead lights, accelerating down the abandoned street. With as little traffic as there was, he kept his siren silent. No need to wake the sleeping neighborhood, he figured.
“Ready for this?” he asked Viggy. There was no tail thump that time, just a mournful look that Theo caught in the rearview mirror. “Sorry, buddy. You’ll have to wait to see your fan club. Otto needs our help.” His foot pressed harder on the gas, and a tiny shock of excitement bubbled up in him. It was familiar, yet foreign, since he hadn’t felt anything except for numbness on a call for months. Theo welcomed that surge of adrenaline. He’d missed it. Turning the corner onto Timson, Theo saw the front of a newer Ford pickup. Behind it, Otto and another man were silhouetted by Otto’s squad car headlights.
“Vehicle belongs to Gordon Schwartz,” the dispatcher continued, and Theo’s shoulders tightened. Schwartz meant possible explosives, which meant Lieutenant Blessard was going to want Viggy to do a check. Theo glanced in the rearview briefly as he pulled in behind Otto’s vehicle. Vig’s tail was firmly tucked, and he’d started panting tensely, the very picture of canine anxiety.
Quickly letting dispatch know he was on scene, Theo got out of the car, turning on his portable radio as he did so. Otto had Gordon out of his pickup and in cuffs, and Theo cautiously approached, his gaze scanning the scene to make sure someone else wasn’t going to pop out on them. As he passed the truck, he looked in the bed and then the cab. Gordon was screaming at Otto until he caught sight of Theo.
