28-
"Time to make a phone call."
Pete's voice dragged Darcy out of her thoughts. As near as she could figure, she had been here for three days. Pete had moved the bed closer to the wall where she could look out the window. She was also wearing only one handcuff again, sitting up on the side of the bed. He hadn't tried to touch her since he'd cut her scrubs off – in fact, when he'd given her a second set of pajamas he had resolutely turned his back so she could change without being stared at. He even brought her some water and a wash cloth, and soap, so she could get cleaned up. He went so far as to apologize for the lack of hot water, otherwise she could have used the shower.
He was holding out a cell phone. Darcy merely looked at it. "Who am I supposed to call?"
"Mark, of course."
Darcy snorted. "He doesn't have a phone. At least not that I'd know the number. He ran off, remember?"
Pete's smile faded. "Surely he has a cell phone."
"I didn't ask." Darcy shrugged.
"This throws a bit of a wrench into my plans."
"Bummer." Darcy's voice carried nothing but boredom.
Pete's smile returned. "Then we'll call someone else to relay a message. Who should it be? Sue?"
"Sue? Sue didn't know him." Darcy looked at the floor, because she didn't want to look at the phone in his hand. "Call Ava."
"Ava. Your friend from the car accident."
"Yes. From the 'accident'."
"And why would she be able to pass along a message?"
"Probably because that's where Mark would be staying. Unless he's at a motel somewhere, and Ava wouldn't let anybody stay in a motel if she can help it." It wasn't Ava that Darcy wanted. It was Glen. But she sure as hell wasn't going to tell Pete that.
"Well it doesn't hurt to try." He held out the phone where it was in Darcy's line of vision. "You dial. And talk. Chat. Don't try to give them a hint about where we are…"
"I don't even know where we are." Darcy interrupted.
Pete went on without batting an eye. "I'll give you two minutes. Tell them I want Mark to call back within the hour. Or I'm going to start putting a cut on you for every five minutes that passes after that hour." Darcy took the cell phone and saw that he had the scalpel in his hand as well. She looked at it dully before punching in Glen's number. She closed her eyes as it rang on the other end, wiling him to be home. He was always home.
She almost sobbed when he picked up with his usual short 'yeah'. "Hey."
"Darcy?"
"Yes."
"Darcy…where are you? Are you all right?"
"I'm…ok. I guess." She ignored the other question. "I've only got a minute."
"I'm listening." Glen was also doing something with one of his computers. She could hear him. Tears slipped from her eyes.
"He wants Mark to call him back within an hour."
"He's standing right here. Do you want…"
"No. I can't. Not now." Darcy didn't want to talk to Mark because talking to Mark would probably kill her. "If Mark doesn't call back, he says he'll start cutting me. Marking the time."
"Son of a bitch…" Glen muttered. "Darcy…"
"Hold on." Darcy looked at Pete. Pete was staring at his scalpel, not looking at her. "Phone number?" She repeated the number to Glen even though she was sure that Glen already had it.
Glen seemed to sense her reluctance to talk. He lowered his voice so he spoke barely in a whisper. "I'm tracing you. We know who you're with, the general direction he took you. We're gonna find you."
"I know." Darcy smiled. Pete tapped his wrist. "I have to go."
"Darcy…"
"Just pass the message along to Mark please." Darcy hit the end button and handed the phone back to Pete. He put it into his pocket and just stood over her, staring down at her. "They're going to pass along the message."
"Good. Then this could all be over by tonight, if he plays his part."
Darcy doubted it. Pete seemed to be content in letting things drag on as long as possible.
~~!~~
Mark had to fight not to snatch the phone out of Glen's hand. He watched the other man hang up and continue to type on his computer.
"I'm supposed to call back…"
"You have an hour." Glen pointed out.
"I don't need an hour." Mark reached for the phone and Glen stopped him.
"You need a little time to get a handle on yourself. You won't do her any good if you jump too fast. We have to be smarter than this guy."
"He'll cut her."
"After an hour. We at least have to play along that we're tracking you down to give you the message." Glen looked up at him. "We are going to find her."
"We have to." Mark went back to pacing. He kept looking at the clock, and was getting angrier by the minute.
It had been three days of hell for him. At least he wasn't alone. Glen was as worried as he was. He had the added benefit of being able to do something about it – namely calling the cops and ordering them to get him the surveillance footage from the hospital. Mark had been too upset to be amused by the way the cops jumped whenever Glen told them to.
He had gone to the hospital a few minutes before eight and found out that Darcy had gotten off early. The woman – Carol – had paged her over the intercom system but she had not appeared. Mark figured maybe she had forgotten, although that did not sit well with him. He drove to her house, where the same roommate he'd met the day before informed him that Darcy wasn't home and that she'd had dinner plans so maybe she had gone out.
It was news to Mark. When he went back to the hospital Carol had let him use the phone to call Glen. It hadn't taken long to get the other man worried as well. No one had seen Darcy since she'd gotten off work.
Glen biggest gripe had been Darcy's resistance to keeping a cell phone on her. At least it was until the police showed up with the surveillance videos. He and Mark watched as Darcy was led out of the hospital minutes before Mark showed up to get her.
"Five minutes and this wouldn't have happened." Mark said hollowly as Glen re-watched the video.
"We can't know that." Glen had gotten on one of his computers and within thirty minutes he had tapped into the traffic cameras that were around the university.
"How did you manage that?"
"The illegal way." Glen didn't elaborate. Instead he scanned through the footage until he found what he was looking for – the same truck that they'd seen exiting the parking garage. He had headed north out of town. "Not much out that way for a good couple of hours. They could technically be anywhere."
"But you don't believe that."
"No. I think he's relatively close by. He wouldn't have wanted to take her far, because there'd be too much risk of getting caught out."
It became a waiting game. Glen had the police out checking. Short of a door to door search, they had come up with nothing. It was Ava who pointed out that Pete might have a second vehicle, one he used to make trips into town rather than the truck. He would figure they'd be looking for him, and he'd be figuring right.
And now finally a phone call. Mark wished he could have at least heard Darcy's voice. But maybe Glen was right. He was agitated enough as it was.
It was of course Glen who figured that Pete Hughes was someone who might have known Mark from the past. They were from the same small town. Mark had no idea who the man was though, even when he saw pictures of him. He wasn't the type that ran with the crowd Mark kept company with.
"What are you doing?" Mark finally couldn't take the silence anymore. He wanted to be doing something. Anything.
"Running a trace on the cell phone."
"Is that legal?"
"Not really. And it might not work because it's probably a burner, and those don't usually have GPS chips in them. But at least we can see the general area it came from."
"Did she say anything else? Was she ok?"
"She said she was. He only gave her a minute to talk." Glen sighed grimly. "Just like I thought. The phone is useless. Unless when you call him you can keep him on the line longer."
"It's been thirty minutes." Mark said, getting agitated again.
"Calm down. We're not gonna let the whole hour go by." He picked up his own cell phone and plugged it into his computer. "You've got to keep him talking. Don't get angry. Pretend you don't know him."
"I don't know him."
"Yeah but he thinks you should. Otherwise we wouldn't be here." Glen slapped the phone into Mark's hand. "If he wants to meet up, agree to it. And don't act overly concerned about Darcy."
Mark frowned. "What? Why?"
"Because the more he thinks you care, the more likely he's gonna be to hurt her." Glen studied Mark for a moment. "He already threatened to cut her. Not to kill her. He wants you to see his handiwork, because he thinks you deserve it."
"Maybe I do." Mark looked at the number that Glen had written down before sighing and punching it in. He braced himself to hear Darcy's voice, reminding himself to remain calm.
What he got instead was a perfectly pleasant male voice. "That was quicker than I thought it would be."
"What do you want?" Mark asked.
"What do you think?" Pete chuckled. "Justice. Retribution?"
"For?"
"Don't pretend you don't know."
"I'm afraid I don't."
"Jezzie. Jezzie and my baby."
Mark frowned deeply. "Your baby?"
"Of course." Pete sighed. "You killed them both. It should have been you that died that night."
"I won't argue that."
Mark's comment seemed to stun Pete for a few moments. There was utter silence. "Meaning?" He finally asked.
"Meaning it should have been me that died. But it wasn't. And I've had to live with that for the past eight years."
"Oh. I suppose I should feel sympathy for you." Pete scoffed. "You took away the only thing that mattered. So I'm going to do the same."
"What are you talking about?"
"Darcy is what I'm talking about." There was a rattling sound as Pete shifted the phone. "She's beautiful. It would be a shame to ruin that, to make her pay for your mistakes."
Mark's hand tightened on the phone but he counted slowly to three before speaking. "I've already paid for my mistakes. As a matter of fact, I've got papers showing that I wasn't even in error."
"That's a lie."
"No. My conviction was overturned. I served the time and I can't get that back but according to the papers I have, I never should have been convicted in the first place." Mark chuckled hollowly. "Matter of fact, Adams had to repay the money he took from me."
He could hear Pete breathing heavily on the other end of the line. "Bullshit. You want me to cut her? Is that what this is about?"
"I don't give a shit what you do. You shouldn't have dragged her into it. You have a problem with me, then by all means let's take care of it. Leave her and anybody else out of it." It almost killed him to utter those words but Glen nodded approvingly.
"Right. Are you trying to say you wouldn't suffer if I were to take my sharp little knife and run it across her throat? I could torture her a little first. Cut off a few bits here and there. My knife is very sharp – it could handle some wet work before getting down to business." Pete's voice dropped. "Of course before I could do any of that, I would want to consummate our relationship first. I mean…I've been courting her for a couple of months now, it would be a waste to kill her off before I got a taste of what we'll both be missing."
"What do you want from me?" Mark managed to keep his voice steady although he was shaking from holding back his rage. He had never been so pissed off.
"What I want is what I said. Although I suppose now things have changed. Is this your phone?"
"Yeah."
"Good. I'll call back in two hours. And I'll let you know where we can meet."
"You're going to let her go."
"I haven't decided that yet. It all depends on you. Two hours." With that, Pete hung up. Mark tossed the phone onto the desk and covered his face with his hands.
"Fuck." That about summed it up.
"I have guns. Do you want one?"
Mark looked up to see Ava standing in the doorway. He had not heard her come up the stairs. She looked worriedly between the two men.
"We don't know how much good a gun would do, babe." Glen smiled at her and went back to his computer. Ava sighed and went to Mark to lightly rub his shoulders.
"The cops?"
"Worthless." Glen finally leaned back. "They're still in town at least. All the towers are local. No GPS on the phone. He didn't put her on the line, did he?"
Mark shook his head.
"Because he wants you to worry." Ava said softly. She looked at Glen over Mark's head. "Do something."
"I'm doing what I can."
"You can do more. Darcy always said you were a half-step shy of being some kind of evil overlord."
"I'm all ears if you have any ideas." Glen said, smirking at the reference. He'd heard it before. He leaned forward and clapped Mark on the shoulder. "Go outside. Walk it off. You have a couple of hours. We'll brainstorm. Maybe I can talk to the police chief and see if they can't get a better fix on the cell signal." He didn't look like he had much faith in that. "At least they'll know."
Mark shook his head but got to his feet. He'd be watching the clock yet again but Glen was right. He couldn't just sit here. Without another word he left the room and headed down the stairs to walk the path out to the beach. He needed to feel a calming influence and that seemed like the only place he would get it.
