Not if I have anything to do with it, thought Tristan.
Kendricks stared ahead, rubbing his eyes sporadically as if he was tired. His mood seemed to be shifting again.
“Hey, Kendricks?” Tristan asked, just trying to divert his attention as she unraveled the last of the hard rope from around her wrists.
“Be quiet, I am thinking!”
“Umm, Mr. Kendricks?”
“Stop calling me that, Catherine!”
Kendricks was yelling, not paying Tristan any mind. The time was now. Tristan stood up in the back of the car, desperate to become free of his control, desperate to get back home. She remembered what her father had told her and her brothers when they were younger when another local girl was kidnapped.
If anyone tries to kidnap you, you do whatever you have to do to get the car to stop. Kick, hit, scream… then when the car comes to a stop you run. Look for the signs for Cavegat Falls.
She knew what she had to do. She flung the worn, fraying rope over Kendricks’ head, letting it drop to his collarbone and before he knew what was happening she had pulled the rope tight around his neck. Kendrick panicked and flailed in the front seat, hands no longer on the wheel.
“Let me go!” screamed Kendricks, his throat raw from the pressure. The Nova, still going 70 miles per hour, swerved dangerously down the highway and began to veer off the road. Tristan applied her foot on the back of Kendricks’ seat to get better balance, but tripped, falling backwards onto her seat. As Tristan fell back, the rope dropped, and Kendricks fell face first into the steering wheel. As the car flew off the road and slammed into a shallow gravel ditch with a loud bang, and an incessant beep, Tristan braced herself in the back seat. Kendricks' head had hit the steering wheel, and he wasn't moving.
Meanwhile, Tristan was sitting in the back seat, unharmed other than for her pre-existing injuries. She leaned forward, trying to identify Kendricks' state. Blood was splattered across the steering wheel, where his head lay causing the horn to beep. He was not moving. She cautiously leaned up to see if there was anything she could take as a weapon, and with luck, a pocket knife was sticking out of Kendricks' back pocket. Awkwardly, she leaned forward with both arms stretched out and plucked the knife from his back pocket and put it in her own.
She knew if she didn’t kill him, he would be back for her but as she looked at Kendricks’ unconscious face, she couldn’t bring herself to do it. She gripped her wrists, as she rubbed the red rings around them, caused by the hard rope. Slowly, she exited the car, stepping gingerly onto gravel below, careful not to make any sound. Tiptoeing forward, she peaked inside the driver's side window to get a better look at Kendricks. He was knocked out cold. Blood spatter on the steering wheel, head pressing hard, causing the horn to wail incessantly. The windshield was cracked, splintering across the entire sheet of glass from the pressure of the crash. Kendricks wasn't going anywhere.
Tristan crept around the front of the vehicle to assess the damage. The car was banged up, but not inoperable. The front of the vehicle was fully intact, other than a broken headlight and a busted windshield. The engine was still running. That was all that Tristan needed to know. She opened the driver side door and pushed Kendricks seat belt and watched as he fell out of the car and onto the dirty ground of the ditch.
She climbed into the vehicle, slammed the door shut, and stomped on the gas pedal, climbing out of the gravel ditch and back onto the highway. As she sped off, she watched Kendricks rise to his feet and climb back onto the road as he screamed for Catherine in the distance.
*
"DiNolfo speaking," said the Sergeant abruptly as she picked up her phone. She had just gotten back from Elkhart, eager to get paperwork started to get a search warrant for Bernard Kendricks' apartment. The second she got to her desk her phone was blowing up, line one was ringing and the answering machine was blinking frantically.
"Hi, Sergeant, my name is Fred Cornerstone. I am a deputy with the Sunbury Police Department. I understand you are lead on an investigation pertaining to Tristan Morrow from the Elkhart area. Is that correct?"
"It is. Is there something wrong?"
"There was a situation at St. Benedict’s Hospital for the Infirm today."
Jenna’s breathing hitched.
"What kind of situation?"
"Tristan, as you know, was a patient at the hospital was kidnapped, and her father was shot."
In a fit of rage, DiNolfo kicked her desk hard with her boot, causing a picture frame with a photograph of her parents to fall flat on the desk.