He was sure Martin Krall was home, since there was a car parked in front of the garage. Maybe he was right on the other side of the door, six feet away, gloating about his successful kidnapping of Carli Ferguson and how he put one over on, not just the FBI and the New York and Massachusetts State Police, but on Bill Ferguson himself.
Bill flicked the safety off the Browning and grasped the tarnished brass doorknob with his right hand. He was sweating like he had just done fifty pushups. Another crash of thunder sounded outside, and the resulting flash of brilliant lightning illuminated the garage like Fenway Park during a night game. He turned the knob, opened the door, and cautiously peered inside, then walked through the door into an empty kitchen.
Dirty dishes littered a single-basin sink as well as the kitchen table, which was located next to the garage entrance. The dingy green and white tiles of the linoleum floor were way overdue for a good mopping. But the thing that drew Bill Ferguson’s attention immediately upon entering the kitchen, as soon as he had determined no one was present and about to shoot him, was the terrifyingly large bloodstain splattered all over the floor and halfway up the wall of a hallway running adjacent to the kitchen. It looked as though someone had died a violent death here. Recently.
A surge of fear and anguish coursed through his body. A mental picture of Carli lying on the floor mortally wounded, leaking blood from a serious wound while the I-90 Killer watched in amusement, sprang unbidden into Bill’s mind. He set out to check out the rest of the house, hurrying, moving as fast as he could without alerting Krall to his presence.
The remainder of the home’s first floor was just as deserted as the kitchen, although signs of habitation were everywhere. A dirty pair of white gym socks had been tossed haphazardly onto the living room floor next to a sagging green couch in front of the television. An opened newspaper covered the messy coffee table. Dirty drinking glasses were scattered around the room, some still half-filled with liquid.
But there were no people, injured or otherwise.
Bill bolted up the stairs and quickly searched the second floor, once again finding plenty of evidence that Krall lived here, but nothing whatsoever to indicate the presence of Carli or any other kidnap victims.
Bill realized that, if she was here at all, Carli must be in the basement. He hoped the I-90 Killer hadn’t created his own private little dungeon there, like the portable one in the back of his truck, or worse. Bill raced down the carpeted stairway to the first floor and into the kitchen.
Adjacent to the entryway was a wooden door, identical to the one from the garage, located to its right as he faced it. This had to be the doorway that would lead to the basement and, hopefully, to Carli.
Bill allowed himself a pleasant, momentary vision of Krall off somewhere else, like he had thought before, at a job or shopping or even searching for another victim. In this scenario, Bill would waltz down the stairs, find his little girl safe and sound, untie her, and bring her home. He would be more than happy to let Special Agent Angela Canfield handle the job of hunting down and arresting Martin Krall.
It was a nice dream. But Bill knew it was an unrealistic one as well.
He repeated his exercise of a few minutes ago, leaning up against the door and pressing his ear against it, straining to hear voices or footsteps or any other sound that would give him some indication of whether anyone was there or not, and if they were, what they might be up to.
He could hear nothing but the relentless pounding of the wind and rain against the house and the occasional terrifying crash of thunder and lightning. Once more, he grasped a brass doorknob with a sweaty hand and eased the door open, praying to God that his luck would hold.
Bill exerted a steady upward pressure on the knob, hoping the added tension would prevent the door’s hinges from squeaking excessively and alerting Krall, if he was there, to his presence. The door slipped open, revealing a wooden stairway disappearing into the gloomy semi-darkness of the basement.
These stairs, like everything else in the home, appeared badly in need of repair. One tread, about halfway down the stairs, had come loose and been thrown haphazardly onto the riser. He’d have to be careful not to trip on that or some other loose tread on his way down.
He took one step, then two, then a third, and slowly descended into the stifling humidity of the cellar. Shadows moved below, and Bill knew he had been right. Whatever was happening in this house was happening down here.
One more step, and Bill’s eye level was finally below the first floor joists, allowing him a view of the entire basement. He stopped in his tracks, horrified. Chained to a bed, lying on a ratty, filthy mattress, was his little girl. Dried blood crusted one side of her head, running from her scalp, creating a mass of hopelessly clumped and knotted hair, down her face and onto her Avril Lavigne t-shirt. Her jeans were a filthy mess, stained with dried blood and urine. But all he cared about at this moment was that she was alive! She’s alive! Carli’s alive!
A man—undoubtedly Martin Krall, although his back was to Bill, so he could not say for certain—approached Carli from the left of the stairs. His right arm was swathed in bandages and Bill flashed on all of the blood he had seen on the kitchen floor. Was it possible Carli had inflicted that injury on Krall? His heart swelled with pride for his gutsy child.