Haunted Hearts, page 8
“Oh, thank God!”
“The latch,” he said, pointing at it.
He’d used her ladder. Bless him. Quickly, she undid the lock. The window stuck when she tried to pull it up, but her adrenaline surged. She gave a hard yank, and the window screeched although it only lifted a few inches.
“That’s good enough,” he said. He squeezed his fingers through the opening and forced the window open wide enough for him to climb inside.
Callie had never been so happy to see anyone in her life. Without thinking, she lunged at him.
“I’m locked in,” she babbled as she grabbed his shoulders with both hands. “The lock turned, and when I went over to open it, it wouldn’t move. I tried everything I could think of, but I couldn’t get out. But then it started shaking on its own.”
“Callie, breathe.” Landry dipped his head so he could look into her eyes. “Are you all right?”
“No! There’s someone in my house! They tried to get in my room!”
His look turned hard as he glanced at the door.
She dropped her voice to a stage whisper. “There were footsteps, but then this other noise came down the hall. I didn’t know what to do. I don’t know what it was.”
“You did exactly the right thing. You called me.” The muscles in his arms were tense, but his gaze gentled when he looked at her. “Let’s get you out of here.”
“Yes,” she said. That was an excellent idea.
His gaze ran down her form. Her pajamas weren’t sexy, just a Red Sox T-shirt and shorts, but she wasn’t wearing a bra. And her legs were bare.
“Here,” he said, plucking her robe off the foot of the bed. “Put this on.”
He slipped the robe over her shoulders and shoved the slippers he found on the floor at her, all while placing himself between her and the locked door.
“Did you hear anything after the noise?” he asked. “Any doors slamming? Which way did the footsteps go?”
Callie fumbled her slipper. He thought the intruder might still be there.
“Toward the kitchen,” she whispered. “I think.”
She suddenly realized how cold she was. The temperature in the room was freezing, and opening the window certainly hadn’t helped. She jammed the slipper onto her foot. All she wanted to do was take one more step toward her rescuer and absorb all the heat she felt surrounding him, but he was in full cop mode.
“We’re going out the window,” he said.
She nodded. Window. He was full of good ideas tonight.
“You first,” he said.
She cinched her robe tight and turned, but froze mid-step. It was jet black outside. Not even the moon was out. Shadow Valley was steeped in darkness.
“I’ll be right behind you,” he said, nudging the small of her back.
He’d better be. Taking a steadying breath, Callie crawled out the window. She gripped the ladder tightly as Landry held onto her arm and searched blindly for a metal rung with her foot. When she found it, it was so cold that her foot nearly cramped. She forced herself to make her way down the ladder. Wet grass clung to her legs when she touched the ground, and she shuddered.
Landry was close behind her. She stepped away to give him room, but the moment he was beside her, she reached out for him. Screw cop mode; he was big and tough, and she was scared. Her hand tangled in a strap of his bulletproof vest, and she held tight.
“Chief.”
Callie spun around and stepped back. She collided against Landry’s chest, and his hand automatically settled at her waist.
“It’s just Officer Raikins,” he said.
The flashlight pointed at them dipped, and a skinny, red-haired policeman approached them. “The front and back doors are secure,” the man announced. “Locked.”
Callie felt Landry’s look turn on her.
“I want you to wait in my truck,” he said.
“But...” She really didn’t want to be alone.
“Now.” He reached into his pocket and handed her the keys. With one hand planted firmly on the small of her back, he escorted her to the big black 4X4 he’d left on the street. “Lock the doors. If you see anything or anyone, lay on the horn. If somebody approaches you other than me or Officer Raikins, drive straight to the police station.”
“Chief—” she said weakly.
“I’ll be back as soon as I can.”
CARTER WAITED UNTIL Callie was safely locked inside the cab of his truck before he turned his attention back to the house. “She heard two distinct noises, footsteps and something else she couldn’t identify,” he told Bill as they stood on the front walk. “We could have two intruders.”
He eyed the layout of the place. “We’ll go in through the bedroom. She says the lock is jammed, but I’d rather break down an interior door if we have to cause damage.”
Bill nodded, but his face was ashen. They didn’t get many break-in calls in Shadow Valley, but Carter knew that wasn’t the problem. “Bill, it’s just a house. Suck it up.”
He gestured impatiently to the ladder. Once he saw Bill take the first step, Carter’s mind went back to the woman he’d just stowed in his truck.
“Damn it,” he said under his breath. He hadn’t liked the look on her face when he’d come through that window. She’d been terrified. Anger bubbled up inside him, but his concentration focused when it was his turn to re-enter the house.
It was time for him to do his job.
Once inside the bedroom, he nodded at Bill, and they readied their weapons. Moving quietly on the balls of their feet, they approached the door from the side. Reaching out, Carter tested the lock. It twisted easily, releasing with a soft click.
He looked at it in surprise.
“Don’t touch the handle on the hallway side,” he whispered to Bill. “I want it dusted for prints.”
Bill nodded and, on Carter’s signal, they went through the door. They moved together, their backs bumping, as they made their way down the hallway. It was empty. So were the bathroom and the living room.
Carefully, Carter swept the space. There weren’t many places to hide. Callie was still in the process of unpacking. He nudged the larger boxes with his foot just to be sure and checked all the windows. None of them looked as if they’d been disturbed.
The wood floors creaked under his feet, but there wasn’t much he could do about that. He carefully moved on to the kitchen. Compared to the living room, there were even fewer places that an intruder could hole up. A quick look at the back door proved it to be locked, just as Bill had said. Carter started for the rear staircase that led up to the second floor.
Clunk.
As one, he and Bill swiveled around toward the basement door. Carter knew that noise. It was the same sound that had made Callie jumpy the other day. He waited a moment before it came again.
He thought she’d had someone come out to look at that.
With a glance at each other, he and his officer crossed the room. The door to the basement squeaked when Carter opened it. Adrenaline started coursing through his veins. The area needed to be searched, but damn, he hated staircases. They were a vulnerability. If anybody was down there, they’d have a clean shot at him.
Still, it needed to be done.
He swatted the light switch atop the stairs, and the lone bulb in the center of the room lit. Nothing showed itself. Determinedly, he started down the steps. Bill was close behind, searching the other side of the open room.
Something suddenly moved in Carter’s line of sight.
He held his weapon steady, even as his body went taut.
A mouse.
It scurried underneath a storage shelf, back into the shadows, but his relief was short.
He quickly made his way down the stairs and put the wall at his back. There was a feel to the place, one he didn’t like. He scanned the big, dank cellar, trying to put his finger on the source of his uneasiness. It was an open room with nothing more than some shelves of junk, a washing machine, and a dryer.
And a furnace.
It thumped again, and he walked over to look at it. He shook his head and signaled Bill to head back upstairs. They had the second floor and the attic yet to search.
In the end, they found nothing. No intruders and no signs of entry or exit.
Holstering their weapons, they met up again outside of Callie’s bedroom door. Carter nodded at the door handle. It was all that they had. “Dust it.”
“Uh, are you sure, chief?”
“You got a better idea?”
Bill shuffled his feet. “I... Well, I was just wondering if you were taking everything into account.”
“Like what?”
“This is the Calhoun place.”
Carter’s blood pressure tweaked. “Don’t give me that. She had an intruder. Somebody rattled that door handle.”
“I know. I just didn’t see any evidence of a break-in, and I thought—”
“Thought what? That you’d like desk duty for the next two weeks?” Carter rolled his tight shoulder and took a calming breath. “Just see what prints you can get.”
“Yes, sir.” Bill’s head dipped. Without a word, he headed out to his squad car.
Carter ran a hand through his hair. He didn’t have time for any superstitious garbage. Callie was already frightened enough as it was. They were going to treat this as a possible break-in.
Nothing else.
He headed out to get her. The moment he stepped out the door, the chill in the air turned his breaths into cloudy puffs in front of his face. Still, he could feel her gaze home in on him like a hot laser beam. He rounded the front of the truck, and she hastily unlocked the door.
“Did you find anything?” she asked. “Did you catch anyone?”
“You have mice in your basement.”
Her eyes were wide and dilated. “That’s it? Nothing else?”
“The house is clear.” He saw her shiver and jumped right back into first-responder mode. “Hell, you could have turned the engine on to keep warm.”
He grabbed a ragged old blanket he kept behind the seat and wrapped it around her shoulders before taking the keys out of the ignition. “Come on, let’s get you back inside.”
She glanced warily at the house.
“I’ll go with you,” he said.
He stepped back, not letting her dally. She was chilled, and the longer she waited, the harder it would be to gather the nerve to go back inside. Hesitantly, she swung her legs out. Her robe split open and a long, lean thigh was left bare. Carter looked away. He was here on business. Business.
He led her up the walk. She moved slowly although the cement had to feel like a block of ice underneath her slippered feet. He glanced at her face. She was white as a sheet. “It’s all right. Raikins is the only one in there.”
“Are you sure?”
“I’m positive. We searched the place from top to bottom.”
She pulled the blanket tighter around her shoulders and nibbled on her lower lip. His gaze was drawn unwaveringly to her mouth.
“Mice, huh?”
He shook his head to break the spell. “Yeah, down by your laundry area.”
“I hate mice.”
He looked down with surprise when she slipped her hand into his. Their palms met, and she gripped him tightly. When she finally started up the steps, he moved with her. He held the door open for her, and she walked into the entryway. It was as far as she got.
“Why don’t you go into the living room and sit down?” he said.
She took a deep, calming breath, but didn’t let go of his hand. “Okay.”
Bill glanced up when he saw them come into the room. He was in the hallway, kneeling in front of the bedroom door with a print kit.
“Callie, this is Officer Bill Raikins,” Carter said. He discreetly pulled his hand out of hers and settled it more impersonally on her shoulder. “Sit down. Can I get you anything?”
She remained standing. Her gaze was on the paraphernalia spread out on her hallway floor. “What’s he doing?”
“Taking fingerprints. You said your intruder rattled the door handle.”
She nodded. “If it hadn’t been locked...”
Carter couldn’t help but squeeze her shoulder comfortingly. Together, they watched as Bill pulled the tape off and bagged it.
“Did he—or she—do anything else?” Carter asked. “Touch anything else? Could you tell where they came from? You said you thought the footsteps moved to the kitchen.”
“It was a man,” she said with certainty, but then her forehead rumpled. “Or an awfully brawny woman. The footsteps were heavy.”
She shivered, and he pulled the drooping blanket back over her shoulder.
“I don’t know,” she admitted. “My X-ray vision was on the fritz. I don’t know what was on the other side of that door and, honestly, I get queasy whenever I think about it.”
There it was, the biting humor he was used to, although the queasiness factor blunted its effect.
Bill collected his equipment and walked over to join them. “Ma’am,” he said, “I’m sorry that this happened.”
Callie nodded. “Thank you for responding so fast.”
Bill shuffled his feet under her attention. “Is there anything else that you think I should dust? Chief Landry mentioned you heard two noises.”
Carter almost winced when Callie went ramrod straight. “What exactly was the other noise?” he asked.
“I... I don’t know.”
“Could you describe it?”
She shuddered and moved so close that she bumped against him. “It came from everywhere, through the walls and the ceiling.”
She glanced around the room nervously, but he pressed the issue. It was important. “Was it mechanical? Or human?”
“It was a keen.”
Bill’s skin paled in contrast with his red hair. He pulled his notebook out of his pocket and wrote down the word. “A keen,” he said hoarsely.
Enough. Carter guided Callie to the sofa and made her take a seat. “This house sits back in the woods. There’s more wildlife out there than you would expect.”
“You think it was an animal?” she asked, quickly latching on to the idea.
“I know it was. I live close to the woods myself. You hear some strange things every now and then.” He threw a glare over her shoulder at Bill for good measure. One word. One word and not only would the officer be pulling desk duty, he’d be pulling night desk duty.
Bill’s Adam’s apple bobbed, but he nodded in understanding.
Carter gestured at the fingerprint kit. “You get anything?”
“Too much. There were a lot of smudges and overlapping prints.” Bill shrugged. “It’s a door handle.”
“We’ll make do with what we have.” Carter watched the way Callie took great care in wrapping the old, tattered blanket around her legs. This break-in had rocked her, but he’d seen this kind of a reaction before. Invasion of privacy struck at the core of a person.
He crouched down in front of her. He hated to do this to her, but he had to question her while everything was fresh in her mind. “Do you think you could answer some questions?”
She let out a long, shaky breath. “Okay.”
He gestured toward Bill’s notebook, and the officer lifted his pen. “Can you think of anyone who might have done this? Have you noticed anyone hanging around the house? Watching it?”
She looked at him with wide eyes that got him right there. “You mean like one of your thrill seekers? Shouldn’t everyone in town know the house isn’t deserted anymore?”
A cold knot formed in Carter’s gut. He didn’t think that this break-in was some teenage lark. The guy had been trying to get into her bedroom. His hands clenched into fists, but he forced them to relax. “Is anything missing?”
She blinked as if she hadn’t even given that a thought and looked around the room. “I don’t think so.”
“Take your time. If you notice anything later, give us a call at the station and report it.”
“Okay.”
This was harder than he’d expected. He took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Has anyone made you feel uncomfortable? Have you had any run-ins with anyone lately?”
A familiar spark lit her eyes. It was dim, but it was there. Relief washed through him. There was that spirit, her strength.
“Nobody’s bothered me,” she said.
Except him.
He cleared his throat. “We checked all the doors and windows, and they looked secure. Can you think of any other way that this person might have gotten into your house?”
She paled. “No.”
“Have you given anyone a key?”
She shook her head.
“Not even David Hughes?”
She flinched, but then her jaw went hard. “He has nothing to do with this.”
“I know he’s been helping you around the house.” Even after his warning... The town gossip mill had kept Carter abreast of everything that had been happening at the Calhoun house.
“David’s been helping with the painting, but I haven’t given him a key.” She folded her arms over her chest. “It doesn’t matter. It wasn’t him. He would never do something like this to me.”
Just like that, that invisible wall sprang back up between them.
Carter put his hands on his thighs and pushed himself to his feet. Irritation bubbled up in his throat, but he kept his voice on an even keel as he looked down at her. “That’s enough for tonight. Is there anyone I can call for you? Alice? Mamie?”
“You’re leaving?”
God, the look in her eyes. He reached up to rub his shoulder. “Bill needs to get back to the station with that evidence, and I should canvass the neighborhood. It’s not that late. Somebody might have seen something.”
“But... But... What about the garage?” she blurted. “Did you search the garage?”
“That’s where I got the ladder, but I’ll check it before I go.”
“The chimney? That could have been a—what do you types call it?—a point of entry.”
“There’s nobody in your chimney, Callie.”
Her fingers bit into the musty blanket. She refused to say it, but he could see she didn’t want to be alone.
Carter nodded at Bill, releasing him.
