Off Limits(55)

Patrick mistook my momentary flashback for a question about his choice of vehicle. “I have another, but this should be better for our needs,” he said, sliding into the shotgun seat. “Think you can handle it?”

“Quite,” I said, starting the engine and putting it in drive. I jammed the accelerator to the floor, heading out toward the main street. Old habits die hard, and while it had been five years, I could still drive well. “Where do we go?”

“South, along 75,” Patrick said. “I think the exit is 224. It's the Hudson Bridge Road exit.”

“Gotcha,” I said, gaining speed. A terrible dread settled in my stomach as I pushed the truck past sixty, shooting through a red light and earning a few honked horns. “Hope your insurance is paid up.”

Patrick didn't reply, instead calling the cops. He talked with the dispatcher for a few minutes, explaining the situation. When he hung up, he was pissed off. “Fucking cops can't do much without knowing an address,” he said. “And Abby has only been missing a few hours. Shit!”

“Calm down,” I replied, my fingers tight on the wheel. “Abby told me you've had heart problems in the past. I don't need you having a f*cking coronary on me while trying to help Abby.”

Patrick glanced at me, then shook his head. “What is it with you, Bell? You kill your friend, but now you're trying to save my daughter?”

“I killed my friend because he was trying to rape a teenage Iraqi girl, and he was going to stab me with a bayonet,” I answered, not taking my eyes off the road as I shot up the on-ramp to the Interstate, already going seventy-five. “As for Abs, she’s a special girl, as I’m sure you know.”

“Yeah, I do,” Patrick replied. “Hold on, let me try something. I gave Abby a Camaro as a graduation gift from high school.”

“Yeah, I rode in it yesterday. Nice car. You got it tuned up, too.”

Patrick grunted in acknowledgment, then continued. “I had it equipped with OnStar. Her phone is under my contract, and that damn gadget has every gizmo on the planet on it.”

I saw where he was going. “You can have those tracked. The car's OnStar and her phone's GPS. One of them should still be working.”

“That's what I figure,” Patrick replied. He dialed his phone again, talking to an OnStar rep. As the official owner of the car, he was able to get the car's location and have it sent to his truck, where it popped up on an in-dash navigation system. “Finally, a use for that hunk of junk. Abby insisted I get it though. Never have used it for more than a fancy clock and CD player until now.”

“More importantly, now you can tell the cops,” I added, watching as the route to the point was laid out over the navigation.

He shook his head. “OnStar is doing that for me right now. They can feed the cops the exact GPS coordinates. I'm going to try and get an aerial shot of the area though, just in case.”

He tapped at his phone, cursing occasionally as he fiddled with the unfamiliar technology. “After this, remind me to learn how to use this goddamn thing,” he finally said. “I just let Abby do most of this for me.”

“I will,” I replied, pushing the truck faster. Above ninety, it started to shimmy some. The high tires and boxy exterior were meant for rugged low speeds and not aerodynamics, so I kept the speed down at eighty-five. “Four miles until the exit.”

“Do you love her?” Patrick asked randomly, his head still buried in his phone. “You're not just trying to seduce her?”

“I'll die for her if I need to,” I answered grimly. “I came to your door—hell, I kicked it down, knowing there was a decent chance I'd end up catching a shotgun to the chest. Does that answer your question?”

“I think it does,” Patrick replied. “I knew you two were still talking, by the way.”

“How?” I asked.

He pointed to his phone. “I get a detailed bill on the phones by email every second of the month. That includes every number that she's called or texted in the past thirty days.”

“She was angry with me when she found out who I was. I wasn't trying to mislead her, but that first night, I didn't really know who she was either.”

I got off the Interstate and kept following the navigation. I knew at some point soon I'd have to keep my eyes open. The way Abby had described the house, the road likely wasn't going to be well-marked or even paved.

Patrick looked out the window, seemingly lost in thought before he spoke up. “After her mother and sister were killed, I only had Abby,” he said softly, looking out on the rapidly dimming evening sky. “If I was overprotective, it was because I couldn't stand to lose her too.”

“You won't,” I promised, turning right. “I think this is the right road. I see a house up ahead—see the lights?”

“No,” Patrick admitted. “You must have better eyes than me.”

The road quickly became rough and bumpy, and I wondered if we were on the right track. Still, the house grew closer and closer, and we were getting closer to Abby's car, too. I gunned the engine, not caring if we tore up the shocks on the truck. Patrick said nothing, putting his hand on the dash and hanging on grimly while we bounced our way down the washboard road.

The house was on the edge of the lake, a two-story job that looked like it wasn't quite good enough to be a permanent house, but had when it was originally built been a pretty good vacation getaway. On our left, I could see blue lights approaching, and I knew the cops were approaching on another road, probably one that ran along the edge of the lake. Still, they were a good distance away and weren't rushing the way we were. I couldn't trust that they'd get there in time, and I pushed the engine harder.