Wrecked (Josie Gray Mysteries #3)(28)
“Any news yet?”
“Not enough to make a difference. No contact from Dillon or the kidnappers.”
“All’s quiet around here. A few cars drove by on Schenck Road, but no one stopped. I been outside all day.”
“All right. Thanks, Dell.”
She didn’t have the energy to talk, and Dell no doubt understood. Josie opened the back door of her jeep and Chester climbed inside. She drove home and checked the mailbox for communication concerning Dillon, but it was empty.
Chester jumped out of the jeep and ran to the house, his nose to the ground. He reached the front door, whining and then barking, sniffing at the jamb. Typically he was excited to be the first one through the door, but now he barked and whined as if he’d picked up a strange scent; his anxiety was obvious and she was immediately on edge.
She pulled her Beretta out of her gun belt and held it in her left hand, safety off, while she unlocked the door. She carried a Beretta PX4 Storm Compact, a 9 mm that fit her hand perfectly. She snapped her fingers and ordered Chester to sit. She switched her gun to her right hand and held Chester’s collar with her left. She bumped the front door with her knee, and as it swung open slowly, the living room came into view. Since Dillon’s disappearance she had been keeping the house closed up and the curtains pulled. The living room was dimly lit by a table lamp that turned on automatically at dusk. Everything appeared to be in order.
She stepped inside, holding Chester back by the collar. Barking, he strained toward the kitchen. She yelled his name to get him to stop but it was no use. He lunged forward and broke free as they reached the kitchen door. He frantically sniffed around the kitchen, his nose to the floor. Josie held her gun in the ready position, checked the kitchen, and, standing to the side of the pantry doorframe, opened the pantry door. Once she was certain the front part of the house was clear she crept down the dark hallway.
She moved quickly through the bedroom doorway, backed into the nearest corner to scan the room, then moved to the bathroom, and followed the same procedure on into the spare bedroom. She flipped on the room’s light and found the alarm control box lying on the floor. It had been ripped out of the wall. She cursed and went back to the kitchen, where she found the back door closed but unlocked, and a six-inch, round piece of glass in the window to the right of the door removed. The sight of it made her face burn with rage. Someone had cut the piece of glass out of the sidelight beside the door, reached their hand inside, unlocked the door, and entered her house.
Chester stood at the entrance to the pantry, pawing at the wall where Josie hung her gun belt each night after work. Ignoring him, she pulled her cell phone out of her pocket and called in a breaking and entering to the night dispatcher, Brian Moore. Within seconds he was back on the line to tell her Marta was on her way.
Staring at the back door now, with the glass removed, she called the security company’s number that she had saved in her phone. When she received a recorded response she left an angry message about the failure of their system and demanded a call back that night. She hung up and walked over to the pantry, where Chester was still whining and pawing. When she stepped inside she gasped, pulling back in shock. There was a small, gray mesh bag that she had never seen before hanging from the hook where she hung her gun belt. The idea that someone knew where she hung her gun each night made her feel physically ill.
Unable to wait for Marta, she called Otto.
“What’s up?” he said.
“Someone broke into my house. They disabled the alarm and broke in through the window.”
“Are you safe? Are you in the house now?”
“I’ve checked the house. Based on the way the dog’s reacting, I figure they stopped at the front door to see if it was locked, then cut the window out of the back door and did a quick dash through the house to disable the alarm system. They spent time in the kitchen and the pantry. Beyond that I’m not sure.”
“You call this in yet?”
“Marta’s on her way.” Josie had grabbed a pair of tongs from the kitchen drawer and was carrying the mesh bag over to the kitchen counter. “They hung a bag inside my pantry where I keep my gun belt. There’s a cell phone inside the bag.”
“Hang on! Those phones can be used as detonators! Don’t open that until we get someone over there from the bomb squad.”
“Otto. This is from the kidnappers. I know it is. They don’t want to blow up the person they’re communicating with.” She clicked the speaker button on her phone and laid it on the kitchen counter. “I’m putting my gloves on now. I want you on the phone with me when I open this.”
She could hear him exhale. The phone in the bag was a cheap flip model. Holding the edges, she opened it and clicked the menu button to look at the sent/received calls. There were none. She used the tip of a pencil eraser to scroll down to text messages and clicked “open.”
“Jesus, Otto. There’s three messages.” She clicked the first and a photograph of Dillon appeared. She drew her breath at the sight of him.
“What?”
“The first message is a JPEG. It’s Dillon.” She choked back a sob. “Jesus, Otto, there’s a bag over his head. It’s just him from the waist up. It’s a bad picture so I can’t see details. I know it’s him though.” Tears welled up in her eyes and she forced herself to continue. “He’s wearing the shirt and tie he had on that morning.”