Cold Case Justice

He shone his flashlight all around, still not seeing any sign of a road or an alternate route back into town. He slowed down in his jogging.

What had he gotten himself into? Rochelle had witnessed a murder. He was in way over his head. Had he been right to trust his gut feeling or had he been impulsive in thinking he had to rescue Rochelle and her son? His sense of duty had to end somewhere. As soon as he handed her safely over to the police, he could step back from all of this.

He’d had a moment after he’d been knocked down at the hospital that he’d thought to run back to where people were and get a nurse to call the police, but he knew he had only seconds to catch up with Rochelle and her abductor before she’d be lost for sure and then Jamie would be an orphan.

He checked his watch. He could search another ten minutes and still have time to get back to Rochelle if he ran. The looming darkness made everything look different, but his experience as a hiker had forced him to pay attention to landmarks in all kinds of conditions. He’d find his way back just fine.

His boots crunched on the snow, and a chill settled over his skin. He walked faster, shining the light in an arc. The silhouette of a structure came into view. He walked toward it and realized it was a house with no lights on. Probably nobody home. All the same, he knocked. He waited, staring up at the night sky, which had grown darker. Stars twinkled down at him, and the full moon provided some illumination. He knocked again, this time louder, praying that lights would come on and someone would open the door.

He peered in the window but couldn’t see much. The place might not be occupied year-round. There were plenty of vacation cabins out this way. It could be months before the owners came back. There was no garage, and he didn’t see a car anywhere. As expected, when he tried the door it was locked.

He needed to get back to Rochelle. As he ran, he weighed his options. Rochelle would be feeling a little stronger after resting. They might be able to hike out to the country road where the accident had occurred. They’d have the cover of darkness in their favor, and they could walk parallel to the road until they found a place that was less steep. He stuttered in his step. Not the best plan. He had no idea what additional injury Rochelle had suffered from the second accident and he wasn’t doing too great, either. His best guess was that she wouldn’t be able to walk very far. They would have to hope a car picked them up right away.

Rochelle had been pretty certain the thug had friends who would come looking for her. Her kidnapper had been in rough shape, but it was probably too much to hope that he would just get a ride back into town.

Matthew pushed tree branches out of the way. He was getting close to where he’d left Rochelle. He shone the light. He could see where the snow was pressed down and the pile of branches he’d gathered for her to sit on, but no Rochelle. He wasn’t panicked. She might have gotten up to keep warm.

He followed the footprints in the snow that indicated which direction she’d gone, but they ended abruptly in a dry patch of ground. He was about to call her name when he heard a rustling in the trees, and then a man grunted. He turned off his flashlight and slipped behind an evergreen.

The crunching of footsteps told him the man was maybe ten feet away. Matthew scanned the darkness. Rochelle must have heard the man coming and hidden somewhere, too. He caught a flash of color as the man walked past him—not the same man who had been in the car accident, not Blondie. This guy was thin. He waited for the footsteps to fade. He could still see the flashlight bobbing in and out of the trees moving farther away.

“Rochelle.” Matthew’s voice came out in a harsh whisper. His muscles tensed when he didn’t hear anything.

He angled out from behind the tree and returned to where he’d seen her footprints. He slipped into the forest. When he looked over his shoulder, the flashlight of the thug was coming back toward the clearing.

He darted through the trees, his feet pounding against the frozen ground. His voice filled with desperation as he whispered, “Rochelle.”

“I’m here.” She appeared out of the darkness, still wearing his coat.

He grabbed her hand. “He’s coming back this way.”

He pulled her through the forest. He could hear the rapid crunching of their footsteps. The light came directly toward them. They’d been spotted. With Rochelle lagging behind him as he held on to her hand, he knew they weren’t going to outrun this guy. He guided her toward some brush hidden from the moonlight by a canopy of trees. They huddled low and close together waiting for the sound of passing footsteps. He listened to the ragged exhale and inhale of her breath. All this movement was hard on her. Moments later, footsteps crunched through the dry snow. They remained still, their shoulders touching, until the noise faded.

Finally, she released a heavy breath. “I think he’s gone...for now.”

“We should get up to the road.” What choice did they have but to try to get out that way? He rose to his feet and put out a hand to help her up. She groaned in pain as she got to her feet. The accident and all the running had weakened him, too. If his muscles ached, hers must be in worse shape.

As though she’d heard his thoughts, she said, “I’m okay.” But the waver in her voice gave away how much pain she was in.

He took her hand. “Hopefully, a driver will come along quickly before that guy comes back.”

They wove through the evergreens, finally emerging from a cluster of trees. Matthew dove to the ground, taking Rochelle with him. She groaned when she hit the ground. Two cars with the lights on were parked along the road. He lifted his head and counted at least three men patrolling the road.

Rochelle gasped, her voice filled with fear. “That’s Elwood Corben, the man who’s after me.”

She pointed toward a man standing beside one of the cars.

What could they do? Rochelle couldn’t keep moving, not in her condition. Running in the valley parallel to the road until they were out of sight of the patrollers might be too much for her. This Elwood Corben had brought some manpower with him. What if he had someone patrolling the road in a car? They might have to run for miles before they were in the clear.

“Come with me. I know a place we can hide for a while.” Moving away from the path, he wove through the trees, listening for the footfalls of the man searching the woods for them. Rochelle lagged behind him. When he turned to look at her, she was bent over though trudging forward. She lifted her head.

“We’re almost there.” He pressed his hands against her cheeks. “Can you make it?”

She nodded but then her head tilted back as she swayed. He caught her and carried her the remaining distance to the cabin, setting her on her feet outside the door. She continued to lean against him for support while he broke the window and reached in to unlatch the door. Because crime was not a huge issue around here, security measures were usually not extensive. He’d leave a note with his phone number explaining why they’d broken in and offering to pay for the window.

The cabin was one large room with an adjoining bathroom. Whoever lived here had left behind a minimum of possessions. Rochelle collapsed onto a couch that must fold out into a bed. He found a blanket and laid it over the top of her. He dare not build a fire in case the men got this far out with their search. His guess, though, was that they’d be watching the road for a long time before they changed tactics on their search.

The gash on her head had begun to bleed again. He dressed it and dug through his pockets for the remaining ibuprofen. There was no running water but he found some tomato juice in the pantry. She took the pill.

Worry colored her expression. “What are we going to do if they come here?”

“I’ll stay awake. If we have to run, we’ll run. As soon as we have a little light, we’ll find a way back into town.”

“I know you want me back in the hospital.” She gazed up at him with wide brown eyes. “But when we get back to town, we have to get my son first. Please.”

“Of course.” After all this, her focus was still her son. He slid down to the floor using the couch as a backrest. He wondered what he had gotten himself into. In a million years, he couldn’t imagine that all of this was because of a murder. “Rochelle, why didn’t you go to the police when you witnessed this man kill Jamie’s father?”

She closed her eyes and covered them with her hand. “He threated to hurt my family. It was ten years ago. I was young and scared and I ran away. But now he’s found me.”

“You can go to the police now and tell them everything that happened then and today. They will help you.” She looked so forlorn, so defeated, that he didn’t regret listening to his gut feeling. Rochelle had needed him. Still, he was in over his head.

There was a long moment of silence before she answered. “I want to believe that, but I saw Corben talking to a cop in the courthouse and...this is a small police department and he’s a powerful man. He’s had police on his payroll in Seattle.”

Her voice faded.

He rose to his feet, needing to get an idea of the layout of the house and to think over what she had said. She grabbed his hand.

“Matthew, you didn’t have to do all this, but I probably wouldn’t be alive without you.”

Her hand felt like silk in his. As he looked into her eyes, affection for her tugged at his heart. He pushed his feelings aside. The trouble she faced was complicated. Way more than he had bargained for. Whatever had sparked inside him in that moment when she touched his hand—this was not the time or place to dwell on it.

“Yeah, well, it was for the kid.” He pulled away and wandered through the house, not finding anything useful—some canned goods, but not a gun or anything he could use in self-defense. When he returned to the sofa, she was fast asleep.

He listened until her breathing became steady and deep. She looked almost peaceful as she slept. He found another blanket that he wrapped around his shoulders. He slipped down to the floor using the couch as a backrest. His reaction to her thank-you surprised him. Maybe it was just about all they had been through in the past ten hours. Women he’d rescued on calls sometimes sought him out afterward. He recognized that glow of affection when they said thank-you, and he knew that relationships born out of trauma never worked out.

The best thing to do was to get Rochelle back to town and call the police so that kid had a fighting chance at a normal life.

Ten minutes passed and he felt himself nod off and jerk awake, bracing for the possibility that Elwood Corben and his thugs might burst through the door at any moment.

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