“This is a remarkably effective tool,” his guest said. “I was pleasantly surprised to find it in your top desk drawer. Remarkably effective. And in case you were worried, I had the foresight to wear rubber gloves, in case the electricity travels through the handle.”
As Brian tried to stand, he heard the popping of the current again. He didn’t understand why he hadn’t noticed the popping when the first jolt of electricity was delivered and hoped that he would never have to hear it again.
Three seconds of searing, contracting, exhausting pain, then, nothing. Complete absence of pain. He felt his body soaked with sweat and could feel the blood still pouring from within his mouth. He raised his head and locked eyes with his attacker.
“Peeez, wha u wan?” he mumbled; his tongue screaming for no movement.
“I am sorry, Doctor Lucietta, but it seems that you are very poor at speaking with a shortened tongue. Please, try it again. I will listen more closely.”
“Wha u ewe wan rom e?”
“Sounds like you are asking about my intentions? Nod if I heard you correctly.”
Brian nodded his head as more blood was sprayed into the air by a painful cough.
“Fair question,” his attacker said. “All I want to know is where I will find William Straus?”
Brian raised his hand and pointed to a picture hanging on the far wall of his office.
“Here?” his attacker asked. “I will find him here?”
Brian nodded then heard the popping sound again.
When the current stopped, Brian’s body was convulsing. His legs and arms were uncomfortable, but the pain in his chest was what Brian was most concerned with.
“I’ve never used one of these Tasers. I had no idea that a cartridge was needed in order to deliver the voltage,” Brian’s attacker said. “I must commend you for your forward thinking. Having a cache of additional cartridges hidden in your bottom drawer: Brilliant.”
His attacker popped in another cartridge, squeezed the Taser’s trigger, and sent another round of shock treatment into the body of Doctor Lucietta. Without pause, he slammed in another cartridge, squeezed the trigger again but heard no report of the popping noises that signaled a passing current.
“Three successive doses,” the attacker said. “Your Taser is good for three doses. Not that you will need to know that information, but it is a good bit to have.”
Brian was unable to move. Though the only pain he was feeling was his severed tongue and the fading discomfort in his chest, his muscles were spent. He saw that his attacker had moved across the office and was carefully inspecting the photograph that contained the location that William Straus would be found. He knew this was his chance. He knew he had to reach the door and the safety that the hallway just beyond his office door would provide.
Brian summoned every last bit of his energy and forced himself onto all fours. His arms screamed and shook violently as he demanded that they pull him towards the door. His legs offered no assistance to his arms and were nothing but dead weight needing to be dragged across the office floor. His eyesight was spinning and his thoughts, muddled. But he felt himself moving. Moving towards the door and to safety. His closed one eye to better keep to his course.
His senses were muted except for his smell. As he struggled to reach safety, Brian’s stomach turned at the foul smell that was filling his nostrils.
Though he couldn’t be certain, he believed he has no more than four feet from the door. Four more feet before he could spill himself onto the hallway floor where someone would certainly see him and call for help.
His body was sending random signals to his brain so Brian wasn’t sure if the sharp, stabbing pain he felt when he was two feet from the door was something new or just his muscles continued reaction to the stun gun.
But when he saw the blood flowing down his arms and onto the floor, Brian knew that the pain in his neck wasn’t a side effect. The next thing he felt was a continuation of this new pain. But this continuation was deeper. Slowly reaching through his neck, into his throat and then, the long, thin knife finished its journey.
His arms went numb as they folded beneath his weight. He could feel nothing; no pain, no twitches, no blood running its way down his body.
“I made it,” he thought as his eyes clouded over, and he felt a shallowness in his chest.
“Thank you for the information,” he heard his unwelcomed guest say as if speaking from deep inside a tunnel. “Good night, Doctor, and, again, thank you.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
Derek’s departure was sudden. No more than five minutes after his call with Ken O’Connell ended, Captain Smith gave Derek his clear expectations then made sure Derek’s car started and headed away from Piseco Lake New York.
When Derek was no further than three miles away from the lodge, he pulled his car over to the side of State Route 8, pulled out his cell phone from his pocket, and redialed the last number called.
“Ken O’Connell.”
“Ken, it’s Derek Cole.”
“Problem?”
“Unfortunately, there is, and the problem is yours,” Derek said. “The last conversation we had was not as private as you would have liked.”
Derek explained the circumstances of their last call. He explained that Ralph Fox and Captain Jared Smith from the state police heard that Ken was not in the Bahamas but was in Chicago, the same city where two murders had just taken place.
Ken was silent as Derek explained that while he could have refused to make the call in front of others, learning that Ken hadn’t made the flight to the Bahamas made him very suspicious. Ken O’Connell said nothing when Derek explained what he had found beneath the bedroom of Alexander Black and how it seemed highly likely that Alexander had an accomplice. Derek tried to describe what he’d seen on the trail, marked with freshly painted hearts and stocked with supplies. He explained how the timeline of the murders in Chicago demanded that Alexander had either learned how drive and to steal a car (though no cars were reported as being stolen in the area) or Alexander was given a ride.
“You’ve seen the pictures of him,” Derek said. “The chances that anyone would have pulled over and picked him up if he were hitchhiking are highly unlikely.”