Page 95 of Sting
Josh anxiously awaited daybreak.
He sat at the kitchen table, fiddling with a box of toothpicks, nearly jumping out of his skin at every sound. He was reminded of a popular bumper sticker from a few years back: YOU’D BE PARANOID TOO IF EVERYBODY WAS AFTER YOU.
The darkness made him jittery, but he was afraid to turn on the lights, now even more so than before. A light had brought about Shaw Kinnard’s capture. That was just one of the surprising tidbits that had been on the late newscasts.
According to the report, a fisherman had spotted light inside a building that had been abandoned for years. He had alerted local authorities to it, and that had led to Jordie’s rescue and her abductor’s arrest.
Good fortune for her. Disaster for the perpetrator.
Since Josh fell into the latter category, he’d taken the lesson to heart, switched off the TV immediately, and had kept every light off since. Total darkness was safer, but hell on his nerves. Throughout the wee hours, he’d crept from window to window of the house, afraid that when he looked outside he would see armed men in uniforms sneaking up on him, surrounding the house, spreading a net he couldn’t escape.
He wasn’t that good with guns, but he kept a loaded pistol within reach on the table next to the box of toothpicks. He was glad he’d planned ahead and had left the gun here in the house along with the frozen TV dinners and stocked pantry. It gave him peace of mind. With it close at hand, he didn’t feel so naked and exposed.
He detested being naked and exposed. Even in his own shower. Because occasionally, as much as he tried to avoid it, he would accidentally catch a glimpse of himself in the bathroom mirror and see his grotesque scars.
The passage of time had faded them. They were no longer red and pink but slick and white and shiny, like repulsive worms crisscrossing his back. He remembered being told how lucky he was that his clothing would conceal them. Even Jordie had told him that once.
“Nobody will ever know they’re there, Josh.”
He had yelled at her that he knew they were there.
That indisputable fact had shut her up. She’d never tried that platitude on him again.
Frustrated over the reminder of his deformity, he knocked the box of toothpicks over the edge of the table. They spilled onto the floor. Still feeling restless, he reached for one of his cell phones and bounced it in his palm. He’d removed the battery from the one he’d used to call Joe Wiley. This was a new phone, new battery, and it was charged.
He was tempted to call Wiley again, ask him if what they’d reported on TV about Jordie was true and that she really had come through her ordeal unharmed. He also wondered if Wiley had asked her about Costa Rica yet.
She would probably be mad at him for telling the FBI agent about her and Panella’s little getaway. From the day she’d returned from Central America, the junket had been a closed subject. Taboo. Off-limits. Josh’s tentative inquires about it had been met with frigid silence. She was probably still touchy on the topic.
But he’d had to give Wiley something last night, hadn’t he? Would Jordie rather have remained at the mercy of Shaw Kinnard, hardened criminal? They’d said on TV that he had been “gravely wounded,” but they hadn’t disclosed the nature of his injury or how he’d sustained it.
Josh hoped he’d died.
He knelt, gathered up the toothpicks by feel, and replaced them in the box. Then he made another circuit of the ground floor of the house, tiptoeing through the dark rooms, taking peeps out the windows. No need to check the second floor. He’d done so twice.
Outside, nothing was moving. He was okay.
But the suspense to know about Jordie was killing him. Yielding to temptation, he returned to the kitchen, picked up the phone, and tapped in Joe Wiley’s number. After three rings, the agent answered, sounding groggy, as though the call had woken him up.
“I heard about Jordie. Is she really all right?”
“Hi, Josh. I wondered when you’d break down and call me. I had a bet going with my wife that you—”
“Is she?”
“She’s fine. But why don’t you come see for yourself? I’ll come get you, drive you straight over to her.”
“Is her kidnapper dead?”
“Last I heard, no. But you’re not the only one who hopes he’ll die.”
Josh recognized that statement as a dangled carrot. Nevertheless, he couldn’t resist it. “I’m sure Jordie does. Did he do something to her? Hurt her?”
“She says no. But I wasn’t referring to her. I talked to Billy Panella tonight.”
Josh snorted. “Liar.”
“A few hours ago.”
