Part 13 (1/2)

I shoved a fork full of chicken into my mouth and smiled.

”Wow,” I said. ”This is good stuff. Dig in.”

Chapter Twenty-Four.

We sat at the table for more than an hour following my rant. Caroline had waited several minutes before she spoke, but she finally managed to ease the tension and we ended up talking seriously about what we needed to do to prepare for the birth. Gracie became fussy about thirty minutes into the conversation, so Caroline took a brief break and put her to bed. Randy even ate a couple of bites of his supper, and eventually his face returned to its natural color.

I didn't really mind that Randy and Lilly would be living with us. The house had seemed too empty and too quiet since the kids went off to college. I didn't mind the fact that they were getting married, either, because from everything I'd observed over the past three years, they genuinely loved each other. And the more I'd thought about it, the more the idea of having a grandchild appealed to me.

I glanced at the clock around 9:45 and suddenly realized that I'd forgotten about Sarah. I got up from the table, picked my cell up off the counter, and punched in her number. She didn't answer. I hit re-dial. Same result.

”She's not answering,” I said to Caroline, who had started to clear the table.

”She said she'd be back by ten. Give her the benefit of the doubt.”

”Why won't she answer her phone?”

”Maybe she turned it off or left it in the car. Maybe the battery's dead. Relax. She'll be here soon.”

I put the phone down and helped Caroline, Lilly and Randy clear the table, load the dish washer, and clean up the kitchen. By the time we were finished, it was a little after ten. I dialed Sarah's number again. No answer.

”I guess I'd better go over there and see what's going on,” I said.

Lilly and Randy were driving back to Knoxville, so I kissed Lilly goodbye and punched Randy in the shoulder. Caroline stayed home with Gracie, and I drove her car through Johnson City to the house on Barton Street where I was raised. Sarah's Mustang was in the driveway, along with my truck. I walked up to the front door and opened it, fully expecting to find her sitting at the kitchen table or in the den, drunk and belligerent, but as soon as I stepped inside, I knew something was wrong. The house was filled with the powerful odor of gasoline.

”Sarah?”

I walked down the hallway off the kitchen toward the bathroom and bedrooms, the smell getting stronger with each step.

”Sarah!”

I wondered whether she might have gone over the edge, whether she had decided to kill herself rather than go through rehab and burn Ma's house down in the process. The bathroom door was closed, but there was light s.h.i.+ning beneath it. I opened the door and looked inside, but there was no sign of her. I heard a moan. It was coming from Ma's old bedroom, just down the hall. I walked quickly to the room and flipped on the light.

Sarah was lying face up on the bed, wearing only a bra and panties. Her eyes and her mouth had been covered in silver duct tape and her arms and legs were both spread. Her wrists and ankles had been fastened to the bed posts with barbed wire. The bedding beneath her was soaked in gasoline.

I hurried to the side of the bed. ”It's me,” I said. ”It's Joe.” I reached down and removed the tape from her mouth as gently as I could.

”Get it off my eyes,” she said. ”Get it off my eyes.”

She yelped as I pulled the sticky tape from her eyelids.

”What happened?” I said. ”Who did this?”

”Get me out of here.”

I went to work on the barbed wire next. It had been cut into lengths of about eighteen inches and wrapped like bread ties around her wrists and ankles. I got the wire off of her right wrist and right ankle first. She had a few puncture wounds, but they didn't look too serious. As I moved around the bed to free her left wrist and ankle, I saw a gas can sitting on the floor. There was a cigarette lighter on top of it.

”Hurry up,” she said.

I freed her and took my phone out. I was punching in 9-1-1 when she grabbed my wrist.

”Don't,” she said. ”Let's just go.”

”You need to go to the hospital,” I said, ”and I need to call the police.”

”Please, not now. Hand me a blanket from the closet. You can call the police after you get me out of here.”

She stood while I got her a blanket. I wrapped it around her and started leading her to the front door.

”Who was it?” I said.

”I don't know. Two of them, I think.”

”They were waiting for you when you got here?”

”No. They must have followed me. They came in just a few seconds after I got here. It happened so fast. One second I was walking down the hall and the next I was on my back in the bedroom with tape over my mouth and eyes. They cut my clothes off. The knife was so cold, Joe.”

”Did they. . . did they-”

”They didn't rape me. They didn't say a word until after they poured gas all over me. I thought they were going to burn me alive. Then one of them he had a Spanish accent put his lips next to my ear and said, 'Tell your brother to back off. Next time we won't be so gentle.'”

Chapter Twenty-Five.

Sarah's physical wounds required only first-aid. The psychological damage was impossible to a.s.sess.

Tell your brother to back off.

The message had to have come from Lips...o...b..or Pinzon or both. The more I thought about it, the more I seethed. The murder case was getting out of control. At first, the suspects had done what normal suspects do they'd gotten rid of as much evidence as possible and run off to Nashville. But then, unlike normal suspects, they started applying heavy political pressure. Since that hadn't worked, it appeared they were willing to resort to terrorism.

After I got Sarah home and settled in, I called the police and went back to her house. I also called Bates and filled him in, but the attack had occurred inside Johnson City so the city police would handle the investigation. The crime scene unit didn't find anything, which didn't surprise me. When they were finished and everyone had left, I locked the place up and drove back home. It was four in the morning.

The next morning, we decided against taking Sarah to Ashville to rehab. After what she'd been through, we decided that being around family would be best for her. She said she wanted to stay with us for awhile, and that was fine with me.

On Monday morning, I was back in the office early. The grand jury was scheduled to meet at nine. Proceedings conducted by grand juries, at both the federal and state level, are supposed to be secret. Grand jurors, clerks, police officers, judges and prosecutors are forbidden by law from disclosing anything that occurs while the grand jury is meeting. Each county in Tennessee has its own grand jury twelve people, plus a foreman, randomly selected by drawing names of registered voters from a box. The grand jury's purpose is to issue indictments, official pieces of paper that formally charge a person with a criminal offense. They serve for one year the foreman serves two years in Tennessee and they meet at the beginning of each term of criminal court. They can also be called into session under special circ.u.mstances, and that's what I'd done.

Typically, only the police officer who is handling the case appears before the grand jury. He or she lays out the case, and the grand jurors have the opportunity to ask questions. If the grand jurors wish, the district attorney can provide them with legal advice or even question the witness. The officer then leaves and the grand jury votes on whether to return an indictment.

In this case, however, with so much at stake, I decided to call all of our witnesses in. The father of the boy who originally spotted Lisa testified, as did the other two people who reported finding the other two girls. Hobie Stanton, the medical examiner, Erlene Barlowe and her bouncer, Turtle Yates, Hector Mejia, Zack Woods, the limo driver and the fisherman who saw the Laura Mae being removed from the lake all testified. Bates brought his laptop and showed the grand jurors the phone calls Nelson Lips...o...b..made from the back of the cruiser, and by that time, we had his phone records and knew the calls were to his mother and his brother, John. It took the grand jurors less than half an hour to vote yes to indicting all three men, and the court clerk issued warrants for their arrest. I handed the warrants to Bates.

”Don't pick Nelson up until the other two are arrested and brought back here,” I said. ”Put them in the same holding cell, and make sure you have it wired.”