Identity Read online

  Table of Contents

  PROLOGUE

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

  CHAPTER THIRTY–SEVEN

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

  CHAPTER FORTY

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

  CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

  CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

  CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

  CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER FORTY-NINE

  CHAPTER FIFTY

  CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE

  CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO

  CHAPTER FIFTY-THREE

  CHAPTER FIFTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER FIFTY-SIX

  CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER FIFTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER FIFTY-NINE

  CHAPTER SIXTY

  CHAPTER SIXTY-ONE

  CHAPTER SIXTY-TWO

  CHAPTER SIXTY-THREE

  CHAPTER SIXTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER SIXTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER SIXTY-SIX

  CHAPTER SIXTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER SIXTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER SIXTY-NINE

  CHAPTER SEVENTY

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-ONE

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-TWO

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-THREE

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER SEVENTY-SIX

  PROLOGUE

  The warm spray from the rain shower soothed her beaten body. As Sarah lathered her body with the perfumed body wash, the fragrance enveloped her. Her thoughts kept coming back to three days ago. What had happened to her to be in this position...a captive in her own house...in her own bedroom! He wanted control of the company, a company that her father and her husband’s father nurtured to success. What had made her husband so different from his father who was a kind-heated soul? Maybe what they say is true; there is a “bad seed.” Her husband surely disguised his true nature from everyone.

  She looked down at her arms, and she rubbed the body wash on them...the bruises on her arms were starting to turn putrid yellow. Soon, the fading bruises would no longer be a reminder of the abuse she suffered from her “loving husband” and no longer evidence against him. She continued feeling calm as the warm water offered her body soothing relief.

  She sensed that she was no longer alone when she turned off the water and slid the shower door open. She reached around and grabbed the bath towel to dry off. As she stepped out of the shower her senses, again, signaled that she wasn’t alone. Was her “loving husband” in the bedroom and, waiting for her? She looked at her image in the vanity mirror while drying her body. Her image reflected gauntness in her face. However, the black eye that she received no longer looked so ominous.

  She couldn’t remain in the bathroom all day, as she was starting to feel the cold air on her body. She slowly approached the bathroom door. She reached for the doorknob and slowly turned it. The door flew back at her causing Sarah to stumble. She grasped with one hand holding on to the towel, which was wrapped around her body. Rodney, her husband, caught hold of her wrist, which still had the doorknob in her hand. He pulled her to him.

  “Had enough? Ready to sign the papers?” He said sarcastically.

  Sarah remained mute as she clung with the one hand to the towel covering her body.

  Rodney forcefully pulled her through the confines of the bathroom entry and threw her on the bed. Sarah tried to shift her body on the bed to get away from him, clutching both the towel and the comforter as protection. But, it was too late for her to do anything to help herself as he fell on top of her pinning her body. Her mind knew nothing good would happen.

  “Miss me? I didn’t think so.”

  “Please, please don’t,” she begged.

  “We’re going to have some fun tonight. I see it in your eyes that you can’t wait.”

  A chill went up her spine when she heard his words.

  Sarah had no fight left in her. She was weak from hunger. In the past three days all she had eaten was a sleeve of crackers she had found in her nightstand.

  As he straddled her body holding onto her wrist, he used his other hand to unfasten his belt. When it was free from his pants, he made a single loop and wrapped it around her free wrist. He then grabbed the hand that was clutching the towel covering her body. Holding onto her wrapped wrists, Rodney pulled both her arms above her head.

  “Wouldn't you like to consider signing those papers now”? He paused. “Still not talking. Well, we’ll see how you feel later.”

  Sarah's thoughts of the company and her father were interrupted. She heard the sound of Rodney's zipper being pulled down. He wrapped his arms around her waist and flipped her on her stomach, lifting her body so that her buttock faced upwards.

  “Now we are going to have some fun,” his voice had a glint of laughter.

  Rodney pulled his penis out of his pants. He used his hands to part her cheeks, and, then, savagely rammed himself into her ass.

  “Please, no. Stop." Sarah screamed. "You’re hurting me.”

  “Silly woman.”

  He kept pumping his penis in and out, her cries of pain muffled by a pillow. Finally, he came. When he pulled out there were traces of blood clinging to his penis. His face lit with a vicious smile.

  “Wasn’t that fun?” He sardonically whispered in her ears.

  After what seamed like an eternity, he lifted himself off of Sarah. At last, she felt some relief as he got off the bed. She could only wonder what would be next.

  Surely, he couldn't do more to her before she would be dead. Suddenly, it dawned on her: "He is going to kill me!" Rodney didn't need her to sign the papers; he would inherit the company upon her death.

  She heard him zip up his pants. She thought. "How is he going to do it? How is he going to explain it to the police? What is his perverse plan?" She didn't have long to wait.

  He grabbed her by her wrapped wrists and pulled her off the bed, landing her on the floor. She was too weak and couldn’t get her legs to move and flee. Then, she felt the pain as he kicked her several times in the abdomen. She knew by the force she had internal damage…what, she wasn’t sure. Rodney then he dragged her from the bedroom to the top of the stairs. She looked down, knowing that was going to be her fate…a broken neck from a fall down the stairs. Rodney lifted her up by the wrists. She was sure she dislocated both her shoulders by his recent torture. He unwrapped his belt as she tried to stand in a defensive move.

  “It would have been so easy if you would have just signed the papers. But, no, you had to be stubborn. Well, this is where it got you.”
/>   “You won’t be able to charm yourself out of murder.”

  “My dear, your death is going to be an accident.”

  With that statement, he grabbed the statuette on the side table and hit her on the head. Sarah collapsed and fell down the eighteen steps to the bottom of the staircase.

  CHAPTER ONE

  The sun was slowly rising after a cold rainy night. The temperature still hadn’t budged over thirty-five degrees. An early snow was in the forecast for the previous night, but cloud cover kept the earth warm. A light mist was falling.

  Sarah was so cold. The coldness of her body masked the pain she felt. Her automatic reflexes tried to pull up a covering that wasn’t there to warm her.

  Although she wasn’t conscious, her brain repeated echoed, “You’re not going to die! Stay strong! You’re not going to die! You’re not going to die! Stay strong!”

  With loaded backpacks, the brother and sister walked down their farm driveway to the highway to meet the morning school bus. When they reached the corner of driveway and highway, they stopped and waited for the bus to arrive. Although they had it down to the exact minute to arrive at the stop, today they were early. Maybe it was fate.

  The girl shuffled her feet drawing circles in the gravel roadside. The boy picked up gravel stones on the easement and was skipping them along the paved highway. He followed his last stone as it fell into the ditch along side the road.

  “Hey, somthin’ down there.” His eyes traveled to the shallow roadside gully.

  “Probably a dead animal,” the sister responded.

  “Naw, too big. I’m going down there.”

  "You better not go down there," the sister warned.

  Ignoring his sister's warning, it took a few seconds for him to reach his destination.

  “Nancy! Come quick.”

  The girl ran to see what her brother had found. Both looked down at naked woman lying in the gully.

  “Don’t touch her!” The girl screamed.

  “I’ve gotta see.” He gave the woman's leg a kick.

  The woman replied with a weak moan.

  As the children were wondering what to do next, the bus was coming down the highway, lights flashing, stopping at the farm’s driveway. The bus’ doors unfolded giving access for the children to board.

  The boy rushed to the steps and quickly spit out the words to the driver. “There’s a lady in the ditch.”

  The words were said so quickly the driver replied, “Slow down, what did you say?”

  “There’s a lady in the ditch. She’s alive!”

  The driver turned off the bus’s motor and got down from her seat. She slowly moved over to the steps, her weight prohibiting her moving with any speed. By this time, all the bus windows had been pulled down and children of all ages were popping their heads out to see the naked lady in the ditch. The boy and the driver walked over to where Nancy was standing next to the woman. The driver gasped as she saw the woman lying there with bruises and traces of blood on her body. With as much speed as she could muster, the driver got back to the bus and rushed to her radio control microphone.

  “Central, central...Emergency. Over,” the driver spoke in a controlled tone.

  “Central here. What is your emergency? Over.”

  “This is bus Number 4, Mae Brown here. At the corner Highway 52 and Morton Family Drive, Stop Number 12, there is a medical emergency. Over.”

  “What is the type of the emergency? Over.”

  “There is an injured woman in the ditch along side the highway. Over.”

  “Will Contact Emergency Services. Stay at your location until they arrive. Will notify Wildwood Elementary that your bus has been delayed. Over”

  The driver hung up the microphone. She took her coat off the back of the seat and carried it down to where the woman was lying. She covered the woman with the coat to hide her body from the prying eyes of the children. Mae stood next to the two children watching the woman. The wait seemed forever before the emergency vehicle showed up flashing its red lights as it stopped behind the bus.

  The EMT’s hopped out of the vehicle with their medical supply bags. They scurried down the ditch to where the woman was lying. One paramedic removed Mae’s coat, throwing it to the side, and covered her body with a black plastic sheeting while the other opened the “magic” life-giving bag, administering an IV and placing an oxygen mask on her face. Their training allowed them to work in unison silence. The second paramedic returned to the vehicle to a get collapsible gurney to lift the woman from the ditch to the emergency vehicle. The first paramedic snapped on his two-way radio to contact the dispatch operator at Memorial Hospital with a preliminary report on the victim.

  As they were working, another vehicle came into view. The Sheriff’s Patrol car stopped behind the Emergency Services vehicle with his red and white flashing lights.

  “The victim is a 30-40 year old woman suffering from hypothermia, with contusions and insect bites. Additionally, the right leg appears to be broken and there is blunt trauma to the back of the head; however, the bleeding has ceased. There is an absent of pulse. Over.”

  “Once secure in the vehicle administer, increase IV fluid to D5W monitoring vital signs in transport, notifying immediate return of pulse. Over”

  As the paramedics carefully moved up the ditch with the woman, the children started leaving the bus to get closer to the action. They sensed this was a serious operation, but still their little giggles could be heard. Mae Brown took several steps blocking the children from getting closer to the action and shuffled them back to the bus. Mae spread her bulky arms wide to encircle the children as she ushered them in the bus.

  One paramedic stayed in the back compartment of the emergency vehicle with the victim while the other started the vehicle with the lights flashing. It made a U-turn on Highway 52 and headed to Memorial Hospital.

  “Nancy, Shawn. Are you okay,” their mother cried as she ran down the farm’s driveway. She could see the flashing lights and of the EMT vehicle fading in the distance.

  The brother and sister turned as a response to their mother’s cries. Then and their mother wrapped her arms around the two. “What happened?”

  “We found a body.”

  “Shawn kicked her.”

  “I did not. I just nudged her.”

  The sheriff approached the family. “All right children, I’m Sheriff Johnson and I have a few questions.”

  “I’m Shawn Hanson…I found the body.”

  “I’m Nancy, and he kicked her.”

  “Okay did you touch anything?”

  “Are you kidding?" Shawn replied. "It was gross. And then, the bus came and all hell broke loose!”

  “Shawn! Watch your language,” their mother piped in.

  “Okay, if I have any further questions, I’ll get back to you.”

  Mae had already boarded the bus and left the door open for the Hanson children. Once on board, the children crowded around them asking questions. Mae shouted, “Get back to your seats and buckle up. You’re going to school.”

  The sounds of “boos” echoed throughout the bus.

  As the bus pulled away, the County Investigative Vehicle pulled up behind the Sheriff’s car. The freezing rain started in earnest.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Rodney returned to his to home later that night after “dropping off" Sarah. He looked around as he entered front door and saw that he would be busy in the coming hours cleaning up the actions that had taken place this past week. First things first.

  He entered the library and placed an intercontinental call to Rome, Italy. After several minutes, an accented voice answered.

  “Ciao.”

  “Naldo, did you receive my package?”

  “Si. I have found a woman that has the same coloring and body type that you described. She rented the car last night. I paid her well to drive the rental from Roma to Napoli. Today she will take the car on the route that I have directed her to follow. Earlier, I packed the tr
unk with your wife’s suitcase. Then I cut the brake line. When she gets to the mountains, she will be no longer. The signora will be unable to stop and the car will fall down the cliff. I will follow to make sure the car catches fire.”

  “Well done. I will see you after I identify the body. I have the three hundred Euros we agreed upon."

  " Signore, you are mistaken. We agreed upon eight hundred euro."

  "I...I'm sorry. You are correct. I will have your money ready when we meet."

  Both disconnected the call without further comment.

  Rodney returned to the entry hallway. In his mind, he reviewed the past few hours. Put everything back to “normal” to be ready for his wife’s return from her Italian shopping spree. He chuckled. Everything is working out. It was all about details, he thought.

  By 4:00 a.m., he accomplished his work, down to the last detail. He replaced the broken statuette with one from the library bookshelf. Now he had time to catch a few hours of sleep before going to work.

  Shortly before 9:00 a.m. Rodney arrived in the Robinson—Williams parking garage. He pulled his red Benz-SLR in the “Reserved” parking space next to the basement elevator door. He headed to the elevator while remotely locking his car. As he entered the elevator, several employees rushed through the parking lot in hurried steps. One man raised his arm indicating to Rodney to hold the door. In the elevator, the man looked at Rodney and gave him an acknowledging head bow. The young redheaded woman entered the elevator next and smiled as she gazed into Rodney’s icy blue eyes. He smiled back and thought, “Possibilities?” True to form, he never missed an opportunity to turn on his infectious smile.

  “Floor?” She asked.

  ”Ten.” He watched as she pushed the seventh and tenth floor button; the man watched the encounter between the two and asked the woman to push 5. The elevator bell dinged as it stopped on the fifth floor. The man gave a whispered "have a good day" as he exited the elevator. The door closed, and the elevator started the climb to the seventh floor.

  “Your position here?”

  “Junior editor." She blushed as she replied, knowing full well whom she was talking to.

  The elevator bell dinged and the woman broadly smiled and nodded her good-by. Rodney rode the elevator to the tenth floor and exited to the Executive Suites. Mrs. Green, his assistant, rushed to him saying her good morning simultaneously handing him several phone messages.