Smoke, Mirrors, and Murder

as it pulled up alongside his station wagon. He looked for another cruiser in his rearview mirror, but there was only one.
    But his optimism vanished when he felt the cold steel of the gun barrel against his head. Anderson had also spotted the state trooper, and he snarled, “If he tries to stop us, you’re dead. And so is he, and so is the lady.”
    Parry didn’t dare glance to the left as the trooper’s car kept pace with his for a few hundred yards, and he hoped to hear a siren. But then it pulled ahead and disappeared around a curve. Apparently, the trooper hadn’t been alerted yet about the robbery at the Giant T and their kidnapping. Parry wondered if he should have deliberately sped up, turned out his lights, honked his horn—anything to get the trooper’s attention.
    But the chance was gone. And Anderson was probably right; a lone trooper walking up to a car where a gunman waited probably wouldn’t have had a chance. And if Anderson killed a cop in front of them, their own lives weren’t worth much.
    As Parry turned onto I-90 and headed up the grade to the summit of Snoqualmie Pass, the gunman alternately warned him not to attract attention by driving too fast or recklessly and urged him to speed it up.
    Even in April, there were still snowbanks this high in the Cascade Mountains, but the ski lifts weren’t lit up, and it was so dark. Giant fir trees shrouded each side of the road, looming over them. Only rarely did Parry see another car on the freeway.
    Martha Carelli was silent, but her fears for her family were growing. She could barely see now, and her nose was so swollen she had to breathe out of her mouth. Her head hurt fiercely and she trembled with shock.
    The dashboard clock read midnight. Both Doug Parry and Martha Carelli were aware that their captor might decide at any moment to shoot them and dump them in the lonely forest.
    They reached the summit a little after 1 A.M. Then they were heading down the western slope, passing the exit ramps to the foothill towns of North Bend and Issaquah. Bellevue and Mercer Island were densely populated and now there were more vehicles on the freeway.
    They had been on the road more than three hours since leaving the Giant T store. Parry felt certain that the alarm must have been given by now. Surely police personnel in the Seattle area would be looking for them. He both sought and dreaded the confrontation that was to come. He had little hope that he and the injured woman beside him would survive if a shoot-out occurred. Anderson seemed to be under the influence of drugs, alcohol, or some mental disorder. At the very least, the realization that he faced a very long prison term if he was caught was enough to make their kidnapper reckless.
    If he had nothing to lose, why should he care about what happened to his captives?
    Doug Parry tried to talk calmly to Mike Anderson. The man was a powder keg ready to explode at any instant. He was panicky and not thinking clearly. Still, Parry was astounded when Anderson suddenly said, “Hey! I’ve never been to Seattle before. I want you to give me a tour of the city.”
    He had to be kidding. But he wasn’t. Their abductor wanted to see the tourist spots in Seattle before he did whatever he planned to do to Doug Parry and Martha Carelli.
    Parry complied, and exited I-90 on the west side of the floating bridge that connected Mercer Island to Seattle. Even though it was dark out, he drove slowly for a while along the scenic route that bordered Lake Washington, pointing out various spots of interest: the Stan Sayres hydroplane pit where the big boats raced every summer, the Arboretum, Husky Stadium, and the University of Washington.
    The Giant T manager was worried about Martha; he was certain she had a concussion and her wounds and bruises grew more obvious as time passed. Her head had swelled up to almost twice its normal size. But Anderson seemed to have no compassion at all for her.
    After they had circled around the university campus, Anderson suddenly said, “Now, I want you to drive to a dark place—someplace like a parking lot or something.”
    “Why?” Parry asked, trying to keep fear out of his voice.
    “Because I have to get rid of you,” Anderson answered flatly.
    Anderson obviously intended to kill them. Probably he always had, and he’d only been using them to assure that he got far away from Franklin County.
    Doug Parry made his decision. Instead of heading meekly to a secluded spot where