The Evan Buckley Thrillers: Books 1 - 4 (Evan Buckley Thrillers Boxsets)

by James, Harper

  ‘Since we last spoke, I’ve found out McIntyre ransacked my apartment. You probably knew that last time we talked. I don’t give a shit either way, but will you please try to get it into his thick skull that I haven’t got any copies’. He didn’t even feel any guilt this time. ‘Also point out to him that if I was a blackmailer I wouldn’t just leave all my valuable evidence lying around for some amateur sneak thief to break in and find. If it existed, which it doesn’t, it’d be in a safe deposit box.’

  He paused to catch his breath. She’d gone quiet, shocked by the force of his outburst.

  ‘One last thing. I haven’t been to the police about the attack and I’m going to let this ride as well. But that’s all. Any more of this shit and I’ll tell them everything I know, and then maybe they’ll start poking their noses into the things you’re so worried about. I hope we’re clear on this.’

  He ended the call before he said anything he regretted. He’d been a hair’s breadth away from saying he’d tell her father about the affair. Then they’d have to deal with that shitstorm, photos or no photos. He really didn’t want to have to do that, because it would turn him into the blackmailer they were so certain he was.

  He spent the rest of the evening putting his apartment back together which didn’t do his mental state any good at all. There were a lot of memories of his life with Sarah spread around the apartment, except now they were spread around the floor. On a day-to-day basis they tended to merge into the background and he didn’t really see them. But an evening spent picking up the pictures that McIntyre had thrown across the room, and all the other mementos of their life together plunged him into a trough of despondency. What was even worse was that he started feeling guilty about his afternoon romp with Barbara. It was ridiculous, but there it was.

  Once he’d got the place back into some kind of order he had a quick nightcap and took himself off to bed. He fell asleep immediately and dreamed of a fishing trip with Faulkner and Kevin Stanton, catching one Largemouth Bass after another, all of them with Sarah’s sad face and Barbara’s perfectly-formed breasts, then laughing wildly as they gutted the furiously flapping fish, while Hugh McIntyre stood naked on the shore and shot at them with a high-powered rifle.

  Chapter 27

  HE WAS UP EARLY the next morning like a small boy excited about his long-awaited fishing trip with a favorite uncle. In reality, he wasn’t looking forward to it at all. There were too many awkward questions to be asked. Perhaps he should ask them in the car before they got out onto the lake, where he had a chance to get away. It was a ridiculous thought. If he was thinking along those lines he shouldn’t be going at all. Apart from being a bit gruff at times, Faulkner had treated him well.

  What niggled was that Faulkner was holding something back. Not only that, the more he looked into the case, the more it seemed Faulkner was hiding. The only way he was going to find out the whole truth was by talking to him.

  So here he was, driving the now familiar route to Faulkner’s trailer park at this unearthly time of day. He hadn’t been fishing since he was eight years old when his old man used to take him before his health gave way. It looked like it was going to be a beautiful day and, if it hadn’t been for the doubts he had about Faulkner, he couldn’t have imagined a better way to spend it. Well, thinking back to yesterday’s unexpected delights, he could—he’d swap Faulkner for Barbara—but this wasn’t such a bad alternative.

  He couldn’t see any signs of life when he got to Faulkner’s trailer. He’d expected to see a pile of fishing gear ready and loaded into his car, and hopefully a jumbo icebox full of cold beer too. Perhaps Faulkner had overslept. He smiled to himself. It would be just perfect. He was looking forward to waking him up with a few choice words to get him back for his comments the previous evening. They’d see who couldn’t haul their lazy ass out of bed.

  He knocked on the door a lot louder than was necessary, and then did it again without giving Faulkner a chance to get to the door. Despite all the noise, there was no sound or movement coming from inside the trailer. Nobody could have slept through all that. Maybe he was on the can. He gave it another couple of minutes and knocked again. Still nothing. Something wasn’t right.

  He looked around and saw an old packing crate lying behind Faulkner’s car. He carried it over and put it under the window next to the door, then climbed up onto it and looked through the window.

  ‘Hey, you. What the hell do you think you’re doing?’ a voice shouted from behind him.

  Evan jerked around at the sound and slipped off the crate, raking his shin on the edge as he went. He hadn’t heard the guy coming. The guy was big and aggressive and didn’t smell too good.

  ‘What do you think you’re doing?’ he said again, still advancing on Evan.

  Evan held up his hands. ‘I’m looking for Matt Faulkner. We’re supposed to be going fishing.’

  ‘Fishing?’

  Evan decided not to try out Faulkner’s wiseass comments on the guy. He didn’t look as if he was in a laughing mood.

  ‘Yes, fishing. We agreed I’d meet him here at seven, and we’d go fishing together.’

  The guy grunted. ‘Maybe he overslept. No need to go waking the whole trailer park,’ he said, calming down a bit. ‘Why don’t you try ringing his phone, instead of trying to break his door down?’

  Evan felt a bit stupid that he hadn’t thought of that before this meathead. He got out his phone and dialled Faulkner’s number. They could hear it ringing inside the trailer.

  ‘It’s ringing out,’ he said, and closed the connection. ‘I was about to see if I could see anything through the window.’

  The guy shrugged. ‘Give it a go, why not.’

  Evan was pleased to get the official go-ahead from the park’s unofficial security force. He climbed back up onto the crate and peered through the window shielding his eyes with his hands against the glass. He couldn’t see anything.

  ‘Can you see anything?’ Meathead asked.

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘Try knocking again. But not so loud this time.’ He made a keep-it-down gesture with his hands. ‘I don’t want you waking up the wife. Only damn time of day I get to myself.’

  Evan had a bad feeling about the whole situation and didn’t think there was much point in knocking, but he was anxious to keep the guy happy. He climbed down and knocked again. They stood and waited together in the early morning light.

  ‘What happened to your ear.’

  ‘Somebody bit it.’

  The guy gave him a look like he’d never heard of such a thing. Which was odd, because, in Evan’s opinion, if there was going to be any ear biting going on, this guy looked exactly like the sort of person who’d be doing it.

  ‘You don’t say.’ He shook his head in amazement.

  ‘I know, unbelievable, isn’t it?’

  ‘What did you do to him?’

  Evan wasn’t about to put himself down by admitting he’d done precisely squat. Besides, he wasn’t here to pass the day shooting the breeze with Faulkner’s neighbors, he was here to catch fish. He cocked his ear theatrically.

  ‘I think I heard something inside.’

  ‘I didn’t hear anything and I’ve got two good ears,’ the guy said with a smirk.

  Evan made a point of knocking on the door again even though it was obvious he wasn’t going to get an answer.

  ‘Is there a superintendent or somebody with another key?’

  ‘I’ve got a key.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Yeah, really.’ He couldn’t fail to pick up on the surprise in Evan’s voice. ‘What, don’t I look responsible enough to have one?’

  Evan certainly didn’t want to go down the road of insulting the man’s trustworthiness.

  ‘I think it would be a good idea if you went and got it and we checked to see if he’s okay.’

  ‘I suppose. He’s an old guy and all.’

  He lumbered back to his trailer, opened the door gingerly and tip-toed back in
side. It was obvious he was scared stiff of waking the slumbering wife inside. That was why Evan hadn’t heard him coming. He reappeared a few seconds later carrying a big ring of keys. He caught Evan staring at them.

  ‘Surprise, surprise, eh. Lots of folks trust me to keep a spare key.’

  Evan had no idea where his defensive attitude came from. Something must have happened in his childhood to make him overly sensitive.

  ‘I think you’re the most trustworthy person I’ve seen all day. Shall we just open it up and see if he’s okay?’

  He found the right key and unlocked the door, pushed it open, then stood back and gestured for Evan to go in first.

  ‘Faulkner. You in there?’ he called as he climbed the steps.

  He went in and looked left and then to the right. Everything looked exactly like it had the last time Evan was there apart from the fact that Faulkner was lying on the floor, half in and half out of the bedroom. There was a vicious looking gash on the side of his head, which was lying in a pool of congealing blood.

  Evan ran across and knelt down next to him, felt for a pulse. It took him a while to find the right spot, but it was there, even if it was very faint. Faulkner’s chest rose and fell with each shallow breath.

  ‘Get an ambulance,’ he shouted at the guy who had just entered the trailer.

  ‘Oh shit. There’s no way she’s gonna sleep through all this.’

  ‘I’m sure Faulkner will be touched by your concern for his welfare. Call an ambulance. Now!’

  The guy’s mouth was hanging open and his face had turned ashen. Evan threw his cell phone to him.

  ‘You don’t have to live with her, buddy,’ he said, catching the phone and fumbling with the keys.

  Evan looked down at Faulkner helplessly while the guy gave the details to the 9-1-1 dispatcher. He had no idea what to do. It looked like he’d lost a lot of blood, and it wasn’t good that he was still unconscious. There was a gaping laceration where the skin had been split wide open, but he couldn’t see any visible bone fragments or exposed brain. The bleeding had already stopped so all he could do was sit tight until the ambulance arrived.

  It didn’t take long for them to get there. When they arrived, the guy was back outside, sitting on the packing crate with his head in his hands. Some tough guy you turned out to be, Evan thought. He explained the situation to the paramedic in charge as his crew loaded Faulkner into the ambulance.

  ‘Do you have any idea what time it might have happened?’ the medic asked.

  ‘It was sometime after seven p.m. last night. That’s when I last saw him.’

  ‘That’s a twelve-hour time frame. Did anyone else see him after that?’

  ‘He had a visitor who was still here when I left. Apart from that I don’t know. You should probably work on the basis that he’s been out for twelve hours.’

  Which in his opinion was exactly when it happened, down to the last quarter hour—between the time he left just after seven p.m. and precisely fifteen minutes later when Carl Hendricks blasted past him on the highway.

  Chapter 28

  HE GAVE GUILLORY A call to put her in the picture. With any luck she could get the case assigned to her.

  ‘Have you any idea what time it is? Do you even know what day it is?’ she said, when she finally picked up.

  ‘It might be the last day of Matt Faulkner’s life,’ Evan said. Maybe it was a little melodramatic but it sure got Guillory’s attention.

  ‘What the hell are you talking about?’

  Evan took her through the morning’s events but didn’t say anything about his suspicions yet.

  ‘Are you still at Faulkner’s place?’ Guillory asked when he’d finished.

  ‘Yeah, I’m still here with the guy that let me in.’

  ‘Wait there. I’m on my way over. I’ll call the department and let them know I’ve got it.’

  She got there in under ten minutes. Evan was relieved to see that she didn’t have her partner, Ryder, with her. The big guy was still sitting on the packing crate, busy excavating the contents of his nose with his finger. Evan called him over and introduced him to Guillory. His name was Briggs. He’d got a bit of color back into his face and had stopped looking as if he was going to be sick any minute. Guillory asked him to tell her what he knew and Briggs ran through the morning’s events.

  ‘What about last night?’ Guillory asked when he’d finished.

  ‘I was out having a couple of quick beers with some of the guys.’

  ‘Good for you. Did you see anything unusual is what I meant?’

  Evan reckoned Briggs would have been lucky to be able to see his trailer after the couple of quick beers he’d consumed.

  ‘No. Nothing. Sorry.’

  ‘What time did you go out?’

  He made a pretence of thinking about it. Evan would have bet dollars to donuts that he’d gone to the bar at the exact same time for the last twenty years.

  ‘About six, I suppose.’

  ‘When did you get back?

  ‘About eleven.’

  ‘As you say, just a couple of quick beers.’ Guillory said, nodding. ‘Lots of people see you in the bar?’

  ‘Yeah, everyone knows me.’

  ‘I bet. How come you’ve got a key?’

  ‘Because I’m his neighbor and that’s what neighbors are for.’ He was getting indignant again. ‘You’re as bad as him,’ he said, jabbing a none-too-clean thumb in Evan’s direction. At least it wasn’t the finger most recently seen buried in his nose.

  ‘I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but there are a lot of other people live here. They’re all neighbors too.’

  ‘Probably because I’ve been here the longest, then.’

  ‘Okay, Mr Briggs, I think we’re done here. Someone will be round to take a statement later. I think your wife wants a word.’ She nodded towards Briggs’ trailer.

  Briggs turned and looked at the diminutive woman standing in the open doorway to the trailer with her hands on her hips. His face dropped.

  ‘Sure you don’t want me to hang around? Something might come to me.’

  ‘Well if it does, you be sure to let us know.’

  Guillory turned to face Evan. Behind her Briggs gave her the finger and then walked unhappily back to his trailer.

  ‘Okay Mr. P, what have you got for me? I can see you’re fit to burst with something.’

  ‘I’m pretty sure I can tell you exactly when it happened and who did it.’

  Guillory made a show of looking at her watch.

  ‘And it’s not even eight o’clock yet. Not bad. How about motive? Or do I have to wait until eight thirty for that?’

  Evan ignored the sarcasm.

  ‘I was here around seven last night. That’s when I arranged to go fishing with Faulkner.’

  ‘Fishing?’

  Too good to pass.

  ‘Yes, you know, you go out in a boat with a rod and a reel and catch fish. Millions of people do it every day. It’s called a hobby.’

  Guillory gave him a look but didn’t say anything. Evan was sure she wanted to laugh.

  ‘Anyway, when I got here, Faulkner had a visitor. There was a Dodge Ram in the driveway.’

  ‘A Dodge Ram.’ She shook his head in mock amazement. ‘You know, I don’t think I’ve seen one of those for I don’t know how long, must be two or three minutes at least. I don’t suppose there can be more than two hundred thousand of them in this state.’

  She held up a finger as if something had just come to her.

  ‘That’s okay though, if you took down the license number,’ she said, her eyebrows lifting in anticipation of a positive response.

  Evan shook his head. Guillory nodded.

  ‘Maybe next time. Did you see who the visitor was?’

  Evan shook his head again.

  ‘Faulkner shut the door so I couldn’t see in.’

  ‘Uh-huh. Does this get any better? I don’t exactly feel like I’m drowning in a sea of hard facts.’

>   Evan ignored her.

  ‘When I was driving home I had to stop on the shoulder to make an urgent phone call. While I was sitting there, the same Dodge Ram went past me, going like a bat out of hell.’

  ‘You’re sure it was the same one? Even though you didn’t have the license number.’

  ‘It was the same color. I’m pretty sure it was the same one.’ He could hear how weak it sounded as he said it. ‘I can’t be one hundred percent certain,’ he admitted.

  ‘Shame. That’s what license plates are for I suppose. Okay, what happened next?’

  Evan got the impression Guillory wasn’t taking him seriously. He’d soon change her tune.

  ‘I followed it.’

  ‘Any particular reason?’

  ‘Nothing I can put my finger on, but that doesn’t matter. What matters is who was driving it’

  ‘For Christ’s sake Buckley, just spit it out.’

  ‘Carl Hendricks. I followed the pickup to his farm and saw him get out of it.’

  He was disappointed with Guillory’s reaction. He didn’t get the Hallelujah he was hoping for. Guillory didn’t even whip off her hat and toss it in the air. Instead she folded her arms across her body and cradled her chin in her hand.

  ‘Let me get this straight. Your theory is that Carl Hendricks was the man in Faulkner’s trailer and shortly after seven last night he brained him with some unidentified heavy object and then hightailed it back to his farmhouse. And this theory is based on the possibility that the two Dodge Rams you saw were one and the same.’

  Despite Guillory’s sceptical tone, Evan was sure that was exactly what had happened.

  ‘Yes, that’s exactly what I think.’

  ‘Any ideas about why he might have done it?’

  ‘No, but I heard Faulkner and the other man arguing.’

  ‘You didn’t mention that. Did you hear what it was about?’

  Luckily, she didn’t give Evan a chance to say no, he didn’t know that either.

  ‘Doesn’t matter. I’ll allow for the possibility that the man in the trailer was the one who attacked Faulkner. But you’ve still got a problem connecting the two pickup trucks.’