by Lauren Carr
“Why are they naked?” Helen asked while keeping her head adverted from the scene.
“Don’t you have an AFIS app on your phone to check their fingerprints in the national database?” Doris handed a business card to Helen.
“I don’t need them naked to take their fingerprints.” Helen read the card.
Final Solution Agency was the name on the card.
What kind of name is that for what kind of agency?
“Oh good.” Doris turned her attention to the captives who were moaning. “They’re coming to. Now we can get this party started.”
As soon as the larger of the two men regained consciousness to see that he was naked and duct taped, he let loose with a string of obscenities. Helen wasn’t sure which made him madder—that he had gotten captured by two women or had gotten captured, stripped, and taped to a chair by two women.
“Are you through?” Doris paused to read the name on his Maryland driver’s license when he stopped to catch his breath. “Ralph?”
“No, I’m not through. I have rights.” Ralph struggled against Helen, who went behind the chair to scan the print from his index finger with her phone. “I want my lawyer now. I’m going to sue your asses.”
Doris cocked her head and bestowed a charming smile on them. “Yes, you do have rights. I have rights, too. I have the right to protect my property and you two were on my property and I strongly suspect it was for no-good.”
“We got lost,” the smaller man said. “We were trying to figure out where we were when you rear-ended us.”
“Now, Tony.” Doris make a clicking noise with her tongue. “How can we possibly develop a mutually beneficial relationship based on trust if you’re going to lie to me.” With a knowing smile, she moved in closer to them. “Do I look like I was born yesterday?”
“Um—” Tony said.
“‘Um’ is not an answer.” Doris picked up one of their phones. “There’s no way you were lost. The map on Tony’s phone brought you straight here to this address from Rockville, Maryland. The link to that map was texted to you from SD Associates shortly before noon. Now, I want to know who SD Associates is and why they hired you to come out here.”
“To commit murder.” Helen showed her phone to Doris. “They’re hit men. At least Ralph seems to be.”
Ralph’s fingerprints had generated a hit in AFIS. His prints had been found at the scene of a cold case in the Baltimore area. The victim had been a young pregnant woman believed to have been involved with a married man. She had been killed execution style.
A salacious smile crossed Doris’s face. “Oh, this is going to be such fun.” She turned to them. “Who’s SD Associates? What did they send you out here for?”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.” Ralph stuck out his chin.
“Dinner!” Doris shouted.
On cue, Sadie and Mocha lunged from where they had been sitting docile. They bore their teeth. They actually seemed to foam at the mouth as the two men tried to pull their legs up onto the chairs out of their reach.
“Doris, you can’t!” Helen said.
Doris snapped her fingers and told the dogs to stand down. Instantly, they dropped back. “Why can’t I?”
Aware of the men watching them, Helen lowered her voice. “Remember what happened the last time?”
With a wave of her hand, Doris dismissed her concern. “The wise always learn from their mistakes. Believe me—” Her giggle had a touch of insanity. “I won’t make that mistake again.” She threw open the door. “I’ve checked out a new book from the library. It was written by a serial killer—of course, he couldn’t use his real name. He’s got this recipe that will totally dissolve their bodies in less than forty-eight hours. That reminds me—” She checked the time on her watch. “Oh, dear me! I forgot to take the roast out of the freezer to thaw for dinner. Oh, Helen, can you be a dear and gas up the wood chipper?” With that, she hurried out the door.
Both men’s eyes were as big as saucers.
Helen examined the two men’s phones to see if she could uncover anything about who had sent them.
“You two are crazy!” Ralph said.
“They’re bluffing, Ralph,” Tony said.
“They’re going to run us through a wood chipper.”
“Do you see her gassing it up?”
“Thanks for reminding me, Tony.” Tucking their phones into her pocket, Helen picked up the five gallon can from where it was stored in the supply closet and went outside—leaving Sadie and Mocha standing guard over the two men.
Once she was outside, Helen set the gas can down and called Ray Nolan.
“Looks like the Geezer Squad has been put through its paces this weekend,” Ray told her. “I’ve been doing a background check on Daniel Cross and it makes for very interesting reading.”
“The president’s nominee to lead the CIA?”
“Blair’s letter to the senate judiciary committee accuses him of being a traitor and the circumstantial evidence I found on the internet kind of supports that,” he said. “He was the recipient of the prestigious Slade Scholarship for undergraduate school. Got the full ride—all four years.”
“Slade Industries,” she said. “Leban Slade is a billionaire.”
“Cross also got the full ride for graduate school thanks to Leban Slade,” he said.
“Does that really prove he’s a spy? He could have gotten the scholarships because he’s very smart.”
“If he’s so smart, why’d he accept a government service job at half the salary that Slade industries, one of our country’s biggest government contractors, could pay him? Answer. Because Cross could do a lot more for Slade working his way up in the CIA.”
“That sounds pretty circumstantial to me,” she said.
Ray grumbled. “What did you call for besides to burst my bubble?”
“SD Associates,” Helen read the caller ID on Tony’s phone. She read off the phone number of the last call he had received. “They texted the address and map for the Matheson farm. Who is that?”
Ray hummed while checking his information. “Stu Dunleavy, attorney at law.”
“Are you kidding me?”
“Didn’t Chris say last night that the Dunleavys were Blair’s friends?”
“If they’re such good friends, why did Stu send a couple of hitmen out here to the farm?” After disconnecting the call, Helen started up the wood chipper and turned up the power to make it as loud as possible. Then, she trotted back into the woodshop to find Tony and Ralph sitting up tall—their eyes even bigger than before.
Doris flew through the other door with a pink tool chest tucked under her arm. “Oh, Helen! You are not going to believe what I’ve just remembered.” She dropped the tool chest on the floor and opened it up. “Kirk got me these tools for Christmas about twenty years ago.” She extracted an electric drill from the case and attached a long thin drill bit to the end. “It’s a little rusty, but—” She looked at Ralph. “Are you up to date on your tetanus shots?” She shrugged. “It isn’t like it matters.” She started up the drill and aimed it at his crotch.
Ralph tried to back away. Huge drops of sweat rolled down his flabby face.
With a shake of her head, she turned it off. “Nah, this bit is much too long. I need a shorter one.” She knelt to search through the box.
“Okay, I’ll talk!” Ralph said.
“Shut up, Ralph!”
“She’s going drill a hole in my penis! I need my penis, Tony!” Foam was forming on Ralph’s lips as he confessed. “Stu Dunleavy hired us to burn down the farm and make sure we took out Chris Matheson with it! We were waiting up on the ridge for him. She said he’d be back later on this afternoon.”
“She?” Helen asked. “Isn’t Stu a man?”
“His assistant. She called Tony.” Ralph turned to his partner.
“What’d you say her name was, Tony?”
“I’m not talking ‘til I get a deal!”
“Jenn!” Ralph blurted out. “Her name is Jenn!”
“You’re an idiot, Ralph!” Tony said. “So what if she drilled holes in your penis? You weren’t gonna need it after she put you through the wood chipper!”
Doris agreed. “Tony does have a point, Ralph.”
Chapter Eighteen
“Must be nice.” As she disembarked from the private plane at the airstrip in Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, Francine turned around to take it all in.
It took one call from Jessica Faraday to secure a private plane for Jacqui and Francine to fly to Kitty Hawk and rent a car to visit Marianne Landon, Les Monroe’s assistant in Switzerland.
“I must say, as down to earth as Murphy is, I had no idea he was married to money.” Jacqui hurried into the small airport to pick up the keys for the rental car. Marianne’s house was still forty minutes down the coast and she didn’t want to be hunting for it in the dark.
“Handsome, brave,” Francine gushed. “Absolutely adorable.”
“The only one more adorable than him is Christopher.”
Holding the door leading into the small airport, Francine paused with her mouth hanging open. “Jacqueline, was that a sexist statement that I just heard out of your mouth about our dear Christopher Matheson?”
Jacqui uttered a deep throated laugh. “I may be demure, but I also have a healthy appreciation for a well-toned set of buns just like any other red-blooded woman.”
Minutes later, Jacqui was driving their rented sedan down Route 12.
Widowed at a young age, Marianne Landon had been free to work at numerous overseas stations with the state department. After returning from Switzerland, she retired and moved into a small home on Pamlico Sound.
Marianne had sounded so hesitant when Francine had called that afternoon, that they feared she would change her mind about meeting with them. After ringing her doorbell a third time, they felt as if their fears were realized.
“Let’s go.” Jacqui turned to go back to the car.
“One more time.” Francine pressed the doorbell.
“Coming!” They heard running feet on the other side of the door before it was yanked open. A tall slender woman with long dark hair with silver streaks stood before them. Her hair was dripping wet. She wore a bathrobe hanging open over a wet swimsuit. Clutching a bottle of beer in her hand, she looked slightly wild-eyed. “I was in the hot tub.” She opened the door to invite them inside. “Can I get you a beer?”
Jacqui declined. Francine accepted. Marianne invited them to take a seat in the living area of the great room while she fetched the beers from the galley kitchen.
“Thank you so much for seeing us on such short notice,” Jacqui said while moving a stack of magazines from a cushion on the sofa to make room to sit next to Francine.
“I didn’t catch who you were with,” Marianne said with her head in the fridge. “Did you say you were with the judiciary committee about Daniel Cross’s nomination?”
“We’re working with their investigators,” Francine said.
Marianne returned from the kitchen with a bottle of beer in each hand. Both carried a beer glass turned upside down over its open top. “I don’t see where I can be much help with that. I only met Daniel Cross once.”
“When was that?” Jacqui asked.
“When I was stationed in Switzerland.” Marianne took a drink from her beer. “He stopped to see Ned Schiff on his way through to …” She shrugged her shoulders. “I don’t remember. It wasn’t a planned official visit by any means.”
“Do you remember when that was?” Francine asked.
Marianne was silent. She took another drink. When she spoke, her voice was quiet. “Kind of hard to forget. … It was the last day that I saw Les and Blair.”
Francine and Jacqui exchanged long glances.
“Les Monroe,” Jacqui said. “Your supervisor.”
Marianne nodded her head. “And Blair Matheson. She was head of the project archiving communications throughout the region after we had to upgrade our satellites and systems.”
Francine referred to Jacqui, who had a knack for being tactful, to ask the next question.
“Did either of them, Blair or Les, see Cross when he was passing through on that last day?”
Marianne rose her eyes from where she was staring at the coffee table between them. “That’s what this is really about, isn’t it? It’s about time someone asked about it. But the real question is, what’s anyone going to do about it?”
“Depends on what it is?” Francine asked. “If you don’t tell us what it’s about, then how can we do anything about it?”
“I don’t have any desire to commit suicide by shooting myself in the back three times,” Marianne said.
“If you knew Les didn’t commit suicide, why didn’t you tell anyone?” Francine asked.
“Like I said, I don’t want to commit suicide.” After setting her glass on the coffee table, Marianne went to the windows to close the curtains.
“Did Daniel Cross and Ned Schiff make your boss commit suicide?” Jacqui watched Marianne turn the deadbolt on the door. Not wanting to give away that Blair had not died in the terrorist attack, she asked, “Did they make Blair disappear?”
“I have no proof of anything,” Marianne said. “Daniel Cross was a hero in the intelligence committee after tracking down the group responsible for killing a U.S. ambassador. Ned Schiff was his pet. I was just a little admin assistant. My suspicions meant nothing. Like anyone would listen to what I saw and suspected.”
“We’re listening,” Francine said. “We came all the way from Washington to hear what you have to say. Would we do that if what you saw and suspected meant nothing?”
Marianne took a long drink—weighing her options.
Francine gave it one final push. “Blair Matheson had three little kids.”
That did it. Marianne hung her head. She lowered herself onto the seat across from them.
“It was about a file Blair found on Lithuania’s mainframe.”
“What file?” Jacqui asked.
“It seemed to be an anomaly.” Marianne shook her head and shrugged her shoulders at the same time. “Every communication was backed up and categorized. But Blair found this one file—I don’t even know what it was. She had opened and read it. She was so upset about what was in it that she brought it to Les’s attention. He took it to Schiff who said it was nothing and to delete it. Trash it. But Blair didn’t want to do that. She was mad as hell about it and stuck to her guns. The fighting went on for several days. Suddenly, out of the blue, Daniel Cross shows up in our office with Schiff. All four of them were behind closed doors. The meeting went on for hours and there was a lot of yelling.”
“What was being said?” Jacqui asked.
“Blair was saying that we needed to do the right thing,” Marianne said. “Les agreed with her. They wanted to send this report to Washington. Then, I heard Daniel Cross laugh. He had a cruel laugh. So arrogant. He said that if Blair was to be gone tomorrow, that no one would even remember her name a month later.” She swallowed. “The next day, she was gone.”
“Did Daniel Cross threaten either of them?” Francine asked.
Marianne shrugged her shoulders. “Schiff told them to think about it. Give him and Cross time to cushion the blow. That’s what Cross said, ‘Cushion the blow in Washington.’ They wanted twenty-four hours. Blair didn’t want to give it to them, but Les agreed. Politics, I know. Schiff did pull rank and basically ordered him to give Cross one day.” Tears filled her eyes. “Next morning, I came in and Schiff called everyone together and said Les had committed suicide.”
“By shooting himself in the back three times,” Francine said.
“The only reason I know that is
because I saw the first autopsy report. A few weeks later, there was a second autopsy report that listed the official cause of death as suicide.” Marianne fingered the collar of her robe. “I’d heard a rumor that the medical examiner who did the first autopsy had died.”
“What about Blair Matheson?” Jacqui asked.
“Schiff said she had requested time off. He said it was best. She wasn’t being rational and that maybe some time off would give her time to rethink her priorities.” Marianne’s eyes narrowed. “I think the same people who killed Les killed her and dumped her body in Nice.”
“Where’s that report they were fighting about now?” Jacqui asked.
Marianne sighed. “Long gone. Ned took over the communications department before Les’s body was cold. He made damn sure the report was gone with no copies anywhere.”
“Someone had to have printed up a copy,” Francine said.
“If so, where is it now?” Jacqui asked.
“Oh dear,” Doris said with a heavy sigh when she saw Chris’s truck come into view on the other side of the horse pastures.
He was driving at a much slower pace than usual. Generally, Chris had a lead foot—speeding at five to ten miles per hour over the limit. Preoccupied with the news he needed to break to the girls, he took his time driving home.
Helen felt a sense of delight upon seeing Chris returning home safely and dread with having to explain the two naked men being guarded by Sadie and Mocha in the workshop. She and Doris had hoped that the police would arrive to take Ralph and Tony into custody first. It would have made explaining that afternoon’s events so much easier.
Chris parked his truck in his usual spot next to the barn. He sensed something was odd by the way they blocked the workshop door. His eyes narrowed to gray slits when he slid out of the driver’s seat. He held the door open for Sterling to jump out. “What’s going on? Are the girls all right?”
