by Nora Roberts
“You’re circling right back around to the cult.”
“That’s the root. You, Clare, see something you weren’t meant to see, twenty years ago. A few years later your father juggles a deal that everyone who knew him would say was totally out of character. And when he’s dead, he’s the only one the finger points at. Parker’s the sheriff, which makes it pretty handy.”
“Parker? You think Parker was in on this whole businessr?”
“I think he was in on it right up to his fat neck. Maybe his conscience started to eat at him or maybe he just couldn’t think straight when the blood drained out of his head into his dick, but he tells Sarah Hewitt things best kept to himself. He’s losing it, and he packs up, leaving his cushy job, his home, his security. A few months later, he’s dead.”
“Dead? You didn’t tell me he was dead.”
“I’m telling you now. What do we have since then? A kid hitches the wrong ride a couple miles outside of town, and she’s dead. Somebody kills Biff and dumps her body in the field so it looks like he did it all by himself. And he’s not around to say different. Lisa MacDonald is attacked. Sarah Hewitt disappears, after she drops hints to me about Parker.”
“And the books,” Clare murmured.
“Yes, the books. I can’t see Biff and your father having the same taste in reading material without a reason.”
“No,” she said faintly. “No, neither can I.”
“And if they were both involved, others are, too. Carly Jamison was murdered, Clare. I don’t think she was the first, and I’m dead scared she’s not going to be the last.”
Saying nothing, she got up, went to her tote bag and took out a sketch pad. She brought it to the couch and handed it to him. “I did these this afternoon.”
Cam opened it. The first page was a drawing of robed figures standing in a circle. It was almost reverent. He wondered if she knew. In silence he turned the pages, studying each one. A woman spread on a slab of wood, a cup between her naked breasts. A single figure, robed, with the mask he recognized from his research as the Goat of Mendes.
“Was this your father?”
“No. He wore another mask. A wolf.”
He studied another drawing. One man stood with his arm raised while the others faced him and the woman. Beside them flames rose out of the ground. Another drawing showed a small goat, a knife held at its throat.
Clare turned away then.
After a brief glance back at her, he continued through the pad. She’d drawn the men, masked and naked, circling the fire while another copulated with the woman. Cam focused on the man in the wolf’s mask, the blood dripping from his fingers.
She was only a baby, he thought, and had to force himself not to shred the drawings into pieces.
“Do you know where this place is?”
“No.” She faced the window, looking out into the wet, dreary night.
“The way you’ve drawn it, it looks like a clearing.”
“There were trees. A lot of trees, I think. Then it all just opened up. It seemed like a very big place, but that could have been because I wasn’t.”
“After this last scene you’ve drawn, what happened?”
“I don’t know. I woke up in bed.”
“Okay.” He went back over them, searching for details she might not even be aware of including. One of the men she’d drawn was short, stout with a thick neck. It could have been Parker. Maybe he just wanted it to be Parker.
“Clare, when you drew these, were you just relying on impressions, or were you able to picture it all clearly?”
“Both. Some things are very vivid. The night was clear, lots of stars. I could smell the smoke. The women had very white skin. Some of the men had farmers’ tans.”
He looked up sharply. “What?”
“Farmers’ tans. You know, brown faces and necks and forearms.” She turned back. “I didn’t remember that until today. Some of them were pale all over, but it was still spring. The one in the goat mask—the one in charge—he was very thin, milky pale. The way you are when you don’t get any sun.”
“What about voices?”
“The one in charge, his was very powerful, authoritative, mesmerizing. The others were always mixed together.”
“You’ve drawn thirteen figures. Is that right?”
“Did I?” She walked over to look over his shoulder. “I don’t know. I didn’t think about it, really. It just came out that way.”
“If it is, and our theory is right, at least three of these men are dead. Sheriff Parker, Biff, and your father. That means, to hold the number, they’d have recruited three more. Where is this place?” he murmured.
“Somewhere in the woods. Lisa ran out of the woods.”
“We’ve been over every foot of Dopper’s Woods. Bud and Mick and I, and men we drafted from town. We split up into three groups over two solid days and combed every inch. Nothing.”
“It would take ten times that number to search every wooded area in this part of the county.”
“Believe me, I’ve thought of that.”
She glanced over his shoulder at the sketches again. “I guess this wasn’t as much help as you’d hoped.”
“No, it’s plenty of help.” He set the pad aside before reaching up for her hand. “I know it was tough on you.”
“Actually, it was purging. Now that it’s done, I won’t have to think about it. I can get back to work.”
“When this is over, I won’t be bringing the job home with me and dragging you into it.” He brought her hand to his lips. “That’s a promise.”
“You didn’t drag me into this. It’s beginning to look as though I’ve been in it for a long time. I want to find out what my father did or didn’t do, and put it behind me. Maybe that’s one of the reasons I came back.”
“Whatever the reasons, I’m glad you’re here.”
“Yeah, me, too.” She made an effort to shake off the mood. Putting her hands on his shoulders, she began to rub the tension from them, smiling when he let out a satisfied ah. “Anyway, I’d be really disappointed if you didn’t bring the job home. How else will I keep on top of all the gossip?”
“Yeah. Well, this afternoon Less Gladhill’s girl spun out coming around to Main from Dog Run and creamed Min Atherton’s Buick.”
“See?”
“Between the two of them, they had traffic backed up from one end of town to the other. Min was standing in the intersection directing traffic in a plastic rain hat and white galoshes.”
“I’m sorry I missed it.”
“When you marry me, you’ll have a direct line to the pulse of Emmitsboro.”
“First you have to build a garage, though.”
“What?”
“A garage,” she said, bending over the back of the couch to nip his earlobe. “I have to have a place to work, and I’ve already figured out you’d be annoyed if I set up in the living room.”
He swung an arm back, hooked her, and pulled her over the couch on top of him. “Is that a yes?”
“First I see the plans for the garage.”
“Uh-uh. That was a yes.”
“It was a conditional maybe,” she managed before he closed his mouth over hers. His hands were already busy. With a gasping laugh, she shifted over him. “I guess it was more of a probably.”
“I’m going to want to make babies.”
Her head shot up. “Now?”
He pulled her back again. “For now we’ll just practice.”
She was laughing again when they rolled off the couch onto the floor.
Part Three
_____
He who has understanding,
him calculate the number of the beast,
for it is the number of a man.
—Revelation
Chapter 28
As whores went, Mona Sherman was a crackerjack. Since the age of fourteen, she’d been earning a living by selling her body. She liked to think that she performed a public service. And performed
it well. She took pride in her work, running her business by the creed that the customer was always right.
Like a good utility man in baseball, Mona could—and would—do whatever was requested. For twenty-five an hour. Straight or kinky, rough or smooth, bottom or top, as long as the pay was right Mona was your girl. Satisfaction guaranteed.
In her own way, she considered herself a feminist. After all, she was a businesswoman who set her own hours and made her own choices. She figured her street experience would have earned her an MBA.
Mona had her own corner and a steady stream of repeat customers. She was a likable woman, friendly before, during, and after business transactions. With ten years of experience under her garter belt, she knew the importance of customer relations.
She even liked men, regardless of build, personality, or staying power. With the exception of cops. She hated them on principle—the principle that they interfered with her inalienable right to make a living. If she chose to make that living with her body, it was her business. But cops had a way of hauling you in whenever they got bored. She’d had the shit beat out of her in holding once and placed the blame squarely on the cop who had stuck her in there.
So when she was offered a hundred times her going rate to pass a mixture of lies and truth on to a cop, Mona was more than happy to oblige.
She had gotten half the cash up front. It had been delivered to her post office box. Being a good businesswoman, she’d slapped the money into a six-month CD so it would earn solid interest. With it, and the second half, she planned to spend next winter in Miami. On sabbatical.
She didn’t know who the money was from, but she knew where it was from. Through her professional relationship with Biff Stokey, Mona had earned a few extra bucks getting gang-banged by a bunch of loonies in masks. She knew that men liked to play all sorts of weird games, and it was nothing to her.
As agreed, she’d contacted Sheriff Rafferty and told him she had information he might be interested in. She arranged to meet him at the scenic overlook off 70. She didn’t want a cop in her room. She had her reputation to think of.
When she drove up in her battered Chevette, he was already there.
Not bad-looking, for a cop, Mona mused, and ran through her lines again in her head. She had them cold. It made her smile. Maybe she’d try Hollywood instead of Miami.
“You Rafferty?”
Cam looked her over. She was leggy and slim in her off-duty outfit of shorts and a tube top. Her hair was cropped short, with the tips bleached platinum. She might not have looked her age if it hadn’t been for the lines carved around her eyes and mouth.
“Yeah, I’m Rafferty”
“I’m Mona.” She smiled, reached in the little red purse that hung from a strap between her breasts, and took out a Virginia Slim. “Got a light?”
Cam pulled out matches, struck one. He waited until a family of four walked by, squabbling as they headed for the rest stop facilities. “What have you got to tell me, Mona?”
“Was Biff really your old man?”
“He was my stepfather.”
She squinted her eyes against the smoke. “Yeah. There sure ain’t any family resemblance. I knew Biff real well. He and I had what you could call a close business relationship.”
“Is that what you’d call it?”
He was a cop, all right. Mona held the cigarette out, tapped ashes delicately on the ground. “He’d roll into town now and again, and we’d party. I’m real sorry he’s dead.”
“If I’d known you were so close, I’d have invited you to the funeral. Let’s get to it. You didn’t ask me to meet you out here just to tell me Biff was a regular.”
“Just paying my respects.” He was making her nervous, as if she were an actress on opening night. “I could use a cold drink. They got machines back there.” She sat on the stone wall with the mountains and valley spread sedately at her back. Cocking her head and giving him a sultry look, she said, “Why don’t you buy me a drink, Rafferty? Make it a diet. I gotta watch my figure.”
“I’m not here to play games.”
“I’d talk better if my mouth wasn’t so dry.”
He reined in impatience. He could play this two ways. He could be a hard-ass, stick his badge in her face and threaten to take her in for questioning. Or he could get her the damn drink and let her think she was leading him by the nose.
Tapping the filter of the cigarette against her teeth, Mona watched him walk away. He had cop’s eyes, she thought. The kind that could spot a hooker even if she was wearing a nun’s habit and saying Hail Marys. She was going to have to be careful, real careful if she wanted to earn that other twelve-fifty.
When he came back with the Diet Coke, Mona took a long, slow sip. “I didn’t know whether to call you or not,” she began. “I don’t like cops.” She felt more confident, starting with the plain truth. “In my business, a girl’s got to look out for herself first.”
“But you did call me.”
“Yeah, ’cause I couldn’t stop thinking. You could say I wasn’t giving my clients my full attention.” She took a deep drag, blew smoke out through her nostrils. “I read in the papers about what happened to Biff. It really shook me, his getting beat to death that way. He was always real generous with me.”
“I bet. So?”
She tapped her cigarette again. The family walked by, to pile wearily into their station wagon and head north. “Well, I just couldn’t put it out of my head like I wanted to. I kept thinking about poor Biff suffering that way. It didn’t seem right. You know, he was into some pretty bad business.”
“What kind of bad business?”
“Drugs.” She inhaled slowly, watching him. “I’m going to tell you, I don’t hold with that shit. Maybe a little grass now and again, but none of the hard stuff. I’ve seen too many of the girls burn themselves out. I got respect for my body.”
“Yeah, it’s a temple. What’s the point, Mona?”
“Biff did a lot of bragging about his sideline, especially after he was, like, satisfied. Seems he had a connection in D.C., a Haitian. And Biff, he was the mule.”
“The Haitian have a name?”
“Biff just called him René and said he was a real high roller. Had a big house, fancy cars, lots of women.” She was cruising now and set the can aside on the wall. “Biff wanted all that, he wanted it bad. He said if he could make a score, a big one, he wouldn’t need René. The last time I saw him, he said he was moving out on his own, that he had a shipment and was going to deal it himself and cut René out. He bragged about how maybe we’d take a trip to Hawaii,” she said, deciding to embellish. She’d always wanted to go to Hawaii. “Couple days later, I read about how he was dead. Biff, I mean.”
“Yeah.” He studied her. “How come you waited so long to contact me?”
“Like I said, I don’t have any use for cops. But Biff, he was a good guy.” Mona tried to bring tears to her eyes, for effect, but couldn’t quite manage it. “I read how they’re saying he raped and killed some kid. But I don’t buy it. How come Biff would rape a kid when he knew he could pay for a woman? So, I start thinking, maybe this René guy whacked them both, and since Biff was a good customer and all, I thought I ought to tell somebody.”
It sounded neat, very neat and tidy. “Biff ever talk to you about religion?”
“Religion?” She had to hold back a smile. It was a question she’d been told to expect and told how to answer. “Funny you should ask that. This René was into some weird shit. Devil worship, Santa—Santer—”
“Santeria?”
“Yeah, that’s it. Santeria. Some Haitian thing, I guess. Biff thought it was great. Real spooky and sexy. He brought some black candles up to the room a couple of times, and I’d pretend like I was a virgin. We’d do a little bondage.” She grinned. “You get what you pay for.”
“Right. Did he ever talk about doing a real virgin?”
“Virgins are overrated, Sheriff. When a man’s putting down cash, he wants
experience. Biff liked some unusual stuff, athletic, you know? A virgin’s only going to lie there with her eyes shut. If I were you, I’d get a line on this René.”
“I’ll do that. You keep available, Mona.”
“Hey.” She ran a hand down her hip. “I’m always available.”
Cam didn’t like it. Not one bit. The D.C. police had run a make on the Haitian for him. René Casshagnol a.k.a. René Casteil a.k.a. Robert Castle had a rap sheet that would stretch to the Caribbean. He’d done time, once, for possession, but none of the other charges had stuck. He’d been arrested or questioned on dozens of charges, from distribution to gunrunning, but he was slick. He was also vacationing in Disneyland at the moment, and it would take more than the word of a hooker to extradite him.
Why would a big-time drug dealer kidnap and kill a runaway? Because of his religious deviations? Maybe, Cam mused. He couldn’t ignore the obvious. But would a man with the Haitian’s experience make the clumsy mistake of exhuming the body to point the finger at someone else? It didn’t fit. A man like René would know too much about police procedure.
In any case, Cam could still spot a plant. His next order of business was to find Mona’s connection to Carly Jamison’s murderer.
Cam took out a file to read it over again. It was the middle of June, and the weeks were moving too damn fast. He was closing the file again when Bob Meese came in.
“Hey, there, Cam.”
“Bob. What can I do for you?”
“Well, I got this curious thing.” He scratched the top of his balding head with his index finger. “You know I bought a lot of stuff from your mama—furniture, some lamps, and glassware. Ah, she get off to Tennessee all right?”
“She left yesterday on the train. Is there a problem with any of the stuff you bought?”
“I couldn’t say as it was a problem. I was cleaning up that chest of drawers—already got somebody interested. That’s a real fine oak piece. ’Bout 1860, I’d say.”
“It’s been in the family.”
“It needed a little work.” Bob shifted uncomfortably. He knew how touchy some people could be about selling family pieces. He had to play this cagey for a number of reasons. “Anyhow, I was taking the drawers out to sand them up some, and I came across this.” He took a small book out of his pocket. “Found it taped to the bottom drawer. Didn’t quite know what to think of it, so I brought it in.”
