Jackson, his assistant had told him, was an investigator for the District Attorney in some unheard of place in Georgia, who had somehow tracked down their corporate number and wanted the name of a player using the avatar “Abomination.”
Jackson had already e-mailed pictures and news stories regarding the shooting Abomination might be responsible for, and even a copy of a letter supposedly written by Abomination.
Jason hadn’t looked at any of it yet. He didn’t think he wanted to cooperate.
His 19-year-old assistant, Bianca, came in and switched on a second screen. This one showed a map with dots lighting up.
“I checked and we’ve got a little cluster of players in this one little spot,” she said, “About 120 miles from Atlanta, way out in the middle of nowhere. Abomination is from there, too. He’s not playing now. Somebody bought the game last night, started and quit and then played a while this morning. There’s one player, Arggface, who’s close to Abomination. He’s playing right now.”
Jason sat down and looked through the news stories. He read the copy of the letter from Abomination twice.
“This is a stupid letter,” he said, “It sounds like a practical joke to me. What if they surround the house and shoot our player or something? Then it could come out that we gave them his name, and he didn’t do anything but pick the wrong avatar, or he did write the letter, but it was just his idea of a joke. Let the law sort it out if they can. I don’t want to release any information.”
Bianca nodded and said, “I’ll call him back and say no.”
“Don’t call,” Jason said. “You’ve got his e-mail now, so just e-mail him back and tell him we don’t give out our players’ names. Keep it simple. You know, like an auto-response. Better yet, wait until tomorrow and add the customer service survey, so it’s like we’ve got somebody overseas handling it.”
“Gotcha,” Bianca said. “And Sal and Isabella are waiting to talk to you about the Monster Bees launch.”
Mallory finished taking pictures and doing interviews at the gym and was having lunch with Sasha Richards at the hospital cafeteria.
“I hope you don’t mind eating here,” Sasha said. “Ricky’s been telling me I should be at home resting, but I can’t seem to rest with him in the hospital. Of course, once he moves to the physical therapy unit, they’ll probably run me off.”
“So his recovery’s going well?” Mallory asked, hoping to cover that and get back to talking about the gym.
She got more of an answer than she expected.
“Physically, yes,” Sasha said. “He’s strong, and he’s the kind who’s going to put up with any amount of pain and stress to get back on his feet. He just doesn’t do so great if he’s lying there thinking. Everybody’s told him it wasn’t his fault, that nobody could expect something like that, but he still feels responsible. He keeps going over and over the fact that they all got killed and he didn’t, and over and over the fact that he really can’t remember any of it – I mean the shooting.”
Mallory nodded sympathetically.
“He’s remembered a little more. He does remember Aaron Twitchell tying that tourniquet on his leg,” she said, “and a little bit in the ambulance, but before that all he can remember is just coming to the top of the hill and everybody cheering for China when she made it to the top. He’s having these awful dreams with a black flag waving, and he keeps thinking that he must have seen the shooter and is just blocking it.”
“He just feels so responsible,” she said, close to tears,” I told him that I felt guilty for letting China use my bicycle and gear, because if I hadn’t thought of doing that, she’d still be alive. Of course, when I said that, he said there was no way I could know. I told him he needed to forgive himself the same way.”
Mallory hadn’t been prepared for such an outpouring. She couldn’t see changing the subject back to the gym abruptly, so she asked gently, “Were you and China Carson close friends?”
“I’d say so,” Sasha said. “Well, more like I was a kind of mother figure for her. She was such a success story for us. Oh, that sounds awful, doesn’t it?”
She began to cry, and Mallory patted her on the back gently until the sobs subsided.
Sasha finally said, “I’m sorry, I’m an awful person to interview. I love those volunteers for what they’re doing, but it’s going to take a miracle to keep the gym open at this point. Ricky’s going to have to have therapy for months, and we both thought we were so super healthy we didn’t need health insurance. I think we’re probably going to have to sell our house to pay for his medical costs. We just invested everything we had into the gym.”
Mallory got up, thinking about the blast of advertising coming from the other gym.
“Don’t worry about the interview,” she said, with a smile. “I can see I picked a bad time, and I’ve got a good story already from the volunteers. Let’s go see if we can get a picture of you with Ricky together.”
Rondelle Carson had been back at work at the Magnolia County Medical Center for two days and was relieved to be out of Russell’s house.
“He’s gone back to work,” she told her friend Doris Barnes while they were on their lunch break. “He had a lot of customers to catch up with, and I think it will be good for him to get busy. It sure is better for me, because I couldn’t say or do a thing to help him. He was just crazy with grief to start with, and then he got too calm. Between you and me, I’m keeping his guns at my place just to be on the safe side. He’s mad about it, but I told him I’ll give them back when deer hunting season starts because that’s all he’s ever used them for anyway.”
She frowned and said, “I don’t think he’ll ever really get over this. He just adored that girl.”
“I saw her picture in the paper,” Doris said. “She was just gorgeous.”
“Well, that was taken after she lost all the weight and got into all the makeup and new clothes,” Rondelle said with a slight tone of disdain. “The thing about Russell is that he loved her when she was chubby and didn’t have her hair streaked and her ears pierced. They were high school sweethearts. Neither one of them ever dated anybody else that I know of.”
Doris, who was dealing with 40 extra pounds, asked, “Well, how did she lose the weight?”
“Oh, some program at the gym,” Rondelle said. “She paid good money for somebody to tell her to eat less. I have never understood how such an industry got built up around losing weight. You just have to eat sensibly and get a little exercise.”
“Rondelle Carson!” Doris said. “You’ve never had a weight problem in your life. What do you weigh? 98 pounds?”
“One hundred and five,” Rondelle said with some dignity. “And that’s because I don’t overeat, and I stay busy.”
“I have seen you eat half a fried chicken at one sitting,” Doris said. “You put a half a cup of sugar in your coffee, and you’re always going to the vending machine. It’s genetic. Russell looks like a string bean, too.”
“Well, Russell eats a lot, but he works hard, and he runs every evening,” Rondelle said. “I told him once he ought to get China to run with him instead of wasting money on that gym.”
Doris had something else on her mind – something that Rondelle had told her in confidence a few years back, that she had been trying to figure out how to bring up.
“I’m sorry I couldn’t get to the funeral,” Doris said, changing the subject. “I have a card to send to Russell, and I was going to write a little note to him. I heard that the preacher talked about the baby, and I was wondering if I should mention the baby. I was surprised…”
“Oh, Lord,” Rondelle said. “I forgot I told you about that. Doris, I hope you haven’t mentioned that to anybody.”
“Well, I certainly haven’t,” Doris lied. “I was just thought when I heard that probably they got it worked out some way, like going to one of those fertility clinics or something.”
Fifty miles away in Macon, Sunshine Chapman was getting back into her job. Th
ere had been a big vase of sunflowers on her desk when she came back on Monday, with a note that said, “It will get better.”
The idea seemed to be that it was from the whole group, but she knew perfectly well that Bradley Turner, the younger of the two partners who owned the firm, had thought of it and bought the flowers, too.
She wished that Garth had some of Bradley’s thoughtfulness, but then she reminded herself that life had been hard for Garth, and he was under a lot of stress. Of course, she was too, with losing her mother that terrible way, and with all the fuss with Andy, but Garth just didn’t have her ability to see things from other people’s perspectives.
Every time they talked about the house, he would argue for just evicting Andy as soon as it was legally possible, and she would try to explain why that didn’t seem right to her. She told him that Andy would settle down. Maybe he’d want to buy the house himself, or maybe he’d see the advantage in having a smaller place close to work. She just wanted to give him some time to adjust.
“Hey, Sunshine,” Bradley said. “You okay?”
She managed a smile “I’m getting there,” she said. “It’s good to be back at work.”
“Well, if you need to talk, I’ll listen,” he said. “I know you’ve been through a rough time.”
At Robins Air Force Base, Andy Chapman surprised his supervisor by bringing up something unrelated to work.
“Would you happen to know a good attorney?” he asked.
His supervisor did, and after a quick look on his computer wrote down the telephone number and address on a piece of notepaper.
“Thank you,” Andy said, taking the paper. “And, uh, do you know a good locksmith?”
Hunter picked Bethie up at school and went home early. Tyler was taking over, and she could almost feel the responsibility being lifted off her shoulders. It felt good for now, she thought.
She called Mary Bailey when they got home and asked her to come over for a visit and supper.
“Why don’t I cook the supper?” her mother-in-law asked when she arrived.
“That’s what I was hoping you’d say,” Hunter said, laughing. “And while you’re doing it, let’s talk about babies.”
“Well, I can tell you one thing right now,” Mary said, putting on one of Hunter’s aprons. “That baby’s daddy is an expert on the subject.”
“So he tells me,” Hunter said. “He’s the baby-whisperer. He used to be able to get Bethie to sleep just by patting her back. He can change a diaper in his sleep. But I don’t think he’s going to be able to take maternity leave.”
Sam came home late, frustrated about T.J.’s not having heard from the computer game company, and a little worried that Tim Watkins wouldn’t be able to resist talking to his high school friends about Abomination. But, he told himself, the good thing about the nighttime was that nobody was likely to be out shooting people with an assault rifle.
There was, he thought, rest for the weary.
He got the call about the fire at the GetFit gym at 3 a.m.
CHAPTER 13
Sam woke Hunter up and told her where he was going.
“And don’t even think about coming down there,” he said, putting her cell phone by her pillow. “Call me if you need me.”
As soon as he got outside he could see the blaze lighting up the sky in the east, and he knew how bad it was. The old gym where he had learned to play basketball and Ricky Richards had built a thriving business was a goner.
The only good thing, he thought as he started up his car, was that there were no nearby buildings—just a parking lot on one side and a scrappy wooded area on the other, with the railroad tracks beyond that.
Mallory Bremmer arrived near the blaze with two cameras at almost the same time Sam did, parking just behind him. Skeet waved and came over to them.
“Taneesha’s gone over to the Richards’ house,” he said. “She told Sasha she shouldn’t come down here. She’s going over there to stay with her and see if there are some friends she can call.”
“Good,” Sam said. “Mallory, how’d you get here before I did?”
“Miss Rose Tyndale called me. She heard the sirens and went to her window and saw how the sky was lit up. We’re not that far away.”
Her phone sounded a few notes of piano music, and she answered it.
“Hey, Mr. Bankston. Yes, sir. I’ve got my camera, and I can take video, too. Yes, sir. I know the rule. Hunter told me that when I first started?”
She listened while her eyes darted around, taking in the whole scene.
“What rule?” Sam asked suspiciously.
“Get as close as you can and take as many pictures as you can before they stop you,” Mallory said with a grin.
Sam was about to give her instructions about where to stop when he saw Merchantsville’s Fire Chief, Donny Backer coming toward him, looking grimy and tired. A wiry balding man, Backer took off his helmet and leaned against Sam’s car, waving Mallory away as if she were a small child. She backed off and took a quick picture of the two of them talking.
“The roof had just caught fire when we got here,” the chief told Sam. “Old Mr. Woodall just happened to look out his bathroom window. You know, everybody says he’s senile, but he sure called this one right. Said it was near the railroad tracks and couldn’t be anything but the old gym.”
“Got any ideas?” Sam asked.
“Yeah, but I’ll hold off until the inspection’s done. The Fire Marshall had approved it before Ricky Richards opened it up two years ago,” the chief said. “They put a lot of work into this old building – all new wiring, the works. All the same, nobody can do much when this much old wood starts burning, and this one had a real head start.”
“How soon can somebody inspect it?” Sam asked.
“Way it’s going now, I’d say before noon tomorrow. Hey, where’d that kid from the newspaper go?”
Taneesha watched Sasha Richards carefully. She was huddled on the sofa in a nightgown. She seemed frightened.
“I’m going to get dressed and go over to the hospital,” she said. “I need to talk to Ricky.”
“I can take you over there,” Taneesha offered.
“I’m going to want to stay with Ricky once I get there,” she said.
Sasha went to get dressed, and when she came back, she had her car keys in her hand.
Taneesha noticed the keys shaking in Sasha’s hand.
“You shouldn’t be driving,” she said gently. “I’ll drive your car, and get somebody to come pick me up at the hospital.”
“Thank you,” Sasha said.
At sunrise, a small crowd had gathered, and Mallory was still taking photos. She had used up the microchip in her Nikon, edited out the worst ones, and taken more. She had started using her cell phone to take videos once there was some light. The big blaze was gone, but there were smaller fires in sections of the remaining ruins. She could identify the gym equipment, scorched machinery still standing. Her eye was mostly on the firefighters, though.
Across town, Sam was in the shower scrubbing his hair to get rid of the smoke smell and Hunter was in the kitchen making tea for herself and Bethie and coffee for Sam.
Once she had the water going, she poured fresh water for Flannery and the cats, a big bowl for Flannery on the floor, and another for the cats on top of the dryer so that Flannery wouldn’t nose them out of the way.
She scooped out the dog food for Flannery and opened two cans of cat food. The cats were already crowding the dryer top and setting up a chorus of wails.
She barely noticed them, though. It was an automatic morning routine, and her mind was on the front page of the paper. Tyler had been getting papers out before she was born, but she wondered if he had ever had a fire destroy a front page human interest feature.
She had read Mallory’s story about the volunteers who were going to save the gym. It was good, but the gym those nice people wanted to save didn’t exist anymore.
Something, she thought, might
be salvaged from the story for an editorial, and they would have a story on the fire. Sam had told her about Mallory showing up with her cameras, but he apparently hadn’t seen her for more than a few minutes, and his mind was on other issues.
This should be a milestone day, she thought – her last day at work before she returned as a working mother – and all she was thinking about was the Wednesday deadline.
Then Baby Bailey gave her a swift kick, and Bethie arrived in the kitchen dressed for school but looking sleepy and frustrated. She was holding her shoes in her hands.
“I can’t find any matching socks,” she said, frowning.
“That’s because your Grandma Mary picked up everything that was on your floor last night,” Hunter said. “Go look in the dryer and find some, and then we’ll have some tea.”
T.J. called Sam at nine.
“You won’t believe the answer I just got from Last Man Standing,” he said. “I’m sending you a copy. They won’t cooperate. It’s like they turned it over to customer service.”
“Well, do what you can,” Sam said. “I can’t deal with that this morning. Ricky Richards’ gym burned down last night, and I think it could be arson.”
“How much have they got that place insured for?” T.J. asked.
“I was just about to call Jack Bremmer and find out,” Sam said.
At the newspaper office, Hunter, Tyler, and Novena were all congratulating Mallory on her photographs.
“No problem with filling page one,” Tyler said. “We’ll use this one with the full blaze over the fold, and four or five with the firefighters close up. I’d even go for that one of Sam talking with Chief Backer.”
“Could you do a background story on the gym?” Hunter asked Tyler. “Sam says it must have been fifty years old at least.”
“More like sixty,” Tyler said. “What’s that smell? It’s like an ashtray in here.”
Over Troubled Water: A Hunter Jones Mystery Page 12
