Silent until now, Ramon placed his hand on her forearm. “I got it, sis,” he said, reaching for the bottle. “Stay here.”
Brushing away his hand, she shook her head. “No, I’m fine,” she said, her voice strained again as her erstwhile composure slipped away. “I need to stretch my legs anyway.”
Sam suspected her grief would continue to come in waves. One never knew what random reminder or emotional trigger would begin a new downward spiral.
Ramon seemed confused by his sister’s reaction and started to rise, but sat back down when his grandmother, standing in the archway to the kitchen, shook her head at him. Sam thought she mouthed the words, “Not now.”
Vargus leaned over and patted Ramon on the knee. “Son, rest assured I plan to help your sister however I can. Whatever she needs. I know she didn’t sign up for this. She came all the way to Indiana to support her husband, my good friend, and I won’t forget that. I’m sure she’s told you, Dave and I go way back. I wanted good things for him, hoped to help him out here. If Sally chooses to stay here and keep this home, I’ll find a good position for her with my company. Dave told me she was an administrative assistant back in California. I can arrange something similar here. And if she chooses to go back to San Bernardino, I’ll give her whatever assistance I can.” He leaned back. “Short term, if she needs help with funeral expenses, I’ve got it covered. What I’m trying to say is, she’ll have options.”
“Thank you, Mr. Vargus,” Ramon said, genuinely moved. “I appreciate that.”
“God knows, I’ll miss Dave,” Vargus said. “I can’t even imagine what this must be like for her…”
Sam noticed the grandmother’s fleeting frown and looked at Dean, nodding slightly toward the old woman. When he stood, Dean rose with him. Castiel looked a question at them, but Sam shook him off. The angel nodded and remained standing between the wingchairs.
Vargus had segued into offering Ramon a job at his plant whether or not Sally chose to stay in Indiana. Ramon seemed to be considering the offer when Sally returned from the garage, passing through the kitchen. As she stepped past her grandmother, the old woman placed a hand on her upper arm and gave her a searching look. Sally nodded once and returned to the sofa. Sam thought maybe her eyes had become a bit raw since she’d stepped out.
Together he and Dean walked toward the kitchen.
“Could we speak in private?” Sam asked the grandmother as they passed her. She seemed to have been expecting this and wordlessly followed them into the kitchen. Reaching for glasses from a cupboard, she proceeded to fill them with chilled water from a dispenser in the door of the refrigerator.
“Mr. Vargus talks about options,” the grandmother said. “But Sally decided to leave this morning. She’s already making arrangements. David’s parents want to see his body before it’s moved, but that simply postpones the inevitable.”
“Is everything okay with Sally?” Sam asked softly, so his voice wouldn’t carry into the other room.
The grandmother shook her head. “Such a tragedy, especially with this latest news.”
“What news?”
“She was sick again this morning,” the old woman said, absently pushing the glasses across the countertop toward them. “She said she didn’t want to know, that it was all too much. But this is different. It’s not a house. Not something you can ignore or run away from. I finally convinced her to take the test.”
“Test?” Dean asked.
“Yes,” she said solemnly. “It was the plus.”
Still confused, Dean looked a silent question at Sam.
But Sam felt the pieces coming together. Everything started to make sense. “Sally’s pregnant.”
NINETEEN
“Sally’s”—Dean caught himself and lowered the volume of his voice—“Sally’s pregnant.”
The grandmother nodded. “Only a few weeks,” she said. “But she will keep the child. That’s why she made the decision to leave. She’ll be a single mother, raising a child on her own. She wants to be near family. Mr. Vargus has offered to help her, but he is not family. He was close to David, but they hadn’t seen each other in a while and Sally is not close to this man. Here, she is among strangers in a place which has only bad memories for her. And for her family.”
“Found our connection,” Dean said.
Sam nodded. “All the victims had some sort of relationship with a pregnant woman.”
Unfortunately, each victim had a relationship with a different pregnant woman. There was no common denominator.
“Small problem,” Dean said. “Until a few hours ago, nobody knew Sally was pregnant. Not even Sally.”
“Please do not tell this news to anyone,” Mary said. “Not even Ramon knows.”
“We’ll keep the information confidential,” Sam assured her.
Dean downed his glass of water while imagining how much more refreshing a cold beer would have been. But he’d been trying to cut back, earn his choir boy badge in an attempt to keep the Mark’s violent urges under control. With a sigh and a slight head shake, he placed the empty glass in the sink.
Through a gap in the curtains of the small window over the sink he could see the backyard of the Holcomb house and beyond, to the open space past their fence and the abandoned house on the far side of that lot. He remembered the field had been overgrown and the house had been visited by teenagers secretly indulging in alcohol and other controlled substances. But the condition of the connecting property had improved. Dean heard the buzz of the motor before he spotted the old man on the riding mower, trimming the weeds to a respectable height.
Dean recalled the stuffed plastic trash bags lined up by the front door of the house and wondered if the lawnmower man was the irregular caretaker of the place. If he’d been around at the time of Dave Holcomb’s attack, he might have witnessed something that could help in the investigation. So far, the closest they’d come to having an eyewitness was Jesse Vetter and Olivia Krum, who had been in the same house but several rooms distant when the Perreault attack occurred.
“Gonna see a man about a mower,” Dean said to Sam, pointing toward the caretaker visible through the window.
* * *
While Sam remained at the Holcomb residence with Castiel, Dean jumped in the Impala and followed the winding suburban street around to the curb of the vacant house. He parked opposite a GMC pickup from the late fifties; its red color had faded over time to a shade best described as rust. Hitched to the pickup was a single axle open trailer with a plywood bed and ramp that had a decidedly homemade quality. Or perhaps the original materials had been patched or replaced over the years with a dedicated DIY mentality. Neither truck nor trailer had a business sign on display, adding to the homebrew quality of the setup. If the old man on the riding mower was running a business he had avoided any attempt at marketing his services to the locals.
As Dean exited the Impala, the old man neared the back of the vacant house, his mowing grid taking him from the back of the property to the front. Dean estimated that he had less than fifteen minutes remaining to finish the job. The man made a turn at the right edge of the property line and rumbled back toward Dean, finally noticing the visitor.
The old man wore a grease- and grass-stained John Deere trucker hat, a threadbare red plaid shirt, naturally distressed jeans and scuffed, steel-toed boots. His face brought to mind prunes and old leather, with a touch of sunburn on his ears and the tip of his nose. A spotty gray beard swathed the bottom half of his face and the upper half of his neck, trimmed well enough to keep his thin lips visible but any attempt at precision grooming ended there.
When the riding mower came within arm’s reach of Dean’s position, the old man switched off the power and sat there for a moment, silently squinting at him.
Though he hadn’t donned his Fed suit, Dean had his fake FBI ID and flashed it for the old-timer. “Special Agent Banks, FBI.”
The old man brought up some phlegm, turned his head to the side and spat an impr
essive distance before answering. “You don’t say?”
He climbed off the riding mower with deliberate care, as if giving his old joints time to acclimate to a new alignment. With both feet on the ground, he pulled a rag out of his back pocket, wiped off his hands, tucked the rag away and held out his right hand. “Arthur Keating.”
Dean shook the proffered hand and said, “I’m investigating a death on the property next door.” Not wanting to panic the locals with tales of a serial killer on the loose in Braden Heights, he phrased the statement to conform to the official party line of an animal attack rather than a murder. He had no qualms about telling the family of victims he believed they were murdered, but telling the general public might annoy the police and end any pretense of cooperation and sharing of information. Moreover, their FBI credentials might not hold up to additional scrutiny. If Assistant Chief Cordero ever decided to call Washington to lodge a complaint about rogue agents, that day would not end well. “Hoping you can answer a few questions.”
“Holcomb fella?”
“Got it in one,” Dean said. “Know anything about it?”
“About as much as they put in the papers,” he said. “And what little I hear around town. Not one to trade in gossip but the stories going around these days certainly perk up the ears.”
“I bet they do.”
“Way I hear it, you got more than one of these guttings.”
“There have been similar incidents.”
“I’m no wildlife expert, Agent Banks,” Keating said. “And I don’t expect you are either.”
“Not at all,” Dean said.
“I’m at a loss what kind of animal might be responsible for all this.”
“Some animals might surprise you,” Dean said.
Keating flashed Dean a bit of knowing side-eye. “Suspect you’re right,” he said. “But I don’t see how I can help.”
“Answer a few questions.”
“All right,” he said. “I’d invite you inside, but there ain’t no decent place to sit.”
“Out here’s fine,” Dean said. “Do you own this property?”
“No, sir,” Keating replied. “Look after it now and then. Long as someone pays for the privilege. Last owner died, left a contested will, tied up in the courts. I’ve been paid by the executor, usually after enough people complain about the state of the place.”
“That why you’re here today?”
“No, sir,” Keating said again. “Real estate agent paid me to spruce up the grounds, make it presentable. Said she’s putting the Holcomb place back on the market and doesn’t want the neighborhood eyesore driving down the asking price.”
“So you weren’t working the grounds the day Holcomb was killed.”
“No,” Keating said. “And thank God I was nowhere near here. Could’ve been me gutted instead of Holcomb. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve lived a long life—not always good or easy, but I don’t have too many complaints—and Holcomb was a young fella, certainly not deserving of what he got, far as I know, but I ain’t ready to give up the ghost yet. Suspect I have a few more years in these creaky bones.”
Dean looked across the open field, mostly mowed, to the rotted fence Dave Holcomb had been attempting to repair when he was attacked. “Notice anything out of the ordinary back by the Holcomb property line?”
“Other than weeds?” Keating shook his head. “Couple fast food wrappers, garage sale flyer, few pages from a newspaper. Stuff I suspect the wind had a hand in depositing back there against the fence.” He shrugged. “Of course, if there were shell casings or cigarette butts back there, I might have missed them.”
“Good thing we’re not looking for a sniper,” Dean said.
“Wasn’t always like this,” Keating mused.
“How’s that?”
“Braden Heights,” Keating said. “Town’s growing, for sure, but it’s been a quiet growth, if you know what I mean. Not much trouble. Not real trouble anyway. Teenage mischief, broken windows here and there. But nothing to make you double-check your locks at night.”
“That’s good to know.”
“I get the local monthly paper, The Corner Press,” Keating said. “Hell, everyone does. It’s free. As you’d expect, it’s mostly local interest stuff, advertiser supported. But they also list the police blotter activity and it’s mostly minor crimes; a comfort in a way, if you think about it. Live as long as I have, and you know how much worse that type of listing can get.” He looked at the section of the yard he hadn’t yet mowed and Dean imagined he wanted to get back to it. But he wasn’t quite done. “As the town grows, as it becomes more successful, you know the bad stuff will come.”
“But you didn’t expect it to come so soon,” Dean guessed.
“No, sir,” Keating said. “I have days filled with gloom and doom thoughts, but I never imagined something this bad would come so soon.”
“It’s not normal,” Dean said. “No matter how big the town. Sometimes bad things happen.”
“Suspect you’re right,” Keating said. “Braden Heights had a good run, been quiet a long time. At least since they changed the name.”
“Changed the name?”
“Of course, they had to,” Keating explained. “After the tragedy.”
TWENTY
Assuming Dean wouldn’t need assistance with questioning a groundskeeper, Sam had stayed behind at the Holcomb residence with Castiel, but he was beginning to doubt he’d mine much more information out of the family or Vargus. Before Dean left, they’d established a pregnancy connection between the murders, but Sally’s pregnancy remained an X factor. It seemed as if only Sally and her grandmother knew about the pregnancy, and then only for a day. But four male victims involved with four pregnant women was a bit much to chalk up to coincidence.
“Yes, moving to a new home is stressful,” the grandmother said, in the kitchen with Sam. “But she hasn’t really had time to settle in here. Better to think of it as an ongoing move.”
“Won’t be easy,” Sam said. “Repacking everything.”
The Winchesters traveled light and never had to consider packing up a lifetime of accumulated belongings. Until they’d found the bunker, they had no furniture at all. Every possession they had could fit in the trunk of the Impala, alongside their hunters’ weapons cache.
From the other room, Sam detected a change in volume as Stanley Vargus said his goodbyes.
“Ramon will help, and the Holcombs,” Mary said, walking from the kitchen before Vargus left. “I can’t lift much, but I can pack plates, tape up boxes. We’ll hire movers for most of it.”
Stanley Vargus paused in the doorway facing Ramon, who held the door open for him, and Sally, who stood with her hands clasped before her, a polite smile flickering off and on as she struggled to retain her composure. Castiel hadn’t strayed too far from the wingchairs.
“These aren’t just words, Sally,” Vargus said. “I mean to help out, however I can.”
“Thanks,” Sally said.
“I convinced Dave to come here. So I want to cover his funeral expenses. You don’t need to worry about that.”
“I appreciate that,” Sally said, her lips trembling.
“Dave always called you Sally, but going through the paperwork to have a check cut, I noticed a different name listed for spouse…?”
“Oh, Sally is a nickname,” she said. “Not my legal name.”
“That’s my fault,” Ramon said. “When I was a kid, I couldn’t pronounce Dalisay so I called her Sally instead. And it stuck.”
“Why do you think these two insist on calling me Grandma Mary, instead of Marilag?”
“Well, I’m glad I’ve cleared that up,” Vargus said. “I’ll have a check sent over tomorrow if not later today.”
“Thank you, Mr. Vargus,” Mary said with a slight bow of her head. “Ramon and I appreciate the kindness and support you’ve shown our Sally.”
“Believe me,” Vargus said, clearly moved. “It’s the least I can do. Dave
was a good friend. And I feel somehow responsible for this whole situation.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Sally said, wiping away a tear. “There’s no way you could have known something like this… how this could happen.”
He shook his head, at a loss for words.
Sally stepped forward and hugged him.
Vargus shook Ramon’s hand. “Job offer stands, son.” He took the grandmother’s hand gently and thanked her for her hospitality. Then he turned to Sam and Castiel, who hung back a little from the group. “Find whoever took Dave away from us,” he said grimly. “And lock the bastard up for the rest of his worthless life.”
After he left, Ramon closed the door so it hardly made a sound.
Sally turned away and hugged herself, looking somewhat lost as she surveyed the house which hadn’t yet become a home and now never would. “I don’t know anymore,” she said. “Sometimes I feel Dave’s presence here. Maybe I should stay. Maybe I won’t feel completely lost and alone…” She turned, facing the backyard but staring off into space. “But then I close my eyes and I see him out there, how I found him…”
“That will never change, Dalisay,” the grandmother said. “You made the right decision. Best to leave as soon as possible.”
Ramon shook his head. “You don’t need to stay here, in this house, sis,” he said. “But you could stay in Indiana. Evansville, maybe.”
Mary shook her head. “Too close,” she said. “Start making new memories far from here.”
“No matter where she goes,” Ramon said, “she won’t forget what happened here.”
“This place is bad for her now,” the grandmother said. “I wasn’t sure before, but I am now. Bad omen.”
“What’s changed?” Ramon asked, looking back and forth between them. “How is it worse now than before?”
The old woman crossed her arms, her mouth clamped shut, but stared at Sally, not Ramon. Clearly, she felt the answer wasn’t hers to give.
Supernatural--Cold Fire Page 14
