The Novels of Nora Roberts, Volume 3

by Nora Roberts

  He sat. Not beside her, not on the bed, but on the chair so there was distance between them. “Nobody I ever cared about—nobody outside of on the job—ever said anything like that to me.”

  “Then I’d say you cared about the wrong people.” She got up, walked to the bathroom to blow her nose. When she came out, she stood leaning on the doorjamb, watching him from across the room.

  “You went out and got my dogs for me. With all that was going on, you went out and brought them back for me. You could’ve sent someone else or just blown it off. Road’s flooded, they’ll have to wait. But you didn’t. I have friends who’d have done the same for me, and me for them. But I can’t think of any man I’ve been with, any man I’ve slept with, who would have done it.”

  A ghost of a smile touched his mouth. “Then I’d say you’ve slept with the wrong men.”

  “I guess I have.” She went over and picked up the shirt he’d discarded when they’d come in. With some care, she unpinned the badge, then brought it to him. “This looks good on you, by the way. Sexy.”

  He gripped her hand before she could step back. Still holding it, he got to his feet. “I’ve got an awful need for you. It’s more than I’ve had for anyone else, and may be more than you want.”

  “I guess we’ll find out.”

  “You wouldn’t have admired me a year ago. Six months ago. And you need to know that there are still days it seems like too much trouble to even get out of bed.”

  “Why do you?”

  He opened his other hand, looked down at the badge. “I guess I’ve got an awful need for this, too. That’s not heroic.”

  “Oh, you’re so wrong.” Her heart was lost. In that one moment it simply slid out and dropped at his feet. “Heroism’s just doing more than you want to do or think you can. Sometimes it’s just doing the crappy things, the unhappy things other people won’t do.”

  She stepped closer, cupped his face in her hands. “It’s not just jumping out of a plane onto a glacier ten thousand feet up because there’s nobody else there to do it. It’s getting out of bed in the morning when it seems like too much trouble.”

  Emotion swirled into his eyes, and he lowered his cheek to the top of her head. “I’m so in love with you, Meg.”

  Then he kissed her hair, straightened. “I need to go out. I want to check the river, patrol before I turn in.”

  “Can a civilian and her dogs do a ride-along on that?”

  “Yeah.” He ruffled a hand over her damp hair. “Dry your hair first.”

  “Will you tell me what you know, about Yukon?”

  “I’ll tell you what I can.”

  TWENTY-FOUR

  HE WENT BACK to the scene of the crime in the early morning drizzle. Ten steps from the door, Nate thought. Left in plain view of anyone who might have come in or gone out of Town Hall. Plain view of anyone driving by, walking by.

  More than left, he amended. Executed in plain view.

  He walked inside, through to the meeting center. He’d ordered everything left as it was. The folding chairs, the big projection screen remained in place. He brought it back, into his head, the way it had been the night before.

  He’d come in a little late, just before the lights had gone down. He’d scanned the crowd as much out of habit as looking for Meg.

  Rose and David had been in the last row. Her first night out since the baby. They’d been holding hands. He remembered seeing them both at intermission—with Rose on the phone, probably checking with her mother, who was home watching the kids.

  Bing had been near the back. Nate had ignored the flask he’d held between his knees. Deb and Harry, The Professor. A small clump of high schoolers, the entire Riggs family, who lived in a log cabin out past Rancor Woods.

  He’d estimate that half the population had been there—which meant half hadn’t. Some had left at intermission. Any of those who’d stayed might have slipped out and in again.

  In the dark, while attention was focused on the screen.

  He walked back to the lobby when he heard the outer door open and watched Hopp shove back her hood.

  “Saw your car parked outside. I don’t know what to think about this, Ignatious. I can’t put two thoughts together about it.”

  She lifted her hands, let them drop again. “I’m going to go over and see Lara. Don’t know what I’ll say. This is such a crazy thing. Mean and crazy.”

  “I’ll go with mean.”

  “But not crazy? Somebody carves up a harmless dog outside Town Hall, and that’s not crazy?”

  “Depends on why.”

  Her mouth flattened at that. “I can’t see any why to it. Couple of people are saying we’ve got a cult, high school kids experimenting or some such thing. I don’t believe that for one minute.”

  “It wasn’t ritualistic.”

  “Others think it’s some loony, camped out near town. Maybe it’s a comfort believing none of us could have done such an awful thing, but I don’t know that it makes me feel any better to think we’ve got a crazy lurking around who’d kill a dog that way.”

  She studied his face. “You don’t think that.”

  “No, I don’t think that.”

  “Are you going to tell me what you do think?”

  “I think when somebody kills a local dog, in the middle of town, in front of a building where a good half of that town’s sitting, he’s got his reasons.”

  “Which are?”

  “I’m working on it.”

  HE DROVE ALONG THE RIVER before heading to the station. It was a sulky gray today, with those plates and chunks of floating ice dull on its surface.

  Meg’s plane was gone, a clear symbol that he couldn’t box her up somewhere safe and close. Bing and a two-man crew were patching a section of road. Bing’s only acknowledgment as Nate slowed to pass was a long, steady stare.

  He drove to the station to find Peach urging coffee on Joe and Lara. Peter stood by looking very much like a grown man struggling not to cry.

  Lara, her eyes swollen and beet red, sprang up the instant Nate stepped into the room.

  “I want to know what you’re doing about Yukon. What are you doing to find the bastard who killed my dog?”

  “Now, Lara.”

  “Don’t ‘Now, Lara’ me,” she said, whirling on her husband. “I want to know.”

  “Why don’t you come back to my office. Peach, hold off anything that comes in, except an emergency, for the next few minutes.”

  “All right, chief. Lara.” She gripped Lara’s hand in hers. “I couldn’t be more sorry.”

  Lara managed a short bob of her head before she shot her chin into the air and sailed into Nate’s office. “I want some answers.”

  “Lara, I want you to sit down.”

  “I don’t want—”

  “I want you to sit down.” His tone was quiet, but the authority in it had her dropping into a chair.

  “The town voted for this police department. Voted to bring you in and to pay the tax that pays your salary. I want you to tell me what you’re doing. Why you’re not out there right now looking for that son of a bitch.”

  “I’m doing everything I can do. Lara,” he said in that same quiet tone before she could speak again. “Don’t think for a minute that I’m taking this lightly. That any of us are. I’m pursuing it, and I’ll keep pursuing it until I can give you those answers.”

  “You’ve got the knife. The knife that—” Her voice broke, and her chin bobbled, but she sucked in air, pushed back her shoulders. “You ought to be able to find out who owned that knife.”

  “I can tell you that the knife was reported stolen yesterday morning, along with other items. I’ve talked to the owner, and I’m going to get statements from people who were in Town Hall last night. I can start with you.”

  “You think one of us killed Yukon?”

  “That’s not what I think. Sit down, Lara,” he said when she leaped to her feet. “You were both at movie night. So let’s go over what you
saw, heard.”

  She lowered, slowly this time. “We left him outside.” Tears swam into her eyes. “He was getting so he couldn’t hold his bladder, so we left him outside. It was only for a few hours, and he had his doghouse. If we’d left him in—”

  “You don’t know if it would’ve made a difference. Whoever did this could’ve broken in, taken him out. From what I’ve heard, you gave that dog nearly fourteen good years. You’ve got nothing to blame yourself for. What time did you leave the house?”

  Lara bowed her head, stared at her hands as her tears plopped onto them.

  “Right after six,” Joe said, and began to rub his wife’s shoulder.

  “You go straight to Town Hall?”

  “Yeah. We got there about six-thirty, I guess. Early, but we like to sit close to the front. We dumped our jackets on the chairs. Three, four rows back, on . . . on the left side. And we socialized awhile.”

  Nate took them through it. Who they had talked with, who had sat near them.

  “Anyone ever complain to you about the dog?”

  “No.” Joe sighed. “Well, maybe a few times when he was a puppy. He used to bark if a leaf stirred. And he got out once and chewed up Tim Tripp’s boots from off his back stoop. But that was years ago, and Tim got kind of a kick out of it because the damn boots were almost bigger than Yukon. He settled down, after he got out of the puppy stage, he settled down.”

  “How about the two of you? Have you had a problem with anyone lately? An argument?”

  “I got into it some with Skinny Jim over the Iditarod. It got pretty heated. But that sort of thing happens. People get worked up over the Iditarod, and they’ve got their favorites.”

  “I had to call Ginny Mann into the school because her boy hooked twice.” Lara fumbled out a tissue. “She wasn’t happy about it or with me.”

  “How old’s her boy?”

  “Eight.” She blinked rapidly. “Oh God, Joshua couldn’t have done that to Yukon, Nate. He’s a good kid—just doesn’t much like school, but he wouldn’t have killed my dog because he was mad at me. And Ginny and Don, they’re good people. They couldn’t . . .”

  “Okay. If you think of anything else, you let me know.”

  “I want—I want to apologize for the way I jumped on you before.”

  “Don’t worry about that, Lara.”

  “No, it wasn’t right. It wasn’t right and it wasn’t . . . You saved my son’s life.”

  “I wouldn’t go that far.”

  “You helped save it, and that’s the same thing to me. I shouldn’t’ve come in here the way I did. Joe tried to calm me down, but I wouldn’t be calmed. I loved that damn dog.”

  AFTER THEY’D LEFT, Nate uncovered his case board. As he pinned up the pictures he’d taken the night before, Peter came in. “Okay, chief?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I feel like I should’ve been able to handle Mrs. Wise. I got twisted up. I, well, Steven and I hung out together a lot, and . . . I grew up with that dog. My dad, he has the sled dogs, and they’re great. But not the same as a pet. Even when Steven went to college, I’d go over and see Yukon sometimes. I guess that’s why I had some trouble with everything last night, too.”

  “You could’ve told me.”

  “I just . . . I was just twisted up. Um, chief? Is that going to be just an open case board now? I mean, should we put copies of notes and other case-related items on the board?”

  “No.”

  “But . . . you’ve got Yukon up there now.”

  “That’s right.”

  “You think what happened to Yukon’s related to the others? I feel stupid, but I don’t understand.”

  “Thinking they’re related might be stupid.”

  Peter stepped closer. “Why do you?”

  “At this point I’ve got no clear motive for anyone killing that dog.” Nate walked around to his desk, unlocked a drawer and took out the sealed knife and gloves. “These belong to Bing. He reported them stolen yesterday morning.”

  “Bing?” Peter’s eyes widened. “Bing?”

  “He’s got a temper on him. He’s got a sheet, and most of it deals with assaults. Violent behavior.”

  “Yeah, but . . . God.”

  “We’ve got a few ways to look at this. Bing gets in an argument with Joe somewhere along the line. Or Joe and Lara do something that aggravates him. He stews about it, decides to teach them a lesson. So he decides to kill the dog, reports the knife and gloves as stolen, then goes off after intermission last night, knowing the Wises are inside. He gets the dog, brings him back. Kills him, leaves the knife and gloves figuring he’s covered because he’d reported them stolen. Then he goes home and works in his garage.”

  “If he was mad at Mr. or Mrs. Wise, why didn’t he just punch Mr. Wise in the face?”

  “Good question. Another way we can look at it is, somebody wanted to cause Bing some trouble. He pisses a lot of people off, so that’s no stretch.”

  He eased a hip onto his desk, his eyes on the board. “They steal his knife and gloves. They use them to kill the dog, leave them where they’ll be found. Or . . .”

  He moved to the counter, started a pot of coffee. “We ask ourselves how Galloway’s murder, Max’s death and the killing of a dog might be connected.”

  “That’s just it. I don’t see.”

  “The killer left us one big clue. Cryptic or obvious, depending on which angle you look from. The dog’s throat was slit. That’s what killed him. But the killer doesn’t toss the knife aside. He takes another minute. Had to roll the dog over to do it. To bury the knife in its chest. Why?”

  “Because he’s sick and he’s mean and—”

  “Put that aside and look at the board, Peter. Look at Galloway. Look at the dog.”

  He struggled with it, Nate could see. With looking close at the grisly pictures. Then he let out a little breath, as if he’d been holding it. “Chest wound. They both have a blade of some kind in the chest.”

  “Could be coincidence, or maybe somebody’s trying to tell us something. Now, take another step. Where’s the connection between Galloway, Max and the Wises?”

  “Well, I don’t know. Steven and his parents moved here when I was about twelve, I guess. That was after Galloway was gone. But they knew Mr. Hawbaker. Mr. Wise ran an ad in The Lunatic most weeks for his computer servicing. And Mrs. Wise and Mrs. Hawbaker took some classes together. The exercise class at the school and the quilting class Peach has going.”

  “Something else connects them. To our knowledge they didn’t know Patrick Galloway, but for sixteen years everyone believes Galloway just took off. Now they don’t. Why?”

  “Well, because they found him when . . . Steven. Steven’s the one who found him.”

  “Get away with murder for sixteen years, then some dumbass college boy and his idiot friends screw it up for you.” Nate listened to the coffee plop into the glass pot. “A pisser, all right. If they hadn’t been up there—that time, that place—odds are things would be fine. Another avalanche—nature’s or one the State set off to clear the mountain—that cave could’ve been buried again. For years. Maybe forever, if your luck held.”

  He eased a hip down on his desk while the coffee brewed. “Now you’ve got to go and kill again. Kill Max, or induce him to kill himself. You’ll get away with that, too. You believe that. You have to believe that, but there are cops in Lunacy now. Not just state, but town cops, right underfoot. What do you do about that?”

  “I . . . I can’t keep up.”

  “You distract them. Vandalism, petty thievery. Little things that keep them occupied, just in case they’re thinking about more important things. You pay that dumbass college boy back, and you give the cops something else to worry about at the same time. Two birds. But you can’t resist being a little fancy, giving them an elbow in the ribs. So you mimic your first murder by shoving the knife in the dog’s chest.”

  He got up, poured coffee for both of them. “Now, it could be you’re
so fucking arrogant and full of yourself that you use your own knife, your own gloves. Strong possibility when you profile Bing Karlovski. Or you’re so clever, so full of yourself, you plant them so the finger points elsewhere. If that’s the case, why Bing? Where’s he connect?”

  “I swear I don’t know. I’m trying to get all this into my head. Maybe it doesn’t have to connect. Bing’s ornery. He irritates people. Or there was just an easy chance to steal the knife.”

  “None of it’s chance. Not this time. We need to find out where Bing was—exactly where he was in February of 1988.”

  “How?”

  Nate sipped his coffee. “For a start, I’m going to ask him. Meanwhile I want statements from everyone who was at movie night, and everyone who wasn’t. That’s going to take time. You tell Peach to make a list that divides the township and outlying into three parts. We’ll each take one.”

  “I’ll tell her right now.”

  “Peter?” Nate stopped him at the door. “Weren’t you scheduled to work last night? To cover the desk?”

  “Yeah, but Otto said he didn’t feel like going to the movies so we switched. That’s okay, isn’t it?”

  “Sure.” Nate sipped his coffee again. “That’s fine. Go ahead and get Peach started on that list.”

  Nate crossed to the board and drew lines connecting Joe and Lara Wise with Max and with Bing.

  “Nate?” Peach peeked in. “You still want me to hold things out here?”

  “No, whatcha got?”

  “Had a report of gunfire and a bear sighting. Same people who reported the dead body that was a pair of boots. I gave both of them to Otto, since he was already out on patrol. Gunfire was Dex Trilby’s truck, which is older than I am, backfiring.”

  “And the bear was what, a squirrel standing on a log?”

  “No, the bear was a bear. Those idiot Outsiders put up a bunch of bird feeders around the cabin, draw the birds in. Well, a bear can’t resist fresh bird feed. Otto ran it off, and made them take down the feeders. He’s a little irritable after having to go out there twice already today. So if something else comes in, I thought I’d hand it off to you or Peter.”