Death Notice

by Todd Ritter

  Carl caught on and pulled Henry away from the crowd while Kat scrambled up the ladder leading out of the tank. Once she was free of the water, she grabbed a towel and hopped out of the booth.

  “Chief,” Carl called. “Over here!”

  Water still pouring off her body, Kat allowed herself a moment of silence. It was brief—an indulgent second of calm before the storm about to take place. When the second passed, she sprang into action.

  “Who’s it for?” she asked as she approached Henry.

  “Someone named Troy Gunzelman.”

  Kat inhaled sharply. Troy’s mother stood on the other side of the booth, probably within earshot. This was bad. Horribly so.

  “Are you sure?”

  She desperately wanted it to be a hoax. It was possible, after all. Maybe word had leaked out about George Winnick’s faxed death notice and one of Troy’s friends was trying to put one over on the police. Hell, maybe it was Troy himself.

  Henry held out the page and Kat snatched it without a word. The moisture from her fingers seeped into the paper as she read the lone sentence typed across it.

  Troy Gunzelman, 17, of Perry Hollow, Pa., died at

  6:30 P.M. on July 4.

  The death notice wasn’t a copycat. It was worded exactly like the one for George Winnick. Eyes moving to the time stamp in the upper left-hand corner, Kat saw the fax had been sent at six. Five minutes ago.

  “His mother is right over there,” Kat said. “We need to ask her where Troy is.”

  It wasn’t a great plan, but it was the only one she could think of. Besides, maybe Lisa would tell them that Troy wasn’t alone or that he was in a public place. Hopefully, he was on Main Street at that very minute, lost in a crowd of people so heavy that the killer couldn’t reach him.

  Trying to keep things calm and inconspicuous, Kat tapped Lisa Gunzelman on the shoulder and led her behind the dunk tank.

  “Do you know where Troy is right now?”

  Lisa’s eyes widened slightly as they swept over Kat, Henry, and Carl. Being a mother herself, Kat knew that if she had been asked such a question, the first thing she’d do was offer one of her own. Mrs. Gunzelman was no different.

  “Is something wrong?”

  Not wanting to lie, Kat evaded the question. “We just need to locate him.”

  “Is he in trouble?”

  He might be, Kat thought. He might be dead. Or dying. Or having his lips sewn together at this very moment. Instead, she said, “It’s very important that we talk to him.”

  “He’s at the high school,” Lisa said. “He went there to lift weights.”

  “Even in the summer?”

  “Every day. Coach’s orders. He has his own keys so he can go and get in shape for the fall.”

  “Does Troy have a cell phone?”

  Lisa nodded and recited the number. Carl whipped out his own phone, dialing furiously. Pressing the cell to his ear, he waited.

  “There’s no answer.”

  “Keep calling,” Kat ordered. “If he answers, tell him to lock himself inside until I get there.”

  She sprinted the two blocks to the station, water still trailing after her. She had just reached the Crown Vic when she heard a voice behind her.

  “I’m going with you.”

  It was Henry Goll, momentarily forgotten in the chaos of the past five minutes.

  “I can’t let you do that,” Kat said before climbing into the car.

  Henry responded by getting inside with her and buckling his seat belt, showing he had no intention of leaving.

  “I’m grateful for what you’ve done,” Kat said. “You’ve been a huge help. But this is an official police matter. I won’t let you be a part of it.”

  “I am a part of this. Whether I want to be or not, I’m involved.”

  “It’s too dangerous.”

  “You think I’m already in danger,” Henry said. “Or don’t you remember the little present that was sent to me back in March?”

  He had her there. The killer clearly had chosen him alone to be the recipient of the death notices. Kat didn’t know why, but there was no denying Henry had been made a part of the crimes.

  Without saying a word, Kat got out, rushed to the trunk, and removed a black vest from its depths. Sliding behind the wheel again, she tossed the vest onto Henry’s lap.

  “You can go if you wear this.”

  Henry lifted the vest to his chest. “What is it?”

  “Kevlar. It’s bulletproof. And it better be on you by the time we get to the high school.”

  “What about you? What do you have for protection?”

  Kat showed him the Glock she had also removed from the trunk. “Don’t worry about me. I’ve got this.”

  As Henry put on the vest, she peeled the Crown Vic out of the parking lot. She had wasted too much time arguing with him. Now she had to get to the school as fast as possible. The obituary said Troy would die at six thirty. It was now quarter after, and the math was clear.

  Troy Gunzelman had only fifteen minutes to live.

  _______

  Through a combination of driving skills, blind luck, and a disregard for traffic laws that only a police chief could get away with, Kat got them to the high school in five minutes. Henry admired her speed, even when she veered into the parking lot so hard it made his stomach lurch. If every second counted, then Kat’s NASCAR-worthy driving saved them minutes.

  During the frantic drive, Henry also impressed himself by getting the bulletproof vest on just as they reached the school’s main entrance. The Kevlar was heavier than it looked. More solid, too. He felt guilty for being so armored when the chief was wearing nothing but a T-shirt over a sopping bathing suit. Her still-wet hair was stuck to her cheeks, sending rivulets of water running down her neck. But it didn’t slow her down. As they barreled toward the school, she grabbed the radio.

  “Carl? Did you reach him yet?”

  The deputy’s voice erupted with a crackle. “No. I’m only getting voice mail. Are you at the school yet?”

  “We’re here,” Kat said. “We’re about to go in.”

  The patrol car’s tires squealed as she steered it into the heart of the school’s parking lot. Rows of vacant spots slipped past the window. The entire lot was empty, except for a battered Mustang in the distance.

  “That’s it!” Kat yelled when she saw it. “That’s Troy’s car. He still might be here.”

  She swerved the patrol car past the Mustang on her way to the school itself. Once there, she brought her car to a gut-tugging halt.

  “Ready?” she asked.

  Henry nodded. As ready as he could be.

  Kat was first out of the car, whipping out her Glock as she sprinted to a side entrance. She tried the door. It was unlocked. Before going inside, she hissed instructions at Henry.

  “Stick behind me. Don’t touch anything. Don’t try to be a hero. And if something happens to me, run back to the patrol car and drive to the station as fast as you can.”

  She pushed through the door, Henry right behind her. Just inside the school was a darkened gymnasium. Henry saw a polished floor, basketball hoops, and bleachers along the wall. What he didn’t see in the gym was a sign that anyone else was there. No one stirred in the corner shadows. No sound rose to the rafters.

  The weight room’s entrance was on the other side of the gymnasium. Instead of crossing the open gym floor, Kat opted for the cover of the bleachers. Stumbling in the darkness, she and Henry dodged the metal grid work under the stands until they were on the other side, right next to the weight room.

  Its door was open, and both Kat and Henry peered inside. The lights were off. The room was empty.

  The door next to the weight room led to the lockers. If Kat felt any hesitation about entering a place marked Boys Only, she didn’t show it. She burst through the locker room door and immediately pivoted on her heels to see if anyone was behind it.

  No one was.

  “Clear,” she whispered
.

  Henry moved into the locker room, buffeted by the smell of steam, sweat, and urine. A small office sat to his right, its door closed and its lights off. The rest of the place was aglow, lit by fluorescent bulbs buzzing overhead.

  Kat tried the door to the office. “It’s locked. Go check the shower.”

  Henry crossed the room, running past rows of lockers until he reached the communal shower. It was empty, but remnants of steam warmed his face.

  “Someone was just here,” he said.

  Kat turned from the office’s front window, where her face had been pressed against the glass.

  “But if it was Troy, where did he go?”

  Henry didn’t have an answer. Troy Gunzelman’s car sat in the parking lot, but there was no sign of him inside. Not good odds for the quarterback.

  While Kat poked through a closet filled with sporting equipment, Henry checked each row of lockers, looking for something amiss. He found it in the second to last row, where the door of one locker was ajar. A crumpled towel lay on the floor in front of it.

  Henry moved to the locker, dropped to his knees, and touched the towel. It was still damp. Rising to his feet, he looked inside the locker.

  A squirrel peered back at him.

  The animal was dead. Motionless, it lay on a sweat-drenched T-shirt, its beady eyes pointed directly at him.

  “I found something!”

  “What is it?”

  “You need to come see for yourself.”

  Joining him, Kat looked in the locker and cursed. She grabbed the squirrel and examined its stomach. A thin line scarred the gray fur, closed up by a series of stitches. Kat drilled an index finger between two of the sutures. When she removed it, the tip was coated with a beige powder that emitted a slight pine scent.

  “Sawdust,” she said. “The thing has been stuffed.”

  Just like the cat in George Winnick’s barn. Henry knew with certainty that whoever abducted George had just done the same thing with Perry Hollow’s star quarterback, in the exact same manner. Which meant that not only was Troy Gunzelman missing. He was also most likely a dead man.

  SIXTEEN

  The first wave of backup, courtesy of the county sheriff, arrived at six forty-five. State troopers showed up five minutes after that. Together, they helped Kat seal up the locker room. Then the gymnasium. Then the school itself.

  At seven, Kat contacted Carl and told him to remain at the station. They had enough manpower for the time being and she wanted someone there in case Troy turned up alive and well.

  “Has word on the street leaked out yet?” she asked.

  “Not yet, but Lisa Gunzelman’s been calling nonstop. I told her you’d tell her what’s going on.”

  Kat did, at seven thirty. She was brief, telling Lisa only that Troy was missing, police were looking for him, and that she needed to stay home by the phone in case he called. She didn’t mention the death notice. Or George Winnick. Or how the town wasn’t as safe as she thought.

  After that, Kat called Lou van Sickle and asked her to pick up James from Jeremy’s house and babysit until she got home. Dinner and fireworks were no longer on her schedule.

  “Just tell him I have to work,” Kat said. “Feed him. Take him to the fireworks. Then tuck him in and tell him I love him.”

  The first member of Nick Donnelly’s task force arrived just after eight. It was Tony Vasquez, who greeted Kat in the school’s parking lot with a fist bump. Upon seeing Henry Goll, he said, “You again. Are you a cop or a reporter?”

  “Neither,” Henry said.

  “Then what are you doing here?”

  In truth, Henry was stuck with Kat for the moment. She didn’t want to let him out of her sight, not with a killer still at large. The obituary writer might not have wanted police protection, but he needed it. And for the moment, being in the same spot with her was the best protection Kat could give.

  “He’s with me,” she said.

  The answer was good enough for Trooper Vasquez, who said, “I called Nick and told him what happened. He’s trying to get here now.”

  “Where is he?”

  “Upstate New York. With the Betsy Ross Killer.”

  The Betsy Ross Killer, who, it turned out, wasn’t Perry Hollow’s killer, despite his confession. Kat should have been angry at Lieutenant Donnelly and his team for not knowing that sooner. But she didn’t have time for anger. Another resident of her town was missing and she needed to find him.

  “What can I do to help?” Tony asked.

  “Start a search party.”

  “Where should we look?”

  Kat had no idea. If Troy was still alive—which seemed less likely with each passing minute—then he was probably in the same place where the killer had dispatched George Winnick. If he was dead, then his body could be anywhere, perhaps even the exact spot where she had found George.

  “Old Mill Road,” Kat said. “See if you can set up a checkpoint there, too. Tell them to stop every pickup truck they see.”

  Soon after Tony left to round up volunteers, Rudy Taylor showed up to take his place. Dressed in a tuxedo, he looked like a high school freshman arriving for his first prom.

  “I’m a backup violinist for the Philadelphia Orchestra,” he said, explaining the outfit. “We had an Independence Day concert at the art museum.”

  Kat didn’t care where Rudy had come from or what he was wearing. She just needed someone with a mind as keen as his examining the crime scene.

  Inside the locker room, she led him to Troy’s locker. The dead squirrel was still inside.

  “We found this. Stuffed. Just like the cat.”

  Rudy loosened his bow tie and looked around the locker room. “There’s a mess of DNA in here. Sweat. Pubic hair. A thousand prints on every conceivable surface. This won’t be easy.”

  As Rudy went to work, Kat retreated outside, where Henry still waited. He sat on the sidewalk, back pressed against the side of the school. The Kevlar vest had been removed and now sat next to him in a heap.

  “I think I have time to take you home now,” Kat said. “So get in the car before I change my mind.”

  Henry grabbed the vest and got to his feet without speaking. He climbed into the passenger seat of the Crown Vic. Kat slid behind the wheel. As soon as she started the car, Carl Bauersox’s voice squawked from the radio.

  “Chief? You there?”

  “I’m here,” Kat said. “What’s happening?”

  “Bad news. I just got a call from someone out on Squall Lane.”

  The lane was a pine-shaded road that ran parallel to Lake Squall’s western shore. A few million-dollar vacation homes dotted the area, built by wealthy Philadelphians looking for a taste of rustic living.

  “What did he want?”

  “He said he just saw a coffin floating in the middle of the lake.”

  Kat noted the caller’s choice of words. Not box. Coffin. Just like the trucker who first spotted George Winnick.

  “I’ll be right there. Meet me by the boat launch as soon as you can.”

  _______

  Kat and Henry beat the deputy to the police department’s boat by a minute. Once Carl arrived, the three of them hopped into the ancient ten-footer that was kept handy for the occasional water rescue. Despite its age, the boat got the job done, cutting quickly across the lake’s glassy surface.

  Kat sat next to Henry at the front of the boat, their eyes scanning separate sides of the horizon.

  “See anything?”

  Henry shook his head. “Nothing.”

  The night boasted a half-moon, which made Kat grateful. Low in the sky, it cast a glow over the water so bright they barely needed to use the spotlight mounted on the bow of the boat. On the shore, narrow beams of light bounced through the trees next to the water. Flashlights, no doubt manned by volunteer state troopers. Tony Vasquez’s search party was already under way.

  Turning to Carl, who manned the motor in the back, Kat asked, “This guy who called, where
does he live?”

  Carl pointed across the lake to a massive, lodge-style house pressed against the water’s edge. A solitary figure stood on its wide deck, backlit by the home’s interior lights as he watched the boat pass. When Kat waved, the figure waved back, arm arcing widely in the moonlight. She wondered who the mystery resident was and how he knew it was a coffin floating in the lake.

  Overhead, a bottle rocket sliced the sky. A second later, a boom erupted through the clouds. It was followed by a red glow that briefly shimmered in the sky. Next came two more booms and two more flares of color, this time green and yellow.

  Fireworks. They were being set off right on schedule.

  Kat looked in their direction, seeing the shimmering colors just above the tree line at the lake’s far shore. The more powerful ones cleared the trees entirely, rising high before exploding into blooms of fire that reflected off the water’s surface.

  Next to her, Henry rose to his feet.

  “I think I see it.”

  Kat’s gaze swept away from the sky and across the lake, stopping at a dark rectangle bobbing a few yards from shore. Following her orders, Carl steered the boat in the object’s direction. He cut the engine when they drew close, letting the boat drift the rest of the way.

  As the fireworks continued overhead, Kat swiveled the boat’s light toward the rectangle. Illuminated, it looked like an exact copy of the coffin George Winnick was found in. Untreated wood. No visible markings. Obviously handmade.

  Reaching beneath her seat, Kat grabbed a retractable pole with a large metal hook attached to the end. Extending the pole to its full length, she swung it out over the water. The hook caught a corner of the coffin, and with Henry’s help, she pulled it toward them.

  The coffin hit the side of the boat with a jarring thud. Something was inside it, that much was certain. A hollow box couldn’t have caused that much of an impact.

  Once again, the coffin’s lid had been nailed shut, although Kat had cracked it when she hit it with the pole. That corner was slightly askew, creating an opening large enough for her to slide her fingers inside. With Henry leaning over the side of the boat to steady the coffin, Kat pried the lid up, easing a nail out of the wood. She did the same to each subsequent nail, working diligently until she had one side loose. A grunt and a tug took care of the rest.