Hidden Fire, Kobo

by Terry Odell

  "Whatever. He's good for the basics, but nobody gets to see him mix glazes or load the kiln when he's firing his personal stuff. His secret formulas are locked up somewhere and he doesn't work here when he's creating one of his collections."

  "I heard he has apprentices doing some of the basic household pieces he sells. You know, his coffee and tea sets. I can understand him not wanting to crank out a thousand coffee mugs." She tried to keep her tone casual, her face mildly curious. Surely it would be normal for a prospective student to try to get the inside skinny on the workings of the school.

  "If he does, it's not here," Nikki said. "He teaches the undergrads throwing and sculpting techniques." She huffed. "That is, for about one out of four lectures and labs. It's us—the grad students—who do most of it."

  "What about the advanced work? Like what you're doing. Is he helpful?"

  She looked away before answering, as if she was afraid someone would hear. "Overall, yes. He's not always accessible, but I guess you've figured that out for yourself."

  "That doesn't sound fair," Sarah said.

  "Maybe not, but we come out of this place with an advanced degree and we can say we studied under the magnificent Hugh Garrigue. It's an entry ticket to gallery showings."

  Sarah tried to remember if she'd seen any of Nikki's work last night, if it might be something she could sell. But that would mean admitting she owned That Special Something and she didn't want to take a chance someone would make the Garrigue connection.

  Nikki led her into one of the studio rooms where eight students sat at wheels and others worked at benches along the perimeter of two walls. She thought of the seniors she worked with at Saint Michael's. She roamed from wheel to wheel. Most students gave her a cursory once-over and continued creating. Trays of clay figures stood on racks along another wall, drying until they could be fired. Nowhere in the room could she see pedestal-based mugs.

  "How many workrooms like this do you have?" she asked.

  "Six," Nikki said.

  "I don't see a kiln in here. Where do you fire?"

  "The kilns are down in the basement, near the loading dock."

  Under what she hoped was the guise of legitimate questions, Sarah followed Nikki through the department until she had to teach her class.

  "Good to meet you," Nikki said. "Hope I didn't put you off. This is a great campus."

  "I'll wander a bit," Sarah said. "If that's all right."

  "Enjoy."

  Sarah went through the studios, searching for anything she could report to Randy, stopping here and there to chat with the occasional student. Most seemed quite pleased with the program, but consensus was Hugh Garrigue carried around a surplus of ego. He wasn't usually gone as long has he had been this time, but nobody seemed to think it out of character.

  When noon came and went and she hadn't heard from Randy, she tried not to let it get under her skin. He might be on vacation, but he was following a lead. Probably lost track of time. Hunger gnawed at her stomach and she thought of the muffins in Randy's truck. He'd undoubtedly eaten them by now. She glanced at her phone. The signal was weak, but not so low that a call wouldn't come through. At least she didn't think so. Or had she missed one? She checked the log. Nothing since she'd used it last. Maybe she'd go outside and try from there. Meanwhile, she set it to vibrate and shoved it in her pocket where she'd notice a call.

  Irritation mounted. They'd discussed this. He'd promised to stay in touch and this was vacation, or so he kept saying. Not official police business. Had he been honest?

  She stormed down the corridor. A bell rang. Doors opened. People filled the narrow hallway and she played human pinball dodging them while looking for an exit.

  "Sorry," she repeated as she made her way toward a door with a red illuminated exit sign above it. She found herself in a stairwell. Remembering Nikki said the kilns were on the lower level, she went in that direction.

  At the bottom of the stairwell, she pushed on the metal bar of the steel exit door and found herself in a dimly lit corridor. She aimed for the red exit sign above a door to her left. On the way, a door labeled "Kiln Room" roused her curiosity. She twisted the knob. When it opened, she stepped inside.

  A maze of kilns of varying ages, sizes and shapes filled the room. Wooden shelves held pieces waiting to be fired—some bisque, some glazed. She picked her way through the room for a closer look. Nothing resembled the kind of work Hugh Garrigue sold on his website or had sent her for her shop. Although much of it was quite good, it still had a student quality overall. Still no pedestal-based mugs. Not surprising, considering. After all, if they were being used for smuggling, he'd probably make them somewhere else.

  Like wherever he was? And what good was she doing here? Play-acting. She was no detective. She glanced at her watch. Twelve-thirty. So much for Randy's promise of an hour. It had been two.

  The door opened. A couple walked in pushing a cart laden with greenware, voices hushed but from the tone, definitely arguing. Sarah froze for an instant, then ducked behind the nearest pottery-filled shelf unit, peering between a row of bisque-fired vases.

  The woman walked over to one of the kilns. "This one's free."

  "Relax, baby," the man said. "No worries. Everything's going to be cool. The term's almost over and we'll be out of this dump." He loaded pottery into the open kiln. "I can hear the surf, smell the sunscreen and taste the rum. Until then, it's business as usual." He pushed the empty cart aside. "Okay?" His voice softened.

  "Okay," she whispered.

  They definitely weren't arguing anymore. They were also between her and the door. Sarah made herself as invisible as possible, hoping they wouldn't go much further. Heat radiated against her back. She ignored it as she tried to ignore the sounds of growing ardor from the couple. Neither showed signs of abating and sweat trickled from her scalp down her neck. Soon, her shirt was damp and clung to her. Her leg muscles protested the position. She shifted, nudging the pottery rack enough to jiggle the vases.

  She froze. The couple was still lip-locked. Had they heard?

  "You hear that?" the man asked, still kissing the woman.

  Sarah held her breath.

  "Mmm. Hear what?" the woman murmured.

  "Sounded like pots moving. I should check."

  "Geez," the woman said. "You're more paranoid than I am. Things settle in here all the time. Someone slams a door down the hall and everything rattles." She gave a throaty laugh. "Besides, I've always said I can make the earth move for you." From the shadows, Sarah saw the woman adjust her blouse and finger-comb her hair. "We should be going anyway. I've got a class in ten minutes. You can take up where you left off tonight."

  Sarah peeked between the shelves and bit her lip to keep from crying out when she realized who they were. She cowered behind the pottery, willing them to move faster, to leave already. When the door finally closed, she grabbed her phone and punched in Randy's number.

  Answer. Where are you?

  The ringing stopped, but she heard nothing from the other end. "Hello? Randy?" she said in a loud stage whisper.

  Some faint static, then nothing. She pushed the door open a crack, looking in both directions down the hall. Empty. She hurried to the exit door and crept onto the loading dock. With a full-strength signal on her phone at last, she ducked behind a stack of cartons and called Randy again.

  "They're here," she said as soon as she heard him answer. "Both of them. I was wrong again. I didn't think they were together, but they were and it sounded like they're involved like we thought he might be only it's both of them." She paused, gasping for breath.

  "Slow down, Sarah. Deep breath. Count to ten."

  "Ten, shmen. It was them. You have to get here. Fast."

  "What are you talking about?"

  "Saturday. Two customers, waiting for Jennifer to get their stuff. First I thought they were together, but they didn't match. He was in jeans, not sloppy, but a notch below casual. She was all elegant. They separated and I re
member thinking I was right that they weren't a couple. That they simply happened to be standing next to each other when I came out. He went off to browse and she stood near the counter, but then I had customers to deal with."

  "So two of your customers are on campus. Did you find out who they are?"

  She clenched the phone in her fist. "Not her, but he's the ATM guy. My customer. The one who wasn't really Walter Young." She paused. "I didn't mention that part, did I?"

  "No, you didn't. All right. Where are you and where is he?" The concern in his tone made her shudder.

  "I'm outside the ceramics lab building, at the loading dock. Behind a pile of cartons," she added. "Kind of hiding."

  "Good move. Stay exactly where you are. I should be there in ten minutes, tops."

  Automatically, she checked her watch. She hoped his estimate wasn't like his one-hour prediction. "All right."

  Seconds ticked by, each one taking several minutes. She watched the entrance to the loading area for Randy's black pickup, ears tuned for the return of the man who wasn't Walter Young and his companion.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Randy wheeled the F-150 through town and strove to keep his pulse under control. The sound of Sarah's voice when she called sent his pulse racing, sweat dripping and nausea roiling. It also gave him a good excuse to leave Gloria Osgood's parlor and her disgusting lemonade.

  His encounter at the garage had yielded nothing more than a squatter who Kovak would have pegged as a taco short of a combination plate. The real Walter Young's house was locked tight and deserted, but well maintained. Curtains or shades on all the windows. No car in the carport.

  From there, he'd tracked down Gloria Osgood, the property owner who made Maggie Cooper seem reticent. However, in exchange for some information and what was turning into a killer headache, he'd endured three glasses of her homemade lemonade. Apparently the concept of sweet was foreign to her.

  Wearing black slacks and a long-sleeved tunic-length shirt with flowers appliquéd across her ample chest, the woman had greeted him warmly and insisted he come in and sit if she was going to answer his questions. "It's so nice to have someone to talk to," she'd said. "I recently retired from nursing. I'm still getting used to all the free time. Maybe I'll pick up some part-time hours."

  Her steel-gray hair was cut short, her gray eyes magnified by black-framed glasses. She'd confirmed Hugh Garrigue had rented from her years ago, when he was newly arrived in town. Although she was aware of his current standing in the art community, she hadn't seen or heard from him since he paid his last rent check.

  "He has family in Alabama, I think he said. Or was it Arkansas? One of those redneck states. I remember that much, because he seemed so westernized," she'd said. "No Southern accent at all." If the man had managed to get a word in edgewise. He wondered if she'd heard him speak enough to discern an accent.

  She'd had nothing negative to say about Walter Young. A perfect tenant. That in itself sent Randy's cop antennae twitching. Nobody was perfect unless they were trying to be invisible. Paid his rent on time, kept the yard looking nice. Worked at the University. She knew nothing about his family. Those details didn't matter to her. When someone filled out a rental application, she merely verified they were employed where they said they were and the University had vouched for him. Likewise for Trent Wallace, her other renter, although Randy hadn't had a chance to check out that property.

  Randy would have liked a peek at the rental agreements, but couldn't figure a way to ask for them within the boundaries of his quickly fabricated cover story. As it was, she'd kept the conversation bouncing around like a tennis match and he didn't think his questions were beyond the scope of his make-believe survey about rental property owners. The vacant house, she said, was going to be renovated in the spring and she'd thanked him for letting her know someone had been living in the garage.

  The campus came into view at last and he passed the playing field, crossed Harpst Street and wound his way through the cluster of buildings Sarah had visited yesterday. Behind the ceramics lab, she'd said. He hadn't seen this side of the buildings. He searched for a loading dock and yanked the wheel hard when he spotted it. He'd barely pulled into the lot when a flash of Sarah's chestnut hair, followed by the rest of her, popped up from beside the loading platform.

  He stopped the truck and she yanked the door open. Seeing her, hearing the seatbelt click shut as she settled into her seat, filled him with relief. He suppressed his desire to touch her. And even more, he refrained from saying anything about how worried he'd been. A lesson he'd finally learned. She didn't like visible protection.

  "Go," she said.

  "Where? Do you know where they went?"

  "Oh," she said in a small voice. "Guess not."

  He pushed his sunglasses up and pressed his fingers to his temples. "They could be anywhere. You said they were in the ceramics lab?"

  "Yes, both of them. I don't know her name, but she's slinky with salon-induced red hair. I'd know her if I saw her."

  "So they were both in your store and both here. How do you know they were pretending not to know each other before? Maybe they're acquaintances, or business associates and were interested in different things."

  She nibbled at her lip. "A feeling I guess. In the shop they were … pointedly casual. But here, they definitely know each other. Well. Very well. As in I was afraid they were going to have jungle monkey sex right then and there. That well."

  "I get it."

  She pulled out her phone. "Let me try to reach Jennifer. See if she remembers what they bought."

  He waited, half-listening to her side of the conversation, trying not to think about the way Gloria Osgood's lemonade was churning in his stomach.

  Sarah put the phone down, grinning like the canary-eating cat. "She remembers. The man bought a set of four pedestal coffee mugs. She remembers the cash payment and that he signed the guest book, said he was a Garrigue collector."

  "The mug purchase moves him higher on our suspect list. What about the woman?"

  "She didn't buy pottery at all. She wanted Jennifer to check on some napkin rings to see if we had enough for a set of twelve."

  "All right," he said. "No need for them both to buy the mugs if they're together. But what's their connection to the university? Students? Staff? Faculty?"

  "I don't know. They were loading a kiln. Can't you check with your campus cop friend?"

  "About what?"

  "I don't know. You're the cop. Find out where he works, or if he's a student. Or her. They wouldn't have been loading a kiln without a reason."

  "Okay, start at the beginning. One step at a time."

  She recounted what she'd heard, but nothing tracked. All he heard was Gloria Osgood's yammering. His head throbbed in rhythm to her remembered words.

  "You all right?" Sarah asked. "You look pale. Your stomach?"

  "Headache," he said. The world went out of focus for a minute and he rubbed his eyes. "There's aspirin in the glove box."

  She found them and handed him the bottle. He popped the cap and dry-swallowed two.

  "How can you stand that?" she asked.

  "One of my many talents."

  "So what now? Do we drive around looking for them? Or—" she looked at her watch. "Come back here tomorrow morning at nine."

  "How do you know that? Did you hear them?"

  "No, but figure greenware will take nine hours to fire and twelve to cool. They'll have to unload it or risk someone messing with it."

  "Sounds good. I'm going to give Rachel Michaelis the information, update Kovak and the chief and then you and I are going to drive up the coast and commune with the redwoods for a couple of hours. I'm not a cop in California. I have no authority here. Everyone has been cooperative, but bottom line is it's their job, not mine."

  "But don't you want to break the case? Be the one to provide the missing piece?"

  He considered it through the twisted mat of thoughts in his brain. "I want the case
to be solved. Nobody should get away with murder, or smuggling, or breaking up someone's livelihood. But right here, right now, I'm happy to hand the efforts off for a few hours to have some time with you."

  Her smile eased some of his pain. So did knowing he wasn't going to panic worrying about her being caught in the middle of a police investigation that might get ugly. A walk through the redwoods would do them both a lot of good.

  He backed away from the loading dock and drove between the buildings and across the parking lot. "I need to call in what I have," he said. "See if Kovak can send me a copy of the ATM picture of your customer. Then I'm going to talk to Rachel Michaelis."

  She furrowed her brows. "Are you telling me to go somewhere where I can't hear?"

  "No, not at all." He tried for a smile, but the aspirin hadn't kicked in yet and his face hurt. "I'm letting you know what I'm doing. Like I said I would."

  "That's good enough for me. I could use a ladies' room as long as you'll be busy."

  She left for the building and he punched in Kovak's number. "Can you trace Walter Young's car?" he asked.

  "Hang on. Find something?"

  "Just a hunch." He waited, wishing the aspirin would take effect. Kovak came back on the line. "A '97 Nissan Altima. Black."

  "Plate?"

  Kovak recited the information.

  "I was by his place. It's locked up tight, no car in the carport. Things are starting to connect. Call County, ask for Hannibal or Eldridge. One of them should have the witness reports and the CSI skinny on tire tracks. A partial of that plate rings a bell. It might have been at our crime scene." He rubbed his temples. "You have anything?"

  "Maybe. How does a lead on our killer sound?"

  * * * * *

  Sarah stared at herself in the mirror. Between the heat of the kiln and nerves, she'd sweated enough to wish she could shower and wash her stringy hair. She settled for washing her face and finger-wetting her hair, then aimed the air from the hand dryer at her head. More like a hair-don't, she decided after viewing the results, but there wasn't much else she could do. Besides, Randy'd seen her looking worse than this and she didn't think the redwoods would mind.