by Jean Rabe
“Spencer County,” Paul said glumly. “Things like this, serial killers, ain’t supposed to happen in a place like Spencer County.”
“Damn straight.”
“Wonder if there are more bodies out there? From this killer?”
Oren shrugged. “In between things JJ’s checking with sheriff departments in Kentucky, seeing if they’ve got any Christmas corpses. Nothing else in Indiana that’s popped up. But something in Henderson might be related, she said. Something marked as an accidental death that she got the report on. If there’s a thread, somebody will drive over there tomorrow after Conrad’s funeral and talk to Henderson police.”
“Piper said the guy bought eleven Merry Christmas mugs. Did you know that, Oren? Eleven. Didn’t buy the last one in the case because the design on it was crooked, Piper said. Eleven.”
“Didn’t know that,” Oren said. But he’d been avoiding working with the new sheriff, avoided being in the same room with her when possible. “Good time to be Jewish, eh? Make sure they take good care of you, Paul. I’ll try to get back here Saturday.”
He stopped in the waiting room to introduce himself to Anthony Delaney, who was sitting cross-legged on the floor, hands on his knees, eyes closed, and lips working. He waited for the monk to finish whatever he was doing. When Anthony opened his eyes, Oren could tell he’d been crying.
“I’m Oren Rosenberg, the chief deputy.”
Anthony stood and held out a hand. “Pleased to meet you. Actually, I think I remember you. I was younger.”
“I used to be younger, too.” Oren put on his hat. “I’m sorry about your father, sorry for your loss.”
“Thank you.” Anthony bowed his head. “And for Sweet Abby T, Sam Reynolds, and most likely Jake. Detective Gerald told me that Jake is dead, too.”
“Yes, I’m sorry for all of them.”
“Life is temporary,” Anthony said. “And Buddha posed that we should not worry about temporary things. But it should not be a murderer’s purview to decide how temporary someone’s life is.”
Oren didn’t have a response. He waited a beat. “I’d like to ask you about your father.” Oren figured Piper had plenty of time to talk to him, driving him back from the airport. But she might not have asked the right questions. Randy had obviously talked to him, too.
“Everyone seems to want to ask about my father.” Anthony let out a deep sigh. “Actually, I’d have time to talk on the way back to Rockport. Give me a lift? Detective Gerald suggested I ask you for a ride. I came here in the ambulance with Mr. Blackwell, and a little while ago he asked me to go back to his house and take care of his pug. He gave me a key. I’m staying there for a few days, and—”
“Sure, I’ll give you a ride.” He noticed the monk didn’t have a coat. “Did you get any dinner?”
A head shake.
“We’ll stop at this little diner on the way. My treat. I’m hungry, too.”
Oren figured what’s one more long night, right?
Twenty-Seven
Randy wanted to solve this by himself. He knew Oren was just as driven; neither had been faced with a serial killer in the county before, and neither wanted a twenty-three-year-old first-time sheriff to take credit for catching the guy.
Randy wanted that credit.
“Do you like her?” Oren had asked him more than a few times.
He still couldn’t say that he didn’t like her. Piper had given him no reason not to like her…other than her age, which by itself wasn’t enough reason. But he didn’t like working for her. She’d probably ream him a new one if she knew he was pursuing a suspect without writing the name of the guy on her precious whiteboard and telling her about it. She’d have every right to be pissed…suspected she’d be seriously pissed when she found out how lax Buck had been. He could wiggle around the chain-of-command thing; tell her he didn’t want to burden her about a lead when she had her father to worry over.
Randy figured he would benefit more from the victory of solving the case than Oren would. At sixty-five, Oren was likely going to retire soon, maybe real soon if Piper passed the sheriff’s exam in April. So solving the case wouldn’t do the grizzled chief deputy all that much good—outside of going out on a high note and grabbing some headlines. And Randy could slip into the chief deputy job if Oren left, but the more he thought about, the more he knew he really didn’t want to work for a twenty-three-year-old newbie.
For Randy…solving a case like this would open a lot of doors and get him out from under Piper Blackwell. There would be plenty of headlines; and not just in the itty bitty county weekly. Headlines in the big Indianapolis paper, in the Evansville Courier, and it would make the national wires—because serial killers were gruesome news that people all over the country were fascinated with. Hell, maybe Randy would gain enough notoriety that he could push for the chief deputy posting over in Vanderburgh, and then he’d run for the top spot there come the next election. Catching a serial killer would give him a great campaign platform. Sheriff Randy Gerald.
But to make the catch, he’d have to work fast. Piper was calling in the State sometime tomorrow. They’d probably send investigators down over the weekend. And she’d mentioned the F.B.I., too. Crap. Serial killer? Four victims? The big Fed guns might turn out in force and try to take his glory.
The killer was a county man, or someone who had county ties. Randy had always been rock-solid certain of that. And so he should be caught by a county deputy…by the county detective. Maybe Randy would get enough material to write one of those true crime books. A case like this, posing people to replicate Christmas cards, that ought to sell, right? Maybe someone would make a movie out of it, if not a big theatrical release staring Matt Damon or Daniel Craig, then at least one of those made-for-TV Lifetime shows. He’d be happy with either.
If Buck had been thorough, had given half a shit about doing his job, the clues would have fallen together faster and Randy might have been driving to Owensboro two days ago to follow this lead, not getting ready to do so right now. He stopped back at the office to look at one of his reports, just to make sure he had the right address—no use storming into Kentucky if he didn’t know where he was going. He checked on Merry while he was there, and walked her out to pee next to the car tire.
He glanced up, the sky was clear and the stars out in serious numbers, diamonds scattered on black velvet, one of his former girlfriends used to say. The only lights that competed were at the edges of the parking lot. In a big city the stars were harder to see because of all the street and business lights. The sheriff’s department sat near the downtown, but there wasn’t much operating along the main street anymore. A few taverns, an antique shop that opened when the aging owner had the whim, Harlan Crook’s law office. God, he loved this small town and this rural county; he liked the feel of it. The air was good here. Still, he was going to be destined for greater things in a much bigger place if this played out the way it was looking. And if his hunch was wrong, he’d pull in Oren and they’d come up with another suspect to chase.
But he hoped he was right.
His breath puffed away like he was sending smoke signals to God. Dear God, let me be right. The dog hunched near the sidewalk. Randy hadn’t brought anything with him to pick up the poop. He went back inside and tucked Merry in the kennel. Time to get going.
“I thought you were done for the day,” Teegan chimed from her office. “Didn’t you say you were done?”
“Still working,” he said. “I’ve got another thing to check on.”
“Something good?”
“Very strong lead. I’ll radio you if it turns into anything.” He looked in through her doorway. “Hey, I still need you to walk the dog before you go. I need to keep her here for a while, understand? Consider her evidence.” Because she really is.
“Sure thing.” She smacked her gum. “How’s Paul?”
“Still breathing.”
“Breathing’s good.”
Randy headed south and across th
e bridge that led to Kentucky.
The scanner chatter was light. He listened to a report of a DUI north of Rockport; apparently someone had stopped at a tavern after work, drank too much, and then while attempting to go home instead plowed into a tree. DUIs…the number one ticketed offense in Spencer County.
He pulled the recorder out of his pocket, sat it on the passenger’s seat. Randy had spotted Anthony Delaney in the ER waiting room, recognizing him—even without hair—because of the pictures at Conrad’s house. Randy stopped to chat with the monk before visiting Paul, and he recorded the conversation just as he had when he’d interviewed others these past few days.
And when Randy was through, he almost didn’t stop to visit Paul. He was excited, thought he might be onto something, wanted to pursue this angle right now. But he’d bought the chocolates, and he was only a dozen or so yards away from the former sheriff. Still, he hadn’t stayed long at Paul’s bedside, not even five minutes, bumped into Oren on his way out, and that stalled him. He nearly grabbed Oren by the shoulders and told him about the discovery. But fortunately he’d stopped himself. He really couldn’t afford to share this. Oren most certainly would want to go with him, and then the credit would be divided.
Fifteen years with the Spencer County Sheriff’s Department, the lone detective, this would be his. He wouldn’t have to call the twenty-three-year-old sheriff “boss” much longer.
He turned down the scanner, pressed play on his recorder, and cranked the volume.
“Do you mind if I record this?”
“No. That’s fine,” Anthony had said.
“How do I refer to you? Brother? Or—”
“Please call me Tony.”
“Tony, good. I’m sorry about your dad, Tony. No one deserves to die like that, murdered. The neighbors all spoke well of Conrad.” The faint clatter of a wheeled medicine cart was heard in the background. “It’s our job to find the man who killed your father…and Abigail Thornbridge and—”
“Sweet Abby T. She’d sent me another fruitcake some weeks ago. I’d told the sheriff that.”
“Did you know Sweet Abby T well?” Obviously, Randy had thought, otherwise she would not have sent him a fruitcake.
“She was the principal at my grade school, had been one of my father’s teachers…when she was right out of college. I liked her. A small place like this, it is easy to become friends with people of all ages, to see them at picnics and church socials. I’d stayed in touch with her when I left the States.”
“We think the murders are connected.”
“I understand that.”
“There’s a connection with Jacob Wallem, too.”
“Jake? My dad wrote that Jake did some work for him and—”
“Yeah, well we’re pretty sure Jacob Wallem was murdered by the same guy.” Randy had paused, gauging Tony’s reaction. The monk’s stoic face had shifted to disbelief, then sadness. He’d wished Piper had broached the death of Jacob Wallem, but he realized she’d not had the time, just coming from Wallem’s house, no positive ID made. “Samuel Reynolds is dead, too.”
“Another childhood friend of mine.”
“Yeah, I’d gathered that from a Christmas card your dad had sent Sam, mentioned some of your old toys he wanted to give to Sam’s children.”
There were no words for a few minutes, the click-clack of someone’s heels against the tile, the shoosh of double-doors opening as a man came into the ER coughing up a lung. On a chair in the waiting room across from them a young woman had hummed. Randy had noticed she had earbuds and a cord leading to a shiny blue mp3 player in her pocket; looked healthy, probably waiting for somebody who wasn’t.
“Related, all of it,” Anthony had pronounced. “But why would someone kill these people? Harmless people. Good people. I’d heard from all of them at Christmas, got cards and letters.”
Randy had wondered why people would send Christmas cards to a Buddhist monk. But then he recalled that Conrad Delaney had sent a Christmas card to the Jewish coroner. Maybe they were all just keeping in touch, and Christmas gave them an excuse to do that.
“We’re working on that, a motive. It doesn’t appear to be robbery.”
Anthony had shaken his head. “Sammy didn’t have much money. He struggled to keep his farm. He would email me sometimes, ask about the weather in Thailand, tell me about his bills. I should have emailed him back more often, but I limited my time on the computer.”
So Buddhist monks used computers. Not so primitive as he’d imagined.
“Better than here, the weather in Thailand, I suspect,” Randy had said so softly the recorder barely picked it up.
“Do you have suspects, Detective?”
“I’m not at liberty to discuss that.” Randy had heard that particular line several times in cop-themed television shows. “I can tell you, however, that we’ve been talking to a lot of people. Interviewing people who knew the victims.”
“Like you are interviewing me?”
“Yeah.”
“Have you talked to my brother? Zach might be able to help. He knew all of those people, too. A few years ago he used to help Jake with the beagle rescue group. He might have a better idea who would mean those people harm.”
“I’ll probably talk to him again tomorrow after your dad’s funeral.”
“It is a sad occasion, the funeral, but I look forward to seeing Zach again. He is going to pick me up at Mr. Blackwell’s house, where I am staying, drive me to the funeral and to the cemetery.”
“How long will you be staying, Tony?”
Another cart clattered by and the sick man kept coughing. Thankfully, a nurse appeared and ushered the man down the hall. Probably pneumonia, Randy had thought.
“I planned for two weeks, but my return ticket is open-ended. I might stay a little longer, attend the other funerals, look in on old friends. Sheriff Blackwell says my father’s house will be cleared soon and so I can stay there. Though this is sad, it will be good to spend time with my brother.”
“You haven’t seen him in a while.”
“We email from time-to-time, have for several years, but I have not seen him since I left the States after graduation. Too long, I realize, but the time was like butter, so easily it melted.”
“Yeah.” There was more silence, and Randy had noted this wasn’t like the previous interviews he’d conducted. The other people thought they needed to fill up the silence with small talk, but the monk just sat there. Eventually, Randy started again. “I imagine Zachary will be glad to catch up with you, too.”
“Face to face will be better than our scant emails. I hope I can help him find a new job, help him with his resume, look through all the classified ads in the paper and on the Internet.”
Randy had been puzzled. He’d remembered Zachary saying he worked at Plank Manor out on Heartland in Owensboro, that he’d been there a while and was going for a promotion, and that he could only get three days off for Conrad’s death.
“He been out of work long, your brother?”
“Since around Thanksgiving, I believe. He said it was a seasonal lay-off, too many employees. But I knew better. Zach always had trouble holding a job. He’d done something to get himself fired, I know. He has not yet found inner peace. Perhaps I can help with that, too.”
Randy hadn’t known what to say after that, but his mind churned. Zachary Delaney had been on Buck’s list of people to double-check, verify alibis. Buck had signed off on Zachary, but he couldn’t have made any calls, or he would have flagged the fact that Zach had lied in the initial interview about being employed and punching a time clock. Lie about one thing…lie about something else.
The silence got to Randy for a change. “You mentioned your brother knew Jake, something about beagle rescue?”
“My brother loves dogs.”
Randy had sat down at that point, rubbed his chin and felt the stubble he’d forgot to take a razor to this morning. Randy couldn’t explain it, but the hairs on the back of his nec
k fairly danced. He was getting close to something important.
“Loves dogs?”
“We had one when were kids. What is the saying?” The monk pursed his lips in thought. “I remember. Everyone believes they have the best dog in the world, and every one of them is right. Duke was the best dog ever.”
“Tell me about it, please.”
“Sure, but what does that have to do with your investigation? How will that help find my father’s killer?”
Randy had been quick to answer. “I’m trying to find out more about your father. Even years back to when you were a kid. I paint a picture of the victim, and that helps with the solution. So, go on please.”
Randy remembered that Anthony had smiled sadly, his eyes focusing on something far beyond the ER waiting room.
“Zach, when he was young, had the most amazing mutt, Duke. Maybe a Golden Retriever mix, maybe mixed with a Great Dane. He was huge. Dad had bought him for Zach’s seventh birthday. So naturally he was more Zach’s dog than mine, even though I enjoyed Duke, too. They just fit together, Zach and the dog, did everything together. Duke slept on Zach’s bed.” Anthony stopped.
“Go on,” Randy had urged. “I’d like to hear about Zach and Duke.”
“This isn’t about my father, it’s about a dog.”
“I know, but your father bought the dog.”
“My brother did not kill our father.”
Perceptive, Randy had realized. The monk had figured out that Zach was his suspect.
“Oh, I know he didn’t. I’ve already interviewed your brother. He’s definitely not a suspect.” Randy could lie effortlessly to someone if he needed to. “We had a nice long talk, your brother and me. So, go on about the dog.”
“He was only seven, Duke, when he started falling down and having seizures right after Halloween. We took him to the vet’s. I’d just gotten my driver’s license, so I drove. Zach held him in the back seat. There were x-rays and blood tests, and the vet called it a form of pancreatic cancer. Zach cried so hard.” Another pause.
