Bug Man Suspense 3-in-1 Bundle

by Tim Downs

  “It sounds to me like you’ve learned a lot.”

  “I just wish I’d caught it earlier. It breaks my heart to think how many times I disciplined her for not listening or not paying attention. I didn’t understand that her brain just doesn’t work the same way as other kids’. But Callie’s my first, and they say firstborns are slower to be diagnosed because parents have no other children to compare them to.” She paused. “Maybe I could have paid more attention to her if I hadn’t had my hands full with Michael all the time.”

  Nick let a moment go by before he asked, “What can you tell me about your husband?”

  Kathryn pulled out a chair and slowly sat down. “I met him not long after you left. Michael was passing through town; he stopped at my bank to ask about a farm loan and I did the interview. He was handsome, and confident, and he had all these lofty ideals. He said he had a tomato farm here in Sampson County and he had all these dreams and plans for it. He told me all about organic farming—about toxin-free foods and how it was a debt we owed to future generations. And I believed it, because I believed in him. He was so passionate, so energetic, so convincing. I didn’t realize until later that he was manic-depressive—bipolar I think they call it now. I happened to meet him during one of his manic cycles. There was nothing he couldn’t do, or so it seemed. He just swept me off my feet.” She winced. “That makes me sound so pathetic, but that’s what it boiled down to. Anyway, we had one of those whirlwind romances and we got married just a few weeks later. I gave up my job at the bank. I moved up here with him and we went to work on this farm. That’s when I began to see his other side.”

  “What happened?”

  “He started to crash. He’d hit one of his depressive cycles and he’d get moody, angry, irresponsible—he’d let the farm fall apart and he’d leave the whole thing to me. I’ve got five acres here, Nick—that may not sound like a lot, but it’s way too much to take care of all by yourself. Michael was just no good to anyone during his depressions. He knew it too—and he’d try anything to dig his way out.”

  “Including drugs?”

  “Yes. That’s when he started using, and that’s when things really started going downhill. An organic farm doesn’t generate a lot of cash—we were lucky if we cleared twenty-five, thirty thousand a year. You don’t do this kind of thing for the money—you do it because you’re philosophically committed to it. When Michael started using drugs, our savings disappeared overnight. We were about to lose the farm and I didn’t even know it because Michael kept the books. Losing the money was bad enough, but the drugs—I just won’t put up with that, especially with Callie around. You know how I feel about that.”

  Nick remembered.

  “Then Michael would get clean for a while, and when he did it was like he was a different person—like the person I married. He was always so sorry, and he’d make all these promises about what he was going to do and how he was going to turn things around for us here—but it never happened. The good Michael would just slowly fade away, and the bad Michael would gradually take his place—and the cycle would start all over again. A year ago he moved out—just cleaned out our checking account and left without a word. I tried to find him. I tried to do what I could to help him, but he took all our money and left me with a farm to run and a daughter to raise by myself. What could I do? I felt so guilty. I felt so helpless. I felt . . .”

  She put her face in her hands and began to weep.

  Nick looked over at the little girl, contentedly flipping the pages of her book, oblivious to her mother’s pain. Sometimes it’s nice to have your own little world, he thought. He gave Kathryn a few minutes to regain her composure before he said: “The Sampson County police think your husband’s death might have been drug-related. What do you think?”

  “I honestly don’t know. I hardly even knew him anymore. He’d drop by unexpectedly from time to time, but whenever he did he stayed in the workers’ cottage behind the barn—and he’d always tell me how he was going to make good around here, that he had some big deal he was working on.”

  “What kind of deal?”

  “Who knows? He always said that—Michael always had some deal he was working on that was about to solve all our problems, but it never happened. How do the police know his death was drugrelated?”

  “They don’t—they’re guessing. But it’s a reasonable assumption given the circumstances.”

  “What circumstances?”

  Nick nodded to Callie. “Can we talk in front of her?”

  Kathryn clapped her hands to get her daughter’s attention. “Callie, honey, why don’t you go read in your room for a while?”

  Callie scooped up her books and headed for her room without a word.

  Nick waited until the bedroom door closed behind her. “Your husband was shot twice in the back, Kath. He was running away from someone and he headed into your fields, which is probably where he’d go if he was trying to lose someone or hide. That scenario suggests a prior conflict—maybe a drug deal that went bad.”

  “You mean here? On our property?”

  “Possibly. This would have been about three days ago. Do you remember hearing any gunshots around that time? It probably would have been at night, though I can’t say for sure until I calculate the postmortem interval.”

  “We’re out in the country,” Kathryn said. “You get used to hearing gunshots out here. You learn to ignore them.”

  “There would have been at least two of them,” Nick said, “one right after the other.”

  “I didn’t hear a thing—and Callie’s very sensitive to sudden noises. If she had heard it she would have let out a scream.”

  “Yes, I’ve heard her. That’s quite an alarm system you’ve got there.”

  Kathryn looked at Nick. “You think Michael might’ve had some deal going on here? Whoever shot him could have shot us too.”

  “This is all still speculation,” Nick said. “All we really know so far is that someone shot your husband. They won’t know about the drug angle until they have a chance to check it out. Detective Massino is bringing in a drug-sniffing dog team to search the place and see what they can find.”

  “And what will you be doing?”

  Nick paused. “Look, I need to ask you something.”

  “Okay.”

  “Why did you send for me? Don’t get me wrong, I’m glad to help an old friend—but your county coroner could have given you a fairly accurate postmortem interval. What do you need me for?”

  She rested her hand on Nick’s forearm. “My husband has been out of my life for a year,” she said, “but he was still my husband and somebody killed him. I want to know who and I want to know why. I can’t move on until I know. I deserve to know, and so does Callie—if she’s going to grow up without a father, she should at least know why. If anybody can help me answer those questions, you can. We both know how the police work. Sure, they want to know who killed Michael—but not the way I do. It’s not personal for them; it’s personal for me, and you’ll make it personal too. I know that about you, Nick—I remember. That’s why I called you. Will you help me?”

  “Kath—I have to tell you the same thing I told you the last time I worked for you: I can’t promise anything. I can give you an accurate PMI, but beyond that there’s no guarantee I’ll be able to figure out anything.”

  “At least I’ll know someone tried his best. You always do that.”

  Nick stopped to consider. “Okay—but no guarantees. Understood?”

  “Thanks, Nick. I knew I could count on you. What will you do next?”

  “I collected some specimens. I’ll take them back to my lab at NC State and get them into a rearing chamber right away. Let’s get that postmortem interval—we’ll go from there.”

  “What can I do to help?”

  “I’ll need to take some temperature and humidity readings. I have to make sure I’m rearing my specimens in exactly the same conditions I find here. I’ll get a reading before I go, but I�
�ll need to come back at different times of the day and take some readings then. Would that be okay?”

  “Sure. Callie and I are here most of the time.”

  Nick got up and began to gather his things.

  “Nick, I . . . I can’t offer you twenty thousand dollars this time.”

  “No problem. Feed me.”

  “What?”

  “I’m still single, Kath. My business card says, ‘Will Work for Food.’”

  She smiled. “I think I can handle that—it’s a farm after all.”

  “Then it’s a deal.”

  She walked him to the door and they stopped. “It’s really good to see you again, Nick, but I wish you didn’t have to see me like this. I wish things had turned out better.”

  Nick shrugged. “You did all right for yourself if you ask me.”

  “You think so? I’ve got a dead husband and debt up to my ears and a five-acre farm to run all by myself.”

  Nick nodded toward the bedroom. “You’ve got her. That’s more than I’ve got.”

  5

  Pasha Semenov steered his black Porsche Boxster south on the 540 outer belt in north Raleigh. The 540 took him in the opposite direction from NC State, but he didn’t care. The new outer belt was the only road in Raleigh with enough room to open the car up and burn off a little carbon. He missed the freeways back in Russia—not the old federal highways that still turned to mud after every downpour, but the sleek new paved roads that stretched for miles with hardly a car on them except for the pitiful Ladas that puttered along like ox carts.

  “Where are you taking me?” the young woman in the passenger seat purred.

  “Home,” he said simply.

  “Mmm. Sounds like fun.”

  “Your home—I have something to do.”

  “Take me with you, Pasha.”

  He glanced over at the woman. Though the top was down and the car was going almost ninety, only a few strands of her silken blonde hair drifted in the wind. Porsche makes a good machine, he thought. Very good air flow—but what would you expect from a Dutch designer? And German engineers always make a good vehicle.

  He flashed her a gratuitous smile. “Not tonight, sweetheart.”

  The little city of Raleigh felt suffocating to him. It had no skyline and no nightlife—just a handful of boring brick structures huddled together like a stand of dying trees. He missed Moscow: the clubs, the bars, the girls—especially the girls. American women were pleasant enough, but they were too demanding and they played too many games. Russian women meant business; they knew what they wanted and they told you. Russian women were lean, hungry—they came to the cities to move up in the world and they worked hard to do it. American women seemed soft by comparison—almost flimsy. And he was bored to death with phony blondes. What is it with Americans and blonde hair? he thought. He would have done cartwheels if he could find a nice Russian redhead for a change.

  “Remind me where to turn,” he said to her. “I still get lost on American roads.” Pasha wasn’t lost—he had just forgotten where the woman lived, and he thought it would be more diplomatic to appear helpless than bored.

  Five minutes later they pulled up in front of her apartment.

  She stroked his forearm and smiled. “Sure you won’t come in for a while?”

  “Some other time,” he said.

  “Will there be another time?”

  “Absolutely,” he lied.

  Pasha was out of the parking lot before the woman reached her front door. He headed back for the freeway again. He pushed the pedal to the floor and let the wind blow the last trace of the woman’s annoying perfume from the leather seats.

  Pasha straightened his arms and pressed himself back against his seat. He listened to the steady hum of the flat-6 engine and let his mind drift. The left front wheel unexpectedly caught the edge of a pothole and jolted the car. The sensation triggered a memory . . .

  Six months ago, in Russia . . . he was sitting in the backseat of an armored Mercedes S500 wedged between two of his grandfather’s bodyguards. The car rode heavy due to the added weight and beefedup suspension, and Pasha remembered feeling his spine jar whenever the driver failed to avoid a pothole on the old farm road. But Pasha didn’t care; it felt so good just to be moving again after three months rotting on a bunk in that miserable cell.

  He remembered looking out the window. The view was distorted slightly by the two-inch-thick bulletproof glass—it was like looking into an aquarium. But there was nothing to look at anyway; the harvest was long since past and his grandfather’s fields that lined the dirt road on both sides were barren and brown. Pasha’s eyes were starved for color, and he longed for something brilliant and bright to look at.

  He turned to the man on his left. “Who are you?”

  “Gordyev,” the man replied without returning his gaze.

  “FSB?”

  “Da.”

  Pasha turned to his right. “You too?”

  The man nodded once.

  Dedushka knew what he was doing. The FSB was the state security organization that had replaced the KGB back in ’91 when it was disbanded for taking part in the failed coup attempt against Gorbachev. Not a good idea, biting the hand that feeds you, but overthrowing the government was an old tradition in Russia, and old traditions died hard. The KGB had been replaced by the Ministry of Security, then the Federal Counterintelligence Service, and finally the Federalnaya Sluzhba Bezopasnosti—the Federal Security Service or FSB. Pasha shook his head. Each successive name for the Russian intelligence service sounded a bit more pleasant, as though one of those American advertising agencies had been hired to improve their “image”—like the silly hats they put on the animals in the Moscow circus. But an animal is still an animal, Pasha thought, and the FSB was the place to go if you needed a bodyguard who would kill someone without a second thought.

  Dedushka had twenty of them on the payroll.

  Pasha leaned forward and addressed the driver: “How much longer?”

  “A few minutes. Relax.”

  “I’m sick of relaxing. I want to have some fun.”

  “Then stay out of prison.”

  “You’re a funny man. Why don’t you give me your name? I’ll tell my grandfather how funny you are.” Pasha glared hard at the rearview mirror and a pair of fearful eyes glanced back.

  The car slowed and turned left. Two minutes later they pulled off the road into a half-acre clearing in the endless expanse of fields. There were two rusting corn cribs with corrugated roofs and an ancient combine with paddle-wheel blades that sat framed in the yawning doorway of a sagging red barn. To the right of the barn, at the edge of the fields, two more bodyguards stood with their feet shoulder-wide and their hands folded at the groin, dressed incongruously in gray suits and dark glasses. Standing between the bodyguards was his grandfather, busily raking corn stover into bundles and hauling it to a nearby wagon.

  Pasha got out of the car. The old man did not look up as he approached. Pasha stood behind his grandfather and said nothing; he stood like one of the bodyguards, mimicking them.

  Two minutes passed before the old man finally turned. He looked Pasha over without expression and said, “Is this how you greet your grandfather after three months?”

  “It could have been less,” Pasha said. “You could have arranged it.”

  “Your sentence was three years.”

  “You’re an important man. I didn’t need to go at all.”

  “I think you did. Now—greet your grandfather.”

  The two men embraced like wrestlers. Pasha’s arms wrapped around his grandfather like a cooper hoisting a keg, but his fingers couldn’t even touch behind the old man’s broad back. Pasha imagined himself twisting and throwing the old man to the ground, but it would be like trying to uproot an oak. Besides, the last thing he wanted was a contest of strength with his grandfather right now—he wasn’t ready for that yet. He couldn’t afford the price of defeat; twelve billion dollars was a lot to lose.r />
  His grandfather took a step back and looked at him. “So—what did they teach you in the White Swan?”

  Pasha shrugged. “To treat a woman with more respect, I suppose.”

  The old man huffed. “Do you think I care what you did to that woman? That was stupid of you, yes, but I sent you to prison to learn other lessons.”

  Pasha looked at him coldly.

  “An American magazine says I am worth twelve billion dollars. Did you know that?”

  “No, Dedushka.”

  “Liar. And you think I’m going to just hand it to you like a boar’s head on a silver platter so you can become a prince like one of the Romanovs; so you can live a life of luxury; so you can waste it on those tramps you collect.”

  Pasha said nothing.

  The old man shook his head. “You will be a prince when I think you are ready—not before.”

  “I’m ready now,” Pasha said. “I took care of Nikolai Petrov for you. I’ve done everything you’ve asked of me.”

  “Not yet. Your education is incomplete.”

  “Then send me to school, not prison.”

  “The White Swan is a school. What did you learn there?”

  Pasha didn’t reply.

  “I didn’t send you there to learn to do laundry or mend shoes,” the old man said. “I sent you there to learn business—just as I learned business in the gulag at Solikamsk.”

  “There is no business in prison,” Pasha said. “Just time.”

  “Did you learn to survive? Did you learn to recognize your enemies while they were still friends?”

  “Yes.”

  “No school of business can teach you that. I learned those lessons at Solikamsk and I wanted you to learn them too.”

  The old man reached out and took a silver pen from Pasha’s shirt pocket. He held it up and examined it, then twisted the shaft and unscrewed it into two separate pieces. He inverted one of the pieces and a small bullet fell out into his cupped hand. He looked at Pasha. “Did you make this?”

  “I excelled at metal shop.”

  “Good—it shows ingenuity.” He replaced the bullet and reassembled the two halves. “Does it work?”