by Lauren Carr
“What’s up with him?” David whirled around to glare at the dog once the doors were shut.
Archie suggested, “Maybe she had a particularly nice dog biscuit in her pocket that he wanted to steal.”
“I thought he was a B&E type of dog,” Mac said, “not an armed robbery sort.”
Whining, Gnarly pawed at her.
“He didn’t like her,” she explained. “Not everyone likes everyone.”
“Just because he doesn’t like someone, he doesn’t have to rip her throat out,” David said.
Once they stepped outside into the parking lot, Gnarly exploded again into a fit of snarling barks. He lunged on his leash with such force, trying to charge across the parking lot, that Mac had to grab the end of the leash from Archie in order to drag the dog in the other direction to the cruiser.
“Gnarly has lost his mind,” David told Archie as she climbed into the front seat while Mac played tug of war with the dog to get him into the back. “I can’t take him with me anymore. He’s too unpredictable.”
“He was fine until he ran into that woman that came out of the elevator,” Archie said. “Gnarly has a good sense of people. Maybe she’s a bad person.”
“And maybe he’s nuts.” David fastened his seat belt and turned on the engine. “He’s stolen from all of your neighbors and has started shoplifting from the stores on the other side of the lake, damn it.”
They waited for Mac, who had to lift Gnarly up to set him in the back seat. “I don’t know what’s gotten into him.” He climbed in next to the dog and closed the door. “Something’s gotten under his skin.”
David put the cruiser into reverse.
Suddenly, Gnarly was in Mac’s lap. Barking and snarling, Gnarly pressed his nose against the window.
With the dog blocking David’s view in the mirror, he pressed his foot on the brake. “Mac, do something about him. I can’t see.”
“What are you so upset about?” Mac looked through the window to determine what Gnarly wanted so badly.
They were looking at a parking lot. It was only half filled with a variety of vehicles. Recalling that Gnarly was trying to get to the other side, Mac peered in the direction that the dog had tried to drag him. On the other side of the parking lot, far away from the main entrance, where the lighting wasn’t as bright, there was only one vehicle parked in the last space next to the rear exit, which provided easy access to the side roads out of town.
It was a black Ford SUV.
Where did I see a black Ford SUV?
“Mac, do something about Gnarly,” David was saying. “I can’t see to pull out.”
“Wait!” Mac pressed his index finger against the glass. “I think Gnarly is trying—”
The police cruiser jarred with the impact of a blow from overhead.
Archie screamed.
Mac would later recall thinking that he had never realized she was capable of reaching such high notes.
David whirled around to see what had shattered the wind-shield. He only caught a split-second glimpse of it before the front airbags exploded. The shock caused him to hit the gas pedal, which shot the cruiser backwards straight into the path of a van carrying a group of senior citizens. With no time to stop, the van plowed into the cruiser’s driver’s side, which set off the side airbags.
Gnarly, who seemed to be as stunned as everyone else, held Mac pinned against his seat while he cried into his ear. “Gnarly,” Mac moaned while patting the top of his head, “you’re a good dog, but I’m going to kill you.”
The inside of the cruiser seemed to take on the atmosphere of an electrified nightclub with the lights flashing and the sirens going off. The police operator’s voice called out from the radio to confirm notice that the cruiser had been in a collision and needed emergency response. In Mac’s aching head, she sounded like she was calling from another planet.
After David confirmed that they had indeed been in an accident, she asked, “What did you collide with?”
“A dead body.”
Chapter Eleven
Smirking faces flashed before Mac in his dreams.
Freddie Gibbons Junior sneering during Mac’s interrogation about the seven innocent women he had raped in Rock Creek Park. Each attack escalated in violence. He won the status of killer after strangling his last victim.
He taunted the detective. “Yeah, I did it. What are you going to do about it?”
Then, there was Leo Samuels. The gold and diamonds he wore on every part of his body cost more than the house Mac would later lose to his wife. All had been paid for with blood money collected from his business of drugs and prostitution.
The day Samuels strutted out of the courthouse after Mac’s evidence against him had been tossed out, the gang leader made a point of plowing into the detective. “Later, sucker.” His breath felt hot against Mac’s face.
For an instant, Mac wanted to press his gun against Samuels’s stomach and pull the trigger. He wanted to give his victims the justice denied to them by the system. The same type of justice that someone had given Sid Baxter.
“There’s the bastard,” Mac’s partner cursed.
He started out of a sleepy trance he had fallen into while staring at a spot on the lid of his coffee cup to gaze across the street to where the creature posing as a human being going by the name of Sid Baxter had climbed out of his car. He was clutching an armload of what appeared to be mail to his chest. A plain brown envelope was tucked under his arm.
At the back door of his house in the lower-middle-class neighborhood, Sid Baxter looked around while digging in his pockets for his keys.
Mac put the binoculars to his eyes to close on Baxter’s face. “He looks worried.”
“He should be.”
Detective Paul Grove was Mac’s senior partner. During his long police career, Detective Grove had seen it all. Some detectives grow from what they see; others become bitter, like Grove.
“I still can’t believe they let that bastard back out on the streets,” he muttered.
“He won’t be for long,” Mac said. “We’ll get him.”
Sid’s dark little eyes darted around until he saw Mac watching from the sedan across the street. Spotting him, Sid clutched the package tighter to his body and hurried inside.
“He spotted us,” Mac told his partner.
“So what?”
They made no move to conceal themselves. They didn’t have to. Since Sid Baxter had been released after confessing to killing eight-year-old Andy Sweeney, the prosecutor and police chief had ordered two units to keep the pedophile and child killer under constant surveillance until they could find some way to get him behind bars.
“He actually confessed, damn it.” Detective Grove wasn’t alone in his anger.
The detectives in homicide were outraged that Judge Garrison Sutherland had tossed out Sid Baxter’s confession and released him. It wasn’t expected of a judge who had been so passionate about justice when he was a prosecutor.
After four nights of listening to Detective Grove’s complaining about the justice system and tailing a man who did nothing at night except watch television, Mac snapped, “If you want to blame anyone for releasing the likes of Sid Baxter back out on the streets, blame Fitzwater. He’s the one who blew it. Not Sutherland. Fitzwater.”
Grove argued, “Listen, I know you and Fitzwater don’t get along, but he did his job. He found out who snatched the kid. He got a confession, damn it. And the court let him go. Fitzwater did what he needed to do.”
Mac resumed staring at the small house tucked toward the back of the bare lot to leave only a small backyard. While the other homeowners did what they could to make their cozy spaces as inviting as possible, Baxter did nothing. There were no shrubs or trees. The backyard was confined behind a chain-link fence.
“You’re aware that Andy Sweeney was about the same age as Tristan.” Grove aimed for Mac’s vulnerable spot. “If it was your son, you wouldn’t be sitting here making excuses for Suther
land letting Baxter go. Baxter’d be dead already.”
“No, it would be Fitzwater that’d be dead for screwing up the whole investigation and sending us all back to square one.”
Detective Grove was right. Detective Fitzwater and Mac had mixed like oil and vinegar ever since Mac got promoted to the homicide division right out of uniform, an unusual appointment for a detective so young. Fitzwater didn’t like the young officer. He was openly insulting and more than once hurried to their lieutenant to take credit for Mac’s theories on cases.
Mac could see Sid Baxter going through the mail at his kitchen counter.
“Have you ever watched National Geographic?” Mac asked his partner.
“What?” Detective Grove’s doughy face screwed up at the notion of wasting his time watching anything so educational. “Nature shows?”
“Tristan’s into science.” Mac didn’t want to confess that the shows captured his interest as well. “Anyway, on these shows, when a pack of wolves go chasing after a jack-rabbit, if the rabbit’s lucky, he can jump into a hole where the wolves can’t reach him. When that happens, the wolves have a couple of options. Some wolves waste their time banging their heads trying to get the rabbit by following the path it took to hide. The smart ones will look around and find another way to get to it. Some will even double back around and come up behind the rabbit to snag it from behind.”
Mac took his eyes off Sid Baxter to glance back at Grove. “I don’t like to waste my time banging my head against a rock trying to get into a hole that I can’t fit into, or coercing confessions that aren’t going to be worth the paper they’re written on. I’d rather spend my time doing something worth-while, like doubling back and finding another way in to nail my suspects—ways that are going to stick.”
Mac turned back to watch Sid Baxter at his kitchen window. With excitement that resembled a child on Christmas morning, he unwrapped the package sealed in plain brown paper.
“And what about when those legal weenies at the court-house decide to block that way in because it’s infringing on some poor pervert’s rights?” Grove asked in a mocking tone. “Frankly, to tell you the truth, if that Sweeney boy’s dad came over here right now with a shotgun to blow Baxter away, I wouldn’t be inclined to stop him.”
Mac brought the binoculars to his face to watch their suspect more closely. “Baxter got something in the mail.”
“What?”
With his eyes glued to the glasses, Mac caught sight of the object clasped in Sid Baxter’s hand when he stuck a cigarette between his lips. “It looks like a tape.” He felt his blood rise. “It must be a sex tape. Child pornography.”
Mac adjusted the focus on the binoculars to get a closer image of the tape before Sid Baxter left the room to go view it in the living room. He didn’t want to leave the warmth of the car to crawl into the bushes on the other side of the house to look in the window.
His grin broadening in what had to be anticipation, Sid Baxter brought the lighter up to the end of his cigarette and flicked the end—
Still hearing the roar of the bomb that blew Sid Baxter to pieces, Mac sprang up on the gurney.
David was on the next gurney flirting with the nurse bandaging his shoulder.
Hearing Mac’s cry, she whirled around to ease him into lying back down onto the gurney. “It’s okay, Mr. Faraday, you’re all right. You’re in the hospital. You suffered a blow to the head. You need to rest.”
Mac laid his head back down on the pillow and floated back to the boat dock off Spencer Manor.
Spencer, Maryland, had been founded by Mac’s ancestors and was populated with residents who made up the listing of Who’s Who. Mac’s neighbors were rich and famous, like Andrew Keating had been. His life had been one of fame, luxury, and achievement, until Jillian Keating ended it.
Once again, Mac found himself outside the courthouse while Jillian Keating swam through the sea of journalists with Natasha Holmstead at her side. Wrapped in her fur coat, she had flipped her blond hair over her shoulder and smiled for the cameras in all her glory after getting off for killing her husband.
She slowed her pace when she saw Mac, the cop who had captured her. A brilliant smile crossed her face. Her driver opened the back door of her limousine. Before getting in, she paused to look Mac in the face. With a wink, she puckered her red lips and blew him a kiss. Without a word, she climbed into the back of the limousine and sailed away.
As the car faded from sight, Mac turned away to see the killer’s defense attorney, Natasha Holmstead. Her smile of triumph matched that of her client.
“How can you even look at yourself in the mirror?”
Mac’s grip cutting into the flesh on her arm turned her triumph into fear.
Judge Garrison Sutherland appeared at his side. “Let her go, Mac.”
“He was a lonely old man and she used him,” Mac hissed at her. “Jillian made him fall in love with her, and then she killed him. For what? His money? He thought she loved him and she killed him.”
“Let her go,” Garrison ordered the detective.
“Parasites and monsters,” Mac fumed. “That’s who you work for. Parasites and monsters. How can you look at yourself in the mirror, twisting the system around the way you do to let them back out on the street?”
“Detective!” Garrison snapped out the title like a whip.
It was the only time Mac saw fear in Natasha Holmstead’s face. His grip on her arm seemed to shut off the usual strong-willed demeanor that had become her trademark.
“We’re the ones who have to clean up the messes your clients make after you open the door to let them back out on the streets.”
“Mac!”
He felt a firm grip on his shoulder.
“Mac, wake up.” David’s voice broke through his dreams.
Mac opened his eyes. The white ceiling above him, and the call for a doctor in the corridor outside his room, reminded him of where he was. He sprung up in his bed.
He remembered Archie’s screams. “Archie!”
“It’s okay, Mac. Everything is okay.” David pressed him back down by his shoulder. “We’re at WVU hospital. You hit your head, but you’re going to be okay.”
Feeling his forehead, Mac could feel the puffy bruise over his right eye. As his vision cleared, he saw that David’s left arm was in a sling. “You?”
“It’s only a dislocated shoulder. Hurts like hell, but I walked away. Not bad for getting hit in the driver’s side door by a van. Airbags did their jobs. Archie walked away without a scratch. She’ll be having nightmares about a woman landing on her face right in front of her, but other than that…”
The more Mac woke up, the more his head hurt. “What happened to me?”
He was surprised by David’s laughter. “Your airbag went off like it was supposed to. Luckily, the impact was perfectly cushioned by Gnarly’s head. You got head butted by a dog.”
“Gnarly, I’m going to kill you.” The pounding lessened when he laid back down to rest his head on the pillow.
“It didn’t feel much better for him. He was staggering around after the emergency crew got him out of the cruiser.”
“Where is he now?” Mac wanted to know.
“Bogie’s driving them home. Archie and I have given our statements to the police about last night. They’ll be wanting to talk to you.”
Now it was coming back to him. Gnarly’s barking. His attempt at attacking the red-head in the elevator. Her deadly eyes. The black Ford SUV.
Mac grabbed David’s wrist. “I remember now what got under Gnarly’s fur. It was the black Ford.”
“What black Ford?”
“SUV parked on the other side of the parking lot.” Mac was clinging to David’s good arm and shirt. “It was the same black Ford SUV that the shooter escaped in after shooting at us at Nancy Brenner’s house. I recognized it. Gnarly must have recognized the scent. And that woman who got off of the elevator. It had to have been her.”
“Someone threw
Bonnie Propst off her balcony.” David pried Mac’s fingers off from where they were digging into his arm. “The police told me that her place was wrecked. She put up quite a fight before going over the balcony railing.”
“It was the same person who was shooting at us. She didn’t want Bonnie Propst talking to us.”
David said, “She has to be Nita.”
Mac agreed. “If she went after Bonnie Propst because her late husband’s name was on that list, then his murder has to be connected to Themis, whatever that is.”
* * * *
They were on their way back to Spencer in the back of a state police cruiser when the state forensics lab emailed to David’s phone their report on fingerprints found in Stephen Maguire’s suite.
“Her name is Justine Kable,” David said while reading the report. “We found her fingerprints all over Stephen Maguire’s room, including the headboard. I think it might be a good bet that DNA tests will show that the vaginal fluid we found on the sheets was hers, too. Her prints were in the database from when she used to be a schoolteacher. Now she’s a bartender at your inn.”
Clutching the bruise over his right eye, Mac moaned, “I’m beginning to hate the sound of that.”
“Sound of what?”
“Your inn.”
David chuckled. “We’ll drop you off at the manor and—”
“No,” Mac said. “I want to know why my bartender is slipping between the sheets with my guests. I’m not running one of those types of establishments. Take me to the Inn. While I’m there, I want a drink.” After calling Jeff Ingle to ask when Justine would be working next, he told David, “She’s on duty now.”
During the mid-afternoon lull before the early dinner hour, the lounge was empty except for a couple nuzzling in the corner booth by the fireplace. A curvaceous woman wearing thick make-up, Justine Kable was cleaning the last of the glasses to get the bar ready for the happy hour crowd.
When David stepped up to the bar in the civilian clothes he had changed into at the hospital after their accident, she snapped, “Lunch time is over. We won’t start serving the dinner menu until four o’clock.” When she saw Mac turn from where he was admiring the view of the mountaintops on the horizon, her attitude softened. “Unless you want us to open earlier, Mr. Faraday.”
