by C. A. Shives
Faith shook her head. “No, not really. It's not that she had a violent streak or anything. She was just always really opinionated and quick to speak her mind. She wasn't afraid to say what she was thinking, and she wasn't afraid to tell everyone her opinion. A lot of people didn't like her because she was so blunt. But that was one of the things I liked most about Charlotte: what you saw is what you got. She wasn't two-faced at all. If she didn't like you, she didn't play all nicey-nice when you were around.”
“She must have made some enemies that way.”
“She did,” Faith said. “A few years back Ron Ballard had just sold Shady Hill Diner to new owners, and Charlotte was helping the new folks with their bookkeeping as a neighborly gesture. You know the retarded man who works there? Archie?”
Herne nodded. He'd seen Archie clearing tables and mopping floors at the diner.
“Well, as Charlotte's looking over the books, she finds out that in the twenty years Archie's been working for the diner, Ron Ballard hasn't once given the retard a raise. Not once. He'd given every other employee raises except Archie. Charlotte was pissed. Nothing she hated more than someone who professed to be a 'good Christian' but loved money more than Jesus. So a few days later we're at this church event where they were giving a Christian Humanitarian award to Ron Ballard. And people are standing around him chatting before the shindig begins. Charlotte marched right up to the group and announced what he'd done to Archie, and she called Ron an asshole for treating a retarded man so badly.”
“That must have gotten a reaction out of the group.”
“Oh, it did,” Faith chuckled. “Most of them gasped and started chattering about how rude Charlotte had acted, but I saw a few of them give Ron a sideways glance. You only need to plant one or two seeds before people start looking at you differently. And Ron's always acted like a pillar of the community. Everyone loves to watch an idol fall.”
“So Charlotte had a lot of enemies?”
“Oh, I wouldn't say that,” Faith said. “Most people respected her outspokenness. She didn't speak out of cruelty or anger. She was always rooting for the underdog. Charlotte was popular in high school. A cheerleader. Homecoming queen. All that stuff. Despite her harder side, she had a ton of personality. And she was gorgeous. Really beautiful. Most of the boys in school wanted to date her, but she was pretty picky about the boyfriends. She only had a few serious ones, as I remember it.”
“Did she do well in school? Good grades?”
“She did well, but not because she studied hard. Charlotte's one of the smartest people I know. She didn't have to study. Not like me. I had to work hard for the grades I earned. But she sailed through it and barely opened a book. In fact, by our senior year, she was hanging out more with the party crowd. But it didn't affect her grades. Nothing ever really affected her.”
A hint of wistfulness weaved its way through Faith’s words, and he heard the tinge of envy that colored her voice. In his mind, he saw them as they might have been in the past. Charlotte the cheerleader, surrounded by admirers. Her faithful friend beside her, dowdy and average, but Charlotte too focused on herself to notice how her friend struggled. For just a brief moment Herne wondered if Faith really wanted him to find the friend whose shadow she had lived in for so long.
“How often did you two talk?” Herne asked.
“Oh, almost every day,” Faith said. “At least a few times each week. Sometimes we'd meet for lunch. This time of year things are slower on the farm, so I'd drive in to town during her lunch break and we'd go to the diner together. Sometimes she'd come over and have a beer in the evenings, especially if Thad was working that night.”
“What type of marriage did she have with Thad?” Herne asked.
Faith squared her broad shoulders. “A good one,” she said. “They were happy.”
But he heard the lie in her voice.
“Look, Mrs. Montgomery,” Herne said. “It's vital that I know about Charlotte. Who she really is, not just the person you want to recall because your memory is tainted by the fear that she may be dead.”
Faith recoiled as if Herne had slapped her face. “Damn, Mister,” she said. “You're a straight shooter.”
Herne didn't respond, letting the silence stretch between them. Faith gnawed at her bottom lip, her eyes vacant and staring, and Herne patiently waited until she made her decision. When her glance snapped towards him and she straightened her back, he knew he was going to get the information he wanted. Whatever that information might be.
“They might have been having problems,” Faith admitted. “I always thought they got married a little too quickly. Couples need to take time to get to know one another before they run for the altar. My husband and I met in grade school.”
“What kind of problems were they having?” Herne asked.
“I don’t know for sure they were having problems,” Faith said. “But it couldn’t have been anything Thad did wrong. He loves Charlotte. He’d never beat her or anything like that. But they were drifting apart, I think. They didn't spend much time together because of Thad's schedule. I don't think they loved each other anymore. Actually, I don't think they ever really loved each other.”
Again Herne heard the wistfulness in Faith’s voice. You’re in love with him, Herne thought.
“Was there another man? Another woman?”
Faith shrugged. “Charlotte never suspected that Thad was running around, and she never mentioned another man to me, so I don't think it had reached that stage yet. We were best friends. She would've told me if she suspected Thad of cheating. And there's no way she would've kept an affair of her own a secret.”
You didn't know her as well as you think, Herne thought.
Herne stood to leave. He knew this woman, Charlotte's best friend, had little more to offer him. Despite their years of friendship and almost daily interactions, Faith knew nothing about Charlotte's lover.
Charlotte had been discreet.
CHAPTER 10
NOVEMBER 6 – TUESDAY NIGHT
The Hurricane Police Department needed remodeling. Cracks threaded through the plaster walls, which smelled of mildew and dust. A desk and office chair barely fit into Tucker's small office. So instead they convened in the main open room, which held a large table with folding chairs. Two desks sat in the corner: one for Saxon and one shared by the two officers in the department. Officer Johnson sat with his broad shoulders hunched over the desk, his eyes focused on the computer as he pecked at the keys. He stopped only once to brush his hand over the top of his hair, so short he looked like an army grunt.
Officer Miller—almost a mirror image of Johnson—thumbed through a file cabinet, his hands flipping through the manila folders.
Tucker sat at the large table and gripped his brown hair with his long fingers. He didn't glance up when Herne entered the room.
“Elizabeth is at her wit's end,” Tucker said. “She's so focused on Charlotte that she isn't eating. Isn't sleeping. Isn't doing anything except hounding me and staring at the fucking wall. I keep telling her that I'm doing my best, but there's been a murder in town that needs my attention. She's pissed as hell at me, Art.”
“She knows I'm looking for Charlotte,” Herne said.
Tucker looked up, his eyes narrowed. “I know. And that's probably been the only thing saving my ass from her wrath. I think she trusts you to find Charlotte more than she trusts me.”
Herne shrugged. “She knows I'm persistent.”
“Persistent. That's a nice way to phrase it. She knows you're like a damned crocodile. Once you get your mouth around something, you shake the shit out of it until it’s dead.”
Saxon walked into the room as Herne lowered himself into a chair. “I checked on McNeil's history,” she said, handing Tucker a file.
“Anything useful?” Tucker asked.
Saxon shook her head, her short, dark hair falling across her face for just a brief moment. “I don't think so. His colleagues report that he's hard-working and dil
igent. A good student. Dependable and always conscientious. He doesn't have a black mark against him, and I couldn't get anyone to say a single negative word.”
Tucker passed the file to Herne. “I had Saxon check into McNeil like you asked. But there doesn't seem to be a link between him and Charlotte, or a link between him and Gabe. Care to share the reason you wanted a background check on him?”
“Let’s shelve that for now,” Herne said. “It’s probably nothing. In the meantime, we know there is probably a link between Charlotte and Vanderbilt. They dated in high school. They worked for the same construction company. It would be a strange coincidence that she would go missing and he would be murdered in a matter of a few days.”
Tucker's gaze was hard and flinty. “Coincidences happen,” he said. “And right now Vanderbilt's murder is my top priority.”
He glanced at Saxon and lowered his eyes. “Anything on Vanderbilt's past?”
She passed him another file, and Herne noticed their fingers brush. Neither one of them seemed to react to the contact, but he felt the electricity in the air. It was impossible to miss.
“His wife was hysterical when I tried to talk to her. She kept screaming that her 'lousy whoring husband should have had his pecker cut off instead of his guts cut out.' Her words, not mine. She was throwing pans, smashing dishes, and pretty much scaring the hell out of her kids. I called Paul Lee. He brought a sedative, and by the time I left the wife was snoring on a pull-out sofa.”
“What about friends and co-workers?” Tucker asked.
“As far as I can tell, Vanderbilt didn't have any friends. At least, no one admits to being friends with him. His co-workers didn't have much to say, except they all agreed that Vanderbilt was a real ass. He was a foreman on the job, and he bullied his workers and treated the staff like shit. I'm not surprised. He recently got in an altercation with someone at Harold's Tavern. Harold called us, but by the time Miller got there, both men had already split.”
“Did Vanderbilt interact with Charlotte at work?” Herne asked.
Saxon nodded. “Most of his co-workers knew both Vanderbilt and Charlotte from high school. When I mentioned that the two of them had a past together, I got a lot of snorts. Rumor has it that Charlotte went to prom with Vanderbilt but ditched him immediately after arriving at the event because he showed up drunk. Since then, they've only worked together and never socialized.”
“That story sounds familiar, now that you mention it,” Tucker said. “I think Elizabeth told me it once.”
Saxon's lip curled into a sardonic smile. “I grew up in Baltimore,” she said. “It's hard for me to understand this small town stuff. Everyone's born here, everyone goes to school here, and everyone dies here. Doesn't anyone want to get out and see the world? Doesn't anyone want to break free from this little community? It's pathetic. It's almost as pathetic as marrying your high school sweetheart.” She pushed away from the table and stalked out of the room.
Herne thought back to the first time he’d ever seen Elizabeth. A random lottery had matched Tucker and Herne as college roommates. During their freshmen year the pair had spent winter break in Tucker’s hometown of Hurricane. Almost the moment they arrived in town, Tucker had proudly introduced his girlfriend—a girl he'd dated in high school—to Herne. Tall and slender with brown hair that shimmered auburn in the sunlight, Elizabeth had reminded Herne of the horses that dotted the landscape of Hurricane’s countryside. Tucker had married that girl from high school. And, apparently, Saxon was pissed about it.
“Don't ask,” Tucker growled to Herne. “When it comes to being a cop, Saxon's one of the best at keeping her emotions under control. But I guess she can't do the same when it comes to her personal life.”
“And you're part of her personal life now?” Herne asked.
“No,” Tucker said. “Not yet. But we work together, you know. So we're getting closer all the time. And with the way Elizabeth has been pushing me away…”
Herne said nothing. He didn't want to acknowledge the twist in his gut at the thought of Elizabeth without Tucker. Didn't want to admit to himself that he might not be able to resist the temptation of his friend's wife, especially once she was no longer married.
“What about the press on this case? Have you managed that?”
Tucker blew an exasperated sigh. “That bitch you're cozy with from TV News 4, Lori Sims, keeps hounding me about the homicide. I've pretty much told her that we think it's a drug-related event and that the killer is likely some dealer from the city. It's gotten her off my ass for the moment.”
The intercom sounded and Sheila, the police dispatcher, spoke to Tucker. “Chief? I see Dr. Lee coming this way.”
A few minutes later Paul Lee strode into the room, his round belly hanging over the top of his black pants. He said, “I don't have much time. Lenny Klein broke his ankle again. I’ve got to get to my office so I can set the bone.”
“Have you finished the autopsy of Gabe Vanderbilt?” Herne asked.
Lee's almond eyes darted to Herne. “Straight to the point, as usual. I like that about you. I've got some preliminary results, but I'm still waiting on a lab report.”
“Tell us what you've got,” Tucker said.
“Well, based on the bruises and contusions on the victim's wrist, I'd say he was restrained in the handcuffs before death. At this point, I'd guess cause of death was blood loss due to his evisceration.”
“You mean the killer cut him open and let him bleed out?” Tucker asked.
Lee nodded. “Pretty much. But there was an interesting mark on his neck. Looked like he may have gotten an injection of some sort. And since the neck isn't a place that doctors or druggies tend to use as an injection site, it's possible the killer drugged him in some way.”
“To make him compliant,” Herne said.
“In addition,” Lee continued, “there was a mark cut into the victim's posterior region.”
The room fell silent for a moment.
“Are you saying the killer carved something on the victim's ass?” Tucker asked.
Lee handed them a photograph of Gabe's buttock. Two red lines had been cut into the man's white flesh, the lines intersecting at their centers.
“Looks like a cross to me,” Tucker said. “Or an X.”
“That's what it looks like to me,” Lee said. “Now, I have no way of knowing with certainty whether these cuts were deliberate or accidents. But given the even depth of the lines, their almost absolute straightness, and their symmetry, I'd guess these were deliberate slashes.”
“A signature,” Herne said. “The killer was leaving his mark.”
“In addition, despite what it looks like in movies when a killer cuts up someone with a standard kitchen knife, it's a lot harder to make a clean cut into flesh than you would think. Based on my analysis of the carving, as well as the entry and exit points of the larger, anterior wound, I'd guess that the blade used in this incident was very sharp, very thin, and possibly a little flexible. This was not a standard butcher knife that you would buy at K-Mart.”
The sound of a throat clearing caught Herne's attention. The three men turned to see Johnson towering over them. Herne watched the officer's Adam’s apple bob in his thin neck as Johnson cleared his throat again.
“Excuse me, Chief,” Johnson said. “But I kind of collect knives. I'd be happy to do some research into possible blades that might fit that description, if you'd like.”
Tucker eyed the young patrolman. Then he grinned. “Sure, Johnson,” he said, waving his hand. “You're in charge of the knife research.”
“Thank you, Sir,” Johnson said.
“But you're on patrol duty right now, aren't you?” Tucker asked. “So you're going to have to wait until your shift is over.”
“Yes, Sir,” Johnson said. He walked out of the room, and Herne would have sworn the young man had a spring in his step.
“Johnson's been angling for a promotion,” Tucker explained to Herne. “He's been asking for m
ore responsibility around here, and I haven't been too quick to give it to him. Hell, most nights the only action we deal with is a drunk driver or a fight at Harold's Tavern. There's just not a lot to pass along. But he does like knives—the kid's always got two or three blades on him—so this might be just the job for him.”
“Well, I'll leave the police work up to you gentleman,” Lee said. “When I get a toxicology report from the lab, I'll let you know.” The Asian doctor left as briskly as he arrived, his short legs carrying him quickly across the room.
The silence that settled between the two men hung in the air, heavy like the scent of grease and sweat and coffee that enveloped them.
“I guess I should thank you for helping out with Charlotte,” Tucker said. “I don’t have the resources for both cases, and a homicide comes first. Besides, Elizabeth trusts you…”
“I intend to earn her trust,” Herne said.
“I know. So what's your next move?” Tucker asked Herne.
“I still think there's a close link between Charlotte and Gabe. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that she went missing and he got killed. They knew each other in school. They dated. They worked for the same company. I think I'll look for the man he fought at Harold's Tavern.”
“Fine,” Tucker said. “That's one less person for me to question. But let me know what you find out.”
“I will,” Herne said.
“I mean it, dammit,” Tucker said. “Don't hide anything from me on this case, Art, or I swear this will be the last time I ask you for help.”
“You didn't ask for my help,” Herne said, pushing away from the table.
As he stared down at Tucker’s hard eyes, Herne could almost hear his thoughts echoing in the cold room.
You don't want the kind of help I have to offer.
CHAPTER 11
NOVEMBER 7 - WEDNESDAY MORNING
A tiny beam of sunlight struck the mattress beside Charlotte. She’d been awake for a long time. Maybe hours. Time had a way of passing in a different way since she’d been captured.
