Текст книги "Never smile at strangers"

Автор книги: Jennifer Jaynes

сообщить о нарушении

Текущая страница: 15 (всего у книги 19 страниц)

Chapter 56

THE SUN WAS a sharp afterglow in the western sky when Haley returned home from her shift at Luke’s. When she turned onto her street, she was shocked to see the sheriff’s cruiser parked in her driveway.

Her heart sped up.

Her mother. Something was wrong.

Jumping out of the station wagon, she hurried to the carport. There, she found the sheriff sitting on one of the rocking chairs facing the bayou. The detective sat next to him.

The sheriff looked up from his coffee, fine beads of sweat coating his hairline. “Why hello, Miss Haley,” he said.

“My mother. Is she. . . okay?”

“Now, now, this isn’t about yore mother. I’m sure she’s fine,” he said, straightening in the chair. “Just need to ask you a few questions.”

Haley nodded.

“You know a little girl named Sarah Greene out of Truro?”

Haley shook her head. “No, I don’t think so. Why?”

“Her parents have reported her missing. They returned home from a trip to Biloxi and she wasn’t there. She was with a friend until Sunday evening, but no one’s seen her since.”

Haley’s hand went to her mouth. “Oh my God.”

Another girl had disappeared.

The detective stood. “You said that you don’t know her?”

Haley shook her head. “No. I don’t think so. I know an Olivia Greene. At least there’s an Olivia Greene who comes into Luke’s sometimes. I’ve seen the name on her credit card. Is Sarah her daughter?”

The detective nodded, thumping his notebook against a bent elbow.

“Do you think she could have run away?”

“No,” the detective said.

“Who is she?” Haley asked.

“She’s a sixteen-year-old junior at St. Theresa’s. On summer break like the rest of the kids. Does some babysitting for folks.”

The springs on the back screen door snapped and Haley’s mother stepped out.

“Mrs. Landry,” the sheriff exclaimed. “I didn’t know you were home. We knocked, but. . .”

Haley’s mother glanced at the two on her carport, then at her daughter. One eye was made up nicely with makeup. The other was bare as though she’d forgotten what she’d started. She was also wearing a sundress, but it was Becky’s and was a couple of sizes too small. “Another child went missing?” she asked. “Did I hear that right?”

“Yes ma’am.”

“Oh my, what’s the world comin’ to?” she asked of no one in particular. Then her gaze fixed on Hebert and his styrofoam cup. “Come on in for some real coffee. You can ask my daughter questions inside where it’s cooler.”

She held the screen door open.

“Now you’re talkin’” the detective said, splashing his coffee into a barren flowerbed.

The sheriff forced a thick fist into his front pocket and unfolded his handkerchief. “I need a damn cigarette, that’s what I need,” he said, red-faced, wiping the sweat from the sides of his big head. “If I’m gonna die, I might as well let one o’ them kill me.”

Haley followed the men in.

Chapter 57

JUST HOURS AFTER the news broke about the missing girl, the media descended on Grand Trespass in a way it hadn’t when Tiffany disappeared. Camera vans, reporters, men with maps and radios congregated at public meeting places. Sarah Greene’s parents were driven into Lafayette in Sheriff Hebert’s police cruiser to make their tearful statements on television, then quickly driven out again, back to Truro. The sheriff told the community to keep an eye out, lock their doors and watch their children extra closely.

Two FBI agents, Special Agent Denise Jones and Special Agent Leon Adashek, were called in from the New Orleans bureau to work with the local law on the case. The agents showed up at all of the residents’ homes for statements, made certain the woods were combed thoroughly and Grand Trespass Bayou was dragged.

The two were working the case much differently than Guitreaux had. They weren’t interested in wasting any time. They were out to find someone and quick, no matter what it took. And they seemed particularly interested in one Grand Trespass local.

Haley, Erica and Austin were on the clock and Chris was reading the Daily Advocate at the counter on Wednesday when the two FBI agents showed up. They both sat at the counter and ordered pastries and coffees.

Erica found the female agent, Jones, riveting. She looked pulled together and polished in her starched khakis and a lavender polo shirt. A thick black belt with a gun holster was cinched against her small waist. She was forty-something and very beautiful. She was another woman who reminded her of her mother. Calm, cool, collected, self-possessed with a type of toughness that was uncommon in most women—at least the ones Erica had known.

Odd as it was, Jones even reminded Erica a little of Pamela. Though her father’s live-in was simple and uneducated, she, too, had an air of self possession. She knew who she was, something that puzzled Erica.

“How long did you say you’ve lived in these parts, Chris?” Jones asked, bringing her cup to her lips and blowing on the steaming coffee.

“Twenty years, ma’am,” Chris said, looking up from his newspaper. One eye was fixed on Jones, the lazy one on the front door of the diner.

Jones nodded.

“In a small town like this, you’re bound to know nearly everyone. Isn’t that right?” Agent Adashek asked.

Erica saw the muscles in Chris’s face constrict. He shot a quick glance at the portrait of his dead daughter. “That ain’t so,” he said, his weary eyes focusing again on the agent. “Like I’ve told you before, several times actually, people ‘round here are scattered. Spread out. We go to other towns to do our shopping mostly. Just cuz you own land in Grand Trespass don’t mean that you know all the other town folk.”

“You saying you don’t know many people here, Chris?” Jones asked, feigning surprise.

Chris scratched his head. “Yore puttin’ words in my mouth. Of course I know people. Didn’t say I didn’t.”

“Well, that’s what it sounded like you said,” Jones said.

Chris gazed out at the family of four who were seated closest to them. A boy in a WWE t-shirt was picking apart a ham and cheese sandwich while a smaller boy in a NASCAR shirt was pleading with his mother for another milk shake.

Haley shuffled toward them with customers’ orders, her face blank. She pushed open the door to the kitchen trailer and disappeared in the back.

Jones interjected. “Okay, well let’s try this, how well did you know Tiffany Perron?” she asked Chris.

His shoulders sagged and his voice was as low as a whisper. “How many times are you goin’ to ask me the same dang questions? Seems as though you think I have somethin’ to hide and I don’t.”

Jones smiled. And when she spoke it wasn’t a whisper. “Nothing? You call a record for peeping in innocent folks’ windows and invading their privacy nothing?”

Chris’s face went red. He stole a quick glance at Erica to see if she was listening. Then he looked down at his hands.

Erica was listening. . . intently. . . and she knew she should busy herself somewhere else in the diner, but she wasn’t about to go anywhere. Chris? Peeping? She pretended to wipe down the counter.

“How about Sarah Greene?” Adashek asked.

“I don’t know nothin’ about a girl named Sarah Greene.”

Jones flashed a photo of Sarah, and Chris looked away. “You already showed me that. Look, Tiffany Perron worked for me. She came in, she worked, and she went home. That was it. This Sarah Greene? I haven’t a clue who the girl is.”

Jones spoke this time. “Would you say the rumors are true? That you had a crush on Tiffany Perron?”

Chris’s grip tightened on the paper. “The kid was nineteen for God’s sake.”

“And that you were a little too touchy-feely with her? Probably creeped her out?”

Erica’s eyes narrowed. Chris was touchy-feely alright, but he was like that with everyone, including men. It was just his way of being personable. And yes, it was a little creepy if you were like her and didn’t like to be touched, but he didn’t mean any harm.

And him having a crush on Tiffany? What man who knew her didn’t at some point in time? Did that make every man a suspect?

“I don’t know what yore talkin’ about,” Chris snapped.

The door to the trailer opened and Haley walked back in. She smiled tiredly at the group and poured herself a cup of coffee.

The sun had become harsh outside and its rays coursed through the diner. Chris scooted his stool back loudly and got up to adjust the blinds.

“You’ve got some scrapes on your forearms,” Adashek called to Chris. “You like the woods? Spend much time in them?”

Chris’s snakeskin boots clicked against the tile as he went to the front doors. He flipped the sign on the door that read Open to read Closed. Then he turned to face the agents.

“I don’t appreciate this line of questioning. Especially in public. . . and in my place of business with my employees in earshot. There has to be a law against this shit,” he spat, anger flashing in his eyes. “I’ve been an upstanding member of this community for years now,” he barked, a ray of sun bouncing off the side of his crimson face.

The family stopped eating.

“Upstanding?” laughed Adashek, the edges of his lips curled into a grin. “So peeping is considered upstanding in this town?”

Chris’s eyes flickered. “Someone’s probably out there killin’ girls but the law keeps hasslin’ me. Have I made mistakes in the past? Yes sir, I have. But I’ve paid for them. Yore wastin’ your time here tryin’ to drag my name through the mud.” He pointed in the direction of Main Street. “Wastin’ precious time that you could be using tryin’ to find out what’s happenin’ out there.”

Chris’s neck was as red as a crawfish, and with his face creased the way it was, he looked about ten years older than he actually was.

His eyes landed on Haley and Erica. “We’re closin’ early for the day. I’ll have Kim come out to help close up, so after these customers are done, you gals can go on home. But business as usual tomorrow.” His eyes went back to the agents. “And if you two are through, I’m leavin’.” He waited for a response but got none. “So, am I excused?”

“Have a good day,” Adashek said, pleasantly. “If we have more questions, we’ll just swing by.”

***

“HOW LONG AGO did they leave?” Detective Guitreaux asked, his voice too even not to be perturbed. Erica could tell from the first time she’d seen Guitreaux with the FBI agents that he wasn’t crazy about the fact they were there. However, his face was now a blank slate, no emotion registering across his features. He looked as political, hard-to-read, and inept as always.

“About ten minutes ago.”

Guitreaux scratched his neck.

“They’re really getting around, those FBI guys,” Erica said, hoping to elicit a reaction. Just one small reaction from Guitreaux. If she knew anything about men, she knew they couldn’t stand being outdone by another man. Especially when it came to their jobs. The fact that a man and a woman might outdo Guitreaux was probably even worse.

The Detective looked toward the window. “I’d like a coffee and one of those chocolate danishes, if you don’t mind,” he said, scratching his neck some more.

“They were questioning Chris,” Erica added.

“Is that so?”

She set a cup and saucer in front of Guitreaux. She filled the cup with coffee. “Made him so upset we’re closing early for the day. You’re the only one I’ve let in since he left.”

She pulled a danish from the pastry bin and served it to him. “Seems like they know something they’re not sharing,” she prompted. “Think they do?”

Guitreaux dipped the pastry into his coffee then took a big bite.

“Chris. . . a peeping tom. Really. Now how weird is that?” she said.

Guitreaux almost choked.

“Where’d you hear that?” he spat, wiping his mouth.

“From the agents. They talked about it here at the counter like it wasn’t a secret or anything. Is it?”

“Now don’t go spreading that around,” Guitreaux warned. “That’s not information the sheriff wants out there.”

“You know anything about this Sarah Greene girl?” Erica asked. “I mean, have any clues turned up that you know about?”

He quietly chewed.

“She take anything with her when she disappeared? Like a runaway would? Clothes? A toothbrush?”

Guitreaux took a long drink of his coffee. He set the cup down. “You’re full of questions. Thought you didn’t know the kid.”

“I don’t. I just want to, you know. . . learn about what ya’ll do. Investigations stuff.”

“You’re kiddin’ me. A pretty little girl like you?”

Erica tried hard not to glare at him. She needed something from him. Something important.

“Just doesn’t seem like the kind of work that pretty ladies like you would be interested in is all,” he added.

Erica lowered her voice. “I’m writing a book. A mystery. So I’m, you know, doing some research.”

For a second, his eyes filled with what looked to be curiosity. “No shit? School project or the real thing?”

“The real thing,” Erica said between clenched teeth. The guy turned her stomach with his incompetence. But she knew the sheriff wouldn’t give her the time of day, much less the FBI, so her hands were tied.

“What about?”

“Can’t really say,” she said. “Anyway, think I could tag along with you a little? Watch how you investigate?”

Guitreaux shook his head. “Oh, I don’t know about that. You may be a little distracting, honey. . . if you know what I mean.”

“No. I don’t. What do you mean?”

He looked her over for a long moment. “How old are you?”

“Nineteen.”

“Hmm. . . Yeah, I don’t know. I’ll think about it.”

Chapter 58

“YOU SLEEPIN’ WITH him?” Mac asked, his eyes shiny against the dull glow of the porch light.

“What?” Haley asked, incredulously. The dust hadn’t even had a chance to settle since Austin and Erica had driven off. It felt strange to find Mac waiting for her.

“I’ve noticed he’s been taking you home an awful lot,” he said. It was the first time she’d seen Mac’s eyes look so cold.

“Mama’s been leaving with the car lately. We work together, so Austin’s given me a few rides.”

“Wasn’t Erica working tonight? She could have taken you home.”

“Austin took her home, too, Mac. Her truck won’t start. Besides we closed early today. What is this about exactly?”

He took his gold lighter from his pocket and snapped it open, then shut. “You didn’t answer my question.”

A wave of anger passed through her. “No, I’m not sleeping with him. He’s got a girlfriend. But even if I were, I don’t think you and I would be discussing it.”

Mac said nothing. He held the gold cigarette lighter in his hand and the lid snapped open and shut again. Then he looked down at his muddy boots.

“And how did you know Erica was working tonight? Are you checking up on me?”

“I watch out for you,” he said, his voice soft but the vein in his neck trembling. “You know that.”

“But that’s not your job anymore.”

He looked out at the bayou. “Yeah, guess not.”

Haley studied Mac and suddenly wondered if he was more sad than angry. She noticed a sack next to the rocking chairs. “You brought crawfish?”

Mac nodded. “Ordered extra from Comeaux’s. Thought about your family.” He pulled his cap from his head and looked at her, his hair disheveled and plastered against his skull. He ran his fingers through it. “So, you like him like that?”

“What?” she asked.

“Austin.”

“Like what?” she countered. “The way you like Rachel Anderson?”

Chapter 59

HE HURLED THE large rock and the big window shattered, the racket slicing through the still night. What he was about to do was risky. Riskier than anything he’d ever attempted. But he had no choice. Rachel was gone and this might be his only chance.

He had given Tom the benefit of the doubt with Tiffany, thinking that if he destroyed her, the family would have the opportunity to go on happily. Tom had had his chance and failed miserably.

Now he’d suffer the consequences for his actions.

A light blinked on in the bedroom. A moment later, one in the living room. The backdoor swung open and Tom Anderson stepped outside.

“What the hell?” He shuffled toward the broken window, stood in his bathrobe and scratched his head.

The crickets had gone mute those first few moments after the earsplitting noise of the window shattering, but now they began chirping again.

Adrenaline boiled in his veins. In a flash, he rushed up to Tom and struck him hard in the head with a metal bat. The older man cried out and, immediately, dropped to the ground. As Tom squirmed in the damp grass, his head cradled in his hands, he struck him several more times. In the kidneys, the backs of his thighs, his shoulders. Then he cuffed him.

He pulled him to his feet and pressed the hunting knife to his throat. Tom groaned.

“Fuck with me. . . just one time, and that’ll be the last thing you do. You clear on that?” he growled from behind the wool ski mask.

Tom nodded.

“Get movin’,” he snarled and pushed Tom toward the woods. He needed the man to cooperate for the trek back to the pond. Once there, he would finish him and dispose of the body.

Shivers coursed up the back of his neck as they walked through the dense brush, a hunting knife jammed into Rachel’s husband’s back. A second knife wedged between his belt and waistband. An owl screeched, its nocturnal hunt interrupted. The moon, fat and furious, sliced through the trees to light their gloomy path.

But he was suddenly having difficulty breathing. His breaths came ragged and shallow behind the itchy wool ski mask and he knew it was just the beginnings of a panic attack. The more he walked, the more ragged they came. He tried to think of something else. Something comforting to quiet the anxiety.

As they marched, single file, among the indistinct shapes and shadows of the murky woods, he forced himself to think of Sarah Greene. Her kill had been different than Tiffany’s. With Sarah, he’d spent a fair amount of time scrubbing blood from the walls and dingy carpeting of his bedroom.

The rush was like nothing he’d experienced before. It had been even more intense than with Tiffany. But the calm didn’t last for long. After only a few hours his mother’s horrifying presence had made it back inside his head. He wondered when it would ever end. And if it even would.

“Why are you doing this?” Tom asked, interrupting his thoughts and bringing him back to the present.

“Shut up and walk,” he warned.

“Does this have anything to do with Ra–?”

He yanked the handcuffs upward and Tom squealed. “I said don’t fuckin’ talk and I meant it.” He also applied more pressure to the knife pressed against Tom’s back.

The man went silent.

Just a hundred yards into the woods, the itching from the mask became so fierce, he couldn’t stand it. As he reached to readjust it, Tom suddenly sprinted.

It took him a second to realize what was happening. But quickly he was on the man’s tail. He chased the man as he zigged and zagged through the tall trees, screaming for someone to help him. Tom was fast, but handcuffed, he had trouble keeping his balance.

Catching up with him, he sank the knife deep into Tom’s spine. The man let out a thunderous yelp and tumbled forward, blindsiding a tree. Then he fell to the ground with a loud thud.

He hovered over Tom who lay wheezing and stinking of urine. Pale moonlight that had made its way through the tangle of giant trees lit the area just enough for him to make out the terror on Tom’s bloody face.

“Please. I’ll do anything. I. . . I have children.”

“You should have thought of them while you were fucking their babysitter,” he said, taking the bat from its harness.

“No, please,” Tom pled, wide-eyed. Pathetically, he inched backward on his rear end as though there was hope of getting away. “Please. I have money. I can pay you.”

He raised the bat above his head.

“Oh God, no. Please. No.”

Tom screamed the first few times the bat made contact with his head. But then the screaming quickly stopped.

He stared down at Tom’s body, his head nothing now but blood, bone and tissue. An exquisite calm entered him. But oddly, as the calm came and the rage dissipated, so did his energy.

He became lightheaded as something bright flickered meaninglessly behind his eyes. He yanked off the mask but it did nothing to help. He felt drunk and was desperate for rest.

He stumbled a couple of yards away from the body and its offensive odor and sank to the ground.

***

HE AWOKE TO daylight and instinctively wiped the dried saliva from the edges of his lips. He blinked. There were trees. Birds were singing. Above him a chattering squirrel leapt from one tree to another.

He tensed as he remembered. He was in the woods, laying a short distance from Tom’s body. He’d fallen asleep.

He’d fallen asleep!

He glanced at his watch and his heart pounded. This was dangerous. Very dangerous. The woods were too well-traveled with the investigation going on.

There was a rustling and he rose to his feet. He looked around woozily, his neck snapping left to right. He turned in a circle, his eyes darting every which way, taking in everything possible.

Then he discovered what the noise was. On the ground to his right lay a martin bird. Its wings and beak were squashed as though it had been stepped on, but it was still alive. Its beady black eyes were open and it gazed up at him, quivering.

He knew some believed that seeing a wounded bird up close was as unlucky as shattering a mirror or having a black cat cross your path. They believed it was an omen for something bad happening, a very unfortunate turn of luck. Luck. . . that he never had in the first place.

Spooked by his presence, the bird began to flail its better wing. It managed to scoot around in a 180, but after a few seconds it stopped. It watched him and began to tremble again.

He couldn’t stand it. Its helplessness. Its pain.

Gazing up at the sky, he pleaded for forgiveness, then took a step forward, thrusting his foot hard into the bird’s skull. . . and its suffering immediately ended.

Tears filled his eyes and his insides screamed. As far as he knew, the animal had been innocent.

He averted his eyes from the dead bird and started towards Tom, who hadn’t been innocent. He’d need to work quickly. If someone along the way saw him. . .

A branch snapped close by. He stopped and his body went rigid. Someone stood a few feet away from him. His hand shot to his back pocket to rest on his knife.

“Hel-lo,” he said, as casually as he could when he saw who it was.

“Howdy,” Chris replied, looking dumbfounded.

He’d seen Chris, the man who owned Luke’s, in the woods twice before. “You’re out awfully early. It’s barely seven o’clock.”

Chris glanced around, but said nothing.

He eyed the binoculars hanging from Chris’s neck. “What are the binoculars for?”

The man’s face went red but he didn’t answer.

“Don’t you worry, I won’t tell anyone that I saw you out here with those.”

Chris closed his eyes.

Sweat formed at his temples. The only option he had sickened him. “You lonely, Chris?”

Chris’s eyes opened. At first it looked like he was going to argue, but then he just looked resigned. “I. . . yeah, I reckon I am. But I’m no killer. That’s not me. I just have me a little problem. Since Luke Anne died and all, I’ve—”

“Been peeking into folks’ windows, right? Since your daughter died you haven’t been able to help yourself.”

Chris’s forehead creased with worry. “Yeah, but that’s all. I have nothin’ to do with those girls goin’ missing.”

“I understand. See, I’m lonely, too.” His grip on the knife tightening.

“You?” Chris studied him and he saw the man notice the blood stains on his arms.

He went for the knife.

Chris turned to run, but he didn’t get far.