Solid as Steele (11 page)

“You still think the house is out in the country?”

She hesitated. “I don't know.”

“What's different?”

“I just have the feeling that I wasn't all that far from here. And…” She huffed out a breath. “There's the way he set up the area inside at the front door. If the house were in the country, maybe nobody would come around. But I think he decided he had to have the entry looking normal. I mean, if someone rang the bell, and he opened the door, they'd see a vestibule that looked like part of an ordinary house. So he was thinking that maybe somebody would come to the door. I know that's kind of going in circles, but do you know what I mean?”

“I think so.”

She made a frustrated sound. “My clever idea of dreaming a visit there didn't work. Let's go back to plan A.”

Jamie waited for Mack to challenge her.

All he said was, “What's plan A?”

She breathed out a little sigh. “Figuring out a link between the victims.”

“Okay. But first we need something to eat.”

“Yeah.”

She started to throw back the covers and realized she was naked.

“I'll get you something,” Mack said.

He climbed out of bed, went to the closet, and brought her the dress shirt he'd hung there, in case he needed it.

Before she could say anything, he grabbed a pair of jeans and walked into the sitting room, giving her an excellent view of his muscled body.

Jamie sat up and pulled on the shirt, feeling a little strange about wearing his clothing.

Was he putting his brand on her, or had he just picked something that would cover her up?

She pulled a pair of panties from her suitcase and put them on, then walked into the front room.

This was no normal morning after. She'd had the clever idea of dreaming herself into the funhouse. It hadn't worked out the way she'd thought. Neither had the next part. She'd ended up making love with Mack, and she wasn't going to tell herself it hadn't been good. Too good, actually.

She needed a little space, but they were stuck together in this hotel suite, and she couldn't go outside to get away from him because that tactic hadn't worked out so well, either.

Maybe breakfast would distract her. Breakfast was normal, right?

He'd already pulled on a T-shirt and put two bowls and the box of cereal they'd bought on the table. She got milk from the small refrigerator, while he made coffee using the packets the hotel had provided.

“Orange juice?” he asked.

“A little,” she answered.

Still uncomfortable, she crossed to the coffee table and picked up the notes she'd made on the murder victims along with some newspaper pages she'd printed from the library files. Most of them were about the funhouse case, but she also had the article that involved Craig.

Back at the dinette table, she shuffled through the papers as she drank her coffee, then suddenly set the cup down with a thunk.

“What?” Mack asked.

She could feel the tightness in her chest when she looked up. “I told you I met Craig when he came to Gaptown on a case.”

“Uh-huh,” he answered, and she could see he was suddenly on the alert. He was probably wondering why she had to bring up Craig now.

“He came here investigating insurance frauds. Then he came back for something else. A kidnapping.” She turned her palm up. “When we were at the library, I…uh…saw an article about the second case and printed it.”

“Why?”

“I…just did.” She raised her shoulder. “It made me feel closer to him.”

He wrapped his hands around his coffee cup. “Okay.”

“Did you know about either case he was working on here?”

Mack shook his head.

“When he came back to town, he was chasing a man who was estranged from his wife and had snatched their son. The guy was driving west in a bad rainstorm. Maybe he was going to stop here for the night or something. But when he got off the highway in Gaptown, he was in a one-car accident.”

Mack nodded.

“He skidded and hit a light pole. His car was wrecked. His son was injured and taken to the emergency room.”

“Do I need to know all those details?” he asked, his voice tight.

“I'm giving you the background. They quote the emer
gency room nurse in the article. The nurse was Lynn Vaughn.”

He almost sloshed coffee into his cereal bowl.

“Lynn Vaughn?” he repeated.

“Yes.”

“What did she say?”

Jamie passed the paper to him, and he quickly scanned the article.

Lynn hadn't said much, only that the boy, Billy Fried, had been brought in and then released. Because his father was in police custody, the child had been turned over to county social services.

She watched Mack read through the article. “There's nothing else of interest,” he said.

“Don't you think it's weird that it mentions Lynn Vaughn?” she pressed.

He shrugged. “I guess she was on shift that night.”

“Maybe. But I think we should look through later papers to find out what happened,” she said.

“Why should we? Don't you think it's just a coincidence?” he snapped.

“It could be, but I can't shake the feeling that it may be more.”

He looked like he was fighting the impulse to snap at her again, and she was sorry she'd put him on edge.

When he spoke, he answered in an even tone. “I guess we can go back to the library.”

“But you don't think we should bother?”

“You're suggesting it could be a lead in this case.”

“I think it could be.” She shrugged. “Let's call it a strong hunch.”

They'd run out of things to say to each other and ate the remainder of the meal in silence. When they were finished Jamie got up to put the dishes in the sink.

“You get dressed. I'll wash them,” Mack said.

“Thanks,” she answered, wondering if he was trying to be nice or trying to show her how helpful he could be.

At the entrance to the bedroom, she turned to see him getting the bottle of dishwashing liquid out of the bottom cabinet.

Before he turned around and caught her watching him, she closed the door and got a clean shirt and a pair of jeans from her suitcase.

Beside her was the bed where they'd slept together. It still didn't feel right to have had such a wonderful time in his arms, but it didn't feel all that wrong, either.

What was so bad about going on with her life, she asked herself. Wouldn't Craig want her to do that?

Or was it bad because she'd known that Mack was attracted to his friend's wife? She'd been kind of attracted to him, too. Certainly she'd noticed him among the Light Street detectives and Randolph Security men she'd met at parties. But she'd made sure it stayed on a superficial level with Mack Steele because she was married to Craig. Now, everything had changed, but she was having trouble coping with the new reality.

She took a quick shower, pulled on her underwear, then hung the wet clothes in the bathroom over the towel racks. Cautiously, she opened the door and stuck her head out. Mack must have decided to stay out of the bedroom until she was done because he was nowhere in sight.

She grabbed her clothes, finished dressing in the bathroom, then cleared out. When she came back to the living room, Mack was staring out the window. From the way his shoulders tensed, she knew he'd heard her.

“What are you doing?”

He turned to face her. “Scanning the parking lot for suspicious-looking cars.”

“You see anything we should worry about?”

“No. But I'm still thinking about whether to change hotels again.”

“It gets kind of wearing, moving every night. Why don't we just stay here? There aren't a lot of choices in town. Anybody that could find me at this place could find me somewhere else. Or do you want to go to the Bruce House? It's a B and B.”

“Under the circumstances, we're probably better off not having to make breakfast conversation with other guests.”

“Good point.”

When he went to get dressed, she took his spot at the window, looking out until he came back about fifteen minutes later.

“See anything we should worry about?” he asked when he returned.

“Nothing obvious. But I'm probably not as good as you are at spotting trouble.”

“I was thinking we'd go to the library to check the local papers again,” Mack said. “But while I was taking a shower, I came up with something else we could try.”

“Which is?”

“We never looked up Jeanette Baker's specialty.”

He sat down on the couch, opened his laptop and turned on the machine.

While he waited for the computer to boot up, Jamie paced back and forth across the living room. Mack glanced at her but didn't complain.

Then he began typing, and she sat down beside him, waiting while he went to Google.

When he found Jeanette Baker's obituary, he scanned the entry.

Jamie made a small sound when she saw that Jeanette
had worked for Allegany County social services in the Children's Division.

“Oh Lord. I guess you're thinking the same thing I am.”

“That she was the one who took custody of Billy Fried.”

“Can you find that out?”

“Maybe.”

He got out of the website and went into another, this one linked directly to the child services division of the county system. Jamie sat tensely next to him until a screen popped up with the answer. Jeanette Baker had been the social worker assigned to the little boy.

“That's the link between them,” Jamie breathed. “They were both involved in the kidnapping case that brought Craig back here.”

“Yeah.”

She gasped as another terrible thought struck her. “He was killed by a hit and run driver. Do you think that could be connected?”

“It could be,” he said, the words coming out low and grating.

“Oh Lord,” she said again. “Oh Lord.”

Mack reached for her hand, but she sprang off the sofa.

“I'm sorry. I…”

She charged into the bedroom and closed the door, looking at the bed for a long moment. The bed where she and Mack had made love. She'd almost convinced herself that it was okay. Now she knew that she and Mack were involved in the case that Craig had been investigating.

Was that why he'd been killed? And by the same guy who had gone after Jeanette and Lynn Vaughn? It seemed impossible that those three people were linked up. But
at the same time, it had come to make a kind of horrible sense.

With a trembling hand, she reached to straighten the covers. When the bed was more or less back together, she crawled in, still with her clothes on.

As a little girl, getting under the covers and feeling their weight on top of her had always been comforting. The habit had persisted into adulthood.

Numbly, she pulled the sheet, blanket and spread up to her chin, making a cocoon for herself as she felt hot tears well in her eyes. She didn't try to stop them, but she sure as hell hoped that Mack wasn't coming in here.

She let the misery flow out because she was helpless to do anything else. All the pain of Craig's death flowed over her again.

A long time later, a knock at the door woke her, and she realized she'd fallen asleep.

She pushed herself up and ran an unsteady hand through her hair. When she looked at the clock, she saw that three hours had passed. Somehow she'd slept that long. Probably because she couldn't face reality.

“Are you all right?” Mack called out.

“Yes,” she forced herself to say.

He waited a long moment before asking, “Can you come out? I've found out something else about the case.”

“What?”

“It's a little inconvenient talking through a closed door.”

“Okay. Just a minute.” She heaved herself out of bed, then staggered into the bathroom where she used the facilities, splashed water on her face and ran a comb through her hair. She still looked like hell, but she didn't particularly care.

Feeling uncertain about facing Mack, she walked stiffly
to the door and opened it. He was sitting where she'd left him on the couch. The computer was still on his lap.

He looked up, and she felt his gaze.

Ignoring the scrutiny, she crossed the room, sat down in one of the dinette chairs and folded her arms across her middle.

When she didn't speak, he asked, “I did a bunch of research on the case. Are you going to get upset if we discuss it?”

She struggled to keep her voice even. “I hope not.”

“Is there anything I can do for you?”

“No. Just tell me what you found.”

She saw him swallow and knew that he wanted to talk about the two of them, but she wasn't going to let him do it. Not now.

“I think I've figured out the link between the three victims.”

“You mean four, don't you? Because I believe we both know that Craig was killed by the same person.”

Mack kept his voice even. “All right, four.” He pointed to some notes he'd made. “The father of the boy was named Henry Fried. He was tried in court here in Gaptown on the kidnapping charge. He got six years because it was a domestic case, but he got out early on parole.” He paused and gave her a direct look. “The foreman of the jury that convicted him was Tim Conrad.”

She felt a wave of cold sweep over her. “They're all linked to that case.”

“Yeah.”

“So we have to assume the person who killed the three people here and Craig in Baltimore is Henry Fried.”

“Yes.”

Her voice hardened as she felt a new sense of purpose take hold. “We can find him!”

“Unfortunately, not right away.”

“Why not?”

“He seems to have dropped off the face of the earth.”

“He's not dead! He's killing people.”

“He must be using a different name.”

She dragged in a breath and let it out, consciously making her voice less strident as she fought to control her emotions. Getting upset wasn't going to do her any good.
She needed to stay calm and focus on facts. “I guess that makes sense. What do we know about him?”

“He was an engineer with a good paying job—working for a high-tech waste management firm in Baltimore. Until his marriage went sour.”

“An engineer. So he's technically oriented. He could have designed the…exhibits in his funhouse.”

Mack nodded.

“But we still haven't found the house.” She got up and paced to the window, then back toward the hallway, sorry that she'd bailed out and left Mack to do all the work. She'd come to Gaptown because she wanted to be part of the process. This morning, she'd freaked out over the knowledge that the same guy had murdered her husband. But that only gave her a more urgent reason to figure out who had killed Lynn Vaughn, Jeanette Baker and Tim Conrad. They'd also find Craig's killer. A while ago, she'd been too upset to realize that. Now she was determined to get the guy.

“What else did you get on him?” she asked, sitting down next to Mack.

“His wife's name. It's Helen Fried.”

“Did you talk to her?”

“I wish I could have. But after she got her son back, she kept getting threatening communications from Fried.”

“While he was in jail?”

“Yes. Eventually, she and the boy disappeared. I can't get a line on her. Which makes me think that's what her ex-husband's mad about. She took the boy somewhere he can never find him, and he's angry with all the people involved in the case here in Gaptown. Didn't you say he told the women they'd ruined his life?”

“Yes, but it's his fault, not theirs.”

“According to standard logic. According to his logic, they stole his son away from him.”

She pondered that. “He's getting revenge against them.”

“It looks like it. I've been searching the web since you…” He stopped and started again. “I haven't come up with any leads on him. He's gone underground, and I'm not sure how to figure out who he is.”

“The funhouse is around here. We could check real estate records.”

“We'd have to check a lot of records. And we don't even know if he bought the house, rented it, or found an abandoned place and moved in. Still, real estate transactions might be our best option.”

She nodded.

Mack sighed. “I need to knock off for a while. I'll go out and get some food and bring it back.”

She gave him a considering look. He'd been at this for hours, and she'd been sleeping. “Okay,” she said softly.

“You need to eat, too.”

“I'm not hungry.”

“Not eating isn't doing Craig any good,” he said, his gaze drilling into her.

Her voice turned fierce. “What's that supposed to mean?”

“It means that your husband is dead, and you should keep your strength up if you want to find the guy who killed him.”

She glared at him, wanting to ask what her eating had to do with it, but she did understand the logic of keeping herself in good shape.

“What are you going to get?” she asked.

“What do you want?”

She turned one hand palm up. “I don't care.”

“I saw a Mexican-style fast food restaurant when we were driving around downtown. I can bring us back tacos or burritos. Which do you want?”

“Either is fine with me.”

His eyes narrowed. “Stop acting like nothing matters to you any more.”

“Stop telling me what to do,” she shouted, then wished she hadn't raised her voice.

They stood staring at each other for charged moments. Finally, he turned and walked toward the door. In the hallway, he paused. “I'll be back as soon as I can. Keep the security lock on the door.”

“Of course.”

When he'd left, she pushed the safety bar into place, then stood for a few minutes with her back against the door.

She knew Mack was trying the best he could to solve the murders and also to give her the space she needed.

She went back to the bedroom, fixed the bed, then restlessly walked around the suite.

 

M
ACK DROVE AROUND
the downtown area, looking for the taco joint he'd seen before. He was beginning to think he'd dreamed it up.

Finally he saw the sign in the distance. Only it was on a one-way street, and he had to circle back, cursing that nothing was going right at the moment.

Well, he couldn't say nothing. They had made some progress on the case, thanks to Jamie's printing that article about Craig, then insisting that he check up on Jeanette Baker. Was that a psychic insight?

He sighed. Maybe if he'd been alone, he would have had the same spooky feeling when he'd seen Lynn Vaughn's
name in that article and started digging on his own. Only he wouldn't have looked at that article in the first place.

Too bad they had no idea what name Fried was using now. That was going to make finding him a little difficult. Perhaps it was time to go to the police with the information they had, but he couldn't do that without consulting Jamie.

Of course, he and Jamie had a lot more to talk about than just the case, if either one of them was up to it. He'd thought he had started building a relationship with her. Then Craig Shepherd had jumped back into the picture and changed everything.

He sighed. He and Craig had been good friends—which didn't make any of this easier. They'd all thought Craig had died in an accident. Now it looked like he'd been murdered. Catching the killer would mean a lot to Mack—for his own satisfaction and for Jamie. He knew this was tearing her up. That was perfectly obvious.

But had everything changed between himself and Jamie now? Were they back to the way things had been before this trip?

“Damn.”

He slapped his hands against the steering wheel, then ordered himself to calm down. He'd waited a long time to reach out toward Jamie. He'd gotten through to her. He could do it again.

Unless she had decided to totally shut him out because she couldn't cope with anything besides her husband's murder.

 

W
HEN JAMIE'S CELL PHONE
rang, she jumped, then dug it out of her purse. It was probably Mack calling about dinner.

When she looked at the phone number, she sucked in a sharp breath. It wasn't Mack calling.

She considered not answering. Then she changed her mind and pushed the button.

“Mom?”

“Jamie! Thank God.”

Her mother sounded frantic and breathless.

Alarm leaped in Jamie's chest. “Mom, what is it?”

“You've got to come over here right away.”

‘What's wrong? Did Clark do something to you?”

“I can't talk about it over the phone. You've got to come here. Right now.”

She thought about what to do. “I'm at a hotel downtown. Mack is out getting us dinner. I don't have a car.”

“Can't you take a cab?”

“You need me right away?”

“Yes. Please, Jamie. It's…urgent.”

“Okay. I'll be there as soon as I can.”

Jamie looked around the room, found the hotel notepad and scrawled a message for Mack: “My mom's in some kind of trouble. I'm going over there.”

Then she called the front desk.

“This is Jamie Shepherd in room 524. Can you call me a cab?”

“Certainly.”

“How long will it take?”

“Maybe five minutes.”

She got out her cell phone again, but she'd never put Mack's number into her memory, and since she hadn't gotten any calls from him on the phone, she couldn't get his number that way either. The note would have to do.

As she rode down in the elevator, she went back over the call from her mother. Gloria had sounded frantic, but
there was no way to know what was wrong. Not until she got there.

She wished Mack were with her, and with that thought came the realization that she was starting to depend on him. Or to put it another way, she knew she could depend on him.

Probably he was going to be angry that she'd gone out. Well, she'd deal with that after she found out what was wrong at home.

When she got to the lobby, she started for the front door, then stopped. She hated to be looking over her shoulder every second, but she knew Fried could be lurking out there.

Instead, she waited inside, until she saw a cab pull up at the door. Then she hurried across the lobby and exited the building.

Before she got in the cab, she gave the driver a long look, but he was a short, pudgy guy. Nothing like the man she'd seen in her dream trips to the funhouse.

“Where to?”

She told him her mother's address and sat back, trying to calm the pounding of her heart. She'd been telling herself for years that she didn't care what happened to Gloria Wheeler. Apparently she had been fooling herself.

It was only a short ride to her mom's place. When the cab arrived, she stared at the property. Clark's truck wasn't in the driveway, but he could have moved the vehicle somewhere else. After paying the driver, she got out and started up the sidewalk. The curtains in the front window were drawn, and the front door was closed.

Jamie tried the knob and found the door was unlocked. Cautiously, she pushed it open and peered into the cluttered living room.

The lights were on, but the room was empty.

“Mom?”

As she stepped inside, she heard a muffled noise from the bedroom.

“Mom?”

She hurried across the room and down the short hall, then stopped abruptly.

Her mother was sitting in one of the dinette chairs, her hands tied behind her back and a gag in her mouth. When she saw Jamie, her eyes went wide.

Jamie had started toward her when she heard a harsh voice from behind her. “Stop right there. Put your hands in the air if you don't want to get shot right now.”

 

M
ACK KNOCKED ON THE
hotel room door. When nobody answered, he knocked louder and called out, “Jamie?”

When she didn't answer, his heart started to pound.

Setting the bags with the tacos down on the carpet beside the door, he fished his key card out of his pocket, unlocked the door and charged into the living room. It was empty, but he saw a message written on the hotel notepad.

His curse filled the room as he read it.

Running back to the door, he scooped up the food bags and set them on the coffee table. Then he exited the room again and went back to the lobby.

“Did you see Ms. Shepherd go out?” he asked the guy behind the desk.

“Yes. She called for a cab.”

“How long ago?”

“Twenty minutes.”

Twenty minutes was a lifetime.

Mack ran back to the car, jumped inside and started the engine. Lurching out of the parking lot, he headed for the house where they'd visited Jamie's mom.

When he got there, he jumped out of his SUV and ran up the front walk. The door was open.

“Mrs. Wheeler?” he called out.

When nobody answered, he stepped into the house. A thumping noise from the back had him running down the hall, gun drawn.

Gloria Wheeler was sitting in a chair in the bedroom. Gagged and tied.