Vendetta Stone (28 page)

Jimmy Boyle was driving too fast on Interstate 24 West, slogging through the driving rain on his way to Nashville when his cell phone rang. He recognized Jackson’s number and put the call on speaker so he could keep both hands on the wheel.

“Hello,” Big Red said.

“Where are you?”

“
I’m passing the Smyrna exit now. I should be there in about forty minutes. Where you calling from?”

“
I’m almost at my brother’s house, and then I’m going to swing by Vandy. Can you meet me at the Parthenon?”

“Why sure
, Jack. I’m in my brother’s car. I left yours in Lynchburg. You were right about being followed. That cop sure looked mad. But I didn’t tell him nothin’.”

“Did he give you his name?”

“Yep, but I don’t remember. Let’s see. Oh yeah, Mike something. A big, dark-haired fella, called himself a friend of yours, but I didn’t trust him.”

Jackson
smiled. He wasn’t alone in the stealth department.

“Well, we
ll. That’s interesting. Pretty stocky, with narrow eyes?”

“Yeah, you nailed him
.”

“All right, Red, see you in a little while. Be careful, though. They might still be watching you.
Let’s meet by the picnic shelter.”

Red
looked in the mirror and spotted a Tennessee state trooper keeping pace with him about ten car lengths behind.

“
Oh man, you might be right,” he told Jackson. “There’s a highway patrol—wait, he’s getting off the road. Looks like you got nothin’ to worry about. Seeya in a few minutes.”

Red hung up and w
atched the trooper exit as he crossed into Nashville’s Davidson County. Actually, Red should have been looking ahead. He passed a black car just pulling onto the interstate. It kept pace with the oblivious Jimmy Boyle, who tuned in to the oldies channel.

“Thanks for your help, Trooper,” Barr
y Mendez said as he took over in the unmarked police car.

“Let us know if we can be of further assistance,” the
state cop radioed back.

“All right
, Red. Where are you taking me?” Mendez said.

Delmore Wolfe felt stoked, and not just from the drugs. His gamble paid off. Tiring of sitting outside Jackson’s house, Wolfe had spent an hour prowling around East Nashville for Jackson’s car.

He swung back by the Stone house and took a sharp left. Another cop car
did a drive-by. Wolfe reckoned others sought Jackson and decided he better find him first. Then a cool thought crossed his mind. They’re going to arrest him for Herb’s murder. I bet that’s why the cops are looking so hard for him. They’re closing in.

A
nother thought wiped the grin off Wolfe’s face, and his chest tightened.

H
e might be at the psychiatrist’s office right now.

Panicking, Wolfe
entertained one last possibility.

Maybe he’s gone to see his brother.

Wolfe hit the gas, and it took about twenty minutes to reach Patrick Stone’s home. A silver Malibu sat under the carport canopy, one he hadn’t seen before. He parked down the street for about five minutes, waiting to see who came out of the house. His Super Hearing device picked up muffled sounds inside before the door opened and a man came out. Wolfe couldn’t tell who because the umbrella obscured his view. He cracked a window for a better look as an umbrella lowered.

“We’re late for our appointment,”
Wolfe said as he glimpsed Jackson Stone’s profile. Jackson backed out of the driveway and took off. So did Wolfe. With all his plans falling into place, he contentedly followed Stone to his meeting.

But time was running out for Mike Whitfield, frantic to find Stone. He left messages at various phone numbers, and sent emails, then visited Stone’s brother at his Brentwood office.

“My wife
arranged for Jackson to talk to a psychiatrist the other day, but neglected to tell him about it until we got there. He got mad and we left and haven’t talked to him since,” Patrick said.

“
If there’s anything you can tell me to help me find Jack, or if you should talk to him, please let me know,” Whitfield said.

“There is one thing. A reporter left a message last night describi
ng a . . . I don’t know, suspect? It sounded like he wanted to warn Jack about him.”

“Yeah
, I know. I talked to the reporter last night. We’re looking for the same guy. I think he’s looking for Jack.”

That
worried Patrick. He presumed Jackson could take care of himself, but might not be thinking straight. If the cops were worried . . . .

“
What is the name of the psychiatrist Jackson saw?” Whitfield asked.

“Doctor Erica Karnoff. She’s over at Vandy.”

Whitfield thanked Patrick, then dialed Chief King’s private number as he sped back to Nashville.

“Sir,
I’m headed Vanderbilt to meet with a Doctor Erica Karnoff. I’ll keep you posted.”

The storm that hung over Nashville had approached from the southeast, welcome relief from the heat wave. Temperatures had hovered around one hundred degrees for the past two weeks. It was the middle of hurricane season in the South, and when one moved inland in such dry conditions, the ensuing downgraded storm could still come so hard that flash floods overloaded sewers and sent water backing into the streets. It was one of those days.

Cars splashed sprays
five feet as they hit the standing water along West End. Thunder boomed as the storm settled in above the Vanderbilt campus. Across the street at Centennial Park, lightning lit the dark skies like spider veins.

On a typic
al August day, the park teemed with sunbathers, joggers, mothers pushing kids’ strollers, businessmen eating lunch, grandparents and grandkids feeding the Lake Wautauga ducks, homeless men panhandling or scrounging through the garbage cans for food, and musicians playing guitars or fiddles or banjos or bongos.

But the rain kept everyone away from
the sprawling park, home to the Parthenon, an exact replica of the ancient wonder in Athens, Greece, which boasted magnificent columns topped by pediments of gods, goddesses, warriors on horse-drawn chariots, centaurs, Minotaurs and gryphons. Inside the temple stood a forty-three-foot-tall, gilded statue of Athena, the Greek goddess of wisdom, with a thirty-five-foot spear and shield at her side, and in her right palm, Nike, the goddess of victory.

It was under
renovation, almost finished with one scaffold remaining.

Jackson
approached Centennial Park from the west side of Nashville, followed by Delmore Wolfe, hot on the scent. Unaware of the tail, Jackson dialed Doctor Karnoff’s office.

“T
his is Jackson Stone,” he told the receptionist. “I have an eleven o’clock appointment with Doctor Karnoff, but I might be a few minutes late.”

“I’ll let her know,
” she said. The other line buzzed, and she punched it.

“T
his is Sergeant Whitfield of the Metro Police Department. I’d like to speak with Doctor Karnoff.”

The receptionist connected Whitfield
. He explained to Doctor Karnoff the urgency for the call, that Jackson Stone’s brother had mentioned the meeting that went awry the other day, that he carried important information for Jackson pertinent to the investigation into his wife’s death. Mike wondered if Jackson rescheduled for another day.

“As a matter of fact, we went ahead with the meeting. He has another appointment at eleven this morning,” Doctor Karnoff said. “I’ll be glad to let him know you’re looking for him.”

“Actually, I’m on my way there now. I won’t take more than five minutes of his time. I promise”

Erica hung up
, and her secretary buzzed again.

“Mister Stone called and said he might be late for his appointment.”

Red
approached downtown from the east. Already late for his Nashville appointment with Jack, he might run even later. Was he still being followed or just being paranoid? He noticed the black car behind him about five miles ago, and it kept pace. Jackson’s vanishing act wasn’t going to be blown by him. Red exited and headed downtown instead of toward the park, then dialed the last number on his cell phone. The trailing car also turned right.

“I may
be a few minutes late. I’ll try to lose him, but if I don’t make it, you know why.”

I drove by the Parthenon and around algae-stained Lake Wautauga to the back side of the park before I stopped and ran over to the picnic shelter under an umbrella that didn’t keep me dry.

Despite the storm’s intensity, I couldn’t help but notice the lone car pull past me.
What I didn’t notice was Clarkston driving his wife’s car. He could be devious, too.

The wind picked up
, and I looked up at a stripe of lightning on the other side of the park, followed by the echoes of a cracking limb.

“
Mind if I join you?”

I whipped around so fast I strai
ned my neck. Dan Clarkston, the next-to-last person I expected to see at the park, closed his umbrella. I tried to answer as nonchalant as possible.

“Why sure
, Dan, have a seat,” I said, patting the bench. “You doing weather stories now?”

“So who are you meeting?”

“It’s lunchtime, and I wanted to get out of the office on such a beautiful day,” I said in a sarcastic tone. “Why you following me?”

“I don’t know what you saw last night on that video, but I want some answers
, and you’re going to provide them. Start talking.”

“Is this on or off the record?”

Clarkston got in my face. “Cut the bull, Gerry. You owe me.”

Stone arrived and headed our way.
Pittard got out of Clarkston’s car to join us.

“O
kay, I’m meeting with Stone. I told you about the Sunday profile I’m working on. I planned to suggest that he do your show, but I don’t know now. I don’t like being followed.”

“What show?”
Jackson Stone asked as he caught the end of the confrontation.

“
Ed and Tara
,” I told him, and nodded Clarkston’s way. “Dan here invited me to be a guest on the show with you if you’d agree to do it. I could use an all-expenses paid trip to New York City, Jack. Start packing.”

“Oh, I am,
” he said, a cryptic statement that we’d only later come to understand.

“How about it
, Jack? I think you’ve met my cameraman, Greg.”

They
shook hands. Clarkston pressed for an answer.

“I know y
ou’re here to meet with Gerry. He thought maybe you would be willing to do an exclusive with me after you’ve finished your interview with him. I don’t have anything scheduled the rest of the day, so I’ll be glad to wait. In fact, I insist.”

The look I gave Stone
told him to accede, and he picked up his cue, smiling.

“I’ll tell you what,”
Jackson said. “My time’s kind of limited right now. Why don’t I swing by the station this afternoon? We’ll talk about New York. It’s time to take the story national, I guess. Right now, I’d like to talk to Mister Hilliard. Alone.”

Dan smiled and left as if
he’d won this round. He’d lost again.

The cat-and-mouse contest that was being played with Clarkston wasn’t the only game of hide-and-seek in Nashville that stormy morning. Sergeant Whitfield made it from Brentwood faster than expected. About to enter Doctor Karnoff’s medical office, he answered his cell phone.

“I’ve been spotted,” O
fficer Mendez told his superior. “I’ve been following Red, and it seems like he’s doing everything he can to stay away from the Vanderbilt area. We’ve been driving around downtown for fifteen—wait, he’s pulling over and getting out.”

“Don’t lose him,” Whitfield said. “Stone’s supposed to be on his way here, but he mig
ht meet Red first. Call if Stone shows.”

Big Red played country music tourist on his first trip to Nashville since the last Gulf War veterans’ reunion. Despite stormy conditions, tourists roamed everywhere and at ten thirty a.m., country music blared from several venues. Red entered Bert’s Beer Barn and ordered a house draught and a cheeseburger. Officer Mendez found a vantage point where he could watch and wait.

Red also waited
, trying to figure how he could slip out undetected by that smart fella outside. Red didn’t care about his identity, just that he lost his pursuer. Red put a couple of dollars in the collection can to benefit Angela’s Angels.

A few miles away, Whitfield hoped Jackson would surface soon, whether at Doctor Karnoff’s office or downtown. He’d warn him to be on the lookout for the mystery man in the photo. Jackson and I waited, too, for a break in the case. We didn’t wait long.