And somehow, inexplicably, he found himself working for Ken, indebted to him, even.
“How did this happen?” he asked out loud.
But he knew how. He had been so obsessed with finding the real Skeleton King, with avenging Clay’s death, that he had made himself vulnerable. And a man like Ken Smith didn’t need an invitation to wield that to his advantage.
The snow was so heavy now that Drake found that even with the wipers set to maximum they were doing a poor job of clearing the windshield. He pulled the wiper stalk, but instead of washer fluid spraying the windshield, all he got for his efforts was a light on the dash indicating that he was out.
“Shit.”
Drake was forced to slow to a crawl. Now that he was outside the city, the quality of the roads deteriorated substantially, and he could feel the tires beneath the Crown Vic starting to slide across the surface rather than drive.
And the bone… the bone that Ivan delivered on behalf of Ken Smith… where the hell is it?
He racked his brain, trying to remember, but he was drawing a blank.
It had been in his pocket when he had gone to the barn on both occasions, he was sure of it. He was positive, because he distinctly remembered the feeling of the hard surface as he pressed it between thumb and forefinger.
But after that… where the hell did it go?
Tail lights suddenly illuminated the snow in front of him, and Drake slammed on the brakes.
The Crown Vic immediately went into a spin and he cried out, yanking the wheel against the rotation.
There was an awful squeal, and he saw the ditch at the side of the road careening toward him.
Someone screamed—it was him, it had to be him—and he instinctively let go of the wheel and brought his hands up in front of his face.
Chapter 59
“What should we do with him?” Agent Stitts asked as they stared at Glenn Happ through the glass.
“Let him rot. We can keep him for forty-eight hours without pressing charges. I figure we keep him until the very last second.”
Detective Yasiv came into the room, and all eyes immediately went to him.
“Sergeant Adams? I’ve got practically every beat cop in the city on the look out for Colin Elliot—they’ve all been given photographs, and his car has been flagged. If he shows his face tonight, we’re going to nab him.”
Chase thanked the man.
“And the secondary residence? Elliot’s place up north?”
Chase turned back to the now fidgeting landlord.
“Drake’s taking care of that.”
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw something in Agent Stitts’s face change. It was a subtle gesture, a simple tick in his cheek, but Chase’s time playing poker made her aware, without doubt, that this was a tell.
Yeah, he fucked up, fucked up big time, but he was trying to help. And now I need him.
The NYPD were good, sometimes great, at their job, but other times not so much. Drake, on the other hand, wasn’t bound by bureaucracy or strict rules. Which is why she had gone to him in the first place. And, yes, the whole business with Ivan Meitzer and the Times was a direct result of this flexibility, but it was a risk she was willing to take… again.
“Sergeant Adams?”
“Hmm?” Chase said, turning back to face Officer Dunbar.
“I said, I found out something about Glenn…”
“Go ahead.”
“You know that photo I showed you? That was from a computer engineering course that he took at MIT.”
Chase’s neck straightened.
“He went to MIT?” she asked, barely believing what she was saying.
This man with the ‘aint’s’ and ‘didn’t do nothings’ went to MIT?
Officer Dunbar shook his head.
“Not exactly. Took a course by them. Part of the free online courses that they started offering a while back. Got a certificate in computer programming.”
Even the fact that Glenn managed to get a certificate, even in an unaudited course such as the one Dunbar was describing, surprised Chase. And yet as shocking as this fact was, she failed to see the connection.
“And?”
Dunbar glanced around nervously, suddenly less confident than he was a moment ago.
“And remember Drake’s e-reader? How the IP was all scrambled… I doubt that Colin, a writer, would be able to do something like that,” Dunbar raised a finger and pointed directly at Glenn. “But this man might.”
Chase let this sink in for a moment.
“You think—” Detective Yasiv began, but Chase hushed him.
He wasn’t the killer, of that she was certain, and her gut told her that he wasn’t even involved.
Glenn Happ had no idea what she was talking about when she mentioned the books, let alone the murders.
And yet…
There’s something wrong with the profile… it just doesn’t feel right.
Chase immediately turned to the door and pulled it wide.
He might not know he’s involved, but maybe, just maybe he was manipulated into doing something that he wasn’t even aware of.
And there was only one way a man like Glenn would allow himself to be manipulated in that way.
“Chase?” Agent Stitts asked as she left the room. “You okay?”
Chase didn’t answer. Heart racing, she went immediately to the Interrogation Room and stepped inside.
“You’re back. I need to… I need to get out of here. I need—”
Chase held her hands up, a gesture so dramatic that Glenn leaned away from her, the chains on his wrists clanging loudly.
She knew what he was going to say—that he was going to ask for a lawyer—and she couldn’t let him finish his sentence.
Not right now.
She just had a few more questions.
“Before you say anything, just listen. You answer a few more questions, and I’ll let you leave. And not in two days, but now. Right now. But if you say anything else, I’ll hold you for the entire forty-eight hours permitted by law. Do you understand?”
Glenn opened his mouth to speak, but Chase held a hand up, once again stopping him.
“Just nod if you understand.”
Glenn, his jaundiced eyes now wide, nodded several times.
“Okay, good. Now answer this…”
Chapter 60
Drake blinked once, twice, and then a third time, confirming he had somehow managed not to rear end the car that had stopped in front of him.
Breathing heavily, Drake looked around, trying to catch his bearings. When he had jammed on the brakes, his car had spun, and eventually it had come to a stop perpendicular to the road, just inches from the top of the embankment, and only a few feet from a thick oak tree below.
That was close.
Drake patted the dash of his Crown Vic, thanking his lucky stars that it was an old, heavy beast. It wasn’t like the newer vehicles made of plastic and foam, light things that would hydroplane on a puddle.
No, his Crown Vic was like him: an old heavy beast.
Drake reached over and unbuckled himself, put his gloves on, and stepped out into the still blowing snow.
“Hello?” he shouted into the storm as he made his way toward the other car. He had seen the taillights, they had been bright enough to make him stop, but now, with the snow coming down, they had degenerated to diffuse glowing red eyes in the night.
“Hello?” he repeated.
Out of habit, he checked to make sure that the gun was still tucked in the back of his pants. Drake quickly pulled out his cell phone, noted that he had only one signal bar, and then slid it back into his pocket.
He didn’t think that anything sinister was going on here, but after what had happened with Raul, he wasn’t about to take any chances.
Drake slowed as he approached the car. It was still running, and he was confused as to why it had come to a complete stop in the middle of the empty road.
And yet he wasn’t
angry so much as he was concerned.
A heart attack, maybe? The driver had a hard attack? A stroke?
“You okay in there?”
The storm was so loud now that he had to shout to hear his own voice.
When Drake was finally within a few feet of the car, he realized why the driver had stopped. The left rear tire was a spare, a small rubber thing about two-thirds the size of the stock tires.
In fact, Drake realized that both back tires were doughnuts, and to top it off, the front two tires looked flat.
“What the hell?”
The snow at his feet was so thick that it had reached halfway up the bottom of the spare tires.
Drake moved to the front door, and tried to peer inside the window.
“Hey, buddy? You alright in there?”
The window was fogged and even by cupping his hands against the glass, he was unable to see inside.
Drake knocked on the glass several times.
“Hey? Hey buddy?”
When there was still no response, Drake reached for the door handle. It was unlocked, and he pulled it open.
Confusion washed over him.
The front seat was empty. The keys were in the ignition, and the car was on, but there was no driver or passenger in sight.
Drake leaned further into the car and peered into the backseat.
Nothing.
He pulled his head out and was in the process of straightening when a growl from his left drew his attention.
Drake’s eyes went wide and he stumbled backward.
A figure lunged at him wielding what he thought was a tire iron. It was an awkward, ungainly strike that would have missed, had Drake kept his footing.
His heels shot out in front of him, and he fell on his ass. As he went down, the arcing tire iron followed.
It cracked loudly off the top of his head.
The assailant also appeared to stumble in the snow, which was probably the only thing that kept the tire iron from splitting his skull open and send his brains splattering across the white expanse.
Drake grunted and tried to swear, but the only thing that came out of his mouth was an unintelligible mumble.
The figure fell directly on top of him, forcing the air from his lungs. He tried to push off, but his hands had suddenly become obstinate, stubborn things that refused to listen to his brain.
The white specks of swirling snow suddenly dimmed, becoming gray flakes in an otherwise black void.
A split second before darkness overcame him, Drake caught sight of his attacker’s face, which was set deep inside the hood of a winter coat.
Drake tried to speak, to shout, but succumbed to unconsciousness before he could manage a single word.
Chapter 61
Colin Elliot ran his hand across the top of the door, trying to feel through the thick pad of snow for the key.
When he felt nothing, he swore and removed one of his gloves. As he did, he noticed a small cut on the knuckle of his index finger, and his frustration transitioned into shame.
I hit her… I hit her and now I’m going to pay.
He couldn’t believe that he had actually done it. It wasn’t the first time he had thought about it, of course, but there was a huge difference between thinking something and actually doing it.
She pushed me… she pushed me too far. Every man has their breaking point, and this was mine.
With freezing fingers, he searched back and forth for the key.
When he didn’t find it, his grimace became a scowl. Colin turned his eyes to the snow around the door, looking to the spot that he had found the key last time he was here.
He was on one knee, rooting through the packed snow when something occurred to him.
Colin whipped his head around to confirm his suspicions. And then, seeing the familiar shape and pattern of footprints, his breath caught in his throat.
Someone’s been here.
Colin leaped to his feet, giving up on finding the key in the snow, if it was still there.
I have to get inside, I have to get inside now!
With a trembling hand, he reached for the doorknob, while at the same time bracing his back foot, readying himself to kick the damn thing down.
To his surprise, the door was unlocked, and he pushed it open.
His eyes scanned the interior of the house, his heart still racing in his chest.
The interior of the small cottage was musty and frigid, but empty.
Everything was exactly the way he had left it that day he had come with Colby and Juliette.
Except that was the problem.
When he had come here, his black notepad had been on the counter, and he had taken it back with him.
Only now it was here again, back in the exact same place as before.
Colin squinted at the notepad as if it might transform into a giant beetle the way the typewriter had in Naked Lunch.
But of course, it didn’t.
I took it… I remember coming inside and grabbing it, before heading back out to stop Colby from drowning Juliette in snow.
After that, he thought he remembered putting it in his computer bag, but couldn’t remember opening it since.
So how the fuck did it get back here?
Still staring at the notebook, he kicked snow from his boots and entered the cottage. Then he flicked on the lights, which bathed the main room in a dull yellow glow. His steps as he approached the counter were slow, deliberate.
Hesitant.
He was halfway there when he heard a sound.
Colin froze as he listened.
At first, he thought it was mice again, which wouldn’t be a surprise considering how old the place was, how many holes and cracks there were in the floorboards.
He had also seen mouse shit in some of the drawers the last time Ryanne had driven him out of the house and he had spent the night here.
But when the sound came again—powerful scratching this time—Colin knew that this was no mouse.
And when the words followed, his heart stopped completely.
“Please? Anyone up there? Please, I’m freezing down here. Please help me.”
Chapter 62
“Yeah,” Glenn said with a hint of pride. “I scrambled the IP. But so what? That ain’t a crime last time I checked. In fact, I bet it’s part of the Constitution or some shit. Big brother ‘n’ all that.”
For what might have been the twentieth time, the man tried to cross his arms over his chest and then appeared to look annoyed when the chain caught.
He was like a child, continuing to check that a live burner on the stove would scald.
Chase shook her head.
“Yeah, it’s not a crime. But if you want to get out of here, you’re going to tell me who you scrambled the IP for.”
Glenn squinted at her.
“For Ryanne. What’d you think?” he laughed. “You think I did it for Colin?”
Chase swore and started toward the door.
“Is that it?” Glenn called after her. “Can I go now?”
Chase ignored him and knocked on the door. When it didn’t immediately open, she kicked at it with her foot.
Stitts pulled it wide, a stern expression on his face.
“You said I can go! Hey! Lady, you said—”
Chase slammed the door closed behind her.
“What? What’d he say?” Agent Stitts asked as Chase hurried toward the other room. “The intercom was still off.”
“He said he scrambled the IP for Ryanne, not Colin,” Chase replied as she pulled the door to the observation room open. Inside, she was surprised that another man, one she didn’t recognize, had joined Dunbar.
Her first thought was that it was another IA goon, and she instinctively moved a half step behind Agent Stitts.
The man had horseshoe hair and thick glasses hiding beady eyes. He was so short that Chase thought that she might actually be the taller of the two.
In heels, there was no doubt.
&
nbsp; “Who’s this?” she demanded, her eyes glaring at Dunbar.
Officer Dunbar raised his hands defensively.
“This is the handwriting expert that I sent the books to… is this a bad time or… do you want me to tell him to leave?”
Chase had to think for a moment why Dunbar had reached out to a handwriting expert, but then she remembered that he was analyzing the books from Drake’s e-reader.
Red Smile.
“Benjamin Laroche,” the man said in a nasal voice. He held a hand out in front of him.
Chase eyed him up and down.
“Tell me what you’ve found,” she barked.
Benjamin cleared his throat.
“Well, I came to several conclusions based on the files that were provided to me. I must advise you, however, that this is not my—”
“Get to the point!”
The man’s eyes bulged.
“My first conclusion is that the author of the Manbeast series, I believe his pen name is R.S. Germaine, is not the same person who wrote Red Smile. I repeat, R.S. Germaine and L. Wiley are not the same person.”
Chase squinted as she processed this information. Things were suddenly starting to fall into place.
“What else?” she asked, the fury suddenly gone from her voice.
But despite her question, Chase knew the answer.
It was the reason why the entire profile felt wrong the moment Agent Stitts had opened his mouth.
“And I can tell you, with 98% certainty, that Red Smile Parts I, II, and III weren’t written by a man, but by a woman.”
Chapter 63
Colin threw the door to the cold cellar open and stared into the darkness.
There’s someone down here!
He reached for the light switch, missed, and his hand slammed against the frigid wall.
“Hello?” he called out, his voice wavering. “Hello?”
He ran his hand up and down the wall, searching for the light switch.
I imagined it… Ryanne’s got me so messed up that I just—
“Please… I’m freezing down here.”
Colin’s hand finally found the switch and he flicked it on. There was a fizzle and a pop, which was punctuated by a brief flash of light before everything was once again shrouded in darkness.
Detective Damien Drake series Box Set 1 Page 71