“I think if she followed, it’d be easier.”
She gave that a moment, said, “Okay,” then slipped out of the booth.
Miles was briefing Charise about the change in plans when Chloe’s Pacer appeared from around the back of the diner. They heard the car before they saw it. It was a a minisymphony of rattles and groans and squeaks, as well as a deep-throated rumbling from a busted muffler.
“You’re going in that, sir?” Charise asked.
“Evidently.”
“Would you like me to drive—what is that, Mr. Cookson? It looks like a goldfish bowl.”
“A Pacer.”
“Would you like me to drive that, and the young lady could drive this car? You’d be more comfortable.”
Miles smiled. “No, but thank you.”
Chloe brought her car to a stop, brakes squealing, next to the limo. “Hop in,” she said, her window rolled down. Charise gave the car a visual appraisal and did not appear pleased.
“This thing pass a safety test?” Miles asked.
“I make up for its deficiencies by being a great driver,” Chloe said. “Been driving since I was fourteen, legally since sixteen. I even drove a delivery truck when I was seventeen. It was a FedEx van, and I kind of took it for a joyride without permission, but once I got behind the wheel it was a piece of cake. When I was nineteen my mom rented a motor home thing and we did a trip to D.C.”
Miles went around to the passenger side, where he encountered the biggest car door he had ever seen. And then he remembered that the Pacer had been designed with a longer right-side door to allow easier access to the rear seat. The door sagged when he opened it, as if too heavy for the hinges.
“When you get in,” Chloe said, “you have to pull really hard to get it back in place.”
“Noted,” Miles said, getting both hands on the armrest and pulling with everything he had.
“Okay, let’s hit the road. But first …” She took out her phone. “You got some sort of ID?”
“Huh?”
“Driver’s license or something?”
Miles blinked, took out his wallet, and dug out his license. Chloe took it in one hand and took a picture of it with the other.
“What are you—”
“Hang on,” she said. She handed back the license and did some swift tapping, followed by a whoosh. “Emailed it to Viv, at the diner. In case you’re actually a strangler-rapist-serial-killer guy.”
“Understood.”
Still holding the phone, she said, “I’ve been documenting all these encounters, you know, relating to my family history, my background. I’ve been doing video of my grandfather, and Todd, and I should have recorded our whole meeting just now.”
“That’s okay.”
“No, no, it’s not. I really want this stuff. It’s important. You hold this and shoot while I’m driving, okay? ’Cause I can’t exactly film and drive at the same time. If I’m talking, shoot me, and if you’re talking, do the selfie thing. Can you do that?”
“I suppose. So we’ll use the time to tell each other a little more about ourselves?”
“Exactly,” she said, cranking the wheel and hitting the gas. The back wheels kicked up gravel. She glanced in the rearview mirror, saw the black limo falling in behind. “Hope I didn’t chip her paint.”
Miles asked her to tell her story first. She said she didn’t need him to record much of that, since she already knew it. But she told him about her upbringing, about having two mothers, the teasing and the abuse she got from other kids growing up, and how that wasn’t entirely a bad thing because it had toughened her up, taught her not to give a shit about what other people think.
She told him about the video interviews she had done with her grandfather. “You never know how much time he’s got left, so you want to find out as much as you can, while you can.”
“I understand.”
She glanced over at him, grimaced. “Sorry. That came out sounding a little insensitive.”
“That’s okay.”
“My mom’s going to be pissed,” she said.
“Why?”
“She thinks this is a bad idea.”
“You told her we were driving up to see your half brother?”
“Not that. This whole thing about finding out who you are. I don’t mean you. I mean, like me. She didn’t want me sending my DNA to WhatsMyStory. She was furious about it. And now, out of the blue, you getting in touch, me finding out who you are, that just might push her over the edge.”
“Why do you think that is?”
“She feels threatened. For so long it’s just been me and her. We were this tiny contained unit, you know? But me finding out about half siblings, it’s like, what’s that phrase? They’re going to breach the ramparts?”
“Yeah.”
“What the fuck is a rampart?”
“It’s like a castle wall.”
She nodded, eyes on the road ahead. “Okay, point the phone at yourself. It’s twenty questions time.”
“What?”
“I’m gonna ask you some shit, see if we really have stuff in common.”
“Okay,” he said, holding up the phone and aiming it at himself.
“Favorite movie?”
Miles thought for a moment. “I have a couple. The Godfather, the second one. Rear Window.”
“Rear what?”
“Rear Window. A Hitchcock classic.”
“The fat bald guy?”
“Yeah. The fat bald guy. You?”
“Lady Bird,” she said.
“I never got to that one.”
“Okay, so that was a miss. Favorite ice cream?”
“Butter pecan,” he said, and instantly saw the disappointment on her face.
“Rocky road,” she said.
“They both have nuts in them,” Miles said, but Chloe did not look encouraged.
“Favorite TV show,” she said. “Of all time.”
“The Wire?”
“Oh, come on, that’s everybody’s go-to answer. Be a little original.”
Miles had to think again. “I guess maybe Six Feet Under, about the family that ran the funeral home. Although, given the theme, I might not enjoy it as much today. You?”
“Don’t laugh.”
“I won’t,” he said, now aiming the phone at her.
“Mister Rogers. He died around the time I was born and so they weren’t making any new shows. But my mom found tons of episodes at a flea market that someone recorded on videocassette. Remember VCRs?”
“I do.”
“So I had about fifty episodes that, when I was little, I’d watch over and over again.” She bit her lower lip for a second. “I used to imagine he was my dad.” She glanced over at Miles. “I bet you don’t even own a cardigan.”
“I don’t.”
“Okay, gonna give this one last try. Favorite fast food.”
“Pizza.”
“God damn it,” Chloe said, banging her fist on the steering wheel. “Tacos.” She shook her head and looked at him sorrowfully. “No way you’re my dad.”
“I guess there’s no point even doing a DNA test,” he said. “Can I put the phone down now?”
“Hell no. Keep shooting. Tell me your story.”
He told her about growing up in Stamford. His father, an insurance salesman, was an alcoholic. His mother dealt with her husband’s addiction by taking pills. Despite their addictions, they managed to get through each and every day, doing their best to fool the world into thinking they were a happy couple when in fact they were barely holding it together. For Miles and his older brother, Gilbert, home life was akin to walking on eggshells. His father was consistently abusive emotionally and, occasionally, physically. When Gilbert left to go to college, Miles knew he couldn’t survive in that house if no one was there to have his back, so he left, too. Not officially. But he bounced around from one friend’s house to another until he finished high school, and then he was gone for good.
�
�Are your parents still alive?”
“No. After my brother and I left the nest, they were in a car accident.”
“Do you miss them?”
“Yes,” he said.
That surprised her. Her eyebrows shot up for a second. “Really?”
“They’re my mom and dad,” he said.
“You and your brother—shit, I just realized I have an uncle—are you close?”
Miles considered the question. “We have been. He works for me. But I think this would be the wrong week to ask him if he feels close to me. My arm’s getting tired holding this phone.”
“Suck it up. What’s the deal with your brother? Why’s he pissed with you?”
Was he ready to get into it? About how he planned to disperse his estate? He’d made it clear to Chloe he was well fixed, but if it had occurred to her some money might be coming her way, she gave no indication.
“Long story,” he said, finally, putting down the phone and turning off the video function.
They made a stop at a fast-food burger place—they hadn’t passed any place advertising pizza or tacos—and Miles invited Charise to join them.
Charise, a large woman who tipped the scales at 225, said she was trying to eat more healthily, but one whiff of all that grease weakened her resolve.
While the three of them ate, Chloe, her mouth full of fries, said to Charise, “This is my first meal in my entire life with my dad.”
Charise’s eyebrows rose a notch. “Oh?”
“This doesn’t look like the kind of place that has champagne,” Chloe said, grinning.
“I don’t think so,” Miles said. “Maybe later.”
Charise looked across the table at Miles, her expression an unspoken question. Miles was about to offer a short explanation, but Chloe cut him off.
“Save it for later. No one wants to hear the word ‘sperm’ while they’re eating.”
They were back on the road in twenty minutes. Bringing Charise up to speed would have to wait, given that she was in the trailing car. About an hour after they’d left the burger place, Chloe pointed ahead and said, “This is it, up here. Just past the fire station.”
She slowed the Pacer, hit the blinker, and turned off the main road onto a gravel driveway. She made a turn around a copse of trees, and there was the trailer. Charise stayed on the main road, pulling over onto the gravel shoulder to wait.
“So this is it,” Miles said, scanning the trailer from one end to the other.
“I don’t see his car,” Chloe said. “Let me try him again.”
She got out her phone, tapped the screen, put it to her ear. She waited for several seconds before it went to voice mail.
“Hey, Todd,” she said. “We’re at your place. Where are you? Wherever it is, you need to get your ass back here ASAP. I brought someone you need to meet.”
She ended the call, tucked the phone back into the front pocket of her jeans.
“I heard it inside,” Miles said.
“Heard what?”
“When you called him, I heard a phone ring inside the trailer.”
Twenty-Three
Worcester, MA
The plan had been, once Kendra Collins and Rhys Mills got to the funeral home about an hour’s drive from Springfield—one of several across the country with whom they had a standing arrangement for body disposal—they would search Todd Cox’s body for a second cell phone before they put him on the conveyor belt and sent him on his final journey, right into the crematorium. They’d realized there had to be a second phone after recalling the Verizon bill they’d seen on the trailer’s kitchen table. They were hoping to find it in Todd’s pocket.
They hauled the body bag up onto a table, unzipped it, and Kendra, pulling on some latex gloves and holding her breath, dug down into the front pockets of the dead man’s jeans, but came up empty.
“Maybe it’s in one of his back pockets,” Rhys suggested, turning away, trying not to gag.
“Help me turn him on his side.”
“Shit,” Rhys said, holding his breath as he rolled the body onto its side so Kendra could check the back pockets.
“Nothing,” she said, stripping off the gloves with two declarative snaps. “Where else could he have it?”
Her partner shook his head as he let the body settle onto its back again. “Nowhere else for him to carry it.”
“Maybe it fell out and it’s in the bag somewhere,” Kendra said, looking at Rhys.
“What?”
“Feel around.”
He met his partner’s look with one of disdain. “You’ve already been digging around in there. You do it.”
“I just took off my gloves.
Why don’t we just call the number and listen for the ring?”
“I don’t have a number for his personal cell phone. Do you?”
“No. Come on,” she said. “Snap on a pair and give it a go.”
He didn’t miss her double meaning. She knew he was squeamish about bodily fluids—other than blood—and the bag was swimming in it.
Fuck it.
He pulled on the gloves and felt around inside the bag, right into all four corners, under Cox’s lifeless legs, around his head. He withdrew his hands, carefully peeled off the gloves, saying, “Nothing.”
“Son of a bitch,” Kendra said.
“Yeah,” Rhys said.
“Could it be in any of the garbage bags?”
The bags of material removed from the trailer were still in their van and Todd’s Hyundai, outside. Their next stop was to be a nearby junkyard, where the car would be crushed into a cube, never to be found again.
“We would have noticed it, wouldn’t we?” he said.
She briefly closed her eyes, as though seeking some sort of divine guidance. “I think we would, but we need to check.”
“We leave the bags in the car, let it get crushed with everything else, does it matter?”
“We’ll never know,” she said. “We have to know. The phone matters. It’s something he handled. There’s more traces of him on that than just about anything else.”
He knew she was right.
Confident now that the phone was not in the body bag with Todd, they could at least proceed with this stage of their duties. They moved the bag and its contents onto the platform in front of the door to the furnace. Rhys fired it up, and they waited for it to reach the desired temperature, then watched as the body was conveyed into the raging furnace.
That done, they went back outside to the Hyundai, parked in back of the funeral home, and hauled out all the bags.
“There’s no easy way to do this,” she said.
They dumped everything out onto the parking lot. Cleaning rags, clothing, bedding, the laptop, all of Todd’s most personal items, like his toothbrush and comb. They spread the items out on the pavement. They found the cheap flip phone that had been on the kitchen table in the trailer, but that was it.
Rather than put everything back into bags, they tossed it all, loose, into the trunk and the back seat.
Kendra said, “We have to go back.”
Rhys leaned up against the Hyundai and hung his head. “I’m so fucking tired.”
“I know. Let’s get rid of the car, get some breakfast, mainline some caffeine, we’ll go back.”
Wearily, he nodded. “You take the car, I’ll follow.”
They went to the junkyard, asked for “Harry,” who was happy to put the car into the crusher after Rhys slipped a thousand in twenties into his greasy palm. They stayed until they saw the Hyundai go into the crusher and be reduced to a small cube of mangled metal and plastic.
They found a nearby Denny’s and demanded coffee immediately. Kendra ordered a veggie omelette, Rhys went for the steak and eggs.
“You know, I usually work alone,” Rhys said as he sipped on his first cup.
“Same,” she said. “But the client was right, figuring this was a two-person job.”
“Yeah,” he said. “Different.”
/> “So, Rhys, you got a real name?”
“I do. But how do you know it isn’t Rhys?”
“No one would really want to be named Rhys. If it was your name, you’d change it.”
“How about Kendra? Sounds like you walked out of a Chanel ad.”
“Okay, so I’m not Kendra and you’re not Rhys.”
Rhys raised his mug and smiled. “To us, whoever we are.”
She raised her mug and clinked his, as if they were wineglasses.
Their waitress arrived with the food, and even before the plate had been set down in front of her, Kendra had her fork in her hand. She speared some home fries, shoveled them into her mouth. While chewing, she said, “This one is a weird gig.”
“Gig? What are we, a band?” he asked, cutting into his steak, checking to see whether it was rare, as he’d ordered.
“Everything’s a gig to me,” she said. “You don’t have questions?”
He shrugged and chewed. “Everything’s a job, a task to be completed.”
“This list, though,” she said. “What’s the connection? Why the special instructions about cleaning the scene? The fires?”
Rhys slowly shook his head. “Only know what you need to know.”
They ate hurriedly and soon were back in the van, heading to Todd’s trailer outside Springfield. Nearly an hour later, when they were within a mile of their destination, Kendra yawned and said, “I should’ve had one more coffee.”
“Did you see that place we passed about two miles back?”
“Yeah.”
“Why don’t you let me out, I’ll look for the phone, you go back and get us a couple more coffees, come back. If I haven’t found it by then, you can help me.”
Kendra nodded. She saw the driveway up ahead.
“Don’t bother pulling in. Just drop me,” Rhys said.
The van slowed and came to a stop at the end of the driveway. Before he opened the door, Rhys hit the button on the glove compartment and opened it, then removed a silencer-equipped Ruger and tucked it into a deep, inside jacket pocket.
“Expecting trouble?” she asked.
He smiled. “Like the Boy Scouts say.” He opened the door. “Maybe get a donut or something, too, if they’ve got it.”
He slammed the door and started walking up the driveway while Kendra waited for the traffic to clear so she could do a U-turn.
Find You First Page 15