by Bill Hiatt
The Serpent Waits
Bill Hiatt
Edited by
Lewis Pollak
Cover design by
Peter O’Connor
Copyright © 2019 by Bill Hiatt
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental. Names of places, companies, and historical figures are either fictional or are used fictionally.
Created with Vellum
For all those people who felt out of place but persevered anyway
Contents
1. Something Doesn’t Add Up
2. Checking Sources
3. Landladies and Leprechauns
4. The Job Interview
5. In the Enemy Camp
6. Planning an Escape
7. Revelations
8. Denial Isn’t Only in Egypt
9. Down the Rabbit Hole
10. Through the Looking Glass
11. Evil Twins
12. Losing Yourself
13. When One Door Closes, Another Opens
14. The Twisting of the Serpent
15. Blast from the Past
16. Unexpected Twist
17. Old Unfamiliar Places
18. Testing the Boundaries
19. Security Breach
20. Decisions
21. Looking for a Back to Stab
22. Beauty and the Beast
23. The False Pharaoh
24. Unearthing the Past
25. Switching Sides
26. Fault Lines
27. Intertwined Dilemmas
28. Right Under Their Noses
29. To the Rescue
30. Ambush
31. Twists and Turns
32. The Universe at Stake
33. Seer in a Maze
34. Family Reunion
35. Surprise!
36. Reversal
37. Unexpected Rescuer
38. Murder in His Heart?
39. Midair Collision
40. Beware the Shadows
41. Haunted House
42. Dark Strategies Revealed
43. Coming to Terms
44. New Ties
45. Home Is Where You Hang Your Sword
46. Homecoming Surprise
About the Author
Other Books and Booklets by Bill Hiatt
Something Doesn’t Add Up
My editor had a way of looking at people that hinted they were crazy without actually saying so. He was using that look on me right now despite his otherwise grandfatherly façade.
“Carrie Winn is a well-known philanthropist without even a hint of scandal. Not one hint. Ever.”
“That’s just because no one has looked really closely, Silas.” I smiled at him as if he weren’t figuring out what size straight jacket to put me in.
Silas, as his name made him sound, was old enough to be my grandfather. His thinning white hair, prune-like face, out-of-fashion leisure suit, and real bow tie all reinforced the generation gap between us. The antique oak desk behind which he sat and the manual typewriter to his left emphasized his ties to the past—the age of real journalism, as he always said. But I knew the typewriter was just for show and that what he actually used was the networked computer workstation on the other side of his desk. His commitment to the standards of quality and the integrity of bygone days was real enough, though.
“You’re my best young reporter. I’d hate to see you kill your career with supermarket tabloid nonsense. I’d also hate to see the reputation of the Investigative Oasis tarnished.” He leaned back in his chair. “Nonetheless, because you usually have good instincts, I’ll let you lay out the evidence for this supposed conspiracy before I say no, Amy.”
I wasn’t a big fan of being called Amy, but I seldom insisted on Amenirdis, which I wasn’t crazy about, either. Why couldn’t Mom have been a hippie instead of an expert in Nubian history? I’d have preferred Moonbeam or something to being named after a sister of the first Nubian Pharaoh of Egypt. Even in the black community, the name raised some eyebrows, and it was invariably a chore to explain where it came from. An even bigger chore was getting people to pronounce it correctly.
It wasn’t like me to let my mind wander that way during a conversation. I became uncomfortably aware that Silas was waiting for me to say something. “I never used the word conspiracy.”
“I stand corrected.” Silas’s face undercut his words. His expression of disapproval looked set in concrete.
“To be honest, I’d only heard good things about Carrie Winn, too—until a former city council member from Santa Brígida contacted me.”
“A city council member who is willing to speak on the record only if he can remain anonymous.”
“He’s afraid of reprisals.”
Silas chuckled. “Yes, no doubt he has reason to be. Carrie Winn might sneak up on him in the dead of night and brain him with one of her public service awards.”
“This story is important!” I said slowly, emphasizing each word. “You told me I could lay out the evidence. Are you actually going to let me do it?”
Silas gestured for me to proceed, but I felt as if I were doing my pitch to a stone wall. I’d never forgive myself if I didn’t at least try, though.
“Let’s call the council member Bob. Bob has lived in Santa Brígida almost since the town was founded in the late 1990s. He didn’t want to look a gift horse in the mouth, but he was surprised at how cheaply Carrie Winn’s development company was selling homes in the area. The place is near enough to Santa Barbara to be an easy commute, and you know how rapid development has been in the surrounding areas since Santa Barbara tried to limit its own growth. Winn could have sold homes in Santa Brígida for three times as much, maybe more.”
“Yes, providing low-cost housing does sound sinister.”
I ignored Silas’s sarcasm as best I could. “Most wealthy philanthropists keep their philanthropy separate from their business interests. I can’t think of any other examples of someone, no matter how charitable, selling off real estate for a fraction of current market value. Anyway, it wasn’t just the pricing that concerned my source. It was the string of inexplicable events that happened afterward.
“Carrie Winn never ran for city government, but she ran the city government. Normally, my source agreed with her policy proposals, so he didn’t have a problem with her, but there was something weird about the way in which opponents either changed their mind abruptly—or, in a couple cases, left town even more abruptly.”
“Naturally, you interviewed them to find out why.”
“Well, that’s the first problem. I can’t find them. It’s as if the Earth opened and swallowed them.”
“The number of missing persons in California, excluding people known to be abducted and missing after catastrophes, was still over 40,000 last year, and Santa Brígida had a couple over several years? You’ll have to do better than that.”
“Well, how do you account for the fact that Winn has a security force far larger than the local police department?”
Silas shrugged. “Maybe she’s eccentric. She wouldn’t be the first billionaire of whom that could be said. Any unusual activity with the security guys?”
“As far as my source can tell, her entire security force disappeared on October 31, 2012. She hired a completely new group right after that. Please don’t tell me you think that’s normal. By the way, I can’t find any of her original security men, either.”
I n
oticed the first cracks in Silas’s concrete expression.
“Go on,” he said, sitting forward a little in his chair.
“That was also the point at which Carrie Winn’s personality seemed to change. She’d been floating plans for a state senate run in 2014, which she dropped completely. She also poured far more of her resources into philanthropy. Her earlier efforts seemed mostly for show. Then, for no apparent reason, she became much more serious about them.”
Silas sat back in his chair. “Maybe she had some kind of change of heart at that point. That’s hardly a crime.”
“No, but it’s unusual. How many people change that much without some kind of major event in their lives that acts as a stimulus?”
“Perhaps there was such an event,” said Silas, straightening his glasses. “That doesn’t mean it has to be something sinister.”
The conversation was heading in the wrong direction again. I had to do something to get it back on track.
“There’s also the question of her suspicious activities with the young people in town.”
Silas sat up again. “How young? And what kind of activities?”
“High school at the time. Bob remembers something about a few of them being invited to some kind of Halloween party. One of the parents told him it was a big affair to which dignitaries from all over the state had been invited.
“Bob did some checking, though. He thought it odd he hadn’t been invited. The thing is, no one else had been, either. He checked discreetly. These high school kids did go over, apparently. They were the only guests. Silas, this is the same night Winn’s whole security force disappeared.
“Not only that, but one of the kids, Stan Schoenbaum, suffered some kind of breakdown. My source couldn’t get details, but his parents were afraid he’d have to be institutionalized. Another one, Carla Rinaldi, was in a coma for months afterward.”
I had Silas now. I could tell from his shocked expression. The cement had cracked completely.
“Surely, there was an investigation.”
“Surprisingly, no. But this is Carrie Winn, and Carrie Winn can do wrong in that town, apparently. Stan recovered in a few days, and much later, so did Carla. Winn paid for all her treatment. As far as my source knows, nobody ever raised the question of what happened that night, and no one ever suggested Winn was in some way responsible.”
“Do you have a working theory about what happened?” asked Silas. He was looking very intently at me.
“I’m going to need to do some research before I can theorize intelligently. My source cautioned me against coming to town as a reporter and asking a lot of questions. Winn has recently completed the headquarters for a subsidiary company right in town, and it’s hiring staff. With your permission, I’d like to go in undercover.”
Silas frowned. “I’m not sure I want to lose you for as long as something like that might take. Anyway, isn’t it going to be obvious you’re a reporter?”
I didn’t want to tell him I doubted that many people in Santa Brígida visited the website for Investigative Oasis, but fortunately, I had a better approach. “I’ve got a PI friend who knows people. He can arrange for a fake ID and enough background to qualify for a low-level job, one for which the background may not be scrutinized very hard.”
“Let’s give you a work history that will stand up to scrutiny, just in case. I’ve got former colleagues in several large companies. At least one of them is bound to be willing to play along. Let’s give you a glowing rec for—what were you thinking about applying for?”
“Let’s keep it simple and say secretarial work. You know how people tend not to notice secretaries? It’s a good way to fly under the radar.”
Silas nodded. “And yet, secretaries often know where all the bodies are buried, so to speak. Uh, there is one thing about that, though. Amy, I want to be clear before I say what I need to say that this is in no way intended as any kind of flirtation.”
I smothered a snicker. “I promise I won’t misinterpret.”
Silas repositioned himself in his chair a couple of times, and his cheeks reddened slightly. “I’m not sure you’d be as inconspicuous as most secretaries. I have a hard time thinking you’ll be completely under the radar for the men in the office.”
My ex, who had been an art major in college, had often praised the way the differing dark shades of my hair, eyes, and skin complemented each other. He also became poetic about how the voluptuous curves of my body looked as if they’d been sculpted by some Pygmalion trying to create the ideal female form. It was too bad he never managed to look beyond the physical.
I smiled. “Even I know how to be inconspicuous when the situation demands it. Besides, a lot of these corporate types have a harder time than you think seeing beyond their profit margins. I’ll be fine.”
“All right, give me a day, and I’ll have glowing references for you as a secretary. That is, you’ll have those references if you promise me you won’t take unnecessary risks. If Winn is up to something underhanded, and particularly if she really has made people disappear, I will not have the same thing happening to you. You are to take no chances, understand?”
I had to smile at how easily Silas morphed into a stern father figure.
“OK, Dad, I’ll be careful.
Silas didn’t return my smile. “I’m going to hold you to that.”
Having gotten what I came for, I excused myself as quickly as I could. I said I wanted to start preparing, but the real reason was to cut off any further questions about what I thought Winn was up to.
If Silas knew what I was thinking, he really would believe I was crazy.
Checking Sources
I had a job interview at Gwraig y Llyn Consulting, the new Winn subsidiary, at three in the afternoon. That would give me plenty of time to meet with Dennis McBride, my city council source, in the morning.
I’d expected to meet with him in Santa Brígida, but he’d insisted on a motel outside of town. Nothing like starting the day with a little cloak-and-dagger anonymous source meeting.
There was a fair amount of tourism in Santa Barbara County, so there were many hotels and motels in the area. That made it all the more annoying that McBride made me drive almost all the way up to Santa Maria to see him.
Actually, Santa Maria, with its numerous accommodations, would have made more sense. He set the meeting in Orcutt, a small town with enough charm to attract tourists interested in antiques or wine tasting but very few places to stay. McBride must have had to dig deep to find the Final Rest Motel. Aside from the fact that it sounded uncomfortably like a funeral parlor, it wasn’t listed on any of the travel websites I checked. McBride could hardly have found a less conspicuous place anywhere in the county.
I should have driven up from LA a day earlier. I was already tired by the time I pulled into Orcutt, so tired that I almost missed the motel and sailed right on down Clark Avenue. Luckily, I was keeping track of the address numbers.
I parked and walked back toward where the motel should have been. Sure enough, the Final Rest was there—a surprisingly small building that originally must have been a large house before it got converted. It was painted an unappealing blue-gray and had an office in the front. I could see two sets of steps on each side. Only four units? Why even bother?
I walked back to number four and knocked.
“Who is it?” asked a shaky voice almost in a whisper.
“Amy Monroe.”
The silence was so long I was tempted to ask if he wanted me to slide my ID under the door or something, but then the door opened a little way.
McBride’s bleary eyes blinked at the sunlight, then looked at me as if I were an ax murderer. I could smell the whiskey on his breath. I had a sinking feeling I’d gone out on the limb for a story based on the ramblings of someone mentally ill or alcoholic—or, the way my luck ran, both.
“You’re the woman I spoke to?” he asked.
In our first conversation, McBride had mentioned looking me up onli
ne, so he’d probably seen at least one picture of me. Was he so drunk that he couldn’t recognize me? I did my best to choke down my annoyance. “Yes, we’ve spoken several times, Mr. McBride. We talked about Carrie—”
“Hush!” he commanded, as if saying Carrie Winn’s name would conjure her up. “Get inside!” He moved back just barely enough to let me in, then slammed the door the instant I was through.
The room was disturbingly dark. McBride had all the blinds shut tight and only one dim lamp on. Either the motel management was trying to conserve electricity, or he had swapped out the bulb for a lower wattage one himself. Either way, I felt as if I had entered a cave. I discreetly checked my purse to make sure I’d remembered to pack my pepper spray.
“Sit down,” said McBride, waving an arm at one of the chairs as if I were taking too long. Once I was seated, he moved unsteadily over to the other chair.
Even in the dim light, I could tell he looked haggard and very little like the picture of the confident businessman I’d dug up.
“I’m sorry about being so cautious,” said McBride. “As soon as we’ve talked, I’ll be on my way out of state. The more distance I can put between Carrie Winn and me, the better.”
“I hope you won’t be driving.” I knew it was the wrong way to start, but I couldn’t help visualizing him wrapping his car around a tree. Hell, the guy couldn’t walk a straight line at this point.