A Clamour of Rooks (The Birdwatcher Series Book 4)

by European P. Douglas

  Chapter 20

  Tyler’s phone rang far into the night. He’d been sleeping deeply, and he was groggy and his mind still cloudy as he answered.

  “Hello?”

  “Tyler, it’s Sarah.” He sat up now, more awake.

  “Sarah! So glad to hear you’re okay.”

  “Yeah, I’m fine,” she said, “Which is more than I can say for everyone else who was there today.”

  “Delgado?” Tyler asked, surprised. Though this could be a good thing for him to have Delgado out of the way.

  “No, no, he’s fine too. Neither of us had reached the scene before the bombs started going off.”

  “He had the whole place wired?” Tyler asked.

  “To kill the hostages and also the rescue team,” Sarah confirmed.

  “I’m very sorry to hear that,” he said.

  “I was surprised you weren’t on the scene,” Sarah said, and he felt she would have appreciated the emotional support had he been there.

  “Sorry, I had a late-night last night, all night really on another story and I was in bed until well after the news had broken. One of the other guys from the paper was out there to cover when they couldn't raise me on the phone.”

  “Oh,” her voice was limp and uninterested.

  “Are you okay?” he asked, “Where are you?”

  “I’m at home,” she said, “Not long in.” He noticed she didn’t answer the other question.

  “Do you want me to come see you?” he asked.

  “I don’t think so,” she said, not sounding sure. “I was calling to tell you something you need to know.”

  “Oh yeah?”

  “Spalding called Delgado last night.”

  “Delgado? Why?” He felt he knew why; another attempt at mixing up the game.

  “He told him everything about you and me since the start, everything he knows anyway, even about Carson Lemond.”

  “Shit,” Tyler said in an exhale. “What’s going to happen now?” Surely Sarah would be fired for this, but she didn’t sound too upset.

  “He’s not going to tell anyone,” she said, “He’s going to work along with us until we catch Spalding.”

  “I don’t like the sound of this.”

  “He said he wasn’t going to do anything illegal or underhanded but he’s on my side,” Sarah said.

  “How do we know he’s not working for Spalding?” Tyler asked. He felt she was being very naive considering the recent past.

  “I’ve had him checked out and have been keeping an eye on him myself at times after work,” she said.

  “That’s not enough to be sure and you know it,” he told her. He didn’t want Delgado in this business at all. No matter what happened it would be a bad ending with him as part of it. A glimpsed image of Delgado dead in a forest grave came to mind, Tyler leaning down to take his eyelids for the collection.

  “We’re closing in on Spalding,” Sarah shot back. “I can feel it. Let me worry about Delgado!”

  “It’s not just you who has to worry though is it?” Tyler shouted, “What if he decides to use what he knows against me and gets me arrested?”

  “He’s not going to do that,” she said.

  “How do you know?” Tyler said, “What guarantee of that can you give me, huh?” He knew she would not answer this, there was no way that she could.

  “Please don’t fight me on this,” she said after a long pause. “I feel he’s on our side, I’m keeping as best an eye on him as I can.” It wasn’t enough for him; she couldn’t do half the job of surveilling Delgado that would satisfy him. Perhaps killing him was the only way to get past this, perhaps that was what Spalding had intended in getting Delgado involved in the first place. Tyler shook the thought away.

  There were myriad reasons not to do it. For one thing it was far too soon after his last kill, doing it again could push Tyler into a spiral of murder on a schedule he could never keep apace of. It would be the ruination of him. Delgado was also too close to the work Tyler was doing on these cases. There was no doubt he would be questioned, and another agent might already know of Delgado’s dislike for Tyler personally. It wouldn’t look good and coupled with everything else Tyler had been questioned about in the past few years they would surely start looking a lot deeper in his own background and who knew what they might find out then, especially if Spalding took an interest in that investigation.

  “I don’t want to fight you Sarah, but I think we need to handle this differently. I don’t think we should tell him everything we’re doing, especially if, as he says himself, he doesn't really want to get involved.”

  “What do you mean?” she asked.

  “We tell him only what he needs to know, and we run everything by each other first before he hears about it, agreed?” Sarah didn’t answer for a moment; he let her think about it without pushing again.

  “Alright,” she said finally. She sighed deeply. “I can’t wait for this to be all over,” she said.

  “It’s getting closer,” Tyler encouraged her, “You said so yourself.”

  “I know, I’m just scared about how it will end.”

  “You’re going to be fine,” he said.

  “I’m not worried about me,” she replied. “I’m scared that we won’t get him alive, that I’ll never get to see him tried for what’s done and thrown in a supermax prison for the rest of his life.”

  “I’m sure you’re going to get to see all of that in time,” Tyler said, though he was thinking the exact opposite. He walked down the stairs now to look at his computer as they spoke. There was no way Tyler was going to let Spalding live through this if he could do anything about it.

  “I hope you’re right,” Sarah said.

  “I am,” he affirmed. “Where exactly was the place today anyway?” he asked. Sarah told him and he looked on the map of his computer for it and found the area. He made a tag on it and looked at the four accumulated tags and two red lines on the map. He smiled to himself.

  “You better get some sleep,” he said to her, “I’m sure there’s going to be a lot of work to do at that site.”

  “Yeah,” she agreed. “Goodnight.”

  “Goodnight.” Tyler hung up and looked at the map again. The net was closing in on Spalding alright, and not even Sarah knew how tight it was right now. It would be too late for her dream to come true before she would get to realise it though, he smiled to himself at this thought.

  Chapter 21

  Megan was distraught when she heard the news of what had happened at the site she’d identified as a possible Spalding hideout. She cried and cried in her mother's arms for hours on end. A sick feeling sat plump in her stomach and she couldn’t shake the idea that she was responsible, and that Ellie was going to be among the dead.

  “It’s all my fault,” she wailed time and again to which her mother would reply,

  “None of this is your fault, Meg, that evil man killed them.”

  Later, after the crying had both exhausted and dehydrated her, Megan lay on the couch with her head in her mother's lap. She sipped from a glass of water with a straw in it every few minutes. Her eyes felt sore from crying and her skin was taut on her cheeks. She hadn’t said anything for a long time and Melissa had stayed silent too, just stroking her daughter’s hair repeatedly to soothe her and make her feel safe.

  Megan’s phone began to vibrate beneath her. She sat up with a start and Melissa looked at her in fright.

  “It’s just my phone ringing,” Megan reassured her.

  “Don’t answer it, Meg, just leave it be,” she said.

  “It’s Agent Brightwater, I have to answer it,” Meg said, putting the phone to her ear, “Hello.”

  “It’s me, Sarah, I’m sure you’ve seen on the news what happened today. I just want to let you know that we don’t think Ellie was among the victims here today.”

  “You don’t think?” Megan asked and at that same moment understood why it wasn’t confirmed yet. “Oh, I see,” she added qui
ckly.

  “I also wanted to make sure you understand that this is no way your fault, Meg. Spalding had this planned all along, we would have found this place ourselves sooner or later and the result would have been the same. It’s how he designed it to happen. No one could have done anything to stop it.”

  “Did you find anything, anything useful?” Megan asked.

  “Still too early to say, but we hope so.” The line was silent then and Megan glanced quickly at her mother and then looked away to avoid her eyes for what she was about to say next.

  “I was thinking about directing my coursework towards working for the police,” she said.

  “What!” Melissa protested but Megan waved her away without looking towards her.

  “Well, the police could always do with more high-quality recruits and I think you fit that bill perfectly.”

  “Is there any avenue you think would be best for me to take?”

  “Well,” Sarah made this word long and Megan felt she was thinking throughout. “Do you have any interest in psychology? That’s a field we will need more and more expertise as time goes on.”

  “Yes, that sounds great,” Megan said, “This was one of the courses she had regretted not taking when she was at university.

  “What is it? What sounds great?” Melissa was asking in alarm.

  “Okay, thanks Sarah,” Megan said.

  “Did you recognise anything else from the photographs I left with you?” Sarah asked.

  “No, sorry,” Megan said, “But I’ll look at them again just in case.”

  “Thank you, I’ll get them picked up from the house soon. I’ll try do it myself but if I can’t I’ll let you know who is coming and when they will be there so you know.”

  After the phone call and brief low-grade argument with her mother about her decision to join the police (her mother didn’t fight too hard as she was sure it was only a passing whim and would be gone soon), Megan went up to her room to lie down for a while.

  Staring at the ceiling, she felt sure she wasn’t doing all she could to help the police catch Spalding. There was a new vigour growing within her as she began to think of herself as a member of the police force. If she couldn’t come up with something she would be letting them all down.

  She pictured the settings when Spalding had made her eat with him in the farmhouse or the shack. The cutlery and plates were always very old looking but clean. The food was sometimes takeaway or sometimes easy home cooking, but she had never seen him cook it and they always ate in a room separate from the kitchen..

  Spalding had spoken to her of abstract things, about the fluidity of the world, the changing face of right and wrong over the centuries. She was sure he was trying to win her over to his cause but to what end she did not know. Did he want her to become a killer like him too?

  Why would he want that?

  Megan never once got the sense from Spalding that he had any remorse or regret for what he was doing. While he could understand Megan’s fears and emotions he didn’t have any of his own. He said he had long since become ‘free’ of his emotions and his life had improved day on day since that time.

  As she recalled his saying this an old image came to mind, one that she had imagined before, that Spalding had had his unclothing from emotion epiphany while standing by a waterfall.

  Why had she this image in her head? He didn’t tell her this. Or had he? Megan sat up on her bed. Three times at a minimum Spalding had mentioned some waterfall as being his favorite place in the world. He had ever named the place but surely that was something, there were a finite number of waterfalls in the US weren’t there after all? This was what she’d been hoping for. It may be a very long shot, but it was a shot, something the FBI could follow up on. Imagine if he was caught while relaxing at his favourite waterfall, wouldn’t that be something.

  It was unlikely that Sarah was going to have the time to talk to her again today, so Megan put her information in a text message and sent it to her that way. It would probably be a good while before Sarah saw it. In the meantime, Megan would think some more and see if she could come up with anything more that might be of use. She felt good about this, feeling useful for the first time in a very long time. She felt part of a team and working towards a goal gave her a determination that had been lacking for months now. She was going to be a police officer and one day an FBI agent. That was her future, not a scared girl living behind closed doors. This future felt good.

  Chapter 22

  Tyler’s information network stretched far and wide on the east coast of the US. It was through this network that Tyler was in Washington D.C tonight to meet Matt Ivory, a former police detective who now ran a private security firm in the nation's capital. They met in a bar, Tyler recognizing him from police photos he’d looked up online.

  “Good to meet you, Matt,” Tyler said, taking his hand and shaking.

  “Likewise,” Matt said. They sat down at the bar, they were the only two people at it, and Matt ordered them a couple of beers. “So, you think I can help you out in some way?” Matt said when they were settled in.

  “Yes, it’s a bit delicate to ask but if anyone has a gut on this it’s going to be you,” Tyler said.

  “I’m intrigued.”

  “Well, I’m sure you’ve heard about the recent murders committed first by FBI Agent Malick and then Sergeant Duggan in Baltimore?”

  “Who hasn’t,” Matt scoffed. “Assholes giving us a bad name.” Tyler noted he still considered himself a police officer even though he'd left the force. He was going to have to be careful about what he said.

  “In each of those cases, Agent Brightwater of the FBI was involved, and the two killers were close by her, one even tried to kill her.” Matt nodded. “Well, Brightwater has a new partner at the FBI now and I want to make sure he doesn’t turn out to be the same.” Matt looked at him seriously,

  “I take it it’s someone I know?” he asked. Tyler nodded,

  “It is. Pedro Delgado.” Matt looked at Tyler a moment and then burst out laughing.

  “I’m sorry to laugh,” he said after a second, “But I can assure you right now, you don’t have anything to worry about with Pedro.”

  “He’s clean?” Tyler said.

  “Straight as an arrow, heart on his sleeve kind of guy,” Matt said. Was this Tyler’s impression of him? Not to date, but then Tyler hadn’t seen him work in any cases yet. All he’d done was warn him away from Sarah, and now he was telling her he wasn't going to break any rules for her- save keeping her secrets.

  “No temper, nothing like that?” Tyler asked.

  “No more than any good cop,” Matt shrugged.

  “Any trauma hanging over him?”

  “Like what?” Matt looked suspicious of this question.

  “I don’t know, did he shoot anyone, arrest anyone who turned out later to be innocent. Any crimes that got under his skin and he never solved?”

  “He’s pulled his gun plenty of times, but never shot anyone that I can recall,” Matt said thinking. “There was one case, up in Edgarton that got to him. A few child murders we were never able to solve.”

  “When was that?”

  “Oh, about seven years ago I think. Terrible case,” Matt shook his head at the memory.

  “Did you have any suspects?”

  “We had a couple, but they never panned out. Later on, we got some reports about a big guy seen on a few CCTV images that were found, but we could never ID the guy and he was never questioned or ruled out.”

  “So, he could be the killer, and he’s still out there,” Tyler said.

  “We kept an eye on any other child murders in the neighbouring states but never got anywhere with it.” Tyler let silence fall a few moments as they both looked ahead and took a few sips of their beers.

  “The case sounds awful,” Tyler started up again, “But you guys must have seen plenty of horrible things. What made this one stick so bad for Delgado?” Matt’s mouth opened, but he didn’t spe
ak. He had almost said something and now he was weighing up whether he should divulge or not. He looked into Tyler’s face.

  “No one else is going to hear about any of this, right?”

  “Right,” Tyler said, “I’m just looking out for my girl.” Matt nodded, this seemed to be something he could understand.

  “Around the time of the child murders, Delgado’s wife, Angela, lost a baby.”

  “Oh shit,” Tyler said, shaking his head. “An accident or natural?” he asked.

  “Natural,” Matt said, “But I could see in Pedro a deep hurt. When he saw those dead children, he saw his own dead child and like any good father he wanted to do something about it. The fact that in the end he couldn’t has probably stuck with him to this day.”

  “Sounds rough,” Tyler said. “I’m glad that in my line of work we don’t generally get to see the body at the scene.”

  “Be thankful for that,” Matt said, “And if you ever do get the opportunity to take a peek, don’t do it. You’ll regret it.”

  “Thanks for the tip,” Tyler said. If only this guy knew all the things Tyler had seen over the years. “So, sounds like Delgado is an all-round saint and I don’t have anything to worry about.”

  “Pretty much,” Matt agreed. “He’ll look out for her too. He takes his responsibilities as a partner very seriously.”

  “That’s very good to know,” Tyler replied. “So, how’s the private security business these days?” For the next forty minutes they went back and forth on this topic. As tight lipped as Matt was about Delgado he couldn’t stop talking about his new work. Tyler got the impression that Matt might even be hinting at a job for him at the firm if he wanted it. He commented on Tyler's physique and said he was clearly smart and looked strong too.

  Tyler was staying in town that night and after leaving the bar he went to his hotel for some late dinner. As he sat watching the sports news on the hotel bar TV, a new idea came to mind. It would solve his Delgado problem or else really throw the cat amongst the pigeons with Spalding. Either way it looked like it would be to his own advantage. With his idea in mind, he looked up the child murders case Matt had been talking about. The information he’d received on Delgado that night was priceless.