by Ben Follows
"Yeah," said Curtis, "she's either hiding or in danger."
"Either is possible."
Frankie pulled off the highway and into a gated community. The police were gathered around the house, and their sirens lit up the rest of the neighborhood. This was the kind of neighborhood where the occupants expected quiet. Curtis was certain a few of them were angry with the noise the police were making.
They pulled up and flashed their identifications. The cop raised the caution tape and let them inside the crime scene.
They parked and walked up to the front door of the house. They were led to the room where the murder had happened.
Ralph Lawton was sitting in his chair, the movie on the screen frozen on a landscape shot of an empty desert.
They walked into the room and up to the detective, who introduced himself as Marcus Lattrello. He was a broad-shouldered man with a faint trace of an Italian accent.
"What happened?" said Curtis, taking out his notepad.
"Around ten tonight," said Latrello, "Ralph sent all his workers home. Normally about a dozen people are working on some part of the house until midnight, but he sent them all away. Around midnight, one of the workers, a gardener named Barry, realized he'd forgotten his phone and came back to get it. He found the body. We haven't been able to find any trace of the gun. More interesting to me is the liquor glasses sitting on the ground. Lawton seems to have been intoxicated while the event was taking place, but there are two glasses on the ground."
"He was drinking with someone?" said Frankie.
"That's my guess."
"Is Barry still here?"
Latrello nodded. "He's sitting in the kitchen."
Curtis nodded and walked to the kitchen. Frankie would deal with looking through the rest of the crime scene.
He found Barry sitting on a stool at the kitchen counter, a panic blanket around him. Despite the humidity in the house, he was shivering and clutching a cup of coffee in his hands.
Curtis took a seat beside him. "Hi, Barry. My name is Special Agent Curtis Mackley with the FBI. Are you the one who found the body?"
"Yeah," said Barry. "That's me."
He pulled the panic blanket tighter and leaned on the counter.
"Barry," Curtis said, "I know this is hard for you, but I'm going to need you to tell me everything that happened."
"How far back?" said Barry, looking down at the ground. "I mean, I can tell you how I started working here, or how I found out about the job, or how--"
"Barry," said Curtis, putting a hand on his shoulder. "Tell me about today."
"Okay," said Barry, looking away. "Everything about today was usual, except for the girl, I guess. At least until Mr. Lawton asked me to come to watch a movie with him and then told everyone to leave. I mostly just work in the gardens. Mr. Lawton never cared about the gardens, but he thought it was something rich people were supposed to care about. I saw him out in the gardens maybe once or twice in the three years that I've worked here. It was a dream job. Mostly I just got paid to make whatever garden I wanted. I was working on an assortment of tulips when he called me in."
Curtis held up a hand. "The girl?"
"A woman came here this morning. A few hours after the news came out that Henry Mavis had committed suicide. I'm not really sure what it was about, but Mr. Lawton seemed concerned about it. He told a few of the maid's someone might be coming to visit. He refused to give any more information, and I don't think he really knew if anyone was coming. He started drinking earlier than normal."
"Then someone arrived?" said Curtis. "Did you get her name?"
"No," said Barry. "She looked like she was late-twenties, early thirties maybe. Caucasian, short brown hair. A little on the heavier side."
Curtis took his phone out of his pocket and pulled up a picture of Lauren Mavis. "Is this her?"
Barry squinted at the picture and took Curtis's phone from his hand. He handed the phone back.
"Is it her?" said Curtis.
"I think so," said Barry. "I just saw her from a distance."
"So, you don't know what they talked about?"
"They went into the movie room for a while. I don't think she drank anything. She seemed worried. One of the maids overheard them talking about money, but I don't know anything more than that."
Curtis made a note. "What else can you tell me about the woman? Anything strange about how Ralph was acting after she left?"
"I don't know," said Barry. "He asked me to sit with him and watch that cowboy movie he loves. He's had it on an almost endless loop for months at this point. I think he had decided that he was going to be killed or kill himself. He wanted to die while he was watching that movie. I don't know why."
"Maybe it just made him happy," said Curtis.
"Maybe," said Barry. "I suppose that's as good a goal for your death as anything else."
Chapter 15
Lauren looked up at the apartment building where Debra Coleman lived. It was early in the morning, and she had driven all through the night. She had wanted to put as much distance between her and Ralph's house as possible.
Despite all the money she'd received, Coleman had stayed in this decrepit apartment building on the outskirts of Albany. Maybe she was just better at concealing her wealth than the others.
Lauren wondered whether Coleman could be the killer, but her gut didn't think so.
She got out of her car and walked into the building. She rode the elevator to the fourth floor and walked to Apartment 402.
Within ten feet of the apartment, she knew something was wrong. The door was slightly ajar, and light from inside the apartment was streaming out into the hallway.
She approached the door and stepped inside, dust curling around her feet as she walked.
It was a small, basic apartment. The windows were open, and a brisk breeze was blowing through the room. The blinds flapped in the wind.
"Hello?" said Lauren.
There was no response.
Why had Coleman been living like this? Why hadn't she done what the others had done and lived like royalty? What was the point of all that they had done if you couldn't enjoy it a bit? Lauren had used the money to support herself while she pursued a career at a startup that was promising but had no guarantees of paying her any serious salary.
She walked through the entire apartment. There was no one there, and it looked like Coleman had left in a hurry.
If she was gone, then there was no way anyone would find her until she wanted to be found.
Lauren sighed and looked around the apartment.
"Well," she said to no one, "my list of options just keeps getting shorter and shorter, doesn't it?"
Chapter 16
Curtis and Frankie returned to the Lawton estate at nine the following morning. They interviewed everyone who worked at the property and around the other houses in the gated community, looking for anyone who had seen the killer.
Once they finished, they visited the detectives and medical examiners, and were brought up to speed.
After that, they walked to a nearby park and sat down on a bench at the edge of a pond. They looked over a manmade lake as the sun bounced off its surface.
Frankie leaned back, rubbed her eyes, and flipped open her notepad. "Okay," she said, "let's recap. General Henry Mavis allegedly kills himself. No signs of outside influence or being forced to do it are available, except for the fact he was intoxicated. There's too many fingerprints in the hotel room to figure out if someone else was there. Blame the lazy cleaning staff at the hotel for that, and for making me never trust the sheets at a hotel ever again."
"You did before?"
"Then," said Frankie, ignoring Curtis, "Lauren Mavis disappears. We have no trace of her after she left her workplace and drove away. We might be able to connect her to a rental car, but even that isn't helpful at the moment. We have teams looking for her at all hours of the day, but we haven't been able to find anything."
"Which must be intention
al. She's a tech-whiz who would know how to make herself disappear, at least for a few days. Although the FBI teams should be able to track her down eventually."
Frankie nodded. "That's the hope. And then we have Ralph Lawton, the longtime second-in-command of Henry Mavis. He starts acting even stranger than usual when he finds out about Mavis. He starts drinking heavily and tells his workers to leave early, something out of character. Someone comes into his home, apparently without driving in or using the gate, has a drink with him but doesn't leave any fingerprints, then shoots him in the chest and leaves."
Curtis leaned forward. "The first question we have to answer is how these are connected, if they are."
"It certainly seems like it."
"But we can't assume that. We need to prove a connection."
Frankie nodded. "There's also the money problem. Both Mavis and Lawton seemed to have had access to significantly more money than can be explained. There's a reason that so many veterans are homeless, yet those two were living in luxury."
"Who else was part of their inner circle?"
Frankie flipped through her notes. "There was a small group of personnel who managed the military base. Mavis and Lawton oversaw the base, as well as Debra Coleman, the head of training, and Jason Wilson, head of operations. Those four were the only ones who were involved in the discussions of how to operate the base. If you wanted anything done, you had to go through one of those four."
"So those are the four we need to find. We have two of them, we need the other two. What about Lauren Mavis? Where does she fit into this?"
"I have no idea," said Frankie. "We need to ask her."
"That's easier said than done," said Curtis. "She's missing."
"We'll find her," said Frankie, leaning back and sliding her notebook into her pocket. "What are you thinking?"
Curtis looked at her, then back at the ducks in the lake. "We need to follow the money. It doesn't matter how well someone hid its origin. It can be found. Maybe Lauren Mavis knows. We should go to her workplace and talk to her friends and family there."
As he finished speaking, Curtis's phone vibrated in his pocket. He answered the call. It was Mason. "This is Mackley."
"Get into the FBI offices now!" he said. "We have a huge lead. There's no time to waste."
"What is it?"
"Can't say it over the phone. They might be listening."
The call ended abruptly.
Curtis looked over at Frankie, who was looking at him with a smirk.
"Let's go," she said.
Chapter 17
Mason led Curtis and Frankie into the basement of the FBI offices and into the hallway of interview rooms. He stopped in front of a one-way mirror through which they could look into the interview room.
Curtis looked through the window. A woman was sitting at the table. She had short black hair and the physique of someone who spent hours a day in the gym. She stared forward without focusing on anything, like she was deep in thought. She had a sandwich and a glass of water in front of her. The sandwich had a few nibbles taken out of it, but mostly it was untouched.
"This is Debra Coleman," said Mason. "She turned herself into the FBI two hours ago. She was the head of training for Henry Mavis's Military base. She's only interested in talking to the FBI agents in charge of the investigation. She seems to already know who you are, because we tried sending in other agents and she didn't seem remotely interested in talking to them."
"Does she know who the killer is?" said Curtis.
"I don't know," said Mason. "She just said she has information."
Frankie looked into the room. "She's smarter than the others. She isn't waiting to be killed. She's turning herself in."
Frankie gestured for Curtis to follow and walked into the interview room. They walked inside and closed the door behind them.
Coleman looked up and smiled. "It's about time you two showed up," she said with a smile. She had a gold tooth in the top right of her smile. "I'm surprised it took so long."
Curtis took his seat. “Nice to meet you, Mrs. Coleman."
"Miss Coleman,” Debra clarified. “I have no interest in locking myself to some man."
"Miss Coleman," said Curtis. Frankie sat beside him and took out her notepad. "What do you have to tell us?"
Coleman leaned back and sipped her water. "I want full immunity and protection from the FBI. You won't be able to stop anything else from happening without help from the inside, and I'm almost certain I'm the only who has come forward. Do we have a deal?"
"We have a deal," said Curtis without a second thought. Frankie shot him a sideways glance.
"I want it in writing," said Coleman.
"I can't do that," said Curtis. "You have to trust me. Do we have a deal or not?"
"Okay," said Coleman after a moment, leaning back in her chair. "I want a cup of tea. Then I'll talk."
"We'll get you that," said Curtis, turning to the two-way mirror and nodding, assuming that Mason was still standing there and would get the message. A moment later there was a single knock on the window, indicating he'd heard them.
Coleman chuckled. "You mean that little pipsqueak? The kid who looks like he just graduated high school?"
"He's a smart kid," said Frankie. "He'll be doing big things."
"Tell him to grow a beard," said Coleman. "That way he might actually look like he's been through puberty."
"I'll be sure to let him know," said Curtis.
The door to the room opened, and Mason walked in with a cup of steaming tea. He placed it in front of Coleman, who smiled at him.
Mason turned to leave, then stopped and turned back. "Just so you know," he said to Coleman, "I'm twenty-six, and I was top five in my class at Princeton."
"Sure you were, cutie pie," said Coleman with a smile. "I'll bet all the ten-year-old girls love you."
Mason scoffed, but said nothing else, turning on his heel and walking out of the room.
Curtis waited until the door was closed behind him and then turned back to Coleman, who was tasting the cup of tea and bobbing the tea bag up and down.
"So," said Frankie, taking over the conversation. "What can you tell us?"
"I'm sure this won't be shocking to you," said Coleman, taking her tea bag out of her cup and placing it on the table, "but all of this boils down to money."
"What happened?"
Coleman sipped at her tea then looked up at them. "At our base, there were some serious issues. The most pressing was the terribly low budget we were given. Although we were an American military base in a foreign country, it seemed like we could never get enough funding to cover even the basic necessities of maintaining the base. I was there for almost four years by the time General Mavis took over. He was so optimistic and believed in doing the right thing that it almost broke my heart. He must have made some sort of mistake to end up there."
"Why do you say that?" said Curtis. Frankie took notes beside him.
"It was called St. Jonathans Air Force Base," continued Debra, "and it's infamous among the military as a place you get sent when someone doesn't like you. In particular, if someone with power doesn't like you but doesn't have any real reason to get rid of you, or if they suspect you of something but can't prove it. That's when you end up at St. Jonathans."
"I thought General Mavis was a hero," said Frankie.
"I'm getting to that," said Debra. "Mavis arrived as an optimistic man, but to become the hero who saved the base, he needed to become a worse version of himself, he needed to become that which he hated most. A liar, a murderer, and a thief."
"Wait," said Curtis. "You're saying he was a hero because he gave up his morals?"
"I wouldn't say it like that, but that's essentially accurate."
"Tell us about that," said Frankie.
"I'd been there for a few years," said Coleman, leaning back. "I knew that it was essentially the end of your career if you ended up there. Young kids would come in for a rotation. I would train them
, and then they would move onto their next assignment. We, the management, were the ones who were stuck. Other than a few visits home, we weren't sent anywhere else. Short of quitting the military, there was nothing we could do about it."
"Was Ralph Lawton there as well?" said Frankie.
"Not yet. Ralph came in a few months after Mavis. By that point, Mavis was starting to lose the sparkle in his eyes. He had sent thousands of letters, called everyone he could think of, and tried every avenue at his disposal, and he still didn't even have enough money to cover the operating costs of the base. The cars we had were a decade out of date, the food was disgusting, and the buildings were falling apart. If the government had just diverted the price of one new tank to our base, we would have been fine for a few months, but that wasn't going to happen. We were going to languish here, as punishment for things we didn't know we had done. We weren't getting anywhere playing by the rules."
"So you broke the rules?"
"Exactly," said Coleman. "The great hypocrisy of St. Jonathans Air Force Base was the fact that, while we barely had enough to survive, the base was used to store a large amount of money. Some of it in gold, some in bonds, and all of it under our protection. They had put Mavis in charge of it for the same reason he was unwilling to do anything that went against code. He believed in rules. He believed in fairness. He believed in honor. "
"And what did you think?" said Curtis.
Coleman shrugged. "I'm selfish. There's nothing wrong with that. There's nothing wrong with acting selfishly as long as you don't bring anyone else down with you."
"What happened with the money?" said Frankie.
"You're focused, aren't you?" said Coleman with a chuckle. "We stole it. Can I get another cup of tea?"
Frankie looked at Coleman. "Can you elaborate?"
Coleman nodded. "It's simple. We needed money to improve the base. By this time, Ralph Lawton was the second-in-command. He and Mavis complimented each other well. Mavis took rules too seriously, and Lawton didn't take them seriously enough. But when the time came that the base desperately needed money, they came together."