Black River (Sean O'Brien Book 6)

by Tom Lowe

  “Something was different from one rifle compared to all the rest.” O’Brien pointed to the screen. “See the fifth soldier from the far left?”

  “Yes,” Roth said. “What about him?”

  “It’s not him. It’s what came out of the barrel of his musket.”

  “What came out?” asked Goddard.

  “Nothing. That’s the point. Nothing visible. In slow motion, we can easily see the paper wads each re-enactor shot from his barrel. That indicates each man was firing blanks. The paper wads drifted down like confetti. But not with the fifth soldier from the far left. His barrel discharged smoke and a solid object, something black that is only a tiny blur even a thousand frames per second, or ultra-slow motion. Stop and hold the frame the millisecond before smoke comes from the barrel.”

  Roth said, “Let’s go frame-by-frame, Chris. Maybe we’ll see the damn near impossible.”

  Chris nodded, his index finger clicking each frame of video in single increments.

  O’Brien pointed to the screen. “Hold it there. Right before the blast of smoke…see the black object? It’s just a blur, but it’s there.”

  Roth blew air out of both cheeks. “Man oh man. We’ve looked at that scene dozens of times. The director’s looked at it. Nobody picked up on that. You’ve got a damn great eye. You might make an excellent editor. I need another slice of pie to process this.” He reached over for the pizza.

  “Just lucky. Do you have a reverse shot, something taken from the point-of-view of a camera pointed at the re-enactors?”

  “We do. It should be in the same bin, Chris.”

  “Okay.” Chris hit the play button.

  O’Brien looked at the row of re-enactors, counted the fifth from the far right. Watched the discharge of the rifles. Even in normal speed, he could tell the rifle fired differently from the others in the platoon, more kick.

  Roth said, “Out of twenty-four soldiers, wonder why that re-enactor’s rifle fired differently.”

  O’Brien lowered his eyes from the screen to meet Roth’s gaze. “Because he fired a bullet.”

  “Oh shit.” Oscar Roth sank back in his chair.

  O’Brien looked at Chris and said, “Can you push in on the section of the frame where we can get a closer look at the fifth soldier from the far left?”

  “Can do,” said Chris, adjusting the editing software to slowly zoom into the area.

  O’Brien nodded. “That’s good. You can freeze the shot?”

  “Easily.”

  O’Brien said nothing as he stared at the face of Cory Nelson. Silas Jackson was born bad, and dangerous.

  Roth said, “If that re-enactor knew he had a live round in his gun, it means he meant to fire a bullet at the poor bastard who was killed. And that’s shooting with the intent to kill…murder. Something tells me you didn’t come here to get pointers on editing. So who the hell are you, really—a detective?”

  “I’m sort of like you guys. Someone trying to edit the pieces together in a whole picture, that’s all. I’m not a detective, but one will be here within the hour.” O’Brien lifted the phone from his pocket, the audio record light still on. “Both of you have been very hospitable, and I thank you for that. But, as you can see, a crime happened—murder on the set. You’re editors. So please don’t edit out what the three of us just watched. Our conversation is in here.” He held up his phone, clicking off the audio record. He stood up to leave.

  “We’re screwed,” said Roth.

  O’Brien walked toward his Jeep, pulled out his phone to call Laura Jordan, then saw that he’d received a voice-message from Kim Davis. He sat in his Jeep and played the phone message through the Bluetooth sync on the radio speaker. “Sean, please call me when you get this. It’s Nick. I’m worried about him.”

  O’Brien blew out a breath. “You’re next Kim. I promise.” He called Laura and asked, “How’s Max doing?”

  “She was the big hit of the birthday party. That little dog can play hide-and-seek as good as the kids. Paula wants a wiener dog.” Laura laughed.

  “Has everyone gone home?”

  “The last child was picked up an hour ago. Katie and Les left about fifteen minutes ago. The only person still here is Cory. He’s helping me with the dishes.” She glanced across the kitchen to where Cory Nelson was hand-drying a wine glass.

  “I’ll be there in twenty minutes. Maybe the three of us can have some coffee and a slice of birthday cake.”

  “Sounds good, Sean.”

  O’Brien accelerated the Jeep, dialing Kim. She answered and said, “I’m worried about Nick. Are you near the marina?”

  “About a half hour away. Where’s Nick?”

  “On his boat, I think. With a woman.”

  “Sounds like Nick.”

  “She’s definitely not Nick’s type. She’s sophisticated and subtle, but really good at getting people to talk. That’s not hard with Nick, especially after a few drinks.”

  “What did she ask him?”

  “I couldn’t hear everything, even though Nick’s voice carries across a room. They sat at the bar drinking Ouzo and eating oysters. Then I saw them leave, walking down L dock toward Nick’s boat. I’m sure Nicky can take care of himself, but what really got my attention was when I heard her mention your name. I was waiting on another customer at the time, but I did catch her asking about charter boat rentals, fishing guides, etcetera, and she slipped in your name. ‘Tell me about Sean O’Brien,’ she said to Nick. She asked him if you were chartering your boat. You rarely do that anymore. Where’d she get your name?”

  “I don’t know. I’ll be there soon.”

  Dave Collins set a bag of groceries on the dock, fishing in his pocket to find a key to unlock the gate entrance to L dock. Closing the gate behind him, he spotted the woman leaving Nick’s boat. Although Dave was more than two hundred feet away, he could tell there was something different about the woman. Perhaps it was her clothing, more fashionable than what most of the women wore getting on or off Nick’s boat. Maybe it was the way she carried herself. Perfect posture. An unruffled, unflappable look.

  Dave continued walking, stopping to fake an interest in something, keeping the woman in his peripheral vision. He watched a brown pelican sail over the marina, alighting on the roof of a fifty-foot houseboat, smoke curling up from the closed cover of a smoker grill on the boat’s transom. The scent of broiled grouper and corn-on-the-cob drifted in the air with the odor of marine varnish.

  He watched the woman step from Nick’s boat onto the dock. He assumed she’d soon be walking past him, her eyes trained straight ahead, her thoughts hidden.

  He was wrong.

  She stepped off St. Michael, casually glancing around the marina, her eyes hidden behind dark glasses, her body language unrehearsed, moving in an slow stroll. She strode past Sean O’Brien’s boat, walking the remaining seventy-five feet toward the end of the dock.

  Dave walked slowly, the woman in his sight. She looked at a gleaming white Hatteras moored in the deeper water at the end of the dock. After less than a minute, she lifted a phone to her ear and began heading back toward Nick’s boat. And then, with no hesitation, she snaked down the side dock where Sean’s boat, Jupiter, was tied. She stepped onto Jupiter’s cockpit. In less than thirty seconds, she entered the boat, closing the door behind her.

  “Trouble in paradise,” Dave mumbled, walking quickly to Nick’s boat. He stepped onto St. Michael’s cockpit. Approached the door and tried the handle. It was unlocked. He entered. For a second, he thought Nick was dead. Dave ran to the couch where Nick lay sprawled, his body rigid, eyes wide, staring at the ceiling.

  “Nick! Hold on, Nick.” Dave felt for a pulse, touching Nick’s stiff arms and legs, checking for signs of blood. “What happened?”

  Nick whispered, “The woman…she…I can’t feel my legs.”

  Dave glanced at the glasses on the coffee table. He lifted the empty glass, a residue of ouzo in the bottom. He sniffed the rim of the glass. “Hold o
n, Nick. I’ll get you medical help.”

  Dave punched 911 on his phone. When the operator answered, he said, “There’ been a poisoning in Ponce Marina. Send an ambulance. It’s 4561 Riverview Drive, on L dock. The victim is on a boat called St. Michael. Please roll immediately.”

  O’Brien made small talk with Laura Jordan and Cory Nelson over coffee in Laura’s kitchen before he reached in his pocket, hit the audio record button on his phone and said, “Cory, I’m thinking about getting an outdoor grill. I have a question about the grill in Laura’s backyard. Since you’re the grill-master, maybe you can give me some pointers.”

  Nelson grinned. “Great barbecue isn’t always about the grill. But starting out with one that allows multiple cooking surfaces will help get the entire meal done at the same time. All grills are definitely not the same, and bigger isn’t always better. Not that I’m an expert. All I’ve learned, I picked up from watching Bobby Flay. Let’s go outside and take a look.”

  Laura smiled and said, “A clean grill is the best grill.”

  Max followed O’Brien and Nelson into the backyard. They walked up to the grill and Nelson removed the cover. He’d cleaned it well. Shiny. The grill surface reflecting the sun. A spatula, tongs and filet knife were stacked vertically in a hollow spot for utensils. Nelson said, “Laura’s got what I’d call the Subaru of grills—it’s reliable, gets you where you want to go, but it’s not always a smooth ride. Jack bought it after grilling for years on a rusted charcoal hibachi. Jack was like that, tight with a dollar.”

  “Is that why you killed him?” O’Brien watched Nelson’s pupils constrict. “Was it because Jack was tight with a dollar or you wanted to be tight with his wife?”

  Nelson crossed his arms. “What meds are you on, pal? Jack was my best friend.”

  “At the party, when I told everyone that Silas Jackson was arrested for killing Jack, you were the only one who didn’t show surprise. Why? Because you set Jackson up to take the fall.”

  “This conversation ends now. Get the hell off this property.”

  “You’re not the homeowner. But you are the guy who’d like to be in this home. To get here, you had to take out Jack. And you did it when and how it was almost untraceable. You’re the guy dressed in a Union uniform, a uniform that Silas Jackson would never wear. You planned it well—shoot Jack in a Civil War battle scene with dozens and dozens of extras and re-enactors on a movie set. With cannons firing and men charging through the woods, you figured no one would ever trace the trajectory of the bullet. But, what you didn’t plan for was the fact that the film crew was shooting that scene with high-speed cameras. Which means, when the video is played back at normal speed all the action is greatly slowed down. And in ultra-slow motion, it’s easy to see that the bullet came from your rifle barrel. Everyone else was firing blanks. And it’s easy to see you were aiming right where Jack Jordan stood when a Minié ball tore through his brain.”

  “Then call the real cops, asshole. Even if there was a round in the rifle it doesn’t mean I put it there. Anybody could have done it when the guns were stored in the prop area.”

  “I’m betting it was your rifle. One you’ve used many times in Civil War reenactments. Once you killed Jack, you set your sights on Professor Ike Kirby, killing a hotel clerk to get to him.’

  Nelson shook his head, eyes wide, incredulous. He glanced at the grill surface.

  O’Brien said, “I imagine the Civil War contract would command a high price for bidders who want to own a piece of history.”

  “You’re fucking crazy!”

  “You have no idea just how crazy murder can make me. Have you already sold the diamond? Or are the two, the contract and diamond, going as a packaged deal?”

  Nelson snatched the knife from the grill. He crouched low. The knife in his right hand. His upper body like a wound up spring, a predator readying to strike. “It’ll be self-defense. I’ll tell ‘em you came at me with the blade. I took it away and fought you off me. Shit happens.” He attacked, the knife slicing the air.

  O’Brien jumped backwards. Max barked, running in front of O’Brien.

  “Mommy! Mommy!” Paula Jordan stood on the steps near the back door and screamed.

  Nelson glanced her way and ran as Laura opened the door. “Oh my God! Paula, go inside.”

  Nelson bolted, running through the open wooden gate, down the driveway, jumping into his truck, squealing tires, knocking over Laura’s mailbox and leaving ruts in her yard. O’Brien watched him for a second then used his phone to call Detective Dan Grant. Laura walked up to O’Brien and said, “Put the damn phone down. Now!”

  The call went to Detective Dan Grant’s voice-mail. O’Brien said, “Dan, its Sean. You’ve got the wrong guy for the murder of Jack Jordan. Call me.” He disconnected and looked at Laura, arms folded across her breasts, eyes heated. “Laura, let’s sit down.”

  “Why were you fighting with Cory? He’s family.”

  “Maybe you couldn’t see it from your angle, but Cory pulled a knife on me. I was about to take it away from him when Paula opened the back door. Let’s sit at the picnic table, under the shade, okay? There is something I need to tell you.”

  She followed him and they sat on opposite sides of the table. O’Brien chose his words carefully. “Cory Nelson is not family. He’s not the man or the person you think he is, Laura. The reason he pulled a knife from the grill and wanted to kill me is because I told him that I know he’s the one who murdered Jack.”

  She held her left hand to her mouth, gold wedding ring shining in a dapple of sunlight breaking through the boughs of an oak tree. “No, no you’re wrong. That can’t be. He’s like an uncle to Paula.”

  “I wish I was wrong. I’m sorry, but it’s true.” O’Brien told her how he knew what happened to Jack and said, “Odds are that Nelson killed Ike Kirby and the hotel clerk too. Now he has the Civil War contract.”

  “Oh dear God.”

  “After I speak with the detectives, police will probably have Cory in custody in a couple of hours.”

  Laura’s face was drained. Pale. Lips tight. Mouth turned down. She watched a cardinal eat from a birdfeeder in the backyard. “Why? How in God’s name could he have done these horrible things? Killed Jack and two other people…even killing the dog next door.”

  “Greed. Jealously. A psychopath colors outside the lines. It often begins after using a black crayon on the page of their delusional mind to eliminate the face of the victim. Total detachment.”

  “I feel so naïve. So duped by Cory. But now it’s making more sense. All the phone calls…phone calls of concern for me and Paula, he said. The meals he brought over to the house. The glasses of wine he poured to help me, as he put it, ‘take the edge off.’ I told him how the stress of Jack’s death, of becoming a single parent, the theft of the diamond, the contract, and even the painting you’re looking for—how all of it had made me really depressed for the first time in many years. That, on top of the threat’s I’d received made me scared and vulnerable. He was preying on my weak moments. He was causing those weak moments! I was so stressed my body has been in knots. After I told him that, he began massaging my shoulders one afternoon in the kitchen. When he tried to go further down, I stopped him. He made light of it and said there were more knots in my lower back. I trusted Cory. What if police can’t find him?”

  “They’ll find him.”

  She looked away, seeing but not seeing the white tufts of cottonwood seed drifting in the wind from a large tree in her neighbor’s backyard.

  “When Nelson’s arrested, I’m hoping they’ll find the diamond stolen from Jack and the Civil War contract stolen from Ike Kirby.”

  “Dear God…this means you think Cory killed three people for those two things.”

  “It looks that way. If they find the diamond and contract on Nelson, they’ll be returned to you. It’ll be up to you to decide what happens to them.”

  “And I’ll do what Jack wanted to do, return the diamond to E
ngland. As far as the contract, since there’s no more Confederacy, there is no one to return it to. England’s still here.” She looked over at Max on the ground and raised her eyes to O’Brien without lifting her head. “What if Cory isn’t arrested soon and he comes back? He has a key to the front door, and he knows the alarm code. I have to change the locks.”

  O’Brien stared at her for a long second then looked at the open wooden gate where Nelson had fled. Laura said, “You look deep in thought. Why are you staring at the gate?”

  “I don’t think Nelson will be back, but that doesn’t mean you and Paula are safe. If police can’t tie Nelson to the theft of the diamond, some may think it was never stolen, but rather hidden in your house like the contract was concealed. Do you have a place, maybe a relative’s home, somewhere you can go to for a while?”

  On the drive back to Ponce Marina, O’Brien called Detective Dan Grant and filled him on the details. “Only because of the ultra-slow motion playback can we actually see ballistics from a 165-year-old musket.”

  “And you can clearly ID the shooter as Cory Nelson?”

  “Yes. There’s a crane shot, an aerial shot from a drone camera, and the ground-level angles. It’ll give you a good look at the trajectory from where and how he pointed the rifle to the spot where Jordan was killed. Nelson’s delusional. He thinks just because we don’t have video of him loading the rifle he can skate.”

  “A jury just only needs to believe he pointed the rifle at Jack Jordan with the intent to kill. If Nelson killed Jordan, did he shoot Professor Ike Kirby and the hotel clerk? Did he break into Laura Jordan’s home and steal the Civil War contract?”

  “If you find the Civil War contract, yes. The diamond is where the big money lies. From what I can gather, Nelson managed to ride Jack Jordan’s coattails. Jordan was the passionate historian. A devotee of Confederate legend and lore. He also was good at raising money to fund his documentary work. I think Nelson wanted to be not like Jordan—but rather to become Jordan. To seduce his grieving wife, to move into his house. Because he wasn’t entrepreneurial, like Jordan, he needed a long-term revenue stream. The sale of the diamond and the contract would do that.”