by Andy Straka
“More than a kid, I'd say,” Marcia corrected me. A small bone of contention between us. She was always telling me I still treated Nicole like a child. That's what you get, I guess, from a divorced, overly protective father suddenly forced to take up residence with his teenager, as I had been with Nicole.
Dr. Drummond went on. “Marcia's told me Nicole's seen her own type of family trauma.”
“Yes, she has,” I said. Nicole's mother, Camille, lay paralyzed in an extended-care facility near Roanoke, the fallout from a nearly fatal overdose. Camille had money, so the cost was not an issue, but visits were hard. A feeding tube tends to stifle conversation.
“Karen said you showed her a picture earlier,” Marcia said. “One you got from the gentleman you went to see in northern Virginia.” I had shown Dr. Drummond the copy of the picture the Paitleys’ son had given me. She hadn't recognized the elderly couple standing with her ex-husband. “May I see it?”
I unfolded the paper from my pocket and handed it to Marcia.
“That's George and Norma Paitley, all right.”
“You remember them?”
“Vaguely. I think they showed up at a couple of early fund-raisers here in Charlottesville. Their son was in graduate school at the university or something. Aren't these the people who had the accident described in the newspaper articles Cassidy found in her sister's suitcase?”
“Uh-huh.”
She nodded.
“Shouldn't we be going to the police with this information?” Dr. Drummond asked.
“On the way to your hotel to pick you up earlier, I stopped by my office and made another copy of both the articles and this photo. I put them in an envelope and dropped them by police headquarters for Bill Ferrier.”
“But you'll keep investigating, won't you?”
“Yes.”
“Good. The man in the other room with your daughter—Mr. Toronto?—you said he used to be a detective too?”
“Yes. A very good one. I may need his help on some things, but if he has to leave, we'll make sure someone is here with you.”
“We should continue to stay here, then?”
“As long as no one knows you're here, I think that would be best.”
“Is that all right with you, Marcia?” Dr. Drummond looked at her friend. “We seem to have invaded your home.”
“Of course it is. You and the girls are welcome here anytime, no matter what the circumstances.”
“Thank you. I don't know what we'd do up here otherwise. I don't know how to thank you either, Mr. Pavlicek. My daughter says she's paying you.”
“All taken care of in that department.”
“What about the police?”
“It's your call, ma'am.”
“Please, just call me Karen.”
“Okay. It's your call, Karen. If you take your daughter and go to the police you might be better off. Then again, your husband will definitely know where you and Cassidy are.”
“You really think Cassidy and I might be in some danger too?”
“Well, we've got a missing daughter whose car was found with blood all over it. We've got your husband talking to that same daughter late the night she disappeared and having both girls followed. And we've got a decades-old unsolved hit-and-run murder that your daughter had some interest in, also with links to your husband.”
“Marcia said she told you earlier today about the incident that happened between her and Tor all those years ago.”
“Yes.”
“I'm glad she waited until after the divorce to tell me. I'm not sure I would've believed her before then.”
“I'm sorry to have to ask you this, but do you think your husband has made unwanted sexual advances to other women? I mean, besides Marcia.”
“I honestly don't know. I suppose anything's possible.”
“Maybe something happened and Cartwright found out about it.”
“But why?” The resolve that Karen Drummond had obviously called up in order to keep going began to waver. Her lips trembled. One hand pushed her hair back from her forehead. “Why would Tor want to harm one of his own daughters?”
“That's what I can't quite figure.”
Marcia looked up from our conversation. I followed her gaze to see Cassidy, in one of Marcia's old bathrobes, entering the porch.
“Honey, you should be in bed,” her mom scolded, but she stood up and hugged her. She and Marcia switched places, and mother and daughter sat on the couch.
“Can I get you something to eat?” Marcia asked.
Cassidy shook her head. She leaned forward with her hands cupped around most of her face and rubbed her eyes. I could see her cheeks were streaked with tears.
“You all right?” I asked.
“I just can't believe it, you know?”
I nodded.
“Do you think Wright's dead?” Her lip trembled as her eyes locked on mine.
“We don't know that, not for sure.”
“But you think she might be.”
“It looks—it looks like a possibility.” I didn't know what else to say.
“But she might not be, either. She might just be… she might just… “ Her eyes brimmed over with tears, and she covered her face again.
Her mother patted her hair and gently rubbed her back.
Then Cassidy said, “I still want you to find out for sure about Jed, and most of all I want you to find out if this has anything at all to do with my father.”
I nodded. “There is the possibility that your sister might've been the victim of a kidnapping. On the other hand, it could've just been random violence.”
“Either way, I want to know,” she said. She had stopped crying now, and her mouth was set in a firm, straight line.
“We all want to know, honey,” Karen Drummond said.
She nodded, closed her eyes, and leaned her head back on the couch.
I glanced out of the sunporch windows, through the curtains. A dark blue sedan turned the corner down the street.
“Hey, Dad.” Nicole's voice rang out from the kitchen. “I think we've got something.”
“That's great, honey,” I shouted back. “Jake, could you come out here, please, on the double? Ladies, if you'll just stand up and move slowly out of sight to the back of the house. Cassidy and Karen, it'd be best if you two and Nicky went upstairs.”
Marcia straightened up in her chair. “What's happening, Frank?”
“I think we're about to get company,” I said.
16
The two detectives took their time getting out of their car and coming up the walk. Ferrier was looking over the front of the house. Upwood carried a little notebook. I should have known they might be looking for me again. I'd made sure I hadn't been followed earlier, especially when I picked up Karen Drummond from the Omni, but out of habit I'd carelessly parked my truck behind Marcia's car in the driveway (Jake had hidden his Jeep in the garage). All the two cops had to do was look.
They rang the doorbell. Marcia went to answer it. Toronto and I had quickly split a cold beer from the fridge into two glasses and raided the game drawer to spread a few chips around the table and deal two hands of stud poker.
“Look who's here,” Marcia said as she ushered the two detectives into the kitchen.
“Hey, guys. Long time no see, I said. “Awfully late for a social call, isn't it?”
Toronto discarded only one card and picked up a new one. Going for the straight or the flush?
“We were in the neighborhood,” Ferrier said. “Saw your truck.” He watched for a moment, while I picked up a four and a jack to go with my two sevens and a queen. “Didn't know you had an out-of-town guest. How you doing, Jake?”
“Stupendous.” Toronto nodded in his general direction. He was wearing his pale brown gas station attendant shirt with the sleeves cut off. The name patch on the shirt said CARL. Out of the corner of my eye, I caught Carol Upwood ogling his biceps.
“Really has been a long time since I seen you
last. Was over that business in Leonardston, wasn't it? You were playing cards then, too, if I recall. You and I lost a game of hearts.”
“Good memory.”
“You and that Commonwealth's Attorney over there still an item? What was her name again?”
“She and I are still friends,” Toronto said. With him, no one was an item.
“In town on business?”
The question might've been loaded, but Toronto didn't miss a beat. “Nope.” He pitched a couple of white chips from his pile into the center of the table. “Social.”
“Some hunting, maybe.”
“Maybe.”
“You bring that bird of yours?”
Toronto shook his head. Smiling, he said, “Nahhh. Frank here needs a little remedial help with his redtail.”
It wasn't true, of course, but I nodded.
“Still haven't got you to take me out hunting with your bird, Frank,” Ferrier said. “We need to do that.”
“We do,” I said. I threw three chips on the table to raise Toronto.
“I see you've moved on a bit yourself,” Toronto said, appraising Carol with a wink.
“Yup. They've got me tutoring brilliant young detectives for the locals now.”
Carol actually blushed.
The two detectives watched Toronto see my bet and raise me three. Considering that neither one of us had any idea how much we were playing for, it seemed like a bold move.
“Well, I know you didn't just stop by to watch us play poker and drink beer, Bill,” I said.
“No, sir. As a matter of fact, we didn't. I got the envelope you dropped off for me earlier.”
I nodded. “Makes for interesting reading, doesn't it?”
“Most definitely. Where'd you get the articles and the picture?”
“That's the real interesting thing. The articles came courtesy of the missing Cartwright Drummond.”
“S'that a fact?”
“The picture took some professional private detection.”
“I'll bet. I sure as heck hope you aren't tampering with any evidence.”
“Moi?”
He said nothing, took a long, cold look around the rest of the kitchen. “We also had a few more questions for Cartwright Drummond's mother and wondered if maybe you might've bumped into her this evening.”
“The doctor?” I did my best to feign ignorance. “I thought she was still talking to you guys.”
“We stopped by her hotel to see her, but she's not in her room.”
I shrugged.
He eyed Marcia, who'd been hanging in the doorway listening. “How ‘bout you, Ms. D'Angelo? You know who Dr. Drummond is?”
Marcia nodded.
“Haven't seen her today, have you?”
“Sorry, Detective. I can't help you.”
“Ummm.” He watched Toronto raise me another two and call.
“All right, folks, sorry for barging in on you so late.” He turned toward the door. “Good evening, Jake, Ms. D'Angelo. Frank, you think we might have a word with you outside?”
I took a sip of beer. “Absolutely.” I winked at Toronto. “But I'm taking my cards with me.”
I followed the two detectives back outside and down the walk to their car. Upwood leaned against the bumper. Ferrier had produced a toothpick from somewhere and rolled it between his lips. Steam came from all our mouths. I wished I'd slipped on a jacket.
“Frank, listen,” he said, taking the toothpick out. “I don't need to know everything you're doing, but I sure as shootin’ expect to be kept informed, especially if you get anything solid or something important develops.”
“I'm afraid I'm just trolling the periphery on this one, Bill.”
“Yeah? You seem to be laying things out pretty nicely for someone who's just trolling.”
“Maybe a bit too nicely?” Carol added. She looked at Ferrier and nodded. Suspicion, thy name is woman.
“Anything new on the girl? Ransom note? Calls?” I asked.
They shook their heads.
“The clock's ticking.”
“Tell me about it,” Ferrier said. “Here's the thing. My hunch is there's gonna be all sorts of shit hitting the fan around here pretty soon over this. You get my drift?”
“Uh-huh.”
“You'd best remember how to duck.”
“Thanks for the heads-up.”
“Oh, and one more thing.”
“What's that?”
“Since when you think you going to beat a man's straight with only a pair?”
17
Again it was a night of little sleep. I got up early the next morning, this time to take a jog. The day was shaping up to be picture-perfect for spring: bright blue sky, the air already warmer than the night before. Nuthatches, Carolina wrens, and even a few bluebirds sang along my route down Rugby Avenue onto Rugby Road. Out of curiosity, I decided to detour down through University Corner, behind the old medical school, through the parking lots and over Jefferson Park Avenue to the parking garage across from the primary-care building where I'd discovered Cartwright Drummond's rental car.
I was stunned to see a small crowd gathered on the sidewalk. Behind them, in a row along the curb, were two large satellite trucks and three or four television vans. Apparently, this spot had become media central for the unfolding drama and mystery of the disappearance of Cartwright Drummond. Three officers manned a barricade, keeping the curious away from the trucks. Across Lee Street a TV crew was busy setting up for an interview. The reporter, a dark-haired twenty-something male wearing a trench coat and tie, looked more like a made-up Humphrey Bogart than any of the real detectives downtown. I couldn't help musing about the image people would see on their screens—early-morning steam from the “brave” announcer's breath, the stark gray image of the concrete garage. What a fractional depiction of reality it would be. I slipped past the crowd and kept jogging. The last thing I needed was some orange-faced reporter shoving a microphone into my face.
“Hey, Pavlicek.”
I winced and turned to see none other than Jed Haynes, standing to my right with his hands in the pockets of a university warm-up jacket. He must have been in the crowd of bystanders and broken away when he saw me. I waited while he came abreast of me.
“It's all over the grounds. Everyone's been talking about it since the other night.”
“Entertainment for the masses,” I said.
“Is she dead?”
I took a long look at him before I answered. His cheeks were ruddy and narrow, his hair pleasantly disheveled. Anger still smoldered in his eyes, but it seemed to be more under control now.
“What would make you say that?” I said.
He shrugged and pointed to the second story of the garage. “I saw a lot of cops and a van that was marked ‘Forensics’ up there the night they found her car.”
“You get around, don't you?”
He shrugged.
I said nothing.
“Well? What do you think? She dead?”
“Like I told you before, I'm not a cop, Jed. I'm out of it. Better talk to the police. I know they'll want to be talking to you.”
“They already have. And I'm supposed to be going back down to talk to somebody else this morning.”
I glanced around. Bet somebody's keeping an eye on you, too, I thought. But I saw no one.
“They won't tell me anything,” he complained. “They just keep asking more questions.”
“Maybe it'll make you more humble,” I said.
“But did they find her body?”
I ignored his question, turned, and broke into a jog again, crossing the street to make sure I put as much distance as possible as soon as possible between myself and the big trucks. Thanks to the likes of Willard Abercrombie, Cassidy Drummond's fear was fully realized: the investigation had gone media.
Nothing would be sacred now; nothing would be free from potential exposure. Not even the minutest details of a young girl's life. Hey, I make my living asking ques
tions too, but even I stop at bra sizes.
Speculation is cheap. Whatever happened, on the slim chance that Cartwright Drummond might still be alive, time was running out.
An hour later, showered, shaved, and halfway presentable, I appeared on Marcia's doorstep once again. I was there to collect Nicole, who'd spent the night at Marcia's behest to keep Cassidy company. The plan called for Toronto to follow Nicole and me over to my office in his battered Jeep, then we would go over the computer files they'd uncovered the night before. Nicole had no classes today, so I'd told her she could come help out if she wanted. There was no plan to leave Cassidy and her mom or Marcia without protection, though. Toronto, foreseeing the need to relieve himself of full-time security duty, had, the day before, made what he called “an arrangement.”
The arrangement answered the door.
He was at least six-eight and more than three hundred pounds, most of it muscle. His head was bigger than my midsection. His jaw appeared capable of crushing small aluminum cans.
Toronto stood smiling right behind him. He was decked out in black combat boots, green coveralls, and a Virginia Tech baseball cap that in some parts of C-ville might have invited a fistfight, although I doubted anyone would dare challenge Toronto.
“Frank, I'd like you to meet Mr. Earl. Mr. Earl, this is the fella I was telling you about. My old partner, Frank Pavlicek. Best damned PI around.”
Mr. Earl grinned and took my hand in his giant paw. He shook it like it was a rag doll. I felt fortunate to get it back.
“Mr. Earl is Samoan. You might remember him. He spent a couple of seasons at right guard for the Philadelphia Eagles a few years back.”
I didn't remember but figured the safe thing to do was nod. “Right. Sure.”
Mr. Earl nodded back. We all nodded. Toronto ushered me into the kitchen while Mr. Earl went about checking the window casings.
“This guy for real?” I said when we were out of the big man's hearing.
“Saw him kill a pimp in New York last year with his bare hands. Dude had been whoring out strung-out teens, one of whom happened to be his sister's baby girl.”
“Okay … I guess. He armed?”
He nodded. “Beretta and a shotgun. Don't worry. I've worked with Mr. Earl a lot. He owes me a big favor.”