A short, balding man with a big red nose blocked Rachel’s path before she could reach the crowd.
“What is the meaning of this?” The small man spit as he spoke.
“I’m looking for a Martin Malone. He also goes by the names Marco, Giovanni, Mr. Caro, et cetera.” Rachel flashed her badge and then the sketch. “Do you recognize this man?”
The man tensed up. “Should I?”
“Think real hard, pal,” she said. “Or I’m going to start asking the newlyweds and the esteemed guests the same question.”
The little man squirmed. “What do you want from me?”
“Proceed with the wedding, but no one leaves this area, understood?”
Eying the officers behind Rachel, the man nodded.
She signaled for a few officers to flank the wedding area, with orders to watch and wait until the ceremony was finished. McConnell didn’t want to risk losing the Poisoner. She would question everyone here if need be. She ventured back toward the estate. There was a barn-turned-lounge nearby and a few rentable cabins. Farther off in the distance, multiple tool huts and the wine press building were visible. The vineyard itself was built on the bend of a hill. Beyond the rows of grapevines, woods flanked the area, and the beautiful mountain stood mightily in the distance. Is this romantic enough for you, Martin?
Rachel checked the estate first. It opened into a small shop with shelves of wine, and there was a clerk whom Officer Jones pulled aside for questioning. There were a number of wine tasting stations and hors d'oeuvres set on the table. Rachel scanned the various bottles, trying to make a connection with the ones found at the mothers’ crime scenes. None matched. She moved up through the halls and into the cellar. It was a wide room with kegs and dust-coated wine bottles costing hundreds of dollars each. She brushed her foot on the wooden floor as she looked for any sort of trapdoor or hidden latch. Not even a hint.
“Ava? Hailey? Emily?” Rachel called out into the room. She focused her hearing, waiting for a reply. Ashton stepped out of the shadows wearing his pumpkin-head mask. Ethan followed behind, soaking wet and poison falling from his lips. Those two again.
“What did you find?” Rachel asked them.
“I’ll only talk to Mallory,” Ethan said defiantly. His glasses were fogged up. Long brown locks of hair tumbled down his shoulders.
“Buck up,” she told the kid. “This not the time for playing games.”
The boy glared.
Rachel asked, “How close am I, or is this place a dead end?”
The Orphan boys pursed their lips. They returned to the darkness of the shadow. Rachel rubbed her forehead. She was on her own for this one. Despite all the action, she felt the case was moving at a snail’s pace. She needed to find and save the surviving girls before the Poisoner decided to sacrifice another in the name of tragedy.
After clearing the estate, Rachel moved to the barn lodge. It had a charming and purposely rustic appearance. There was a bar inside with mounted game and fishing trophies on the walls: a mix of bucks, trout, and bass. At her request, the bartender gave her a tour of the building. He led her into the drinks cooler. She moved aside a few kegs and listened for any noises from the abducted children. Nothing.
Outside, the police were interviewing the vineyard workers. The wedding after-party was being disrupted by the officers, though it didn’t seem as if they were learning anything important. Peak called Rachel.
“Any luck?” she asked.
“On Martin? No.”
That was a discouraging thought.
“That’s not the reason I called.”
“Then what is?”
“I searched their pesticides containers inside of the storage sheds. Most of them were empty.”
“Coincidence?” Rachel asked as she gestured for a few officers to move to the sheds on the property.
“Too early to tell. I’m trying to get the sales records for when they purchased these pesticides. See if they should be running low,” said Peak. “Either way, they have some pretty powerful stuff here. There’s a chance it’s illegal.”
“Keep me posted,” Rachel replied and ended the call. Perhaps Peak was on Martin’s trail and Rachel was fumbling around like an idiot. She marched through the mowed grass pathway wide enough for two cars to pass through and headed into the wine press. An officer stepped out and shook his head.
Rachel’s phone rang again. It was Officer Jones this time. “What’s up?”
“We got someone at the wedding who recognizes Martin’s face.”
“Do they know what name Martin was going by?”
“Mr. Foire. He owns the vineyard and is in charge of planning the wedding, too.”
“Find out why the other employees haven’t told us about this guy. I want to know his first and last name, his daily routine, his favorite color, anything and everything. I’ll be over there shortly.”
Rachel removed the lock and entered the equipment shed. It was a cramped square room with pesticide containers and gardening tools. Shelves lined the walls. They were packed with cans, boxes of nails, and other small items used for quick home repair. Finding nothing of importance inside, she headed to another building, one of the rent-a-cabins set apart from the rest.
The house was one and a half stories tall. The half part was the small loft, accessible by a ladder. It consisted of a cot, a small clothing trunk, and a little window the shape of an orange slice. The first floor had a studio layout with a kitchen, dining table, and living room melded into one. There was a bathroom set off to the side. A number of wildflowers lined the windowsills. The curtains were plush and the color of cream. Inside the bathroom, Rachel found men’s cologne and hair products. She exited and circled around back, stepping over a familiar herb. Its stem was green and fuzzy. The leaves with a purple tint slightly masked the round black berries. Atropa belladonna. Rachel snapped a picture of it. It could be just a random plant.
She marched around the back of the house, finding cellar doors. She stood before it for a moment. She kept a hand on her gun, ready to draw, and pulled the handle. With a creaking noise, the door opened onto a flight of descending steps. She flipped the light switch at the bottom, flooding the tall shelves packed with wine bottles with light. There was a table in the back with two chairs and a laptop. Something told Rachel that they probably didn’t treat all of their esteemed guests with such amenities. She felt the Sense activating, sharpening her eyesight and prompting her to pull her pistol. Scurrying on across the ceiling was a woman with a twisted neck and a loose-fitting white bathrobe one breeze away from falling off. Blue, red, and yellow paint dripped from her pasty-white skin and platinum blond hair. She looked at Rachel with wide, dilated blue eyes.
“Cora Brewster,” Rachel said the woman’s name. Her daughter was Hailey.
Stepping out of another corner was a wide-framed woman in a flowing red dress with long dyed-red hair. She frowned heavily. A drop of bile and wine escaped the corner of her tight lips. Anastasia Sebring, Ethan’s mother.
Mumbling to herself, the next victim made herself known. Dark-skinned Jasmine Rickers, mother of Emily.
Lastly, Carolina Thurston, the Delinquent Orphan, stepped down the stairs behind Rachel. The cellar doors slammed behind her. Her face was covered in leaking lacerations. Her hair was patchy with bald spots and uneven bangs. She’d cut open the corners of her mouth from ear to ear, revealing the entirety of her jaw whenever she parted her lips as she did now.
“It’s been a while,” Rachel said to the women. “You here to help or hurt me?”
Jasmine stomped to Rachel, her brown eyes big and full of fury. “Where is my baby?”
“Why do you think I’m here?” Rachel asked rhetorically.
Carolina put her hand on Rachel’s shoulder.
Rachel recoiled. “Don’t touch me.”
“I waited for so long,” Anastasia said, “and you failed my son.”
The words hit Rachel where it hurt. “Not every story has a happy
ending.”
Carolina snickered, the lower third of her face slipping open. “Time’s up.”
“You’re kidding me, right?” Rachel asked. “You have all the time in the world to wait.”
Cora clacked her teeth together, and a droplet of blood trickled onto Rachel’s shoe. “Not my Hailey.”
“We can talk about this later,” Rachel growled.
As soon as she said the words, a wine bottle flew at her. She pulled her head away at just the right second, feeling the wind brush by her face. Another bottle shot from the opposite shelves. Rachel dodged that one, too. Both bottles shattered.
Remembering what Mallory did at Woodhall, Rachel took a deep breath and with all her might, yelled, “Enough!”
She felt a pulse of energy erupt from her body. It blew Cora from the ceiling and caused the other Orphans to stumble back before vanishing in a blink. Rachel felt her heart rate slow. She studied her hands and torso, feeling what could be described as a tiny shocking sensation zapping throughout the inside of her body. Of what she had read and understood, her mother’s leather-bound journal made no mention of this type of reaction. Is the Gift changing, or am I getting stronger? Rachel didn’t know the exact answer, but somehow it linked to Mallory.
Something thumped beneath her feet. Rachel turned her attention to the hardwood floor and listened. Movement. A scuttle.
She followed it with silent steps. She kept both hands on her pistol, training it at the floorboards. She stepped behind one of the shelves of wine bottles and stopped in front of a wooden barrel. There was a square outline in the floor below it. She heaved the barrel aside and examined the locked trapdoor with a tiny keyhole. She took a knee, pulled out her lock-picking tools, and started working. When she heard the satisfying click, she held her weapon on in one hand and opened the trapdoor with the other. A sharply inclined ladder plunged into the dark room beneath. Rachel steadied her breath and entered, conquering one step at a time. She flashed her weapon across the second cellar deep underground, wondering in the back of her mind who built this place and what they intended to store here.
Her flashlight scanned various bottles. Their corked necks jutted from wooden shelves with diamond-shaped cubbies. The place reeked of feces and sweat. Rachel gagged by the time her foot landed on the final step. Something moved in the far corner. Her muscles tensed. She trained her gun at the point where she saw the movement.
Screams echoed through the cellar as three figures charged at Rachel with sharp shattered halves of broken wine bottles. She hesitated on the trigger pull as the three feral little girls collided with her, taking her off her feet. Her bottom hit the ground. A jagged piece of glass zipped past her cheek, missing her eyes by centimeters.
The little girls screamed and kept on trying to stab Rachel with the sharp shards. The detective disarmed them by slapping away the weapons and prying herself from the girls. “Detective Rachel Harroway. Highlands PD!”
The three girls froze.
The one at the center had dark skin and frizzy hair. Her cheeks were sunken, and her dark eyes were big and bloodshot. Dirt stained her wrinkled pajamas. Her bare feet were pitch black up to the ankle. The girl to the right of her looked to be of similar age. She had long, tangled hair, and the dirt of the cellar had turned her cute pink shirt the color of soot. More dust and dirt smudged her pale face and across her forehead. The final girl was smallest and had straight, almost white hair with bangs so long that they tumbled over her face. She was trembling more than the other two.
“You’re a cop?” the dark-skinned one asked with disbelief.
Rachel let the child hold her badge. “You’re Emily Rickers.”
Rachel put her hand on the next girl. “Ava.”
Her lip quivered. “You forgot about us.”
Rachel shook her head. “No. I never did.”
Rachel helped the last little girl stand. “Hailey.”
“Where’s my mommy?”
Ava barked at her. “Dead, idiot.”
Rachel put away her weapon. “Where’s Martin?”
“Who?” Emily asked.
“Mr. Caro,” Rachel elaborated.
“We’ve not seen him since this morning,” Emily replied.
“What did he last say to you?” Rachel asked.
Hailey twiddled the thumbs of her dirt-stained hands. “That today is the day the world weeps.”
Rachel got chill bumps. “Did he say what that meant?”
The little girls shook their heads.
Rachel paused for a moment, thinking about the best course of action. She realized the little girls were staring at her and stepped aside, allowing them to go up the ladder first. Ava elbowed past the other two girls and escaped without looking back. Emily was a bit more cautious, and six-year-old Hailey was the last one.
“We didn’t want to hurt you,” she said in her tiny voice. “But Ethan said we needed to fight.”
“Go on, now, Hailey. I’m right behind you.”
Rachel quickly climbed up after the girl, but not before noticing a bottle of Yellowtail. She removed it from the shelf and studied the inside. There were traces of squashed belladonna berries within. She took it as evidence and followed the children out of the cellar. Despite it being overcast, they blocked the sunlight with their forearms. A few officers saw from a distance, exchanged hurried words, and then rushed to the children’s aid.
Rachel saw the mothers standing amidst the rows of grapevines.
“Happy?” Rachel mumbled.
They looked at her with newfound respect.
She jogged back to the estate, ready to hear what Officer Jones learned from the workers. He was speaking to the short man with the fat nose.
“Harroway!” he called out. Rachel approached. Jones turned to the man. “Tell her what you told me.”
The man grumbled. “I believe the man from your sketch is Mr. Adam Foire. He owns this vineyard. Stops by occasionally.”
“When was the last time you saw him?”
“A day ago,” the man admitted.
Rachel turned to Jones. “Take him downtown. I want his statement in writing. Oh, and you may want to get a lawyer.”
Rachel’s phone rang. It was Peak again.
“I found something.”
“So did I, the abducted girls.”
“They’re alive?”
“More than alive. They tried to gut me. We have ambulances en route now.” Rachel’s heart wouldn’t stop pounding. Months of hard work was all paying off. “What did you find?”
“The name of the man who runs the vineyard. Adam Foire. He matched the sketch.”
“Funny,” Rachel said. “That’s name of the man who owns Blue Hill.”
“He owns both.”
“Looks that way.”
“That explains where he got his money, and why he had no qualms about burning down the rented estate. I wonder how much other real estate he has a hand in.”
“It doesn’t matter,” Rachel said with complete seriousness. “He told his captives this morning that he’s going to strike today.”
Peak soaked in the words. “The pesticides. We need to warn McConnell at the fundraiser dinner.”
Rachel paced, watching the police taking down statements from various witnesses, and the bride and groom in complete despair that their wedding plans were ruined.
“Rachel?”
“It doesn’t sit right with me,” she admitted. “Why go after the fundraiser? That’s not his style. Besides, McConnell has that place on lock.”
“I hate when you’re right.”
She watched an officer force a worker to call back the watering drone. The unmanned machine zipped through the air and landed with expert precision. “Did you see any drones at Bellissim?”
“No.”
“He must’ve taken them out…” she thought aloud.
Nearby, the freed captives were given bottled water and blankets while they waited for the EMTs to arrive.
R
achel’s heart rate spiked. Her eyes widened. “The vigil. When does that start?”
“Uh, it’s nearly 6:00, so I’d say it’s going on as we speak.” Peak cursed. “You don’t think...?”
“Most of the town will be there, Peak,” Rachel said as she rushed for her car. “We need to move, now!”
9
Vigil
Rachel’s tires skidded as she drifted down the curving mountain road. She corrected her vehicle before clipping the guardrail and then stomped the accelerator.
“Requesting all available units to Fifth and Main,” she said and then tossed the police radio aside.
The bulk of the local police force was either at the vineyards or patrolling the fundraiser. She would mostly be on her own for this one. She rounded a turn, seeing the town of Highlands in the distance. The sun was falling behind the mountain, and the mid-autumn chill was starting to kick up again.
Trees and bushes blurred by outside the car window, along with the Orphans of those who died on Halloween night, and long before that. Rachel was far too focused to notice. She sped past Chan’s, her father’s church, and dozens of familiar mom-and-pop restaurants that had long replaced cheery skeletons with pilgrims and Indians. Police blockades had been set at the far end of Main Street. A massive crowd of locals and their families gathered around the middle of the street in front of a platform with a queue of guest speakers. Every able-bodied person held a lit candle. News vans and reports filmed live coverage of the event. Mothers bounced their infants against their shoulders. Some of the grown men cried. It was the type of event that police couldn’t shut down at a moment’s notice.
Rachel swerved into the nearest parking lot, parked diagonally across two lines, and rushed out of her car. She sprinted to the crowd, scanning for Martin Malone. There were too many faces, too many suspects, and not enough resources to properly vet them. Think, Rachel. Think. She turned her eyes to the stage. A few of the local church leaders were talking. Rachel saw her father in one of the seats. Her stomach dropped. She quickly pulled out her phone and gave him a call. Liam checked his phone with a concerned face and then put it back into his pocket. Rachel growled.
The Lost Orphans Omnibus: A Riveting Mystery Page 34