Death & the Brewmaster's Widow

by Loretta Ross

  Copyright Information

  Death & the Brewmaster’s Widow © 2015 by Loretta Ross

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any matter whatsoever, including Internet usage, without written permission from Midnight Ink, except in the form of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

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  Any unauthorized usage of the text without express written permission of the publisher is a violation of the author’s copyright and is illegal and punishable by law.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  First e-book edition © 2015

  E-book ISBN: 978-0-7387-4746-0

  Book design by Donna Burch-Brown

  Cover design by Lisa Novak

  Cover illustration: Tim Zeltner/i2i Art Inc

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  dedication

  This book is lovingly dedicated to the memory of

  Beth Ann “Trinka” Hodges, a bright soul gone too soon.

  “Friend, I will remember you.”!

  acknowledgments

  I’d like to thank the following for their help in my research for this book:

  Captain Tom Gillman, St. Louis Fire Department, Ret., for his generosity in sharing his knowledge of the workings of that august institution.

  Firefighter/EMT Sean Grigsby, for answering my random, oddball questions about firefighting.

  Jordan Woerndle, for sharing information on the fascinating Lemp/Cherokee caves. As I’m writing fiction, I should note that I took liberties with that information. I should also note that this cave system is closed for safety reasons and I do NOT encourage anyone to go exploring there.

  And Deputy Jeramiah Sullivan of the Henry County, Missouri, Sheriff’s Department, for his insight into police procedure. (Any errors that remain in this area are my responsibility alone.)

  Finally, I’d like to thank my friends and family and the members of my community for being so kind and supportive of my writing career.

  one

  Death and the fire captain came in through the front door.

  Wren Morgan came out of the kitchen with a coffee pot and three cups on a tray. The lean black man in the St. Louis Fire Department dress uniform was a stranger to her, but she’d been watching through the blinds as the two men talked on the sidewalk and she knew who he was now. She’d seen pictures of him in happier times, posing with Death’s younger brother, Randy.

  “Honey, this is Captain Cairn. He was my brother’s commanding officer. Captain—”

  “Call me Cap. Everyone does.”

  Death shot him a faint grin. “Cap, this is my girlfriend, Wren Morgan.”

  “Miss Morgan, a pleasure to meet you.”

  “And you. Would you like some coffee?”

  “Yes, please.”

  They settled around the coffee table and Cap set his briefcase on the table and opened it. “One reason I needed to see you is because we still have to settle your brother’s estate.”

  Death was surprised. “It’s not already settled?”

  “No. You didn’t know?”

  “By the time I woke up in Germany, it seemed like everything was already done. I just figured my ex-wife got any money and spent it while I was overseas.”

  “I see.” Cap rustled some papers. “Actually there was a complication. The day before Bogie—Randy—”

  “It’s okay,” Death said with a wry grin. “I was Bogie in the Marine Corps, too.”

  “Right.” Cap spared him a brief smile. “The day before Bogie died he got word that you’d been killed in action. Glad that turned out not to be true, by the way.”

  “Thanks,” Death nodded.

  Wren, sitting beside him on the sofa, ran a hand lightly down his arm in silent agreement. In contrast to Captain Cairn, Death wore old blue jeans and a tattered T-shirt. There was a smudge of grease across his forehead and a light sheen of sweat coated his muscular arms. The last thing he looked was fragile, but she knew that in many ways, he was.

  Death had been through hell in the last year. He had been wounded in action in Afghanistan and spent three days hiding in an area controlled by insurgents before being found by allied forces. When he finally woke up, after spending weeks in a coma, he learned that his younger brother had died in a fire and his wife had cleaned out their bank account and left him.

  “Anyway, that morning he got a call from, ah, your ex-wife?”

  “Madeline.”

  “Madeline. Right. They had a bit of an altercation and the upshot was that he re-wrote his will at the last minute. He left everything to the fire station—I don’t think he could think of anyone else right then and he was determined that, if anything happened to him, Madeline wasn’t going to profit by it. After he died and you were found alive, Madeline filed to contest the will, arguing that he wouldn’t have written you out of it if he knew you were still alive. Frankly, we agree, and there shouldn’t be any problem with having that will thrown out and his previous will reinstated. However, we can’t just do it on our own.”

  Death sighed and looked down at the floor between his feet. Cap’s voice softened. “Are you alright talking about this, son?”

  “Yeah, I guess. It just … feels kinda like blood money, you know?”

  “I know, but your brother would have wanted you to have it. I tried contacting you through Madeline, but after you divorced I wasn’t able to get in touch with her. I just happened to see your name in the news and the police chief here knew where to find you. Anyway, I’ve got some papers here for you, so we can finally get this taken care of. Also,” he reached into his briefcase, “I thought that maybe you’d like to have this.”

  He pulled out a silver shield, set against red velvet in a burnished silver frame. He offered it to Death, who took it with a puzzled frown. “It’s your brother’s badge,” Cap said.

  “Yeah, I know but … did he have two? Because I already have one the coroner sent us.”

  He got up and went to a curio cabinet. Though he slept at his own apartment, Wren’s place was quickly becoming home. His pictures and few mementos sat on the shelves and hung on the walls beside hers now. He came back with a small box containing a copy of the badge in Cap’s hand. Cap took it with a frown. “Did the coroner say where he got this?”

  “He said he took it off the body.”

  “That’s impossible. The morning he died, Bogie snapped the back off his badge. We got called out before he had time to fix it. When he went into that fire, his shield was lying on my desk.”

  _____

  “I
didn’t even want Bogie working that day,” Cap said.

  They had moved into the kitchen, where the light was better. Cap sat with his hands locked together on the surface of the table. Death was out on the front porch talking on his cell phone.

  “I thought he needed some time off to deal with everything. He looked so lost when I tried to make him leave, though, I didn’t have the heart to send him away. I wish now that I had, of course.”

  “It wasn’t the fire that killed him, though. Right?” Wren posed the question gently. “It was an aortic aneurysm. Nothing anyone did caused it, and there’s no way anyone could have foreseen that it would happen.”

  “Still …” Cap’s voice trailed off.

  Wren refreshed his coffee and her own, then sat down across from him and pulled the two badges over to look at them. “How do you think this happened?” she asked. “Where did the extra badge come from?”

  “At this point, I don’t really know.”

  “Could someone have thought his badge was lost in the fire and replaced it so his family would have one?”

  He thought about it. “Maybe.” He sighed. “Probably, I suppose. The fire department doesn’t just give out badges. Someone has to buy it and fill out the paperwork. When I tried to do that with Bogie’s badge, our battalion chief already had. He was a friend of the boys’ grandfather and I figured he just wanted to clear a way for Death to have his brother’s badge. He could have gotten a replacement badge if he thought Bogie’s had been lost. I don’t understand why he wouldn’t have come to me about it, though.”

  Wren looked up. “These badges aren’t identical, you know? The numbers are different.”

  “What? Let me see.”

  She moved her chair over closer to him and slid the badges across the table so they could look at them together. “See, the one you brought says ‘4103’ but the one Death already had says ‘4183’.”

  “That’s Bogie’s badge number. 4103. The other one is wrong.”

  Death came back in. “I couldn’t get hold of Madeline. I did talk to her mother, Evelyn. The coroner’s office shipped Madeline a carton full of Randy’s personal effects. Evelyn was there when it arrived. The badge was on top, in the box, and there was a note with it, but Evelyn doesn’t remember who it was from or what it said. They put the carton in the basement. Chances are it’s still there. If I can get hold of Madeline and get that carton, maybe there’ll be some explanation.”

  “Bogie had a friend at the coroner’s office,” Cap said suddenly. “An assistant M.E., Sophie something. We’d see her sometimes at fatality incidents. I think your brother was sweet on her, to be honest. She always made a point to talk to him.”

  Death stood in the middle of the floor, hands in his pockets, studying the worn linoleum. His stance was uneven, like a sailor standing on the rocking deck of a ship or a man standing on an Earth that was no longer reliably solid beneath him. His face was closed, guarded, and when he spoke his voice was tight. “Cap,” he said, “I gotta ask—”

  “No,” Cap said immediately. He rose and crossed to the younger man, put a hand on his shoulder, and guided him to a chair. “I know what you’re going to ask, son. The answer is no.”

  “But, if it wasn’t his badge—”

  “You were a commanding officer,” Cap said. “In the Marines. You had guys you were responsible for, so I know you’re going to understand when I tell you this. That kid was mine. I would give anything if there were some way he could still be alive. But I was there. I saw his body. I identified him. The coroner’s office double-checked against his dental records. I’m sorry, Death. I’m so sorry. But your brother is dead.”

  _____

  Ten months earlier. St. Louis, Missouri.

  They called it the Brewmaster’s Widow.

  The Einstadt Brewery had closed with the onset of Prohibition in 1920 and never reopened. Some of the company’s buildings had been torn down and some had been reclaimed for other uses, but the malt house, with its massive brick grain silos along one end, sat untouched.

  To the trained eye of a firefighter, a single glance was enough to recognize an arson fire. Everything was burning, even things that were not flammable. Blue flames danced across brick walls, the accelerant leaving behind telltale swirls. Where the fire met real fuel, ancient wood and rubber and fabric, it burned a deep, angry red. Billows of smoke filled the room, obscuring the remains of brewing tanks and decaying equipment. Visibility was almost nonexistent. Even moving was treacherous. Along the north side of the building was a two-story warren of offices and storage rooms. The doorway into it glowed like the gates of Hell.

  The whole place would have to be searched for victims, and the grain silos were a dust explosion waiting to happen.

  Captain Cairn was pulling a line with his engine crew, helping 27’s fight the fire while his truckies searched the building and his Advanced Life Support unit stood by hoping not to be needed. The heat was intense, the heat from the fire adding to the heat from the day. Twenty-five pounds of turnout gear, not counting the breathing apparatus, did nothing to help that situation.

  He tightened his hands around the 2-inch hose and blinked sweat out of his eyes, leaning forward to see through thick, black smoke. The fire was loud—so loud that it drowned out all other sounds, becoming more a pervasive silence than a noise in its own right. And then another noise broke through, a noise that was designed to be heard even over the roar of flames. A sound that sent a chill of fear through every firefighter who heard it.

  It was a personal alarm. Somewhere in the building, one of their own was down.

  One of his men. The alarm came from the offices and storerooms where Tanner and Bogie had gone to search.

  Every firefighter in the building had heard the alarm and was responding. Cap called in Talia and Yering even as he and his engine crew made for the doorway, using their line to knock down the flames around them and snaking their way through the debris. Behind them, 27’s set up to clear and maintain an easy exit. Cap and his men reached the doorway just as Tanner rushed out of a room down the hall and to the left. Rowdy caught sight of them and gestured without pausing, indicating a door to their right and shouting over the flames.

  “Cap! Bogie!”

  The wooden floor trembled beneath their boots as they rushed down the corridor. Blue flames from the accelerant danced across the brick walls and they soaked the floor as they passed so that it wouldn’t catch fire beneath them. The scene inside the room where the alarm sounded was one that would live in Cap’s nightmares for the rest of his life.

  A heavy wooden bookcase, a floor-to-ceiling bookcase that had taken up one whole wall of the room, had collapsed and was burning with all the heat that well-dried oak could produce. Randy Bogart’s left boot was just visible at the bottom of the fire.

  They knocked down the flames and dug him out, but he was unresponsive. The falling bookcase had broken his face mask and his face was badly burned. His brother firefighters got him outside and the paramedics with the ALS unit did their damnedest, but it was to no avail.

  It wasn’t until later they learned he’d died of an aortic aneurysm, a weak spot in his aorta. It must have been something he’d always had, a silent killer lying in wait. When the bookcase fell on him, the spike in his blood pressure would have been enough to pop it open. In all probability, he was dead in less than two minutes.

  _____

  “So where do you think the extra badge came from?”

  Wren shrugged.

  Outside in the bright morning sunlight an auction was just underway. Sixty-three-year-old Sam Keystone had the gavel and had started selling off a long table of knickknacks and mismatched dishes while his twin, Roy, heckled him from the edge of the crowd. Inside the cash tent, set up on the lawn of the house they were going to sell that afternoon, it was shady and cool, with a light breeze tossing the tent flaps and rustling the edges of the receipt book.

  “The extra badge is totally authentic. If it didn’
t have the one number wrong it would be identical to Randy’s real badge. Captain Cairn says that actual badges aren’t that easy to come by. There’ve been too many cases of people getting into homes by claiming to be firefighters checking on fire codes and things like that. There was a serial rapist that operated that way on the East Coast a few years ago.” Wren snagged a soda, then sat on the ice chest. “There are only a few companies that are licensed to make badges and you have to have all the right paperwork and authorizations to order one. And impersonating a firefighter is a crime, just like impersonating a police officer is.” Leona Keystone shuffled her stacks of one-dollar bills into order and closed the lid of the cash box with a snap. “Well, somebody managed it. What about the guy who really has that number?”

  “A boot over at Station 17.”

  “A boot?”

  “A new guy. They call them boots. He wasn’t on duty that day and his badge is accounted for.”

  “Where’s Death now?”

  “He’s trying to finish up a case he’s working on. Industrial espionage. He’s figured out who’s behind it, he’s just gotta catch them in the act. He’s trying to clear up everything he’s got going on now so he can go to St. Louis and settle Randy’s estate.”

  “Are you going to go with him?”

  Wren hesitated.

  “You know, if you need the time off, that’s not a problem.”

  “Thanks. I appreciate it. I really do. But … should I go? I mean, I want to be there to support him if he wants me, but I don’t want him to feel I’m smothering him either.” She chewed on her lower lip.

  “When he first married Madeline, she wouldn’t let him go anywhere or do anything alone. She was always so jealous. And he said at first he was flattered, but when he was sent overseas she cheated on him almost immediately. He figured then that she was suspicious of him because she was inclined to cheat herself. So I don’t want him to think that I don’t trust him because I don’t want him to think that he can’t trust me, though I don’t think that he thinks that and I don’t want him to think that I don’t want to be there if he needs me either.” She sighed. “Am I overthinking this?”