by Linda Ladd
“Who? Tell me who, Willie.”
“What if he finds out?”
“We can protect you. All you have to do is tell the truth. Where are you now? At the academy?”
“No. I left after I talked to you.” More quiet. “I’m pretty shook up.”
“Where are you? We can meet. Talk somewhere private.” I glanced at Black. He looked interested. Or was that annoyed?
“I got a place. Nobody knows about it but me. I stay there sometimes.”
“Is that where you are now?”
“Yeah.”
“Tell me how to get there.”
“You know Highway 5, out past that old schoolhouse they made into a museum? It’s right past there. The mailbox has a fish on it, you know the symbol for Jesus Christ.”
I frowned. Weird. “Okay, you stay there. Don’t talk to anybody. Don’t call anybody and don’t let anybody come inside.”
I shut the phone. “Willie’s ready to crack. You want to tag along?”
“You bet.”
I hit speed dial for Bud. It rang twice before he picked up. I said, “Where are you?”
“Brianna invited me in for coffee.”
Code for he was spending the night with her. “Willie Vines is ready to talk. Black and I are on our way.”
“Shit. Now?” Bud was not thrilled. “Where?”
I told him, took a U-turn on the road, and headed out again.
Black said, “Never a dull moment with you, Detective. Any chance this is a trap?”
“Could be. Willie’s pretty tame to take on both of us. He’s scared of Joe McKay. You should’ve seen the look on his face when McKay walked in on us.”
“What’s the link?”
“That’s what I wanna know.”
It took almost thirty minutes to find the right mailbox. There was no traffic except a few cars slipping their way home from New Year’s Eve parties. The snow did not let up, but the Humvee was like our own personal snowplow.
“There’s the mailbox. Looks like he knocked the snow off so we could see it.”
“Maybe he called us from out here on his cell.”
A single pair of tire tracks led off down a heavily wooded road. Branches rattled against us on both sides.
Black said, “Man, watch it, you’re scratching the paint up.”
“Sorry.”
Half a mile later we saw the house. It was very old, a typical farmhouse sitting in a snowy field. Every light was on. I pulled up out front beside a dark-colored, beat-up old Chevy pickup. I turned off the ignition but left the headlamps on, illuminating the front door. It was standing ajar. My sixth sense quivered alive.
“I don’t like this.”
“Me, either.”
“You gonna wait for Bud?”
“No.”
“Maybe you should.”
I got out and pulled the .38 out of my ankle holster. My stilettos sank down into the snow and froze my toes. The snow had turned to sleet now, and I could hear it pinging against the Humvee. The motor made cooling sounds. Everything else was silent. Black got out the other side. To my surprise, he pulled out his own .38 from the small of his back.
“You’re carrying?”
“I learned the hard way last summer always to be prepared.”
I said. “Something’s very wrong here.”
“Tell me about it.”
There were lots of tracks on the path to the front door, going both ways and up the steps. I stood and listened. No sound. No movement. I pulled up the end of my skirt and tucked it inside my parka, just in case I had to kick somebody in the groin. We crept up the steps on either side. It was obvious Black had training somewhere, sometime in police procedure. Probably in his Army Ranger days. I was glad I had him for backup.
I rapped on the door. “Willie? You in there?”
No answer. I pushed the door open with the toe of my stiletto. It swung inward with a long, horror-film creak. Inside, there were signs of a struggle. A massive struggle. Overturned chairs. Broken dishes. Huge pool of blood settling into the shape of California and the Baja peninsula.
Bud’s Bronco appeared behind us, the lights flashing across where we stood on the porch. He stopped and got out. Drew his weapon.
“Take the back, Bud. We got blood inside.”
He headed around the side, his flashlight beam revealing slanted, shining lines of sleet. Black had his gun barrel up against his right shoulder. I inched inside, back to the door. He followed. Still no sound. Two doors led off the living room. Bloody drag marks provided a red-carpet indicator to one door, probably the bedroom. I tensed as a door was kicked open in the back of the house. Then Bud’s shout.
“I’m in. Clear.”
Seconds later he appeared at the kitchen door. I gestured to the bloodstained path. We moved together toward it, circumventing furniture and backing along each wall. Black stayed where he was and covered us. The blood trail looked fresh, shiny, and wet on the scarred, dark-green linoleum.
Bud leaned back then darted a quick look inside the room. “Oh God, it’s a bloodbath in there.”
“Let’s go. I’m low.”
We moved fast. Bud came behind me. The room was empty. No closets. No hiding places. Just enough blood and gore to take my breath away.
I kept my arms extended with the gun. “Somebody got slaughtered in here.”
“Sweet Mary.” That was Black, now at the bedroom door.
The twin bed was covered with a chenille bedspread. It was so soaked with blood that at first I didn’t realize it was yellow. But that wasn’t the worst part. There was a head and torso lying on it, hacked up beyond recognition. And other body parts. More were scattered around on the floor.
A long, sharp machete was lodged in what was left of the chest cavity. The odor of fresh blood, raw and coppery and nauseating, filled the air. My stomach revolted, spewed bile up the back of my throat. I forced it back down but couldn’t speak. Nobody said anything, just stared at the carnage. Finally, I said, “Think that’s Willie?”
Bud moved closer to the bed, stepping carefully around the mutilated body. He pointed to the torso. “The shirt’s got his name embroidered on the pocket.”
I looked at a severed foot leaning against the pillows. “Oh God, he had those boots on tonight.”
I swallowed hard, not yet wanting to believe it. “This could be a setup, to make it look like him. It’s so different from the other scenes. It doesn’t add up.”
Black said. “Only Willie would have reason to set the vic up to look like himself. And why would he do that?”
Good question. “Who knows? Maybe he’s the perp, or maybe somebody else wants us to think so. Buck can tell us that soon enough. Okay, let’s step back, take some deep breaths and put on some protective gear before we contaminate the scene.”
I phoned Charlie, woke him up, and he was too shocked by the news to even curse me out. He said he’d alert Buckeye and forensics. Yeah, happy New Year, everybody.
I hung up and said, “What’s your take, Bud?”
“Looks like it started out in the living room.”
“Somebody hacked this guy to bits,” Black put in. “This is rage like I’ve never seen it before. The killer had to be covered with blood. Look at the walls. The ceiling.”
“How’d the perp get out without leaving bloody footprints?”
Bud said, “He went out the window. Look.”
There were smears on the sill, the lower pane, the window frame. “We’re gonna get him this time. He had to have left something behind.”
I waited for Bud to stomp outside and bring in paper booties and latex gloves. We all put them on, and I walked to the window, sidestepping pools of gore and torn flesh. I pushed open the window and shined Bud’s flashlight on the ground below. The snow was crimson and disturbed. The bastard rolled around and cleaned himself off in the snow. Made a bloody snow angel for us to find. I swept the beam out across the yard. Four-wheeler tracks led off toward the woods.
; “He rode a four-wheeler out of here. Just like McKay did at my place. Maybe we can match the treads.”
I thought about how scared Willie’s voice had been earlier on the phone, how I’d said I’d protect him. My stomach dropped, cold and hard. McKay had to be the perp. My gut was still telling me that, making me sure of it. And I was going to get him for this. Willie Vines was going to be his last victim.
TWENTY-TWO
In the wee hours of New Year’s Day Buckeye descended with his team on Willie Vines’s place, sweeping the crime scene and pretty much as horrified by the carnage as we were. Dawn came and eventually dazzling blue skies that brought on the mother of all headaches. I swallowed some Excedrin and tried to forget about it, because it would take hours and hours just to clean up the gore and gather body parts. Our interviews had turned up the fact that Willie had no living family. Seemed a little coincidental that all three of our victims were basically alone in the world. Except for Christie, whose relatives hadn’t cared enough to show up yet to claim the body.
Black took off around five o’clock to get a few hours’ sleep before he checked on his Cedar Bend patients staying at the Lodge over the holidays. It was late morning before Bud dropped me off. I let Jules Verne out to do his business, then crashed for three hours before I was up and dressed and phoning Bud. A call to the director with the sad news about Willie informed us that the director himself could alibi Joe McKay. He’d had drinks after the gala with Joe and two board members and their wives. Apparently the director was considering McKay for an instructor’s position at the academy, probably ESP in Ten Easy Lessons. Something told me he’d fit in out there real well. But that wouldn’t stop me from leaning on McKay. Willie was terrified of McKay, and now Willie was dead. It was time to pay a little visit to Joe’s utopia in the woods and sweat him a little. I picked up Bud in my Explorer.
Bud looked tired but he still had sharp creases in his jeans. Jeez. How’d he do that? His first words were, “Do we have a warrant to search McKay’s place?”
“Not yet. Buckeye’s gonna call me if they turn up incriminating evidence at Willie’s house.”
“Where’s McKay live?”
“Charlie said he’s staying out in the middle of nowhere. His family’s old homestead. I’ll find it, don’t worry.”
Out in the middle of nowhere was the understatement of the year. And we thought Willie lived in the sticks. Oh yes, deep, deep in the dark, dark woods well past Willie’s house and the academy. Why would a young guy like McKay want to live way out here? Probably because he had lots of skeletons in lots of closets. Closets full of machetes and spiderwebs.
“This is it. Charlie said to look for a rusted mailbox with the name Bulinsky on the side.”
I turned onto a snowpacked dirt road. There were no four-wheeler tracks but a car had driven down the road recently.
“Looks like he’s home,” said Bud.
“Let’s just hope he’s home with Willie’s blood on his clothes.”
They drove through naked trees, limbs heavy with snow. The sun was too bright even for my sunglasses, and I felt my headache intensify. We caught sight of a farmhouse a lot like Willie’s, but maybe a bit less dilapidated. A brick chimney was billowing black smoke into the crisp morning air. Wood was stacked around as if he’d been remodeling. As we approached, I caught sight of Joe, standing out in the back near a detached garage. He saw us, too, I guess, because he headed at a run for the back door.
I floored the accelerator, and we fishtailed dangerously on a patch of ice and slammed to a stop near the front door. We drew our weapons and jumped out. Bud took the front, easing slowly up the porch steps. I made my way around the side of the house through deep, pristine snowdrifts. At the back I hesitated, aware he could be lying in wait with a sawed-off, double-barreled shotgun or a bloodstained machete, even. Willie’s dismembered body came to mind. I swallowed hard, felt a trickle of fear, which I ignored. I darted a look around the corner of the house. Found the backyard was deserted. Lots of trampled snow. A half-built snowman with a carrot nose. Huh? Now that seemed a bit incongruous. Maybe ice-cold killers liked playing in the snow, too. Maybe they packed ice around their hearts to keep them deadly.
Out front Bud beat a fist on the door and yelled “police” and “open up.” I kept my gun fixed on the back door, finger on the trigger, fairly certain my friend, Joe, would barrel out any minute, guns a-blazing.
Footprints in the backyard went every which way, obliterating each other and intersecting with motorcycle and four-wheeler trails. A lot of them led into the old garage. The door was up. I sidestepped my way toward it, weapon and eyes trained on the back door. Bud was beating on the front door some more. I took a quick peek inside the garage, leading with my gun, at the ready, oh, yes.
Inside I found McKay’s Harley-Davidson, and in the lean-to metal shed attached to the side of the structure, there was lots of junk stacked around: gardening tools, old tires, lawn mowers, empty paint buckets.
I turned and scanned the yard for four-wheeler tracks into the woods. I heard a sound and swiveled my weapon to the house. Joe McKay stood on his porch in a black sweatshirt and denim jeans. “Why hello, Detective Morgan. You looking for something in my garage?”
Mr. Pleasant, all smiley and dimpled up with charm. His breath plumed when he spoke. Mine plumed with molten anger. I called Bud’s name, told him to come around while I walked slowly toward Joe, holding the Glock with both hands, pointed straight at McKay and ready to fire.
Joe watched me. I watched his hands. “Beautiful day, isn’t it? After all the snow. Weather Channel says more’s coming. Sure is different than southern California, believe me, but still a nice change.”
I wasn’t there to discuss weather patterns and Doppler radar, so I said nothing. But I watched his eyes and detected something different in them. Worry, maybe? Good. I wanted him to be worried. Bud showed up and joined our little meteorological tête-à-tête.
“Well, now, you got Detective Davis with you. And look at those big guns. Hell, if I’d known you two were coming out, I’d’ve cleaned up some. Would’ve even shaved for you, Detective Morgan.” He rubbed fingertips across his whiskers. His beard stubble was shades darker than his long, sun-bleached hair.
I moved to the foot of the steps and stared up at him. He stared at my weapon. He was nervous; I could sense it. I hadn’t seen him nervous before. Maybe butchering some poor kid beyond recognition had stressed him out a little.
“Surely you didn’t come out here to shoot me, did you, Detective? Want me to put my hands up and not make any quick moves? Maybe I should lean against the house and spread ’em.” Now he was more his smart-ass self and sporting more dimples than a golf ball.
“Know what, McKay, the funniest thing happened last night. Willie Vines got hacked up into a million little pieces.”
“Huh?” McKay’s deep dimples faded to lines bracketing his mouth.
“Yeah, too bad, right? We were just wondering if you had any blood-soaked clothes lying around your house, maybe with Willie’s blood type on them.”
McKay frowned. “Know what, Detective? Sounds to me a lot like you’re accusing me of a crime. That so? If you are, you better have something to back it up, or I might just have to cry harassment to my old friend, Charlie, and sue your pretty little ass.”
Bud said, “Wow, you’re really scarin’ us now, McKay. See how we’re shiverin’ and shakin’? Hey, I know what, how about being nice and inviting us in. You know, let us look around and see for ourselves how innocent you are.”
McKay laughed, a regular Jolly Old St. Nick. “Sure thing, Detective. Cough up a warrant signed by a real, live judge and mi casa es su casa.”
I said, “You saying we need a warrant to pay you a friendly call?”
“You bet you do, doll. You’ve zeroed in on me as the perp from day one and I sure as hell won’t help you frame me with all the shit going on around here. What’s the plan, huh? Planting an eight ball of crack behin
d my toilet bowl? Not that I don’t trust you, but stranger things have happened. Know what I mean? I haven’t done jack since I came back here, but you keep coming at me, anyway. Hell, you really think I’d off somebody with you hounding my ass twenty-four/seven?” He kept glancing out over the backyard at the tree line. I followed his gaze and saw nothing but snow and naked trees.
I said, “Where were you last night after the gala?”
“With Director Johnstone at his place. Sort of an informal job interview. Ask him, if you don’t believe me. And ask the two advisory board members and their wives who were there, too.”
“Don’t worry, I plan to.” That alibi was a little too convenient for my taste. Maybe we ought to take Director Johnstone in and hammer his story apart for a while.
“You’re grabbing at straws, Detective. And if you have a hankering to visit my house, that’s fine by me, just show me the warrant. And good luck. No judge is gonna see probable cause to let you rifle through my stuff. You don’t have a thing on me, and you never will. Because I didn’t do anything. Especially to Willie. I liked that kid.”
“Yeah, I can tell you’re all broken up.”
Bud said, “You’re coming off like a lawyer, McKay. Why’d you run when you saw us comin’?”
McKay gestured at a shotgun propped in the corner. “I wasn’t expecting company. I’m new in these parts. Couldn’t figure anybody I knew would be coming to call on New Year’s morning with these kind of road conditions.”
“You always give shotgun welcomes?” I said.
Bud said, “You got a real isolated place out here. Wonder why?”
“It’s a dangerous world we live in, now you know that, detectives. Man livin’ way out here’s got to protect himself.”
I thought I heard something inside his house. I frowned. “You got somebody in there with you, McKay? Somebody you forgot to mention?”
“Nope. Like I told you before, I’m all alone in the big, cold world. Television’s on, though. Rose Bowl parade. Just love those floats made up of flowers. I really got to get back inside or I’ll miss seein’ the Queen and her Princesses.”