Retribution (#3)

by M. M. Mayle

  She wrenches the door open, dives inside with Jakeway back on his feet and insanely swiping at her with the hideous blade. She activates the door locks without a second to spare. He continues the assault, stabbing at sheet metal, pounding on windows, howling in rage as she dumps the contents of her bag onto the seat beside her and madly stirs through it for car keys she might have forgotten she was carrying if David hadn’t left the garage door opener clipped to the visor.

  “David . . . Oh God . . . David!”

  She hiccoughs violently and grabs for the opener just as Jakeway starts beating on the car door handle with the spade she tossed aside. If the sonuvabitch trades that in for the sledgehammer standing in a nearby niche next to the snow shovel, she doesn’t stand a chance.

  She activates the garage door opener. Nothing happens. She tries again, squeezes it hard enough to crack the case. Still nothing happens and Jakeway’s pounding on the car harder than ever.

  “God-dammit!” she yells and throws the useless unit at the windshield, where Jakeway’s bloodied face is now pressed. The infamous garage door maneuver must have jarred the electrical plug loose, as it did those many weeks ago when it was only imaginary fuckbags she was trying to escape.

  She cranks the engine, revs it hard, drops into reverse and stomps the accelerator to the floor.

  — FOUR —

  Early afternoon, August 15, 1987

  After a heart-pounding trip from the Wolcott nursing home, Nate skids to a stop on Old Quarry Court, where he deliberately blocks the empty driveway of number 13. He shifts into park, kills the engine, and releases the seat belt just as the Chandler garage door explodes outwardly, propelled by a vehicle coming straight at him in reverse.

  He’s broadsided on the passenger side before he can even think of getting out of the way; he’s pounded against the doorframe, bounced off the steering wheel, pelted with nuggets of flying safety glass, and stunned by sounds evoking the Northern Michigan crash before he can even begin to wonder what the fuck’s going on.

  When his car steadies and shudders down onto its shocks, he can see without getting out that the assaulting vehicle penetrated a good six inches inside the normal contour of the big sedan.

  What are the odds, he asks himself; how many red lights and stop signs did he safely run on the way here only to be struck down at destination?

  “Jesus, Jesus, Jesus.” He finds his voice and then his nerve. Favoring a shoulder that’s beginning to throb, he steps into the street and advances on the other vehicle. It’s a grey Range Rover. Exactly like the one Laurel drove when she lived here; exactly like the one she sold to David Sebastian after she left town.

  “Duh,” he mutters as he puts two and two together and shields his eyes to peer inside, prepared to ask David what the fuck that was all about. But Laurel is behind the wheel; David is nowhere in sight.

  “Laurel?” He bends down, presses his face against the window to get a better look. “Are you all right?” he says. “Are you hurt?”

  He tries the door and she lets loose with a stunning stream of oaths and threats.

  “Laurel! Unlock the door!”

  “Go to hell! You won’t get me that easy,” she shouts and leans on the horn.

  Until now he’s given no thought to the possibility of gawkers. Or paparazzi, for that matter. He takes a look around. A few neighbors have gathered on the other side of the street, drawn, no doubt, by the sound of the garage door splintering into kindling, followed by the resounding clash of metal on metal. More will gather if he can’t convince Laurel to let up on the horn.

  There’s no point yelling or rattling the door handle. Whatever caused her to smash her way out of the garage still has hold of her and shows no signs of letting go. He retreats from the Rover, moves toward the garage, where the answer to all this must lie. He hasn’t taken three steps when the horn stops and she calls out to him.

  “David,” she says, and he can’t be sure if she thinks he’s David or if she’s trying to summon David.

  He turns around to see her open the car door and step out. “David,” she says again and points at the garage. She says something else in a strained voice—something unintelligible—and sinks to her knees.

  At that, one of the neighbor women runs forward, followed by two of the men, who all ask what they can do without asking what’s going on. Totally unexpected from people who allowed Mrs. Floss’s ignominious death to go unnoticed for days on end. Or maybe they’re trying to make up for that travesty.

  Nate and the woman help Laurel to her feet.

  “You can’t go in there,” Laurel says, now reduced to a hoarse whisper, her face paper-white, her eyes unblinking as she allows them to ease her back behind the wheel of the Rover, the nearest place to sit. “You can’t go in there,” she says just audibly, “he’s still in there and he’s got a knife.” She waggles a cautionary finger and slumps against the steering wheel.

  “I think she means the fellow who shot out through the grade door right after she backed through the overhead,” one of the men offers. “I was getting ready to cut the lawn when I heard the crash and looked up in time to see this guy hightail it outta there. Didn’t know what to think, so I called the cops.”

  With that news, there’s no good reason not to enter the garage and discover what drove Laurel to the brink of madness. Nate picks his way through debris scattered on a driveway that’s ten miles short of being long enough to dispel his fears. Each step he takes brings him that much closer to a reality he never wanted to embrace and could never quite reject.

  Despite his unfortunate acquaintance with blood and gore, the sight of David Sebastian sprawled in a grotesque position on the garage floor, his hair pulled into a single tuft as though having been used as purchase, his head thrown back, and his throat cut ear to ear—cut deeply ear to ear, with great gouts of blood pooled either side—drops him to his knees.

  Words fail him. Even oaths. He wants to go as shocky and spacey as Laurel and hide within a dark recess of himself; he wants to deny that a scenario very similar to this was playing in the back of his mind when he raced here from the nursing home; he wants to pray that he’ll never again be proved right.

  But why David? How does he figure into any of this?

  He remains with the body long after hearing emergency vehicles arrive; he senses a swarm of activity behind him that signals the invasion of vicarious thrill seekers he’d like to swat like so many gnats; he feels a hand on his throbbing shoulder, a familiarity he doesn’t tolerate well under the best of conditions.

  “Mr. Isaacs, I need you to relocate so the paramedics can get in here,” the owner of the hand says.

  Nate looks up, recognizes one of the detectives encountered during the aftermath of the Floss tragedy, and gets to his feet. The detective leads him to an ambulance, where Laurel is receiving attention, where he refuses attention even though his shoulder is stiffening and an area of rib cage is becoming sore.

  Another detective approaches, looks him over as though assessing mental strength on the basis of outward appearance, and martyrdom doesn’t seem like such a bad idea.

  “We’re gonna need your statement and one from the lady,” this older, crustier-sounding detective says.

  “I need to give a statement to the Wolcott police,” Nate says.

  “What’s Wolcott got to do with it? You’re in Glen Abbey, buddy.” The detective looks him over again, this time with naked disdain.

  “Wolcott’s got everything to do with it, buddy, and if you won’t patch me through I’ll handle it myself!”

  Nate glances in the direction of the Chandler house, unsure if the phone there is still connected. But even if it is, it’s off limits now. His glance takes in crime scene tape isolating the entire Chandler property, including the battered Range Rover. That could mean his car will be impounded as well. Not that it’s drivable.

  A glance in the opposite direction shows another stretch of police tape confining the gallery of onlookers t
o the landscaped island centering the cul-de-sac. An appeal to them is bound to produce access to a phone, especially if he happens to mention this detective is attempting to thwart a police investigation.

  He says as much to the detective, who responds to the threat by steering him to one of the squad cars parked near the ambulance. The scornful detective makes a big show of heaving himself into the front passenger seat, and after a lot of back-and-forth, connecting with the Wolcott Township Police by two-way radio. He requests an interviewer, then hands the tethered microphone out the open door to Nate.

  “This better be good,” the detective says and hunkers down to listen.

  When he’s given every reason he can think of for the Wolcott police to investigate Benjamin Chandler’s death as a homicide, the interviewer requests corroboration of the tie-in—the alleged Sebastian homicide—and verification of Nate’s identity.

  He hands off to the detective, who supplies what’s needed, reading data from the driver’s license Nate produces, reciting from memory the known details of David’s death. Less surly than at the start, the detective ends the transmission and returns his attention to Nate.

  “If this all pans out the way you theorize, me and a lotta other people will want to know why the hell you didn’t come to us—to somebody, to anybody—before now,” the detective says.

  “Because we didn’t want to believe him . . . because we were afraid to believe him,” Laurel says from close by.

  “Jesus!” Nate gasps when she steps out from behind him, apparently restored other than for scraped knees and lingering whiteness around her mouth.

  “How long have you been listening?” he asks.

  “Long enough. Long enough to understand why you’re here.”

  “Then you heard—”

  “I know David is dead. I knew it when I heard his head hit the garage floor. I know you believe my father was killed to lure me here—to bring Colin within range—and I’m inclined to agree. I know David was killed by mistake, that Colin was the target, and I know Colin will be inconsolable when he finds out.”

  She could be speaking of strangers; she could be one of the investigators for being so detached and matter-of-fact. Laurel could either be the strongest woman he’s ever encountered or still in the grip of shock.

  She turns to the detective as he emerges from the squad car. “We have to go to the city right away and we don’t have any way of getting there,” she says in the same uninvolved way.

  “Sorry, ma’am, I can’t let you go till I have your written statements. Standard procedure.”

  “Fuck procedure for once!” She explodes with involvement, startling everyone within hearing. “We’re not suspects, we’re not flight risks, for heaven’s sake, and we couldn’t be a whole helluva lot more interested in helping you do your job! Just let us do ours and you’ll get your statements. And more. Nate, tell him.” Laurel says in a voice that goes with snapped fingers.

  “Mrs. Elliot is referring to material documenting what is known of the alleged perpetrator. Given the chance, I can provide background, possible motive, possible links to other crimes, a credible pencil sketch and a legible photograph of the suspect.”

  “Why didn’t you say so, for the luvagod? Oh, yeah, nobody wanted to believe,” the detective snarls.

  “Would you have believed?” Nate says. “Would you have put out an allpoints bulletin if I’d told you anytime before now that a potentially deranged Native American—a supposedly unrequited suitor of the late Aurora Elliot—was systematically executing those he deemed guilty of contributing to her downfall and—”

  “I get your point,” the detective says.

  “I’m glad. So how about getting us a ride into Manhattan so we can proceed.”

  “I’ll see what I can do.”

  While they wait, they’re forced to witness the transfer of David’s shrouded body from garage to ambulance. The rubber body bag might as well be transparent; the ghastly image he saw in the garage is the dominant one. If Laurel is experiencing the same, she’s not letting on when she steps forward to lay a hand on the packaged remains as the paramedics collapse the wheeled stretcher into the ambulance interior. On the basis of that gesture, Nate decides she is the strongest woman he’s ever encountered and shock doesn’t enter in.

  The detective returns with a young uniformed officer. “Here’s the deal,” the detective says. “Officer Decatur here is gonna drive you into the city to wherever you’ve got this additional info stashed. Me and my partner will then join you there. Let’s say in two hours, let’s make it five o’clock.”

  Nate agrees, gives the detective his Manhattan address and phone number and they’re free to go—for the time being.

  The officer escorts them to an unmarked car parked on the opposite side of the court. Laurel hesitates entering it for a moment, her attention drawn to the hubbub of activity at the open end of the cul-de-sac.

  A glut of media trucks are parked there. Reporters, cameramen, and freelancers are agitating behind police barricades in numbers far surpassing worst-case scenarios. A mere foretaste of things to come.

  Trepidation is a live thing riding alongside him when they enter Manhattan. With less than forty blocks between them and his Fifth Avenue apartment, it’s a little late to be formulating a plan for telling the others—as if there existed a plan that could make that any easier.

  Laurel’s dread manifests in the form of fussing with her hair, smoothing a black linen dress that looks slept in and probably was, and chewing on her bottom lip until it begins to look bruised and swollen. She seems unaware he’s watching and says nothing until they cross 59th Street and she realizes no one instructed the driver to let her off at The Plaza.

  “You’re coming with me,” Nate says, suddenly full of a second wind that’s brought with it the beginnings of a plan.

  “But—”

  “It belatedly occurs to me that Jakeway’s still on the loose. He could be following us, for all we know. And if he isn’t, it wouldn’t be that hard for him to determine where Colin Elliot is staying. You saw the media presence in Glen Abbey and there were paparazzi at the nursing home, just as you feared. The Plaza’s undoubtedly staked out and would be even if your wedding and your father’s death were the only stories they were chasing. With this new development . . . I hate to think . . . I hate to think of the press crumbing a trail—no, providing a beacon that leads to—”

  “What are you getting at? Make your point,” Laurel snaps.

  “You’re all going to stay with me. You, Colin, your brothers and sister, Bemus, Tom Jensen, are all gonna hole up at my place where no one will expect you to be and security’s infinitely better than at a hotel.”

  “Good luck convincing Colin to agree.”

  “If you agree, he’ll agree.”

  “I don’t know.”

  “We’ll find out shortly,” Nate says as the driver negotiates the long cross-town block over to Fifth.

  — FIVE —

  Midafternoon, August 15, 1987

  Nate asks for Boris Godunov when he connects with The Plaza from his kitchen phone, gambling that Colin still uses that pseudonym at checkin. The gamble pays off; Colin picks up and focus shifts to keeping him on the line once he knows who he’s talking to.

  “I repeat, whatever you do, do not hang up!” Nate says.

  “Bleedin’ relax, will you? Nobody’s ringing off. Actually, I was gonna get in touch with you in a bit and you’ve saved me the bother. I wanted us to get sorted about the invasion of hot-air balloons that disrupted my—”

  “We can go into that another time.”

  “No, I think I’ve waited long enough to say what’s—”

  “What’s done is done, for God’s sake! Let it go. Shut up and listen, will you? It’s imperative you hear what I have to say! I’m just back from Jersey where—”

  “Yeh, yeh, I know. Where you were sent to collect Mr. Chandler’s belongings from the nursing home. They did tell me that m
uch.”

  “Can you listen for a minute? There’s been trouble! Bad trouble. David . . . David Sebastian’s been killed. It happened in the garage of the Chandler house. It was the Jakeway creep we were worried—”

  “The fuck you say! Don’t give me that rubbish!”

  “Colin . . . I’m sorry, but it’s true. Laurel was able to identify—”

  “Laurel! Where is she? Is she all right?”

  “Laurel escaped. She’s here with me. She was badly shaken, but she got away without serious injury.”

  “Escaped? Injury? She was attacked? What in bloody hell are we talking about? Never mind, I’m coming there. You’re at home, right? Tell her I’ll be there straightaway I find Bemus—fucking hell, where has he gone to, then?”

  “Shit,” Nate says after Colin hangs up. “I forgot to tell him to bring Amanda.”

  “But he is coming?” Laurel says from across the room.

  “Yeah, but he doesn’t know he’ll be staying. I’m leaving that part to you.”

  Nate punches redial, again asks for Boris Godunov and this time there’s no answer. That doesn’t automatically mean Amanda is with Colin—or even that Colin is in transit—but he can’t prove or disprove it because there’s no one else to call. Laurel, when asked, has no idea what names her brothers and sister registered under and he can’t begin to guess, so he’ll have to hope for the best.

  He joins Laurel at the breakfast table where she’s taken her usual seat. “No one answers so they must be on the way,” he says, contemplating a wait that may be more trying than the wait for a ride into the city. “Can I get you something? Can you eat something?” he adds, recalling the last time she was here and the way she dealt with stress on that occasion.

  “No, thank you.” She refuses even the water he offers. After a long awkward silence, she ventures to say that the wedding was lovely. “Everything was perfect. Even the weather. And the media was kept at bay, major thanks to you for your fantastic idea. Colin tried to call you about that yesterday morning. He thought you came over with Amanda and was giving the Dorchester switchboard hell until I convinced him you were in the States.”