by Kylie Brant
Sophie ignored his suggestion, coming to stand beside him. He knew better than to waste time arguing with her and instead spent the energy on the crowbar. It took a minute of determined prying to have the lid rising, and as it did he stepped aside, one sleeve raised to his face. It was little protection from the overwhelming stench of decay.
“Oh dear God.” Sophie’s voice behind him was horrified. His vision was impeded for a moment by the swarm of insects he’d disturbed.
But there was no mistaking the bloated unmoving body inside as being all too human.
* * * *
Franklin J. Paulsen III had enjoyed moderate success as a trial lawyer. With offices in West Des Moines and Ankeny he managed a combined staff of sixty. He had a home in the gated Des Moines neighborhood of Glen Oaks, a membership at its exclusive country club and a townhouse in Florida. Thrice divorced, he’d been wily enough to engineer pre-nups for each, so he’d extricated himself from wedded bliss with slippery ease.
Despite his many accomplishments, he hadn’t yet reached the professional heights of Marcella Rosen or Antonio Cavanaugh, two of his fiercest competitors. He lacked Marcella’s old money and Antonio’s over the top attention-getting behavior, both of which garnered a lot of business and press that otherwise might have come Franklin’s way. He’d long maintained that all it took was one high-profile case to cement his place in the upper echelon of Iowa’s legal community.
Mason Vance provided that case.
Whether the man was guilty or innocent was beside the point. If it went to trial—and Franklin would make sure it did—the national media attention would more than make up for the fact that he was working the case pro bono. This was the biggest crime story in Iowa’s history. There’d be interviews, magazine spreads and very possibly a TV documentary. All of which would elevate Franklin’s career to the lofty status he deserved.
That Vance was an alleged monster didn’t enter into the equation at all. Even monsters deserved their shot at justice.
He allowed himself to fantasize about the possibilities as he parked his car at Manor Oaks and walked up the pebbled hydrangea-flanked walk to the double front carved oak doors. Franklin came each evening promptly at six. Mother would be back from dinner and was usually alert for an hour or so before the bedtime routine would begin. By seven he’d be on his way to dinner at Lucca’s with a nubile young blonde attorney looking to switch firms. He didn’t necessarily have a place in his offices for another lawyer, but Franklin prided himself on keeping an open mind. And based on their previous date, the young attorney excelled at blowing his.
He signed in at the front desk just inside the door and read through the daily notes collected by the staff about Mother’s day. The bills for the place were astronomical, but the real guarantee of quality care was his daily personal visits. It was hard to cut corners with a family member checking in every day.
“I didn’t realize you’d be joining us this evening, since you sent your assistant to check on your mother,” the receptionist said chattily. She’d swung her chair from the front desk to the computer screen on an adjoining counter.
Franklin’s gaze flew to that of the plump middle-aged receptionist. “Pardon me?”
“Ms. Mason?” The older woman got up to lean over the desk and tap a business card that had been paper clipped to the top of the notes. The card he hadn’t even noticed since it bore his business logo. “She arrived about fifteen minutes ago. She’s with your mother now.”
Her words flowed over him as he stared hard at the name embossed on the business card. With his firm’s logo on it.
Vanecia Mason.
The woman lowered her voice, the pleasant smile on her pudgy face not altogether masking the note of censure in her voice. “We appreciate that you’re a busy man, Mr. Paulsen, but perhaps a phone call would be in order the next time you send one of your colleagues to our home. In the interest of security.”
Her words were lost behind him as he turned away and almost ran to Mother’s room. It had been carefully selected and a premium price paid for one not too close to the dining room racket, yet close enough to the social activities so as not to discourage Mother from joining in. He burst in the door of her room, chest heaving more from fear than exertion.
The space was large and private, boasting a set of triple windows that overlooked a serene courtyard. It was furnished with some carefully selected items from Mother’s home. Her prized rocker. The dresser that had belonged to her parents. A specially ordered queen-sized Sleep Number bed with elevate options.
A woman standing over Mother’s small form in the bed held a large pillow in her hands. As she raised it and leaned toward Mother’s head, a flare of pure panic jolted through Franklin.
“Get away from her! What are you doing?”
‘Vanecia Mason’ turned her head and shot him a smile over her shoulder. “Hey, Frankie. About time you showed up. Just thought your mother looked a little uncomfortable. I was going to add another pillow.”
Hurrying across the room he snatched it from her hand, sending a frantic look at the sleeping woman in the bed. Mother’s frail chest rose and fell with reassuring regularity.
“What are you doing here? Our deal was to meet in the parking lot. You are never to come inside. Ever. I was very clear about that.”
‘Vanecia Mason’ crossed her arms and looked amused. “Careful you don’t pee yourself, Frankie. Were you under the impression that you were the one making the rules here? That’s pretty stupid, even for a lawyer. I need to talk to Mason. Put a call through.”
Momentarily mollified that his mother was fine for the time being, Franklin put a finger to his necktie, loosened it a fraction. There was a fleeting instant in which he wondered if he’d gotten himself in too deep.
One had to be determinedly unobservant not to guess the identity of the woman he’d met with here a few times at the behest of his client. Her image had been splashed all over the news for weeks. Tall and big-boned, but lean, the way—he thought with a hint of fear—a hungry tigress would be. The sedate gray suit and pumps were at odds with the air of toughness, the hard eyes. The same hardness he saw every time he made the mistake of looking directly into his client’s.
“This…arrangement is going to have to change.” What was meant as an order came out in a stammer when that pale gray gaze landed on him. “I have my professional reputation to worry about.” But he knew he had much more than that to be concerned with. His law license hung in the balance if anyone suspected he had dealings with the Cornbelt Killer still at large.
Alleged killer, he reminded himself. The distinction didn’t allay his nerves.
When he felt his blood pressure rise at the thought of his exposure, he comforted himself with the fact that no one had recognized her at the desk of the rest home today. So how could he have been expected to make the identification?
His excitement over landing this client had blinded him to reality for too long. He could admit that now, when he was in too deep to extricate himself. Franklin had excellent sources at the Polk County jail and so knew for a fact that Mason Vance had interviewed both Marcella Rosen and Antonio Cavanaugh before settling on him. His good fortune had blinded him to some of the red flags raised in the time since he’d take Vance on as a client.
Like facilitating occasional phone calls from his ‘fiancee.’
“This will be the last time we’ll meet like this.” The bravado he’d summoned died a rapid death when she stared hard at him. “I’m not going to risk my license on this case. From now on, it’s by the book.”
The woman’s smile turned his blood to ice. “Sure. Mason will understand. In the meantime I hope you don’t mind me continuing to visit your mother. I think she really took a liking to me before her nap.” The threat was clear.
“Franklin?” His mother picked that moment to wake. “Who’s this woman? This isn’t one of the nurses. What’s she doing here?”
He stepped up to the bed, took his m
other’s hand and said soothingly, “She’s just leaving, Mother. Please excuse us.”
He grasped the younger woman’s elbow and escorted her out of Mother’s room as he pulled his cellphone from his pocket with his free hand. Polk County jail was on speed dial. Under Baxter’s smirk of amusement he requested an urgent call with his client and prepared to wait the several minutes it would take for them to bring Vance to the phone.
“I’m going to have a talk with security here and let them know you aren’t to be let in the door here again.”
“No, Frankie, you’re not.” The mean settled in her eyes turning them a flat steely gray. “And here’s why. Security cameras would show that you and I have had several conversations over the last couple weeks on the grounds here. Wouldn’t take anything at all to tip off the cops to take a look at them. After of course I have a friend slip in here and arrange a little accident for dear ol’ mom.” She gave a smile of mock sympathy. “Bones that age break so easily don’t they? Like dry kindling. It’d be a shame for her to shatter a hip or pelvis just because you’re being short-sighted.”
His bowels turned to ice. The specifics of the case against Mason Vance were all too familiar to him. And he was beginning to believe everything the news reports had said about this woman, as well.
With a flash of understanding he realized why Vance had summoned one after another of his colleagues to the jail. Not just to evaluate their legal expertise, as Franklin had assumed. But to allow this woman the opportunity to assess each for possible vulnerabilities.
And his mother was his.
When the familiar voice came on the line, he handed the cell wordlessly to the woman who was certainly Vickie Baxter. And while he walked back to his mother’s room, his mind frantically whirled with ideas to get out of this mess.
Nothing occurred. And Franklin couldn’t help but be reminded that all the people Vance and Baxter had set their sights on had ended up dead.
Chapter 2
Boone County Sheriff Beckett Maxwell declined to speak from the front of the DCI conference room, instead electing to stand beside his chair. “State fire marshal made the official call that the fire was a homicide. He says unless the victim figured out a way to bathe in accelerant and bind herself to the steering wheel, she had help. The autopsy isn’t scheduled for a couple days, but calls to Ellen Webster’s number have gone unanswered. When I contacted the DMPD I discovered her daughter had reported the woman missing last night.”
“Results of the department’s interview with the daughter and canvass of Webster’s friends and neighbors should be completed today,” Agent Jenna Turner volunteered as Beckett reseated himself in the chair next to her. The way he jostled the agent as he made himself comfortable didn’t escape Sophia’s eye. Nor did she miss Jenna’s irritation as she moved infinitesimally away.
Sophia hid a smile. She had a feeling that Cam had subjected Jenna to more than he knew when he’d paired the agent with Maxwell yesterday. The sheriff was attractive, amiable and likely all-too-used to female attention. Jenna’s lack thereof would be construed as a personal challenge.
“You working on dental records?” Cam asked.
Beckett nodded. “The daughter gave us Webster’s dentist’s contact information. It won’t take long to be certain.”
Sophia’s earlier flash of amusement faded as she thought of the unknown family member anxiously waiting for word of the test results. Families of the victims of the Cornbelt Killers had waited years for the last tenuous thread of hope to be snapped. Neither scenario would be easy.
Cam turned his attention to the group gathered in the room. “We got a hit on the latents on the corpse in the trunk at the Des Moines airport yesterday and an identification has already been made.”
Sophia listened to Cam from her seat in the swim of chairs. The group was smaller than it had been a few weeks ago when the task force was newly formed. With Mason Vance jailed, Sonny Baxter dead, Rhonda Klaussen, aka Vickie Baxter presumed fleeing the state, the DCI brass had lost no time reallocating resources. There were now only four agents assigned solely to the case, with others utilized on an as-needed basis.
As much as she wanted to believe more manpower wouldn’t be necessary, Sophia knew that Cam’s next words were going send that hope up in flames.
“Curtis Traer. Fifty years old. Has a sheet spreading over the last two decades, but only did time once—three years for aggravated assault.” A mug shot of the man found in the trunk was displayed on the overhead screen. “He’s been out for a couple years, although his probation officer indicates he’s had chronic unemployment issues. Currently living with his sister, who claims a woman came to the door looking for him last week and left a number for him to call. Three nights ago when the sister got home from work, Traer was nowhere to be found. We’ve got DCMD officers canvassing the neighborhood now. But the sister tentatively ID’d Vickie Baxter as the woman who came to her door. She denied ever seeing her before or hearing her brother speak of her.”
“Baxter’s got brass balls, that’s for sure,” Maxwell muttered.
Cam sent them a grim smile. “That’s becoming apparent. Last night Agent Turner and Dr. Channing also had an opportunity to speak with Courtney Van Wheton for a short time in her hospital room. From what Van Wheton said it was clear that Baxter was a participant in her initial torture, before being ordered away from the barn by Vance. Van Wheton was able to put to rest any remaining questions we might have had about the extent of Baxter’s involvement. We can now narrow our focus to what’s keeping the woman in the area. So I’ll turn this over to Dr. Channing.”
Sophia rose and joined Cam at the front of the room. The small group included Special Agent in Charge Maria Gonzalez and Major Crime Unit Assistant Director Miller, but not the agency director himself. Yet another indication that this case had been formally moved off the front burner. She imagined Cam would consider the lessened scrutiny a good thing, except when it came to resources.
She took a moment to retrieve her notes from her briefcase, hoping that her sleepless night didn’t show on her face as starkly as her mirror that morning had attested. When the call from the hospital early yesterday evening that Courtney Van Wheton was asking for her, Cam had elected to stay with the crime scene team at the parking lot and dispatched Sophia and Jenna for the initial interview. He’d believed, and Sophia had concurred, that the former victim would be more comfortable initially talking about her ordeal to females.
The interview had been necessarily brief, the disclosures harrowing. But it had been long enough to unlock the door to memories of Sophia’s time as Vance’s prisoner. When it had proven impossible to sleep, she’d gotten up and worked on filling in details on the profile.
But even then sneaky terrifying reminders of her own ordeal had persisted. Her reaction to the memories seemed like cowardice. Sophia hadn’t suffered what Van Wheton had at Vance’s hands. Not even close. And yet…
Her fingers trembled slightly as she opened the profile she’d retrieved. “Courtney Van Wheton told us that she saw Vickie Baxter once, when she first awoke in the abandoned barn Vance was using to confine his victims. She said Baxter suggested torture techniques to use on her, and actively participated in the acts. When Baxter professed her desire to help Vance rape the woman, he ordered her away to deal with her ‘crazy ass kid’. The two had a short argument before Baxter stormed off, leaving Van Wheton alone in the barn with Vance.”
Alone. A mental image flashed across her mind. A vast cavernous space, its darkness splintered by fingers of daylight filtering through the cracks in the walls. She felt again the wash of despair she’d experienced while there and took a moment to fortify herself before continuing. “Lab results confirm that Baxter’s prints were found in the first cell inside the door where Vance had confined Van Wheton.” And so had countless others, given that there had been matches to latents from several of the identified victims.
The first stall had been occupied by Courtney.
Sophia had been secured in a cell at the other end of the barn, her vision obscured by the wooden slat sides and the stone wall behind her. She’d had no idea that she hadn’t been the only victim in that barn. Until it was too late.