by Mason Cross
Even so, I might not have made the connection if Sarah and I hadn’t had the conversation in the kitchen. If she hadn’t wanted to come with me, perhaps I wouldn’t have had to think so much about my concerns about why Carol had gone on the run.
But so what if the car was the same as the one I had seen earlier? So the owner of the car lived in a house around here. No reason to be suspicious. I glanced at the car as my headlights lit it up from behind. Force of habit, I read the license plate and filed it away just in case. There was someone in the driver’s seat.
If this was the Jeep I had seen earlier, the driver must have been waiting for more than an hour. And if he lived in one of the homes on this street, or was visiting, why was he parked at the curb beside a stretch of fence, rather than directly outside one of the houses?
It wasn’t much, but it was enough to ring an alarm bell.
I looked straight ahead as I passed the black Jeep, not giving any indication that I had even seen it. I turned the corner at the intersection and turned onto the main route back to the parkway. I drove a couple hundred yards and pulled to a stop beneath the ink-black shade of a cypress tree.
I opened the glove box and took out my Beretta 92 pistol. I started walking back the way I had come on the wide sidewalk, telling myself this was probably nothing. But it’s always better to be safe than sorry. When I got to the first corner I saw that the black Jeep was in the same position, but it was too far away to tell if anybody was still in the driver’s seat.
I took my phone out and called up a map of my current location. There wasn’t a quick alternative route to the house. I decided just to go back the way I had come, on the opposite side of the road from the car. It could still be a coincidence, I reminded myself. Maybe he was waiting for somebody. Maybe he had pulled over for a nap. Maybe lots of things.
As I got closer, I still couldn’t see anyone in the seat. A couple of seconds later, I was close enough to confirm there was no one behind the wheel. I crossed the road on the diagonal. The Jeep had Nevada plates. Spotless interior. No crumpled magazines, no baby seats, no fast-food garbage. The driver was a neat freak, or it was a rental. Again, that didn’t necessarily mean anything. Nor did the fact the driver, who had apparently been waiting there the whole time I was in Sarah Blackwell’s house, had then left the car right after I had driven by.
I quickened my pace. I heard footsteps approaching and saw an elongated shadow stretch out from the corner in the streetlights. A tall, skinny man in knee-length shorts and a white t-shirt appeared, holding a bunched-up lead in his hands. There was a patter of paws on the sidewalk and a golden retriever appeared in his wake. We nodded to each other and I rounded the corner. As soon as he was out of sight, I broke into a jog, starting to wonder if I had been too slow in coming back.
Sarah’s house was in darkness. There was no outward sign of anything wrong. I glanced at the neighboring house. It was also in darkness, no sign of life. I made my way up to the door. I stopped and listened. At first there was nothing.
And then a sharp thump broke the silence, as though something heavy had been dropped.
A second later I heard a scream. It was Sarah.
The door was locked. I took a step back and picked up one of the big terracotta pots by the door. It was even heavier than it looked, which was good. I braced my feet and hurled the pot through the glass of the door. It shattered, and the pot smashed onto the tiled floor of the hall, breaking into big pieces.
I reached in, twisted the lock and shouldered the door open. I flattened my back against the doorframe for a second, then risked a glance upstairs. I could hear movement from the second level. I ducked inside and ran for the stairs, keeping my gun aimed up at the landing. The nearest door to the top of the stairs was open; the light was off but there was enough light from the windows to see the outline. And then a shape blotted out the light. Two shapes.
“Stop right there.”
Sarah was there, and she wasn’t alone. A man the size of a gorilla was in the doorway, his fingers clamped around her throat and bracing her against the doorframe. She was gagging. Her toes were raised an inch or so above the ground.
I aimed the gun at his head. “Let her go. Now.”
The big man seemed to consider for a second, then moved like sheet lightning. He swung his arm around. Sarah stumbled forward and he used the momentum to throw her at me. I got my gun out of the way and caught her awkwardly with my left hand as her impact sent us both backwards down the stairs. I dropped the gun and flailed out, my hand finding the guardrail and gripping on as I took both our weights. As Sarah recovered her balance and sat down on the stairs, I heard a window open somewhere. Our eyes met. She was holding her throat but managed a thumbs-up with her other hand.
“Go,” she said, her voice like an eighty-year-old smoker’s.
I grabbed my gun and stumbled back up the stairs and into the bedroom the man had vanished into. The window was wide open, the curtains swaying a little in the night breeze. I looked out and saw the man scaling the fence at the back of the yard. From my vantage point, I could see how he could simply jump a couple of fences to come out on the street where the black Jeep was parked. It would be a much quicker trip across the yards. I turned around, launched myself over the windowsill, and dropped to the ground, rolling on impact. I raced to the fence and vaulted it, landing in the next yard, my eyes on the opposite fence. He wasn’t there, which meant either he was a lot quicker than he looked, or ...
Stupid. As I turned my head toward the shadows at the side of the fence, I felt a fist like a sack of cement slam into me. As I staggered back, he kicked me square in the stomach. I doubled over and went down. I brought a hand up to protect my face, but he had already dismissed me. As I struggled to my feet, I saw the big man clamber over the next fence, the flimsy wood barely supporting his weight. I pulled myself to my feet and started to run, my speed cut in half by the fact I was still winded. I knew I was on to a loser. I tried to calculate how much of a head start he had as I reached the fence, feeling as though I was moving in slow motion. As if in answer, I heard the sound of an engine start up, the motor revving, wheels spinning as he took off in a hurry.
With difficulty, I climbed back over into Sarah’s yard and went around the front. She was waiting at the door I had smashed through a couple of minutes before, one hand braced on the doorframe, the other massaging her throat.
“Is he gone?” Sarah was breathing hard; her voice sounded less throaty now, but like she was only just keeping hysteria at bay. Small wonder.
“I’m afraid so,” I said. “Who the hell was he?”
Sarah turned around so her back was to the doorframe and slid down until she was sitting on the threshold. She drew her knees up to her chest and put her arms around them.
“I don’t know,” she said. “But he asked about somebody named Dominic Freel.”
17
By the time she had directed Blake to the fuse box so he could get the power back on, Sarah guessed her heartbeat had decreased to only double its normal rate or so.
He seemed to be satisfied that the intruder was long gone, but he kept the gun in his hand while they went through the house, checking each room. Sarah found herself being as thorough as she had been when searching the house next door. She realized with a shudder that it would be a long time before she would come home and not have to do this: checking the closets, under the stairs, the basement, under all the beds.
After she called the police, she told Blake about what she had found before she had been interrupted by the noise of the door opening. Blake agreed with her, that it was too much to be a coincidence. They now had an idea of what Quarter by June meant.
While they waited for Las Vegas’s finest, Blake did some investigation of his own. He worked out that the man had gotten in through the back door. The lock appeared fine to her, but he said it had been picked. He took a flashlight into the yard and found footprints in the loose gravel beside the fence bordering o
n number 32. Had the big man been there in the yard the whole time they were in the house?
It took Blake less than five minutes to come up with those details, but it was more police work than the cops who showed up almost an hour later did the whole time they were there. There were two of them, both male: an overweight old white cop and a slim, young black cop: Officers Derrick and Miller. They took a statement in the kitchen while Blake leaned against one of the kitchen counters, arms folded, speaking only when addressed. They weren’t too interested in Blake once they had established he was just a friend who had happened by at the right time. Officer Derrick raised an eyebrow at the male friend dropping by in the middle of the night, but didn’t comment on it. Blake seemed to subtly alter himself when the police arrived. He became ... not invisible, exactly, but certainly inconsequential. They asked for his details when they ascertained he wasn’t a member of the household, and he had reeled off the name Pete Milligan and a California address like it was the unremarkable truth.
Sarah smiled at “Pete.” Inwardly, she was screaming, Are you kidding? She wanted to excuse herself, go upstairs, and lock herself in the bedroom until she had a chance to work out exactly what the hell was going on. Now her mysterious visitor, who was friends with her mysterious neighbor with the fake name, suddenly had a fake name himself. What the hell had she gotten herself into?
The officers turned their attention back to her. She told them everything she could remember about the break-in, which turned out to be more than she would have liked. Every second of the encounter seemed as fresh as though it had just happened. She left out the fact they had searched Carol’s house, of course, but she knew that had been the reason the man had taken an interest in her.
“Do you think the individual knew you were at home?” Derrick said.
Sarah sighed. They hadn’t been listening to a word she had said. She suspected Derrick had a well-worn list of questions to ask in the event of a home invasion, and he didn’t like to deviate.
“That’s why he broke in,” she reminded him. “He wasn’t trying to rob me, he wanted to know where my neighbor was, remember?”
They lingered a little longer, going through the motions of asking a few more questions before handing her a form they said she would need for her insurance claim. As they bid her goodnight, Sarah realized that she was actually grateful for the irritation she felt toward the two of them. It had taken her mind off the man who had entered her house, the way his muscular frame had filled the doorway of her study. Pissed off was better than afraid any day of the week.
She closed what was left of her front door, thinking she would have to call somebody about that, and went back through the kitchen. Blake was in the same position he had been all through the interview, leaning against the counter.
“I’m coming with you,” she said, without preamble. “To Arizona.”
Blake looked as though he had been expecting this. It wasn’t as though he could continue to argue she was safer here after all. “Fair enough.”
She was mildly surprised. She had been expecting him to put up more of a fight; suggest she go stay with a relative perhaps.
“Okay,” she said, mentally shelving the rest of the planned argument and taking a second to figure out which part of the conversation they had skipped to. “First thing in the morning, then?”
“First thing in the morning.”
“What was that about with the cops?” she asked, suddenly remembering the name he had given them. “Pete Milligan?”
Blake shrugged. “A bad habit, I guess. No reason.”
“The bad habit seems to be catching.”
18
Night traffic was light. Gage avoided the parkway, and was glad he had made that choice when he heard the siren heading west. On the way back to his hotel, he stopped in a deserted mall parking lot to remove the fake license plate. He didn’t know whether anyone had gotten a look at it, but it was wise to take precautions.
He wondered who the man in the blue Ford had been. The man who had so inconveniently come to the rescue of Dominic Freel’s curious neighbor. Still, he was almost certain she had known nothing useful. If she had, she would have started talking before her friend came back. More annoying was the knowledge he wouldn’t get a chance to search Freel’s house now. Too bad, but he already had another promising lead with Logan McKinney down in Phoenix. There was nothing else for him in Summerlin.
After he had changed the plate, he satisfied a hunch by taking out the picture of Freel at the party with the two women. He was right: the dark-haired woman on the right of Freel was the neighbor. He assumed the other one was the wife she had mentioned.
Looking at the carefree smile on her face in the picture made Gage think about the terrified expression he had personally put on her face tonight. He didn’t revel in it, but interrogating her had been worth a try, to make sure she didn’t know where Freel had gone. He wondered why she and the man were so interested in her neighbor’s house, before putting it out of his mind.
He used the public access computer in the hotel’s lobby to book a ticket on the first flight to Phoenix in the morning, leaving at seven-fifteen. He took out the pictures of his target. The two images the men in the bar had given him. If McKinney knew where Freel was, then Gage too would know very soon indeed.
He went back to his room, relieved to find the warring couple next door were silent. Either they were asleep, or they had done everyone a favor and killed each other. He lay back on the too-small bed, switched the light out and closed his eyes.
19
WEDNESDAY, 00:32
I made more coffee while Sarah looked up and called a twenty-four-hour glass repair company. A guy in dark blue coveralls appeared within an hour and quickly repaired the damage I had done to the door. The glass was replaced and the lock was secure, but we already knew the man who had broken in would not be dissuaded by locks. I talked Sarah into getting some sleep, because we had a long drive in the morning.
I knew I ought to take my own advice, but instead I spent a while leafing through Carol’s notebook. It wasn’t a journal or a diary, so there were no dates. In the first third of the book was a page with doodles and words. A few of them looked familiar: Samaritan, Crozier, Carter Blake. There was a question mark next to that last name. It wasn’t the name she knew me as. It told me exactly when she had written on this page. I wondered if she had thought about contacting me when she saw my picture on the news during the Samaritan case back in 2015. Or when the Winterlong scandal blew up in the media the following January. I wondered if she had joined the dots to the killing of her boss, and my part in it all.
I looked back at the sketch of the old building from the mining town. After Sarah had gone to bed I had looked online for information on the place. There wasn’t much to be had. Corinth had been abandoned decades ago, and it wasn’t pretty enough or historically significant enough to be on the tourist trail. Something told me that the town’s anonymity was important. I didn’t think we would find her there. It was unlikely Carol and Freel would be camped out in the middle of nowhere with no running water, but I thought this would put us in the right area. On the face of it, they had no reason to drive hundreds of miles to visit an unremarkable ghost town in the desert. Nobody had any reason to go there. But that’s what made it interesting enough to stick out. I didn’t hold out much hope that we would find Carol in Corinth itself, but there was something there.
And then there was Quarter, a few hours farther south.
I opened the notebook again to one of the pages Sarah had highlighted: the one with all the different signatures.
The script was cursive, careful. I pictured Carol whiling away an hour in a coffee shop or a highway rest stop thinking about her different lives over the years since New York. The first name on the page was Carol Langford, the name I knew. The last was Rebecca Smith. In between were eight other names. Where had she been in that time? Did she ever think about when she was Carol Langford? Did she e
ver think about me?
I closed the notebook and put it down on the coffee table. I gave the ground floor of the house and the backyard another inspection and then walked out front, looking up and down the road and listening. Whoever the man in the black Jeep was, he was long gone.
Sarah had told me the spare bedroom was made up, but I elected to stay downstairs, just in case. I took a sheet and a pillow from upstairs and brought them down to the couch in the living room. I took my shoes off and unstrapped my shoulder holster and tucked my gun under the pillow, then I lay down. It was a comfortable couch. I had slept in beds that were far less comfortable. A short time later, I was asleep.
I awoke just after seven, with the rays of the sun streaming through the windows. I could smell coffee brewing. I stood up, put the gun back in the holster and walked through to the kitchen in my socks. Sarah Blackwell was either a naturally early riser, or she hadn’t gotten much sleep. She had changed into jeans and a white t-shirt and brown leather sandals. She was standing at the island in the middle of the kitchen beating eggs in a mixing bowl.
“Scrambled eggs?”
I told her that sounded good. She motioned for me to sit down at the table. There was a big pile of paper stacked neatly. Printouts. I leafed through: they were front pages from the Las Vegas Tribune, all with dates around the time Carol had disappeared, as well as what looked like the property pages from the local newspaper in Quarter.
I leafed through some of them idly. Nothing jumped out. A moment later, Sarah joined me with two heaped plates of eggs, half a dozen slices of whole wheat toast, a big pot of coffee and a jug of orange juice with ice cubes floating in it. I guessed she was enjoying having somebody else to cook for other than herself. I ignored the juice and poured coffee for both of us.
“The guy from the Iron City news site got back to me,” she said, after swallowing the first forkful.