Krewe of Hunters Series, Volume 5

by Heather Graham

  “Grammy, Gramps!” they called.

  The kids pushed past Nathan Oliver and Joe Brighton to reach the congressman and his wife.

  Kendra scooped up the smaller one and Congressman Walker picked up the older girl, whirling her around. Ginger ran in after the girls.

  “I’m sorry!” Ginger said, breathless. “They got past me. They wanted to see you right away.”

  “It’s fine, Ginger,” Walker said. “My daughter brings the kids over and takes a shopping day now and then,” he told Matt and Meg. “I love to see them!”

  “These people were just leaving,” Kendra said abruptly.

  The child in her arms was staring at Meg. She had curly hair and huge blue eyes and was as cute as a child could be. She gave Meg a huge smile and reached out a hand. Meg reached back and the little girl squeezed her finger.

  “Pretty!” she said.

  Meg couldn’t help flushing. “Thank you. And you’re very pretty, too.”

  “Ellery, will you see the agents out?” Kendra asked, a bit impatiently.

  “Can you can play with us? Please!” the toddler in Kendra’s arms begged.

  “Oh, now, Brittany, you know grown-ups have to work. And the agents are working now,” Kendra said.

  “I’d love to stay, play,” Meg told the child, “but your grandma’s right. I do have to work.”

  “This way, please,” Ellery said.

  When they got to the door, Ellery offered them both cards. “I think the world of Lara. If you need anything else, don’t hesitate to call.”

  Matt handed him a business card in return.

  Meg didn’t have any yet.

  “We appreciate that,” Matt said. “Now let me ask you this. Lara didn’t say anything to you that she didn’t say to Congressman Walker, did she?”

  Ellery opened his mouth. For a moment, Meg was certain he was going to say something revealing, something unexpected, but he was looking toward the office.

  She swung around; the door was just closing.

  “She wasn’t happy that the congressman wanted to compromise on the health bill and not remain true to his campaign promises. She really was…disillusioned. That happens around here. But you can’t win. If you stick to your guns, you create a stalemate, nothing gets done and people are angry. If you compromise, then the idealists are angry. It’s not easy,” Ellery said.

  “No, I understand that. Did she say anything to you about home, or going anywhere, at any time?” Matt asked.

  Ellery turned to Meg then. “Agent Murray, are you the Meg Murray who’s Lara’s good friend?”

  Lara had evidently talked about her. It seemed pointless to lie.

  But she didn’t have to answer, because Matt did.

  “Yes, Agent Murray and Lara were good friends,” he said.

  Ellery Manheim smiled awkwardly. “Then you know that she loved Richmond, where she was born, and the place she officially called home. But she talked to me about the past, and said she loved hanging around in Harpers Ferry with you and your grandfather the most. Lara said you and she loved to play at the national park, and that you crawled up to the heights and hung around when the ghost tours were going on. You reenacted John Brown’s raid and you actually had a job with the parks department for a while, right?”

  Meg knew how to keep a straight face. But she still hadn’t managed to control her coloring and felt a flush rise to her face, along with the urge to cry.

  Yes. Lara had talked about her to this man.

  “That night she told us she’d had it with politics. She was going home,” Ellery said. “Ian tried to convince her to stay. I did, too. But she kept insisting that she was going home. When she left, Ian and Joe and Nathan and I kept up the conversation. Then, after she’d been gone ten or fifteen minutes, Ian suddenly stood up and said, ‘Lord, it’s almost three in the morning!’”

  “What about Lara?” Meg asked. “So no one went looking for her, to make sure she got home okay?”

  “Honestly, I figured she was fine, that she’d managed to hail a cab or, with the adrenaline she had going, she might even have walked to her place. You know where she lives, right?”

  “Of course,” Meg said.

  “And we’ve been there already,” Matt added.

  “You found nothing?” Ellery Manheim asked.

  Matt Bosworth smiled. “We didn’t find Lara,” he said. “Thanks for your help. And I’m sure we’ll be talking again soon.”

  He headed out to the car. Meg followed.

  She was tall, and walked with long strides, but she had to hurry to keep up.

  Matt was silent as they got into the car.

  “Walker does seem to be a real family man,” Meg said. “When she went to work for him, she thought she’d finally met a decent politician, a man who meant to do good things.”

  “What’s the impression you got of him?” Matt asked, backing out of their parking spot and then moving forward onto the street.

  “His wife is as loyal as they come, the grandkids obviously adore him. I also think he cared about Lara. He was certainly ready and anxious to see us,” Meg said.

  “Yes. But he could’ve seen us at his office. Seeing us at his home seemed…staged,” Matt argued. “I’ll admit the kids were a nice touch.” He sounded a little—just a little—sardonic.

  “You—you think Ian Walker could have…could have killed Meg?”

  “I don’t know yet. One thing I sure as hell do think is that man’s hiding something. What it is, we have yet to discover.”

  * * *

  Lara had screamed. She’d shouted until she had no voice.

  She’d explored her world of darkness. Dirt, stone, strange metal blades. She was in a space of about ten feet by fifteen, with a giant stone in the middle.

  She didn’t dare think about the creepy crawly things in this small dark space.

  She’d found one plastic gallon jug filled with liquid. Despite her thirst, she hadn’t tried the liquid at first. It had to be a trick. She was supposed to drink and find out that it was lighter fluid or drain cleaner or something equally toxic.

  Then her thirst had become overwhelming, and she’d known she’d rather die fast, even in agony, than suffer that torture any longer.

  She’d still had the sense to drop a little of the liquid on her fingers. She’d smelled it, felt it—and then she’d tasted it. She’d meant to go slow; she couldn’t. She had drunk too quickly and then gagged and nearly vomited, except that her stomach was empty and she’d retched with nothing but the water coming out.

  It was water, just water. She learned to take one tiny sip at a time.

  No one came. The hours dragged on.

  She heard nothing; she saw no one. All she could do was huddle in the cold.

  She was naked and in the dark. She had to stay alive; she had to hope and pray and not give in to desperation. She’d been dumped here to die.

  Why not just kill her?

  Because maybe her body wasn’t supposed to show up yet.

  That thought almost made her laugh. Why were they worried about her dead body when no one seemed to know where her living body was?

  She thought she heard singing. She listened and wondered again if she was dead, if the first stages of death contained all the pain and fear of life. She seemed to be hearing something like a very old hymn, one that might’ve been sung for centuries, although she couldn’t recognize any words.

  She tried screaming again. Screaming and screaming…begging for help. Until she was hoarse again and no sound came.

  She allowed herself a moment’s humor. Were the angels singing for her?

  Was she in a vault, in some forgotten graveyard of a godforsaken town?

  No, the stone in the middle told her it wa
sn’t a vault. The regular shape of the place was, however, created by man.

  She thought she saw figures before her eyes and realized she was shaking.

  The cold night had seeped into this place. And yet she felt strangely warm.

  She was getting a fever.

  Think about Meg. Meg would come for her. She could’ve sworn that she’d thought so determinedly about her friend that she’d actually seen her face—that she’d actually begged her for help. Was that yesterday? She didn’t know. In this world without day or night, without time, she had no idea.

  Meg had seen her, too. Hadn’t she?

  But Meg saw the dead. Soon, she’d be among them.

  CHAPTER 4

  Back at Lara’s apartment, Meg went through her friend’s drawers and prowled the apartment, looking for anything that might indicate that Meg had been back. Her purse was gone; she hadn’t owned a car. Her work had been on Capitol Hill and she’d either walked, which she loved doing, or taken a taxi if she wasn’t with friends or business associates. She also used DC public transportation.

  Matt Bosworth waited patiently, studying the house.

  Meg could see that Lara had apparently made coffee and cleaned the pot the morning before she’d left. Her breakfast was usually fruit and cereal; there was a banana peel in her small compost bin, and a single cereal bowl in the dish drainer. Lara never used her dishwasher unless she had a party. She considered it a waste of energy.

  In the bedroom Meg was going through the closet again when Matt Bosworth called out to her. “She kept a journal? A written journal?”

  “Yes,” Meg called back.

  “Then maybe there’s something in her most recent journal,” he said.

  Yes, Lara’s journal! She should’ve thought of that first thing—before pawing through all her belongings.

  Agent Bosworth came into the bedroom, a book in his hand. It was a journal with handsome black binding and an imprinted Green Man tree. He had it open and was reading it.

  Meg suddenly realized that they were both delving into Lara’s life; she really had no more right to do that than he did.

  At least she was Lara’s friend.

  On the other hand, he’d been around for a while and this was business, this was his job. Delve, pry, do whatever was needed.

  He read aloud, “‘Sometimes I want to go back. Way back to the days of innocence when we truly believed. Follow the trail as Meg and I did when we were students. Richmond to Sharpsburg, on to Harpers Ferry where we were home, and Gettysburg, where we learned that ideals are everything, and that good men may fight for different causes.’”

  He looked over at Meg. “That was her last entry. Dated the day before she went missing.”

  “What did she write before that?”

  He handed her the book. She started to sit down on the foot of the bed—and then didn’t. A forensic team might come in and she wanted to compromise as little as possible.

  She stood up again and flipped through the entries.

  “She noted her meeting the other night, too,” she told Matt. “Right before the entry you read. She wrote it earlier that same day. ‘Stand by my convictions.’”

  “But since the other entry was after that,” Matt began, “she really might’ve gone somewhere. Maybe she was preparing to leave, in case things didn’t go the way she thought they should. Do you think she might’ve tried to follow that trail? I’m assuming you did make that journey at some point?”

  Meg nodded. “As you know, she was from Richmond, and I was from Harpers Ferry. I still have a home there, a lovely old place.” She looked up at him. “Stonewall Jackson never stayed there, but one of his physicians did. My grandfather owned it and his family before him. Lara’s aunt loved to come to Harpers Ferry during the summers. She was a river-tubing enthusiast. That’s where Lara and I became friends. Anyway, once we were eighteen, we’d head out every summer from Richmond, where we went to college together. We’d go back to my place—or rather, my grandfather’s. He left it to me when he died a few years later. Then we’d go to Sharpsburg and Gettysburg.”

  Matt looked interested enough that she was encouraged to continue. “Lara studied the Civil War. She could give you whole biographies of both Union and Southern commanders, and she was ardent about Lincoln. She believed that old politics really do influence new politics, that there’s a connection. And she was always frustrated with the way politics are now. For example, she used to tell me that when our Founding Fathers finished serving their terms, they went back to their original jobs. They weren’t supported forever. They were equal with the people they served. Lara knew that neither the senate nor the house would ever vote to give money back, but she still believed that there were people out there who wanted to serve rather than find a cushy career.”

  She realized she was telling him far more than necessary; she just needed him to understand what a principled person Lara was.

  She lowered her head. She knew she’d seen Lara in the mirror. Once again, she was convinced that Lara was dead. She had to be.

  “Sorry, I don’t mean to get carried away here. But yes, we both loved the trip. We went to museums, reenactments, churches, graveyards—all over. Oh, in Colonial Williamsburg, she was crazy about the old taverns. Thought they were so much fun. We loved to go up to the Harpers Ferry cemetery up on the high hill. Sometimes we just enjoyed the view of the Shenandoah and the valley below, and sometimes we made up stories about the names we could read on the graves.” Meg stopped speaking.

  “I’m not sure we’ll be able to find her, even if we attempt the journey,” he said. “For now, though, I think we’ve discovered everything we can here. I should go back and check in at the office. I’ll get you to your car first,” he told her. “We’ll call to let you know what’s next.”

  “I’m going to take this and read through it,” Meg said, indicating the journal.

  “Good plan,” he said simply. When he turned and headed out, she followed him, locking up. When they returned to Adam’s house, she wasn’t sure what she was supposed to do. She started for her car.

  “Where are you going?” he asked.

  “Quantico,” she said. “I have to be out of cadets’ quarters by the end of the week.”

  “We can help you move. You need to come back and report to Adam first. I’ll go see what Jackson and the Krewe have uncovered, but you need to see Adam.”

  When they arrived at the office, she walked in ahead of him, afraid Adam would announce that they hadn’t found a thing to suggest that anything had happened to Lara Mayhew.

  But she was wrong; Adam had them both come in.

  “Do we have anything? Anything that’ll justify spending taxpayers’ money?” he asked immediately.

  “Lara isn’t at her apartment,” Meg answered. “And I don’t believe she’s gone anywhere. The suitcase she always uses is there and none of her clothing seems to be gone.” She waited, still and stoic, for Matt to speak.

  To her surprise, he proved to be an effective advocate. “There’s something odd going on. What it is, I don’t know. Today Walker attempted to show us what a wonderful family man and good all-around guy he is. I’m not saying he isn’t, but he admitted to an argument over the way to pursue a bill he’d been working on with Congressman Hubbard. Apparently, Walker’s determination to stand strong died along with his friend.”

  Adam nodded. “What else do you have?”

  “What do we know about the death of Garth Hubbard?” Matt asked.

  Adam looked slightly taken aback. “We know there were questions. There always are. But from what I’ve read, it was all aboveboard. He did have a heart condition. His own physician was there and unsuccessfully tried resuscitation. There was an investigation, and nothing was found other than that he had a heart attack.” Adam paused, then said, �
��Still, something about it bothers me.”

  Matt went on to describe their visit; he discussed each of the men who worked for the congressman, Ian Walker, Kendra Walker, the children and everything that had happened, everything that had been said. His memory and his ability to relay details were impressive.

  “In your view, is there any chance that Walker is somehow involved with Lara’s disappearance—and Congressman Hubbard’s death?” Adam asked, frowning.

  “I don’t know what he might be involved in. But I agree with you—something isn’t quite right,” Matt said. “And it all bears investigating. If we could find Lara—or discover just what happened after she left the congressman’s office—I think we’d learn something.”

  “What about the murdered women?” Adam asked.

  “Not sure. At this point they don’t appear to be connected. That is, unless we find…” He paused, glancing at Meg. “Unless we find Lara Mayhew.”

  Ripped to pieces and floating in the river, Meg thought.

  Adam turned to her. “We’ll be in touch, tell you what direction we plan to go in, Meg. Go home now and try to get some sleep. Matt, would you see her out?”

  “Adam, thanks, but I don’t need to be seen out. Agent Bosworth, have a good evening.” She nodded politely. Then she walked out, determined to leave under her own steam.

  An official sticker had been placed on her car. She left it where it was.

  For a moment, she thought Matt had followed her out, after all. She looked over her shoulder; he hadn’t.

  She got into her car and started home, then decided to buy some groceries before arriving at Quantico. Normally, she would’ve gone to a store on the base, but it would be faster to stop before she got there. All she wanted was to be at home, by herself.

  There was a gas station on the way, which carried coffee and cereal and milk. Maybe not the freshest in the city, but it would do.

  Meg parked her car, locking it.

  Lara’s journal was in the car and she didn’t want anything stolen while she was inside—especially that.