The Harbinger Collection: Hard-boiled Mysteries Not for the Faint of Heart (A McCray Crime Collection)

by Carolyn McCray

  “You know the drill, Yvent. If you are so innocent, then give me alibis for the murders.”

  “Why don’t we read him his rights?” Glick said. “And take this into interrogation?”

  None too happy about being interrupted, Kent allowed Ruben to Mirandize Yvent. His only comfort was that, if they had Yvent here, he couldn’t be killing Nicole somewhere else.

  * * *

  That loud clunk sounded again overhead. The trapdoor opened, flooding the cellar with sunlight. Nicole gripped Megan to her, whispering into her ear. “Just five minutes.”

  A hand reached out and grabbed Megan by the hair and pulled her forward, up a stepladder.

  “No!” Nicole shouted, jerking Megan back. The young woman was freed, but only after the killer had a chunk of her hair. Megan screamed, but Nicole shoved her to the far side of the cellar, out of Wallflower’s reach.

  “Take me,” Nicole said, stepping forward into the warm sunlight. “You know it’s me you want.”

  There was a moment when the killer paused—cocked his head, then beckoned her up the stairs. Five minutes, Nicole reminded herself. She just needed to be brave for five minutes.

  Where the hell was Kent? Couldn’t he just smell the fear and find her? Usually he was so in synch with the killer that he was two steps ahead of him. But, in the profiler’s defense, Wallflower had gone completely off book here. None of it made any sense.

  The killer waved for her to hurry.

  Five minutes, Nicole reminded herself as she stepped onto the first rung of the stairs. Her foot slipped and the killer reached out and caught her, sparing her a nasty fall.

  So their profile was right about one thing. He was a gentleman. Up until the moment he killed you.

  * * *

  Ruben watched Kent pace back and forth behind Yvent as Joshua rushed into the room. The tech seemed winded.

  “It’s confirmed. The list of pollens matches Yvent’s exactly.”

  “Of course it does!” Yvent exclaimed. “It isn’t much of a setup if you miss a few.”

  Ruben wasn’t feeling it, and he worried if Kent wasn’t just too close to see it, too. Yvent was twitchy and worried. Serial killers, when questioned, were usually calm, cool, distant and disdainful. As if they were above the questioning.

  “Alibi?” Kent pressed though.

  “You know I live alone,” Yvent sighed. “I don’t have one for any of the murders.”

  “Besides,” Yvent said. “Do I honestly seem like I could seduce five women into my car? I can’t even get a date to the orchid ball, and I am a superstar in that field.”

  The kid was right. He was too young and too inexperienced. As crazy as it seemed, Ruben believed the fact that Yvent was being set up. But how?

  Kent wouldn’t let it go, though. “Get tired of tracking down the killers? Decide to find out what it felt like to squeeze the life from someone?”

  “No!” Yvent argued. “No. Like I said, I couldn’t have pulled off the kidnappings.”

  “I notice how you don’t protest too much over the killings,” Kent said. “I notice how you don’t say you couldn’t have shot someone.”

  “Because we all know that I could do that,” Yvent said, then hurried on. “Not to an innocent, but we’ve all been trained to kill. We all know that I have the skill set to do that.”

  “Again, not helping your case, exactly,” Kent said.

  Ruben wasn’t so sure why Kent was beating this drum so hard. If it was clear to Ruben that Yvent wasn’t the killer, then why was the vaunted profiler so far behind the curve?

  * * *

  Kent watched Yvent practically pee himself. The kid was not the killer, damn it. But Kent was certain that the killer was one of their own. Kent was certain that he had attracted quite the crowd on the other side of the one-way glass. The killer might even be out there. And the longer the killer thought that Kent was focused on Yvent, the better for the investigation.

  Although to Ruben it looked like Kent had gone mad. Like Kent couldn’t see that Yvent was flashing every “I’m really innocent” micro-expression in the book? Seriously.

  No, instead, Kent was letting his brain percolate. Who could have set up Yvent? And why Yvent? The kid was a pretty easy mark. Like he’d said. He was single, so establishing an alibi would be difficult.

  So who? Joshua came to mind, but he had some pretty tight alibis, one of them being stabbed at about the time the last victim was taken. Plus, he didn’t have the social graces to pull this off, either. Someone else in the lab? Someone who could have tampered with the swabs?

  Joshua burst into the interrogation room again.

  “You’ve got to see this!” he announced.

  “What?” Ruben answered.

  Joshua put his iPad on the table and hit play. “There aren’t any orchid spores in the nasal swabs!”

  Kent frowned. “What do you mean?”

  “I mean, there isn’t a spec of orchids in the victims’ nasal passages!”

  “But,” Ruben stammered, “The expert listed them all.”

  “I know!” Joshua exclaimed. “Kind of suspicious, right?”

  “How did you figure this out?” Kent asked.

  “You know how you are always telling me to expand my skill set?” Joshua asked. To be honest, no, Kent didn’t remember telling the odd tech anything like that at all, but that wasn’t the point.

  “Yes?”

  “So I thought, I can become a pollen expert. I got on the internet,” Joshua said. “I started looking through the extra swabs I had and couldn’t find a single orchid grain.”

  A shock like a lightning bolt coursed through Kent. This was the break they were looking for. This was the error the killer had made.

  * * *

  Joshua had never felt so proud. His irrational jealousy had once again come through. If he hadn’t been trying to prove he was as good as Mr. Fancy University Pants, he never would have found this clue.

  “It’s not just that,” Joshua said. “There are like a dozen other pollens that aren’t categorized by the ‘expert.’”

  “Such as?” Kent asked.

  “Huckleberry, for one,” Joshua said. “You don’t find much of that in the city.”

  “Let’s go,” Kent said, heading for the door.

  “Wait,” Ruben said. “What are we saying?”

  “That either the doctor or one of his staff is Wallflower,” Kent said, like it was so obvious. He turned to Joshua. “Can you get us a more exact location based on the mixes of pollen?”

  Joshua was both thrilled and terrified that Kent has asked that question. He wasn’t exactly an expert on pollen yet. But he had to try. It was Nicole, after all. “I’ll give it a shot.”

  Kent turned to Ruben. “You coming?”

  “Where?” Ruben asked.

  “The university. Let’s go check in on this professor.”

  * * *

  Nicole had to lurch a bit to miss a pile of sheep poo. She seriously hadn’t thought that would ever be a concern in her life. Raising her hand to shield her eyes from the bright sunlight, Nicole surveyed her surroundings. For as far as the eye could see, there was rolling pasture. Waves and waves of tall green grass. The landscape was dotted with sheep and baby lambs. There seemed to be a blooming orchard to the south and long rows of berries to the north.

  All and all, if she weren’t following a serial killer to an ominous-looking barn, the scene would have been idyllic. There was something vaguely familiar about the figure ahead of her.

  Something strangely kind about him. After saving her from the fall, he’d helped her up the stairs, and even now hadn’t tied her hands. She had to keep reminding herself that the guy had drugged her and injected fly eggs into her belly. She hated to say it, but if he was her neighbor, she’d probably be one of those people that said, “But he was always so nice.”

  He’d just assumed that she would follow him. Of course, what else could she do? He knew that she knew that he was a goo
d shot with a rifle. There were no other houses within running distance. Nicole would rather not get shot in the back, thank you very much.

  Although taking her chances in the sketchy-looking barn didn’t sound so fun, either.

  Wallflower strode forward though, opening the squeaky barn door.

  “After you,” he said.

  Even now, he was the consummate gentleman.

  Did she recognize his voice, though?

  “Dr. Rodden?” Nicole asked.

  Wallflower turned, taking off his sunglasses and hat. “Nice to see you again.”

  Nicole didn’t know what else to say but, “Why?”

  “You looked right at me while you were playing tennis. I thought for sure you’d recognized me.”

  “No,” Nicole said. “You were hidden in shadow.”

  A wide smile crossed Rodden’s face. “Oh well, a happy accident, then.”

  Peering around the doctor into the barn, where all manner of creepy farm tools hung from the rafters, Nicole wasn’t so sure that’s how she would describe it.

  CHAPTER 19

  Ruben gripped the wheel, speeding as he’d never sped before. Not even Kent was egging him on. He had to shove it all down. The fear for Nicole. His mistrust and hatred of Kent. None of that mattered. Just getting Nikki home safe did.

  If anything, Ruben had to buy into the Kent mythology and pray that the profiler had something up his sleeve that Ruben just couldn’t comprehend. That Kent really did have magical powers.

  “You met him,” Kent stated. “And you didn’t notice he was a psychopath?”

  Ruben’s jaw ground together. Wasn’t Kent enough of an über-deductionist to know that Ruben had played that exchange with the doctor over and over again in his head, trying to figure out what he missed?

  “Nicole didn’t either,” Ruben growled.

  “Ah, blame the victim?” Kent snapped.

  “We’re not all you,” Ruben said. Actually, he was usually quite glad that most people weren’t like Kent. Today, though, he was wishing he could have picked up that glint in the pollen doctor’s eyes even if it cost him his sanity as it had Kent.

  “Nothing threw any red flags?” Kent pressed.

  “Isn’t that the point of a sociopath?” Ruben shot back. “That you can’t tell? They’ve masked their behavior so carefully that they blend in.”

  “He’s not a sociopath,” Kent replied. “I believe that he’s a psychopath who has manners. There’s a difference.”

  Ruben was pretty sure that he was white-knuckling the steering wheel so tightly he was cutting off the circulation to his fingers. “You also said this guy was breaking all the rules. So I’m not even sure that you could have picked him out.”

  Although, odds were, Kent would have. He would have smelled it on him.

  Ruben skidded the car into the university’s parking lot.

  They both hopped out of the car and raced into the botany building.

  Kent streaked ahead of him, jerking open the glass door, then hauling ass down the hallway. He only stopped when he reached the door of Dr. Rodden, head of the forensic botany lab.

  By the time Ruben caught up with him, Kent had intercepted several students. “Where is Dr. Rodden?”

  The students shrugged. The younger woman answered. “He didn’t come in today.”

  “Is that unusual?” Kent asked.

  “He’s usually here seven days a week,” she answered.

  Ruben searched for Rodden’s desk. “Look at this,” he said, pointing to a bundle of nasal swabs on the professor’s desk.

  “Yeah, he told us not to touch those.”

  “The seals haven’t even been broken,” Ruben noted. “He never even looked at them.”

  “Why bother when you knew exactly what you’d find?” Kent commented. He turned to the students. “Where does Dr. Rodden live?”

  They both shrugged. Yes, this was the generation that was going to save them. Right.

  Kent bolted for the door and was headed back to the car. He called Joshua. “Anything?” Clearly Joshua had answered him in the affirmative, as Kent climbed in the car. “Head east of the city.”

  Ruben broke some kind of speed record following Kent’s odd instructions. They were heading out into the middle of nowhere. At least they were doing so quickly.

  “It’s the next right and it’s onto a dirt road,” Kent said, abruptly changing the conversation as he usually did. “So you might want to lay off the gas.”

  However, Ruben didn’t. Kent wasn’t the only one with some hidden skills. Ruben took the corner at full speed, only taking his foot off of the pedal as he spun the wheel to the right and slammed the parking brake on. The SUV skidded in a ninety-degree turn. He kicked at the brake, releasing it as he straightened the wheel, then hit the gas as they streaked down the dirt road.

  “Or you could do that,” Kent muttered.

  After hitting enough potholes in the road to dislodge a stubborn kidney stone, they arrived at the farmhouse. It looked so quaint. Ruben hadn’t even stopped the car completely before Kent jumped out and headed for the front door.

  “The warrant isn’t signed yet!” Ruben yelled, to no avail. Kent turned and, like a firefighter, kicked backwards to break open the door. Well, now that was done, there was no reason Ruben shouldn’t follow.

  “Nicole!” Kent shouted as he checked the house room by room. “Nic!”

  After clearing the ground and second floor, Ruben and Kent met at the basement door. Ruben set up on the right side and nodded, aiming his gun at the impending opening.

  Kent jerked open the door, racing down the steep steps, not waiting at all for Ruben to get set up. The profiler could be running headlong into a trap, heedless of the danger to himself, Ruben, or even Nicole.

  But all they found was a dank, onion-filled cellar. No sign of the women.

  “There was a barn,” Kent said, and took off up the stairs again. Ruben didn’t even bother warning him that they still didn’t have a warrant.

  They raced across the grassy field to the large red barn. It wasn’t locked, so Kent just opened the door. Wool was found in large rolls off to the side, and the upper loft was filled with hay.

  “Nicole!” Kent yelled, then started kicking the dirt. “There’s got to be a hidden door…”

  Ruben added in the search, but no door was to be found.

  Kent kicked a wooden post. “They’ve got to be here.”

  Flipping open his phone, Ruben called Joshua. “There’s nothing here.”

  “Ask him if any other properties met the pollen profile.”

  Ruben repeated the question to Joshua, then came back with the answer. “No, not really, but I’ll double-check. The weather service uses an averaging program, so I’ll have to drill down into their data to find discrete points.

  “Then drill away,” Ruben said as Kent sat down on his heels, hanging his head.

  “This is my fault,” the profiler lamented.

  No, this was not acceptable. “Bullshit,” Ruben said, grabbing Kent by the jacket and hauling him to his feet. “You can indulge in self-pity and recrimination after you find Nicole.”

  * * *

  Kent stared at Ruben. But what the detective didn’t know was that Kent had felt his mojo slipping. It had taken a pollen profile to geographically locate the perp. Kent had totally and completely missed the rural connection in the profile.

  His arrogance fed his abilities. Without it, what was he but a rather overly posturing FBI agent? Kent was shaken to the core, feeling that sense of purpose and rightness slip away from him.

  At the moment he needed it most.

  “Walk it off,” Ruben said, giving Kent a good shove to the barn door. “Our backup and warrant should be here any minute.”

  Like either of those things was going to do them any good. Nicole wasn’t here, and he didn’t know where else to look. However, Ruben was right—walking, getting moving, was probably the best thing at the moment.


  And it was an absolutely beautiful day. Nicole would appreciate it—if she was going to die, it should be a on a fine spring morning.

  The baaing of sheep and the bleat of lambs drew his attention. They were all crowded around a gate in the fence. Kent walked amongst them, petting one on the head, then another. They all seemed intent on the fence, though. The lead sheep—which was almost an oxymoron—was nudging the gate with his nose.

  Kent looked around at the sheep surrounding him. They wanted to go home. Which meant this farm wasn’t their home.

  He waved to Ruben. “I’m following the sheep!”

  The detective waved him off, turning to talk rather urgently into his phone.

  That sense of peace that came with walking the right path swept over Kent. The sheep were his guides. He unhooked the gate and the sheep charged through it.

  The sun was setting. Would this be the time that the sheep would be fed? Or did they just want their own barn?

  Kent’s mind wandered through this intriguing development. Why would the sheep be on that farm? And the wool?

  He opened his phone. “Joshua, find out about sheep farming.”

  “I am sorry,” Joshua said. “Did I hear you correctly? Did you say sheep farming?”

  “Yes,” Kent answered, following the herd. “I know it sounds weird, but humor me.”

  “No,” Joshua said. “It is weird because I identified sheep spores in half the victims’ nasal passages.”

  Even more sure of himself, Kent waved his arms, trying to get the sheep to move faster. Some had stopped to eat some dandelions, while an ewe paused to nurse her lamb. While heartwarming, it was slowing down their journey. He really needed to know where these sheep lived.

  Joshua rang back. “Hey, just like dogs and cats track in pollen from outside, those sheep could have carried huckleberry pollen with them.”

  “Yeah,” Kent said. “Way ahead of you. Where is the nearest farm?”

  “That would be a half a mile to the southwest,” Joshua answered.

  “Send me the location,” Kent said, pulling ahead of the herd. His phone dinged and Kent processed the address through his GPS. Using his phone rather than the sheep, Kent headed over a ridge to find a house and barn nearly identical to the last property.