The Madness Below: An Alastair Stone Urban Fantasy Novel (Alastair Stone Chronicles Book 20)

by R. L. King

  “Damn right it isn’t,” Dez added with more vehemence. “Neil, this could have happened to anybody.”

  “But it didn’t. It happened to me.” He clenched his fists over the pages. “You know, I halfway wished they’d killed me too, that night while they were out killing people.”

  “You don’t mean that.”

  “I do mean that.” He lowered his voice and met Dez’s eyes. “I—I should have paid more attention. I should have noticed something was wrong.”

  Stone was watching Warby’s aura. At his last sentence it flared red, perhaps as if he’d intended to say something else but changed his mind.

  The officer shook her head. “It’s all right.”

  “It’s not all right. It’s punishment, that’s what I think. God is punishing me. There’s got to have been something—some sign—that I should have noticed. I see those kids every day. I know them—or at least I thought I did.” He let out a shaky breath and shook his head. “Why did they kill all those people, but not me?”

  Dez was about to reply, but Stone held up a hand. “Mr. Warby—please. I’m so sorry—I don’t want to intrude on you for too long. If we could get back to my questions, we’ll clear out of here and leave you alone.”

  He sighed and lowered his head. “Go ahead, then.”

  Stone considered his words carefully. In Warby’s current state, he probably wouldn’t get too many coherent answers out of him. “Was your group together the whole weekend?”

  “Together?” He looked up. “Yeah, of course they were. We wouldn’t have let a bunch of kids go wandering off on their own.” For the first time, his voice showed a faint edge of annoyance.

  “From what I’ve heard, one of the students did go off on her own, to the convenience store, on Saturday night.”

  Warby bowed his head again. “Oh. Yeah, you’re right. Jazmin. She—she has—had—an older boyfriend. She might have sneaked off to meet him.” He sighed. “She had some issues with following the rules. Always has.”

  “Is it possible any of the others might have gone with her?”

  “Why would she take anyone else with her, if she wanted to hook up with her boyfriend?”

  It was a good question. “The convenience store was only a mile or so from the campground?”

  “Yeah. Just down the road.”

  Stone nodded. “Tell me about the hike, please, Mr. Warby. How far did you go?”

  “I don’t know exactly. Couple of miles up, I guess. Took us a couple of hours to get up there. We didn’t go fast. Could have done it in less than an hour if we had, but we didn’t. Just kind of…strolled. You know—enjoying being out in the forest. It’s pretty up there, even after the leaves are gone.”

  Stone looked at Dez again. Warby was rambling, but for now he decided to let him do it. “Did you stop at all?”

  “Yeah. We got to a clearing and everybody sat down to rest. Some of the kids brought junk food with them, so they were all sitting around eating chips and candy bars.”

  “And they didn’t go off on their own then?”

  “No—well, except a couple of them had to…uh…use the facilities. Joe Buchanan had to do ‘number two,’ so he was gone a little longer. Not too long, though. Maybe fifteen minutes—twenty tops.”

  “And of course no one went with him.”

  Warby’s gaze came up, sharper. “To take a crap?” He gave a bitter chuckle. “Muriel tried to get him to take a buddy with him, but you can imagine how well that went over. Joe’s about six-three and plays football.”

  “No, I suppose that wouldn’t have worked. So then you returned to your campsite, yes?”

  “That afternoon, yeah. We took it slow going back down, too. Got back around four.”

  “And nothing seemed unusual there? Nothing moved around, out of place?”

  “Not a thing. This time of year, not many people use the campgrounds. Too cold, and the tourists want to see the leaves. We left the food and stuff in the cabins so it didn’t tempt the wildlife.”

  “Fair enough. So you all went to sleep in your cabins on Saturday night. The boys were in with you, and the girls with Mrs. Burford, correct?”

  “Yeah. Leaving teenagers unsupervised, especially in a mixed group, is a bad idea. The girls’ cabin was strictly off limits to the boys, and vice versa. We made sure of that.”

  Stone considered. While it was possible Joe Buchanan could have discovered something during his fifteen-minute bathroom jaunt, it didn’t seem likely—especially since nobody else had accompanied him. Same with Jazmin—from the convenience store owner’s account, she was doing exactly what everyone thought she was: waiting for her boyfriend to show up, and getting annoyed when he didn’t.

  He frowned, replaying Warby’s words in his mind, trying to think of a time when the students could have sneaked out en masse. Unless Warby and Burford were extremely heavy sleepers, it didn’t seem possible that seven students could have left the two cabins without waking them.

  But there were three cabins.

  Warby’s aura flare from earlier, when he’d started to say something else and then changed his mind, came back to Stone. “Mr. Warby…I hate to say this, but I’m getting the impression you’re holding something back from us.”

  “I’m not holding anything back,” he said quickly. “I’ve told you everything I told the police. You know that, Dez. You saw the reports on our interviews, right?”

  “Yeah,” she said. She tilted her head at Stone. “What are you talking about?”

  Stone was sure he was right now. As soon as he finished his question, Warby’s aura had flared again, even brighter than before. He was definitely hiding something, and Stone had a suspicion of what it might be. The only question was, how could he get the man to admit it if it was true?

  “Were you and Mrs. Burford in your respective cabins all night?” he asked, keeping his tone neutral.

  “Why wouldn’t we be?” Again the quick answer, and again the aura flare. Now, red flashes danced around it, and even his physical body showed tension.

  “Neil?” Dez leaned forward. She’d noticed it too.

  Stone took a deep breath. This was going to be an uncomfortable question, and there was no sugarcoating it. “Mr. Warby…”

  “Yeah?” Warby was back to staring down at the yearbook, but none of his tension had subsided.

  “I’m terribly sorry to ask you this, since I know it’s got to be difficult for you, but I’ve got to ask. It’s very important.”

  He looked up, suspicious. “What?”

  “Were you and Mrs. Burford perhaps…seeing each other?”

  The bright red corona around Warby’s aura confirmed a direct hit.

  He didn’t look at Stone, but his shoulders slumped. “Having an affair, you mean?” He snorted a humorless laugh. “You can call it what it is. Yeah. Yeah, we were. How did you figure it out?”

  Dez was regarding both Warby and Stone with shock. “Neil…?”

  “I was an idiot. I know that now. I don’t even know why I did it. But yeah, we were. Not for long—only the last couple of months. And I’ve regretted it every day since…since Sunday night.” He dragged his gaze back to Stone. “How did you know?”

  “There were three cabins at the campsite. You and the students were only using two of them. I thought it might be possible that you and Mrs. Burford might have…made use of the third one while the students were sleeping.”

  If there was any shred of fight left in Warby, Stone’s words took it out of him. “Congratulations, Mr. Stone. You figured out what the police didn’t. It never came out that we were…seeing each other…during the initial questioning, and I didn’t volunteer it. I don’t think Muriel did either. I know she didn’t. But yeah, you’re exactly right. We sneaked over to Cabin Three for a while on Saturday night. Only for a couple of hours, though. And those kids were fast asleep. We checked before we left.”

  Dez sighed. “Neil, come on. You know as well as I do how good kids are at fakin
g sleep.”

  “Were they still there when you returned?” Stone asked. “Did you check?”

  “Of course we checked.” Warby seemed to be getting a bit of his energy back now. “Both of us did. All seven of them were there, still fast asleep, when we got back.”

  “And what time was that?”

  He shrugged. “Damned if I know. Late, though. Had to be three-thirty, four a.m. Look, I’m sure they didn’t get out. Kids that age sleep like logs, and we tired ’em out on that hike. And anyway, even if they had sneaked out, what would it matter? Do you think they went off in the woods and made some kind of…murder pact?” His voice caught on the words murder pact, and his gaze rose again to meet Stone’s. “You don’t get it, Mr. Stone, whoever the hell you are. These were good kids. I’ve known most of them for years. I’ve known their parents for years. They had their little problems, sure, but they were normal teenager problems. Absolutely nothing I’ve ever seen them do would have led anybody to think they’d do…” His voice hitched in his throat. “this.”

  He clenched his fists and slammed them down on the desk so hard the yearbook jumped. “I should have seen something!” he yelled. “I should have spotted something… some sign…” He examined his hands, and when he spoke again, his voice trembled with unshed tears. “It’s all going to come out now, isn’t it? Everyone will have to know.”

  “I don’t know,” Dez said softly. “It’s not my call. You’re not a suspect, and this isn’t an official interrogation. But if it comes out that you told me and I didn’t reveal it…”

  “Yeah. Yeah. This is all my fault. I’m being punished. Might as well make it official, I guess…”

  “Neil—” Dez began.

  Warby jammed his still-clenched fists into his face. His whole body shook. “Just…go,” he muttered. “I don’t have anything else to say. Do what you have to do, or don’t, but just…get out and leave me in peace.”

  Stone rose. “Thank you, Mr. Warby. I’m sorry to have disturbed you. If it makes you feel any better, your story might help us sort all of this out. We’ll go now.”

  He waved Dez toward the door as a knock sounded from the other side. “Are you all right in there?” Lisa Warby called. “Neil?”

  Dez opened the door to reveal Warby’s wife, holding a tray containing three glasses of iced tea.

  For a moment the two of them only looked at each other, and then Mrs. Warby caught a glimpse of her husband, who had slumped over the yearbook on his desk. “You said you weren’t going to upset him,” she said, frowning.

  “We’re very sorry, Mrs. Warby,” Stone murmured. “We were just leaving.”

  “Yeah. You’d better.” She set the tray aside and shepherded them back down the hall toward the front door, obviously annoyed at both of them but saving the worst of her ire for Dez. “Don’t come back here unless it’s official business, Dez. I mean it. He’s a mess, and this just made things worse. I’m trying to get him to go for counseling, but he refuses.”

  “We won’t come back. I’m sorry. I’ll keep both of you in my prayers.”

  Lisa Warby’s only response was to close the door on them. It wasn’t quite a slam, but by the customs of this genteel, grief-stricken little New England town, it might as well have been.

  Outside, Dez held her questions until they were back in the Jeep. “That was amazing,” she said. “Sad, but amazing. How did you figure it out?”

  “I watched his aura while he talked. It was a bloody mess. I expected that to some extent, of course, but he’s a dreadful liar. I’m surprised he got through the police questioning without spilling the whole story.”

  “He’s probably trying to protect Muriel,” she said soberly. She lowered her voice even though they were alone and driving. “I don’t think either of their marriages are too solid. Muriel’s husband is a bit of a controlling bastard from what I’ve heard, and Neil’s wife has never been happy that they couldn’t have children. So…” She shrugged. “They’re both attractive—normally, at least—and not that old. These things happen.”

  “You sound like you approve.”

  “I don’t approve or disapprove. It’s none of my business what people do behind closed doors, and I don’t think it’s the town’s business, either. Especially if it doesn’t help. Do you think telling my superiors is going to help the police solve this mess?”

  “Honestly? No. Even if they find out the two lovebirds had nipped out for a quickie in Cabin Three, they still won’t figure out the rest of it. But I’m convinced that for us, this is the key. Those students left the cabins, I’m sure of it. They could have been gone for as long as two hours—longer, if Mr. Warby isn’t being truthful about how long he and Mrs. Burford were gone.”

  “But where did they go? How would we ever find out? They could have gone off in any direction, and there’s no way to track them in all those fallen leaves, even if the crime-scene guys and those tabloid idiots hadn’t already tramped around all over the place.”

  “That’s a damned good question. I’d still like to talk to at least one of the students if we can manage it.”

  “I don’t even know if they’d talk to you if you figured out how to do it. From all the reports I’ve heard, they haven’t had much to say. And they’ve all got lawyers—even the ones who don’t have any family left have public defenders.”

  “Yes, well, let me think about that for a while.”

  “You mentioned you had an idea.”

  “I do, but it won’t be easy to implement, and I’ll need some potentially risky help from you. Would you be willing to do that?”

  “Depends on what it is.”

  Stone could see she was still reluctant. “Let’s leave it for now. You said you could take me up to the campsite? It might be I can pick something up by examining the area magically. If that’s so, then I might not need to talk to them at all.”

  Her relief was evident. “I can absolutely take you up there. It’ll take most of the rest of the day, though, especially if you want to see the route they took on their hike. Let’s stop off at the house so I can pick up a few things, and we’ll get an early start. We can grab something for lunch from the drive-thru on the way, so nobody sees us together.” She eyed his black wool overcoat. “And you should probably borrow one of Walt’s down coats. It’ll get chilly up there, especially if we stay after dark.”

  Stone shrugged. “Bring it along and we’ll see.”

  They arrived at her house and she pulled the Jeep into the driveway. “You can wait here if you like—if you don’t want anything, I’ll just run in and grab what we need.”

  “That’s fine.”

  Stone settled back in his seat and closed his eyes. He was still convinced there was a dimensional rift up near the campground somewhere, but whether he’d be able to find it was another matter entirely. He hoped if it was there, it was pumping out some heavy-duty magical energy, either near the campsite or at the location where the students had stopped to rest on their hike. Otherwise, it was unlikely he’d get anywhere without spending days wandering around in the forest. That wasn’t something he wanted to do.

  He was startled out of his thoughts by a sharp knock on his window. He jerked and opened his eyes.

  Dez Griffith stood next to his door, looking upset. Her aura looked upset too, and she wasn’t carrying a coat or anything else.

  “What’s going on?” He quickly shoved the door open, looking around for potential threats, but didn’t see any. “Are you all right?”

  “Yeah, I’m fine. But I think you need to come inside.”

  “Why? Has something happened?”

  “I think somebody’s been inside the house. I’d left my laptop on the table last night after we talked, and I was going to put it away. And now it’s gone.”

  7

  Stone followed Dez back to her house. “Are you certain? Was there any sign of entry? Broken window, cracked door—”

  “Nothing like that. And yeah, I’m certain. I looke
d around, thinking I might have put it back and forgotten about it, but it’s gone.”

  “Your husband and sons couldn’t have returned early to surprise you?”

  “No—I talked to them last night. They’re still in Boston, planning to go to a Bruins game tonight.”

  “And you haven’t got a burglar alarm?”

  She snorted as she opened the door and strode inside. “Dr. Stone, I don’t think you understand what it’s like normally here in Treadley. This is one of those towns you hear about, where people leave their doors unlocked. Before last Sunday, our crime reports looked like something out of the Fifties. The only reason I bother locking my doors at all is because I’m a cop and I keep my gun in my house.”

  “Is your gun missing too? Is anything else?” Stone shifted to magical sight, following her through the kitchen to the family room where they’d chatted the previous night.

  “The gun’s locked up in the safe upstairs, and it’s still there. Far as I can tell on a quick glance around, nothing else is missing. Just the laptop.” Her eyes widened. “Do you think somebody could have heard me tell you I kept a copy of the video? Maybe last night at the Busy Bee? Are you certain that spell of yours worked?”

  Stone didn’t answer, but a growing feeling of dread crawled up the back of his neck. The “cone of silence” spell, as Dez had called it, worked great against mundanes—but not as well against the magically talented. “Let me take a look at the entry points—both doors and windows.”

  “Damn,” she said with a frustrated sigh. “It had to have been while we were talking to Neil—and we were gone less than an hour. That suggests whoever it was, they were watching the house, waiting for us to leave.”

  Stone agreed with her, but didn’t say so. When he shifted to magical sight and took a look around the house’s lower floor, it didn’t take him long to find where the intruder had gotten in. He crouched in front of the back door leading out of the kitchen, studying the faint magical traces hanging around it. Somebody had used magic to pop this lock. It was an easy spell, one any apprentice could manage, especially on a simple lock like this one.