The Fury hp-4

by Jason Pinter

  Downing, there was a piece of metal near her body. I'm positive it was steel wool. Which means the intruders knew where Helen was. And between the silencer and the offroad tires, they didn't want anyone to know they were there."

  Fear grew in Amanda's eyes. "That means the same people who killed Stephen probably killed Beth."

  "And are still after Helen," I said. "Not only that, but they're actually taking precautions during the murders.

  According to Makhoulian, no shell casings or bullets were found at Gaines's apartment. Whoever killed him took them to prevent analysis, but left the gun itself.

  Somehow I don't see my father on his hands and knees picking up spent shell casings, or digging a bullet out of the wall. And why would they leave the gun?"

  "Someone out there has the answer," Amanda said.

  "We need to find Helen Gaines," I said. "She has to know what's going on. And something has to be fright ening her enough to stay away from the cops."

  "If someone doesn't want to be found," Amanda said, "they won't be found."

  "Not necessarily. If you have the resources, anyone can be found. The trick isn't going from point A to point Z. There are stops in between. Each one will lead you closer. We need to find the next step, even if it only takes us a little bit closer."

  "So who knew Helen Gaines besides Stephen and

  Beth?" Amanda said. "And who knew Stephen besides

  Rose Keller?"

  "The question isn't necessarily who knew Helen and

  Stephen," I said, "but who else knew Rose and Beth?

  Beth-Ann Downing had a daughter. Sheryl Downing, who now goes by the name Sheryl Harrison. She's thirty-five, and according to the Indian Lake officer who spoke to Sheryl, she and Beth hadn't spoken in nearly ten years, ever since Sheryl moved to California.

  For there to be that kind of estrangement, something had to have driven mother and daughter apart."

  "But it could be anything," Amanda said dubiously.

  "Maybe Beth disapproved of her daughter's husband.

  Maybe Sheryl didn't like her mom's cooking."

  "Or maybe there was something else," I said. "It took a lot more than burned meat loaf to make me want to leave a burning trail of rubber when I left Bend."

  "So how do you plan to get in touch with Sheryl?"

  "She lives in Sherman Oaks. We have her name.

  She's on her way to New York, but will likely still be checking her messages. Give me one minute."

  I went to my laptop and booted it. Opening Internet

  Explorer, I went to 411. com. I plugged in Sherman

  Oaks as the city, then entered the name Sheryl Harrison.

  The page loaded for a few seconds, and then three names popped up, along with their phone numbers.

  "Let's hope this works."

  I called each of the three numbers. The first Sheryl

  Harrison picked up. I told her I had a question about her mother, Beth. She said her mother had died years ago.

  I thanked her and hung up. Neither of the next two were home. One of them might have been the right one. I had no idea if they were, or which one. But I left them both the same message:

  "Hi, Sheryl, my name is Henry Parker. I'm so sorry for your loss. I have a question about your mother. I don't mean to pry, and I know this is a difficult time for you, but I wouldn't be contacting you if this wasn't of the utmost importance. If you can, please call me back at the following number."

  I left my number on both machines, and thanked them again for their time. One Sheryl would call me back. I had to believe that. And to believe that, all I had to do was wait.

  After a quick slice of pizza, I threw off my clothes and stepped into the shower. I immediately noticed there were no towels hanging on the racks. Either we'd used them all and they were in the laundry waiting to be shipped off, or Amanda had purposely taken them all out so I'd have to beg for one. I had a feeling it was the latter.

  For some reason she got a kick out of seeing me open the bathroom door just a crack, then squirt through the apartment naked looking for something to cover myself up with. She called this game "hide and peek," and I'd be lying if I said she was the only one who enjoyed it.

  For some reason, I was too scared to play it on her.

  The water felt wonderful, hot and nearly scalding. A long shower would do my body good, just to take my mind off everything. We had to start up again soon, but every brief respite was a moment to be savored.

  After that, I threw a pair of shorts on while I airdried, then went to the bed and passed out. Amanda was already asleep, surrounded by enough pillows to build a fort big enough for both of us. No reason to ask where all my towels were. Sleep came easily.

  It must have been several hours later when a shrill ring woke me up from the darkness. I blinked, noticed

  Amanda was no longer on the bed. I groped around for the phone, forgetting where I'd placed it. Then I heard

  Amanda from the living room.

  "Henry, your phone is ringing!"

  "Who is it?" I replied, picking crust from my eyes.

  "Check the caller ID."

  "I don't know, but it's an 818 area code."

  Eight-one-eight. That was a California area code.

  I leaped out of bed, toppling half a dozen pillows onto the floor. I was wearing nothing but a towel. Not like whoever was calling would notice. Then I bolted out of the bedroom-stark naked, the towel fluttering to the floor-and made a beeline for the phone.

  Amanda was standing there, holding it in one hand while trying to stifle a laugh with her other.

  "Sweet dreams?" she said, looking south.

  I scowled at her, crossed my legs, grabbed the phone, looked at the ID and pressed Send.

  "Hello?" I said, hoping I'd made it in time.

  "Is this…Mr. Parker?" It was a woman's voice I did not register in my memory.

  "Yes, who is this?"

  "Sheryl Harrison. I had a voice mail from a Henry

  Parker asking to call back at this number. Something about my mother."

  "Yes, Mrs. Harrison, thank you so much for calling me back. I was wondering if I could talk to you about your mother, Beth. Do you have a few minutes?"

  "I'm leaving the church right now. My mother's funeral is tomorrow. I have an hour before my appoint ment with the florist, that's all the time I can give you. If you can meet me on Twenty-seventh and Third, you'll have whatever time is remaining before my appoint ment."

  "I'm leaving right now," I said, looking around to see where I put my pants.

  "Just so we're clear, I know who you are, Mr. Parker.

  You're a reporter. To be honest, I really want nothing to do with you, and you're not going to get much more than a 'no comment.'"

  "This isn't for my job," I said. "It's personal. It's about my father. He's linked to this crime. You'll under stand when I see you."

  "Is that right. So none of this will end up in print."

  "Not a word."

  "In any event, everything that passes between us is officially off the record."

  "I understand," I said. "You have my word."

  "So if any word of our conversation ends up in print,

  I'll own your newspaper, your apartment and every pen and pencil you've ever held."

  "I swear on my life, this is personal."

  "We'll see." She hung up.

  I looked up to see Amanda standing there holding a pair of slacks and a clean blue shirt.

  "If you're not out this door in three minutes," she said, "I'm going down there to meet Sheryl Harrison in your place."

  16

  The good and bad thing about New York is that if you don't have time to sit stuck in traffic while your cab racks up forty cents every one-point-two blocks, you can pick from myriad transportation options. There are dozens of subway and bus lines that crisscross the city like a drunk doctor's stitching, and even if the Second

  Avenue subway remains a figment of the city's i
magi nation, there's always a way from point A to point B.

  Of course, even though there happens to be a large public transportation system, it was still as spotty ser vicewise as your average Wi-Fi connection. Which is why I stood sweating in a dank station for nearly half an hour before the 4 train rumbled to its stop. By the time I took a seat across from a heavily tattooed couple playing tonsil hockey like they were trying out for the

  Rangers, my nice blue shirt was soaked through with sweat and my pressed slacks looked like they'd been crumpled in a ball in a Russian steam bath for a week.

  Thankfully, the one place in New York that was airconditioned was the subway cars, so when I transferred to the 6 and got off at Twenty-eighth and Park, my clothes looked only mildly rumpled. I couldn't decide whether this appearance would make Sheryl Harrison more or less skeptical of my motives.

  Hustling over to Twenty-seventh and Third, I saw an attractive black woman standing on the corner. She was finishing the last of what appeared to be a sandwich or a wrap, and held a gigantic iced coffee in her other hand. The smart yet subdued suit she wore seemed to work for someone in mourning, yet keeping her ap pointment book up-to-date.

  Just as I approached, she strapped her purse to her shoulder and began to walk away.

  Sprinting across the street, I yelled, "Miss Harri son! Sheryl!"

  She turned to look at me, the expression on her face unchanging. Panting, I caught up to her, composed myself. "Mrs. Harrison, Henry Parker, so sorry, the subway, I-"

  "I'm on my way to the florist. I don't have time to stop and chat. You're welcome to walk with me, but as soon as we get there we're done."

  "I understand," I said, falling into step with her.

  It was a dry, sunny day, and pretty soon I wasn't even thinking about the trip down. Sheryl Harrison walked west down Twenty-seventh, and I followed.

  "I'm sorry for your loss," I said.

  "I doubt that," she said. "Though the police did tell me you found her. Is that right?"

  "That's right," I replied. Sheryl nodded, kept walking. She was tall, about five-ten, with an almost regal walk. Her hair looked professionally done, her makeup highlighting her natural features rather than

  trying to add some that weren't there. She took long, gallant strides, and though I wasn't a short guy I found myself expelling quite a bit of energy just to keep step.

  To my surprise, Sheryl did not ask a follow-up question. Not about the circumstances in which I found her mother, if she had any last words, nothing. If she was in mourning, she hid it. If she had any feelings for her mother, they were worn far below the sleeve.

  Without Sheryl prompting, I told her about Stephen

  Gaines, about my father's arrest for his murder. I also told her how Rose Keller had pointed me in the direc tion of the cabin at Blue Lake Mountain, and how I was working to prove my father's innocence. She listened without saying a word. I couldn't tell if she was merely aloof, distracted with everything that had gone on, or, more distressingly, not surprised at all.

  "Were you two close?" I asked. A rhetorical question, but what I hoped would be a baby step in finding out more about Beth-Ann Downing and her re lationship to Helen Gaines.

  "I hadn't spoken to my mother in almost ten years,"

  Sheryl said, her gaze straight ahead. She spoke as if I was asking her about her previous employment. And I noticed she used the past tense- hadn't. Most people, when discussing a recent death of a friend or family member, would slip up, say haven't as though the person was still alive. Somehow I got the feeling this was a day Sheryl Harrison was prepared for.

  "Did she ever try to reach out to you?" I asked. "Or mention friends, associates, anyone?"

  "Mr. Parker," Sheryl said, a hint of annoyance creeping into her voice. "I answered your question. My mother and I were not close. Not even before I left the city. Yes, she did try to reach out once or twice. I didn't return her phone calls."

  "Why not?"

  "Perhaps you're too young to have experienced this, but when someone hurts you so badly-I'm not talking about a faulty relationship or bad argument-I'm talking about hurts you in such a way that decimates you, your confidence, your life in such a way that the only chance you have to life is by cutting off a diseased limb, you don't care or make an effort to reconnect. If anything, you stay away from it."

  "What did your mother do to you?" I asked. This came out less incredulous than expected. If I didn't grow up with a father whose mission in life seemed to be to alienate his family, this kind of revelation from

  Sheryl might have taken me aback. Instead, I under stood, maybe even empathized with her.

  "What didn't she do." Sheryl sighed.

  "When you left," I asked, "was it one act that drove you away, or did the camel's back suddenly give out?"

  "A little of both," Sheryl said. We turned right on

  Madison, began to walk uptown, my legs growing sore with the exertion. I was in good shape, but Sheryl

  Harrison looked like she was ready to compete in the

  Olympics. "But if there was one thing that I could point to that destroyed my relationship with my mother," she continued, "it was the drugs."

  I stopped for a moment. Sheryl did not stop with me, so I had to jog back to keep pace.

  "Drugs?" I said, surprised. "What do you mean?"

  "Well, when I left it was still the crack," Sheryl said with the blank expression of a clinical diagnosis. "I'm sure there were a few other things mixed in there- meth, weed-but it was the crack that burned her humanity from the inside out."

  "She did this while she raised you," I said.

  "I don't think she was as heavily into it while I was a child, but by the time I got to high school it was like coming home to a woman who'd turned into a funhouse mirror."

  "Jesus," I said.

  "I don't think Jesus smoked crack," Sheryl said. For the first time, I heard a lightness in her voice, as though she was amusing herself. "And all those people who call you late at night to ask if God has a plan? I tell them

  God didn't have a damn thing for me. He gave me a treasure map to a pile of dog shit, and I had to clean up after it myself. Finally I got tired and moved on."

  "How long did your mother do drugs?" I asked. "Was it something she picked up?" I felt slightly off kilter with this line of questioning. Growing up, I'd experi enced many forms of addiction of personal evils, both in my family, my relationships and my friends. I'd lived through Jack O'Donnell's alcoholism. I'd seen first hand what external poisons could do to a person inter nally. One thing I'd never been exposed to on a personal level was a habitual drug user. Yet both of us had left family behind to free ourselves from their trappings.

  "Let's see…how long did my mother use? My whole life," Sheryl said. "You know you can pretty much make your own crack pipe using household materials. My dad died when I was a baby. One of my first memories was seeing all these pretty flowers my mother, Beth, used to keep around the house. Pretty flowers inside this metal tubing. One day I brought one to school, and I got a belt across the back because of it. Turns out those little roses you buy at any gas station are actually crack pipes in disguise. You just take off the foil and remove the rose, stuff about an inch of Brillo pad into the tubing.

  That's your filter. Take a rock and put it on the Brillo pad, then run a lighter over it, constantly rolling the tube between your fingers to make sure the rock burns easily. Some kids learn how to build sand castles, braid hair, make macaroni necklaces. I learned how to build a crack pipe."

  "Do you know if your mother was still smoking it when she died?"

  "I'd be shocked as hell if she wasn't," Sheryl said.

  "And I remember there were days when my mother forget to pay her electric bills, and rather than own up, she'd just go with Helen up to that cabin. Don't get me wrong, Henry, in some way I loved my mother. But I saw her death coming from miles away. It was only a matter of time before her life ended, and ended badly.

  B
ut one thing I do know, that lovely Ms. Helen Gaines?

  She was the biggest enabler my mother ever had."

  The words struck me like a punch. Helen Gaines? I knew Stephen had a habit, but Helen?

  "Don't look so surprised," Sheryl said. "Based on where they lived during that time, Alphabet City in the

  '80s? Would've been a surprise if they didn't end up addicts. I mean, I remember this WASPY-looking young punk always coming by the house to drop off whatever my mom had ordered. Remember his name too, Vinnie."

  "Vinnie?" I said, the surprise in my voice evident.

  Rose Keller had said that whenever she needed a new supply she would call some delivery system where they'd send over a guy named Vinnie. I had no idea how many Vinnies there were, but it was clear this system had been in place over a decade and was likely still in business today. This wasn't just some petty drug deal, but something much larger.

  "Take that British singer, Amy Winehouse," Sheryl said, "then multiply it by ten and that's how bad my mother was. So my guess is this. If my mother was killed while hiding out with Helen Gaines, I'd bet my husband's Infiniti it's got something to do with drugs.

  And Stephen Gaines must have crossed some damn un pleasant people."

  17

  Rose Keller was home. This didn't quite surprise me- most graphic designers worked freelance. So I figured she wasn't the kind of person who woke up to an alarm clock at six forty-five, got dressed and grabbed a tall latte on the way to the office. When I called at eight in the morning, it was no great shock that Rose Keller sounded like a bear awoken from hibernation.

  Actually, she kind of reminded me of what Amanda sounded like before her first cup of coffee.

  One thing I learned early on when talking to sources: get them early, or get them late. During the day, everyone was at work. There was always an excuse not to talk. I hate to say this, but often a source would agree to talk to you if only to prevent you from ever interrupting their private time again. Probably the only time I would compare my profession to that of the noble telemar keter.