by B. V. Lawson
The smell was almost enough to wish Drayco had a filter mask. Oil, burned plastic, smoky charbroiled wood, chemical foam. An aromatic stew of poisons. On the bright side, no one had died in the fires so far. No humans, nor stray dogs or cats. “Any motives?”
“We thought it was like New York, homeless men burning down warehouses to get the copper to sell. But why only the senator’s properties? A homeless man with a political ax to grind?”
“How many more warehouses does the senator own?”
“A dozen. Guess he bought in when the property values were low, hoping he’d cash in when developers swooped in. Hell, I’d bet a year’s salary he had inside knowledge. Or crafted legislation making it easier to develop in those areas.”
“Oh, what cynicism—and about a Super Politician, too. Defender of untruths, injustice, and the American power-play. You sure this one was arson?”
“The investigators found more gasoline accelerant.”
Drayco kicked a broken piece of glass with his shoe. “On a much more important note, how’s Tara?”
“Refuses to leave her studies. I did extract a promise not to go anywhere without a buddy, preferably a linebacker. FYI, when Tara told me she started feeling bad after drinking a beer, I insisted on a blood check. They found traces of Rohypnol in her system.”
Drayco wasn’t surprised, but it worried him, all the same. “Like Cailan and Shannon.”
“Roofies are also used as date-rape drugs, so there may not be a Cailan-Shannon link. Don’t like any of the possibilities.”
“You give her the ‘keep an eye on her drink at all times’ lecture?”
“Twice, for good measure. And to keep that cellphone handy.”
Behind the barrier tape, orange cones marked sites of interest found by arson investigators sorting through the debris. A few tarps covered possible clues. Drayco said, “Sorry to call you so early. Thought you might sneak a look in the database before Onweller arrived.”
“Thank God Onweller’s morning routine includes stopping by Panera for cinnamon-nut bear claws. I got in and out without him seeing me.”
Sarg pulled out his notebook. “The info from Reed was a bombshell. The ViCAP run on the cases in Beantown and Philly showed the local PDs didn’t report anything about synesthesia or musical codes. Didn’t make the connection, but why would they? The kids weren’t music students. And they didn’t have their own Drayco music guru.”
Sarg flipped over a page. “Oh, and the M.E.’s office found something interesting from Shannon’s body.”
“I’m all ears.”
“News flash—not suicide.”
“They’re positive?”
“If the killer hoped leaving the knife would make us think suicide, he goofed. He didn’t realize killing Shannon on top of a tarp and later removing said tarp would leave signs.”
“Blood smear patterns?”
“Yep. And Shannon’s fingerprints oh-so-carefully placed on the matches had traces of blood. Kinda hard to light a match to heat a knife—”
“If you’re already dead. Guess it’s a moral victory of sorts.”
Sarg thrust his notebook in his pocket. “So you talked to Gilbow again? You get a vaccination against him or something?”
“After he received one of those notes, he wants to go with me to the Eastern Shore. Thinks it will be ‘enlightening.’ More likely, he needs material for another book.”
“The shore?” Sarg said, with a sideways glance at Drayco. “You might bump into Deputy Nelia Tyler.”
Drayco didn’t want to roam around in Sheriff Sailor’s backyard without checking in, so he had a legitimate reason for seeing Tyler. Besides, she was a good person to have in your corner when the chips were down. “Possibly,” he said. “I doubt Gilbow will come. Not a happy flyer.”
“The Big Man himself scared of a teensy widdle putt-putt plane?”
Drayco smiled. “Don’t diss the putt-putt. Cessnas are reliable. And you get a real pilot instead of a computer.”
A flash of something behind Sarg caught Drayco’s eye, something fluttering low to the ground, and he headed for it. With one knee bent on the ground, he called out, “Got any evidence bags?”
Sarg disappeared while Drayco examined threads wrapped around a tiny sapling poking through a crack in the concrete. Sarg bounded back with a small baggie and a pair of tweezers he handed to Drayco, who extracted the red material and placed it in the bag.
“What is it?” Sarg peered over Drayco’s shoulder.
“Red threads. Looks like cotton.”
“Red cotton, you say?”
Drayco didn’t have to look at Sarg to know they were thinking the same thing—about the red threads the Medical Examiner found in Cailan’s mouth. An abandoned warehouse would make a good place to carry out a murder before the body was moved to Kenilworth Gardens. Red threads were common, so it was likely a coincidence. Drayco hated coincidences.
Sarg took the bag as Drayco handed it over and said, “Forget dead-eye Drayco. Eagle eye is more like it.”
“It might not be important.”
“See, you’d definitely be wasted in a corporate security job.”
“Wasted or not, I have three days to decide. If I don’t give them my answer by then, they’ll get someone else.”
One of the arson investigators called out to Sarg, and he motioned he’d be right over. First, he asked Drayco, “How long you gonna be shore-seeing?”
“A few hours. That should leave plenty time to chat with Shannon’s parents.”
That was the main reason for going, but there was more to it than that. The challenge of flying the plane was brain Drano, helping to clear his mind, almost as good as playing Bach counterpoint. The chance to see Nelia—and Darcie, of course—was a bonus.
40
Wednesday, 29 October
Drayco gauged the altitude of the patchy clouds overhead. The TAF was dead on target. Visibility six miles, scattered clouds at four-thousand AGL. He’d filed an IFR flight plan to make it easier to get in and out of the thirty-nautical mile security zone established around Washington after 2001. Better to be a known entity in the system than to get an F-16 fighter jet escort to the ground.
After he’d dutifully called Andrew Gilbow to tell him the takeoff time and Gilbow hemmed and hawed, Drayco was certain he’d be flying solo. Hooray for small favors—the air in a small plane could get stuffy on its own. So when he saw two figures headed in his direction on the tarmac, he was surprised, and a little disappointed, to hear Gilbow’s voice.
“You decided to come.” He took in Gilbow’s ridiculous leather jacket and World War II-style aviator scarf.
“Thank my wife. She’s the daredevil in our household, but I figured what’s fit for the goose is fit for the gander.”
The other figure approaching the plane was Adele herself. She smiled brightly at Drayco and ran her hand along the wing of the plane, brushing Drayco’s fingers. “I was going to invite myself and tag along. It’s not every day you get to go flying with such a debonair pilot. Alas, I have other commitments.”
She peered into the cockpit. “How does a man your height fit inside such a tiny thing?”
“With a crowbar.” Drayco indicated the towbar lying on the ground. “That’s the co-pilot’s job.”
Gilbow was distracted, and for a moment, Drayco thought the man had taken him seriously. But he gave a humorless laugh. “Just don’t ask me to fly the thing.”
As Drayco continued his preflight inspection, Adele followed him around, asking the occasional question and taking the occasional opportunity to get closer to him. Gilbow’s reaction was a slight smile that made Drayco remember Gary Zabowski’s insight—Adele Gilbow’s flirting was a way to keep her husband interested.
Drayco gave Gilbow his own headset, and after a brief delay waiting for their IFR release, they were off and climbing up to five-thousand feet. Gilbow’s hands stayed laced into a white-knuckled ball in his lap as he babbled nonstop, not looking out the wind
ow. Drayco tried pointing out a few features along the route, hoping to give him something to focus on other than his phobia.
Drayco asked, “What is it about flying that scares you?”
“Oh, I don’t know, spiraling down, spending the last moments of your life in terror, knowing you’re going to end up in a burning, twisted heap of metal.”
Drayco smiled. “I won’t let that happen.”
Gilbow didn’t smile. “You can’t promise that, can you?”
“If it’s within my power to prevent it, I will.”
“There are too many things outside one’s power for that to be a comfort.”
Gilbow remained silent while Drayco replied to an ATC call over the radio, and he stayed silent for several minutes after. Drayco was beginning to enjoy the flight when Gilbow started babbling again. “Brain scans show different parts of the brain are activated by different phobias. And adolescence is critical to the development of abnormal behaviors and fears.”
“Like the link between boys who are cruel to animals and grow up to be serial killers?”
“Certainly. I assume you’ve checked into Gary Zabowski’s background? It would be interesting to know if any pets died of mysterious circumstances in his neighborhood.”
“I’ll keep that in mind.” Drayco doubted there’d be any such cases. It was the type of mass-market pablum he’d expect from someone who charged five hundred an hour as an expert witness. Plus a three-grand retainer and expenses.
Drayco descended to three-thousand feet, and they ducked into a few clouds, making things bumpy. He’d slipped a barf bag into the middle console, just in case. “How long had you known Cailan? I assume Troy Jaffray made you her godfather after he was made her legal guardian.”
“She was eight, a very impressionable age. And to lose both parents suddenly was quite a blow. Troy needed all the moral support he could get, and I was happy to help. That was before I married Adele.”
“And you saw no signs of any cult influences or secretive behavior?”
“None at all. Typical college student stress. Grades. Romantic relationship problems.”
“You’re referring to Shannon Krugh. You said you had her in one of your classes.”
“Not memorable, academically. The signs of her bipolar were fascinating, from a clinical standpoint. I’m thinking of writing a book on bipolar disorder. My publisher is putting on the pressure for another bestseller. The last one sold half a million copies.”
Drayco considered putting the plane into a sudden stall to see how a best-selling psychology guru would handle it. He pointed to a postage-stamp clearing on the narrow strip of land in the distance. “That’s Accomack, where we’re headed.”
Gilbow looked out the window. From his clenched jaw, he must have realized for the first time they were flying over water, Drayco’s favorite view of the Chesapeake Bay. Gilbow said in clipped tones, “How much longer until we’re over land?”
“Not long. Fifteen minutes or so.”
A sudden wave of wake turbulence hit the small plane, making Gilbow flail around for something to hold onto. The first thing he grabbed was the right-seat yoke, pulling it back sharply. The stall horn screamed an alert, and Drayco felt the sensation of the plane dropping out from under him.
He had the Cessna under control in seconds, a maneuver he’d trained for countless times. The heated lecture he felt like giving Gilbow evaporated when he saw Gilbow’s hands stuffed under his legs and his body shaking even more than the plane in the stall.
Gilbow said into the headset, “You’d better keep your promise. I don’t want to die in some fiery inferno burned alive like a piece of toast.”
He kept his eyes shut tightly after that, leaving Drayco alone with air traffic control to talk to the rest of the way. No other planes were in the pattern, and Drayco made as smooth a landing in Accomack as he could.
He taxied to the small terminal and had the plane buttoned down in short order. As soon as they’d touched down, Gilbow was chatty again, acting as though they’d never been in a plane. A Benadryl on the return trip for the professor might be a good idea. Make it two.
The two men were greeted by none other than Deputy Nelia Tyler. Despite his earlier heads-up phone call, he wasn’t sure she’d show. “So you really can fly,” she teased Drayco.
Gilbow said to Drayco, “Beautiful women see you off, and beautiful women greet you. The pilot’s life, eh?”
Beautiful married women, Drayco wanted to point out. Still, he was happy to see her and placed a hand on her shoulder as he introduced her, until he thought better of that and put his hands in his pockets.
Nelia walked them to her patrol car while Gilbow looked around at the environs and commented, “It’s flat as a hotcake around here. And quiet.”
Nelia chuckled. “Flat, I’ll grant you. The area used to be quiet, but we’re in danger of losing the sleepy charm due to the Wallops Island development. And D.C. weekenders.”
“Change can be good,” Gilbow said.
“Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose.”
Gilbow blinked several times. “Your accent doesn’t sound French, Deputy.”
Drayco explained, “Her mother is French. And a violinist.”
“Intriguing. Someday you’ll have to tell me how a lovely lady with such a background wound up in law enforcement.”
Drayco had warned Nelia on the phone about Gilbow and how he used information from people he encountered as fodder for his books. Without their permission, in many cases. With details changed just enough to avoid getting sued.
Nelia cagily replied, “It’s a boring story. And now, I believe you wanted to meet Shannon Krugh’s parents? It’s a ten-minute drive over to Maxateague.”
“Such quaint names over here. Chincoteague, Machipongo, Kiptopeake, Nassawadox. Doesn’t sound like there’d be any crime around here for you, Deputy Tyler.”
“You’d be surprised. I met Drayco while investigating two murder cases here. Greed, jealousy, prejudice—any place with at least one person has all of the above.”
“Such a dark view of human nature, Deputy. You’d make a fine psychologist.”
“Or attorney.” Nelia was smiling, but Drayco saw the tension in her shoulders. It was the new norm for her, judging by the last two times he’d seen her.
Drayco changed the subject. “I hate to rush things, but I promised to have the plane back by four. Depending upon any storm development ahead of the approaching front.”
Gilbow stopped dead beside the car. “Storms?”
Drayco gritted his teeth. Yep, two Benadryl. “You can usually find a path around them.”
Gilbow glared at Drayco, glared at the sky and slammed the car door after he climbed in. Nelia gave Drayco a sympathetic look and said, “Follow me, then?”
“To the ends of the earth. Which, on a narrow peninsula between the Chesapeake and Atlantic, isn’t all that far.”
Nelia glanced at Gilbow inside the car and muttered to Drayco, “Let’s hope he’s not afraid of water, too. The Krughs live on a marsh.”
“Did you tell them we were coming?”
“I did. They refused, at first. This is still very raw for them.”
Raw barely described an emotional gash like the one that had slit open the souls of Shannon’s parents. Closure was only a dressing, yet it was the best he could give them. Too late now, but he worried Gilbow would be alcohol thrown into that wound, making things worse. Mirroring his thoughts, a turkey vulture on the driveway blocked their exit and stubbornly refused to move. Nelia turned on her siren, and the vulture let them pass.
41
Nelia was right about the marsh, which reminded him of Kenilworth Gardens. Fingers of ocean pushed into the coastlines of the Eastern Shore, creating soft mud banks for minks and muskrats and hosting tall grasses for wintering nests of mallards and blue-winged teal. A natural tidal give-and-take, unlike the man-made Tidal Basin of the Potomac. There, gates controlled the water while a nin
eteen-foot bronzed Thomas Jefferson kept a brooding, watchful eye.
D.C. was all about control. Out here, no one controlled much of anything, let alone the winds and the waves—one of the reasons Drayco enjoyed his trips to the shore. Another reason was currently standing in the doorway of the cottage before them in a deputy’s uniform, introducing Drayco and Gilbow to the Krughs.
Shannon inherited brown eyes and a slightly crooked smile from Beatrice Krugh. But she didn’t bear a strong resemblance to her mother or her father. Neither of the senior Krughs was particularly welcoming, but they were polite.
“Shannon was an only child,” Mrs. Krugh said, not looking at the photo of her daughter on the table beside the frayed gray sofa. She didn’t have to look, the expression on her face clutching a thousand remembered snapshots tucked in a mental file.
Paul Krugh added, “She was a good girl. Or tried to be. It was that demon inside her.”
Drayco said, “You mean her bipolar disease?”
Krugh nodded. “That’s the fancy name they give it. T’was a demon to her. She tried to overcome it. To obey us.”
“Honor your father and your mother, that your days may be long in the land the Lord your God gives you,” Gilbow said. “The second most important commandment, or so my own father said. I discussed that with Jaffray once.”
“Jaffray?” Krugh gaped at him. “Ain’t that the name of the other girl they said my daughter killed?”
Drayco leaned forward in his chair, intentionally blocking Gilbow from a direct sightline with the Krughs. “Her name was Cailan Jaffray. She was the niece of a religion professor at Parkhurst, Troy Jaffray. For the record, I don’t believe your daughter killed Cailan or herself.”
Krugh whispered, “Troy Jaffray,” and jumped up. “I’ll go get us some iced tea.”
Not the reaction he’d expected. Drayco glanced toward the kitchen where Krugh had disappeared, wondering if he’d come back. Drayco asked his wife, “Did you know Mr. Jaffray? He grew up near here.”
Mrs. Krugh smiled slowly. “Knew him? I dated Troy. Thought we’d get engaged, but then he met his future wife.” Her voice trailed off. “Paul and I got married not long after. I was pregnant with Shannon.”