Criminal Intent (MIRA) (14 page)

“I have to call my insurance company. They’ll probably want to send somebody out to look at it.”

“We’re done processing the scene. There is something I’ll need the three of you to do. You, and everybody who works for you. I’d like you to stop by the station to be fingerprinted.”

Her heart began a slow thudding. “Why?”

“You’ve all spent time in the shop. We need to eliminate your prints from whatever we got today.”

It made sense in more ways than one. The fact that it terrified her didn’t negate that. Not only would it move the investigation along more quickly, but it was best for her and Sophie if she gave the police their prints up front, removing them immediately from the list of possible suspects. Her prints and Sophie’s both existed in some database somewhere. But the names attached to those prints didn’t match the names they were using now. Giving their prints to Hunter was risky, but less so than allowing him to run them along with any others he might have found. “Sophie and I can stop by sometime today,” she said. “What about you, Estelle?”

“I
might as well come with you. What else do I have to do? It doesn’t look like I’ll be renting out videos anytime soon.”

While Annie listened, Davy Hunter walked Estelle through last night’s closing routine. Everything had gone as usual. She’d closed down at eight, waited for Kenny Moreau’s older brother to pick him up, then locked up as she always did. Cashed up, emptied the register, put the receipts into an envelope and the money into a zippered canvas bag. She’d spent a few minutes tidying up. Boomer had picked her up around eight-thirty, and on the way home, they’d swung through the Key Bank drive-through, where she’d deposited the money bag in the night deposit slot. Then she’d gone home. She and Boomer had watched some television and gone to bed around ten.

Annie’s evening had been equally uneventful. She and Sophie had popped a bag of popcorn and watched a couple of videos. They’d gone to bed around midnight. Both of them were sound sleepers. Neither of them had heard a thing during the night. Neither of them had any idea that anything was amiss until Annie had gone downstairs and discovered the wreck that had once been her video store.

“Even for a sound sleeper,” Hunter said, “it’s hard to believe you didn’t hear anything. Whoever did this must’ve made a fair amount of noise.”

“Yes,” Annie said, “but you have to realize that the store’s directly under the kitchen. I sleep in the living room. It’s in the overhang, so I might not hear what’s going on downstairs. And Sophie’s fifteen. She could sleep through a nuclear explosion.”

His blue eyes zeroed in on her as though he wasn’t quite sure he believed her. “And you’re certain,” he said, “absolutely certain that you don’t have any enemies who might’ve done this out of spite?”

“I already told you, I don’t even know anybody in this town. I’ve
met a handful of people, in the most superficial of ways. The Crowleys across the street, Mr. Gilbert at the bank. I’ve patronized the hardware store and the lumber company. Grondin’s Superette. Sonny Gaudette, although I have yet to meet him in person. That’s pretty much it.”

“And there’s nobody you know from before you came here, somebody with a grudge, who might have followed you to Serenity?”

Thinking of Luke Brogan, she considered the possibility and dismissed it. “No,” she said. “Unfortunately.”

“Sophie? What about you?”

“I rode my bike downtown yesterday morning. I went into a couple of the stores on Water Street, but I didn’t talk to anyone. Oh—I did stop at the library to get a library card. I talked to the librarian for a few minutes. Mrs. Atwater? The only other person I’ve met here is Mrs. Crowley. And her twins. I’m going to babysit for her starting next week.”

“Okay. Now I’m asking you the same question I asked your mom. I want you to really think about it. Do you have any old enemies who might have thought this was a funny thing to do? Anybody who might’ve wanted to get back at you for some reason?”

“Mr. Hunter,” Annie interjected, “this is ridiculous. We just moved here from Nevada. I hardly think any of Sophie’s fifteen-year-old acquaintances would travel that far just to vandalize my video store.”

“Neither do I, Ms. Kendall,” he said, “but I have to ask. No old boyfriends, Sophie? Any guys you’ve turned down for a date? Maybe somebody who wanted to get a little friendlier than you thought was appropriate?”

“No,” Sophie said solemnly. “I don’t date.”

“All right. What about you, Ms. Kendall? You’re an attractive woman.” Those blue eyes took her in, head to foot. Appraising her worth, the way another man might estimate the value
of a used car. “You must have a few gentleman friends in your past. Anybody who has a reason to harass you?”

“My husband died two years ago, Mr. Hunter. There’s been nobody since then.”

“Nobody,” he echoed, as if he found it difficult to believe.

“That’s right,” she said defiantly, thinking he was getting just a little too personal here. “Nobody.”

“Look,” he said, “I really don’t mean to pry. It’s just that sometimes a victim will remember something when their memory’s jogged, something they wouldn’t have thought of on their own.” He set down his coffee mug on the counter behind him. “Sometimes, something that seems trivial turns out to be important.”

He was right. Annie let out a hard breath and willed herself to relax. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I don’t mean to be difficult. This thing has me more spooked than I’d like to admit.”

“That’s understandable. Estelle? We haven’t heard from you yet.”

Estelle shrugged. “I already told you, I don’t have a clue who might’ve done this. I certainly don’t have any enemies.”

“Boomer have a run-in with anybody lately?”

“Not that he’s mentioned. And isn’t that reaching a bit? I can’t imagine somebody tearing this place apart because they were pissed off at Boomer.”

“It’s pretty far-fetched, I’ll admit. But I have to cover all the bases. Have you had any bad experiences at work lately? Any disgruntled customers who thought they were above having to pay a late fee?”

Estelle started to shake her head, then paused. Thoughtfully, she said, “There was this one incident that happened a couple of weeks ago. This guy came in the shop, and he was feeling no pain, if you get my drift. Three-thirty on a Sunday afternoon, and he was so drunk he was staggering. He started hassling me—”

“Over
what?”

“He wanted some movie that wasn’t in. Somebody else had already rented it out. That didn’t set too well with him, so he took it out on me.”

“What happened?”

“He started getting physical. Grabbed me by the arm. I got scared.” Her hand went to her belly in a protective gesture that was probably unconscious. “I reached for the phone to call the cops, but his buddy apologized and dragged him out of the store.”

“And you never reported the incident?”

“No. I mean, he was gone. I guess I could’ve filed a complaint, but it was over and done with. Why stir up trouble if you don’t have to?”

“I don’t suppose you know his name?”

“Oh, yeah,” Estelle said darkly. “I know his name, all right. I went to high school with him. Jeffrey Traynor. He was a shithead in high school, and he’s a shithead now. Some things never change.”

Annie walked Davy Hunter to his car. At close range, she could see the tiny wrinkles that fanned out from the corners of his eyes. There was something about those wrinkles, some vulnerability they exposed, that reached inside her and tugged at some half-forgotten emotion.

She cleared her throat. “Do you think anything will come of this Jeffrey Traynor?”

Sunglasses in hand, he leaned against the driver’s door, his arms folded across his chest. Even leaning, he was tall enough that she had to lean back to look up at him. “I wouldn’t get my hopes up too high,” he said. “Traynor was drunk when he came into the shop and hassled Estelle. He probably woke up the next morning with a wicked hangover and a boatload of guilt over what he’d done the night before. Once people sober up, they
usually regret the things they did while they were under the influence. He probably won’t dare to come near this place ever again.”

He sounded as though he was talking from personal experience, but she didn’t know him well enough to comment. “What next?” she said instead.

“Next,” he said, “you come down and give us your prints so we can eliminate them. Then we run the ones that don’t match any of yours, and hope something pops. I’ll be talking with Jeff Traynor, see if I can prod anything out of him. And with Kenny Moreau. Kids his age, sometimes they get involved in feuds. We don’t have any gangs per se here in Serenity, but still there are cliques. Rivalries between different groups. Sometimes, resentment over some real or imagined slight gets carried a little too far. Plus, we’ll keep our eyes and ears open. With this kind of thing, people have a tendency to brag. That’s how most of ’em get caught. I’d like to say it’s good police work that nets these guys, but the truth is, they usually trip themselves up because they can’t keep their mouths shut.” He kicked absently at a chunk of broken pavement. “You have this place insured?”

“Yes, thank God. I need to get it back up and running as soon as I can. I’m not so worried about losing revenue. To tell you the truth, I’m not sure how much profit the store’s making anyway.” She dragged a hand through her hair. “I’ve gone over the books, but not in depth. Not yet. So I still don’t have a complete picture. Mike Boudreau was in one hell of a hurry to dump this place. Maybe there’s a reason for that.” She paused, a little embarrassed at revealing her own softheartedness. “My big concern is Estelle. I have a feeling she really needs this job.”

He fiddled with the bows to his sunglasses. “To tell you the truth, I’m more concerned about you. This happened downstairs while you and your daughter were asleep upstairs.”

Sophie.
She’d
been so wrapped up in her anger that she hadn’t even considered their safety. Concerned, she said, “You think whoever did this might come back?”

“Probably not. Still, you ought to think about getting some kind of security system. At least install some decent locks. I’d replace the front door while I was at it. They kicked it in like it was made of cardboard. Get yourself a steel door and have it professionally installed. They’re not infallible, but anything you can find that’ll put some distance between you and them is an improvement over what you have now. What about smoke alarms? I assume you have them, and they’re in working order.”

“Yes. Of course. But—” Her heart clutched in her chest. “You don’t really think somebody would—”

“No. But it pays to be cautious.” He stepped away from the side of the car and opened the driver’s door. “I’ll be in touch. Thanks for the coffee.”

He slid into the driver’s seat, locked his seat belt. While she watched, he turned the key in the ignition and started the engine. With the push of a button, the driver’s window slid down soundlessly.

“Watch yourself,” he said. And drove away without looking back.

T
his
was supposed to be a place of peace, a place of tranquility, but all he felt in his gut was turmoil. Over in the back corner, a groundskeeper was working around the grave markers, raking the grass, pulling up wilted flower arrangements and tossing them in a wheelbarrow. Overhead, birds twittered in the trees. It was hotter than a son of a bitch, but Davy’s hands and feet had turned to ice the instant he climbed out of the patrol car. A barn swallow darted and swooped above his head as he picked his way across a carpet of lush green to the reality he’d been avoiding for what felt like his entire life. Five rows down and three across. Just like a crossword puzzle. After thirty-five years of squabbling with her father, Chelsea’s destiny was to spend eternity at Cyrus Logan’s side. She was probably still laughing at the irony of it.

Funny, he drove past the cemetery a half-dozen times a day and seldom gave it a thought. It was easier that way, easier to remain in denial, easier to wall himself off from the pain than it was to face it. Since the day they put Chelsea in the ground, he hadn’t set foot in this place. He’d seen her after they pulled her out of the river, before Keith Gagnon got a chance to pretty her up with embalming fluid and cosmetics. Ty had tried
to convince him that he didn’t want to see her like that, that he wouldn’t want to remember her that way. But what the hell difference did it make how he remembered her? Whether his memories were of Chels laughing and vibrant, or heaving a mug of hot coffee at him and screaming like a fishwife, it wouldn’t make a damn bit of difference. Dead was dead, and all the wishing in the world wouldn’t change it.

He hadn’t attended the funeral. People thought it was strange, but he simply hadn’t had it in him. He’d made all the arrangements and paid for it out of his own pocket. Paid for everything, from the casket with its satin lining—and who the hell needed satin when they were dead?—to the headstone that marked her grave. It was time, he supposed, to find out just what he’d gotten for his money.

Davy located her grave and squatted down on his haunches to get a better look. The stone he’d bought was a simple rectangle of gray granite. He wasn’t the kind of man who believed in sentiment. There were no little cherubs, no hearts or flowers, no
beloved mother
or
beloved wife
or even just plain
beloved.
The stone was simple, straightforward, to the point. Chelsea Logan, born in this year and died in that one. Chelsea Logan who, by dying, had acquired the same status as everyone else here. Death, the great equalizer, had finally put her on an even footing with her neighbors.

He wasn’t sure why he’d picked this particular hot summer morning to come here and lay himself bare, to scrape at the scab without mercy until he revealed the raw wound beneath. Something inside him, some internal clock, had told him it was time. He hadn’t bothered to bring flowers. He’d never brought her flowers when she was alive. It would be hypocritical to start now.

She’d been sweet and spiteful, tender and twisted. From the time she’d been old enough to know the difference between male and female, Chelsea Logan had exploited that difference. When
she walked into a room, all heads turned and all other women became invisible. It was just her way. She was the golden girl, adored by many, hated by an equal number. She played on her strengths and struggled to overcome her weaknesses, both real and imagined. Chelsea might have been beautiful, but she was far from perfect. She had her faults, some of them blatant, screaming faults that even he hadn’t been able to overlook. He’d loved her anyway. What that said about him, he wasn’t sure he wanted to know.

They’d been a family once upon a time, he and Chels and Jessie, so far back in history that Jessie had been small enough for him to carry around on his shoulders. It had been the happiest time of his life. But the marriage had ultimately failed. Tying Chelsea down was like caging a wild bird. She’d been miserable. Because misery loves company, he’d eventually been miserable right along with her, and what was the sense in even bothering to try once that happened? So they’d split up.

In retrospect, divorce had worked out a lot better for them than marriage ever had. As long as he was willing to overlook her numerous liaisons with other men, they’d gotten along just fine. For the better part of a dozen years after the divorce, they’d maintained an on-again, off-again relationship. Chelsea would get bored with whatever or whoever she was doing, and she’d crook her finger, and he’d come running. He’d known the relationship was toxic. He just hadn’t been able to break his addiction to Chelsea’s slow-acting poison. Having a piece of her, however small and insignificant, had always seemed preferable to having none of her.

Now that he actually had none of her, he was finding that it wasn’t really so very different after all. As long as he stayed away from this place, he could pretend their relationship was on yet another hiatus, that he and Chelsea had once again wandered to opposite ends of the earth and would eventually rendezvous back here in Serenity again.

But
it was nothing more than a fantasy. The proof was here in front of him, etched indelibly in cold granite.
Chelsea Logan. 1969-2005.
The end of the fairy tale.

He wanted a drink. Right here in the cemetery, a hundred yards from the sanctity of the First Methodist Church and two hours before noon, when the official drinking day got started, he wanted a cold beer or two or twelve. The real thing, not that near-beer that was a pale imitation of what it was designed to take the place of. If he had a twelve-pack in his car right now, he’d spend the rest of the day sitting here in this cemetery, in the midst of all these dead people, and drink himself into a stupor.

But Davy Hunter was nothing if not a practical man. He didn’t have any beer, and if he didn’t show up back at the station pretty soon, Dixie would send Pete out looking for him. And though it might be the worst kind of cliché, it was true that there was no sense in crying over spilt milk. Life went on, even when you didn’t want it to. If there was one thing he’d learned from the last fourteen months, it was that.

Out of nowhere, his mind conjured up a picture of Annie Kendall, all soft blond hair and outraged blue eyes and righteous indignation. How much did she have to do with the reason he’d come here today? He didn’t dare even attempt to answer that question. It wasn’t a place he was ready to go. But he was too honest to lie to himself. Something about the woman had reached inside him and touched that wall of stone he’d built up as a defense mechanism. That was as much as he was willing to admit at this point. Something inside her spoke to something inside him. It was too soon to read anything into it, enough simply to acknowledge its existence. That acknowledgment was a single, tentative first step back toward the land of the living.

That and his visit here today.

Davy stood up and stretched his cramped muscles. He had things
to take care of. People to talk to. An investigation to run. Now that he’d finally come here, he knew he’d be back again. So did Chelsea. When she was alive, Chels had always been able to see what was inside him. There was no reason to think death had changed that. No need for goodbyes. Chelsea wasn’t going anywhere. Neither was he, not for a while, anyway.

As he walked back across the springy grass to the police cruiser he’d left parked at the gate, Davy realized for the first time that maybe he was going to survive this tragedy after all. Maybe having something to focus on would be good for what ailed him. Maybe, he reluctantly admitted, Ty Savage had known what he was doing all along.

He fired up the Crown Vic, radioed in to Dixie so she wouldn’t think he’d driven off a cliff somewhere, and headed across town to question Jeff Traynor.

Tracking down Robert Sarnacki was a piece of cake. All Louis had to do was run a credit check on the man, and
voilà!
He had Sarnacki’s address and phone number right in front of him. Judging from his credit report, Sarnacki could easily have owned the goose that laid the golden egg. He had a mortgage that would have bankrupted most normal working people, auto loan payments totaling more than Louis’s monthly rent, and various types of business expenses, although it was difficult to tell from the credit report just what business Sarnacki was in. The man had all his little duckies lined up in a row, and one of the cleanest credit records Louis had ever seen. There wasn’t a blur on his record, not even so much as a late payment on his wife’s Marshall Field’s card.

He had to dig a little deeper to find out how Sarnacki and Spinney were related. Turned out Sarnacki was her mother’s second cousin, which explained why Louis had missed him completely on the first go-round. Usually by the time blood got
diluted that far, there was little to no contact between relatives. But apparently Spinney and Sarnacki were close, to the consternation of her father, who obviously didn’t approve of the man.

When he ran a Google search, he hit pay dirt. Robert Sarnacki was in construction, although he had his finger in a number of other pies, and there were rumored ties to the Mob. Those rumors had yet to be substantiated, but they were enough to justify Bill Wyatt’s dislike of the man. Sarnacki was Loaded, with a capital
L,
which explained the exorbitant mortgage and the expensive cars.

It didn’t take an Einstein to fit it all together. Sarnacki and Spinney were thick as thieves. The man lived in Detroit, he owned property all over the greater Detroit area, and he was filthy rich. Robert Sarnacki not only knew where Robin Spinney was, he’d probably financed her disappearance himself. Louis was willing to bet a month’s pay that if he were inclined to research more deeply the Dearborn ranch house Spinney had bought but never lived in, he would find that she’d bought it from Sarnacki Construction or one of its subsidiaries.

Louis shut down his laptop, closed it carefully, and returned it to its leather carrying case. This afternoon, he would find Sarnacki’s house, take a ride past, scope it out. What he saw there would determine his next move. Tonight, he’d have a nice dinner—on Brogan’s dime, of course—then he’d sit down and formulate a carefully-thought-out plan. There were a number of viable options for getting his hands on Spinney’s address, and Louis knew them all. He considered himself a Renaissance man, capable of any number of things. When the time came to act, he’d be ready, with all the necessary tools at hand.

But first things first. When he wasn’t in a position to offer written reports, Louis always made a point of phoning his client whenever there was something to report. He considered staying
in touch one more facet of the exemplary service he provided. And it was time to report in.

He picked up his cell phone and dialed a number in Mississippi. Luke Brogan was about to become a happy man.

Davy found Jeff Traynor working the breakfast shift at the McDonald’s across the river. Traynor was somewhere in his early twenties, and the day manager had assigned him the highly skilled tasks of sweeping floors and taking out the garbage. He was clearly executive material. A tall, gaunt, hollow-chested kid, Traynor hunched over when he walked, reminding Davy of an old drawing of Ichabod Crane that he’d seen in one of Jessie’s childhood storybooks. His pitted face was undoubtedly the legacy of a bad case of adolescent acne. He wore the standard fast-food uniform, covered over with an apron that had probably once been white, but which now bore the multicolored remnants of God only knew what. If Davy thought too hard about it, he’d probably never be able to choke down another Big Mac, so he focused instead on the kid’s eyes, which held a glassiness that was just a shade beyond natural.

“Whatta you want with me?” Traynor asked.

Davy glanced around. Traynor’s co-workers, while continuing to man their stations, evidenced clear interest in what the police had to say to him. “Is there some place we can talk in private?” he said.

“I ain’t done nothing wrong.”

“Then you don’t have anything to worry about, do you?”

Traynor mumbled something under his breath that sounded suspiciously like
asshole,
but Davy decided not to call him on it. They sat on a picnic table out back of the parking lot in the bright morning sun. Traynor reached into his shirt pocket and pulled out a pack of Marlboros, lit one, and tossed the match onto the ground. “So?” he said.

Davy
adjusted his sunglasses. Feet propped on the bench seat, hands braced against the table top, he leaned back and turned his face up to the sun. “I hear you had a run-in with the clerk at the Twilight Video a couple of weeks ago.”

Traynor took a long drag on his cigarette and slowly exhaled the smoke. “So?”

Nearby, a pair of seagulls squabbled over the remains of an Egg McMuffin that had fallen from an overflowing trash can. “Want to tell me about it?”

“I didn’t do nothing.”

“Yeah,” Davy said. “I seem to remember you already told me that. Now I want to hear about you and Estelle. What happened?”

Traynor flicked an ash. “Whatever that fucking bitch told you, it’s a lie.”

The squabble over the Egg McMuffin intensified, with much squawking and flapping. The victor flew off, prize dangling from its beak. “What makes you think she told me anything?” Davy said.

Traynor stared at him defiantly, then glanced away. “Fuck you, man.”

“I’m pretty sure that would be an anatomical impossibility. Tell me, Jeffrey.” Davy leaned forward, his elbows propped on his knees, and studied the kid’s body language. “You know what I did before this? I worked for the DEA.”

Traynor, still puffing on his Marlboro, stiffened perceptibly.

“I see you’ve heard of them,” Davy said, “which means you know I’m familiar with pretty much every street drug out there. I know what they look like, I know their mortality rates, I know their short-term and long-term effects on behavior and general physiology. See, I may look stupid, but I’m really not.” He took his time, let the kid think about it, let him squirm for a minute or two. “So,” he continued, quiet and unhurried, “unless
you want me to take a closer look at those dilated pupils of yours, maybe even make you empty your pockets, you’re probably going to want to cooperate with me. Otherwise, we could end up taking a little trip together, to a place where I can demand samples of body fluids. You don’t really want that.”