Presumption of Guilt (15 page)

Sally wasn't alone in her evaluation. “Very homey,” her father said. “If you're a polar bear.”

But while she was once more absorbing the novelty of standing on trespassed ground, Dan was on task, hoping to fulfill his obligation to Willy Kunkle by finding something more revealing than Johnny Lucas's shortcomings as an interior decorator.

He began in the office, after they'd completely surveyed the building's interior, noting every door, window, light switch, and staircase—as was Dan's normal pattern. Sally stood by, at once learning and taking in the feel of the place. They'd discussed how his search of Lucas's possessions would be more of a raid than a training session, and therefore more given to speed and results than to instruction.

That being so, she couldn't but admire Dan's concentration and economy. With the precision of a surgeon, she imagined, he used gloves and a miniature flashlight attached to a headband to help him forage through drawers, files, an assortment of cabinets, and a laptop computer—using his cell phone camera to photograph items he thought might be relevant.

Twice, the motion detector was triggered on their radios, and they gathered at the window to see if the oncoming vehicle might be Lucas's, but both times proved to be false alarms.

From the office, Dan led them to the bedroom, where he quickly identified Johnny's side of the bed and his half of the closet. He noted the man's personal details, from the kind of book he had on the nightstand to his bottled prescriptions and taste in shoes, clothes, and even shampoo.

And in contrast to his calm and peaceful tone of voice, Dan maintained an impressive, sure-handed speed.

This turned out to be a good thing, since the third alarm led to them watching the Lucas vehicle slowing down, about to enter the short driveway.

“Oh, shit,” Sally moaned.

“Not to worry,” Dan reassured her, politely gesturing toward the bedroom door. “Just head for the window we entered by. You remember the way.”

It was said as a statement, and gave her the confidence to proceed without misstep. As she went, she mimicked Dan's habit of replacing everything as he'd found it—from the angle of an open door to the way a small carpet corner had been flipped up. “Leave no trace” went beyond mantra here—in instances like this, it contributed to survival.

As she was instructed, Sally exited the building quickly and carefully, leaving no footprints in soft soil and putting the rubber-soled slippers they both wore to their quietest use. She crouched by a bush on the periphery of the lawn and waited nervously for her partner in crime to follow her out.

The lights went on at the front of the house, spreading across the lawn in a semicircular stain. The shadows of two people began to drift across the curtains.

And still, there was no sign of Dan.

Sally began to consider her options. Create a distraction? Throw a stone through a far window? Phone the house to immobilize at least one of the occupants? She'd been given the home's number just in case, thinking the gesture absurd at the time. Maybe she should knock on the door, pretending to seek directions, or report a fire up the road. The one thing she didn't consider was to use the throat mic to consult her dad. She was too worried about distracting him just enough to throw off his game.

She rose tentatively, on the verge of acting on any of these choices, when his shape appeared briefly at the window. He shut it behind him as if in a graceful afterthought and soundlessly slid up beside her, just as the same window popped into harsh relief via a hallway light behind it.

“Did you enjoy yourself?” he asked, slipping his arm around her shoulder, the canvas bag he'd stuffed with documents in his other hand.

She nodded, confessing, “But this is definitely going to take getting used to.”

*   *   *

Sheriff's deputies in Vermont walk a parallel line alongside most other police officers. They go to the same academy for their training and end up with the same certificates, but once on the job, they discover—if they weren't already aware of it—that their boss, and thus their agency, is a form of law enforcement doppelgänger. A Vermont sheriff is not a hired chief or a pulled-from-the-ranks state police colonel—he or she is a politician and business owner, and not even required to be a certified cop, even though they all are. Each county's sheriff is paid by the state, and expected to perform such duties as civil process, court security, and prisoner transportation, but the actual requirements of the office are flexible. If a sheriff—elected for a four-year term—chose to simply sit back, do nothing, employ no deputies, and collect his or her salary—they could do so legally. It might turn out to be a short career, but at almost seventy-five thousand dollars per year, not an unprofitable one.

No Vermont sheriff acted this way, but David Spinney had done his homework, and discovering this enormous degree of latitude had been helpful in understanding why some sheriffs stuck their necks out to create virtually full-service agencies, and others were far less ambitious, merely working to stay employed.

The core of the dilemma, as David had found out, was that sheriffs, regardless of their aspirations, had to be profit-minded, first and foremost. Unlike the state police or municipal departments, sheriff's offices ran on contracts—to stand by road construction projects, secure facilities such as Vermont Yankee in the old days, enforce traffic for a particular town, or supply the school resource officer at the local high school. In other words, despite the fact that they existed by edict of Vermont's constitution, and not by statute, sheriff's offices nevertheless had to fund their operations in an assortment of inventive ways.

As in verifying VINs—or vehicle identification numbers—which is what David was on his way to do that morning when he found himself meditating on all this.

He wasn't unhappy being employed within this unconventional, often versatile framework. He liked his colleagues, enjoyed the autonomy of working from his cruiser for most of the day, and was becoming increasingly self-confident through every day's string of spontaneous interactions. As he saw it, this job was an excellent training ground for discovering if he wanted to stay in law enforcement, and in what capacity.

But right now, he had to document an automobile's provenance, as part of its being transferred from one owner to another. Not glamorous, but necessary, and certainly an opportunity for a nice drive in the country.

He wasn't crazy about how this particular road was turning out, however. This was his first time in this corner of the county, and from a well-maintained, well-traveled dirt road—if a little spongy because of mud season—this one was rapidly disintegrating into little better than a greasy rutted goat path. Still, his GPS urged him onward, insistent that the address he sought lay ahead.

Which it did, finally. Through his mud-spattered windshield, Dave made out a sad-looking trailer tucked under a row of ancient hardwoods, with a blighted front yard spread out like a soiled apron. He pulled up next to a battered pickup truck, swung out of the cruiser, and looked around.

“Hello?” he shouted, at least expecting the obligatory Heinz 57 dog.

But there was no response.

He reached through his vehicle's open window for the radio mic, to inform Dispatch of his arrival and confirm the address, when he felt a rough hand yank him back outside. Something hard jabbed him in the back, and a harsh voice ordered, “Move one muscle and you die. Do not turn around.”

Of course, instinct dictated otherwise. Dave did twist slightly, quickly enough to catch a glance of his assailant's shoulder, before a thick cloth sack was dropped over his head, obscuring his vision.

“What the hell?” he yelled. “I'm a cop.”

“No shit,” was the response, as Dave felt multiple hands seize his arms and legs and yank him free of the ground.

“Put me down,” he ordered, kicking and struggling as best he could.

They did, dropping him hard on his face. The wind knocked out of him, he heard several people laughing and felt one of them use his own handcuffs to secure his wrists behind his back.

“Can't believe it was so simple,” someone said, his voice tense with excitement.

“Guys think they're so fucking great,” said another. “Wait till this gets around. Got the camera?”

Dave was fighting panic, his own rapid breathing making him light-headed in the bag. “Stop this,” he said. “Stop it now. What you're doing isn't worth it. This is a major felony. You will be caught.”

“Use the tape,” ordered one of the voices. “Shut this asshole up.”

The familiar screech of ripping duct tape preceded Dave's head being wrenched to one side and a tight band clamping the bag's fabric against his mouth. Breathing became even more challenging, and speaking impossible.

“That oughta do it.”

More tape was then used around his ankles and knees, severing his last vestige of independence. With that piece of tape applied, David felt his heart sag, and he stopped resisting.

Instead, he altered strategies—trying to make out how many of them there were. Identify them via their voices, he told himself. Link them to a cause, or a purpose, or a locale by some carelessly dropped reference. And listen for any names that might be mentioned.

And try not to think of what they're planning.

As they manhandled him across the yard—presumably to another vehicle hidden behind the trailer—he thought that he could distinguish three voices, which fit the number of hands he felt on his body. They sounded young, as if in their twenties or late teens, like himself, and high-strung—nervous about what they were doing. From odd snatches of conversation, the entire enterprise was starting to sound like an absurdist prank of some sort, rather than a lethally intended kidnapping.

Whatever it was, David's ability to listen in on it vanished as he was dumped into the trunk of a car, and all sensory input was reduced to darkness and a muffled orchestra of indistinguishable voices, engine noise, and a string of thumps and bangs as the car traveled down the same rough road he'd used to get here. He remembered TV shows where the victim cataloged any and all passing sounds—factory whistles, train noises, the echoing rattle of a car passing over a wooden bridge, and so on—to be relayed in perfect order to investigators later. All he was aware of were his aches and pains, his rising panic, his increasingly labored breathing, and a sense of impotent rage.

It ended, seemingly a long time later, when all motion stopped, fresh air poured into the trunk, and David was lugged back outside to the accompaniment of his captors' laughter, to be unceremoniously dumped onto a thick patch of grass. In the background, he could hear the sound of rushing water.

“Okay, asshole, end of the road. Smile for the camera.”

He heard them arguing about the best angle for their shot, before another voice asked, “You ever been on the receiving end of a Glock, Mr. Deputy?”

David felt what he assumed to be the hard, metallic pressure of a gun barrel against his head.

“This is what it feels like. Before everything goes dark.”

He waited, not breathing, not moving a muscle, his eyes squeezed shut.

And then, as suddenly as it had begun, it ended. The gun was removed, the laughter faded, the car drove off, and David Spinney was left alone, listening to the water passing by.

 

CHAPTER TWELVE

Joe hung up the office phone and addressed Lester Spinney. “Technically, that call was for you. We're going to the ER.”

Joe was slipping on his jacket as he spoke. “Everything's okay—a hundred percent, from what I was just told—but your son was just transported there to be checked out.”

Lester stood up quickly enough to send his chair skittering into Sam's desk. They were alone. “What the hell?”

Joe placed his hand on Lester's shoulder. “He's fine. They're following protocol—same process you've been through a dozen times. I'm coming with you, and,” he added with emphasis, “I'm driving.”

“What'd they tell you?” Lester asked as they left the parking lot shortly thereafter.

“Essentially, nothing,” Joe said. “The sheriff got an anonymous call, telling him to pick up one of his deputies by the side of Stickney Brook, right off Route 30.”

“What?” Lester exclaimed. “He was standing there with his thumb out?”

Joe kept his eyes on the traffic. He was taking backstreets to the hospital, hoping to reduce the trip to no more than five minutes. “I don't know, Les, but I doubt it.” He suddenly flashed on a case he'd investigated over twenty years earlier, and added, “Maybe someone handcuffed him to a tree or something. Weirder things have happened.”

The ER wasn't busy, it being only midmorning, and one of the nurses at the long counter lining the central passageway looked up from her paperwork, took them in at a glance, and directed simply, “Room Three.”

There, they found a doctor and another nurse, the first a woman and the second a tall bearded man, tending to David Spinney, who was sitting upright on a gurney in his undershorts. His face fell at the sight of his father.

“I don't believe it. Dad, who called you?”

Lester gave him a lopsided grin. “Like I needed calling. Don't you know you're part of the biggest gang in the country?”

Despite his son's obvious unhappiness at being found so exposed, Lester walked up to him and tousled, if not his hair, there being so little of it, at least his son's closely cropped head.

“Dad,” Dave protested.

Lester ignored him, addressing the doctor. “Any damage?”

She shook her head. “Minor abrasions and bruises. We conducted scans of his head and neck to be on the safe side, but he appears to be in perfect shape.”

She turned to the nurse, said something unintelligible, signed a clipboarded form, shook David's hand in farewell, and left, taking the nurse with her.