At the Stroke of Madness (7 page)

R. J.
Tully watched O’Dell sort through some file folders stacked on her desk.

“So much for vacation,” she said, her good mood put on hold.

He thought her mood had changed because of the phone call from Dr. Patterson, but O’Dell seemed to be ignoring the fax machine behind her as it spit out page after page of details about Patterson’s missing patient. Instead of retrieving and examining those pages, O’Dell was searching for something already lost in her stacks. Perhaps a case she had planned on taking home with her to peruse during those backyard digging breaks. What was one more if she added Dr. Patterson’s?

Tully sank into the overstuffed chair O’Dell had managed to cram into her small but orderly office. It always amazed him. Their offices down in BSU—Behavorial Science Unit—were Cracker Jack boxes, yet hers included neatly stacked bookcases—not one errant hardcover squashed on top. Now that he had a closer look, he could see they were categorized. And alphabetized.

His office, on the other hand, looked like a storage closet with stacks of files and books and magazines—not necessarily each in separate piles—on his shelves, on his desk and guest chair and even on the floor. Some days he was lucky to find a path to his desk. And underneath his desk was a whole other matter. That’s where he kept a duffel bag of running shoes, shorts and socks, some of which—especially the dirty ones—never managed to stay put in the bag. Now that he thought about it, maybe that was the mysterious smell that had recently begun to take over the room. He missed having a window in his office. In Cleveland he had left behind a corner office on the third floor in exchange for a Cracker Jack box three floors underground. He missed the fresh air, especially this time of year. Fall used to be his favorite season. Used to be. Back before the divorce.

Funny, but that was how he kept track of time these days—before the divorce and after the divorce. Before the divorce he had been much more organized. Or at least he hadn’t been such a mess. Since his transfer to Quantico he hadn’t been able to get back on track. No, that wasn’t true. It had little to do with the move. Ever since his divorce from Caroline his life had been a mess. Yes, it was the divorce that had caused this nosedive, this spiral into disorganization. Maybe that’s what bothered him right now about O’Dell’s attitude. She really seemed to be taking this finalization of her divorce as a form of liberation. Maybe he envied her just a little.

He waited while O’Dell continued her search, still ignoring the wheeze of the fax machine. He wanted to say something to retrieve her good mood, something like, “What? No color-coded filing system?” But before he could say it he noticed the files she had pulled out of the stack all had red tabs. He rubbed at the beginning of a smile. For as predictable as his partner was, why couldn’t he figure out what the hell she was up to most of the time? Like, for instance, how long did she intend to taunt him with that last doughnut? She had brought it down from the cafeteria with her, still wrapped in cellophane, untouched and now sitting on the corner of her desk—yes, sitting on the edge of her desk, tempting him.

Finally she slipped the file folders into her briefcase and turned to collect the faxed pages. “Her name is Joan Begley,” O’Dell said, looking over the information as she put the pages in order. “She’s been a patient of Gwen’s for more than ten years.”

Gwen. Tully still hadn’t allowed himself to call her by her first name. To him she was Dr. Gwen Patterson, D.C. psychologist, best friend to his partner and sometimes consultant to the FBI and their boss, Assistant Director Cunningham. Usually the woman drove Tully a little nuts with her arrogant, know-it-all psychobabble. It didn’t help matters that she had strawberry-blond hair and nice legs.

He and Dr. Patterson had gotten carried away on a case last November. Exchanged a kiss. No, it was more than that. It was…it didn’t matter. They had decided it was a mistake. They had agreed to forget about it. O’Dell was looking at him as if expecting an answer, and only then did Tully realize he must have missed a question. Patterson’s fault.

“I’m sorry, what did you say?”

“She was up in Connecticut for her grandmother’s funeral and no one’s seen or heard from her since late Saturday.”

“Seems odd that Dr. Patterson would be so concerned about a patient. Is there a personal connection?”

“Now, Agent Tully, it would be highly unprofessional of me to ask Dr. Patterson that question.” She looked up at him and smiled, which didn’t prevent him from rolling his eyes at her. O’Dell might be organized, but when it came to protocol and procedure or sometimes even common courtesy, she conveniently forgot to look at whose toes she might be stepping on. “Actually, just between the two of us, I think it’s a bit odd, too.”

“So what are you going to do?”

“I told her I’d check it out, so I guess I’ll check it out.” But O’Dell sounded nonchalant about it. “Do you know any law enforcement officers in Connecticut I could call?” she asked him, her attention already on another red-tabbed file folder she had missed on her desk. She picked it up, opened it for a quick glance, then added it to her briefcase.

“Where in Connecticut?”

“Let’s see. I know she told me.” O’Dell had to flip through the faxed pages, and Tully wondered why she didn’t remember the basic details from the phone call. Or was her mind simply already focused on her backyard retreat? Somehow he doubted that. His bet was that she was focused on the contents of those red-tabbed file folders, stuffed safely in her briefcase. “Here it is,” she finally said. “She was staying in Meriden, but the funeral was in Wallingford.”

“Wallingford?”

O’Dell double-checked. “Yes. Do you know anyone?”

“No, but I’ve been through that area. It’s beautiful. You know who might be able to tell you who to call? Our buddy Detective Racine is from there.”

“Our buddy? I think if you know where she’s from, she’s your buddy.”

“Come on, O’Dell, I thought you two made nice…or at least called a truce.” The D.C. detective and O’Dell clashed like night and day, but on a case almost a year ago, Julia Racine ended up saving O’Dell’s mother. Whatever their differences, the two women now seemed to have what he’d call a healthy tolerance of each other.

“You know my mother has lunch with Racine once a month?”

“Really? That’s nice.”

“
I
don’t even have lunch with my mother once a month.”

“Maybe you should.”

O’Dell frowned at him and went back to the faxed pages. “I suppose I could just call the field office.”

Tully shook his head. For a smart woman his partner could be annoyingly stubborn.

“So what was this Begley woman seeing Dr. Patterson for?”

O’Dell looked at him over the faxed pages. “You know Gwen can’t tell me that. Patient confidentiality.”

“It might help to know how kooky she is.”

“Kooky?” Another frown. He hated when she did that, especially when it made him feel like he was being unprofessional, even when she was right.

“You know what I mean. It could help to know what she’s capable of doing. Like, for instance, is she suicidal?”

“Gwen seemed concerned that she may have gotten involved with a man. Someone she met up there. And that she might actually be in some danger.”

“She was there for how long?”

O’Dell shuffled through the pages. “She left the District last Monday, so it’s been a week.”

“How did she get involved with a man in less than a week? And you said she was there for a funeral? Who meets someone at a funeral? I can’t even pick up a woman at the Laundromat.”

She smiled at him, quite an accomplishment. O’Dell hardly ever smiled at his attempts at humor. Which meant the good mood lurked close to the surface.

“Let me know if you need any help, okay?” he offered, and now she looked at him with suspicion and he wondered, not for the first time, if Dr. Patterson had confided in O’Dell about their Boston tryst. Geez, tryst wasn’t right. That made it sound…tawdry. Tawdry wasn’t right, either. That made it sound…O’Dell was smiling at him again. “What?”

“Nothing.”

He got up to leave. Wanting her to believe his offer had been genuine, he added, “I’m serious, O’Dell. Let me know if you need any help. I mean with any of your cases, not with the backyard digging. Bad knee, remember?”

“Thanks,” she said, but there was still a bit of a smile.

Oh, yeah, she knew. She knew something.

Wallingford, Connecticut

L
illian Hobbs loved her Mondays. It was the one time she left Rosie alone during the busy rush hours, steaming milk for lattes, collecting sticky quarters for cheese Danishes and the
New York Times.
Not a problem. According to Rosie, the busier, the better. After all, it had been Rosie’s idea to add a coffee bar to their little bookstore.

“It’ll bring in business,” Rosie had promised. “Foot traffic we might not get otherwise.”

Foot traffic was just the thing Lillian had dreaded. And so at first she had revolted. Well, maybe
revolted
was too strong a word. Lillian Hobbs had never really revolted against anything in her forty-six years of life. She simply hadn’t seen the wisdom in Rosie’s side enterprise. In fact, she worried that the coffee bar would be a distraction. That it would bring in the gossipmongers who would rather make up their own stories than purchase one off their shelves.

But Rosie had been right. Again. The coffee crowd had been good for business. It wasn’t just that they cleaned them out of the daily
New York Times
and
USA TODAY.
There were the magazine sales, and the occasional paperbacks that got picked up on impulse. Soon the regular coffee drinkers—even the mocha lattes with extra whipped cream and the espresso addicts—were browsing the shelves and wandering back into the store after work and on the weekends. Sometimes bringing their families or their friends. Okay, so foot traffic hadn’t been such a bad thing, after all.

Yes, Rosie had been right.

Actually, Lillian didn’t mind admitting that. She knew Rosie was the one with a head for business. Business was Rosie’s forte and books were Lillian’s. That’s why they made such excellent partners. She didn’t even mind Rosie rubbing her nose in it every once in a while. How could she mind when she was allowed to revel in her own passion every single day of the week? But Mondays were the best, like having Christmas once a week. Christmas sitting in a crammed, dark storage room, soothed by her cup of hazelnut coffee and armed with a box cutter.

Opening each box was like ripping into a precious gift. At least that’s what it felt like for Lillian, opening each new shipment of books, pushing back the cardboard flaps and taking in that aroma of ink and paper and binding that could so easily transport her to a whole different world. Whether it was a shipment of eighteenth-century history books or a boxful of Harlequin romances or the latest
New York Times
bestseller, it didn’t matter. She simply loved the feel, the smell, the sight of a box of books. What could be more heavenly?

Except that this Monday the stacks of ready and waiting cartons couldn’t keep Lillian’s mind from wandering. Roy Morgan, who owned the antique store next door, had raced in about an hour ago, breathless, ranting and raving and talking crazy. With his face flushed red—Lillian had noticed even his earlobes had been blazing—and his eyes wild, Roy looked as though he would have a stroke. Either that, or he was having a mental breakdown. Only Roy was probably the sanest person Lillian knew.

He kept stumbling over his words, too. Talking too fast and too choppy. Like a man panicked or in a frenzy. Yes, like a man who was losing his mind. And what he was saying certainly sounded like he had gone mad.

“A woman in a barrel,” he said more than once. “They found her stuffed in a barrel. A fifty-five-gallon drum. Just east of McKenzie Reservoir. Buried under a pile of brownstone in the old McCarty rock quarry.”

It sounded like something out of a suspense thriller. Something only Patricia Cornwell or Jeffery Deaver would create.

“Lillian,” Rosie called from the door of the storage room, making Lillian jump. “They have something on the news. Come see.”

She came out to find them all crowded around a thirteen-inch TV set that she had never seen before. Someone had slid it in between the display of pastries and the napkin dispenser. Even Rosie’s coveted antique jar that she used for the pink packages of Sweet’n Low had been shoved aside. As soon as Lillian saw the TV, she knew. First a coffee bar, now a TV. She knew that whatever was happening would change everything. Not for the better. She could feel it, like a storm brewing. Could feel it coming on like when she was a child, and she had been able to predict her mother’s temper tantrums before they started.

On the small TV screen she saw Calvin Vargus, her brother’s business partner, standing in front of the petite news reporter. Calvin looked like a plaid railroad tie, solid and stiff and bulky but with a silly boyish grin as if he had discovered some hidden treasure.

Lillian listened to Calvin Vargus describe—although they were getting his bleeped version—how his machine had dug up the barrel out of the rocks.

“I dropped it. Bam! Just like that. And its
(bleep)
lid sort of popped off when it hit the ground. And
(bleep)
if it wasn’t a
(bleep bleep)
dead body.”

Lillian checked the huddled crowd—about a dozen of their regulars—and looked for her brother. Had he come in yet for his daily bear claw and glass of milk? And his opportunity to complain about today’s aches and pains. Sometimes it was his back, other times it was the bursitis in his shoulder or his ultrasensitive stomach. She wondered what he would think about his partner’s discovery.

Finally, she saw Walter Hobbs sipping his milk as he sat at the end of the counter, three empty stools away from the frenzy. Lillian took the long way around and sat on the stool next to him. He glanced at her and went back to his copy of
Newsweek
opened in front of him, more interested in the headlines about dead Al Qaeda members found a world away than the dead body in their own back yard.

Without looking up at her and without waiting for her question, Walter Hobbs shook his head and mumbled, “Why the hell couldn’t he have stayed away and left that fucking quarry alone?”