Bullet Beach (27 page)

‘Why are you here, Channarong?'

Channarong smiled, put his hands together in that prayerful way, and left.

TWENTY-SEVEN

As was often the case, Cross acted in opposition to the little voice inside him that said, ‘Don't do this.' The little voice also called Cross ‘stupid' and deserving of the horrible things that would happen to him.

He drove to Woodruff Place, Center Drive. He believed that Sarah Taupin would go there, not to Fishers to be with her father and certainly not to the lake. He believed that she, at least intuitively, knew her father was capable of cold and calculating acts to get what he wanted. With her mother gone, he believed she would be more comfortable on her own.

Standing on the porch, looking through the screen door, and seeing her packing boxes, he realized he was not completely right, merely right enough. She was there, but she had no plans to stay.

He knocked lightly on the wood frame of the door. It rattled a bit. She jumped. She had been lost in her own thoughts and she looked toward the doorway as if she expected a tiger.

Sarah flicked on the porch light. She didn't recognize Cross.

‘Yes?'

‘My name is Cross. I'm a private investigator.'

She may not have recognized his face, but she did his name. She froze.

‘I believe your life may be in danger.'

He had no more than uttered those words than he saw Raymond Taupin enter the living room from the hall. He held a cell phone to his ear.

‘Come away from the door,' he said to Sarah and then apparently interrupted by an operator, said, ‘Hello, yes, my name is Raymond Taupin.' After telling them that the man who murdered his wife was at the door, he provided the Woodruff Place address.

Cross wasn't sure, but he thought he saw a small, grim smile cross Taupin's poker face. It didn't matter.

‘Your father killed your mother,' Cross said.

Sarah didn't move.

‘Come away from the door,' Raymond said, flipping his cell phone shut. ‘The police will deal with him.'

‘I know you don't want to believe me, but I have a witness. And you, like your mother, are a detail that needs taken care of. You need the protection of the police.'

‘He's a lunatic, Sarah. Four bodies. Your mother, for Christ's sake. Come away from the door.' He moved toward her. ‘Shut the door and lock it now.'

‘Sarah, I'm not sure why your father killed them, but he did. I think you should come outside, get away from him. Please, for your own safety.'

Taupin reached what appeared to be a zombie Sarah. He shut the inner door without even glancing at the detective. Cross could hear the locks click into place. He moved to the three steps on the porch and sat facing the street, waiting. There were streetlamps on the broad grassy median that ran the length of Middle Drive. It was so quiet now. He shut his eyes and listened to the night, hoping to hear approaching sirens, but heard only the faint sound of traffic on Tenth Street, blocks away.

He pulled out his cell and punched in the number for Lieutenant Collins.

He knew full well that Taupin was capable of killing his daughter – and that he now had Cross's visit as cover. ‘Yes,' Taupin would say, ‘that man killed my entire family.'

Collins's rings ended with a voice telling him to leave a message.

‘Taupin is with his daughter. I have reason to believe he might kill her.'

There were sirens now. Getting louder.

A black Ford Victoria and several patrol cars pulled up. But Cross was deeply disappointed. It was Swann, not Collins who approached him, ordering the uniforms to get inside the house with whatever means necessary.

‘I thought this was Collins's case,' Cross said.

‘There's “was” and there's “is.”'

‘I see.'

Swann was unlike either Collins or Rafferty, but like most cops. His suit was just a little wrinkled and too tight, bought no doubt a few years earlier, before he put on the inevitable few pounds a decade. His tie had been pulled away from his neck and the top button of his shirt was no longer buttoned. However lax about his dress, Swann was wound pretty tight by the rules. Cross would have bet his life that Swann had never taken a bribe, never looked the other way. He was by the book and in that way also contrasted both Collins and Rafferty. That it was Swann who responded was an indication that Saddler's long leash had been replaced with a short chain and a choker ordered from higher up.

‘What are you doing here?' Swann asked, one foot on the second step.

‘I came to warn Sarah that her life was in danger.'

He shook his head, looked at the sky. Not getting an answer from above he leaned down, putting his face inches from Cross's. ‘You are accused of killing his wife, his son-in-law, two of his staffers and an unknown woman . . .'

‘The maid from the lake house. A Colombian woman.'

‘You're coming in,' he said, but his train of thought was hijacked by the discussions inside the house.

Cross used the moment to call Kowalski.

‘Going downtown,' Cross said.

‘You know,' Kowalski said, ‘we don't have an uptown, do we? Some places have an uptown as well as a downtown.'

‘Swann seems to be in charge.'

‘Shit,' Kowalski said.

‘Haven't you given Saddler the tape?'

‘To her office, I did. I'm not sure she's had a chance to hear it.'

‘Can we move this along a little bit?'

‘I'll meet you downtown. What's going on at Woodruff Place?'

‘Taupin's here to protect his daughter.'

‘Dad of the year.'

This time there was no conference room. They were in an interrogation room – the size of a closet. Kowalski leaned back in the corner of the dingy little room. Swann's jacket was off and the tail of his white shirt had escaped from his waist. He either didn't notice or didn't care.

‘You say Taupin pulled all of this off,' he said, ‘but Taupin's passport indicates he was in Mexico City before, after and during the first two murders.'

‘He's the type to have it done,' Kowalski said.

‘Let Cross do the talking, OK.'

‘He's the type to have it done,' Cross said. ‘Lieutenant please, talk to your colleagues. We've got a recorded statement from Taupin's maid that says she saw me taped to the chair when Mrs Taupin was murdered.'

‘So you say. But your only witness is your attorney, remember? And now you've got some third-world, illegal immigrant testifying in Spanish about something you probably told her to say. Is that about right?' Swann didn't wait for an answer. ‘We have you with both sets of bodies and God knows what went on with Edelman. I count five deaths and you look good for all of them.'

‘So what's with Saddler and Collins?' Kowalski asked.

‘Yesterday's news,' Swann said. ‘Why don't you make it easier on all of us and just tell us what happened? What is it you've got against Taupin?'

‘Didn't even know who Taupin was until I was set up with the corpses.'

‘DA says it's you,' Swann said. ‘Arraignment tomorrow.'

‘News at eleven,' Kowalski said.

‘What?'

‘Play the tape on the news.'

‘I can get a gag order in three seconds,' said a skinny man in a dark suit, slipping in the door.

‘The DA himself,' Kowalski said.

‘Hi Kowalski.'

‘Hello professor.'

‘Cross here is trying to tell me that Raymond Taupin has guns for hire,' Swann said to the DA.

‘You've been watching too many movies, Cross,' the DA said.

‘And Mrs Taupin?' Cross asked.

‘At the lake. Have phone calls, the timing of which would not allow for Mrs Taupin to be in Indianapolis at the time of death.'

The knock on the door was a surprise. Collins walked in, all dressed for an evening out. With him was Sarah Taupin, looking like she wanted to crawl in a hole.

‘Getting kind of crowded in here,' Swann said. ‘What's going on?'

The door had yet to be closed and it wasn't until Lauren Saddler came in, looking like the cat who swallowed the canary.

‘This game is usually played in a phone booth or a Volkswagen,' Swann said. ‘What's going on?'

‘You want to tell them, Sarah?' Saddler asked. She glanced at Cross.

‘My mother shot my husband and Alejandra Perez.'

‘Why?' Swann asked.

‘It was inevitable. Marshall was very devoted to human rights and my mother thought only certain people had them. They fought over it many times. This time was too much. She slapped Alejandra. And Marshall said he was going to report her and that he'd see to it that she and my father would do time.'

‘She walked into the den and got her shotgun,' Sarah said.

‘Hers?' the DA asked.

‘Handed down from her father.'

‘Yes.' Sarah's voice was small, a little girl's. She was terrified.

‘You saw her shoot them?'

‘No, but I saw her march them out. It was night. She marched them down to the water.'

‘You didn't try to stop her?' Swann asked.

‘Smart lady,' Kowalski said. ‘She marches the two out into the lake, shoots them while they're waist deep in the water. No blood to clean up at the house. No splatter. Bodies are close to the plane and with the water helping out with gravity are easier to maneuver.'

‘Your mother is that cold?' Swann asked.

Sarah just looked at them. ‘You don't know them.' She shook her head as if trying to shake sense into it. ‘And I thought she was just going to send them away.'

‘Why did you come forward now?' the DA asked.

‘When Mr Cross came to my door tonight and I saw him and I knew he was going to be punished for it. And then when he said my father killed my mother, I had to think about that. I had to consider what would happen. It was too much. It was really too much. And I knew he did it. Why would this man,' she pointed to Cross, ‘kill my family? And what would happen to me if my father found out that I knew? And it was a matter of time before he would know that I knew.'

‘We have a call placed from your lake landline phone to a person who acknowledges she received a call from Mrs Taupin at that time.'

‘The plane,' Cross said.

‘Mrs Taupin has a pilot's license. It's her plane that's tied up on Lake Wawasee. She can bring the bodies down and return in a very short time,' Kowalski said.

‘You'll probably find a call from Raymond to Edelman that night.'

‘Why would Edelman play this game?' Swann asked.

‘Taupin held Edelman's paper. Edelman lost his wife already and Taupin could take his business any time he wanted,' Cross said. ‘Get a forensic accountant to look at his books. There's a safe behind the big fish. Poor Edelman probably did kill himself. He had nothing to live for.'

Swann threw up his hands.

The DA was conspicuous by his silence.

‘Why did Taupin kill his wife?'

‘She got him into this mess and that act would hang over Raymond for as long she was around to tell the story,' Cross said, looking at Sarah Taupin. ‘I'm sorry.'

She shrugged. ‘It's not much of a family.'

‘If Mrs Taupin went down as the murderer, he was done in the community,' Cross continued. ‘All his moral high handedness was a pose anyway, but it couldn't withstand this kind of scandal – murder, illegal immigrants, abuse. But if she were murdered then he'd have the sympathy of the community. He simply cleaned up all the details. Except for Carolina. And he would have killed her if he could have found her that day. If Kowalski hadn't come along, I'd be dead too, unable to tell tales, and blamed for all of the deaths. He'd be completely in the clear.'

‘Where is Taupin?' the DA asked.

‘Sitting out front, thinking everything is all right,' Collins said. Cross was glad Sarah could not see the lieutenant's grin.

‘Sarah needs protection,' Kowalski said.

‘Yes, we know,' Saddler said. ‘She'll remain here with Lieutenant Swann as we exit. Once we have Taupin in custody, Sarah will be released. Then it depends on the judge in the morning. Right?' She looked at the DA.

He nodded agreement before shaking his head in frustration. Unpleasant work remained in front of him.

‘Free to go?' Cross asked.

Saddler nodded. ‘Behave yourself.'

Cross and Kowalski exited the crowded little room and went out. A uniformed officer stood a few feet away from Raymond Taupin who sat in the guest chair at an empty desk.

‘You want to catch something to eat at the Slippery Noodle?' Kowalski asked Cross.

‘Good idea.' He stopped by Taupin and moved in front of the man. ‘Bring you back anything? Hamburger maybe.'

Taupin blinked a few times and glanced away. But, Cross thought, the man had to know that something had just gone terribly wrong. A reptile to the end.

The place was crowded. Serious drinkers in the front room, music lovers in a large back room, down the long hallway. Blues sounds found their way toward them, heavily filtered through the loud conversations and sounds of dining clatter.

Settled in, Kowalski took a deep breath. ‘You know, this whole fucking thing came about because Taupin was too cheap to pay a living wage to his help.'

‘I doubt if his connection to Colombia was just a couple of apparently expendable maids.'

‘Let's eat, drink and be merry,' Kowalski said.