Dead Right (12 page)

Sweat trickled through his hair, rol ing from his temples.

He must’ve made some noise because John suddenly looked at him a little more closely. “Somethin’ wrong, Ray?”

Ray staggered to his feet and dragged some money from his pocket. “I’m n-not feeling wel . M-must be the flu,”

he said. Then he dropped several bil s onto the bar—how many, he had no idea—and stumbled out.

The instrument panel lit Madeline’s right side in glowing amber. “What?” she cried.

Hunter stared straight ahead, into the darkness. “You heard me. Take me back.”

“You can’t be serious!”

“What did you expect?” he countered. “That I’d be happy to hear what you just told me?”

“I thought you were going to make every attempt to solve my father’s murder! That’s what you said!”

He focused on her. “That was before I knew there’d be children involved.”

She snapped off the radio. “If you care so much about children, why not do what you can to protect them? There could be a sexual predator on the loose.”

“There are a lot, believe me.”

“And they have to be stopped one by one.”

She had him there.

“If the good guys refuse to fight, the bad guys win, don’t they?” she went on.

But he wasn’t a good guy. He’d proven that with Selena.

And now he had a daughter he couldn’t protect from the men who came and went in Antoinette’s life. Although she’d been safe so far, there was no tel ing who her mother might hook up with next. It worried him constantly.

This case could hit too close to home. He was looking for ways to anesthetize himself against reality, not take a cold plunge into the worst of it. “I’m not real y in a position to do this.”

“You came al this way. Do you have a case that needs you more?”

He couldn’t say he did. Actual y, he was getting tired of the emptiness with which he purposeful y surrounded himself. If he didn’t embrace a more meaningful cause soon, when would he? After working another twenty, thirty, forty “he’s cheating on me” cases? He wasn’t the only one who’d been involved in a bad marriage and paid a heavy price for his mistakes. But it wasn’t just Antoinette’s venom.

It was the regret he felt about his own culpability. He wasn’t worthy of more than he had.

“Are you going to answer me?” she pressed.

He rubbed his temples. Should he turn and run? Or stand and fight? “Were they al the same size?” he asked at length.

“No.”

“Have they figured out who the underwear belonged to?”

“Only one pair.”

“And?”

“They belonged to Grace.”

Adrenaline shot through him. The answers to this case seemed to be very close to Madeline. “Your
stepsister?
”

“Yes.”

“How do you know?”

“I recognized them, and she identified them.”

“Grace is an adult now,” he said. “She can tel us what happened.”

Madeline didn’t answer immediately.

“What?” he said.

“She says nothing happened, that she was never molested or abused.”

That was more than a little surprising. “But, except for the rope, the items in that bag sound like souvenirs.”

“She doesn’t know how her underwear came to be in that suitcase. She says they must’ve been stolen while they were hanging on the line to dry.”

“Seeing them didn’t upset her?”

Madeline appeared to be choosing her words careful y.

“She acted a bit strange, but she’s always been…difficult to read. According to her, they’re not necessarily indicative of a crime. She said that whoever col ected those things could’ve been fantasizing. She was an assistant district attorney, so she knows about stuff like that.”

“I don’t buy it.” Hunter didn’t care what Grace had done for a living, he didn’t believe her fantasy theory.

“Why not?”

“Think about it. That suitcase wasn’t in a closet or under a bed, where someone could sit in complete privacy and fondle and fantasize. It was in a car. Plus the underwear was of varying sizes, which suggests they came from more than one source. Whoever hid those items in the trunk was an active predator. I’d put money on it.” He could tel Madeline thought so, too, or she wouldn’t have pul ed off the road to tel him this. “Was there anything on them?” he asked.

She looked confused. “You mean a pattern or decoration?”

“I mean blood or semen.”

“We haven’t heard,” she said, making no effort to hide her distaste. “Toby sent them to the state lab only a few days ago. He said it could take a while, possibly months.”

“Who’s Toby?”

“Pontiff. Stil water’s chief of police.”

Hunter hated to ask this next question, but he had to. “Is there any chance those things could’ve belonged to your father?”

Her eyes widened in righteous indignation. “Of course not!”

“Then where’d they come from?”

“From the man who kil ed him! Chief Pontiff and I are speculating that whoever was carrying around that suitcase confessed to my father, and my father was going to turn him in.”

“A hush murder.”

“If that’s what you want to cal it.”

Someone
had gained control of the pastor’s car. That person might’ve taken advantage of the opportunity to dispose of incriminating evidence. But sacrificing the underwear didn’t seem consistent with the kind of man who’d keep souvenirs like that to begin with.

Unless the perpetrator feared someone else was on to him….

“Maybe,” he said.

“I should tel you the police also found some black hairs caught in the driver’s seat,” she said grudgingly.

“Are they getting a DNA sample from them, as wel ?”

“No. Maybe they’l do that later, but there doesn’t seem to be much point right now. They look like Clay’s and probably are. Like the rest of us, he was in and out of that car.”

“Could that suitcase have belonged to Clay?”

“No. My stepbrother would never hurt a child.”

Hunter would form his own opinion on that once he’d met Clay. “What was your father and Irene’s sex life like?” he asked.

The change of subject seemed to take her off guard.

She blanched as if her mind had just presented her with a picture she’d rather not see. “They seemed…normal. What was
your
parents’ sex life like?”

He refused to apologize for her discomfort. “I have to ask difficult questions,” he said. “If you want to find the truth, there’l be a lot more of them.”

“Does that mean you’re taking the assignment?” She raised her chin. “Or is my father’s case more than you can handle?”

She was chal enging him. Obviously, she thought that would make a difference.

He’d played it safe for so long, Hunter felt like he was standing on the edge of a precipice, about to jump. By accepting this job, he was leaving the relative comfort of his own demons and surrounding himself with hers. But the possibility that there might stil be little girls victimized by the owner of that suitcase made it impossible to walk away.

Most pedophiles didn’t stop until they were forced to.

“I’l do it,” he said. “But if we’re going to Stil water, I’m driving.”

She stared at him. “What?”

“When’s the last time you had a good night’s sleep?”

“I’m okay.”

She started the car, but he covered her hand when she reached for the stick shift. “I’m taking over, or we’re turning around.”

“You don’t know the area.”

“You can give me directions.”

He expected her to continue arguing. After al , they’d only met a couple hours ago and here he was demanding to take the wheel. But she must’ve been even more tired than he’d guessed because she nodded and opened her door.

“In another twenty miles or so, take 70 West. Turn off at 45 South and stay there for about forty miles. Then take 72

East and wake me when you get to 365. I’l help you through the rest of it.”

“Wil do,” he said and they traded seats.

Ten minutes later, she was leaning against the door, fast asleep, and he was trying to convince himself that he didn’t real y find her al that attractive.

To Hunter, Mississippi had always conjured up images of pre-Civil War plantations, moss dripping from the branches of magnolia trees, the river meandering lazily through cattails and marshes. But he was in the northeast of the state near Tennessee and Alabama, hil country, and it didn’t look anything like he’d imagined. Here, he saw oaks and maples and a variety of pine trees lining the road.

“Are we there yet?” Madeline murmured, rousing as he came to a crossroad with a single stop sign.

“We just passed a place cal ed Corinth. You might want to make sure I haven’t missed 365.”

She pushed her thick auburn hair away from her face as she sat up and peered out the window. “Keep going, 365 is another few miles.”

As Hunter gave the Corol a more gas, they passed yet another church. How many could one fairly un-populated area support? Granted, the churches were al smal , mostly one-room wooden structures with high-pitched roofs and usual y a steeple, but he’d noticed several in the past ten minutes alone—Signs of Life, New Salem, Poplar Springs Free Wil , Southwood, Shady Grove, North Crossroads Community and the Pleasant Grove Church of Christ.

“What was the name of your father’s church?” he asked.

She covered a yawn. “Purity Church of Christ.”

“Named after you, huh?”

“I’m going to regret tel ing you my sexual history,” she muttered. “I can tel .”

“Why? I’m impressed.”

She eyed him warily. “You sound like it.”

“I am!”

“How old were you when you lost your virginity?”

“Younger than thirty-two.”

“By a decade?”

“Younger.”

“Nineteen?”

“Eighteen.”

“That’s not
too
bad. For a Californian.”

He chuckled. “I’l bet you’ve had more experience than I have in the last five years.”

“Why? Have you been thinking of entering the priesthood?”

No, he’d been stuck in a marriage with a woman he’d come to loathe. “I’m not religious. My parents shoved it down my throat when I was young. I haven’t recovered yet.”

“My father would’ve been able to convert you,” she said confidently. “You should’ve heard him preach.”

Hunter wasn’t convinced, but he didn’t say so. “Who took over his congregation when he went missing?”

“Reverend Portenski.”

“Was it a position Portenski particularly coveted?”

“He didn’t even live here when my father disappeared.

“He didn’t even live here when my father disappeared.

He heard about the opening and came to inquire several weeks afterward.”

Portenski didn’t seem to have much of a motive for murder, but Hunter wasn’t crossing anyone off the list just yet.

“Turn right here,” she said.

Hunter did as she told him. “Have you ever done any traveling?”

“No.”

“You’ve never left the South?”

“Not even for col ege. I went to Mississippi State, which is only about three hours from here, and graduated with a degree in journalism. Now I own the only newspaper in town.”

“Then you’ve done wel .”

She gave him a sheepish grin. “It’s not as prestigious as it sounds.
The Stillwater Independent
comes out once a week, and I’m usual y the major contributing journalist, depending on what I pul from the bigger papers, of course.”

She rested her head on the back of her seat and watched him from beneath her eyelashes. “What about you?”

“I went to San Diego State. But surfing came between me and a degree.”

“I knew it!”

Laughing, he held up one hand. “Just kidding. Actual y, I had a 4.0 al the time I was in school.”

Her eyes narrowed. “No, you didn’t.”

He merely smiled.

“You probably surfed for as long as you could get away with it, then went into the police academy when you realized you had to grow up.”

He’d been tel ing the truth about his grades, but he didn’t bother trying to convince her. It didn’t matter if she believed he’d been a slacker. But the fact that she knew anything about his background surprised him. “Who told you I used to be a cop?”

“Grace did some research.”

“Investigating the investigator, eh?”

“I guess you could say that.”

“Smart. What else do you know about me?”

“That you’re good.”

He grinned, unable to resist the opportunity to tease her.

“I told you that on the phone.”

“You were talking about sex.”

“Some men are good at more than one thing.”

“I thought you were too jaded to be attracted to me.”

“No, I’m too jaded to act on the attraction.”

Despite what he’d said, the sudden silence was charged with sexual awareness. “Ours is a professional relationship,” he added. But the statement sounded a little forced, and she immediately cal ed him on it.

“Who are you trying to remind? Me—or yourself?”

He felt his mood darken. “You’re not making this any easier.”

“I’m not doing anything,” she said innocently.

“Just tel me how to get to your house.”

“Make a right at the stoplight. After about two miles you’l find a country road that goes over a hil and dead-ends at a smal brick cottage with ivy on one side.”

“That sounds like ‘over the river and through the woods.’

You can’t be more specific?”

“Don’t worry. You won’t miss it. It’s the only house on the street.”

“And this
small
cottage has guest quarters?” This suddenly became a very salient point.

“It’s actual y a detached garage that I converted into a guestroom. Very cute.”

“Wil I have my own shower?”

“Yes, but no kitchen.”

“Not a problem. I wasn’t planning on cooking.”

“I suppose that’s my job?”

“We could always go out,” he said with a meaningful grin. “I happen to have an expense account.”

She grimaced. “Right. I’l cook.”

8

T
he guest cottage was similar to the main house, which reminded Hunter of an old Italian farmhouse—the kind often depicted in movies—except that it had only one room with a smal bathroom.

“It’s a little stuffy in here after being shut up for so long because of the rain,” Madeline said. She lit a vanil a-scented candle as she showed Hunter around, but as far as he was concerned, the place had smel ed great from the beginning, like fresh linens and a trace of Madeline’s perfume.