Fifth Son (32 page)

“Good guess,” Sullivan said.

“What's up?”

“Green wanted some answers on this mystery print he's got. Tell him it's still a mystery. The old man's a no match, and damn near had another stroke when I showed up to print him.”

“We owe ya, Lou. Any other news back there?”

“The place is humming. Biggest excitement we've had all year. The brass is crawling all over the case. Our bigwigs talking to the
OPP
bigwigs. Tell Green he's going to have to check in before his new boss puts his balls in her sights.”

Sullivan chuckled. “I'd like to be around for that one. Any news from the dig?”

“Yeah, Cunningham called, so excited he forgot to be pissed. The bone guy says it's definitely a human skull, probably a large male. Looks like it was cracked open, maybe with that axe. They're going to try to test the axe for blood, which would be the icing on the cake.”

After Sullivan disconnected, he took the opportunity to phone his staff sergeant. Green let the discussion wash over him unheard as he mulled over the latest developments. The damn fingerprint didn't fit anywhere! But it had to mean something. Someone else had been present at the murder scene that day. Not Tom, not Lawrence, not Norman. That person had touched the note with Derek's blood on their hands. Yet the note had been stuffed in Lawrence's tin can and buried under the planking in the corner of the shed, while Lawrence had ended up with Derek's crucifix around his neck. Furthermore, Robbie had seen only Tom and Lawrence, glimpsed Tom chasing Lawrence in order to kill him. That memory had been abruptly broken by the arrival of a car down the lane. Who? Almost certainly one or both parents, who would have therefore witnessed the same scene Robbie did. And drawn whatever conclusions Tom had pointed them towards.

In his letter to Benji, Tom described having to “catch the fucking maniac” and lock him up. What if that was the truth? Green could think of only one way that all these disparate pieces of the story fit together. Someone had met Derek in the shed earlier, killed him and left the body. Lawrence had either witnessed the killing or stumbled upon the body afterwards, along with the fragment of the note. Following his own peculiar logic, Lawrence had put the note in his can with his other articles of sin, and buried it in its usual spot. Perhaps he had even stayed with the body, and at some later point Tom found his brother bludgeoned to death, Lawrence covered in blood, and jumped to the horrified conclusion that Lawrence had killed him. A conclusion which seemed all too credible to the rest of the family, who had watched Lawrence's descent into madness.

In his rage, Tom had attacked Lawrence and was probably prevented from strangling him only by the arrival of the parents in the car. That even explained the so-called suicide marks found on Lawrence's throat when he was admitted to St. Lawrence. The family's cover-up was thorough indeed!

The scenario was impeccable. There was only one major missing link; the identity of the actual killer. Green approached his dawning answer carefully, examining it from all angles. Reverend Taylor claimed Derek was distraught after the fight with his father and decided his new love affair could not work out. Sophia had implied much the same thing. According to both, Derek had been planning to give up and leave his lover behind. The note about the bus seemed to imply otherwise, but it was only a fragment. What if he, Green, had been reading it backwards all along? What if the note was not from Derek, but to Derek, telling him to meet him at three p.m. at “our place”.

The shed. Green held his breath as he considered the beauty of the idea. The logistics of how the notes were passed remained a question mark, but not an insurmountable one. Perhaps they had a secret mail drop on the path between their two houses, by which they could arrange their trysts. Sandy, defying Derek's order to stay home, or perhaps unaware he was about to be dumped, left the note to meet Derek in their special place. Once there, Derek told him it was over and Sandy flew into a rage, grabbed the first instrument he could lay his hands on and crashed it down onto Derek's skull. Then in a frantic effort to erase all traces of his presence, he seized the note which might still have been in Derek's hand, unknowingly tearing it as he pulled it free.

Pure speculation, with only the barest of bones to hang it on, but it fit all the facts! Now it was time to see if it could withstand the sober second thought of Brian Sullivan.

As they raced through the deepening dusk, past lakes and rocky outcrops and acres of skeletal trees, Green put his theory into words. Sullivan listened as he always did, quietly, intently and without interruption. At the end, his thoughtful expression had creased with worry.

“You're not objecting, Brian.”

“I was remembering. This morning when I took the warrant to Scott, first thing he did was call Sandy. Said what the hell did you get me into? Like it was Sandy's idea to cement over that shed.”

“Right! Because now that the house had passed to new owners, they were starting to dig things up!”

“Gives Sandy a motive for bumping off Lawrence too.” Sullivan was warming to the idea. “Lawrence might have witnessed the murder or seen him leaving. Sandy couldn't be sure he'd stay crazy enough not to say something. When Lawrence showed up back in town, Sandy must have been shitting bricks!”

All of a sudden the solution to one of the enduring puzzles leaped into focus. The church door! Not only could Sandy have spotted Lawrence and lured him to the church, but as a realtor he even had access to the key to open the door. Perhaps he had begun with a reassuring talk about their old days together, only to turn deadly when Lawrence showed his fear.

But Green's euphoria at his sudden insight died abruptly as the next question hit him. “But if Sandy's the killer, why is he going after Tom? Why put himself in the limelight and risk his connection to Derek being exposed?”

Even as he uttered the question, he felt his blood run cold. Kyle had seen something that afternoon in the woods, and Green, through sheer stupidity, had passed that information on to Jeb.

“Maybe he's not going after Tom,” he said. “It's Kyle.”

A
s
the two detectives pulled into the brand new
OPP
station in Madoc, night was already stealing into the shadows at the edge of the road. Two cruisers were parked out front and a couple of officers were talking by the front door, but there was no sign of the mobile command truck nor the specialty teams the incident commander had mentioned. Let's hope all the officers are out in the field, Green thought, covering every inch of dirt from here to Peterborough.

Sullivan must have seen the scowl on his face, for he shot him a warning glance. “Just remember we have no jurisdiction here, Green. We're here as a courtesy, but it's their show. Their call.”

“Their turf, but our suspect. Our victims. All I want is to be kept in the loop.” Green jerked open the cruiser door, but before he could even get out, one of the officers came down to greet him.

“You here on the abduction case?”

Green introduced himself and Sullivan. “Where the hell is everyone?”

“Over setting up Mobile Command, sir, near the location of the stolen vehicle. That's where the search is starting from.”

Green's annoyance flared further, but he held his tongue and snatched the map from Sullivan. “Show me,” he said, spreading the map on the hood. In the dimming light, the officer traced a route deep into the back country north of Highway 7. The map showed little but lakes and bush. It's going to be a long night, Green thought with a sinking feeling.

“Any sighting of the red Dodge Ram?” he asked.

“No, sir. So far he hasn't been spotted on the 401 or the 7, but he should be pulling in here any moment. We've been instructed to detain him, to keep him out of the way.”

“Whatever you do, hang onto him. Don't let the guy anywhere near the search, he may be implicated.” Green folded up the map and circled the cruiser to yank open the passenger door. He signalled Sullivan out with a jerk of his head. “This time you drive, and I'll navigate.”

Using the map light in the cruiser, Green guided them through a series of obscure turns in the deepening twilight until distant pinpoints of red and white light lit up the trees ahead. As the detectives drew closer, the massive mobile command truck became visible on a grassy knoll beside the road, surrounded by half a dozen cruisers,
SUV
s and pick-up trucks, all sporting official
OPP
insignia.

Sullivan pulled onto the grass next to a pick-up, and both men climbed out. The wind had died down, but darkness had already chilled the air. Green took a deep breath, smelled the crispness of cedar and the faint decay of fallen leaves. The mobile command post was a fifth wheel trailer positioned at the highest point of the knoll, probably to facilitate communications in this remote, rocky terrain, Green surmised. No one was outside, but the murmur of voices emanated from within.

As Green and Sullivan approached, the side door opened and a slim, impossibly fit-looking man emerged. He had a brush cut, pencil-thin mustache and shoulders so square Green expected him to click his heels and salute. The man instinctively headed towards Sullivan with his hand outstretched.

“Inspector Green? I'm Mark Riordan.”

Green bristled. “I'm Green. Any sign of them?”

The man didn't miss a beat, pivoting smoothly to give Green's hand a sharp tug. “Not yet. Come on inside, and I'll bring you up to speed.”

Inside the trailer, Green's attention was immediately drawn to a brightly lit table in the centre of the room, on which lay a huge topographical map. More maps and white boards covered most of the walls, and the other tables were cluttered with technical equipment. An officer in a dark windbreaker was hunched over a phone at the front of the trailer, and several others milled about in the cramped space, checking equipment and jotting notes. Radio chatter crackled in the background, providing status reports.

Green headed over to the map on the table. A plastic overlay was marked with indecipherable lines and squiggles. “Where are we?” he asked.

Riordan circled his long, calloused finger to encompass the entire surface. “This map details the immediate area within a twenty mile radius. The maps on the wall are to a smaller scale and show all the roads and navigable paths between here and Peterborough.” He tapped a spot marked in red. “Mobile Command.” He drew his finger along the road to another mark nearby. “The suspect's truck was located here, about five hundred metres further up this road. Canine unit started at the truck a little over an hour ago, picked up a trail heading north towards this lake area.”

“But he's had a hell of a head start,” Green said. “Probably twenty-four hours.”

Riordan inclined his head and spun on his heel towards a map on the wall. “Based on your man being on foot and being encumbered by a child who may not be able to travel very fast—”

Green thought of the muscles rippling across Kyle's chest. “He's a well-developed teenager who can probably outrun all of us.”

Riordan barely registered a reaction. “By our calculations, on a path or road they could have covered thirty K by now, so we've set up patrol units on each of the roads at that perimeter.” He pointed to some faint lines on the map. “Old logging roads and rail lines. We've got our
ERT
people on
ATV
s checking the outlying parts for signs of activity.” His finger hovered over a tract of land unscarred by either road or trail. “If they're bushwhacking—and preliminary indications are that's the case—then the dog's our best bet.”

“One dog?” Green said incredulously. Beside him, he felt Sullivan fidget uneasily, but all Green could picture was one dog against this vast acreage of bush.

Riordan stiffened almost imperceptibly. “Plus an experienced search team. There are four Emergency Response Team members out on foot with the dog, providing back-up.”

“What about helicopters? Boats on the lakes?”

“That's the next step if it comes to that. But a careful grid search from the last known position is still the best approach.” One of the officers approached to draw Riordan aside. “That was Spencer, sir. K-9 lost the trail near a stream. The dog's going in circles.”

A scowl rippled across Riordan's tight control. “Your fella must've done something to throw the dog off. Does he know dogs? “

“He probably hunted with them as a kid,” Sullivan said. Green suspected the wily Tom had learned a lot of other tricks during his misspent youth, and whatever gaps remained had been easily filled during his jail stints. Trust Tom to spoil this man's perfect search plan.

“Well, the dog's good,” Riordan said as if reading his mind. “She might figure it out yet.”

“It's practically dark, though,” Green said.

“Not a problem. The weather's clear, and our
ERT
teams have good gear. My information is your suspect is not armed?”

“Not likely,” Sullivan said. More officers wandered in to study the map. Sullivan glanced around the room. “Anything we can do?”

Pointedly Riordan's gaze took in their city suits and a faint smile twitched across his military features. “You'd be most help finding out everything you can about our suspect—his knowledge of the terrain, any contacts in the area, his survival skills, his habits—and feeding it to Detective Logan over there.” He nodded to the plain clothes officer on the phone. “We've already got your Detective Peters out with one of the patrol units.”

A chuckle ran through the knot of officers jotting notes on the white board nearby. Green didn't even want to speculate what the chuckle meant. His gaze was drawn again to the topographical map on the table. To the endless acres of uninhabited wilderness and the tiny back lane on which the truck had been found. It didn't make any sense! It was miles from anywhere.