Killer Weekend (18 page)

   "It's a situation that requires discretion on all our parts," Parker said.

   "I'm afraid it's very late, and I'm very tired and I don't understand." Trevalian evaluated his chances of breaking the guy's neck without any noise. Not great.

   Parker climbed another step.

   Trevalian extended his hand to stop the man. "I don't like tight spaces," he explained. He could knee the man in the face from this position.

   Parker lowered his voice. "There's been an incident with one of our staff. A Ms. Cunningham." He answered Trevalian's blank expression. "Lilly Cunningham. Our lounge singer in the Duchin Lounge. I believe you met Lilly."

   He said nothing, wondering if he'd been set up. She'd managed to get into his room; she'd drunk his booze. An extortion racket?

   "There's been an assault. All I need is five minutes. Really. I'd rather not do this in a stairwell."

   "Do what?"

   "Lilly remembered your room number. That's how I got your name."

   Trevalian said nothing.

   "She said you got a look at the man," Parker explained. "A possible suspect. These can be tricky cases to prove. He-said, she-said."

   "A matter for the authorities," Trevalian said. "Please leave me out of it."

   "She's not pressing charges. The police are not involved. But if we can confirm the man's identity, he will never set foot on company property again."

   Trevalian doubted the explanation. "I saw her with a man. But I'm afraid I didn't get a good look at him."

   Parker's face fell. "Anything about him would help. We'd like to get rid of this guy."

   Trevalian spoke, bringing the man into his confidence. "Let me put it this way: If you saw Lilly and some guy in the hallway, who would you be looking at?"

   "Yeah . . . I hear you."

   "I'm sorry," Trevalian said, "but that's how it was."

   The man appeared crushed. "Listen, you remember anything, give me a call. The front desk can find me."

   "My apologies to Ms. Cunningham."

   "The difference is," Parker said, more determined than ever, "you can choose not to be involved. But Lilly's going to climb back up on that stage with that creep out there looking at her."

   "I'll sleep on it," Trevalian said. He rounded the landing and hurried up the stairs, thinking there was precious little time for sleep.

   His mind had briefly been elsewhere—a mistake he rarely made. He had a switch to make, and, if possible, he wanted to do it now, while it was still dark out.

C
ivil twilight was listed as 5:41 a.m., a naval term referring to the first glimpse of a defined horizon. Trevalian didn't want the horizon or himself defined or glimpsed as he made the switch, and so two hours after being stopped by the hotel security man, and an hour before civil twilight, he made his way out of a ground-floor exit as Rafe Nagler. Toey, the German shepherd service dog, pulled at the harness at his side.

   The first of these switches was changing Nagler to Meisner, for a blind man could not be seen climbing behind the wheel of a car. At 5 a.m. the Sun Valley grounds stood deserted, nothing but faux gas lamps and vacant sidewalks. He followed sidewalks from the lodge to the indoor ice rink and a dark open-ended shed that contained a backup Zamboni. He used the shed as a changing room, stripping off and pocketing Nagler's facial hair, wig, and glasses. He dumped the sport coat there—the only evidence he would leave behind for the next hour—revealing the black fleece vest that had been hiding beneath it. He quickly clipped a leash to Toey's collar and unfastened the harness, concealing it up his back, inside the fleece vest. He let the string leash play out, to where Toey had a twenty-foot lead, and the two made their way out into the giant parking lot that serviced the resort.

   He appreciated the black-hole quality of both sky and air as he drove north from the resort into national forest. He kept a close eye on the odometer as well as the rearview mirror. He turned east onto a dirt track marked for Pioneer Cabin, and put a half mile between him and the asphalt he left behind, having never seen the twinkle of another set of headlights.

   The darkest hour really was just before the dawn. He doublechecked the car's ceiling light making sure it wouldn't turn on as he opened the door. He stepped outside. The cold mountain air stung his lungs and he coughed, immediately trying to stifle the sound.

   He leaned back into the car facing two dogs—both shepherds. Toey remained in the front seat, where he'd put her, the leash still attached to her collar. Callie lay down on the backseat, nothing but a long black shape.

   He shut his door, came around the car, and opened the passenger door. Callie jumped to all fours and stuck her nose from behind the front seat. Toey bent around to meet noses. Trevalian yanked on the leash and pulled Toey from the car. He double-checked that the small flashlight worked, and then, returning it to his pocket, he led Toey off into the dense forest of Douglas fir and lodgepole pine. A hundred and fifty yards later he knelt and fed her some cheese-flavored chowder crackers from the minibar. He lavished her with praise and softly thanked her for being a good dog. Then he unclasped the leash, commanded her to stay, and walked away.

   Twice he turned back and used the flashlight to ensure she was holding the command, her eyes a hollow luminescence in the dark. But in the short time they'd been together he'd learned that Toey was a particularly kind and obedient dog. She wasn't going anywhere.

   His original plan had been to cut her throat and bury her out here,

miles from any possibility of being found. But now he walked away, then ran, knowing she would obey his command and "stay" for probably ten or fifteen minutes or more.

   He reached the car, fastened the guide harness to Callie, and moved her into the front seat.

   The switch was made. And with it, he'd cleared the last of his obstacles.

W
alt awakened in his daughter Emily's bed to the ringing of the phone in his own bedroom. For the second night he'd avoided that mattress.

   He dragged himself out of the stupor of two hours' sleep, managing to answer the kitchen phone before voice mail picked up.

   "It's Kathy. I'm sorry to call you at home, Walt." Dispatch. Walt pulled himself into focus. "I tried both your cell and pager first."

   "Go ahead." He rubbed his face to clear his thought. It didn't work.

   "Stuart Holms called at five fifty-six a.m."

   Walt checked the kitchen clock: seven minutes had passed. "Go on." Maybe he wouldn't need the coffee. Just mention of that name had jolted him awake.

   "He was a little abusive, sir. Bossy. I told him nine-one-one took the emergency calls. He told me to go to hell."

   Walt knew Stuart Holms by reputation. This didn't surprise him. "What emergency?"

   "He wouldn't tell me. That's what I'm saying. Demanded to speak with you personally."

   An alarm sounded in Walt's head: He didn't know Stuart Holms personally.

"He sounded upset," she went on.

   Fifteen minutes later, Walt was refueling the Cherokee, wearing a fresh, starched blue uniform shirt and sipping hot coffee from a travel mug. He called the number Stuart Holms had left with dispatch, but had only reached an assistant who said Holms needed to speak with Walt "as soon as was humanly possible."

   Yet it was Holms himself who met Walt at the front door to the colossal modern home out the Lake Creek drainage. Nestled at the base of the mountains, it felt to Walt like a museum of contemporary art. Holms led him to a café table with a view of an enclosed garden through a wall of floor-to-ceiling windows. They were waited on by a slim woman in her thirties who had a French accent. Stuart Holms ordered Walt a sausage omelet, toasted bagel with cream cheese, coffee, and orange juice. He took smoked salmon, capers, and guava juice for himself.

   Dressed in blue pajamas, Holms wore a terrycloth bathrobe and sheepskin moccasins. He looked younger than Walt had imagined him. His name had been in the business pages for decades.

   He focused intently on Walt and spoke in a croaking voice that needed more coffee.

   "I apologize for the secrecy, Sheriff, but there's no such thing as privacy, and I need to keep this private. I called you because this home is in the county, not the city, and I've had it on good authority that you're a hell of a lot more trustworthy than the Ketchum police chief."

   "I don't know about that. What's the nature of your complaint?"

   "Not exactly a complaint. More like a report. It's Allie—Ailia—my wife. She failed to come home last night." He looked to Walt for some kind of reaction. "This is entirely out of character, and I'm worried. If I raise the alarm it'll be over the wire services before I've had my morning swim. With Patrick's conference and all . . . No need to spoil his party."

   "A guy like you? You've got your own people," Walt said.

"You want my people to handle it, they can, I suppose," Holms said.

"Does she carry a cell phone?" Walt asked.

   "Last I saw her, she'd gone for a run. This was a little after five, yesterday evening. She missed the luau."

   "You've tried her cell phone?"

   "I called it, only to hear it ring down the hall. It's on her dresser. Damn awful feeling, that is."

   "Five p.m. yesterday," Walt stated. "How 'bout the staff?"

   "Did she sleep somewhere else? That's what you're asking, isn't it?
With someone
else? You think she's going to slip back into her room and come out yawning as if she overslept? I don't think so."

   The food arrived.

   Walt took down the particulars as he ate. Stuart had expected to see her at the C
³
luau. He'd left word with the staff that she was to call him the moment she returned home. Upset with her, he'd headed home, had taken a sleeping pill, and awakened at 5 a.m. to find her room still empty.

   Walt polished off the omelet. He thought of his own wife—nearly mentioned it.

   "Fabulous omelet," Walt said.

   "That's Raphael, my chef."

   "An artist."

   "I'll tell him. He'll be pleased."

   "We usually give it some time before investigating reports of missing persons, but we can act on this if you like. My question is: What kind of press can you tolerate? If we take this, it'll mean some phone calls, questions being asked. It's going to be pretty clear, pretty quickly, what's going on. I wish I could change that, but it's going to get out."

   "I want her found." He didn't touch his own plate—an artful display of smoked salmon and a bagel.

   Walt ran through what his deputies referred to as her 411. "She drives a pale green Volvo SC-90," Holms told him. Then he reached into his robe's pocket and passed a five-by-four card across the table. It included the vehicle's registration number, her age, weight, and the clothes she'd last been seen in—a gray, zippered shell, a white jogging top, and blue shorts. A recent photo had been digitally printed in the lower corner.

   "I have very competent staff."

   "What about your own detail?" Walt asked again.

   "We use a company for overseas travel. Yes. New York. Washington. L.A. But not up here. Raphael goes with us everywhere. A few assistants. That's all."

   Walt studied the photo, remembering where he'd last seen this same woman: on the balcony with Danny Cutter at his brother's cocktail party.

   "Yes, there's an age gap, if that's what you're thinking," Holms said. "But I'm only sixty. And a young sixty at that. She's beautiful, and outgoing, and a wonderful conversationalist who likes to talk. Find her, Sheriff."

   "Her favorite places to run?"

   "The bike path. Adam's Gulch. Hulen Meadows. Lake Creek. Over the saddle and into Elkhorn. She varies it."

   Walt wrote these down on the back of the same card.

   "It's a lot of ground," Walt said.

   "That's why you're involved."

   "We'll get started," Walt said. "And we'll keep it under the radar as much as possible."

   "If you start asking around, Danny Cutter's name is going to come up. That's not news to me, and it's behind us. Just so you know."

   "Okay," Walt said, though his voice belied him.

   "Ailia and Danny are to be
partners
in a company I'm helping him finance. Those fences are mended."

   Walt faintly nodded, wondering why, if they were mended, Holms felt obligated to mention them.

A
n hour past a sunrise lost to an overcast sky, the rain began. The dirt road out Adam's Gulch, where the pavement ended, had turned to pale brown slop. Low, swirling clouds concealed the tops of trees up on the crests of the surrounding mountains. The sky fluctuated between a light mist and a steady drizzle. Mountain weather.

   Walt donned a tan, oilskin greatcoat bundled in the back of the Cherokee along with climbing gear, snowshoes, and two backpacks capable of keeping him in the woods overnight—one for summer, one for winter. He offered Brandon a poncho, but his deputy refused the offer, content to play the he-man, macho outdoorsy thing to the limit, even if it meant a head cold. The parking lot bustled with law enforcement and Search and Rescue personnel. Nothing like a missing rich woman to get the adrenaline running. A ribbon of Day-Glo tape was lifted, admitting two pickup trucks, both carrying dog kennels in their beds.

   Alone, to the right of the Porta Potti and the trailhead sign, a pale green Volvo, its engine cold, was parked over dry dirt. It could have been there an hour or overnight. But it belonged to Ailia Holms and was empty.