Murder in the Smokies (12 page)

Ivy eyed his outstretched hand, her expression wary.

“Come on, Hawkins. Everybody can handle a slow dance. Even a clumsy little mountain girl like you.”

Her eyes narrowed with mock outrage. “Oh, now you’ve asked for it.” She took his hand and let him pull her to her feet, moving willingly into the circle of his arms. She lifted her chin, her dark eyes flashing a challenge he wanted more than anything to meet.

She had a natural feel for the music, her body catching the rhythm and making it part of her. And damn, she felt good in his arms. He wondered what would have happened if he’d stuck around all those years ago instead of leaving. When she was seventeen and he was twenty, would he have taken her to her high school prom?

Would they have been married with babies by the time they reached their thirties?

But he’d left. And those were questions that would never get answered now. Still, there were some questions she could answer for him, at least. Answers about the years of her life he’d missed because he’d left Bitterwood behind.

“Who took you to your prom?” he asked, bending closer to whisper in her ear, trying to remember some of the kids her age in town. “Tommy Adler, maybe? I know, Josh Belholland. He was always sniffing around you back in the day—”

“Who said I went to the prom?”

“The boys ’round here are idiots, then.” She felt warm and soft pressed against him, moving in gentle sways to the music. He felt his hand creeping downward, toward her backside, and almost let it reach its goal before stopping right at the curve of her waist. She was in his arms, one hand moving in light, shiver-inducing circles across his lower back. He’d be an idiot himself to do anything to change that situation.

“Maybe if you’d stuck around Bitterwood, you could’ve asked me.” She said it lightly, as if making a joke, but there was a serious undertone to her voice.

“I was just thinking about that myself,” he said, infusing his words with a smile. “I’d have been a little old for you at the time, maybe, but as we got older, it wouldn’t have mattered.”

She shook her head. “I’m not sure you’d have looked at me any differently when I was seventeen and you were twenty. Our relationship was never like that.”

“By that time, your mama pretty much hated the name ‘Calhoun,’ didn’t she? Remember how you had to sneak around to see me toward the end?”

“I remember.” She laid her head against his shoulder. He breathed in the scent lingering in her hair. “I still haven’t told her you’re back in town.”

“Afraid she’d forbid you from seeing me?”

Ivy looked up, flashing him a look full of amused consternation. “If she was smart.”

He brushed his lips against her temple as he pulled her closer. “Then I’m glad she doesn’t know.”

They danced quietly through another ballad, this one a plaintive plea for forgiveness from .38 Special. “I think I’d have wanted you back then,” Sutton whispered in her ear. “Lord knows I want you now.”

Her breath came out in a shaky little hiss as she lifted her head to meet his gaze. “Sutton.”

He bent his head slowly, giving her time to change her mind. But she rose to her toes, her lips parting as she curled her fingers around his neck.

Lights flashed suddenly through the conference room window from outside, painting the wall with bright streaks. Sutton turned in time to see a truck moving past the front of the building out of sight.

“We can’t be this lucky,” Ivy murmured, already moving out of his arms.

Sutton followed her out of the conference room and through the front door, his hand settling on the butt of his Glock where it nestled in a waistband holster behind his back. Ivy had drawn her weapon, moving fast but with stealth, angling her approach from the side of the building to maintain cover as long as possible.

A truck had come to a stop at the self-serve cleaning station, the back doors angled just in front of the drain.

While they’d been inside the building, the last of twilight had faded into inky darkness, punctuated by circles of muddy yellow light cast by the tall lamps that flanked the parking lot. Close to the building, however, darkness reigned, rendered even blacker when compared with those oases of light.

Ahead, Ivy was little more than a compact silhouette creeping through the gloom. She’d changed out of her work suit into a pair of dark jeans and a black cotton sweater that hugged her curves in all the right places but served as a successful bit of camouflage in the night. From behind, he could see only the pale flesh of her hands and the occasional flash of skin beneath the wavy mass of her ponytail.

From the angle where they were, the corner of the office building nearly hid the cleaning bay from view. Only the back end of the truck remained visible as they moved closer. So far, nobody had gotten out to open the truck and commence with the washing.

Ivy slowed to a stop at the corner and Sutton slipped into place behind her. One hand reached out behind her, as if to reassure herself he was there. He touched her fingers, and she squeezed hers around his for a moment, before drawing away to sneak a peek around the corner.

She ducked back quickly, flattening herself against the building as a man came into view. He was tall and lean, in his early forties and dressed in dirty gray coveralls spotted with what looked, in the artificial light, like splashes of ink.

“Let him show us what’s inside,” Ivy whispered, her voice little more than a breath against his cheek.

The man unlocked the back door of the truck, stepping back quickly as he swung it open. Thick, dark red liquid began to trickle out immediately, aided by gravity from the truck’s slightly inclined position.

Sutton’s gut tightened. Even from the distance of several feet, the sickly metallic odor was unmistakable.

Blood.

Chapter Twelve

For a moment, Sutton thought Ivy was going to slingshot out from the shelter of the building and take down the man by herself. But even as her muscles bunched to strike, she swung around suddenly toward him, her eyes glimmering in the low light.

“No jurisdiction,” she breathed, even that tiny bit of sound thick with frustration.

He hadn’t even thought of jurisdiction, he realized. He’d been too focused on getting a better look at what the man was up to.

“I don’t need jurisdiction,” he whispered in her ear, his lips brushing the delicate curve of cartilage.

She clutched the front of his shirt. “Sutton—”

He pressed a swift kiss on her forehead and moved out into the open, keeping his hand on the Glock. He walked quietly, his gaze on the man who now stood with his back to the building, watching the blood drip out of the inclined truck.

“May I help you?” Sutton asked.

The man jumped at the sound of Sutton’s voice, and he whirled to face him. “Who are you?”

“Security,” Sutton answered. It wasn’t a complete lie.

“Oh.” The man relaxed. “Look, I know this is after hours, but I’ve done this before and nobody ever complained, so I didn’t think—” He stopped rambling and took a deep breath. “The butcher was late getting to my hogs, which meant I was late getting them to the meat market. I couldn’t wait till morning, see? I don’t have cold storage anywhere big enough.”

Sutton listened to the man’s explanation, studying his body language with a practiced eye. He seemed relaxed enough, if a little flustered. “What’s your name?”

“David Pennock. My brothers and I run Pennock Farm over in Walland.”

“Nice place.” Ivy came into the open, her weapon holstered and her hands by her sides. “I went to college in Chattanooga with your brother a few years back.”

Pennock’s smile looked friendly. “Must’ve been Kevin. Only one of us with a damn bit of brains.”

“You’ve done this before?” Sutton asked.

“You mean clean out the truck after hours?” Pennock nodded. “Not real often, but sometimes if things get backed up at Merchant Brothers—that’s the butcher we use—we get behind delivering the fresh cuts of meat to the area markets that carry our products.”

“Aren’t there sanitation rules about carrying raw meat?” Ivy asked, moving around the truck to look at the open doors at the back. Sutton crossed to her side and looked into the truck.

There were large electric coolers built into the inner walls of the truck, he saw. “If you carry the meat products in there, why is there all this blood in the truck?”

“One of our pallets broke when we were loading a couple of dressed whole hogs—we have a couple of customers who prefer to do the processing themselves, so we let Merchant Brothers slaughter the hogs and drain their blood. Apparently one big old fellow had an aneurysm somewhere in his system that didn’t bust until we dropped him on the way into the truck. Made an unholy mess, but since all the other meat is kept in the coolers, which are sanitized daily, I figured we could wait until after delivery to clean out the mess in the truck.” Pennock looked defensive. “Other people do it, too. I mean, nobody ever said there was a rule about it.”

“Other people?” Ivy asked. “You’ve seen other trucks being cleaned out after hours?”

Pennock’s brow furrowed. “You’re security, too?”

“Actually, she’s a police officer.” Sutton didn’t mention the different jurisdiction.

“Oh. This is against the law or something?” Pennock looked alarmed. “I swear I didn’t know. I won’t ever do it again.”

“Did you see other trucks cleaned out after hours?” she repeated, ignoring his sudden nervousness.

Pennock glanced at Sutton, as if looking for moral support. “A time or two.”

“Recently?”

“I saw one maybe a month ago,” Pennock answered. “Is there something going on?”

“Do you remember anything about the truck you saw a month ago?” Ivy pressed.

He shook his head. “It was just a truck. They were parked here and some guy was mucking out the back. That’s how I got the idea it was okay to clean up after hours.”

“Do you remember what was in the back?”

Pennock’s alarm was back. “No. Just something wet. I didn’t get a good look. I don’t even remember if there was any sort of sign on the side.”

Ivy looked at Sutton, frustration lining her features. As she opened her mouth to say something, Sutton’s phone buzzed in his pocket. He gave her an apologetic look and moved away from them, checking the number. It was a local Tennessee area code, the number unfamiliar. Sutton almost ignored the call. But at the last moment before it went to voice mail, he answered. “Sutton Calhoun.”

“Sutton, it’s Seth. Your daddy’s had a fall and he’s in the E.R.”

* * *

“I
T
’
S
A
CLEAN
BREAK
of the humerus, about three inches above the elbow.” Cleve Calhoun’s doctor was a very young orthopedic surgeon who had introduced himself as Dr. Choudry. What he lacked in age and experience, he made up for in composure and confidence. “Right now he’s stable and resting under a mild sedative. We were able to realign the bones without surgery, but given his age and his stroke-related disabilities, we’ll want to keep him in the hospital for at least three more days, until we’re satisfied he can deal with the cast and its limitations on his movement.”

Sutton wanted to feel relieved that his father’s injury wasn’t far worse. It certainly could have been—Seth had looked pale and pinched when he greeted Sutton’s arrival to the River Bend Medical Center, as if the past few hours had taken years off his life span. “He tried walking on his own,” Seth had explained on the elevator ride to the fourth-floor waiting room.

“Why would he do such a thing?”

Seth had looked reluctant to answer.

“What aren’t you telling me?” Sutton had pushed.

“He kept yelling your name as he got up,” Seth had replied. “I heard him all the way from the kitchen, but by the time I got there, he’d already taken a tumble.” Seth had led him down the hall to the waiting area, where several other people sat in groups of two or three around the large room, but it wasn’t so crowded that they’d had trouble finding a couple of seats to themselves away from the others.

“You heard him say my name?”

“One of the clearest things I’ve heard him say,” Seth had admitted.

“What do you think it means?” The question had spilled from his lips before he could stop it.

“Maybe seeing you reminded him of what he used to be like,” Seth had suggested. “Could be he wants to be like that again.”

They’d waited another half hour before Dr. Choudry had arrived to catch them up on his father’s condition.

“Do you have any questions?” Dr. Choudry asked.

It was Seth, not Sutton, who answered. “His head was bleeding like it had cracked open. You didn’t even mention that.”

“It was a superficial cut. Head wounds can often bleed profusely. But the EMTs said he hadn’t lost consciousness, and the CAT scan showed no signs of a closed head injury. We’ll keep an eye on his vitals, but I don’t see any reason for concern. You’re free to visit with him until visiting hours are over. Just be aware that the medication we gave him to ease the pain of his break will make him drowsy, so he may not be in a sociable mood.”

After the doctor left, Seth started toward the door immediately, but all Sutton could do was drop into the nearest seat, leaning forward, his head resting on his hands.

“You’re not going with me to visit him?” Seth sounded incredulous.

Sutton looked up at the other man. “There’s a lot of bad blood between Cleve and me. You know that.”

“He’s a sick old man who could use a little human kindness.” Seth’s expression shifted to a smile as false as the anxiety in his green eyes was real. “Lord knows, he won’t get much human kindness from an old scammer like me, right?”

“He always liked you.”

Seth shrugged. “Kindred souls.”

“You’ve taken care of him.”

“So?” Seth’s tone was defensive.

“So, thanks.”

Sutton could tell that Seth didn’t know how to respond to gratitude. He probably hadn’t gotten many kind words of any sort in a long time. Not that Sutton could feel very sorry for him. Seth Hammond had made his choices with his eyes wide open. He’d hurt his share of innocent people over the years, following in Cleve’s duplicitous footsteps. He’d earned his bad reputation fair and square.

“I think he’d like to see you,” Seth said a moment later, filling the uncomfortable silence.

“I think he’d like to see you more.”

“It’s not a competition.”

Maybe it wasn’t. But if his father had risked his neck trying to prove his manhood just because Sutton had bothered to come around after fourteen years of silence, the old man probably wouldn’t appreciate Sutton bearing witness to his failure.

“You can tell him I’m here. If he wants to see me, I’ll go.”

Seth studied him through narrowed eyes. “Okay. You’re right. That’s the way to handle it.”

Sutton waited until Seth left the waiting room to pull out his cell phone and check his messages. He had a routine check-in call from the office. He handled that with a quick text to Jesse Cooper, reassuring him that everything was okay. The only other message was a text from Ivy.

Got the list and headed home. How’s your dad?

He smiled at the brief message. A woman of few words, his Ivy.

He sent back a message reassuring her that his father was doing well, considering, then sent a second message asking her to let him know if she found anything interesting in the list Rachel Davenport had given her.

He settled into his chair for a long wait, acutely aware of just how much he wished Ivy were there to keep him company.

* * *

T
HE
BLOOD
DRIPPED
SLOWLY
from the back of the truck, looking like crude oil in the glow of the high-pressure sodium vapor lamps that punctured the darkness in the parking lot with circles of yellow light. He breathed deeply, filling his lungs with the sweet metallic tang.

A flicker of movement from inside the building drew his attention away from his task. He didn’t stare directly at the window where the woman stood, little more than a silhouette hovering at the edge of the frame. Instead, he framed her in his peripheral vision and went back to his cleaning.

He wished he had his rifle. It amplified his natural power, the weapon with its deadly load an appendage entirely under his control. Knives were toys. Exciting and stimulating. But like toys, their uses were largely limited to recreation. Yes, they could kill as well as entertain, but they were grossly inefficient as tools.

Rifles were coldly effective death-bringers. Utilitarian. Unsexy. But brutally efficient.

With a single shot, he could drill the life from the woman hovering at the window, watching him with a blend of curiosity and fear.

But this was the wrong situation for the rifle. He was too out in the open. Someone would hear and see.

The shadow in the building moved again. The knife in his pocket, wiped clean of all but the most microscopic of blood transfer, felt heavy and alive. How easily, he wondered, could he subdue her and put her in the back of the truck without drawing attention?

So easily...

Ivy woke without transition, one second asleep and the next awake. But the dream lingered, along with the metallic smell of blood. She knew it was just an olfactory memory of the pig blood that had spilled from David Pennock’s rented truck. Before she’d let Pennock leave, she’d collected a blood sample on a clean square of gauze she’d taken from Davenport Trucking’s on-site first-aid kit. It was currently air-drying in preparation for her taking it to the Bitterwood Police Department’s small crime scene unit, which had kits that could rule out the possibility that the blood she’d collected was human blood.

She was pretty sure Pennock had been telling the truth. Rachel Davenport had positively identified him as one of the company’s longtime clients, and with a few calls she had confirmed most of the rest of Pennock’s story. The blood test would simply provide a little reassurance that her instincts were on target.

She’d fallen asleep at her desk again, her face pressed into the list of names and businesses Rachel Davenport had supplied. A quick check of her watch explained the ache in her back; it was four-thirty in the morning. She’d been asleep hunched over the desk for most of the night, ever since Rachel had taken pity on her and delivered her home to Bitterwood after Sutton—and her ride home—had headed for the hospital in Knoxville.

She wondered if he was still there. She hadn’t heard from him other than a couple of brief text messages earlier that evening. Groaning, she rose from the desk chair and stretched, promising herself that as soon as she closed this case, she’d take a whole week off and do anything she wanted. Which at this rate might be to sleep all day and all night.

Going back to sleep at this hour would only make her feel groggy all day, so she settled for a quick shower and two cups of strong, hot coffee to get her going. She took time to scramble a couple of eggs and toast slices of wheat bread for breakfast, settling at the kitchen table with the list of names she’d gotten from Davenport Trucking.

None of the names had caught her interest the first time through, and the second pass wasn’t proving to be any more enlightening. She and Antoine would just have to go at the list the old-fashioned way—hoofing it from company to company to ask a few questions about where their rented trucks had been on the dates and times of the four murders.

She set the list aside and opened the file she’d compiled on the murders. The newest additions were color printouts of the images the surveillance crew covering the cemetery had sent her the day before. She’d already looked through them twice so far, but she flipped through the pages one more time, taking in the faces, many of them familiar, that had passed through the cemetery since she’d assigned the surveillance crew almost two weeks earlier.