Murder on the Lunatic Fringe (Jubilant Falls Series Book 4) (10 page)

“She called it a focus group, I guess,” Buchanan went on. “Anyway, I think it will be good for members of the community to have input on the newspaper.”
“The community has always had input into the Journal-Gazette,” I said, defensively. You’ll have less input than you think, Angus, I thought. You won’t dictate my news coverage.

“Well, you and I may have to disagree on that, Addison,” Angus gave me his best used-car dealer smile. “I’m looking forward to tomorrow’s meeting, though.”

“Excuse me?”

“She didn’t tell you? I just got an e-mail saying she’s set up a meeting for two o’clock tomorrow afternoon.”

I gritted my teeth. “I didn’t think we were meeting until next week.”

Angus pulled his Blackberry from his shirt pocket. “Nope. This e-mail just came a few minutes ago. We’re meeting tomorrow. I guess I’ll see you then, huh?” Angus shook my hand and headed toward another couple looking at used vehicles.

“I guess so.” I tried to sound pleasant, but somehow, the only thing I really felt was aggravation.

Shake it off, Penny
, I told myself as I went into the dealership to find my husband and daughter.
Earlene’s your boss now. Things are bound to be a little different.

Once the papers for Isabella’s car were signed, and the check written, she and Duncan headed back home. I headed back to my office.

Graham’s vacation form was on my desk; he’d requested the rest of the week off. Beside the form was a page from a reporter’s notebook, scrawled with Graham’s handwriting:

Addison—KB and JJ don’t want to go on the record about the slaughtered goats, so no luck there for a story. The story about the DUI checkpoints is done and in the system. I’m on my way to Indianapolis. See you next week—Graham.

“Well, shit,” I said to myself. “I can’t make up the news. Maybe something else will happen while Graham is gone.”

Sighing, I tied up a few more loose ends, found and responded to Earlene’s e-mail about tomorrow’s focus group meeting, and submitted the ad for Elizabeth’s job to an online journalism job board. I turned off the computer and, slinging my purse over my shoulder, shut off the lights as I closed the office door.

As I turned around to lock the door, I heard the sound of a sniffle. It was Elizabeth, wiping tears from her eyes.

“You OK, Elizabeth?” I asked.

“I’m fine,” she said, wiping her nose. Her purple hair made her eyes look that much redder. “I guess I’m going to miss this place more than I thought.”

“We’re going to miss you, too,” I said, patting her on the shoulder. “You’ve done a good job here. You’ve grown a lot professionally and you’re going to do a great job in Akron.”

“Thank you.”

I patted her shoulder again and headed down the back stairs toward the pressroom and the employee parking lot. As I left, I caught a quick glance of Elizabeth holding a toothbrush and sobbing.

Chapter 16 Graham

Bill didn’t really have a heart attack, but Addison didn’t have to know that.

The ruse got me to get out of the office for a few days, enough time to do a little digging.

I also wouldn’t have to look at Elizabeth for her final two weeks in the office. Before I left town, I dropped the toothbrush she kept at my apartment on her desk, along with some other personal belongings.

The drive to Richmond, Indiana, took me slightly over an hour from Jubilant Falls—about the same time it had taken Mother to get there from her gated community outside Indianapolis. Enough time to think about the questions I wanted to ask her about Benjamin Kinnon.

The restaurant was dark and Mother was waiting for me in an inconspicuous corner. She was impeccably dressed, as always, in a pair of slim black pants and a short-sleeved, pale pink blouse. Shiny black sandals encased her painted toenails; pearls hung from her ears and around her neck. Her subdued makeup was flawless. A wide-brimmed summer hat and large sunglasses sat on the seat next to her purse.

The dinner crowd was beginning to filter in. She twirled the stem of her martini glass between her fingers as we looked over our menus. She ordered a salad. I chose crab linguini—this meal would be on her tab.

I started by asking about my two younger brothers.

“So how are Jackson and James?”

“They’re fine. They’re spending the week at soccer camp. Jackson starts his freshman year in high school this year.”

“So where’s Bill?” I asked.

“He’s in Florida this week, on a golfing trip. We bought a condo outside of Boca Raton last year and he takes clients down there for golf outings.”

“Sounds pretty fancy.”

“You know, only the best for Bill. So what did you want to ask me about?”

“Tell me about Benjamin Kinnon.”

She sighed and cast her eyes toward the ceiling. “I knew this was coming. I just didn’t think it would take so long.”

“So is he my father?”

“You have to understand, Graham, I was going through some hard times then—I’d made several extremely poor decisions…”

“Yes or no, Mother. Is he my father?”

“The social worker at the hospital kept pushing me to name someone as the father on the birth certificate. Benny Kinnon was around the most, so I wrote down his name. There were…” She paused, took a ladylike sip from her martini, and looked across the room at the other diners, no doubt checking to see if anyone might know her. “…A lot of men in my life at that time. I don’t know if Benny is really your father or not.”

I pulled Kinnon’s folded police photo from my shirt pocket and took my press pass from around my neck. I laid the two of them side by side on the table. She flinched.

Sarcasm seeped into my voice. “Looks like you guessed right.”

“Graham, please. You don’t understand—”

“No, you don’t understand,” I snapped. “I have spent my life as the dirty little secret from your past. You were a drug-addicted hooker when I was a kid. You were a topless dancer when you met Bill and after you married him, I became a painful reminder of everything you wanted to forget!”

“That’s not true! We always gave you the best of everything!”

“As long as it didn’t involve anything more than writing damned checks! You and Bill shipped me off to boarding school the first chance you got—and kept me away as long as you could pay my tuition!”

“Graham, that’s not fair!”

“I remember the day you were arrested, Mother. I still remember your torn tee shirt and the ragged jeans. I can still see your busted lip and the black eye Ben Kinnon gave you. You’ve got fancy clothes and nice jewelry today, but I know the truth about you.”

“Lower your voice!” She hissed, leaning across the table. “People will hear you!”

I complied, but anger still came through in my words. “I want to know how much you know about Ben Kinnon.”

Mother gripped the stem of the martini glass and continued to speak low.

“Sometimes he had a job, but mostly he boosted cars, then sold them to chop shops. When he couldn’t steal cars, he stole credit cards then sold what he bought with those cards. When he got some extra cash, he bought drugs and brought them over to share with me.”

“Like what?”

“Graham, do we have to go through this? Really?”

“What kind of drugs did you do with Benjamin Kinnon?” I asked again.

She sighed. “Heroin mostly. I used to shoot it between my toes so no one could see the needle marks. Sometimes we did crystal meth.”

“When did you last see him?”

“He was arrested the same day I was arrested. I haven’t seen him since.”

“You were charged with heroin possession, right?”

Mother looked around, hoping no one was listening. “Yes, Graham. I was.”

“What was he charged with?”

“Distribution. He had a lot more heroin on him than I did. We were both high on smack and got into a fight. The neighbors called the police and they found the heroin.”

“The neighbors weren’t the only ones to call the police, Mother. I did.”

“Oh my God.”

“What did you expect? You were getting the shit beat out of you! Where did you meet Benny, anyway?”

Mother took another genteel sip of her martini. “Junkies always seem to find each other. I was his lookout when he stole cars.”

“Did you ever work with him on the stolen credit cards? Like when he tried to buy stuff?”

“Sometimes, if it was a female name on the credit card…” Mother’s voice trailed off, then turned whiney. “Graham, you have to understand that those were different times for me. I met Bill and he really was a savior for me, for both of us. You understand that don’t you?”

“I understand that I spent four years in foster care while you spent two years in prison and then took two more years to get yourself together. I understand that you stopped doing drugs and married a very rich man who wrote a lot of checks to keep me out of his hair.”

“Don’t look at it that way, Graham,” Mother wheedled. “You couldn’t have had the things you had if it wasn’t for Bill.”

“I also understand that you had all your Indiana court records sealed right after you got married. Was that Bill’s doing, too?” A quick online search before I left Jubilant Falls confirmed that for me.

“He understood that I’d made a few mistakes and deserved a new start.”

“Including hiding a son by a known heroin dealer and thief.”

“We never hid you! That’s not fair!”

“No, but after Jackson and James were born, I certainly wasn’t made to feel part of that family.”

“Oh, Graham, I’m sorry. You have always been my son and I have always loved you.” She reached over and patted my hand and I dropped the interrogation bit, despite the anger I still felt. She was my mother, after all. She had come a long, long way from what she had been and, however poorly she may have handled the situation, she took me along for the ride. “I just have one question, Graham. Why ask about Benny Kinnon and why now?”

I took a deep breath. “My girlfriend and I—we had a little pregnancy scare. It kind of got me thinking.”

“Oh! You have a girlfriend! How wonderful!”

“
Had
a girlfriend. We broke up.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.”

I shrugged. I wasn’t going to go into the details with her. Instead, I changed the subject. “Do you know where Benny Kinnon is now? What he’s into these days?”

She looked shocked. “No. Why would I?”

“No reason, just asking. We never talked about it before and it wasn’t until this other... mess… that I even thought about him.”

The waitress brought our meals to the table and the conversation changed: Bill’s golf habit, the boys new private school, Jackson’s newly discovered fascination with girls, the death of an aged Yorkie I never met, and where James was considering going to college. She never asked about my job and I never volunteered anything. We shared a piece of cheesecake, she paid the bill and we got up to leave.

“I know I made a lot of mistakes, Graham, and I’m sorry about that,” she said as we hugged. “I’m sorry to hear you and your girlfriend broke up, too.”

I shrugged. “Can’t do anything about it now—about either situation.”

She ran a manicured hand through my short brown hair, no doubt a show for those around us. “I know. I love you Graham.”

“I love you, too.” I turned to leave, heading toward the door and the parking lot. We wouldn’t walk out together—we never did. As I pulled out into the street, Mother was standing at the restaurant’s front door, hiding behind the large floppy summer hat and big designer sunglasses.

That’s OK, Mother,
I thought.
I won’t tell anyone we met, either.

***

“Hey Kinnon, where are you?” It was Elizabeth calling on my cell phone. I was back on the Ohio side of the state line, driving down the highway and contemplating what I was going to do next.

“I’m on my way to the hospital in Indianapolis. My stepdad had a heart attack,” I lied. “I’m off for a couple days.”

“Yeah, that’s what Addison said.”

“So why are you calling me?”

“Because I don’t believe her—or you.”

“Well, that’s your problem, isn’t it?”

“Kinnon, c’mon. Do you have to be such a prick?”

“You don’t tell me you’re leaving to take a new job, you let me make an ass of myself proposing to you and I’m the prick? Tell me how that works.”

“Kinnon, please.”

“What do you want?” I slid my Toyota into the exit lane. It would take me down another interstate through Collitstown; midway through the city, I’d take an exit for the two-lane state highway that would bring me back to Jubilant Falls in about forty-five minutes.

“I want… I want to explain myself. I want to say I’m sorry.”

“I think you pretty well did. You’re bored with your job, you’re bored with me, you got a new job and you’re moving to Akron.”

“Graham, it’s not just that—”

“Yeah, it is Elizabeth. Yeah, it is. I gotta go.” I disconnected the call with my thumb and tossed the phone into the passenger seat.

Her sudden need to apologize surprised me. It could make what I was about to do a little more difficult, I thought to myself. I probably couldn’t go back to my apartment now. She’d see the car, know I wasn’t in Indianapolis, and come knocking at my door. Knowing Elizabeth, she would be insistent enough to drive past my place over and over again until she found me and pushed her reasoning why she wouldn’t marry me down my throat. I couldn’t afford a hotel room; maybe a rental car would be enough to throw everyone off.

The next exit took me to the Collitstown airport. I pulled off and drove into the airport garage. Parking my car in the last spot on the top level and stuffing my press pass into my pocket, I went in search of a rental counter. Half an hour later, I was back on the highway, this time driving a black Mustang and on my way to taking down Ben Kinnon.

Chapter 17 Katya

We are fire and gasoline, Jerome and I. When we fight, it’s an explosion. When we make up, it is again an explosion. This time, the explosion happens in my house, in my bed, at night.

We fell apart, breathing heavily. I rolled on my side toward him and lay my hand on his cheek. He pulled me close and pressed his lips against my forehead.

“Katya,” he whispered. “Oh, my Katya.”

“After trial, Jerome, what happens to us?” I asked softly.

He sighed, kissed my forehead again, but didn’t answer.

“Can we stay here? I love my farm and I don’t want to leave it.”

“It depends on a lot of things— how the trial comes out, for one. You know that.” His words were soft.

“You will stay with me?”

“Always.”

I wrapped my leg around his strong, brown thigh. “
Ah-byet,
” I whispered into his ear in my native tongue. “Promise.”

The sound of car wheels on gravel stopped him from answering. Jerome jumped from the bed to the window, pulling on his jeans as he peeked through the curtain.

“I don’t know who this is—they’ve got their headlights turned off,” he hissed, reaching for his gun on the bedside table.

Dressing frantically, I peered over Jerome’s shoulder, trying, as he was, to see who was coming up my driveway.

It was a big car, what they call sport utility vehicle. I couldn’t tell the color in the dark, but there were two people in the front seat. The car stopped and the passenger, a big burly man stepped out, an automatic rifle in his hand.

“Quick! You know where to hide!” Jerome ordered sharply, poking his gun barrel between the windowsill and the curtain.

“Jerome,” I whispered touching his shoulder. “I love you.”

His brown eyes moved from the window to mine. Handing my cell phone to me, his words were quiet. “I love you, too. You know who to call.”

I ran to the closet, and, pushing my hanging clothes to one side, found the pocket door that opened into the old walls of the farmhouse. Inside the walls, against old plaster and wood, my protectors had nailed a hand-made ladder, which led to a panic room in the attic.

From the outside, the room looked like a row of old antique dressers and trunks, fronted by a large wardrobe, piled against a wall. The wardrobe was attached to the false wall and had a false back, like the closet, for escape from the front.

The panic room walls, and the wardrobe, built a few feet away from the real wall, were bullet proof, reinforced with metal.

I was supposed to hide here if someone suspicious came to my farm.

As the front entrance burst open downstairs, I pulled the closet’s back door closed behind me and scrambled up the ladder.

Crawling from the ladder into the panic room, I slid the door behind me closed, my terror growing. Kneeling in the dark, I scrolled through the numbers on the cell phone’s dim screen with my thumb.

“Where is it? Where is it?” I whispered in Russian. To protect me, in case I lost my phone, the emergency number for the Witness Security Program (or WITSEC as Jerome called it), the one to call in case we were discovered, had been entered on my cell phone as a fake pizza place, but what was the name? What was the name?

Furniture crashed on the first floor and two men’s voices echoed through the floorboards of my panic room as their heavy steps pounded up the stairs.

“Where are you, bitch? Where are you?” I knew that voice: It was Luka Petrov, one of Kolya’s thugs. Luka had been an enforcer for Kolya for many years, collecting his debts, silencing those who would oppose my husband, the man I was to testify against.

“Stop or I’ll shoot!” Jerome shouted.

I dropped the phone as gunshots rang out, pushing myself with my legs, crab like, into a corner. Jerome cried out—bullets must have struck him. I covered my mouth with both hands, digging my nails into my cheeks to keep myself from screaming.

“Where is she?” Luka demanded.

I imagined him standing over Jerome—I know how Luka works. Kolya taught him well. Like Kolya, Luka doesn’t kill on the first shot. Kolya’s first shot would have wounded, enough to get the victim—like my sister as she held her baby daughter, or now, Jerome—to understand what he wanted.

There was a thud, probably a kick. Jerome moaned.

“Where is she? The woman you call Katya—where is she?” Luka screamed. Another thud, another moan. “You have her hidden in this house, yes? Perhaps upstairs?”

Bullets ripped through the attic floor outside my panic room. Still tight against the wall, I bit the palm of my hand to keep the screams from coming. The floors beneath me, like the walls, were reinforced to keep bullets out, but because the farmhouse was so old, the room was not soundproof. Had I fallen, or screamed, they would know where I was.

“Maks,” Luka said to another man. “We must take our guest downstairs and show him why it is better to cooperate.”

No, Jerome! No!
I wanted to scream. I knew what came next—more kicks, more punches. First one ear would be cut off, then the other. Luka’s bare hands would pull out teeth, twist private parts, until he got the answer he wanted. Then he would place the barrel of his gun against his victim’s forehead and pull the trigger.

There was no doubt Luka had learned Kolya’s ways well. I’d seen photos of Alexis’ body, my sister’s husband, after he refused to tell Kolya’s thugs where I went. Next, Kolya had them hunt down Svetlana and baby Nadezhda and kill them in cold blood.

I’d seen those photos, too. A U.S. marshal had shown them to me when we had to leave my last hiding place, the hills of Virginia’s Shenandoah Valley.

I’d broken rules by keeping in touch with them and they paid terrible price. Now, I’d broken rules again and someone else who loved me would also suffer and die.

No one was would be able to find me here in Jubilant Falls, they said. You’ll be safe here in Jubilant Falls. Until once again, I broke the rules and once again, someone suffered.

I slid one foot across the floor, trying to bring the phone closer to me. I had to call, to save Jerome’s life. In the bedroom beneath me, Jerome screamed in pain as he was dragged to the stairway. More screams as they pushed him down the stairs and he landed with a thunk at the bottom.

A thick, sickening silence settled upstairs. Was Jerome talking? If he was I couldn’t hear him. Were Luka and his goon torturing him? Was he already dead?

I reached for the phone and began to scroll through the numbers again— there it was! The name of the fake pizza parlor was the last number in my phone: Zapponelli’s Pizza. I pressed the number, but all I heard was a weird electronic sound. Did the call go through? What was happening? Did the heavy metal walls that kept out bullets also keep my phone calls in? I’d never had problems making cell phone calls before. I tried again, then again. Why wouldn’t the call go though?

Heavy footfalls thudded up the stairs to the second floor, then up the attic stairs. Luka was coming for me, roaring, screaming, like an animal. Had Jerome told them where I was?

Panicked, I dropped the phone as I scrambled back to the ladder in the wall, sliding the wall panel closed behind me. I climbed down into the space between the walls and waited for death.