Nowhere to Run (23 page)
Auggie fingered the cell phone. He fell in step beside her and when she looked at him askance, he asked, “The men’s room?”
“Take that hallway and where it turns to the left you’ll see the restrooms.”
It was in the opposite direction she was going, so he stopped as if he were heading the other way, waiting until she got far enough ahead of him. She’d already forgotten him, however, and was aiming toward a room farther south. Auggie yanked out his cell and quickly placed the call to D’Annibal’s office.
“D’Annibal,” the lieutenant answered.
“It’s Rafferty,” Auggie said. “Anything new on Zuma or the Martin killing?”
D’Annibal didn’t waste time with preliminaries. “Nine and Sandler interviewed Camille Dirkus, mother to Aaron Dirkus, Upjohn’s son. Apparently the son and a couple of the whizbang Zuma techs who worked the computers had this little marijuana-growing operation. Upjohn found out about it and threatened to fire Dirkus’s ass. Camille was fighting with both of them, but it’s possible some other player with a bigger operation took offense.”
Auggie stared into the middle distance, stunned. He hadn’t expected there to be an answer. Could that be? He immediately wanted to refute the lieutenant’s words. Could he have been so wrong about Liv? Had he blinded himself to the fact that her personal dramas were just that, personal dramas? Was he so completely
wrong
?
wrong
?
D’Annibal was still talking, telling him how the department was following leads, plucking threads, finding this big one smack in the middle of Zuma’s fabric. He finished with, “So, bring in the Dugan woman and let’s get on with it.”
“Okay,” Auggie said, but the reluctance in his tone reached D’Annibal’s ears.
“Whatever the problem is, fix it.”
“I will. Hey, put out the word to look for a 2005 GMC truck. Gray. Trask Martin mentioned it to Liv. Said a guy was looking for her at her apartment and that’s what he drove.”
“Liv?”
“It’s what she goes by,” Auggie answered evenly.
“Got a license number?”
“I woulda given it to you.”
“Not much to go on,” D’Annibal reminded him tautly. “While you’ve been playing house with one of our suspects, we got all kinds of stuff breaking around here.”
“She’s a suspect?” Auggie challenged him, but the lieutenant just ran right over him, “I sent Nine and Sandler out on another call this morning. A dead body found in a field . . . a woman . . .” Quickly, he brought Auggie up-to-date on the homicide that had taken over the station this morning.
A field. A woman. “You think it has anything to do with Zuma?” Auggie asked, his mind racing.
“That’d be a stretch. But it’s a copycat of the Dempsey homicide about a month ago.”
Auggie knew about as much as the public on the Dempsey murder; he’d been wrapped up in his Alan Reagan persona and hadn’t been following it too closely. But the particulars were ringing other, distant bells. “Did you put someone on that cold case, the serial strangler around Rock Springs twenty years ago?”
“I said I would. Got a lot of stuff coming down here, Rafferty. I’ll check on the truck, but I—”
“Who’re you talking to?” Liv demanded in his ear. Auggie whipped around. She’d pulled on her baseball cap and was staring at him from beneath the brim with wide, wounded eyes.
He clicked off his phone and dropped his arm. “The lady I was talking to, Sofia . . . her sister used to work for Grandview. She gave me her number. I was trying to reach her and follow up.” The phone rang in his hand and they both looked at it. Auggie felt his pulse escalate. D’ Annibal. The ass.
Liv’s gaze was like a laser on the phone. “Are you going to answer it?”
Hell. No. Shit. He glanced at the number and realized it wasn’t D’Annibal. It wasn’t even in this area code.
She was waiting for him to answer and he did so like a man facing the gallows, in slow motion, his mind screaming through excuses and explanations when she learned he was with the police.
“Hello,” he said into the phone.
“Oh . . . uh . . . I got a call from someone named Dugan? About Everett LeBlanc?”
Auggie snapped to attention. “Uh, yes. Ms. Dugan is right here.” He held out the cell to her and mouthed, “LeBlanc.”
“What?” Liv whispered, but she took the phone.
He looked around. There were no cameras here but he wished they were outside of Grandview, in the privacy of the Jeep.
“This is Liv Dugan. Is this Mr. LeBlanc?”
Auggie put a hand on the small of her back and guided her back outside as she spoke on the phone. He lifted a hand in a silent good-bye to the rangy receptionist as they stepped back through the sliding glass doors. He could tell Liv was not talking to Everett LeBlanc himself. Sounded like the man might be renting LeBlanc’s home and was using his phone.
They were at the Jeep when she hung up.
“What?” he asked.
“He’s staying at the LeBlanc home. Everett was married to Patsy—must be the nickname for Patricia—but they’re divorced.” She shook her head and looked around the grounds. Dappled sunlight lay on the grass, filtered through three large oak trees. “He gave me Everett’s Portland number.”
“What is it? I’ll plug it into the phone.” Liv recited the number and Auggie added it to his call list under LeBlanc. “You want to call him now?”
“I don’t know.”
“C’mon.” He put his arm through hers and led her to the Jeep. When she was safely inside, he went around to the driver’s door.
Liv watched him slide into the driver’s seat and start the engine. She was fighting the conflicting desires to run far, far away or throw herself into his arms. The last few days had been jagged peaks and low troughs, and she felt that same out-of-control sensation that had swallowed her up as a teenager and sent her to Hathaway House.
She’d never had sex like that. Never. But then she’d barely been sexual at all. It had all been so embarrassing and messy and uncomfortable, and now she knew it had been partly because of her; she couldn’t give of herself. Couldn’t let herself be transported away.
Until yesterday. When he’d said, “I’m going to kiss you.”
For a heartbeat she’d thought it was sort of a joke. Ha, ha, ha. Just kidding. Except when he’d looked down at her through blue, blue eyes as he captured her mouth and her knees had buckled.
Buckled.
Buckled.
She was still having trouble putting the memory of his body moving inside hers to some other part of her mind. Every time her brain touched on it she got a sexual thrill just from remembering it. No wonder people raved about sex. She finally
got
it.
got
it.
And those dancing, jolting thoughts were superseding her paranoia, keeping it locked down as if it had been physically subdued.
She’d agreed that they should go to Grandview together, but she’d still been floating inside with thoughts of their lovemaking. Then when she’d watched him enter the building and talk with first the receptionist, then the larger woman, then disappear around a corner, she’d suddenly gotten scared, certain she’d been had.
She’d smashed on the baseball cap, entered the building, offered the woman at the desk a smile, then walked past as if she knew where she was going, had been at Grandview a hundred times before. She’d been blind. Her brain fed with images of Auggie calling the police, or sneaking through the back corridors, looking for an escape, or something.
And then she’d caught him on the phone and she’d nearly come undone.
Who are you talking to?
she’d wanted to scream. Luckily, her voice had sounded normal when it came. A bit strained. But normal.
she’d wanted to scream. Luckily, her voice had sounded normal when it came. A bit strained. But normal.
And he’d answered her easily. She’d scarcely been able to remember because she’d been consumed with thoughts of his mouth and tongue and hands working on her skin, and she’d focused on his lips and
couldn’t think
!
couldn’t think
!
And then the phone rang again and it was about Everett LeBlanc, and he’d guided her outside and they’d had a conversation and she still couldn’t think, but something that shot through everything was the feeling that she was being played and nothing was what it seemed.
He was looking at her now. Those eyes intense.
She remembered the way he’d sighed and groaned and laughed softly at different moments of their lovemaking.
Lovemaking . . .
“There’s something wrong with me,” she blurted out, unable to stop herself. “There must be. I feel out of control.”
He glanced away from her, as if it hurt to look at her.
“What about your girlfriend?” she asked. “What was it like with her?”
“Ex-girlfriend,” he reminded her. He looked back at her. “It wasn’t like this.”
She collapsed against the Jeep seat, spent. She was still holding his phone and she saw him look at it, slide a hand her way, palm up, asking for it. She put it into his hand, careful not to touch his skin. She was way, way too susceptible.
“This isn’t going well,” she said on an expelled breath.
“Isn’t it?”
“No.” She choked out a laugh. Then shook her head. “Are you going to call the sister and ask about Navarone?”
He hesitated a moment, then said, “She told me to Google him. I think that’s what I’ll do.” And then, “We need to talk to your brother.”
A shiver slid down her spine. She was trusting him some, but it felt dangerous.
He glanced at the Jeep’s clock, said, “Let’s get something to eat,” then pointed the nose of the vehicle back on the road. As they sped away from Grandview Senior Care, he said, somewhat ominously, “We don’t have much time left. I want to find out as much as I can before things change.”
“Before things change . . .” she repeated.
He slid her a look, a frankly assessing look that was full of repressed sexual energy. Her heart jolted. So, he was feeling it, too. She gazed back at him, suddenly wanting to pull over and make love in the Jeep. As fast and furious as possible.
As if picking up her vibe, he hit the gas and growled low, “Look at me like that again, and we won’t make it back to the house.”
With that she sank back into the seat and wondered if she were truly losing her mind.
Chapter 16
The mood around the station Sunday afternoon was gloomy and restrained. Gretchen was on the phone to missing persons, trying to get a lead on the new vic, George was looking through Zuma Software records, though more desultorily now than before, as he’d become convinced there was nothing there, and September was still reviewing her meeting with Camille Dirkus and the woman’s belief that the shootings were drug-related. There was the smell of revenge and retribution to her insistence, however; Camille was distraught over her son’s death and she wanted to blame both Kurt Upjohn and Aaron Dirkus’s roommates for everything.
It didn’t help that both Upjohn and Jessica Maltona had taken a turn for the worse.
September walked down the hall to the water cooler and poured herself a cup. She stood in the hallway, smelling the scents of floor wax and Pine-Sol, drinking slowly. She hadn’t liked the way Gretchen had handled Camille Dirkus; she was too brash, too impatient, too everything. Camille hadn’t appreciated the treatment, either, and her short, blond hair had bristled as her pinched mouth bit out answers and finally spewed her theory about the drug operation. She was certain Kurt Upjohn and the roommates had sparked a retaliation from a bigger fish up the chain. That’s who they should be looking for. Not wasting time talking to her!
When September and Gretchen related Camille’s theory to D’ Annibal, he’d taken in the information and, from what September had gleaned, had asked Wes Pelligree to look into it. Personally, she didn’t think it was the root cause of the shootings, but maybe . . .
Returning to the squad room, she overheard a few of Gretchen’s terse remarks into the phone, then tuned her out. She and Gretchen were never going to be simpatico; they were just too different. As she looked out the window, her mind drifted again to the woman’s body found in the field. DO UNTO OTHERS AS SHE DID TO ME. The words, carved into the vic’s skin, were an extra violation that bothered September deeply.
“Okay,” Gretchen said, slamming down the receiver. She leaned back in her chair and ran her hands through her curly dark hair. “From the description, I think our vic is one Emmy Decatur. Her roommate called her into missing persons this morning. She and the roommate, whose name is Nadine, work at a tanning salon in Laurelton. The Indoor Beach.”
“Let’s go,” September said, glad to get moving again.
“Helluva way to spend another Sunday,” Gretchen muttered, heading for the door.
“Overtime,” George said from his desk, not looking up, to which Gretchen merely snorted.
They got to The Indoor Beach in twenty minutes. It was at the end of a strip mall, painted a virulent shade of puce, and announced in big black words across the front window: TAN, TAN, TAN!!! IMPROVE YOUR APPEARANCE!!! IMPROVE YOUR LIFE!!!
There were two young women behind a podium that served as the reception desk. They both looked vaguely at September and Gretchen, their thoughts clearly elsewhere. Their attention sharpened when Gretchen showed her badge and asked, “Nadine Wilkerson?”
The taller of the two started as if she’d been goosed. She had light brown, straight, flattened hair, the kind that comes from seriously removing the curl through a procedure. “That’s me . . . are you here about Emmy?” she asked tremulously.
“Do you have a picture of her?” Gretchen asked.
“Oh, God, have you found her?” She looked ready to faint.
“Why don’t you sit down?” September suggested, motioning to one of two white, wicker chairs for waiting customers. Nadine walked on wobbly legs and collapsed into the chair. “She’s dead, isn’t she?”
“We don’t know anything yet,” Gretchen said.
The other girl said, “Oh, golly.” She was blond and petite with a dark tan that looked like it had been painted on. Maybe it had.
“I’ve . . . uh . . . I’ve . . . got a picture . . . in my purse?” Nadine said. She sat a moment longer, then stood up and walked around a partition. A moment later the sound of a locker slamming shut was heard, then she returned with a snapshot, which she handed to September.
In the picture were two girls in bikinis waving from a boat. One was Nadine; the other was their victim. September handed the photo to Gretchen, who said, “Do you know how to get in touch with Emmy’s parents?”
The color drained from Nadine’s face. “Ohhhh . . .” she cried, collapsing back in the chair. “It’s her. It’s her. Oh, God, God, God!”
The other girl said, “Oh, golly.” Blinked, and then said, “Her parents live around here somewhere. I’ve known Emmy a long time.”
“Anything else you can tell us about her?” Gretchen pressed.
September urged Nadine, “Put your head between your knees.”
“Um . . . oh, golly . . . I don’t want to be mean or anything, but she was kind of a man hater.”
“No!” Nadine lifted her tear-stained face to glare at her coworker. “She was just a loner. Her parents live on Sycamore Street,” she said to September. “Not far from here. Street ends in one of those circles and they’re the yellow house at the end.” Her face screwed up, more tears forming. “They kicked her out when she was a junior. They probably won’t even care!”
“Don’t believe it,” Gretchen said, and they left for Sycamore Street
There was no one home, so Gretchen took down the address and phoned the station, asking for someone to get her a number. It took a few minutes, but Gretchen got the cell number of Mrs. Decatur, who fell apart like Nadine when she was asked to come and identify the body.
“Now, we know who the vic is,” Gretchen said. “We just don’t know who killed her. Jesus, at this rate we’re gonna need some more detectives. Where the hell is your brother?”
Good question, September thought.
Hurry up, Auggie. Bring Dugan in and get back here.
Hurry up, Auggie. Bring Dugan in and get back here.
“Huh,” Auggie said, seated at the table, his gaze on the screen of his cell phone. “Dr. Frank Navarone was last employed at Halo Valley Security Hospital. Google. Who knew?” Liv was staring at him, wide-eyed. “You okay?” he asked.
She seemed to shake herself out of a reverie. “Remains to be seen.”
Auggie scrolled through his numbers. “You ready to call LeBlanc?”
Her answer was a short bark of humorless laughter. She held out her hand for the phone and he held up a finger.
Finding the number he’d entered earlier, he pushed CALL and handed her the cell. She put the phone to her ear slowly, as if it weighed a ton.
He leaned close to her and she cocked the phone so he could hear. The line rang four times before a man answered, “Hello?”
“Mr. LeBlanc?” Liv asked.
“Yes?”
She drew a breath. “My name’s Olivia Dugan and I was adopted by Deborah and Albert Dugan from Rock Springs.” The strangled sound he made said he knew where this was going. “I guess you know why I’m calling. . . .” she trailed off.
“You’re looking for your father. Well, you found him.” He didn’t sound pleased.
“I don’t want to bother you, but I got this package from my mother, my adoptive mother, Deborah Dugan . . .” She went on to explain how it had arrived after she turned twenty-five and that her birth certificate was inside. “I’m trying to figure out why she sent it to me. Could I meet with you? Just for a few minutes?”
“You could,” he said reluctantly.
“Is Patricia around?” she asked.
“Nah. Patsy and me, we were married but we were so young and it was over before you were even born. We had to give you up. Neither of us knew anything about anything. We couldn’t raise a kid.”
Auggie pulled back and mouthed for her to find out where he lived. Liv asked LeBlanc for his address and he grudgingly gave it to her, a condo on Portland’s eastside. Liv told him she could be there in a half hour, and LeBlanc grunted an assent.
The LeBlanc condo was in a large complex with units facing outdoor balconies, much like Liv’s apartment complex. Liv’s legs were leaden even while her insides were thrumming, a kind of anxiety building with the thought of meeting her biological father. She’d never really cared, or wondered about her birth parents. In point of fact, ever since her mother’s death she’d felt disconnected from her family except for Hague. But Hague’s problems had prevented her from any kind of closeness with him, so she’d basically always been on her own.
Everett LeBlanc’s condo was on the third floor. They took an elevator up that let them out on a gallery that faced west, toward a common area the condominium complex enclosed. They walked to the door together and Liv hitched her backpack on her shoulder, feeling a brief moment of wonder that she had Auggie as an ally. She’d given up questioning his motives. She didn’t really care. He was with her now and she was grateful.
Drawing a breath, she rapped on the door with her knuckles. Momentarily, she thought about what she looked like: jeans and a dark blue T-shirt and sneakers. The baseball cap had smashed her hair and belatedly she fluffed it with her fingers, then dropped her arms. What did it matter now?
LeBlanc opened the door, a man in his late forties with brown hair and a pair of hazel eyes that caused Liv’s throat to close briefly. She could see a resemblance, the genetics obvious. It was slightly eerie and for a moment she and Everett just looked each other up and down.
“Well, come in,” he said gruffly, and she and Auggie walked inside.
He gestured them to a well-worn couch and sat down in a chair opposite them, moving some magazines to the floor. “I don’t know what you’re lookin’ for or how I can help ya, but fire away.”
Liv hardly knew where to start. It was Auggie who asked, “You watch the news, Mr. LeBlanc?”
“If ya mean, did I see Olivia’s face, yes I did.”
“I didn’t have anything to do with what happened at Zuma,” Liv said quickly. “But I think . . . I don’t know . . . maybe it happened because of me. We won’t stay long. I just . . . would you look at these pictures?” She yanked the package from her bag and slipped out the photos, handing them to him. “You lived around Rock Springs, too, right? I was born in the hospital in Malone.”
“That’s right.” His head was bent to the photos. He looked each one over carefully, then set them down.
“The man walking toward the camera, reaching for it. He’s a doctor, we believe. Dr. Frank Navarone.”
“I don’t know. My memory for that time’s not so good. You should really check with Patsy. Your—er—mother.”
“Can you give us her address or phone number?” Auggie asked as Liv absorbed his words.
“Sure thing.” He went into the kitchen, yanked out a drawer, and pulled out a small, leather-bound book. “Want me to write it down?” he asked, but he was already dragging out a tablet and pen from the same drawer and scribbling it down. He ripped off the top sheet of paper and handed it to Liv. “You think this doctor’s behind the shootings?” he asked.
“I don’t know. Maybe. Maybe I’m wrong, but I feel like it has something to do with me. Like he’s after me.”
Everett picked up the photo of the stalking man grabbing for the camera. “He sure doesn’t want his picture taken.”
Auggie glanced at the address on the paper Everett had given Liv. “Patsy Owens? She’s remarried.”
“Uh-huh. To Barkley Owens.” Everett made a face. “We don’t keep in close contact anymore, but if you see her, say hi for me, okay?”
“I will,” Liv said. An awkward moment passed and Liv looked at Auggie, who got to his feet. She followed suit and so did Everett. They gazed at each other and then he nodded and gestured toward the door.
“Be seein’ ya,” he said as he showed them out.
In the elevator on the way down, Auggie said, “Do you want to call Patsy?”
Liv nodded. “Yep.”
“Still think we’re on the right trail?”
“You think I’m wrong?” She gave him a long look. His T-shirt was starting to stick to him in the afternoon heat and she had to drag her eyes away, her mind thinking about how she would like to rip his shirt off and press her own overheated flesh against his.
“I think we’re running out of time,” was all he said.
September returned to the station in the afternoon to find Wes Pelligree at his desk. The rest of the room was quiet. There was a distant humming from the air conditioning that cycled on and off when the temperature reached the eighties, but otherwise the place was like the proverbial tomb.
“There you are,” she greeted him. “I was beginning to think you were a figment of my imagination, Wes.”
“Everyone calls me Weasel,” he reminded her.
“There’s nothing ‘weasel’ about you,” she said.
Wes smiled. He leaned toward a cowboy style with leather boots, low-slung jeans and black shirts that made his six-three seem even taller. Today he was in “uniform” and his smile moved slowly across his lips. He’d been undercover like her brother for most of the time September had been with the force.
“If I looked like a weasel, then I would be gettin’ upset,” he said. “But I don’t.”
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