The Drowning Pool (9 page)

“We could get the reports and think about it.”

“It doesn’t mean that he murdered Bradshaw, but there might be a connection,” he acknowledged.

“I wonder if we’ll find any link between Walling and Sonny. You don’t mind if I look into that?”

Gardner nodded his head in approval. He wanted her to get involved in the case, to care about solving Bradshaw’s murder. Maybe working in Webster Township wasn’t the greatest thing in the world for Bert, but Gardner had the feeling that returning to New York would be worse. Whatever the source of Bert’s unhappiness, she needed distance from it. He was about to suggest making a visit to the Scofields, the other couple that had been friendly with Bradshaw, when a call for detectives came through.

The call took them to County Highway 683. They drove quickly along the single lane road as it snaked a serpentine path through well-forested land. A patrol car was there waiting for them. Although two blankets were securely wrapped around her, and the night was warm, a young girl stood shivering on the dirt shoulder of the road, an uneasy, fresh-faced uniform patrolman beside her. Her dark hair hung limp and matted, plastered with blood against her face. Bert helped the girl sit down in the backseat of the blue and white cruiser. She was trembling so badly that her movements were completely uncoordinated. Carefully, Gardner took down her statement, writing the key facts he intended to deposit on another detective’s desk for further investigation.

The girl spoke in a disjointed manner, but he was accustomed to that and listened patiently. She was a local resident who’d decided to hitchhike to the shopping mall. Two young men picked her up. Her description of them was vague and confused, but Gardner decided not to prod her; she was still in a state of shock. All she could remember about the car they drove was that the color was a metallic silver. She had no idea of the make, model or license plate number of the vehicle.

“They drove off the main road and into the woods. Then they took turns raping me.” She began to sob uncontrollably. “I begged them to stop but they wouldn’t listen. They were animals!” Bert held the girl and comforted her until she could resume her story.

The young men had left the girl naked, beaten and humiliated in that isolated spot. Eventually, bruised and bleeding, she managed to make her way back to the main highway. There a cruising township police car had spotted her and stopped to lend assistance. Gardner finished taking down the girl’s statement by the time the ambulance arrived.

“They’ll take good care of you at the hospital,” he said, trying to sound reassuring.

“Do I have to go there?” She seemed very frightened, her eyes enormous in a small, heart-shaped face.

“You’ll have to be examined,” Bert said gently.

“No. I’m scared.”

“How about if I call your parents so they meet you there?” Gardner said.

She shook her head. “My dad, he’s going to kill me! He’ll say it’s all my own fault for hitchhiking.”

“I’ll talk to him,” Gardner promised. “They really need to know so they can help you.”

As the ambulance moved away, lights and siren piercing through the growing twilight, Gardner was thinking of his own two young daughters and how he’d feel if something like this happened to one of them.

He’d call the girl’s parents and make certain that someone sympathetic took charge of the investigation. From his point of view, helping people was the most important function of his job. About ninety per cent of his time on duty was devoted to assisting people with one type of problem or other, only about ten percent to making actual arrests.

“Imagine, crime exists even in beautiful suburbia,” Bert said with a note of sarcasm in her voice.

“Anywhere there are people,” Gardner replied, his features taut and grim. He didn’t miss the sadness in Bert’s eyes.

* * * *

Kim sat on a large tree trunk that had somehow managed to drift on to the beach. The sea lapped up against her toes. In the distance she could make out Staten Island and Brooklyn. Sailboats, motorboats and jet skis meandered their way about the water. She loved it out here, loved the bay and the beach. Out on the jetties, people were patiently fishing. She was alone but not lonely. This was such a peaceful place. Not far from here the house she’d grown up in stood, rented by her mother to strangers. Just as well. There weren’t many happy memories there. She didn’t think she wanted to ever go back there again.

Thinking about the past, she pulled her cell phone from her shorts pocket and scrolled down to her mother’s number. The phone rang several times before Ma picked up.

“I couldn’t really talk when you called me back,” she told her mother. “I was with Mike over at his house.”

“That’s the policeman, isn’t it?”

“Yes.”

“He’s the one you care about, isn’t he?”

She hesitated, but why keep things from Ma? There had been too many secrets between them while she was growing up, and it had been so destructive. “Mike proposed to me. He wants us to get married.”

Ma’s reaction was immediate. “That’s wonderful!”

“Maybe.”

“I don’t understand, dear. I thought you told me you love this man.”

“I did. Maybe I still do. I don’t know. I’m confused, Ma.” She picked up a small scallop shell and turned it over. “The thing is, I was nearly killed last fall. Mike was there for me. I think I might have reacted too strongly to the situation. Not that I don’t have feelings for Mike, but I’m just not certain. He’s about ten years older than I am. He’s been married before. He has two daughters who live with him. I don’t know if I’d fit in with his life. And besides, you don’t need to be married to have great sex with someone. Sorry, Ma, I hope I didn’t scandalize you with that comment.”

“Dear, it takes a lot to shock me. But you’ll be thirty on your next birthday. Isn’t it time you started to think about marriage, maybe having children of your own?”

She watched someone unleash a German shepherd, allowing the animal to prance into the ocean. How joyful that dog must feel being released and free! It would be great if she could be released from her personal prison. But Kim knew only she herself could do that; only she held the key.

“I’m not certain exactly what I want, Ma.”

“Or who? What about that professor friend of yours?”

“Don Bernard phoned me. He wants to take me out.”

“That’s the professor you said was sophisticated and charming? Is he the sort of man you want?”

“You’re asking me questions I just can’t answer.”

“Well, think carefully about what you’re doing. I think marriage would be good for you. And Mike sounds like a good, steady man.”

“I imagine you thought that about Carl at one time.” Why had she said that to her mother, knowing it had to be painful? She was angry with herself.

“Honey, Carl was a good man. It was the army that ruined him. You know he was permanently disabled. It made him bitter, made him do things, things he wouldn’t have normally done.”

“Ma, Carl murdered other people. When are you going to stop making excuses for him?”

“I don’t want to talk about it! Let’s discuss other things, please.”

So the conversation got casual again. Ma talked about Florida, how nice it was, and how she would probably sell the house in New Jersey.

“But, Karen, if you decide to get married, let me know. I want to be at your wedding.”

“Sure, Ma, and I’ll phone again soon.”

She disconnected and put the phone away. Talking to Ma really hadn’t helped. She buried her toes into the sand and turned her face to the sun.

Maybe she thought too much. It made life complicated. When she was in Mike’s arms, all she knew was that he wanted her, and she wanted him just as much.

SEVEN

Mike Gardner opened his desk drawer and took out the brown paper bag that contained his dinner. Evie had neatly packed two turkey sandwiches, but he found them soggy with excess mustard. He had a sneaky suspicion it was Evie’s punishment for him not eating dinner with the family, even though she knew perfectly well that he had to rotate shifts. Again he reached into the bag, discovered a large, ripe Jersey peach, and bit into that first. That made him think of Kim Reynolds. She was a true Jersey peach, juicy and sweet, but with just an underlying edge.

What was going to happen with them? He’d thought he knew where the relationship was headed, that they were in a really good place; he wasn’t so certain of that anymore. Kim was special. They shared a connection very few people ever had. He’d lost Evelyn. He didn’t want the same thing to happen with Kim. He shouldn’t have been so jealous, so possessive of her. He knew how she felt about her independence. He could be sensible and in control on the job, but when it came to Kim, emotions got in the way.

The office was unusually quiet at this hour. He was alone in the drab room shared by the plainclothes detectives. The frosted glass door that led to Captain Nash’s office swung open and the captain barreled toward him.

“Mike, is St. Croix around?”

“No, she went out for something to eat.”

“Just as well. I was looking for a chance to talk to you alone. Think you could eat in my office?”

“As well as anywhere else.” Gardner picked up one of the offending sandwiches and took it with him.

Nash was a big, burly man possessed of homely features. His nose, broken at some indefinite time in the past, had never properly mended and gave him the intimidating appearance of a former boxer. Gardner seated himself across from the captain.

“What’s your take on the Bradshaw case?”

“We’re questioning people,” he said carefully. “We have several suspects.”

“Translation, you got nada.”

“We’ve got some solid leads.”

“I’d like to see you wrap this one as soon as possible with no screw-ups.”

“I always try to be thorough. What’s the problem?” He took a bite out of his sandwich, the oozing mustard stinging the corner of his mouth.

“You know how local politics are,” the captain said with an uneasy shrug.

“Someone putting on the pressure?”

Nash cleared his throat. “I got a call from Pete Ginley this morning. Maybe you know him?”

“Know of him. On the town council, right?”

“Yeah, and he also heads the planning commission. He’s a pal of George Page.”

Gardner felt like a character in a comic strip, a light bulb glowing incandescently over his head. “Let me guess: Page, who happens to be the builder and owner of La Reine Gardens, is worried about unfavorable publicity.”

“You got it. Ginley says that his friend Page is concerned because it’s not just a local story anymore. An article appeared in
The Star-Ledger,
which means people are reading about the drowned man all over the state. I think what’s really bothering Page is the fact that he’s eager to double the size of his complex. He also put in a bid to build a big shopping center. The planning commission is very sensitive to public opinion and pressure. If the newspapers start giving this story a big play with articles on crime in suburbia and how unsafe it is to walk out alone at night in this township, well, you see what could happen.” Nash waited for him to say something. When he didn’t, the captain continued. “A lot of people would benefit if Page put a large shopping center into this community. I’m not talking another dinky strip mall. And the apartment complex is quality stuff. That can only improve the town and life for the homeowners. A lot of us wouldn’t like to see the council deny Page approval on his plans. Let’s face it, we’ve had enough shoddy, substandard housing tracts thrown up around here. We’ve got to encourage people like Page. You ought to know that the chief’s involved in this too.”

“Not another friend of Page.”

Sarcasm was wasted on the captain; he never reacted to it.

“You got it. And he wouldn’t be the only unhappy camper if Page doesn’t build further in Webster. Take Mayor Ryan, for example.”

Should he start taking notes? Gardner felt like he was a student back in high school, but he listened politely without interruption.

“The Mayor is also a friend of George Page, as it happens.”

“I guess a person can never have too many friends,” Gardner said with a hint of irony, thinking of what Kim had said the other evening.

“And I don’t have to tell you about the feud that the mayor and the chief are having. Now to some folks, it all seems like petty crap, but to those of us who understand the situation, we see that it’s a serious matter, a question of power and control with significant implications.”

A question of who gets the most pay-offs
. Gardner couldn’t help being cynical. He’d lived in the town enough years to suspect graft and corruption, not that he could really prove anything. They were too smooth for that. Hard evidence was difficult to come by. Then again, the entire state had been controlled by corrupt politicians for as long as he could remember.

“So the mayor and the chief have put aside their personal differences to help Page?” Gardner surmised.

Nash eyed him askance. “You implying something?”

“Not a thing. I just find human behavior fascinating.”

“Helping Page is the only thing the chief and the  mayor agree on these days.” Nash cleared his throat and continued. “I’ve decided to keep you working evenings for a while. Since Bradshaw was whacked in the evening, and most of the people involved are available then, it seems the smart thing to do. Hope you don’t object.”

“Would it matter? I’m sure my kids will be thrilled. You want to explain it to them?”

Nash quickly sought to change the subject. “How’s St. Croix working out? You breaking her in?”

“More like the other way around,” Gardner said with a wry smile.

“I knew she wouldn’t be easy to work with. A real pistol. That’s why we gave her to you.”

“Should I send a dozen roses as a thank-you?”

“Don’t be a wise ass. The chief says she’s a first-rate cop. They wouldn’t have hired her otherwise.”

“Unless the chief was under pressure from the mayor and the department had been criticized publicly because of its discriminatory policies.”