Buch lesen: «To Die For»

Chapter One

It was raining when Lieutenant Mike Gerard got to the motel, but rain in August doesn’t come down cold even in Connecticut. Stuffy was what it was, making it uncomfortable to wear a raincoat. But the uniformed cops from the units already on the scene were in raincoats, one way of picking them out from the crowd of gapers they were keeping back.

“Sergeant Renquist is inside waiting for you, Lieutenant,” one of the uniforms told him as he got out of his car. “He’s pretty sure it’s another one.”

“Make sure you keep the press away until the lab people are finished,” Mike said, ignoring the rain. “They almost mucked up the last murder scene, and I don’t want it happening again.”

The man nodded and turned back to help the others with the crowd, leaving Mike to enter the motel unit alone. Once inside, though, he was no longer alone. The forensics team was already there in the usual mob, working over every inch of the room.

“The body’s over here, Mike,” Art Renquist called. The room’s bed stood to the left and Art was just beyond it, looking down at what lay on the floor. Art looked as rumpled and tired as Mike felt, and the extra ten years of age Art carried made his appearance that much worse for wear. Mike circled the unmade bed, and joined Art’s inspection.

“The doc thinks he’ll find the same twelve stab wounds,” Art told him, gesturing to the bloody corpse. “And if that letter opener isn’t one of the set, then I’m Santa Claus. Once we get the note loose, we’ll be able to compare the handwriting.”

Mike nodded as he stared at the corpse, sickened more by the implications than by the terrible sight. This was the fifth victim murdered in the same way, which once again confirmed that there was a psychopath on the loose. Whoever the perpetrator was, he left precisely twelve stab wounds in the body, then attached a note to it by putting a letter opener through the note and into one of the wounds.

“‘From your secret admirer,’” Mike muttered, wondering for the thousandth time what that meant. It had been printed in awkward block letters on all of the notes, set off by the presence of the letter opener. The opener was silver-bladed and gold-handled, a meaningless design in black on the gold handle, a shocking-pink ribbon tied just below the handle. The letter openers looked as though they should be given to friends as inexpensive gifts, not left in a handful of dead bodies.

“The victim’s name was Roger Saxon, but he registered day before yesterday as Roger Brown,” Art said, consulting a small notebook. “According to the ID in his wallet, he was a private detective from New York. But there’s nothing to say he was here on business. Since it’s Sunday we can’t check with his office, so that’ll have to wait until tomorrow.”

“How about his cash?” Mike asked, turning away from the body. “Is it still in his wallet, or missing?”

“Gone, just like with the other victims,” Art answered with a humorless smile. “Aren’t you glad they dumped this on you when the fourth body turned up? That’ll teach you to be the best cop in the state.”

“Cut the bullshit,” Mike answered with a grimace. “I was lucky a few months ago, and that’s the way my report read. I think the chief is hoping I’ll get lucky a second time, because if we don’t get this psychopath soon, he could be out of a job.”

“And we’ll be on the unemployment line right along with him,” Art grumbled. “Why would somebody who kills like this take whatever cash his victim has? He’s not trying to make it look like a robbery, or he’d take watches and jewelry and credit cards too. What could he possibly be doing?”

“He’s trying to tell us who he is,” Mike said, having spent a lot of time considering the point. “It’s probably the best clue we have, but we haven’t been able to read it. Once we do—”

“Excuse me, Lieutenant, but there’s a lady outside who says she has to talk to you,” a uniformed officer interrupted suddenly. “She said to tell you she knows the victim.”

“If she isn’t a reporter, you can bring her in,” Mike said as he looked around. “I’ll talk to her over there near the television set, where the lab crew has already finished.”

The officer nodded and went back out into the rain, and Art put a hand on Mike’s sleeve.

“I wish you the best of luck, buddy,” he said with a grin that was too worried to look amused. “If this is the break we’ve been waiting for, take pity on all of us and don’t blow it.”

“Art, he said she knew the victim, not the murderer,” Mike pointed out with a shake of his head. “Try to take it easy, will you? We’ll catch him, and before we all get tossed out.”

“Try to make that ‘before the next body,’” Art suggested, looking at him with haunted eyes. “Five of these is five too many, and don’t forget that one was a woman. I don’t think I could take another one like that.”

Mike watched Art walk away, finally understanding what was really bothering him. It had taken Art two bad marriages and a lot of years before he found a woman to be in love with. Since they were dealing with a crazy, the next victim could be anyone at all and women weren’t safe. Art was picturing himself arriving at a crime scene to find the woman he loved as the victim.

There’s something to be said for being alone, Mike thought as he moved to the area near the TV. Usually the loneliness was a black gap in his life dating back even before the divorce, but every now and then it was shaded with relief.

“Excuse me, but are you Lieutenant Gerard?” a low, pleasant voice asked, pulling him out of his thoughts. “The officer said I was to talk to a Lieutenant Gerard.”

“That’s me,” Mike acknowledged, turning to look down at the woman who had just come in carrying an umbrella. She was somewhere in her mid-to late-twenties, with dark blond hair and gray eyes. Jeans and a T-shirt covered a good figure, and she would have been prettier if her face hadn’t looked so drawn. “You told the officer that you knew the victim?”

“More than that,” she said, guilt clear in the gray gaze coming up at him. “I hired him, so his being dead is my fault. There’s no law to hold me responsible, but there should be. There should be.”

She brought one hand up to cover her mouth, the gesture holding off the hysteria that obviously wanted to claim her. Mike moved forward quickly to put a comforting arm around her, impressed in spite of himself. Instead of hesitating, she’d immediately come forward with what she knew. Most people would have tried to hide their connection, hoping at the same time to bury their feelings of guilt.

“Why don’t you and I go and get ourselves some coffee at the diner next door?” Mike suggested after a moment, then began to urge the young woman back toward the door. “Once we’re comfortable, you can tell me all about it.”

There was no resistance as he guided the woman out and away from the crowd of onlookers. Happily the media hadn’t gotten here yet, so he and the woman were able to walk quietly to the diner only a few feet beyond the motel.

“Okay, let’s start from the beginning,” Mike said once they were seated in a booth. “What’s your name, and why did you hire a private detective?”

“My name is Tanda Grail,” the woman answered, running a hand through her hair. “If the name sounds familiar to you, it should. My brother Don was the first victim of that maniac.”

Mike hid his surprise, but not his interest. Don Grail had been found dead a week earlier in his rental car, starting the chain of bodies that hadn’t yet stopped. Mike had only been working the case since the fourth victim, which was why he hadn’t recognized the first victim’s sister.

“And you hired a private detective because the police weren’t getting anywhere with finding your brother’s murderer,” Mike suggested. As a guess it was the next thing to a certainty, and Tanda looked at him with defiant gray eyes.

“It’s been a whole week and the bodies just keep piling up,” she challenged, bleakness behind the defiant tone.

“After the third body was found I knew you would never catch the killer, so I went shopping for someone who might. Saxon’s agency was recommended to me by a friend, so I called them. After explaining that they couldn’t do anything to interfere with the police investigation, they sent Saxon to look around. After being here only a day and a half he called me last night to say he discovered something totally unexpected, and would give me a full report this morning. When I got here and saw all those police cars…”

“You knew that someone had noticed his discovering that ‘something unexpected,’” Mike finished when she didn’t. Frustration was climbing high and trying to smother him, but losing his temper would have been a waste of time. “I wish to hell people would learn to call the police first and their favorite gossip partners second. The morgue would have a lot fewer bodies that way.”

“We were supposed to talk to the police together,” she offered, at least having the decency to look embarrassed. “That way he would not be acting behind my back, and I’d be there to explain why he was here. The agency said police departments don’t like having private investigations into cases they’re working on.”

“But we do enjoy being given leads when we’re at a dead end,” Mike said, trying to sound a bit more reasonable. The woman had lost her brother, after all. “Was there anything else Saxon told you last night? Any comment at any time, no matter how unrelated it sounded? Did he keep any files, take any notes?”

“He had a file with the newspaper articles on each of the murders,” she said. “I supplied that, and the first day he was here he double-checked the papers to be sure I hadn’t missed anything. He kept a small notebook, where he wrote down directions and things.”

“And about what he told you?” Mike prompted, leaning on the table with both arms. “Is there anything you can add to what you’ve already said?”

“Saxon laughed and said it was the purest kind of luck.” The frown on her face was one of concentration, and somehow, Mike noticed, the expression made her look unexpectedly attractive. “Saxon said if it had been anyone else who was sent here—well, the implication was no one else would have spotted what he did. What I don’t understand is how he could have let the murderer get close enough to kill him. He didn’t strike me as a stupid man, so how did it happen?”

“There are any number of reasons why he made the mistake,” Mike said, glad to see that she was already shaking off the guilt. “Even professionals get caught by surprise, especially if they underestimate their quarry. Saxon seemed to be a fairly big man, and almost certainly believed he could take care of himself. If you depend on greater size or even superior ability when dealing with a psychopath, you need to have your head examined. Ready for that coffee yet?”

“Yes, as a matter of fact I am,” she answered, giving him a tentative smile. “I still feel responsible for Roger’s death, but you’ve made it a little easier for me. Thank you, Lieutenant Gerard.”

“Call me Mike,” he said, gesturing to a waitress for two of something to drink. When the woman held up the coffeepot Mike nodded, then looked at Tanda again. “I can understand how impatient you felt, but now there’s a way for you to help. Are you willing?”

“Of course,” Tanda agreed with raised eyebrows. “No matter what you happen to ask for in the way of that help, I’ll give it if I can. I was willing long before this.”

“But before this we didn’t have something for you to be willing about,” Mike countered, leaning back to let the waitress put a cup in front of him. Once they both had coffee and the woman was gone, he continued, “Roger Saxon saw something while he was here that turned him into a victim. Aside from the murderer, you’re the only one who knows where he went. Will you help me to retrace his movements?”

“Try and stop me,” she said, now looking doggedly determined. “But what about the second half of the problem? From what Roger said, it was something he originally learned elsewhere that gave him the real hint. How do we find out what that something was?”

“I do that finding out, by contacting his agency,” Mike answered quickly. Tanda was faster at understanding than he’d thought she’d be, and he was pleasantly surprised. “We’ll certainly have to go back years in his life, and simply hope we get lucky. If the incident wasn’t something he was publicly involved in…”

“We may never find it,” she summed up glumly when he let the sentence trail off. “But retracing his movements could give us a clue about what to look for, so let’s get started with that. When he got here day before yesterday, he registered at the motel then called for directions out to my place. He showed up about half an hour after the call.”

“Where is your place?” Mike asked, pulling out his notebook and a pen. “Close enough so that he might have stopped somewhere on the way?”

“Not really,” Tanda replied. “I have a place on Old Stage Road, and for me it’s only a fifteen-minute drive. For a stranger to find it you can add at least five minutes to that first fifteen, and another five if he didn’t leave the instant he hung up. If he stopped somewhere, it had to be on the way and at a place where he could be in and out.”

“I’ll drive it myself, and look for any possible stopping places,” Mike said, making a note. “How long did he stay?”

“About an hour or so,” Tanda estimated as she tasted her coffee. “I gave him the file of newspaper articles, and then he questioned me about my brother. It was the logical place to start, and I was expecting it. He also asked if I recognized any of the other victims from their pictures in the newspaper, and I said I didn’t.”

“And what did he ask about your brother?” Mike said. “Try to remember as many of the questions as you can.”

“Since my brother lived out of state, he asked how long he’d been here,” Tanda said, now staring down at her coffee cup. “I said Don got here August first, just the way he always does. He’s come back every August first for the last five years as a vacation of sorts, I guess. Then Roger asked me why my brother hadn’t been staying with me. That was when I had to admit I wouldn’t have let Don stay with me.”

Mike watched her as she fell silent, remembering reading parts of the statement she’d made when her brother’s body had first been found. It would have been nice if Mike could have spared her the need to go through the whole thing again, but Tanda Grail seemed determined not to hide anything at all.

“Don—Don wasn’t what you would call a nice person,” she groped, raising her gaze again as she tried to explain the condemnation. “When I was very young I adored my big brother, just the way everyone else seemed to. He had a charm about him that most people found irresistible. I think I must have been one of the first to notice that he used the charm to use people. You know, to get out of chores or have favors done for him?”

Mike nodded in answer to the question. He’d known people like that, just as everyone did.

“Our mother never did see through him, but Dad finally did,” Tanda continued. “There was some sort of trouble with the police, and when Dad brought Don home there was a big fight. Don kept insisting he was innocent, Mom supported him, Dad yelled that Don had been caught in the act. All Dad wanted Don to do was admit his guilt and show something in the way of remorse, I think. It didn’t happen, because the only thing Don was sorry about was the fact that he’d been caught.”

She paused to sip her coffee again, and then she shook her head.

“When I got home from school the next day, Don was gone. He’d taken the emergency money Mom kept in a jar behind the preserves, and had left with as many of his clothes as he could stuff into a single valise. It was obvious why he’d left, but Mom insisted he’d done it to keep from being railroaded. Not only did Dad lose the bail money he’d posted, but Mom made him offer money as reparation to the people accusing Don. If he hadn’t made the reparation, then the people involved wouldn’t have dropped the complaint against Don, and Don would have been a wanted man wherever he went.”

“And it never occurred to your mother that if you’re innocent you stay and fight,” Mike couldn’t help remarking. “Especially if your family is willing to stand behind you.”

“It wasn’t entirely Mom’s fault,” Tanda answered wearily. “Don never let her see the ugly side of him. All she knew was that Don was her son and she loved him. Mom kept insisting she understood why Don had disappeared like that, but he hadn’t even left her a note to say goodbye. When more and more time went by and there wasn’t a single word from him, she must have begun to suspect the truth. It made her grieve herself to death.”

Mike could see the anger in Tanda, remembered anger that was still strong. It made the cop in him stir uneasily, but he didn’t interrupt.

“Dad took her death hard, and when Don finally came back—three years after the day he disappeared—Dad refused even to see Don.” Tanda had taken a deep breath, and it seemed to have calmed her. “My big brother had apparently done very well for himself, and everything about him screamed money. He seemed to think we would welcome him back as soon as he paid for any inconvenience he might have caused…

“Well, Dad refused to talk to him, but I didn’t,” Tanda stated, defiance clear in her eyes again. “First I made him come up with the money Dad had thrown away getting him free of all charges, and then I told Don what I thought of him. Don didn’t stay for the whole speech—I guess the truth made him too uncomfortable—and although he was here the whole month, he never tried to come back to the house. It must have finally gotten through that we didn’t want to know him.”

“But now you’re trying to find the person who killed your brother,” Mike pointed out. “Are you doing it out of respect for your mother’s memory, or is there another reason?”

“My dad died less than a year ago,” Tanda said, now toying with her coffee cup. “I wouldn’t have gotten in touch with Don even if I’d known where he was, so I was shocked when he showed up for the funeral. He paid for everything, mourned alone, then left again without even trying to speak to me. He seemed…quieter than usual, somehow changed, and when he came back at the beginning of this month he sent a note asking me to have dinner with him.”

“And you went,” Mike said, knowing it for a fact. “Did you find out if he really was changed?”

“Maybe I was kidding myself,” she answered with a shrug and a sigh. “All I know is that his practiced charm wasn’t beating me over the head any longer, and what he wanted to talk about was our time as kids. I found out in passing that he was a widower, and I hadn’t even known he’d been married. I think it had finally come to him that he and I were the last of the family, and he was trying to make things right between us.”

“But before he could do it he was killed,” Mike summed up, finally understanding. “He might not have been serious about it, but now you’ll never know.”

“But I will know who killed him,” she said, staring at Mike fiercely. “It’s a final gesture I owe my brother, even if he wasn’t serious. What else can I tell you?”

“How about the details of your own whereabouts?” Mike said, taking advantage of the moment. “Saxon called you last night, and arranged to see you in person this morning. What time did he call, and where were you from then until you got here?”

“He called about seven-thirty last night,” she said, again frowning in thought. “I went to bed early, and was out by four this morning to track fugitives.”

“To do what?” Mike asked, looking up from his notebook to blink at her. “You couldn’t have said what I thought you did.”

“Oh, we weren’t tracking real fugitives,” she answered with a laugh that brightened her whole face. “It’s what the exercise is called, and I usually have friends doing the remote part. Teddy went first this morning, and she performed beautifully.”

“It’s obvious that I’m missing something here,” Mike said, still staring. “Who is Teddy, and what sort of exercises were you doing?”

“I thought you knew,” Tanda said with a smile replacing the laugh. “I raise and train bloodhounds, and right now Teddy is my star pupil. Yesterday afternoon one of my friends laid a trail through Rimsdale Mall, visiting certain prearranged stores before leaving by a specified exit. At four this morning Teddy followed that trail, and found every stop her quarry had made. Doing the tracking with no one around is to keep onlookers from getting upset.”

“But you said the trail was laid yesterday afternoon,” Mike protested. “Since the mall doesn’t close until 9:00 p.m., how could there still be a trail after so many people have walked over it? There’d be nothing left to follow.”

“For you and me, maybe, but not for a really good bloodhound,” Tanda corrected with amusement. “Teddy’s father once followed a trail that was laid through a site that was about to be used for a three-day Renaissance fair. He wasn’t put on the trail until the fair was over, but he still had no trouble. Very often the hardest part is to train your tracker to follow the trail, not shortcut to the end of it. If the trail is too short and the person being tracked is standing at the end of it, that’s what happens.”

“That’s something I’d like to see someday,” Mike said, seriously fascinated. “So you were out this morning tracking fugitives. Was there anyone with you?”

“Only Teddy and Masher,” Tanda admitted, losing her amusement. “They may be good trackers, but they lack something as witnesses. I hadn’t realized that I could end up being a suspect.”

“Right now I’m only collecting information,” Mike soothed, surprised to find that he didn’t consider Tanda a suspect. “Since your own movements can’t be confirmed, let’s go back to Saxon’s. You told him all about your brother, and then what did he do?”

“He asked about where Don had been staying, then wanted directions to the local newspaper office,” Tanda responded. “I told him about Don’s house, but I don’t know if he went to look at it.”

“That’s the house your brother bought and renovated five years ago?” Mike asked, remembering the reference to it in the case file. “I understand that he put a lot of money into the place, but only lived in it one month out of the year. Do you have any idea why he did that?”

“None,” she admitted. “It certainly wasn’t for the purpose of being close to Dad and me. We were never invited out to see the house. I understand he bought the place longer than five years ago, but didn’t do the renovations until then. Whatever, he didn’t even mention it at dinner.”

“Well, I think this is enough to get started with,” Mike said, closing his notebook. “I should have more information later today, and probably more questions to go with it. Will you be at home?”

“All day,” she said, finishing her coffee. “Feel free to come by with as many questions as you like. You’re very easy to talk to.”

“Most people would not agree with that sentiment,” Mike told her with his own amusement as they left the booth. And to be honest, he’d just been thinking the same about her… “I’ll try to call before dropping in.”

“Fine,” she said with a smile, offering her hand. “Thanks for the coffee—and the understanding ear.”

“Understanding your situation isn’t terribly difficult,” Mike said, liking the firm way she took his hand. “Losing a brother is the hard part of life. You may not have liked your brother, but that doesn’t mean you didn’t love him.”

She looked as though she was about to say something else, then apparently thought better of it. After retrieving her umbrella she left the diner, unaware of the way Mike’s gaze followed.

You’d better watch that, old man, he thought as he stopped to pay for the coffee. No matter what you said, she is a suspect, and it won’t do you any good to let gray eyes make you forget that. She isn’t the first attractive woman you’ve met, so get a grip on yourself.

With that firm advice ringing in his head he went back out into the rain, but it didn’t do the good he’d been hoping for. He never had met a woman like Tanda Grail before, and it was more than the possibility of new answers that made him look forward to their next meeting. Maybe he would even find an excuse to ask her out to dinner…

TANDA GRAIL CLIMBED into her van, then sat there for a moment with her eyes closed behind the hand covering them. Events around her were growing from bad dream to nightmare, and she had already begun to feel helpless to stop them. But that didn’t mean she intended to quit on the promise she’d made herself. She would find the one who had killed Don, and make sure he or she faced everything the law demanded.