Tailspin

  TWENTY-FIVE

  She was good, Jack thought, very good, a deft manipulator. She’d managed to turn it all around, and what she said made sense. It was obvious to Jack that Rachael had never considered this. She looked poleaxed.

  Jack said, “Ms. Kostas, I understand your father was quite the autocrat, that Rachael’s mother was so afraid of him she didn’t tell Rachael who her real father was until after Carter Blaine Abbott died.”

  “That is nonsense. Absolute nonsense. My father was a great man, a brilliant man, a man with extraordinary vision. Look around you—he founded Abbott Enterprises fifty years ago with a small strip mall, and look what it is today: a power not only in the U.S. but in the world. Abbott is both respected and admired, and that is because of my father’s legacy.

  “To his family he was kindness itself. But I will tell you this—he couldn’t abide fools or liars; he protected his children, took care of them. When he saw your mother, young as she was, he knew what she was, and so he saved his son from her.

  “Did you show up on my brother’s doorstep because that scheming mother of yours needed money and you were the one who was to get it for her?”

  Rachael wanted to kill her on the spot, to put her hands around her neck and . . . but she said, her voice calm, even pleasant, “That was very well done, Mrs. Kostas. You put me on the defensive, a skill Jimmy said you have in spades. I would not like to own a company you wanted to acquire.

  “But finding out about my father’s death isn’t about your spite, isn’t about your dislike for me. It’s about getting justice for a very fine man.”

  Laurel slammed her fist on the desktop. “I know the truth, and it’s quite horrible and needless enough, without implying anyone else was involved. If you didn’t kill him, then the senator was drunk and he lost control of his car.”

  “Surely you knew your brother didn’t have a single drink since he killed that little girl, Melissa Parks, in Delancey Park eighteen months ago, nor did he drive a car after that evening.

  “You had meals with him, saw him in social settings. Surely you noticed he no longer drank, never drove? This is the truth. I know it to be the truth. Actually, he always drank club soda. Therefore, he couldn’t have been drunk, nor could he have been driving. Someone else was.”

  “I will not speak further about this.”

  “I know Jimmy told you and your husband, and Quincy, about what happened eighteen months ago. Moreover, he told you he couldn’t stand living with the guilt anymore and that he was going public with all of it. He said you and Quincy were both furious when he told you what he planned to do, that even though he would be the one ruined by his confession, you and Quincy didn’t agree. You felt it would blacken the family name, call into question the family honor, make business partners question the Abbott honesty. He said you and Quincy were enraged. He was disappointed because he wanted you both to understand, to support his decision to go public.”

  Laurel drew herself up to her full five-nine height. She looked faintly bored. “Whatever aberrations my poor brother suffered from at the end of his life, they are no longer of any concern to anyone. I loved my brother very much. I admired him, but he wasn’t a strong man.”

  “Not strong? I didn’t know him very long, ma’am, but I’d say he was one of the strongest people I ever met.”

  “I want you to go now. I have nothing more to say to either of you.”

  Rachael said, “There is something else, Mrs. Kostas. Did you and your brother, perhaps that lecherous husband of yours, drug me and tie my feet to a block of concrete and throw me in Black Rock Lake because you knew I was going to tell the world what my father had done?”

  “You leave my husband out of this, you little bitch! You claim someone tried to kill you? Threw you into a lake?” She laughed, tossed her hands. “How very melodramatic you are. Who would possibly believe someone like you? You are nothing more than a temporary annoyance. Get out.”

  Rachael said as she turned, “Actually, I’m far more than a temporary annoyance, Mrs. Kostas. I own Jimmy’s house. I have a third of his money, a third of his stock. I hope you contest the will. I hope you demand DNA testing. Yes, let’s do it, as publicly as you like. It will give me a chance to announce to the world what vipers you and your brother are.”

  Laurel leaned forward on her desk, her hands fisted on the desktop. “Get out of here now!”

  “I know why you’re trying to kill me. You’re afraid I’ll make Jimmy’s announcement for him. You’ve had three tries—three!—and yet here I am, standing in your office. Jimmy’s death was no accident, and you well know it. Just think about the reporters sleeping in your front yard, Mrs. Kostas, once everyone knows the truth.

  “Enjoy this cold, soulless office while you can, ma’am, because you’re not going to be in here much longer.”

  “What is going on here, Laurel? Julia told me the FBI was in your office. Oh, it’s you. What are you doing here, Ms. Janes?”

  “She looks a bit red in the face, Quincy,” Stefanos Kostas said, stepping around his brother-in-law.

  Jack and Rachael turned to see Quincy Abbott and Stefanos Kostas. Quincy was what Jack expected an Abbott to look like—very expensive Italian suit, black with very thin red stripes, a white shirt, a red tie. He was elegant, polished, and at that moment he looked more bewildered than angry. But there was one thing that was off—it was the toupee he wore. The color was perfect, but the style didn’t quite fit the shape of his head.

  As for Kostas, Jack thought he looked like a dissipated playboy, a man who lived only for his own pleasure, for his own whims. He was handsome, Jack supposed, fit, well-dressed, but there was something off about him, too, and it wasn’t a toupee. He didn’t know at that moment what it was.

  Rachael turned and said pleasantly, “Uncle Quincy, this is Special Agent Jackson Crowne. He’s here to find out what happened to my father and who tried to kill me last Friday night, Monday, and—goodness—yesterday, as well. But I’m sure you know all about that, don’t you?”

  Quincy Abbott laughed, then looked sideways at his sister and said, “Sounds to me like a boyfriend gone nasty. Who have you been sleeping with?”

  Rachael thought about her one-time fiancé from Richmond. What a fiasco that had been.

  Stefanos waved his question away. “What’s this about killing you?”

  Jack said pleasantly, “Perhaps you, sir, Mrs. Kostas, and Mr. Abbott could tell me where you were on Friday night.”

  Quincy raised a brow. “I was at Mrs. Muriel Longworth’s welcome party for the new Italian ambassador. Stefanos, you came in later, as I recall.”

  Stefanos nodded and looked at Rachael’s breasts.

  “I will not dignify your question with a reply,” Laurel said.

  Rachael said, “Uncle Quincy, Jimmy told you about killing that little girl.”

  “Perhaps he did. I wasn’t much interested, to tell you the truth. Oh well, who cares now? The senator is dead and buried. I just wish he hadn’t left you our house. As for the stock, at least you don’t have enough to cause trouble.” He brightened. “You said someone is trying to kill you? Well then, have this FBI agent go find him and throw him in jail.” Quincy Abbott nodded to both of them, gave his sister a long look, turned on his designer heel, and left Laurel Kostas’s office.

  Stefanos leaned against the door, arms across his chest, and said to his wife, “I’ve been shopping. Guido called me about this very lightweight wool I’m wearing. What do you think?” He looked at Rachael’s breasts again, knowing his wife was watching. If she’d been Laurel, she’d have shot him dead. But Laurel said nothing, didn’t appear to notice anything amiss.

  The three of them, Rachael thought, didn’t appear to live on the same planet.

  Rachael walked out, Jack right behind her.

  Jack’s last memory of Laurel Abbott Kostas was of the cold, ripe malice in her eyes, her husband leaning against the door, like a beautifully suited lizard. He thought about Juki
e Hayes, owner of a junkyard in Marlin, Kentucky, a good ole boy who visited neighboring towns. He killed people and buried them under ancient wrecks of cars, between stacked tires, stuffed inside car trunks. He told Jack he liked the smell of the decaying bodies. Jack still had nightmares about Jukie, and the stack of bones he’d uncovered beneath a tarp thrown over a dozen steering wheels. Odd that a wealthy Greek playboy would remind him of Jukie, but he did.

  Both of them breathed in the sea air as they walked down Calvert Street to the Inner Harbor. Jack laughed. “She’s a terror, Rachael, scares the crap out of me. Quincy doesn’t like her, but he knows she has the power. Is he afraid of her? I wonder.”

  “I need to take a shower,” Rachael said. “That Stefanos Kostas is a dreadful man. And she didn’t appear to even notice he was eyeing me.”

  Jack stopped in the middle of the sidewalk, put his hands on her shoulders, and said, “You held it together. You went after her. That was well done. I’m proud of you.”

  Rachael stood very still, aware of people moving around them, aware that she felt good about herself too, and pleased at what he’d said. “Thank you. You said Quincy is afraid of his sister. Why?”

  Jack dropped his hands and he and Rachael moved back into rhythm with the crowds of tourists. “He’s smooth as silk, terrified someone won’t believe he’s God’s gift to the world, and weak. He’s not in his sister’s league. As for the toupee, nothing said is too much. This was only the first salvo, Rachael.”

  Madonna’s voice blared out “Like a Virgin.”

  Rachael’s eyebrow went up when Jack pulled out his cell. “Yeah?”

  He listened. His hand tightened on the phone. He listened for a very long time.

  When he slipped his cell back into his jacket pocket, he said, “That was Savich. The guy I shot in the shoulder yesterday in Gillette’s kitchen—the woman on the walkie-talkie called him Donley—they ID’ed him from a blood sample from the kitchen floor. His name is Everett, Donley Everett. Turns out he showed up in Clapperville, Virginia, went to a local doctor’s house and forced the doctor to treat him. He didn’t kill the guy, thank God. Evidently Donley thought the doctor lived alone, and so he left him bound and gagged in the basement. Turns out the doctor’s wife had been on a business trip. She arrived home an hour after Everett left. They called the police, who put out an APB on him.”

  “What’s Donley Everett’s physical status?”

  “The doctor said he was running a fever when he showed up, that if he’d had that bullet in his shoulder for another day or so without treatment, he might very well have died. Everett forced him to remove the bullet with only a local anesthetic, which he did. He told Savich the guy didn’t make a sound.

  “The doctor gave him a week’s worth of antibiotics, some heavy-duty pain meds. He said Everett would feel rotten for a while, but he thought he’d pull through. The doctor wasn’t very happy about that.

  “Savich said the doctor was very relieved when Everett only tied him up in the basement.”

  “What about the other guy at Slipper Hollow, the one you shot dead? You said the woman called him Clay?”

  “Yes. There’s no word yet on his whereabouts. Savich thinks, and I agree, that Everett buried him somewhere deep in the sticks. Savich said they ran Clay’s first name through the system. He’s sending photos on my cell of two guys who seem promising, both with the first name Clay, one of them is a known associate of Everett, so he’s the most promising.”

  They waited next to a Starbucks, both staring down at the cell screen.

  In another second, Jack was looking at a guy named Clay Clutt. But he wasn’t the man Jack had shot at the edge of the forest in Slipper Hollow.

  He called back. “It’s not Clay Clutt.”

  “Okay, Clutt was my warm-up. Here’s the second one. He’s worked with Everett in the past. Coming through now,” Savich said.

  “Bingo,” Jack said to Savich a few minutes later. Clay Huggins. Rachael listened to him tell Savich about their meeting with Laurel Kostas, her husband, Stefanos Kostas, and Quincy Abbott. When he pocketed his cell, he said, “Both Donley Everett and Clay Huggins have sheets reaching to Kalamazoo, including suspected murder. Neither has been convicted. Savich is sending out agents to both gentlemen’s places of residence. He said he and Sherlock are going to Everett’s apartment, since it’s likely he’s holed up there, nursing his wounded shoulder and popping pain pills. Savich said it sounds like we stirred up the snakes, which is good. Let’s call it a day, Rachael. Let’s have that lobster.”

  TWENTY-SIX

  Washington, D.C.

  Late Wednesday afternoon

  When Savich pulled his Porsche to the curb half a block from Donley Everett’s apartment building, the sun was low in the sky, the June air soft and warm.

  The apartment building was in the middle of a transitional neighborhood, where the old single-story houses from the forties and fifties were slowly being rehabbed or torn down. Unfortunately for the new, larger homes, the yards were still as minuscule as they’d always been. Everett’s apartment building looked maybe ten years old, well-maintained, with a redbrick facade.

  Sherlock waved at Dane Carver and Ollie Hamish, who were just getting out of Ollie’s black Pacifica, behind them the two surveillance agents.

  Savich and Sherlock watched as Ollie and Dane circled to the back of the building to check out exits. There weren’t many tenants around yet since federal offices, the bread and butter of the Washington workforce, were just now closing down for the day. They heard a baby gurgling happily through an open window on the second floor, heard the new country singer Chris Connelly singing about his cheating love raking over his heart. Savich liked Chris Connelly.

  The lobby was small, one wall lined with green-painted mailboxes, a live palm tree in a metal pot against another, its fronds stretching wide.

  Sherlock double-checked the mailboxes. “Yep, D. Everett in 4C.”

  Savich looked at the two elevators. One was parked right there, the door open. He pushed the stop button, and they took the other one.

  Donley Everett’s apartment was on the corner of the fourth floor. Savich punched in Dane’s number, said quietly, “Apartment 4C is on the east end of the building. I’ll bet you there’s a fire escape there.”

  “Yeah, I see it,” Dane said. “There’s only one back exit. We got it covered. Our two other agents are outside the front doors, keeping an eye on the lobby. Holler if you want us up there, you know, you being such a wuss and all, you might need some backup.”

  “That’s okay, Sherlock’ll take care of me.”

  Sherlock pulled a stick of gum out of her pocket, popped it into her mouth, and began chewing. Savich positioned himself at the side of the door. She rapped smartly on Everett’s door and called out through the chewing gum, “FedEx for Mr. Donley Everett.”

  She smiled straight ahead into the peephole and blew a big bubble, letting it splat against her mouth.

  A man’s low voice said, “Go away, little girl. I’m not expecting anything from anybody.” There was pain in the voice, she heard it clearly.

  Sherlock’s face disappeared from the peephole for a moment as if she were checking something. “It says here on the package, sir, that it’s from Gun Smith Euro, whatever that is. It’s sort of heavy. Wow, do you think it might be a gun? Did you order one? I’ve never seen a gun up close before. But hey, if you want it, I can’t leave it without a signature.”

  “But I didn’t order a . . . Wait a minute, you don’t want to touch that package, you hear me?” Everett released three locks, then jerked the door open to stare at the redheaded woman who’d blown such a big bubble before it popped, holding a SIG Sauer aimed at his chest. “FBI, Mr. Everett. Nice and easy now, hands behind your head and step back, one step.”

  “Hey! FBI? Whoa . . .”

  Sherlock slowly lowered her SIG until it was aimed at his stomach. “A gut shot isn’t pretty, Mr. Everett, but hey, it’ll go nice with you
r shoulder.”

  Everett stumbled backward, twisted suddenly, dove behind the black leather sofa, and fired.

  The bullet was wide, struck and shattered a lamp.

  “You idiot!” Sherlock yelled, and fired at his foot, which was showing from behind the sofa, missing his big toe by an inch. “The next bullet will go in your calf, then your knee, and you’ll be crawling around for the rest of your sorry life! Throw out that gun! Now!”

  Savich moved around to the other end of the sofa. “Now, Everett, or when she shoots you in your left knee, I’ll get your right. Yep, there are two of us. Throw out the gun right now or you’re going to be in very great pain.”

  They heard Everett cursing behind the sofa, then there was some back-and-forth discussion, blurred and contentious, as if he and his evil twin were arguing his odds.

  “Gun out now!” Sherlock screamed.

  The gun came flying out, skidded across the hallway floor. Sherlock stepped on a nice Kel Tec PF9 9mm. “Betcha when they dig slugs out of the Slipper Hollow house, we’re going to find a match. Now, Don, come out nice and slow.”

  “Don’t shoot me!”

  “Show me your face in two seconds and I’ll consider it.”

  When he finally crawled out from behind the sofa, using only one hand, he looked clammy and pale, his eyes a bit dilated, and he was cupping his right arm, held up and close in a blue sling.

  “Stand up!”

  He managed to hoist himself to his feet. He held out his good hand, palm open, toward them. “Who are you? What is this?”

  “Pay attention, Mr. Everett. We’re FBI,” Savich said, and pulled out his shield, waved it at Everett. “Why don’t you have a nice seat over on that La-Z-Boy? No stupid moves, Don. I don’t want to have to kill you on such a lovely summer day.” He punched in Dane’s number and said, “No problem here. We’ve got him. Come on up.”

  Everett said, “It’s not lovely, it’s too hot, it sucks. Dude, can’t you see me? Look at my arm. I’m sick, real sick. What do you want? I didn’t do anything. I don’t know anything about any Slipper Hollow.”