My stepfather. The giant. A gentle soul, so many said, but they didn’t know his truth, didn’t have to smell the stink of him as he rutted. My jaw tightens as I think of the bastard. May his black soul rot in hell.
“Please,” Nikki is saying, frustration evident in her voice, “you have to let me help you.”
Oh, right, that’s what you’re doing, Nikki. Helping me by writing and selling my story. As if I would believe her stupid pleas for a second!
“Talk to me.”
Without a word, I hang up my heavy telephone receiver. “Guard,” I say as I clamber to my feet, my shackles rattling. I don’t bother looking over my shoulder as the foiled reporter stares after me.
So you think you know me, Nikki?
Guess again.
CHAPTER 8
“I need a smoke.”
Reed, who had been reading testimony from the trial, looked up and found his partner pushing back her chair from the table where she’d been working.
“Thought you quit.”
“I didn’t say I was going to have one, I just said I needed one,” Morrisette clarified. It had been her turn at the case file after a morning of sorting and double-checking that all the evidence was still intact. The flattened snake, the cigarette butt, and the clothes of all the victims had been sent to the lab for updated analysis; a partial list of names and addresses of witnesses who were still alive had been compiled; the autopsy report on Amity O’Henry and the medical records of the other victims had been reviewed. Even the clippings from Blondell’s fingernails, taken the night of the attack, were being searched for DNA, but the theory was that since they’d been clipped after Blondell had been seen at the hospital, and presumably had been cleaned before she had surgery on her right arm, they would come up with nothing worthwhile, no epithelial tissue of the unknown assailant, who, of course, most likely did not exist.
Morrisette dug through her purse, found a pack of Nicorette gum, and tossed a piece into her mouth. “Let’s take a break, grab some coffee or something. Talk this out. There’s only so much sitting I can do.” She checked her watch. “We kinda missed lunch.”
“Fine. Let’s grab something.” The room was getting to him too. They’d already logged in hours sitting with dusty files and twenty-year-old evidence. He’d made several calls and set up some interviews, the first of which was with Niall O’Henry, to find out why he was recanting his testimony and to get his new view of what had happened the night his sister was killed. Since he’d been a child when he’d taken the stand, there was no talk of perjury—at least none Reed had heard. Unfortunately, the first time that was convenient for David Blass, who insisted upon being present at the meeting, wasn’t for a couple of days. Rather than argue the point, Reed had acquiesced. It might be best anyway, because by the time he interviewed Blondell’s son, he would be up to speed on the case, through his first look at all the evidence. “Crab cakes? At Hoppers?”
Hoppers was a beach house converted to a restaurant on Tybee Island and was a good half an hour away. “Trust me, we need the break,” she said when she noticed he was about to argue about the loss of time. “Sometimes getting away from it, talking it out, helps.”
She was right, and Hoppers, with its view of the beach and the pier that stretched into the Atlantic, would be a good place to find a new perspective. The food was excellent, the prices were reasonable, and she was right, they both needed a break, a change of scenery to discuss the case.
“Sounds good.”
“I just need to stop off at the ladies’ room.” She was already heading for the door, chewing her gum frantically and eyeing her cell phone.
Reed took a quick detour to his office, skimmed his recent e-mail, then grabbed his jacket and sidearm from the back of his chair, logged out, and caught up with Morrisette at the stairs. Together they made their way outside, only to run into Deacon Beauregard heading into the building.
“I was just about to check in with you,” the ADA said as they stepped outside. A cold blast of wind raced down the street, kicking up a bit of trash and a few dry leaves. “How’s the O’Henry investigation going?”
“All right,” Reed said.
“Helluva thing.” Morrisette squinted up at Beauregard.
Unlike his father, Deacon was strapping and fit. Flint had, from all accounts, smoked more than he drank, while his diet had been rumored to revolve around a deep fat fryer. With a fondness for pecan and peach pie, as well as cheeseburgers, po’boys, and any traditionally Southern food, Flint, in his later years had become jowly in the face and soft around the middle. Department pictures taken the last years of his life revealed as much.
Not so with his boys. Deacon didn’t smoke, avoided booze, and spent two hours a day at a gym. At six foot two, he had towered over his father, but he was just as dedicated and focused as his old man had been—at least, that was the current consensus in the department. The younger son, Holt, was a different story altogether. He too was athletic and tall, like his older brother, but there’s where the resemblance stopped. Briefly, he’d become a cop like his old man, but he had bombed out. Reed didn’t know that whole story but decided he’d check it out.
Currently he was dealing with the older brother, and he watched as Beauregard’s lips flattened. “I just can’t believe that after all these years the little prick is changing his story! What’s up with that?” Obviously disgusted, he added, “Dad worked damned hard on that conviction.”
Reed said, “We’re talking to Niall O’Henry and his attorney later in the week.”
“Maybe you can convince him to stick with his original story,” Beauregard suggested.
“A little late for that,” Morrisette said dryly.
“This was Dad’s biggest case, and it’s a shame to see Blondell O’Henry walk when she killed her own daughter in cold blood. She tried to take out the other kids too. And now one of them is saying she didn’t do it?” He let out a huff of air. With a glance at his watch, he said, “I’ve got to run, but if there’s anything I can do, just let me know.”
“Your dad have any private notes?” Morrisette asked.
Beauregard’s eyes narrowed a fraction. “What do you mean?”
“Just that. Lots of times when a detective is caught up in a case—when it becomes his life’s work, so to speak, like I’ve heard it did with Flint—he keeps his own notes, unofficial stuff, musings, ideas that are, for one reason or another, cast aside, don’t make it into the case file.”
For a second, it seemed that remark got Beauregard’s back up, but if so, he disguised it quickly. “Don’t think so, but I’ll check with my mother. She still lives in the same house, and Dad used the second bedroom for an office once my brother moved out.”
“Flora, right?” Morrisette said. “The place on Stevenson, a few blocks off Victory Drive?”
“Yeah.” The skin over Beauregard’s face tightened a bit. “How’d you know?”
Morrisette’s gaze was icy. “Been around the block a couple of times.”
He eased into his smooth-attorney attitude again. “I’ll check with her, and please, keep me up to date. Anything I can do to help.”
Morrisette said, “Find us the murder weapon.”
“What?” Beauregard glared at her.
“It would help if we had the damned gun,” Morrisette clarified. “The .45.”
Beauregard looked at her as if she were nuts. “I don’t have any idea where—”
“She’s kidding,” Reed cut in. “We’ll keep you abreast of the investigation.” He started for the parking lot.
“Do that.” Obviously irritated, Beauregard stormed into the building, and Morrisette caught up with her partner.
“Just because he’s a prick doesn’t mean you have to make him show it to you every time you say something,” Reed observed.
“A prick and then some. He’s already shoving his nose in our business. I’ll drive,” she added, keys already in hand as she headed to her aging Chevy Impala, th
e upholstery on the back seat showing the impressions of her kids’ car seats.
“Beauregard’s still an ADA,” Reed reminded her as she unlocked the car and slid behind the wheel.
Morrisette made a retching noise.
Reed half-smiled as he sat down in the passenger seat. Their doors shut in unison, and before he’d snapped his seat belt into place, she’d started the engine with a flick of her wrist.
She said, “Beauregard’s like his old man, only a little more polished, the rough edges smoothed out, but still rough underneath.” She adjusted the rearview mirror. “Deacon goes to great pains to look smooth and refined. All an act. He’s a bully. Just like Flint.” Backing out of the parking space, she added, “I don’t trust him.” Throwing the car into drive, she eased out of the lot, and as soon as there was a break in traffic she gunned it. “As I said, too damned slick. Too concerned with appearances. At least Flint didn’t give a crap about that.”
“But you didn’t like him, either,” Reed said as she changed lanes and headed west on Liberty Street.
“I’m definitely not a member of the Flint Beauregard fan club, which puts me in the minority at the station. The way you hear Red DeMarco or Bud Ellis tell it, Beauregard was second only to Jesus Christ in working miracles, at least when it came to solving cases for the PD.” Still working her gum, she shot Reed a knowing look as she drove out of town and, once past the city limits, hit the gas. “Sometimes I wonder how the department keeps running now that Beauregard’s gone. Again, a goddamned miracle!”
Alfred Necarney’s trick knee was acting up again, his arthritis throbbing. The damned docs at the VA said there was nothing much they could do about it, and he figured they probably were right. He’d had the bum knee for forty-odd years, ever since he took some shrapnel from a land mine in Vietnam.
A pisser, that’s what it was, but then again, most things were. Like the way Mandy-Sue hadn’t waited for him back then. While he was on a tour of Southeast Asia for Uncle Sam, she’d taken off and married Bobby Fullman, just like that. Alfred had come home to a hero’s welcome, a knee that never worked quite right, and no bride waiting for his return.
He’d driven up to this cottage in the north Georgia hills, outside of Dahlonga—the one his granddaddy had left him while he was out of the country—settled in, and never left. As for Mandy-Sue, good riddance to bad news. He’d heard from Nola-Mae, his flap-lipped sister, that Mandy was a grandma now four times over and that Bobby, that son of a bitch who’d been one of Alfred’s best friends at Tyler High, had died two winters ago of pneumonia.
Couldn’t of happened to a nicer guy, Alfred thought for the two hundredth time. What a cocksucker Bobby Fullman had turned out to be.
But that was all ancient history; Alfred had settled into this three-room cabin, made it his own, made a few “improvements” to the place, and had his own thriving, if not exactly legit, business on the side. That is, when he wasn’t logging. Which, just three months ago, he’d given up completely, even sold what equipment he’d collected over the years.
But he was set, at least money-wise. Social Security had kicked in just this past April, so times were good. He still worked a little, but that was about over too, and he wasn’t sorry to give up rising before dawn to clear-cut a hillside with a bunch of damned kids, none of ’em past thirty-five or so. Besides, the damned environmentalists were gettin’ in the way of that too. Just like everything else.
This evening, the rain had quit just before darkness had descended, and the forests surrounding his old cabin smelled fresh and clean. Yep, he loved it up here and had quit thinking how his life would have been different with Mandy-Sue in the suburbs of Atlanta. Shitfire, he’d have hated that. Probably that prick Bobby Fullman had done him a favor.
He was about to turn on the news when headlights splashed against the windows of his house. At about the same time, old General, his hound of indeterminate mix, sent up a ruckus that set off the chickens, who’d just roosted for the night. Now they were squawking, making a helluva racket.
Checking to see that his shotgun was propped near the front door, Alfred climbed out of his recliner, his nightly nip of whiskey waiting on the nearby table. It was his ritual: not a single drop would pass his lips until the six o’clock news came on the tube.
So who the hell would be stopping by? Alfred was, and had been, a loner all his life. People considered him odd, and he did nothing to discourage that opinion. The way he figured, the fewer people who knew him, the better. Absently scratching his beard, he stared out the window.
Whoever was driving the pickup had left it idling near the old pine tree, where he’d set up a picnic table that he used for target practice. Each Sunday afternoon, he’d line up his empties from the week and take aim. Though it had been a long while since he was in the army, he could still shoot the hell out of a Budweiser can at a hundred yards.
It took him a second to recognize the man who was striding toward the front porch. Dressed head to toe in camouflage, he’d been to Alfred’s home before. A customer. A good-paying customer at that.
General let out a low, warning growl.
“Hush!” Alfred said, and the dog instantly quieted, though his droopy-eyed gaze followed the visitor. Through the screen door, he greeted the taller man. “Howdy. You here on business?” It was a superfluous question; they both knew the answer.
“Yeah.”
“How many this time?”
“Not sure. But a few. Let’s see what ya got.”
Alfred was nodding and wondering just how much he could charge. He didn’t want to lose the guy as a customer, but he had expenses to cover, and now that his logging days were over, he was on a fixed income. “Okay. Let’s go out back and take a look.”
Without further ado, he grabbed his keys and walked outside, down the long front porch and around the side of the house, where Alfred had several old trucks parked, all in various states of repair, another side occupation.
He unlocked the shed in the back of the house, then once inside, rolled up the old rag rug and found the trapdoor. He climbed down the ladder first, flipped the switch, and illuminated the concrete bunker, which he’d built himself. It was rudimentary but had everything he needed down here. Heat, light, water, and cases of canned goods. The place was ventilated too, and there was a toilet of sorts, though he hated to think that if there was ever a nuclear blast he’d be stuck down here waiting who knew how long for the radiation to dispel. He knew that idea to be a fool’s game, but the bunker was here, just in case, and in the meantime he used it for another purpose.
For his babies.
The walls were lined floor to ceiling with Plexiglas-and-wood cages he’d constructed himself. Some held sand or mulch with ladders or fake tree limbs, along with the water and lights on timers. Most important, each terrarium housed one of his snakes.
He felt a swell of pride as he watched them move slowly in their cages, their eyes bright, their tongues flicking in exploration, the beauty of their scales glistening as they moved. It was in Vietnam that he’d first become fascinated with the pit vipers, cobras, and kraits of Southeast Asia. Here, in the hills of Georgia, on his grandfather’s old estate, he’d decided to catch his own domestics and sell them.
Rat snakes, milk snakes, black racers, and hognoses—you name it, he had most of the nonvenomous kind, but Alfred knew that this customer, like so many of his, was interested only in his babies who had fangs.
“What would you like?”
His client walked to the far wall, where he eyed the terrariums for rattlers, corals, copperheads, and water moccasins.
“Coral snakes this time,” he said, eyeing several cages. “At least to start with.”
My banded babies, Alfred thought as he eyed the colorful rings on the coral snakes. Red on yellow, kill a fellow. Red on black, friend of Jack. These were definitely red on yellow.
“And let’s make it three. That should do. Now, how about the copperheads?”
 
; “Got a fine lot,” Alfred bragged, showing the client his three largest—beauties each one, and a little different in size and color.
“They are. I’ll take all three.”
“Really?” Alfred was already counting the dollars in his head. He was thinking that this week he could buy the more expensive whiskey that was displayed on a higher shelf at Marty’s Liquor Store, a luxury he rarely afforded himself, as practical as he was. Things were definitely looking up.
“Yep. That’ll do it, I think.” The customer looked him squarely in the eye and reached for his wallet. “How much do I owe you?”
Alfred wanted to bargain, start high, then accept something a little lower so that the customer would return. He never wanted to lose a customer since his business wasn’t exactly sanctioned by the state of Georgia, but this guy worried Alfred a little. He was just one of those dudes you knew instinctively not to push too far; he looked like he might have a hair-trigger temper.
None of his clients were mainstream, of course, but this one, there was something a little unnerving about him. Still, they dickered a little over the cost, settled on a price that warmed Alfred from the inside out. Once the cash was exchanged, Alfred found his hook and tongs and began fishing out three of the best corals he’d caught in the last year, feisty little things that curled over the tongs.
The client handed him a leather pouch, one with holes in it, and swore he’d take them directly back to wherever the hell it was he came from and put them in a terrarium he’d made himself.
“I’ve seen yours, decided to build my own.”
“Well, that’s good.” Alfred dropped the snakes, one by one, carefully into the pouch, and felt a pang to see them go. He’d caught each one himself, in the wilds of Georgia, and it pained him a little to know that he’d never look into their faces again.