A Cold White Sun: A Constable Molly Smith Mystery (Constable Molly Smith Series) (29 page)

Chapter Thirty-six

“I’m impressed, Ms. Jenaring. Highly impressed. That’s a solid piece of work.”

Michelle Jenaring, age seventeen, beamed around her mouthful of braces. She lifted her fist into the air and pumped it. The class applauded.

Mark Hamilton laughed. He had high hopes for Michelle, one of the brightest of his students. She planned to major in math at university, and he was proud to think he’d played a role in helping the shy girl find her true calling in life.

He glanced at the clock on the wall. One minute until the end of the school day.

It had been a good one. The grade nines had slumbered through their class, as usual, the grade tens had complained about the amount of homework, also as usual, but the grade twelves had been interested and engaged. He enjoyed having the advanced precalculus class last period, ending his day on a high note. These kids were taking this course because they wanted to be here. Most of them were headed for university to major in the sciences.

The bell rang, and students scrambled to gather up books and bags.

“Mr. Hamilton to the office. Mr. Hamilton,” announced the PA system.

He grumbled under his breath. What was it now? Had he placed a comma in an incorrect place on some kid’s report card, or neglected to tick a box on his employment record? At least it wouldn’t be that ridiculous Cathy Lindsay wanting his ‘help’. He immediately chastised himself for the thought. Sure the woman had been a nuisance, but she didn’t deserve to die because it made Mark Hamilton’s life a fraction easier.

He’d made a damned fool of himself at the funeral on Monday. One minute he’d been in the church, squeezed into a pew between an elderly woman with a heavy hand on the cologne bottle and a fat kid with sharp elbows who sent text messages the entire time. Next minute, he’d been at a ramp ceremony in Afghanistan, watching as they loaded the coffin of Corporal Fred Worthing onto an airplane for the long journey home. Fred, good old Fred, father of five, who never met a kid he didn’t want to play soccer with. Who died because Mark Hamilton didn’t have the guts to save him.

He’d watched them carry the flag-draped coffin across the tarmac. Soldiers saluted, music played, and civilian women wept.

Sergeant Mark Hamilton had also wept. He stood at attention, ramrod straight, his arm in a stiff salute as tears streamed down his face. Everyone thought he was crying for Fred, but he wasn’t. He cried for himself. He cried for the wreck of a man he’d become.

As they said the meaningless words over Cathy Lindsay, Mark cried for himself once again while the ever-present demons laughed and danced the jig on the grave of his pride.

Perhaps the demons had had enough fun for a while. Since he’d fled the church, he’d been feeling okay. Better than he had in a while. He’d even slept last night; his sleep not disturbed by nightmares he could not remember come morning.

The grade twelve precalculus students always made him feel good. He saw his own love of mathematics reflected in the best of them. As long as
there were
students who loved math and wanted to learn,
he knew
he could cope.

He made his way to the office through the throng of laughing, chatting teenagers, hoping he could wrap this up and get to basketball practice on time.

***

John Winters arrived at Trafalgar District High as school was letting out. He wanted an official presence, so he’d brought Molly Smith and a patrol car.

Teenagers poured out of the school, everyone of them eyeing the police vehicle prominently parked in the no-parking area by the front doors. A couple of droopy-panted boys made an abrupt change of direction and bolted back into the school. No doubt to find another exit.

He wished he could ask them to turn out their pockets.

Instead, Winters and Smith climbed the steps and went into the building.

“Did you go to this school?” he asked her.

“Yeah. It sure is weird wearing this uniform here. Look at those girls. They make me feel about a hundred years old.”

The girls in question, all long swinging hair and thin hips, burst into giggles when they saw Smith looking at them.

The two women working in the office stopped whatever they were doing to watch the police enter. One rose and came to the counter, a greeting on her mouth, concern in her eyes.

Winters showed his identification, although the presence of a uniformed constable was probably ID enough. “I’m looking for a teacher here. Mark Hamilton. Was he in class today?”

“I believe so.”

“He should be on his way to the gym,” the second woman called. “Basketball practice today, and Mr. Hamilton’s the coach.”

“I’d like to speak to him. Can you page him to come to the office, please.”

“Certainly.” The woman exchanged a glance with her colleague as she headed for the public address system. “Mr. Hamilton to the office. Mr. Hamilton.”

Mark Hamilton soon arrived, shock on his face when he saw who waited for him. Kids drifted to a stop in the hallway. They lingered outside, exchanging questions, peering through the glass walls.

“Sergeant Winters,” Hamilton said. “What can I do for you?”

“I have a few questions regarding the death of Cathy Lindsay.”

Hamilton’s right eye twitched. “Okay.”

“We can’t talk here. I’d like you to come to the station.”

“I’m not finished for the day. How about if I come down after work?”

“Now, Mr. Hamilton.”

A drop of moisture appeared at Hamilton’s hair line. His eye twitched again, and he grasped his hands together so tightly the skin turned white. Winters could have phoned Hamilton, asked him to drop into the station. He could have come alone, in a plain vehicle, to pick the man up. But he’d chosen a patrol car with a uniform escort because Mark Hamilton was clearly a man under pressure. Add a bit more pressure, tighten the screws.

Stand back and observe the fallout.

Hamilton’s eyes darted around the room: the policewoman, standing behind and slightly to one side of Winters, the watching staff, the growing pack of kids outside the office.

“I have questions for you regarding your relationship with Mrs. Lindsay,” Winters said.

“I had no relationship with her.” Hamilton looked at the watching women. “You know that, right? I had no interest in Cathy.”

“That’s right. Why Mark was never anything but polite no matter how much she swanned over him. Isn’t that so, Betty?”

Betty, no longer smiling, muttered words of agreement.

This was not, Winters realized, a supportive audience. Clearly Mark Hamilton was popular here. He glanced at the windows, murmurs building in the hall as word spread and students gathered. He cursed himself. Coming here had been a mistake. A serious one.

He hadn’t wanted to pull Hamilton out of class, so he waited until school was finishing for the day. It had been a long time since John Winters had been in a high school. He’d forgotten this was precisely the time when the halls would be most crowded and the kids wouldn’t be hurrying to their next class.

“Let’s go,” Winters said.

“Are you arresting me?” A vein began to beat in Hamilton’s neck. Sweat poured off him, although the room wasn’t overly warm.

“No, Mr. Hamilton, I am not arresting you. I have questions and I thought it would be better if we talked where we could have some privacy. Not here.”

“You can use Ms. Herchman’s office. She had to go to a meeting and won’t be back today,” the helpful receptionist said.

“Mark.” Winters tried to sound both forceful and friendly at the same time. “Let’s go.”

“What about basketball?”

“I’ll go down to the gym, tell the boys practice is cancelled for today,” Betty said.

Molly Smith stepped forward. She placed her hand on Hamilton’s arm. He flinched.

Betty gasped.

“That won’t be necessary, Constable,” Winters said. “Mr. Hamilton is not, as I said, under arrest.” If he were under arrest Molly would be handcuffing him. Winters hated to think of the reaction to that. “Shall we go?”

Hamilton’s eye was twitching so badly it might have been doing a dance. He clenched his fists, took a deep conscious breath, and let it out slowly. He was a big guy, powerfully built. He might be more than a match for a middle-aged man and a woman.

Winters decided to drop it. Hamilton showed signs of being unstable, which was why Winters had thought bringing him down to the station would be a good idea. Clearly it wasn’t. He was about to tell Hamilton to go to his practice and come to the station after, when the man uncurled his fists and said, “Not a problem. You have to find out what happened to Cathy. We all want that, don’t we?”

The staff mumbled agreement.

“Janet, the boys can have their practice without me. Tell Randy he’s in charge.” Hamilton gave Winters a smile as warm as that of a grinning corpse laid out for Doctor Lee’s inspection.

Winters nodded to Smith, telling her to leave first. As she opened the door a wave of sound rolled over them. A hundred or more students must have been in the hallway. They stood watching, some muttering, no one smiling. Kids blocked the path to the doors. Two boys stood at the front of the pack, arms crossed over chests.

Smith stepped forward. Her back was straight, every muscle in her body tense. She did not, Winters was pleased to see, have her hand resting on her pepper spray or, god forbid, her Glock.

The boys didn’t move.

Winters was aware of how quiet it had become. The murmurs had stopped; no one spoke. In the office, Janet held a phone in her hand.

“You kids have nothing to do?” Hamilton said, his voice surprisingly strong, pitched to carry. “Martin Robotham, if the results of your last test are any indication, you should be home studying.”

Some of the kids laughed. A tall gangly boy with a buzz cut and a few stray whiskers on his chin turned to the onlookers and lifted his arms in triumph.

The tension broke, and the crowd shifted. Winters could see the doors ahead. They walked on. Behind them, the path closed as the kids followed.

Smith held the back door of the car open for Hamilton, but she did not put her hand on the top of his head or shove him in.

Winters got into the passenger seat. He turned and faced the man in the back. “Thank you, Mark.”

“I didn’t kill Cathy Lindsay, you know.”

“Glad to hear it.”

Chapter Thirty-seven

Margo spent the day in a state of fevered excitement. Eliza had not come in, and Margo was in charge of the gallery. She was busy, lots of people wanting to see the new show, preparations to be made for the formal reception tomorrow evening. Eliza would be pleased to see red stickers on two of the paintings, and the show wasn’t even officially open. Renata Reingold’s art was too abstract to suit Margo’s taste, but she didn’t have to like the work to sell it.

She’d followed the beige Corolla last night, through the twisting streets hacked into the side of the mountain, close enough that her headlights lit up the license plate. It was him. Jackson! They hadn’t gone far before the Corolla slowed to turn into a driveway. The garage door opened automatically, the car drove in, and the door shut behind it. Margo pulled up across the street, hoping the driver would have to come out of the garage to get into the house. But he didn’t. In a few moments lights began switching on inside.

She sat in her car, palms wet, heart beating, debating whether or not to approach the house. Eventually, she decided against it. It was late, probably not the best time to talk to a man with life-changing news. Besides Steve might have stayed up, waiting for her.

Now
she knew
where Jackson lived, Margo could return at a more-suitable time.

The curtains were pulled back and she could see him moving about. He walked up to the window, lifted his arms to draw the drapes. Then he stopped, peering out into the night. Margo’s heart leapt into her throat.
He sensed her. Knew she was close
. That bond they shared, reaching out to him. A car drove by, throwing light around her. Jackson didn’t acknowledge her, and the curtains were pulled sharply closed.

She put the car into gear and drove home almost bursting with happiness.

She’d barely slept. Lying in bed, watching the celling, beside a gently snoring Steve, Margo had made her plans. When the gallery closed at five, she’d go home, have dinner with Steve, tell him she had to hurry back to work to finish preparing for the reception. She didn’t like to lie to Steve, but he didn’t understand how she felt about Jackson, and so she’d sometimes not told him the whole truth. She didn’t want to upset him.

Steve couldn’t understand. Ellen, her daughter, refused to understand. How could they? They’d never had a child stolen from them. Two children. Gerald killed in a car accident, her grandchild along with him. Gerald would not be coming back, the precious grandchild would never have a chance at life, but everything would be good now that Margo had found Jackson. Her baby boy. They’d taken him away, but he remained in her heart. Never forgotten.

“It’s good, but I’m not comfortable with the use of so much yellow. Is there something a bit less colorful perhaps?”

“What?” Margo snapped out of her dreams. The customer was addressing her. “Colors. Renata is known for her bold use of primary colors.” She’d read that in the brochure. “There is one small watercolor on paper that might be more to your taste.” She led the way across the room.

Margo would go to Jackson’s house tonight.

He’d be thrilled.

***

Molly Smith dropped Sergeant Winters and Mark Hamilton, the high school teacher, at the station and took the car back out on patrol.

Wasn’t that a potential nightmare? For a while there she’d feared they were about to have a riot on their hands. If they’d taken a resisting Hamilton out in handcuffs, they probably would have. She got cold shivers simply thinking about it. A riot in a school. She’d didn’t know if she’d have the fortitude to defend herself, if it came down to it.

Thank god she hadn’t had to find out.

Was it possible Hamilton had killed Cathy Lindsay? He didn’t seem the type. Seemed like a nice enough guy, and the kids obviously liked him. Of course, that had nothing to do with anything. Didn’t everyone say, when they found out their neighbor was a serial killer or mass murder, that he seemed like a normal guy who kept to himself?

She could see why Winters was interested in Hamilton. She recognized him as the man who’d fled Cathy Lindsay’s funeral, running down the hill as if the hounds of hell were in pursuit.

Today, in the school office, she’d sensed something in the man. Fear, violence, she hadn’t been sure what. It was there, under the surface, yet close enough to the top it threatened to overwhelm him. He’d broken out in a sweat as soon as he’d seen the police, every muscle in his body tensing. And that tick in his eye, what was that about?

It might mean nothing. Lots of people didn’t like to be interviewed by the cops, no matter how innocent they might be.

“Five-one.”

She grabbed the radio. “Five-one. Go ahead.”

“If you’re free, you’re wanted back at the office for a ride.”

“On my way.”

The ride, as she guessed, was Mark Hamilton. He was sitting on the hard, narrow bench in the vestibule when she got there, shoulders hunched, hands clenched between his knees.

“Mr. Hamilton, I’ll take you back to the school. Mr. Hamilton?”

He looked up. His right eye twitched in an unbalanced rhythm. His face was deathly pale beneath his winter tan and his brow dripped with sweat.

“Are you okay, sir?”

“I…I need to go for a run. Take me home, please.”

“It’s kind of icy for running. The temperature’s been dropping all day and the melting snow’s refreezing. Treacherous stuff.”

“I have a treadmill in my basement.”

“That’s good.” She hesitated. “Don’t you want to go back to the school and get your car first?”

“There will be people…questions. I need to run now.”

“Okay, home it is.” She hesitated before holding out her hand. He took it, and she pulled him to his feet. Hamilton was shaking like a leaf in a strong wind, his hand slick with sweat. He clung to her. Embarrassed, she jerked free. She glanced into the office. Winters stood by the console, watching, his face drawn. He gave her a small nod.

She took Hamilton to her car and helped him into the passenger seat. Approaching six o’clock, thick threatening clouds had brought an early night.

They said nothing as she drove through the streets, the only sound the hum of the engine and the soft ping of ice pellets clattering against the car windows as a cold rain fell. She pulled into Hamilton’s driveway and he leapt out of the car with a sudden burst of energy.

“Sorry about that, Officer,” he said, giving her a smile so strained it was more of a grimace. The tick in his eye had stopped and his color was recovering. “I don’t care much for enclosed spaces.”

“Good night, sir.”

“Good night. Thanks for the lift, eh?”

She waited beside her vehicle until he was inside.

Strange guy.

Over the next couple of hours, as she drove up and down the streets, watching for trouble or someone needing assistance, Molly Smith thought about a lot of things. About Cathy Lindsay, gunned down. She probably wondered, if she noticed it at all, why someone had punched her in the back. And then she was dead. Before she hit the ground, they said. Her poor husband, her poor kids. Winters seemed to think Hamilton might have been the shooter. Smith doubted it: the way his hands shook he’d have trouble hitting a barn door unless the barrel of the gun was touching it. Who then?

They probably never would find out. Smith herself figured it for a fun killing. The perp long gone, heading for another town, another person out for a walk on a nice day.

God help us all.

The sign was turned to closed at Mid-Kootenay Adventure Vacations. Her parents had had a pretty good marriage. They’d been together since their university days, and Andy had learned to let Lucky have her way. Which usually wasn’t a problem as they agreed on most things. Lucky’s relationship with Paul Keller was going to be a darn sight more tumultuous. Smith wondered if the Chief had any idea what he was getting into. He probably did. He’d known Lucky for a long time, and often from the other side of the barricades. Things with the new resort would be heating up come summer when construction crews moved in. When they started chopping down trees and damming the river.

Molly Smith did not want to ever again see her mom at a riot.

She found her thoughts drifting to Adam. She hadn’t seen him since he got back on Monday. He’d been busy with a convenience store hold up some distance away, and then a grow-op raid. He’d suggested they go out for dinner tomorrow night, someplace
special
, said he’d get someone to cover for him so he could relax and enjoy the evening. Special. She wondered if he was going to pop the question. Would he have a ring in a small blue box, would he get down on one knee, would a bottle of expensive Champagne be waiting in the wings? Or would he just be Adam and say something like, “Wanna move into my place? Save on rent.”

She decided that whatever he said, her answer would be yes.

She’d risked hurting Adam, or worse, by flirting with Tony. She’d had a narrow, and lucky, escape. Never again.

If she’d come to realize one thing with this Cathy Lindsay business, it was that life comes with no guarantees. No point in waiting for the right moment, waiting for opportunities to present themselves, or the circumstances to be exactly to your liking. Wait long enough and the right time might well never come. She glanced at the clock. Almost eight. She’d swing by the convenience store and get herself a drink and a bag of almonds. Another quiet night in Trafalgar. As she reminded herself not to say the Q word, the radio snapped to life.

“All units, all units. Report of an active shooter at 87 Lakeview Drive. Injuries.”

Smith slapped the console, bringing up lights and sirens. She took the corner into Pine Street on two wheels while startled pedestrians watched her go. The car fishtailed on the road, but the tires gripped, and she raced up the mountain.