American Crow (14 page)

‘And Chrissie might be hanging out with
those damned kids too. Jesus...Do you need anything?’

‘The number of your wife’s friend would
be a good start...’

‘Anything else I can help you take care
of down there?’

‘No,’ I said firmly, not wanting the
complication of Tug driving down and getting involved. A cop snooping around
was a sure-fire way of scaring people off who had information.

‘Okay, if you say so...’

He reeled off Martha’s number and his
wife’s again then I extracted myself from the conversation having got what I
wanted. Next stop I decided was the Street Level Café in Lexington, Kentucky.
Hopefully there I’d pick up a new lead for Olivia and Ethan, and maybe Tug’s
errant wife too.

If the café drew a blank, then there was
always this friend of Chrissie’s to tap up. Maybe she’d have a clue as to where
in the mountains I could begin my search, know where there were some active
protests going on?

For a second my thoughts returned to the
guy back in the barn. If he were indeed something to do with the girl’s
disappearance, then what in the hell was I getting involved in, just by heading
down there? What was supposed to be a straight forward tracing job was
beginning to look anything but...

I shook my head in bewilderment and lit
the stale cigarette I’d found in the glove compartment, reflecting on the case
piece by piece as the ash burnt slowly down.

It was looking increasingly as if Olivia
had walked into some serious trouble in the Kentucky mountains, or back in
Minneapolis. The hundred dollar question was what? The next one after that was,
would I find her in one piece by the time I’d tracked her down anyway?

For a second I wondered if it was worth
Deacon’s money or the stress to find out, and more importantly, whether I
wanted another teenage death on my hands if things didn’t turn out right. That
would send me into a tail spin, I was sure of it...I put the wiper blades on
double time, then leaned forward on the wheel and looked up at the tar-black
clouds racing overhead.

‘What shall I do sweetheart, eh?’ I
asked, as if Laura were up there listening again.   

A vicious thunder clap broke above me a
few seconds later, so loud I thought it was going to blow the glass out of the
windows. I shook my head and turned on the radio, believing she had just given
me her answer, a similar warning to the one I’d received back in Jed’s truck on
the highway at the beginning of the case, and one that I still wasn’t quite
ready to hear…

Chapter Fourteen

‘turned over’

Lexington, Kentucky. Early eve.

I
needed a beer, maybe three after the long drive. Luckily I
found the bar I was looking for easily enough, halfway down a quiet side-street
in what seemed a respectable part of town. It didn’t look like the sort of
place to give a stranger hassle, and for that, I was mightily glad after all the
excitement.

After the barn situation I’d decided to
get the hell out of Iowa pretty damned quickly, and travelled across most of
Illinois the night before, passing through Springfield and St Louis before
resting up near Mount Vernon in a cheap motel for a few hours, paid for by the
money I’d pulled from the gunman’s wallet.

The next morning I’d crossed the state
line into Kentucky unhindered by any further troubles, then worked my way east
towards Lexington where I eventually made contact with Martha Reynolds, the
friend of Tug’s wife.

After being initially suspicious, she
explained that she hadn’t heard from Chrissie in quite a while, before offering
the number of another friend of hers who lived in the centre of Lexington who
she said might be able to help better.

The woman was a regular face amongst
local environmental activists she’d explained, so there was a good chance they
may have come across Olivia already if she was protesting up in the mountains.

If I was lucky, she might be able to put
me up for the night too, if I was stuck for somewhere to stay. Not that I
needed free accommodation now. I still had at least another three hundred bucks
to work through from the bounty hunter’s wallet, as well as the gunman’s, and
that was after purchasing yet another winter coat and a clean pair of cargo
pants from an out-of-town store.

As soon as I’d reached the outskirts of
Lexington I’d dumped the car behind some bustling Chinese laundry, found a steakhouse
to re-fuel in then went to search for the bar Martha had advised to check out,
if her friend wasn’t answering her phone. The place was a regular haunt of hers
she said…

For a while I sat staring mindlessly at
the T.V screen above, until some baseball player hit a massive shot into the
crowd, much to the pleasure of a cluster of fans behind me breaking the
relative quiet.

I turned and enjoyed the revelry for a
while, then started thinking about the case again. I sighed audibly, not quite
believing what had happened back at the truck-stop with the bikers, at the barn
and both the diners, then wondered how many more surprises I was going to have
to deal with before I found Olivia Deacon, and whether it was going make me
feel any better about Laura’s death when I finally did. Christ, all I had to do
was find a missing teenager. Did it have to be that bloody difficult?

I looked at my phone and contemplated
giving Nancy another call, as well as Tug’s wife. I’d tried them both, six or
seven times already, and each line went directly through to voicemail. I picked
up the cell and stared at it for a moment, then absentmindedly at some city
type hunched over his drink. He looked up suddenly and grunted in satisfaction
as another home run was scored, before lowering his chin back into his upturned
palm seemingly depressed.

My attentions shifted to a guy to my
right. He was smartly dressed, wearing a white V-neck jumper and an expensive
watch. He had his head lowered and was playing with his iPhone while drinking
what looked to be a Bloody Mary. Next to him was a spare stool, then some tall
guy sporting a conservative tie and a disgruntled expression. He was reading a
copy of the New York Times.

‘Can I get you anything else, sir?’ the
plump barman said suddenly, drying a beer glass as if in a trance.

‘Sure, I’ll have another one of these.
They’re excellent.’

‘Bourbon Barrel Ale. Sure thing...’

I watched his rotund frame head to the
fridge, then turned and scanned the rest of the bar to make sure I hadn’t picked
up any new admirers. There were around twenty customers in the establishment
all told. It seemed fairly empty for such a large concern, but then again it
was still early evening. Most of the clientele looked like the sort who were
just having a quick drink after a hard day’s work before they headed home to
their husbands or wives.

‘There we are, sir.’

The barman placed the beer down in front
of me along with some complimentary Pretzel sticks. I tipped him generously
then pitched the question I’d wanted to ask since stepping into the bar.

‘Do you happen to know where I can find a
woman called Nancy Stringer?’ I said discreetly. ‘She’s supposed to drink here
sometimes. I’m a work colleague of hers from way back. We lost touch...’

The bartender nodded slowly pouring the
fresh beer.

‘Sure...everyone knows Nancy. She’s lives
about four or five blocks from here on Bloomfield Avenue in one of the old
colonial houses. Pink I think it is, with brown wooden shutters. You can’t miss
it.’

‘And what about the Street-Level Café? Do
you know that?’

‘It’s roughly in the same direction I
would say, sir...but just a little bit further on, off Rose Avenue.’

I tipped him again then noticed the
newspaper guy studying me for a little too long. I returned his gaze for a
moment then pulled away. He looked down at his paper. I obviously interested
him; like I had the bailiff in Iowa…Maybe it was just my London accent drawing
his curiosity?

I worked my way through the rest of the
beer then decided to leave, not wanting to get too inebriated and wanting to
sort out a decent hotel for the night before it got too late.

I walked along the bar towards the exit,
head lowered as if deep in thought, then felt the eyes of the newspaper guy
burning into me...

Outside, I rounded the corner, gave it a
minute, then walked back in front of the window as if I’d changed my mind about
my direction, and glanced in to check the scene. The guy with the newspaper was
now standing in the corner on his cell, his back turned from the rest of the
bar for privacy. Lexington’s walls had ears it seemed, as I suspected...

I carried on and took the first right,
then navigated the entire block so that I returned to where I’d started out and
followed the barman’s instructions. After ten minutes or so, I arrived outside
a row of quaint terraced houses as he’d described. I stood there for a while,
enjoying the cool Kentucky air devoid of Minnesota’s biting chill, scanning the
building for signs of life.

All appeared quiet from the outside. I
turned and checked the street in both directions for any unwanted visitors,
then the neighbours’ houses for signs of activity again. Out of the four, only
Nancy’s place was shrouded in total darkness. I wondered if she was in and had
just switched off her cell because she was having an early night, or it had
simply run out of battery and she wasn’t home…

I swung open the gate, walked up the
gravel path and tentatively knocked on the door. No one answered. I tried
several more times politely then decided to try the alleyway a few doors down,
which seemed to service all the properties from the rear.

I stood in the shadows for a moment and
observed the woman in the first house washing up in the kitchen, then eyed the
one next door. The lights were blazing, but all seemed quiet. After that it was
Nancy’s. It was just as dark at the back.

My attentions flitted to the final house.
The lights were on upstairs, the top room illuminated by a flickering
television set it seemed, the sound of which was just about discernible from
outside.

I walked casually up the path to Nancy’s
door then saw it move suddenly in the breeze. My stomach tightened at the
feeling of déjà vu. It felt as if I was standing back at the door of the flat
in Minneapolis again...

‘Hello?’

No answer. I went in. The place was
pitch-black, but smelt of woman, of musky perfume and fresh flowers. Something
wasn’t right though. I could feel it in the prickly air.

‘Hello…’ I said again tensing, expecting
someone to jump out.

I fumbled for the light switch and lit up
the hall. Opposite was a welcoming living room with a polished wooden floor and
a log burner in the centre, which was cold. I turned and tried the door to my
left and found a medium-sized kitchen. Everything was in order. It smelt of
dried herbs and cleaning products.

I stepped out and walked across the
living room, past a flight of uncarpeted stairs, and tried another two doors
beyond it. The first beneath, revealed a gleaming white-tiled bathroom, the
second opposite, was a total mess. I tapped the door fully open with my foot
then found the switch to illuminate more of the chaos.

The room looked like a study come spare
room with a sofa-bed backed up against one wall and an empty desk opposite with
a shelf above it used for filing, most of which was now scattered across the
floor along with a handful of broken pictures yanked from the walls. I turned
around and headed back into the living room, picked up the poker from the
hearth, then climbed the stairs one tread at a time, wanting to make sure I was
all alone.

On the landing I discovered four more
doors, three of which were fully open. I tried the closest one first. Just an
airing cupboard. The next was a toilet. The one after that was a spare room
with a single bed and built-in cupboards. It smelt cold. Unused. That just left
the main...

I stepped in expecting to see further
mayhem, or even a body. The room had been left untouched... The guys who’d
turned over the study had obviously found what they’d wanted. I exhaled
anxiously and scanned Nancy’s bedroom. It had pastel-coloured walls and built
in wardrobes and a white metal-framed bed, with a couple of tasteful pictures
displayed on the distressed side-tables either side of it. I strolled over to
get a closer look.

One was of a guy I’d seen downstairs, who
must have been a partner or someone close. The other was of herself with what
appeared to be a sister or cousin, judging by the similarity in looks, the
relative being an inch taller and sporting a neat blonde bob in contrast to Nancy’s
long brown hair.

Seeing enough, I headed back downstairs,
deciding it wasn’t best to hang around too long in case the cops were already
on their way, or if Nancy returned suddenly and saw me in her trashed house and
got the wrong idea.

I tip-toed over the strewn files and
picked up a business card from the table advertising her services. It read:

Nancy Stringer

Environmental
Biologist

73 Garland
Square

Lexington

Kentucky

At the bottom was the usual set of numbers.
One for a landline and the other for a mobile, different to the one I’d been
given. I assumed it was just for work. I put the poker down and pulled out my
phone, then punched in its number. I needed to make contact with the biologist
sharp and let her know her house had been broken into at the very least. I
pressed the dial button and heard it ring, then waited as it rang unanswered
and went through to voicemail, just like the other cell.

I thought about leaving a message for a
second then clicked off, cursing. I preferred to talk to her directly, as it
was always more personal and always got the better response. That just left the
protesters’ café to work a fresh lead in the meantime...An unsettling thought
filtered through my mind. What if she had been in the house when the trouble
had happened?

‘Shit...’

I eyed the floor again and the chaotic
mess. Then I stooped down to pick up one of the broken pictures ripped from its
wall mounting. The photo was looked to be of Nancy, crouching down by some river,
taking what appeared to be water samples. In one corner was some writing in
italics:

‘Cumberland mountains, 2008’

I eyed the biologist intently. Her long
hair was pulled back into a tight ponytail this time, revealing more of her
attractive oval face and easy smile. She looked happy and relaxed, as if she’d
just shared some pertinent joke with the owner of the camera.

I put the picture back on the wall
carefully then stepped back out into the living room, wondering if it was her
work that had courted such trouble, then felt a strong hand suddenly grabbed my
wrist.

‘What the...’

I flew head first towards the hearth and
landed hard on my hands and knees. Quickly, I rolled to one side and tried to
set myself up for a defensive kick, but the attacker’s reactions were sharper
than mine, and I felt the unforgiving metal of his gun smack hard across my
temple. I groaned and threw a lame punch as I fell forwards, then glanced up a
final time in a daze, as the stranger brought his weapon down again and again...