Competition Can Be Murder (23 page)

Fresh drizzle began to hit my windshield as I drove away from the center of town and located the roundabout that would point me toward the airport. The familiar route always made me feel like miles of countryside would go by before I got there, and the effect was especially noticeable today with the low cloud cover and cocoon-like feeling inside the car.

The Air-Sea Helicopters van Drake had been driving sat outside the small detached office building, alongside Meggie’s tiny car and another I didn’t recognize. Brian’s personal car, probably. Next to the office, the hangar doors were closed, the building’s gray exterior blending so well with the weather that it appeared almost ghostly in the mist.

I fumbled with my umbrella, trying to handle it and the car door and my purse and my keys all at once. This desert kid was still far from adept at handling wet-weather paraphernalia. By the time I’d crossed the graveled parking area and a stretch of grass that separated it from the sidewalk, my shoes were picking up dampness.

“Hi, Charlie,” Meggie greeted as I walked in.

She’d turned the heater on and the office was cozy.

“Are the guys . . .” I started to ask if they’d taken flights, but saw Drake standing by a wall map just then.

“No,” he said. “We’re socked in. Rain’s one thing, but the winds out there over the sea have picked up. It’s pretty rough.”

“Is Brian . . .”

“Went over to the hangar for a minute. He’ll be right back and I’ll introduce you.”

I shed my damp jacket and purse and turned to Meggie. “Looks like you’ve got everything here back in shape,” I said.

“Yeah, wasn’t too bad,” she said. Her dimpled smile belied the ordeal she’d been through just a few days ago. “I didn’t want Brian to come back to a mess.”

Here was Meggie, probably five years older than Janie, and about twenty years ahead of her in maturity. I thought of the possibility that Janie and Richie would decide to get married and raise their baby. The girl had a lot of growing up to do. Somehow, though, I couldn’t see Edward sitting still for his son becoming trapped in a marriage at a young age. This was a man who’d have bigger plans for his boy. I didn’t look forward to watching the fireworks when the Campbells faced that situation.

“ . . . check it again.” Drake’s voice broke into my consciousness with something that seemed to require a response from me.

“Sorry, hon, I was drifting.”

“I said that I was going to take you out and buy you a fabulous present,” he said, trying hard to keep his face serious. “But, since you didn’t act like you wanted it . . .”

“You did not.” I turned to Meggie. “What did he really say?”

“He said that he’d take you out to lunch, and when you got back he’d check the weather forecast again.”

“That sounds much more like it. And the answer is yes. Just for the record, the answer would have been yes if the question had involved a fabulous present, too.” I mouthed a little kiss his direction.

“Mind if Brian’s included in the lunch plans?” he asked.

“Maybe we could all four go?” I asked, looking at Meggie.

“Oh, not me, thanks. I just had something.”

As if he’d been paged, Brian Swinney came through the door. I hadn’t met Brian when we first arrived because he’d already been in London. Drake and I had taken our check flights with a government man from the Civil Aviation Authority. Brian could have been Drake’s older brother, tall, slender, with salt-and-pepper hair and a rugged face. The dark brown eyes framed in black lashes were the main difference. His grip was firm when Drake introduced us, his smile showing straight teeth and an inner warmth. I could easily see why the two men had become fast friends all those years ago.

Lunch plans decided, the three of us piled into the company van and headed back toward town. Brian had a favorite seafood place, one we hadn’t discovered yet, and we ended up in a back corner of a large room packed with Formica tables and funky plastic chairs. Ours was one of the few spots with a half-wall divider, making it feel somewhat like a booth. With the possibility of flights this afternoon, we passed on the offer of ale and stayed with Cokes instead.

“Drake tells me you’ve found yourself in the middle of a mystery out at Dunworthy,” Brian said, after we’d all ordered the lunch special, a grilled salmon.

I sketched out the barest outline of Richie’s kidnapping, not wanting to bore him with too many details or admit how far I still was from retrieving the teenager.

“Funny bunch, those Dunbars,” he said, taking a sip from his tepid Coke. “Always something going on with them, I think.”

“You mean they’ve had other kidnappings in the family?” I asked, amazed.

“Oh, no, not that. Always something, though, it seems. Years ago—I was flying in the States back then—there was some scandal with Robert Dunbar’s sister. Left her husband and ran off with an Italian count or something. Don’t remember all the details. Then there was a big huff soon after that when Elizabeth married Edward Campbell. He came from some rogue branch of the clan that no one much respected.”

The waitress appeared with our salmon and conversation broke off for a few minutes as we lemoned the fish, buttered the bread, and took first bites.

“Have there been recent problems with the Dunbars or the Campbells?” I asked. “Something that would make an enemy mad enough to kidnap Richie?”

He leaned in over his plate. “Well, Robert Dunbar certainly isn’t the most popular MSP in the country, I’ll tell you. Regularly in the thick of things, he is.”

“Like?” I knew about his unpopular vote on wool pricing, but wondered what else Brian might know of.

“Oh, the thing we’re into up to our necks right now,” he said. “This business between the helicopter operators and the boat guys. Dunbar’s vote on one bill took away the subsidies those boat operators have gotten for years. Now they have to compete like the rest of us, and they don’t like it a bit. Owners wanted to cut wages to make up the difference but those union men pitched a fit over that.”

“Any of them personally threaten Dunbar?” I asked.

He shrugged. “Wouldn’t surprise me. It was a close issue. He and two other Members cast the deciding votes.”

“What about this guy, Brankin, that’s been so vocal toward us? Is he pretty high up in the union?” Drake asked.

Brian took a bite of garlic toast and worked it around in his mouth a moment. “Brankin’s a thug. Pure muscle—below the neck, that is. Does what he’s told.”

“And he’s been told to intimidate us?”

“Apparently so.”

“I told Joe to save that fuel line he removed from the Astar,” Drake said. “I want you to take a look and see if you think someone punctured it.”

“Brankin might do something like that, but I tend to doubt it,” Brian said. “For one thing, I’m not sure he’s smart enough to open the service door, much less figure out which lines carry the fuel. I won’t rule it out, though. Could have ordered someone else to do it. One of that little gang always hanging around him.”

“He wouldn’t have had time to study it much,” Drake said. “I’d landed out there and shut down, just long enough to use the head and go over the schedule with Finnie. I wasn’t inside more than ten minutes.”

“Yeah. See, I think Brankin probably wouldn’t have taken the risk of being caught in the act. He’s more a dark-alley kind of guy. Catch you alone and whack you from behind. You want to watch yourself around him, that’s for sure.”

“Think he could have handled a kidnapping?” I asked.

“Wouldn’t put it past any of ’em to grab some kid. Don’t think Brankin could’ve planned the whole thing. And I really doubt he’d be the type to stick around and babysit the kid for days. Has there been a ransom demand?”

“Fifty thousand pounds.”

He waited, silent, while the waitress picked up our plates.

“That’s not much. Union guys would probably be wanting a lot more than that. But you never know. Couple of the men, acting on their own, it might look pretty good to them.” He picked up the check and raised his palm to wave off our money. His company credit card would cover lunch.

“Another thought,” he continued after signing the slip, “is that they may have gotten word about you two living at Dunworthy. Hitting the Dunbars may actually be their way of hitting us too. Two birds with one stone kind of thing.”

I hadn’t considered that. I rode quietly in the back seat of the van on the way back to the office. I hated to think that Drake’s and my work could have led these thugs to the Dunbar family.

Visibility had improved considerably by the time we got back to the airport and I had a feeling it meant we had some flying to do.

Meggie greeted Brian with a handful of message slips. “Good to be home, eh?” she said with a grin.

While he flipped through the messages, wadding about every other one and tossing it into the trash, I decided to check in with the Dunbars. The phone rang ten or twelve times and I was about to hang up when a breathless-sounding Robert picked it up.

“What’s going on?” I asked.

“Oh, Charlie, I’m so glad you’ve phoned. We . . . we’ve had a new development, a rather gruesome package.”

“What do you mean?” I could hear raised voices and muffled confusion in the background. “Robert, what’s going on?”

“I think you’d better come,” he said. The line went dead.

I stared at the receiver in my hand for a minute. Gradually, the other three voices in the office worked their way back into my consciousness.

“Hon?” Drake was giving me a quizzical look.

“Do you need me here?” I asked.

“We were just discussing that,” he said.

Brian piped up. “I think we can handle it. Problems?”

“Um, yeah, I think so.” I looked back at Drake. “I think I better get out to Dunworthy. Stay in touch.”

A nagging sense of unease fluttered through me as I started the car. What did Robert mean by ‘gruesome’? I couldn’t begin to assess that comment, along with the commotion that seemed to be going on. I hit the highway, going well over the speed limit.

By the time I reached the turnoff to Dunworthy, my thoughts had run the gamut through the list of known Dunbar enemies, to the likelihood that they’d lost their sack of ransom money and still didn’t have their grandson back. I raced up the lane, whipped into the parking area and killed the engine.

Robert met me at the door. “Brace yourself, Charlie,” he said, placing a gentle hand on my forearm. “It’s quite upsetting.”

“What’s upsetting? Tell me what’s going on.”

“We received another note this morning,” he said. “And a package.”

Was I going to have to drag it out of him one iota at a time?

He saw my impatience. “The package contained a . . . a . . . finger.”

“A finger? A human finger?” My head spun. “Let me see it.”

“Are you sure? I mean, it’s . . .”

“I think I better.” Even as I spoke the words, the other half of me screamed out to go home and stay away from these people forever.

He took me inside and led me into the great hall. A small, white box, about three inches square, sat on one of the inlaid tables. It looked like a jewelry box, the kind commonly found in any tourist shop, containing a brooch or pair of earrings. The semi-glossy finish might well contain fingerprints.

“Has everyone touched this?” I asked.

“Molly found it. And then I handled it as well. Once we found out what was inside, no one else wanted near it.”

On the chance there might be a usable print or two, I didn’t pick it up. I lifted the lid by two opposing diagonal corners, using the tips of my thumb and third finger, avoiding the box’s flat surfaces. There inside, on a soft bed of cotton, lay a darkened, shriveled finger.

Lunch rolled over in my stomach but settled in place. I bent to get a closer look at the stiff digit. I guessed it to be the index finger of an adult. It lay on its cotton bedding, slightly crooked, bluish-gray with a longish, dirt encrusted nail. The severed edge had been cut cleanly with something very sharp. There was no blood to be seen.

“When did this arrive?” I asked.

“Don’t know. Molly found it right here on this table this morning. Dusting the room, she was. Said she thought one of us had left it out. Glanced inside to find out who’s it was. Nearly frightened her to death, poor girl.” He shifted from one foot to the other, clearly agitated by the sight of the finger.

I replaced the lid.

“Oh, Charlie!” Sarah spotted me from the entry and wrapped me in a hug. “I’m so glad you’ve come.”

“I just learned about this,” I told her.

“Horrible! Elizabeth’s had to be sedated. Edward’s given her something and he’s up there with her now. I told poor Molly to take the rest of the day off, but she says she’d do better by keeping busy. Afraid I feel the same way myself. Can’t seem to sit down.” Her hands fluttered as she spoke, and I noticed her eyes wouldn’t look at the box.

“You said there was also a note?” I asked, glancing at both of them.

“Ah, yes,” Robert said, fishing into the pocket of his cardigan for it. He handed me a slip of paper.

It looked like a half-sheet of typing paper, ragged where it had been torn in two, and folded to the size of the box.