Deadliest of Sins (2 page)

One

Patsy King had just
aimed her right foot at Mary Crow's nose when the Rolling Stones blared forth over the grunts and groans of the karate class—Mick Jagger, singing “Start Me Up!”

Startled, Mary jumped back from Patsy's oncoming foot and scrambled to grab her gym bag. “Start Me Up” was the only ringtone she'd ever purchased—and she'd dedicated it solely to calls from the Honorable Ann Chandler, governor of North Carolina.

“Sorry,” Mary apologized to Patsy, who was now hopping on one leg like a wounded stork. “I've got to take this call.”

Hurrying past scowling old Yamamoto, the renegade sensei who gleefully taught women every forbidden kick and illegal hold in all of karate, Mary grabbed her bag and went out into the hall. She fumbled with the phone, finally cutting Mick Jagger off mid-chorus. “Governor Chandler?” she said, her voice echoing in the empty hall.

“Hello, Mary. How are you?”

“Fine, thanks.”

“Are you in your office?”

“No ma'am.” Mary felt her face grow hot, as if the governor had caught her goofing off in a woman's self-defense class when she should be working. Then she realized it was a foolish reaction—though she was on retainer as the governor's special counsel, she'd had no directives from Raleigh, nothing much to work on at all. So she'd filled her empty hours with learning eye gouges and how to release her inner tiger.

“Can you get to someplace private?”

Mary glanced down the hall. The lower floor of the downtown Y held the ladies locker room (which was private but could get noisy) and a deserted dance studio, empty until the noon Zumba class. She ducked into the dance studio. “I'm in a private place now.”

“Mary, we have a situation in Sligo and Campbell Counties that I'd like you to look into. Are you aware of the Bryan Taylor case?”

The name rang a distant bell, but nothing specific. “No ma'am, I'm afraid not.”

“Bryan Taylor was a gay man who was found beaten to death in Campbell County last month. A year ago, another gay man was similarly killed in neighboring Sligo County.”

“That's terrible,” said Mary.

“Have you heard of Homer Trull, North Carolina's latest em-
barrassment?”

“You'd have to live in a cave not to have heard of Homer Trull.” Mary recalled the infamous YouTube video of a fiery preacher advocating that gays and lesbians be imprisoned behind electric fences. It had gotten over half a million hits; only a handful had been positive.

“Do you know how many CEOs have cancelled meetings with me since that moron went viral?” The governor's voice crackled with anger. “I'm sitting here looking at a ten percent unemployment rate and this Reverend Trull is yammering about creating a concentration camp for gays!”

“It did make the state look pretty bad.” Mary wondered where the governor was going with this. “How can I help?”

“I want to find out if Reverend Trull had anything to do with these attacks against those young men.”

“You mean beyond preaching about the evils of homosexuality?”

“Yes. He certainly hasn't backed off any of his statements, and I happen to know that he started a legal defense fund for the young man who was ultimately acquitted of the Sligo boy's murder.”

Mary frowned. “That's pretty risky territory, both legally and politically. Aren't the local DAs looking into this?”

“Not to my satisfaction,” said the governor. “They claim they're hamstrung because there's no law against gay hate crimes on the books, and all this nonsense goddamn Trull spouts is protected speech.”

“They do have valid points, ma'am.”

“They also don't have any balls, if you ask me. They're just scared of losing their jobs. They've both got real Bible-thumping, conservative electorates.”

Mary walked over and looked out the tall windows that looked out on the mountains that surrounded Asheville, her current home base. “So what's my part in this, Governor?”

“Mary, next week I've got a meeting with the Ecotron Corporation that'll put five hundred new green jobs in Campbell County—
if
I can assure them their gay employees won't get clubbed to death by religious lunatics. I already have the votes in the state house to add homosexuality to the hate crimes act, but that won't happen until the legislature reconvenes this fall. It would ease Ecotron's mind considerably if I can tell them that I've got my special prosecutor investigating anti-gay conspiracies down there.”

“But …”

“It's all set up, Mary. The DAs know you're coming, and they're on board with it. With you there, they won't have to take any more calls from me.”

I bet they're just tickled pink
, Mary thought, knowing that DAs guarded their little fiefdoms like junkyard dogs.

“You have the full authority of my office, Mary. That means backup if you need it—the SBI, the AG's office.”

“I see.”

“Get down there right now and you can attend Reverend Trull's prayer meeting tonight,” said Ann Chandler. “I need a report on my desk next week. I need to show Ecotron that I'm serious about protecting their people. Gay might be the new black in the rest of Dixie, but it's not going to be in North Carolina, at least not on my watch.”

Mary changed into her jeans and hurried out of the Y, glancing at Yamamoto, who now had the class sitting on mats visualizing the invisible, protective tiger that lived inside them all. Thinking that an extremely visible tiger in Raleigh had just sent her on a mission, she walked quickly through downtown Asheville, heading back to her office in the Flat Iron building. That day the town seemed awash in teenagers—hordes of them came out of the Civic Center, wearing different-colored camp T-shirts—green for Camp Altamont, red for Camp Ridgetop, other colors denoting camps she did not recognize. Tourists who normally clogged the sidewalks were taking refuge in the outdoor cafes, sipping lattes while they stared grumpily at all the shrieking campers. As Mary turned down Haywood Street, a trio of street musicians played, while another young woman had sprayed herself silver and was posing as the Statue of Liberty. Mary had to smile. It was too bad Ecotron didn't want to put their jobs in Asheville. People wouldn't blink an eye at anybody being gay, and the city could use the tax revenue.

She hurried past her favorite bookstore, then turned up Battery Park. Her office was in a building built in 1925. Its dark woodwork and frosted-glass door panels reminded her of old Humphrey Bogart movies. She'd managed to get a small office on the top floor that had a spectacular view of the western mountains. The only drawback was the elevator. One of the few remaining that required an operator, its pilot was Franklin, a rail-thin man with sleepy eyes whom she suspected spent much of his shift on the top floor smoking weed. Most of the time it was faster to walk up the six flights than to wait for Franklin. Today, though, she lucked out. Franklin was letting an old woman out just as she turned the corner.

“Going up?” asked Franklin as Mary skidded into view.

“Can you get me to five faster than I can walk?” asked Mary.

“Depends how fast you walk.”

Sighing, Mary got in the ancient cage. Franklin closed the brass gate, then turned the crank. With a shudder, the elevator began to rise.

“You having a good day?” asked Franklin, his tone laid-back and dreamy.

“Too early to tell yet,” Mary replied. Her assignment in Campbell County seemed dubious, but she would do as the governor directed. Anyway, it wasn't as if she had anything else going on in her life right now. “Lots of kids in town today,” she said.

“Summer Camp Tour of Asheville today. Eighty jillion campers running around,” Franklin replied. “I just took one up to your floor.”

“My floor? What for?”

“Probably a dare. One or two sneak in here every year. They all think this building's haunted.”

Sometimes Mary thought the same thing, given the odd creaks she'd heard late at night. But ghosts were not her concern today; hate-mongering preachers were. “Thanks,” she said as Franklin opened the gate on the fifth floor. “Have a good day.”

“It's all ups and downs for me,” said Franklin.

Suffering Franklin's bad pun with an inward groan, Mary hurried toward her office, quickly negotiating the maze-like series of sharp turns and half-staircases that led there. She passed the communal ladies' restroom, then an architectural practice, then she was there, at her own little office—
Mary Crow, Special Prosecutor
lettered on the pebbled glass door. The only thing amiss was the small boy hunkered against her doorway, pale, skinny arms gripping blue-jeaned legs, looking up at her like some waif from the streets.

“Well, hello,” said Mary, surprised. “Can I help you? Did you get separated from your group?”

“I'm not with a group,” the boy replied. “I'm looking for Mary Crow.”

Mary frowned at the child. “I'm Mary Crow. How can I help you?”

He stood up, dug in an old blue backpack held together with duct tape, and pulled out the front page of a newspaper. “I read about you here,” he said, his voice high, his accent rural.

Mary fumbled with the newspaper, her own backpack, her purse, and her office keys. “Come on in,” she said. “It's too dark to read anything in this hall.”

She unlocked her door, threw her stuff on the small sofa that sat beneath her windows. The boy stood there, watching as she scanned the article from the
Campbell County Clarion.
“Governor's Special Prosecutor to Open Investigation” read the headline.

“What the—” she said. She turned to the kid. “Where did you get this?”

“Gudger brings it home sometimes. He likes to look at the car ads.”

Mary read the rest of the article, which delineated Ann Chandler's concerns about anti-gay sentiment in the area. “However you may feel about homosexuality,” the governor was quoted, “gay people are citizens and citizens have rights. Nobody in North Carolina should fear for their lives because of their sexual orientation.” The article went on, citing Chandler's position that anti-gay activity was costing the state jobs, and that she was sending her special prosecutor, Mary Crow, to look into whether any of this activity was illegal. Mary read the article, then checked the date. It had come out a week ago.

“Damn!” Mary whispered, forgetting that a child was within earshot. “She set me up.”

She started to walk over to her desk to call Ann Chandler on her landline when she remembered the little boy standing in the middle of her office, staring at the toes of his sneakers.

“So who are you?” demanded Mary. “Why did you bring me this article? Are you gay? Did someone try to beat you up?”

The boy looked up at her, wide blue eyes horrified. “N-No ma'am. I'm only eleven … I'm not nothin' yet.”

Mary's anger evaporated. She realized she was peppering this child with questions as if he were on the witness stand. He was just a little boy. A scared little boy, at that. “I'm sorry,” she apologized. “This article just took me by surprise. What's your name?”

He stuck out his hand, formal and serious. “I'm Charles Oliver Buchanan … Chase, they call me.”

She shook his hand. It was shaking and cold, like some little thing that'd been left out in the weather too long. “What can I do for you, Chase?”

“I need you to help me. Somebody stole my sister.”

Two

“Stole your sister? What
do you mean?”

“Everybody says she ran off with her boyfriend, but I know different. She would never go anywhere without telling me. She promised me that, right after we moved in with Gudger.”

Mary frowned. “Who's Gudger?”

“Mama's new husband. Here.” He reached into his backpack again, this time handing Mary two folders. One held a thick collection of newspaper articles pasted on lined notebook paper. All pictured a beautiful young girl with long blond hair, who'd apparently gone missing after a babysitting job. The boy's second folder had “EVEDINSE” printed on the cover. It held pages of drawings and torn-apart maps, timelines scribbled in green markers.

“Everything's in there,” the boy told her. “Everything they've written about Sam, along with what Gudger's done since she's been gone. He's bought a motorcycle and new tractor and a—”

“Wait.” Mary held up one hand to stop the tumble of words that flowed from this pint-sized Sherlock Holmes. “I'm sorry about your sister, but this is a job for the police. I'm a lawyer. I work for the governor, on special cases. Your local sheriff should be investigating this.”

“He thinks Sam ran off with her boyfriend!” the boy cried. “Gudger told him so.”

“And the sheriff believed Gudger?”

“Gudger used to be a cop. Everybody believes him. The sheriff says I used up all my brownie points with him months ago.” The boy's chin quivered. Mary realized he really was a child—blond hair still baby-fine, the back of his neck velvety looking. It would be years before his cheeks would know the bite of a razor.

“So you're in trouble with the sheriff a lot?” asked Mary.

Shrugging, he mumbled his reply. “I used to call 911 some, back when we lived in the duplex. The sheriff thinks I'm a sissy.”

“How'd you get up here?”

“Hitched a ride.”

“
Hitched a ride
? With whom?”

“I don't know. Some old man bringing a load of peaches up from South Carolina.”

Mary blinked. Eleven-year-olds hitching rides on peach trucks with wild tales of familial kidnapping was a new page in her book. Though the kid wore faded jeans and a too-big white T-shirt, his clothes were clean and he didn't smell nearly as ripe as some of the campers she'd passed. He just looked scared and hungry, as if someone had sent him to bed without supper for the last couple of months.
Watch out
, she warned herself, thinking of Lily Walkingstick,
kids have a million ways to break your heart
.

“Well, I don't think hitchhiking is the smartest thing to do,” she finally told the boy. “But it doesn't sound like something a sissy would do.”

He pulled out a funny little homemade purse with an owl appliqued on the front. “I brought money to pay you,” he said. “It's Sam's money, but I don't figure she'll care.” He counted out an array of bills, some loose change. “Ninety-four dollars and seventy-one cents. I know lawyers cost a lot more than that. I can pay you more as we go along.”

“How would you do that?”

“Cut grass, trim hedges,” he replied, looking at her with such serious innocence that she didn't know whether to laugh or cry. “This fall I hope to get a paper route.”

Mary handed the creased, limp bills back to the boy. “Thanks, but I can't take this. Like I said, I'm not a lawyer for hire anymore.” She glanced at her watch. Almost two. She hadn't eaten since early morning and a headache was beginning to lick around her temples. “Have you had lunch?”

“No ma'am.”

“Are you hungry?”

“I've been worse off.”

“Well, I'm famished,” said Mary. “Let's go get something to eat. You can tell me more about your sister over lunch.”

She'd planned to get a quick bite at the Indian restaurant on the ground floor of her building, but she didn't think young Sherlock would go for Bhel Puri or Papri Chaat. Instead, she took him to the homey restaurant across the street, where they served traditional American fare.

“You like cheeseburgers?” she asked, as they stepped up to the counter.

“Yes ma'am,” he whispered, his eyes wide at the size of the burgers coming out of the kitchen.

“Good. So do I. ” Mary put two cheeseburgers, fries, and sodas on her credit card and then led the boy to an outside table. She noticed he looked at every passing car, as if one of them might hold his sister.

“So have you lived in Campbell County all your life?” she asked as they waited for their food.

“No ma'am. Just two years. We lived in West Virginia until my daddy died. Then we went to live in Gastonia. Mama got a job there, taking care of Cousin Petey.”

“And that didn't work out?” asked Mary.

“It was great until Cousin Petey died. Then her kids came and made us move out. But I got to take all of her books, and she gave me her granddaddy's army pistol, until Gudger made Mama sell it to Dr. Knox.”

Mary nodded as a waiter placed two cheeseburgers and a basket of fries on the table. The boy fell to, attacking his burger as if he hadn't eaten in days.

“So then you came to Campbell County?”

“Mama got a job in a nursing home,” the boy said, his mouth full. “We moved into this duplex. The men next door were drug dealers. They used to hassle Sam all the time. That's when I got out my pistol and started calling the police.”

“What do you mean, hassle Sam?”

The boy wiped his mouth with his hand, sucked down half his Coke. “They'd knock on the door, scratch on our windows. They used to holler terrible things … about how they wanted to take her clothes off and do stuff to her. Mama made us lock ourselves inside the house until she came home from work.”

“Why didn't you move?”

“We were going to, but then the car needed a new gasket and Sam got bit by a dog and had to have a lot of stitches. After all that, we didn't have the money to move. Mama said as bad as the duplex was, it beat living in our car.”

Working poor
, thought Mary. Staying afloat, then one or two unexpected bills come along and they're sunk. “So how did this Gudger get in the picture?”

“He was still a cop, then. He came over once when I called. Then, after he met Mama, he came over every time I'd call. He'd go over and talk real mean to the druggies. Things would get better for a few days, then it would start all over again.”

“He never got a warrant to search the other side of the duplex?” Mary wondered if the cop had ignored standard procedure because he liked seeing the boy's mother.

“No ma'am.” The boy licked his fingers. “He said he never found any possible cause.”

“Probable,” corrected Mary. “Probable cause.”

“Yeah,” he said, swirling a French fry in a pool of ketchup. “That's it.”

“So why do you think Gudger stole your sister?”

The boy looked at her with blue eyes that seemed far too old for his peach-fuzzed face. “Because Sam stood up to him one time too many. Gudger sold her to someone—you know, to be their slave.”

Mary almost choked. “That's a pretty serious charge.”

“But it's true!” Chase dug in his backpack and brought out the EVEDINSE folder again. “Look,” he said, turning to a page that looked like some kind of connect-the-dot puzzle. “Gudger always said she was too big for her britches, that Mama spoiled her, that she needed to be taught a lesson. But then one night, for the first time ever, Gudger loans Sam his car. Lets her drive, all by herself, to her babysitting job. That's the night Sam disappears. Gudger pretends to be all shook up—he calls his old cop friends, is real nice to my mom, tells everybody Sam's run away with a boy. But you know what I caught Gudger doing, the morning after Sam disappeared?”

“What?” asked Mary, intrigued in spite of herself.

“Looking at motorcycles, on the computer,” said Chase, triumphant. “A week later, he rolls up on a brand-new Harley, smiling like he's never even heard of Sam, while my mom's inside crying her eyes out. Then he got mad because nobody wanted to go on a ride with him.”

Mary didn't know what to say. This child had concocted an entire kidnapping theory based on his dysfunctional family and possibly abusive stepfather, then hitchhiked up here to tell her about it. Whatever else he might be, he had grit and a prolific imagination.

“I've known hundreds of police officers in my career,” she finally said. “Most are good, courageous people, who want to do good jobs. Maybe Gudger bought the motorcycle just to take everyone's mind off your sister.”

“But Sam promised she'd tell me if she ever left,” he said, blinking back tears. “She swore on the Bible!”

“Honey, sometimes when teenagers are really unhappy, they do crazy things … things they don't mean. Don't give up on her yet—she'll probably come back before school starts. Nobody wants to miss their senior year.”

He shook his head, adamant. “No. She's gone. And she didn't run off with a boy, either. The one boy she liked moved to Charlotte, and he didn't even have a driver's license. If you don't help me, I'll never see her again.”

“I'm so sorry,” Mary said, “but this isn't what I do anymore.”

There seemed nothing more to say, so Mary asked the waiter for a to-go box and packed up half of her hamburger and the rest of the French fries. “Look, I've got to get going,” she told him. “How are you going to get back home?”

“I dunno,” he whispered, growing even smaller in his seat. “I hadn't thought about that yet.”

She looked at him, seeing him with his bitten nails and scrawny neck riding in the back of truck load of peaches, full of hope and ninety-seven dollars, coming to hire her to find his sister. That had taken some nerve—too much nerve to leave him here at Kats N Dogs with only his thumb to provide him a ride home.

“What did you say your name was again?” she asked.

“Chase Buchanan.”

“Well, Mr. Chase Buchanan, you picked the right day to hitch up here. I happen to be heading down your way this very afternoon. Would you like to ride with me?”

“Oh yes ma'am,” he replied, his voice shaking with relief. “That would be awful nice.”

“Then take the rest of this food. You might get hungry watching me pack.”

She took the little boy over to the condo she'd sublet, parking him in front of the television while she threw clothes in a small suitcase. She had no idea what to take on a homophobic preacher conspiracy hunt, so she packed jeans, a skirt, and her beige linen jacket that went with everything. She was about to close her suitcase when she saw her Glock 9, gleaming dully in its shoulder holster at the bottom of her underwear drawer. As an afterthought, she threw it in her suitcase, along with a box of ammunition. Though she doubted she'd need to pack heat at a prayer meeting, she
was
going where two young men had been beaten to death.

“Ready to go?” she called as she hurried down the stairs, where Chase was sitting in front of the TV, watching a movie where zombies were threatening to eat both houses of Congress.

“Yes ma'am.” He stood quickly, as if embarrassed to be caught watching such a silly movie. “I'm ready.”

“Then let's get moving.”

She turned the TV off and headed down to the basement of her condo. Chase followed, backpack strapped to his shoulders. Mary opened the garage door and turned on the lights. The Miata she'd driven for the past ten years gleamed, its new paint job reflecting like obsidian glass.

“Wow. This is way cooler than any of Gudger's cars.”

Mary smiled as she put her small suitcase in the space behind the roadster's two seats. “She gets me where I need to go. Hop in.”

“Could we ride with the top down?” he asked, gaping at the little roadster.

“You'll have to hold my suitcase.”

“I don't mind.” He got in and buckled his seat belt, putting his backpack between his feet and holding Mary's suitcase in his lap.

Mary unclamped the roof, pushed it into the well behind the seats. A few moments later they were driving through downtown Asheville, heading for the county where girls disappeared, little kids brought the heat down on drug dealers, and ministers of the gospel advocated the extinction of homosexuals.