Goodbye Sister Disco (20 page)

TWENTY-SEVEN

Klosterman pressed the buzzer at the A&W hamburger stand and a voice came back on the squawk box. Klosterman said he would take a deluxe cheeseburger value meal and a Coke. The voice said was Pepsi okay? Klosterman said no, but he would take a Dr Pepper. He turned to Hastings and said, “What do you want?”

Hastings's stomach had become sensitive over the years. He liked the taste of fast food, but his system wouldn't abide it. In contrast, Klosterman could eat anything.

“Just coffee,” Hastings said.

“Come on,” Klosterman said. “You've had an injury. You've gotta eat something.”

“Just coffee. I'll get a sandwich later.”

Klosterman sighed resignation and ordered coffee.

The food came and they stayed in the car, like the guys in the Sonic commercial, only older and a little less self-aware. Hastings sipped the coffee and felt the heat travel up to his head, jump-starting the cortex. Wincing, but he would be okay.

Klosterman said, “It went okay, I think.”

Hastings said, “Back there?”

“Yeah. The ASAC was being an asshole, but those other guys seemed okay.”

“They probably are.”

“You think they'll be able to get an ID on those guys?”

Hastings sighed. “I don't know. Maybe.” He wasn't too optimistic though and it showed on his face. He said, “I've got to get back out to the Penmarks. Can you do something for me?”

“Sure.”

“Talk to Rhodes and Murph and have them check out Edie Penmark. The sister.”

Klosterman was holding the cheeseburger, some of it sticking out of the wrapper. “Why?” he said.

“I'm not sure yet,” Hastings said. “Yesterday, I interviewed her and she came on to me.”

“Really?” Klosterman was not smiling. He knew it was not an adolescent subject.

“Yeah. Kind of creepy, actually. She may be unstable.”

“You think she had something to do with this?”

“No, not necessarily. But I wouldn't be surprised if she were into some pretty bad shit.”

“Drugs?”

“Maybe.”

“Did you ask her?”

“I didn't ask her that directly. If I had, she wouldn't have answered. I got the feeling she was hitting on me to throw me off. To distract me.”

“The only worse thing than a bad girl is a bad girl with money.”

“Well, what I'm wondering is, is this bad girl connected to bad people? Who are not rich?”

“If she's buying, she may be,” Klosterman said. “Yeah, we can check her out.”

“Thanks. Hey, will you drive me to Laclede's Landing? That's where I left my car.”

“You think you can drive?”

“Yeah.” Hastings gestured to his head. “Like hitting your head on the ceiling.”

“If you say so.”

*   *   *

The security guard let Hastings by and when he pulled up to the drive, he saw an unfamiliar Mercury Marauder there that he suspected belonged to Jeffrey Rook. Not an official police car, but resembling one enough to give the illusion of security and authority. Hastings saw that and sighed. He knew what waited for him inside, but his comfort was secondary.

And sure enough, there was Jeffrey Rook, waiting in the front hall, standing a few feet in front of Lexie Penmark, his patroness. Hastings felt his anger set on slow boil now, the fright of being nearly stabbed to death not quite out of him yet and now he had to tell himself not to deck this big piece of shit.

Jeffrey Rook, an authority figure in his own mind, had his hands on his hips like a school principal, but performing for Lexie Penmark, maybe hoping to get in her pants, and he said, “Would you mind explaining what happened?”

Hastings stopped and briefly looked the big man up and down, as if just noticing him. Then he walked past him to Lexie Penmark. Hastings said, “Where's your husband?”

Lexie Penmark looked back at Rook, surprised that he had been ignored. He had spent so much time and effort building himself up and the lieutenant had simply ignored him. She said to Hastings, “He's in his study.”

Hastings nodded and walked off.

*   *   *

Gene Penmark sat behind his desk, his hand on his face. It stopped Hastings. He had never seen Penmark this way before. Vulnerable, frightened, human. Who could say what it was? All he had been through and still there was no word, no sign, that his daughter had been released. They had not let him know that they would keep their word or that they would not. He had done everything they had asked him. He had given them the money, unmarked, nonconsecutive bills. And yet he had no word about Cordelia. His wife was standing with another man in another part of his house, wanting to somehow control the situation. But she wasn't standing with him.

Gene Penmark did not wonder if he was the first man of power and wealth to trade in a wife. It was not his nature to think about things like that. He was, in his way, a brilliant man and an innovator and a huge success. But he was not worldly. Nor was he given to honest introspection. Lexie Lacquere was aware of these defects in his makeup and she did not hesitate to exploit them. Gene had an ego and it took little to assuage it. Compliments, flattery, self-deprecating remarks about her own ignorance. She timed these things and she did not overplay them. As a result, Gene Penmark never really asked himself whether Lexie loved him or his children. Indeed, he did not stop to ask himself if he was lucky or unlucky to have her in his life. The way he saw it, he was entitled to someone like her.

But sometimes the unconscious mulls over things even when the conscious does not. So when Hastings walked into his office, Penmark was sad without fully knowing why.

Penmark looked up at him and for a moment did not say anything.

Then he said, “They're going to kill her, aren't they?”

Hastings said, “We don't know that.”

“I don't understand these people. They got their money. Why can't they let her go?”

“I don't know.”

Penmark said, “I talked with her mother today. And that's what I said to her: ‘I don't know.' She's—inconsolable. Taking medication. I don't know what to say to her. She was screaming at me and I didn't know what to say to her. I've always known what to do. I've always had control over things. And I have no control over this. Adele thinks it's my fault.”

Hastings said, “Why is that?”

Penmark shrugged. “The money, the success. She told me today that it's all I've ever cared about. More than her, more than my children, more than Lexie. She told me that I don't give a shit about Cordelia.”

“She's upset, Mr. Penmark.”

“Yeah. Maybe. I don't know.”

“Mr. Penmark, you spoke on a Nextel phone with the kidnapper. And those conversations were ones we couldn't hear.”

Penmark was looking down at his desk, disoriented and alone. “I told Agent Kubiak about it,” he said.

“I know. I read his report. But I want you to tell me about it too.”

Gene Penmark shrugged. He said, “He told me to get on the train. And then to leave the money on the train. And then to get off at Union Station.”

“When you were on the train, did you recognize anyone?”

Penmark shook his head.

Hastings took out a photograph of the man who had tried to kill him in the bathroom. He put it in front of Penmark.

“Did you see that man?”

“I saw him on the train, I think. I never saw him before that.”

Hastings pulled out a copy of the charcoal sketch of the man in the black raincoat. He said, “And him?”

“I don't remember seeing him on the train. I don't think I do. I never saw him before. I know that.”

“And you're sure you've told us everything?”

Gene Penmark lifted his head. “Yes,” he said. His face was contorting now, pain and anger registering. “What do you mean? You think I'm hiding something?”

“I didn't say that.”

“What are you saying?”

“Take it easy, Mr. Penmark. I'm not accusing you of anything.”

“You guys, it's just a fucking job to you. But this is my family.”

“I know. But I assure you that we're doing everything we can.”

“Then where is she? Where the hell is my daughter? You don't even know. Lexie was right.”

There was a pause.

Then Hastings said, “Right about what, Mr. Penmark?”

“She—she said that you guys don't know what you're doing.”

Hastings sighed. “I think that's Mr. Rook talking.”

“So what? He couldn't have done any worse than you guys.”

“Mr. Penmark, I can't tell you that I know how you feel, because I don't. It's not my daughter that's been kidnapped. If it had been, I know I'd have trouble holding myself together. Respectfully, I don't know why your wife felt it was necessary to hire Mr. Rook. But I assure you, he is not helping anybody. Now if he had some experience with kidnapping, I'd be happy to listen to him. But he doesn't, so I'm not going to.”

“He—”

“We all want answers and solutions, Mr. Penmark. But he's just second-guessing so he can look important. And it's not helping. This is not the sort of thing you can solve by hiring your own police department.”

Penmark was looking at his desk again, his thumbs up to his mouth.

Hastings said, “Okay?”

“Okay,” Penmark said.

“Now, as you know, we disseminated copies of the sketch of the man on the train to the news media. And Agent Kubiak has also given them a photo of the man who attacked me. We don't know their identities, but we're hopeful that someone in the greater St. Louis area has seen them.”

“So we wait?”

“Well, partly.” Hastings said, “Now, I've been thinking that the person who did this knows you. Or at least knew something about you. Did you get that feeling during your dialogue with the kidnapper?”

“Honestly? No.”

“Hadn't heard his voice before?”

“No.”

“You have staff at this house, yes?”

“Yes. Agent Kubiak went over that with us.”

“And drew no suspects, correct?”

“Correct. Are you saying it was an inside job?”

Not for the first time, Hastings noted that civilians liked to use crime terminology. Inside job. Five hundred large. And so forth.

“Well,” Hastings said, “not exactly. What I mean is, the people who abducted Cordelia knew where she would be, what party she would be going to. Maybe even who she would be going with.”

“Or they could have just followed her there.”

Hastings made a gesture. “Yeah, they could've.”

Penmark said, “Do you want to speak to my wife about it?”

“Yeah, that might help.”

“I'll get her.”

Penmark came back with her. When she came into the room, she looked at Hastings with a little bewilderment and some guarded hostility. But she had come without Rook and that was at least a partial victory.

But the first thing she said when she sat down was, “Have I done something wrong?” Her tone clipped and a little surly.

“No,” Hastings said. “I just wanted to check something out.”

“Okay,” she said. Her legs were crossed.

“I wanted to know if you knew what Cordelia's plans were the night she was abducted.”

“You want to know if I knew her plans?”

“Yes.”

“No, I didn't. I think I told you before we hadn't seen her since the Tuesday before.”

“You did. But did she call either one of you, or e-mail, to let you know where she would be that night?”

Gene Penmark said, “She didn't tell me.”

Lexie said, “She didn't tell me either.”

Hastings said, “Would you happen to know if she told anyone?”

They looked at each other and both shook their heads. Gene said, “She could have told any number of people. We honestly don't know.”

“She didn't come here before going to the party?”

Lexie said, “I guess she could have and we didn't know about it. But I was back here by three and she wasn't here then. And Gene got home around six that evening. He changed and we went to the dinner party.”

Hastings said, “I know I've gone over this with you before, but I think that the people who kidnapped your daughter knew where she was going to be that night. That they knew her plans. The drop with you”—Hastings gestured to Gene Penmark—“that was very well planned. I'm sorry, but it was. If they planned that so well, they must have planned the initial abduction with the same care.”

Lexie said, “You think they knew her?”

“I don't know,” Hastings said. “They knew who she was. Who she went to the party with. They knew who she'd leave with.”

Lexie said, “What about the man you killed?”

It surprised Hastings, the ex-reporter popping him with a question like that. And she asked it like a reporter too, her tone dispassionate and professional.

Hastings said, “Excuse me?”

“The man you killed at the train station,” she said. “Haven't you gotten anything from that?”

Hastings avoided eye contact with the victim's father. “No,” he said.

“If you hadn't killed him,” Lexie Penmark said, “maybe he could have given us some information.”

“Yeah, maybe,” he said. He would give the woman that.

But it wasn't enough. Lexie said, “Was saving yourself more important than saving her?”

The woman was giving him something of a nasty smile now. Enough that he felt sorry for her husband. He could ask the husband if he could be alone with his wife so that he ask her what her fucking problem was. But then that would bother the husband, maybe even emasculate him, which was what probably what this woman wanted.

Hastings said, “Mrs. Penmark, if I'd been killed, it wouldn't have made your stepdaughter any more safe. Yesterday you asked me if I wanted to work for your husband's company. I said no and you've been trying to undermine me ever since. Is there something behind this?”