Nowhere Safe (29 page)

Did he leave any fingerprints anywhere?

The bedroom doorknob and panels.

Quickly he grabbed another towel and wiped them off. His heart was pounding. He ran the towel over the knobs on the door to the garage, then, shouldering his way through, he cleaned the man doorknob as well, carrying the pan with the chicken in his other hand.

At the car he put the pan in the front seat foot well, slid into the driver’s seat and inserted the key. Claudia’s breathing was ragged and deeper, like maybe it would stop altogether.

Reversing onto the street, he put the car in drive, touched a toe to the accelerator and disappeared. He met no one en route as he drove carefully all the way back to Daria’s house.

George called September’s cell as she and Wes were crossing the Marquam Bridge on their return from Tiny Tots Care. “We got a call from a Mr. Dorcas, who just happens to live right next to the Harmak house,” he told them. “Last Friday the Dorcas’s daughter, Diane, was out with her boyfriend, Keith Collier, and they had just come back and were saying good-bye to each other when this woman came barreling out from the backyard. Damn near ran into them. She was stuffing something in her pocket that they didn’t quite see. Coulda been a gun, but they didn’t think that at the time cuz they didn’t hear the shots. She just ran off.”

“She ran out from Stefan’s neighbor’s backyard?” September questioned.

“That’s what I said.”

“The shooter?” she asked with repressed excitement.

“Sounds like it’s the right timing. Guess it wasn’t till Sunday that the girl realized that her neighbor was dead. She overheard her parents talking about hearing something that night that they thought was a car backfiring. Then they saw the news and wondered if it was the shots from the Harmaks’ . The daughter was scared and called her boyfriend, but they didn’t come clean until today.”

“She didn’t tell her parents?” September asked.

“The kids were making out by the road when the woman appeared. The parents hate Collier. The daughter was supposed to be with her girlfriends that night, but snuck out and met him instead. She didn’t want to confess, so it got delayed. Typical stuff.”

“How well did they see the woman?”

“Close up. Security light came on and the place was lit up like day, apparently.”

“Was she wearing jogging clothes and a baseball cap?”

“Don’t know. The Dorcas family’s coming down to give us a description.”

“Okay.”

“What?” Wes asked, when September had clicked off.

“We might have a description on our vigilante.”

 

 

The Dorcases arrived at the station about an hour after Wes and September returned. They were utterly uncomfortable being at the police station and their daughter, Diane, felt the same. They did not invite the boyfriend along, so September put a call in to Keith Collier’s voice mail and asked him to get in contact with her.

Diane’s description of the woman avenger was very generic but she said Keith could probably tell them more. From September’s point of view it was a win, whichever way you looked at it, because one of the first things out of Diane’s mouth was the fact that the perpetrator had indeed been wearing a baseball cap and jogging clothes.
Bingo,
September thought in jubilation. Things were turning around. The case was coming together and Jake was awake and going to be okay.

She drove to the hospital to see him as soon as the Dorcases left. He was dozing most of the time while she was there, but held on to her hand again. Though she wasn’t certain he really heard her, she told him all about the investigations she was working on. In that regard, he was the best kind of listener. No interruptions, questions, or distractions. Finally, she ran out of things to say and with exhaustion creeping in, she took her leave. And this time when she snuggled into the bed they shared, she fell asleep cradling the pillow to her face, a smile flickering on her lips even in sleep.

 

 

Wednesday morning September leaped out of bed and apart from a sharp twinge of protest from her neck wound, did a quick check of her body and decided all systems were a go. Today was Jake’s surgery and Stefan’s memorial service. On the work front, she hoped Keith Collier had called back, and if he hadn’t she was going to hunt him down and get his input on the description of the woman who’d nearly run them over.

She was at Bean There, Done That picking up an iced coffee—her summer drink and now her fall one, too—when her cell rang. Wes, she saw. “Good morning to you,” she said.

“Cheery. Where are you?”

“Getting coffee. D’Annibal told me to take some time off and I’m starting by showing up late today.”

“We’re getting traction. You got a minute.”

“Sure.”

“Your stepbrother’s van,” he said. “It was wiped clean but there was a long hair, possibly female, found inside it. Not sure whether they can extract DNA yet, but it jibes with the woman vigilante theory. If we catch her, we might have something to put her in the van.”

“When we catch her,” September corrected him.

“Second, the Clatsop County Sheriff ’s Department caught up with Daniel Quade, per your brother’s intel from Bill Quade. He coughed up the name of one Hiram Champs, Mr. Blue to those who know him, as his skin is apparently blue.”

“Just like Auggie said.”

“Quade said he got the ketamine from Champs, so Clatsop County checked out his place. Anyway, they found nothing. It was almost like he was waiting for them. In fact he invited the deputies in for herbal tea.”

“What do you make of that?” September asked, sipping her cold drink. She didn’t give a damn that the weather was dropping in temperature and there was talk of bitterly cold rain and hail for Halloween.

“Quade’s getting the stuff wherever he can. Maybe he got it from him, maybe he didn’t. There’s a hot springs on Champs’s property that Quade and his new girlfriend like to use. Sounds like he and Champs had words about that, so maybe Quade’s getting payback. He spread the lie that he was moving to California, but he didn’t go that far.”

“Does it look like Champs gave him the ketamine?”

“The deputies weren’t sure. Champs is kind of like a mystic. Believes in all sorts of herbal remedies. He could be the dealer, or he could be someone Quade found it convenient to blame. At least Quade’s admitting he gave it to Carrie Lynne, for recreational use only. He just happened to then move on to the next girl and Carrie Lynne used it to take her life. I don’t like the guy, but I believe him.”

“What about Champs?”

“I’m gonna keep an ear to the ground. Keep checking with Clatsop County.”

“Okay, is that it?”

“Uh-uh. We’ve got another missing person. A sixth-grade girl spent the night with her dad—part of a custody arrangement—but when he dropped her off at the mom’s, Mom wasn’t there. He left without checking and the girl called it in. Wasn’t Mom’s usual MO.”

“Maharis on it?” September was walking through fits of wind-driven rain to her car, her coat practically ripped from her fingers where she was holding it together with her right hand.

“Yeah, but get this. The girl, Molly Masterson, goes to Twin Oaks.”

That caught her up short. “It’s barely been a week since Stefan was left tied to the pole.”

“Which is another thing. Stefan had gunshot residue on his right hand. Latest theory is he might have shot himself by mistake, maybe wrestling for the gun. If we catch our vigilante, it may be hard to prove murder.”

“
When
we catch her, Wes. And I’ll worry about proof then.” She climbed into the Pilot. “Jesus, Wes. Is that all? I was going to say we haven’t heard from Keith Collier yet, so I might have to track him down.”

“Maybe you won’t have to,” he said breezily. “I could have all our cases wrapped up by the time you get here.”

“Bull. Shit.”

She hung up on his rolling laughter.

 

 

Lucky followed Ugh to school and waited in her Sentra while he went inside. She’d trailed him to a cul-de-sac the night before and had waited impatiently for him to come out, hoping he was just making a stop off before he went to a bar. She’d been afraid to turn into the cul-de-sac in case someone saw her and so she’d parked outside of that tight circle, settling in to wait along the cross street. She had dared to take a stroll along the sidewalk in front of the houses and duck into a park across from the house Ugh’s Lexus was in front of, but she couldn’t see through the curtained windows, so she’d had to go back to her car. Fairly early in the evening she’d seen the Lexus come out of the cul-de-sac, and she’d thought maybe he would head for a bar, but instead she followed him all the way to his driveway. She’d thought about sneaking along the neighbor’s fence again, but too many cars were passing by at that time and a woman with a German shepherd was out walking her dog, so she stayed put. By the time she dared to sneak along the hedge and spy on him, the Lexus was parked by the station wagon and the house was dark save for a light in the back that might have come from the kitchen.

He was in for the night. He’d clearly met up with whoever lived at the house and that had been enough. A woman? The one he’d been flirting with in the school parking lot on Monday? Someone else? Someone
young
?

No. She didn’t think so. She sure as hell hoped not. If he’d actually hurt someone on her watch . . .

She inhaled and let out her breath heavily. She was going to have to intercept him, but where? Not here.

Did she dare just go to his house? Show up with some sweet dreams in a thermos and dressed in her short, short skirt and say what?
Hi, Mr. Harding. I’m here to give you what you want....

It would be so much easier if he would just hit a bar. Alone. Without the woman from the parking lot or anyone else.

Discouraged, she turned back to the Creekside Inn.

 

 

The service for Stefan at Rigby House, a venue for memorials, meetings, and octogenarian birthday parties, was blessedly short. Apart from the Rafferty clan and a smattering of the Twin Oaks staff, it was very poorly attended. September sat between July and Evie, who’d insisted on going, though March, clearly annoyed and baffled by his daughter’s request, had tried to talk her out of it. Throughout the service, Evie clutched September’s hand, and September squeezed back, silently letting her know that she understood.

Auggie made an appearance but stayed in the back of the room, acknowledging September with a nod. She would have liked to meet with him and tell him about Evie, but that was for the future. Clearly Evie hadn’t confessed what she knew about Stefan to her father; September hoped she’d been more forthcoming with her mother. Time would tell.

Verna cried throughout the service, while Rosamund, tucked close to Braden in a black sheath that showed her growing bump, looked properly serene, stoic, and sympathetic, playing the part for all it was worth.

“She glows,” July muttered in disgust. “Look at me. I’ve never looked worse.”

July’s skin was several shades paler than normal and her blue eyes were a bit sunken. September decided not to say anything one way or the other, so July snorted. “Thanks for trying to make me feel better.”

“You don’t look that bad.”

“Gee, thanks.”

As soon as it was over, September was outside, dialing her cell phone. She called Jake’s mother, who told her the surgery was over and went well.

July caught up to her, her own baby bump barely visible, though she did look like it was a hellish pregnancy. “You okay?” she asked.

“Best day of my life.”

“What the hell does that mean?” she asked crossly.

“Jake’s through his surgery and he’s going to be okay.”

 

 

Graham’s head was not in the moment. Teaching was such a painful task, and the blank stares of his students, as if they were all stoned, generally made him want to slap them silly and scream at them to wake up. Today, however, it felt like all those eyes, row upon row of them, were staring him down, like they
knew.

It had taken him well past midnight to get Claudia Livesay in the ground. The wind had been fierce and those sudden buckets of rain chilled him to the bone. Afterward, he’d stayed in the shower until he’d run the water heater out of hot water. Even then he was shivering—from the cold and so much more.

When he’d gotten to school the news was already out. Ms. Livesay wasn’t home when Molly got dropped off by her dad! The girl had to call 911 herself! Where was she? Did something happen to her?

Mrs. Pearce grabbed his arm when their third-period classes were letting out. “Oh, my God, Graham. What do you think happened?”

The girl with the rosebud lips had filed out of her room behind the rest of the children, throwing a worried look over her shoulder at her teacher.

“What’s her name?” he asked, lost in his own world.

“What? Whose?”

He tried to focus on Pearce. Her forehead was puckered, her lips pinched. “Umm . . . Molly’s mother. I can’t think of it.”

“Claudia. Livesay. She goes by her maiden name. You know it,” she chided. “Oh, my. I feel just awful for Molly. Where is she? I mean, you don’t just leave your child unless something terrible’s happened, right?”

He’d moved on from her as soon as he could, but then it was lunchtime and the staff was abuzz with rumors. But even in the midst of it, while he felt like he was having an out-of-body experience, deep inside he was laughing his ass off. They were all so gullible and unaware. Maybe even a little titillated by Claudia’s complete lack of responsibility.

But later, he’d made the mistake of walking to the front of the building where there was an impromptu meeting being held by Principal Amy Lazenby, the battle-ax of all battle-axes with her short gray hair and mannish style. A pair of diamond stud earrings winking in her fat ears, a gift from her boyfriend, someone had said—though he didn’t believe for a minute that she had anything to do with men and vice versa—didn’t help cut that image, either.

And David DeForest’s simpering wife was there, too. Graham could feel her gaze touch on him, even while she clung to her husband’s arm.

“We should get the police here,” DeForest was saying, and his wife agreed on a gasp, “It’s like someone is targeting Twin Oaks!”

Lazenby said, “Hopefully, Ms. Livesay will have already returned home. The Laurelton PD and Detective Rafferty, whom I’ve personally met, are on the case. I’ve asked them to let us know the moment Claudia Livesay is found.”