The Coaster (26 page)

“Yeah, we actually could,” Swanson said.

That got Sarah's attention. “What does that mean? Nobody could have predicted that.”

“Let's just say we may have given Sam a nudge in the right direction.” Swanson said.

“What do you mean ‘we'?”

“Our organization is far-reaching. We've got techies to bug your house and hack your e-mails, and a team of operatives across the country willing to do whatever is necessary to get the job done.”

Sarah's eyes were blazing. ”If what you're saying is true, how'd you do it?”

“Easy as pie.” Swanson had a smug grin on his face. “We just swapped out his digitalis for a much stronger dose and then sat back and waited. It's the same way that male nurse in New Jersey killed all those people. They overdose, but all they have in their system is stuff they're supposed to be taking.”

Sarah wanted to be sure Swanson wasn't lying. “Wouldn't the increased dosage be discovered at the autopsy?”

“No, but even if it was, they'd probably blame the pharmacist,” Swanson said.

“But how could you know I'd be named trustee?” I asked.

“We got some expert legal advice from your friend Dan Langham.”

“You got Lang to change Sam's will?”

“He explained to us that Joan would still be in charge of the money unless Sam died before the end of the year. All that marital versus family trust business.”

A sickening realization suddenly punched me in the gut. “Wait a minute. Are you saying this whole scheme to kill Sam came about just because I was the son-in-law?”

“That's exactly what I'm saying,” Swanson said. “It's really
your
fault Sam's dead. If his daughter had married a better man, he'd still be aliv—”

Swanson was interrupted by a fist in the face from my wife. “You son of a bitch!” she screamed. “I'll kill you!”

Sarah's ring cut the bridge of Swanson's nose and he fell on his back more from surprise than the force of the blow. Or maybe I'm not giving Sarah enough credit. She jumped on top of him and started pounding his face. Blood was flying everywhere. She was sitting on his chest whaling away. I could have pulled her off but I didn't. Swanson deserved the beating and Sarah deserved to be the one delivering it.

Swanson finally managed to push her off and they both got to their feet, breathing hard. Swanson's face was a bloody mess. His nose looked like it might be broken. One of his fake teeth was chipped. Sarah wiped the hair out of her eyes and inadvertently smeared blood across her forehead like war paint from the blood of the vanquished.

Swanson stared at Sarah, seething with anger. “If you weren't a woman…”

“You'd what?” I asked. “Get your ass kicked even worse?”

“Shut up, Bob,” Swanson said. “What kind of man lets his woman fight his battles for him?”

“I don't know, but it's got to be better than being the kind of man who gets beaten up by that same woman.” I pointed at the drone in the sky. “Give it up, Swanson. You're on tape confessing to murder. You're going away for a long time.”

Sarah chimed in. “And with your pretty boy looks, you're going to be very popular in prison.”

“The video's already been sent,” I said. “The cops are probably on their way right now. You might as well turn yourself in.”

“Like hell.” Swanson glanced around looking for a way out. He started to run toward the house where the sedan was parked.

I yelled after him. “I disabled the car on my way in, Swanson.”

Sarah looked at me. “You know how to disable a car?”

I shrugged. “The keys were in it. Now they're not. I'd call that ‘disabled.'”

Swanson made a U-turn and raced back toward us, his three-hundred-dollar loafers now caked with mud. I braced myself for what looked like an attack but he veered away and headed for the barn, the one place I didn't want him to go. Sarah and I chased after him. As we neared the door, we heard a loud roar and Swanson came flying out of the barn on the ATV headed straight for us. Sarah and I had to dive out of the way like border checkpoint guards when someone crashes through the barrier gate.

I helped Sarah up and we watched as Swanson tore across the grass toward the driveway. He would need to make a sharp right to get on the paved surface, but he was only increasing his speed.

“Uh, honey?” Sarah asked. “Did you ever fix the throttle on the ATV?”

I stuck out my hand. “I don't believe we've been properly introduced. I'm Bob Patterson.”

“I'll take that as a ‘no.'”

“I've been meaning to,” I said. “But I've been kind of busy with this whole mortal threat to my family thing.”

The ATV's engine continued to howl as Swanson approached the driveway. There was no way he was going to make the turn at that speed. There's a huge hundred-year-old oak tree at the head of the driveway. The trunk of the tree has got to be at least eight feet in diameter. If you drove a Hummer into it at fifty miles an hour, it wouldn't even budge, so I was pretty sure the ATV stood no chance. Swanson sped across the driveway and hit the tree dead on. The impact flung him forward headfirst into the trunk.

I told Sarah to go to the barn to check on Nellie, who had been up in the loft operating the drone. I ran over to Swanson and rolled him over onto his back. There were bits of tree bark embedded in his bloody face, but it was hard to tell how much of his damage was caused by the tree and how much by Sarah. He was badly injured but he wasn't dead. The ATV was on top of him and he appeared to be paralyzed, at least temporarily.

“Call 911, Bob,” he croaked. “We can still work this out.”

“You know,” I said quietly, “this all came about because you thought I was a pushover.”

“True, Bob…I underestimated you…you're not a killer.”

“I've learned it all from you, Swanson.”

“What have you learned?” Swanson gasped.

I kneeled down and took Swanson's face in my hands, my palms on his cheeks. I leaned in close and whispered. “Behind every great fortune, there is a great crime.”

I twisted Swanson's head violently with both hands. There was a sharp
crack
and then silence, except for my own heart pounding in my chest and Sarah's approaching footsteps.

Chapter Thirty-one

“Do you think we should move?” I asked Sarah. “It seems like it's awfully easy to get yourself killed around here.”

“I don't think we need to move,” Sarah said. “Those two deaths were so ridiculously improbable, not to mention convenient, it's hard enough to believe it happened even twice.”

“Right,” I said. “Like in
The World According to Garp
when he buys the house with a still-smoking plane sticking out of the roof because the odds of it happening again are astronomical. I think we're safe from now on.”

I got the pickup and we threw Swanson's body in the back. It was becoming our own personal meat wagon. I found his gun and flashlight in the grass. The gun was bent and didn't look like it would fire, not that I had any bullets. I threw it in the back of the truck. The flashlight was in perfect shape. Those things are indestructible. They should have commercials where people try to break them like the gorilla and the Samsonite luggage. I was keeping this bad boy. I put it in my pocket.

“What about the ATV?” Sarah asked.

“It's destroyed,” I said. “We'll have to get someone to haul it away.”

“How do we explain the accident?”

“I'll say I was driving it.”

“Then why aren't you hurt?”

“Guys who sell scrap metal for a living don't ask as many questions as suspicious wives. Half the junk that ends up in their hands is probably stolen. But if he asks I'll tell him I managed to jump off just in time.”

We hid the pickup behind the barn for now and went inside. The horses were standing there in the dark like they always were. A trap door above our heads opened and a ladder slid down to the floor. Nellie descended the ladder carrying an iPhone.

“Where's the drone?” I asked.

“I landed it outside after Swanson took off on the ATV. I was able to control it pretty well. Not like Nick can, but not bad for an old guy.”

I had considered having Nick operate the drone but Sarah squashed that idea immediately. She also nixed my plan of tying Emily up in the yard as bait like the goat in
Jurassic Park
. Seriously, though, I only thought about it for like one second. I am an excellent father.

“What about the video?” I asked Nellie. “Did you get it?”

“I got it,” Nellie answered. “It's right here on my iPhone. You want to see it?”

“Sure.”

Nellie pulled the video up and hit play. The first thing you could see was the ground falling away as the drone rose into the air. It looked more like a video game than real life. After a few minutes, you could make out three separate individuals even in the dark. As the camera got closer, you could even hear us talking. Swanson said his lines like an evil genius explaining his scheme for world domination to James Bond as he's hanging upside down over a shark tank. Just before the drone flew away, there was a crystal-clear shot of Swanson pointing the gun straight at the camera and pulling the trigger.

“Nice shot, Tarantino.”

Nellie grinned. “All these years of filming childhood events my family will never watch has finally paid off.”

“Don't erase it. Actually, send it to my phone.”

“Roger. And I need it for back-up documentation for my enormous bill.”

“Isn't the video already uploaded to the Internet?” Sarah asked.

I looked away. “I, uh, actually, I lied about that.”

Sarah was not happy. “You're kidding.”

“You don't have Internet access out here in the barn,” Nellie said. “Although I'd be happy to get you all wired up. I'm thinking of buying a boat.”

“Let's try to leave
some
money in the trust.” I turned to Sarah. “The uploading to the Internet thing was just a bluff, like the envelope to the lawyer.”

“Yeah, that worked like a charm,” Sarah said. ”In fact, your whole plan was ingenious. Especially how you let Swanson take your gun to give him a false sense of confidence.”

“My
unloaded
gun,” I corrected her.

“But you didn't know that at the time.”

I put my arms around her and looked into her eyes. Both of them. “Look, if you really want to, we can have a full debriefing at a later date. But what's the difference? Chalk it up as a win and hope we never have to do anything like that again.”

Sarah hugged me tight. “You're right. I'm proud of you.”

“Good. Now you and Nellie get out of here while I get rid of this dead body.”

***

I looked out of the barn toward the house. No movement that I could see. We hustled over to Sarah's car and she and Nellie got in and drove away. I walked to the front of the house. The first guy I tranquilized was still lying on his back. I leaned down and lightly slapped his cheeks a few times. I was thinking about going into the house for a pitcher of water to toss in his face when his eyes started to flutter and he let out a groan.

I wasn't worried about what the bench-press brothers might do to me when they woke up. Unlike in the movies, if you get knocked unconscious for a couple of hours, whether by a drug or a blow to the head, you don't wake up feeling fine. These guys weren't going to be looking for revenge. They were going to be looking for a toilet to puke in. And I sure wasn't worried about them going to the police. What were they going to say? This guy killed our boss while we were in the middle of a home invasion?

After a few seconds his eyes focused and he saw me. “You guys need to get out of here,” I said. “Swanson confessed to murder. The cops are on the way.”

“Gnnnnnh,” he said.

“Don't worry, I'll keep you out of it. I know you guys didn't do anything. But who knows what Swanson might say? You need to get out of town as fast as you can and don't look back.”

I helped him to his feet and led him around the back to his unconscious doppelganger. “See if you can rouse him. I'm going to go find your car keys.” I took the flashlight and searched the bush I thought they landed under. They were right there, but it somehow took me ten minutes to locate them. By that time, the two behemoths were already sitting meekly in the car. I leaned in the window and handed whoever was driving the keys.

“Seriously, go straight home, pack your things and hit the road. Swanson's going down and you don't want to go down with him. If anyone asks, I've never seen you guys. Good luck and Godspeed.”

“Thanks, Mr. Patterson,” the driver said. “We owe you one.” He put the car in gear and drove slowly down the driveway. His headlights bounced back and forth as he corrected left and right to stay on the path. I don't know how the darts correlate to alcoholic beverages, but these guys had to have had at least the equivalent of a couple of six-packs. Hopefully they'd sober up before they got pulled over. I didn't want these idiots trying to talk their way out of a traffic stop. But I had other things to worry about. For the second time in the last week, I was on dead body cleanup duty and this time the bodies had to stay gone for good.

***

Swanson had mentioned the Muffin Monster is used in sewer lines to make sure the pipes don't clog. In fact, it's specifically designed to shred waterlogged objects into little bits, but I don't know how many dead bodies that usually entails. It probably depends on the city.

I only had two bodies, and I knew the Muffin Monster would work underwater, but I ultimately decided I would have to take care of this nasty business on land. My kids swim in that pond. Not to mention the difficulty of dragging the Muffin Monster out into the middle of the pond and feeding two bodies into it without drowning. I was going to be lucky if I could get Corny to shore.

I went into the garage to look for one of those orange extension cords you use to plug things in outside. I found a 200-footer I purchased with the idea of snow-blowing the entire driveway in front of the house. Huh. Still in the packaging. I got Sarah's mask and fins from the house.

I tossed everything in the back of the pickup and drove behind the house. I wheeled the Muffin Monster close and was able to wrestle it onto the tailgate and slide it into the truck bed. I got back in the pickup and drove over to the pond.

I unrolled the extension cord and plugged one end into the dock socket and the other end into the Muffin Monster. I pressed the start button and was relieved when the blades started turning. Now all I had to do was retrieve a dead body from the middle of a freezing cold pond in the dark.

I stripped down to my underwear. Even though I knew there was nothing really dangerous in our little pond, the human brain is conditioned to imagine monsters lurking in the darkness. Like anything else frightening or unpleasant (death, a social outing with Sarah's coworkers, etc.), I tried not to think about it. I'm good at that. Most people are.

I put the flashlight in my mouth and swam until I saw the sunken boat. Not a very good hiding place. Pretty easy to find, even at night. I swam down and dragged Corny out of the boat. The body was bloated enough that I never could have gotten it out except that a lot of the flesh was missing, thanks to the efforts of whatever creatures feed themselves by scavenging at the bottom of a pond. I spent some time on the surface breathing in and out and trying not to puke, and then made my way to shore.

I dragged Corny up onto the dock and collapsed onto my back. I just lay there for a few minutes staring up at the sky and getting my wind back. I got up and sloshed my way over to the pickup and opened the tailgate. Yaaah! There were two eyes staring at me from the truck bed. I almost shit myself. How could I have forgotten Swanson? John Wayne Gacy or the Green River Killer might lose track of a body here or there, but Swanson was fully fifty percent of the dead bodies I'd ever encountered. And he was brand new. He should have been fresh in my memory.

I drove as close as I could to the wooded area near the pond and hauled the bodies, the Muffin Master, and the sanitizer into the trees as far as the extension cord would go. You can imagine the rest. It was as horrific as you would expect. I don't know if it scarred me for life, but let's just say I'm not going to be making my own sausage anytime soon.

I sprayed everything in the area with the sanitizer. I even went around and washed off the areas where my dart-gun victims had fallen to get rid of any traces of blood or tranquilizer. While I was at it and since I was already wet, I hosed myself down with the sanitizer as well. I left the two machines on the porch, spotless and evidence-free. It was three in the morning. Sarah and the kids had been asleep for hours. Disposing of a couple of dead bodies took a lot longer than I thought it would. I went inside and showered and went to bed.

When my head hit the pillow, the adrenaline drained from my body and I started to fall asleep almost immediately. That was the most physical activity I'd had in one day in at least twenty years. But I kept thinking about the Sanitol sanitizer. It was an amazing machine. Anything can be free of contaminants in thirty seconds with virtually no cleanup. I should probably carry around a plastic bottle of the stuff in the glove compartment in case I ever get pulled over after a couple of drinks. Just a quick spray in my mouth and
Why, no, Officer, I haven't had anything to drink at all.
The possibilities were endless….