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Authors: Kevin O'Brien

BOOK: The Last Victim
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Bridget lifted her head from the pillow and squinted at the clock on her nightstand. Two-fifteen. She needed to look halfway presentable for her breakfast gig in less than five hours. And it was a photo op, no less.
Crap.
Bridget had been tossing and turning since midnight. So many things were going through her head. Maybe Brad had been right. Maybe she shouldn’t have gone to Olivia Rankin’s wake. Perhaps that flat tire had been a sign telling her to turn back. If she hadn’t attended the wake, maybe she would have fallen asleep tonight without a hitch.
It had been strange, seeing Fuller Sterns after two decades. She wondered why he was suddenly so anxious to speak with Brad. Did it have anything to do with Olivia’s death? Or Gorman’s Creek? Brad actually
talking
about Gorman’s Creek tonight—though briefly—was something of an unsettling milestone, a reminder that their tired old sin couldn’t be completely erased.
Bridget threw back the covers and climbed out of bed. “Damn it,” she muttered, putting on her robe.
She wandered down the stairs to the kitchen, where she poured herself some brandy. For a while, after Gerry left, she’d come to rely a bit too much on the stuff at bedtime. But she’d kicked the habit, figuring if something happened to one of the boys late at night, she would have been useless. It had been months since she’d dipped into the brandy supply.
However, at the moment, Bridget figured one shot wouldn’t kill her.
She took her brandy into the TV room, a large, wood-paneled area off the dining room. There was a brick fireplace, and on the wall, framed family photographs. Bridget had taken down only one photo—of Gerry and her on their wedding day. All the other photos of Gerry remained.
At one end of the room was a huge picture window that looked out to the backyard. Bridget caught her reflection in the darkened glass as she stepped into the room, carrying the drink in her hand. With her robe on and her hair a mess, she looked like a lush.
Suddenly, she realized there was another image in the darkened glass. It seemed to move and merge with her own. They looked like dancing ghosts. Bridget stopped dead. There was a man in her backyard—staring at her.
Gasping, she dropped her glass of brandy. It shattered on the floor—by her bare feet.
Bridget ran across the room and flicked on the light switch. A couple of floodlights went on in the backyard. Trying to catch her breath, she anxiously studied the illuminated yard, but didn’t see anything. The man had disappeared. Or maybe he was just hiding.
She hurried into the kitchen and reached for the phone on the wall. That was when she saw someone dart past the window in the kitchen door.
“Oh my God,” she whispered. She was thinking about her sons, asleep upstairs. Bridget grabbed the phone and dialed 9-1-1.
Her heart was racing, and the two ring tones seemed to last forever until the operator answered: “Police Emergency.”
“Yes,” Bridget said, steadily. “My name is Bridget Corrigan, and I’m at 812 Greenwood Lane. I need to report a prowler.”
“Is he in the house now?” the operator asked.
“No—at least, I don’t think so,” she replied. It suddenly occurred to her, what if there were two of them?
“Let me confirm that address,” the operator said. “Eight-twelve Greenwood?”
“Yes, that’s correct,” she replied into the phone. Bridget felt something warm and wet under her bare feet. She looked down at the tiled floor, and realized she was standing in blood. She’d cut her feet on the glass.
“Hold the line, ma’am,” the operator said.
“I can’t,” she argued. “This—this phone isn’t cordless. My two sons are asleep upstairs. I need to go up there and make sure they’re okay—”
“We have a patrol car in your vicinity,” the operator said. “Can you describe the prowler?”
“Um, about six feet tall, medium build.” Bridget glanced toward the kitchen windows, then down the hall at the front door. “I didn’t see his face, but he was wearing a leather jacket. Listen, I can’t stay on the line. I have to check on my sons—”
“I need you to hold on, ma’am,” the operator said. “Just—please, hold on. . . .”
“Did this guy try to get into the house?” Brad asked in a hushed voice.
Bridget sipped her coffee. “No,” she muttered. “No sign of an attempted break-in. Whoever he was, the police couldn’t find him.”
Brad frowned. He shared the sofa with her. He wore a T-shirt and slacks, but no shoes or socks. He’d been changing his clothes when Bridget started telling him why she’d only gotten two and a half hours of sleep the previous night.
They were scheduled to speak at a party luncheon at the Portland Red Lion. The hotel had given them a hospitality room—with two extra phone lines and a fax machine, all of which never stopped ringing. The hotel had also provided them with a tray full of sweet rolls and an ice chest crammed with soft drinks. A large coffeemaker was brewing, and the aroma filled the large burgundy-and-beige room. The TV set was on at a low volume. Two members from Brad’s staff—along with Bridget’s assistant, Shelley—kept running in and out of the suite.
Bridget rubbed her forehead. “Anyway, the police didn’t leave until about four this morning—”
“Brad, sorry to interrupt,” said his assistant, Claudio, a handsome black man with a buzz cut and glasses. He handed Brad a fax. “Here are the figures you wanted on the state unemployment rate for August.”
“Thanks, Claudio,” he said. He glanced over at his other assistant, Chad, and Bridget’s assistant, Shelley. They were both on the phone. He turned back to Claudio and gave him a tight smile. “Listen, could you guys give us a couple of minutes alone?”
While Shelley, Chad, and Claudio stepped out of the suite, Brad stole a sip of Bridget’s coffee. “You should have called me, Brigg,” he said. “Are the boys okay?”
“Oh, they’re okay. They slept through the worst part.” She shrugged. “I didn’t call, because I didn’t want to wake you up. No reason the
two
of us should feel like the walking dead today.” Bridget sipped her coffee. “At first, the police seemed to think I was crazy. But I’d turned on the sprinkler before we left for your place last night, and switched it off when we got home. So the ground was still damp. They found footprints all around the house. Looked like the same set, they said.”
“But the cops found absolutely no sign of an attempted break-in?”
“No, thank God.”
He leaned closer to her. “Well, I think this might’ve been one of those things that come with the territory when you’re on TV. These snoops with nothing better to do have been sneaking up to our house for months now. Last week, we caught two women—and their
kids
—trying to peek into our front window. There were five of them, for God’s sake. And—get this—when Janice asked them to leave, they got all huffy with her.”
Bridget frowned. “But do you have them coming up to your windows in the middle of the night?”
“Twenty-four-seven.” Brad sighed. “Still, I hate the idea of you being there alone with the boys while these idiots are coming up to the house. I’ll see if I can get the precinct to put an extra patrol on your block. Are all your locks working? Is the house alarm system up to snuff?”
Bridget nodded. “The cop was asking me the same thing this morning. I had it all upgraded when Gerry left, remember? Anyway, the police were very thorough and . . .”
Bridget trailed off as she caught a glimpse of Brad on the muted TV set. It wasn’t a flattering photo of him—and bad pictures of her brother were hard to find. “Hey,” she said, grabbing the remote. She turned up the volume. “God, you look horrible. Is this a new Foley commercial?”
“Oh Lord,” Brad grumbled. “Yes. I’ve already seen it.”
“Brad Corrigan wants to take away your fishing rights,” the announcer was saying. Brad’s photo dissolved over a scenic shot of a boy fishing with his father. The circle-with-a-slash symbol was slapped over this idyllic image—punctuated with a somber drumbeat on the sound track. “Corrigan’s proposing a bill to outlaw fishing in certain sections of the Willamette River, and that’s just not right.”
“And that’s just bullshit,” Brad growled at the TV.
A crestfallen blond-haired boy with a fishing reel over his shoulder turned toward the TV viewer with tears in his eyes. “I won’t be able to go fishing with my dad anymore,
”
he lamented.
“C’mon, Brad, why won’t you let that kid go fishing with his daddy?” Bridget asked.
“Because the fish in some areas of the Willamette are poisonous, due to all the pollution,” Brad said. “I don’t want to outlaw
fishing
. I’m trying to get the river cleaned up so people won’t die when they eat the fish they catch there. But Foley—”
“I know all that,” Bridget cut in, waving away his explanation. “You’re preaching to the choir. Quiet, I want to hear this.”
Another shot of Brad—looking angry—came on the TV screen. “Brad Corrigan is also proposing a bill that could shut down dozens of plants and factories in Oregon. Thousands could lose their jobs.” The slash-through-a-circle symbol struck an image of a factory with smokestacks against a gorgeous sunset. Then they showed footage—probably from the forties—of smiling factory workers filing into a building. The same slashed circle lingered over their happy faces.
“Don’t tell me,” Bridget said to her brother, eyes on the TV. “This has something to do with you wanting stricter standards for employee safety and for industrial waste disposal. Am I right?”
“Bingo.”
“I don’t want my daddy to lose his job,” said another tearful child—a little black girl with her hair in braids.
Jim Foley appeared on the screen. Wearing khakis and a denim shirt with an open collar, he sat on the edge of a desk. The ruggedly handsome, gray-haired sixty-year-old looked very relaxed and accessible. A regular Joe. He had a warm smile and appeared to be a tall man—in very fit condition.
Actually, Jim Foley was a multimillionaire, the former CEO of a huge intermobile corporation. He stood five eight in his stocking feet, and beneath those casual clothes he wore a man’s girdle. But few people knew that. Jim Foley had paid one of the West Coast’s most prominent marketing firms to advise him on sharpening his TV-image—to compete with the handsome and charismatic Brad Corrigan. Thanks to marketing experts, makeup, and crafty camera angles, Jim Foley came across as tall, stoic, friendly, a little bit gruff and a little bit sexy—a cross between Harrison Ford and Tom Brokaw.
“There are over a hundred reasons why you shouldn’t vote for Brad Corrigan,” Jim Foley said to his TV viewers. “But I’ll give you just one reason—your children.”
“Who wrote this?” Bridget said. “It’s terrible.”
“Wait a minute,” Brad said. “Here comes the trademark sign-off.”
Foley smiled into the camera. “I’m your friend, Jim Foley, and I want to be your senator.”
“With friends like that, who needs enemas?” Bridget remarked, shaking her head. “I can’t believe you let him get away with all those distortions and lies.” She clicked off the TV.
Brad took a folded white button-down shirt out of a plastic bag from the cleaners. “I’ve discussed it with Jay, and he says I’m better off not acknowledging Foley’s bullshit.”
Jay Corby was Brad’s campaign manager, a slick huckster and a bit of a control freak. Bridget often thought Jay underestimated their opponent. Foley had interests in two local TV stations, a radio station, and a major newspaper in Portland. The distortions he broadcast weren’t being contradicted by anyone.
Bridget sighed. “If you don’t challenge him on these lies, the thousands and thousands of people who see him on TV will take what he says as gospel. I can’t believe you’re letting him get away with this.”
“Oh, this is nothing,” Brad replied. “I think Foley’s just warming up for now. The campaign hasn’t even
started
to get dirty yet.”
Bridget said nothing. She watched her brother retreat into the bathroom.
Brad had gained his popularity from endless personal appearances and word of mouth. The independent weeklies in Portland, Salem, and Eugene were behind him. It was only from the small press—along with several Internet sites—that people got the truth about Jim Foley.
While Foley was CEO of Mobilink, Inc., the company got away with violating dozens of ecological, safety, and antidiscrimination laws. Before caring so much about “our children” in his current ad campaign, Foley consistently rejected proposals for employee pregnancy-leave benefits and on-site day care facilities.
Under Foley’s regime, the company avoided paying any state or federal income taxes for four years—thanks to some crafty manipulations of their books. Certainly helping matters were Foley’s close ties to the current incumbent senator, Glen Eberhart. Foley had been a huge contributor in Eberhart’s last campaign. Foley had also used his media connections to downplay a scandal last year when Eberhart’s drug habit was uncovered. The senator, who suffered from chronic back pain and obesity, had been buying addictive painkillers and diet pills from a black market supplier for months. Foley’s press and Eberhart’s followers quickly forgave the senator for violations that would have landed some poor, anonymous
nonwhite
man in jail for at least two years.
Wisely, Eberhart chose not to run for office again—and he endorsed the candidacy of his buddy, Jim Foley.
Before retiring from Mobilink, Foley persuaded the board of directors to give him a nine-million-dollar bonus—in addition to his secured pension of $2.5 million a year. Then one of the last things Foley did as CEO was manipulate the books again and reward his board of directors with bonuses—while taking away the retirement and unemployment benefits for three-quarters of Mobilink’s workforce.
There was a story about Jim Foley speaking informally to a group of clerks during a tour at one of Mobilink’s terminals. It was after lunch, and Foley must have been drunk or very full of himself at the time. In his short talk, Foley compared himself to a proud Indian warrior chief, who would keep riding and riding his horse until it was dead, and then he would eat it. “You people are like my horse,” he concluded.
One clerk, a nine-year employee named Mike Nuegent, ceremoniously spat in his face. Two more quit on the spot. Mike Nuegent mysteriously died later when he plunged from the roof of an abandoned apartment building. The police ruled his death as a suicide.
Brad hired a couple of investigators to determine if the “horse” story was true. No one would go on record. Witnesses had been threatened or harassed. Even Mike Nuegent’s widow wouldn’t be quoted. Off the record, Mrs. Nuegent was certain her husband had been murdered.
It was clear to those who bothered to think beyond what the Foley media machine told them: Jim Foley would treat the people of Oregon as he had the bulk of Mobilink’s workforce. Only big business, special interest groups, and
Jim Foley
would benefit from his winning the Senate race. The rest of the state would be screwed.
Foley based his campaign on bringing back “family values” and lowering taxes. He even claimed that God wanted him to be Oregon’s senator. He’d given up drinking and found Jesus at just about the time he’d gone into politics. His campaign speeches were often sprinkled with references to God, morality, or the power of prayer.
Divorced during his Jim Beam days—and now remarried to a Good Christian Woman nineteen years younger than himself—Foley couldn’t reproach the “family values” of his opponent. Brad Corrigan was married to the same woman for eleven years with one child and another on the way. Moreover, Brad was devoted to his father—and to his twin sister and two nephews. He was untouchable.
Almost.
Brad said he was pretty certain Foley had investigators digging into his and Bridget’s past for something that might discredit them. Bridget had known as much when she went to Olivia Rankin’s funeral service yesterday. Yet she’d gone anyway—against Brad’s objections. Now she wished she hadn’t. Could that dark-haired stranger who had been staring at her during the service be working for Foley? And if he was a Foley spy, how much did he already know?
The phone rang, but Bridget didn’t make a move to answer it.
Brad stepped out of the bathroom. He was straightening his tie. “Maybe you should bring the troops back in,” he suggested.
“In a minute,” Bridget said soberly. She waited until the phone stopped ringing.
Eyes narrowed, Brad stared at her.
“I want to apologize,” she said finally.
He let out a little laugh. “What for?”
“You didn’t want me going to Olivia’s wake, but I went anyway. I was being selfish, trying to—exorcise my own demons from twenty years ago, and what happened at Gorman’s Creek.”
He glanced toward the door, then gave her a wary look. “Brigg—”
“Maybe I was rebelling against you,” she continued. “I’m not totally sure of my motives now. But I know, it was a bad decision to go. I hate the idea that one of Foley’s spies could easily have followed me there.”
Brad sat down next to her on the sofa. “Please, shut up,” he whispered in her ear. He patted her arm. “We didn’t check this room for bugs. And we’ve been scheduled to speak here for a month now. That’s plenty of time for Foley’s tribe to have set up some kind of
eavesdropping
party. Get my drift?”

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