Блейк Крауч: Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 133, No. 5. Whole No. 813, May 2009

Attempted murder added to the list of things to keep him in jail, but a bonus would be to have him on ice while they got a search warrant for the stolen firearms that could tie him to the earlier double homicide. Unless they’d already made the connection to that crime themselves, I needed to get word to someone, and talk Megan into an interview.

I made an executive decision.

“Megan, you’ve been through a lot, and you’re safe, but this situation is too dangerous. I need you to come with me right now as soon as I—”

I was reaching for the phone when I heard a car coming. I looked at Megan, but she was already on her feet, saying, “We got a plan, so you just keep him distracted. I got a place I can hide. Go ahead. Let him search.”

And she headed toward the back of the mobile home.

I couldn’t hear her leaving, but I did hear a car door slam outside. I had to keep him away from the professor, no doubt the world’s worst liar, and I had just enough time to grab her coffee cup and shove it into the dishwasher. I raced to the door and opened it a crack to peek out, standing slightly to one side just in case.

A man was getting out of a black Tundra with heavily tinted windows and California plates. It sure didn’t look like a rental to me; it was probably stolen.

That bastard had either given Marcella a second helping in her hospital room, or found some note in her book next to Weibold’s address, or followed me in the fog and temporarily lost me.

Had he also come in on foot first to eavesdrop? No, I’d have heard his footsteps on the gravel. It was all around the place. Even so, I should have been more careful. I wondered if Megan had gotten to where she was going, and how come I hadn’t heard any gravel as she left.

I put on a neutral face, opened the door, and came out. I got a look at him as the porch light hit his face. He fairly exuded meanness and the need to dominate, and especially in light of Megan’s story, I was shaking scared. But we actors learn how to breathe, we practice, even the understudies, so we know how to look calm when our knees are ready to buckle. Standing on the wooden porch, I said, “Hi. If you’re here for the professor, he’s—”

“You know why I’m here,” he said with a sigh that might have been fatigue or a signal that he wasn’t going to suffer fools. “I heard my daughter’s here.”

His foot was on the bottom step. I stood my ground, stalling. “I’m Lane Terry, the investigator your wife hired.” He ignored my outstretched hand, so I let it drop back to my side. “I guess the minister got in touch with Ruth, huh?”

He said nothing, but started up the steps.

“Mr. Holloway, I’d have saved you all the trouble but I couldn’t get through to that number in Anaheim she left. Anyway, your daughter was here until yesterday, but she left.”

“Uh-huh,” he said, clearly not buying my story.

“Why don’t you come on in?” I turned to the door, avoiding eye contact and sort of ignoring him, the only form of self-defense that might work, like when you meet a really big dog.

Steps ahead of him, I could hear some scrabbling on the kitchen ceiling that I didn’t think was a nesting bird, so I went for the kitchen counter with more hope than expectation, hit the “brew” button on the espresso machine, and said, “I’ll bet you could use a cup of coffee, too.”

“All right.”

The machine gave off a loud hydraulic mutter, and I hoped I hadn’t destroyed it, but when it made a satisfyingly loud grinding sound, the wheeze of steam and smell of coffee immediately reassured me that it was acting on cue. I eyed the spigot in case it started to drip, and announced loudly, “The professor’s working, but he was nice enough to offer me some coffee before I headed back. See, Megan left yesterday with two other kids.” I rattled around looking for cups and heard a clunk directly over my head but slammed that cupboard door as though I couldn’t find them, and tried another. Adrenaline having come to my rescue like the cavalry, my hand was rock steady as I retrieved cups, stuck one under the dispenser, hit “serve,” and the brewing noise continued as the fragrant brew flowed. In a pause from the machine, all was quiet above.

“There a bathroom down that hall?”

“Sure is. Second door on the left. You go right ahead, and I’ll go get Dr. Weibold to talk to you.” I wanted to give him just enough time for a superficial search, and I hoped that Megan was well hidden and didn’t move. As I saw him head down the hall, I admit to wanting to make a mad grab for my car keys and take my chances with the fog at seventy miles per hour. Instead, I went lamblike to the trailer. The professor was at his computer, staring at a screenful of numbers and unfamiliar symbols.

“Her father’s here,” I said in a near whisper.

He nodded, his Adam’s apple jumping out of the way as he swallowed. “I heard the car door slam.”

“Professor, I think you should avoid seeing him. I’ll tell him you’re busy and see if he buys that. If he doesn’t, I’ll come get you and you take my lead, play along with absolutely anything I say. Understand?”

He nodded again.

I grabbed a paper and a pencil with “National Geographic Survey” written on the side, and made up an address in the last town I’d passed. I pointed at it, talking fast. “Now, this is where she went with her two friends, a boy and a girl, yesterday afternoon. The minute I’m out the door now, call nine-one-one.”

I heard crunching gravel outside, then boots on the steps. Weibold got up as though facing a firing squad and went to open the door. As the two men shook hands, I said, “Dr. Weibold, this is Mr. Holloway. He’s Megan’s dad.”

Weibold surprised me under pressure. Though avoiding eye contact, he sounded sincere enough when he said, “Sorry you missed her, sir. I imagine you came quite a substantial distance and that you’re understandably concerned about her welfare. She was fine when she left yesterday afternoon with some young people she met in town. This is the address they gave me.”

He held out the paper to Holloway. “I’m not sure if it’s a residence or some kind of shelter, actually. It’s outside Quarry. That’s a small town where you can find most things, not that far north of here, maybe ten or fifteen miles. Of course, in this fog and with these roads, one could reliably calculate that it would take you in the neighborhood of—”

“That’s all right,” said our visitor as he snatched the paper from Weibold’s hand. I was about to jump for joy as he read it and turned toward the door, but my impulse was premature. He turned back. “Tell you what,” he said to me. “You drive me over there so I won’t get lost by myself or following you.”

“You’re the boss,” I said in as cheerful a manner as I could manage.

Then he turned to the professor. “You come along, too.”

“Well, I do have an early meeting in the morning, and while I didn’t mind doing a favor—”

“You’re coming,” Holloway said in a tone firm enough to freeze anyone in mid-excuse.

He watched me as I retrieved my purse, and I knew there was no trying to get help. I had no idea whether he believed me or if he planned to take us out somewhere and dump our bodies. Maybe, as a fugitive, he just didn’t want to take the chance of using the car that he’d come in. Long, tall Weibold folded up like a pocket knife to get into the backseat of the Honda, and Holloway took the front passenger seat. He clearly intended for me to drive, probably so I couldn’t pull anything. Even if he didn’t suspect us, a person with his background would keep watch, even on someone I sincerely hoped he’d taken for some ditzy detective wannabe from a tourist town filled with “illegal alien” servants of the corrupt and godless town residents.