Julia Spencer-Fleming - All Mortal Flesh

“Let me get this straight,” Jensen finally said. “You think this teenager might have killed Audrey Keane?”

“I don’t know,” Clare said. “But I do know it’s an awfully weird coincidence that four people have had animals killed recently and all of them are Quinn Tracey’s customers. And, of course, the Van Alstynes had hired him, too.”

“The murdered woman wasn’t Mrs. Van Alstyne, though. Does Tracey have any connection to Audrey Keane?”

“Not that I know of. But maybe it’s like the animals. He was in a relatively remote place, no one was around, and so he… killed her.” Stated baldly like that for the first time, it sounded lame. “There’s a well-known connection between sadism to animals and violence against humans,” she said defensively.

“I’ve heard that, yeah. There’s also a well-known connection between being an incredibly bored teen trapped in the countryside and dumb, destructive pranks. Do we know for sure all these animals were killed by a human being instead of a predator?”

Someone in the room with Jensen spoke to her. The words were too far away and indistinct for Clare to make out, but after the unknown officer had finished, Jensen’s voice came back on. “Okay, I’m told investigation confirmed Perkins’s dog and Underkirk’s pig were killed by someone. The chief suspect in the dog’s case is a neighbor whose favorite snowmobiling course was blocked off by Perkins. The theory about the pig is that somebody wanted it for its meat and got scared off by Underkirk before he could finish the theft.”

“But you didn’t know about the Quinn Tracey connection then,” Clare said.

“No, the department didn’t.”

“Will you have someone look into it?”

“I’ll pass the information along to Deputy Chief MacAuley. He’ll put someone on it as soon as he can spare the manpower.”

While Jensen had been talking, Clare had tightened her grip on her coffee mug. Now her knuckles showed white. “You can’t wait until Lyle MacAuley decides there’s nothing more important. You need to investigate this now. Quinn Tracey may have murdered Audrey Keane.”

“This kid who has no record-you haven’t run into him on anything, have you?” The question was spoken to the anonymous officer. He said something to Jensen. “Okay, he has no record and no encounters with the police,” she told Clare. “And according to his guidance counselor, he’s bright and hardworking, and he evidently has an involved, caring, educated family. And you think because two of his snowplowing clients had animals killed-crimes which were investigated but didn’t implicate him-that last Monday he decided to slash a complete stranger’s throat and cut her face off. Is that about it? Your theory?”

When you recognize an ambush, Hardball Wright said, don’t think you can turn tables on the enemy. You can’t. Get out while the gettin’s good.

“Thank you for your time and consideration, Investigator Jensen.” Clare did her best to sound as if she didn’t want to strangle the woman on the other end of the line.

“Thank you for reporting this possible criminal activity, Reverend Fergusson. I’m sure we’ll be speaking again soon.”

Clare hung up. God. If Karen Burns were here, she’d probably thump Clare over the head for contacting Jensen without a lawyer standing by.

The remaining coffee was cooling rapidly. Better chuck it out and start over again. As she passed the office toward the ladies’ room, Lois called out, “What did the police say?”

Clare allowed herself the detour. She perched on the edge of the secretary’s desk. “I spoke to Investigator Jensen. She didn’t come right out and call me an idiot for conflating a couple of dead cats into a conspiracy theory, but she managed to get her point across.”

“Sorry,” Lois said.

“She didn’t dismiss the possibility that the Tracey boy might be involved in some of the animals’ deaths, but she shot down my idea that there might be a connection between them and Audrey Keane’s murder. She thinks it’s just vandalism gone awry.”

Lois tilted her head, causing her strawberry blond bob to swing along one side of her jaw. “She has a point. When my brother was in his teens, he and his friends used to set haystacks on fire for fun.”

“You’re kidding. You could burn someone’s house or barn down.”

“There’s not a lot to do when you’re a kid in the country.” Lois gave her a sympathetic look, then perked up as the sedate fox-trot music on the radio gave way to the thunderous sound of the Storm Center First Response Team’s theme music. Clare retreated with her cold coffee and her shredded enthusiasm, pursued by dire predictions of snow, snow, and more snow.

Humility. That, Russ decided, was the lesson the universe wanted to teach him. Certainly, the value he placed on his wife and marriage first. He would never, as long as he lived, forget the horrible pithed feeling of hearing Linda was dead and the soul-lifting experience of having her resurrected by Sergeant Morin’s fingerprint kit. It was almost-not quite, but almost-enough to make him believe in God.

Which is where the humility came in. He had spent the morning visiting all Linda’s most recent job sites: a second home for skiing, a mother-in-law apartment, a charming farmhouse trying desperately to be a stately home with curtains swagged and draped and pelmeted up to the not-high-enough ceiling.

In each location, he had to explain that he had lost his wife. That she had left without word and had not contacted him in close to a week. Had anyone heard her mention a man? Or seen her with anyone other than one of her freelance seamstresses?

Humility. Clare would probably say it was good for him. He might have swallowed it with more grace if he had gotten anything other than embarrassed, sympathetic looks and “Sorry, I don’t know anything that can help you.”

He tightened his hands on the wheel of his truck and flicked on his wipers to rid the windshield of its steadily accumulating snow. Noon. The forecaster hit it dead on. He ought to call Harlene, make sure she got Duane and Tim, the part-timers, suited up for emergency response. If what the weatherman predicted was to be believed, they’d be coming up deep snow and whiteout conditions. He should also-

He caught himself short. He couldn’t do a damn thing. He was an acting civilian until Jensen decided to give him back his badge. It was up to Lyle to make sure the department was ready for the Blizzard of the Century or the Killer Storm or whatever theme name the television stations would come up with to describe it. His job was to make it to his last stop. Linda’s most recent work site. The Algonquin Waters Spa and Resort. He didn’t hold out high hopes. It seemed like every time he came near the place, it was a disaster. The summer it was being built, he had taken off from its helipad in a chopper-the first one he had ridden in in decades-and promptly crashed. This past fall, he had the worst dinner of his life there, seated next to his wife and across the table from Clare. Christ, he was still suffering indigestion from that one. The ballroom and most of the ground floor going up in flames was sort of an anticlimax.

He knew what he was doing, recounting his past miseries at the Algonquin. He was avoiding thinking about what he was going to do if he didn’t turn up any trace of Linda. He had no other leads. He had nothing. And the thought of returning to his freezing cold house, with its bloodstained kitchen and the fluttering ghosts of disappeared identities…

He shook his head, concentrated on the road. Past the turnoff, the hotel’s private road was almost dry, the heavy-hanging pines sheltering it from the early snow. The road switched back and forth, climbing the mountain, until it opened out to the parking area, the wide portico, and the snow-covered, rock-walled gardens. He was surprised to see so many trucks and SUVs parked along the curving drive. While the Algonquin was planned as a year-round resort, it was supposed to be closed for rebuilding until spring.