Linwood Barclay - Far From True

“A Jaguar. An old classic one, red. An E-Type, I think.” Carlson, who’d worked out of a cruiser for years, knew every kind of car out there, even the antiques.

Lucy Brighton put a hand on the wall to steady herself.

“Was the license plate AFV-5218?” the girl asked. Her mother turned, saw that her daughter had returned.

“Oh, Crystal.” She reached out an arm and pulled her daughter close.

“Uh,” said Carlson, glancing at his notes, “yes. That is the plate.” He looked at the girl. “You have a good memory.”

“Has something happened to Grandpa’s car?” To the police detective, Crystal said, “It’s an antique.”

“I’m afraid so,” Carlson said.

“I like that car.”

“I bet.”

“Sweetheart,” Lucy said, “I’m just trying to find out what—”

“Are they dead?”

Lucy hugged the child, patted her head. “It’s okay. It’s going to be okay.”

“I hope they’re not dead,” she said flatly, trying to free herself. “I’m supposed to go over there on Saturday when you go to the conference. I like to go over.” Crystal said to Carlson, “My grandpa has pinball games in his basement.”

“Is that so?” Carlson said.

“Miriam is nice to me. She isn’t my grandmother, but she’s nice to me.”

“Sweetheart, please go up to bed. I’ll come see you after the policeman leaves.”

“Okay.” Crystal made the trip back up the stairs.

“I just have a few more questions,” Carlson said. But he also had information to pass along, including where the bodies would be taken. In another ten minutes, he was out of there.

He headed home to get some sleep before reporting back to the station at eight. He entered the house as quietly as possible, but those damned hardwood floors gave him away every time. The boards creaked under his feet as he came inside.

“Angus?” The voice came from upstairs.

“Just me. Go back to sleep, Gale.”

A woman in her thirties appeared at the second-floor landing. She flipped on a light. She had short, streaked hair and wore a frayed housecoat. “This is way past the end of your shift.” Not an accusation, just a statement of fact.

“I would have called, but then I’d have just woken you up.”

“What’s going on?”

“There was a crazy thing. The screen at the drive-in fell over, killed some people.”

“Oh my God, how could that happen?”

He waved his hand tiredly, too weary to explain. “Who knows? Just go back to sleep.”

“I was awake anyway.”

“Still, you should—”

“I was thinking.”

“I gotta eat something,” he said, and went into the kitchen.

Gale descended the stairs, followed him, asked what he wanted. There was some leftover beef stew she could reheat in the microwave. Or, given that the clock was closer to breakfast than dinner, she could scramble him some eggs.

He opened the refrigerator, took out a beer. “This’ll do for now.”

“I was thinking that—”

“I’m really tired. Do we have to do this now?”

“You don’t even know what I’m going to say.”

“I don’t?” he said before drawing on the bottle, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. “Let me see if I can guess.” He opened a hamper in the fridge, took out some wrapped deli meat, put the package on the counter, and ripped it open. He grabbed a handful of thinly shaved Italian salami and shoved it into his mouth.

“You think we’re ready,” he said. “Your biological clock is ticking. If we’re ever going to do it, now is the time. Why should we wait? A child will make us a family.” He cocked his head at her. “How’m I doing?”

Her eyes were starting to swim.

“Thought so,” Carlson said.

“You’d be a wonderful father,” Gale said. “I know you would.”

“That’s not what I’m worried about,” he said, shoving another handful of meat into his mouth.

“You’re worried about me? That’s it? You’re saying I won’t be a good mother?”

“That’s not what I mean,” he said, although it came out much less clear than that with his mouth full of salami.

“That’s what you think.”

“No one has a kid thinking they’re going to be anything less than a great mother. A great parent. It’s after they have the kid they find out they’re no good at it.”

“I know we’d be good.”

Angus Carlson studied her. “No one knows anything for sure.”

“It doesn’t have to be the way it was for you,” she said, reaching out, touching his arm. “Just because your mother—”

He pulled away. “I’ve got to get some sleep. I have to be in early.”

He set his phone to wake him in two hours. Thirty minutes after that, he was at the station, expecting to head back out to the drive-in, but Duckworth had other ideas.

“Some bomb experts from the state are helping us at the site today. We’ve got plenty of uniformed officers interviewing witnesses, people who were there, who’d gone to see the movie. I want you out at Thackeray.”

Thackeray College?

“What do you want me out there for?” Carlson asked.

“The Mason Helt business,” Duckworth said.

Mason Helt, the Thackeray student who’d been shot dead by the college’s head of security. Helt had been killed after attacking Thackeray security guard Joyce Pilgrim, who’d been acting as a decoy, hoping to get the attention of whoever had grabbed and molested three female Thackeray students.

“What’s left to do?” Carlson said. “They got the guy.”

Duckworth said, “According to Ms. Pilgrim, before Helt died, he said something about being put up to this, like it was a gig, a hired performance. I want to know what the others have to say. If there was someone else involved, we need to know.”

“You think I’m not good enough to work the drive-in,” Carlson said.

Duckworth shot him a look, but sidestepped the accusation. “If that screen hadn’t fallen over last night, I’d be at Thackeray myself this morning asking questions.”

Carlson said, “Fine.”

Duckworth started to walk away, paused, turned back. “About Duncomb.”

“Duncomb?”

“Clive Duncomb. Their chief of security, who put the bullet into Helt. Former Boston PD. Thinks he’s John Wayne. Should have brought us in on this from the very beginning but chose to handle it himself. So far, he seems to have admin behind him, even though Helt’s parents have filed a multimillion-dollar suit against the college. He wrote the book on how to be an asshole.”

“Okay,” Carlson said. A pause, then, “Thanks for the heads-up.”

The three students who’d been attacked — presumably all by Helt — were Denise Lambton, Erin Stotter, and Lorraine Plummer. None of them had seen the man’s face, but their descriptions of what he’d been wearing — a hoodie with the number 23 on the front — matched.

He had contact information for all three, but only one of them,Lorraine Plummer, was available for a face-to-face. This, it turned out, was the end of the semester, and most students had returned home. Erin Stotter had gone back to Danbury, Connecticut, and Denise Lambton had gone to Hawaii — a graduation present from her parents.

Lorraine, however, was staying, having signed up to take courses from May to August so she could obtain her degree more quickly. She agreed to meet with Carlson in the college’s main dining hall, an arena-sized room with a vaulted ceiling. There were only half a dozen students there when Carlson arrived. Lorraine was sitting near one corner, working on a small laptop, a paper cup of coffee next to it.

“Ms. Plummer?” he said.

“You’re the policeman?” said the student, who Carlson guessed wasn’t more than five feet tall, maybe 110 pounds wet. She wore her black hair to her shoulders and was dressed in a gray sweatshirt and jeans.