“Well?” Ava asked when Seth walked into the kitchen.
“Cat and mouse,” Seth said. “He intentionally reached for Clara so he had an excuse to call animal control. Then he sniffs around to see if they’re onto him for animal mutilations.”
“What animals?” Ava asked.
“I asked him,” Seth said. “Dogs.”
“He was going to . . .” Dale started. “With Clara?”
“We have to assume,” Seth said.
“She’ll be safe with us,” Switch said. “You have enough sway, O’Malley, to get him banned from base.”
“I’ll call,” Seth said. “What’s the hand look like?”
“It’s not a knife wound,” Fran said. “That’s what I was hoping for. Ava, you want to take a look? Bob?”
Ava and Bob went to stand behind Fran. She increased the size while Ava bit her lip.
“Ava?” Fran asked.
“Looks like an animal bite,” Ava said. “But too small for Clara. Maybe a cat or a ferret? And . . . something’s not right.”
“Bob?” Frank asked.
“It looks like a wound that’s supposed to look like an animal bite,” Bob said. “I had a case once where a guy did this with a pair of nail trimmers. Got infected.”
“Do you remember the case?” Seth asked.
“I can find it,” Bob said. “Sure.”
“Anything might help,” Seth said.
“You know what I think,” Ava said.
Everyone turned to look at her.
“I think we should focus on the remains from Arizona,” Ava said. “If there’s even a remote chance that he did the mutilations, he’s bound to have screwed up on at least one. Sure, he’s perfect now. But ten years ago? Fifteen? His first one? I’d bet he wasn’t so cool.”
“We need only one solid murder conviction to put him in prison for life,” Seth said.
“Good thinking, Ava,” Bob said.
Fran, Leslie, and Nelson nodded their heads in unison.
“Switch and I will move to his apartment at the Fort. We’ll take Clara. My employees can take care of the store for a while,” Éowyn said. Switch put his arm around her shoulders, and she smiled. “What are you going to do?”
“I’m going to look into cattle mutilations,” Seth said.
“We should have at least three weeks before he kills again,” Nelson said. “It’s not a lot of time.”
“Let’s hope we find a way to stop him in that time,” Seth said.
“What are our questions?” Ava asked.
“Why the detectives got involved?” Bob asked.
“I’ll talk to Martha and see if she knows,” Seth said.
“We can track down the wives and surviving relatives of these others,” Fran nodded. “I bet they have some idea.”
“What else?” Ava asked.
“Why detectives?” Maresol asked. “There are lots of smart people in the world. Why go after police detectives?”
Everyone looked at Seth, and he nodded.
“We have to figure out why he dated me,” Éowyn said “He must have wanted something. Did I give it to him? Or was it all a part of the game?”
“Or just the thrill of the lead-up to murder,” Seth said.
“Anything else?” Ava asked.
“We have to find evidence,” Bob said. “Real, concrete evidence that we can try him on and get him off the streets.”
“I’m wondering about money,” Leslie said. “Seth, your note says that Martha said that his grandfather holds his chain, gives him money. But Davies makes a good salary. Why does he need extra money? Where does his money go?”
“Éowyn?” Seth asked.
“No idea,” she said.
“We should find out,” Fran said. “Money could be a key to figuring out what’s going on.”
“How so?” Ava asked.
“Maybe he hasn’t come after Ava because Seth doesn’t need money,” Fran said.
“You mean these other detectives got involved in the case as a side job for cash?” Seth asked. “That’s probable.”
“Or he picked Seth because he has money,” Fran said. “It could be either.”
“Good thinking, Leslie,” Ava said. “Fran.”
Leslie and Fran smiled.
“I wish I knew what motivated him,” Seth said. “He has everything—looks, education, enough power to satisfy most men, women . . . What motivates him to murder?”
“Do we know what motivates psychopaths?” Nelson asked.
“Power,” Bob said.
“More power than he has right now?” Seth shrugged. “He’s putting his real power at risk to have pseudopower over a few individuals.”
“Maybe that’s it,” Maresol said. “He’s hooked on the gamble. Risk it all, win or lose, that kind of thing. Éowyn said he was like that when they dated. Could be how he is.”
Seth nodded.
“You know what I think?” Dale asked.
They turned to look at him.
“I think he’s a slave to someone else’s whims,” Dale said.
“Someone’s making him do this?” Fran asked.
“Think about it,” Dale said. “Éowyn left him a couple times, and he didn’t kill her. He’s not acting out of anger or a need for revenge. He’s doing something else. I almost wonder . . .”
Dale’s voice faded out.
“You wonder what?” Maresol asked to encourage him.
“I wonder if these crimes are designed to keep good detectives busy while something else goes on,” Dale said.
“Like a murder in the middle of a hurricane.” Ava nodded. “Any ideas what?”
“No idea,” Dale said. “And I’m probably wrong. It’s just that you see this guy as a mastermind, blah, blah . . . He doesn’t seem that way to me. He seems more like the knife and less like the person who wields the knife.”
“That’s a marriage made in hell,” Ava said. “He likes to kill, and the other guy . . .”
“Calls the shots,” Dale said.
He looked around to see that everyone was nodding.
“It’s not your dad, Ava, ’cuz he’s dead, and Davies is still killing,” Dale said.
“We need to figure out if there’s someone else involved,” Seth said. “Because Dale’s right. Shooting a coyote thinking it’s Clara? That’s something Davies would do. But a mastermind who tricked the best minds in the country into watching him get away with murder?”
“It’s a stretch,” Éowyn said.
No one seemed to have anything else to add, so they packed up to leave. Fran gathered her grandchildren, and Leslie wrestled her infant from Maresol. Dale slunk off to his bedroom when Éowyn and Switch left with Clara. In his usual way, Nelson packed up his computer and gear and left without a goodbye. Bob stayed for a while to work out a plan of attack with Ava, while Maresol gathered her things.
“Listen,” Seth said to Maresol. “I’d like it if you stayed here for a while.”
“You would?” Maresol asked.
Seth grinned. He had no idea why Maresol thought he didn’t want her around, but that’s what she thought. There was no convincing her otherwise.
“I just think it’s a good idea for a while,” Seth said. “None of us should be alone.”
“You think he’s going to come and romance me?” Maresol grinned.
“Sure,” Seth said.
Maresol laughed.
“Will you stay?” Seth asked. “I can send Dale to get your cat.”
“It’s okay. My youngest and his wife are staying there,” Maresol said. “But I can only stay for a few days. I have a life that’s not just this house, you know.”
“I do,” Seth said.
“You’d better catch him fast,” Maresol said.
Maresol picked up her things and went to the first-floor bedroom suite she used. Seth smiled at her retreating form. He noticed Bob and Ava were talking at the front door. He went into the kitchen to finish the cleanup. He’d just loaded the dishwasher when Ava returned.
“Is Maresol staying here?” Ava asked.
“I asked her to,” Seth said.
“Good,” Ava said. “I worry about her on her own.”
Seth shot her a look of gratitude, and she grinned. He started the dishwasher.
“Come on, old man,” Ava said. “Let’s go to bed.”
“You don’t have to ask me twice,” Seth said.
He was following her out of the kitchen when the music came. There was no way to explain what happened. It had been this way since he was sitting in Sister Asella’s first-grade class all those years ago. One moment, he was in the thinking, feeling present. The next moment, his senses were filled with music. He saw notes dance in front of his eyes. He heard a full symphony rising in sound and tempo. He stopped walking.
He felt, more than saw, Ava come to him. When she touched him, his entire body exploded with desire for her. She said his name and then gave him a cocky grin. Without saying another word, she led him to the den couch.
He heard cloth ripping. He felt her hands on his naked flesh, and he was lost in her. He never knew how long these sessions lasted. Five minutes? Five hours? They rode the waves of the music playing in his head. Ava’s breath was fast and begging. She cried out, and then again. Her explosive release matched the timpani culminating in a crescendo deep within him.
When he looked up, he was playing the piano in the basement. The digital recorder in his hand had been running for almost three hours. And Ava’s naked form was wrapped in one of his mother’s handmade quilts on the leather couch. He got up to add wood to the dying embers of a fire in the fireplace and lay another quilt over her.
She grabbed his hand and gave him a quiet smile.
“Are you coming to sleep?” Ava asked.
“I need to check something,” Seth said.
“You made a breakthrough on the case,” Ava said.
“More like another question,” Seth said.
She touched his bare chest, and he realized he was wearing only his boxer briefs. He grinned. She rolled over and went back to sleep. He went to a drawer hidden in the back wall’s mahogany paneling and put on an ancient Eastman College T-shirt and East High Angels sweatpants. He looked at Ava to make sure she was asleep before taking an untraceable cellphone out of a hidden panel in the liquor cabinet.
“Name,” the man’s voice answered the line.
“Magic,” Seth said. There was a tone. He said, “O’Malley.”
There was a click while they traced the phone and matched his voice. After solving a big case for them, Seth had maintained a loose association with the US intelligence agencies and they with him. They had no problem asking him to solve their mysteries. In return, every once in a great while, he could get information available only through them.
“Go ahead,” the voice said.
“I need a timeline on a Vietnamese national,” Seth said.
“Resident? Or citizen?
“Permanent resident, last I knew. He could be a citizen now,” Seth said. “Possibly diplomatic. Location over time, but anything you have would be helpful.”
“Name?”
“He used to go by Liễu Chiến,” Seth said. “I’ve heard he goes by Nguyễn Làm Chinh.”
“He’s employed by the State Department.”
“I just need a timeline of his whereabouts from say . . . 1980 to now,” Seth said.
“Request submitted, but I added location and activities. We’ve had our eye on this one since . . . You know a Mitch Delgado?”
“Sure,” Seth said.
“He registered an alert in . . . uh . . . looks like 1987. We have detailed reports on this Nguyen’s activities since that time.”
“Including known associates?” Seth asked.
“Of course. Would you like me to send those?”
“Sure,” Seth said.
“He was denied citizenship on Delgado’s recommendation.”
“Good to know,” Seth said.
He started to add “Thanks,” but the line was dead. He looked at the phone and set it back in the hidden compartment in the cabinet. He sat down at the piano, but realized he was too exhausted to play. Grabbing a quilt from the chest, he lay down on the rug next to Ava and fell into a sound sleep.
|-||-|||-||-|||-||-|||-||-|||-||-|||-||-|||-||-|||