With the laser flashlight concealed inside the sweater I usually wore to ward off the chill of air conditioning, I hesitated in the lobby of Sirius Dynamics to gather my composure.
Look casual. Look as though you don’t know you’re being followed…
Frowning, I considered that. Labelle had told me I was being followed. So wouldn’t he be suspicious if I didn’t look as though I knew I was being followed?
“Fuck it,” I muttered, and headed for the door. If my followers didn’t already know I was onto them, they soon would.
Driving down the highway toward my farm, I kept a wary eye on the vehicles around me. No way to know if any of them were actually following me. With the long stretches of highway out on the open prairie, it was perfectly plausible that the same vehicle might follow me all the way to one of the major cities.
I slowed and turned onto the gravel road that led to my farm. My followers would know I was headed home, and there was nothing but miles of empty gravel road north of me. If they’d been watching me for a while they’d know I never went that way, so they’d likely wait for me out on the highway.
Unless…
My pulse accelerated as I stopped at my gate. What if they’d tagged my car with some kind of transmitter?
I unlocked the gate, drove through it, and locked it again behind me with my heart thumping. As soon as the garage door rolled down behind me, I pulled the bug detector out of my waist pouch and let out a breath of relief at the sight of its steady green light.
All right, then. As long as I left my cell phone at home to be sure they couldn’t track me through it, I’d only have to watch for a physical tail.
Inside my house, I exchanged my smartphone for a couple of secured phones and grabbed some snacks for the road. A few minutes later I locked my gate behind me and turned north.
As I drove up the hill beyond my farm, I spotted the glint of a parked vehicle on the highway. I couldn’t make out any details over the two-mile distance, but I didn’t need to. The glint moved, and a moment later a distant plume of gravel dust told me my tail was firmly in place.
The crest of the hill hid my pursuers from view as I coasted down the other side, but they’d be able to find me just fine. The warm August air was barely moving, and my dust would hang like a beacon for several minutes after I’d passed.
“Eat my dust, assholes,” I muttered, and settled in for a nice drive in the country.
I slowed to a crawl each time a hill hid me from view, and several miles of zigzagging along gravelled roads closed the gap between us enough that I could make out a silver SUV. It stayed too far away to identify the make, but I memorized the grill pattern and noted that unless there was somebody hiding in the back seat, my original assumption of ‘they’ was wrong. Only the driver. Good.
I emerged on pavement at last and turned west toward Innisfail, keeping an eye on my rear-view mirror. The silver SUV halted at the stop sign behind me and waited a few seconds despite the lack of oncoming traffic.
Okay, buddy, go ahead and play coy, but you’re going to have to cuddle up a little closer in a few minutes…
Sure enough, the SUV closed the gap as I entered Innisfail. The driver kept a couple of vehicles between us at all times, but where I turned, he followed.
Pretending cluelessness, I parked and went into a grocery store. Basket over my arm, I circulated close to the front windows and spotted the SUV parked on the other side of the lot. When I came out with my small sack of groceries and drove down the street, the SUV followed a few cars back as usual.
My heart picked up the pace. So far, so good. Just let him get used to waiting for me in parking lots…
Next stop, a drugstore. I bought a box of cough drops just for the sake of leaving with a purchase, and spotted the SUV parked a few slots over.
When I pulled out, I thought I’d lost him. A steady stream of traffic prevented him from turning out after me, and I was several blocks down the street by the time he tagged onto the tail end of the procession.
Despite the tension of being followed, I breathed a sigh of relief. As long he was sticking to me, it meant he was likely alone. If he had stopped pursuing I would have had to guess whether it was because I’d truly lost him, or somebody else had picked me up.
Time to end this.
I spotted a small fast-food restaurant with a front and back door and pulled in close to the front. Striding to the entrance with my sweater swinging from my hand as if I hadn’t a care in the world, I shot a quick glance over my shoulder. The silver SUV was just nosing into a parking spot on the opposite side of the lot.
Perfect.
Inside, I ordered a burger and fries to go and nodded toward the back door. “I’m just going to use the washroom while I wait.”
The young server gave a disinterested shrug, and I strolled away. Bypassing the washrooms, I slipped out the back door.
A bit of cautious circling positioned me at the corner of a reeking garbage dumpster, with a clear view of the back of the silver SUV. Hoping his concentration was focused on the restaurant’s front door and not on his rear-view mirrors, I pointed the flashlight and steadied my hand against the dumpster.
The red dot wobbled onto one of the rear tires and I drew a slow breath, then depressed the switch and panel. For a couple of long seconds nothing happened.
Then the tire blew like a shotgun blast.
I flung myself back against the dumpster, heart hammering. Holy shit, I hadn’t realized it would be so loud. I chanced a peek around the corner, but apparently the driver had thought it sounded like a shotgun blast, too. As I watched, his head appeared briefly above the seat, then disappeared again. A quick peek to see who was shooting at him.
Grinning, I focused on his other tire. Let’s just keep him guessing.
The second explosion was even louder than the first, but I didn’t stick around to check the results of my handiwork.
Scuttling back into the restaurant, I hurried up to the counter to collect my food, trying to look as though my sweaty fist wasn’t clenched around a classified weapon.
I needn’t have bothered with my Oscar-winning acting skills. The kid didn’t even glance my way, nor did he seem the least bit concerned about two explosions from the parking lot. With the warm greasy bag swinging from my hand, I did my best nonchalant stride out the door to my car.
When I drove away, the SUV driver was standing beside his vehicle with his cell phone pressed to his ear. His scowl followed me out of the parking lot, but I was pretty sure the scowl was all that had followed me.
Just to be cautious, I headed back to the QE2 highway and merged onto its busy northbound lane. A few miles of high-speed driving brought me to a small highway where I turned off and zigzagged west and north. After half an hour with no sign of pursuit, I relaxed into the enjoyment of driving the back roads and reached into the bag for my lukewarm burger.
Soon after I had devoured my food, I was fighting sleep. The relentless sun blazed in the driver’s side windows, overwhelming the cool breath of air conditioning on my face.
I blinked hard and patted my cheeks. Wake up and concentrate.
Now that I wasn’t distracted by evading Labelle’s man, my worries turned to my upcoming interviews.
What should I ask? Dammit, I shouldn’t have let Kane drive away without at least giving me some guidelines. There was probably some established technique for interviewing witnesses, and if I were a real agent, I’d know it. Mumbling curses under my breath, I made a mental note to look for a course on that, too. But in the meantime, Daniel’s life might depend on my investigative skills.
That disturbing thought held sleep at bay for the rest of the trip while I compiled mental lists of questions only to discard them and start over.
With a few minutes to spare before my first meeting, I pulled into a supermarket parking lot in Stony Plain and read over the police reports, then leaned my aching head against the headrest.
God, I wasn’t looking forward to this interview. Contrary to Hellhound’s optimistic prediction, Selena Bruner had been reluctant to agree to our meeting. And who could blame her? Over a year after her son had been abducted and presumed murdered, why would she want to revisit the trauma?
When I finally pulled up at the address Kane had given me, my nerves were strung tight.
A little old house sagged dispiritedly in a yard overgrown with weeds. The lawn looked like it hadn’t been mowed all summer and a torn screen hung from the front door like a grey flag of despair.
I moved cautiously up the cracked walk and mounted the peeling front steps to rap on the door above a grubby note that stated ‘Doorbell broken. Knock.’
No answer.
Dammit.
I checked my watch. Seven o’clock, as agreed. I knocked again.
After a third attempt I was turning away when the door opened and a dead-eyed woman in a stained bathrobe regarded me without expression. Even from several feet away the stench of alcohol carried to my nose.
“Hi, Selena? I’m Aydan Kelly,” I said, and offered my hand. “We spoke this afternoon…” No comprehension lightened her face, and I added, “About Peter’s disappearance…?”
She shrugged and turned away, mumbling something that might have been ‘Come in’.
The entrance opened onto a kitchen to the left and a living room to the right, and she shuffled into the living room to drop into a faded recliner. In the corner, the television blared some inane talk show. The sour scent of unwashed dishes emanated from mounds of pots in the kitchen sink.
Selena didn’t invite me to sit, but I picked my way around the empty Doritos bags and rolls of fluffy dust on the floor and squeamishly relocated a mound of laundry to perch on the edge of the couch. At least the heap of clothes didn’t smell. Probably clean laundry waiting to be folded and put away. I hoped.
I eased out a breath and began, “So Peter disappeared last year in June…?”
“No, he was murdered by my rat-bastard ex last June.” Her words came out with weary venom. “I don’t know why you’re wasting your time talking to me. I don’t know a damn thing except my only kid is dead and that asshole isn’t convicted yet. I’m going to live exactly long enough to watch him get sentenced and then I’m going to slit my fucking wrists.” She gave me a baleful bloodshot glare. “And don’t hand me any bullshit about how I’ve got so much to live for. Without Peter I’ve got nothing!”
She reached down beside the recliner and extracted a half-empty vodka bottle from the heap of crumpled fast-food wrappers. Noting the size of her gulp, I decided to ask my questions fast while she was still capable of replying.
“I’m sorry to make you go through it again,” I began. “But five other boys his age have been abducted and we think it might be… a serial killer.” I hesitated to speak the words, but Selena didn’t react.
“I don’t give a shit,” she mumbled, her words slurred from what had undoubtedly been the first half of the bottle. “Peter’s dead. Nothing’s going to bring him back.”
“But I thought you wanted to see his killer convicted,” I argued. “What if it turns out it wasn’t your ex at all?”
“Oh, it was him, all right.” She slugged more vodka. “They found Peter’s blood on his shoe. Him and his bullshit about how I couldn’t raise Peter right ‘cause I’m only a woman. So he took him away from me. Took him out in the woods and murdered him and got rid of his body so I couldn’t even say goodbye…”
Tears leaked down her cheeks and she took another savage swig. “Everything. He took everything I had. Peter. Lost my job ‘cause I couldn’t get my shit together. Now I’m gonna lose my house. He shoulda jusht… just killed me, too…”
Sickness filled my soul as I looked around at the devastation of her life. Under the patina of dirt and despair, heartbreaking glimpses of a happier time shone through. Delicate watercolours on the walls; a cabinet displaying pieces of fine china through the dusty glass; colourful plant pots that must have once housed cherished greenery instead of the withered sticks that remained. The only clean area was a small table with two candles flanking a framed photo of a grinning freckle-faced child that could only be Peter.
“But Peter loved you,” I said softly. “Wouldn’t he want you to-”
“Peter doesn’t want anything ‘cause Peter’s fuckin’ dead!” She lurched to her feet and the vodka bottle described a dangerous arc toward the door, its contents sloshing. “Get out.”
“But, Selena…”
“Out! Get the hell outta here.” She advanced unsteadily, scowling through the tears that still trickled down her cheeks. Her hand shifted to a white-knuckled grip on the bottle’s neck, and I took the hint.
Backing toward the door, I tried again. “But you might be able to help the other boys…”
“I look like I give a shit about any other boys? I only give a shit about Peter, an’ he’s not coming back!” She swung inaccurately at me with the bottle. “An’ don’t you come back, either! Jusht leave me… Leeme…” Her arms fell to her sides and her chest heaved with sobs. “Alone…”
My heart breaking, I reached toward her but the threatening bottle swung again.
“Okay, I’m going. I’m so sorry for your loss…” I retreated and closed the door, the broken screen settling behind me with a flat slap of finality.