CHAPTER TEN
At a local lunch place after the library, Amanda bit into her corn bread and moaned. “This is amazing.”
Jake dipped a fry into a wad of ketchup. “You’ve never been to LA?”
“Los Angeles?”
Jake grinned. “Lower Alabama.”
“Ha-ha.” Even living in Georgia, she hadn’t had down-home vegetables like these before. Green beans with actual flavor. Catfish with a light dusting of corn meal. Fresh biscuits hot from the oven. Fried okra. Corn bread that melted in your mouth.
After a few minutes enjoying her meal, she reached for the papers he’d copied at the library. “This says there are four witnesses to the accident. All of them still live here, according to the phone book. We should speak with them this afternoon.”
“What about your carousel research?”
“I can start fresh tomorrow.” Once the ghosts are gone.
“Let’s not dismiss what you need,” he said. “This trip is about both of us.”
A warm feeling bubbled inside her. She’d picked a considerate guy, but right now, she didn’t want him to be.
“Let me help you today. Besides,” she said, “the sky is cloudy. The last thing I want to do is spend a day at Zephyr Land in the rain.”
He looked up at the graying feather-like clouds in the sky. “Good point.”
“Great, then it’s settled.”
Relief washed over her. No more dealing with Zephyr Land ghosts. At least not for the rest of today.
“Anything in those papers about the fire the librarian mentioned?” Jake asked.
Amanda coughed. The food burned the back of her throat, and she reached for the glass of ice water.
“You okay?”
She nodded. “Was the part about the fire true? I mean, the lady said herself she wasn’t the official librarian—”
“Didn’t you like her?” Jake asked, his brows narrowing.
Like her? A complicated question indeed. She was family. Everyone had wacky relatives in the South, but hers raised the bar.
“She’s fine,” Amanda said. “But no one’s mentioned a fire until now. Maybe the woman was mistaken.”
“Why would the substitute librarian lie about a fire? It doesn’t make sense.”
She chewed her sandwich, worry going down her throat with every bite. “Let’s not bother the librarian again.”
Jake washed down a taste of icy Coke. “Why?”
Stall him. Pivot the conversation. Turn it back to focus on the tasks at hand.
“I’m only saying we should focus on interviewing the witnesses. I’ll do analysis on the carousel tomorrow.”
He shrugged. “You seemed distant at the library. You and the woman looked like two Chatty Cathy’s whispering. What did you say to her?”
Don’t tell anyone about who I really am?
Amanda’s mouth went dry. She grabbed her drink. “Nothing.”
Jake cocked an eyebrow. “You don’t chat that much with a stranger over nothing.”
She searched her mind for an excuse. A way to get off this topic and dismiss the strange secrecy that had become her existence. There had been too many moments like this one, her needing a quick escape from his scrutiny.
“I…I mean…”
In her peripheral vision, she noted a name jotted down on the papers they’d copied.
“Look,” she said. “Randall Kern. Why does that name sound familiar?”
Jake’s eyes widened. “Seriously? He was only one of the top roller coaster designers in the country.”
“This says he was one of the witnesses.”
Jake gave a decisive nod. “Let’s interview him. It would be an honor just to meet the man.”
Amanda smiled to herself. Men were game to go along with anything as long as they thought the idea was theirs to begin with.
“Sure, let’s go.”
When they arrived at Randall’s house, Amanda’s mouth fell open. The Colonial style house looked like it had once been a quaint Southern home. Not anymore. Termites had chewed through every corner and beam, and a few side boards were missing. The front lawn appeared worse. Like a garage sale had vomited everywhere.
“Is this guy some kind of recluse?” she asked.
Jake appeared surprised too, learning his hero was a slob. “I don’t know. The world hasn’t seen much from him lately. His great stuff was twenty, thirty years ago.”
She reached for the car door handle and let herself out. “Maybe this is what happens when a genius doesn’t have anything else to work on?”
He joined her beside the car, gazing at the junk-strewn lawn. “I guess so.”
They dodged the many rusted metal scraps covering the front lawn and reached the door. With a firm hand, Jake rammed the door knocker three times.
No answer.
Jake walked the length of the porch and tried to peer in the old windows. “I don’t see anything.”
She glanced around. “Looks like he isn’t home. Let’s go to the other witnesses’ houses and then come back.”
“May as well.”
They trod carefully back to the car. Jake started the engine, then squealed the tires as he raced to get away.
“Whoa, what’s the rush?” Amanda asked. “The next witness, a Mary Galden, is only around the block.”
Jake put on his main poker face. Flat lips, unclenched jaw, gaze straight ahead on the road. Making it impossible to figure out what he might be thinking.
After a silent quick ride, he finally spoke. “Randall Kern was one of the greats. Books were written about him. Television how-to shows interviewed him all the time. So what the hell happened that he’s now living like some wild woodsman gone insane?”
Amanda shrugged. “I don’t know. Some people can bend with the times, like a tree in a storm. I guess others can’t.”
“I don’t want to end up like him.”
“What? Why would you end up like that?”
He didn’t answer, just glanced at the paper with the witness addresses.
They pulled up to a sage-green shotgun house. He shut off the engine.
“Jake?”
Turning to face her, he said, “I often wondered why Randall Kern didn’t continue to design roller coasters. He’s not retirement age yet, and the man was a genius.”
“And?”
“Whatever happened had to be enough to halt his career and turn him into someone with a junkyard lawn.”
“You can ask when we find him.”
Jake fiddled with the keys before removing them from the ignition. “If I don’t get this department promotion, my career will stall out. It will be five to six years before another one opens up, and I’m too young for tenure. Maybe that’s what happened to Randall. Maybe the newest technologies came along and drove him out. I don’t want to wind up some recluse—”
“You won’t.” She put her hand on his right leg. “Trust me.”
He smiled but didn’t seem convinced. In that moment, she knew how important this promotion was to him. She knew he’d wanted that as the next step, but until now, she didn’t realize just how powerful the consequences would be if he failed.
“C’mon, let’s go talk to Mary,” Amanda said.
Nodding, he slipped the keys in his pocket and stepped out of the car.
Mary’s door was a lovely shade of taupe that offset the sage-green paint. In the center was a collection of dried flowers with colorful ribbons. Below it, a gold knocker.
He knocked twice. Seconds later, an athletic-looking tan woman answered the door.
“Yes?”
“Mrs. Galden?” Jake asked.
The woman took a few gulps of water from the monogrammed bottle she held. “Who’s asking?”
“Jake Mercer, ma’am. I’m an engineering professor at University of Georgia, and I’m trying to determine what happened to the coaster at Zephyr Land ten years ago.”
Her eyes widened, and she licked her lips. “Call me Mary. Come in.”
They entered, and Amanda immediately noticed the décor. Most adult women had pictures of family, maybe a colorful design of some sort on their walls. Mary’s walls were covered with posters of Olympic runners. The den resembled a sports shop more than a woman’s home.
“Have a seat,” Mary said. She went into the kitchen and brought back three bottled waters. “Hydrate while we chat.”
“Thanks,” Amanda said as Jake studied one of the posters on the wall.
“We hope we aren’t disturbing you,” Amanda said. “Your name was on a list of witnesses at the Abandon Library. This is important to Jake.”
Mary’s chapped lips turned into a frown, making her face appear tight. Like she’d had too many cosmetic surgeries.
“Are you okay?” Amanda asked.
“Fine.” Mary’s gaze met Amanda’s, yet the woman seemed to stare far off into space. “Your boyfriend is lucky to have someone so supportive of his career.”
“I tell her that all the time,” Jake said with a wink. “So, what can you tell us about that day?”
Amanda cleared her throat, hoping Jake would get the hint to take things slow. Mary appeared saddened all of a sudden. Rushing the topic of the deadly accident wasn’t the best way to get information out of her.
“This must be difficult,” Amanda said, hoping to put some empathy into the conversation. “But we need to know more about what happened.”
Mary nodded. “I was the office manager at Bello and Toale. They were in charge of the coaster’s design, along with all the other rides in Zephyr Land.”
“So you kept the place running,” Amanda said.
Laughing, Mary said, “How’d you know? Are you an office manager for a place too?”
“Right now I’m a receptionist for a finance company, but I hope to get an apprenticeship at a carousel restoration company soon.”
Mary nodded. “The carousel. I remember telling Bob we should go on the carousel.”
“Bob?” Jake asked, his scrutinizing gaze seeming to hang on the name.
Tears spilled down Mary’s face. “My husband.”
Amanda and Jake exchanged glances. There was nothing in the file about her having lost a husband at Zephyr Land.
“Forgive me, but I want to clarify by asking. He was one of the passengers on the coaster?”
“Yes. He wanted to be the first to ride it, just like everyone else at the firm.”
Amanda rested a hand on Mary’s. “Tell us what happened.”
With a heavy sigh, Mary said, “Everything had been put in place. All the rides, all safety checks. It all passed with flying colors, so we had a company promo the day before officially opening the park.”
Amanda thought of Opal and the other ghosts, who must have worked at the company too. Well, not Becca, of course.
“Were relatives of the employees encouraged to come?” Amanda asked.
Jake shot her a questioning look, which she shrugged off.
“Yes,” Mary said. “There were children, teens, and all the execs.” She motioned to her sofa, and Jake and Amanda sat side by side. An agitated Mary sat in the recliner opposite them, her legs crossed, her toe jiggling.
Jake leaned forward and clasped his hands together while resting his elbows on his knees. “What do you think happened? You said it yourself—the rides had passed all safety checks.”
Mary sat silently for a moment. “I wish I knew,” she whispered.
Amanda jotted down some notes. “Do you think someone could have sabotaged the ride, wanted revenge against your firm for any reason?”
“You think someone rigged the coaster?” Mary’s voice cracked, and she wiped away the surging tears.
“Amanda,” Jake said with a stern tone. “No, ma’am, we are just doing our research at this point. I don’t know what caused the derailment. Not yet.”
Amanda bit her lip. She hadn’t meant to upset Mary, but she knew damn well someone had murdered those people deliberately. The ghosts had told her so.
A lot of good that answer is.
“We were in the amusement park business,” Mary said. “Why would anyone want to hurt those innocent people?”
“That’s just a theory,” Jake said. “From an engineering perspective, your firm did everything right. We’re just looking for any alternative reason as to how this happened.”
Amanda rustled her notebook pages, glanced at the other witness names. “Do you know any of these people? Malcolm Smith, Terry Bako, Randall Kern—”
“Randall, yes. I know him.”
“Where are you going with this?” Jake mouthed.
Obviously, he didn’t want to hear that his hero and engineering mogul would have murdered those people. But Amanda needed to get to the truth, and fast. Get the ghosts released so she could have some peace.
She furrowed her brows, hoping he would keep quiet and let her ask the needed questions.
“Tell us about Randall. We tried going by his house, but he wasn’t home.”
Mary shrugged. “He used to work for the firm. Decent guy. Volunteer firefighter, that sort of thing.”
“He worked for your firm?” Jake asked. “That’s not in any of the newspapers or articles.”
“You must not have found the lawsuit papers,” Mary said.
Jake arched an eyebrow. “Lawsuit?”
Mary waved a dismissive hand. “It was all bollocks. Randall wanted more credit for the design than he was given. He’s some engineering hot shot, you know—”
“Yes ma’am, he is,” Jake said. “He was one of the pioneers in the industry.”
“Well, the way I heard it, he wanted more recognition and more money. The partners—Andrew and Chester—wanted to get rid of Randall because he was being the squeaky wheel. Always complaining. Always saying they were doing things wrong.”
“Like what?” Amanda asked. Maybe this Randall guy had motive.
Mary brushed through her hair with her fingers. “The partners ended his contract, claiming no more work was needed. Randall sued, claiming they used cheap equipment on the coaster. Something about shoddy bolts. The whole thing was one big mess.”
“Aren’t roller coasters required to have Grade Eight or Grade Nine bolts?” Jake asked. “I started to inspect the circuit this morning, but I haven’t been able to access all the parts to the cars yet.”
“Yes, we used Grade Eight premium,” Mary said. “Accusations went back and forth for weeks. Once we won the lawsuit, we replaced everything to ensure all bolts were premium and accounted for. The firm took every precaution. That’s why the derailment is such a mystery.”
“How long ago was the lawsuit?” Jake asked.
Mary stared out into the backyard, thinking. “I guess about twelve years ago?”
Only two years before the accident? Might be coincidence, might not.
“Do you think Randall or anyone else could have wanted to hurt the people at your firm?” Amanda asked.
“Bite your tongue,” Jake said. “Look, I’ll admit the guy has turned into a recluse, but he is an engineer at heart. He would never design anything dangerous.”
Mary adjusted her sitting position and nodded toward Amanda. “He’s right. Randall was ultra-safety conscious. Even though things didn’t work out with his employment, I can’t see him killing anyone deliberately.”
“You don’t think he’s dangerous?” Amanda asked, continuing to ignore Jake’s questioning glare.
“Randall helps at the VA hospital, volunteers in the community. Why would a killer do that?”
“Agreed,” Jake said. “Why would a killer do that?”
“I don’t know,” Amanda said. But I know someone killed those people. They’re still in Zephyr Land.
“Is there anything else you can remember about the day?” Jake said.
Mary talked about how perfect the day had seemed—bright sunshine, giggling children by the picnic tables, how happy everyone had been.
Amanda listened, made mental notes, but let Jake do the remainder of the interview. Her suspicions were now directed at this Randall Kern. The sooner she could gather enough information, the better off things were going to be.