Читать книгу Detective Carson Ryder Thriller Series Books 7-9: Buried Alive, Her Last Scream, The Killing Game - J. Kerley A. - Страница 23

Two days passed. I resumed my climbing lessons and afternoon hikes, occasionally seeing a law-enforcement vehicle speed by, Beale’s county mounties or one of the FBI’s dark cruisers. The Bureau berthed at two cabins by the park. It looked like they’d brought in a couple additional agents, or maybe clerical types to keep the paperwork straight.

I knew they’d start by interviewing anyone who’d ever had a beef with Burton or Powers or who’d done time in prison or psychiatric observation. They’d check locals with violent backgrounds. Evidence – what little there was – would be shipped to the Bureau’s labs, waiting for that one hit: the partial fingerprint, the molecule of DNA in Burton’s truck or on Powers’s clothing.

I hoped the Feds could identify Soldering-iron Man, the anomaly, the victim with no known ties to the area.

Gloria Krenkler and I hadn’t harmonized at our initial meeting and I’d judged her harshly based on my natural aversion to arrogance. I had been wrong about people before – often to my detriment – so I called John Morgenstern, a long-time FBI buddy. Harry and I had met John when he instructed us in behavioral psychology years ago. He was a straight shooter who gave me background info, knowing I’d never pass it on.

“Carson!” came the happy exclamation at the far end of the line, the Bureau’s training academy in Quantico, Virginia. “How they hanging?”

“Off a cliff this morning, John. I’m on vacation in Kentucky, getting in some rock climbing.”

“Keep a tight grip, buddy. What can I do for you?”

“Got a mean case nearby and I’ve got a fingertip in the proceedings. A state detective got bumped hard by one of your field agents, Gloria Krenkler. I was just wondering about Krenkler’s capabilities.”

“She’s been based in the New York office for over a decade. Working mail fraud, mainly, heavy detail work, sitting at a desk and poring over reams of paper. We’re short-handed, homeland security issues. I imagine it was felt she needed to get back out in the field a bit and—”

“You’re giving me everything but an answer, John.”

Morgenstern loosed a long sigh. “Let me put it like this, Carson: Krenkler’s smart, but not creative. She makes up by being dogged, getting the job done a half-inch at a time. If Gloria Krenkler was an auto mechanic she’d tear down the engine to get at the tailpipe.”

“I sense a need to control. Anger issues, perhaps.”

A pause. “You’re the one with the psychology degree.”

“Just between you and me, John, do you respect Gloria Krenkler’s abilities?”

“She can get the job done.”

“Do you like her as a person?”

“Enjoy your mountains,” he said, hanging up.

I decided to grab lunch at the lodge. When I arrived, McCoy was there, perhaps who I’d been hoping to see. He gestured me to his table. I sat and ordered.

“So, Lee,” I said, handing the waitress my menu, “you’re probably spending a lot of time with the FBI, right?”

He frowned over his coffee. “Agent Krenkler views me with curiosity, like I’m a two-headed calf. She can’t understand why an adult would spend his life in the woods, even asked me if I had a ‘Boy Scout complex’. She grilled me for a half-hour on the murders, but that was it.”

That Krenkler didn’t see McCoy’s worth was inexcusable. “How about the website?” I asked. “Monitored day and night by the Feds?”

He nodded. “They tried to reverse-track the listings, but it was a dead end.”

Meaning the killer knew enough to cover his electronic trail. “What’s Cherry up to?” I asked, trying to keep my voice professionally disinterested.

“I spoke to Donna yesterday. She seemed embarrassed about being removed from the case so I kept the conversation short.”

I’d been dismissed from investigations before. Even if you’d been doing a kick-ass job, you felt like a dolt. What made it worse was knowing lack of progress in the case would be blamed on the initial investigators. “We’re having to go back and re-check all the sources,” I heard Krenkler complaining to her supervisors. “Detective Cherry left a lot of loose ends.”

I returned to the cabin and found Mix-up snoozing on the porch. I didn’t have to shut him in the cabin when I left, finding he never ventured far. When I’d whistle, he was always at my side within a minute, often soaking wet from the creek. He did the same back on Dauphin Island, and I wondered if my genetic boullabaise of a dog carried a homebody species inside, or was loath to wander too far from his beloved food bowl.

I considered calling Donna Cherry – only to offer a sympathetic ear, of course – but heard my brother’s words as clear as he’d spoken them in person:

“If she’s pretty, you’ve commenced a charm offensive to get into her pants, Carson. You need the attention.”

I decided what I needed was a drive through the mountains. Mix-up seemed content snoozing in the sun, so I left him to his dogdreams and followed my muse, circling through the Gorge until the road somehow dumped me several miles distant, in Campton. Being so close to Cherry’s office, I was compelled by civility to stop and wish her well.

She was at her desk, hair pulled back in a streamlining of red, a pair of silver earrings bobbing against her milky cheeks. She wore a white blouse and dark pantsuit that would have turned any buxom starlet du jour into a sexless manikin, and I wondered if Cherry was – consciously or not – aping the drabness of the Feeb’s palette.

She looked up and I thought I saw a spark of smile, quickly extinguished in favor of nonchalance. I spun a chair in front of her desk, where I saw a grouping of photos from Powers’s death scene.

“You’re back on the case?” I asked.

Cherry shrugged. “I figure Krenkler’s first day push-away was a shot over my bow, making sure I knew my place.”

“Which is?”

“Making multiple copies of all case materials,” she said, keeping her face and voice emotionless. “Making runs for coffee and burgers. Smoothing the lady’s way into interviews with locals.”

“Ever think she’s keeping you close to keep you open to blame?”

“That thought has occurred, Kemo Sabe. I’m watching my flank.”

I’ve watched it a time or two, my mind said. My mouth said, “Krenkler making any headway?”

Cherry leaned back in her chair and sighed. “She wants to do all the interviews herself, like I’m too incompetent to ask a question. Trouble is, she’s got this imperial attitude. And she’s got all these guys in dark suits with her every step she takes, no idea how scary it is to a lot of the populace.”

“People clam up the second Krenkler appears,” I said.

Cherry nodded, silver earrings bouncing. “They pretend to be as dumb as she thinks they are. It seems to validate her suspicions, so she treats them even more like ignorant children and the circle keeps spiraling down. She has no concept of mountain folk.”

I nodded understanding. Any group from a relatively isolated and low-money background learns the ritual as a form of protection. When you don’t know how the rulers will use information, the best play is playing dumb. To the well-heeled, knowledge is power. To the poor it’s usually just a target on their backs.

“What’s Beale doing?” I asked.

“He’s turned the Woslee police force completely over to Krenkler. She uses them for errands. She uses everyone for errands.”

Cherry’s cellphone rang. She pulled it from her jacket. “What? Where? How bad?” she said, listening between the words. She snapped the phone shut and shook her head.

“Caudill’s got a problem. Some preacher has gone O.K. Corral and is holed up in a church shooting anything that moves.”

“Anyone hurt?” I asked.

“A county worker brush-cutting a side road got hit in the thigh. He found cover under the tractor, but Caudill can’t get to him. Uh, Ryder …”

“I haven’t been to church in a while.”