Authors: Steven James
“I’ve been trying to keep a low profile.”
“I’ll always remember those months we had together at the group home. You remember the first time? In the forest?”
“The cat?”
“Yes. What I did with the pocket knife?”
“I remember.”
“I’ve gotten much better since then, Aaron.”
“I have no doubt.”
“Practice makes perfect.”
“What is it you want, Sevren?”
“I want you to stop interfering in my game. Or maybe I want you to enter it with both feet. I haven’t decided.”
“So. The two girls.”
“Yes. You used my handiwork to hide your own. You remembered from those afternoons in the forest, with the animals.”
“There won’t be any others. I promise.”
“Mmm. Well, before you cross your heart and hope to die, I have to say, I think you used me. And I think you might owe me a favor.”
Aaron should have seen it coming. Sevren had somehow tracked him down. He could tell the authorities who Aaron really was, and completely disrupt the family’s plans. Everything could be lost. Aaron decided he needed to evaluate this situation very carefully. “What kind of favor do you want? Money?”
“No, Aaron, not for me. I want something money can’t buy. I want you to help me tell a little story to a certain FBI agent who just doesn’t know when to die.”
“I’m listening.”
And when Kincaid found out that the agent was in North Carolina, he realized it was destiny after all that was bringing them together.
And he was always glad to fulfill that.
As I crossed the street toward the federal building I noticed that the crime-scene investigation unit had finished with Margaret’s car. Nothing remained in the parking lot to tell the world a dead body had been there earlier in the day except for a discarded wisp of yellow police tape scurrying across the blacktop. I wondered how the CSIU team was doing with the remains of Grolin’s house and that cave. Probably had to hire a local vertical rescue and assist team to help them rappel into the cavern.
As I looked around the parking lot, I glanced back at my hotel and noticed the curtains flutter shut in a room on the second floor.
Wait a minute.
My room was on the second floor.
I counted the windows.
No maids would be in there this late in the day.
Someone was in my room.
For a split second I thought about charging into the federal building and trying to round up some help, but I discarded the idea immediately.
No time. Whoever’s in my room will be long gone by
the time we arrive.
I sprinted back across the street, bolted up the stairs to the second floor, and whipped out my SIG.
I opened the stairwell door and scanned the hall. No one.
Eased down the hallway.
Room 231.
Someone followed you this morning on your way into town.
Room 229 . . . 227 . . . 225 . . .
Now someone’s in your hotel room.
223 . . . 221 . . . 219 . . .
I leveled my gun.
. . . 217.
The door was closed, locked. I pressed my ear against it, listened. Yes, movement. Someone was definitely inside.
I slid my key into the lock and slowly nudged the door open. I couldn’t see the entire bedroom, just the entryway. Whoever was in there was around the corner out of sight, opening and closing drawers.
I cleared my throat. “I’m a federal agent. It’s been a really long day, and I’m holding a very wicked gun. So don’t move.” I don’t think those are the exact words we’re supposed to use, but it seemed to do the trick.
The sound of the drawers stopped.
“Do something stupid, and you’ll end up dead,” I said.
I heard whoever it was mumble something.
“Step out slowly.” I eased forward, steadied my gun. “Hands in the air.”
A tall, angular man, mid-forties, with a tangled sallow beard and big ears stepped into view. “Don’t shoot!” His hands were shaking. “I’m an investigator!”
“What?”
He reached for his pocket.
“Hands up! Keep your hands where I can see them.”
He froze. “I’m just trying to get my wallet.”
“I’ll do that,” I said. “Lie down. And watch those hands.”
He lay on the floor. I smelled something sharp. Urine. The guy had wet his pants. Not quite what I would have expected from our killer.
He was facedown on the carpet now, his hands spread.
“Was that you this morning following me in your car?”
He nodded.
I reached into his pocket, pulled out his wallet, flipped it open. “Reginald Trembley, private investigator? That you?”
He nodded.
Don’t be stupid, Pat, play it safe. Remember, the killer knows
how to get close. To gain trust.
I pulled out some plastic cuffs and slipped them around his wrists, yanked them tight. He grunted, but I didn’t care. “This is just so we can talk without me having to hold a gun in your face the whole time. All right?”
He nodded again.
I holstered my gun and quickly frisked him to see if he was packing a piece or if he’d taken anything from my room. He seemed clean. I helped him up and sat him on the bed, then asked him, “So who are you working for? What are you doing in my room?”
He seemed to have regained some of his courage since emptying his bladder. He sneered at me. “I don’t have to tell you anything.”
I’d expected as much. “OK. I completely understand.” I picked up the room phone and dialed a number. “Yeah, Dante, it’s Pat. I’m at the hotel: room 217. Caught someone rummaging through my things. I want you to come over. He doesn’t want to talk. Bring the stuff.” I hung up the phone.
A wave of fear washed over Reginald Trembley’s face. “Who’s Dante?” he said. “What’s ‘the stuff’?”
I walked into the bathroom, pulled down the shower curtain, then returned to Trembley.
“Dante’s a friend.” I glanced at my watch. “He was right across the street. I’d say you have about two minutes before he gets here. If I were you, I’d talk now. Because when Dante gets here, things are going to get messy. Dante is really good at his job.”
I laid the shower curtain on the floor in front of Trembley and spread it smooth. His lips were quivering. The guy was about to cry. “Bethanie’s parents hired me,” he said.
“Bethanie? Bethanie Dixon?”
He nodded.
I went for some towels. “Why?”
“They think she was murdered. What’s that shower curtain for?”
“She
was
murdered. It’s to protect the carpet.”
“No, by the cult members from the group she was with out West.”
I returned with the towels. “Cult? I thought she was studying in a private college in New Mexico.”
“That’s the line they used to cover things up, to tell the family members.” He eyed the shower curtain spread out at his feet. “Please. You don’t have to do this.”
“I’m not going to, Dante is. What else? You have ninety seconds.”
Trembley’s rate of delivery began to improve dramatically. “Bethanie joined this group. I’m not sure who the leader is; everyone just calls him the Father. He claims he was there at Jonestown, you know Jonestown?”
I got the iron out of the closet. “I’ve heard of it. Keep going.”
“Claims he was there as a kid and survived. I don’t know if it’s true or not. You don’t need that iron, OK? I’m talking, all right?”
I plugged it in.
“Her parents wanted me to get her out of the group; they were gonna sue, I think.” He was talking so fast now I could barely keep up. “But then he let her go, and she turned up dead. They’re pretty sure his group did it, but the cops said it was a serial killer.”
“What do you know about this guy they call the Father?” I glanced at my watch. “One minute.”
“I don’t know, I swear! I’m not really that good. I didn’t find out very much, and then when she ended up dead and—”
The door swung open.
Trembley was shaking. “No, no, please.” He closed his eyes.
Sheriff Dante Wallace walked in munching on a cheeseburger. “What’s going—what do we have here?” he said. “Reginald Trembley?”
Trembley opened his eyes. “Sheriff Wallace? You’re Dante?” Trembley looked at me. “He’s Dante?”
I watched in disbelief as Dante leaned over and cut the cuffs off Reginald’s wrists. “You two know each other?”
“Get outta here, Reggie,” Sheriff Wallace said. “I don’t want you messin’ up this investigation. You got it?”
“Yeah, I got it.” Reginald Trembley nodded, rose, and stumbled out the door. For his sake I hoped he had a change of clothes in his car.
“What’s going on?” I said. “He broke into my room.”
“He’s a snitch.” Dante looked at me. I was still holding the iron. “What’s all this here stuff on the floor?”
“I thought I might spill something,” I said. “He’s a private investigator
and
a snitch?”
“Look, Trembley knows everybody. He’s been on our bankroll for the last two years. This region is one of the main drug corridors to DC and New York City up I75 or I95 from Florida, across on highway 26 or 40. Meth dealers, marijuana, dirty cops, you name it. He knows ’em all. That old boy’s connected.”
“So you just let him go?”
“We bring him in for something like this, we lose out in the long run. He didn’t take nothin’, did he?”
“No. I don’t think so,” I said with a sigh. I unplugged the iron.
One step forward, two steps back.
I reached into my wallet and dug out eighty dollars. “Hey, take this for your phone, Dante. I can give you more if you need it. I’m really sorry about that.”
He took another bite of his burger, eyed the money for a moment, and then accepted it. “That should be good. I’ll swing by and get me one on the way home. Thanks.”
“Yeah.”
He was still looking at the towels and shower curtain. “Any new leads on the case?”
“Maybe,” I said. “I’ll keep you posted.” Then I glanced down at the floor. “I guess I should put this stuff away. I’ll talk to you later.”
He stared at the iron for another moment or two before he turned. “Yeah, OK. See that you do.” Then he left, taking another bite out of his supper.
As I began cleaning up, I noticed something on the carpet glimmering in the light.
I knelt beside it. A lapel pin of a Confederate flag.
Just like the one the governor was wearing.
Must have pulled off Trembley’s shirt when I made him lie on
the floor.
I decided it was time to listen to those phone transcripts and see what Bethanie had to say about Governor Sebastian Taylor.
Once inside the federal building I didn’t waste any time locating the transcripts of Bethanie’s calls to Governor Taylor’s office. As I read through them I realized she was clearly terrified but also afraid to give specifics. Maybe she was worried someone was listening in.
“Tell him the boy remembers. Tell him the boy is coming,”
she said over and over.
“You have to tell him!”
“The boy remembers,” I whispered.
Trembley had said the cult leader in New Mexico claimed to be a Jonestown survivor. Was he “the boy”? Terry had said Governor Taylor was a CIA agent stationed in Guyana at the time of the tragedy. Was this cult guy after the governor?
I flipped open my computer to try and figure out what “college” Bethanie and Alexis had attended in New Mexico.
An hour later it was pitch black outside, and I was still searching, still coming up with nothing. I heard some footsteps and looked up. Ralph and Lien-hua walked in toting takeout boxes of Chinese food. “It’s the best Chinese food in Asheville,” Lien-hua was telling him. “Which isn’t saying much.”
Ralph stopped abruptly when he saw me. “What are you doing here, Pat? Aren’t you supposed to be picking up your daughter from the airport?”
“Her flight was delayed,” I said. “Comes in tomorrow morning. Remember when I was followed earlier today?”
Ralph set down his food. “Yeah. So you know who it was?”
“Yeah. Mind if I join you? I’m starved.”
In between bites of General Tso’s chicken and beef chow fun, I filled them in on what Trembley had told me at the hotel and what Terry had told me on the phone.
“Jonestown, the governor, the murders, they’re all connected . . . ?” said Ralph.
“Looks like it,” I said. “I read through the transcripts of Bethanie’s phone calls. She was afraid for her life. And according to the case files, one of the women in Alexis’s apartment complex thought she was acting nervous in the days preceding her death.”
Lien-hua used chopsticks like an artist uses a brush. “So you’re thinking maybe this cult leader in New Mexico is planning something against the governor, and when Bethanie and Alexis caught wind of it and tried to leave and warn Governor Taylor, this man, the Father, had them killed?”
I nodded. The theory explained a lot about the location and timing of the murders but still left some major questions unanswered. “I’ll admit it’s a work in progress.”
“How did the Father find out the details from the case files?” asked Ralph. “Location of the stab wounds, type of rope, stuff like that?”
I shook my head. “I don’t know. Some of it was made public, but not all of it.”
“But why go through all the trouble of staging a crime to make it look like a serial killer did it?” asked Ralph. “Why not just kill them and then dispose of the bodies?”
“Bethanie’s family was already suspicious,” I said. “That’s why they’d hired Trembley in the first place. If she suddenly disappeared, it would have brought even more suspicion on the group, maybe even put an end to their plans.”
“So what do we know about this cult leader?” asked Lien-hua.
“Almost nothing so far. I’ve been trying to find stuff on the Internet, but I’ve come up dry. It’s like he’s a ghost.” I sighed. “I even tried contacting Bethanie’s family, but they’re not returning any of my calls. They might be in hiding. I guess if we had a little more info on Jonestown it might help us see where all these stories intersect.”
Lien-hua’s eyes lit up. “I thought you’d never ask.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I researched group dynamics and cult behavior for my master’s degree, spent a couple months studying Peoples Temple.”