Dying to Tell (29 page)

sixty-eight

In the basement of
the Kit Kat West, Ollie and I showed Bear the back wall stacked with Nomad shipping crates. Well, I showed Bear; Ollie just tagged along. Sitting beside the crates was Keys's old steamer trunk partially covered with a tan tarpaulin.

Bear said, “Okay, Tuck, what's this all about?”

“Show him, kid,” Ollie said.

I pointed to one of the crates already pulled from the stack. It was about two feet square and nailed shut. “Open it, Bear. Unless I'm slipping, there's a bunch of gold and jewels waiting in there.”

Ollie added, “It's kinda like a rainbow—Leprechauns with a pot of gold.”

He was trying to compete with my Zombie joke.

Bear pulled out a pocketknife and levered open the crate. It took him a few minutes and he broke his knife blade in two, but he continued until the wooded lid was on the floor beside him. When he pulled back a layer of plastic padding, the glint of gold and gemstones peeked out from inside.

The end of the rainbow.

Bear stood back. “Holy shit, Tuck. It's here.”

“I know.” I didn't, really; I'd guessed. So had Ollie. “Check a couple more.”

Bear searched around the basement and found a handyman's toolbox in a cabinet by the stairs. Then he went to work on several of the Nomad crates until all but a couple were open and their contents laid out on three folding tables.

The tables were covered with Youssif Iskandr's Egyptian treasures. There were gold amulets laden with emeralds and what I think were rubies. I say amulet because that's what they call those things on the science channels I often watch late at night. There was also a small box that resembled a sarcophagus (History Channel Thursday nights) with a carved pharaoh's head on one end. The box was the size of a shoebox and it too was decorated with gems and gold with hieroglyphs carved on its sides. There were dozens of small stone statues, some artifacts covered with gems and others with gold. The boxes weren't empty yet and in front of us were millions of dollars of antiquities hidden in William's secret vault for over seventy years.

“Damn, Tuck,” Bear said. “I can't believe it. It's like some old movie or something.”

“Think Charlton Heston,” I said. “I did.”

Ollie stood in front of the table and looked down at the loot. “Yeah, a fortune. But it ain't worth all this killin'. And it wasn't worth Youssif's life to start.”

Bear's cell phone rang and he took the call. A moment later, he stuffed it back into his pocket, frowning. “My men just hit B.C.'s place out in the sticks. Empty. But they found an old dark blue
pickup truck parked in the back. And get this, they found a smashed up cellphone in the trunk. It was William's. And it looks like B.C. doctored himself after getting shot. They found a couple plastic medical containers in his trash—for blood—and other medical supplies.”

I nodded and watched Ollie as he looked over a stack of gold and ceramic statues. “What d'you find, Ollie?”

“The jackpot, kid.” He touched my shoulder with one hand and one of the statues—a
sphinx-shaped
ceramic piece—with the other. “William's missing bookends.”

The room flashed black.

William Mendelson sat behind the small steel counting table inside his vault. He was bent over, examining a glass frame. He held it up to the light for a better view. It was a papyrus scroll. Beside the table, his safe was open, and it was empty.

In fact, the entire vault was empty—the treasure was already gone.

Ollie and I watched as William laid the glass frame on a file in the middle of the counting table.

“Do you know what this is?” William asked as he looked toward the vault door and tapped the file.

The killer stepped into the vault. “Your inventory.”

“Precisely—and it tells me much.” His voice was soft, calm, and without worry that his life was about to end. He tapped the framed scroll. “In this frame is a scroll that dates back to the time of Khufu in the Fourth Dynasty—I'm sure of it. To think that Keys and I have kept these treasures to ourselves. They belong with their people. And I am going to rectify that.”

“You'll expose Keys. Do you want him dead, too?”

William lowered his eyes to the file. “No. And I don't want to die, either. His secret weighs heavy on us both. Those were dark times and he has more than atoned for his sins.”

“Then why?” the killer asked.

William folded his hands and looked at the killer with sad eyes. “I know about the account. I know you stole some of these treasures and sold them. Did you think I wouldn't find out? I'm consulting with someone who has the credentials to assist me—Professor Tucker, from the university. She has contacts with the police and will help me sort this out. I will not press charges—how could I?”

“You've consulted with an outsider?” The killer moved closer. “You should not have done that. This treasure is worth tens of millions. You owe me, William. You don't get that, do you? You—this bank—destroyed my family. It's not about the millions—oh, I'll take that, too—but it's about family. And I'm getting revenge.”

“Revenge? I don't understand, but then, neither do you. By selling those pieces, it is you who have brought the danger to us—to Keys and me. We were going to return those treasures and end this madness.” William slammed his hand down on the framed papyrus scroll and cracked the glass, sending shards sliding off the table. “Don't you see? We have to make this right.”

“All right, William. If it's that important to you. Show me the scroll. Khufu, you think?” The killer moved behind William and put one hand on his shoulder, then drew a .
22-cal
revolver with the other.

William raised the scroll. “Khufu was—”

The sharp
crack
inside the vault was not as surprising as the look in William's eyes as he saw the last seconds of his life spill onto the desk before him.

“I understand, William. And I'm sorry. But you can't tell. Not about Keys. Not about this treasure. Not about me.”

Footsteps ran down the stairs into the anteroom behind us.

Marshal Mendelson ran into the vault, sweaty and out of breath. “Dear God, what have you done?”

“You knew I had to.” The killer's voice was calm, relaxed. “You knew.”

“No.” Marshal stared at his father. “I just wanted out. I needed the money. Nicholas bailed me out—I told you it was over. I didn't want this.”

The killer laughed. “You sound like Keys. We have to get out of here before that idiot B.C. shows up. He'll get the blame and I'll be gone. You can play the grieving son and the score will be almost even.”

Marshal peered down at his father's body. A strange, eerie calm flooded his face. “It didn't have to be this way.”

The killer grabbed the Khufu scroll. “Yes, it did.”

sixty-nine

Angel lay silent and
unmoving in her hospital bed. A labyrinth of wires and tubes invaded her body. The rhythmic
beep-beep-beep
of the life machines filled the stillness while their lights and dials illuminated the room like eerie eyes and demonic fingers. Three times over the past hours the doctors revived her, and three times she'd returned to my world. On her fourth resuscitation, her vitals fell and her breathing became almost imperceptible. Whatever thread of life she grasped escaped us both. Now she stood beside me near the window and watched herself slip in and out of worlds.

I stood waiting for her decision. Silence was my only vote.

Outside her room, a nurse wearing surgical scrubs came down the hall and stopped at a portable computer terminal outside her door. She glanced up and down the hallway, checked the terminal's monitor, and scrolled through the screens. She tapped here and there on the keyboard and got busy with work. Twice she looked through the ICU window and rechecked her watch before she returned to the computer screen.

Everyone was on deathwatch.

“Tuck, I'm staying with you.” Angel looked from her dying body to me. “Bear will take Hercule. He'll be fine. We can both be with him like you've been. It'll be better than before.”

I put a finger to her lips. “No, Angel. You belong here now—and for a long time. Fight back. Fight back and you can still make it. We'll work things out.”

“No. It's my choice, not yours.”

I touched her face and let my finger linger on her cheek, a feeling I hadn't truly felt for a very long time. I missed that. “I wasn't given a choice, but you have one. Fight back, Angel. Stay with Bear and Hercule. Please? Do this for me.”

The nurse walked into the room and over to Angel's body lying on the bed. She checked more monitors and electronic devices standing guard. Satisfied, she turned to leave.

The heavy, acrid odor of smoke reached me as the nurse made her move.

And just then, I understood.

The nurse closed the curtains on the observation window and returned to Angel's bedside. She withdrew a syringe from her smock, slipped it into the IV bag's port hanging above her bed, and depressed the plunger. The contents flowed into Angel's IV line.

Angel and I watched from across the room.

“Bear!” I yelled and grabbed the electrical line Bear had purposely left snaking from a wall junction panel. It took but a second for the electricity to take effect. The euphoria was instant and the power overflowed from me. My world opened and collided with the living.

And I was there—beside Angel's bed—staring into Karen Simms's eyes.

“What the hell?” Karen's eyes exploded. “Who are you? Where did you come from?”

I grabbed her hand, yanked the syringe from it, and tossed it onto the floor. “Hello, Karen. I thought you'd never show.”

“No … no. It can't be.”

“I'm Detective Oliver Tucker of the Frederick County Sheriff's Department—well, formerly at least. Angel, my wife, called me Tuck.” I shoved her backward against the glass observation window just as the door swung open and Bear Braddock rushed in.

“Oh, hell no.” Karen tried to find escape behind her. “You're dead. William told me you were dead. This can't …”

Bear wrenched Karen's arms behind her, pressed her
face-first
into the wall, and snapped handcuffs on her wrists. Then he spun her around and held tight to the handcuff chain to leverage her arms high and keep her off balance up on her tiptoes.

Karen settled and stared at me, her face wild and frightened. “You're dead. Aren't you?”

“Oh, I'm dead all right, Karen.” I walked over and locked eyes with her. “I'm just not gone. And that's the trick, don't you think?”

seventy

“Get me out of
here, Detective.” Karen pressed back into Bear. “Get me out of here,
please
.”

“Karen Simms,” Bear said as he stooped and picked up the syringe, “you're under arrest for the murders of William and Marshal Mendelson and, after this trick, the attempted murder of Angela Tucker.” Bear finished the conventional Miranda rights and pushed her down into one of the chairs across the room.

“Attempted murder?” Karen pointed her chin at Angel. “She won't be testifying.”

“Sure she will, Karen.” Bear lifted the IV line she had poisoned. The end of the line should have
been
attached to a needle in Angel's vein but instead it was affixed to a small plastic bottle hidden in the bed linens. The bottle had already captured the syringe of poison Karen injected.

“Glad you like needles,” Bear said in a dry voice. “The Commonwealth has one for you.”

Angel—Angel in my world—said, “Tuck, I thought Karen was dead.”

“Yes, Angel, me too.” I told her what Bear's men found at B.C.'s house. I ended with, “Karen found out about William's treasure and was selling it piece by piece until he caught her. But by then, Raina had traced it and found her, then found William and Keys. William called you to that meeting to ask for help—he needed your contacts at the Smithsonian to sort it all out with the Egyptians before anything happened to him and Keys.”

Karen stared at me as I began to fade. Her eyes darted to Bear, me, and back to Bear. “Detective, it was all Marshal. He was over his head with some loan sharks. He …”

“Bullshit, Karen,” Bear said as Cal walked into the room with another deputy. “You found his treasure and set up that secret account to sell it. You tried to frame Poor Nic and Keys by putting the account under their company name—Nostalgia—except the address went to a PO box that wasn't Nic's. Marshal may have helped you, but you did the killing. You killed William to keep him from revealing his secret to Raina before you could sell all his treasure. And then you killed Marshal. Why, did he get cold feet?
”

Karen's eyes were steel. “That stuff was worth millions—more, even. Marshal was a bastard and he killed his father to get the treasure. I just helped with the bank account to sell it. And then he was gonna turn me in for William's murder, like he was all innocent and shit. Do you believe it? He committed suicide …”

“No, Karen.” Bear eyed her. “You killed William. And you're going down for Marshal's murder, too. But hey, that was a neat trick pouring your blood all around your apartment to make us think you were dead. If we hadn't found the containers at B.C.'s place, we might have never figured it out. I guess being a nursing student paid off.”

Karen cursed and turned away.

Cal said, “And we have B.C. He's talking so much we can't keep up. Seems he didn't like you setting him up with Raina just to get him shot and arrested for murder. You used that .22 to kill William, then you gave it to B.C. for the phony bank heist. You set him up to look like he'd robbed William's vault and killed him. Then you sent the poor sap to help Raina get Keys to confess. What, did you figure she'd kill him and Keys to cover her tracks and yours at the same time? And why try to kill Poor Nic?”

Karen's face flushed. “That was meant for Professor Tucker. Bartalotta got in the way—dumb luck, right?” She looked up at Bear and her face dissolved into a cocky, nasty grin. “But I figured, what the hell, Bartalotta will find B.C. to pay him back. Then, there won't be any witness to rat me out.”

“Angel?” I said, and Karen looked for me but couldn't find me. “Why kill Angel? She wasn't involved with all this.”

Karen lifted her chin. “William told her everything. She had to go. She even found Raina at that Washington warehouse—I followed Angela there. I figured that crazy Egyptian bitch would finish her off once and for all. But she didn't, so …”

“That's the funny thing, Karen,” Bear said. “Raina may be a crazy bitch, but she never killed anyone. Oh, her family did, but not her. You're the murderer.”

“She's no saint, Braddock. It was her fault I had to do it. Angela Tucker would have figured out it was me sooner or later. What was I supposed to do? Just wait around for her to figure me out?”

Bear leaned forward. “So, you followed Angela out of DC and drove her off the road.”

“I had no choice. It was William's fault for talking to her.” Karen let a sly grin escape the corners of her mouth. “Look, I have a deal …”

“William didn't tell her anything,” Bear growled. “He never spoke to Angela. She was heading to see him for the first time the morning you killed him. Angela never knew what William wanted.”

She stared for a moment. “But … he told her before, in emails. She had to know.”

“No, he never told her.” I leaned close to her and whispered, “I'm gonna haunt you for the rest of your life. Me and every ghoul I can find—maybe William and Marshal …”

“Come on, Braddock, let's make a deal.” Karen's eyes darted around the room looking for me—or others. “I'll confess everything. I'll give the money back—”

“Give it back?” Cal took her arm and stood her up. “Willy knew you were stealin' and he moved the treasure to Keys's club for safekeepin' until they could return it. He knew you'd make a move on the rest.”

“Money? You think this was just about money?” Karen's face chilled to ice again. “My stepdad was a fireman. He saved William when he started the annex on fire years ago. William was down in his secret vault—no one knew it was there back then. My stepfather and another fireman had to hunt around to find him. But then my stepfather got trapped behind the vault gate. He was burnt so bad he never worked again. William was untouched—didn't have so much as singed hair. My stepfather drank himself to death and mom died trying to make ends meet. William Mendelson and that damn treasure destroyed my family. Sure, I wanted his money; I earned it. And I got them—I got their money and them, too.”

Tommy. Fire. Smoke.
Revenge
.

Bear looked over at me and then at Karen. His face softened a little. “For your family, I'm sorry, Karen. But you're still going down for the murders. Now, if—”

“Look, I know things about Franklin Thorne.” She wet her lips and looked from Cal to Bear. “I saw him in the bank at all hours of the night. He was up to something, I'm telling you. He—”

“Thorne's an international jewel thief, Karen,” Bear said and laughed when her face paled. “He was there to rob William, too. And I suspect he was onto you. In fact, I wouldn't be a bit surprised if your stolen money is long gone from your offshore account. It's probably in
his
Swiss bank about now.”

“Thorne … a thief?” Karen shook her head as her eyes raged. “He used me. I led him to it all. That miserable lying bastard!”

“She's loonier than a clown on steroids,” I said.

Cal pulled her toward the door. “Let's go, Karen. Your old boyfriend, B.C., made a deal that'll keep him off death row. Maybe being nuts will save you.”

Cal paraded Karen from the hospital room.

Angel sat beside me on the couch. When her eyes rose to me again, she was crying. “It's time—I have to choose. It's so hard, Tuck. It's so hard.”

“Stay alive, Angel. Stay with Bear and Hercule and your life. I'll be fine. And I promise, no more snooping around on you. Well, maybe a little.”

She laughed between the tears and took my hand. “I know Hercule would be fine with Bear. And we'll both be with him … always.”

“No, Angel.”

“Being with you is all I want, Tuck.” She leaned forward and kissed me. “I know what I have to do.” She kissed me a second time, long and hard, then smiled as she slipped away into nothing.

A moment later, her life machines beeped and cried out. Lights flashed everywhere. Footsteps ran up the hall and anxious voices grew louder and louder. When the doctor and nurse burst through the doorway, they went straight to the life machines. The doctor scanned the readouts, checked numbers, and slowly turned off the alarms.

The doctor looked down at Angel. “Dear God.”