The Fury hp-4 Read online

  She pressed Play, and soon a familiar tune came over the speakers. It was Bob Dylan's "Not Dark Yet." It was a beautiful, melancholy song. I looked at her, confused.

  "I know you like this song," she said, a sweet smile spread across her lips. "I figured we can split music choices. There's more stuff you like on there."

  I stayed quiet, just smiled at her, listened to Dylan sing.

  As we began the drive, we fell into a routine that was becoming familiar and comforting. Our conversations came easily. Each silence felt warm rather than simply because of a lack of topics to discuss. Being by this girl's side filled me up in a way I'd never truly experi enced. Nothing between us had been forced. From the moment we met during the most stressful situation imaginable, there were a million moments when, if we'd not been stronger, things could have broken apart.

  Not too long ago I'd done just that. I thought I was being noble, chivalrous. Putting her life before mine. I learned quickly my heart didn't agree with that decision, and neither of us had rested easy.

  When I contacted her for help on a story-that phone call as much for emotional help as professional-it was only a matter of time before we got back together.

  Amanda was smart, tough, resilient. Stronger than I was. And together we were more than the sum of our parts. If not for her, my father might still be sitting in an

  Oregon prison trying to simply wait out the legal process. At least now we had a chance to help set things right.

  Of course, the one bad thing about being together was our tendency to snack. We went through two large coffees, a giant bag of Combos and half a dozen cookies by the time we hit I-95. If we kept going at this pace I'd have to ask Amanda to start hauling my big ass around in a pickup truck to talk to sources.

  The scenery driving up was truly breathtaking. Pine trees studded the landscape as we passed numerous hiking and cross-country skiing trails. There was little up here for visitors other than what nature offered. I could see why Stephen Gaines liked to come here. As much as I loved the clicks and clacks of the newsroom, there was something about the peace and quiet this area offered that appealed to me.

  It was six o'clock by the time we turned onto I-87

  North heading toward Blue Mountain Lake. The city itself was nestled in Hamilton County, in the town of

  Indian Lake. After passing Albany and Saratoga

  Springs, we turned onto Route 28 toward Indian Lake.

  The drive down 28 was breathtaking. The roads were teeming with lush, green trees, small-town stores and crisp blue water. It was the NewYork that existed outside of what people commonly associated with New York.

  Nearly untouched by technology, commerce and industry.

  About half an hour down 28, we passed a brownbrick building on our left. The sign read, Adirondack

  Museum. The lettering was burned into a wooden plaque, and unlike some other museums I'd seen in my travels this one looked remarkably well maintained. It was a shame, I thought, that I'd seen so many places yet actually experienced so few. When I traveled, there was always a reason. A story, something pulling me to a des tination. There was never much time to enjoy my sur roundings. I was here for business, and as much as I could admire the beauty of this place, I wouldn't-at least now-be able to lose myself in it.

  We drove several miles down Route 28, the majesty of Blue Mountain Lake on our left. I could picture

  Stephen Gaines (or was it myself?) sitting in a chair by the water, writing in a spiral-bound notebook, listening to nothing but the world itself. It was a far cry from what

  I'd gotten used to in the city. Either I could love being here for the blissful solitude-or it would drive me crazy not to hear blaring horns and the music of the newsroom.

  There were several unpaved roads, which, according to Rose, led to various cabins. There weren't many year-round residents up here, and most of the occu pants were, like Stephen and Helen, city dwellers who came to get away from the hustle and bustle. Each house stood far enough away from its neighbor to allow peace and quiet, but were close enough that it did feel like somewhat of a community up here.

  As we approached the turn onto Maple Lodge Road, on the northeast ridge of Blue Mountain Lake, I noticed a set of tire tracks leading up to the cabin that looked fairly recent, and another set leading away. They looked like the same type of tread. The weather reports said that it had rained here just two days ago, so whoever had come here had done so in between the time Stephen

  Gaines had died and now. And if, as Rose thought,

  Helen had come here, we would hopefully find her.

  The tracks leading away could have been Helen shopping, picking up supplies.

  Amanda turned the stereo off. I could feel the breath become shallow in my chest. Helen Gaines had to have answers. Even if she didn't know who killed her son, she would certainly know what he might have been mixed up in that got him killed. She was our only hope, our only lead. My father's only hope.

  We pulled onto the driveway and slowly entered the

  Gaines residence. The only sounds were the rustling of leaves in the slight wind. I could hear Amanda breathing beside me. I felt her hand on my elbow for reassurance.

  As we got closer we could see the cottage. It was two stories tall, made from rounded interlocking logs. The front door was bracketed by six logs surrounding a makeshift porch. A chimney jutted from a roof lined with a green material. It looked as if some sort of moss or other plant life was growing on it. The chimney was static. I lowered the window, smelled the air. It was clean. If Helen was here, she hadn't made a fire recently.

  "Henry," Amanda said, her hand gripping my arm tighter. "Look at that."

  In the dirt driveway, we could clearly make out the tread markings from a second set of tires. These treads were marked with numerous crisscrossing lines, both vertical and horizontal in even patterns. Truck tires tended to have more grooves, deeper cuts, better for sluicing water and specifically designed for off-roading.

  These tracks likely belonged to a some sort of SUV. Our eyes followed the tracks back to a clearing in the woods.

  Whoever had come here hadn't used the front door.

  They'd come in a different way. They didn't want to be seen arriving. Who could have come here besides

  Helen? And what kind of person would have come not wanting to be seen? Clearly, whoever had come here knew they would be coming in through the woods, and needed treads that could handle it. Somebody wanted to not be seen using the front door.

  "This can't be good," Amanda said under her breath.

  "What if someone is still there?"

  She didn't need to say that that person might not be

  Helen Gaines.

  I stopped the car short of the driveway and put it into

  Park. I kept the engine running. Just in case.

  With the engine purring, we both unlocked our doors and tentatively stepped into the evening air. Wind swirled around us as we stared at the cabin. I couldn't see much inside, so I crept closer, hunched low to the ground. Dirt crackled under my feet as Amanda kept pace several steps behind me.

  I crept up the front steps and up to the door. Both side windows were closed, and a drape prevented me from viewing what was inside. I gently knocked on the door.

  There was no doorbell.

  "Miss Gaines?" I called. "Helen?"

  There was no response.

  I called louder. Waited a minute. Heard nothing.

  I walked back down the steps, then decided to go around the house to see what we could find.

  Heart pounding in my chest, I slid up to a side window, cupped my hands to the glass and peered in.

  The room was dark. There was a long couch, and I could make out a television stand and what looked like a desk. Other than that the room was impeccably clean.

  Peering in closer, I could see a faint yellow glow ema nating from a room beyond this one. A light was on somewhere on the first floor.

  "Stay here," I said t
o Amanda.

  "Like hell," she replied. That was the end of that discussion.

  Staying low, we sidled around the back of the house where another window faced the forest. Off in the distance, I could make out a narrow road, paved poorly but wide enough for a car to fit through. It did not face the front of the house, and would be unseen by anyone who was not in this room at the time. The window was mere yards from the SUV tire tracks.

  There was no doubt; whoever had come here had used that path to gain access to the house.

  I approached the window. My breath was ragged, and

  I could hear Amanda panting behind me. Gently I stood up until my eye line was just over the windowsill.

  I made out the top of a shower rod and a medicine chest.

  This was clearly the downstairs bathroom. Then I saw it.

  The right medicine cabinet was open. Pills and makeup were spread out all over the counter. Bottles were broken. Things scattered everywhere.

  That's when Amanda stood up, saw the entirety of the bathroom, and let out a bloodcurdling scream.

  When I saw what she was looking at, it was all I could do to stifle mine.

  A body was facedown on the floor. Her blouse was ripped and tattered. Her arms were splayed out in a horribly unnatural position.

  And a pool of blood was spread around her head like a gruesome sunrise.

  Without thinking, I ran to the nearest tree, propped my foot against a limb and pulled until I heard a crunch and the thick branch snapped off. Taking a running start, I brought the limb back behind my head just like when I played Little League, and slammed the branch against the windowpane. The glass didn't shatter, but a large crack snaked down the middle. Just enough. Two more whacks and enough glass had broken for me to clear the rest out with the branch. I carefully climbed through the window. The blood around Helen Gaines's head looked dark red, almost dried but not completely. A small piece of metal floated in the gore, but I couldn't tell what it was.

  I smelled the air, a faint but still noxious odor present. I looked closer. There was a chance she was still…

  I gently moved her hair away from her neck so I could check her pulse. And that's when I realized that this woman was black. It was not Helen Gaines.

  I pressed three fingers against her carotid artery, praying for a pulse. I felt nothing. I pressed again, this time on her wrist. Silent. Dead.

  I looked at the body.

  My hands shook as I reached into my pocket and pulled out my cell phone. Thankfully there was recep tion. My fingers fumbled and I had to dial 911 three times before getting it right.

  "911, what is your emergency?"

  "A woman's been killed at 97 Maple Lodge Road.

  Please get here quick."

  "Sir, can you check her pulse?"

  "There's no pulse. Please just get here."

  "All right, sir, an ambulance is on the way. Do you know the victim?"

  "No," I said, nearly passing out as I sat down on the rim of the porcelain bathtub. "I don't."

  Sitting in the pool of blood, about two feet away from the body, was a tiny diamond earring, lying next to another thin sliver of what looked like gray hair. The diamond was a princess cut. One day, a few weeks ago,

  I was looking online at engagement rings. Thinking about whether I could see Amanda wearing one. I re membered seeing the name-princess cut-and thinking it was perfect. A princess for a princess, I'd thought.

  But there was only one earring on the ground.

  The other was either taken by the killer. Or still being worn by someone who'd escaped.

  Then I looked at the body again. The victim's ears weren't pierced. Which meant the single earring on the ground had belonged to Helen Gaines. And she'd dropped it before she fled.

  Her name was Beth-Ann Downing. She lived two floors above Helen and Stephen Gaines in their apart ment in Alphabet City. She and Helen had been friends for fifteen years. She owned a Camry, which she parked in a garage on Fourteenth Street. A call to the garage confirmed that Beth had taken the Camry a few days ago and had not returned it. Beth-Ann Downing was fifty-three years old. Divorced. One daughter who lived in Sherman Oaks, California, Sheryl Harrison, who was on a flight to New York City to attend her mother's funeral.

  Beth had worked as a bank teller. According to the police, gas and credit-card receipts showed she'd left the city with Helen Gaines the very night Stephen Gaines was killed. A waitress at a diner on I-87 recognized Beth and said she'd been eating with another woman. That woman fit the description of Helen Gaines, Stephen's mother. Beth was either fleeing from something, or was simply helping an old friend who was fleeing from something.

  And last night she was killed when a bullet severed her brain stem, fired from less than a foot away. Death was almost instantaneous.

  Almost.

  And I wondered if Beth-Ann Downing had even known what her friend was running from.

  We'd given our statement to Deputy Reece Watts of the Indian Lake Police Department. I took a little extra time washing the blood off my fingers.

  We told the police everything we knew. From early forensics, it appeared that an SUV or van of some sort approached the Gaines residence during the night, when both Helen Gaines and Beth-Ann Downing were asleep.

  They pried open the storm shutters and snuck in through the basement.

  Beth had awoken, and went downstairs to check on the noise. She saw the intruders. The police confirmed there was more than one. Several pairs of footprints, they said. They chased her to the bathroom, where they shot her. In the confusion, Helen Gaines had escaped.

  That's why we saw tire tracks leaving the cabin.

  Helen had fled while her friend was being murdered.

  Nobody had any idea of the whereabouts of Helen

  Gaines. She hadn't called the police. Hadn't stopped anywhere for help.

  She'd just disappeared.

  It might have just been me, but that didn't seem like typical behavior for a woman whose only son had just recently been killed. Especially when the alleged murderer was locked up awaiting trial.

  I had no idea how this would play in regards to my father. Stephen Gaines was still dead. The police were still figuring out if anything in the cabin was missing.

  If they could chalk it up to a burglary gone horribly wrong. Or if there was something else. Another reason the intruders had come to that cabin in the middle of the night.

  Regardless of how the autopsy and discovery came out, I couldn't believe the murder was the result of a botched robbery. The killers had brought in weapons.

  For protection? Maybe. To scare any residents?

  Perhaps. Or maybe they brought them because they were there for the sole purpose of killing Helen Gaines.

  And Beth-Ann Downing just got in the way.

  On the ride back from Blue Lake Mountain, neither

  Amanda nor I said a word. The iPod sat on the armrest untouched. We had no coffee, no snacks. It was just completely and utterly silent.

  I parked the car on the street near my apartment.

  Amanda came upstairs with me.

  Upon opening the door, I had a momentary burst of fear. I generally took my safety for granted, despite the fact that I'd been the recipient of some fairly severe beatings over the past few years. I had scars on my leg, my hand and my chest as a result of in truders. Yet I wanted to believe I was safe. With

  Amanda I usually felt that way. But tonight, after seeing how another person's life-a helpless person-could be invaded and snuffed out so quickly, it made me rethink the simple dead bolt that protected my apartment.

  "Did you see," Amanda said, forcing the words out,

  "all that blood?"

  I nodded. Went into the kitchen and poured us each a glass of water. Amanda gulped hers down while I sat there holding the cool glass in my hands, wondering just what the hell was going on.

  It didn't make sense that Helen Gaines would be on the run. I had to assume my father did not
kill Stephen

  Gaines. I also had to assume that Helen Gaines knew who the real killer was. And if that was true, she fled because she did not feel like contacting the police. She fled because of something she knew, either about her son or his killer.

  She'd gone to upstate New York to hide from some thing or someone. And not just from her son's killer.

  From something larger. If you fear one person, that fear can be contained, limited. Controlled. You can seek the help of cops, lawyers. There are always people who can help.

  What exactly was Helen Gaines fleeing from?

  I thought about what Binks and Makhoulian talked about at the medical examiner's office. Binks said that

  Stephen Gaines was killed by a pistol likely covered by some sort of makeshift silencer. That insinuated the murder was premeditated. Of course, any prosecutor could make the claim that my father made up his mind to kill Stephen, that his death would allow my father to keep on living without paying the money Helen wanted, or exposing his bastard child to his family. The motive would still hold up.

  But then I thought about seeing Beth-Ann Downing lying facedown in that pool of blood. The scene was gruesome and hard to look at, yet I'd trained myself to do just that. You had to divest yourself of any emotional attachment. Present the facts. They would tell the story themselves.

  Beth was lying in a pool of blood. I remembered seeing something floating in that pool. A small piece of gray hair. I hadn't thought much about it then, merely processed it into my memory, but now I called it back up.

  The strand was very thin, very short, almost a hair's width. But it wasn't hair-it was metal.

  The conversation with Binks and Makhoulian came back to me. The silenced gun that was used to kill

  Stephen.

  Most silencers were not professional. They were made from simple items. A pillow. Aluminum tubing.

  Aluminum tubing filled with steel wool.

  I looked up at Amanda.

  "Steel wool," I said.

  "What?"

  "The gun that was used to kill Stephen-whoever did it used aluminum tubing filled with steel wool to create a silencer. They didn't find evidence at Stephen's murder scene, but the coroner said the wounds sug gested a silencer. But it was impossible to tell what kind of silencer was used. When I saw Beth-Ann