“This is blackmail,” said Kermode.
Pendergast turned to her. “I might point out it wasn’t actually a miscommunication. My understanding is that Chief Morris indicated she would have access to the remains. He then withdrew that assurance, due to your own gross interference. It was unfair. I am merely rectifying a wrong.”
There was a pause while the others digested this. “And what,” asked Kermode, “will you do for us in return? That is, if the chief releases this lady friend of yours.”
“I’ll persuade Captain Bowdree not to take her complaint officiallyto the FBI,” Pendergast said smoothly.
“I see,” said Kermode. “It all depends on this Captain Bowdree. Provided, of course, this person even exists.”
“How unfortunate for you that Bowdree was an unusual name. It made my task so much easier. A phone call established that she was well aware of her Colorado roots and, in fact, quite proud of them. Mrs. Kermode, you claimed The Heights made a good-faith effort to locate descendants. That is clearly a falsehood. Naturally, this is something the FBI would have to look into.”
Jenny noticed that under her makeup, Mrs. Kermode’s face was very pale. “Let’s get this straight. This Swanson girl — she’s what, your girlfriend? A relative?”
“She’s no relation to me.” Agent Pendergast narrowed his silvery eyes and looked at Kermode in a most unsettling way. “I will, however, be remaining in Roaring Fork to take in the Christmas season — and to make sure you don’t interfere with her again.”
As Jenny watched, Pendergast turned to the chief. “I suggest you call the newspaper right away — I imagine their deadline is looming. I’ve already booked a room for Ms. Swanson at the Hotel Sebastian, and I hope that — for your sake — she does not spend another night in your jail.”
11
It was a few minutes before midnight when the silver Porsche 911 Turbo S Cabriolet pulled up to the elegant front door of 3 Quaking Aspen Drive. It did not stop there, however, but continued on into the shadow of the four-car garage beyond.
The young man at the wheel put the vehicle into park. “Home,” he said. “As you requested.” He leaned over the gear lever to nuzzle the girl in the passenger seat.
“Stop it,” she said, pushing him away.
The young man pretended to look hurt. “I’m a friend, aren’t I?”
“Yes.”
“Then bring on the benefits.” Another attempt at nuzzling.
“What a dork.” The girl got out of the car with a laugh. “Thanks for dinner.”
“ Andthe movie.”
“And the movie.” Jenny Baker slammed the door, then watched the car move off down the long, curving driveway until it reached the road leading to the gatehouse of The Heights, down in the valley half a mile away. For a lot of her girlfriends back at Hollywood High, losing one’s virginity seemed like a badge of honor: the sooner the better. But Jenny didn’t feel that way. Not on a first date, and certainly not with a dweeb like Kevin Traherne. Like so many of the male youth in Roaring Fork, he seemed to think that his father’s dough was the only excuse he needed to get into a girl’s pants.
She stepped up to the closest garage door, punched a code into the panel, and waited for the door to ascend. Then she walked past the row of gleaming, expensive cars, pressed the button to close the garage, and opened the door to the house. The security alarm was, as usual, off — there were few burglaries in Roaring Fork, and never a one in The Heights…unless you counted Corrie Swanson’s breaking into the warehouse, of course. Her thoughts returned to the town meeting earlier in the day, and to the intimidating FBI agent in the black suit who’d descended on it like an avenging angel. She felt sorry for the chief: he was a decent guy, but he had a real problem with letting other people — like that witch Kermode — walk all over him. Nevertheless, she was glad the agent — Pendergast was his name, she remembered — had gotten Corrie out of jail. She hoped to run into her again, ask her about John Jay, maybe…as long as the chief wasn’t around.
Jenny walked through the mudroom, through the pantry, and into the expansive kitchen of the vacation home. Through glass doors she could see the Christmas tree, all decked out and blinking. Her parents and her younger sister, Sarah, would be upstairs asleep.
She snapped on a bank of lights. They illuminated the long granite countertops; the Wolf oven and dual Sub-Zero refrigerator and freezer units; the three doors leading, respectively, into the laundry, the second kitchen, and the dining room.
She suddenly realized there had been no patter of nails on the floor, no shaggy, friendly dog wagging his misshapen tail in greeting. “Rex?” she called out.
Nothing.
With a shrug, she got a glass from one of the cabinets, walked over to the fridge — decorated, as usual, with Sarah’s stupid Nicki Minaj photos — poured herself a glass of milk, then took a seat at the table in the breakfast nook. There was a stack of books and magazines in the window seat, and she pushed a few aside — noting as she did so that Sarah had finally taken her advice and begun reading Watership Down—and plucked out her copy of Schmalleger’s Criminal Justice Today. As she did so, she noticed that one of the chairs of the kitchen table had been knocked over.
Sloppy.
She found her page in the book and began to read, sipping her milk as she did so. It drove her father — a high-profile Hollywood lawyer — crazy that she wanted to go into law enforcement. He tended to look down on cops and prosecutors as lower forms of life. But in point of fact he was partly responsible for her interest. All the cop action movie premieres she’d attended — produced or directed by her father’s clients — had left her fascinated with the job from an early age. And starting next fall, she’d be studying the subject full-time, as a freshman at Northeastern University.
Finishing her milk, she closed the book again, put her glass in the sink, and walked out of the kitchen, heading for the stairs up to her room. Her father had the connections to keep her from getting summer jobs with the California police, but there was nothing he could do to prevent her winter break internship here in Roaring Fork. The very idea of it made him nuts.
Which, of course, was part of the fun.
The huge, rambling house was very still. She ascended the curving staircase to the second floor, the landing above dark and silent. As she climbed, she thought once again about the mysterious FBI agent. FBI, she thought. Maybe I should look into an internship in Quantico next summer…
At the top of the stairs, she stopped. Something was wrong. For a moment, she wasn’t sure what it was. And then she realized: Sarah’s door was wide open, faint light streaming out into the dim hall.
At sixteen, Sarah had reached the age where adolescent privacy was all-important. These days her door was closed at all times. Jenny sniffed the air, but there was no smell of weed. She smiled: her sister must have fallen asleep over a magazine or something. She’d take the opportunity to sneak in and rearrange her sister’s stuff. That was sure to get a rise out of her.
Quietly, she crept down the hallway, approaching her sister’s room on silent feet. She came up to the door frame, placed one hand upon it, then slowly leaned her head in.
At first, she could not quite process what she saw. Sarah lay on her bed, tied fast with wound wire, a dirty rag stuffed into her mouth, a billiard ball at its center — Jenny noticed a number, seven, engraved into its yellow-and-white surface — and secured behind her head with a bungee cord. In the faint blue light, Jenny saw that her sister’s knees were bleeding profusely, staining the bedcovers black. As she gasped in horror and shock, Jenny saw Sarah’s eyes staring back at her: wide, terrified, pleading.
Then Jenny registered something in her peripheral vision. She turned in mid-gasp to see a fearful apparition in the hall beside her: wearing black jeans and a tight-fitting jacket of dark leather. The figure was silent and utterly motionless. Its hands were gloved and gripped a baseball bat. Worst of all was the clown mask — white, huge red lips smiling maniacally, bright red circles on each cheek. Jenny stumbled backward, her legs going weak beneath her. Through the eyeholes on each side of the long pointed nose, she could see two dark eyes staring back at her, dreadful in their lack of expression, in awful counterpoint to the leering mask.