Dark Hunger (A Nick Teffinger Thriller / Read in Any Order) (23 page)

Everything was as he left it.

Good.

Who would end up here?—that was the question.

Lauren Long?

Rave Lafelle?

London Fontelle?

Some spur-of-the-moment stranger?

Not Brittany, though.

Definitely not her.

He looked at his watch—11:48 a.m.

He called Brittany. “Are you free for lunch?”

She was.

Fifteen minutes later they met at Marlowe’s on the 16th Street Mall. She wore a conservative, gray pantsuit with her hair up, very professional.

She looked nice.

“I didn’t feel like driving back this morning so I took a flight instead,” Tripp said. “I’m thinking that you and me can fly down this weekend, stay at the MGM for a few days, and then drive back—if you’re in the mood.”

Chapter Eighty-Two

Day Eight—April 19

Tuesday Morning

______________

UNABLE TO GET OUT OF HER GIG at the Old Orleans, Rave kissed Twist goodbye Tuesday morning and flew to Denver. London picked her up at DIA and told her that Teffinger took her to Cameron Leigh’s house last night; and what they found.

The calendar.

Chicago.

The arrow.

“Somehow, Cameron was connected to Kennedy Pinehurst,” London said. She, in turn, ended up in an abandoned warehouse, naked, suspended by her ankles in an upside-down spread-eagle position, with her throat slit from ear to ear.

“I just find it troubling that Cameron was also tied down in a spread-eagle position,” London said.

“So what are you saying?” Rave asked. “That the slayers killed this woman—”

“—Kennedy Pinehurst—”

“—Right, her.”

“That to me seems pretty obvious,” London said. “What that means is this—if we can figure out who killed Kennedy Pinehurst, we’re going to learn the identity of one or more of the slayers.”

Rave chuckled.

“What?” London asked.

“How are we going to figure that out if the Chicago police haven’t been able to?”

“We have two things going for us that they don’t,” London said. “First, we know about the connection. Second, Cameron’s house is here in Denver, not in Chicago. And we have access to it.”

“We do?”

“I unlocked the back door last night before me and Teffinger left,” London said.

THEY PARKED TWO DOORS DOWN from Cameron’s house and headed straight for the back like they owned the place. To Rave’s surprise, London pulled two pairs of latex gloves out of her pants pocket and handed a pair to Rave.

“Put these on.”

Rave grinned.

“You’re such an organized little criminal,” she said.

“Yes I am.”

They looked around.

Saw no one.

Then turned the doorknob, entered, and closed the door behind them.

“We need to be careful to not mess things up,” London said. “I don’t want Teffinger to know anyone’s been here.”

They were looking for more information on the connection between Cameron Leigh and Kennedy Pinehurst, and figured it would most likely be on one of the hundreds of pieces of paper on the desk. So that’s where they devoted their attention.

They divvied up the papers.

And read every single one.

Starting with the ones on top.

Then moving into the drawers.

They found nothing of interest.

“It must be in her computer,” London said. “Unfortunately, the cops took it.”

“Now what?” Rave asked.

London shrugged.

Then she put a curious look on her face and said, “Maybe she stuffed it in one of her books.”

They walked over to the wall of books and started leafing through them, putting each one back exactly where they found it.

“So how well did you know Cameron?” Rave asked.

“Very,” London said.

“Did you ever suck her blood?”

“Many times; and vice versa.”

“How about Parker?” Rave asked.

“Cameron was like Twist,” London said. “There was a lot of sharing that went on.” She paused and added, “Parker’s fallen pretty hard for you. I suppose you know that.”

Rave nodded.

“I hope you two can make a go of it,” London said. “I’d like to see Parker happy. He deserves it.”

“Have you ever been intimate with him?”

London shook her head.

“If you mean sex, no.”

“Did you ever want to?”

“Of course,” London said. “Early on. But he was always looking past me, for something more.”

Rave laughed.

“More? What could be more than you?”

“You, apparently.”

IN ONE OF THE LARGER HARDCOVER BOOKS, they discovered something interesting.

Very interesting.

Namely, several printouts from Internet searches.

Printouts of newspaper articles on the disappearance of Kennedy Pinehurst, to be precise.

Mostly from the Chicago Tribune.

“Bingo.”

None of the sheets of paper had any handwriting.

“So what does this mean?” Rave asked.

“It means she was researching the Kennedy Pinehurst murder,” London said.

“Why?”

London shrugged.

Then she said, “Probably for the same reason we are. She must have known that a slayer killed the woman.”

“But why would a slayer kill Kennedy Pinehurst?” Rave asked.

London cocked her head.

“The same reason they’d kill Cameron, or you, or me,” she said. “Kennedy must have been a vampire.”

“You think?”

London nodded.

“There’s no other explanation,” she said.

“But you never heard about Kennedy Pinehurst before, right?”

“Right.”

“So how would the slayers know about a vampire if the other vampires don’t?”

London retreated in thought.

“There are only two things I can think of,” she said. “Either our genealogist is leaking information; or they’re doing their own genealogical research.”

THEY GOT A BLANK PIECE OF PAPER and wrote down the dates of all the newspaper articles, so they could print them off the web later and have their own copies.

They put the originals back in the book.

And put the book back on the shelf.

And left.

Locking the back door behind them.

Outside, walking back to the car, Rave’s phone rang and Tim Pepper’s voice came through.

“Are you free this afternoon?”

“I can be.”

“I’m going to see if I can get the guys down for a short practice session,” he said. “I’d like to work up those two new songs you wrote and roll them out tonight. I want to watch the crowd go nuts.”

Rave’s heart raced.

Chapter Eighty-Three

Day Eight—April 19

Tuesday Morning

______________

BRYON TEFFINGER GOT TO BED TOO LATE last night and got up too early this morning. To compensate, he stopped at a 7-Eleven on the way to work and filled a thermos with coffee. Elton John’s “Saturday Night’s Alright” came from speakers. The kid behind the cash register stopped reading a book called Witness Chase long enough to take Teffinger’s money.

“You seem familiar,” the kid said.

“I stop in here all the time.”

“Oh.”

Teffinger was almost out the door when the kid shouted, “Hey, you want a cup?”

Teffinger ran back in, grabbed a disposable cup from the coffee area, and said, “Thanks.” He had half the thermos under his belt by the time he got to the office. As usual, no one else had shown up yet, so he fired up the coffee pot before heading to his desk.

Chicago was one hour ahead of Denver.

Even with the time differential, Teffinger doubted that his counterpart, Thomas Stone, would be in yet. He called anyway. Nope, Stone wasn’t in yet. “Give him another hour,” the desk clerk said.

“Thanks.”

Forty-five minutes later, Teffinger called again.

“I said an hour, before,” the desk clerk said.

“Right, I know,” Teffinger said.

“Give him another fifteen minutes.”

Teffinger waited ten minutes and then called again.

“I said fifteen minutes, before.”

“Right.”

“Give him another five minutes.”

Four minutes later, Teffinger called again.

Stone wasn’t in.

“Give him another minute,” the desk clerk said.

“I’m just going to wait on the line until he gets in,” Teffinger said.

“Fine.”

Elevator music appeared.

One minute later, Thomas Stone’s voice came through.

“THE DESK CLERK SAYS YOU’VE BEEN HARASSING HIM.”

Teffinger grunted.

And said, “I have a second case here in Denver that I’m pretty sure is connected to your Kennedy Pinehurst case. My victim is named Cameron Leigh, twenty years old, murdered. Someone tied her down in a spread-eagle position and pounded a wooden stake into her heart—in an abandoned warehouse.”

Silence on the other end.

Teffinger could almost hear Stone processing the buzz words.

Spread-eagle.

Abandoned warehouse.

“Have you ever heard of her? Cameron Leigh?” Teffinger asked.

“Can’t say that it’s ringing a bell,” Stone said. “Tell me why you think the cases are connected.”

Teffinger told him.

About the calendar.

Chicago.

The arrow.

The date.

“It sounds like you’re on to something, but I don’t know what,” Stone said. “It’s weird, though.”

“What?”

“Well, you initially contacted me thinking that Kennedy Pinehurst was connected to that missing woman—”

“—Jena Vellone—”

“—Jena Vellone,” Stone said. “And now you think that Kennedy’s connected to this other woman—”

“—Cameron Leigh—”

“—Cameron Leigh,” Stone said.

“And?”

“Well,” Stone said, “if both of your assumptions are correct—namely that Jena Vellone and Cameron Leigh are each connected to Kennedy Pinehurst—then that means that Jena Vellone and Cameron Leigh are somehow connected to each other.”

Teffinger raked his fingers through his hair.

“I was just about to figure that out,” he said.

Stone chuckled.

They talked for another five minutes and then hung up.

WHEN SYDNEY SHOWED UP two minutes later, Teffinger filled her in. “I don’t think it will do any good to go back through Jena’s house,” Teffinger said. “If the name Cameron Leigh was anywhere, it would have jumped out at us the first time. Cameron was already dead before Jena got taken.”

“Agreed,” Sydney said.

“Same thing with respect to Cameron Leigh’s house,” Teffinger said.

“Agreed.”

Teffinger took a sip of coffee and found it lukewarm. He poured the rest in the snake plant and got a fresh cup.

“So what do we do now?”

Good question.

Chapter Eighty-Four

Day Eight—April 19

Tuesday Afternoon

______________

AFTER LUNCH WITH BRITTANY, Tripp walked down the 16th Street Mall under a bright blue Colorado sky, hornier than usual. The temperature was nice, about seventy. Lots of people were out strolling around.

Including lots of females.

He bought a pair of mirrored sunglasses from a street vendor for ten dollars, to better hide his face as he checked out the eye candy.

He passed the Rock Bottom Brewery, spotted a bench next to the sidewalk, and took a seat.

Someone had left a Rocky Mountain News there.

He thumbed through it.

Four or five pages in, he came across something interesting—the picture of a very nice looking woman next to an article, “Radio Personality Geneva Vellone Shocks Listeners.” The article explained that Geneva Vellone is the sister of Jena Vellone, the TV 8 reporter who disappeared last week. Yesterday, during Geneva’s morning talk show, she shocked listeners by making an on-air plea to the person who abducted Jena; a plea for him to take her in exchange for Jena.

Interesting.

Very interesting.

A SECOND ARTICLE on the same page was of equal interest. It had the picture of an incredibly good-looking man below the caption, “Detective Still on Case.”

According to the article, Denver homicide detective Nick Teffinger had been with Jena Vellone the night she disappeared. Jena’s blood had been found in Teffinger’s truck, which had been confiscated by the Cherry Hills P.D. Teffinger had no authority to investigate the woman’s disappearance—it wasn’t a homicide, it didn’t occur in Denver, and, most importantly, Teffinger was a person of interest. Last week, the Denver Chief of Police issued a public statement confirming that the investigation was being handled solely by Cherry Hills and that Teffinger was not involved. And yet, yesterday Teffinger reportedly showed up in San Francisco trying to get access to confidential police records in connection with work he said he was doing on the Jena Vellone case.

In the meantime, Teffinger was the lead investigator in connection with the murder of Forrest Jones, the man who suffered a bizarre vampire-like death with a wooden stake in his heart. That killer, ironically, remained at large.

Teffinger had a good reputation and a good arrest record.

But police protocol was clear in that officers are not authorized to participate in the investigation of a crime in which they are a suspect or a person of interest.

Was the chief ignoring protocol?

And, even worse, covering it up?

Or had Teffinger turned into a rogue cop?

Stay tuned.

End of article.

TRIPP COULDN’T HELP BUT CHUCKLE, especially since he had recently been in Teffinger’s house. What a tangled web this had turned out to be.

He focused on the picture of Geneva Vellone.

She would be worth spending some quality time with.

Most definitely.

Chapter Eighty-Five

Day Eight—April 19

Tuesday Afternoon

______________

AFTER THEY LEFT CAMERON LEIGH’S HOUSE, Rave called information and obtained a phone number for one Suzanne Wheeler in Montreal, Canada; the woman who she suspected to be the genealogist working with Parker.