Tales of Chills and Thrills: The Mystery Thriller Horror Box Set (7 Mystery Thriller Horror Novels) (68 page)

“We have a BOLO—Be On the Look Out—issued. The TV people ran
a picture of him and the car last night. A lot of calls came in overnight.
We’ll find him.”

“You want more coffee?”

“Please.” He gratefully accepted the refill. It had been a
late night.

He waited until she returned the pot to the counter. “I know
you told Ellis you didn’t see anyone over at Beason’s house the other night.
The night he went missing. But what about earlier in the week? Anybody hanging
around? Stranger in the neighborhood?”

Miz Rose moved to the playpen in the corner of the kitchen
and deposited Tasha inside it. She handed the child a toy, then returned to the
breakfast table. “I tol’ you about that house down to the corner? The people
coming and going?”

He nodded. He’d passed the tip to the Drug Task Force.

“Every now and then, you get some banger drive up and down
the street, showing out. Flashing guns or cash.” She cocked her head, thinking.
“I did see one fella earlier this week. A hard man. I ain’t just talking
muscle. There be something in his face made those young punks step back.”

Huh.

“You get a good look at him?”

“Not too tall. Same size as me. Wearin’ blue-jeans and one
of them sweatshirts with a hood.”

Robbins pulled out a notebook. “Age? Hair color? Race? Any
of that?”

“He black. ‘ Bout thirty. He bald, but look like he be
shaving his head like the toughs doing now.”

“Think you could work with our sketch guy? The Faces
program?”

“Like they do on TV? I could try. You think he might be the
one run off with George?”

There was no sense in alarming her—she had enough to worry
about with the gangs taking over the next block. “We’d want to talk to him. See
what he knows. Like we did with you and his neighbors. I called most of
Beason’s family. They haven’t seen him, but I’m having a hard time finding a
couple of them. The middle daughter. You have any idea where she might be?”

“She dead.”

Hard to return a phone call from the afterlife.

Miz Rose picked up a cloth and wiped the highchair tray.
“Latoya be in school with me. Leastwise ‘til she drop out. She be into crack. I
heard she do whatever she thought needed doing to get her next high.”

“Vicious cycle.”

“Uh-huh. Never was sure who the daddy was, but she had three
babies. Poor little ones never had a chance to be nothing but wild childs.”

“Know where they are?”

She shook her head. The beads woven into the cornrows
clicked a musical tune. “They come ‘round. George give them a place to stay and
clean up. Food. Then they gone again. The oldest one, Akeem, he stay with
George a while. Seem to steady the boy. He finish school and join the army just
in time to go fight Mr. Bush’s war. ‘Bout broke George’s heart when that boy got
kilt.”

“The Gulf War?”

“One of them wars. I can’t keep straight what they calling
it. Seems like soon as one place be done, another war breaks out next door. Our
boys and girls been over there for forever.”

“Over ten years since the Towers fell,” Robbins said. “I
don’t know what we’ve got to show for all the dying.” At times, fighting those
wars seemed a lot like what he did as a law enforcement officer. He could keep
arresting speeders, druggies, and wife-beaters for the rest of his career and
it wouldn’t change a thing. New speeders, druggies and wife-beaters would step
up and take their places.

Just like the wars would breed new terrorists who’d rise up
and replace the ones the army killed.

But life would be a lot worse if neither he nor the army
tried.

“Lord, it be sad when a man buries a child, much less a
grandchil’.” Miz Rose crossed the kitchen and pulled a broom from inside a
closet. “George buried him over to the cemetery, next to his mama. Now his
grand-mama buried there, too.”

Beason’s wife. Robbins toyed with his coffee mug. The
daughter’s accusations curdled the milk in his coffee and his stomach. He
couldn’t discuss the case, but could he call this an interview? “Beason’s wife
died?”

“Last year. The cancer got her. She didn’t want to go to the
old folks’ home. Said she wanted to die in her own bed.”

“Can’t say I blame her.” It would be awful to end up in a
hospital bed somewhere, hooked up to a bunch of wires and tubes. “Someone come
by the house to help take care of her? A visiting nurse? Hospice?”

“The nurse come around, but George, he the one did most the
work. I helped much as I could.” She shook her head, remembering, as she slowly
swept the floor around the highchair. “Give him some time to hisself; chance to
get out the house. Taking care of Delores be just like taking care of my
babies. Poke food in one end and wipe it off the other.”

Robbins tried to imagine doing that for Sharon. Or worse,
her taking care of him that way.

“I always says, you do what you gotta do. The Lord give us
the strength we need. It weren’t the care-giving got to George. Delores’ pain
what tore him up.”

“Pain?” He’d seen people shriveled up from chemo but hadn’t
thought about pain.

“The cancer eat into everything—started in her female parts,
but got into her bones.” She propped the broom against the table and sat down.
“I ‘spect you talked to the daughter.”

Robbins looked up, caught off guard again.

“Gloria come by, once a month, Sunday after church and
pretend she don’t see her mama’s thin as a shadow. Delores put on her wig and a
smile for the girl. But I seen her afterwards. Cryin’. Beggin’ George to make
the pain stop.”

Miz Rose stood and walked to the sink. “Girl shore shot her
mouth off when Delores passed.”

Robbins stared at her straight back, at the hands that gripped
the edge of the counter. Only the white knuckles gave away her tension. Was she
telling him George killed his wife?

“He love that woman.” The words were a whisper. “They
married over fifty years. I wasn’t sure he wanted to live on without her.”

Something unexpected squeezed Robbins’ chest, sent waves of
pain surging out of the black well inside him. He didn’t want to put himself in
Beason’s shoes. He didn’t want to hurt for Beason’s loss—or wish he had that
kind of relationship.

Would he be able to do that for Sharon? Nurse her day and
night?

Know she was in agony and nothing he did could stop it?

Did he love her enough to end that kind of pain? To risk
alienating his children? Risk his badge? Jail?

“Don’t you be down on George Beason. Or you-self.” Miz Rose
had turned away from the sink and was watching him.

It was facing reality, not being down on himself. He’d never
thought about getting old. Dying by inches.

Never had to make the harsh choices Beason had faced.

He did know he would never put Sharon in a position to make
that call. He’d eat his gun before he put her through that kind of hell.

But right now, the thing that scared him the most was, he’d
spent twenty-five years with Sharon and he didn’t know the answer.

Shouldn’t he know?

The Newberry County Sherriff’s Department had a large new
building just outside the city limits. Built during the housing boom, when
Newberry became an ex-urb of Columbia, the larger agency had a lot of
technology upgrades, including a Faces program. City and county got along, or
at least Robbins got along fine with the deputies. Whenever he’d asked, they’d
never turned down a request to use the automated sketch artist program.

Robbins escorted Miz Rose into the station. Given the work
she did with Child Services, she knew a good many of the deputies and staff,
but since he was asking her to stick her neck out and identify a guy who might
turn out to be a scumbag of the first order, he wanted to make sure they
treated her right.

“Don’t worry if the sketch looks like a hundred other men,”
he told her. “The guy isn’t a suspect.”

“Not yet.” Cornrow beads clicking softly, Miz Rose followed
the tech to his computer station. “How we get started with this?”

Robbins watched for a moment, then returned to the front
desk. “If one of your guys can’t run her home when they finish, give Jordan or
me a call.”

“Shouldn’t be a problem,” the desk officer said. “It’s been
a slow week.”

The Newberry city police station was on the other side of
town, less than ten minutes away. Robbins passed the courthouse with its big
white columns and rounded the square. The flowered bushes—azaleas mostly—were
blooming and tourists were already wandering around the memorial gardens.

Between the Revolutionary War and the War Between the States,
South Carolina was full of historic sites. Not what he wanted to spend time
doing, but as long as the crime rate stayed down and the tourists—and their
dollars—kept coming, the City Council would be happy. And happy City Councils
kept the chief happy, which kept the chief off everyone’s ass.

Robbins left the small historic district, crossed the river
and passed the municipal building. Unlike the sheriff’s department, the police
station shared space with fire and rescue, as well as the municipal court. He
automatically counted the ambulances, pumper and ladder units, the Haz-mat
truck. All present. Slow week, slow day, Robbins agreed, as he turned into the
parking lot.

All he had to do was find George Beason.

He picked up his messages and flipped through them, noticing
the Beason-related calls had been batched into Best-Chance, Follow-up and
Hopelessly-out-there groups. For a moment, he tapped his fingers against the
desk, his mind still churning with Miz Rose’s comments about family tension.

He could do his part.

He pulled out the Yellow Pages, turned to lawn services, and
hired a guy to cut the grass.

The yard taken care of, he made another personal call, then
turned his attention to the message slips. He’d already returned the first
three Best-Chance calls without learning anything worthwhile when Jerry Jordan
hurried through the squad-room door.

“Anything new?” Jordan asked.

Robbins thought about giving him crap for coming in early,
but it was the kid’s first interesting case. “Miz Rose saw a guy hanging around
the house. With the kids there, she keeps an eye on the street. Her first
impression is the guy’s an ex-con. Maybe something there, maybe nothing.”

“He might’ve been casing the place, but that neighborhood
wouldn’t be the first place I’d head for B&E.”

Robbins agreed. “Either he’s in with the dealers or he was
looking for somebody. Miz Rose said he was around in the afternoon. All her
kids are home from school by then. Could be he was watching them. I asked for
patrol to drive through the neighborhood for the next few days. Here.” He
handed the batch of Follow-up message slips to Jordan. “Anything from the
bank?”

“No activity at all on the account.” Jordan flipped through
the message slips. “I set up a watch on it.”

Robbins wondered if no activity was good or bad. Was Beason
dead or alive? His car high-jacked? Or was he off somewhere on a personal
mission?

No way to know until they found the old guy.

Robbins dialed the number on the next Best-Chance message
slip.

“Nippon Center. How may I direct your call?”

“I’m looking for Mr. Koga.”

A moment later, a male voice with a faint Asian accent
answered. “Thank you for returning my call, detective. I saw the request on the
television news for information about an older Negro.”

“We’re looking for George Beason. Do you have information
about him?”

“He was here—at the center—yesterday evening, shortly before
we closed.”

“You’re sure it was Mr. Beason?” What was the guy doing up
in Greenville?

“I’m quite sure. Their presence was somewhat unusual, so I
would have noticed them anyway, but several events made me certain to remember
them.”

“You said ‘their’ and ‘them.’ Another person was with Mr.
Beason?”

“A younger man. Medium height, but very muscular. I found it
unusual that one so young would be bald.”

Huh. Miz Rose’s neighborhood bad-ass? “Head-shaving’s
popular right now. But go ahead with your story.”

“At first, I thought the young man might be a relative,
perhaps a grandson. He appeared solicitous, keeping a grip on the older man’s
arm. Given the older man’s infirmity, it seemed helpful, but then later, the
younger man became angry with him.” The director paused. “I’m telling you
events out of order.”

“Let’s start at the beginning. I want to record this. You
okay with that?”

“That will be fine.”

Robbins set up the equipment with the speed of long
practice, went through the identification process, then waded back into the
discussion. “Why did you find the men’s presence unusual?”

There was a brief silence, as if Koga were considering how
to answer. “Are you familiar with the Nippon Center?”

“I’ve heard of it.” Robbins vaguely remembered a write-up in
the newspaper a few years back. What did the Center have to do with Beason?

“The Nippon Center is gift from the Japanese people. A
cultural exchange. The Center blends 14
^th
century Japanese antiquity
with modern design. In addition to the tea house, we feature a large dry
garden. You may refer to it as a Zen garden. Most people who visit the Center
come for contemplation or meditation. As I said, not many Negros come here.”

Robbins had spent most of his military tour in Okinawa. He’d
found some Japanese could be disdainful of races they considered inferior. He’d
also noticed the Chinese and most people of color—any color—fit into that
category. He left the director’s assessment alone for the moment. “You said
several events occurred.”

“When the men arrived, they walked through the garden and
the parts of the Center which are open to the public. The younger man asked
where the seals were.”