“That ten carat ring you put on her finger didn’t look like whimsy.” Jimmy leaned forward, his eyes focused on Wells. “You two were on the cover of all the gossip magazines when you got engaged. I remember thinking at the time, ‘What’s that good looking gal doing with some old guy?’”
Mort watched Wells’ fists clench against his Italian wool slacks. He saw his blood pulsing in his neck and knew that despite the billionaire trappings, Wells wasn’t far removed from his gangster roots.
Wells kept his eyes on Mort and answered Jimmy’s question. “I give diamond rings to the women who clean my toilets. What’s your point?”
“My point is we have reason to believe Cameron Williams is dead.” Mort watched Wells take in the news. A short, sharp intake of breath. Three rapid blinks of his steely eyes. Nothing more.
“What do you mean, ‘reason to believe’?” His tone revealed nothing.
“Her baker came for his shift last night.” Mort looked to Jimmy. “Around 8:30, right?” He returned to Wells. “He finds the place trashed. There’s blood. He calls us. We can account for everyone who works there except Cameron. No one’s seen her since yesterday afternoon. This morning the lab tells us the mess in the bakery matches Cameron’s blood type.”
Meredith Thornton’s smile was polite but distant. “You’ll forgive us, Detectives, if we don’t understand why you’re bringing this to us.”
“We didn’t bring it to you.” Mort held Wells’ gaze. “We brought it to him.”
“No body?” Wells asked.
“We’ll find her, Bradley.” Mort smiled. “You have personal experience with how fast the Seattle PD catches bad guys.”
Wells’ jaw muscles churned. His rocking was barely noticeable. He didn’t blink.
Neither did Mort.
Wells broke his stare and turned to look up at Meredith. He smiled and patted her hand again before opening his desk drawer. Mort saw Jimmy’s right hand slide to the holster on his belt.
Wells pulled out a card and tossed it across the granite slab. “My private number, Detective. Call me when you’ve got something more than ‘a reason to believe’. I’ll send flowers.” Wells looked up to the perfectly dressed woman behind him. “Meredith, could I ask you to see the officers and their animal out, please?”
He reached for the phone before she could answer.
Mort and Jimmy got up. Bruiser stood immediately and watched his master’s face for instruction. Jim nodded his assurance to the dog and grabbed the card from Wells’ desk. Mort knew he planned to offer it to Micki as a souvenir. Meredith circled around the desk and led them out of the study.
Another five minutes got them to the front door. Meredith Thornton smiled. Warmly this time.
“Detective, I’m being harangued on a daily basis by a determined Executive Provost.” She played with a long gold chain that hung from her neck. “You’re holding a valuable piece of research equipment. Walter Buchner wasn’t authorized to take the synthesizer from the lab. It’s a one-of-a-kind prototype.” Meredith touched a gentle hand to Mort’s arm. “I’d count it as a personal favor if you could release it back to Audiology first thing Monday morning.”
Mort reached for the door knob. “I’ll think about it.”
Lydia grabbed a towel from the stationary bike and wiped the sweat off her face and neck. Her hour-long workout stretched into two as she struggled to stop the carousel of mental anguish.
Savannah was dead. Lydia climbed on the bike and pedaled fast. Savannah was dead. She leaned forward, aerodynamic to the misery flooding toward her. Savannah was dead. She increased her speed. Legs burning. Lungs bursting. Palms slick with sweat on the grips. Savannah was dead. Faster still. Gasping. Feet slipping off abused pedals. Chest collapsing onto the handlebars. One wail of pain into the empty room, and still Savannah was dead.
She heaved in life-affirming air and wished she could halt the instinct. The Fixer was out of business. Mort and his son had uncovered too much. She was useless. Drained. Worthless.
Her mind skipped to Mort and a hand went to the wooden whistle hanging from her neck. The whisper of hope struggling to be heard against a cacophony of self-loathing suffocated. Buried by the memory of Cameron staring at her that last day. Innocent eyes confused and frightened as Lydia aimed her gun.
Lydia whispered to the void, “I’m done”.
She tossed the sweaty towel into the hamper, climbed the basement stairs, rounded the corner into her kitchen, and stopped mid-step.
Two dozen red roses in a crystal vase stood on the counter next to her sink.
Lydia stood stock-still, listening for movement. Hearing none, she crossed to the counter and pulled the small card tucked into the thorny stems.
Well done, Fixer.
She swallowed hard. A throat spasm threatened. She ran to the sink and vomited. She didn’t bother to check the house. They could enter at will. They controlled her.
She rinsed her mouth clear, scrubbed the sink clean, and watched the swirling eddy rush down the pipe. She tore the florist card into tiny pieces and forced them down the drain.
Lydia walked back to the roses. She put her nose next to a perfect bud, breathed in the heavenly scent, and plunged her thumb into a thorn. She recoiled in pain, pulled her hand free, and counted the drops of blood that splashed onto the granite.
Meredith expected to see Carl in her office. She called him from the car on her way back from the trustee dinner for major donors. What she hadn’t expected was to walk in and see Bradley Wells sitting across from her desk. She viewed it as a stroke of efficient luck.
“Brad. I’m glad you’re here.” She draped her velvet coat over the credenza and used both hands to re-settle her hair. “Did you enjoy this evening?”
“Not really.” He threw Carl a pointed look. “Your conversation with Kellen seemed to have you captivated so I left without saying goodbye. I called Carl immediately. He said you were coming back and I made the decision to invade your meeting.”
Meredith glanced toward the cabinet on the far wall. Carl rose from his seat, opened the cabinet, and poured two shots of Smirnoff’s over ice. He brought the drink to Meredith and asked Wells if he wanted anything. Wells asked for scotch, neat.
“Carson Kellen is a good friend to the university. His family endowed two chairs in medicine and he and his wife contributed the first large gift to the pediatric library. I’m hoping his generosity will extend to a new genetics lab.” Meredith focused her attention on the chill the vodka traced down her throat. “He’s angling for a seat as trustee, you know.” She offered Wells a slow smile. “But I have another nominee in mind.”
Wells took the tumbler of scotch Carl offered him and stared into his glass. “I’m aware of that, Meredith. After what I heard this evening, however, my enthusiasm is waning. In fact, I’m beginning to question my association with the school at all.”
Meredith leaned against her desk. She set her own glass down. “What did you hear, Brad?”
Wells glanced at Carl and took a sip of scotch.
“You know my philanthropic philosophy. We had a long discussion about it when you first approached me.” He shot Carl another hard glance and Meredith asked if Wells wanted to speak privately.
“No,” Wells said. “It’s best you both hear what I have to say. You remember me telling you I don’t give to charities? That I invest in success?”
Meredith nodded. “I do. And we’ve used your investments well. You’ve been instrumental to our progress in so many ways.”
“There are rumblings, Meredith.” Wells turned in his chair to face her. “I’ve been a businessman long enough to know that major collapses generally start with the same low and persistent murmurs I heard this evening.”
Meredith furrowed her brow. “Rumblings? Murmurs? Of what sort and from whom?”
“The trustees. The donors.” Wells stood. “The university is in the headlines daily after the murders of Bastian and that researcher. That’s not the kind of publicity that bodes success.”
Meredith shook her head. “This is a large university in a major city, Brad. It’s an unfortunate artifact of society, but crime does exist. I’m sure the police will find the culprits soon and this will all be behind us.”
“And now Cameron’s dead.” Wells turned and walked three steps toward the door. “I heard this evening your interim neuroscience chair had a fiancé who recently suicided. That’s a lot of bodies, Meredith. I don’t care how big a school or city. These kinds of stories distract focus.”
“What am I supposed to do about that?” Meredith instantly regretted the shrill in her voice. “I’m not Batman. I have a university to run.”
Wells turned and faced her. “I’m beginning to doubt your ability. I learned tonight Bastian did as well. The poor bastard was trying to have you ousted, or so I’m told. Now Snelling tells me research dollars are down. Some might say catastrophically. The mounting murders, faculty lack of confidence, and now this financial crisis; Meredith I don’t see how I can continue my support.”
Meredith glared at Snelling. She’d asked him to keep the financials quiet until she developed a plan to address the shortfall. True to form, he’d been unable to keep from sharing every little secret he knows.
“Carl.” Her voice was cold. “Leave us alone.”
Snelling’s head did a quick bob and he hurried out of the office. Wells and Meredith stared at each other for several long moments. Meredith finally took a deep breath and forced a smile.
“I think we can find a mutually satisfactory solution to all this.” She motioned to the fireplace. “Let’s make ourselves comfortable and talk.”
“Damn it all to hell.” Mort had everything riding on the dogs. “They were chomping at the bit. They got nothing?”
Jim DeVilla thanked the canine patrol for their work and closed the door to Cameron’s shop. “Bruiser and I were with them every bark of the way, Mort. Noses to the ground right down to the water. Dogs can’t track what they can’t smell.”
Mort kicked his leg into empty air. “Call a dive team. Wells did Cameron, I know it. We find her body we’ll get something off it.”
“You gonna drag Puget Sound?” Jim held his friend’s stare. “Wells was at work when this went down. No fewer than thirty people can verify it.”
“Convenient, don’t you think?” Mort rubbed the back of his aching neck. “Don’t forget who he’s got on his rolodex. He sits back with thirty alibis while his goons do the wet work. But he’s good for this, Jimmy. Probably Bastian, too.”
“Guys like Wells have supermodels’ and movie stars’ numbers, too. You think he’s gonna stay lonely long?” Jimmy pulled a roll of mints from his jacket and popped a couple in his mouth before offering some to Mort and Bruiser. Mort took one. The dog took two. “Why would he risk offing Bastian and the caterer when he’s got Oscar nominees ready to be his date at the next White House dinner?”
Mort crushed his mint with grinding jaws. “Bastian humiliated him in front of the whole world. I don’t see Bradley Wells walking away from that.” He took a long look around Cameron’s shop. “Or maybe he thought with Bastian out of the way Cameron would come running back. When she didn’t, he got pissed. Look at all this blood, Jimmy. This is a crime of passion.”
“So now what?”
Mort took a seat at a bistro table and pushed out a chair for his friend. Bruiser clicked over to join them. “Now we connect the dots. Bastian to Buchner to Cameron. See if we’ve got enough to make a move on Wells.” He counted the steps on his fingers. “Buchner’s holding a voice synthesizer that proves a hired gun, code name Fixer, did Bastian. From what Robbie’s been able to uncover this Fixer doesn’t come cheap. Wells has the kind of dough that could bring her in. We can prove the money orders used to place the ads all came from Seattle. Buchner makes a second connection to the Fixer with that thank-you note. Hired guns don’t like to be remembered. The Fixer makes sure old Wally doesn’t get another chance to slip up. ”
“That connects Fixer to Bastian and Buchner,” Jimmy said. “We got nothing connecting the caterer. Besides,” Jim pulled his notebook from his jacket and flipped to a certain page. “Your number one pick for The Fixer, this Savannah Samuels? She was on a slab in an Olympia morgue when the caterer gets hit. And none of this connects Wells.”
“Work with me, Jimmy. Suppose Wells hires this Fixer to hit Bastian. Uses Buchner as his go-between.”
“You got anything connecting Buchner to Wells?”
“How about a starving grad student gets a call from the university’s biggest benefactor?” Mort asked. “Wells shows Buchner the tape of Bastian slaughtering Ortoo. We know Buchner’s an animal rights activist. Maybe he hooked him that way. Or how about Childress’ talk about research assistants living and breathing for their next endowment? Maybe Wells promises him a big fat check to underwrite his work on that voice-producing thing. All he has to do is go to the warehouse and hire The Fixer."
“You think Bucher’s got it in him to hire a hit?” Jim rubbed the spot between Bruiser’s ears.
“People do lots of things for money, Jimmy. If Wally became convinced there was no other way to stop Bastian’s research, he might justify it.” Mort leaned forward. “Let’s say The Fixer takes the job. Kills Bastian.” His voice endowed his developing theory with credibility. “Wells thinks he’s done. Bastian’s out of the way and he’s clear to win Cameron back. But Wally goes all sentimental and thanks The Fixer for a job well done. The Fixer goes rogue and takes Wally out. Wells learns about it in the morning papers. He couldn’t care less. In fact, maybe he feels like sending The Fixer a thank-you of his own for tying up a loose end.”
Jimmy nodded and gave a sly grin. “Or maybe it’s not The Fixer who took Buchner out. That would explain the different M.O.’s.”
Mort like that his friend was warming to his ideas. “That bloodbath at Buchner’s apartment isn’t like any of the hits we’ve tied to The Fixer, that’s for sure. It’s much more in tune with Wells’ pals from back in the day. But that wouldn’t explain why Savannah was so upset she went running to her psychologist crying about being responsible for Buchner’s death.”