“I need you to stay back, Mr. Zubatov. This man could be dangerous,” said the cop.
“Sergei!” I shouted over my shoulder. “You tell this officer who I am or, I swear to God, you will
never
get Ash’s white chocolate truffle and Amaretto cake recipe!”
“Steady on, Bradley. Threats like that will only cause me to
dessert
you.”
“Do you know this guy?” the trooper asked Sergei.
There was a slight pause, and I knew that Sergei was weighing the loss of a great recipe against a few more moments of devilish amusement. Finally, he said, “Yes, I do. He’s Bradley Lyon and he works for Sheriff Barron. I stopped to tell you that . . . and to take a couple of photographs that we can chuckle over later. Right, Bradley?”
“Oh, the fun we’ll have,” I grumbled. Then I said to the trooper, “May I please stop assuming the position?”
“Yes, of course, and I’m sorry, sir,” said Fuller. “I just transferred here from Richmond last month, so I’m still getting to know the local cops.”
“And you’ve met the local greasy-spoon operator,” I said as I turned around and rested my butt against the bumper to take the weight off my left shin.
“Yes, sir, I eat at Mr. Zubatov’s place a couple times a week.” Fuller bit her lip as I rotated my left ankle and gritted my teeth. She said, “Your leg really is hurt.”
“Yep.”
“I’m sorry.”
“No need to be.” I cautiously stood up. “The car does reek of dope and I
was
speeding. I was on my way to the Massanutten Crest Lodge to chase down a hot lead on a potential homicide I’m working.”
Fuller radioed her dispatcher to cancel her backup and then handed my badge case and pistol back to me. “Here. No hard feelings?”
“About you drawing down on me? None. If I were in your place, I’d have done exactly the same thing.” I turned to Sergei as I slipped the gun back into my shoulder holster. “
You
, however . . . And what exactly did you mean when you said you were taking pictures?”
Sergei held up his cell phone, and his grin grew even broader. “What I wouldn’t have given for a tiny telephone that doubled as a camera back during the old days. And just wait until you see the photos. You have this exquisite woebegone look.”
“I’m glad I was able to brighten your day and I’d love to hang around and let you torment me some more, but I’ve got to run,” I said, limping toward the driver’s door of the Aztek. “I’ll see you later tonight.”
“Good, but until then, give this some thought: Where can I put a poster-sized framed copy of that picture?” Sergei asked merrily as he followed me.
“Actually, I know the perfect place you can put it. But don’t get a frame with glass. It’ll just hurt that much more.” I shut the car door and resumed my journey to the lodge.
Driving through town, I passed the Remmelkemp Mill Apostolic Assembly, where I saw that the pastor, Terry Richert, and another guy had just finished hanging a banner above the church community center’s door. The sign read, TEDDY BEAR SHOW, SATURDAY, 9 A.M.-4 P.M. I honked and waved, while making a mental note that I had to finish Bear-atio’s trousers sometime tonight.
The Massanutten Crest Lodge is about five miles west of town and stands high on the east side of the mountain. It’s located in an alpine landscape, which is why I guess the resort consortium modeled the place after King Ludwig II of Austria’s famous fairytale-like Neuschwanstein Castle. Tourist guidebooks describe the large hotel as looking imposing, but I think the kitschy Sleeping Beauty castle looks as out of place in the Virginia mountains as an ashtray in a hospital room.
The oval-shaped driveway in front of the faux barbican entrance to the hotel was gridlocked with luxury cars and even a couple of limos. Then I remembered it was Friday and the weekend guests were arriving. That likely meant I’d wait for God knows how long for someone to find the hotel’s security director for me, and I was already racing the clock to contact Marilyn Tice. Fortunately, I noticed a road sign that read EMPLOYEE SERVICES with an arrow pointing left. I made a left turn and followed the road around the side of the building.
The employee administration offices were located at the back corner of the hotel. I parked the car, and as I got out, Kitch began to jump up and down and whine, indicating that he had to make a potty call. There was no telling how long I’d be in the hotel, so I hooked the leash to his collar and let him out of the car. I figured I’d come back for the police radio, so I grabbed my cane and led Kitch toward a grassy and wooded embankment behind the hotel. There were brown piles of leaves scattered on the slope, and it looked as if the hotel gardeners had been tidying the grounds in the wake of the rain.
I don’t know why, but Kitch is pretty particular about where he goes to the bathroom. He wanted to smell every tree and bush, and before long, we were behind the hotel. As Kitch snuffled at one of the piles of leaves, I glanced over at the loading docks. That’s when I saw the late-1970s black Dodge pickup truck parked near a short flight of steps that led to a door. I squinted to see the license plate and recognized the alphanumeric sequence from the wanted flyer that hung on the bulletin board at the sheriff’s office. It was Chet Lincoln’s truck.
There was no time to ponder why Chet was there, because at that same moment, the door opened and a bald-headed man emerged from the building. He was looking downward at something he held together in his hands at about chest height. I couldn’t be certain, but the man’s posture suggested he was counting currency.
Game Warden Randy Kent was right. Chet
did
look a lot like the cartoon mascot Mr. Clean, but there were a couple of major differences. The poacher wasn’t wearing a big gold hoop earring, and instead of Mr. Clean’s sparkling white togs, Chet was dressed in grungy jeans and a black sweat-shirt that bore the message GOT AMMO? stenciled across his chest in white letters.
When Chet reached the top of the stairs, he finally looked up. That’s when he noticed me. We stared at each other for a second or so, and even though I leaned on a cane and had Kitch, I could tell that he somehow knew I was the law. Maybe all those years of hunting had imparted in Chet an instinctive awareness of a fellow predator. And now, recognizing that he was the prey, he darted down the stairs toward the pickup.
I shouted, “Hold it right there, Mr. Lincoln! We need to talk!”
By then, Chet had already thrown the truck door open and dived behind the wheel. I knew there was no way I could get to the truck before it took off, and pulling my gun wasn’t an option either. Chet hadn’t attacked me, and technically the only reason he was wanted was for a poaching warrant, which wasn’t a violent crime . . . at least as far as humans were concerned. The best thing I could do was immediately contact the sheriff’s department and get a patrol car rolling in this direction. However, I’d brilliantly left the police radio in the car.
Chet was just firing up the Dodge’s engine as I jammed my right hand into my coat pocket to retrieve the cell phone. With any luck, the day-shift dispatcher wasn’t a fan of crossword puzzles and she’d answer the phone quickly. Then things got really interesting. Oblivious to the drama unfolding before him, Kitch had finally selected the piece of greenery he wanted to irrigate. He lunged for the tree just as I began to pull the phone out. Unfortunately, I had the dog leash looped around my right wrist and the sudden jerk caused the phone to catapult from my hand. I watched it sail end over end and disappear into the large mound of leaves.
The Dodge roared away from the loading dock and headed toward the highway at a breakneck speed. Meanwhile, I’d let go of the leash and was on my hands and knees, frantically searching through the wet and slimy leaves for the freaking phone. By the time I found it and called the sheriff’s department, Chet was long gone. It was galling. This was the second time in less than twenty-four hours that a member of the Lyon family had allowed a criminal to escape.
All in all, it hadn’t been a great moment with Mr. Lincoln.
Ten
I took Kitch back to the Aztek and dried his paws with some fast-food-joint napkins I’d found in the glove compartment. Then backup arrived in the form of a humming white golf cart with a flashing yellow light on its roof. The lodge’s security director, Leonard “Linny” Owen, was behind the wheel.
I’d met Linny more than a year earlier while giving his personnel some training on identity theft prevention. Since then, I’d come to both mildly like and pity him. He was the nephew of the hotel’s owner and basically a clueless and somewhat rotund nice guy trying to masquerade as a dynamic and hard-nosed security boss. However, the charade wasn’t fooling his employees, as evidenced by the nickname they’d given him. Linny thought it was an affectionate diminutive of
Leonard
, but one of the guards had told me the name in fact derived from Linny the Guinea Pig, a plump, talking rodent from some kids’ animated TV series called
The Wonder Pets
.
Linny clambered from the cart. “Hey, Brad, did you see a big black pickup truck speeding through the lot?”
“Yeah, the truck belongs to a guy named Chester Lincoln. He knew that I knew that he has an arrest warrant, so he took off.”
“What the heck was he doing here?”
“That’s an excellent question, Linny. The truck was parked next to the loading docks and I saw Chet come out the back door.”
“His last name is Lincoln? It doesn’t ring any bells, but I’ll check the employee roster to see if he has any relatives working here. Count on it, I’ll get some answers,” said Linny as he slammed his fist into the palm of his other hand and jutted his fleshy jaw out, reminding me of an oversized guinea pig
Il Duce
.
I bit my lip to stifle a smile. At the same time, I realized that Linny’s idea was a wise one and told him so.
He said, “So, did you come up here about the Saab being stolen? Have you found it? Ms. Driggs is very upset.”
“No, we haven’t. Sorry. And hey, what was this I heard about the lightning frying your security cameras?”
Even though we were alone, Linny furtively glanced back and forth. “I’d really appreciate it if you kept that under your hat. We lost sixteen cameras, and I don’t have the spare twelve grand in my security budget to replace them and all the wiring.”
“So ask your manager for some extra money.”
“I would, but, well . . . back when I had this new surveillance system installed, he suggested that I add lightning arresters and surge protectors. But that was expensive, and I’d already told my uncle that I was going to come in under budget. So . . .”
“You didn’t follow the manager’s advice, and you don’t want to let him know that.”
Linny nodded glumly. “Or my uncle.”
“Yeah, you’ve got a problem. Look, I’ll talk to Ms. Driggs if you think it’ll help, but right now I need to interview one of your hotel employees.”
“Thanks, Brad. Who do you want to talk to?”
“Marilyn Tice. My information is that she’s on the housekeeping staff.”
“Yeah, the second-floor team. What’s this about?”
“It’s still kind of confidential. But I can assure you that she isn’t a suspect in a crime,” I said, adding a silent
For now
.
I’ll get her myself,” said Linny as he climbed back into the golf cart. “Go ahead and park in one of the handicapped spaces in front of the hotel and I’ll meet you in the security office.”
“Thanks, but I forgot to bring my handicapped hanging placard.”
“Don’t worry. I’ll advise my people.”
Linny drove off. I poured some bottled water into the metal bowl I’d brought along and let Kitch have a drink before I put him back into the car. Then I went around to the main entrance of the hotel, parked, and slowly made my way through the chaotic lobby to the elevators. The security department offices were located in the basement. With its stark cement walls and overhead fluorescent lighting, this part of the medieval-themed hotel was ruthlessly modern.
The door to the security department opened into a small suite of offices. To the left and visible through a large plate-glass window was the security video monitoring room, where a woman sat in semidarkness apparently watching thirty or so color television monitors set in a bank of three even tiers. On the opposite side of the room was a closed door with a sign indicating that it was Linny’s personal office. I glanced a second time at the video control booth and had one of those annoying yet unidentifiable feelings that something didn’t look quite right.
However, I couldn’t give the matter any further thought, because Linny came swaggering into the security office. A weary-looking middle-aged woman wearing a pale blue housekeeping uniform followed him, keeping her gaze aimed at the floor. It was obvious from Marilyn Tice’s demeanor that I’d arrived too late. She’d already spoken with her husband.
“Marilyn,” Linny began gravely, “this is Brad Lyon from the sheriff’s office, and he wants to talk to you.”
She barely nodded.
Inclining my head in the direction of his office, I said, “Linny, do you mind if we use your personal office? It might be better if we had a little privacy.”
“Be my guest. I’m going over to human resources to check out the employee list.” Then Linny pivoted to face Marilyn and pointed a pudgy finger at her. “I want to remind you again of our company policy of cooperating fully with local law enforcement. You do like working here, don’t you?”
“Yes, sir,” Marilyn whispered.
“Then answer this man’s questions. I’ll be back in a little while, Brad.”
I winced inwardly. The twit thought he was helping me, but ham-handed tactics like that usually backfired. Even if Marilyn provided a statement, she could later recant it, claiming she’d been under duress. So the first order of business was to make sure she understood that the security director hadn’t threatened her on my behalf.
Once Linny was gone, I gently said, “Look, Mrs. Tice, ignore what that blowhard just said. As far as I’m concerned, you’re here voluntarily. If you’ve got nothing to say, that’s fine. If you want to leave right now, that’s fine, too.”