All Mortal Flesh

FORTY-EIGHT

Russ kept his mouth shut and his eyes on the switchback he was negotiating.

“I should have guessed. Even this comes back to Clare Fergusson. Did she come running to comfort you as soon as she heard the good news?”

He saw Debbie’s lights in the rearview mirror. She had made the curve safely.

“Boy, is she going to be pissed off when she finds out I’m still alive.”

I’m not going to mention Lyle, he told himself. I’m not going to mention Lyle. That was serious, deep-talking, kick-in-the-guts stuff.

Linda was quiet as they went through another turn down the mountain. They were getting close to the public road. He hoped the plows had been through.

“So who do you think did it now? I mean, who would want to kill our cat sitter?”

Ours? It’s not my damn cat. “We’re looking for Dennis Shambaugh, her boyfriend. His fingerprints were at the scene, and he fled when I went to question him.” Linda had never much cared for hearing about the details of cases he worked on. It struck him that this was one of the most detailed discussions of a crime they had ever had. Of course, it was also the first time anyone had been killed in their kitchen.

“I can’t believe it,” Linda said. “My God, I met him. And then he turns out to be a murderer? I never would have guessed it.”

He slowed down but didn’t stop at the sign at the bottom of the Algonquin’s road. A quick look told him nothing was coming in either direction. He rolled onto the white and featureless expanse of Sacandaga Road.

“Where’d you meet him?” he asked.

“At the house. He dropped Audrey off.” She turned in her seat. “Who’s been taking care of Bobbitt?”

“Who’s Bobbitt?”

“My cat.”

“You named the cat Bobbitt? As in, Lorena Bobbitt?” He shook his head. “The responders took it to the county shelter.”

“You let them take her to the shelter?”

“I had a few other things on my mind than the damn cat, Linda.”

“I can’t believe you! You thought I was dead, and you didn’t even bother to keep the last living connection to me.”

“If you wanted me to have a connection with the cat, you might have tried telling me about it. Or-hey, here’s an idea! You get me to watch the cat while you’re gone instead of hiring a woman whose boyfriend is a convicted felon! Oh, but wait. That would have required you to mention that you were going to disappear for a week!”

The truck shimmied beneath him, and he realized he was going way too fast for the conditions. He took his foot off the gas.

“I’ve already apologized,” Linda said, her voice barbed. “I don’t know what else to say. I can’t undo it or make it not have happened.” She looked out her window. She didn’t say anything else. She didn’t have to. He recognized the words. She was throwing back what he had said to her the afternoon he told her about Clare.

“Look,” he said, “this is ridiculous.”

“It certainly is. You’re treating me like I’m one of your criminals. You say you thought I was dead. Didn’t you miss me? Aren’t you glad to see me?” She held her hands in front of her, as if asking for a higher power to give her an answer.

“Christ on a crutch. Of course I am.” He took one hand off the steering wheel and gripped her hand hard. “I was-part of me kept thinking you were going to show up at any minute, and then I’d realize what had happened. It was like getting knocked down by a tidal wave, over and over.” He drew their interlocked hands over to his thigh and hammered on his leg. “Now you really are here. I just need a little time to get my feet under me and catch my breath.”

“Silly man. Of course I’m really here.” She squeezed his hand and smiled at him. “If this helps us realize what we mean to each other, then it will have all been worth it, huh?”

Not to Audrey Keane. No. He wasn’t going to go there. He wasn’t going to ask Linda to be someone she wasn’t. He smiled back at her. She was here. She was back. Of course, that meant all their problems were back.

No. That wasn’t fair. He was the one who evidently needed something he hadn’t been finding at home. Linda had been perfectly content with their marriage.

Sure. She had gotten it out of her system with Lyle.

His pants pocket beeped loudly. “We must be back in signal range,” he said. “Would you grab my phone and see what messages I’ve got? I don’t want to take my hands off the wheel.” The snow-covered road blended imperceptibly with the snow-covered farmland, and the barbed-wire fences he knew marked out the pastures running alongside them were hidden by curtains of white and gray.

Linda wiggled his phone out of his pants and dialed his voicemail. She punched in his mailbox number and listened. “It’s your mother,” she said. “She’s worried about you. She wants to know where you are. She loves you. Call her.” Linda looked at him.

“Erase it.”

She beeped for the next message. “It’s… Ben Beagle from the Glens Falls paper. Wants to get a statement from you. No, an interview.” She frowned. “What’s the sensational event that happened at the station last night?”

His stomach lurched. “I’ll tell you later.” God. He was going to have to explain spending the night with Clare. Linda would never believe they hadn’t had sex.

“He leaves you a couple of numbers to reach him at.”

“Uh… better save it.”

She beeped again. “Oh, it’s Lyle.” She raised her eyebrows. “The state police caught Dennis Shambaugh, and he and… who? I didn’t catch that. Anyway, they’re going to Troop G headquarters for the questioning.” She smiled. “He says to call him if you find out anything about me. Isn’t that sweet?”

“Erase it.” How many times over the last seven years had she mentioned MacAuley with the same dismissive affection? Lyle was right-it hadn’t meant anything to her, not even enough to make her get twitchy or avoid the man. Russ didn’t know if that disturbed him less, or more.

“Harlene,” Linda said. “She wants to know if you’re anywhere near 645 Old Route 100 because… what? Meg’s boy Quinn? What a POI?”

“Person of interest. Linda-”

She frowned and held a hand up, listening. Her face changed. “Oooh. Now I get it. Reverend Fergusson is involved.”

He snatched the phone from her in time to hear Harlene’s recorded voice saying, “I’m looking for a responder, but we’re short, and with the storm and all-well, you know. Give me a call when you get this.” He hit repeat.

“Hey, Chief, it’s about two o’clock, and I need to know if you’re anywhere near 645 Old Route 100. It’s the home of, hang on, Craig and Vicki MacEntyre. You know we’ve had a couple-three animal killings lately? Somehow that Jensen woman put ’em together with two other unreported cases, and now Quinn Tracey is wanted as a POI. Reverend Fergusson thinks the boy may be at the MacEntyres’, and she’s headed over there. I tried to talk her out of it, I did. I’m looking for a responder-”

Russ stopped the message and hit the return call button.

“I thought you didn’t want to take your hands off the wheel,” Linda said.

He ignored her. Harlene came on the line. “Millers Kill Po-”

“It’s me,” he said. “You got anyone over at the MacEntyres’ yet?”

“Chief? Someone from the new hotel called and said your wife was back?”

“Yes. The MacEntyres’?”

“Oh. No. Flynn dispatched, but there was a bad crackup on the way and he’s handling traffic.”

“Have you heard from Reverend Fergusson?”

“Nothing new.”

“Why’s Quinn Tracey a suspect?”

“He plowed for all the victims.”

“All of them? And we’ve got a total of five cases?”

“Correct.”

“I’m on it. ETA five or ten minutes. I got nothing here, so for God’s sake get me backup as soon as you can.”

“Will do.”

Harlene hung up, and he had a second to appreciate the one woman in his life who didn’t argue with him or ignore what he said and do any damfool thing she liked, the one woman who did what he asked and told him what he needed to know in short sentences.

“You are not running off to get Clare Fergusson out of trouble,” Linda said.

“This is police business.”

“The hell you say. I heard that message, too. Quinn Tracey may know something about some animal killings.”

“Linda-”

“No! You let me finish! It is not like you have a hostage situation or a five-car pileup or whathaveyou. I know that boy. There’s no way he’s ever hurt anything in his life. Someone else can respond to that call.”

“Linda, we’re practically there. For chrissake, we have to go past 645 Old Route 100 to get to Mom’s house.”

In fact, he had reached the T-intersection. He slowed and put on his blinker. No cars coming in either direction. In his rearview mirror, he could see Debbie getting closer and closer. Too close. He pulled onto Old Route 100 just in time to avoid her front fender. She managed to stop before sliding into the intersection, at least.

“I’ll park nearby. You and Debbie can wait. I’ll only have to stay until Harlene can get an arresting officer on site.”

Linda sat, silent, as the heater blew and the wipers thumped and he hunched closer to the windshield, trying to stay on a road surface he couldn’t see. A cluster of rural delivery mailboxes materialized from the scrim of snow. He read the numbers. Not yet.

He drove on another mile, checking out two more mailboxes, until he found 645. The house itself was set far enough back to be all but invisible in the storm, but the dark bulk of the family’s barn loomed next to the road, disappearing upward into the ever-increasing gray.

He slowed, stopped, and finally located the MacEntyres’ driveway. He turned in, followed by his sister-in-law, but had to stop immediately in order to avoid running into a snow-covered Subaru.

Clare Fergusson’s Subaru.

“Wait here,” he said, reaching for his jacket.

Linda stared through the windshield. If she hadn’t known, the bumper stickers on the car would have given it away. Who else had both the THE EPISCOPAL CHURCH WELCOMES YOU and MY OTHER CAR IS AN OH-58?

“Listen.” Linda unbuckled and twisted in her seat to face him. Her voice was dead serious. “If you do this, I’m getting into Debbie’s car and going to her hotel.”

“Dammit, don’t act like a spoiled brat who’s going to hold her breath until she turns blue.”

“I mean it, Russ. You choose, and you choose now. It’s me or her.”

He could see she was upset. Her cheeks were two bright red spots against pale skin, and her jaw was rigid. But he could also see Clare’s face, that night. I’m not willing to buy my happiness with your marriage. And neither are you.

“I already chose,” he said, his voice harsh. “I chose you.”

“Then drive me home to your mother’s.”

He let out a breath of frustration. “This is police business.”

“Goddammit! You have never put our marriage first! Never! For twenty-five years I’ve been the one who has to understand. I’ve been the one who puts myself and my needs second so the marriage comes first! It’s time for you to put your money where your mouth is!”

“You put our marriage first? You mean, like when you threw me out of the house? Like when your entire life became the goddam curtain business? Like when you slept with Lyle MacAuley? Was that putting our marriage first?”

Linda turned white. Absolutely white.

“Wait,” he said. “I didn’t mean it.”

She opened her door and jumped out.

“Linda!”

She flung her seat forward and hauled her suitcase out with such force she spun around in the MacEntyres’ driveway. She slammed the truck’s door shut hard enough to set his ears ringing.

“Wait.” He scrambled out of the cab. “Linda, wait.” She waded through the snow, too far ahead for him to physically catch her. She reached Debbie’s rental car.

“Linda! Wait!”

The door slammed. He was almost there, close enough to see her snapping out something to her sister. Before he could reach the car, Debbie backed out of the drive.

“Goddammit!” The car’s rear wheels spun up twin fountains of snow, then lurched forward, fishtailing back down Old Route 100.

Goddammit. When he found Quinn Tracey, he was going to make that kid sorry he’d ever been born.