Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 103, No. 3 & 4. Whole No. 625 & 626, March 1994

Cruel Choices by E. L. Wyrick

© 1994 by E. L. Wyrick

Like one of the characters in his story, Georgian E. L. Wyrick makes his living as a school counselor. This first published fiction will be followed up later this year by Mr. Wyrick’s first novel, A Strange and Bitter Crop (St. Martin’s Press)...

Kevin Spurlock unsnapped the button under the belt on his plaid polyester pants and blew air through puffed cheeks. “Gettin’ too darned fat.”

Lucas Anderson ignored Spurlock’s self-evident revelation and leaned against the century-old water oak. He stroked his beaked nose slowly as he stared at the body that hung over the rotting porch railing of the dilapidated shack. Flashing blue and red lights from the police cars and the ambulance cut through the swirling October mist that fell from the black sky, creating a hue that washed out the color of the blood dripping from the victim. Lucas was grateful for that.

Spurlock scratched his navel. “Ninth murder just like this one in two years. It’s got to be the Dixie Mafia. I guarantee it.”

Lucas slid down the oak until his bony knees nearly reached his chin. “I’m telling you, Kevin, never, ever, say the words ‘Dixie Mafia’ to me again. I’ve told you a million times, it doesn’t exist.”

Spurlock hitched up his pants and said, “You got any better ideas?”

Lucas shook his head.

“Well, then, how about B. R. Matthews?”

Lucas ran his hands through his prematurely thinning hair. “The problem is, why?”

“Why? Who knows?” Spurlock pointed to the dead man. “Maybe these guys welshed or something.”

“They’re not all guys.” Two of the nine victims had been women.

Spurlock disregarded the correction. “You know as well as I do that B. R.’s into it all — gambling, auto theft, ’shine, drugs.” Spurlock snapped his pants together again. “Even if we can’t prove it, you know it’s true.”

Lucas nodded. When it became apparent the killings were not isolated domestic disputes, the first person he thought of was B. R. Matthews. But two years of investigation had uncovered no connections between Matthews and the victims. None.

And the murders were coming closer together. After the last shooting, Lucas had decided he had to try something to unsettle the guy who was doing this and at least slow him down. Lucas announced that he was close to an arrest, which was an absolute lie. Now it was obvious that the tactic had failed.

The rail-thin detective looked away when the EMTs pulled the body off the railing and placed it on a pallet. He’d seen eight other faces that had been blown away. Looking at another one wouldn’t help. He stood and tried unsuccessfully to rub the tension out of his tight shoulders. “I’m heading home.”

Spurlock dug in his navel again. “Me too. Gonna go see B. R. Matthews in the mornin’.”

Lucas opened the door of his 1972 Toyota Carina. He blinked the mist out of his eyes and said to Spurlock, “You do that.”

The man on the radio was saying something about a missile attack on Iraq, but Lucas wasn’t listening. Instead he squinted in confusion at the face of his clock radio that sat next to his bed. The red numbers indicated it was five o’clock, which was the same time the radio always turned itself on, but this morning was different. Most mornings, Lucas was already awake, lying there thinking, when the radio clicked and the news began. He had arrived home just after two and last remembered the red numbers turning to three-fourteen. His foggy mind tried to figure out the amount of sleep it had gotten, but it was having a hard time handling the process of subtraction.

Lucas lifted his hand to slap at the rarely used snooze button, then lowered it again. The teenaged voice from Teal County’s only radio station had begun reporting the local news, and the latest murder was the lead story. The detective lifted his pillow against the fiberboard wall of his fourteen-foot-wide trailer and listened to the scant details provided.

Now Lucas was wide awake. There was no doubt that the people at the radio station knew only a little less than he did. Lucas also knew that if last night’s shooting followed the pattern of the other eight murders, he might never know much more than he knew now. And he knew that his lack of knowledge would make it impossible to stay in bed, so he didn’t.

By five-twenty, the coffee was ready and the Patsboro Herald had arrived. As he did every morning, summer or winter, Lucas sat on the makeshift porch he’d fashioned in front of the trailer, drank coffee, and read the paper. The headline screamed that another murder had occurred. Lucas was amazed. The body had been discovered shortly after nine the previous night and the Herald never reacted so quickly. In fact, only one of the other murders had rated a headline. That was the one from McCarty’s Creek.

Lucas, who rarely used obscenities, said, “Damn,” and threw the paper down in disgust. That’s when he saw it. A note taped next to his door. He tore it down and read, “I’ll be leaving Fluffy with you tonight, if you don’t mind. I’m going to Hartwell to see Aunt Ruth and will be back the day after tomorrow.” It was signed, “Mama.”

“Damn,” Lucas said again, “The Gnat.” He hated that dog. His mama’s dog was a ball of white fur that stood about six inches tall and never stopped jumping and yapping. He couldn’t stand gnat dogs. He picked up the paper again and began reading. Even thinking about eight, now nine, unsolved murders was better than thinking about babysitting Fluffy.

By the time he finished reading the paper, and after going into the trailer for two more cups of coffee, rays from the rising sun were falling on the rolling hills that fronted the trailer. The clouds from the night before had moved to the east, leaving behind crisp, clean, clear air. Lucas slouched in his metal chair and stared at the scenery before him.

Something moved. Nothing ever moved on those hills at this time of the morning except an occasional deer, and what he saw was not a deer, but it was gone before he could see what it was.

Lucas leaned back in his cracked leather chair and gazed at the blackboard before him. This one was really black. He had procured it when the Teal County School District modernized and went from black to green. That had happened in 1990.

The victims’ names were listed on the board: Jim Landry, Sherry Drake, Roscoe Flinn, Terry Stark, Elvis Coulter, Martha Williams, Jason Barrett, Ted Black. But that was only eight.

Lucas walked around his desk and added Arthur Peterson, the victim from the night before.

During the past two years, the names had been put on the board and erased over and over as Lucas searched for connections. They’d been reordered based on arrest records, employers, occupations, hobbies, acquaintances — even places of birth. Nothing had come together.

As Lucas sat again, Tammi Randall walked into the room and sat in the chair next to Lucas’s desk. She crossed her legs carelessly. Lucas knew there was no message in that. He knew Tammi didn’t think of him in that way. For that, he was sorry.

“Number nine,” Tammi said.

“Yes.”

The two sat for a moment staring at the names on the board. Lucas broke the silence. “Got a client upstairs?” He nodded toward the ceiling. The Teal County Jail was one story above Lucas’s office.

“Wayne Myers.” Tammi recrossed her legs. She was an attorney for the Teal County Legal-Aid Society. While she and Lucas were usually on opposite sides in court, they had become friends when they were both involved with uncovering Jink Jarvis’s smuggling ring.

Lucas had arrested Wayne Myers. “That case is open and shut.”

“I know. I’ve read your reports.” Tammi rested her chin on a fist, unknowingly accentuating her sensuous lips. “Still have to be sure he’s treated fairly.”

Lucas nodded.

“It’s my job. Even when I know he’s guilty as grits.”

Lucas nodded again, then moved his eyes reluctantly to the blackboard. Tammi followed his gaze.

“I keep thinking about the kids,” Tammi said.

“The kids?”

“Yeah. I read obituaries. Got the habit from my mother.” She nodded at the board. “Every one of those people had kids.”

Lucas knew that, of course, but he hadn’t focused on it. He immediately worked through the odds. Nine murdered victims and all have children. Nothing special, he decided. Most folks had kids.

Except him.

“That is a shame,” Lucas said.

Tammi rose from her chair. “Well, time to go visit Wayne. Just can’t wait.” She departed, leaving the scent of Shalimar behind.

Lucas slid down in his chair, breathed deeply, then shook himself. He picked up the preliminary report from the Georgia Bureau of Investigation field men and found what he expected. It was just like the others. The victim was shot in the face by a .223-caliber round. The ballistics expert who was at the scene guessed that the range was more than a hundred yards. Because rifles, unlike some handguns, don’t leave signature markings on the bullet, the type of weapon would probably remain unknown. For reasons unknown to Lucas, he guessed a Ruger Mini 14, but it could just as easily be an M-16.

There were no other clues. Not a footprint, nor spent shell casings. No discarded cigarettes for DNA tests, no fiber evidence. No witnesses.

Nothing.

He stared at the names on the blackboard. Connections, he thought. “Kids,” he said aloud. He sat straight and turned to his filing cabinet. He pulled out eight thick folders that contained his notes from the first eight murders. He put them on top of the thin folder from last night’s shooting and pushed them across his desk toward the blackboard.

Lucas erased the victims names, then put them up again horizontally. He consulted the folders and wrote the names of the children on the board underneath each of their murdered parents’ names. When he finished, twenty-two children had been listed. He leaned on the edge of his desk and sighed. More than half of the brothers and sisters had different last names. So many broken families.

This is stupid, he thought. Without any physical evidence, finding connections among the victims was all he could hope for. But after two years of investigation, he’d found none. Were their kids connected? He didn’t know what to think.

Juvenile was downstairs in the basement. Lucas called and asked for Mack Bryson. If anybody could tell him something about the kids in the county, it would be Mack.

Bryson arrived five minutes later. “Seen the paper?” he asked.

“Yeah.”

“Made the headlines again. First time since the colonel got it at McCarty’s Creek. I guess eight poor folk equals one McCarty’s Creek.”

Eight of the nine murders had occurred in impoverished settings like the one from the night before — two from Elysian Fields, three from Stoney Bottom, one from Rat Row, and two from other isolated points of poverty. Two were women and seven were men. The fourth murder, the one from McCarty’s Creek, was different.

McCarty’s Creek was a new development of expensive homes designed to attract people from Atlanta to Teal County’s pastoral setting. Lucas was surprised when the GBI’s ballistics report came back positive. The shell was fired from the same gun as the others. He had figured that one was an anomaly.

“I could do without headlines,” Lucas said as he moved to the blackboard. “Quick question.” He pointed to the children’s names. “You recognize any of these?”

Mack answered immediately. “One big time. The rest, no.”

“Who’s big time?”

“Coulter. Bad news. Drugs mostly, but that got him involved in other stuff.”

“Like what?”

“I heard satanic.”

Lucas shifted his eyes toward the board. A moment passed. “Nobody else?”

“Nope. What’s the deal? Anything I should know?”

“Nah,” Lucas said as he sat in his chair again.

Mack was at the door. “I’d like to know about Coulter. Word is he’s improved a bunch since his daddy got it. I’d like to know if he’s backsliding. Wouldn’t surprise me.”

“Let you know.” As soon as I know something, Lucas thought with a sense of hopelessness.

The Teal County High School secretary sat behind a counter that was surrounded by students. Lucas squeezed between them to capture the harried woman’s attention.

“I’d like to talk to you privately,” Lucas said.

The secretary pushed her cat-eye glasses up her nose. “Gladly.” She motioned for Lucas to follow her to a room filled with file cabinets.

Lucas nodded toward the crowded counter. “What’s going on?”

“Pep rally this afternoon. Happens every time we have one. They want to check out. I have to talk to their parents before they go.”

“Why don’t they want to go to the pep rally?”

“No school spirit,” she said in disgust.

Lucas closed the door so he could hear. “I’m Detective Anderson. I need to talk to somebody about Joe Coulter.”

The secretary curled her lips. “Devil worshiper.”

“I heard he’s changed.”

“Those kind never change. Once Satan’s got ’em, it’s too late.”

“Who can I talk to?”

She pushed her glasses up again. “Probably his counselor. Coulter’s a ‘C’ so it’ll be Dan Rooker. Dr. Rooker, that is. He’s got A through F.”

“A through F?”

“Last names.” The secretary opened the door and pointed the way. She didn’t want to talk about Joe Coulter.

Dan Rooker leaned back in his chair. He was wearing a well-worn maroon sweater vest, maroon and silver striped tie, and brown Hush Puppies. His full beard was flecked with gray.

Lucas put his elbows on his knees and leaned forward. “I’m Detective Anderson.”

“Yes. I’ve read about you in the Herald. You’ve become the proverbial legend in your own time.”

Lucas buried his embarrassment and said, “I want to know something about Joe Coulter.”

“He in trouble?”

“No. Not at all. I’m investigating his father’s murder.”

“Stepfather,” Rooker corrected.

Lucas furrowed his brow. “His name was Coulter, just like Joe’s.”

“Mr. Coulter had an affair with his brother’s wife. He ended up marrying her.”

“So, he was Joe’s stepfather and...”

“... uncle.”

The two sat in silence for a moment. “Anyway, like I said, I’m investigating the murder.”

Rooker cupped his face in his right hand. “Probably the best thing that ever happened to Joe.”

“His stepfather being murdered?”

“Proof is in the pudding. Joe’s doing much better.”

“Tell me about him.”

Rooker pulled on his beard. “He’s a good kid.”

“The juvenile authorities have a different opinion.”

“Look, Detective. Joe comes out of a bad situation. Terrible background. His stepfather was rotten. That’s why Joe did all those things.”

“What’d his stepfather do to Joe?”

Dr. Rooker didn’t respond.

“What did he do?” Lucas repeated.

“Have you heard of a code of ethics?” Rooker asked.

This time Lucas didn’t respond.

“I am a counselor.” Rooker waved his arm. “What goes on in here is private.”

“We’re talking murder.”

“Get a court order,” Rooker said curtly.

That was the end of the conversation. Lucas walked out of the counselor’s office and stood in the hall. He hadn’t gotten Jink Jarvis without perseverance. If the counselor wouldn’t help, or couldn’t, maybe the principal would.

The principal did talk. He made it clear he wanted to get rid of the kid. “Panthers’ spots don’t change,” he said.

“Panthers are black,” Lucas said. “They don’t have spots.”

“Same thing.” He called Coulter from class to prove it.

Joe Coulter was pasty white. He had fine but curly hair worn in a bush that fell on his shoulders. Homemade tattoos of hypodermic needles and pentagrams had been etched onto his arms. The sleeves were cut off his jean jacket.

Lucas identified himself and asked the boy about his stepfather who was also his uncle.

“I know who you are. You think I did it. You think I killed him.”

Lucas responded instinctively. He figured this was a kid he couldn’t mess with. Coulter would be on top of mind games in a second. Lucas just shrugged.

“I didn’t off him, but I’m glad the bastard’s gone.”

“Watch your language, young man,” the principal said. He shrank in his chair at Coulter’s look.

Lucas said, “It’s my job to find out who killed him. Got any ideas?”

Coulter put his hands behind his head and intertwined his fingers. “Somebody who can shoot.” He put his hands before him as though he were holding a rifle. “Boom.”

Lucas questioned the teenager for another half-hour. Too much time had passed since his stepfather’s murder to establish Coulter’s whereabouts on that night. Instead, Lucas asked where Coulter had been the previous night, during the time of the latest killing. He’d been home alone. His mother worked the second shift at the mill. Did he know the children of the other victims? He said he’d seen them around, but that was all. Did he hunt? Coulter said he used to. He hunted narcs. That’s the way it went.

Lucas wondered what this kid had been like before he improved. Lucas also pondered Coulter’s knowing who he was and the movement he had seen on the hills in front of his trailer that morning. Despite the wondering, when the interview was over, Lucas only knew that Coulter did not have an alibi for last night. Not much.

The principal had enjoyed the interrogation, so after expressing halfhearted reservations, he allowed the detective to interview the rest of the victims’ children and stepchildren, but not the McCarty’s Creek teenager. That would require parental permission.

As it turned out, not being able to talk to the boy from McCarty’s Creek didn’t matter. Interviewing the remaining children took four and a half hours, and school was out by then anyway.

Lucas walked down the empty school corridors and thought about the day. Except for Coulter’s attitude and a shaky alibi, none of the interviews had provided an iota of a clue as to possible connections between the children or with the murders of their parents.

What a waste of time, Lucas thought. Unless, of course, Coulter panned out. He figured the chances of that were about as good as Detective Spurlock finding something on B. R. Matthews. It was doubly depressing to think he was following in Spurlock’s footsteps.

Lucas’s head was down in thought, so he didn’t see the secretary when she walked out the door. He bumped into her and grabbed her elbow to keep the woman from falling.

She pushed her glasses up her nose indignantly. “They did it, didn’t they?”

Lucas released her elbow. “Who?”

She looked up and down the hall and whispered, “Joe Coulter and William Barrett.”

Lucas wasn’t surprised at Coulter. He didn’t understand her suspicion of Barrett. He was the kid from McCarty’s Creek.

Lucas shrugged. “I don’t know.” He wanted to gain her confidence, so he emulated her caution and looked toward both ends of the empty hall. He said quietly, “Why do you think William Barrett had anything to do with it?”

“Dungeons and Dragons.”

“What?”

“In the library. Every day during lunch. He plays Dungeons and Dragons on the computer.” The secretary pushed her glasses up again and nodded knowingly. “It’s Satan’s work.”

Lucas was tired. He’d had precious little sleep the night before. Now he wanted to go home, have a beer, and go to sleep.

But he couldn’t. He hadn’t talked to William Barrett yet. Lucas had thought that could wait, but the secretary’s revelation changed his mind. For Lucas Anderson, unraveling Teal County crime was his life. Other than his trailer and the Toyota, his reputation for doing that was all he had.

He drove to McCarty’s Creek.

The Barrett house sat on the crest of a hill that overlooked the subdivision. To its rear was a pasture that had provided a clear shot from the woods on the other side. William Barrett’s father had been sitting next to the pool drinking a gin and tonic when he was shot.

Lucas talked to the mother first. She was reluctant to allow the detective to question her son. She said he was just recovering from the shock of his father’s death. She added that shortly before the murder, his father had told William that he had been adopted as an infant. Two jolts within a month. Now, his grades had improved and he was beginning to lose some of his lifelong shyness. She didn’t want him traumatized again.

Lucas told her that his questions would be gentle. He wouldn’t discuss the murder. He only wanted to ask William about some other students at school. Finally, the mother agreed.

When the mother left the living room to find her son, Lucas took advantage of her absence to look around. It had been over a year since he had been in the home, and at the time he hadn’t focused on it. The murderer had obviously not come near the house. In fact, Lucas had seen nothing of it except this living room, where the victim’s wife had answered questions about her husband.

The living room featured French doors that led to the pool area. Doors to the right led to a dining room, the kitchen, and the entrance foyer with stairs to the second story. A door to the left was closed. Lucas approached it, looked around, turned the knob quietly, and pushed it gently. The door swung open to reveal a study.

A fireplace surrounded by bricks stood on the opposite side of the room from where Lucas stood. There was a massive desk to his right. The pictures hanging on the wall behind the desk were shots of William’s father while he was in the marines. An elaborate and fully stocked wet bar stood next to the desk. Lucas’s attention was drawn to the wall to the left of the fireplace.

A finely crafted teak display cabinet ran the length of the wall. The detective wanted to go look, but was afraid William and his mother would return. He had no warrant and the door had been closed. He didn’t want to find something that he couldn’t use in court. That drove him crazy because the cabinet was filled with weapons.

Colonel Barrett had been a collector. The case contained pistols, shotguns, and rifles. The distance from the door was too great for Lucas to identify the rifles, but he assumed several were capable of firing a .223-caliber round at a hundred yards with accuracy. When Lucas heard footsteps coming down the stairs, he closed the door and returned to the chair in which he had been sitting.

The boy walked behind his mother. She reached back and tugged on his arm before he came into full view. William was small for his age. His pale face contained delicate features. His hair was of medium length and bangs fell across his forehead. When he moved to the sofa to sit, Lucas noticed his graceful gait. Lucas wondered how Colonel Barrett had felt about the feminine son he had adopted.

Lucas said he was investigating the father’s death and apologized for bringing up a painful memory. The boy nodded. Lucas questioned him as he had the others and heard similar answers. William knew some of the other victims’ children, but none were close friends. He had seen Joe Coulter, but had never talked to him. He had spent the previous evening alone in his room playing Nintendo. His voice was flat.

When Lucas asked about Dungeons and Dragons, William’s mother spoke. “You weren’t supposed to play that anymore.”

For the first time William’s face showed some emotion. His thin, rosy lips pressed together and his eyes narrowed. “That’s when I was younger. I’m older now.”

His mother glanced at Lucas. “We’ll talk about that later.”

Lucas tried to figure out some way to be invited to look at the guns in the den, but couldn’t think how to do it. He didn’t want to spook the boy.

Not yet, anyway.

Something was all over his face, licking and yapping. Lucas reflexively swatted at it and felt something furry go flying, followed by a yelp. He opened his eyes, and in the reflection from the light of the full moon that seeped through the jalousied window above his head, saw a snow-white blob of fur jump at him from the floor. He swung again, harder, and this time the dog got the message. This time she stayed on the floor and yipped.

Lucas rubbed his eyes and looked at the clock radio. Four forty-five. He leaned over the edge of his bed and yelled, “Shut up!”

Responding to the attention, Fluffy jumped up and down and increased her pitch.

After throwing his pillow at the frenetic dog, Lucas sat up and subtracted. This time, it wasn’t difficult. He’d collapsed at nine the night before, and immediately knew he’d had plenty of sleep. He got up, opened the metal door of his trailer to let the dog out, and started the coffee maker.

The paper hadn’t arrived yet, so Lucas sat on the porch and waited. When the paperwoman’s VW pulled into Lucas’s dirt driveway, Fluffy ran toward the noisy car. “Damn,” Lucas said in disappointment when the VW missed the dog, but the close call caused Fluffy to run whimpering under the trailer.

Lucas turned on the porch light and skimmed through the rehash of old news from the murder of two nights before. He had retrieved another cup of coffee before he read the editorial. It was about the murders. It was about how it was time for the Teal County Sheriff’s Department to do something about them. Hadn’t over a month passed since Detective Anderson said he was close to making an arrest?

Lucas threw the paper down, as he had done the morning before, and said harshly to the empty landscape before him, “You screwed up, Lucas. Big time.” At the sound of Lucas’s voice, Fluffy appeared and peed on the paper.

Just as he bent and kicked at Fluffy, Lucas heard a whistling by his left ear, followed immediately by a thud from the trailer wall behind him. He immediately recognized what was happening. He’d heard that whistling once before. He fell face down on the plywood floor of his porch and covered his head. Fluffy yelped and began licking Lucas’s face happily.

Lucas grabbed the dog and threw her off the side of the porch, then he followed her just as another thud sounded behind him.

The dog, excited at the prospect of unexpected play, followed Lucas as he rounded the trailer. Lucas curled behind the concrete-block supports and rubbed under Fluffy’s snout. When ten minutes had passed, Lucas knew it was over. This man, or child, or whoever was shooting at him, wouldn’t wait around. Lucas knew that.

Lucas grabbed the dog’s head and held her still. “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but, Gnat, you are one hell of a dog.”

Lucas was in his office staring at the blackboard full of names, just as he’d done for two years. Before this morning, he’d felt depressed as he studied the constantly reordered information that had gotten him nowhere.

Now he was angry, and that troubled him. The anger should have come simply because innocent citizens were being murdered. Hadn’t he said in his interview with the Georgia Police Academy ten years ago that he wanted to be a law enforcement officer because of his deep concern for his fellow citizens? Yet before the attempt on his own life, he’d felt nothing but depression about his own diminishing reputation. He should have been angry, he told himself, that such things as these murders could happen.

Lucas shook his head. “Maybe you’re human after all,” he said to the empty room.

He ran a hand through his hair and shook his head again, and then concluded aloud, “So if you’re angry, use it.”

When Tammi had mentioned the kids, Lucas had felt a slight click. It wasn’t an “aha,” but it was enough to act on.

Teal County wasn’t New York City or Houston or San Francisco. There were no gangs or cults. Kids here didn’t kill their parents.

But...

He thought of Joe Coulter.

Lucas had been to a seminar in Atlanta on satanic cults. He’d heard some amazing stuff about human sacrifices and indescribable sexual activities among children. He also learned about how deceptive the kids who were involved could be.

But nine murders with no clues. Impossible. Maybe Satan could do it, but not his children. They’d make a mistake. And could any kid shoot so well from more than a hundred yards?

Maybe, if one kid’s father was a former Marine who collected guns.

He looked over the notes he had made after his interview with William Barrett. His eyes were drawn to the last line.

“I’m older now.”

Age. Again.

Lucas grabbed the phone and called the school secretary. When she refused his request, he asked to speak to the principal. The principal gladly provided the birth dates for each of the children of the murder victims. After some quick calculations, the connection was obvious. Every victim had a child who was thirteen, or about to turn thirteen, at the time of the murder. But what did that mean? What was it about the age thirteen?

The age of transition. The age when all hell breaks loose. Unlucky number. Evil number.

Then he thought of something else. The lecturer at the Satan seminar had described some of the rituals. A common thread was saying things backwards. The Lord’s Prayer, for example. Was thirteen a lucky number for Satanists?

Some kind of initiation — kill a parent?

Lucas shook his head. “You’re reaching, big time,” he said to the empty room.

Still...

Lucas leaned back in his chair and blew air. He decided he’d return to the school and check the kids’ schedules from the beginning of their high-school careers. That would take some time. Teal County High School held grades eight through twelve. He’d see if the kids had classes together. Maybe homeroom. He assumed the counselor wouldn’t consider schedules to be confidential. If he did, he figured the principal wouldn’t.

He looked at the blackboard through squinted eyes. All those names were swimming in front of him. How many more people, and now maybe Lucas himself, would be blown away while he looked for connections by moving the kids’ names all over the board and drawing lines as he had done for their murdered parents?

Or stepparents?

Lucas clucked his tongue, thinking again about the broken families. He looked at the children’s last names and counted the stepchildren.

A moment later, Lucas’s vision cleared. He sat straight up in his chair and stared at the names on the board.

Stepchildren!

That’s when it happened — the “aha!”

Lucas moved to the blackboard. First he wiped out all the names of children under twelve. Then he erased Heather Landry, who was Kim Franklin’s stepsister. Larry Stark, stepbrother to Richard Crew, was next. Then Hamp Williams. His stepsister was Joanne Blevins. Then Jeff Peterson was gone. He left Joe Coulter’s and William Barrett’s names. They connected. All of them connected. Every dead parent still had a child on the board.

The large number of broken families had blinded him to the coincidence that should have been obvious.

Lucas knew who had murdered the parents. He didn’t know why, but he knew who. All he had to do now was find the rifle that matched the bullets, and he was certain he knew where it was.

Kevin Spurlock walked in the room. “I know B. R. did it. I stayed on him all day yesterday and I’m goin’ back right now. I guarantee you it has somethin’ to do with gamblin’, drugs, or cars, or ’shine.” Before Spurlock could sit down, Lucas grabbed him and steered him out the door.

“Hey, what you doing?”

“Going to the courthouse. I need your help.”

“About time,” Spurlock said.

“How can I help you?”

“I need to talk to you about Joe Coulter again.”

Today, Dr. Rooker was wearing gray Hush Puppies. “Glad to, except for what’s confidential.”

Lucas stroked his nose. “I need to know about some other kids too.” He took a pad from his coat pocket. “William Barrett, Kim Franklin, Richard Crew, Mariah and Melissa Drake, Rich Flinn, Kalli Black, Phil Blevins, Greg and Jeff Daniels.”

Dr. Rooker nodded and rested his elbows on his chair. “All good kids.”

“Even Coulter?”

“Victim of circumstance,” Dr. Rooker said. “The principal told me you talked to him. I talked to Joe and he told me what he said, so that part’s not confidential. His stepfather was horrid. Alcoholic. One time he got drunk and vomited. He rubbed Joe’s face in it. Tell me, Detective, what would you be like if you’d lived Joe’s life?”

“It’s horrible, I’m sure, but that’s no excuse for murder.”

A beep came through Dr. Rooker’s telephone. The secretary announced a call on line one for Detective Anderson. Dr. Rooker handed Lucas the phone.

Lucas said, “Good. That’s what I thought. Thanks.” He put the phone in its cradle.

Lucas looked at Dr. Rooker. “You’re A through F.”

“What?”

“The way your counseling staff divides up the students. You’re A through F.”

Dr. Rooker caressed his beard.

“For example,” Lucas said as he sat straight in his chair and glanced at his notebook, “you counsel kids with last names like Coulter, Barrett, Franklin, Crew, Drake, Flinn, Blevins, Black, and Daniels. Those are your clients.”

Dr. Rooker slumped slightly.

“That was Detective Spurlock on the phone. We got a search warrant. He found the rifle. A Ruger Mini 14 with a night scope attached. It’s on the way to the GBI for ballistics.”

Dr. Rooker swiveled in his chair, away from Lucas. “I know... you know... what it’s like. You see it just like I do.”

“What, Dr. Rooker?”

Rooker swiveled around quickly. “Day after day they come in here. Year after year. Kids who exist in a living hell. A long time ago I thought I could make a difference. Help them adjust.” His voice cracked.

“Isn’t that what counselors do?”

Rooker’s fingers supported his forehead. “That’s what you think when you’re just out of school.” He pounded his fist on the arm of the chair when he said, “But it’s impossible! What can I do about parents who are drunkards or dopeheads and abusers? What can I do when the kid has to eat his stepdaddy’s vomit?”

“You call Family and Children’s Services,” Lucas said.

Rooker laughed sarcastically. “Yeah, right. And the kid’s back in the home within weeks. Months if he’s lucky.” The counselor rubbed his face with his hands, then held them still. “I used to tell them, wait. Just wait and hang in there and in a few years, you can be out on your own.” He rested his face on his fingers and shook his head. “That is not good enough.”

“So you took care of it yourself.”

Rooker pounded his fist again. “Yes! Every one of those kids has a whole new life and I can prove it.” He pulled out a raft of folders from his desk drawer. “Better grades. Teacher evaluations praising improved behavior. Club activities.” He threw the folders at Lucas’s feet. “It’s all there.”

Lucas let the folders lie. The detective wanted to mention that he had no kids. He hadn’t abused anybody, and yet only a gnat dog had saved him.

But Lucas didn’t say anything. His anger had diminished. “You can’t kill people, Doctor.”

Rooker stared at Lucas. Tears emerged from the counselor’s eyes. “Maybe you don’t know what it’s like.” He unbuttoned his left sleeve and pulled it up.

Lucas winced involuntarily at the sight. He’d seen it before — scar tissue left from cigarette bums.

Rooker let his sleeve drop. He said quietly, “Detective Anderson, the death of the spirit is much harder than the death of the body. Sometimes... life forces cruel choices.”

And then Dr. Rooker wept.