Lethal Read online

  She defied him with her glare, her upright posture, her sheer force of will. Telling him to go straight to hell was on the tip of her tongue.

  But Emily giggled.

  In her sweet, piping voice she addressed something to the characters on the program, then squealed in delight and clapped her hands.

  Honor’s bravado evaporated. She lowered her defiant chin, and rather than telling him to go to hell, she said, “There’s a storage box under the bed.”

  Chapter 6

  It wasn’t a long commute between Tom VanAllen’s home and the FBI’s field office in Lafayette. Often, he considered it not long enough. It was the only time of his day in which he could switch off and think of nothing more complicated than to stay in his lane and drive within the speed limit.

  He wheeled into his driveway and acknowledged that his house looked a little tired and sad compared to others in the neighborhood. But when would he have time to do repairs or repaint when something as necessary as mowing the lawn was only done sporadically?

  By the time he entered through the front door, those self-castigating thoughts had already been pushed aside by the urgency of the situation in Tambour.

  Janice, having heard him come in, hurried into the entryway, cell phone in hand. “I was just about to call you to ask when you’d be home for lunch.”

  “I didn’t come home to eat.” He took off his suit jacket and hung it on the hall tree. “That multiple murder in Tambour—”

  “It’s all over the news. The guy hasn’t been caught yet?”

  He shook his head. “I’ve got to go down there myself.”

  “Why must you? You dispatched agents early this morning.”

  Royale Trucking Company conducted interstate trade. When the carnage was discovered inside the warehouse, Tom, as agent in charge of the field office, had been notified. “It’s politic for me to review the situation in person. How’s Lanny today?”

  “Like he is any other day.”

  Tom pretended not to hear the bitterness underlying his wife’s voice as he headed down the central hallway toward the room at the back of the house where their thirteen-year-old son was confined.

  In fact, where he and Janice were also confined. Sadly, this room was at the epicenter of their lives, their marriage, their future.

  An aberrant accident in the birth canal had cut off their son’s oxygen and left him with severe brain damage. He didn’t speak, or walk, or even sit alone. His responses to any stimuli were limited to blinking his eyes, but only on occasion, and to making a guttural sound, the meaning of which neither Tom nor Janice would ever be able to interpret. They had no way of knowing if he even recognized them by sight, or sound, or touch.

  “He’s soiled himself,” Tom said upon entering the room and being hit with the odor.

  “I checked him five minutes ago,” Janice said defensively. “I changed the sheets on his bed this morning and—”

  “That’s a two-person job. You should have waited for me to help you.”

  “Well, that could have been a wait, couldn’t it?”

  Quietly Tom said, “I had to leave earlier than usual this morning, Janice. I had no choice.”

  She blew out a gust of air. “I know. I’m sorry. But after changing his bed, I had to do laundry. It’s not even lunchtime, and I’m exhausted.”

  He stayed her as she moved toward the bed. “I’ll take care of this.”

  “You’re in a hurry to get away.”

  “Five minutes won’t matter. Will you fix me a sandwich, please? I’ll eat it on the way down to Tambour.”

  After seeing to Lanny, he went into their bedroom and changed out of his suit and into outdoor clothes. Before day’s end, he would probably be called upon to join the manhunt. He had little or nothing to contribute to such an undertaking, but he would make the gesture of pitching in.

  He dressed in jeans and a short-sleeved white shirt, and slipped on an old pair of sneakers, reminding himself to check the trunk of his car for the rubber boots he used to wear whenever he went fishing.

  He used to do a lot of things he no longer did.

  When he walked into the kitchen, Janice’s back was to him. She was preoccupied with making his sandwich so he studied her for several seconds without her being aware of it.

  She hadn’t retained the prettiness that she’d had when they first met. The thirteen years since Lanny’s birth had taken a visible toll. Her movements were no longer graceful and fluid, but efficient and brisk, as though if she didn’t hurry up and accomplish the task at hand, she would lose the wherewithal to do it.

  The slender young body she’d boasted had been whittled away and now she could be described as gaunt. Work and worry had etched lines around her eyes, and the lips that had always been on the verge of smiling were perpetually drawn with disappointment.

  Tom didn’t blame her for these changes in her appearance. The changes in him were just as disagreeable. Unhappiness and hopelessness were stamped indelibly onto their faces. Worse, the changes weren’t only physical. Their love for each other had been drastically altered by the ongoing tragedy that their life together had become. The love he felt for Janice now was based more on pity than passion.

  When first married, they’d shared an interest in jazz, movies, and Tuscan cooking. They’d planned to spend a summer in Italy attending cooking classes and drinking the regional vintages during sun-drenched afternoons.

  That was just one of their dreams that had been shattered.

  Every single day Tom asked himself how long they could go on in their present state. Something must change. Tom knew it. He figured Janice did, too. But neither wanted to be the first to wave a white flag on their commitment to their helpless son. Neither wanted to be the first to say, “I can’t do this any longer,” and suggest doing what they had pledged never to do, which was to place him in a special care facility.

  The good ones were private and therefore costly. But the exorbitant expense was only one obstacle. Tom wasn’t certain what Janice’s reaction would be if he suggested they amend their original policy regarding Lanny’s care. He was afraid she would talk him out of it. And equally afraid that she wouldn’t.

  Sensing his presence, she glanced over her shoulder. “Ham and cheese with brown mustard?”

  “Fine.”

  She folded plastic wrap around the sandwich. “Do you plan to stay away overnight?”

  “I can’t leave you alone with Lanny for that long.”

  “I would manage.”

  Tom shook his head. “I’ll come back. Fred Hawkins will share with me all his case notes.”

  “You mean the oracle of the Tambour Police Department?”

  Her sarcasm made him smile. She’d known the Hawkins twins from her last year of high school, when her father had decided to move “to the country” and had taken Janice out of the parochial academy in New Orleans and transferred her to the public school in Tambour. While the distance wasn’t that far, the two environments had been worlds apart.

  Janice had experienced a reeling culture shock and had never quite forgiven her parents for uprooting her during that all-important senior year and transplanting her in “Bubbaville.” She considered everyone in Tambour a hick, starting with, and in particular, Fred Hawkins and his twin, Doral. It amazed her that one had become an officer of the law, the other a city official. Even by Tambour’s standards, the twins had exceeded her expectations of them.

  “Everybody in Tambour wants the head of Sam Marset’s killer on a pike, and they’re breathing down Fred’s collar to get it,” Tom told her. “The coroner estimates time of death for all seven victims at around midnight, so Fred is”—he glanced at the clock on the microwave oven—“almost twelve hours into the investigation, and he doesn’t have any substantial leads.”

  Janice winced. “The scene was described as a bloodbath.”

  “The photos my men sent back weren’t pretty.”

  “What was the owner of the company doing
in the warehouse at that time of night?”

  “That struck Fred as odd, too. Mrs. Marset was of no help because she was out of town. Fred’s thinking is that maybe this Coburn created some kind of problem, got into a fight with a coworker, something serious enough for the foreman to call Marset. They’ll check phone records, but a reason for Marset’s being there at that unusual hour hasn’t been established yet.”

  “Is Lee Coburn a habitual troublemaker?”

  “His employment record didn’t indicate that. But no one claims to know him well.”

  “I gathered that by Fred’s press conference. Beyond a description and a police artist sketch, they don’t seem to have much.”

  “He put false information on his job application.”

  “They didn’t check it out before they hired him?”

  “An oversight I’m sure the human resources staff is regretting.”

  “Why did he lie on his application, I wonder. To hide a police record?”

  “That was the general consensus. But so far his fingerprints haven’t turned up any prior arrests.”

  Janice frowned. “He’s probably one of those wackos who slips through the cracks of society until he does something like this. Then everybody takes notice. What I don’t get is why these nutcases go after innocent people. If he bore a grudge against the company, why didn’t he just wreck one of the trucks? Why go on a killing spree?”

  When Tom had first met Janice, she’d been a feeling, compassionate human being who often championed the underdog. Over the years her tolerance level had steeply declined.

  “Apparently Coburn doesn’t have the outward markings of a wacko,” he said.

  “Wackos rarely do.”

  Tom conceded her point with a tip of his head. “Coburn had recently been placed in charge of shipping manifests. Maybe he cracked under the pressure of new responsibility.”

  “That’s plausible.” Her expression indicated that she knew something about cracking under pressure.

  Tom took a canned drink from the fridge. “I’d better be off. Fred’s waiting on me. If you need me, call. I’ve always got my cell phone.”

  “We’ll be fine.”

  “I turned Lanny when I cleaned him, so you don’t have to do that for a while.”

  “Don’t worry about us, Tom. Go. Do your job. I’ll handle things till you get home, whenever it is.”

  He hesitated, wishing he could think of something to say that would brighten her day, wishing there was something to say. But he knew there wasn’t, so he trudged from his house with the overgrown lawn, feeling the burden of their lives weighing heavily on his shoulders because he didn’t know how to make it better.

  He felt no more confident about improving the situation in Tambour.

  Chapter 7

  Honor retrieved the sealed rubber box from under her bed.

  Coburn replaced the mattress, then, without ceremony, dumped the contents of the storage box onto her snowy white comforter and began pawing through Eddie’s personal effects.

  First to attract his attention were Eddie’s diplomas from high school, LSU, and the police academy. He removed the first from its leather folder and searched the folder itself. But when he ripped away the moire lining, Honor protested, “There’s no need to do that!”

  “I think there is.”

  “I’m saving those documents for Emily.”

  “I’m not doing anything to the documents.”

  “Nothing’s hidden behind the lining.”

  “Not in this one.” He tossed the first aside and reached for another, subjecting it to the same vandalism. When he was done with them, he examined Eddie’s wristwatch.

  “Pretty tricked-out watch.”

  “I gave it to him for Christmas.”

  “Where’d you buy it?”

  “What difference does it make?”

  “A local store?”

  “I ordered it online. It’s a knockoff of a fancy one.”

  “How much did it cost?”

  “Around three hundred dollars.”

  “Not thousands?”

  “Do you want to see the receipt?”

  “No, but you’ve contradicted yourself. You said you didn’t use the computer for personal business.”

  Wearily she sighed. “I’ve ordered things.”

  “Did Eddie?”

  “I never knew him to.”

  He held her stare, then let it go and moved on to Eddie’s death certificate. “Broken neck?”

  “He died instantly. Or so I was told.”

  She hoped he’d died immediately and hadn’t suffered. The medical examiner had told Stan and her that even if he had survived the neck injury, he probably would have died of his extensive internal injuries before reaching the hospital.

  After perusing the death certificate, Coburn thumbed through the guest book for the funeral service.

  “Whatever you’re looking for isn’t in there.” It was breaking her heart to see items that were precious only to her handled by a man with blood on his hands, literally and figuratively.

  She was especially incensed when he picked up Eddie’s wedding ring. It had been on Eddie’s finger from the day they’d stood at the altar and exchanged their vows until she’d been called to the morgue to identify his body.

  Holding the ring close, Coburn read the inscription inside. “Ah. What’s this?”

  “Our wedding date and initials.”

  He read the engraving again, then bounced the ring in his palm as he regarded it thoughtfully. Finally he looked up at her and, after a moment, extended his hand. She held out hers. He dropped the ring into her palm and her fingers closed around it.

  “Thank you.”

  “I don’t need it anymore. I memorized the engraving.”

  He went through Eddie’s wallet several times, then actually turned the leather inside out. It produced nothing except expired credit cards, Eddie’s driver’s license—he examined the laminate to make sure it was sealed all the way around—and Social Security card. There were pictures of her and Emily that had been trimmed to fit the clear plastic sleeves.

  He picked up the empty key ring and dangled it in front of her face. “A key ring without keys?”

  “I took off the house key and hid it outside in case I ever lock us out. The keys to the squad car and Eddie’s locker were returned to the police department.”

  “Do you have a safe deposit box?”

  “No.”

  “Would you tell me if you did?”

  “If it guaranteed Emily’s safety, I’d drive you to the bank. But I don’t have a safe deposit box.”

  He continued to examine and question her about each article arrayed on her comforter, which he’d soiled with his muddy clothes. But it was an exercise in futility as she’d known it would be. “You’re wasting your time, Mr. Coburn. Whatever you’re looking for isn’t here.”

  “It’s here. I just haven’t found it yet. And you can drop the ‘mister.’ Just plain Coburn will do.”

  He came off the bed, planted his hands on his hips, and made a tight circle as he looked around the room. She had hoped he would quickly find whatever it was he was after, then leave without harming either Emily or her. But the fruitlessness of his search was beginning to frustrate him, and that didn’t bode well. She feared that she and Emily would become the scapegoats for his mounting frustration.

  “Bank statements, tax records. Where’s all that?”

  Afraid not to cooperate, she pointed overhead. “Storage boxes in the attic.”

  “Where’s the access?”

  “In the hall.”

  He dragged her along behind him as he left the bedroom. Reaching high above his head for the slender rope, he pulled down the trapdoor, then unfolded the sectioned ladder and motioned to her. “Up you go.”

  “Me?”

  “I’m not leaving you down here alone with your daughter.”

  “I’m not going to run away.”

  “That’s
right. I’m going to see that you don’t.”

  To protest his logic would be futile, so she started up the ladder, acutely aware of her exposed legs and the view he was getting of her backside. She climbed as quickly as possible and was actually glad to be stepping up into the attic, when it had always been a place she would rather avoid. She associated attics with cobwebs and rodents. And attics were sad places, dark depositories where the cast-off articles of one’s life were sent to molder.

  She yanked the string on the bare bulb in the ceiling. The file storage boxes were right where she knew they would be. She picked up the first one by the open slots in its sides. Coburn waited in the narrow opening to take it from her and carry it down. They repeated the procedure until all had been removed from the attic.

  “This is pointless,” she said as she dusted her hands and reached for the string to turn off the light.

  “Wait a minute. What about those?” He’d poked his head up through the opening and had taken a look around, spying the boxes that Honor had hoped would escape his notice. They were standard packing boxes sealed with tape. “What’s in those?”

  “Christmas decorations.”

  “Ho-ho-ho.”

  “There’s nothing in them that you’ve asked to see.”

  “Hand them down.”

  She didn’t immediately obey. Looking down at him, she wondered if she could jam her foot into his face hard enough to break his nose. Possibly. But if she missed, he might trap her up here in the attic, leaving him alone with Emily. As galling as it was to take the coward’s way, Emily’s safety demanded it.

  One by one, she handed the other three boxes down to him.

  By the time she had descended the ladder and raised the trapdoor back flush with the ceiling, he was stripping the sealing tape off one of the boxes. When he pulled back the flaps, it wasn’t tinsel that blossomed out, but a man’s shirt.

  He looked up at her, the obvious question in his eyes.

  She remained stubbornly silent.

  Finally he said, “He’s been dead how long?”

  His implication smarted because she’d asked herself many times how long she was going to keep perfectly good clothing boxed in her attic when needy people could use it.