Fatal Distraction Read online

  “It’s the voice, and his manner. He acts like he’s talking me down off a ledge and waiting with a straitjacket. On the surface, it’s all very soothing, but I get the feeling he’s getting juiced up by everybody’s pain.”

  Without warning, Jess seemed to run out of adrenaline and collapsed into the chair. When she resumed speaking, her tone was calmer. “I mean, I know he’s a grief counselor. So sure he’ll be present during tough times. And he’s probably good at his work. But—”

  A double rap on the door on the opposite side of the fireplace from the one Frank and Jess had used to enter through the kitchen was abruptly followed by the squeak of the hinges as it opened. An unmistakable baritone voice preceded him into the room.

  “Helen, I’m going to be leaving now, but I’ll be back to sit with Oliver for a while tomorrow—” When he’d reached the point where he could see Helen’s legs extended toward the fire and that she wasn’t alone, Ben Fleming began to apologize as he moved closer, his sight line still partially impeded. “Oh, I’m sorry. Please excuse me. I didn’t realize you had a guest—”

  He’d limped all the way around the corner of the big fieldstone fireplace, using the entrance from the corridor leading to the master bedroom, and could now see Helen completely, as well as Jess in the oversized mission-style chair.

  He stopped, apparently surprised. “Ms. Kimball, isn’t it? You’re not stalking me, are you?” He laughed.

  Jess smiled thinly. “Hi, again.”

  “Are you feeling better?” Ben asked Jess.

  “Better? About what?”

  “Oh,” said Ben, “I mean over the last twenty-four hours or so. It must have been tough for you.”

  “What do you mean?” Jess said, shooting a glance at Helen.

  Ben’s deep voice softened with sympathy. “Just that after so many years searching for your missing child, seeing the Taylor case, a child-killing case, end so dramatically, it must leave you a little deflated. Thinking about Peter and all.”

  From the firm set of Jess’s mouth, her flaring nostrils, Helen thought she might ignite. Instead she said nothing, but simply stared at Ben with a mixture of disbelief and disdain.

  Ben seemed unperturbed by her reaction. “If you ever need me, I’d be happy to help you, you know. Helen can give you my number or would you like a card?”

  He stepped toward Jess, which Helen took as her cue to intervene. She stood quickly and said, perhaps a little louder than necessary, “I have the information if we need it. Thanks for coming, Ben.”

  She almost told Ben not to come back, that she would be home with Oliver and they didn’t need him anymore. But some instinct told her not to shut that avenue, at least not just yet.

  He looked back and forth at them again. Clearly, he wasn’t sure what they were doing in the same room, and he wanted to know. “I may be a bit later tomorrow. I have a few condolence calls to make in the morning. It could take me a while to finish.” Helen offered nothing further. “Good night, then. Good night, Ms. Kimball.” He turned and limped toward the door that Frank had used as his exit.

  Helen waited long enough to be sure Ben was out of earshot before she rose from her chair. She walked to the house phone on the desk in the corner, turned her back to Jess and pushed a couple of buttons. When Frank picked up, she said in a quiet voice, “Frank, Ben Fleming just left me. Please be sure he gets safely off the property, will you? And would you mind asking someone to bring us a pot of strong coffee with two mugs? Thanks.”

  When she replaced the receiver, she returned to the chairs by the fire and told Jess, “We have a lot to talk about and it’s a long drive back to your hotel. Can you stay the night?”

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Thornberry, Florida

  Saturday 9:00 p.m.

  HELEN LEFT JESS TO HER OWN THOUGHTS while she busied herself stoking the fire, moving the glass of red wine out of the way to make room for a cup of coffee, not talking until the coffee arrived. She offered Jess a cup and poured one for herself before resettling this time on the loveseat across from Jess where she would have a clear view of the journalist’s face and entire body.

  Helen had interviewed thousands of people over the years. Crime victims, criminals, witnesses, politicians, potential employees, people from every walk of life, all ages, education and social levels. She was an astute judge of character. By the time this conversation was over, Helen planned to know everything she needed to know about Jess Kimball, even if it took all night.

  Soft questions first was the rule Helen had always used to greatest effect. But she didn’t have any soft questions tonight. Everything was important. Where to start? She glanced at the square white box on the coffee table between them. Might as well get the obvious one out of the way, she thought.

  “What’s in the box?”

  Jess stood up, moved to the box, lifted the lid off. The odor of cigarette smoke wafted from the box’s interior and wrinkled Helen’s nostrils. Jess pushed it toward Helen. When she looked inside, Helen saw a red handbag nestled in a big plastic bag and outside the plastic bag, a pair of latex gloves.

  Jess then recounted her last encounter with Vivian Ward after Taylor’s execution, followed by her return to Vivian’s home to retrieve the red purse. She concluded by saying, “You were right, Governor.”

  “After all we’ve been through together, I think you should call me Helen, don’t you?”

  Jess nodded and smiled weakly. “Vivian would never have given us this evidence until after Tommy Taylor died. And if she’d died before Taylor, then this would have ended up in a landfill somewhere.”

  Helen continued drinking her coffee, thinking three or four steps ahead. There were so many legal and practical issues here to sort through. “Let’s start with the items themselves,” she said. “That explains the handbag. Where did you get this other stuff?”

  “I had the box and the big plastic bag in my SUV, along with the latex gloves. I wore the gloves the whole time I was in the house. I opened the purse only to see if I had the right one. Otherwise, I haven’t touched anything.”

  “Why do you think you’ve got the right red handbag here?”

  “I’ll show you.” Jess stood and donned the gloves, then lifted the large plastic bag containing the red purse out of the box and set them both on the coffee table. When she opened the plastic bag, Helen nearly gagged on the overwhelming stench of cigarette, which somehow reminded her of the smoky reek of arson that permeated the grounds around the burnt barn.

  Jess lowered the plastic bag, opened the clasp on the purse, and opened the top wide, revealing its contents.

  Inside, Helen saw four evidence bags, three sealed with stickers that appeared to have been placed there by law enforcement. There was handwriting on each sticker, but she couldn’t read it without lifting the evidence bags from the purse. In one bag, Helen saw a yellowed cigarette butt from a filtered cigarette. Odd how the mind works, she thought, for she instantly recognized Tommy Taylor’s tobacco brand, after all these years. Each of the other two evidence bags contained a single strand of hair. None of the stickers appeared to have been tampered with in any way.

  The fourth bag was also sealed with a large intact sticker of a different size and color. It contained a sealed white business envelope. On the outside of the envelope, she could make out the typewritten words without her reading glasses: “For Helen Sullivan. From: Arnold Ward.”

  Given the nature of the items, Helen’s mind cut through the thorny legal issues quickly. “You’ve done a nice job here, Jess. Are you sure you’re not a lawyer? Or a cop?” She took a deep breath and stood. “Close the purse up again. Put it back in the plastic bag and back in the box. Put the gloves in too, and put the lid back on just as you had it when you brought it here.”

  She walked over to the house phone again, but this time, she kept her eye on Jess every minute. She punched a couple of buttons. “Frank, I’m also going to need a certified videographer, a law enforcement officer t
o take a couple of recorded statements, and maybe a crime scene technician. How long will it take you to get the appropriate folks together?”

  She listened a few moments and was about to hang up when she remembered one more thing. “I need to speak with the attorney general. Last I heard he was headed to Utah on a ski vacation. Can you find him for me?”

  Strictly speaking, none of this was Frank’s job, but she trusted him, it was late, and someone had to handle things. The entire situation was a powder keg. Instead of saving her successor from unnecessary controversy, she might have handed him the biggest public relations bomb of her tenure.

  Ralph Hayes was going to blow a gasket. That thought, at least, cheered her far more than she would ever admit.

  Chapter Thirty

  Lake Lois, Florida

  Saturday 11:00 p.m.

  BEN TOWELED OFF AFTER HIS SHOWER and wrapped a white terry robe around his flat midsection. He was bone tired, but what his father called good tired, the kind of fatigue that follows good deeds. He’d been working hard of late, logging long hours, both in his grief counseling and in his special projects. He planned to sleep peacefully tonight before an equally busy day tomorrow at Tommy Taylor’s funeral. He’d eaten a bite of dinner with Frank Temple and his crew before he left the Sullivan ranch. He could relax.

  He felt good. Really good. This week, although filled to capacity, had been an especially productive one. Closing the book on the Tommy Taylor case, where he’d provided grief counseling to all of those families earlier in his career, was gratifying. Tommy Taylor was a monster, the Central Florida Child Killer. He had hurt so many families. The world was better off without him. Ben had taken great pleasure in helping the various families achieve closure. After Taylor’s funeral tomorrow, Ben was due a celebration.

  Settling on the bed, he reached for the remote and turned the flat screen on, volume low. He set the timer to turn the television off at 1:00 a.m., in case he fell asleep before then. He wasn’t concerned about awakening on time to attend the funeral. He’d long ago developed the skill of waking up when he needed to without an alarm.

  He swallowed two 800 milligram ibuprofen tablets with a swig of single-malt Scotch to ease the throbbing in his left ankle. His exhaustion, the pain killers and the alcohol should have him sawing logs in thirty minutes or less.

  He’d spent an hour with Oliver tonight and, even if Helen didn’t want to admit it, Ben knew that Oliver was as good as dead already. No, better than dead. Oliver was breathing without a ventilator, which offered Helen false hope. The feeding tube, the medications they gave him, his continuing coma, the seizure, on top of the residual problems Oliver had from his original stroke three years ago, all combined to assure Ben that Oliver would never wake up. Soon Ben would have another funeral to attend.

  Funerals were comforting rituals that commenced the survivors’ recovery from their loved one’s death. Ben had seen this process begin hundreds if not thousands of times when he was a child, living in the flat above his parents’ funeral home. It had only been later, though, when he was old enough to work the funerals that he began to realize how therapeutic they were. Yes, he knew the truth about grief of all sorts.

  Helen had already shown him how resilient she was. Oliver’s funeral would permit her to move on with her life. She’d continue her run for the Senate. She’d be unstoppable after Oliver died. Ben wanted that for her. He wanted her success perhaps more than she did. Yet too soon a funeral would be a tonic for Helen that Ben wasn’t quite ready to allow yet. The longer she continued to nurture pointless hope for Oliver’s recovery, the harder she would grieve when all hope was extinguished and the more she would need him.

  He glanced over to the bedside table and noticed his cell phone. He hadn’t checked his messages today. His mind was a little foggy. He probably couldn’t concentrate on the substance of any important messages. Better to leave them for morning. Then again, there might be good news, too. He was already feeling good, but more positive news was always welcome.

  He sipped the Scotch again, draining the tumbler. He set the empty glass down on the table, and reached for the phone. His motor skills were clearly a bit off, for instead of grabbing the phone, he swiped it onto the carpet. Leave it? Or pick it up?

  More Scotch would be nice. He swung his feet off the bed, reached for the phone and picked up the glass, all a little slower than normal, but manageable nonetheless.

  His gait unsteady, he held the tumbler in one hand and the phone in the other on his way to the decanter. After refilling the heavy crystal, he wobbled back to the bed and settled down again. He pushed the volume up on the television a couple of notches to hear the comedian’s opening monologue. Ben enjoyed comedy.

  He took another large swallow of the Scotch. His eyes were so heavy. He forgot about the cell phone for a little while. Until it vibrated in his hand to signal a new call.

  “This is Dr. Ben Fleming. How can I help you?” he asked, realizing his speech was slurred. He heard shallow, labored breathing and wondered if it was his for a moment, before he realized the sound emitted from the phone. “Are you there?”

  “Dr. Fleming,” a woman’s faint voice whispered with her exhalation. Her pain was evident through his alcohol haze.

  “Yes?”

  “It’s Vivian Ward,” she managed to convey.

  “Oh, good evening,” he said, automatically adopting the soothing voice he used with patients. “How are you?”

  He heard her faint, shallow breaths. It wouldn’t be much longer for Vivian. She would be joining her husband and sons soon. Once again, Ben felt smug about the Wards. The justice system had failed them badly, their situation so desperately tragic. He’d helped them when no one else could, in a way no one else dared.

  “Thank. You. Ben,” she whispered. He heard her gasping for air. “For. Everything.”

  “You’re welcome, dear.” He swallowed more Scotch and waited for her to speak again.

  After a few moments, she said something else. Ben gripped the phone tightly and tried to clear his head. What did she just say? He blinked a couple of times to focus. He heard the little gasps Vivian made in the wake of her statement.

  No.

  She couldn’t possibly have said what he thought, could she?

  “What did you say?” he said without regard for the growing harshness of his own voice. “I couldn’t quite hear you.”

  But someone else had entered Vivian’s room, another woman’s voice, stronger, louder. A voice he recognized. Marilyn Crawford. Mattie’s mother. “Vivian, honey, what are you doing with that telephone? You know you should be resting. Here, let me hang up for you.”

  And the line went dead.

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Thornberry, Florida

  Saturday 11:30 p.m.

  OlLIVER’S EYES OPENED AGAIN. Each time his eyelids lifted without warning surprised him and required a moment to acclimate.

  Once more, he recognized everything he could see in his bedroom, which wasn’t surprising. He’d slept here for most of his married life, and across the hall his entire childhood. He was, as the doctors liked to say, alert and oriented in time and space.

  At least he thought so. Since he couldn’t speak, he could ask no one to confirm his thesis. Doctors had been in and out, but they didn’t discuss his condition in front of him. He was glad they’d refrained from outlining the more terrifying possibilities. Dan the medical resident and Ben Fleming’s earlier discussion had alarmed him enough to make his eyes pop open when he’d first awakened after their departure.

  His medical watchdog was a fellow named Steven. Oliver hadn’t seen Steven, or any of the doctors. They were never around when his eyes were open. Bad luck, maybe. If they observed his eyes open, perhaps they’d know he was conscious. Maybe then they could alter their diagnosis and begin treating him.

  Oliver felt groggy, as if he’d been given sedatives that hadn’t worn off, and a pounding headache that seemed like an old companio
n. How long had that particular tympani been traveling with him? He wasn’t sure. Perhaps it was related to the rapid change in light, from total darkness to visual noise every time his eye lids jerked up.

  He glanced toward the oak dresser across the room where an oversized LED alarm clock reflected the time in bright red numbers large enough for his myopic vision to read. Eleven-thirty p.m. What day? No calendar hung within his limited sight line.

  Checking for improvements since his last alert period, he tried to turn his head, but couldn’t. His eyes were dry, so he tried to blink. That didn’t happen, either. Come on, Oliver. Push! He tried forcing his lids down. Nope. Ain’t happening.

  Systematically, he tested and reviewed his physical status again. He could see as distinctly as his myopia and presbyopia allowed. If he’d been wearing his bifocals, his vision was probably as good as that of any other man his age. He’d joked with Eric and Helen many times that his close vision was perfect, but he needed longer arms.

  Vision okay, he thought. That’s good. You’re too old to learn Braille. The black humor would have made him smile, but he still couldn’t move his lips. At least you know you’re thinking now.

  His eyes burned. He tried desperately to blink or squint. His corneas felt arid enough to glue his lids open. He’d seen one of Helen’s contact lenses shriveled on the bathroom floor once. Is that what happened to the human eye?

  To distract himself, he thought about what he could feel, besides the dryness. IV ports in both arms, no doubt flowing fluids and medications into his veins. Leads pasted to his chest that must have been connected to the steady beating of the heart monitor he’d recognized earlier.

  Heart beating is a good sign. That joke wasn’t quite as funny, since there had been a time when his heart stopped beating right after Milton Jones shot him at Eric’s funeral.

  Don’t think about that. What else can you feel? Tape across a sensitive area of his stomach. What was that? He didn’t recall feeling that before. He couldn’t see his stomach because of the blanket covering him and he couldn’t move the blanket aside. Tamping down the panic as best he could, he moved his internal reviewing process lower.