Hunted (Reeve Leclaire 2) Page 10

  Flint knew immediately who it was from and what it meant.

  So, the next time his mother appeared in the visiting room, Flint lowered his voice and told her, “I need you to call Walter. Tell him we’re on for Plan B.”

  Funny how things turn out.

  He grasps the next log, positions it, raises the ax high, and brings it down with a satisfying crack!

  TWENTY-ONE

  Olshaker Psychiatric Hospital

  A loud noise grabs Reeve’s attention and she peers out the blinds. A group of men are playing basketball. The ball sails through the air and again smacks the backboard with a loud thwack!

  Dr. Blume is saying, “So, Mr. Bender, might I suppose that you and Miss LeClaire are here at least partly because you’re interested in the reward?”

  “Reward?” Reeve shoots Bender a puzzled look.

  He shakes his head. “I forgot to mention it. Fifty thousand dollars.”

  “I’m sure they’ll be more than happy to write you that check if your contribution leads to Flint’s apprehension. God knows, they seem to have no idea where he is.”

  “I’m not here for any reward,” Reeve grumbles.

  “We’re ineligible, in any case,” Bender says. “Or at least I am, I imagine, given my connection with the bureau. But a reward can bring some good leads.”

  “Or plenty of bad ones,” Dr. Blume exhales, rubbing her temples. “I was about to say, you have no idea. But with your experience, I’m afraid you do.”

  Conversation has just turned to Dr. Moody’s funeral when noise again erupts outside. Reeve cranes her neck to watch the hooting men on the basketball court.

  “Did Flint play basketball?” she wonders aloud.

  The other two look at her blankly.

  “Basketball?” Dr. Blume says after a beat. “I would imagine so. Why?”

  “Well, the thing is—” Reeve glances out the window “—I’m sure you’re busy, Dr. Blume, but would you mind if we just look around?”

  A tight smile. “I’m afraid you can’t just wander through the forensic wards. However . . .” Dr. Blume taps her chin, then raises an index finger, signaling an idea. “We have a wonderful public relations person,” she says, picking up her phone. “Why don’t I have Vincent show you the facility?”

  Five minutes later they’re in the airy office of a slight man in a blue shirt and tie who hands each of them a colored brochure printed in calming hues. Reeve studies the pretty pictures, the inspirational quotes. “Don’t you have anything about the forensic wards?”

  The corners of Vincent’s mouth tighten. “That literature is being redesigned. People are usually more interested in the gardens, the food, visiting hours, that kind of thing.”

  “But we’re here about one particular patient: Daryl Wayne Flint.”

  Vincent leans across the desk and drops his voice. “We’re not supposed to talk about that.”

  “You don’t know who we are, do you?” Reeve says, tensing at the prospect of having to explain her history.

  He gives her a puzzled look, but before he can reply, Milo Bender says smoothly, “Allow me to explain. My colleague and I are consulting with the FBI on this case.”

  Reeve hides a smile while Bender mentions several agents by name and drops a few choice phrases.

  Vincent goes wide-eyed. “Oh, of course. They came in and questioned everybody, just like in the movies. I talked to them.”

  “Right, so we’re following up on a few matters today, and Dr. Blume said you’d be the best person to show us around.”

  Vincent’s face brightens. “Absolutely no problem.” He stands, clasping his thin hands together. “What would you like to see first?”

  While Bender strolls ahead with Vincent, Reeve trails behind and watches how Bender walks in stride, echoing body language. Intentionally putting Vincent at ease, no doubt.

  A red sign above a security door announces: Forensic Unit, Medium Security.

  Vincent pulls out a plastic key card, opens the door, and sticks his head inside. A man dressed in scrubs who seems to be guarding the door questions Vincent a moment. He looks them up and down, then stands aside and swings the door wide, gesturing to the left.

  They file in and proceed down an austere corridor while Vincent explains, “It’s rec time for another few minutes, so all the rooms are empty. Don’t worry, it’s completely safe.” He stops and opens a door, saying, “This was Daryl Wayne Flint’s room. It’s been cleaned out, of course.”

  Reeve stops in the doorway of the bright, white room. The cot has been stripped bare. A metal toilet and a metal sink jut from the wall. It’s a relatively humane confinement, she notes bitterly, but her feet stay glued to the floor, refusing to step one inch into her captor’s cage. The lights are hot. She can almost sense his presence, almost see the imprint of his back on the mattress.

  Milo Bender is standing beside her, watching her closely when he says, “Vincent, could we please see the visiting area next?”

  The visitors’ room has all the charm of a cardboard box, with a color scheme ranging from brown to beige. Two rows of brown tables with brown benches, all affixed to the floor. Beige walls, beige flooring.

  Vincent introduces them to a tall man with an etched face who wears his long, black hair pulled back in a ponytail. He looks classically Native American to Reeve, but his name is Synderman.

  “The regular patients, you know, they can walk around the grounds,” Synderman says, gesturing with long fingers. “They have a nicer place with couches and a TV and stuff. But this is what we’ve got for forensic lockup.”

  “It’s better than I expected,” Milo Bender says. “No cubicles with barriers”

  “Oh, we have those, too, but that’s maximum security.”

  Vincent pipes up, “This is where Mr. Flint met his visitors. Synderman talked with the FBI because he was most often the guard on duty.”

  “Yeah, but I guess I don’t know much,” Synderman says. “All the guys we get in here are on the weird side, so it’s not like he stood out, you know? Besides, his mother was his only visitor. There was nothing suspicious or anything.”

  “Do the prisoners and their visitors sometimes share a table with others?”

  “Nah, that wouldn’t be allowed. But sometimes they greet one another, you know, call back and forth. That’s okay.”

  “And did Flint interact with others? Friends, perhaps?”

  “Only Sven. He and Flint were buddies, I guess. I’m sure he’s been questioned already.”

  Reeve hangs back, listening while Bender asks questions in his gentle, persistent manner.

  “Yeah, Sven’s girlfriend is kinda flirty. But there was nothing suspicious, like I said.”

  “What about Flint’s mother?”

  Synderman rolls his eyes. “You ask me, she’s a sentimental old bat.”

  “Really? In what way?”

  “Well, she was always talking about her dead husband.”

  “Flint’s dad?”

  “Yeah.”

  “That’s odd. What did she say about him?”

  “I don’t know. Um, like reminiscing about their wedding day, stuff like that.”

  “Can you be more specific? Did you overhear the particulars of their conversations?”

  “Well, she would say, like, we had such a nice wedding, in such a nice church, and la-de-da. And she’d say, you remember our wedding anniversary, don’t you? And she’d make him recite it back to her.”

  “The date?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Do you remember what it was?”

  He shakes his head, saying, “Nah, I can’t remember particulars like that. I told those FBI guys already. Sorry.”

  When Synderman can remember nothing more, Vincent checks his watch and leads them down a wide corridor to the cafeteria.

  Reeve touches Bender’s elbow and asks softly, “Flint’s mother was married twice, wasn’t she?”

  “That’s right. She’s been married to
a Tacoma pharmacist named Pratt for years.”

  “When was her first marriage?”

  Bender shakes his head. “The date’s in the file, I believe.”

  She closes her eyes, trying to recall anything that Flint might have said about his parents, but comes up empty.

  A few moments later, the greasy, layered smells of the hospital cafeteria spark an unbidden memory. She blinks rapidly, trying to quell a painful recollection of waiting with her father in the hospital cafeteria while her mother endured those final rounds of chemo.

  Bender glances at her and whispers, “Are you okay?”

  She nods and follows Vincent, who is striding ahead, waving toward the refrigerated salads and brightly lit steam trays. “The kitchen staff takes pride in preparing healthy, nutritious meals,” he is saying, seeming most comfortable with this part of his tour.

  Bender asks about how the forensic unit is treated differently from the rest of the population, and while Vincent explains, Reeve murmurs, “Excuse me,” and crosses the room to the gleaming wall of windows. She stands with hands clasped, studying the basketball court, which is now vacant. It seems foreboding, black and wet beneath a low ceiling of clouds.

  Rejoining Bender and Vincent, she asks, “Did Flint play basketball?”

  “Uh, he could have. All our patients are given daily rec time.”

  “May I go out and take a look?”

  “Now?” He wheels toward the windows and frowns. “In the rain?”

  “That’s the idea.”

  Vincent shifts from foot to foot. “Well, I don’t have a key.” He glances out the windows with a grimace. “Let me find the orderly.”

  The orderly, a heavy man who introduces himself as Gary, gently cups Reeve’s elbow and asks, “You’re sure, miss?”

  “Yes, show me exactly what he did.”

  “Okay.” He lifts the hood of his weatherproof jacket up over his shaggy hair and says, “Follow me.”

  The two descend the steps and proceed toward the basketball court. There’s no wind, but drizzle has turned to a pattering rain. Their boots splash out to center court, where Gary stops.

  “Right here. He’d stand right here and spin in circles.”

  She edges the man aside and starts to turn, but the man stops her, saying, “No, miss, the other way. Counterclockwise. Three times. That was his thing. And he would put his arms straight out,” he says, demonstrating, “like this.”

  She stands in the same way, arms extended, and looks across the court, through the chain-link fence toward the parking lot. She turns slowly to the left. The view wheels past: the bright windows of the cafeteria; a stretch of blank wall; and then the ironclad windows of a corner office, which she recognizes as Dr. Blume’s. Next, her eyes follow the tall chain-link fence, beyond which the greenery thickens to forest.

  “Miss? You need to see the rest now?” Gary shifts uncomfortably. “Or is this enough?”

  “The rest? What else did he do?”

  She listens intently while Gary explains, then says she’d like to try it, if he has a few minutes.

  He shoots a glance at the dry steps beneath the overhang.

  “Why don’t you wait beside the building, out of the rain?” she suggests.

  “Well, sure, I guess so.”

  The moment he turns to go, she hurries to the edge of the asphalt and begins circumnavigating the basketball court. As the scene glides past, she notes the people inside, framed by the windows and lit up with bright fluorescent lights.

  Next, she walks across the grass toward the fence line. Rain drips in her face and dampens her jeans, and she’s grateful for Milo Bender’s oversized weatherproof jacket. As she studies the parking lot, a heavy man in a parka appears. She hears the chirp of the keyless entry and watches as he ambles toward a black sedan, opens the door, and climbs inside. The car exits the parking lot, and when it disappears through the trees, she heads back to join Gary on the steps.

  “The rain doesn’t bother you, does it?” he says. “You’re just like him.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “I mean, it didn’t matter what the weather was, he’d still come out here and do his thing. And everyone just kinda left him alone. Some kinds of crazy you just don’t mess with.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Let’s just say he wasn’t the kind of guy you’d introduce your sister to.” He laughs. “Maybe an ex-girlfriend.”

  “Can you think of anything else?”

  He holds open the door for her. “Oh, he had some quirks. He’d tap his foot three times, or repeat something three times. He called all the orderlies guards, and he called Dr. Blume ‘Wanda the Warden.’ Stuff like that.”

  They shed their dripping jackets and head down the corridor, back toward the visitors’ lounge.

  “Hey, can I ask you something, miss?” he says, giving her a sideways look.

  “Sure.”

  “You here for the reward? Is that right?”

  “No, I have, uh, personal reasons.”

  “Yeah? Well, if I was you, I’d go for that reward. Fifty grand, that’d pay some bills. I’d sure go after it if I could, but employees, you know, we’re not eligible. I guess they figure we’d be helping guys escape just so we could rat ’em out and collect some cash, right?”

  “I guess.” She stops and gives him a look. “Does that happen a lot?”

  “What? Escapes? Nah, never. I’ve been here sixteen years and this is the first one I’ve ever heard of. People don’t escape a place like this. Most of the patients are voluntary. Nonviolent. And this is a pretty good treatment facility, really. Even the forensic wards.”

  Reeve and Bender exit the building the same way they came in. They’re hastening through the rain when she says, “Give me one second,” and stops beside a red BMW. A sign on the curb states Chief of Psychiatry.

  She stands in the rain, surveying the road and the parking lot. She peers through the chain-link fence toward the basketball court, then dashes across the parking lot and climbs in beside Bender.

  He looks at her quizzically. “I see wheels turning. Come on.”

  “I keep thinking about motive and opportunity.” She gives him a sideways glance. “That’s what you guys always look for, right?”

  “Sure, partly. Go on.”

  “It just seems obvious that he was playing them.”

  “How so?”

  “That routine of his out in the recreation yard? He could watch whoever was coming and going. I bet he saw the barber arrive. He knew which car was his and where he parked.”

  “The investigators thought so, too. That’s in the file.”

  “Oh.” A beat of disappointment. “Well, so much for my brilliant powers of deduction.”

  “Shows you’re on the right track. What else?”

  She crosses her arms. “Nothing.”

  “What? I’ll bet you’re thinking we ought to talk to Flint’s mother.”

  “God, no. That woman gives me the creeps.”

  He smiles and starts the car. “Well, that’s a relief.”

  While the hospital recedes behind them, Reeve scowls out the window as if studying a Rorschach. Flint drove this same road, dressed in the barber’s clothes, driving the dead man’s Honda. . . . But there’s not a glimmer of intuition in her head. Why did she even bother to come up here?

  “What I’m wondering,” Bender says, “is what triggered all this? Flint was nonviolent and appropriately managed, and then he went haywire.”

  “Maybe we should put together a timeline.”

  “Good idea. What has changed?”

  Reeve fishes a pen and notepad from her purse. “The only real change since he’s been at Olshaker was last winter. Dr. Lerner had to come up here for a hearing and the judge ruled that Flint could be moved from maximum to medium security.”

  “And shortly after that, Dr. Blume became the new chief of psychiatry.”

  “But she said she never even spoke to him.” She huffs
out a sigh. “I keep coming back to his mother and Dr. Moody. I wonder if they had some sort of connection.”

  “That’s possible. Another question: What did Flint do with the barber’s car?”

  “It hasn’t been found?”

  “Nope. Best guess, he stashed it someplace near Moody’s house, but it hasn’t turned up yet. One theory is that he stashed the car with a friend, perhaps a former inmate, maybe an orderly. But the bureau has interviewed the staff, plus anyone significant in the patient population. Nothing popped.”

  “Frustrating.” The windshield wipers beat back and forth as she stares out at an area of mixed residential and industrial use. A vacant lot, an auto body shop, houses in need of paint. The nondescript outskirts of small-town America.

  The tip of her tongue reaches for her upper lip while she pictures Flint speeding away in the Honda. “Flint got away before anyone even knew he was missing. And then he headed to Dr. Moody’s. So maybe we should do the same.”

  “What?” Bender turns to look at her. “You want to go to Dr. Moody’s? Now? Are you serious?”

  “Why not? That’s what Flint did. How long does it take to get there?”

  “I hate to be a spoilsport, but it’s getting late and my old bones are tired. How about tomorrow?”

  She slumps in her seat. “Okay but promise you’ll pick me up at my hotel first thing in the morning.”

  “Hotel? No way. You’re staying with us.”

  “Really? Oh, I don’t want to impose.”

  “We insist. Yvonne’s looking forward to seeing you.”

  She lets out a yelp. “Wait! Stop! Stop the car,” she says, slapping the dashboard.

  He slams on the brakes.

  “Go back, go back!” she says, twisting in her seat to stare out the back windshield.

  “Why?”

  “Just turn around!”

  “What is it?” Bender says, cranking the wheel and doing a quick U-turn.

  “Look there, that sign,” she says, pointing.

  “What sign?”

  “That street sign. Church Street. The guard said Flint’s mother talked about her wedding in a church. He called her a sentimental old bat. Does that sound like her?”