Nighttime Is My Time Read online

  As soon as he opened the door he could tell by the look on her face that something had really shaken her up. She didn’t bother to say hello to him. “Jake, I took a chance you might be in there,” she said. “You interviewed Robby Brent, didn’t you?”

  “Yes, I did. A good interview if I do say so myself.” She’s not going to kill it, is she? Jake thought with dismay. Old Downes probably wants to forget that Brent and Laura Wilcox ever set foot in Stonecroft.

  “Jake, it just came over the news. Robby Brent’s body was found in the trunk of a car submerged near Cornwall Landing.”

  Robby Brent dead! Jake grabbed his camera. I still have a lot of film left, he thought. “Thanks, Jill,” he yelled, as he raced out the door.

  86

  The car with Robby Brent’s body had gone into the Hudson at Cornwall Landing. The normally tranquil park, with its benches and weeping willows, was now the center of police activity. The area had been hastily taped off to hold back the curious bystanders who, like the media, were gathering in ever-increasing numbers.

  When Sam arrived at ten-thirty, the body of the late Robby Brent had already been placed in a body bag and in the morgue wagon. Cal Grey, the medical examiner, filled Sam in. “He’s been dead at least a couple of days. Stab wound in the chest. Went right through his heart. I have to wait till I can take measurements, but I’ve got to tell you, Sam, that it appears to be the same kind of jagged-edge knife that killed Helen Whelan. From what I can see, whoever murdered Brent was either a lot taller or was standing on something like a staircase where he was above the victim. That knife went in at a distinct angle.”

  Mark Fleischman is tall, Sam thought. Talking to Fleischman, he could understand why Jean had been drawn to him. He had a plausible explanation for the reason he had inquired about the fax and for his knowledge that Jean had been a patient of Dr. Connors. Was he being honest, or was he a little too glib? Sam wasn’t sure.

  Before coming to the crime scene, Sam had called Jean on her cell phone, but she had not answered. He left her an urgent message to call him and then dialed Alice Sommers again.

  Alice had partially reassured him. “Sam, when Jean was talking about meeting Lily’s adoptive parents tonight, she mentioned that she wished she had brought more clothes with her. Woodbury Mall is less than half an hour away. I wouldn’t be surprised if she simply decided to ride over there and do some shopping.”

  It was a reasonable supposition, and it had helped to partially allay Sam’s concern for Jean. But now the concern was building, and he knew it was his instinct warning him not to wait any longer to begin an active search for her.

  “Robbery wasn’t the motive,” Cal Grey was saying. “Brent was wearing an expensive watch and has six hundred bucks in his wallet and a half-dozen credit cards. How long has he been missing?”

  “He hasn’t been seen since after dinner on Monday night,” Sam said.

  “My bet is that he didn’t last long after that,” Grey commented. “Of course the autopsy will pin down the time of death much more accurately than I can now.”

  “I was at that dinner,” Sam said. “What was he wearing when you got him out of the trunk?”

  “Beige jacket, dark brown slacks, and a brown turtleneck sweater.”

  “Then unless he slept in his clothes wherever he went, he died on Monday night.”

  Cameras were flashing as photographers behind the tape took pictures of the car that had been Robby Brent’s coffin. A salvage truck had hoisted it out of the river, and now, still attached to the cable, it was standing on the bank, dripping water as technicians continued to photograph it from every angle.

  A local policeman filled Sam in on the details, sketchy as they were. “We think the car may have been dumped around ten o’clock last night. A couple who live in New Windsor were jogging past here at about a quarter of ten. They say they saw a car parked near the railroad tracks and that someone was in it. They turned and started back about half a mile down the road. When they reached this point again, the car was gone, but a man was walking fast along Shore Road.”

  “Did they get a good look at him?”

  “No.”

  “Did they mention if he was tall? I mean really tall?” Sam asked.

  “They can’t agree. The husband said the guy was average size; the wife thought he was pretty tall. Both of them wear distance glasses and admit they barely got an impression of the guy, but they are sure that a car was parked here, that ten minutes later it was gone, and that someone was leaving this area on foot and in a big hurry.”

  God deliver me from eyewitnesses, Sam thought. As he turned back, he spotted Jake Perkins pushing his way to the front of the group behind the tape. He was carrying a camera that reminded Sam of the kind he had seen in a book about the great World War II photographer Robert Capa.

  I wonder if that kid has the gift of bilocation, Sam thought. It’s not only that he seems to be everywhere; he is everywhere. His eyes met Jake’s, but Jake looked away immediately. He’s sore at me for telling Tony to throw him in jail after he claimed to be my special assistant investigating Laura’s disappearance, Sam thought. I could have given him a break and at least said that he’s trying to be helpful, because he was. After all, he was the one who tipped me off that Laura sounded nervous on that phone call.

  He was debating whether to go over and speak to Jake when his cell phone rang. He snapped it out of his pocket, hoping the call would be from Jean. Instead it was from Joy Lacko. “Sam, a call came into 911 a few minutes ago. A BMW convertible registered to Dr. Jean Sheridan has been parked at Storm King Lookout on 218 for a couple of hours. The call was made by a salesman who drove past it around seven-forty-five and then again twenty minutes ago. He thought it seemed odd that the car was there so long and decided to check to see if there was a problem. The keys are in the ignition, and her pocketbook is on the passenger seat. It doesn’t look good.”

  “That’s why she hasn’t been answering her phone,” Sam said heavily. “My God, Joy. Why didn’t I insist that she have a bodyguard? Is the car still at the Lookout?”

  “Yes. Rich knew you’d want to look over the location before we moved it.” Joy’s voice was sympathetic. “I’ll keep in touch, Sam.”

  The vehicle with Robby Brent’s body was starting to back up. Three bodies in less than a week in that meat wagon, Sam thought. Don’t let the next one be Jean Sheridan, he prayed. Please don’t let the next one be Jean.

  87

  Jake Perkins had immediately regretted not acknowledging Sam Deegan when their eyes met. It was one thing not to give the detective any information he might come across, but it was another thing to cut off all contact with him. No good reporter, no matter how insulted he’d been, would ever do that.

  He would have loved to ask Deegan for a statement about Robby Brent’s murder, but he knew better than to do that. He knew what the official line would be—that Brent was the victim of a homicide by person or persons unknown. They hadn’t released the cause of death, but it was a cinch it wasn’t suicide. Nobody climbs into the trunk of a car while it’s rolling into the river.

  Maybe Deegan knows where Dr. Sheridan is, Jake thought. He had tried to phone Jean, but there was no answer in her room. He did want to get confirmation from her that Laura Wilcox had slept in the murder bedroom on Mountain Road.

  Struggling with the heavy camera, Jake worked his way through the crowd of photographers and reporters and caught up with Sam at his car. “Mr. Deegan, I’ve been trying to get in touch with Dr. Sheridan. Do you by any chance know where I could reach her? She doesn’t answer her phone.”

  Sam was about to get into his car. “What time did you try her?” he asked sharply.

  “About nine-thirty.”

  That was the same time I tried her, Sam thought. “I don’t know where she is,” he snapped as he got in his car. He slammed the door closed and turned on the siren.

  Something’s up, Jake thought. He’s worried about Dr. Sheridan, but h
e’s not making the turn back to the hotel. He’s going too fast for me to follow him. I might as well go back to school and clean up the darkroom. Then I’ll head over to the Glen-Ridge and see what’s going on.

  88

  On the way to the observation point, Sam phoned the Glen-Ridge House and asked to be put through to the manager immediately. When Justin Lewis got on, Sam said, “Look, I can get a subpoena for your phone records, but I can’t waste the time. Dr. Sheridan’s car has just been found, and she is missing. I want you to give me right now a list of the phone numbers of all calls received by Dr. Sheridan between ten o’clock last night and nine o’clock this morning.”

  He had been prepared for an argument but did not get one. “Give me your number. I’ll call you right back,” the manager said crisply.

  Sam put his cell phone on the passenger seat as he raced toward Storm King Lookout. He rounded the bend and saw Jean’s blue convertible with a policeman standing beside it. He pulled up behind it and had his notebook and pencil out when Lewis called back. The man obviously had understood the need for urgency. “Dr. Sheridan received seven phone calls this morning,” he said crisply. “The first came at quarter of seven!”

  “At quarter of seven?” Sam interrupted.

  “Yes, sir. It was made on a cell phone from this area. The name of the subscriber was not given. The number is . . .”

  Stunned and disbelieving, Sam wrote down the number that he recognized as the same one Robby Brent had called from on Monday night when he had imitated Laura’s voice on the call to Jean.

  “The other calls have been identified as coming from a Mrs. Alice Sommers and a Mr. Jake Perkins. They both tried to reach Dr. Sheridan several times. There are two from your own number.”

  “Thank you. You’ve been very helpful,” Sam said abruptly, and he clicked off. Robby Brent has been dead for a couple of days, he thought, but someone used the phone he bought in the drugstore to entice Jean Sheridan to leave the hotel. She must have rushed out right after that call came in. Her car was spotted here at 7:45 this morning. Who was she expecting to meet here? She had promised to be careful, and there were only two people she would have met without question. Sam was sure of it.

  He was aware that the cop standing by Jean’s car was giving him a curious stare, but he ignored him. Jean expected to meet either her daughter, Lily, or Laura, Sam thought as he looked blankly at the mountains on the other side of the river.

  Had she been forced from her car at gunpoint, or had she walked over to another vehicle on her own?

  Whoever this psychopath is, he has Jean. Is Jean’s daughter really safe? Sam wondered suddenly. He opened his wallet, raced through the cards inside, found the one he wanted, tossed the others on the passenger seat, and dialed Craig Michaelson’s cell phone. After five rings a computer voice advised him to leave a message. Swearing under his breath, he dialed Michaelson’s office.

  “I am so sorry,” his secretary apologized. “Mr. Michaelson is in a conference at another attorney’s office and cannot be interrupted.”

  “He’s got to be interrupted,” Sam snapped. “This is a police matter—a matter of life and death.”

  “Oh, sir,” the manicured voice chided, “I’m sorry, but—”

  “Listen to me, young lady, and listen hard. You get Michaelson, and you tell him that Sam Deegan phoned. Tell your boss that Jean Sheridan has disappeared and that it is imperative he contact West Point immediately and warn them to put a bodyguard on her daughter. Do you understand me?”

  “Of course I do. I will try to reach him, but—”

  “No buts. Reach him!” Sam shouted, then snapped his phone closed. He got out of the car. I have to put a track on Robby Brent’s phone, he thought, but it probably won’t do any good. There’s only one hope.

  He brushed past the policeman, who started to explain that he knew the salesman who had alerted them to the car being there and that nobody could be more reliable. Jean’s shoulder bag was on the seat.

  “Nothing has been taken out of it?” he snapped.

  “Of course not, sir.” The young policeman was clearly offended at the suggestion.

  Sam didn’t bother to assure him that he meant nothing personal by the question. He dumped the contents of Jean’s bag on the passenger seat, then searched the glove compartment and all the storage areas inside the car. “If it’s not too late, we may have gotten the break we need,” he said. “She was probably carrying her cell phone. It’s not here.”

  It was 11:30 A.M.

  89

  It was 11:45 A.M. before Craig Michaelson phoned Sam, who by then was back in the Glen-Ridge House. “My secretary tried to get me, but I had left the meeting and forgot to turn on my cell phone,” he explained hurriedly. “I just got to the office. What’s going on?”

  “What’s going on is that Jean Sheridan has been abducted,” Sam said tersely. “I don’t give a damn if her daughter is in West Point and surrounded by an army. I want you to be sure that a special guard is put on her. We have a psychopath running loose around here. The body of one of the other Stonecroft honorees was pulled out of the Hudson a couple of hours ago. He’d been stabbed to death.”

  “Jean Sheridan is missing! The General and his wife are on the eleven o’clock shuttle from Washington right now, on their way to have dinner with her tonight. I can’t get in touch with them while they’re on a flight.”

  Sam’s pent-up worry and frustration exploded. “Yes, you can,” he shouted. “You could get a message through the airline to the pilot, but it’s too late for that now anyway. Give me the name of Jean Sheridan’s daughter, and I’ll call West Point myself. I want it now.”

  “She is Cadet Meredith Buckley. She’s a secondyear student, a yearling. But the General assured me that Meredith would not leave the West Point campus either Thursday or Friday because of the tests she has scheduled.”

  “Let’s pray the General is right,” Sam snapped. “Mr. Michaelson, in the unlikely event I meet any resistance when I call the superintendent at the academy, please be available for an immediate phone call.”

  “I’ll be in my office.”

  “And if you’re not, make sure your cell phone is on.”

  Sam was in the office behind the hotel’s front desk, the place where he had started the investigation into the disappearance of Laura Wilcox. Eddie Zarro had joined him there. “You want to keep your cell phone line open, don’t you?” Eddie asked.

  Sam nodded, then watched as Eddie dialed the West Point number. While waiting for the call to go through, he frantically searched his memory for anything that might suggest another path of action. The technical guys were triangulating on Jean’s cell phone, something they expected to complete within minutes. When they did, they’d be able to pinpoint the exact location of the phone. That should help—assuming it isn’t in a garbage heap somewhere, Sam thought.

  “Sam, they’re ringing the superintendent’s office,” Eddie said. Sam’s tone when he picked up the phone was only slightly less forceful than the one he’d used with Craig Michaelson. When he spoke to the superintendent’s secretary, he did not mince words. “I am Detective Deegan from the Office of the District Attorney of Orange County. Cadet Meredith Buckley may be in serious danger from a homicidal maniac. I need to speak to the superintendent immediately.”

  He did not have to wait more than ten seconds before the superintendent was on the phone. He listened to Sam’s brief explanation, then said, “She’s probably in an exam right now. I’ll have her brought to my office immediately.”

  “Just let me be sure that you have her,” Sam asked. “I’ll hold on.”

  He held the phone for five minutes. When the superintendent came back on, his voice was charged with emotion. “Less than five minutes ago, Cadet Buckley was seen leaving Thayer Gate and going over to the parking lot of the Military Academy Museum. She has not returned, and she is neither in the parking lot nor in the museum.”

  Sam didn’t want to believe w
hat he was hearing. Not her as well, he thought, not a nineteen-year-old kid! “I understood that she promised her father she wouldn’t leave West Point,” he said. “Are you sure she went outside?”

  “The cadet didn’t break her word,” the superintendent said. “Although it’s open to the public, the museum is considered part of the West Point campus.”

  90

  Jill Farris was in the studio when Jake got back to Stonecroft. “Robby Brent’s body was in the meat wagon by the time I got there,” he said, “but they’d pulled the car out of the water. He was found in the trunk. I bet President Downes is having a heart attack or at least a bleeding ulcer. Can’t you see the publicity we’ll be getting now?”

  “The president is very upset,” Jill Farris admitted. “Jake, are you through with the camera?”

  “I think so. You know, Jill—I mean Ms. Farris—it wouldn’t have surprised me if Laura Wilcox was found in the trunk of that car with Brent. I mean, what’s happened to her? I’d bet the ranch that she’s dead, too. And if she is, the only one at that lunch table still alive is Dr. Sheridan. If I were her, I’d hire a bodyguard. I mean, when you think how many so-called celebrities won’t stir unless they’re surrounded by a couple of muscle men, why wouldn’t someone like Dr. Sheridan, with a real reason to worry, not get some protection?”

  It was a rhetorical question, and Jake was already on his way into the darkroom, so he got no answer.

  He wasn’t sure what he would do with his shots of the crime scene. It was unlikely that they’d ever see the light of day in the Stonecroft Academy Gazette. Still, he was certain that he’d eventually find a place for them, even though he hadn’t yet received an offer to be a roving reporter for the New York Post.

  When the pictures were developed, he viewed them with intense pleasure. From different angles he had caught the starkness of the car with its sides dented from hitting a rock pile in the river and its open trunk, dripping water. He also had gotten a good shot of the meat wagon, its lights flashing as it backed away.