Untitled (24 page)

          I had two new avenues to investigate. One was Brad's Aunt Mamie, and believe me, I intended to check her out as soon as I could get over to Fairfax. The other, of course, involved the newspaper articles Tammy was kind enough (or maybe just feeling guilty enough) to copy for me.

   I'd barely hopped into the car before I thumbed through the articles. One look, and I knew I needed to call in an expert.

   I headed right over to Kegan's.

   As it turned out, he lived not far from where I'd first encountered Jim—and murder—in a neighborhood just off the beaten path in Clarendon. Kegan's apartment building was small and homey looking. His apartment was barebones essential with an eye on eco-friendly fabrics and a little feng shui thrown in for good measure.

   He was surprised—but happy—to see me and offered me a glass of spring water practically before I was through the front door. It wasn't until he'd brought the water over to a table that looked like it came from the secondhand store that he asked what was going on.

   "These." Tammy had provided me with a file folder, and I plunked it down on the table between us. "Brad was at the newspaper office just a couple days before he died. This is what he was looking for."

   "Really?" Kegan was as jazzed as a kid at Christmas. He scratched a hand through his dark hair. "You found that out? Just by going to the newspaper office? They told you all that? You're incredible, Annie."

   "Not so incredible." I was sure to point this out, even though it was fun thinking it was true. "I wasn't exactly one hundred percent truthful with them."

   "Who cares, if it got us what we need!" Kegan sat down and flipped open the file. He scanned the article at the top of the pile. His brows dropped over his eyes, and he flashed me a look, set that article aside and went on to the next. And the next one after that.

   "Environmental protests. In Colorado." He chewed his lower lip while he quickly leafed through the other dozen or so articles. "Why would Brad—"

   "I don't know." He'd carefully stacked the articles he'd already read, and I dragged them closer. "But I figured you were the man to ask. Every single one of them seems to be about the same environmental group." I rifled through the articles, looking for the name that had caught my eye back in the car, and when I found what I was looking for, I pointed.

   "Here. Mother Earth's Warriors. Have you ever heard of a group by that name?"

   Kegan didn't look sure, and that shouldn't have been enough to discourage me, but truth be told, it did. I had gone to his apartment hoping for answers, even though I knew it was a long shot. The articles went back six years, and the incidents they talked about had happened halfway across the continent. Still, hope springs eternal. Especially in the heart of an investigator who doesn't know a thing about ecological causes.

   "Are you sure you've never heard of them?" I asked Kegan.

   He was too nice to disappoint me and too honest to lie, so he responded to the imploring note in my voice by buying a little time. He read over the article in his hands and summarized as he went along. "It says here that this group known as Mother Earth's Warriors was responsible for a bunch of fires out in Colorado. They burned down some new housing developments they said encroached on what should have been protected forest land." He let go of the article, and it fluttered to the table. "That really hits home."

   My stomach clenched. "You're not telling me you would—"

   "Start fires? Don't talk crazy." I could practically see Kegan wrestling with his conscience. "I can understand why they'd do it, though," he finally admitted. It said a lot about our friendship that he'd trust me enough to confess even to thinking about a felony. "There are less and less places for animals to live, and that means entire species are going to be totally wiped out someday. There are fewer green spaces, more concrete. You don't think that's contributing to global warming? Developers aren't taking any of that into account, and I'll bet these . . ." He consulted the article again. "These Mother Earth's Warriors probably tried to address the issue sensibly. When the developers wouldn't listen . . . well, I've seen this kind of thing happen dozens of times. I'll bet the environmentalists tried, but they didn't get any answers. Or any help from the government. They believed they had to take matters into their own hands."

   "Maybe, but it says here that a couple firefighters were killed battling one of the fires. That takes their protests to a whole new level." Reading about the fatal fires in the article I pulled from the pile and looking at the photo of windwhipped flames, a chill snaked over my shoulders. "It also says that the authorities were closing in on their leader. Look." I tipped the article so that Kegan could see the smaller photo below the one that showed the firefighters and the sky-high blaze. It was dark and grainy, and it showed a thin guy with a scraggly beard and blond hair that cascaded over his shoulders and looked like it needed not only a cut and style, but a good washing, too. "His name was Joseph Grant," I said, reading the caption. "It says that he was the arsonist. Looks like he was killed accidentally by a fire he set himself. The article is four years old."

   I drummed my fingers against the table. "So why would Brad be interested in protests that happened years ago, and a guy who's already dead?"

   "Well, Brad did say he lived in Colorado once." I knew this, of course, but I'd forgotten all about it until Kegan brought it up. "He was a journalist back then, remember. Maybe he wrote about the group. Or knew some of its members. Maybe he knew something about the fire that killed that Joseph Grant guy. Maybe Brad knew that Joseph Grant didn't just die accidentally in that fire."

   "You mean Grant might have been murdered? And Brad knew that? And somebody found out that Brad knew it and killed Brad, too? Wow." I sat back, my head spinning. "It all makes sense, but we'd never be able to prove any of it. Unless . . ." I realized that Kegan didn't know about the package that had been found ripped open in Gillian's garden and filled him in on the details.

   "Maybe Brad did find something interesting in regards to Joseph Grant. Or Mother Earth's Warriors. Maybe he was looking for a way to keep the information safe, so he mailed it to himself. Maybe . . ." I glanced through the articles again. "This Grant guy has light hair. And it's long. He looks like the type who might wear a ratty sweatshirt. You don't suppose—"

   "He's dead. He couldn't have pushed Brad in front of that train."

   "There is that." I sipped my water and thought through the problem some more. No big surprise, I got nowhere fast. "So let's go through it again. Brad takes a sudden interest in Mother Earth's Warriors. Brad sends something to Gillian. Brad gets killed. Gillian gets the package. Gillian gets killed. There's got to be a connection, Kegan. All we have to do is figure out what it is."

   "I'll tell you what . . ." He scooped up the newspaper articles, tapped them into a pile, and put them back in the folder. "I'll keep these and read through them carefully and do some cross-referencing on the Internet. I'll talk to my friends in the environmental community and see what they know about the group and about Grant."

   "And I'll . . ." I hated to admit that I didn't know what I'd do. Right now the connection to Mother Earth's Warriors was looking like our strongest clue. But thanks to his contacts and his experience, Kegan had that covered.

   "I guess I'll go check out Aunt Mamie," I said and brought Kegan up to date on that aspect of the investigation. Even as I explained, I couldn't shake the feeling that an old lady in Fairfax wasn't nearly as strong a link as the newspaper articles and the mysterious Mother Earth's Warriors. "Mamie's not going to get us anywhere," I added. "She's going to be a dead end."

   "You don't know that. Not for sure." Kegan hopped out of his chair and took the file with him, carefully tucking it between a couple books on a shelf. I noticed one of them was the
Whole Earth Catalog
and the other was called
Home on the Range,
and I couldn't help but smile. Leave it to Kegan to not only practice what he preached, but read about it, too! "When will you have a chance to go out to Fairfax?" he asked.

   This was not so easy to determine. I'd already missed a day of work that week, and I was on the schedule at the bank for Saturday. "Sunday," I told him. "Maybe. If Jim doesn't need me to do anything special at Bellywasher's."

   "Yeah, Jim."

   It wasn't what Kegan said, it was the way he said it. Like just thinking about Jim somehow bothered him.

   Call it a professional hazard; I was curious. When Kegan turned away, I cocked my head to try to see his face so I could better gauge his reaction. "What's up with that? You mad at Jim about something?"

   "Not mad. No." He grabbed my water glass and took it into the kitchen, and he refused to meet my eyes. That's why I followed right after him.

   "You're not mad at Jim, but you don't want to talk about him."

   He turned on the water. He squirted the glass with soap (I had no doubt it was environmentally friendly), washed it, and rinsed it. "Jim's a great guy."

   "I know that. But that's not what we were talking about."

   "We were talking about Brad and Mother Earth's Warriors."

   "No, we were talking about me having to be at Bellywasher's on Sunday and you getting all weird when I mentioned Jim's name."

   By now, that glass was the cleanest in Arlington. Kegan washed it again. When he finally turned off the water, he didn't turn around to face me. "I know Jim's older and more successful than me," he said. "I know he's got that whole Scottish accent thing going, and I know how women go nuts for stuff like that, but . . . well . . . I'm going to be successful someday, too, Annie." He glanced over his shoulder at me. Briefly. His cheeks flamed. "Not in a monetary way, I don't think. Not in the way Jim is going to be, because Bellywasher's is such a hit. But I'm going to be successful following my dreams and living up to the things I believe in. I think . . . I think that a woman could find that appealing. And I know I'm a couple years younger than you, but I was just thinking . . . you know . . . maybe someday if you and Jim weren't . . . you know . . . that you and I might . . . you know . . ."

   I did, and at the same time I felt like a fool for not seeing this coming sooner, I also felt my heart squeeze in sympathy for Kegan. I'd already tried to ease into what I had to say with, Yo
u're such a nice kid, Kegan,
when I realized it was exactly the wrong way to address the problem.

   "I'm flattered," I said instead. The truth made a whole lot more sense than beating around the bush. "But Jim and I . . . well, I can't say we're serious, because honestly, we haven't had time to get all that serious. But we're thinking about getting serious. Right now, that's as much of a commitment as I can handle. To anyone."

   Kegan nodded, but he still didn't turn around.

   I showed myself out.

       It's not like I wanted to do it, or that I ever even imagined it might happen. Who would have thought he'd fall for a short, average woman with uncivilized hair and hips that were too big? I thought we were friends, and realizing that I'd hurt a friend made me feel lousy for the rest of the week. Not to mention worrying about what I'd do and say the next Monday when Kegan showed up for class, and I had to act like he hadn't laid his heart on the line— and I hadn't given it a couple of big bruises.

   By the time Sunday rolled around, I was more than ready for a diversion.

   When I called to ask if I could stop to talk to her, Mamie Dumbrowski wasn't in, but a woman who identified herself as Betty said, "Miss Mamie, she'll love having some company."

   Good thing Betty didn't ask what I wanted to see Mamie about. Something told me that when the old lady found out the subject was her low-down, sneaky nephew, she wasn't going to love me so much anymore.

   Mamie lived in a sprawling brick rambler not far off Chain Bridge Road. When I rang the bell, Betty was the one who answered. She was a heavyset, middle-aged African American woman with a glint in her eyes and a ready smile that made me feel like one of the family. She informed me that Ms. Dumbrowski had just returned from church and ushered me into a dining room with windows that looked out onto a rose garden and with a formal cherry dining table and chairs that were polished to perfection. A woman sat on the far side of the table. She was thin and aristocraticlooking with a face so full of wrinkles, it reminded me of a map. She also just happened to have a full head of long, silky hair. It was dyed a vivid shade of yellow.

   I told myself this meant nothing at all—not unless Mamie Dumbrowski happened to have something to do with a wacko environmental group known as Mother Earth's Warriors, anyway. Still, it wasn't easy ignoring the blonde coincidence. Or to keep the excitement out of my voice when I introduced myself and told her what I'd come about.

   "You want to talk about Brad?" Mamie's eyes were blue and hazy. That didn't keep them from being as sharp as a hawk's. When she studied me from across the table, I shifted from foot to foot. "Why?"

   "I understand you weren't happy with the way he handled your finances."

   Her chin came up. "Who told you that?"

   "A friend."

   "Not a friend of Brad's." The old lady's top lip curled. "Brad didn't have any friends."

   "Yeah, I've heard that, too. He had so many enemies, it's making it hard for the cops to figure out who killed him."

   "Who cares!" She dismissed the very thought with the wave of one hand. "He was a louse. You know what that is, don't you? If you have any questions, kid, take a look in the encyclopedia. Right there under the word louse, you'll see it: a picture of Brad Peterson."