Page 29 of Flash Freeze

Has she figured out our strategy?

“Do not answer that, Ms. Kerrington,” advised Buchanan.

“I certainly will,” Amanda countered. “We didn’t need to lift a finger against Gulf Allied to secure that contract. It was always going to be ours. As to a messy business, such as a bomb or fire? Nonsense. Too risky. What if the fire department had been held up in traffic, if the bomb had done more damage than intended, if the chemicals had poisoned the air over that sector of the city? One of our own plants is less than a mile from there. Not only would such a rash act have risked our facility, but I don’t hurt people. If I were going to hurt someone, it would be that bastard Charles, not his innocent employees.”

“Yes,” Athena said. “I understand there’s been bad blood between your families for decades. Can you think of anyone other than Lone Star who might want to send a warning, as you say?”

“All those environmental terrorist groups,” Ms. Buchanan snapped. “We’ve been fighting them in court for years, had injunctions taken out against them, and last fall, all our transport trucks’ tires were slashed and graffiti sprayed on the tanks. We’ve had perimeter fences cut, rocks and bricks thrown through windows, and plenty of threatening letters and emails. Lone Star Industrial has been forced to spend a small fortune on security concerns.”

“Is that why Inspector Nolan wrote you up for EPA and OSHA safety violations last year?” Bach asked. “Because you had to spend all your money warding off some tree-huggers?”

“Hey,” Mr. Adebayo grunted. “Security is a vital issue. Three workers and the inspector were killed at Gulf Allied. We aren’t about to let that happen here.”

Ms. Buchanan drew her lips into a severe line. “I don’t think that’s what he’s implying, Ray, and Ms. Kerrington, do not take the bait. We welcomed having the violations pointed out to us so that we could address them, which we have. To suggest that CEO Kerrington or anyone at Lone Star is happy about Mr. Nolan’s death is insulting. It was simply bad timing that he was in the office when the bomb went off.”

Athena thought for a moment. The coroner said Nolan had been dead about an hour before the fire. Booker had his people all out of the office for a meeting because Nolan wanted the room to himself to inspect the records. If someone whacked him on the head and just left his body there, eventually it would have been found. Booker would wonder what was taking him so long. Campbell said only employees’ and contractors’ vehicles entered through the front gate. So, Nolan’s killer had to have been associated with Gulf Allied Chemicals. The bomber could still be a competitor or environmental activist. So, are we looking for one unsub or two?

“Ms. Kerrington, we saw your media statement yesterday,” Athena said. “It was very generous of you to voice your empathy and back it up with real aid money. You didn’t have to do that.”

“My parents took me to Sunday school when I was a child,” she answered. “A lot of it stuck, especially the Golden Rule part. Those workers aren’t responsible for Charles Whitmore’s sins. They deserve compassion. And I was serious when I said we want this felon behind bars.” She cast a smile at her bodyguard. “Ray here might like a day off.”

Do unto others as you would have them do unto you, Athena remembered from church. She wondered how Amanda’s brother was treated by the family, the church, when he contracted AIDS. It was probably covered up to protect the Kerringtons’ reputation. Maybe they told people it was leukemia or another deadly disease and hid him away. She wouldn’t bring any of that up with Amanda. It was intrusive and irrelevant to the case. Still, being the ‘80s, she wondered.

“So, just to be direct,” Bach said, “you deny having anything to do with the bomb, fire, or Mr. Nolan’s death?”

“Absolutely!” Ms. Buchanan declared. “Neither CEO Kerrington nor anyone in her employ perpetrated an attack on Gulf Allied Chemicals.”

“Shall I escort them out?” asked Mr. Adebayo, his voice deep and unyielding.

Amanda shook her head. “That won’t be necessary. They are just doing their job, and I wish them all the luck in the world. There is someone else you should consider, Special Agent Bouvier.” She met Athena’s gaze. “Charles Whitmore. My little birdies tell me he was about to be slapped hard with violations, and the EPA wasn’t going to let him buy his way out of it. I have no evidence, but, from one woman succeeding in a man’s world to another, just talk to him. You’ll see what I mean. He’d rather jet off to Paris for breakfast than invest in his own company.”

“But risk the lives of his employees to destroy evidence of noncompliance?” Bach asked.

Amanda leaned forward, steepling her fingers.

Athena admired her shade of nail polish. I wonder how that color would look on me? Would Flash like it?

“You assume he cares about anyone other than himself,” Amanda pronounced. With a shrug, she added, “He might have assumed no one would get hurt, or one of his own little birdies might have mentioned Inspector Nolan was in the office alone at the time. Either way, he’s more likely than the Russians or Chinese. I suspect they would have blown the whole factory sky high, civilians be damned.”

Athena rose, and Bach followed. “Thank you for speaking with us today, CEO Kerrington, and for offering the reward. The bureau assigned a couple of junior agents to tip-line duty. We’ll do our best to catch the culprit before they target Lone Star.”

Chapter 14

Where Amanda Kerrington’s seat of power gleamed with contemporary luxury, Charles Whitmore’s Redstone Ranch exuded old money. With the added pre-storm traffic, it had taken Athena and her detective tagalong an hour and a half to reach the sprawling estate. After discussing their impressions of Kerrington, Athena had called Agent Shoops and asked her to start deeper runs on employees at Gulf Allied Chemicals, particularly those who worked in the office. “CEO Kerrington said her little birdies passed on information,” she said, “which means we’re looking for a Lone Star mole in Gulf Allied.”

Bach tried his hand at entertaining Athena with humorous on-the-job anecdotes until his throat got dry—or he figured she wasn’t listening. Then they just played the radio for a while.

“Wow,” he said, speaking for the first time in half an hour. “I wonder how much of this land belongs to Whitmore?” The ranch stretched to every horizon, the fences eventually disappearing into the distance.

“According to public records, 100,000 acres,” Athena supplied as she turned off the access road through massive wrought-iron gates beneath a sign that arced the word REDSTONE. The gates hung from heavy square columns built of the ranch’s namesake rust-red stone. Ancient southern live oaks lined the quarter-mile driveway, their sprawling limbs arching overhead to form a tunnel of green. Cattle grazed beneath the slow nodding of oil wells across the surrounding pastures. The mansion remained hidden until the terminal bend in the drive, where a sprawling wraparound veranda emerged between the oaks.

The two-story estate boasted a Spanish architectural style, from its red-tiled roof to the grand archways edging the veranda. Sandstone walls, long windows, second-floor balconies, and three perfectly aligned dormers completed the Old-World aesthetic. Two Texas sabal palms stood like silent sentinels on either side of the grand stone staircase. The meticulous landscaping included flowerbeds and shrubs, some of which ringed a pole that flew both the American and Texas flags to the right of the front stairs. To the left rose a historic iron oil-well pump like a proud piece of sculpture.

The driveway forked before reaching the mansion, with one path leading around back, where presumably a carriage house had been converted into a garage, and the other forming a turnaround loop.

“I’m surprised armed guards haven’t descended on us,” Bach said as he took in the historic splendor. No sooner had the words left his mouth than two White men in western-cut charcoal suits emerged onto the veranda. Athena pulled to a stop and killed the engine.

“See what you did?” She lifted a brow at Bach, who laughed and shook his head.