AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“So we’re hooking up with Bergin tonight?”
“Yep. At the inn where we’re staying.” Sean checked his watch. “In about two and a half hours. Then we see Roy at ten tomorrow morning.”
“So how do you know Bergin again?”
“He was my law professor at UVA. Great guy. Was in private practice before he started teaching. Few years after I graduated he hung his shingle back out. Defense lawyer, obviously. Has an office in Charlottesville.”
“How’d he end up repping a psycho like Edgar Roy?”
“He specializes in hopeless cases, I guess. But he’s a first-rate attorney. I don’t know what his connection is to Roy. I’m assuming he’ll fill us in on that, too.”
“And you never did elaborate on why Bergin engaged us.”
“I didn’t elaborate because I’m not quite sure. He called, said he was making headway in Roy’s case and needed some investigation done by people he could trust in preparation for taking the case to trial.”
“What sort of headway? From my reading of the case they’re only waiting for him to get his mind back so they can convict him and then execute him.”
“I don’t profess to understand what Bergin’s theory is. He didn’t want to discuss it on the phone.”
Michelle shrugged. “I guess we’ll find out soon enough.”
They left the interstate, and Michelle steered the Ford east along increasingly poor and windy surface roads. As they neared the ocean waters, the briny smell invaded the car.
“Fishy, my favorite,” she said sarcastically.
“Get used to that smell. It’ll be everywhere up here.”
She calculated they were about thirty minutes from their destination along a particularly lonely patch of road when the silvery night was broken by another set of car lights. Only they weren’t on the road. They were on the shoulder. Michelle automatically slowed as Sean rolled down his window for a better look.
“Flashers,” he said. “Somebody’s broken down.”
“Should we pull over?”
He debated this. “I suppose. They might not even be able to get cell reception up here.” He poked his head out for a better look. “It’s a Buick. I doubt someone would use a Buick to lure unsuspecting motorists into a trap.”
Michelle touched the gun in its holster. “I doubt we qualify as unsuspecting motorists.”
She slowed the Ford and pulled in behind the other car. The hazard lights blinked off and on, off and on. In the vastness of coastal Maine it looked like a small conflagration stuck in the limbo of fits and starts.
“Somebody’s in the driver’s seat,” noted Michelle, as she put the Ford in park. “Only person I can see.”
“Then he might be worried about us. I’ll get out and put the person at ease.”
“I’ve got your back in case someone’s hiding in the floorboard and they don’t want to be put at ease.”
He swung his long legs out and approached the car slowly from the passenger’s side. His feet crunched over the sparse shoulder gravel. His breath came out as puffs of smoke in the chilled air. From somewhere among the trees he heard an animal’s call and briefly wondered if it was a moose. Animal Planet hadn’t been clear on what a moose actually sounded like. And Sean had no interest in finding out for himself.
He called out, “Do you need any help?”
Blink, blink of the hazard lights. No response.
He looked down at his cell phone clutched in his hand. He had reception bars. “Are you broken down? Do you want us to call a tow truck for you?”
Nothing. He reached the car, tapped on the side window. “Hello? You okay?”
He saw the silhouette of the driver through the window. It was a man. “Sir, you okay?” The guy didn’t budge.
Sean’s next thought was a medical emergency. Maybe a heart attack. A marine haze had obscured the moonlight. It was so dark inside the car he couldn’t make out many details. He heard a car door open and turned back to see Michelle climb out of their ride, her hand on the butt of her weapon. She glanced at him for communication.
