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s,” he muttered.
“Go before Hurston shuts you down and takes over the Stahd case.”
“The Stahd case is ours.” McCrae was positive. “I’ll go when things cool down a bit.”
“Then I’ll go,” Quin said determinedly. “Before Hurston gets in the way.”
McCrae knew the mettle of Timothy Hurston better than anyone. He liked convenience, tidiness, cases that were neatly tied up and made him look good. The man was running for the state senate, a true politician. He’d decided Bailey’s and Penske’s deaths were a murder/suicide and, by sheer force of will, had slashed down any argument McCrae and others in the West Knoll PD had to offer. Hurston was much loved by the upper brass, so he’d gotten his way. Case closed. A feather in his cap. He’d obviously also since convinced Corinne that he was correct in his assessment of the crime, as she was apparently helping him.
And maybe it was a little bit about her twisting the knife on McCrae, as she knew how he felt about the man’s findings.
“I’ll go,” McCrae said. “And I’ve got a meeting with Coach Sutton later tonight.”
“Good. I’ll keep checking with the lab, see if they’ve pulled any other DNA from the crime scene, and I’ll talk to the employees again.”
“I’d like to be in on any other interviews,” said McCrae.
Quin nodded. “Let’s connect later. Trade stories. I’ll make sure your trip to”—he looked to the open doorway and lowered his voice, changing course—“Hurston won’t know where you are.”
“Good.” If Hurston should so much as catch a whiff of someone challenging one of his settled cases, he’d move heaven and earth to keep them from overturning it.
Quin added, “There was a bar fight with the Crassleys last night. I’ve put Corolla on it.”
McCrae snorted. There was always a bar fight with the Crassleys.
He re-gathered up his belongings and headed out, calling Delta on the way. When she didn’t pick up, he left her a voice message, telling her he would be busy for most of the day, but she could call him and leave messages and texts, and he would get back to her. He also added that, if she needed anything immediately, she should call Quin. Maybe Quin wasn’t Delta’s biggest fan, but he was a fair man, and the way Stahd Senior had eviscerated her on television wouldn’t sit well with Quin’s innate chivalry.
On the drive south, he thought over the information he’d learned about Tanner Stahd’s attack and subsequent death, letting his mind free-associate. He thought of Delta, the elder Dr. Stahd, the personal nature of stabbing someone, the possibility of divorce with an undoubtedly looming custody battle, and the victim himself, Tanner Stahd and his purported womanizing, from high school right on to the present. From there, he thought about Bailey and Penske and Carmen . . .
McCrae looked through the windshield at the passing landscape, fields on either side of the freeway that cut down to the Willamette Valley.
He thought about Jed Corolla, who’d allowed Ellie, Amanda, and Zora into Tanner’s room.
“They didn’t do anything, I swear,” the earnest younger officer had said, catching up with him just before he left for Eugene. “The three of them . . . I was right there. They were just standing back, four feet or so, when Stahd had the heart attack that killed him. They never even got close. He just sat up and yelled, ‘Dee,’ and then dropped back down, unconscious. The staff tried to revive him, but he never came back.”
When McCrae had absorbed that, Corolla added, “That redhead looked like she knew what that meant.”
The redhead. Ellie O’Brien.
“What about the others?” McCrae had asked.
He shook his head. “They all were herded out of the room, and I followed them out. They left.”
McCrae followed his GPS into Eugene and a street a few blocks outside of campus but close enough to get some foot traffic to the Duck-Duck Inn. He’d been given the information on Carville from a series of current and previous coworkers at Lundeen’s who kept sending him from one person to another until he finally learned of Carville’s whereabouts.
The Duck-Duck Inn was undoubtedly named for U of O’s mascot, a Donald Duck replica that had apparently been grandfathered in by Disney to allow for the university’s use. There were Donald Duck caricatures involved in various stages of comic high jinks decorating the otherwise rough board walls. McCrae doubted the image was sanctioned by businesses outside the university grounds, like the Duck-Duck, but no one appeared to be complaining.
He sat down at the end of the bar and ordered a beer. It was about 1:00 p.m. No sign of Carville. Maybe the information was wrong, or maybe he was slated to work later. McCrae turned to his phone, checking e-mails and texts. Nothing new. He’d hoped Delta would contact him, but she’d been radio silent since he left her off with her parents.
Dee, he mused, thinking of Tanner’s last word. Sure, “Dee” could be for Delta, but there were other possibilities as well. Coach was Dean Sutton, he could be the “D.” Or . . . Zora DeMarco. And it certainly didn’t have to be somebody’s name.
After he’d been at the bar about twenty minutes, he called the bartender over, a young woman in a sleeveless shirt with arm tattoos covering nearly every square inch of skin and a series of tiny red stones pierced into an arc around one nostril. “I’m looking for somebody,” he said.
“You a cop?” she asked.
McCrae was in jeans and a blue shirt with the sleeves rolled up. He was almost offended that she’d made him so quickly. “This is outside my job, and the higher-ups would not appreciate my being here.”
She looked interested. “Could you get fired over it?”
