Page 11 of Mile High Mystery

Yet he knew Camille wasn’t cruel. If anything, she was too compassionate, going out of her way to make other people comfortable, even at her own expense. At her funeral, those who had attended had spoken over and over about how generous and considerate she was. Knowing this, Zach could believe she would do anything to protect her family, even if it meant letting them think she was dead and never seeing them again.

And then she had come back here. Maybe she had only wanted to check on him, to make sure he was okay, but he didn’t think so. Agent Dryden had been right when she said Camille had come to warn him.

The idea made him sick with guilt, and he forced his mind to think about something else. Agent Shelby Dryden. She was pretty—not beautiful, but with a rounded face and full cheeks and blue eyes that looked right into him, as if she was searching for all his secrets. She looked younger than she probably was. She looked delicate and gentle, but didn’t back down from a difficult task. She had to be tough to face down the kind of criminals the FBI investigated, not to mention her fellow agents, who, from what Zach had experienced, were a hard bunch.

So Agent Dryden could be hard, too. But she had also been gentle with his parents. She had told them everything they wanted to hear about Camille—all the good things to make them believe she had been happy. But how could she have been happy without her family, when they had always meant so much to her?

Zach thought of the car Shelby Dryden had said was following them tonight. A white Toyota. He didn’t know anyone with a white Toyota, but there must be hundreds of them in the county. And it seemed odd that someone would follow his truck but never do anything. They hadn’t tried to run him off the road or fire any shots or anything.

The idea that someone had been following him, that the Chalk brothers might want to kill him, ought to terrify him. But he didn’t feel fear. All he felt was numb. That was pretty much all he had felt for the past four years. Call it a coping mechanism or the aftereffects of grief. Zach couldn’t seem to feel the things he told himself he ought to feel.

Five years ago

“GOODNIGHT, BENNIE! Have a great time this weekend, Amy! Thanks for everything, Oliver!” Camille waved to the last of the night shift at Britannia Pub as they left the restaurant. Parked across the street, Zach watched the trio of friends pass in and out of the glow of the security lights as they walked to their vehicles at the back of the parking lot. Camille turned the keys in the trio of locks on the back door to the restaurant, then slipped the key ring into her purse and headed down the sidewalk, toward the bus stop.

He started the truck and drove until he was even with Camille. She glanced over and a smile lit her face. “Hey!” He stopped and she pulled open the passenger door. “What are you doing here?”

“I didn’t like the idea of you taking the bus while your car is in the shop, so I came to give you a ride home.”

“You didn’t have to do that,” she said, even as she settled into the passenger seat. “But I’m glad you did. Devon says he’ll have my car ready Friday. The new ignition module is supposed to be in tomorrow.”

“No problem,” Zach said. He turned the key in the ignition and checked the mirrors. Unlike during daylight hours, when the downtown Houston streets hummed with pedestrian and vehicle traffic, this time of night—almost three o’clock—he had no trouble pulling into the street. Traffic still eased down the streets, but the cars were spaced farther apart, and the only other people on the sidewalk were a couple of men leaning against the wall outside the Salvation Army mission and a man in a chef’s checkered pants and clogs hurrying toward the transit station.

They were scarcely a block away from the restaurant when Camille swore. “What is it?” Zach asked, surprised at the outburst from his normally easygoing sister.

“I left my wallet at the restaurant,” she said. “I got it out of my locker on my break to pay Bennie the ten dollars he loaned me to cover lunch the other day, and instead of putting it away afterward I tucked it into the little cubby under the hostess stand.” She looked up at him, expression pleading. “I know it’s late, but I really need to go back and get it.”

“It’s okay.” He turned left at the next street, went around the block and coasted back to his previous parking spot across the street. “Do you want me to go with you?” he asked.

“No. I’ll just run in and get it. It won’t take me a second.” She unfastened her seat belt and slid out of the truck, then jogged across the street. She stood for a moment opening the locks, then disappeared inside.

Zach rested his wrists on top of the steering wheel and looked toward the corner of the restaurant, which was also the corner of the street. Britannia’s front entrance opened onto the cross street, and the red neon of its sign on the side of the building cast a reflection onto the street. The traffic light turned green. By the time it turned red again, he was wondering what was taking Camille so long. He looked toward the alley and the back door of the restaurant, but all was still. He jumped as a loud report echoed down the empty street. Like a car backfiring or firecrackers, maybe over on the next block.

Or a gunshot? Downtown was pretty safe these days, but there was always crime in a city this size. He glanced back toward the corner, and a man ran into the intersection. The solitary figure froze for a moment, lit by the streetlight—a young man in dark pants and a white shirt, his face very pale. He had a prominent nose and chin, his eyes dark hollows in the bright light, his expression one of terror. The young man turned toward him, and instinct sent Zach diving under the dash.

Then the door of the truck wrenched open, and Camille shoved inside. “Go!” she shouted. “We have to get out of here.”

Zach straightened. The man in the intersection was gone, and the light was green again. He put the truck in gear and lurched into the street. He drove wildly, in the middle of the street, running at least one red light, but there was no one around to see him do it.

“There! Turn right there!” Camille pointed and Zach wrenched the steering wheel to the right. He sped past a line of parked cars, then slammed on his brakes as he met a concrete barrier. “It’s okay.” Camille put a hand on his arm. “We’ll be okay now. This is a police station.”

Zach blinked. Now he saw that the line of cars he had passed were Houston Police cruisers. He looked up and saw the lit sign Police. “What happened?” he asked.

Camille was pale, but she looked so much calmer than he felt. “Someone was in the restaurant when I went inside,” she said. “They must have come in after I left the first time.”

“How did they get in?” he asked. “I saw you lock the door.”

“They must have come in the front door,” she said. “They had a key.”

“What do you mean they had a key?”

She wet her lips. “If I tell you, you can’t say anything to anyone,” she said. “Not even the police. Especially not the police. Whatever they ask you, you weren’t there, all right?”

“Why can’t I tell the police? Cammie, what is going on?”

She leaned closer and gripped his arm. “Charlie and Christopher Chalk own the Britannia Pub,” she said. “You know who the Chalk brothers are, right?”

“Of course.” Anyone who lived in Houston and watched the news or read a newspaper knew the Chalk brothers. They owned a lot of real estate. Restaurants and bars, apartment buildings, strip clubs, convenience stores. They were rumored to have connections to the mob or to drug cartels or to illegal gambling and prostitution. Maybe they had spent time in prison. Maybe they had murdered people. How much was truth and how much sensationalism, Zach didn’t know or care.

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