Fallen Sparrow Page 16

“But we can be creative.”

  Hewitt tilted his head. “What, exactly, do you have in mind?”

  The Hampton Inn in Reeds was overkill for the area, Peyton thought. There were several locally owned hotels, and she hadn’t thought the Hampton Inn would make it. She’d thought (maybe even hoped) local businesses would run it out. But, like the Wal-Mart in town, it had not only survived but thrived. Allegiances fade quickly in a down economy.

  She parked her service vehicle, entered the lobby, and walked to the desk.

  “I need the room number of Dr. Sherry St. Pierre-Duvall.”

  “I’ll call the room and put you on the line.”

  The girl behind the counter was college-aged, wearing the standard-issue dark blazer. Her name tag read tanya. Probably an intern, maybe a hotel-management or recreation major at the University of Maine branch at Reeds.

  Peyton looked around. No one was nearby.

  “Actually, this is official business,” she said. Official business. Even to herself she sounded like a TV caricature.

  “Really?” the young woman said, eyes widening. “I can lead you to the room.”

  “No, that’s okay.”

  “No, really. I mean, I don’t mind. I’m studying journalism. Maybe I can—”

  “No. Just tell me the room number. And this is all off the record. Understand?” She knew she had no way of enforcing her request but thought the student-journalist might buy it.

  “Nothing’s off the record unless I agree to it. The Duvalls have rooms 210 and 418.”

  “Two rooms?”

  “One is a suite,” the girl said, nodding.

  Peyton took the stairs, and Dr. Chip Duvall answered the door when she knocked.

  “Oh, Peyton, hi. Is this a personal visit? I guess not. You’re still in uniform.”

  The chain was still on the door.

  “May I come in, Chip?”

  “Of course.”

  He closed the door. She heard the chain rattle, and the door re-

  opened.

  The first thing she noticed was the room looked like he’d just checked in: both queen-sized beds made perfectly, TV remote next to the TV, desk materials organized.

  “Where is Sherry?”

  “Oh, she just stepped out.” He wouldn’t look at her.

  “Will she be back soon?”

  “Um … probably.”

  His cell phone vibrated on the circular table in the corner. He went over and read the text message.

  “Will she be back soon?” Peyton asked again, moving to the center of the room.

  Both closet doors were open. And a red flag went up.

  Chip set the phone down, thinking.

  “I’d like to talk to Sherry, Chip. Where is she?”

  He looked out the window.

  Across Route 1, peopled moved to and fro in the Wal-Mart parking lot. Framed against the late-morning sunlight, they all seemed caught up in separate lives.

  “You came to see me because you thought Sherry might be in trouble,” Peyton said. “Now I’m reaching out, and you’re stalling.”

  “Not stalling,” he said, turning to look at her. “I’m a dentist. That’s all. It’s what I am. It’s what I know.”

  “What does that have to do with me coming to see Sherry?”

  He took a step toward her, his face softening, a faint smile appearing on his face. “I’ve got a bottle of wine on ice in the bathroom sink. Have a drink with me.”

  “It’s not even lunchtime,” she said.

  He sat on the corner of the bed. “It’s funny, when Sherry described you to me, she never told me how lovely you were.”

  Lovely.

  “The last time I was called lovely was by my grandfather,” she said.

  “Is sexy better? Sherry’s not going to be back for a while.”

  He held both hands out, palms up—a What do you say? gesture—and looked at the bed, then back at Peyton.

  She turned and walked out.

  At the end of the hall, she didn’t take the stairs. This time, she took the elevator. And this time, she went up to the fourth floor.

  When the door of suite 418 opened, it wasn’t the man’s face that she recalled.

  It was his hand.

  Twenty-Three

  All she said was: “I’m looking for Sherry.”

  Not even a last name. He would know who she meant. No I’m Agent Cote with US Customs and Border Protection. No official business this time. She was in uniform, and the look on his face said her arrival was an unexpected complication.

  What had she complicated?

  “Sherry and I have been friends since childhood,” she said. “I was nearby and thought I’d take her for coffee.”

  “Who is that, Kvido?” It was Sherry’s voice.

  Kvido had opened the door of the suite but didn’t ask her in. He was missing two fingers on his right hand, the skin at the edges of his palm smooth and strawberry-colored. He stepped back, and Sherry appeared.

  “Peyton, how are you?”

  “I was in Reeds, remembered you said you were staying here, and thought I’d take you for coffee.”

  Sherry didn’t immediately let her in either. She wore a long, thin sweater and jeans. Peyton noticed she wore no shoes on her feet.

  “Sure,” Sherry said. “That sounds great.”

  From behind: “When will you be back?”

  The Eastern bloc accent was unmistakable. Peyton wanted to get inside the suite. She wanted to confirm a suspicion, and she couldn’t do it from the hallway.

  “Sherry, can I use your bathroom before we go?”

  “No,” Kvido, with the Eastern bloc accent, said from behind Sherry.

  “Um,” Peyton said, “ah, okay, I’ll walk the four flights down to the lobby, I guess.”

  “There’s an elevator,” Kvido said.

  “No, no,” Sherry said. “It’s fine. Come in. I’ll get my purse while you use the bathroom.”

  Sherry stepped aside, and Peyton entered the room. Kvido stood, his back to her, dressed in khaki pants and a pale-blue button-down shirt. He was also barefoot.

  Unlike room 210, this was a suite. But there was another difference: this room looked lived in—and there were two suitcases on the floor near the closet but only one unmade bed.

  In Chip’s room, there had been only one suitcase.

  “It was kind of you to think of me,” Sherry said.

  They had exited the Hampton Inn, crossed the parking lot and the four-lane Route 1, and now sat in Tim Hortons.

  “How are the funeral arrangements coming?”

  “I need a florist,” Sherry said.

  “I can recommend a good one.”

  Sherry took out her cell phone and typed in Peyton’s suggestion.

  “Will your children attend the funerals?” Peyton asked.

  “I don’t think so. They’re with Chip’s sister in Portland. Do you think they should be at the funerals?”

  “Do I think they should be?” Peyton said. “Well, it might be hard on them, but they might want closure. I don’t know your children. How old are they?”

  “Sam, my son, is nine, and Marie is six.”

  “You named her after your mother,” Peyton said.

  Sherry looked down at the table. “I learned a lot from my mother.”

  “What did you learn?”

  “You’re genuinely interested. I can see it on your face.”

  “Yes. Personally, I think your mother tolerated your father for too long.” Peyton thought about her own mother, a farm wife, yes, but a fighter nonetheless. No one would push Lois Cote around.

  “I don’t see it that way. Sometimes you get into situations you have no control over, and you have to deal with the consequences.”
r />   “You always have control, Sherry. We all have choices.”

  “That’s the difference between you and me. I don’t believe that. I was never in a position to change anything. My strength was in dealing with the hand I was dealt.”

  “You’re talking about high school, about us.”

  “I couldn’t change anything then, so I made the best of it. I excelled, I went to Harvard, I did the best I could.”

  “Are you happy now?”

  “Happy? What does that have to do with this conversation?”

  “You seem to have it all: a career, two kids, and you married a doctor.”

  “You always have been like this, Peyton. It’s what always drew me to you when we were kids. You have a way of making things seem clear, black and white.”

  “Is that a good thing?” Peyton asked.

  “No. Because they never are black and white. People don’t have the choices you think they do, and you need to be able to live with gray.”

  At the adjacent table, a young mother wearing designer jeans and a Maine Winter Sports T-shirt sat with a toddler in a highchair. She sipped a latte as her baby pushed Cheerios around.

  “I shouldn’t be having this donut,” Sherry said. “It’s the last thing I need.”

  “You look fine. How did you meet Chip?”

  “I needed my teeth cleaned. He called afterwards.”

  “Really? When did you get married?”

  “Seven years ago.”

  “But Sam’s nine. Were you divorced?”

  “No. Marie is Chip’s. Sam is from a prior relationship.”

  “Hard being a single mom, isn’t it?” Peyton said.

  “Yes. You would know. That’s partly why I married Chip.”

  For Peyton, it wasn’t a reason to get married, but she didn’t comment.

  “Chip is fine, and I think he loves me, which is all that matters,” Sherry said to her coffee.

  “Not really.”

  Sherry looked up. “What do you mean?”

  “Your happiness matters,” Peyton said. “It’s what I was trying to say about your mother.”

  “Sometimes it’s hard to think like that,” Sherry said. “I wish you lived in Portland, Peyton. You’re easy to talk to you. You understand things.”

  “I know your past. We’re all the results of our childhoods. You are, and I am. If I took time to analyze it, I’d probably realize I’m a Border Patrol agent because my mother did everything in her power to get me to be a farm wife.”

  “Sounds like you have analyzed it.”

  Peyton grinned. “God love my mother.”

  “We’re not alike anymore, you know? I mean, look at us. I have a Ph.D., my teaching, my books, because my father made me do it. You have your life for the opposite reason, Peyton. I did what I was told. But you broke away.” She turned back to her coffee cup. “Maybe I’m still doing what I’m told.”

  “Who was the man I met today? You never actually introduced us, Sherry.”

  “Just a friend, here to help me make funeral arrangements.”

  “And his name?”

  “That’s sort of a personal question, Peyton.”

  “Yeah, I guess it is since your suitcase was in his suite, or his in yours. But I guess that’s just semantics. It’s really up to you, Kvido, and Chip to decide which room Chip gets alone.”

  “Peyton, I don’t like your tone.”

  “Why didn’t Kvido join us the other morning when you and I met for coffee? He sat in the rental car, the one registered to you. We both saw him from the window. I met you that morning because I thought you needed a friend.”

  “I did. I do,” she said. “Believe me.”

  “Who is he? Why was he watching us? Why did he need to do that?”

  “That’s none of your business, Peyton.”

  “And Chip is okay with whatever is going on between you and Kvido?”

  “Chip’s a sweet man, but he’s naive.”

  “You’re telling me he doesn’t know?”

  “He knows some things.”

  Peyton watched the young mother feed the baby Cheerios. Sherry’s description of Chip didn’t jive with the discovery session she’d witnessed—when Chip treated Sherry like a pet, repeatedly patting her on the thigh, telling her (and her attorney, no less) that he was in control.

  “When Chip came in the diner,” Peyton said, “he told you he’d seen Kvido. He knew Kvido drove away when he arrived.”

  “Listen,” Sherry said, “let’s talk about you. You dating anyone?”

  “You act as if we’re discussing a sweater Chip doesn’t know you bought.”

  “Chip is pulling me in one direction. And Kvido is pulling me in another. Besides, Chip isn’t very exciting.”

  “And Kvido is?”

  “You have no idea. Don’t you love the accent? I met him years ago in Prague. He attended a workshop I gave at a library. He’s a big reader. He read both of my books, came to the workshop because he appreciates my scholarship. We had this wonderful intellectual connection immediately. Now he’s come back into my life. He understands me in ways Chip doesn’t. I’ve always had men push me around. You practically said that yourself. But Kvido is different. What we have is different.”

  They were quiet, Peyton thinking of Sherry’s children, of where this left them.

  “Are you leaving Chip?”

  “Peyton, you ask a lot of questions. All of this is none of your business.”

  “It would be, if Nancy Lawrence was paid by you to be your brother’s alibi.”

  Sherry looked down at the tabletop. She carefully pushed the donut aside, took a napkin from the dispenser, and wiped a coffee spot.

  Finished thinking, she stood. “Thank you for the coffee and donut.”

  “Sherry, I’m trying to help you. I can’t do that if you won’t talk to me about Nancy Lawrence. What is going on?”

  When Sherry turned to leave, Peyton pushed.

  “Obstruction of a Criminal Investigation carries upwards of five years in prison, give or take, depending on how far this goes up the federal ladder.”

  Sherry turned back. “What?”

  “You paid Nancy Lawrence—”

  Sherry’s head shook side to side, denying even before Peyton was finished.

  “—to let Freddy sleep on her sofa the night Simon Pink was shot and the cabin was torched.”

  “No.”

  “Sherry, you need my help.”

  “No,” Sherry said. “No. Mind your own business.” She walked out.

  Peyton called the station and asked for Mitch Cosgrove, the former CPA.

  As they spoke, Peyton watched Sherry cross the four-lane highway alone, looking confused when a car honked at her and she had to step back—like a woman nearly blindsided by something she’d never seen approaching.

  Then she set her jaw and continued on, moving forward almost blindly.

  Twenty-Four

  Mitch Cosgrove, the station’s resident financial guru, was in Secret Service Agent Wallace Rowe’s make-shift office—at the picnic table in what a week ago had been agents’ breakroom. Each man had a laptop open, spreadsheets before them.

  “Lunch party?” Peyton said.

  Cosgrove smiled. Always clean-shaven, he was in his late forties and had a pale, fleshy face. He was not six feet but well over two hundred pounds. Originally from Seattle, he’d joined the Army after high school, attended the University of Washington after, and worked as a CPA on the West Coast before missing what he called “the life.” He was one of those—Peyton had known many—who thrived in a rigid, militaristic atmosphere.

  Small and wiry, wearing a navy-blue sports jacket, Wally Rowe looked like an accountant who ran 5Ks on the weekends, except his sports jacket gaped when he leaned over his
computer, and Peyton saw the Glock 9mm in his shoulder holster.

  “This is Agent Peyton Cote,” Cosgrove said.

  “I recognize the name,” Rowe said. “You’re the BORSTAR agent.”

  The Border Patrol Search Trauma and Rescue team was created in 1998 in an effort to save stranded migrants (and others). The tactical unit was comprised of forty-five agents selected from a nationwide applicant pool. It had been Peyton’s top professional achievement.

  She nodded. “I was nominated and appointed, but you really need to be on the Southern border. I gave up my spot.”

  “Tough decision?” Rowe asked.

  She sat across from him. “El Paso was a great place for an agent,” she said, “not for a single mom.”

  “Never knew that was why you left,” Cosgrove said.

  “Are you two working on something?” she asked.

  “Sort of,” Cosgrove said. “Wally did a lot of white-collar investigations when he was with the FBI—“

  “About a hundred years ago,” Rowe interjected.

  “—which is sort of what I’m doing here with Dr. Chip Duvall.”

  “Perfect,” Peyton said. “That’s what I was hoping we could talk about.”

  “You’re looking for a paper trail, I assume,” Cosgrove said.

  “I’m looking for twenty thousand dollars that Sherry St. Pierre-Duvall gave her brother.”

  “Not sure I have that,” Cosgrove said, “but I can tell you what I do have: Fred St. Pierre was behind on his property taxes for five straight years until about thirteen months ago. Then he paid seventy-eight thousand dollars in back taxes. This payment, essentially, saved the farm.”

  She looked at him, waiting.

  “That’s what I have so far,” he said.

  “He had a good year?”

  “An optimist,” Wally Rowe said. “It’s nice to meet one.”

  Cosgrove just smiled at her. “I’m sure that’s it,” he said. “Actually, Fred St. Pierre did have a better year. Except, given the price of potatoes that year, it’s hard to see how he had seventy-eight grand left over.”

  “Hard to see, or impossible?” Peyton asked.

  “Just telling you what I have,” Cosgrove said. “You can devise your own theories. But Wally, who did this kind of work for the FBI, agrees with me.”