Darkness First Read online

  Maggie went back to the Google search bar and typed in ‘Liz Carroll’, ‘Murder’, ‘Arson’, ‘Maine’. Far fewer hits here. The most interesting was a series of articles by a Portland Press Herald crime reporter named Tracy Carlin on the death of Sean Carroll’s wife and the subsequent investigation. Carlin, Maggie knew, was an old pal of McCabe’s. Maybe her partner could help after all. She’d call him in the morning.

  She read through the articles twice. The murder of an undercover cop in a high-profile drug investigation is a big deal in any law enforcement agency, and the state Drug Enforcement Agency and the Maine State Police CID Division threw both manpower and resources into the effort to find the killer. Scores of small-time Oxycontin dealers were dragged in and grilled for hours. Known informants were pressed hard for information. Those who admitted any contact with Liz Carroll or any knowledge of the Canadian drug theft were bullied, cajoled and in some cases offered confidential deals to reveal their contacts’ distribution sources. Only one useful lead was mentioned. A local distributor admitted she had negotiated a deal with Liz Carroll to reveal her sources in return for protection as a confidential informant and immunity from prosecution. Unfortunately the anonymous informant disappeared and her dismembered body turned up a few days later stuffed into a dumpster behind a WalMart in Brewer.

  Maggie closed her computer, flipped off the light and climbed into bed. As she drifted off to sleep she found herself thinking about her dinner with Sean Carroll and wondering if maybe, just maybe, there might be something there.

  27

  Maggie called McCabe as soon as she woke at seven A.M. There were three rings then the single word ‘What?’ His voice sounded groggy with sleep. ‘What’s up?’

  ‘You’re still asleep,’ she said.

  ‘Yeah. I’m still asleep. What’s going on?’

  ‘Who’s on the phone?’ Maggie could hear the sleepy voice of Kyra Erikson, McCabe’s girlfriend, in the background.

  ‘Hold on a sec,’ said McCabe. ‘Let me go in the other room.’

  She held on.

  ‘Okay, now talk to me.’

  ‘Listen, McCabe, I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘I shouldn’t have called so early. But it turns out I really could use some help.’

  ‘What do you need?’ he said, sounding suddenly alert.

  ‘Let me give you a little background first.’ She filled him in on everything she’d learned yesterday. Her conversations with the Stoddards and Emily. Her visit to Sam Harkness’s house in Roque Bluffs and to the Musty Moose. She told him about her conversation with Harlan, his relationship with Tiff Stoddard and his reaction to the news of her death. McCabe asked a few questions but mostly listened.

  Finally she told him about her dinner with Sean Carroll and what Carroll had said about his wife’s death, Laura Blakemore’s death and the Canadian drug connection.

  ‘Okay. What do you need me to do?’ he asked.

  ‘First off, please read Tracy Carlin’s articles about the Liz Carroll murder. Then talk to Carlin. See if maybe she knows anything more about the killing than what she wrote in the paper.’

  He said he would.

  As soon as Maggie broke the connection, Terri Mirabito called.

  ‘Was she pregnant?’ Maggie asked.

  ‘Yup. Only about six weeks but definitely pregnant.’

  Cause of death, Terri said, was exsanguination. Manner of death, cutting of the carotid arteries on both sides of Tiff Stoddard’s neck.

  ‘She must have bled out in seconds. If the killer was facing her when he cut he would have ended up covered in blood.’

  ‘Any defensive wounds?’

  ‘Nothing under her nails. But she did have a scaphoid fracture of the right wrist. My guess is he grabbed the wrist while she was trying to hit back. Snapped it back and broke it.’

  ‘Murder weapon?’

  ‘A sharp, thin-bladed knife, double edged, the blade less than two centimeters wide.’

  Maggie wondered if Harlan owned such a weapon. Or, if he did, whether he’d gotten rid of it.

  ‘I already sent fetal DNA to the lab. Pines ought to have preliminary reads in a couple of days. In the meantime you should send him any potential matching material you might have. Joe will send his reads down to the FBI to see if we can pick up a match with any of their databases.’

  ‘Good. Let Joe know I’ll be sending him two saliva samples,’ said Maggie. ‘One from a man we know had sex with Stoddard. One from me.’

  ‘Why you?’ asked Terri. ‘I’m reasonably certain you’re not the father of Stoddard’s baby.’

  ‘No, but my brother may be. If I’m not mistaken my saliva will work as well as his in establishing a match.’

  ‘Yes, it will,’ said Terri. ‘Maggie, I’m sorry to hear about that.’

  ‘Yeah. Me too. Ask Joe to put it on the front burner. Call me soon as he’s got preliminary reads.’

  The call ended and Maggie went down to the kitchen and poured herself a mug of coffee. Savage was sitting at the table, leafing through a pile of Sunday papers, ignoring Emmett Ganzer’s image three feet away on the tiny kitchen TV. The sound was muted.

  She clicked the mute button and Ganzer’s voice filled the room: ‘… comment on that yet. As I said before the investigation is just getting under way.’

  ‘What’s this?’ Maggie asked, tilting her head at the screen.

  ‘Initial press briefing,’ Savage said without looking up. ‘Yesterday afternoon. Carroll’s got a gag order going so Emmett didn’t get to say a whole lot. Just a basic description of the victims and the crime scene followed by a bunch of no comments, no suspects at this time and anyone with information please contact blah, blah, blah.’

  Maggie clicked the mute back on. She dropped a couple of pieces of bread into the toaster.

  ‘How come Ganzer’s out there and not Carroll? Everybody says he loves being the center of attention.’

  ‘Carroll wants to be the star of the show, not the warm-up act. He won’t take his turn until he can leap up on the stage and announce, ta-da! An arrest! All the preliminary crap goes to understudies like Ganzer.’

  Maggie buttered her toast and Savage went back to reading the papers. Maggie slid the ones he wasn’t looking at out from under him. Tiff Stoddard’s murder was the lead story in both the Press Herald and the Bangor Daily News. It even made the front page, albeit below the fold, in the Boston Globe: ‘Co-ed Brutally Slain in Downeast Maine. Drug Connection Suspected.’ Not much in the way of details. Her father was quoted twice saying the Washington County Sheriff’s Department was offering logistical and manpower support to the state police and was already helping in any way they could. Jena Sculley, one of the kids who found the body, described the scene in some detail. Emily wasn’t mentioned till paragraph four:

  In a related incident a local physician, Dr Emily Kaplan, was struck and injured by a car driven by the alleged killer as he fled the scene. At this time, it is uncertain what Dr Kaplan was doing there. She is currently in stable condition at Eastern Maine Medical Center in Bangor. A hospital spokeswoman described her injuries as serious but not life-threatening.

  When asked about the possible connection between the murder and the theft of a large amount of Oxycontin in Canada last winter, Detective Ganzer would only say that, while a connection had not yet been firmly established, it could not, at this time, be ruled out.

  A photo of Tiffany Stoddard, a kind of formal shot probably taken from her high school yearbook, accompanied the article.

  Savage looked up from the paper he was reading. ‘What time did you get in last night?’

  ‘Around one or so. You sleep on the couch a lot?’

  ‘Occasionally. Once I fall asleep there, Anya’s learned there’s no point trying to wake me. I just get cranky. I have an old man’s prostate so I wake up at least once during the night. At that point, I go upstairs and climb into bed. Last night it was about three A.M. Make any progress?’

  ‘I talked to Harlan
.’

  ‘You tell him about the cancer?’

  ‘No. Not yet. Time wasn’t right.’

  ‘Then what did you talk about?’

  ‘The murder. Turns out Harlan had something going with Tiff Stoddard.’

  Maggie knew Savage wouldn’t be happy hearing that. His expression confirmed it.

  ‘You tell Carroll yet?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘But you’re going to?’

  ‘Of course. No choice in the matter. Sleeping with the victim automatically makes Harlan a suspect. Makes me a suspect’s sister. Carroll’ll have to bring him in for an interview and you can bet it won’t be me doing the interviewing.’

  ‘Goddamnit,’ Savage said, slamming a folded newspaper loudly against the table. ‘That’s just effing great. The reporters are gonna eat this shit up. Can’t you just see the headlines now? “Sheriff’s younger son and key detective’s brother named as possible suspect in drug-related killing”.’

  He sighed deeply. Stared blankly out the back window then turned back to Maggie and asked the obvious question. ‘You think there’s any chance he might actually have done it?’

  ‘No, I don’t.’

  ‘You just being loyal?’

  ‘I don’t know. Maybe. The Harlan we knew growing up? There’s no way he could have done something like this. He was a hell-raiser for sure but no way a pervert or a sadist. Whoever butchered Tiff Stoddard was both.’

  ‘They say war changes people,’ said Savage. ‘Traumatizes the mind. I never experienced it personally. Too young for Korea. Too old for Vietnam. Your mother sure as hell thought the war changed Harlan. The newspapers and Internet are chockablock full of stories about Iraqi vets coming home and committing murder and/or suicide.’

  ‘Yeah, I read a bunch last night. Harlan told me he killed twenty-three people over there. One close-up with a knife. That’s got to do something bad to your head. So does shrapnel lodged in your brain. Still, there’s no hard evidence he had anything to do with this murder.’

  ‘Does he have an alibi for the critical hours?’

  ‘Yes and no.’ She told Savage what Harlan had told her about his whereabouts.

  ‘This is going to make it tougher for Carroll to keep you on the case.’

  ‘I know.’

  28

  9:30 A.M., Sunday, August 23, 2009

  Portland, Maine

  The seven-story pile of tan bricks at the top of Exchange Street had housed the newsroom and offices of the Portland Press Herald ever since the building had been erected and opened with great fanfare back in 1923, the glory days of print journalism.

  It stood, then as now, amidst the most impressive centers of local power. From windows on one side, the paper’s reporters and editors could look out at Portland’s century-old beaux arts City Hall. From the opposite side they could admire the neo-classical lines of the Federal Courthouse and its plainer sister, the Cumberland County Court, just beyond. Police headquarters at 109 Middle Street was two blocks away.

  At this hour on a Sunday morning, Detective Sergeant Michael McCabe had no trouble finding a parking space directly across the street. He crossed over and entered the building. An attractive blonde in her late thirties stood waiting for him at the bottom of the narrow stairs. They exchanged chaste kisses.

  McCabe and Tracy Carlin had dated casually during his first year in Portland. His BK year as he called it. Before Kyra. Their personalities meshed and they formed a fast and easy kinship. Both were into old movies and good Scotch. Both were single parents of young daughters. And both had gone through and survived messy divorces with habitually unfaithful spouses.

  Things might have slipped naturally, without much thought or effort, into something more serious had McCabe not wandered into Portland’s North Space Gallery during one of the city’s First Friday Art Walks and met a gorgeous young artist named Kyra Erikson.

  Once Kyra was in the picture, it quickly became apparent to both Carlin and McCabe that friendship was a better option than romance. The friendship lasted and for the past few years, they had gotten together occasionally for drinks or lunch and, when it was in their mutual interest, to exchange useful bits of information. Always discreet. Always off-the-record. Never for attribution. When McCabe had called Carlin to arrange the meeting, he’d let her know today would be one of those days.

  ‘He’s with me, Harry,’ Tracy called to the elderly man seated at the security window. The man nodded and waved McCabe through. Carlin led him up the stairs to the newsroom on the second floor. The place was a rabbit warren of small cubicles with a just a few private offices belonging to the paper’s senior editors lined up along one wall. He followed Carlin to her cube. She pulled over a second chair.

  ‘How are you doing, Tracy?’ McCabe hadn’t seen her for a couple of months. ‘Like your new assignment?’ She’d recently moved from the crime desk to covering the State House.

  ‘I do. Aside from having to haul my backside back and forth to Augusta all the time, it’s working out well. Especially now that Ronnie’s old enough not to need sitters. Anyway, you didn’t come up here on a Sunday morning to make small talk. What do you need?’

  McCabe looked around. The large newsroom was nearly, but not quite, deserted. McCabe could see only three other journalists seated at separated desks. Two were hunched over computer terminals and pecking away at what McCabe supposed were stories for Monday morning’s edition. The third, Charlie Issacs, who covered Portland’s art scene, was leaning back, feet on his desk, phone to his ear, talking animatedly to whoever was on the other end. Issacs noticed McCabe and waved. McCabe waved back.

  ‘Anywhere we can talk privately?’ he asked Tracy.

  She cocked her head and gave him a questioning look and then nodded. ‘Sure.’ She got up and led him to the empty office of Joe Fields, the Press Herald’s managing editor. She closed the door and perched on the edge of Field’s desk. ‘Okay, what’s this all about?’

  McCabe sat down in the visitors’ chair. ‘Well, for starters a state police detective.’

  ‘Which one?’

  ‘Sean Carroll?’

  ‘Ah, the young princeling.’

  ‘Why do you call him that?’

  ‘That’s what he is. The heir apparent. Only thirty-three and already odds-on favorite to take Mayhew’s job when Tom retires at the end of the year. Wouldn’t be at all surprised to see him running the whole show before he hits forty.’

  ‘Is he that good?’

  She considered the question. ‘Yes. Sean’s smart, charming and ambitious as hell. And way too good-looking on top of it. What’s your interest in Carroll?’

  ‘He’s running a murder case up in Machias.’

  ‘Yeah, I heard. Tiffany Stoddard. Gruesome enough to knock my piece on Senator Hardesty’s fundraising scandal out of the lead position in this morning’s paper.’

  McCabe smiled. ‘People always prefer reading about gruesome murders to gruesome politicians.’

  ‘Definitely. Especially when the victim’s a sexy young woman. Anyway, what’s your interest in Carroll?’

  ‘A good friend of mine is working with him and I want to make sure she doesn’t get screwed.’

  ‘Figuratively or literally?’

  ‘Either. Both.’

  Carlin smiled. ‘Who’s the lucky girl?’

  ‘Maggie Savage.’

  ‘Maggie? Really? Now that is interesting. What’s a Portland detective doing working on a Machias murder?’

  ‘She’s from there. The doctor who was injured is a close friend. Carroll agreed to take Mag on as a special investigator. What I need to know is: can Carroll be trusted?’

  Tracy arched a single eyebrow. ‘Interesting word, trust,’ she said. ‘If you mean is he a good cop? Absolutely. I haven’t checked lately but I’ll bet he still has one of the highest clearance rates in the history of the state police CID.’ Tracy paused.

  ‘Sounds like there’s a but.’

  ‘There is. L
ike a lot of ambitious men, under the charm, Sean can be ruthless. He’ll do whatever it takes to get where he wants as fast as he can get there.’

  ‘Running the state police?’

  ‘For starters. After that maybe politics. Or possibly business. I get the feeling money and power are both important to him. I’m not sure which is more important.’

  Over the years McCabe had run into a few cops like that. One was currently running the Portland PD. And thinking about running for governor.

  ‘What can you tell me about the murder of Carroll’s wife?’ asked McCabe.

  ‘You read my stories on it?’

  ‘I read them. I guess what I want to know is if there was anything about the murder that didn’t make its way into your stories?’

  ‘First tell me why you – or Maggie – might be interested in that.’

  ‘Apparently, Carroll thinks whoever killed Stoddard may be the same person who killed his wife.’

  ‘What’s the connection?’

  ‘Canadian Oxycontin. As you know, Liz Carroll was killed investigating what became of the drugs stolen in Saint John. What you don’t know is a bagful of Canadian tabs were found last night at the scene where Stoddard was killed.’

  ‘Really? Now that is interesting.’ Tracy’s reporter instincts were kicking into high gear. She slid off the edge of the desk, rummaged in her handbag and found a pack of Marlboros. She walked over to the window, raised it about a foot, lit up and eased her butt down on the sill. ‘Everything I found out at the time was in the articles,’ she said, blowing blue smoke out the open window. ‘Except for one thing. Something I was told by an anonymous source in the state police who made me promise not to reveal his name. I decided not to write anything about it because I could never get any confirmation he was telling the truth. I think the guy may have had an ax to grind. But even supposing he was telling the truth I’m not sure how important that particular truth is. Or why it might be relevant to the Stoddard case.’