Chapters (46)
- Title Page
- Copyright Page
- Dedication
- Acknowledgements
- one
- two
- three
- four
- five
- six
- seven
- eight
- nine
- ten
- eleven
- twelve
- thirteen
- fourteen
- fifteen
- sixteen
- seventeen
- eighteen
- nineteen
- twenty
- twenty-one
- twenty-two
- twenty-three
- twenty-four
- twenty-five
- twenty-six
- twenty-seven
- twenty-eight
- twenty-nine
- thirty
- thirty-one
- thirty-two
- thirty-three
- thirty-four
- thirty-five
- thirty-six
- thirty-seven
- thirty-eight
- thirty-nine
- forty
- forty-one
- forty-two
“Cody Radu,” Jacob said.
Mutters circled the room. Even Lorraine didn’t jump in to his defense.
Jacob was the first to speak. “Cody’s a rich brat who thinks he’s a lot smarter, a lot better looking, and a lot richer than he is. Big fish, small pond. His daddy’s a developer. Cody works for him. Not exactly the Vanderbilts, but around here, they’re high society, which is why they stay.”
“So it was rumored Cody was seeing Ginny?”
Lorraine snorted and muttered, “No rumor about it. He was and everyone knew it.”
“Did Ginny threaten to tell his wife?”
Jacob shook his head. “Tiffany Radu knew all about Ginny. She married the local rich boy and isn’t about to let him go, no matter what.”
Which sounded like a motive for murder, if that rich boy decided he wanted to permanently relocate to greener pastures.
“Cody likes to wallow in the mud,” Jacob said. “Tiffany’s happy to let him, as long as he keeps the muck out of her pretty little life.”
Lorraine shushed him, but only halfheartedly.
“Are we talking more muck than trashy girlfriends?” I asked.
“Sure are,” Jacob said. “Dope, parties, hookers. Hell, I’ve even heard he runs a white slavery ring out of Seattle.”
“Okay, that’s enough,” Lorraine said. She looked at me. “Folks around here don’t have a lot of time for Cody Radu, but all that is just rumor.”
“Like hell,” Jacob said. “Chief Bruyn’s been investigating him for years. Everyone knows he’s up to a shitload of crap, but the cop can’t pin a thing on him. That’s how he figures Ginny and Brandi got killed. Maybe even Claire Kennedy.”
“Blackmail or extortion,” I said. “They threatened to give Bruyn the proof he needed.”
“You got it. The way those girls were killed? Wasn’t about sex. Wasn’t about rage. It was execution, pure and simple.”
eight
eight
Next stop: the commune.
Before leaving the diner, I’d grilled Lorraine and her patrons on the local cult / commune. They were very reluctant to talk about it, wanting to leave the group in peace. Yeah, right. Show me a town where no one jumps at the chance to gossip about the local religious sect, and I’ll show you a town full of deaf-mutes.
The guy who ran the place was Alastair Koppel, a former Columbus resident who’d gone off to college and never came back. Or, at least, not until he wanted an isolated place to start a cult of nubile young women. According to the diner folk, he had at least a dozen of them living up there. Just him and the girls baking cookies.
Yep, cookies. That’s apparently how they made their living. Like a cross between Moonies and Girl Scouts, I imagined, hanging out at airports, giving away world peace with every box of thin mints purchased.