The Triangle Conspiracy

“Where is she?” Sean muttered, but the vehemence was draining out of his voice.

“She probably had sex with five hundred men in the last few years,” Sanborn said, “and almost as many women, for that matter. But she was careful. Remember how she always had condoms handy for you? What made her decide not to use them tonight?”

“Who are you?” Sean whispered, and then he remembered that those were the exact words he’d said to Daryn as he left her apartment a few hours ago.

“Why, I’m Franklin Sanborn. At least I am to you. Now that was a pointless question, Sean. You know, you might still catch the killer if you hurry. There’s a place in this city where people go to remember, where time stands still. You’ll find it, I think.”

The two men looked at each other. Sean couldn’t feel, couldn’t think. Daryn could not be dead. Sanborn was messing with his mind-that was what Sanborn did. He used that nice, easygoing, let’s-all-be-friends voice, but it was pure manipulation.

“You should go to her, Sean,” Sanborn said. “I think it’s the least you owe her.”

“If you…” Sean pulled himself up, holding to the hood of the car. “If she’s…I’ll find you. If she’s hurt or dead or…Jesus Christ, Sanborn, I will find you and I will kill you. You know that, don’t you?”

“Yes, Sean,” Sanborn said, and his voice took on an eerie chill. “I know that.”

27

A PLACE WHERE PEOPLE GO TO REMEMBER. A PLACE where time stands still.

Sean knew.

He had visited the memorial with Faith and Scott Hendler, on a sunny day when sightseeing seemed a perfectly normal thing to do. Back then, he’d been able to imagine that he was in town on vacation, visiting his sister, and they could go for a few hours and act like normal people, doing the things normal people do.

He first had to orient himself as to where he was. Blinking against the alcohol that was still in his system, along with the emotions raging through him, he figured out that the highway was Interstate 35, and that the truck stop was situated just off Northeast 122nd Street in far north Oklahoma City.

He roared onto the access road, then crossed the highway and merged onto the southbound interstate. He nudged the Miata up past eighty. He turned on the stereo. He knew his sister was into “smooth jazz,” whatever that meant, while he preferred old-time rock and roll, the Doobies, the Eagles, Kansas. He expected soft and flowing jazz on the CD, but to his surprise, it was a rock-jazz fusion led by an electric guitar. He turned it up as loud as he could. His head didn’t hurt anymore, and while his stomach still churned and he had moments of dizziness, his head was clearing. He let the guitar pound into him, absorbing the bass beats as if they were blows raining down on him.

“Daryn, I’m coming,” he said.

Some of Oklahoma City’s downtown streets were one-way, and he had to double back a couple of times before he found himself on Robinson Avenue, approaching the National Memorial from the north, on its east side.

The dashboard clock said the time was 4:43. There were few cars in the predawn downtown area. He could see traffic lights stretching all the way through downtown, past Bank of America Plaza and on toward the south side of the city.

He was unsure of parking around the memorial itself, so he swung into the lot of a church across the street. An open-air structure, rough-hewn with wooden pews, stood at the corner of Sixth and Robinson. A sign proclaimed it as Heartland Chapel. Sean stumbled through it, then across the street.

He entered from the east, through the “wall of time” that was stamped 9:01. Its counterpart at the far end read 9:03.

A place where time stands still, Sanborn had said.

“Daryn,” he whispered.

He saw movement on the far side, outside the wall, along the sidewalk. A single uniformed security man passed under a streetlight.

Directly before him was the reflecting pool. To the left was the knoll where the 168 empty chairs sat, each lighted from within at night. It was an eerie tableau, much different from the daytime one. To the right was the plaza where the Survivor Tree stood, above all else. Behind it was the old Journal Record Building, which now housed the memorial’s indoor museum.

Sean walked to the right, down one walkway and up another, toward the big old elm tree. When he turned the corner, he saw her.

“Holy Mother of God,” Sean whispered.

She was hanging in the tree, a rope looped around both her neck and a low branch. Her light-colored T-shirt was stained.

Sean’s knees buckled. He collapsed onto the flagstone walkway.

He forced himself to look up again. He scrabbled along the stones, then pulled himself to his feet.

“I’ll get you down, Daryn,” he said. “I’ll-”

He grabbed hold of her legs and lifted them up, trying to relieve the pressure around her neck.

“Come on,” he whispered.

He glanced out toward the west side. The security man had left the street and walked back onto the memorial grounds, heading this way, up past the children’s area.

“Daryn, please.” Still whispering.

She wasn’t heavy, barely a hundred pounds, and Sean had lifted his share of weights, but there was no “give” in Daryn’s body.

Dead weight.

He almost screamed. He put out a hand, touched her shirt. The blood was fresh and warm.

“Oh God. Oh dear God. Please.”

He looked up at her face. Her neck was twisted grotesquely by the rope, her eyes closed, lips slightly parted.

No breath.

Sean backed away as if burned. The watchman was closer, coming toward the edge of the building. When he came around it, he would be able to see Sean.

He remembered what Sanborn had said. They’d set him up for Daryn’s murder. Somehow…

The intensity of the sex-had that only been a few hours ago?-replayed itself in his mind. Daryn’s insistence that he not use a condom this time, her overwhelming desire to have him climax inside her, followed by her violent reaction to him after he had done so.

What the hell is going on here?

The watchman had disappeared behind the corner of the building. Sean estimated he had less than a minute.

He wrapped his arms around Daryn’s legs again. One of her sandals came off and fell to the pavement.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

Sean turned and ran. He fled across the street, back toward the church parking lot. He didn’t look back. He made it to the Miata and pointed the little car east on Sixth. He came out on Broadway and turned north.

He came to a McDonald’s at Twenty-third and Broadway and pulled in. His hands were shaking so badly he could barely keep them on the wheel. His right hand was covered in Daryn’s blood from where he’d touched her chest.

His mind functioning on automatic, he got out of the car, jamming the bloody hand in his pocket. He went to the door of the McDonald’s, but it was locked. He peered at the hours listed on the sign-it didn’t open until six o’clock. He looked at his watch. Nearly an hour.

He went back to the Miata and got in, sitting in the car. His hands felt dirty, but his mouth could still taste Kat.

Kat. He wanted to think of her that way, rather than as Daryn. As Kat, his time with her had been uncomplicated and free. Her passion, her anger, her lust-they were real. Even though he knew intellectually that they weren’t real, that he really knew very little about the woman hanging in the tree back there, Daryn McDermott or Kat Hall or whoever she was.

When she’d been Kat, he’d been Michael Sullivan, a guy who lived here in this city and made furniture for a living.

All in all, if not for everything that had happened, that might not have been a bad life. Set up a woodworking shop and custom-design and build furniture. Live in this pleasant prairie city, with its distinct seasons and friendly people. Hang out with his sister now and then-get to know her again. As adults, they were pretty much strangers.

But no, he was about to be a fugitive, wanted for the murder of a woman that everyone would soon know was Senator Edward McDermott’s daughter.

God, I wish I had a drink.

Not now, he told himself. Maybe later, when he could stop. He would have to be far from here before that could happen.

He fidgeted in the car, watching the faint glow in the east. The Oklahoma State Capitol was only a few blocks away and he could see its dome from where he sat. The predawn light behind it was postcard-perfect. He looked at his watch and was surprised to see that more than an hour had passed.

Sean wanted to scream.

He turned on the radio, found the news station, listened. The early morning editions were already feasting on the “grisly discovery” at the National Memorial, reporting that “details were sketchy this morning,” but reporting details anyway. It wouldn’t be long before the missing girl Katherine Hall, who’d come home only last night, was identified as Daryn McDermott. And then the coverage would be national.

He put the bloody hand in his pocket again, went into McDonald’s, and used the restroom. He washed his hands and stuffed the bloody paper towel into his pocket. He bought a cup of coffee at the counter, then headed back out into the dawn.

“Sorry, Faith,” he said, starting his sister’s car. He swung onto the highway onramp that ran next to the McDonald’s, and then Sean was gone.

Part Three: Faith

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