Strega (Strega Series) (14 page)

I hung up the phone. One try failed. I didn't know how many chances I had before the system locked me out. I lifted up the phone base, hoping to see another sticky note under it, but there was nothing. I ran to the doorway and looked at the plaque above his door. 313A. I raced back to his desk and dialed in again. I typed in the numbers 3131.
He wouldn't have used his office number as his password. Dumb.
My heart pounded. Another try failed. I was out of ideas.

I imagined the police listening to my message. I desperately continued to push paperclips, erasers, pens, and paper out of my way with the tattered tissue. Then, I saw something that gave me hope. A small square of folded white paper. A lottery ticket. Sitting on the edge of Mr. Whitmore's chair, my palms glazed with sweat, I dialed in again and entered the numbers 4-7-9-1-3. I waited for the monotone voice to tell me I'd failed again, and that my chances had run out.

You have one new message.

I froze. I was in. The message began to play and I listened to my own panicked voice until I heard the magic words.

To delete this message, press four.

I placed my shaking knuckle on the number four and pressed down hard.
Message deleted
. The red light disappeared from the phone, and I breathed for the first time in five minutes. I got up and floated out the door, knowing I'd just pulled off a very amazing, very illegal miracle.

Before I left, I stopped by Mr. Baker's office to return his key and say goodbye. He was still slouched behind his desk.

"Please call me if you need anything," I said as I pulled the door closed behind me. Before it latched, I heard his faint voice call my name. I poked my head back in and found him looking at me curiously.

"Did you learn anything about that dagger yesterday?"

"No, unfortunately." My voice squeaked with as much conviction as I could muster. "Nothing significant anyway."

He shook his head in acceptance. There was no way I was going there with him.

Police cars, yellow caution tape, and big orange cones blocked off the short, previously charming street from both ends. The busy Market Street end had the largest crowd and the most police presence. The quiet, residential end was only blocked by a single cruiser. The Cask was closed, along with every other business on the street. After finally finding a parking spot blocks away, I ran toward the crime scene. There, standing in front of the Cask, was Detective Laine.

I looked for Kate, sure that she'd bypassed the school and come straight here after talking to Sergeant Sullivan. It seemed as though the entire police department was on the scene. Several officers hovered along the barricades. A few guarded the perimeter around Detective Laine. Sergeant Sullivan was surrounded by reporters from state and local papers and TV stations. They scribbled in notebooks and held out their voice recorders while huge cameras hovered above. Some officers were deep in conversation with other officials. Crime scenes were rare in Newburyport until recently, so everyone had flocked there. And my stomach turned with déjà vu.

At the periphery of the chaos, an older man and his wife sat on a bench in front of their house, sipping coffee out of mismatched mugs and jabbering away with passersby. I made my way toward them and eavesdropped as they started from scratch for a sweaty, middle-aged man wrapping up his morning run.

"He was a teacher over at the high school. Killed here last night about ten o'clock," the older man said as his wife nodded in agreement. "But I'm not sure how much you really want to know."

"Oh no, that bad?" the runner asked.

"Well, it was pretty gruesome."

My legs began to tremble. I had to know.

"He was mauled to death. His neck was torn open. That's what killed him. He bled out. They still don't know who or what could've done it. The detective is still over there gathering evidence."

I was lost again, pulled back to the night I found Gram's lifeless body lying on the floor in the sunroom. Mauled, neck torn open, covered in blood. Her case was still unsolved.

"Miss, are you all right?" The runner slipped his arm around me and guided me to the bench before my face met the pavement. The older man's wife ran into the house and returned a minute later with a bottle of water. My whole body shuddered, and if not for their constant reminders, I would have forgotten to breathe.

The violent details were the same. But I knew what killed Mr. Whitmore and why, sort of. What could possibly connect his death to Gram's? As I sat there struggling to make sense of it, I finally accepted the fact that I was not going crazy. Something was seriously wrong. And whatever it was, people were dying because of it. I couldn't just run away, ignore it, or wish it away anymore. I had to get to the bottom of it.

"Do they have any leads?" I asked the older man.

"I don't think so. They've been talking to us residents in the area, and the bartender that worked last night," he said, nodding toward a young man with sandy brown hair, surrounded by reporters. "No one saw anything unusual."

I tried to pull myself together. I had to talk to that bartender.

"Thank you for the water," I said as I reached for his wife's arm. I said a quick goodbye, and before I turned away, they already had the ear of another passerby. I heard them begin the story again as I waded through the crowd.

By the time I got to the bartender, he was surrounded again. I stood close and waited, ready to pounce. Detective Laine moved methodically behind the yellow tape. When he looked in my direction, I gave him a conservative wave. He nodded in acknowledgment and pressed his thin lips together in a straight-line smile.

In his hand, he held a large, clear plastic bag with something in it. I strained to see what it was until finally the standard napkin border came into focus.

Detective Laine was close. Close enough that I could see writing on the napkin. But too far away for me to read it. I reached for my phone and adjusted the zoom on my camera, and discreetly aimed it at Detective Laine. Pretending to scroll through my phone, I waited for the moment the plastic bag was visible. I turned off the flash and snapped a bunch of photos.

With false obliviousness, I scanned the crowd to make sure nobody was watching me. I scrolled through the photos and determined which one was the most clear. I tried my best to ignore the bloodstains as I zoomed in and examined the writing. Right away, I recognized the three symbols scribbled on the napkin. Next to each one, Mr. Whitmore had written something. Beside the first symbol, the word
uruz
. The second symbol,
algiz
. And the third symbol,
ansuz
.

Though I didn't know their relevance, it was clear these words meant something to Mr. Whitmore. I wondered if he'd figured something out about the symbols before he died. I reached into my bag and scribbled the words
uruz
,
algiz
, and
ansuz
on the back cover of his notebook.

While I waited, I listened to the bartender answer a bunch of generic questions from reporters. Nothing he said was helpful, and I knew I was going to strike out, too. I had to think of another plan. When the crowd around him finally dissipated, I inserted myself and tapped him on the shoulder.

"Hi there. Is the bar open tonight?"

He turned to me with a strange look.

"Uh, yes," he said, scratching his head. "It should be. Things should wrap up by noon, they said."

"Are you working?"

"Uh, yeah. That's the plan."

"What time does your shift start?"

"Seven," he said, looking at me like I was certifiably insane. "Why?"

He was tapped out. Uninspired. I was not going to get any good answers. Kate once told me it's hard to see the shadows of night through the glare of day. If I wanted to get anything out of him, I would have to catch him in his element, behind the bar, where he would be able to see Mr. Whitmore again on the other side of that counter.

"I'll be back later. Just wanted to be sure you'd be here."

His head tilted to the side as he struggled to imagine what business a seventeen-year-old girl could possibly have with him.

Suddenly the chaos of the newsroom didn't seem so crazy compared to the rest of my life. I grabbed my assignment from the board and made my way to my computer. Kate was already at her desk typing her story.

"You didn't go, did you?" she asked with trepidation as soon as she saw me. Anyone could have seen the answer in my face. "Oh Jay..."

Before I could say anything, I spotted Matthew coming toward us. He was our office manager. Newly promoted. And the biggest jerk I'd ever met. Just the sight of him was annoying. I settled into my chair and dreaded whatever was about to transpire.

Matthew was a true micromanager, though he had no real authority over any of us. He just gave us our assignments, which were actually delegated by Mr. Dugan. But he inserted himself into everything we did. He came into my cubicle and sat himself on my desk after putting his questionable fingers around the rim of my coffee cup to move it out of his way.
Note to self: scrub and boil before ever using again.

"Did you find anything out downtown?" he asked intrusively, adjusting his greasy hair with his scaly fingers. Nobody in the office told him anything voluntarily. Clearly he'd eavesdropped on my private exchange with Kate. I could see the joy in his eyes as he held this little nugget of information over my head. He knew that Kate and I would both be in trouble if Mr. Dugan found out I'd gone to a crime scene. I despised his arrogance.

"Sooooo?" he continued to prod. "Tell me? You must've learned something while out skulking where you didn't belong." His voice was like a thousand porcupine quills stabbing me at once.

Every reporter that mentored me issued a warning about Matthew. I didn't even make it through my first day without a run-in. I was getting a coffee in the kitchen. He came in, looked me up and down, and winked.

"Nice," he said in the most depraved tone. I was speechless. Later that day, he came by my desk and asked me if I had a boyfriend. His sleazy voice dripped all over me and his eyes wandered all over my body.

"I'm seventeen!" I exclaimed in complete disgust. Without flinching, he shoved a stack of press releases in my face.

"Go through these and make sure they make it in," he said before he walked away. "If you can't handle the work, I'll get your pink ass fired. Just ask around."

I did ask around, shocked that this guy hadn't been fired for sexual harassment, or at least for being a miserable human being. That's when I learned that nobody in the office took him seriously. He was just a pathetic, chauvinistic, slimy pervert who happened to have an obscure family connection to the boss.

"I wasn't there for work." I hoped that my answer would be enough to make him leave, but he sat there waiting for more.

"I'm sorry. I'm heading out soon and I need to get a few things done before I go," I said firmly, wishing my voice could push him off my desk. When that didn't work, I turned away from him and shuffled through my things.

"Maybe when you're eighteen, I'll show you how to get things done." He winked and slithered off my desk.

"You are disgusting," I said as he walked away pretending not to hear me. "And that's a really dumb line."

I wished I could wash off the residual layer of slime he left behind.

As soon as he was out of sight, I pulled out Mr. Whitmore's notebook and turned to my computer. In the browser search field, I typed the first of the three words I'd scribbled on the back of the notebook.
Uruz
.

Page after page, information about the Elder Futhark runes came up. I knew that runes were characters belonging to the ancient alphabets of Northern Europe. But the Elder Futhark runes, a collection of twenty-four symbols, were thought to be the oldest form of the runic alphabet. They were based on old Italian scripts. Etruscan, specifically.

I scanned through the runes and quickly found that
uruz
was one of them. On the back of the notebook, I scribbled down the description beside the word.

Uruz: Physical speed; strength.

I looked for
algiz
and
ansuz,
suspecting that I would also find them among these runes.

Algiz: Defensive shield. Protection. Shelter.

Ansuz: Revelation. Insight. Vision.

I scribbled down their meanings and shoved the notebook back into my bag.

Matthew was walking straight toward my desk. I was instantly annoyed and wished he would just leave me alone. If only he would trip and spill his coffee all over himself, I secretly wished. Forced to walk around with a big old stain on his shirt for the rest of the day. Maybe then he would leave us all alone.

Suddenly I heard a thump followed by several garbled expletives. Matthew was down on his knee, and a gush of coffee soaked the front of his shirt. His arrogance immediately evaporated and his face burned with red-hot embarrassment. The sound of chuckling hummed from nearby cube walls as everyone savored the karma that had finally come around to someone that so desperately deserved it.