Driven to Murder Read online

  “Something’s funny there, Jo. The owner refused to report the shooting to track security. Insisted that the team wasn’t in danger. Puffed all up and said that if an elusive gunman was out to kill, one of us certainly would be dead.”

  “What? He views it as a dramatic form of intimidation?”

  “I guess. But he won’t say who’s supposed to be intimidated. Or why.”

  Three

  Rebecca hung up and stashed the cell phone in her backpack. She hadn’t told Jo about the earlier mishaps. Maybe there was no need. Her teammates had scoffed at her, swore they were just racing accidents. Given the past year, it was possible that she was overreacting, being overly morbid. Hell, it was more than possible, it was likely.

  If you overlooked the gunshot.

  The bullet had been real. It could have been deadly.

  At the edge of the road a Canada goose pecked in the grass for something edible. A Camaro, radio blaring, sped by with a parcel of laughing teenagers looking for mischief. It was still a magnificent day and the drone of high-powered engines said the track was still in use.

  Was she really going to let a self-impressed twit like Peyton Madison spoil her time at the Brickyard? She’d been expelled from the Lotus pits, not the track. There was nothing to stop her from returning to watch the F1 cars practice. She’d grab a hot dog and sit high up Stand J, cheer Schumacher and Montoya through the hairpin turns.

  She settled the backpack on her shoulders and retraced her steps, replaying the conversation with Jo as the noise from the track grew louder. Normally, Jo Delacroix’s voice could sell salvation to an atheist. That was the main reason she’d called him. To let his voice slow the pulsing adrenaline, sooth away her humiliation. He’d calmed her, but something was off. Even in her distracted state she sensed, what—anger, concern, disappointment? Definitely tension.

  Jo Delacroix was her lawyer, that was how they’d met. It was no longer how she thought of him. In her new life, he was her closest friend. Also her savior—literally and emotionally. He was the intellectual thoroughbred in the one-horse town of Head Tide, Maryland. A graceful athlete disguised in summer-weight worsteds. Tall, with mocha skin, mellow amber eyes, generous smile, sensuous walk. Piano player fingers.

  More frequently, as the pre-dawn stars faded over the fields out back, she wondered what it would be like to make love with him. They might have been headed in that direction—before Mick Hagan, her renegade cop, had moved into town. Hagan’s compass was firmly fixed on her. His intensity had derailed Jo, caused him to pull back. Left her stalled at the intersection.

  Practice finished up just before five. She trotted down the stands as the voice on the loudspeaker reminded fans that the gates would open at eight o’clock tomorrow morning for historic F1 car qualifying. She didn’t need to be reminded, though she wondered if there would be a message on the answering machine telling her not to bother showing up.

  She paused just inside the gate, scanned the faces of the exiting crowds. She wasn’t searching for anyone in particular. Just observing. Hoping, as she had in grade school, for a half-smile, the hint of an invitation to walk home in the company of another child. That was a long time ago, at a school with walls and regular hours. Today she was returning alone to the house Peyton had rented for his senior crew members, a sixties ranch located north of the track on Patricia Street within easy walking distance, which was its only charm. It was a bland brick house with three bedrooms, two baths, a patio surrounded by stockade fence, neglected vegetation and on-street parking.

  Peyton wasn’t staying there. He had a room in the city at the Canterbury Hotel, the place to stay if you wanted to be seen. A hotel frequented by celebrities like Mick Jagger and Elton John, and the infamous, like Mike Tyson and Michael Jackson. On race weekends, it was home to those wanting to rub shoulders with the automotive elite. Peyton also had a motor home the size of a Trailways bus parked just outside the track, handy for afternoon naps. His transporter, which would hold four cars, grazed in a lot with dozens more just like it.

  The front door was open when she arrived, only the storm door separating the sunshine from the dust motes. Clearly Ian had hurried home after the last practice lap. Evidence of his presence was strewn throughout the living room. Keys in the brass fruit bowl on the bookcase, a magazine open on the sofa, racing shoes kicked in the direction of the fireplace. He, however, was missing from his usual spots. Not in the small kitchen. Or outside lounging in the last few minutes of sun. Ian Browning, her driver and roommate, was in her bedroom, flipping through the clothes in the closet.

  Rebecca pitched her backpack at the bed. “Find anything you like? The purple knit would be good with your complexion.”

  He had the decency to blush. “I was making sure you hadn’t packed up and split. That’s all. I was worried about you. Where have you been? I cut out after my last run. Told Peyton I couldn’t concentrate with someone taking potshots. What if his aim improved?”

  “I thought moving targets were harder to hit?”

  “Not funny, Reb. Shower and dress. I’m starving. Luis y Maria’s awaits.”

  Burritos and beer sounded like the perfect pick-me-up until she took a good look at Ian. Scowl lines scored the flesh at both sides of his mouth. His eyes flitted around the room like frenzied birds before a storm. Normally, he was an undemanding dinner companion, content to talk about racing and turn in early. Right now, he was not acting himself.

  Not that she could define normal as it applied to Ian. They’d met a scant two months ago at the Washington Vintage Grand Prix. He’d flashed an impish grin, quizzed her on engine parts. When she could tell a distributor from a fuel pump, he’d squeezed her shoulder and whispered in her ear. “Lass, you’re the answer to my mechanical prayers.”

  The head mechanic on his race team had been diagnosed with prostate cancer and wouldn’t be around to work the race at Indy. Somehow Ian had bullied the team owner into offering her the job. Then he’d persuaded her, a newspaper reporter turned classic auto mechanic, to accept it.

  The scuttlebutt among the crew was that Ian’s influence over Peyton involved money, a necessary commodity in a rich man’s sport. He was old enough to have climbed halfway up a corporate ladder, yet bragged he’d never worked a full-time job. He just raced. And while he was young for a vintage racer—mid-thirties versus the average age of forty-five—he was too old to make the leap into competitive racing, which paid its drivers in earnest. Ian seemed to be one of life’s lucky few who had no obligations other than to indulge his whims. Tom summed up what they were all thinking. “Ian’s got to be a trust fund baby, or blessed with very indulgent parents.”

  Rebecca shooed Ian from the room, followed him down the hall. In the bathroom she dropped her team coveralls on the floor and luxuriated in a shower as hot as she could stand it, lathering her hair twice to wash away the stench of exhaust gas. She donned a short print skirt, knit top and sandals, ran a comb through the damp waves. They would air-dry into curls before she finished the nachos. As an afterthought, she added a touch of makeup—armor against the day’s humiliations—and snatched up a sweater on the way out.

  Luis y Maria’s Cantina was a hole-in-the-wall on the strip eight blocks away, wedged between a defunct hardware store and bustling video rental. It was nowhere as dingy as it looked from the parking lot. Colorful piñatas hung over each of the eight tables and mariachi music played through speakers in the four corners. The non-English-speaking wait-staff came in a variety of sizes and closely resembled each other. Most importantly, it had killer salsa and beers cold enough to freeze your teeth.

  It also had Peyton Madison and Wayne Evans seated in a booth at the back.

  “Surprise. Surprise?” Rebecca flipped a look at Ian.

  He shrugged in response, whispered, “It’s time to kiss and make up.”

  Before she could retreat out the door, Peyton spotted them, hailed them like long-lost cousins on his mother’s side. Ian placed a hand on her spine a
nd pushed her forward. She had to move or trip.

  The crew chief’s back was to the door. He didn’t bother turning around. Seated, Evans appeared to loom over Peyton: a head taller and half a foot wider. Standing, he had only an inch on his boss. His short legs and a low slung belly gave him a fortuitous center of gravity for working on open-wheel racers. His hair was prematurely gray; his face permanently creased from scowling at the crew in the sun.

  Peyton slid over, patted the bench for her to sit beside him. While they read the menus, he nattered on about Ian’s chances to put the Lotus on the pole the next day. Chatted away like the gunshot had never occurred, like no harsh words had been exchanged, like he hadn’t expelled her from the track. Acted like her outburst had been forgiven, if not forgotten.

  When he asked the driver a pointless question about the car’s handling, Rebecca closed her menu. Tuned out Ian’s answer. In profile Peyton just missed being good-looking, though she doubted he shared her assessment. A small, well-shaped head, chin narrow and thin, pursed lips. The dark brown eyes would have been alluring if they weren’t usually glancing over your shoulder in search of someone more significant to suck up to. The whole package exuded pampered frat boy, the kind who thought nothing of cheating at cards or welshing on bets. Catching him at it would reveal your low character, not his.

  Two hours later, the tacos were reduced to a smear of red sauce, and Dos Equis bottles littered the table. Peyton still hadn’t mentioned the gunshot. Two hours of chitchat and no one had said a word about it or the other mishaps around the pits. No one had mouthed the word sabotage, though she was willing to bet she wasn’t the only one thinking it.

  Less than a week ago, the car she’d been hired to work on, an Arrows FA-1, had been damaged when a brake line gave way, spraying brake fluid on the front tire. The line hadn’t broken—it had been cut nearly through next to the end fitting. Pressure from hard braking in turn six had separated the line and sent the car headfirst into the retaining barrier. Ian was bruised but unhurt. The suspension of the car was bent beyond repair. A replacement couldn’t be shipped to the track in time for the race.

  Demonstrating his membership in the more-money-than-brains club, Peyton had lowered the ramp of his transporter and pulled out the Lotus 49C. Rebecca had stood with the crew, dumb with awe. While the Arrows—once raced by Ricardo Patrese—was an expensive toy, the Lotus was an historic work of art: the epitome of classic racer, sleek, low and very sexy. It had been driven by Austrian legend Jochen Rindt shortly before his death and sported the number 3, as it had at his victory in the Monaco Grand Prix in 1970. Automotive writers who tracked such things put its price tag at close to a million dollars. It was a car to be displayed in a museum, not raced around the Brickyard.

  But Peyton was determined to race, and to win.

  Switching cars had resulted in long days for the crew. By Tuesday the Lotus had been ready to produce competitive laps. Topping it off, Evans discovered that a spare gas can was filled with water instead of fuel. He caught it before it damaged the engine, but they lost precious track time draining the tank and checking the systems before refueling.

  Then, Wednesday morning, the left front wheel had fallen off on the first practice lap. It was as much luck as skill that enabled Ian to steer the Lotus into the grassy infield, away from the barrier walls, and avoid his second crash in under a week.

  Evans had been furious. “Damn splines are worn. Can’t keep the hub on. Too much stress from hard turning at high speeds.”

  Peyton agreed, waved it away as normal wear, metal fatigue or something. Something that should have been noticed by the tire changer. Hunkering down, Rebecca had pointed to the shiny surface on the threads, insisted that someone had filed the studs down recently. Intentionally.

  No one bought it. They raised a communal eyebrow at the dumb broad butting in again and told her to find replacement studs.

  She’d rocked back on her heels, counted to ten. Yes, she was female, and having a woman in the pits changed the chemistry and everyone’s comfort level. They had to watch what they said, how they said it. Chet Davis, the tire changer, communicated through grunts and only then if she asked a direct question. Tom’s sidelong glances said he was way too conscious of her figure under the one-piece track suit. The crew kid, Evans’s nephew, was straight out of vo-tech and showed off for her at every opportunity, not caring that she was old enough to be his mother. Evans just glowered. Bided his time, prayed she’d make a major mistake. She might know her way around an engine, but that didn’t stop him from branding her as a jinx, as unlucky as any hoop skirt on the deck of a sailing ship.

  Peyton squeezed her knee, edged her from the booth as he rose to pay the bill. Ian stood to let Evans exit for the men’s room, then sat back down, wiping orange grease from his fingers. Rebecca threw down her napkin. “Stay here.”

  In the dim hallway she caught up with Evans, pulled him around to face her. “Did Peyton tell you about the gunshot?”

  He tugged his belt into the ridge below his gut, dropped his fists to his side. A contender ready for the bell. “Yeah. So?”

  “So, he didn’t report it to security. What’s going on?” His eyes narrowed. No response. “The shot could have set the pit ablaze. You would have known that, if you’d been there when it happened. Where were you?”

  Evans shifted his belly, crowding her against the wall. “I was where I belong, Moore, doing my job. What’s yours?”

  She cocked her head. “What are you getting at?”

  He checked that Ian was still seated out of earshot. “You’re the mechanic. You say the brake line was cut. Then why the hell didn’t you notice it before sending the car out? Likewise, if the wheel studs were filed down, who did it? Not one of my guys. I say that old nicked file in your bottom tool drawer could have shaved the threads off real slick. It’s got fresh filings. Guess you’ll say someone could have borrowed it, right? Done the job, put it back and you know nothing. Say whatever you want. We never had problems before you showed up.”

  Evans reversed direction, left her dawdling by the men’s room door. He tossed a wad of crumpled bills on the table and followed his boss from the restaurant.

  Rebecca felt her face flush. How dare Evans accuse her? One minute he swears the incidents are accidents, next breath he’s pointing his finger at her. Any file could have damaged the threads. Any utility knife could have cut the brake line. There were three loaded tool chests in their area alone. Dozens more under the tent. Who knew how many along pit road. All of them contained—

  She jumped when Ian snapped his fingers in front of her face.

  He tapped at the end of her nose. “I know what you’re thinking, my lovely. Leave it alone. If Peyton suspected sabotage, he’d be screaming bloody murder. You know he’ll do anything to give us an edge. Complaining to track management would assure us sympathetic press. That would be his style.” He draped the sweater over her shoulders. “It must have been an accident. Another bit of Peyton’s bad luck. What’s to be gained by ruining a small team like us?”

  It was an excellent question, one that consumed her on the short ride back from the restaurant. Motive was the mystery. Who would gain if the Lotus team was unable to compete? They had a good chance of winning, but so did at least three of the twelve. Unlike demonstration runs, this was a race for money. The winning team would take home $100,000. Though not a fortune, it was an unusual perk for vintage racing. Normally the teams spent a tremendous amount of time and money. All they got in return were bragging rights and a small mention in a magazine sidebar.

  For this, the inaugural race at the Brickyard, a group of investors had decided to raise the bar. Lure the best from Europe to compete and spark U.S. interest in the road racers from the late-sixties, seventies and eighties. The backers were businessmen who shrewdly realized that Americans love competition and demand to see it rewarded. The larger the purse, the more media interest, the greater chance of establishing a new series, or at least an
annual event at Indy.

  If Team Lotus pulled out, the race would still go on. Eliminating them couldn’t be the saboteur’s goal. So what was?

  Four

  They circled the block twice before Ian found a space on the curve. He let the car rumble to a stop. It was a 1957 Corvette he’d borrowed for his stay in Indiana from an enthusiast who got free weekend passes in exchange. It was an all-original car in need of major exhaust work. Ian preferred to park it in sight of the house, but a rental car had taken his favorite spot.

  Retrieving her purse, Rebecca slid her legs over the sill. “You’ll qualify the Lotus tomorrow as scheduled?”

  “Stop fretting, Rebecca. I expect you to be there. I need you. Peyton’s just being pissy. Call it pre-race jitters. Or bad press.” He fished behind the driver’s seat, reached for her hand. Into it he smacked a rolled-up copy of AutoWeek. “Seems Peyton has a nasty habit of rattling cages. Derek Whitten may be trying to shake him up. He’s a smelly beast, rumored to have lethal fangs. No matter what he says, his Brabham can’t compete with the Lotus.”

  “Whitten? The shooter?”

  Ian slammed the car door. “No? Well how about an unsubtle warning from Peyton’s bookie? It says on page eighteen that our team owner has a gambling habit. Wagers beaucoup de pocket change on all types of sporting events. According to the snoops, his cash out exceeds his cash in. I know how much faith you put in reporters’ accuracy.”

  “Occasionally, they get it right. If he’s strapped, how’s he footing the bill here?”

  Ian shrugged. “Who cares as long as he does? He’s boasting about entering a car at Le Mans next year. And plans to invest in an F1 team. In either case, I wouldn’t mind hitching a ride.” He draped an arm over her shoulder and hugged. “So, my sylvan wrench monkey, let’s keep the shooting to ourselves. If the boss says there’s nothing to worry about, I say we agree.”