Bombshell

Rats on Rafts belted out “Orangeorangutan.” He picked up his cell off the desk. “Savich.” He listened, then punched off.

He walked to the door and called out to Ollie, “I have someone here who’s dying to see your photos of Sarah, right, Delsey?”

Something had happened and he wanted to get rid of her. Delsey smiled and met Ollie Hamish at the door. He’d been smooth about it, she’d give him that. What had happened?

When they were alone again, Savich said to Sherlock, “Dr. Hardy said Stony had enough oxycodone and lorazepam to kill him, with plenty left over in his stomach. They call it edible heroin, and an overdose is just as deadly. He said other than being dead, Stony was in perfect health. No signs of anyone forcing those pills down Stony’s throat, no bruising or any other signs of any violence or coercion. He’s going to rule it a suicide.

“And since Dr. Hardy’s rarely wrong, it’s time to go see the Harts. It’s going to be hard, but we’re going to have to find out when Stony stole his mother’s pills. Probably yesterday after the interview.” He sighed, hating to have to ask Stony’s mother that, knowing it would add more pain, more devastation. And guilt.

Sherlock said, “I keep thinking about what Stony said when we spoke to him yesterday—But how can that be? I mean—like he knew something wasn’t right. What was it? Did whatever it was drive him to kill himself? What was he holding back?”

He cupped her face in his big hand. “We’ll find out. But first we’ll have to deal with their grief.”

“I hate this,” Sherlock said.

Tunney Wells, Virginia

Late Monday morning

Savich turned his Porsche onto Cotswold Lane in the Metterling section of Tunney Wells, home of Wakefield Hart; his wife, Carolyn; and their two surviving daughters. It was a cul-de-sac in a high-end community of large houses on big lots with so many pine and oak trees covering the grounds it had to drive the fire department nuts. Though the snow was no longer as thick on the ground, the pristine yards still glistened like diamond facets under the noonday sun. He pulled into the three-car driveway behind a Mercedes and an Audi beside a house that looked like an in-your-face modern painting. The Hart manse was mostly glass held together with steel and a couple planks of redwood and little else. Maybe a third of the other houses on Cotswold Lane were various versions of extreme modern sitting next to Federal-style houses and a few big sprawling Colonials. A mishmash of styles, every one with its own spin on the American dream.

Sherlock said, “The setting’s incredible, and I’ll admit it, the house is a marvel, but I wouldn’t want to live in it. Couldn’t run around in my undies. Hey, idea—I could let you stroll around in your boxers and charge admission.”

And Savich thought, Nope, it would be you strolling around in your hair rollers.

Before he could offer up that thought, she turned sober and grim as a judge, and so he leaned over and kissed her instead. He held her for a moment. “This is going to be tough. The Harts are going to be a mess. Their twenty-two-year-old son was alive one day and dead the next. He killed himself and that’s horrible enough, but to know he did it because he felt guilty about something, couldn’t live with it. How devastating to a parent not even to know what it was that pushed him over the edge, and that he didn’t even talk to them about it.”

“It’s got to have something to do with Peter Biaggini, Dillon. I wish I could figure out what. If only Stony had written more in his suicide note, made things clearer.”

That in itself was odd, Savich thought, as he looked toward a raven hopping up and down on a low-hanging oak tree branch, sending puffs of snow into the air. Most suicide notes he’d ever seen laid things out in detail. “If Peter’s responsible, we’ll get him,” he said.

Mrs. Hart wasn’t at home, Regina, the maid, told them in a charming thick Polish accent, but Beth and Lisa were upstairs. Regina was small and slight, her light hair a near skullcap around her head. She was dressed entirely in black. They saw she’d been crying. They showed her their creds.

“Mr. Hart is here, alone in his study, but they leave soon now for funeral dealing. It is sad thing, very sad thing. Little Miss Lisa tells me Mr. Walter was here Saturday and Sunday, and he was so sad because his friend was dead. But I know Mr. Walter. For him to take his own life, he was beyond sad, and I do not know why.” Regina shook her head and turned away. She led them through an immense angled entry hall that soared high, giving directly onto the blue sky through spotlessly clean skylights two stories up.