Once Shunned Read online

  The sight of the place took Riley’s breath away.

  Her work had brought her to the estates of wealthy people before, but the Cranston mansion dwarfed any home she could remember. It seemed almost like the center of a feudal village—a huge, castle-like building surrounded by smaller structures and houses.

  The two drivers parked the vehicles and they all walked up to the massive front entrance, where they were greeted by a stern, officious butler who was obviously expecting them. As the butler escorted them inside, their footsteps echoed eerily on the stone floor of a long hallway.

  The four agents silently followed the butler along the cathedral-like hallway to a pair of wide-open doors at the end. Without a word, the butler waved his flock inside and then closed the doors, shutting himself outside the room.

  They found themselves in a grand chamber with a high ceiling, dark paneled walls, and a long wooden banquet table. On the wall beyond the far end of the table hung a gigantic oil painting of a grim-faced, gray-bearded man dressed in old-fashioned clothes. Riley guessed it must be a portrait of Brenton Cranston, the Gilded Age steel magnate who had first built the family fortune.

  At the end of the table nearest them, a man in his fifties stood staring up at the portrait, as if in conversation with the family patriarch. He was wearing an elegant silk housecoat and expensive slippers, and he was smoking a pipe.

  He turned at the sound of approaching footsteps and said, “Hello, Agent Sturman. I see you’ve brought some visitors. I hope you’ve also brought some news.”

  “I’m afraid it’s not good news,” Sturman said. He introduced Riley and her colleagues, then said, “Mr. Cranston, I’m sorry to say there’s been another murder.”

  Cranston squinted with surprise and dismay.

  “Who was it this time?” he said.

  “A man who was fishing this morning over at Wickenburg Reef.”

  “And he was killed in the same way as my nephew—and the young woman?” Cranston asked.

  “With an ice pick, yes,” Sturman said.

  Cranston stared silently at Sturman for a moment, then sat down at the end of the long table, looking up at the portrait again as if he expected it to speak.

  As Riley looked at him carefully, she noticed his resemblance to the man in the portrait—a hint of aristocratic breeding, a sense of privilege. Even so, Niles Cranston didn’t have the same forceful gaze that his ancestor did. Somehow, he didn’t strike Riley as an especially remarkable man. Nevertheless, he had inherited a much more than remarkable fortune.

  Finally Cranston said to his visitors …

  “Sit down. Tell me about it.”

  Riley and her companions sat down at the long table near him. Agent Sturman told him the news about Ron Donovan’s murder without going into unnecessary details.

  When Sturman finished, Cranston took a long puff on his pipe.

  Then he said, “So you still have no idea who killed my nephew.”

  Riley could see Sturman wince a little.

  “No,” he said. “I’m sorry. We’re doing everything we can.”

  Cranston glanced at Riley, Bill, and Jenn, and said to Sturman, “Even with the BAU’s help, you’re at a loss.”

  Riley said, “I wouldn’t think of it that way, Mr. Cranston. My colleagues and I just got started on this case yesterday.”

  Cranston nodded. “Yes—after that poor woman’s murder in Wilburton. Too little too late, it seems.”

  Cranston sounded bitter to Riley, but not really angry. She sensed that he felt deep disappointment and frustration at what he’d just heard—and that was hardly any wonder. She shared his discouragement.

  Then Cranston said, “Agent Sturman, during your last visit I talked to you about my family’s enemies. I gave you a list of people who might want to harm anyone in my family—including Vincent.”

  Agent Sturman nodded and said, “We checked your list thoroughly. We don’t believe any of those people were connected, at least not with the first two murders.”

  Cranston’s forehead crinkled skeptically.

  He said to Sturman, “So you’re absolutely positive Vincent wasn’t targeted because … well, because he was a Cranston?”

  Riley spoke up again. “Mr. Cranston, we aren’t positive about anything. But we’ve got good reason to believe the three victims were murdered by the same killer. Do you know of any connection between your nephew and Robin Scoville in Wilburton, or that unfortunate fisherman at Wickenburg Reef?”

  Cranston got up from his chair and started to pace.

  “I don’t see how that’s possible,” he said. “He’d just moved out here from San José in California—that’s where his branch of the family lives. He barely knew anyone in Connecticut except for students he was starting to meet at Yale. I doubt he’d ever even been to Wilburton or Wickenburg. Those aren’t places he would have been likely to visit.”

  Cranston looked hard at Riley again and said, “Agent Paige, I find it hard to believe that fate would single out my nephew … along with …”

  His voice trailed.

  Riley understood that he felt uncomfortable finishing his sentence.

  She said in a reassuring voice, “Along with two perfectly ordinary people, you mean.”

  Cranston nodded.

  Riley said, “You have every reason to feel that way. But please try to understand, Mr. Cranston … fate didn’t single out any of the victims. A cruel and twisted human being did. For all we know, that person had no idea who your nephew really was when he chose him for his first victim.”

  “But you can’t be sure of that, can you?” Cranston asked her.

  Bill spoke up this time. “No, we can’t be sure of anything at this point.”

  Jenn added, “Please try to be patient, Mr. Cranston.”

  Riley winced sharply inside. She knew that Jenn meant well, but it wasn’t a tactful thing to say at the moment. A more experienced agent would know better. And she could see Cranston was ruffled by the remark.

  “I believe I have been patient,” Cranston said to Jenn. Then turning to Sturman he added, “I’ve abided by your wishes so far. I haven’t told anyone that Vincent was murdered, not even in the family. God knows, it’s been hard for anyone to believe that a perfect specimen like my nephew just dropped dead from some sort of natural cause, but that’s exactly what I’ve been letting people believe. Am I supposed to keep on like that forever?”

  Sturman shook his head and said, “No, just until we solve the case.”

  “And when will that be?” Cranston asked, his voice shaking a little. “The FBI hasn’t inspired me with any confidence so far. I’m starting to think I should hire my own investigators—people who really know their work.”

  Riley could see that Agent Sturman was stung by his remark. Fortunately, she knew better than to take it personally.

  She said to Cranston, “I understand how you feel. But we must ask you to please not bring anyone else into the investigation. I promise you, it will only lead to confusion and mistakes and make things much worse. Nothing good would come of it.”

  Riley saw Cranston’s face soften a little. He asked Riley, “How long is this nightmare going to continue?”

  Riley gulped. The last thing she wanted to do right now was make promises she wasn’t sure she could keep.

  Instead she said, “I don’t know.”

  Cranston nodded silently. Riley sensed that he at least appreciated her honesty. Then he sat down again and stared off into space. Riley sensed he had something on his mind that he desperately wanted to say. But she knew better than to ask him outright.

  Just let him come out with it.

  Finally Cranston said …

  “It was my fault—what happened to Vincent, I mean.”

  Riley felt a chill at the deep note of guilt in his voice.

  What does he want to tell us? she wondered.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Riley waited eagerly for Cranston’s next words. She glanc
ed at her colleagues and saw that they, too, were anxious to hear what the man was about to say.

  Cranston’s face twisted with anguish for a moment.

  Finally he spoke. “Forget I said anything. It doesn’t matter.”

  Of course that wasn’t what Riley had expected to hear, but she forced herself to wait. She could see that Jenn was about to insist, and stopped the young agent with a subtle gesture. From her own experience conducting thousands of interviews, Riley knew that the least bit of prodding could shut certain types of people down.

  Silence was the best way of drawing Cranston out.

  Finally he said in a slow, agonized voice, “It was my idea. Vincent coming to Yale, I mean. He wanted to stay near his parents—my brother and sister-in-law—in California. He wanted to go to Stanford. The truth was … I barely knew the boy. I hadn’t seen him since he was a baby, hadn’t shown any real interest in him. It wasn’t any of my business. Still, I insisted. I told his parents that he had to go to Yale.”

  “Why?” Riley asked.

  Cranston’s lips twisted into a bitter, painful, ironic trace of a smile.

  “Tradition,” he said.

  Then he pointed at the portrait. “My great-great grandfather Brenton Cranston got only a third-grade education. He was truly a self-made billionaire—a titan of a man. He sent his own sons to Yale and declared that he wanted all of his male descendants bearing his name to go there too. He made it a condition of inheritance in his will. And so it began. And for some damn fool reason, I …”

  He heaved a long, grim sigh.

  He said, “If it weren’t for me, Vincent would have gone to Stanford instead. And he’d be alive today. This feels like fate’s way of telling me how wrong I was, how indifferent I am to the happiness of others. It never occurred to me … that a tradition could kill.”

  Riley felt a deep pang of sympathy. She’d often seen this sort of guilt among relatives and loved ones of murder victims. Murder had a terrible way of reminding people of their personal failures, causing them to blame themselves.

  And now he’s troubled about fate again, as though he’d given fate the opportunity to strike the young man down.

  She said in a slow, gentle voice …

  “Mr. Cranston, it’s like I told you before. Fate had nothing to do with your nephew’s murder. But I understand how you feel. This is a terrible thing to have to deal with alone. Do you have anyone you can share these feelings with, someone who can understand and help?”

  Cranston drew himself up and relit his pipe.

  He said, “I can manage. I’ll be all right.”

  Stifling a sigh, Riley thought …

  I take that as a no.

  “We’ll go now,” she said to him. “I promise we’ll be in touch as soon as we have any news at all.”

  “I hope so,” Cranston said.

  As Riley and her colleagues got up to leave, something Cranston had just said rattled in her brain. It was the way he’d described his nephew.

  “… a perfect specimen.”

  Jenn, too, had said something similar about the crime scene photos …

  “… he looked pretty nearly perfect.”

  Riley hesitated, then said …

  “Mr. Cranston … did your nephew have any …?”

  She paused and asked herself …

  Any what?

  What was it exactly she wanted to ask?

  And how could she put it tactfully?

  She cautiously continued, “Did he have any—distinguishing characteristics? Some sort of visible—imperfection?”

  Cranston looked puzzled by the question.

  “Imperfection?” he asked.

  “A birthmark, for example,” Riley said.

  “No, nothing like that at all,” Cranston said. “He was … well, very good-looking. Everyone who knew him said so. And of course, he was also an aspiring athlete.”

  Riley thanked him again, and she joined Bill and Jenn on their way to the double doors where they’d come in. Bill turned the doorknob and pushed the door open. The butler who had led them here was standing in the hallway, apparently waiting for them to come out, looking as forbidding as he had before.

  Riley paused in the hall to look back at Cranston. He was still seated at the end of the table, looking up again at that stern portrait on the wall as if expecting it to speak.

  It troubled her to think about the man’s isolation in this vast, drafty, unwelcoming home. There was the butler, of course, and there must also be a fairly large household staff lurking about unseen. But did any of them really care about their employer?

  Niles Cranston seemed to have no companionship at all except that grim, ghostly image of his ancestor on the wall.

  Such a lonely man, she thought.

  His inherited fortune had brought him no happiness that she could detect. Instead, it seemed more like a burden that he could never, ever shake off.

  And now his nephew is dead.

  As Riley and her colleagues stood in the hall, the butler pulled the double doors shut again and said coldly …

  “Kindly allow me to show you out.”

  Riley and her colleagues followed the butler back the way they’d come, through the vast hallway and out the impressive front door.

  As they left the house and walked toward their cars, Agent Sturman asked …

  “What do we do next?”

  Riley exchanged glances with Bill and Jenn. She could tell that they, too, felt stymied.

  She said to Sturman, “What about those names you mentioned a little while ago? The list of people who had bought ice picks?”

  Agent Sturman took out his cell phone again and looked at the message he’d received earlier.

  He shrugged and said …

  “Well, like I said, the three names don’t look that promising. My team found ice pick purchases made by people with criminal records, but none of them for violent crimes. One guy got busted five days ago on a parole violation.”

  Jenn said, “Well, he certainly didn’t kill Robin Scoville or Ron Donovan.”

  “What about the others?” Bill asked.

  Agent Sturman shook his head and said, “Another guy bought his ice pick just last week—too recently to have killed Vincent Cranston. But the third guy … I don’t know …”

  “Tell us about him,” Riley said.

  Sturman said, “Well, his name is Bruno Young, and he bought an ice pick a week and a half ago, long enough to have killed all three victims. He’s on parole after serving time for heroin delivery.”

  “Heroin delivery,” Bill grumbled. “You’re right, that doesn’t sound promising.”

  Riley said, “We’d better check it out anyway.”

  “That shouldn’t be much trouble,” Agent Sturman said. “I’ve got his address right here. He lives in New Haven.”

  “Let’s pay him a visit,” Riley said.

  Riley and her colleagues got back into their borrowed car and followed Agent Sturman’s vehicle back into New Haven. Sturman led them into a seedy, rundown neighborhood. Riley guessed that it had once been a quaint and charming area, with small shops and pleasant apartment buildings. But now the businesses were mostly boarded up, and many of the buildings were in terrible shape.

  Riley saw women lurking in the doorways—prostitutes, she guessed, although they weren’t openly parading their bodies. Police cars were prowling the streets on patrol, so the women probably stayed in the shadows as much as they could, luring their johns instead of boldly approaching them.

  Bill parked their car behind Agent Sturman’s as he parked in front of a decrepit apartment building, one of a row that had probably once been individual houses. Sturman led Riley and her colleagues into the building and up to the second floor. When they found the apartment they were looking for, they saw that the door bore multiple locks. They could hear the sounds of a TV and noisy children’s voices inside the apartment.

  Sturman knocked on the door, and a woman’s voice call
ed out from inside …

  “Who is it?”

  “The FBI,” Sturman called back. “Is this where Bruno Young lives?”

  After a pause, the woman said …

  “I guess.”

  Sturman exchanged glances with Riley and her colleagues.

  Riley called out, “May we come in?”

  After another silence, they heard the woman say …

  “Let them in, Andy.”

  After the rattle of several locks, the door was opened by a teenaged boy with a blank expression on his face. The apartment was tiny and a terrible mess, with dirty clothes scattered everywhere and a mountain of dirty dishes in the kitchen area. Four younger, raucous children were running around making lots of noise.

  An exhausted-looking woman sat in a battered armchair staring at an old television screen, smoking a cigarette and watching what looked like a soap opera. She didn’t look away from the screen as Riley and her colleagues came inside.

  She grumbled, “FBI, you say?”

  Sturman, Riley, and her colleagues all produced their badges and introduced themselves.

  Still staring at the TV, the woman said …

  “And you’re looking for Bruno?”

  “That’s right,” Bill said.

  With a hoarse, asthmatic-sounding sigh, the woman said …

  “Then you’re here to arrest him, I guess.”

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Riley exchanged startled looks with her colleagues.

  What does this woman know that we don’t? she wondered.

  The woman in the battered armchair had immediately assumed she and her colleagues were here to arrest Bruno Young. They’d actually come just to talk to him, to try to determine whether he was a possible suspect.

  Now Riley didn’t know what to think.

  The woman glanced up from the TV screen at the four agents and added …

  “Well, isn’t that why you’re here? Bruno did kill somebody, didn’t he?”

  Riley’s perplexity deepened.

  Bill asked the woman, “Is Bruno Young on the premises?”