Death's Excellent Vacation - By Charlaine Harris & Toni L. P. Kelner Page 0,57

interviews.

Nora gave Peert a quick introduction and said, “Is it possible that this young woman’s story is true?”

“I suppose that it is, but we can find no supporting evidence.” He kept his tone carefully neutral.

Oh, Nora thought, I shall enjoy this. He’s done nothing to follow this lead. Get me my cross and nails, boys, it’s hammering time.

“Is it possible that Jason Kirk is alive? Perhaps ill, perhaps wandering in the wilderness on the north side of Sint Pieter?” Nora said.

“Again, we can only postulate,” Inspector Peert said. “Ill and wandering freely for three months seems most unlikely. Surely there would have been other reports of him; our search crews would have found him if he were rambling insensate. If he is alive and roaming the hills, then that suggests that he does not want to be found.”

Nora had to decide whether to play that comment as a hurtful blow to the Kirk family or as an exciting, intriguing new twist in the story’s worn fabric. She tilted her head again—she was known for the beauty and forcefulness of the head tilt—and decided the audience was hungry for a bit of the inspector’s flesh. “Why would Jason Kirk be in hiding? Nothing in this boy’s past suggests a desire to be away from his family. They are an absolutely wonderful, upstanding family, Inspector.” She said this with a convincing thunder, as if Peert held the opposite view.

“No one knows what goes on in the human heart,” Peert said quietly. “But I will say that I believe Annie Van Dorn believes she is telling the truth. We administered a lie detector test; she passed it.”

That was a news bomb. Nora was speechless for a minute; Molly should have known that tidbit and warned her about it.

Peert pressed on: “If she saw him, then Jason Kirk is not in trouble; he is hiding from us.”

It was not fair. It was not what Nora was expecting. It was not a dodge. And if Jason Kirk was simply hiding out on the island—well, then, he was simply a spoiled brat who’d driven his parents nearly mad with grief. And made Nora look like a fool in front of millions.

This could not be. All of this emotional calculus played out in Nora’s mind in less than five seconds. “If he is hiding, then why?”

“I do not know. We cannot know his reasons. If he has been kidnapped, there is no reason for his abductors to wait three months and not ask for a ransom.”

Nora went back on the attack. “How soon will you expand the search in that area?”

Now she heard the steel in Peert’s voice—even through the distance of the satellite hookup—and it infuriated her. “What choice do we have? You have turned American opinion against our entire nation. We have searched for this young man as if he were one of our own. We have followed every slim lead, and we have allowed your federal agents to comb our sovereign territory. We have endured your abuse and your innuendo as to our competence”—here Nora tightened her lips and straightened her papers, which was Nora’s signal to Molly to cut to commercial now—“and in short, we have done everything possible. You cannot hurt us more, Ms. Dare, but if we do not pursue a lead, we will have to live with ourselves. So every lead will be pursued.”

“I would hope so, and I think it’s a shame that you have not already expanded the search.”

Peert made his tone as sharp as hers. “We did search the area around Miss Van Dorn’s house; there was no sign of an intruder. None. No footprints, no broken grass, nothing.” Now his voice was rising. “So. She believes what she saw, but we can find no evidence.”

Nora thought Peert didn’t know his place; he was ruining the story’s next phase of life. “Or you simply can’t find what might be right in front of your eyes. What police academy did you attend again, sir?” One useful weapon in her arsenal was to make people justify themselves. It never failed.

“What journalism school did you attend, madame?”

Nora blinked, and for a moment the head tilt wavered. She’d never experienced anyone successfully biting back. Her lips narrowed into a slash. “I attended law school, which makes me uniquely qualified to report on cases regarding justice.” The cameras were still live; that idiot Molly hadn’t cut off Peert. “I will hold you to that promise to expand the search, Inspector. Let’s go