Vicious Circle Read online

  “I’m not a baby, mom,” he said as they entered the library.

  “Sorry.” Kat pulled her hand away. “I keep forgetting that.”

  James did, however, let her hold the door open for him. Once inside, he paused to bask in the rush of cool, temperature-controlled air that greeted their arrival. Kat moved on, disliking the way the frigid air formed goose bumps on her sweat-slicked skin. She hated this time of year, shuffling from stifling heat to extreme cold and then back again. Summer colds were caught that way.

  The library itself was surprisingly big for a town as small as Perry Hollow – a remnant from more prosperous days. Near the front door was a reading room, where the town’s seniors came to rifle through the daily newspapers and gossip. Across the hall was the children’s room, a bright and airy place where Kat had spent many hours with James when he was younger. Now he preferred the main room, where books filled oak shelves that rose from floor to ceiling.

  “Show me where you found that book you checked out a few weeks ago,” Kat told him.

  “Which one?”

  “The one with the aliens.”

  “Which one?” James shook his head, exasperated. Kat only imagined how ornery he’d be when he actually became a teenager. “I had two about aliens.”

  In the past few months, James’s choice in reading material had become increasingly morbid. Books featuring monsters and ghosts and, yes, aliens. His therapist told Kat not to worry. It was natural for a boy his age to be curious about all things supernatural. She said it was his way of trying to deal with forces beyond his control.

  Yet Kat couldn’t help but be concerned. James, after all, had come into contact with the Grim Reaper only nine months earlier. He escaped physically unscathed, but emotionally traumatized. Kat’s worry was that the books her son currently favored would only feed into his fear.

  “I don’t know which one,” she said, following him deeper into the library stacks. “I think it had a black cover. Or maybe it was green.”

  “Pictures or no pictures?”

  “Pictures,” Kat said. “Definitely pictures.”

  James scooted down the row, eventually stopping at the halfway point. Standing on his tiptoes, he reached for a book one shelf down from the top. Once he managed to snag it, he pulled it off the shelf and handed it to Kat.

  “This is the one with pictures.”

  The book’s cover – blue, by the way; not black or green – is why Kat sought it out in the first place. It bore a photograph of a crop circle that was similar to the one in Landon Gale’s field, although more elaborate, with slightly more lines and circles.

  She skimmed the book’s pages, spotting grainy black and white photos of mysterious discs in the sky and artist renderings of visitors from Mars. Kat barely glanced at them, slowing down only when she reached more pictures of crop circles.

  There were plenty of them. Studying each page, she saw circles and spirals and orbs with lines jutting out of them. The photos came from all over the world. England. Japan. Russia. A veritable atlas of mysterious markings.

  Turning the page, Kat saw what was purported to be a cave painting from 17,000 years ago that featured a pattern similar to the crop circle on the book’s cover. Scanning the text, she saw mentions of other crop circle patterns appearing in the tombs of Egyptian pharaohs and in writings from ancient China.

  These early references are irrefutable proof that crop circles have been in existence since the dawn of man – and possibly beyond, one photo’s caption said. It also points to extraterrestrial technology that is far more advanced than our own.

  Kat rolled her eyes. If aliens existed – and that was one gigantic if – she highly doubted they would use their “more advanced” technology to mess around in a field in Pennsylvania. She flipped the page, prepared for more photos and half-baked theories.

  Instead, she found an answer.

  It was contained in a section of the book devoted to man-made crop circles, and featured a black and white photograph of a man standing in a wheat field with a rope tied around his waist. The other end of the rope had been loosely knotted around a pole stuck into the ground a short distance away. The man stood on a slab of wood that was a few inches thick and roughly two feet wide. Rope had been tied around holes in both sides of the plank, forming makeshift handles.

  The photo’s caption was just as interesting.

  Lawrence Sutton of Wales crushes a path through a wheat field by pressing down on a heavy board with the help of rope handles. The rope around his waist guides his path, helping him form a perfect circle. Using this simple method, he can complete a crop circle in a matter of hours without the need for light and without creating noise.

  The photo below that one showed the finished result – a series of rings pressed neatly into the wheat field.

  Kat slammed the book shut, pleased she had found at least one piece of useful information within its covers. Although she didn’t know who had created the crop circle, at least she now knew how they did it.

  Five

  Kat dropped James off at the station with several books from the library and orders to Lou to keep an eye on him. Child care was the biggest problem she faced as a single mom, and she took free babysitting where she could get it. Not that Lou nor James minded. They were used to the situation.

  After that, Kat headed out to the Elliott farm. The drive took longer than usual, thanks to the steady stream of cars on their way to see the crop circle. Driving past the Winnick property, she saw it was still mobbed with people – and quite a few news vans. Overhead, one TV station’s helicopter circled the field, no doubt getting footage for that evening’s broadcast.

  Kat drove by as fast as she could. She had seen enough news vans and cameras in her lifetime, thank you very much. The last time people showed this much interest in Perry Hollow, it was because an unlucky handful of its residents had been brutally slaughtered. And while she was grateful that this time the fuss was over a field and not another murder, Kat would have preferred no fuss at all.

  With the news vans in her rearview mirror, she turned right and rumbled down the road leading to John Elliott’s place. The property was well-kept, with a stately farmhouse planted in the center of a lush, rolling lawn. Two rows of oak trees, their leafy branches practically intertwining, lined the driveway.

  Bringing her Crown Vic to a stop next to the barn, Kat was greeted by a big, old bloodhound. The dog’s shoulders came up to her window. When Kat rolled it down, the bloodhound poked its head inside, angling for a pat or a treat. Kat gave him both – a gentle rub of the head and the remains of a turkey sandwich she had bought for lunch.

  As the dog ate, Kat got out of the car and called toward the barn. “John? It’s Kat Campbell. You around?”

  “I’m back here, Chief.” The response came from behind the barn. “Come on around.”

  Kat rounded the barn, seeing a pair of legs sticking out from beneath a battered red pickup truck, mud-caked boots pointed toes-up. Next to them was an open toolbox. She assumed both the legs and the tools belonged to John Elliott.

  “Truck giving you trouble?”

  “Yeah,” the farmer answered, still under his jalopy. “She’s old and had a lot of work done on her over the years. Not sure she can take any more.”

  Kat had gone to high school with John Elliott, back when he was still called Johnny and spent his summers baling hay on the farm owned by his father. She remembered him being rather shy. And unfortunately chubby. And having a farmer’s tan that lasted through the winter.

  But as he slid out from beneath the truck, she saw things had changed. For one thing, John now owned the farm. From what little she heard about him, he was still considered shy. But the chubbiness was long gone, replaced by a tall drink of water poured into a tight pair of Levi’s.

  Despite the first hint of a receding hairline and some gray whiskers salting the stubble on his chin, time had been good to John. He was strong, as evidenced by his handshake, and
undeniably handsome. Plus he had a knee-weakening smile that Kat had never noticed in high school. The oversight made her want to kick herself.

  “I assume,” he said, “you’re here to talk about Landon’s field.”

  “I am indeed. You been over there yet?”

  “Not yet. Aimee called and said it’s a real mess. I’m going to head over there after the crowd dies down.” His gaze slid skyward, calling attention to the helicopter still circling like a desperate hawk. “Think they’ll recover from it?”

  “It’s hard to say,” Kat said, shrugging. “Half their crop is destroyed. And I’m not sure anyone else would want the other half now. The only thing they’ve got going for them is notoriety.”

  John pulled a red handkerchief from his pocket and wiped the back of his neck. Kat could have used one just like it. The sun was at full force, bright and sizzling.

  “You want to go inside?” John asked. “If you’d like, there’s a glass of iced tea with your name on it.”

  The iced tea was sweet, just the way Kat liked it. It was also blessedly cold. She downed half the glass in one gulp, her throat feeling like a fire that had just been doused. John drank his the same way – fast and with abandon. Setting his glass down, he used his arm to wipe his mouth.

  “So how have you been?” Kat asked him. “I don’t see much of you around town anymore. Hope you’re doing well.”

  “Things are OK, I guess. It’s been a lot of hard work keeping this place afloat.”

  “And you do it all by yourself, right?”

  As far as she knew, John had never married, nor did he date much. He was probably too busy with his farm to focus on things like that. But the end result was that some Perry Hollow woman was missing out on a good thing.

  “Just me and the dog,” John said, flashing that killer grin again. “He’s all I need. Keeps me in top shape, the way he likes to run around all these fields. I’m always chasing him.”

  “Landon Gale told me you’ve been a big help to him and his wife. You two ever consider teaming up? It might be easier to manage both farms that way.”

  John swatted away the suggestion like he was shooing a fly. “It would never work. Landon’s a good guy, and he works hard, but he’s just not cut out to be a farmer. I didn’t think he’d last more than a season or two even before his field was destroyed. Now I think it’s inevitable.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “Really good farmers have a special touch that just can’t be taught. You can work as hard as you want, but if you’re missing that magic, it’s not going to work. Only one person on that farm has it, and it’s certainly not Landon.”

  Kat arched an eyebrow. “Aimee? She didn’t strike me as the farming type.”

  “But she is,” John said. “She’s whip smart, that girl. Picks things up instantly.”

  “Landon told me you’ve been giving her a crash course.”

  “I have. And she’s aced every test.”

  He grabbed the pitcher of iced tea that sat between them and topped off their glasses. Once again, Kat gulped it down.

  “Aimee said she was here yesterday. Left around five o’clock. Is that true?”

  “It is,” John replied before taking a sip of his tea. “I think I gave her some seed catalogs.”

  “And what did you do for the rest of the night?”

  John set his glass down and flashed Kat another smile. Unlike the others, this one seemed slightly desperate – a blatant attempt to soften her up.

  “You think I have something to do with that crop circle, don’t you?”

  “I’m just covering all the bases,” Kat said. “Someone had to have made it.”

  “And I guess you’ve already ruled out aliens.”

  Kat thought back to the picture of the man tamping down wheat with only a board and some rope. John clearly was a fit man. It wouldn’t have been hard at all for him to walk out to the field and spend a few hours showing off his artistic side.

  “As a matter of fact, I have.”

  “Are you sure?” John asked. “Maybe it’s a sign.”

  “Or maybe it was someone who wanted to make Landon Gale go away by destroying his soybean crop,” Kat said. “So I need to ask you again, what did you do for the rest of the night?”

  “I worked on the truck a bit. Fed the dog and myself. Watched the Phillies game and then went to bed. I fell asleep with Jay Leno on.”

  “Did you get up at any point during the night? Maybe to get a glass of water? Go to the bathroom?”

  John started to shake his head, but soon stopped himself. “You know what, I did. The dog was barking at something and I went to the window to check it out.”

  “Your bedroom window?”

  “Yes. It faces the back yard and the Winnick field.”

  “Did you see anything out there?”

  This time, John didn’t interrupt the shake of his head. “Sorry, Kat. It all looked normal out there to me. I suspect the dog heard an owl or something and got spooked.”

  More likely, Kat thought, the dog had sensed someone was in the nearby field making hay of Landon Gale’s soybean crop and John just hadn’t seen him.

  Or he was lying.

  It had to be one of the two.

  Kat took one last sip of iced tea before getting up and heading to the door. John followed her out, standing on the porch with his arms crossed. The dog followed even further, trotting alongside Kat to her patrol car. She was giving it a goodbye pat on the head when one last question occurred to her.

  “You and Tom Hawkins get along, right?”

  “I guess so,” John said. “I know others have had some problems, but he and I are square.”

  “When you say others, you really mean Landon Gale, right?”

  “Yeah. I guess he told you all about that already.”

  “He did,” Kat said. “And it doesn’t sound like Tom was being very neighborly. Do you think he’d be able to make a crop circle?”

  “Tom? I doubt it. He’s not in the best shape right now.”

  “What’s wrong with him?”

  “I assume you’re heading there next,” John said, flashing her that sexy grin one last time. “You’ll see what I mean.”

  Kat climbed into her Crown Vic, gave John a wave and headed back the way she came. She turned right at the end of the oak-sheltered driveway, taking a route to the Hawkins farm that didn’t require driving past the busy madness at Landon’s place. She’d seen enough cars on those country roads for one day. But even her alternate route contained at least one vehicle – a Crown Vic just like her own sitting on the side of the road.

  As Kat came to a stop behind it, Carl Bauersox emerged from the cornfield that lined the road. His sweat-soaked face was the same color as a steamed lobster. The back of his neck was even worse. Seeing the sunburn made Kat feel a twinge of guilt for sending him out there on a day this hot and bright.

  “Hey, Chief,” Carl said with noticeable exhaustion. “This is the last of the fields.”

  “John Elliott farms this one, right?”

  Carl nodded. “He’s all corn and some alfalfa. But I did find a soybean field a mile from here. Looks to be the same size as the one Landon Gale has.”

  “Do you know who it belongs to?”

  “Tom Hawkins.”

  “Good work, Carl,” Kat said. “Now go home, put some aloe on that sunburn and get some rest. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

  Kat pulled away, thinking about what John Elliott had told her not ten minutes earlier. Maybe it’s a sign, he said of the crop circle. Perhaps it was. And if that was the case, then it was definitely pointing in Tom Hawkins’s direction.

  Six

  The Hawkins farm was the complete opposite of John Elliott’s. A crowded expanse of barns, sheds and holding pens, it was messier than Kat could have imagined. Instead of oaks, the driveway was surrounded by busted tractors and rusted-out vehicles – a veritable bone yard of farm equipment.

  Kat parked next to
a John Deere that had to be at least fifty years old and headed toward the farmhouse. Sitting in the center of the squalor, the house and made Landon and Aimee’s neglected place look positively palatial. Paint was peeling. Shutters slanted off their hinges. The porch roof sagged so much that Kat was afraid to stand under it. Instead, she rang the doorbell and retreated into the uncovered safety of the yard.

  “You looking for something?”

  The voice, sudden and loud, startled Kat. It came not from the house, but a tin-roofed structure about fifty yards away. The door was open, giving her just a glimpse of the darkened depths inside the building.

  “I’m Chief Campbell. With the Perry Hollow police. I’m here to see Tom Hawkins.”

  “He’s sleeping, I think.”

  Kat approached the shed, catching movement just beyond the doorway. “And who are you?”

  “Hired help.”

  A man emerged from the shed. He was tall, at least six-three, and as round and solid as a boulder. He was so huge that Kat was shocked he could even fit inside the structure. Even more surprising was the fact that she recognized him.

  “Didn’t I arrest you a few years back?”

  The man shuffled with embarrassment, his hands thrust deep in the pockets of his dusty jeans. “Yeah, I think you did.”

  Kat ran through the many people in Perry Hollow who’d had run-ins with the law. Most were the usual suspects – angry drunks, rampant speeders, a few who liked to slide behind the wheel after one beer too many. The human boulder wasn’t one of them.

  “Was it a DUI?”

  “Drug possession,” the man admitted.

  It was enough to refresh Kat’s memory. She had found him and a friend sharing a bong behind the Shop and Save two summers earlier.