His description of a sociopath was like a mirror image of himself. She wondered if he was aware of that. His unblinking stare bore into her with seemingly malicious intent. Riggs felt goose bumps on her arms. Was he manipulating her? She sensed he was playing with her, not in the least concerned. Most people were intimidated the minute they stepped into the interrogation room, unless they were high on drugs or alcohol. His absolute calm was unnerving.
At the sound of a tap at the door, he smiled and broke his stare. A woman Riggs recognized as a defense attorney walked into the room and asked her to leave while she consulted with her client. Her name was Laura Frye; a no-nonsense schoolmarm type, she could wipe the floor with you with one piercing glare over her bifocals.
Riggs stood up to leave and felt Heinemann’s hand rest on her arm. He held out a business card. “In case you need more assistance, public or private.”
She suppressed a shudder and took the card.
CHAPTER
30
WITH THE HOPE that she might be able to decipher something useful from Panetta’s half of the Heinemann interview, Riggs sat reviewing the recording at her desk in the sheriff’s office when her phone rang. The only thing she could note for sure was Heinemann’s colossal arrogance.
With a disgusted shake of her head, she answered. “Riggs.”
“We got bodies.” Blackwell huffed, as if he was walking over rough terrain. “The dogs sniffed out two cadavers jammed into a narrow mine shaft about an hour ago. Can’t haul ’em out till you get here. We’re out in the back forty, so I’ll send Panetta back down to the parking lot to guide you in. Hurry up, it’s hotter ’n’ hell!”
When she drove into the Eden Retreat parking lot, which was overrun with police, FBI, state, and sheriff’s officials, enough to cover a hundred murders, she squeezed her truck onto the grass divider by the road. A wall of hot air buffeted her when she opened the door. The day’s humidity had boiled into a seething mass of dark clouds and scalding wind. At least the clouds blocked some of the sun’s intensity. She grabbed her cadaver kit and her camera.
Panetta, still in his white dress shirt, though his tie was loosened, waved from under the shade of a tree.
“This place is hardly Eden today, more like Hades.” Panetta relieved Riggs of the heavy cadaver kit. “It’s this way, up the hill.”
“Thanks. Yeah, heaven and hell, just like Milton’s Paradise Lost. Am I going to find Satan and all the fallen angels up there?”
“You’re gonna find some dead angels. Both women. Possibly early sixties, maybe older. I’m looking into any missing persons reports in the past twenty-four hours.”
Panetta led her up the paved path, but where it curved off to the right, he kept going. For the next hundred feet they walked across neatly mowed green grass, then stepped over a two-foot rock wall and began the ascent up the hill across tall, wheat-colored dry grass and loose rocks. South of them, down in a shallow valley, rested the city of Ashland, famous for its Shakespeare Festival that Dr. Weldon loved so much. To the north stretched rolling hills of vineyards and pear orchards, a picturesque view if not for the grizzly task at hand.
She steeled herself against the inevitable shock and revulsion that accompanied the detailed investigation of murder victims, reminding herself that she was here for the living. For the loved ones who would inevitably want answers. This place was aptly named after all; like the Garden of Eden, evil had snaked its way in.
Hot wind whistled up from the valley, swirling bits of sand into the air around them.
Panetta leaned into it. “Breathe through your nose, or you’ll be picking sand out of your teeth.”
“I’m more concerned about my eyes.” Riggs squinted against the wind, blinking rapidly.
They proceeded over more rolling hills, the blistering wind stealing her breath the higher they climbed. The retreat was far behind them with nothing but wilderness up ahead, dotted with scrub brush and red-barked manzanita trees. Three vultures, their wings black against the stormy sky, were circling high above them. They crossed a road of sorts strewn with loose gravel, where, directly ahead, stood Blackwell and a clan of police and FBI.
Panetta pointed down the gravel road. “We tracked the road to an abandoned logging camp off Dead Indian Memorial Road. This area here is still technically Eden Retreat. There’s a metal gate that we’re working on getting the keys to so you can drive your truck up here to retrieve the bodies. If all else fails, we’ll cut the gate open.”
Blackwell stepped over a downed tree, the requisite cigar clamped firmly in his teeth. “I figure we got maybe an hour or two before this storm comes over the mountains and spits fire down on us. On top of that I’m having to rotate the officers, all of us, FBI too, because we’re concerned about heatstroke. Two of the guys are already passed out and had to be carted off to the hospital. So I had a bunch of bottled water brought up. Pour it on your head if you have to.”
Riggs nodded and approached the cadavers. The mine shaft had been cleared of the initial layer of dirt, just enough to make out two bodies, their limbs intertwined. From the length of hair and color of clothing, she could guess that they were women. Her face flushed with anger to see life treated with such callous disregard. With renewed energy, she retrieved her bag from Panetta, thanking him, and placed it on the ground. She pulled out latex gloves and put them on. Before touching anything, she snapped pictures, then Tucker and Burns helped her batten down two tarps with metal stakes so the wind didn’t blow them away.
Blackwell cursed, “It’s like the fucking Mojave Desert up here.”
Riggs couldn’t agree more, but as much as she’d loved to hurry up and get finished, she worked carefully, sifting the sand and dirt onto a third tarp behind the shelter of a makeshift plastic windbreaker stretched between two metal poles. The bodies didn’t appear to have been in the ground very long; she estimated twenty-four hours, maybe less. The vics were wedged so tightly into the space they had to shovel around the hole before they could pull the bodies out. It was slow work, as they tried not to disturb the crime scene any more than they had to. Gusts of wind whistled eerily through the twisted branches of a manzanita tree, and the sky turned ominously dark.
Riggs eyed the stormy sky. “Bizarre weather this weekend. It’s as if somebody up there doesn’t like what’s going on down here. Like this place is cursed.”
“The Gods are angry, for sure,” Panetta said. “From the storm yesterday, we can plainly see tire tracks on the logging road. Recent tracks. My guess is late last night after the rain stopped and the road was muddy. There are a couple of good muddy boot prints as well. So whoever dumped the bodies had access with a key for the gate. Since this is technically Eden property, that narrows our suspects.”
“Dr. Heinemann?”
“That would be a pretty good guess. He certainly has the right history, but that doesn’t necessarily mean he’s guilty. But yeah, he’d be my first bet, even though I didn’t get that good a read on him.”
“I know. He could be a pathological liar and a remorseless serial killer, but we need more evidence than just proximity.”
Tucker chimed in, “I got a read on him. He’s a murderin’ egomaniac windbag. I say we haul his ass back in right now and charge him with murder.”
A state trooper came jogging up the gravel road. They had cut the chains free on the gate blocking the road, and it was clear for her truck to enter now. Panetta offered to go get it for her, so she gratefully tossed him the keys.
Riggs glanced down at the two bodies now spread out on tarps, hot wind wiping sand over them as if the earth was fighting to reclaim them. “Evil. It’s a place of evil.”
She knelt down and blinked sand from her eyes. The first vic was tanned and wearing a pink bathrobe over a floral nightgown, no slippers or jewelry. No makeup on her face. The second vic had shoulder-length brown hair and was wearing a T-shirt and shorts, no shoes. Both were slender and probably about the same age.
“What
do ya think?” Blackwell asked, covering his nose as the wind whipped his way. “A day, maybe two?”
She nodded. “I think so. The first vic doesn’t appear to have been in the hole as long as the other one. Her bowels have disengaged, which is some of what you’re smelling.”
Tucker swallowed hard and backed away. “Is that what that is?”
Burns said blandly, “That would be my guess.”
Blackwell scowled. “Don’t puke on the scene, Tucker.”
“You don’t see me hurling up my lunch at crime scenes, do you?” He planted his feet apart and crossed his arms, bulging the muscles. With his face bright red and streaked with sweat, Riggs was concerned.
With a snicker, Burns said, “You’ve always been my role model, Tucker.”
Riggs suppressed a laugh, and hastened to take the scowl off Tucker’s face. “Thanks, guys, for helping pull the vics out.”
“Okay, we’re all singin’ kumbaya now. Let’s focus,” Blackwell warned. “I’ve got every kind of law enforcement in the country aiming their sites on me, and I ain’t gonna do nothin’ to screw this case up. You got it? Now, Riggs, am I right in thinkin’ they weren’t killed at the same time?”
“That’s my best guess at the moment. The first vic was probably killed sometime in the middle of the night, given what she’s wearing. The second one, maybe Friday? I would also suggest they were drugged. I don’t see any defensive wounds. Won’t know about teratomas until the autopsy, of course, but I wouldn’t be surprised.”
A few large drops of rain splattered the ground around them.
“Damn.” Blackwell glared at the stormy sky. “Crime techs are almost here, but it’s gonna be a muddy mess soon, and puttin’ up a tent is out of the question in this godforsaken wind.”
“We need to work as fast as we can,” Riggs confirmed.
“Agreed. Can you do the autopsies tonight? I’d like to confirm the teratoma link and get some IDs.”
“Yes, I’ll set it up as soon as I can.”
Blackwell’s phone rang, he answered, and a moment later he broke into a string of curses. Everyone paused, waiting for an explanation.
“What the fuck, Blackwell?” Tucker asked.
“It’s Heinemann. Somehow he managed to ditch his tail. No one knows where he is.”
Tucker’s jaw dropped. “That maggot got away?”
“Hell and damnation! I was just gonna arrest that piece o’ shit.” Blackwell stomped off in a huff down the hill, punching numbers into his phone.
Just then, gravel crunched under tires, and everyone cast their eyes toward the road. There came a row of vehicles, the crime crew among them to set up a grid. Little good it would do them in the wind and rain.
CHAPTER
31
WITH STU’S WARNING still pinging around in her head, Whit joined the traffic on I-5 headed north toward Ashland and the Siskiyou Summit. Perhaps she should have listened to Stu and taken George with her. Maybe stowed him under a blanket in the back of the car. Cordero wouldn’t have known he was hiding; then at least if she texted him, she’d have immediate backup. Well, it was a moot point now.
A bit paranoid, Whit kept an eye on her rearview mirror to see if anyone was following her, which was basically an impossible task. Traffic was congested as usual. Storm clouds loomed ahead. The temperature gauge on her car read 103 degrees. After she turned off I-5 and neared Eden Retreat, the traffic backed up. A congestion of law enforcement overwhelmed the entire parking lot and clogged the side road that led up to Lake of the Woods and Celeste’s cabin.
Whit inched along with the traffic, trying to see what the commotion was about. A slew of media were clumped down in the parking lot with a few stand-up cameras rolling. She caught sight of Panetta walking across the parking lot and pulled off the road, wedging her car into a spot on the opposite side of the street and facing the wrong direction. Ticket time if any of those cops took notice. Grabbing her pad and pen, she raced across the street.
“Panetta!”
He didn’t appear to hear her as she ran between two cars approaching in opposite directions, one of which honked at her. The driver flipped her off. She smiled and waved. Jerk. Closer now, she called again as he was climbing into Riggs’s F-150 truck. “Panetta!”
Thankfully, he heard her this time and stepped back, leaving the truck door open. “McKenna. Great reporting on your article this morning.”
“Thank you.” She was pleasantly surprised by the compliment.
“Dr. Frankenstein?” He raised a brow, clearly amused, his brown eyes teasing.
Even though she found the title rather ridiculous, she suddenly felt defensive. “Can you think of a better name for a doctor turning human flesh into monster tumors?”
“You make an interesting argument.”
“I’m on my way to an interview and I’ve only got a few minutes, but can you tell me what’s going on here?”
Panetta’s gaze searched her face for a moment, analyzing. She wondered briefly what he was thinking, but soon found out. “I know Riggs trusts you, but she knows you a lot better than I do. I cannot share information with the media during an ongoing investigation even if I wanted to.”
“Oh.” She glanced over at the group of media swarming the wide porch. Her chances of getting through the throng were not great in the small amount of time before her interview.
Panetta shook his head. “No, those journalists are not getting any information either. They’re being told that we have a search warrant for the property and that is all.”
Whit looked him in the eye. “That’s it? That’s the best you can do?”
Panetta merely laughed.
“Come on, Panetta. Give me something.”
With a mischievous grin, he said, “Riggs is at the scene. You understand?”
“Yes. I do. Thanks, Panetta.”
With a salute, he climbed into the truck. Whit happily crossed the road, using a bit more caution this time. She’d make sure to use her interview as collateral for whatever was going down at Eden. If Riggs was on scene, then they had discovered at least one body. However, that didn’t necessarily mean the body was related to her story, but she’d bet money it was.
For the next thirty minutes, she drove through rolling hills and gradually climbed in altitude until the road was flanked by tall pines. It would have been a pleasant trip, except the nearer she drove to the Cascade Mountains, the more anxiety she felt. Would she always have this creeping fear of the woods? It was a sobering thought. A phobia wasn’t something she could rationalize. Riggs had suggested a technique called desensitization—repeatedly subjecting Whit to a walk in the woods until the fear gradually disappeared. It was an entirely unpleasant prospect, but she could see that it was probably necessary in order to overcome the paralyzing panic.
Conscious of gripping the wheel with tense hands, she flexed her fingers, not surprised to find her palms sweaty. Fixing her eyes on the road, she sighed with relief when she saw the sign for Lake of the Woods, but soon the road got bogged down in holiday traffic headed for Aspen and Sunset campgrounds, which were no doubt jammed with trailers, tents, and kids on bikes enjoying the Labor Day weekend.
She turned left onto Mt. McLoughlin Lane, named after the nearly 9,500-foot dormant volcano that overlooked the lake. During the winter months its huge angled peak gleamed like a white beacon from almost any viewpoint in the valley. Now it was a dry, brown, rocky specter that cast a dark shadow onto the lake, which was twenty-six square miles of water surrounded by thick pines.
Tension mounted, along with real regret that she hadn’t brought George along to at least keep her company and, frankly, keep her from coming unhinged. As Cordero had instructed in her text, Whit made a left at a fork in the road where pavement turned into packed dirt and a small sign nailed to a tree read Private Road. The sun-dappled narrow lane twisted around a bend beneath dense towering pines. She could feel the adrenaline seep into her system, ready to mount an attack. It wa
shed over her in white-hot waves, creating a mindless need to escape, as if she were suffocating underwater.
“Damn it!” Whit abruptly jammed on the brake and inhaled a deep breath, counting, then slowly releasing. She gripped the steering wheel and leaned her head against her hands. She couldn’t catch her breath. The breathing wasn’t helping; she had to get out. She shoved the car into park and stepped out, gasping for air. Abandoning the car in idle, she paced back and forth on shaky legs, willing the fear away.
Talking as if to a child, she said to herself, “It’s not Afghanistan. It’s over. You’re safe.” She paced and talked, repeating the refrain, fighting the image of John’s horrified expression when the bullet ripped through his head and her terribly ineffectual efforts to stop the bleeding. The utter helplessness.
Changing direction, she circled around the car a half dozen times. “It’s over. There’s nothing you can do. You’re safe. The girls need you.” She walked, talked, and gradually absorbed the sounds around her. The crunch of leaves under her feet, the whine of a distant motor boat, the bees swirling in the trees.
Thank God no one was around. No doubt she looked like a lunatic.
“Fucking Afghanistan!”
She grabbed the door handle and got back in the car. After a few minutes, she felt in control again. She put the car in gear and pressed on.
As soon as she turned the next bend, the road opened into a quaint, sunny clearing. Thank God for small mercies. Sky and sunlight. She could breathe. A two-story cedar log cabin with a lovely wraparound porch and an exposed stone fireplace was perched near the base of the lake, with a few Douglas firs providing shade. A footpath sloped down to the water, where a jet boat and a canoe were tied to a dock. The expansive lake sparkled like diamonds in the sun, with Mount McLoughlin looming in the distance. The gravel road dipped around the front of the cabin. She parked next to a truck and sent a quick text to George.
A Desperate Place Page 24