by J K Ellem
Under the guise of doing “God’s work” Albert Jessup was able to procure them from many of the families who were the initial members of his congregation. As the commune grew, so did the number of families all providing an endless supply of young girls, and Carl, Albert’s son, who was in his thirties at the time, soon followed in his father’s footsteps. Martha Jessup, Albert’s wife and Carl’s mother, had her suspicions but did nothing. Both of Carl’s parents were now dead, but Carl had picked up the mantle of what his father had started back in the seventies and expanded it into a huge co-ordinated paedophile ring.
But Carl wasn’t as careful as his father back then, and one day when he went into town he lured a child into the restrooms of a local park. That led to the sexual assault charge of a minor in 1977 that Clare discovered. Albert Jessup hired an expensive lawyer out of San Francisco to defend his son. The lawyer claimed that the evidence against his client, Carl, was all circumstantial and that the child was lying, and her testimony couldn’t be relied upon. There were no other witnesses. Money was paid and a plea deal struck, and Carl walked away from court with just a community service order.
“So what happens now?” Shaw asked.
“We keep digging until we uncover the full truth. There are more bodies buried somewhere out there in the forest, girls who were pregnant, girls who Carl Jessup ordered to be hanged then disposed of.”
“And the severed hand that the Sheriff found?”
“We’ll find her, Mr Shaw. We will. We will find them all and bring them home.”
Shaw nodded and stood up, indicating the discussion was over for him at least. He wanted to get back to Clare. It was time to move on and he needed to tell her. He moved to the doorway.
“Oh, Mr Shaw, just one more thing before you go.”
Shaw paused and turned around.
“Do you have children, Mr Shaw?”
Shaw was perplexed. “Children?”
Alina nodded. “Kids, you know, of your own?”
“No, I don’t. Why do you ask?”
Alina shrugged. “No reason. It’s just that you showed tremendous restraint.”
“Restraint? How do you mean?”
Alina stood up, walked over to him and stared him straight in the eye. “I have four children of my own. They’re my life. I speak my mind at times and that gets me into trouble with my family, but that’s just me. I’m not afraid to wear my heart on my sleeve.”
Shaw had no idea where she was going with this.
“What I mean is that I get pretty emotional at times, especially when children are involved.”
Shaw just looked at her.
“I know I shouldn’t, it’s my job and I should act impartial at all times. But we’re all human.”
Shaw could feel her eyes searching his, but he remained silent.
“I don’t know if I would have been as forgiving as you, if I had seen what you had seen firsthand up there at the church. Especially the dead girls.”
Shaw held her gaze.
“Maybe I would have just lost it, you know, and hung the bastard myself. ‘An eye for an eye’ as they say.” She raised an eyebrow.
Shaw offered nothing more for a moment. Finally he said, “Well, it’s a good thing you weren’t there. Can I go now?”
Coronado was silent, sizing him up one more time, fully aware of who he was, his background and his capabilities.
“Take care, Mr Shaw.”
Shaw nodded. “Be safe.” He turned and walked out of the room.
53
It was the moment Clare was dreading, but she knew it was inevitable. “Where will you go?” Clare asked. She was sitting up in bed, and had less tubes in her arms now. Shaw saw that as a good sign, a week had past and she was well on the mend. The color had returned to her cheeks and her eyes were clear and alert.
“Just keep traveling I guess. Head west. There’s still a lot of the Rockies I want to see.”
Clare knew what they had was fleeting. It was unbelievable while it lasted and it had changed her for the better. But she couldn’t hide that she was upset he was leaving. She wished with all her heart that she was physically capable of saying good-bye to him properly, take an entire afternoon and night to do it right, slowly and lovingly, just to two of them, alone in her bedroom, nothing but clean linen sheets, soft music and plenty of wine to drink. She didn’t need food. He was all the sustenance she needed.
Tears filled her eyes and Shaw gently wiped them away with his thumb. “You’ll be fine, Clare. Lacy needs you more than ever. You’re a good person. The town needs more good people like you.”
“You helped. I couldn’t have done it without you.”
“I did nothing, it was you, Clare, they can thank.”
Clare sighed as she looked at him. So young, so good-looking, so good for her.
“Come here,” Clare ordered him, holding her arms out. Shaw paused for a moment then leant down and kissed her one last time.
* * *
They sat next to each other at the bench drinking coffee in Emily’s kitchen, the morning sun pouring in through the window in shards of gold and yellow.
Shaw had hitched a ride back up the mountain with Dan Reynolds. Reynolds thanked him for what he had done. Shaw shrugged it off. He dropped Shaw at Emily’s house before heading back up to the church to meet with more FBI agents. It was going to take weeks, maybe months for the place to be fully processed, all evidence collected and the surrounding forest excavated in the search for more bodies.
“Will you be OK?” Shaw asked Emily. He wanted to grab his gear and say good-bye in person to her.
“I’ll be fine,” Emily replied.
“There are no other evil members from Casey’s family? No other brothers or sisters who will come after you?”
Smiling, Emily shook her head. “No. Alina Coronado from the FBI came by again a few days ago while you were at the hospital in Denver with Clare. She’s liaising with the Federal police over in Australia.”
“Will you stay?”
“In this town?” Emily asked. She looked out the window, thinking of happier times that now seemed beyond her reach. “This town ... it’s different now. I don’t know if I can live here knowing all that misery that went on right under our noses.” She turned back to Shaw. “I’ve changed as well.”
“I know. You are a brave woman Emily. You have endured things I can’t even imagine.”
Emily tried to smile again but struggled. “What about all those children? What about the horrors they have been through? Who will speak for them? What justice will they get?”
Shaw had no answer. “Will you visit Clare?”
“Of course I will,” Emily said without hesitation. “We both need each other now.”
Shaw picked up his rucksack at his feet and Emily followed him to the door. Emily opened it and they paused in the doorway.
“Good-bye Emily.”
Emily reached up and hugged him long and hard. When she finally pulled back she whispered in his ear. “Thanks for everything. I owe you.”
Shaw smiled, a little embarrassed. “You owe me nothing.”
Emily reached up again. “Don’t get any ideas,” she cautioned him with a mischievous smile on her face, then kissed him on the lips, short and sweet.
“What was that for?”
Emily shrugged, “It does nothing for me,” she laughed. “That was entirely for your benefit.”
Shaw smiled, squeezed her arm then turned and walked down the front steps.
* * *
“Well I’ll be damned.” The morning air was clear and crisp, and Walt Pickens could see the man clearly through the windshield of his pickup truck. The man was walking along the shoulder of the road, not more than a hundred yards ahead, snow and ice piled high on either side from where the snowplows had done their job the night before.
Pickens was heading down the mountain, out of Lacy, the road a black ribbon that wound its way through the white landscape.
; He was sure it was the same man he’d seen walking up the mountain road into Lacy last week. He was certain of it. Except now the stranger was heading down the mountain range.
Pickens eased over, tires crunching on the compacted snow as he pulled up on the shoulder alongside the man. There was no other traffic, and he hadn’t seen a logging truck for days now. Something strange was going on at the logging camp, he knew. Ever since an army of police arrived a few days back, the trucks had vanished from the roads and no workers had been seen in the town either. Very strange indeed.
The man stopped walking, his hip in line with the window of the pickup. Pickens leaned across the passenger seat and wound down the window. “Do ya need a ride anywhere?”
The man bent down, his head and shoulders framed by the open window. “No thanks. It’s nice out and I like to walk.”
Walter studied the man’s face, unsure now if it was the same person. He hadn’t got a good look at him last week. “Were you on the road a few days back?” Pickens was just curious. “I thought I saw you coming up the mountain, from Denver?”
The man looked at Pickens for a moment, like he was contemplating how to answer. Then he nodded. “Yes, that was me.”
“So how did you find our little town? Pretty boring I guess, if you’re from the city.”
The man smiled wanting to say something but let it go.
“Well, safe travels partner,” Pickens said.
The man smiled and rapped the roof of the pickup. “Safe travels to you too.”
Pickens put the truck into gear and slowly pulled away, back onto the road.
Ben Shaw watched the pickup truck drive away until it disappeared around a bend.
He looked at the forest around him. It was blanketed in beautiful new snow, the sky stretching upwards in infinite blue.
Then something moved on the other side of the road, amongst the trees, a ripple in the background, a sideways slink of brown color. Shaw shaded his eyes against the morning sun and focused harder.
Nothing. It must have gone.
A slight breeze ruffled his hair. Shaw pulled the collar up of his jacket and continued on his journey.
He passed the town exit sign but ignored the words.
Thanks for visiting Lacy. We hope you enjoyed your stay!
THE END.
1
The Lake House
For nearly two hours she had been sitting almost perfectly still, watching the house across the lake. But she didn’t mind. Nadia Levon shifted slightly, fallen leaves and twigs crunching under her buttocks, the earthy smell of decay surrounding her.
She adjusted the straps of her backpack then brought the binoculars to her eyes again with one hand, the other hand was by her side, fingertips absentmindedly caressing the cold steel of the suppressed Beretta handgun. Like a dependable spouse, it was old but reliable and lovingly maintained. It hadn’t failed her yet.
The light was fading to a fringe of burnt orange in the west, as nocturnal creatures stirred in the forest around her. In front of her a cold expanse of water stretched for half a mile to the foot of the cliffs on the opposite shore, and a small jetty where an expensive pleasure craft rocked gently in the swell.
Back from the jetty, a series of timber stairs zigzagged up the jagged cliff face, with a string of lights guiding the way to a staging platform and gatehouse at the very top.
Too obvious a path to take.
Nadia panned right, across the ragged edge of the cliff top. Other houses hugged the edge overlooking the lake below, the combined wealth of the secluded enclave could be counted in billions, not millions of dollars. But she was only interested in one particular house, a sprawling mansion; the second on the right, perhaps the largest but the most humble. Understated wealth always appealed to Nadia.
She had observed the house during the day, a terraced edifice of industrial chic with a reinforced glass encased tranquility pool at the very front edge, lavish terraced gardens that stepped back up the cliff to the main residence beyond. The house was a low, modular affair of expansive glass, polished steel and smooth concrete.
What did surprise Nadia was the lack of adequate security. Only a single CCTV camera housed by the automatic gates at the front driveway, and another camera positioned at the top of the cliff stairs at the gatehouse. Maybe it was a sign of arrogance by the owner, maybe a sign of carelessness. Nadia believed it was the former given what she had read in the extensive file she had been provided with about the owner of the house. A Swiss banker, no children, late fifties, and too rich to have earned his money purely by legitimate means. But then again, being a clandestine banker and financier for terrorist organizations worldwide tended to be more lucrative than the typical trading of junk bonds and hiding the wealth of the rich and infamous from the taxation authorities.
The last strands of daylight finally seeped away and the moon rose, a huge orb of luminous white that bathed the forest around Nadia in a ghostly wash, and the nocturnal creatures became more vocal.
Nadia got up, stretched her limbs and checked the action of her gun again. It was time.
She skirted the edge of the lake, keeping just within the tree line, a wraith moving amongst vaulted shadows, her eyes and ears attuned to the slightest sound or ripple of movement around her as she made her way around the lake and up the hillside on the western flank.
Thirty minutes later Nadia reached the outer boundary of the property. She scaled a high wall covered in a tangle of star jasmine vines, making her task easier, then dropped down behind a tall and perfectly manicured hedge. The hedge ran the entire western side of the property. The ground floor of the property was walled entirely with floor-to-ceiling double glazing that offered a panoramic view of the lake below and the surrounding woodland. Adjacent properties were some distance away, and were also surrounded by high walls and thick, manicured foliage offering seclusion and privacy.
Two minutes later Nadia was inside the house, the latch on the glass sliding side door providing no resistance at all to her lock picking skills.
She paused in the shadows of a recessed alcove at the end of a narrow corridor. In front of her was a massive open plan living room of soft furnishings in cold leather, a central fire pit, modernistic sculptures on granite pedestals, slim line functional furniture and a large industrial kitchen at the far end. The interior was a minimalistic homage of granite, stone, stainless steel and raw natural timbers sourced from the surrounding forest. Ikea for billionaires.
The atmosphere felt cold and clinical, like a museum of modern design. But despite this, Nadia noted some subtle feminine touches. His wife would not be home this evening. The file said that she was in Zurich on an extended shopping trip. She was in Zurich, but she was in some exclusive hotel getting her ass screwed off by a guy half her age.
A wide hallway branched off to her left and from her memory of the floor plan, Nadia made her way towards the master bedroom, her soft sole shoes silent on the polished concrete floor, gun in hand sweeping left to right towards an open doorway at the far end.
Then a side door opened ten feet from Nadia and a man emerged wearing nothing but a towel wrapped around his bloated waist, his belly massive and hairy, flopped over the front of the towel knot. He was bald with a sweaty meaty face with dark, predatory eyes that stared blankly at Nadia.
Confusion gave way to fear. Who was this tall, lithe woman with raven-black hair and feline eyes of emerald? Why was she pointing a gun?
Nadia waited. She needed confirmation of her presence. It wasn’t essential, she just liked it that way, that moment when all the sins of the sinful came flooding back to them. You would see the change behind their eyes, that slow realization that retribution had come knocking.
The man shuffled forward, rolls of fat beaded with sweat quivered as he moved. “Please,” he blubbered in broken English. “I’m sorry…please…I can make amends.”
Amends?
Nadia tilted her head, and aimed the front sight of the Beretta b
etween his close-set eyes, at the bridge of the nose.
How refreshing, she thought, almost expecting the obligatory, “Please don’t kill me! I’m sorry. It won’t happen again, I promise.”
It would be her making the amends, not him.
So Nadia put a bullet in his head and called it a night.
The man fell heavily, his awkward bulk hitting the concrete floor like a carcass of beef.
As she stepped over the body, she put another two rounds into his head without looking down, just to make sure. It was then she heard a muffled cry ahead from the master bedroom.
Reaching the open doorway she pivoted inwards, the barrel of her gun following where her eyes went.
A shape sat upright on a bed, Nadia squeezed the trigger, pure instinct before her brained screamed for her to stop and she halted the shot.
A young girl, no older than twelve-years-old sat on the bed, a thin sheet clutched around her, barely covering her nakedness. Her limbs and shoulders thin and undeveloped, pale skin, hazel eyes, wide and red-rimmed gazed at Nadia, the girl’s face terrified, dried blood under her nostrils.
The girl looked lost, tiny on the huge ornate bed amongst a sea of pillows and bed coverings violently strewn everywhere.
Nadia looked around the room, then lowered her gun.
“Please,” the girl said, her English heavily accented in Russian, her lips trembling. It was Nadia’s native language, so she replied in Russian. “Get dressed, then leave. Don’t look back and don’t come back. You will not mention this to anyone. Do you understand?”
The girl’s head bobbed vigorously, relief in her distressed eyes.
Nadia nodded and walked out of the room.
2
The Assignment
All she knew was that his name was Giles. She doubted that was actually his name, but that’s what he called himself in all of his encrypted communications.