The Bone Harvest

by Stacy M Jones

  “No, and unless we solve it, they never will.”

  “Do you have the report?”

  “Yeah, I finally got it. I’m going to send it to Purvis for him to review. He might see something everyone else is missing,” Luke said hopefully.

  “You doing okay?” Riley asked softly.

  “I’m as good as can be expected. I just can’t think about what Lily went through too much or I get in my head so much I can’t concentrate.”

  “I understand. I’m just a phone call away, whatever you need. I’ll update you when I know more. Cooper will be here soon to go over the calls he made this morning and compare notes. Call me tonight after you’re settled in the hotel.”

  CHAPTER 16

  “What do you think, Cooper, you want back in?” Captain Meadows asked between bites of his steak. He was sitting across from Cooper at Doe’s Eat Place in downtown Little Rock.

  Cooper had hesitantly taken the meeting not sure what he was walking into. He swallowed the bite of his own perfectly cooked steak and said, “I’m really sure, Cap. I appreciate the offer to come back and be a detective again, but I have a fully-operational business that gives me the flexibility I want. I didn’t fit as a detective. We both know that.”

  “Yeah, but the mayor is breathing down my neck to bring you back,” Captain Meadows added sternly. “After saving Riley like you did last year, and the help you gave us, we need a good man like you. What will it take? More money? A promotion? More time off?”

  Cooper laughed. A few years ago, Captain Meadows practically threw him out of the police station. Cooper wasn’t a good detective. He was great at the nuts and bolts of detective work, but not the politics with the higher-ups, the paperwork, and the high level of crap that came with the job. He couldn’t imagine going back to the police department.

  “Cap, really,” Cooper said, trying to convince him. “I appreciate the offer, but nothing is going to get me back. You can tell the mayor I’m happy to consult here and there, but that’s about all he’s getting out of me.”

  Cooper watched as Captain Meadows put his fork down, surveyed his face carefully, and made intense eye contact for a few seconds too long. “I didn’t think we’d get you back, but it was worth a shot. So then tell me, what do you really think about these letters?”

  Cooper knew there had to have been an ulterior motive to this lunch. He took another bite of steak and chewed deliberately, all in an effort to buy some time. After a sip of his drink to wash it down, Cooper said, “I don’t know any more than you do. I do trust what Luke believes. If he believes it’s connected so do I, even if somewhat cautiously. If we had looked and there were no similar cases, I’d have assumed it was a fake, but we found some. It’s worth exploring.”

  “Don’t get me wrong, Cooper,” Captain Meadows said seriously, “I think it’s real, too. Nobody wants Luke to solve this and get justice for his sister more than I do. I just don’t want to lose him in the process. I don’t want him to climb so far down a rabbit hole, there’s no bringing him back.”

  Cooper nodded in agreement. “How do we protect him from himself?”

  “I figured you’d have an answer for that.”

  “I don’t,” Cooper said regretfully. “Luke is hard-headed and strong-willed. I can keep my eye on him. Riley and I are both helping him out. Riley better than anyone will keep him in check. Even when Luke hasn’t listened to reason from anyone else, he will listen to her.”

  “That’s good. Real good. If you need more support, just let me know. I’ll put a detective or two on it.” Captain Meadows summoned the server and slapped his credit card on the table. He waved away Cooper’s attempt at payment.

  “Thanks for lunch,” Cooper said. Captain Meadows waved a dismissive hand at him. They both stood from the table and grabbed their keys and cellphones.

  As they moved through the restaurant, Cooper assured him, “I’m headed to Riley’s right now. I’ll have a chat about keeping an eye on Luke. We’ll let you know if we need additional support.”

  As they got to the door, Captain Meadows pulled it open, and Cooper came face to face with Holly, who was walking in with a group of women. Cooper nodded hello to her and tried to sidestep around her. She didn’t let him pass. Holly leaned into him and planted a kiss on his lips. Cooper was taken aback. He felt like all eyes in the place were on him.

  Holly pulled back and grabbed for his hand. Looking up at Cooper with a seductive smile on her face, she said in a sultry voice, “It’s so good to see you after the other night. Call me later, okay?” She dropped his hand and walked farther into the restaurant, leaving Cooper feeling awkward in her wake.

  Captain Meadows raised his eyebrows and slapped Cooper on the back as they made their way out of the restaurant and onto the sidewalk. Cooper turned from one direction to the other, trying to remember where he had parked his truck.

  CHAPTER 17

  After Luke called, I made myself a turkey sandwich, grabbed some chips from the cabinet, and called my mother, Karen. Our relationship has improved dramatically since I moved back to Little Rock. She had been dead set against the move, but once she saw my house and spent some time getting to know Luke, she was on board. She did remind me from time to time, in only the way that she can, not to mess it up.

  My mother answered quickly, and after beating around the bush, I finally asked her about the murder in Forest Park Cemetery.

  “You didn’t take any interest in it then. Why now?” my mother asked, skeptically.

  I had been hoping to not get into everything. I didn’t want to worry her, but my mother saw through it as I should have known she would. I spent the next fifteen minutes going through what had been happening with Lily’s case and the letters.

  If I didn’t just give her everything at the front end, she would have just dragged it out of me with endless questions. Like usual, my mother chastised me for being an investigator and always being in harm’s way. She finally gave up the information I was seeking.

  “Nobody searched the cemetery when Amanda Taylor went missing,” she started. “No one could have thought she’d be in that direction. If I’m remembering correctly, Amanda had come up from downtown with friends. She was last seen on the front lawn of the fraternity house talking to some people. Her friends assumed she went off with some guy, or that she went back to her dorm. Nobody gave it a thought until late Sunday night when she had been gone for two days. When her roommate realized she still hadn’t come home, she alerted college officials. They immediately called the police. Troy PD was out in full force. School officials were out. The whole town was out. But everyone was looking between the party and downtown. They looked along the river. They checked the bus route, the route she could have walked home. There was no one looking farther out toward Pinewoods, and there was no reason to search there.”

  “Amanda was found by someone walking their dog, right?”

  “The poor man nearly had a heart attack,” my mother said in an exaggerated tone.

  “What was the cause of death?”

  “Now that’s the strange thing,” my mother detailed. “They never said.”

  “They just never said the cause of death?” I asked incredulously. It was a small town. I knew there had to have been talk. “If not officially, then what was the gossip?”

  My mother hesitated, but then whispered, “That she was pierced through the heart with what they surmised was a sharp thin sword or knife.”

  My mother’s words sent a shiver down my spine.

  She added cautiously, “That’s just gossip. I don’t know for sure.”

  “Any suspects at the time?” I asked, hoping there was one. My mother had a memory like an elephant. The woman forgot nothing down to the smallest detail. Not that I was glad a case was connected to my hometown, but at least we had my mother’s memory.

  “Sure, there were a few. I think they questioned every RPI boy there, every homeless person within a few blocks of Russell Sage and even a weird
maintenance guy at the college some of the girls said was creepy. Nothing. I think the best and most likely suspect the cops figured was one of the RPI boys at the party. Shawn Westin, I believe his name was. He had a car, she was seen talking to him a lot that night, and he had a prior assault charge that was dropped under mysterious circumstances.”

  “What do you mean ‘mysterious circumstances’?”

  “I had heard he raped a girl in high school, and the cops didn’t want to arrest a nice boy from a good family. He was headed to university after all and boys will be boys,” my mother said sarcastically.

  I could tell she was angry. She had never liked the “boys will be boys” excuse. I remember once when we were little a boy had hit my sister Liv. I stepped in and broke his nose. My mother gave me an extra slice of pie after dinner. When the nun at my Catholic school called her in, and she had heard how the boy was just being rough like typical boys, my mother threatened to punch her in the nose. I smiled at the memory.

  “Where was Shawn Westin from?”

  “Virginia, if I’m not mistaken.”

  “Did they have evidence to tie him to Amanda?” I asked, as I got up and walked down the stairs to the kitchen to put my dish in the sink.

  “I don’t know that they ever said much in the news. The neighborhood had gossip as it always does, but I don’t think there was ever much. Jack Malone was the lead detective. You should give him a call and ask. I’ll see him at church this weekend if you want me to tell him you need some information.”

  I dropped my plate in the sink and opened the fridge. I poured myself some more sweet tea. I could tell my mother was moving around as well. The sound of pots and pans clanging in the background was apparent.

  Jack Malone was a retired homicide detective with the Troy police. He was also a long-time friend of my mother’s. They went to grade school and high school together. He was sixty-three, the same age as my mother, and a widower. His family was as Irish Catholic as my own.

  “I’ll probably try to call him before you see him, but thanks. If you remember anything else, call me.”

  I was headed back up the stairs to my office when there was a knock on the front door. I opened it to find Cooper standing there. He thrust a page in front of me. “I found a pattern.”

  CHAPTER 18

  I took the paper from Cooper and looked it over, not quite catching his meaning. It was just a list of cases and dates. “What am I looking at?” I asked as we walked into the kitchen and sat at the table.

  Cooper took the page back from me. He pulled up his phone and showed me a calendar from 1993 and then scrolled forward year by year. “All the missing dates are Friday nights. It’s a pattern. Now we have four – October, universities, freshmen, and Friday nights.”

  I mulled over what Cooper said. “Do we have exactly twenty-three cases or are there more?”

  “There are twenty-five, but he could be mistaken and lost count, or a few of these don’t fit.”

  “I don’t think he lost count,” I countered. “He seemed too precise. Let’s go up to my office and go over some cases. I heard from Luke so I can update you on what’s happening there, too.”

  I poured Cooper a glass of tea before we headed upstairs. I double-checked that my front door was locked, and we made our way to my office. Cooper took a seat on the couch and put his file folder of cases next to him. I sat at my desk.

  I updated Cooper about Luke as well as Lily’s missing fingers. Cooper didn’t say much. He had known Lily so I imagined this was hard for him, too. I had some distance from it, never having met her. I also detailed the Amanda Taylor case in Troy.

  When I was done, Cooper asked, “Is Troy a big city?”

  “No, it’s small. Just about 50,000 people, but it does have three universities. Small downtown, suburbs, and then some rural parts that connect to other towns farther into Rensselaer county, which bumps up to Massachusetts and Vermont.”

  I handed him back the case file so he could look over the case, which now included my notes along with what he had initially pulled from the internet.

  Cooper spent a few minutes going through the file. When he was done, Cooper locked eyes with me. “Since you have connections, you think it might be worth going up there to investigate?”

  “I hadn’t thought of that,” I replied honestly. “I think I’d probably want to make some calls first and see if anyone is willing to talk to me. I’d consider going if we have something to run with. My private investigator’s license is still good.”

  As much as I like fall in upstate New York, I didn’t want to leave Luke alone in Arkansas, even if he was up in Fayetteville. A three-hour drive was far better than being a flight away.

  “I want to go to Atlanta and check out Chamblee University,” Cooper indicated, surprising me.

  I eyed him not understanding. “Why?”

  Cooper leaned forward on the couch and explained, “All the cases we have, girls either go missing from parties near campus or walking home off-campus. Chamblee University is the only case where a girl goes missing from on campus. According to the killer, Chamblee University was his first. Maybe he messed up taking her right from the library, which is why his method changed.”

  I thought for a moment and then countered, “That’s a fair point. It’s so long ago though and the university is still saying nothing happened. Where would you even start?”

  “I made a call earlier today. Jordan Baker’s sister, Adele, is friends with a woman who works at the university. She went to school with Jordan. Adele thinks she knows more than she’s been saying. She might be the key.”

  I shrugged. “I don’t know that it’s worth the trip.”

  “I do,” Cooper said confidently. “If it was his first, he was bound to have made mistakes.”

  “Fair enough. When will you leave?”

  “I want to check in with Luke first and see what he needs.” Cooper leaned back on the couch and ran a hand down his face. He looked back at me and said frustrated, “There are just so many cases. We need something concrete to connect them. Maybe I can find that in Atlanta.”

  I hitched my jaw in the direction of Cooper’s file of cases. He handed them over to me. I picked through the stack of pages. “In how many of the cases you looked through were bodies found?”

  “Two, but like in Lily’s case, all the remains found were bones. What about you?”

  I told Cooper about the four cases – two with just skeletal remains and two where the victims were found relatively soon after they went missing. “It would be interesting to see if we can get any method and manner of death on the case in Troy and the one in Virginia. Maybe at least then we could find similarities in the method of killing.”

  “Want me to make some calls to Virginia? Is it the girl from the College of William & Mary in Williamsburg?”

  “Yes. If you call them, I’ll call my contact in Troy.”

  Cooper agreed, and I gave him my office so we weren’t talking over each other. I headed down the stairs to my kitchen. I hit the bottom stair just as there was a knock on my front door. I opened it to find Luke’s partner Det. Tyler standing on my front porch, looking pale and shaken.

  He thrust a bagged envelope at me and choked out the words, “He says he’s going to kill again this weekend in Fayetteville.”

  I called out to Cooper, who quickly came down the stairs and stood next to me. Tyler shifted his weight from one foot to the other as he tried patiently to wait for us to absorb the message. Cooper read the letter over my shoulder. I felt rapid puffs of air on the back of my neck. The letter was simple enough. It was addressed to Luke, like the others, and indicated that the killer was going to strike again this weekend. His crisp scrolling cursive stated:

  “It’s harvest time again. I’m going back to one of my old haunts. You’re quite familiar with it, Lucas. It’s your alma mater, and where I met your sweet sister Lily. This weekend. Make plans. I’ll see you on the harvest fields.”

  I
handed the letter back to Tyler and moved farther into my living room. I sat on one of my overstuffed chairs while they took a seat on the couch. Cooper and Tyler looked battle-worn, and we’d only just begun.

  Cooper asked, “When did this come in?”

  “Earlier today. We had it tested by the lab and again nothing. No prints. No markings.”

  I reached out for Tyler to hand me back the letter. I turned it over and checked to see the envelope. I was looking directly at the back, but couldn’t see the postmark. “Where was it postmarked from?”

  “Just north of Fayetteville in Springdale. We need to take this seriously.”

  “Of course, there’s no way we can’t. We will all probably need to head up there.”

  “Have you told Luke?” Cooper asked.

  Tyler shook his head. “Captain Meadows wanted you two to see this first. He assumed one of you would want to call Luke. He also wanted me to check in to see what you’ve found.”

  Cooper spent the next half hour detailing everything. He went through each of the cases and noted where bodies had been found. He then narrowed in on the cases in Atlanta and Troy. Tyler asked questions that Cooper answered as best he could. Before I could offer any of my own insight, Cooper told Tyler that he thought he should visit Atlanta while I head back to Troy. That is after we all go to Fayetteville.

  When they were done, Cooper turned to me and asked, “You calling Luke?”

  “It’s better coming from me.”

  CHAPTER 19

  Riley called just as Luke stood at the spot where the groundskeeper had found his sister’s remains. She told him about the letter and that the killer was going to strike again this weekend. Friday, most likely, given Cooper’s assessment.

  Luke hung up with her, knowing they’d be there soon. He formed a plan in his mind. He’d need to go inform the university, the police department and call in the FBI.