Spoils of the dead

by Dana Stabenow

  She spoke with a certain bitterness and he hazarded a guess. “One of your own neighbors, perhaps?”

  Her smile was as frosty as her name. “Perhaps.”

  “You live outside the city limits?”

  Her expression didn’t change but there was some feeling there he couldn’t quite detect. “You’ve met Chief Armstrong then.”

  “We had lunch.”

  She evidently had no intention of bringing him into the loop at this early stage of their relationship. “In fact I do live outside the city limits.”

  Liam foresaw a cruise down the judge’s street in his very near future, and made a mental note to have Ms. Petroff look up the judge’s street address at her earliest convenience.

  “I want probable cause every time, Sergeant Campbell.” This was the judge speaking now, not the fellow drinker next to him at the bar, and his spine straightened. “No shortcuts or no warrants. Am I rightly understood?”

  He very nearly saluted. “You are, ma’am.”

  “I don’t give a damn how badly you or I want them, I don’t even care how guilty they are, they cross the line first. You have reasonable grounds as defined by statute and precedent you can wake me up at three a.m. if you want.” She reflected. “My husband may have an issue with that but that’s his problem.” She bent a stern glare on him. “And no rough stuff. I mean none.”

  Liam tried not to take offense, but his voice hardened nonetheless. “I don’t do rough stuff, Your Honor.”

  “Hold that thought. The academy should have given you all the de-escalation training you need and I know this because I consulted for the panel that wrote their standards. If I catch even a whiff of excessive force used on any defendant you bring before me I will shitcan your case on the spot and thereafter make it my mission in life to hound you out of the Alaska State Troopers and if necessary the state of Alaska itself. Are we clear?”

  “Yes, ma’am,” he said smartly.

  “When was your last refresher?”

  “Two years ago.”

  She grunted. “I recommend you immediately form working relationships with the homeless shelter, the women’s shelter, the food bank, the public assistance office, and the community mental health center. You’ll be able to hand off a lot of the situations that you encounter on your calls if you have all of them on speed dial. It would help if they knew who was calling.”

  Liam noticed she hadn’t included the local PD and wondered why.

  “What do you know about the community itself?”

  He marshaled his thoughts. “Blewestown has some of the lowest per capita crime stats in the state. The economy runs mostly on summer tourism, but a lot of Alaskan gray hairs from Fairbanks and Anchorage are building vacation and retirement homes here, which might explain why there are two brewpubs, three coffee roasters and, for once in an Alaskan community, the bars outnumber the churches. And excellent Wi-Fi, too, which was a nice surprise.”

  “Newenham not so much?”

  “One meg download speed.”

  “Not a streaming hotspot, then.”

  “It was faster to print out and mail a report than it was to try to upload it online.”

  She nodded. “What else?”

  “There’s still some commercial fishing, salmon, halibut, and cod, but they deliver to the only processor left on the Bay in Engaqutaq. There seems to be a thriving arts community with an accent on music, including two festivals, one in the spring and one in the fall. One high school, two middle schools, two grade schools. If you don’t count the charter schools, which seem to pop up like mushrooms everywhere you look.” He blessed Wy for having looked all this stuff up before they made the decision to move.

  “And shrivel up again the moment they’ve managed to rake in as much federal funding as they can,” she said, nodding.

  “There’s a homeless problem but then there’s a homeless problem everywhere you look, in Alaska and Outside.”

  “And a drug trade, mostly homegrown meth, that is increasing by leaps and bounds. Barton’s not wrong about that. Sometimes I think Walter White didn’t die after all; he just moved north.” She saw his blank expression and sighed. “Right, no streaming in Newenham. Well, Sergeant Campbell, my recommendation to you is that you spend the next few weeks driving around your new command.” She hesitated and he tried to look mild and uninquiring because it was always after those kinds of pauses that the authority figures gave you the good stuff. “I would especially recommend that you familiarize yourself with just where the boundaries of city and state meet.” She met his eyes steadily. “The local police chief can be touchy about jurisdiction.”

  “Can he,” Liam said thoughtfully, and in an excess of diplomacy decided not to mention the mediocre burgers and even more lukewarm reception he’d received at lunch.

  She tossed her empty cup in the trash can, where it banked off the rim and fell neatly inside. “You find a place to live yet?”

  “My wife and I bought a house up on the bluff. Used to belong to Jeff Ninkasi.”

  She nodded. “Good people, Jeff, and he brews good beer. Nice house, too.” She sat back. “Well, thanks for coming in, Sergeant, I appreciate the courtesy.”

  “Ms. Petroff informed me that I probably didn’t want to meet you for the first time in court.”

  “Sally Petroff? She’s working for you?”

  “Colonel Barton hired her and had her in place before I got here.”

  “She good people, too, and she’s local, which should help.”

  “What I thought.” He stood up, holding his trooper ball cap by the bill. “I asked her if either of her parents had been in the military.”

  The judge laughed.

  Liam pulled into the driveway of the house on the edge of the Blewestown bluff already with a sense of homecoming. And then he walked in the front door and saw Jo. “Oh,” he said.

  “How was your day, dear?” she said, so sweetly that one could barely feel the acid drip-drip-dropping onto the skin. “Have a good time driving around in that penis extender of yours?”

  He hooked a thumb over his shoulder in the general direction of the Jeep Cherokee Chief looming over the driveway. “You should talk.”

  Wy’s laugh was husky and delicious as always, and for just a moment he was content just to look at her, smiling up at him from the couch, her bronze mane coming loose from its thick braid to form little curls around her face, her brown eyes warm and inviting, her cheeks a little flushed from the half-empty glass of red wine in her hand. If every day of his life ended with him walking in the door and seeing her like this he would die a happy man.

  Jo looked from one to the other and rolled her eyes. “Young love. Gag me.”

  “We eating in or out tonight?” Liam said.

  Wy finished off her glass and stood up. “In. I got a take-out lasagna and Jo tossed a salad.”

  Did you check it for wolfsbane? Liam wanted to say, but didn’t.

  “Look!” Jo said, pointing.

  A moose cow and calf had wandered into the yard, stripping fireweed stalks of their flowers. They moseyed around the perimeter of the yard and vanished into the trees.

  “It always amazes me how they disappear like that,” Jo said.

  “I know, right? They’re so big.”

  Wy handed Liam a big wooden bowl full of green. “Table’s set and the lasagna is ready to come out of the oven.”

  “Great, I’m starved. I had the world’s most uninspired burger for lunch.”

  They sat down at the dining room table and dished out. “What brings you to Blewestown, Jo?” Liam said.

  “I’m on vacation,” Jo said blandly, and in spite of himself Liam laughed out loud.

  Jo, amazingly, laughed, too. “Yeah, all right. I assume you saw the big rig parked up the Bay when you came into town.”

  “It was hard to miss,” Liam said dryly.

  “On lease to RPetCo. They want to do some exploratory drilling.”

  “In the actual Bay?�
��

  She nodded. “There’s oil and gas being produced in commercial quantities up and down the Inlet. Chungasqak Bay is the next geographical step, and it’s a hell of a lot more accessible than, say, the Kamishak. Easier to supply, too, with Blewestown right here and on the road. They’ve got a deepwater dock, too.”

  “All the mod cons.” The lasagna wasn’t bad. He dished up a second slice. “I’d have to guess there are one or two people unhappy at the prospect.”

  Jo snorted. “Good guess. Most of the tourism businesses in town and all the fishermen, just for starters. The Chamber of Commerce, run by a guy named Donohoe, is giddy at the prospect of overseeing the next Prudhoe Bay, but he has to keep it on the down low as half of the chamber members are fishermen and they all talk like they’re watching Deepwater Horizon on repeat. About a dozen small cruise ships a year dock here and their industry rep doesn’t sound thrilled, either, but is otherwise making no move.”

  “Where is the local Native association on the issue?”

  “There are a bunch of them, about one per community. One, the Kapilat Native Association, invested in bandwidth back in the day so they’ve got a lot of money and therefore the loudest voice. Generally speaking the others follow their lead. They haven’t stated their position on oil exploration and development on the Bay, but I’m trying to get an interview with their chief, Alexei Petroff. So far I’ve only talked with him on the phone. He sounds pretty savvy but he doesn’t want to go on the record unless it’s face to face.”

  Wise man, Liam thought. Petroff would get the biggest bang for his association’s buck by announcing their stand in the state’s paper of record. He wondered if Petroff was any relation to She Who Must Be Obeyed in his front office.

  “Lately, an archeologist has been making a fuss about the oil companies putting the human history of the Bay at risk.”

  Liam perked up. “That be Erik Berglund?”

  “You’ve met him?”

  Liam nodded. “Yesterday, at the brewpub. He invited me up to take a look at his dig so I did.”

  “What’s he like?”

  “Six-two, blond, blue, fortyish. The dig’s a tiny little thing, more of a cave, and he hasn’t found much. He’s got a theory about a traditional trail that sounds pretty interesting, though.”

  “Fanatic?”

  Liam reflected. “I don’t think so. Just a true believer. I liked him. You don’t find that many people that excited about their work.” He looked at Jo. “So he’s against the drilling?”

  She nodded. “RPetCo has their own pet archeologist, a guy who’s been pretty much a paid shill for resource extraction companies in Alaska for decades. No resource extraction company wants to be hindered by a lot of unnecessary restrictions that will only delay production.”

  “What would the shareholders say,” Wy said.

  “May you live in interesting times,” Liam said.

  “Yes, and now here comes Alaska state trooper Sergeant Liam Campbell into the mix. Why are you here, Liam?”

  Liam exchanged a fleeting look with Wy and said, “Barton wanted me here to give the new post a push.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “I told you, Jo,” Wy said sternly. “It was time to leave Newenham.”

  It didn’t satisfy the Torquemada wannabe but it did shut her up, and Liam tried not to look too grateful.

  They finished dinner and Liam cleaned up and started the dishwasher. It ran at a low murmur. So far everything in this house was as advertised, and Liam decided it was high time he developed a palate for beer. For the moment he poured himself a finger of Glenmorangie and joined the women in the living room, where Wy had a fire going in the wood stove.

  The glass was an inch away from his lips when his phone sang out with the first bars of “Need You Tonight.” He gave Wy a look. “Seriously, Wy? A boy band?”

  He kept the grin off his face until he was out on the deck, facing away from the two women in the living room giggling like teenagers. “Liam Campbell.”

  “Hey, Liam, it’s Gabe McGuire.” There was a sigh. “I know it’s late and I apologize, but I think I’d be in trouble if I waited until morning to call this in.”

  “Did you try the local cops?” That might have come out a little more crankily than he’d meant it to.

  “I’m outside the city limits. They won’t respond if I’m not paying property taxes in Blewestown.”

  A twittering sound filled the air and he looked up to see a flock of cedar waxwings swirl past. There were several mountain ash in the yard and they assembled into a fluttering, quarreling mess to fight over the berries.

  “Liam?”

  Liam’s turn to sigh. “Tell me what’s up and I’ll decide if I want to wait until morning.”

  Ten

  Tuesday, September 3

  GABE MCGUIRE DIDN’T LOOK ANY HAPPIER to be answering his door than Liam was to be knocking on it. The same could not be said of the two ten-year-olds in the living room. They sported one parent each, a mom and a pop. The kids looked wide awake and wired for sound. Their ’rents each held a phone like they had their attorneys on speed dial.

  The house looked less massive from the inside than the roof had indicated from the road. The main feature was floor-to-ceiling windows that went from wall to wall, cathedral ceilings over a hardwood floor, and a lot of mix and match furniture that had only the maximum amount of stuffing in common, including the dining table, if wood could be stuffed. There wasn’t a screen in sight except for the phones everyone was holding, which Liam found mildly surprising. “Explain to me, please, preferably in words of one syllable, why I am here,” he said.

  McGuire looked over his shoulder. “Who’s that?”

  “This is Jo Dunaway, with the Anchorage News. She’s a friend of the family.” It had been impossible to keep her out of the pickup, and Wy had been no help.

  “A cop and a reporter,” McGuire said. “If this isn’t just the cherry on my day. Could you wait right here while I leg it out the back door?”

  “You called me,” Liam said. “I can go home any time.”

  McGuire’s shoulders raised on a sigh. “Ms. Dunaway.”

  “Mr. McGuire.”

  “This isn’t a story.”

  Jo gave him her best T-rex impersonation. “I’m just here with friends.”

  When she moved McGuire saw Wy and brightened. “Ah, you brought the hot pilot, too. You’re forgiven. Good to see you again, Ms. Chouinard.” He smiled at Wy and Wy smiled right back.

  McGuire was trying to be polite and Liam wasn’t so far gone he didn’t recognize it but he still bristled. Nobody flirted with Wy but him. He didn’t need Jo Dunaway grinning like the Cheshire Cat all over her face, either.

  “Can I get you something to drink?”

  Liam tried not to glare. “You gave me to understand that this wasn’t a social call.”

  “It isn’t.”

  “So? I’m here because…?”

  “Well, you, specifically, are here because the Blewestown PD say they won’t respond to anything outside of the city limits. They say that’s for the troopers to handle. A direct quote from whoever answered the phone and took down my name and in particular my address.”

  Liam thought of Chief Armstrong’s polite but obdurate attitude over lunch earlier that day. “Okay. Fine. What requires any law enforcement presence outside the city limits at ten at night?”

  McGuire looked across the room. “All yours, Kyle.”

  Upon closer inspection, Kyle, the skinny kid with the bright gray eyes and dark hair, looked a little the worse for wear. His hair stuck up in sweaty wads and the sides of his face were scratched and oddly shiny. His left ear might be a little lopsided, too, and the collar of his T-shirt was irregularly stained a dark brown, as if he’d been bleeding on it and the blood had dried there. He looked around at his audience, clearly enjoying the attention, and puffed out his insubstantial chest. “I found a body!”

  Into the resulting dead silence tha
t followed, during which Liam felt rather than saw Jo Dunaway go on red alert, the second kid, slightly less skinny but considerably wider of eye and with hair in infinitely better shape said, “I told you I had a bad feeling about this.”

  “And you are?” Liam said.

  “Logan,” McGuire said. “That’s Logan. And that’s Logan’s mom, Cynthia Reese, and that’s Kyle’s dad, Greg Kinnison.”

  Liam nodded at both of them. “Nice to meet you. Liam Campbell, Alaska State Troopers.” He looked back at Kyle. “What do you mean, you found a body?”

  The stern note in his voice caused Kyle’s grin to fade a little. “I mean we found a body.”

  “You mean you found a body,” Logan said, although it was more of a mutter.

  Kyle gave him an impatient shove. “Shut up. And I can prove it.”

  “Dude, you’re just going to freak them the hell out.”

  “Logan!” his mother said. “Language.”

  Kyle ignored them both and reached down to unbutton the pocket on the calf of his cargo pants, which also looked much the worse for wear. He produced a package wrapped clumsily in what looked like paper towels. He slid to his knees on the floor and with a due sense of ceremony folded back the towels to reveal what was within. Cynthia looked ill and averted her eyes. Greg folded his arms and tried to out-manly the trooper and the movie star.

  Liam heard Wy draw in a quick breath and he said to Jo in a low voice, “Not a word. Not yet.”

  Kyle, a little apologetically, said, “It kind of fell apart when I grabbed it.”

  It was a collection of small bones. Finger bones, if Liam was not mistaken, and he had the sinking feeling that he wasn’t. “You said a body, Kyle.”

  “The rest of it is still back there, sir. This was all I could reach before they pulled me out.”

  “Pulled you out of where?”

  “Out of the cave.”

  Liam looked at Gabe.

  “Erik’s dig.”