Dead Point (Maggie Blackthorne Book 1)

by LaVonne Griffin-Valade

  “You gotta believe me, I’m not supposed to give out that information. It’s up to the owner to tell you. Mr. Trudeau could sue our company if I did.”

  “Trudeau is dead. Strangled.”

  “Jesus.” The woman’s pallid complexion turned more ashen.

  “Where did you haul Mr. Trudeau’s cattle?”

  There it was again, her westward glance for an answer. “I can’t say.”

  “So the answer to your question is yes, you need a lawyer. I’m arresting your ass. Taking you to our shithole county courthouse, where the sheriff will lock you in a holding pen along with all the drunks and meth heads who call the place their second home.”

  “What kind of bullshit is that?”

  “The kind of fucking bullshit I’m suddenly inclined to resort to.”

  “You actually think I might have something to do with the murders of my cousins? Or that old man?”

  “I don’t know. You have a link to all three, and you better tell me where the hell you delivered those cattle.”

  Hollis had returned from lunch in time to interrupt my tirade. “Ms. Bennett, I’m Trooper Jones. We spoke on the phone.”

  She nodded.

  “I’d recommend you answer Sergeant Blackthorne’s questions. She’s kind of lost her sense of humor about multiple murders in her State Police district. Me? I’m just here to help her figure out who killed your cousins and Mr. Trudeau.”

  Jess sighed and faced me. “All right, ma’am. The twins were supposed to return six head of Black Angus steers they’d stolen from Trudeau. They were gonna meet us at nine on Thursday morning so we could load them in my cattle truck. Everything was supposed to be square after that. Trudeau wouldn’t press charges. But they didn’t show. So the old man and I finally loaded up the last of his steers and took off.”

  “How did you know it was the twins who stole the livestock?” I asked.

  “The old man let it slip while we were waiting for them to show up. I let on like I didn’t know who the Nodine twins were. And I was glad they never came. Might have pissed Trudeau off more if he knew I was their cousin.”

  I wasn’t sure I bought that part of the story, but I let it go for the time being. “Where’d you head to after I pulled you over last Thursday?”

  “Instead of Boise, Trudeau led me to some ranch not too far from where you stopped us. When we got there, three big guys stood at the cattle chute, loaded for bear. The buyer argued with Mr. Trudeau and wouldn’t let us unload. And with those three armed guards there, he had to do what the owner said. So I hauled the steers back to the old man’s pasture land and then drove back to Burns.”

  “Could you identify on a map where you tried to deliver the animals?”

  “I’ll try, ma’am. I’m truly not out to hinder prosecution or whatever. I loved those boys to death. Shit. Didn’t mean to phrase it that way.”

  “Follow me.” I led her to the topographic map posted on the alcove wall next to the murder board, Hollis following behind. “Here’s about where I stopped you.”

  She studied the map.

  “On Thursday, you said Trudeau was carrying a gun,” I said.

  “He was, ma’am. He damn well was. More than one, I think.”

  “But not enough to take on the men you said were loaded for bear.”

  “No way. They were armed with Beretta M9s. And that’s just what I saw.”

  “Are you a collector?” Hollis asked.

  “Collector?”

  “You recognized the specific weapons. How is that?”

  She shrugged. “Late-night TV. Gun shows. Online auctions. It’s not rocket science.”

  “No. Just social science,” he said.

  Holly’s snarky remarks were so much more sophisticated than mine.

  “I think it was near here.” Jess pointed to an area slightly north of Seneca. “Weirdest thing I ever saw, too. No wranglers. No dogs. Just those men with guns and some suit in fancy clothes. The place had a different-sounding name, too. Wasn’t called a ranch.”

  “Bear Valley Cattle Company?” I asked.

  “That’s it,” she said, a tinge of relief in her voice.

  “Okay, Ms. Bennett, we’re done for now, but we might have more questions later.”

  “Ma’am, could you just call me Jess? Ms. Bennett reminds me of that idiot I used to be married to. Plus Seth and I got married in Winnemucca last Friday. I go by Flynn now.”

  She put a worn denim jacket on over her sheer blouse, tugged it tight across her chest, and closed the pearl snaps. She placed her petite truck driver hands on my desk across from my equally diminutive cop hands.

  “For Aunt Lynn’s sake, you need to find who killed my cousins.”

  “I hear you, Jess,” I said.

  Al returned from lunch with a bag of green grapes to share and joined Hollis and me at the card table in the alcove.

  “Do you both believe the Bennett woman?” he asked after we described our visit with her.

  “Her last name’s Flynn now. And yeah, I think I believe her. How about you, Hollis?”

  “I definitely believed her about the armed men.”

  “Okay, then. I’d like to interview the ranch owner. What was his name again?” Bach asked.

  “Larkin. Asa Larkin. Legal surname’s Wakefield,” I said.

  “Right. Adopted by an aunt and uncle.” Al pushed his chair away from the table. “Let’s head out there right now, Sergeant.”

  I turned to Hollis. “Dr. Gattis needs a ride to the airport around four o’clock. We might still be out at Larkin’s, and Taylor might not be back before then.”

  He nodded. “I’m on it.”

  “I’ll text Ray and let her know, pass along your number,” I said.

  Hollis plucked a couple of grapes from the bag. “In the meantime, I’m going to make another attempt to contact Frank Sylvester’s accountant.”

  “What’s that about, Trooper Jones?” Bach asked.

  “That Ram pickup the Nodines were driving,” Hollis answered.

  “I remember. Registered to Frank Sylvester, who owns the trucking company in Burns.”

  “Sylvester’s been bedridden ever since he broke his neck a year and a half ago. Don’t think he could have gone to a dealership and bought it, or charged it online, for that matter. Sarge and I want to find out if there was a proxy buyer. Anyway, the manager of the Sylvester’s company gave me the name of their bookkeeper, an accountant at some firm in Portland.”

  Bach gathered up his computer and retrieved his jacket from the back of his chair. “If you get nowhere with the accountant, I know a guy you can call in Portland.”

  I slipped on my peacoat and police Stetson and followed him to his rig.

  Would never have guessed Al liked to blast old-time honkytonk while driving around in his Ford Police Interceptor. Classical or the Mormon Tabernacle Choir seemed more his bent, not Ernest Tubb and Hank Williams.

  He turned down the music a couple of decibels. “You’re lucky you have a good team to work with out here, Maggie.”

  “Don’t I know it.”

  After several miles, I turned the volume down even more and came back to yesterday’s conversation out at Big T. “Do you question my leadership?”

  “Maggie, I’m well aware whose leadership should be in question. Perhaps it is being questioned, but I’m not privy to that information. This is the reality of a career in any paramilitary organization. We all follow someone’s orders, move on to the next thing, and don’t look back. Now if you don’t mind, Patsy Cline is one of my favorites.”

  He nodded toward the volume toggle, and I bumped “I Fall to Pieces” up a notch or two. I had to admit that voice was fine.

  “Our junction is up ahead on the right,” I said.

  He slowed the SUV. “Here?”

  “Yes. The place is about five miles in.”

  We arrived at Bear Valley Cattle Company and found the gate locked.

  “There’s no call button or
intercom.” I checked my phone for bars. “And no service.”

  Al switched on his secondary siren, giving rise to a deafening wail.

  “What the hell is that?”

  “The Federal Signal Q. Two-hundred-watt PA,” he bellowed. “It seems to have done the trick.”

  Larkin, in a down jacket, stepped briskly from the porch of his ranch house and walked toward the gate. Al shut off the siren, zipped his coat, and stepped out of the Interceptor. I trundled behind him.

  When Larkin realized it was a couple of cops, one of whom was visiting him for the third day in a row, he pulled the automatic gate opener from his coat pocket, activated it, and we walked through the entrance.

  “Good afternoon, Mr. Larkin. I understand you’ve met Sergeant Blackthorne already. I’m Detective Alan Bach, Oregon State Police homicide unit.” He handed Larkin his card. “We have a few questions. If we could step out of the elements, we can be in and out in no time.”

  “Certainly. Follow me.”

  Larkin led us to the same room in which Hollis and I had sat questioning him yesterday. I could sense his greater unease this afternoon. A homicide detective had that effect on folks.

  “Sergeant Blackthorne had an interesting conversation earlier today with a driver for a company called Frank Sylvester Trucking.”

  Larkin moved his glance from Bach to me.

  “The driver claims to have tried to deliver twenty-seven steers to you last week,” I said. “She was escorted by the owner of the cattle. She also said there were three armed men standing guard at your loading chute.”

  “Does this have something to do with the killing of those two brothers?” Larkin asked.

  An odd question, I thought. “We don’t know if it’s connected to the Nodine murders.”

  “Let me explain, Mr. Larkin,” Al slipped in. “We’re interested in the truck driver’s story because of the man who tried to sell you those steers.”

  “Guy Trudeau?”

  “After Trooper Jones and I visited you yesterday, we found Mr. Trudeau dead. Another homicide,” I answered.

  He flinched. “How?”

  “The medical examiner hasn’t released a report yet,” I said. Which, technically, was true.

  “Regarding Mr. Trudeau, you ultimately refused to buy his cattle?”

  Bach was gifted at redirecting an interview.

  “Trudeau agreed to deliver thirty-three animals in healthy condition and ready for pasture-finishing, not twenty-seven malnourished and sick ones.”

  Ah, thus Jen Wilson’s prescription to treat whatever Moraxella bovis might be.

  “Sick?” Al asked.

  “A number of his stock were underweight, listless, and had serious eye infections. I wouldn’t let him unload, let alone pay him. That’s why my hired men were there. And armed.”

  “All right, Mr. Larkin. Thank you for your time. I think you answered our questions for now. But we’d like to speak to your men,” Bach said.

  “They’re away from the ranch today.”

  Al stood. “Another time, then.”

  Larkin looked at his watch. “I need to drive to the highway and pick up my son at the bus shelter.”

  “Your boy goes to Grant Union High School, right?” I asked.

  “A senior. Headed for U of O next year. Now if you’ll excuse me, I should get going.”

  We followed Larkin’s vehicle back toward Highway 395, without the honkytonk blaring this time. Both of us silent, watching the man steer his shiny, black, tire-chained Prius over the ice-packed and grooved road.

  “Is Seneca too small to have a high school of its own?” Al asked, breaking the low hush that had settled in the cab of his Interceptor.

  “Yeah. High school–age students, which includes all the ranch kids from around Seneca, go to Grant Union in John Day.”

  “And back there, Mr. Larkin said something about pasture-finishing. What is that?”

  “It’s supposed to guarantee beef cattle raised only on grass and hay aren’t fed grain before being sent to market. Something like that, anyway.”

  “I don’t eat beef myself, but I know I prefer my chicken pasture raised.”

  It was interesting how he let banal personal information dribble out like that.

  “We need to figure out what happened to those twenty-seven steers Trudeau tried to sell Larkin,” he added.

  “And the six others the Nodines had supposedly stolen from Big T.”

  “We’re certain the woman truck driver was being truthful about all of that?”

  I sighed. “We’ve probably got to be open to the idea there’s more to her story.”

  As we approached the junction with 395, Larkin pulled off the roadway alongside a school bus shelter. The son, already waiting to be picked up, stepped from under the shingled roof, glared rancorously at his father, and jerked open the passenger-side door.

  I nodded to the boy, a gesture meaning nothing more than howdy in this part of the world. But his return glower exhibited the contempt and utter disdain he felt for hick cops. I made a mental note to find out everything I could about the rude little bastard.

  “What do you know about Mr. Larkin’s son?” Bach asked.

  “I was just thinking about that myself. Not much is the answer. Not even his name.”

  When Al and I arrived back at the office, Hollis was about to leave for the day.

  “Glad you got here before I left,” he said. “I’ve got news about the bookkeeper-slash-accountant. A woman named Sarah Anderson, but her maiden name was Wakefield. She’s Asa Larkin’s sister by adoption.”

  Bach placed his pack on his temporary desk. “How’d you track that down?”

  “Started with the state’s list of certified public accountants. I verified on a couple of other systems.”

  “Did you speak with her?” I asked.

  “No. I wanted to talk to the two of you before getting in contact.”

  “Are you absolutely sure about what you found, Holly?”

  “As sure as I can be without the Anderson woman’s firsthand confirmation.”

  “Good work. Especially figuring out her maiden name,” I said.

  He shrugged “I was hoping to take it to the next level. Figure out who might be a legal proxy for Sylvester.”

  I peeled off my coat and tossed it over my desk chair. “When you do talk to her, don’t let on you know about her relation to Larkin.”

  “Nah, I wouldn’t do that, but maybe I should try to reach her now.”

  “It’s too late in the day. Contact her tomorrow, and go home like you were about to.”

  “I’m with Maggie. Spending time with your wife and newborn is important right now.”

  “You’ve got kids, Detective?”

  “Five daughters. And Hollis, you’re welcome to call me Al whenever we’re not with the public.”

  “Appreciate that. And I agree with both of you. I definitely need to spend more time with Lil and the baby. Let’s solve these murders so I can do that.” He donned his police Stetson and walked to the door. “Night, Maggie. Al. I’ll be at home if you need me. Oh, I almost forgot. Dr. Gattis canceled her flight plans. There was some problem with the autopsy or something. They were booked up at Mack’s, but she was able to get a room at the Best Western.”

  “Have a good night, and let Lil know I plan to drop by in the next day or so. I have a little something for Hank,” I said.

  “She’ll like that.”

  I put in a call to the school district administrative office at the high school hoping to catch Zan Wilson before he left for the day. He’d been the district superintendent for almost twenty-five years. After his wife passed away, he finished raising his daughter, Jen, alone and sent her off to veterinary school. But when she returned to start her practice with her girlfriend—now wife—in tow, his Christian fundamentalist heart broke in two. Supposedly, Zan and his daughter hadn’t spoken in years, but maybe that would change if Jen and Vicky had a kid.

&nbs
p; He answered after a single ring.

  “Zan. It’s Maggie Blackthorne.”

  “Maggie! I was going to call you. I want you to come talk to students when we hold our career fair next month. Born and raised in this town, went off to college, and moved back years later as a sergeant with the Oregon State Police. That’s a good story.”

  “Kind of sounds like the story of a loser to me.”

  “There’s a lot of respect for law enforcement among our student body.”

  Couldn’t help but roll my eyes. “Maybe, but they probably won’t be too impressed with me moving back to the place where I grew up. You know how most young people are, itching to break free of their hometowns.”

  “But you’ll speak to them anyway, right?”

  “You bet, Zan. Happy to.”

  “Good. Now, what can I do for you?”

  “I’m trying to get some information on one of your seniors.”

  “I believe I’d have to see a note signed by a parent or some kind of warrant for that.”

  Did you suddenly forget about Zan Wilson’s ethical compass, Blackthorne? Still, I pressed him. “Even if it’s just a name?”

  “I can’t imagine a student in the entire district whose name you don’t know.”

  “I’m surprised myself, but I don’t. He’s new. I believe his last name’s Larkin, but it might be Wakefield.”

  “Did you read the latest Blue Mountain Eagle?”

  “I skimmed it a few days ago.”

  “You checked out the sports section?”

  “No, but I take it I should have.”

  “There’s only one new senior this year. Name’s in an article on our basketball program.”

  I didn’t see the difference between just telling me the name and pointing me to an article that includes the name, but whatever. “Appreciate all your help, Zan.”

  “Thanks for taking time out for our career fair. I’ll have the guidance counselor get in touch.”

  On second thought, a career fair gig was an assignment right up Mark Taylor’s alley. Maybe he could throw in a story or two about Disneyland.

  I opened the Blue Mountain Eagle website and scoped out high school athletics. The Grant Union Lady Prospectors basketball team was doing well, probably going to state. Their male counterparts weren’t even close.