Dead Point (Maggie Blackthorne Book 1)

by LaVonne Griffin-Valade

  “Melissa and I decided on no services. He’ll be cremated and the urn placed next to our mother’s in Sam Damon’s mausoleum.”

  His sister, Melissa, always a strange bird, had been a year ahead of me in school. “How’s Melissa doing?“

  “Fine, I guess. Divorced a couple of times. Has difficulty keeping a job.”

  “And Ronny?” Their brother who had run in the band of wild boys along with the Nodine twins.

  “We haven’t heard from Ronny in a long time. He was always Pop’s bright, shining star, and then he crashed to earth on meth and opioids.”

  Pete seemed to be confirming my notion that Ronny was the one who took off with the old man’s money.

  “My sense is your dad had been selling off his cattle little by little. I’m afraid there are only about thirty head of Black Angus remaining.”

  Pete inhaled deeply. “Well, I didn’t expect to inherit much anyway.”

  It was hard to tell whether he really gave a damn about Big T or his father’s death, but who was I to judge. I delved into what snippets of info I could offer, telling him where the small herd was pastured and about the issue of pinkeye among the animals.

  “Okay. I’ll arrange to get the cattle treated and possibly sold while I’m here.”

  “The ranch itself is a crime scene at this point.”

  He nodded. “I saw the warning signs when I was there yesterday. I’ll probably come back in the summer, put it up for sale. Assuming things are resolved by then.”

  I took his hint. He wanted his father’s murder case wrapped up by summer. Probably not as much as I did, though.

  “God, life is just so weird, isn’t it? Strange to come back here for the sole purpose of arranging Pop’s cremation and dealing with his leftover animals.”

  I wrote down the location of Guy Trudeau’s grazing land and added my office phone number. “Give me a call before you head back to Medford, and I’ll let you know if we have any new information.”

  “Thanks. It was good to see you, Maggie, all grown up and official. You look great, by the way.”

  I ignored his parting comment and walked toward the alcove. There was no way in hell Hollis or Taylor would mention Pete’s flirty little compliment, not directly, anyway. But sooner or later, one or both would attempt to slide some smartass remark into our conversation.

  Hollis, looking a little ragged around the edges, followed me into the alcove. “I’d like to take off for home by four. Hank’s a bit colicky.”

  “And Lil needs a break.”

  “She does.”

  I cleared my throat. “And you need one too. I’m beginning to rethink you delaying your leave time.”

  He gave me an ominous look. “We’ve already talked about this, Maggie. I’m here. Until these murder cases are called—solved or put on ice—I’m here.”

  “So noted.” I tacked a blank chart pack page beside the Nodine murder board and wrote Timeline at the top. “We know time of death was sometime between five forty-five and six fifteen in the evening, right?”

  Hollis took the marker from me and scribbled the TOD range on the fresh page.

  “Cecil Burney says he set out for John Day at five thirty to make his six o’clock AA meeting but took a detour to the old mill following after them.”

  “How do you spell Burney?”

  I spelled it out for him, and he added the name and departure time.

  “While I was on the phone with Joseph, I’m sure I heard Cecil shoot the Rottweiler. That was at about five forty-five. He claims he ran back to his vehicle and watched Kat McKay speed by, park, and enter the wigwam burner. Says that’s when he took off for the meeting. And for the moment, I believe him. Mostly because someone I trust told me he arrived at the AA meeting twenty to twenty-five minutes late.”

  And being sober when she told me, I had no reason not to take Lynn Nodine at her word.

  “Why was he so late getting there?” Hollis asked after adding AA meeting ETA 6:20.

  “Says he didn’t want to risk being shot by the Nodines as he drove back by the wigwam burner, so he stayed on the mill road and drove the back way into town.”

  Hollis measured the distance on our map. “It’s a longer route and unpaved and graded, which would definitely make the drive time ten or fifteen minutes more.”

  “So what normally takes about half an hour on Highway 395 would’ve taken forty or forty-five minutes. Which means, given Cecil’s ETA at the meeting, it’s unlikely he killed them.”

  “Plus he’d have to have access to Larkin’s Kel-Tec 9. And as much as I think Burney’s capable of murder, I doubt he managed to get ahold of that gun.”

  “I agree,” I said.

  “Did he express remorse for shooting the Nodines’ dog?”

  “No. He felt guilty about not coming forward earlier with the information about Kat McKay is all.”

  “He doesn’t seem like a person who’d be bothered too much by guilt.”

  Holly’s on-the-nose assessment aside, Lynn was Cecil Burney’s one weak spot. Her lapse back into booze had gotten to the old man.

  “For now, let’s assume he shot the dog and took off to his AA meeting driving the mill road just like he said.”

  “So that leaves us with Kat McKay as a suspect?”

  I had to admit it. “She’s a suspect now for sure, especially since Larkin’s pistol is a match. Larkin’s a suspect too, of course.”

  We sat quietly studying the timeline. Hollis checked his watch.

  “You should get going,” I said.

  “In ten minutes or so.”

  “Kat may turn out to be our prime suspect, but something about that notion bothers me.”

  “Because she’s a woman?”

  “Hell, no. It’s something her kid, Rain, said. He was surprised she was interested in having a gun around at all.”

  Holly drew a line at midpoint across the page. “Maybe her viewpoint changed.”

  “Maybe she really was afraid of Dan Nodine.” I was grasping at a plausible straw.

  “We have to figure out when she returned Larkin’s pistol. Showing up at the murder scene around the time the Nodines were killed, that’s pretty compelling evidence,” Hollis said.

  “I know, I know.”

  He sighed. “Let’s think through the possibility she left the scene right away and someone else arrived just after.”

  That tripped a wire in my tired brain. “What if the murderer didn’t reach the wigwam burner after Cecil and Kat had taken off. What if the killer was there with the twins the entire time?”

  “That’s at least possible.” Hollis wrote Suspects below the line he’d drawn.

  “When Joseph called me, he said they were in bad trouble, had messed up big-time. They knew somebody was coming after them. And from the sound of his voice, they were scared shitless.” I turned to our timeline. “I just can’t wrap my head around Kat being a killer.”

  “I can tell. Maybe it’s a little too close to home. It’s not easy to think someone you grew up with could force those men at gunpoint to sit in the dirt and then shoot them in cold blood.”

  Reality kicked me in the gut. Emotion had blunted my instincts, clouded my judgment, and sent me into denial. I’d been under the delusion that Duncan would see I was just doing my job if Kat was arrested for the Nodine murders. But I knew the truth. If that happened, our short romance would be just that.

  “Speaking of close to home,” Hollis broke in, his way of ending my brooding, “I’m about to head out.”

  “Okay. Thanks for helping me work through some of this.”

  “We’ll get there, Maggie.”

  I nodded and smiled, a small ruse to camouflage my burgeoning distress. Duncan had appeared in my life after a long and loveless drought, and I wasn’t in the mood to fuck up a good thing.

  Before Hollis could gather his things and scram, his desk phone rang.

  “Let it go to voicemail.”

  He looked at the number
on the screen and picked up. In the meantime, my phone sounded too, and Bach’s name popped up.

  “I’m just now managing to get on the road,” he said. “So I’d like you to meet me at the junction to Larkin’s ranch. What’s it called again?”

  “Harden Road.”

  “I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

  “Drive carefully, Al. They’re calling for snow at higher elevations tonight.”

  Taylor was standing at my desk when I finished the call.

  “Can I help you?” My snide tone caught us both by surprise.

  He dropped his chronic smile. Evidently I had nicked Taylor’s ego a smidge.

  “Sorry, Mark. That sounded pretty officious. I’m a little on edge.”

  “It’s okay, Maggie. I just wanted to tell you I’m on my way home.”

  “See you tomorrow.”

  Hollis threw me that look, the one that meant Mark deserved more respect, but he didn’t take it any further.

  I pointed to my phone. “That was Bach just now. I’m meeting him out at Harden Road in a few hours.”

  He pointed to his phone. “And that was Bach’s detective friend in Portland. You wanted to find out who hired Sarah Anderson to be the accountant for Frank Sylvester Trucking.”

  “Asa Larkin?”

  “Yep. He’s Sylvester’s guardian-conservator. No surprise, he also authorized the purchase of that Ram 3500, supposedly on Sylvester’s behalf.”

  “I was sure it was something like that. And speaking of the Ram 3500, Ariel Pritchett told me it was part of the deal the Nodines had going. She thinks with some rancher.”

  “What? Didn’t she tell you before she knew zip about the red truck?”

  “Twice. Said she was afraid she’d get in trouble. Thing is, she couldn’t remember the rancher’s name.”

  “You gave her a clue, right?”

  “Almost. But then I decided to let her come up with the name all on her own, in case the rancher turns out to be someone else. Like one of Larkin’s hired men.”

  Hollis shut down his computer. “Ah, another shiny object.”

  I tossed my keys brusquely in the desk drawer. “Dammit, weren’t you going home?”

  “I’ll see you in the morning.”

  “Good night, Holly,” I said, listing Larkin’s and Kat’s names in his new Suspects category.

  “Breakfast at Erna’s tomorrow? Maybe that will help your mood.”

  “Maybe.”

  It was snowing heavily, the kind of snow I had been crazy about as a girl sledding down Starr Ridge, a long, steep scarp on the backside of Canyon Mountain. Always with a gang of other kids pulled behind somebody’s snowmobile, the entire earth radiant under a full sun. But for tonight’s purpose of driving into the foothills of the Aldrich range to Bear Valley Cattle Company, such weather was a fucking torment.

  I parked on the shoulder of Harden Road and waited for Al Bach, Susan Tedeschi’s hypnotic brand of blues sounding from the speakers. Mind wandering, snow shushing over the windshield of my SUV, I thought of Duncan. His sea-green eyes, that shock of auburn hair turning sandy, the sound of his voice, and how he carried himself with serious but amiable confidence. I thought of how he touched me.

  I wondered what the hell I was doing falling in love in the middle of two homicide investigations. One of which might involve Duncan’s sister.

  Bach slowed his Ford Interceptor and flashed his headlights, signaling me to lead the way to Asa Larkin’s ranch five miles up the snow-laden road. The drive was ponderous, but at least the blizzard had subsided some.

  When we arrived at the cattle company compound, the interior of the main house and the three double-wide trailers were all fully lit, creating strange angular shadows over the shared courtyard. And given the collection of dwellings crowded together, I could’ve imagined a clan of Mormon polygamists converging here and laying claim to the place.

  With the entrance locked and no cell service or way to communicate, Al switched on his emergency lights and activated his blaring Federal Signal Q siren to once more alert Larkin the State cops had arrived. His hired men rallied from their respective double-wides and tracked through the snow toward us. They had tramped halfway across the courtyard when Larkin opened the lock remotely.

  Less emboldened, the ranch hands/bodyguards/whatever stood three abreast and watched warily as we passed and made our way to the front porch of the main house.

  “It’s late, officers,” Larkin said from his open doorway.

  17

  Night, February 27

  Once inside, Asa Larkin’s sleekly decorated front room should have made me feel all cozy with its rustling fire and the aroma of fresh-cut pine, but the icy chrome-and-glass tables and the cold black leather divan and wing chairs belied any sense of hospitality and warmth.

  He invited us to take a seat. “I assume you’re here to return my pistol.”

  Bach placed a digital recorder on the glass-topped coffee table, turned it on, and noted the date and subject of the interview. “We’ve had your Kel-Tec PF-9 tested by a forensics expert. We know it was the handgun used in the homicide of Nodine brothers.”

  Larkin barely flinched. “I’ve rarely even shot the thing, but I’m not saying another word without my attorney present.”

  “We’d be happy to contact a lawyer to meet us back at my office in John Day,” I offered.

  He scarcely avoided a sneer. “I already have one on retainer. He’s worked for me a good long time.”

  I had to wonder why someone working in elder law would need an attorney on retainer. Then again, most lawyers I’d known were cynical, wary, risk-averse creatures.

  “Give him a call,” Al said.

  Larkin paused and cleared his throat. “His office is in Portland. He lives near there in Happy Valley.”

  “Then you’ll need to take Sergeant Blackthorne up on the offer of contacting someone local.”

  Larkin’s face emptied of color. Something had finally rattled the man. “You assume I’m willing to drive to John Day at this hour.”

  “Make no mistake, we assume nothing of the kind. That’s why we have the authority to arrest you and take you there in handcuffs, Mr. Larkin,” Bach said.

  That shut him up, leaving me room to take the discussion in another direction. “The day before the Nodines were murdered, I encountered them driving that red Ram pickup. The vehicle was brand new and registered to Frank Sylvester at his trucking business in Burns.”

  “What does that have to do with me?”

  “Why don’t you tell us?” I needed to rein in my enthusiasm for snark.

  “Sylvester’s my father, at least by birth.”

  “And you had yourself appointed as his guardian, correct?” I asked.

  Larkin couldn’t hide his astonishment. “Yes.”

  I pressed further. “And that’s how you have access to his assets.”

  He nodded slowly. “I’ll inherit it all at some point, anyway.”

  “What’s the date of Sylvester’s most recent will?” I was on a roll, and I planned to keep it up until I was ready to pass Larkin back to Bach.

  “He contacted me a few years ago. Let me know he’d drawn it up. I was to inherit everything. That was before his accident.”

  “And after the accident, you got yourself appointed as his guardian and the conservator of his estate. That’s when you began making large purchases, but not necessarily in the interests of Mr. Sylvester,” I said, my voice calmer than my nerves.

  I tried to gauge the flat affect he’d taken on. “We put people in prison for that, too. Also people who aid and abet criminal wrongdoing. Such as your stepsister, Sarah Anderson.”

  The comment about his sister was the spark that relit Larkin’s flame. “Sarah has no idea about guardian-conservatorship law. She keeps the books and writes the checks when I tell her, and that’s all.”

  “I’m not sure that would convince a jury,” Bach chimed in.

  “And I’m curious,�
� I said. “How did the Nodines have possession of the Ram truck?”

  “They stole it.”

  “Before or after stealing your livestock trailer?” I asked.

  “Both went missing at the same time. So yes, that’s when they stole the truck.”

  “You reported the missing trailer, why not the Ram 3500?”

  “Because technically, it wasn’t mine to file a report on.”

  “Technically, nothing. You didn’t want the police following the path back to your misuse of Mr. Sylvester’s assets.” Al had gotten tired of Larkin’s evasions. “More to our reason for calling on you this evening, the theft of that diesel truck represented fifty grand worth of those assets and perhaps an excuse for murdering the men who took it.”

  “I wasn’t happy when I spotted them driving around, but I’m a Christian, and I do not cheat, steal, or kill.”

  I’d had about all I could take from this hypocrite. “So if you don’t steal, how do you justify siphoning off your father’s estate?”

  “I took some of what will soon belong to me completely. But for the wrong reason. I did it out of greed. Avarice, cupidity, covetousness. A desire for material possessions. I was about to run out of my own funds, and I lusted after that pickup truck the way I never had about anything or anyone in my life.”

  “So when it was stolen, God was teaching you a lesson?” I asked.

  “Yes, and I’ve prayed for forgiveness.” He breathed deeply before going on with his sob story. “I’d left my unlocked truck in the parking lot—key in the ignition, the trailer hitched to the back—while I made a deposit in my bank account.”

  Who knew God was ironic when meting out retribution?

  “Let’s get back to your Kel-Tec PF-9,” Bach ordered.

  “Again, I’ve barely ever touched it. Only started carrying it with me in the car a few days ago. I already told the sergeant, three murders in one week had me on edge.”

  “That’s hard to believe, coming as you do from a metropolitan area,” Al shot back.

  Larkin ignored Bach’s skepticism. “I usually travel with one of my men. They help with ranch operations, but they also act as my security team, I guess you’d say.”