by Leslie Wolfe
The rain kept falling hard, heavy, a low rumbling of distant thunder incessantly reminding him of Mother’s brewing anger. It was a sin to ask what he just did, to even think it, as if he could ever be worthy. Mother liked her sacrifices pristine, untouched, their flawless skin to never have known a man’s caress. Untamed, she continued to demand her due because there wasn’t a single crack of blue in the fearfully gray skies, no matter how tiny, no matter how much he searched the cloud-covered expanse, inch by inch.
“Dear Mother,” he whispered again as he’d done throughout the night, shivering when he saw lightning strike the hills just a few miles north of his house. “Please show your lost child mercy and grace, and grant him one last wish before he perishes from the world of the living. If I could only—”
Thunder crashed so loudly it rattled the windows and shook the massive house, a low-pitched rumbling prevailing over the sound of falling rain for a long, terrifying moment. Saddened, he lowered his forehead, again defeated.
“Please forgive me, Mother, for having dared to ask. She is yours and yours only.”
14
Morning
The first light of dawn found Kay sleeping on one of the cots in the precinct nap room, her hand extended over to the next one, holding Heather’s. She’d tried waking up the little girl the night before when she’d finally wrapped up her visit with the Livingstons and returned to the sheriff’s office, soaking wet, hungry, cold, and miserable. But Heather was in no state to be woken, seemingly about to faint, and Kay had caved again, playing the guilt-ridden game of choosing between the dire urgency to find Julie and the concern for her sister’s health.
That was no easy choice to make. Heather was in shock; forcing her to relive her trauma too early could have lasting effects on her fragile psyche. On the other hand, her sister’s life hung in the balance, every minute Julie spent with her captors diminishing the chances she’d ever be found alive.
Although she wished badly for a hot shower and a glass of wine, Kay had relieved Deputy Farrell instead, letting her go home for the night. She’d rummaged through the precinct’s only fridge and ate some peanut butter from a jar labeled HOBBS, knowing the young deputy wouldn’t mind, then was left with no other alternative than the vending machine’s choice of empty calories. At least they tasted good and crunchy as she ate the onion-flavored chips from the rustling bag, enough to motivate her to lick the salty, spicy dust off her fingers.
By the time she lay down on that cot, it was almost two in the morning; until then, she’d refused to give up, searching for leads in all the databases she had access to, looking for murder-kidnappings with similar modus operandi in the recent past. She’d found none. There had been numerous child abductions, most of them by a family member, resulting from custody battles or spousal abuse contentions gone wrong. Several abductions of girls Julie’s age were recorded closer to the Los Angeles area, where human trafficking flourished despite local law enforcement’s efforts to curb the disheartening number of new cases.
Could Julie have been taken by a human trafficking ring? There was no evidence of one operating in their little town, population 3,824. Not even during the high tourist season when almost a hundred thousand people traveled to Mount Chester to ski, staying in the hotels scattered along the interstate or in the mountain lodges. Traffickers preferred abducting people from large cities like San Francisco or LA. Their chances of getting caught were slim to none when they could quickly become lost in the massive crowds traveling in and out of the two large tourist hubs.
As for Cheryl’s murder, it was a simple, opportunistic stabbing. There was no clear evidence of premeditation, no forced entry, no particularly distinguishable MO. When she entered the few details into the National Crime Information Center, her search returned thousands of unsolved cases.
That’s why she was dying to hear that nine-one-one call.
Every few minutes, she’d checked her inbox for the recording she’d requested from the Redding emergency communications center, but that email refused to show up. At about one in the morning, she stepped out of the nap room and made a low-voiced call to the dispatch, but the supervisor she’d talked to earlier wasn’t available. Grinding her teeth, she reiterated the urgency of the request and hung up, not even having the satisfaction of having yelled at someone.
Then she’d returned to the girls’ side. Loosening her belt a couple of notches, she lay on the clumpy cot and allowed herself a little rest, holding Heather’s hand as she slept. After what seemed like only seconds, she was startled awake by piercing shrieks.
Heather sat on the bed screaming, rocking back and forth, and covering her eyes with her hands. It must’ve been one of her terrible nightmares, snatching her from slumber mercilessly, leaving her breathlessly heaving against Kay’s chest.
Also startled, Erin sobbed quietly, still lying down on her side, shooting Kay terrified glances from the tear-stained pillow. Realizing it would probably take a long time until she could put the girls back to sleep again, she moved over to the next cot and held Heather against her chest, speaking softly to her while wrapping her other arm around Erin’s tiny shoulders.
“I want my mommy,” Erin eventually whimpered, sniffling, then plunged her thumb into her mouth. Kay’s heart twinged.
Then Sheriff Logan showed up, most likely drawn in by the screaming.
It was 5:43—time to go to work.
She pasted a weary smile on her lips. “Good morning.”
He took in the entire situation with a quick glance around the room. Clothes scattered on the floor, the cots pulled together, the two girls she held tightly in her arms. “This situation is untenable, Kay, and you know it.” His five o’clock shadow had grown into a blotchy, salt-and-pepper stubble he scratched with a lot of determination in his short, chubby fingers.
“I agree,” Kay replied, already feeling guilty for holding on to the girls in the interest of finding Julie, when they could’ve slept in a decent bed, maybe even with the aid of some medication, instead of battling the monsters in their dreams in that smelly, dreary corner of the world. But at least they were safe; no one would be able to find them and tie up whatever loose ends they’d want to deal with once the word got out that there were witnesses to Monday night’s murder. “It won’t be for long, I promise,” she offered before Logan could ask. “Right after breakfast, I’ll start working with them.”
“Your twenty-four hours are almost done. Then I make the call.” He cleared his throat and looked briefly at the two girls. “I’m surprised family hasn’t shown up yet.”
She shook her head slowly with a sad smile. “Cheryl was a widow,” she whispered. “I don’t know if there are grandparents—”
A deputy knocked twice, then entered, bringing a tray with breakfast served on paper plates and hot tea for the girls. He placed the tray on a nearby table that used to serve a different purpose before one leg got crooked and it found its way to the nap room to gather some dust. Then he went away, quick to disappear and close the door behind him.
“These girls could be loose ends, Sheriff,” she said, still whispering, realizing how little she knew about the girls’ extended family. But she’d had different priorities, like Julie or the killer, who could decide anytime to pay the girls a visit. “They’ll need protective custody until we eliminate this scenario. And they’re our only chance to find Julie. Other than them,” she added, lowering her voice even more to a barely audible murmur, “we have nothing. No witnesses, no evidence that hasn’t been washed away by rain, nothing.”
She caressed Heather’s hair. The girl was well awake now, her stare vacant, her face expressionless and inert, just like the day before.
“But you have to agree, Kay, this doesn’t make any sense,” Logan insisted, gesturing vaguely with both hands. “As a parent, I’m telling you, this is no place for children, especially in their situation.”
The worst part was she agreed wholeheartedly, yet she had to change his mind somehow. “If we turn
them over to social services, we lose access to them. Any delay could seal Julie’s fate, and you know it.”
Logan pressed his lips together, visibly annoyed. He was a kind man with a reputation for being fair and thoughtful, even if he sometimes rushed into bad decisions, and then refused to change his mind out of concern for how that would reflect on his leadership. He must’ve believed that it was better to be wrong on occasions than be perceived as indecisive or a pushover.
“Any news on the AMBER Alert or the roadblocks?” Kay asked, knowing his own answers would help her make her case.
He wasn’t stupid; he seemed to have read right into her gimmick and shook his head once with a disapproving glance. “Nothing, as I’m sure you might’ve guessed by the fact that no one’s come to inform you of any progress.”
She lowered her gaze for a moment, feeling a little ashamed. He was right to expect more from her. “I still didn’t get a ransom call,” she said, her voice calmer. “I wasn’t expecting one, though. If there were a ransom demand involved, they wouldn’t’ve killed the one person who was the most inclined to pay.” She stood slowly, gently disentangling herself from the girls, then she invited him to step outside. As soon as the door was closed and the children out of earshot, she continued, “The neighbors weren’t much help. They haven’t seen anything they wanted to share, but I believe there’s more to it than what they’re saying. I’ll revisit.”
He nodded, running his hand through his buzz cut with a long sigh. “Door-to-door canvass returned zero results; it’s the damn weather. It’s almost as if the perp waited for this crap.” He gestured toward the window, where large raindrops crashed with a constant rapping. “But I have the nine-one-one call recording cued up for you if you want.”
“You have it?” she blurted, feeling her blood rush to her head in anger. “I’ve been checking my email all night, waiting for it.” That sneaky bastard. He went over her head, knowing darn well she was ready to rip him a new one if he didn’t have a valid explanation for the way it had been handled.
“Well, they sent it to me instead, citing your heightened emotional state,” he replied, making air quotes with his fingers and shooting her a quick, inquisitive glance. “Are you making friends in the local law enforcement already, Detective?”
“I wouldn’t call them friends, Sheriff,” she replied, eager to hear what happened. “What did my new friend say was the reason they didn’t dispatch us in response to the call?”
“They said they thought it was a hoax.”
15
Postmortem
There was something about the morgue that creeped Elliot out—it wasn’t that surprising, considering it was the morgue, after all. Holding a straight face and acting professionally while standing between two shiny, stainless-steel autopsy tables, one with its occupant on display, took every bit of willpower he had. He would’ve easily settled for the written ME report in his inbox, had he not known the importance of a face-to-face conversation with the medical examiner and the opportunity to ask urgent questions and get timely answers.
That’s why he breathed through the mouth, where the stink of formaldehyde and the other chemicals he’d grown used to associating with Dr. Whitmore’s white beard and kind eyes was dampened by the strong flavor of several Altoids Arctic Mints Elliot held in his cheeks as if he were a chipmunk.
Faint piano music emerged from the computer running on the doctor’s desk, the bright notes of Vivaldi’s “Spring” in stark contrast with the body lying on the table, disturbingly naked under powerful fluorescent lights with the exception of a cloth covering his privates. Vulnerable. Unable to defend himself, his modesty, his dignity. The man’s Y incision gaped wide open, his body devoid of all organs, now neatly labeled and preserved in medical jars lined in perfect order on a table nearby. Staring at the source of the music, Elliot inhaled through his mouth, as shallowly as he could, keeping his mind on the music and willing his empty stomach to stay put where it belonged.
“It helps me think clearly,” Dr. Whitmore said, evidently noticing where his attention was focused. “And I’m sure my clients wouldn’t hold that against me,” he added, peeling off his blue gloves and discarding them in a trash can bearing the biohazard symbol right below the motion sensor that pulled the lid open with a whir. “You’re early, but I have a few things.”
“Good,” Elliot replied, shifting his weight from one foot to the other, wishing he was done already and out of there in the pouring rain. He needed a lead like he needed air, or else his John Doe wasn’t going to become much else but an unsolved cold case, just a number assigned by a system and placed on all tags and labels right after the infamous name placeholder Elliot had learned to hate. “Because I have nothing,” he admitted, still trying to hold his breath. The air smelled badly of death and chemicals, but it was the stink of decaying human flesh that unnerved him the most, reminding him of how fleeting life was, of how it could unexpectedly end without a moment’s notice.
The medical examiner flipped through some forms housed in a blue folder. There was a case number printed on the label affixed to the upper right corner of its cover. Every now and then, he mumbled, “Uh-huh,” and occasionally tapped the tip of his pen against a section of the page, probably where something had captured his attention.
“Why do you still do this, Doc?” Elliot asked, a little surprised with himself. It wasn’t any of his business, and he knew better than to pry. His momma would’ve smacked him silly. “You’re retired, aren’t you?”
Whitmore smiled, showing two rows of teeth that looked much younger than he was. “I am retired, yes. But I offered my services to the county for the odd murder case, and, as of late, they keep calling me in.”
It must’ve shown how confused he was, arranging his wide-brimmed hat over a tentative frown and leaning against a white tile wall because the doctor’s smile widened.
“They have no one else, you know,” Dr. Whitmore added, gesturing toward the body. “I like to think I can be their voice and help you get justice for them. That makes everything worthwhile. The smells, the heartbreak, the horror stories—I’ve witnessed a few that are unforgettable. Not here; back in San Francisco County. There was one particular case your partner and I worked on when she was still a federal agent, and I was still, well, unretired,” he chuckled lightly, “that still keeps me up at night.” His eyes veered toward the wall, where a digital clock displayed the time in military format. “Not last night, though, because I was here, wrapping this up. That story’s for another time.” He picked up the folder from where he’d dropped it and sifted through its pages until he found the one he was looking for.
“Do you have an ID yet?” Elliot asked, eager to get started on the victim’s background.
“No ID yet, but his DNA is already running. His fingerprints weren’t in the system, so he’s got no priors. Great dental work that tells you social status. Considering the teeth, the brand-new leather shoes, and the top-shelf clothing, this man was comfortably wealthy.” He turned the page, then nodded, without taking his eyes off the compact paragraphs typed underneath hand-drawn sketches. “Yes, cause of death. This was a contact shot like you suspected, the weapon, a nine-mil handgun, held snugly against his body when it was fired. There was singeing and powder burn tattooing around the wound. We recovered the bullet. Find me a gun, and I can match it to the round that killed this poor fellow.”
That’ll be like putting socks on a rooster, Elliot thought. He’d searched the entire crime scene for that weapon, crawled through ditches and under bushes, smelled deer dung up close and personal, and found nothing. The shooter could’ve easily driven off and thrown that gun out the window in an entirely different section of the woods that flanked the interstate for miles and miles. Or it could very well be on the perp’s nightstand, all cleaned up, waiting for his next victim.
“He’s a tall man, your vic,” the doctor continued, his words scattered on short, shallow breaths. He pushed the bridge of his bl
ack-rimmed glasses toward the root of his nose with one quick, habitual gesture. “He measures 193 centimeters, or six feet four inches.” He approached the back wall of the autopsy room, where digital X-rays were displayed on a wide, wall-mounted screen. He pointed toward one of the images, showing a man’s torso in shades of gray, with the bullet bright white, clearly standing out. “See here? The bullet entered his body at a slightly downward angle and pierced his right ventricle, then lodged in his sternum. Given his height, I believe it’s safe to assume he was shot while sitting down.” Moving toward his desk, he held his hand in a fist with the index finger extended, simulating a pistol, and positioned it downward as if to shoot the imaginary person sitting on his four-legged lab stool. “Like this.”
“I’m going to go out on a limb and assume you’re ruling this a homicide, Doc,” Elliot quipped, touching his stomach briefly as if to appease the angry turmoil in there.
“I tend to do that when people are shot in the back, yes,” Dr. Whitmore replied with a quick smile that immediately vanished from his lips. He read from his notes, flipping through a couple of pages, while Elliot approached the man and studied his features, trying to ignore his open chest cavity.
The first thing that stood out was the tan. The man had spent considerable amounts of time in direct sunlight. His arms were dark from the wrists down and bluish pale elsewhere, speaking of long sleeves worn outdoors, even in the summer. Elliot had seen similar suntan patterns in boaters and surfers, where the crisp Pacific winds enhance the sunburns, even in low temperatures. Surfers wore full-body wetsuits in the ocean water that rarely exceeded sixty-five degrees. Boaters wore wind jackets and bundled up underneath to withstand the chilly gusts at sea, the wind burning skin just as badly as the sun. The man’s feet were pale, as expected from both a surfer and a boater.
The second one was his appearance. His hair was neatly trimmed, and his beard had been as well at the time of his death, two more days of growth rendering it a little bristly and uneven in spots. Yet he looked really put together, charismatic even for a man in his fifties, lying dead on an autopsy table. There was an air of power, of authority to his features that had transcended his passing, probably carved into his facial tone from daily use. The way a woodworker’s hands widen and become shaped a certain way, with square and wide palms and a strong, oversized thumb, John Doe’s jaw muscles, tight, tense lips, and the lines around his mouth and across his tall forehead spoke of the power he once seemed to have wielded.