The Body Keeper

by Anne Frasier

  CHAPTER 57

  Concussion, hypothermia, four stab wounds, three fairly superficial. The other deep, but non-life-threatening. Forty stitches in all that I’m told you slept through. Amazingly, very few signs of frostbite, probably due to the temperatures that were hovering around freezing.”

  It was a lot of words to take in, all of them coming from Uriah, who stood next to Jude’s hospital bed. It wasn’t the first time she’d woken up in a hospital with Uriah next to her.

  The room was dim, the building hushed and hinting of night, but individual lights were almost blinding, courtesy of the concussion. The boy was with Elliot, who’d been instructed not to let him go and not to allow anyone from Child Protection Services to pick him up until she was back home and they had everything sorted out.

  Jude scanned the room, found a clock: 3:21 a.m. Next to the bed was an IV stand with lines that led to the needle taped to the back of her hand. She was turned slightly to her side, pillow propped behind her back. Her body was enveloped in warmth, and she realized she was covered in something generating heat, with several cords running from it and a dial that could increase the temperature. In contrast, her head was cold. She reached up, her fingers coming in contact with an ice pack held in place by an elastic bandage.

  Uriah sat down and pulled his chair close. She told him about going to the farm and what had transpired there. She might have fallen asleep a few times during the conversation. “The concussion probably saved you,” he said. “In Perkins’s panic to get rid of your body, she thought you were dead.”

  She had a vague memory of embracing death. She recalled the comfort of the moment. Maybe the end was like that for many people who knew it was coming. No fear. Acceptance and even welcome.

  “I was wrapped in plastic and dragged through a field. I remember that. I kept thinking I was dead when she was pulling me behind the snowmobile. Like, this is what it feels like to die.” She frowned, forgetting what they were talking about. He prodded her, and she continued, “I tried to stay conscious, but I kept blacking out. Later, I actually played dead as she rolled me over and I fell. Pretty far. I don’t know how much later I woke up. The freezing rain hitting the shower curtain woke me, and I was able to partially free myself of the plastic and climb from the pit. And Uriah, I think there was a body in there with me. You need to check.”

  “I’ve spoken with the county sheriff, but I’d like to get out there as soon as the roads reopen. I want to make sure they don’t miss any evidence. Nanette Perkins’s body is at the morgue. We’ve got Savoy locked up, but no statement from him yet. We have his cell phone with a call to Perkins. Also calls to and from Gail Ford. We’ll know more once we subpoena his phone records and get a search warrant to Ford’s house.”

  They both fell silent. The room was so bright. She put a hand to her head, felt stitches. “I can’t stay awake. Shouldn’t I stay awake?”

  “The doctor said that’s a myth. That sleep will help you heal faster.” He was pale, with circles under his eyes.

  “You don’t look so great.”

  “When I was told to go straight home and rest after getting the MRI, this night was not what anybody had in mind.”

  She scooted back, wincing in pain as she patted what space was left on the hospital bed. “Turn off the light. Lie down a little bit. Close your eyes.” She closed hers.

  She heard the chair creak and felt the mattress dip. His hair brushed her cheek, and she put an arm around his waist. A moment later, his hand grasped hers.

  “What are you going to do about the boy?” he whispered.

  “I don’t know.”

  “You could adopt him.”

  “He’s not a cat.”

  “You’re good with him.”

  “I’m never home.”

  “Elliot could take care of him when you can’t.”

  A child . . . Just months ago a cat had seemed impossible, and now she found herself considering adopting a small human.

  CHAPTER 58

  The following day, while Jude prepared to return home to recover from her injuries, Uriah headed back to the Perkins farm in an unmarked car. His own vehicle was evidence and would not be returned to him for at least a few more days. The Dakota County sheriff and the officers from the neighboring Hennepin County Sheriff’s Office were on site, along with the Bureau of Criminal Apprehension and the state fire marshal.

  It was late morning, the day after the event. Roads were still bad, but better. Two fire trucks were also on location, but the blaze of last night was now a smoldering heap, a brick chimney the lone substantial element left of the structure. Mostly an open black pit, burned not only to the ground but to the basement.

  Out of the car, Uriah tramped through the snow toward what little was left of the charred building, coat hitting his knees. Suddenly conscious of his shaggy appearance, he raked fingers through his hair, pulling out a few strands in the process, shaking it off his hand as he walked.

  The sheriff spotted him.

  “No bodies found inside yet,” the officer said. He was dressed in a brown puffy coat and fur-lined cap. “But there’s a lot of rubble to go through. Gas line from the LP tank and the electric are off, but we have to move with care. You said your partner was left in a field behind the house. We checked the area, and I think we found the spot. A silage pit you might want to see.” He pointed and they both began walking.

  Out in the open the wind was blowing maybe twenty miles an hour, and now that the snow had stopped, temperatures were falling. It seemed to be a common weather pattern. Uriah dug into the pocket of his coat, was glad to find his stocking cap, and tugged it on. Head bent into the wind, the two men trudged through the field.

  The snow had been packed by foot traffic and vehicles. He spotted the concrete edges of the silage pit in the distance. It was an old method for storing chopped-up cornstalks. Once a field was picked, the stalks were threshed to create food for livestock. Sometimes those stalks were mixed with other ingredients, like expired corn syrup and even candy bars still in wrappers. The result was stored and fermented in three-sided rectangular pits about fifteen feet deep, with an opening on one end for a tractor to drive in and out. This must have been where Jude had been dumped, her fall cushioned by the snow.

  The sheriff motioned him along one edge until they were looking straight down into the pit. Below was the ravaged body of a female. Animals had found her. Stomach, eyes, and half the face were eaten, bones scattered, the snow near the body, pink and brown and packed, tracks everywhere. “Coyotes.” He sounded confident.

  “Could be dogs,” Uriah said, just to be contrary. Probably coyotes.

  “Gonna take dental records to ID her. If she has enough teeth left.” The sheriff shook his head.

  They probably didn’t get a lot of murders in this area.

  “Might be hard to determine mode of death too.” He glanced up. “Here they come.”

  Bureau of Criminal Apprehension. Striding across the field with their heavy cases, a group of men and women dressed in navy-blue jackets. It wasn’t Uriah’s crime scene. He would have cordoned off a large portion of the field, but he understood how tough it was to determine a boundary and how hard a scene like this would be to contain. Maybe working from a small area was the best idea and use of limited manpower.

  “I’d like to get a better look.”

  “Be my guest.”

  Uriah circled to the open end. Watching his step, he moved close to the victim and crouched, but didn’t touch her.

  Another frozen body. Not a kid this time, though. He’d guess her age to be anywhere from twenty to thirty-five. Light-brown hair, Caucasian. The remaining tissue and bones and skin didn’t show signs of putrefaction. How long had she been there? Had she been dumped, like the bodies in the lake? He thought back to the length of time the weather had been cold enough to freeze a body and keep it frozen. Maybe a month.

  He spoke briefly to the sheriff and crime-scene team. “Let me know if you
find out anything.” They didn’t have to, but keeping him in the loop could help them all.

  Walking back across the snowy field, he got a text. Expecting something pertaining to the case, he was surprised to see a message from his doctor. Talk about the collision of two worlds.

  MRI looks good. Call my office to schedule surgery. The sooner, the better.

  He’d respond later.

  At the farmhouse, arson experts were on the scene, picking through the rubble. Uriah found the woman in charge and gave her his card, asking that she contact him if they found anything that might pertain to their kidnapping cases. He was about to leave, wanting to go home, take a shower, and find something to eat, when he decided to check the barn.

  Not his jurisdiction, but he certainly had a personal interest in the case.

  The giant sliding door was partway open, with footprints leading in and out, evidence of a search. Inside, the electricity was off. He passed the beam of light from his cell phone around the space. A barn could hide a lot of things with its haylofts and wooden wall ladders that led to cupolas.

  He brushed some of the snow off a vehicle parked near the door and recognized it as Jude’s car. Deeper inside, he checked the cab of both a tractor and a combine, then caught sight of a tarp-covered object on the far side of the building, tucked away in a corner. After stepping sideways around equipment, he released the bungee cords and pulled the tarp free, uncovering another vehicle, this one a fairly new model. Minnesota plates. Hennepin County. Perkins did not live in Hennepin County.

  He tried the doors. Locked. He scanned the area and spotted several shovels hanging from nails. He grabbed one. Holding it with two hands, turning his face away, he broke the driver’s window. He tossed the shovel aside and unlocked the door, reaching across the broken tempered glass to the compartment between the seats, then the glove box, finally coming up with the registration.

  Jenny Hill. The social worker who’d been in charge of the boy’s case. He now had a good idea who the body in the field belonged to.

  He called Jude to fill her in.

  “This could be how the boy ended back up with Perkins,” Jude said.

  “A fabricated report?”

  “That’d be my guess. Perkins might have forced Jenny Hill to file it with a recommendation for returning the child.”

  Another text message, this one from Detective Valentine.

  Savoy says he’s ready to talk, and he wants you to take his statement.

  CHAPTER 59

  You sold children for profit.”

  They were sitting in a police department interrogation room, video camera high on the wall, green light on, indicating it was recording. Since Savoy had already tried to kill him, Uriah wasn’t taking any chances. The retired detective sat at a table across from him, leather restraint around his waist, handcuffs attached, his ankles chained to the floor. Savoy proceeded to tell Uriah about a series of human-trafficking crimes going back forty years, long before he knew about any of it.

  Some people lied and even confessed to crimes they had never committed, some wanted to brag about their wickedness, and others wanted to get the weight of their sins off their chest in what was almost a confession. Uriah wasn’t sure where Savoy fell in the spectrum.

  “I wasn’t involved in the day-to-day, if that’s what you’re implying. It was a big operation, spread across the US. Buyers would request a certain kind of kid, and the company would supply it. Minneapolis was the hub, and Nan and her husband were kind of a clearinghouse. All the kids ended up there. They took care of them and shipped them out.”

  “To men who wanted to have sex with children.”

  “Not just men, but yeah, most were rich white guys.” He was talking like he was telling Uriah about a vacation he’d taken, or relating some boring day in his life. A sociopath who dealt in human beings. It wasn’t Uriah’s job to ask about remorse, and not his job at this moment to judge. He was here to get as much information as he could, and he didn’t want to say anything that might halt the discussion.

  “Who were the buyers?”

  “Most are dead now.” Savoy leaned forward. “I want you and everybody to know this was a business. We weren’t sick bastards kidnapping and raping kids. We weren’t serial killers. We weren’t killers at all.”

  Ah, that’s why he wanted to tell his story. To him, it was better to call it a business, a moneymaking enterprise, rather than human trafficking. It seemed to justify it in his mind.

  “But then Nan and her husband, Lyle, screwed up.” Now he looked upset. Maybe it was a line he’d never wanted to cross. As he continued, Uriah realized that wasn’t where the emotions were coming from. “They killed an entire shipment of kids. A month of work, product delivered from all over the country to disperse.”

  Product. It was hard for Uriah to keep from leaping across the table and grabbing the man by the throat. He struggled to keep his breathing even and his face impassive. Just two guys talking. “Carbon monoxide poisoning,” Uriah stated.

  “We shut down after that, but I kept in touch, and sometimes we talked about restarting the business. More the kind of thing you discuss over a few beers. And believe it or not, Nan used to be pretty hot. And she and I . . . well . . .” He smiled.

  “What about Gail Ford?”

  “She was one of the crew. The kids liked women because they were mother figures. Women kept them calm. Before the carbon monoxide thing went down, we had a buyer who’d paid in advance. A huge amount, like twenty grand, I think.”

  Not so huge for a human being.

  “We needed a kid to replace one of the dead ones. And believe it or not, Ford had this kid who almost fit the description. And she just gave him up. Her own kid.” He leaned hard against his chair back, amazement or maybe admiration on his face. “A little young, hair too dark, so she bleached it and that was it. He was sold to a customer in Oklahoma, I think.”

  “You don’t remember?”

  “There were so many. We’re talking a big business.” Bragging again.

  “How many kids died in the carbon monoxide incident? Do you remember?”

  “Ten.”

  Uriah moved his hands to hide them under the table. They were shaking. “We only found two. Are the rest on the farm?”

  Savoy told him how it had happened in the winter, when the ground was frozen, how Nan and Lyle hid the bodies in a meat locker owned by his brother. He gave a description of the general area. “Like I said, not on me. I don’t even know exactly where it is.”

  “What does the boy who lived with Nan have to do with any of this? The four-year-old? He’s been physically abused. You do that?”

  With hands cuffed together, Savoy pressed a finger against the table to drive home his point. “I’m the hero here. I want you to know that. I want everybody to know that.” He looked up at the camera. “I saved that boy. She was running with him, probably would have killed him if I hadn’t stopped her.” He drew out his next sentence. “That kid is alive today thanks to me.” He leaned closer and lowered his voice. “I could help you. I know this stuff forward and backward. I could be an asset. Think of all the work I’ve done to get new DNA legislation passed. I’m pretty sure that will count for something.”

  Uriah was disgusted. If Savoy couldn’t bargain his way out of this, he’d at least try to come away with some perks. “Why would she want to kill her own child?”

  He let out a snort. “He’s not hers.”

  Not much of a surprise. “Kidnapped too? I thought all of that was over by then.”

  “Not really kidnapped. Secondhand, I guess you could say.”

  “How’s that?”

  “He’s Phillip Schilling’s boy.”

  Jesus. Jude’s father.

  CHAPTER 60

  Lying in bed in her apartment, Roof Cat curled up beside her, Jude only half heard the conversation drifting from the living room. Elliot answering a knock, followed by Uriah’s voice. And then her partner was in the bedroom, cl
osing the door quietly behind him. And he had the strangest look on his face.

  “What?” she asked.

  He grabbed her laptop from the dresser and placed it on the bed. “Log in to our VPN and go to the most recent interviews.”

  “Savoy’s?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Are you going to brief me first?”

  “I want you to watch it without my insight influencing your reaction.”

  She played the video while Uriah perched on the bed beside her, back to the headboard, close enough to see the screen. She took in Savoy’s revelation about how involved he was in the business. And yes, human trafficking. They’d been right about that. She marveled at the man’s delusion and how he put no blame on himself, convinced he’d done nothing wrong. Just an opportunist unable to pass up an easy way to make some extra cash. As she watched, Uriah’s expression upon entering the room continued to nag her.

  And then Savoy spoke her father’s name.

  She felt Uriah’s silence beside her, sensed he was holding his breath. She did not react. The truth was, nothing about her father would surprise her anymore.

  Confession unfurling, Savoy seemed unable to stop himself. “I wonder how many kids that guy has scattered around the country,” Savoy said. “I don’t know the whole story, but one of the girls he kidnapped got pregnant and had this kid in captivity. Schilling paid Nan to raise him. I think it was supposed to be temporary, but he never came back for him. Just kept sending her money. A sweet job. She was happy about that. That’s what I understand anyway. She liked the kid. That’s where she screwed up. She could have dumped him on any doorstep, but she got the idea to drop him at Detective Fontaine’s because they were related.”

  When the interview was over, Jude closed her laptop. “He should be put on suicide watch.”

  “Already did it. Didn’t want to find out he’d hung himself in his cell. Savoy’s best punishment will be to live with the public outcry and the subsequent rejection by his family. What do you think?” Uriah asked. “Is he lying? He’s lying, right?”