by Gregg Olsen
I open another drawer and take out the tapes and player. I know which date I want. I slide it into the player and pour a generous amount of amber liquid in my cup and open both bags of Cheetos. It might be a two-bag tape, with a lot of amber waves of grain.
I stuff Cheetos in my mouth and go find a paper towel to wipe the orange stuff off. I hit the “play” button.
Dr. A: Tell me about Megan Moriarty. What did you find out?
The tape hisses as I pause. I’m thinking. Gathering the information.
Me: She’s another pretty blond. Sixteen.
Dr. A: The same age as Leanne and Shannon.
Me: Yes. Megan Moriarty was on the cheerleading squad at Kentridge High School
Megan lived in a suburb further south of Seattle. I don’t think I would have liked her. I know that it’s wrong. For some reason I never liked the girls on the cheerleading squad. They were so over-the-top in their self-indulgence that if you weren’t a mirror they’d never look at you. At least, they never looked at me. Caleb Hunter said I was way prettier than the six girls that considered South Kitsap their personal turf.
There’s a longer pause on the tape this time, but Dr. Albright doesn’t interrupt my train of thought. The Cheetos, however, do. I can’t stand to be messy. I shut the tape off and go to the bathroom. I wash my hands and face. When I look in the mirror, I think of my mom. Every year I look more like her. Every time I have that thought, I’m reminded of Hayden. I wonder if I can find him. I wonder if he’s in Port Townsend. I don’t know if tracking him down is a good idea, but tomorrow I’m going to try and find out where he lives. I need to know that he’s okay. But surely, if I didn’t know he was back in the country, much less in town, no one else will know. He’ll be safe. Probably. My mother might know, but there’s no way I’ll open that wound again.
Forty-Two
The gun is next to me on the nightstand. I close my eyes but I can’t get Michael Rader out of my mind. The picture Ronnie showed me reminds me too much of my bio-dad, too much of me, too much of the genes we share. I wonder if there’s a DNA strand specifically for killers. If gene splicing, like I saw on a Twitter video clip, can replace that malignant gene with a normal one.
My mom said to look in the past. If it was meant to be a clue maybe it meant Michael Rader’s past and not mine. I give up trying to sleep and take the gun back to my desk. I lay the gun down, get on the computer and skim through the news articles and blogs about the Moriarty case and Mock’s death in prison. I pause and stare at a picture of Mock. He looks bewildered, sitting next to his defense attorney.
In the picture’s background I see Dan Moriarty—younger but out of shape. Next to him is a woman with her hands pressed against her chest as if she’s holding her breaking heart inside. Megan’s mom. She has those same haunted eyes that I saw in Mrs. Blume. No mother ever gets over such a loss.
Next, I scroll down and read one of the articles. The headline is:
Mock Succumbs to Injuries
The article gives me a recap of his crime and a better sense of who Kim Mock was as a person. He was eighteen years old when he was convicted and given a life sentence. He was moved from the juvenile justice center in Seattle to the men’s correctional facility in Monroe. I remember Monroe as a sleepy prison town east of Everett, Washington. As I read, it is as though I’m in a race to capture every detail I can in one giant gulp. He was considered a model prisoner there, teaching other inmates how to read and write. He even led a Bible study group.
The article reads:
On Tuesday Mock was in the prison chapel when an assailant stabbed him with a knife made from a flattened and sharpened spoon. Mock was taken to the infirmary, where he died after surgery. His attacker was never identified. The prison was on lockdown for twenty-four hours, but is operating normally today.
At the bottom of the piece, mention is made that there was a pending investigation into Mock’s death.
I move further down the computer screen. The follow-up article is so brief that if I blinked at the moment it passed in front of me I would have missed it.
Review into Mock Death Complete
Once again, I see the name of the guard who found Kim Mock stabbed to death and alone.
Michael Rader.
Ronnie had found an old address and possibly a phone number for Michael. I need to verify he’s still there. Back when I was hunting for his brother, I found that Alex wasn’t listed anywhere but water records. I need to ask Ronnie if she checked that.
A benefit of being in the Sheriff’s Office is that I am tied into the city and county databases. One of the things I can now access is the department of water records for bills and usage. They will also show if he transferred his water service. It’s just possible he lives in such a remote area that there are no utility services of any kind. Some people live rough in the county. I think of Snow Creek. Still, it’s something I can do.
But there are only a few computer stations that have IT permission to access those records. One of the stations, luckily, is mine. At work only. I’ll check it in the morning.
If that doesn’t reveal where Michael is living, I’ll ask Sheriff Gray to call the sheriff of Snohomish County and make some inquiries. If Michael isn’t working at the prison or living in the county anymore, there must be a reason. He doesn’t have a warrant issued for his arrest, so he hasn’t been caught for the murder of Kim Mock or others.
I put the tapes and player away. The empty Scotch bottle goes in the trash with the Cheetos wrappers. I’m a little hungry but I don’t want to eat. My stomach is queasy. I need sleep.
Forty-Three
In the morning, the hot water from the sputtering shower relaxes me. Washes the bad stuff away. The body wash Ronnie suggested smells and feels wonderful compared to the bar of Dial soap I normally use. It’s lavender scented and so I use it for shampoo as well.
I dry off and go to the closet. My usual lineup of blazers and slacks await me. I think of buying some new clothes. New shoes: sensible low-heeled ones instead of boots. But the places I go sometimes aren’t conducive to that kind of footwear. Also, I’ve ruined several blazers searching inside burnt-out husks of buildings, wading through mud and oil or chemical spills in creeks. What I have is practical. I think I might want some off-duty clothes that are more up to date. Not necessarily feminine, but something more eye pleasing.
I get dressed, slip on the shoulder holster and a blazer, remove the chair from the door and head off to work. It’s early but I’m starving. Cheetos don’t stay with me long. I head for my favorite breakfast place.
Hudson Point Café is open early and it’s very popular with tourists and locals alike. The view from their outside seating is of Port Townsend Bay with its sailboats and cabin cruisers. I know the cook and I order two sausage and egg biscuits for myself, a pancake with bacon and whipped cream for Sheriff Gray, and two poached eggs embedded in light buttermilk biscuits on a bed of spinach for Ronnie. I’ll eat her biscuits if she doesn’t want them. As an afterthought, I order two rashers of bacon and three large coffees to go.
The drive to the office isn’t long, but I consume both sausage and egg biscuits and half my coffee before I arrive in the parking lot. Sheriff Gray’s and Ronnie’s cars are there.
I carry everything inside and go right to the Sheriff’s Office. Nan looks up. She’s smelled the bacon.
“We have a meeting. Sorry, Nan. I didn’t think you’d be here early,” I lie. Then I see the plate with three glazed donuts on her desk, so I don’t feel too bad.
Sheriff Gray’s not on the phone and Ronnie is in his office.
“Close the door,” I say to Ronnie, and put the box of goodies and coffee on his desk. “We’re having a meeting,” I explain and give them their breakfasts. “I see Nan’s already here. I forgot to order something for her,” I say. It’s a lie. I don’t want to encourage Nan to talk to me. The feeding-a-stray-dog rule applies here.
“I brought donuts,” Sheriff Gray says. �
��She’ll be okay.”
Ronnie opens her bag and smiles and we all chow down. Tony sighs, leans back in his chair and proudly displays his whipped-cream mustache.
“You have something on your lip, Sheriff,” Ronnie says.
I think, You have your whole breakfast on your face. I should have had the cook put the boss’s meal in a bowl. But that’s unkind. It’s only a mustache, after all.
He looks around for a napkin. I’ve forgotten napkins. He opens a drawer and brings out a small stack—no doubt from McDonald’s—and hands them out. We all sip our coffee. It feels nice to take a breather. For once, I feel comfortable with other people. We’ve become a team. I still have trust issues, but they will never go away after the life I’ve lived. Still, it’s nice to let my guard down long enough to eat.
Sheriff Gray wads up his bag, tosses it in the trash basket beside his desk and looks at me. “What gives?”
“Can’t I just be nice and bring breakfast?”
“No.”
I look at Ronnie and she grins.
“Okay,” I say. “I want to fill you in on yesterday.”
“And?” he asks.
“And ask a favor.”
“Shoot.”
“I don’t know how much Ronnie has already told you…” I begin, and Ronnie smiles. “What’s going on?” I ask.
“Tell her, Ronnie.”
“Tell me what?” I ask.
Ronnie looks ready to bust. “I’m released back to active duty tomorrow. And that’s not all.”
She pauses, staring at me with a stupid grin. I want to slap it out of her. I don’t like anticipation and we have business to discuss.
“I’ve been permanently assigned here. Tony—Sheriff Gray—asked for it. And…”
I try to look excited to hear what else, but I’m truly just anxious for her to spit it out. I have things to do, people to track down and punish.
“…and he’s going to hire me full-time as a deputy,” she says. Then she does something that I always hate to hear from women: she squeals like a schoolgirl. “Can you believe it?”
No. Yes. Maybe.
“I’m really happy for you, Ronnie. You deserve it. You’ll make a good addition to the office.”
I think that about covers all the nice things I’m expected to say. I even mean some of them.
Sheriff Gray adds his platitudes, but he means them, and turns to me. “Now, what’s the favor?”
“Before I tell you, when are you planning Ronnie’s official hiring ceremony?”
“Next week. She’ll need new uniforms. And she’ll have to get some other plain clothes. I think I’m going to assign her to you for training.”
“As a detective?” I ask. I’m not really surprised.
He gives me a defensive look. “I thought you’d be happy.”
“I am. I mean, that’s great.” I shake Ronnie’s hand and this time I say, “Welcome aboard.”
“Thanks, partner.”
Don’t get cocky.
“I was asking because I want to get Ronnie an assigned log-in for the computers. And I want her to have access to all of our resources and databases. I have something for her to do this morning but it can only be done on your computer or mine.”
“Already done,” Sheriff Gray says. “Before I went to the Civitan meeting Wednesday.”
“Oh. Well, the favor I want to ask is this.” I tell him about Michael Rader’s deeper involvement per my conversation with Debra Blume on Wednesday. I don’t tell him about my past knowledge of this scumbag. “He was, and still might be, working at the men’s correctional facility in Monroe. Ronnie tried to track him down and she thinks he no longer works there. I’m going to check the utility records this morning to see if I can get a forwarding address and confirm the last address, but I—we—need to know if he still works there. I thought if he doesn’t, he must have gotten in trouble. If he has a record with Snohomish County of any kind, you can find out.”
“So you want me to call the sheriff and not the prison because he might still be working there and tip your hand?”
I nod emphatically. “Plus you have a working relationship with the sheriff, don’t you?”
“We’ve had a few drinks together at conferences. I don’t know him well, but enough to believe he can keep his yap shut.”
Forty-Four
I leave for my office and hear Sheriff Gray on the phone asking for the Snohomish County Sheriff. Ronnie comes to my desk.
“You should have access to the database of the Jefferson County Public Utility District,” I say, and pull my chair out for her to sit at my computer. “Go ahead and log in and we’ll see what IT has given you.”
Ten minutes later, we have the information on Michael Rader’s water account. I don’t have to instruct her. She catches on quickly, intuitively. Like me. She pulls up the monthly bills, his account information, payments, payment types: whether check or credit or cash. She finds his address from six months ago and where his account was transferred one month ago. His address is in Clallam County, a small town called Silent Ridge about thirty minutes south of Port Angeles. It sits along the Elwha River running north from the Olympic Mountains into the Strait of Juan de Fuca, the Salish Sea.
We try to find the town itself, but there is very little information except that the Elwha River hiking trail is a popular destination and the trailhead is in Silent Ridge. No population given. The road from Port Angeles ends at the trailhead.
I can’t imagine why a city boy like Michael Rader would move to such a remote spot unless he wants to kidnap hikers and kill them. The Olympic National Forest would be the perfect dumping ground for a serial killer.
Ronnie pulls up the map and we find a GPS designation for the address Rader’s last payment was made from. The Google Map isn’t very helpful. It’s only fifty-eight miles but will be an hour-and-a-half drive to maybe find a dead-end road and a lean-to. Michael Rader would know how to disappear.
I have to decide. Do I go an hour and a half on a wild-goose chase north to maybe find Michael Rader, or do I go two and a half hours south to Kent to find Dan Moriarty? I decide to go to Silent Ridge. I’ll call Dan Moriarty, but I may want to have the Sheriff’s Office there do a welfare check on him first.
The sheriff makes my decision easier when he calls me into his office.
“Snohomish County doesn’t have a criminal record of Michael Rader,” Tony says, “but they do know of him. The sheriff said he got into a little trouble at the correctional facility and quit his job about five months ago. He’s had a few problems in town. Drunk and disorderly. But he’s never been arrested because of where he works. He said they give those guys a lot of slack since they work with the worst of the worst. He gave me the same address that Ronnie had on him. Do you want me to have someone go by there and see if he’s still living there?”
I call Ronnie into the office and we shut the door. “We found a bill he paid a month ago. It was sent from Silent Ridge in Clallam County.”
“Silent Ridge?” Sheriff looks dubious. “There’s not much housing around there, Megan.”
“I didn’t think so. I still want to look.”
“Take Ronnie with you. What can I do?” he asks.
“Can you call the crime lab and see if they ever identified the paralytic chemical they found during autopsy?”
“They haven’t called you yet?”
I shake my head and he gets up and calls Nan in. She comes right away.
Something she only does for him.
“Nan, didn’t you say the crime lab report came in?” he asks.
“I put it on Detective Carpenter’s desk yesterday,” she says.
“That’s fine,” he says. Nan waits but sees he is done and leaves. I shut the door behind her.
“I don’t have a report,” I say. I can’t believe Nan would stoop to being malicious even though I haven’t exactly been nice to her. It’s something I would do. Good for her.
“I’ll call the lab
and get the report sent to me directly and a copy will be sent to your phone.”
“Thanks, Sheriff. We’ll call if we need anything,” I say.
Before we leave, Nan stops us. “I did put the report on your desk yesterday. You must have put it in with some other files,” she says.
“Probably,” I say. “Thanks, Nannette.”
I take Anderson Lake Road west to SR-101. I stop at the Wendy’s in Port Angeles to re-caffeinate myself. Ronnie asks for a water.
“If you’re going to work with me, you need to start drinking big-kid stuff, Ronnie.” I order a coffee for her. She takes the coffee and asks for three creams and three sugars.
It’s not coffee anymore. But it’s a start.
I drive west on 101 and turn south toward Silent Ridge Road. The houses are thinning as we take the wide curving highway south now, and soon there are farm fields and then into the forest we go. I’m beginning to feel like Little Red Riding Hood going to meet the Big Bad Wolf. And I forgot my axe.
“Are we going to call the Clallam County Sheriff and let them know we’re here?” Ronnie asks.
I give her a blank look. If we get into a shooting situation, I’ll call them. When you’re dealing with someone like Michael Rader, it’s better to sneak up on him. Then shoot him and leave quietly. But that won’t work with Ronnie along.
“Are you sure there are no warrants for his arrest?” I ask, fingers crossed.
“I checked. Nothing,” Ronnie says.
“Do you have body armor with you?” I’ve taken to wearing my body armor, or keeping it handy in the back seat. Shoot me once, shame on you. Shoot me twice, shame on me.