“Close.”
“Is it the kind of story you’d also kill for?”
The smirk disappeared, but it took a beat. “What are you suggesting? That I had something to do with what happened to those girls?”
The earlier hush in the newsroom had given way to a low-pitched murmur, like the buzzing of a far-off insect. Rayna pushed back her chair and rose. “So far, Mr. Robbins, you’re the only one I can see who has anything to gain from these crimes.” She expected him to be indignant, but Seth Robbins was, for once, speechless. It was her turn to smile. “I’ll be in touch.”
She left the way she’d come, all eyes once again following her. The conversation had done wonders for her mood.
Her cell rang as she left the building.
“We have an ID on Romeo,” Hank told her.
“Who is he?”
“Jordan Buhler, twenty-six. Lives outside of Corvallis. No record.”
“Close enough that he could have done it. Do you have a phone number for him?”
“Just an address.”
An address was a surer bet anyway. “Do you have anything else on him? Educational background, work history, whatever?”
“Nada. Just what we’ve seen on his Facebook account.”
A pepperoni pizza--loving baseball fan who played the guitar, loved his black Lab and beautiful sunsets. There was a good chance none of it, including the flattering photo, was true.
It wasn’t yet one o’clock. Rayna could be in Corvallis by three. If she had to wait for him to get home, so be it. “I’m going to head there now,” she told Hank.
“You want me to come along?”
“I’d rather you keep digging on Terri Lowe. And do me a favor, would you? See what you can come up with on Seth Robbins.”
“He’s an idiot. Don’t let him get to you, Rayna.”
She laughed. “I’m not.”
~~~~
The address for Jordan Buhler proved to be an older one-story house on a street of similar homes. They appeared to be part of the development boom that had proliferated after WWII. It wasn’t an upscale neighborhood, not even one particularly well maintained, although Rayna guessed it had once shone with new lawns and flower beds. A dented green Taurus was parked in the driveway.
Rayna rang the bell, thinking it likely no one was home. But a female voice responded almost immediately. A minute or so later the door was opened by a stout, older woman pulling an oxygen canister on wheels behind her. Emphysema, from the sound of her wheezing.
Had Rayna rung the wrong house? Or maybe Hank’s information was wrong. “I’m looking for Jordan Buhler,” she said.
The woman gave Rayna a suspicious look.
“Do I have the right house?”
“Yeah, you got the right place. How do you know Jordie?”
“I’m with the Paradise Falls Police Department. I’d like to talk to him about a case.”
“Paradise Falls is a long way from here.”
“Only a couple of hours.”
“Far enough. What makes you think Jordie might know anything?”
“That’s something I need to explain to him.”
She shrugged. “Come on in. I think you’re probably wasting your time, but he’s a funny boy so who knows?”
“Boy?”
“He’s my grandson. He’ll always be a boy to me. Have a seat and I’ll get him.” She waddled off through an open doorway with the oxygen canister trailing after her.
Rayna remained standing, taking in what she could of the room. An older model television—the kind that still had a dial you turned by hand—a sagging sofa, a threadbare easy chair spread with a knitting project, and a newspaper folded open to the crossword puzzle. On the mantel was a photo of a slender woman in her twenties and a laughing, tow-headed toddler. Jordan and his mother? Was he living with his grandmother for financial reasons, or because she needed a caregiver? Were serial killers who preyed on young girls also caretakers?
She heard uneven footsteps in the hallway and turned, stifling a gasp.
The man who stood before her was horribly scarred and disfigured—a burn victim from the looks of him. He wore a baseball cap to cover what looked like a hairless head. His sporadically pigmented skin was stretched tight and smooth over his face. He had no nose, only a hole for breathing, and his mouth was a gash with no lips. One arm was a stump, the other ended in a hand that curled like a claw. It was all Rayna could do to keep from turning away.
“You’re Jordan Buhler?” she asked.
“That’s me. Or what’s left of me,” he added with a laugh. His voice was surprisingly strong and melodic. “What can I do for you?”
“You’re the Jordan whose screen name on Facebook is Romeo?”
“You’re not here to take me to task for false advertising, I hope.” Another chuckle.
The voice didn’t match the man. Rayna tried not to let that distract her. “Caitlin Whittington,” she said.
Jordan stared at her. His eyes were a deep, chocolate brown. “What about her?”
“You tell me.”
“I’ve never met her.” Jordan sounded wary, although with his lack of facial expression it was difficult for Rayna to judge.
“But you’ve written to her.” Rayna took a gamble and added, “You sent her a web cam. And an iPod nano.”
A beat of silence. “So?”
“What were you doing striking up a friendship with a fifteen-year-old girl?”
“There’s a law against that?” Jordan moved into the room with an awkward gait and sat on the arm of the sofa. “Is this porn investigation or something? Because I have nothing to hide. It wasn’t like that.”
“It’s a homicide investigation,” Rayna said.
“What?” Again, she had trouble reading his expression, but his voice registered shock, as did his eyes.
“Caitlin was murdered.”
“My God, when? How awful. What happened?”
“Where were you the afternoon and evening of Friday, March fourteenth?”
“You can’t think I had anything to do with what happened?”
Rayna didn’t know what to think. She felt sorry for him, of course. But who knew what looking like Jordan did might do to a person? Conceivably it could send him over the edge or turn him into a madman.
“Is that your Taurus in the driveway, Jordan?”
“It belongs to my grandmother.”
“Do you have a car of your own?”
“I can’t even drive. I suppose I could learn with some fancy handicap vehicle, if I could afford one, but why? I hardly ever leave the house. I live my life on the Internet.”
“Seducing young girls.”
“I think seducing is a bit of a stretch.”
“You pretend to be someone you’re not,” Rayna said. “I’ve read your profile. I’ve read the emails you sent Caitlin.”
“The web is full of people pretending to be someone else.”
“But in this case, the girl you were communicating with—the one you flattered and sweet-talked and deceived—was murdered. That puts things in a different light.”
“So I pretend to be someone I’m not. Wouldn’t you in my place? I was twelve years old when my father doused me with gasoline and set me on fire. I still haven’t decided if I’m lucky to be alive.”
Rayna sucked in her breath.
“I don’t mean any harm,” Jordan continued. “In fact, I’m very careful not to do harm. If no one is hurt, is it really so wrong? I just want to experience a little of the life I’ll never have.”
“What about the girls? You think it’s fair to them?”
“I don’t lead them on or promise them things. I just want to be a friend.”
“A friend?” Rayna’s tone proclaimed her skepticism.
“What? You don’t think you can make friends online? You think everyone out there has some ulterior motive?”
“I think guys use ‘friend’ to cover a lot of territory.”
&n
bsp; Jordan ran a hand along the back of his neck. “So many of these girls are insecure and lonely, even though they have so much energy and beauty. They’ve got a totally distorted view of themselves. I try to help them see how special they are, to help them feel good about themselves.”
Truth or bullshit? Rayna couldn’t tell. “And the web cam?” she asked. “You need a camera for that?”
“No. It’s for my own pleasure. I like looking at them. I don’t ask them to do anything bad, although some do, all on their own.”
“Maybe that’s because of the phony profile and attractive photo you posted.”
Jordan’s eyes registered sadness. “Yeah. I know. It would be totally different if I put up a real picture of myself.”
Rayna instantly regretted her tactlessness. “I’m sorry, that was mean. I had hoped ‘Romeo’ might turn out to be important to our investigation.”
“Does that mean you don’t have any leads? Besides hoping it was me, I mean.”
“It’s an active case,” Rayna said, her voice defensive. “We’re pursuing various avenues.”
“What about Ty Cross?”
Rayna sucked in her breath, surprised. “How do you know Ty?”
“Like I said, some of the girls I correspond with tell me things. Private things, stuff they might not talk about with their friends.”
“What did Caitlin say about Ty?”
“I wouldn’t break a confidence except . . . if Caitlin is dead, it might be important. She really liked him, or maybe she liked the idea of him because he sounded like a jerk. But in Caitlin’s mind, he was Prince Charming. She’d never had a boyfriend before, never been popular, and then all of a sudden she was the envy of her classmates. The other girls kept asking her if she’d done it with him yet. They sounded like a bunch of sluts to me, but they made Caitlin feel inferior. Like there was something wrong with her or like Ty didn’t really care about her that much.”
“She told you all this?”
“Not all at once, but over time. She made up her mind to have sex with him so she could say she’d done it. I told her I thought that was a stupid reason but her mind was made up. She wanted proof that Ty liked her. Then before anything happened, she found out Ty and another boy had something going. It totally freaked her out.”
“Something going? You mean a homosexual relationship?”
“Right.”
“Did she say who the other boy was? Rob Hardy, by any chance?”
“Rob, yes, that’s it. He was jealous and told Caitlin about himself and Ty, probably to hurt her and send her packing. He certainly succeeded in hurting her.”
So that explained the argument between Rob and Caitlin. As well as Ty’s discomfort with her questions about Rob.
“Ty didn’t want anyone to know about him and Rob,” Jordan explained. “Hey, do you think Ty killed Caitlin to keep her from telling anyone?” Jordan paused. “Or maybe it was Rob who wanted to get rid of her.”
Or the both of them, Rayna thought, not for the first time. “Did she mention her stepbrother, Adam?”
“Some. Not like with Ty, though.”
“What’s the gist of what she told you?”
“It seemed like they got along pretty well. In fact, after what happened with Ty, she joked that maybe she’d lose her virginity to Adam.”
“Did she?”
“Not that she ever told me. That doesn’t mean it didn’t happen, though.”
“Does the name Karen Holiday mean anything to you?” Rayna asked.
“No.”
“Terri Lowe?”
Jordan shook his head. “Who are they? Friends of Caitlin’s?”
“Two more girls from Paradise Falls. Terri’s missing. Karen was murdered.”
“Oh, man. You think the same guy’s involved in all of them? Guess I was wrong about Ty and Rob then.”
Unless the killings weren’t related. Why did Rayna keep coming back to that possibility? Maybe because it made sense.
Chapter 46
Rayna was driving back to Paradise Falls when Hank called.
“Seth Robbins is demanding to meet with you,” he said. “Claims it’s important.”
“Important to him or to us? Oh, never mind, I’ll be there in about an hour.” She had the fleeting thought that after her visit to his office, Robbins might show up with his lawyer to accuse her of harassment, but quickly dismissed it. Even Seth Robbins couldn’t be that much of an ass.
“How’d it go with Romeo?” Hank asked.
“Not the way we’d hoped.” Rayna gave Hank a quick rundown of her conversation with Jordan, including what he’d told her about Ty Cross and Rob Hardy. “I think we ought to get them both in once more and play them off against one another. Maybe we’ll get some answers.”
“That ought to be fun. I wonder how Ty’s going to handle his dad hearing about his sexual exploits with Rob.”
“Yeah, well, that’s Ty’s problem. Maybe if he’d been truthful early on, he wouldn’t be in that pickle.”
“I’ll tell Robbins you’re on your way.”
The freeway was clear and moving at the limit, but Rayna didn’t push it. She was in no hurry for a confrontation with Seth Robbins.
Robbins was waiting for her at the station. He was alone—no attack-dog attorney that Rayna could see—and looked more nervous than angry. They’d no sooner settled in Rayna’s corner of the alcove than he handed her the printout of an email.
“This showed up in my inbox at the newspaper a couple of hours ago,” he explained.
Rayna scanned the message then read it again more slowly.
Dear Mr. Robbins,
Kudos on your efforts to bring to light the repeated failings of the incompetent Detective Rayna Godwin. You must be a smart man, and also a brave man to point out that she’s in way over her head. The woman’s as arrogant as she is incompetent, a combination of traits that never fails to amaze me. But I digress. My point in writing is to say that unless the detective admits she’s a failure and turns in her badge, another girl will disappear in the next forty-eight hours. I know this because I am the person responsible. In case you think this is a joke, let me offer you a bone (sorry, poor choice of words, although rather fitting in a macabre sort of way, don’t you think?). Terri Lowe’s body can be found three miles in from the main highway on Eagle Crest Road just before it crosses the creek. I hope that you’ll publish this email in your Wednesday column. Feel free to invite comment from the ‘good’ detective and the public at large. It should be quite a scoop for your resume, no? You might even find yourself on Oprah.
Rayna’s pulse raced. “Have you been out to Eagle Crest Road yet?” she asked Robbins, passing the note to Hank. Eagle Crest was a winding mountain road that tracked through forest land about ten miles east of town.
“No way. I’m not getting messed up in this.”
“I’d say you’re already messed up in it.” Maybe even part of it. For all Rayna knew, the note could be part of a hoax, another ploy to humiliate her.
“Jesus,” Hank said, looking up from the email. “I hope he’s pulling our leg.”
“How do I know you didn’t write this yourself?” she asked Robbins.
“Me?” Robbins squeaked, managing to sound indignant all the same. “I’d never do something like that!”
“Really. You could have fooled me.”
“You’ve got it all wrong. I’m trying to help.”
“Or deflect our interest in you as a possible suspect. Gosh, the more I consider that possibility, the more likely it is. I resign, we go off looking for some unknown killer, and you wind up a hero of sorts in the press. Win, win, win for you.”
“Look, I know how it might seem but that’s not the case. You’ve got to believe me.”
“Why’s that?” Hank asked.
“It started out as a kind of gimmick for me,” Robbins said, now sounding genuinely chagrined. “Despite what you may think, it was never personal. I rake people over the coals, that�
��s what I do. And my readers eat it up, even when they disagree. I’ve gotten emails from this guy before—he’s the one who told me about your daughter and husband. But this”—Robbins shuddered— “is something altogether different. I’m not going to be a pawn in a game of murder, even if it sells papers.”
Well bully for you, Rayna thought. “You have no idea who sent this to you?”
“None. I swear to God.”
Rayna turned to Hank. “We should have Leavitt see what he can learn about the origins of the email.” She knew the sender’s address would be a dead end, but she was often amazed at what the computer savvy techies in the department could uncover. “And we’d better get a team out to Eagle Crest Road.”
“What should I do about tomorrow’s column?” Robbins asked plaintively, literally wringing his hands. “Should I mention the note at all?”
“I’d prefer you didn’t.” Rayna wondered if Seth’s performance was all an act, and if it wasn’t, how to handle the note. Dear God, she was in over her head,
If only Cody were still here, she thought, and at the same time wondered, where the hell that came from. She didn’t need Neal Cody for anything!
~~~~
It took a team of officers less than an hour to locate Terri Lowe’s remains. She was buried in a shallow grave behind a large boulder about a hundred feet from the road. Her throat had been slit, which was consistent with the coroner’s findings for Karen Holiday.
While the crime scene investigators scoured the surrounding area for clues and the coroner prepared the body for transport, Rayna sat on a fallen log and wondered if she could actually be the cause of all this tragedy. It didn’t make sense, but the emailer was certainly clear about his feelings for her.
Could it be because he thought she was getting close to discovering his identity? Hah, that was a good one.
When the media helicopters began circling overhead and the first press van showed up, Rayna headed for her car. “I’d better notify Mr. and Mrs. Lowe,” she told Hank. “You stay here and keep an eye on things.”
“Shouldn’t we issue a warning that another girl is likely to be taken? We can’t just sit on that information.”
“I’ll talk to the chief. Probably a generic, ‘We have every reason to believe this maniac will strike again soon’ will suffice. People are already nervous as hell. I can’t imagine they can be more alert than they are already.”
Paradise Falls Page 27