Broken Bonds

by Karen Harper

  “I’ve got a flashlight app,” he said, and walked past her to shine it on the wall. When he did, they saw traces of gold or gilt paint had once highlighted the words but had worn away or been scrubbed out.

  “We’ve got the goods on that sadistic, phony cult leader now,” Matt said as they studied the writing.

  The Lord threw Jonah into the sea for disobedience.

  “That supports your waterboarding theory,” she whispered.

  “I’ll bet one of Bright Star’s lackeys slipped up about destroying this hut when they moved, so I pity whoever that is if Gabe can bring charges against that maniac. Let’s take some water from the creek and get out of here.”

  * * *

  At Grant’s house, they all sat in front of the fireplace and listened as Matt explained to Gabe on the phone what they’d found. “Okay, hang on a sec,” he told Gabe. “Yeah, I’ll forward them to you.” He got up from the sofa and moved away into the kitchen. “We were just going to get a water sample. You know, because of that cryptic note Lee Lockwood handed Char. But I guess we should keep the possible water problem quiet for now. I have a friend who can get it tested. We don’t need a panic around here over tainted water when it’s probably not even true.”

  Matt came back in and told them, “I’m going to send him the photos from my cell right now. He’s coming over and I’m going back with him, to show him where it is.”

  “I’m going with you,” Char said. “I saw it all, too. I should be there.”

  Grant put his arm around Kate. “She’s as stubborn as you are, my love,” he told her.

  “A Lockwood trait,” Kate said, and kissed his cheek.

  “That’s for sure,” Grant said. “Kate’s lecturing on her Adena mound finds at Penn State this week, and that’s quite a drive. I told her to shut down the dig for a few days and take Kaitlyn with her since I can’t get away, but no, she has to keep things going here and head out on her own in this weather tomorrow.”

  “Grant,” Kate said, “I’ve trekked all over Europe and driven on the wrong side of the road, as we say, in the Highlands of Scotland, so I can get to the next state and back with no problems. All right,” she added, jumping up. “The least I can do is fill you two up with more hot chocolate and sandwiches before you head out again. Not only is Tess still going to feel nauseous but she’ll be so ticked off to be missing all this. I’m glad I was in on this much before I leave.” She headed to the kitchen.

  “One other thought in all this,” Char said, talking privately to Grant while Matt was working with his phone and Kate was in the kitchen. “Speaking of family ties—I know your brother Brad works for Royce and is close to him. And, like Matt said, we need to keep this quiet right now.”

  Grant narrowed his eyes. Char hoped he wasn’t going to take offense about her not trusting his brother, but, like Orlando, Brad seemed loyal to Royce. She felt bad vibes about Brad Mason, though she couldn’t exactly explain why.

  Grant cleared his throat. “Brad’s had some setbacks in life, but he’s doing well, riding high right now, using his people skills working for Royce Flemming and EEC. But you’re right. He’d tell Royce right away. What worries me is, if he finds out later that we’re in collusion, he’ll probably take it real personally with his big bro. The two of us are still patching up our relationship, but Kate and I will keep this info privileged right now. I appreciate your asking me straight out instead of asking Kate to tell me.”

  Grant left to help Kate in the kitchen as Matt came and sat next to Char. She spoke in a quiet voice. “Are you sure you want to wait to have the water tested before you tell Royce there could be a problem? I asked Grant to keep it from Brad, but he was uneasy with that.”

  “It needs to be our secret for now. I’ll move as fast as I can. My friend in Columbus is a state geologist. I’ll ask him for a personal favor. I know he’ll keep it quiet, too. Then, if anything looks strange, we’ll have it done again—officially.”

  He’d said we, but she wasn’t sure if that included her.

  * * *

  Matt wished Char had not come along with him and Gabe, but he knew anything that could help to spring her family from Bright Star’s hold was important to her, and a cult torture chamber would sure make headlines. It was probably just his nerves, but again he felt they were being watched. He found himself looking ahead, back—especially up on the ridge—as much as Gabe did.

  The shack was just as they’d left it. “Not a place for cutting up meat,” Gabe observed when he looked inside. “If it was for butchering game, there would be bloodstains on the table and floor and these rags would be a mess. And, yeah, that quote is pure Bright Star,” he added as he swung his flashlight beam over the words. “You know, I saw a place where someone had been waterboarded when I was serving in the Middle East. It was pretty crude, too, but similar.”

  “I checked on the carved words,” Char said. “They aren’t a straight biblical quote, but it would link someone being waterboarded to Jonah being almost drowned for disobedience before he was swallowed by the whale. And, I swear, Bright Star sees himself as God or the Messiah—he’s that messed up.”

  “Either delusional or deceptive, but dangerous either way,” Matt put in. “But, if Bright Star’s behind this, the belly of the whale is that prison cult, and people don’t get out after three days and three nights.”

  Despite feeling warm from their hike, Matt shivered and not from the cold. If this sort of thing was going on inside the cult, Char and her sisters would be even more panicked to get their family members out.

  “So, will you go question Bright Star about this?” Char asked Gabe.

  “Yes, and he’ll probably deny it and give me some mumbo jumbo.”

  “Could I go along?”

  Gabe looked at her instead of frowning at the bizarre scene. “Not if I’m on official business.”

  “I told her I’d go with her,” Matt said. “Even if you were out of uniform in a civilian car, he’d see you as the enemy.”

  “Anyone who bucks him is his enemy,” Gabe said. “I never thought this kind of thing was in his bag of tricks. He’s usually into mind control, but this has to tie to him and his wackos. I’m going to look around outside. The photos you sent me were good, Matt. Wish I could put you on salary,” he added as he stepped outside and they followed. “I need a second deputy with the local growth and influx of outsiders around here.”

  “I can talk to Royce Flemming about lobbying for one, maybe even helping to pay for it.”

  Gabe turned back to face Matt. He stopped abruptly, and Char bumped into his back. “Thanks for the offer, but your boss has made that suggestion already—twice.”

  “I didn’t know that. And?”

  “And, no offense, but I turned him down. Conflict of interest, even if he got me a retired or off-duty cop. Royce’s money talks. A lot of the new problems around here stem from the fracking teams or tensions between the locals who’ve had the windfall of fracking money and those who haven’t. There’s a lot more being shattered around here besides shale. And now we’re going to have more upheaval with the Green Tree people protesting to rile everyone up. I feel like I couldn’t protect Woody McKitrick and now I’ll have to keep an eye on Lacey Fencer and her crew—but I’ll find the extra help I need.”

  “But you do think Woody was killed?” Matt asked. He’d come to that conclusion, and it both angered and scared him.

  “In my gut, especially since you two found his cap and the drag marks, even as far as they were from where he fell. But I can’t prove it—yet—not with his catastrophic injuries from the fall.”

  Matt nodded and watched Gabe walk around the structure in a tight circle, then farther out, staring at the ground, just as he had in his backyard after the fire last night. Char took Matt’s arm and stood close; he clamped her elbow tight to his ribs. H
e wasn’t sure if it was a good or a bad sign that he could read her thoughts. Catastrophic injuries from the fall. Matt, that could have been you going off the cliff near Coyote Rock.

  They both jumped when Gabe cried out from behind the shack. “Oh, no!”

  “What?” Matt yelled and started around the corner toward him.

  “Stay back! Don’t come closer in case this area is another crime scene!” Gabe shouted. “Get me a tree branch or something to clear away the snow, will you? Just throw it to me.”

  Matt searched under nearby trees and found a broken limb. Char stood nearby, squinting in the brightness to see what Gabe was standing over as Matt yanked the branch free. It was long enough he could almost hand it to him, but he heaved it at his feet. “What is it?” Matt demanded.

  “Just a sec.” Gabe retrieved the branch and brushed snow away with it. “Oh, damn. Under the snow, leaves and some soil—a shallow grave with a brown-haired person buried in it!”

  Char gave a little scream. “Lee has brown hair!” she cried. “Could Bright Star have found out about the note he wrote me and had him tortured until he confessed—then had him killed?”

  16

  Matt threw an arm around Char’s shoulders to prop her up. Eager to see what Gabe had uncovered but scared to move, she leaned against him. “No, wait!” Gabe shouted. “I— Sorry. It’s a dead beaver buried here. More than one. Shot, I think, five of them. Covered like that, the head on this first one, it looked like human hair.”

  Char nearly collapsed in Matt’s arms. Gabe was not the only one who had jumped to conclusions. Thank God, it wasn’t a human—not Lee or anyone else. But why so many beavers shot and buried when their fur was valuable?

  “Just some lunatic taking potshots?” Matt asked, still hugging her. “Can we come closer?”

  “No, don’t. It’s still a crime scene. It’s not trapping season and there’s a big fine for off-season kills. Maybe someone was just drunk or gun happy. Or upset with how the beaver dams are changing the pond here, messing with the way things were.”

  “Or,” Matt said quietly to Char, “shooting animals to protest the fracking above.”

  “That’s a terrible thought,” she whispered. “But it’s nothing next to someone trying to hurt or kill you to warn Royce. How militant is that Green Tree group that’s supposed to be coming here?”

  Gabe overheard that as he headed toward them. “They’ve been around here before protesting Grant’s lumber mill cutting trees but they weren’t violent. Still, when I researched them, I learned they’ve been known to follow some of the more aggressive tactics like the better-known Greenpeace uses. I hope we don’t have to deal with protests like stopping supply trucks or sabotaging equipment. Look, guys, I need to order a necropsy for at least one of these carcasses—an animal autopsy. It may take a while, but I’ve got to know if it was the gunshot that killed them or something else.”

  “Like something in the water?” Matt asked.

  “Fracking’s still in its infancy here in Ohio,” Gabe said. “There have been problems. That’s a guess right now, but could be. It will take a while for me to get the necropsy results back, so keep me updated on possible water contamination from your sample. Okay? You can probably get results faster than I can.”

  Char’s head snapped up just as if someone had slapped her out of a daze. “You two are actually thinking contaminated water killed these beavers? I mean, Matt said he saw one dead on the creek bank the other day, but why would someone shoot them then—and bury them?”

  Gabe shrugged. “I hope not to hide that they died of contamination—or were suffering from it so they were put out of their misery. We’ll have to keep an eye out here for sick or newly dead animals. Lots of game would drink from the water here, but since the beavers live in it, maybe they’d be hit harder first. It’s all a guess. But with the usual noise from up above, no one would hear a shot—or five.”

  “Sorry to say this,” Matt said, “but I’m hoping it’s just some sadistic nutcase. Besides, if the water was tainted from fracking runoff above this site, we’d see dead fish and frogs, turtles, too.”

  “This time of year they hang out on the bottom and barely move,” Gabe said. “They might not float, or being lower means they’ve got purer water. But would a poacher or someone out just for the fun of picking off beavers bother to bury them?”

  “The Hear Ye people used to hunt down here—maybe they still do,” Char said. “Maybe they shot these, then someone came along—like Matt earlier. They didn’t want to be caught, so they buried them. Matt, you said you heard a shot when you were down here and there is, or was, a tree stand you saw where the shooter could hide. And it’s apparently gone now, so maybe he tried to cover up using that, too, since trapping beaver is off-season.”

  “Char, I know you don’t trust the Hear Ye robots,” Gabe said, his voice stern. “Neither do I, but don’t you think, if it was Bright Star’s hunters, they’d actually eat beaver? They’ve obviously even left their pelts here. Now I’m going to call someone to come and collect one of the beavers. These look like fresh kills, and it’s been cold enough they haven’t rotted and don’t stink—yet. Then I’m going to visit someone who is rotten and stinks to high heaven, the illustrious Bright Star Monson.”

  “I know what you’re thinking,” Matt told her quietly as the two of them trudged through the snow out of the valley. “But let Gabe do his thing first, and don’t you go near that old lunatic asylum unless I’m with you.”

  * * *

  When Matt drove his truck back home with Char holding the precious Cold Creek water sample, he saw the Green Tree protestors were out in full force along the highway at the entrance to the Lake Azure community. What really ticked him off was one sign among the usual KILL THE DRILL placards. It read, FLEMMING IS FRACKENSTEIN.

  Matt pulled in past the landscaped entry, sorry for the first time he’d talked Royce out of making this a gated community. At the time he’d been worried it sent the wrong, elitist message to the locals, but lately they could use the extra security. He stopped the truck, pulled over onto the berm. “Stay here and hold tight to that sample,” he told Char. “I’m going to tell them to keep off the property and see if I can get them to move to the EEC office in Columbus or the largest fracking site here instead.”

  “You mean the old Hear Ye cult grounds? All we need is them hearing about dead beavers.”

  “Yeah, well, they don’t belong here. They’re standing on private property. This investment of Royce’s is separate from the fracking. I’ve tried to make certain of that.”

  He slammed the truck door louder than he’d meant to and strode back toward the highway. What a hell of a day—a week, except for finding Char.

  “Good afternoon,” he called to them, seven protestors to be exact, four women and three men. They got even more animated when they saw him coming. Several vehicles passing on the road honked as if in sympathy—or to protest the protest.

  “I’m Matthew Rowan, general manager of the Lake Azure community. Can I ask who’s your spokesperson? The private citizens who live here have nothing to do with fracking.”

  “That’s a good one,” a burly man said. “Royce Flemming, CEO of EEC, lives here and is here!”

  “He lives in Columbus but is visiting here. You need to take your protest to his corporate offices in Columbus or to a fracking site. This is private property.”

  “He needs to know how citizens feel about their environment—especially in a natural, beautiful place like this!” one woman insisted. When she yelled nearly in his face, the strong scent of her clove chewing gum wafted toward him. “And I’m Lacey Fencer, the spokesperson here.”

  “Lacey, glad to meet you,” Matt said, thrusting out his hand. She ignored the gesture. “I know and admire your cousin Joe Fencer. I just hired him here as a groundskeeper. You see, we d
o care about keeping the environment beautiful.”

  “He’s my second cousin, but he just sold out to the enemy,” she insisted. Compared to the others here, she was really made up, green eyeshadow and crimson lips. Everyone wore coats of synthetic material, no leather or even faux fur, of course. Their signs were all professionally printed, except for the burly guy’s attacking Royce, which was lettered in block print with some sort of big marker pen. Matt noticed that the burly guy must be chewing tobacco, because he turned away and spit a stream of the brown stuff into the snow. If this bunch wasn’t new to town, he would have asked him if he was chewing Red Man.

  Matt fought to keep his temper. “With that huge fracking site across the road from your cousin’s place, I don’t blame him for selling, do you?” Matt asked Lacey. “He was devastated to leave his family farm but he did it for his kids’ future and to keep his family happy. It was a tough, honest choice and should be accepted and honored, not to mention that fracking keeps our country from being so dependent on the evils of foreign oil.”

  “Never mind all that smart, smooth talk,” Lacey said, even louder now, her voice strident. That got her some fist pumps and backup noise from her buddies.

  And Grant Mason was married to this woman once? She was night and day from Kate Lockwood. He admired Lacey for taking a stand to protect the environment, and this area had once been her home, but he wished he could toss them all out in the street. Instead, exhausted and on edge, he spoke in a controlled voice. “Please be sure you keep off the private property here. We like to keep our grass under this snow and our foliage unharmed by intrusion from outsiders—including the pollution of spit from chewing tobacco. If you break the law, I’ll call the sheriff. And be careful of the big timber semis on the road from the nearby mill.”

  He heard Lacey gasp as he turned away and strode back toward his truck. Char, thank heavens, had waited there without getting involved for once. As he turned his back on them, he recalled that Grant had told him just today he had confronted Lacey and her crew when they were picketing his lumber mill last year. And Matt recalled a TV show he’d seen on how some protest groups would go to extremes to draw attention to their causes. He hoped this Green Tree bunch wouldn’t try something crazy like harming animals on their own to draw attention to the evils of drilling. Or could they have done that already?