‘I… I guess not.’
Baxter continued to study her as he spoke. ‘You’re FBI if I remember correctly. Before that a detective, prior to which you were a police officer.’
‘I was.’
‘So you’ll know how to conduct an interrogation.’
‘Of course. Only in this case, with no formal status to call upon, I think we can safely assume it will be more of an interview. A reluctant one, at that.’
Baxter gestured with his hand rocking from side to side. ‘Semantics. First of all, you won’t get to say word one to any of them without making them believe it’s official. You need to understand that going in. Or did you imagine they would willingly volunteer to speak with you? Guilty or not, the kind of boys they are, with the kind of parents they have to stand behind them, either you got authority on your side or you got nothing.’
Sydney took a breath, blew it out through her nose. ‘That has the potential to go all kinds of wrong, sir. One call to local PD or the sheriff, or worse still they decide to involve a lawyer, and it’s over. I’m over, too.’
‘You’re thinking about it all wrong. You’re talking about a head-on collision that doesn’t have to happen. No, for something like this you have to come at them sideways.’
‘You mean approach them away from their homes and away from the reach of their parents.’
‘That’s precisely what I mean. If at all possible. If not, then you look to… finesse things in a way that best suits you and not them. I know these boys, Sydney. And what I don’t know I can find out.’
‘Like you found out about my detective and PD background.’ Sydney drew his eyes to hers. She let them crinkle as she smiled. ‘When I called you, I mentioned I was an FBI agent. None of the rest. You did some digging into me, Mr Baxter.’
He nodded. ‘I did. I figured I needed to know more about you if I was going to help you.’
Sydney angled her head, frowning. ‘Help me? But how did you know I’d come and see you or even contact you again?’
‘Dylan Cole, Mitchell Copping, and Luke DeVeer. I planted those three seeds, Sydney. I knew you’d be back to pick the fruit.’
At that point, Sydney was unable to decide if Duncan Baxter was a bit of an old kook, an irascible curmudgeon who enjoyed making life tougher than it needed to be, or toying with her for sport. She decided it was possibly a rough mixture of all three, but she had come here to have some light shed on these boys, and that was what she intended to leave with.
For the next hour they discussed the students Duncan Baxter believed were much more capable of committing a school shooting massacre than Kevin Muller had been. Or perhaps more to the point, the recently retired teacher spoke and she listened.
Cole would be a tough nut to crack, Baxter insisted. The young man was both street-wise and protected by the shadow of his father’s position within the police department. At school, everybody understood that if you took Cole on, he would most likely best you. The boy was intelligent, not afraid to be spiteful and conniving, and physically he also fit the bill. A hardened brawler, willing to use any part of his body to get the job done. An opponent had all that to get through, only to find that if they happened to emerge triumphant, Cole had a father capable of providing the final devastating blow in one of many forms.
A boy by the name of Hale Newsome, whose own appetites matched those of Dylan Cole, had once pounded Cole into submission in full view of fellow students. Newsome had only defended himself, yet Cole’s father intervened afterwards to ensure the boy received a permanent exclusion from the school. That same night, somebody attacked Newsome as he walked home from the cinema, leaving him bloodied and bruised, with two broken eye sockets. Nobody ever said out loud that Cole’s father was involved, but neither would they have been surprised to hear that he had been.
As for Mitchell Copping, there was a boy with a deep and abiding love of guns and all kinds of weaponry. A dairy farmer by trade, word on the street suggested Copping’s father was also a dedicated survivalist, a man who had little belief in government or its laws. The youngest of three brothers, Mitchell was already being spoken about as an enthusiastic hunter and a true follower of his father’s dogmatic anarchism. He was both feared and revered by other students, and consistently tried living down to his reputation.
‘I never did get a full bead on the Coppings,’ Baxter admitted. ‘I know they run some kind of survivalist compound up there on their land, deep into the woods. A lot of men come and go it would seem, often staying for weeks at a time. That farm of theirs also provides a living, for sure. But I’ve never been able to figure out how they came to be so comfortably off, if you know what I mean.’
‘You’re thinking they have another source of income, one they may not report to the IRS.’
‘Perhaps. Not that I have a clue what that might be.’
In some ways, the DeVeer boy was even more problematic than the other two, Baxter revealed. The cocktail of wealth and entitlement was a heady one. There was nothing Luke ever wanted that he did not eventually get, no kind of situation his father’s money could not buy his way out of. Luke’s arrogance often spilled over into open hostility, at which point his sadistic nature came to the fore. At the drop of a hat, both legal and privately secure barriers a foot thick and cast from steel would go up around the boy and his entire family, protecting them against any kind of intrusion. The DeVeers were an island unto themselves if they chose to be.
‘And they will if you go knocking on their front door,’ Baxter assured Sydney. ‘Even in your line of work, I doubt you will have ever encountered people like them before. It’s not only about their wealth, nor the way they look down on others, either. To me, they are sociopaths. They do whatever they want to do, act however they want to act, behave however they wish to behave, all without the slightest feeling for anyone who stands in their way.’
‘So how would you suggest I approach Luke?’ Sydney asked. She had one or two thoughts herself, based on experience. Yet she was willing to admit to being out of her comfort zone. Local knowledge was worth its weight in gold, but current local knowledge was right up there with platinum. Saddened at the notion of having to rely on someone else’s insight when this town was also her home, Sydney refused to allow the disappointment eating away at her insides to obstruct her overall objective.
Baxter turned the words over. ‘How do you approach Luke? Like you were a baby gopher and he was a rattlesnake.’
‘Seriously.’
‘I am being serious. If I were you, Sydney, I would forget about Luke DeVeer until you’ve looked into the other two boys. Hopefully you’ll find evidence to suggest it was one of them. That way you’ll never have to meet with those awful people.’
‘How come Luke is not being privately educated?’ Sydney asked. Incredible wealth usually bought incredible advantage.
‘The boy wanted to stay close to home. At least until he moves on to college. He’s not the brightest bulb on the Christmas tree, but Daddy will probably donate a library or whatever it takes to get Luke an ivy league place.’
Sydney had finished her coffee, and was staring hard at Baxter. ‘Okay, we’ll circle back to him if we have to. That leaves me with Cole and Copping. Cops and survivalists. What a choice. And here’s me without my banjo.’
Baxter grunted. ‘This is no backwoods redneck paradise, Sydney.’
‘I realise that. I lived here most of my life, remember. Though I can’t say any of these names are familiar to me.’
‘They wouldn’t be. They’re not Moon Falls stock. Other than Cole.’
Sydney tapped a finger against her temple. ‘Of course. Dylan I don’t know, but I do have a vague recollection of having met his father at some point.’
‘Cop blood all the way, there. As for the Copping family, they moved here only a handful of years ago I’d say. Bought up a struggling dairy farm and seemed to make a decent fist of it, though I was not the only one hereabouts to raise concerns about their survivalist shit. The DeV
eers are much more recent, and tend not to socialise with us mere mortals.’
‘Either way, sounds as if I have a job on my hands getting anything worthwhile out of them.’
‘They’re instinctive folk, but they are also thoughtful. I told you who these boys were. I never said it was going to be easy getting to them.’
‘So what if I don’t?’
‘How d’you mean?’
‘What if I can persuade Benton Lowe to carry out his own investigation? If anyone has the authority around here, he does.’
‘You think the sheriff is going to stick his neck out? One of the people who shot Kevin Muller dead. You see him taking on all that trouble just to pull the rug from under his own feet?’
The more she thought about it, the less likely it sounded. Especially given the way Benton had reacted towards her. Sydney blew air through her lips. ‘In that case, I’m thinking my best hope here is to speak to either Cole or Copping when they are well away from their families. The high school won’t do, either.’
Baxter nodded. ‘Remember, I told you I know these boys. I also dug deeper on them, too. How about I brew another pot of coffee and we put our heads together, see if we can come up with a plan? All is not lost.’
If she didn’t know better, Sydney would swear she saw a smile on Duncan Baxter’s face. The retiree was beginning to enjoy himself. The problem for Sydney was, she wasn’t sure if that improved her own situation or made it worse.
Twenty
The sheriff’s department took up a section of the Tuolumne County Justice Building on the corner of Lower Sunset Drive and Yaney Avenue in Sonora. As it continued on down the hill, the structure expanded from a single storey to three, including the jailhouse. The grey edifice to the front made way for beige stucco along its entire length at the sides. To the left of the entrance stood a small raised deck, a wooden table and bench integrated into the outdoor rest area. Benton Lowe double-parked alongside a patrol vehicle sitting in his designated spot opposite the decking, and tipped his cap at a bunch of people currently occupying the benches. A couple of them smiled and gave him a nod of greeting in return.
When he walked into the department, Benton homed in on deputy Sam Grayson, who sat at his usual desk talking on his cellphone with his back to the door. Benton loomed behind the man, who was oblivious to the wide-eyed warnings he received from two fellow deputies seated opposite. After ten seconds of listening to one side of a call so inane Benton questioned Grayson’s appointment to the job, he reached out, snatched the phone from the man’s hand and held it to his own lips.
‘He’ll get back to you,’ Benton said, before disconnecting and tossing the cell onto the top tier of a set of wire trays used for stationery.
‘Afternoon, Sheriff,’ Grayson said, holding his pose as if he were still engaged in the phone call. ‘This is a surprise. We weren’t expecting you.’
‘Clearly.’ Benton took out his keys and slammed them down on the desk in front of the deputy. ‘Okay, listen up, Sam. I have a very important job for you. One befitting a man of your expertise and talents.’
Eyebrows arching, a smile teased its way across Grayson’s thin lips. ‘Yes, sir. I’m your Huckleberry.’
Benton looked down at his feet for a moment. Deputy Grayson consistently acted as if he were starring in a movie. His entire demeanour and manner of speaking was suggestive of someone not at ease fulfilling the role life had handed him. Quoting lines from movies as if they were examples of his own wit and wisdom was one of the man’s many faults. Benton liked to call him on it as often as possible.
‘Sounds very much like Val Kilmer to me, playing Doc Holliday in Tombstone,’ he said, enjoying Grayson’s obvious discomfort. ‘Anyhow, what I need you to do for me is this: take my keys, shift my vehicle along so that you can move yours out of my space. Then you park mine right where it ought to be.’
‘Where do I park?’ Grayson asked, rolling his eyes. ‘There’ll be no spaces left at this time of day.’
‘That’s easily resolved. First thing, when you return those keys of mine, I also need you to fetch me a nice, fresh hot cup of coffee. Upon depositing that coffee on the 49ers coaster on my desk, I want you to leave the building, jump back into your vehicle, and get your ass out there on the streets. Next call comes in is yours, and I don’t care if it’s a cat struck in a tree or an axe-wielding maniac on the loose downtown.’
The gleam having left his eyes, Grayson rose, snatched up the keys and stomped out of the door without another word.
One of the two deputies looking on raised his eyebrows in greeting. ‘Did you not get your fruit and fibre this morning, Benton?’ he asked.
Beside him, his companion chuckled. As did the sheriff, who gestured dismissively. ‘I swear that guy parks in my spot just to annoy me.’
‘To be fair to Sam, he ain’t lying when he says we weren’t expecting to see you here today.’
‘Always expect the unexpected, Adrian.’
‘I guess it’s knowledge like that makes the difference between being a sheriff and a lowly deputy like me, huh?’
‘That and my irresistible personality.’ Benton smiled as he strode towards his office. He paused and turned by the doorway. ‘Where’s Isaac at?’
‘Taking a suspect over to the PD building. Should be heading back about now.’
‘Suspect?’
‘Yeah. That car-jacking in Columbia.’
‘Okay. When he comes in, tell him I want to see him right away.’
‘Yes, sir.’ The deputy threw in a mock salute.
Benton took a seat behind his desk and woke up his computer by shifting the mouse. He typed in his username and password, navigated his way through the system of folders, before opening up the case file attached to the Moon Falls High School shootings. In the section of notes to the foot of the document itself, there was an underlined link to another file. He clicked on it, and a second page opened up on screen. He drew a deep breath and began to read Dexter Muller’s statement, taken by Benton himself following their brief meeting in the library office.
Though he had not been straight with Sydney about the file, he recalled forwarding it on to the FBI field office in Sacramento. He had not marked it for the attention of the SAC, but had assumed it would eventually work its way up to Doman. Admittedly he had subsequently dismissed it from his mind, but as far as he was concerned he had acted according to regulations. This would be the first time he had looked at the document since typing it up.
Nothing he read there took him by surprise. Benton allowed his thoughts to drift back to that awful day of the shooting – by far the most horrendous of his career so far. He recalled that it was Sam Grayson who had notified him of the nightmare in progress. When he showed up at the school, the first responders in the shape of three deputies and four PD officers, were already sealing off the scene and had established contact with the Principal, Edwin Zelaya. By this time the gunfire had stopped, but the shooting had created a chaotic, fluid and complex situation in and around the campus grounds.
All school staff had received training for this kind of incident. They were taught to escape if possible, but not to set off fire alarms as they made their way out of the building because of the potential to create panic. If unable to escape, then hiding was the next priority, though as teaching staff were at pains to point out, when there are thirty people in a room and only flimsy desks and chairs to hide behind, this element of the plan becomes moot. Only as a last resort were they to fight back, by throwing anything they were able to lay their hands on at whoever was attacking them.
Benton shook his head. Scenario-based training was better than no training at all, but having delivered many of the sheriff-led sessions himself, he was also aware that nothing prepared you for the shocking reality of an actual real-life attack. Some people rose to the occasion like heroes, while others lost control of their senses and bodily functions. For others, self-preservation was a human instinct they found impossible to resist
.
He had witnessed it all for himself across the entire campus that day. As many people ran haphazardly from the building yelling and screaming at the top of their lungs, as emerged in orderly lines keeping their emotions in check. Some children even wandered aimlessly around the courtyard as if having no idea what was going on, what day it was, or even where they were. Stupefied by fear, their tether to reality had completely come unfastened.
And then along came the lone figure, approaching from the left-hand side of the main school building. He was about halfway across the quad when Benton noticed him. Tall and lean with a purposeful stride, dressed in dark clothing, including a black woollen ski-mask, and carrying an open holdall over his left shoulder. A perfect match to the description provided by those who had encountered the gunman during the shooting. Though not entirely, Benton thought as he re-read the statement. Remembering the moment in vivid detail, there was one thing missing from the portrayal he and other law-enforcement officers had been given.
The handgun.
The figure striding casually towards them that day had not been carrying anything in his right hand. At the time, with everything that was going on, senses overloaded with heightened sight and sound, Benton Lowe had thought nothing of it. Afterwards, when analysing with a cooler head and no imminent danger for him, his deputies, police officers, school staff or students, still he had not questioned this specific detail.
Now it was there. Front and centre of his mind. Begging for him to both ask and answer it.
Why would the gunman not confront them with a firearm already in his hand?
The “Thank You” card he had ultimately reached for suggested Kevin Muller had emerged into the daylight that day intending to commit suicide by cop. Yet, if that was his true intention, there was no more certain way of ensuring it than holding a handgun and not tossing it away when instructed to.
As it was, the masked figure ignored all demands for him to stop. Did not even put a pause in his step.
So it was right to question why he had approached with no weapon at the end. Even if it was empty. The threat alone would have been enough to secure the fate he had chosen for himself. Until this moment, Benton had spent zero time contemplating the anomaly. Having done so, it nagged at him and refused to stop.
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