Lamb held her gaze. “Is that your doctor friend holding up the wall?”
What the fuck?
Her hands grew icy. “Don’t change the topic. These women we found belong to you.” She fought to hide that Lamb had gotten to her, just as he’d planned. Somehow he’d kept tabs on her. And she did not like it one bit.
I’m on a fucking island two hundred miles away, while he is behind bars. How?
“Are you saying you want to tack three more life sentences on top of my six?” asked Lamb. “That seems like a waste of time. Beating a dead horse, so to speak. I have enough convictions. Give them to the guy who killed those three.”
“Then you need to help us understand who could do this. I have to tell you, Jeff. The scenes are pretty darn perfect. The minute I saw the first, I knew it had been you.”
“It’s not me.” Sullen, he targeted Henry again. “I pictured you with someone taller, Cate.”
Enough.
“What is your obsession with me?” she asked. “Is it because a woman helped put you behind bars? Or do you do that with every person who bests you?” She nudged Mike. “Do you follow Agent Scarn too? What color is his cat?”
Silence. Icy-blue silence.
“So it is just me.” She nodded at him. “You need a new hobby, Jeff. This one is rather pathetic.”
Disappointment rolled off Mike. Cate had blown the interview, and it hurt. She’d let him get to her and divert the focus of the conversation.
Lamb gave a thin smile. “I’m glad you don’t work for the FBI anymore, Cate. I think you would have just lost your job.” He leaned forward, his chains clanking on the table, as he held her gaze. “I know nothing about those bodies. I don’t know who or why.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“Then we’re at an impasse. I’ve got nothing more for you.” He glanced over his shoulder at the guard. “I’m done. We’re all finished here.”
“Bryan Sowle.” Cate was grasping at straws.
“Seriously?” Lamb asked. “That idiot couldn’t pull off something like that. I’m insulted you’d even group us together.” The guard unhooked him, and he stood.
“You didn’t pull it off,” Cate pointed out. “We caught you.”
Now I’ve been reduced to throwing potshots.
“Then I’m sure you can find the next guy.” He shuffled to the door. “Good seeing you again, Cate. You really shouldn’t wear such a dark lipstick. Makes you look old.” The door slammed behind him.
Mike turned to her, annoyance on his face. “Did you have fun insulting each other?”
“I’m sorry.” Tension seeped out of her. “I knew I shouldn’t have come. I’m out of practice.”
“Clearly.” He stood up and strode to the door. “I guess I was smart to plan to see Sowle on my own.”
Henry touched her shoulder. “Lamb had it coming. Let’s go home.”
She covered his hand with hers and inhaled deeply, trying to settle her nerves.
Why did I let him get to me?
8
That evening Henry, Mike, and Cate had burgers and beers at Widowmaker Brewery on the island. Henry held back a laugh at Mike’s expression when the server delivered his burger. Amused by the name, Mike had ordered the Big Heart Attack. The triple-patty burger was six inches high and stacked with bacon, sautéed onions, and tartar sauce. A fried egg dripped runny yolk down one side. Mike stared and then shrugged and attempted to take a bite, wincing at the heavy flow of tartar sauce.
Henry had ordered it one time, and once was more than enough.
After the Lamb interview debacle, Cate and Henry had waited outside the prison while Mike had interviewed Bryan Sowle. Cate had been quiet at first as they’d waited, so Henry hadn’t brought up her train wreck of an interview with Jeff Lamb. Then she’d gotten mad, furious that Lamb had spied on her and possibly her family.
Henry was disturbed by the man’s knowledge too.
He’d let Cate rant until she’d run out of steam, and then they’d both relaxed in the sun until Mike had reappeared. They’d left immediately for the airport, and the plane ride had been too noisy to discuss what Sowle had had to say. Back at the island, Mike had suggested dinner, which had brought them to the brewery. After the first messy bite of his burger had left egg covering one hand, Mike switched to a knife and fork and chopped the impressive stack into what looked like a breakfast scramble. He squirted ketchup all over the heap of food and eagerly dived in.
“What was Sowle’s second-degree-murder charge for?” Henry asked, focusing on his less impressive barbecue burger.
“Started as a bar fight,” Mike said around bites. “They took it outside, and Sowle deliberately slammed the guy’s head against a concrete block. The victim never regained consciousness, and at least twenty witnesses were willing to talk.”
Henry could easily imagine the damage to the victim’s skull.
“What was the fight about?” asked Cate. Her burger was stuffed with blue cheese. Henry wasn’t a fan.
“A woman.”
Cate snorted.
“He asked about you,” Mike told her.
“Me? Why? He never said two words to me. Could barely look me in the eye during our interviews.”
Henry grinned. “Sounds like you made an impression anyway. What’s your feeling about him?” he asked Mike.
Mike grabbed a fresh napkin and wiped his lips. “I don’t think he has anything to do with the new graves. He’s not the brightest bulb. When I asked him about Widow’s Island, he said he’d never been to Canada.”
“Ha ha!” Cate covered her mouth, her eyes sparkling.
“He was also living in Montana during the time period we’re looking at. He’d only returned to Washington six months before he was arrested. Doesn’t rule anything out—he could have made trips. But it does move him down the list a bit.” He took another bite. “So I’m not feeling him for the murders. Even the guard commented that Sowle was a little thick in the brain. He hits first . . . asks questions later. I don’t believe he has the planning element needed to do the setup we saw in the state park.”
“That’s how I remember him too,” said Cate.
“When he asked where you were, I told him you no longer worked for the FBI,” Mike told her.
“Good,” said Henry. “Don’t need someone else looking for you.”
“I told him you moved to Canada,” said Mike, popping a fry in his mouth.
Cate nearly spit out the beer she’d just sipped and laughed. “I guess that’s true, by his definition.” She slid off her barstool and kissed Henry on the cheek. “I’ll be back in a minute.” She headed toward the restrooms.
Henry watched her walk away, pleased to see her happy.
“She surprised me today,” said Mike in a lower voice. “I didn’t expect her to let Lamb push her buttons. I don’t think that would have happened a year ago.”
Henry held up his hands. “Has a murderer ever proved they had accurate knowledge of what was going on in your life? Brought up your family? She handled it just fine when he first tried to rattle her, but when he brought up me, that was too close to home for her. He might have just as well mentioned her grandmother or brother. Cate’s very protective of her family.”
“I can’t have her reacting like that. Blew the interview.”
“Well, she feels bad about it, but she doesn’t work for you,” Henry reminded him. “You took that risk when you yanked her back in against her wishes.”
“She wanted it.”
She did.
“She might miss it sometimes, but I think this showed her she’s no longer the person she used to be. It’s not a good fit for her anymore.” He studied Mike’s disappointed face and didn’t care that Cate had let the agent down. She’d stood up for herself. And Henry.
She had new priorities.
“How did he get information about me? About Cate and me?”
“Obviously he’s in contact with someone on Widow’s,”
said Mike, taking a long drink of his beer. He’d been eating nonstop but had barely dented the heap of destroyed burger on his plate. “Might even be the person we’re looking for.”
Henry pondered this. “You think Lamb keeps in touch with someone here who might be his protégé? Or someone suggested it could be a fan. I could see Lamb offering to chat with someone in exchange for information on Cate.”
“I struggle with the idea that Lamb taught someone to do what he did. The guy is a narcissist. He wouldn’t waste the time of day on someone like that. He does it best, and no one else could match. You saw his face when Cate pointed out that he’d been caught. In his mind he’s still leading the game, even though he’s sitting in jail.”
“I had an odd encounter with the sister of Luke Ruell yesterday,” Henry said, trying to imagine the odd kayak-business owner being mentored by Jeff Lamb.
It didn’t add up.
“Ice cream guy?”
Henry told him about the incident. “I passed it on to Bruce. He or Tessa was going to pay Luke a visit.”
“Good.” Mike eyed Henry over the rim of his beer glass. “You and Cate are good together.”
“I know.” Henry didn’t need someone to tell him the obvious—especially not an old boyfriend of Cate’s. But he figured it was Mike’s way of apologizing about getting steamed over Cate’s interview mess up.
“She seems happy.”
“We both are.”
An awkward silence stretched as they both focused on their food. A long minute later, Cate approached along with her brother and Tessa. Each had a pint of beer in one hand. “Look who I found at the bar,” Cate announced. She introduced Logan to Mike, and the men shook hands. “Tessa has an update.”
“I went to Luke Ruell’s home. Bruce told me about your encounter with his sister at your clinic,” Tessa told Henry. “Wendy is an odd one.”
“They’re both odd,” said Henry.
“Turns out Luke had no idea Wendy had gone to press you for information. She made up the sore throat, by the way.”
“I figured.”
“Luke admitted he’d hung around and watched from the woods after we told him to leave that morning. He saw us looking at the other possible grave spots. When he got home, he told his sister about it.” Tessa sighed. “Wendy has a fascination with crime stories. You should have seen her eyes light up when she saw me in my uniform at their front door. She looked like a junkie staring at her next fix. Back home she keeps a police scanner and listens nonstop. She runs a local Facebook page where she posts a lot of the calls from the scanner.”
“Like a crime gossip page,” said Henry, wondering why people had nothing better to do.
“Anyway, I think Luke is just nosy,” said Tessa. “And his sister even more nosy.”
“Did you expand your list of missing persons?” asked Mike.
“I did. I got a tighter age range from the anthropologist and used the years after the date on the quarter, but I broadened the search area. Did the whole state of Washington. Added Vancouver Island and some of the Canadian mainland. The medical examiner says tomorrow his odontologist will have dental workups from the remains and can compare them to my list of women.”
“Do you have old dental records for all the missing?” asked Henry, knowing the dental workups were ineffective on their own unless directly compared to a victim’s dental records.
“I do for nineteen of them. Five I don’t.”
“There’s that many missing women in the area?” Henry was surprised.
Tessa nodded. “I suspect some left deliberately, but with any luck we’ll have some identifications tomorrow. Then we might find some leads on who did this.”
Hopeful, Henry raised his beer. “Here’s to bringing some closure to three families,” he said in a somber tone.
The five of them clinked glasses, determination on their faces.
9
Around lunchtime the next day, Cate was talking to Mike in the bookstore. He’d continued to use the back room to work in, stating that his hotel had weak Wi-Fi and no private work areas. Cate was a fan of powerful Wi-Fi and had installed it in both the bakery and bookstore.
Her phone chimed with a text.
“Tessa wants to know if you’re in the bookstore,” she told him.
“Why didn’t she text me?”
“Good question.” Cate typed an affirmative reply. “She says she’s headed our way.” Minutes later there was an enthusiastic knocking on the bookstore’s back door, and Cate let in her friend.
“We’ve got two positive identifications,” Tessa announced in an excited voice. “The ME is absolutely certain—well, the odontologist is absolutely certain.” She set down her laptop on the worktable, took a seat, and opened the lid. Cate and Mike moved behind her shoulders to see her screen.
“I’ll take two out of three,” said Mike. “Honestly I was afraid they wouldn’t identify any of them. Two is great. We can start to look for connections between the two.”
“I want that third identification,” said Tessa. “It’s possible it’s one of the missing women without dental records. I’ve got Kurt searching for more info that can show up in the skeletal remains . . . old broken bones, et cetera. If that doesn’t turn up anything, I’ll expand the search area again.”
She typed on her keyboard. “Here’s the official medical examiner’s report on the first set of remains. He’s identified her as Nayla Reynolds from Wenatchee, Washington. Twenty-eight. She vanished while taking her five-year-old to the park. The child was yelling for her mother when other parents stepped in to calm her down and help.” Tessa shook her head. “That’s probably going to stick with that little girl for the rest of her life.”
“That’s a farther distance than I expected,” said Cate. “That’s got to be two hundred miles away. He had to be motivated to bring her that far.”
“Jeff drugged his victims to make it easier, remember?” Mike asked.
“That’s right. Did the tox screen turn up anything?” she asked Tessa.
“No. He’s running some additional screenings that look for other compounds, but they take a few days.”
“Was she married?” asked Cate.
“Divorced. The ex was the first person they investigated when Nayla didn’t turn up. Solid alibi. He was getting a three-hour root canal.”
“Not fun,” said Cate. “But excellent alibi.” Mike nodded in agreement.
“They investigated some old boyfriends and old coworkers—she hadn’t worked since she had her daughter. But no solid leads. This happened on September fifth, three years ago.”
“Is Kurt searching by disappearance date too?” Cate asked. “Is he looking for people who vanished on the fifth?”
“He is.”
“Here are her dental records. Top ones are recent; bottom ones are from her dentist. The dentist took these films three months before she disappeared. The ME pointed out how the three fillings in her molars are identical. You can lay one image on top of the other, and even the shape of the teeth will be identical.”
“Okay,” said Cate. “Who’s next?”
Tessa clicked her keys. “Tianna DeLeon. Age thirty-two, from Everett.”
“That’s quite a bit closer to us than Wenatchee.”
“Her car was found at Sea-Tac six days after she disappeared. She went missing on March fifth of the same year.”
“How?” asked Mike.
“Not sure. Her husband came home from work and found their twins crying in their cribs. Dirty diapers. Hungry.”
“Security-system cameras? Neighbors?” asked Cate.
“No cameras. Neighbors’ cameras caught nothing.”
“Vanished into thin air,” said Cate. “Theories?”
“Nothing with any meat to it. Someone could have knocked on the door or grabbed her when she was outside. They’d speculated for a long time that she’d left. She had postpartum depression, and the twins were hard for her.”
“Husband
cleared, of course,” said Mike.
“Yes. At work all day among a dozen other people. His work computer shows he was actively on it for a good portion of every hour.”
“Big brother is watching,” Cate commented. “What about cell phones for both women?”
“Left behind,” answered Tessa. “Again this woman seemed to vanish into the mist. Few leads. No suspects.”
Cate thought about the mist that often hovered in Bishop State Park.
She did end up in the mist.
“And the dental records?” she asked.
“Tianna’s x-rays were five years old,” said Tessa as she opened new images. “Look here.” She pointed at a tooth that was practically lying on its side in the rear of the mouth. “It’s a wisdom tooth, and it matches the position of this one from the medical examiner films.”
“But there’s a filling here that doesn’t match the old films,” Cate said, eyeing a white blob on an upper tooth.
“That’s a crown. The odontologist explained that it likely replaced this silver filling on the old x-rays.”
“But he’s not certain?” asked Mike.
“Correct. But he is certain that these three other fillings are identical, and he specifically pointed out the shape of this premolar. He says it’s very unusual. I’m sure there are other things, but these were the clinchers for him.”
“Do you have the medical examiner films for the unidentified vic?” asked Cate, not sure why she’d asked, since she was no tooth expert.
“I do.” A new image appeared.
“Is she missing teeth?” Mike asked. “Is that what all the gaps are?”
“Yes. The odontologist said she would be easy to match up to her dental records, and he wonders if she rarely got dental care . . . hence the missing teeth.”
“Is she older?” Cate asked.
“No. He’s estimating twenty to thirty-five at the most.”
“Okay,” said Mike. “We’ve got something to work with here. Time to find some commonalities between the women. Do you have photos of them?”
Tessa pulled up several photos. “Nayla on the left, and Tianna on the right.”
Below the Bones Page 5