by David Gane
“And why haven’t we heard about Gekas on the news?” I ask, and Charlie grabs his phone and scrolls through various social media feeds.
“Nothing. No one’s mentioned a damn thing.”
“So either she’s not really missing or no one knows yet,” I say, and pull out my phone. I scroll through contacts and bring up Gekas’s office number. I call it.
It rings until her voicemail picks up.
I don’t leave a message.
“Try her cell,” Charlie says.
I dial it and immediately hear, The caller is temporarily unavailable … I hang up.
“She could be travelling—“
“Or out of the service area.”
Now Charlie’s dialing a number.
“Who are you calling?” I ask.
“Her boyfriend.”
“Spencer? How do you have his number?” I’ve got a dozen questions and concerns about what Charlie’s doing.
But his rationale is simple. “He’s dating Gekas. You can be damn sure I’m going to check on him,” he says.
Huh. I’ve never known him to feel protective about many people, especially a cop—especially Gekas. I want to say something, but this is not the time.
“What are you planning to say?” I ask.
“Nothing,” he says, flipping on the speaker phone and handing the phone to me.
Dammit, Charlie!
The other end of the line clicks. “Hello?”
My brain scurries to figure out what to say. “Hello, is this Spencer?”
“Speaking. Who is this?”
I expect shit’s going to hit the fan as soon as I say my name, but I do it anyway. “Anthony Shepherd.”
There’s a long pause. “Anthony Shepherd? Ah, yes.” Another pause. “Why are you calling, Anthony?”
Definitely not what I was anticipating. As long as I keep things natural, this might go okay. “Uh. Just wondering if you’ve talked to Detective—to, uh, Maggie lately?”
“She told me she’d be out of town for a little while.”
“Oh.”
Charlie grabs the phone out of my hand, covering the mouthpiece. “Don’t sound so desperate,” he hisses.
“Hello? Anthony?” Spencer says.
“Sorry about that. The phone slipped out of my hand.” I say, though I’m not sure he believes me. “Do you know when she’ll be back?”
“Not exactly. Anything I can pass on to her for you?”
“I, uh, have some information—”
Charlie punches me in the arm and I wince, struggling to hold back the pain.
“I see. Anything I can help with?”
“No, no,” I answer, feeling cornered.
I try to run the different scenarios in my head. If I tell him what we think is happening, it could create unnecessary worry. It’s all speculation at this point, and I can’t even imagine all the trouble we’ll be in if we’re wrong. But if Gekas is in trouble, we need people looking for her—
Finally I say, “Nothing’s wrong. I just wasn’t able to reach her. I was hoping she might be with you.”
He’s not convinced. “Anthony, I don’t really know you, but whatever you’re up to, I’m sure Maggie would likely tell you to stop and let her do her job.”
I’m pretty sure she would too—if I didn’t think she was already in trouble. “Okay. Thanks anyway,” I say, before hanging up.
Charlie stares at me, anxious to know what was said.
I stare back at him. “We need to find Gekas.”
chapter 114
Charlie heads for the stairs, but I don’t move.
“Come on, Shepherd. We’ve got to go.”
“Wait.”
“What? Why? Harriet might not be here, but pretty soon that neighbour’s going to realize we’re breaking and entering.”
I ignore Charlie, though. Until we know where to find Gekas and Harriet, we really have no direction.
“Is there any way to track Gekas’s phone?” I ask.
“Nothing I can do now. I tried getting into her phone a long time ago, but she was too crafty for me.” His hint of admiration makes me smile.
“If we tell the cops, can they do anything?”
He considers. “They might be able to see where her phone last contacted cell towers. They’ve probably also LoJacked her car, so they could track her with that.”
“And we could warn them with an anonymous call?” I’m still worrying about the consequences if we’re wrong. Not only will we be in a heap of shit, but Charlie would probably get booted to some juvenile facility. But neither do I want Gekas’s life in only our hands. The more people looking for her, the better.
“I know a good payphone. No cameras around or anything,” Charlie says.
“Okay. Anything else we can do?”
Charlie runs a hand through his mop of hair. “Let’s flip this. What do we know about Harriet?”
“Besides that he’s a psycho stalker, kidnapper, and possibly ruthless killer?”
“Yeah, besides that.”
I scan the room, looking at the bookshelves. “He teaches—” I catch myself “—taught biology …”
“After we’re done with him, he’s not going to be doing much of anything anymore,” Charlie murmurs.
I try to ignore that and keep listing what we know. “He seems to like the sciences. He’s divorced.”
“His wife is from Winnipeg,” Charlie adds.
“And he’s from …,” I trail off, heading for the desk.
“What?” Charlie demands.
“Statten said he’s from a farm north of the city,” I say, pulling open drawers only to find them empty. I race down to the second floor and into the room with the moving boxes.
Charlie appears at the door behind me.
“If you were hiding or on the run,” I ask him, “where would it be your first instinct to go?”
“Shit,” he says, realizing, crossing to a second box and tearing off the lid. “Home.”
“Look for anything. Pictures, ID,” I say.
“You find me a relative’s name—parent or grandparent—and I can track down an address for you,” Charlie says, grinning. “I can get access to every land title, every owner. Even if he tried to change the name on it, I can tell you any property owner all the way back to 1884, and whether they still owe money on it.”
I shake my head. “Seriously, how did you survive without the internet last summer?” Despite the seriousness of the moment, Charlie’s dependence on all things technological amuses me.
He ignores my question, though, and pulls out a thick folder full of bills. He’s flipping through it when he exclaims, “Man, that explains how he paid for the condo.”
He shows me a stack of credit card bills. Every one of them is maxed out and months behind. Mixed in with them are notices from collection agencies.
“He must’ve applied for every loan he could find and just kept borrowing. Aw, hell …”
“What?
He hands over a bank document.
“What’s this? A loan agreement?” I ask.
“Look at the name of the bank officer.”
I flip through the pages and scan to the bottom. “Aw, hell …,” I say too.
The bank signatory is Paul Gulley.
“Victim number one?” I ask.
Charlie nods.
“So, the first guy is the bank officer that gives Harriet a—” I turn to the front of the document, “wow, a fifty-grand loan, which Harriet then doesn’t repay.”
“Then he kills a student he got into an altercation with—”
“But he taught Rudy years ago—”
“Maybe he held a grudge. Doesn’t matter. Harriet’s connected to both of them.”
“What abo
ut the third victim?” I ask.
“Who knows? Maybe he went on a date with Harriet’s ex. Whatever, we’ve got a pattern forming: revenge.”
“Which maybe explains the others, but what about Mike?”
“Maybe they had a run-in. Maybe Mike rubbed him the wrong way—”
“Or maybe he went after Mike to threaten us.”
Charlie quickly dismisses this. “Doesn’t matter. He chose to do it.”
“And now he’s got Gekas, the lead detective on his case.”
“No better motive than that.”
I continue to dig into the boxful of loose items, finding old computer equipment—a keyboard, a mouse, and a rat’s nest of cables. Beneath it are several old wristwatches and an old wallet. I open it to find an expired driver’s license, along with a social insurance card, and an old credit card.
“I think I have something,” I say, handing over the ID.
“Elias Harriet. Born 1931.”
“Harriet’s father, maybe?”
“Sounds about right.” He pops open his phone and starts tapping and scrolling through pages.
If Harriet has Gekas, I don’t know how long he’ll keep her alive. He kept his other victims for only days, a week at most, before killing them. And we don’t know how long she’s been missing.
Whatever Charlie discovers about Harriet’s father in the next few minutes we’ll need to act on immediately. There can’t be any second-guessing. We might choose wrong—wrong place, wrong direction—but I’m certain that doing nothing would be the worst thing we could do.
“Got it. It’s—dammit!—his farm is almost an hour and a half out of the city,” Charlie says.
“If we’re wrong, we risk Gekas’s life, and get in a whole ton of shit—”
“And if we’re right, we save Gekas, and stop the bad guy—”
“And still get in a whole ton of shit,” I finish.
“Either way, there’s no going back.” He shrugs. “Your call, boss.”
I don’t even need to think about it. “Let’s go get Dad’s car.”
chapter 115
We hurry downstairs, but instead of going through the back, we step out the front door to avoid Harriet’s neighbour. We don’t need him slowing us down. Once we’re on the street, we race straight for home.
I’m hoping Mom and Dad haven’t come home yet. Not only will they be pissed that we aren’t obeying orders, but they’ll shut down our plans completely. No taking the car, no driving out of town, no trying to find Gekas. Sure, we’ll be in deep shit for everything we’ve done so far—Charlie will be sent away and I’ll never see the light of day again—but I just hope that if they’re home, we’ll be able to convince them to go after Gekas. Right now, every second counts, and we still may not have enough time.
We arrive at the house, and thankfully my parents are nowhere around. I rush in and grab Dad’s car keys.
“You know there’s no way we’re going to get away with this, Shepherd,” Charlie says, echoing my thoughts as we climb into the car. “Your parents are going to come back while we’re out. We’re going to bury ourselves with this.”
“Since when did you become the voice of reason?”
“Since you started crossing the line,” is his immediate response.
I hit the garage door button and start the car. “It’s the right thing to do, and you know it.”
He nods. “I do. I’m just not used to you being the one to tell me.”
I slide the car into reverse and we pull onto the street.
chapter 116
Charlie guides me to a phone booth on Albert Street across from a Dairy Queen. It’s an old-style one, closed in on all sides, with a door that folds open. I’m a little surprised to learn that one still exists.
“Trust me,” he says, indicating the area. “Not a single camera around.”
“How do you know these things?”
“A kid got cold-cocked here by a couple of thugs last spring and they took his wallet. I tried to help him out.”
I feel bad. I always expect Charlie’s knowledge to come from some illicit thing like a drug deal. “Did you ever figure it out?”
“Nope. Couldn’t find an image of them or of the attack.”
I can hear the disappointment in his tone. He’d really wanted to help.
“Anyway, go make your call. I’m going to grab us a couple of coffees and food for the road,” he says, pointing at the 24-hour doughnut shop across the street.
I step inside, closing the door behind me. I don’t need change, since all emergency calls are free, so I dial, and the operator picks up quickly. I give minimal information, telling the woman on the other end that it’s important she contact the proper people and locate Gekas. The operator wants me to stay on the line and answer more questions, to know why I think the detective is in trouble, but all I want is to end the call and go.
When I see Charlie walking back, I stumble out a thank you, and hang up.
“All good?” Charlie asks, handing me a coffee. “Done our due diligence?”
“Good enough.”
“Then let’s roll.”
chapter 117
We follow Albert Street north out of the city until it merges with Highway 6. As we leave the city limits, I feel the uncertainty of this decision weigh on me. What was it Charlie had said: No way out of this? No way to go back? As the downtown office buildings shrink in the rearview mirror, I feel quite certain he’s right.
Fear rises in my gut, but I push it away.
Charlie’s quiet in the passenger seat, sipping his coffee, checking his phone. He cracks open the box of doughnuts and takes an apple fritter before offering them to me.
I grab a maple.
He takes a big bite and savours the flavour. “I’m not really a fan of chain bakeries, but after being stuck in the house for as long as we have, I’m willing to take anything.”
He falls silent again.
I can’t stop thinking about the cage in Harriet’s house.
“Harriet’s a small guy,” I say.
“Uh huh,” Charlie answers.
I think back to Harriet’s class. He always wore a suit jacket, button-down shirt, no tie. “I never thought of him as particularly strong.”
“Okay.” Charlie twists in his seat toward me. “So, what’s on your mind?”
“Mike’s a big guy—”
“Which is why he shot him in the back of the head.”
The thought makes me cringe. I hate talking about my friend this way. But I need to keep working it through.
“So then what? We don’t really know where he was killed—” I say.
“Correct. All we know is that it was sometime after his meeting with Autumn—which may very well have been the reason he died.”
I stare down the long, straight highway, considering this.
Charlie continues, “Since we know where he ended up, you’re wondering how Harriet got him there if he’s too small to carry him?”
I nod.
“Could explain why Harriet finishes his victims the way he does.” He takes another sip of coffee. “All of them had to be above 160 pounds. That’s a lot for anyone to deal with. Maybe he needed to dismember them to move them.”
Mike’s one of those victims, and I struggle to keep from imagining his chopped-up body. I force the thought out of my head. I can’t get emotional. I need to keep my wits and help Charlie. Gekas is our priority now.
I clear my throat. “It’s messy work. Has to be lots of blood.”
“Plus the privacy you’d need to do it,” Charlie adds.
“Plus once in the bag, you’re still dealing with the same amount of weight—”
“Well, minus about seven percent from blood loss.”
I stare at him, disgusted that he knows th
is sort of gruesome detail.
He shrugs off my look. “So, say a 160-pound dude, that’s—” he runs the math in his head, “only over ten pounds’ blood loss. Not a lot of difference.”
“So, he has to haul the bag the body’s in to wherever he’s going to dump it.”
“Or use a wheelbarrow. Or take them a piece or two at a time.”
All these thoughts are revolting, and I don’t want to think of them in connection to Mike, so I focus on the practicality of whether Harriet could even pull it off. “And that takes him more time, with more chance of being discovered …”
“What are you getting at, Shepherd?”
“Something’s not quite adding up. It still feels like we’re missing something.”
“We usually are,” he says, matter-of-fact.
He’s right. We’re usually running full steam ahead with half the information, trying to dig up our answers as we go. If Gekas’s life weren’t at risk, I would definitely try to find out more before heading into danger.
“We’re doing the right thing, aren’t we?” I ask.
Charlie picks up another doughnut. “I don’t know, Shepherd. But I trust your gut, and if you say this is what we’ve got to do, then I’m willing to follow.”
I’m astonished by the compliment, and he notices.
“Aww, Shepherd, don’t get all blubbery just because I said something nice.”
I smile and shake my head, secretly thankful his smart-
assery saves me from having to come up with a response.
chapter 118
As we dip into the river valley, Charlie grumbles, “Shit, service is getting spotty.”
“How will you ever survive without the internet?” I say sarcastically.
“You can be a smartass, but I need it to direct us to the house,” he says sharply.
When we come up the other side, the signal returns. Barely.
Charlie opens the glove compartment and pulls out a road map. “Good thing your dad’s old-school.”
He digs through the centre console and grabs a pen. Studying his phone, he starts sketching out the path to the farmhouse while giving me directions. “Turn right here and drive down this road for about ten miles.”