Remnants

by Carolyn Arnold

  She came back with a piece of paper, which she handed to me.

  Her name was Patty Haven, and I was already dialing her as we left the restaurant.

  -

  Chapter 33

  IT’S A GOOD THING TRAVELING didn’t bother Paige. Jack was sending her and Zach all over the countryside with this case. The GPS indicated that they were five minutes from the Lewis household where they’d be talking to Tanya. They’d called ahead so she was expecting them.

  Paige frowned as they pulled up to the house. It was big—two stories and probably three thousand square feet—and the couple hadn’t had kids so that meant Tanya lived in this huge house all alone now. Somehow that made Tanya’s situation feel so much worse.

  Luckily, the front door opened for them by the time they got up the walk, and she couldn’t dwell on it any longer.

  “Agent Dawson?” asked the woman just inside the door, presumably Tanya.

  “Yes, but please, call me Paige.” She smiled. “And this is Zach.”

  The woman nodded. “I’m Tanya. Thank you for coming.”

  Paige glanced at Zach before walking in. Tanya was calm and collected considering everything she’d been going through.

  They took seats in a living room stuffed with photos. There were framed ones on the walls, on the fireplace mantle, on the end tables. And on the coffee table in front of the couch where Paige was sitting, there was a homemade wedding album. It had been covered with satin, lace had been hot-glued around the edges, and another piece of lace was being used to tie it shut. The pictures around the room were mostly of both Tanya and Elijah, except for the ones on the mantle, which also showed a younger man on his own. Paige guessed they must have been childhood photos of Elijah, as the resemblance was unmistakable.

  “You said on the phone that you wanted to talk about Elijah.” Tanya crossed her legs, remaining extremely calm.

  “You reported him missing three months ago from Columbiana Centre, is that correct?” Paige asked.

  “That’s right. If I hadn’t been so stubborn about dragging him along that day, maybe he’d still be here.” Tanya looked Paige in the eye. “The police told me he’d left me, wanted to start a new life, but none of that made sense.”

  “Why’s that?” Paige asked.

  “Everything was going great for us. And I mean everything. We won this house in a lottery a few months before. He’d recently been promoted at work. We were talking about having a baby.” Only with that last statement did her strength seem to crack slightly.

  Zach leaned forward, putting his elbows on his knees. “Can you run us through that day?”

  “There was a major shoe sale going on… I love my shoes.” She forced a small smile. “I told Elijah that we could make a real outing of it—go shopping, have a nice lunch out, and spend the night at a hotel. Columbia is about two hours from here so it also makes for a nice getaway. I told him the day would be my treat. We keep our accounts separate,” she apparently felt she needed to add.

  Paige picked up on the present tense and a stab of sympathy struck her. “Where did you last see him?”

  “I sent him to get us cinnamon buns.” She bit down on her bottom lip. “If I had known he’d never come back, I would have happily forgone the bun and kept him with me…”

  “And where were you?” Zach asked.

  “Trying on shoes.” She attempted a smile again, but it faltered partway through.

  “What time of day was this?” he continued with his line of questioning.

  “About noon.” Tanya apparently didn’t need to think her response through. “By the time twelve thirty came around, I was really starting to panic, wondering where in the hell—oh, sorry for that. I mean, where he’d gone. I tried calling his cell, but it kept ringing and ringing.”

  “Did he ever keep it on silent?” Paige inquired.

  “I don’t think so. His parents are older, and he always wanted to be accessible.” Tanya’s energy dipped now, and she continued in a more somber tone. “Going through all this is killing them.”

  “Understandably,” Paige sympathized. “You seem to be holding yourself together rather well, though.”

  “Only because of Him.” Tanya pulled a crucifix out of her pants pocket. “God, Christ—they give me strength.”

  “It’s nice that you’ve been able to find some peace through all this,” Paige said.

  “I just have to keep the faith that he’ll come back to me.” Her eyes lowered to the cross she pinched in her fingers. “If he doesn’t, well, then that’s something I’ll have to deal with, I guess. But it never hurts to hope.”

  “No, it doesn’t.” Paige’s eyes drifted to the mantle. “Are those photos of Elijah?”

  Tanya brightened at that. “Yes, they are.”

  Paige got up and walked over to take a closer look. The pictures captured Elijah in different poses, but there was a theme. “He must have loved his sports,” she said.

  “That he did,” Tanya replied. “Especially baseball. He was a really good pitcher, too, or at least that’s what he told me. His parents said so, too, but parents always think their kids are amazing. Look at those talent shows, like American Idol. Whoa. Kids come on there to audition after being told by everyone around them that they are the best, and then they croak like something’s dying.”

  Paige chuckled.

  “Did he ever go on to play baseball as an adult?” Zach asked.

  Tanya turned to look at Zach, who was walking toward her and Paige. “No. After he broke his arm, he wasn’t much good at pitching anymore.”

  Paige’s gut twisted. The anthropologist had said that the arm found on Monday had been broken when the victim was a teenager. She took a steady breath. “When did he break his arm?”

  “He was in his teens. I’m not sure exactly when. I could ask his mom, though.”

  Paige put a hand on Tanya’s. “No need.”

  Tanya’s eyes widened. “You know something, don’t you?” She started rubbing her crucifix.

  The truth must have touched Paige’s eyes. She was quite certain that they’d found Elijah, or at least a part of him, but it was too early to say for sure. The doctor who had treated Elijah would hopefully be able to provide an X-ray of the break so the anthropologist could confirm the ID. If not, they’d be waiting on DNA. Either way, the verification process wouldn’t be a fast one.

  “Honestly, Mrs. Lewis, I don’t,” Paige said. “But I will be in touch if we learn anything.”

  Tanya studied Paige’s eyes and eventually nodded.

  “There is one more thing we need to ask you.” Paige proceeded to take out her phone. She brought up a picture of Stanley Gilbert and extended it for her to see. “Do you recognize this man?”

  “No.” Tanya dragged out the word. “Why are you asking me this?”

  “Another woman’s husband has gone missing from a mall, as well, and—”

  “The poor thing.” Tanya was rubbing her cross. Paige wasn’t sure if she was referring to the husband or the wife.

  “She’d seen this man in a janitor getup,” Paige continued. “He had a mustache.” She’d kept the photo held out for Tanya to look at, and her gaze drifted there.

  Tanya shook her head. “I’m sorry, but I’ve never seen this man.”

  “Did you spot any janitors when you were there that day?” Zach asked.

  Tanya took a deep breath, her chest heaving with the effort. “Not that I remember.”

  “Sometimes we can be so focused on what we’re doing, we don’t think we notice what’s going on around us. Usually we remember more than we think.” Zach paused. “What about any man that you saw more than once?”

  Tanya took her time mulling over her answer to that one, her eyes cast down at the floor. Suddenly they shot up. “Actually, there was one. I saw him at the front doors to
the mall, and then I saw him again at… Oh, where was it? I don’t remember which one, but he was standing outside one of the stores.”

  “Did he seem to notice you both times?” Zach asked.

  “He was holding a book, flipping through it.” Tanya looked at Zach. “But yes, yes, he did.” She pointed to Paige’s phone. “But it wasn’t that man.”

  Paige pulled up a picture of Jesse Holt and showed it to Tanya. “What about him?”

  Tanya looked at the photo and shook her head. “I wish I could say yes.”

  Paige put her phone away.

  “Can you remember what he looked like?” Zach asked.

  Tanya curled her lips. “Nothing really stood out about him.”

  “What about hair color? Skin color? Height?”

  “He was a white man. I think he had brown hair, and I’d say he was at least six feet tall.”

  All right, so that would describe a lot of men in America. But still, it gave them more confirmation that Stanley Gilbert wasn’t working this alone.

  Paige and Zach managed to excuse themselves a few minutes later.

  When they were back in the SUV, Paige said, “We found her husband’s arm—I just have a feeling.” She adjusted the air-conditioning vent so it wasn’t blowing directly on her.

  “You can’t be positive until the testing is done,” Zach reminded her as he drove them back to Savannah.

  She was well aware of that, but there was such a lightness that came with the thought of providing closure to someone. The people who missed these men deserved to have that, to know what had truly befallen their loved ones, no matter how ugly it was. But in the meantime, Paige would take what she could, and for now that was a description of their second unsub, no matter how generic it might be.

  -

  Chapter 34

  STANLEY HATED IT WHEN THINGS didn’t go according to plan. It made him nervous and uneasy, his stomach full of butterflies. Such an odd expression…

  Why was he back in Savannah? He must be insane. He’d left everything behind, and he’d made a run for it to be free and clear. But he’d only made it as far as Nashville before he’d heard the news. Body parts were being pulled from the Little Ogeechee River.

  He remembered how his breath had frozen when he’d heard that. Talk about fortunate timing that he was out of reach, but it was his knack for attracting bad luck that had made him toss his phone in the river that day. That’s probably why they wanted to talk to him. Yes, they’d found it, that was all. Or that’s what he was telling himself…

  When he’d ditched the phone, he thought he was making a bold statement that he didn’t want anything to do with his life anymore—at least not the one he’d been living. Darla was enough to tip him past the breaking point, and abducting men, although not something he did for himself, did bring him some stress relief. In the kidnapping scenario, he held the power. He wasn’t browbeaten. A man could only withstand being chastised, manipulated, and disciplined for so long before he had to get the anger out of his system somehow.

  He had planned to go to his parents in Michigan until he’d heard the news about the remains. If the investigation came to his door, his parents’ house would be one of the first places the cops would go. No, there was no sense involving them, and when he’d seen his face on the news, he was assured he’d made the right decision to stay away from them.

  Being wanted by the FBI left him with two choices: go back and defend himself, or keep running. Both had benefits; both had weaknesses.

  He didn’t trust himself in the face of experienced Feds, but he also wasn’t equipped to keep running. He’d always had a stable home life, even if it had become skewed over the last few years.

  He tried to downplay the Feds’ interest in him, but the words nationwide manhunt were being used and he didn’t like the sound of that. The Feds must have had proof of his involvement.

  How though? How had they figured it out?

  A taunting rhyme rattled through his head: What a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive.

  That could sum up the last four years of his life. The FBI must have just started pushing until they found the holes and then picked at them until they revealed the evidence they needed. By now they likely knew everything, and it was in his best interest to stay far away from Savannah. So again, what the hell was he doing back here? Curse his sense of responsibility.

  Stanley pulled into the driveway, and his anxiety ratcheted up further. Tremors laced through him, trying to warn him that he was making the wrong decision. His mind was screaming, Run! But he ignored it and continued up the lane, parked his vehicle, and let himself in.

  The house was quiet and felt empty.

  “Hello? Anyone home?” he called out.

  The pinch came to the back of his neck, and his legs instantly weakened. He fumbled around for something to hold himself up and ended up leaning against a column. He had to get out of there before it was too late. He hadn’t come back to die.

  Shit!

  “Why?” he cried.

  His words met with no response. He sensed a shadow looming above him, and as if it suffocated him, it took all his strength and he fell to the marble floor. If he could look at his attacker, hopefully he could get them to feel something, to stop.

  But his eyelids fell closed, and he knew then that he’d made a deadly choice.

  -

  Chapter 35

  GARRETT’S FACE FELL WHEN HE saw us and Pike. He was probably getting about as sick of seeing us as we were of seeing him. There was far too much death so close together, and it threatened the sanest and most seasoned people in law enforcement.

  The roadside remains were laid out on two gurneys—the skin on one, and body on the other. It was a lot easier handling the sight of it here than it had been in the ditch with insects buzzing around. But it was nine o’clock at night, most of the building was empty, and it was dark outside, making it a little more unsettling than usual. I didn’t think there was ever a good time to be next to a cadaver, though, particularly when it had been mutilated.

  Garrett turned his back on us and scrubbed his hands before putting on a pair of rubber gloves. His eyes were dark and sullen, no doubt a reflection of the rest of us. “Here’s what I have to tell you so far.” He paused. “I’ve been able to confirm the deceased as an Eric Morgan out of Atlanta.”

  “By his tattoo?” Paige’s voice was small as she guessed.

  Garrett nodded.

  Paige lowered her gaze to the floor, and she touched her cheek. I could sense sadness coming off her in waves. Feeling so much empathy for others was both her strength and her weakness.

  Garrett looked at us each in turn. “I’m guessing this isn’t a complete surprise.”

  Jack locked his jaw and shook his head.

  Garrett took a deep breath and continued. “The body was scoured for insects, and fly eggs were found but no maggots.”

  “They start to emerge after twenty-four hours,” Zach said.

  Garrett nodded. “That’s correct.”

  “So Eric was killed within the last twenty-four hours,” Paige deduced. “But he was taken just over a week ago. What was the killer doing with him all that time?”

  “Pure and simple? He was tortured.” Garrett walked toward the body and pointed at the head. “His tongue was removed.”

  “Yes, we found that out at the crime scene.” Jack’s gaze took on a steely intent. “Was it cut out while he was alive?”

  “It was. I can tell this by the amount of healing that has taken place.”

  There were a few seconds of silence.

  “You said he was tortured…” Paige swallowed audibly. “What else was done to him besides cutting out his tongue?”

  “As with the previous remains, restraints had been placed around the wrists and ankles. An earlier micro
scopic examination showed evidence of healing in some areas. It seems plausible that whatever the killer used to subdue the victim was loosened at times and then retightened.” Garrett turned the body over and directed our attention to the back of the neck where there was still skin. He pressed a finger to point out a small pinprick. “Now, it’s quite tiny as you can see, but I believe this is a puncture wound from a needle.”

  “He was drugged,” I spat.

  “Appears so, but toxicology will confirm. Since the body is less decomposed and—I hate to say it this way—fresher, we’ll have a better chance of knowing for sure. And that’s assuming it was in his system at time of death.”

  “The other remains didn’t indicate the victims were drugged, but it does make sense as a means of controlling them if our unsubs held and tortured them for a period of time.” I was holding on to the opinion I’d come up with days ago.

  “What else?” Jack sounded as if he were ready for more bad news to drop.

  “We were able to conclude from the other torsos and their digestive systems that they hadn’t been fed for days before their deaths.”

  “What about Er— him?” Paige put her hands in her pockets.

  “I will let you know, but I wouldn’t be surprised if it is the same for him.”

  My gaze drifted to the body or what was left of it. It was hard to believe that this had once been a vibrant man in his twenties. “We have an entire body this time, limbs attached…” I made eye contact with Garrett. “Were his limbs removed from their sockets?”

  Garrett nodded. “They were, and given time to decompose, his arms and legs would have become detached just like the other remains we’ve examined.”

  Paige stepped closer to Garrett. “Do you think this was part of the torture?”

  “I can’t honestly answer that without taking a closer look at the body to see if it happened before or after death,” Garrett said softly. “As I’ve been made aware of, the testing for DNA in this case is going to be handled by a private lab. Included in what I’ll be submitting is a swabbing of the back of the deceased skin.” Garrett looked at Zach. His recommendation to do precisely that must have made it back to the chief ME from the roadside crime scene.