Now it made sense.
“Jillian discovered that the federal government, in cahoots with Genevive Labs, took advantage of her family. She said they formed a backroom partnership. They scammed the Foxworth family out of land that they never intended to sell.”
Halliday needed to learn more about the Foxworth family. For now he had to stay on course. “Did Jillian have much experience with hunting rifles?”
“No, not at all. A few months ago Jillian met an avid outdoorsman. She fell head over heels for him. He talked her into joining a hunting club. She hated guns. Jillian said she never touched the rifle after their sudden breakup. Jillian did not shoot herself. She believed anyone who took their own life would be committing the gravest of sins.”
“Do you know the man’s name?”
“I never met him. Jillian gave him a nickname, Jack as in ‘Lumber Jack.’”
“Forensics will determine the role the rifle played,” he said. “She purchased it. She joined a hunting club. It doesn’t help your cause that she had the rifle available with ammunition.”
“Wait, she wouldn’t keep live ammunition around. She never intended to fire the gun ever again. I know that.”
“I’ll look into it.”
It occurred to him that their conversation could be recorded by the cell phone operator. Thanks to Homeland Security’s paranoia Chief Brayden could authorize the wiretap and listen to it later. Officials at Genevive Labs didn’t have the authority. They didn’t need it with the chief in their pocket.
“What is it detective?”
“Listen, time is running out. We need to meet now.”
“I’ll call you back within two hours.”
She hung up. He dialed another number.
Voices chattered in the background. Brayden said, “Make it quick John, I’m in the middle of things.”
“Chief, have you determined what ammo the rifle required?”
“It’s .30-06 Springfield. We haven’t found any ammo besides the spent cartridges. No empty boxes; nothing. See what you can find there at her residence.”
Laurel was right. Jillian didn’t have any ammo.
“Genevive security said they have camera footage of you here at Santa Reina Hot Springs early this morning. What gives?”
He didn’t understand how he had missed one of the cameras. “I arrived near midnight after obtaining verbal permission from Jillian Andrews to go through her property to gain access to the rear of Genevive’s property. I left the property by 2:00 a.m., escorted out by Genevive security. From what I understand the fire didn’t begin until this morning. What have you found?”
“It looks like a suicide. Miss Andrews’s friends and coworkers swear she’d never do it. I have no evidence that points to homicide.”
“Chief, when I questioned Jillian yesterday she said Genevive attempted to cover up for poisoning the underground water system. She feared for her life.”
“I’ve interviewed the Genevive techs who were here this morning. They swear they came to notify Miss Andrews that the public spa would be reopening next week. They said the water from her spas tested negative for contamination. Now if you have concrete, plausible evidence to the contrary let me see it. Otherwise, we have nothing. By the way, I want your full cooperation with Brad Palmier. Understood?”
“Yessir.”
“Complete your investigation. Forward the report ASAP. Look for any evidence in regards to the hunting rifle.”
The chief hung up. Halliday wanted to hurl his phone against the block wall fence. The dog looked up at him, wagging its tail. He said, “Go get it pooch,” and slung a rock at the garage.
The dog looked up at him, tilting his head.
Palmier and Genevive Labs’ cheap shot attempt to link him to the fire at the hot springs showed their true colors.
Chapter Twenty Seven
Rich Gladstone, the quarterback, stood under the Walnut tree, tossing stones to imaginary receivers. “Everything okay Halliday?”
“I talked to the chief. Look for ammo for the rifle used in the shooting.”
Gladstone stood, awaiting instructions.
“You begin in the main house. I’ll join you in a few minutes.”
Gladstone stomped out the spent cigarette. He walked off in the direction of the car to gather tools for the investigation.
Halliday picked the guest house lock in seconds. The door creaked when he opened it.
The window drapes had been pulled to, shrouding the small living room in darkness. A distinct odor put Halliday on full alert. He slowly shut the front door behind him.
He flipped on the light switch.
A canoe stretched across one of the walls. He lifted one end. In the corner of the small living room were boxes of dehydrated food packs for Laurel’s treks inside the earth. Could the odor be food packs rotting out? He saw no evidence.
Ropes hung from wall hooks by claws. Rock climbing tools lay in a large pinewood box stretched along another wall.
Laurel must have spent hours reading on one end of an old corduroy upholstered couch. The end tables were stacked with books on caving, canoeing, physics, chemistry and wilderness survival. A mug holding a dry shriveled tea bag sat on the coffee table.
Halliday put on latex gloves. He sifted through some 5x7 photos on the coffee table. One photo stopped him cold. It could have been taken any morning at Noah’s Bagel across the street from his apartment. She had managed to capture a spiritual quality in his face. It looked like the work of a professional photographer, who after taking masses of photos discovered that one special shot. He put the photos in an evidence bag that he stored in his inside jacket pocket.
He lifted a large book off the end table. Journey to the Center of the Earth by Jules Verne. An odd choice for a young woman. However, the Verne classic was the ultimate spelunker story. He opened the cover to the note on the front page:
“Happy Birthday Laurel. I hope you enjoy this treasure that introduced me to life’s possibilities. My father gave it to me on my sixteenth birthday.
Love, Daddy.”
Is that your next project, Laurel, journeying to the earth’s core?
Her mystery continued to haunt him. The photo bothered him. He would have noticed a stunning brunette snapping photos from across the room at Noah’s Bagel. The technical expertise behind her photo of Palmier and his secretary in bed had been equally inexplicable. To accept Laurel’s anonymous activities required blind faith, contrary to a detective’s method.
The small, ordinary kitchen produced extraordinary evidence. A tiny plastic envelope containing SIM cards lay on a small dining table. His phone number had been scribbled on a yellow pad. He removed the first half dozen pages and stuffed them in his pocket.
He placed the SIM cards in a small evidence bag, which he stored in his jacket pocket.
Several boxes of Cheetos crackers lined a shelf on the wall. He opened the refrigerator. A half full casserole dish had been smothered with melted cheese. He closed the refrigerator door. The kitchen wasn’t the source of the foul odor.
The faint but unmistakable smell of rotting flesh caused him to wheeze as he stood at the door leading into the bedroom. He had no doubt now that a dead body resided inside. It had been there for some time. Because of the odor, the perpetrator must be long gone.
Halliday removed his gun while he scanned his surroundings.
His heart pounded. His finger rested on the trigger of his gun pointed at the floor. He listened.
Nothing unusual. With his left hand he grasped the door knob. He slowly rotated it until the latch freed. He gave the door a slight nudge and stepped back.
The foul odor flooded his senses. He instinctively raised the Glock, placing his weight on the balls of his feet.
He wiped his brow with his free hand, his breathing restrained. It couldn’t be Laurel’s body. Who else?
One swift kick caused the door to fly open.
A grotesque creature rushed straight at him!
Halliday gagged. He staggered backwards, stifling the impulse to fire several rounds. The shadowy object retreated just before it reached him.
A hideous dead animal swung in the doorway.
Halliday maneuvered around it as he rushed into bedroom, his Glock leading the way.
Curtains on an open window waved at him.
The adjoining bathroom was empty.
Halliday stuck his head out the window, gasping for fresh air.
He pushed his handkerchief to his nose and returned to the door. The eerie sight caused him to cringe as he struggled to regain his composure. The deformed animal hung from a hangman’s noose. The creature had six legs that drooped from a scrawny body. An ear had been replaced by a horn-like protrusion. One of its bug eyes hung an inch lower than it should have. It appeared as if the animal—a goat? A calf?—had been terrorized before its demise.
He had seen the results of strangulation before. The animal’s eyes held the same terror. It must be the result of biotech run amok, courtesy of Genevive Labs.
Halliday figured this horror show had been staged for Laurel, or her imposter. He took some quick photos with his cell.
Chapter Twenty Eight
At the main house Halliday ignored Jillian’s oak framed sign, PLEASE REMOVE YOUR SHOES.
Gladstone stood in the living room eyeing a bookcase. “Find anything Halliday?”
“Nothing of importance. What about you?”
Gladstone held up a ring. “Spare keys from inside the desk over there.” He gave Halliday a long look. “You sure you don’t need to see a doctor. Your face is as white as a sheet.”
“I’ll be all right.”
The interior of the spa manager’s house didn’t belong to a member of the hunting club. Jillian’s living room covered a niche of the color spectrum from pink to red. Everything had its proper place. She had owned an impressive collection of dolls from all over the world displayed in a glass cabinet. It needed the soundtrack from the Disneyland’s, “It’s a Small World.” He couldn’t imagine Jillian’s woodsman enjoying the rose sofa strewn with pink pillows.
Gladstone held up his gloved hands. “Not a spot of dust on them.”
“Jillian was a tidy lady,” Halliday said, putting on his gloves. “It’s hard to believe that she stuck the barrel of a hunting rifle in her mouth. It would make an incredible mess.” Having said that, he realized anyone was capable of doing anything given the right circumstances. Gladstone, out of inexperience, didn’t argue the point. Halliday had learned that psychiatric disorder often accompanied suicide. That left out Jillian. Suicide required more guts than murder. He suspected Jillian had guts, though.
“Look at this.” Gladstone removed an eight by ten framed photo from the case.
The young detective grasped the frame with both hands. He pushed it toward Halliday for him to get a closer look.
“It’s Jillian Andrews. The man must be her father.”
Gladstone headed down the hallway to investigate the bedroom.
Halliday examined Jillian’s modern, cheerful study. A laptop computer sat on a large oak desk. Behind it, an oak cabinet covered the entire wall. Dolls stood on books. Jillian had apparently been to Asia. He recognized teakwood elephant carvings. Various Buddhist images promised peace of mind. In the opposite bookcase sat blond haired dolls from Europe.
Halliday powered on the laptop.
It requested a password.
He lifted the lamp, ran his hand under the desk pad, and under the front of the desk. He found a business card with account passwords. None of them were the password for the laptop. He placed the card in his wallet.
On an uncluttered wall, she had hung her degree from Stanford University. Beneath it a single line framed adage by Norman Vincent Peale read:
“Never talk defeat. Use words like hope, belief, faith, victory.”
No, Jillian hadn’t committed suicide.
“I found something,” Gladstone yelled out from the master bedroom.
Halliday finished up in the study. He found nothing of importance. The girl had been so damned organized that it would be easy to detect anything out of the ordinary. He headed to the master bedroom.
In the bedroom, Gladstone lifted up what appeared to be a letter by the corner. “Read this.”
The scribbled, unfinished letter from Jillian to her father didn’t fit her neat image. Several lines were crossed out. The despondent girl, after breaking up with the woodsman, wrote that they were winning. She wanted to leave Santa Reina Hot Springs to start a new life. She apologized to her father for her lack of success. She didn’t elaborate. Scribbled along the bottom of the page were the words, I’m so sorry for dear Laurel.
“That’s a despondent woman,” Gladstone said, as he placed the letter in an evidence bag.
Halliday thought it odd that a woman so neat and tidy had such poor penmanship.
“What do you think?”
“No doubt the person who wrote this was despondent,” he said. “Let’s not jump to conclusions. There’s much more going on here than it appears. Do we have any other samples of Jillian Andrew’s handwriting for comparison?”
Her office had probably been torched. “We may find more samples of her handwriting at the spa.”
“I’m planning on heading out to the hot springs,” Gladstone said. “I’ll check on it.”
Halliday said, “Did you find a safe or a lockbox anywhere?”
“No.”
“That’s odd,” he said. “Did you find a jewelry box?”
“On the cabinet against the wall. There’s nothing of value in it,” Gladstone said. “Believe me, after marriage you develop an expertise for gem stones.”
“When I saw Jillian yesterday she wore real pearls. You saw the photos in the living room cabinet. This girl enjoyed wearing expensive jewelry. So what did she do with the good stuff? The jewelry should be in a lock box or safe. I think we need to look further. I couldn’t find the password for her laptop, either.”
They made a thorough search. Twenty minutes later Halliday smacked his hand on an expensive cherry wood dining table. “There’s no safe or lock box in this house.”
“I’ll check her office when I go over to the hot springs,” Gladstone said. “You want I should check the guest house again for a safe?”
Gladstone didn’t need to know about the creature in the doorway. “No, I gave it a thorough search. By the way, make sure that you or Leo check the interior of Jillian’s vehicle. It should be in the parking lot at the hot springs.”
Gladstone wrote down another “to do” in his notebook. Then he gave the living room a final look. “Anything else?”
Halliday shook his head. “No one’s been here since she went to work this morning. Why would she leave a crock pot with a chicken simmering if she hadn’t planned on returning?”
“Which brings up a question,” Gladstone said, “Are suicides planned or impromptu?”
The kid was beginning to use his noggin. “Jillian didn’t impress me as the spontaneous type,” Halliday said. He wondered how her union with the woodsman had begun. “Let’s head back to the office. My car is parked in the lot.”
“Did you sweep the garage?”
“I took care of it along with the utility room.”
“Okay, let’s pack it in.”
He locked the front door behind Gladstone. “When you see the chief ask him if he found out where Jillian obtained the ammunition for the hunting rifle. There’s no ammo here. If possible, we need to prove Jillian did or did not purchase the ammo.”
“Got it,” Gladstone said. He removed his notebook again as they walked off to the car.
“You draw up the report.” He didn’t give Gladstone the SIM card evidence or the photos from the guest house.
“Not much to report besides the letter. I mean, it’s not a homicide.”
Halliday shrugged.
“I’ll get on it when I get back to the office later.”
&
nbsp; “I’ll send you a voicemail if I have anything to add from the guest house. All you have to do is print it out.”
Before they got in the car Halliday said, “Did you receive any feedback regarding the MPs?”
“I’ve got a possible lead. Merced PD reported a missing vagrant. The witness, a bus driver, retracted his statement. I’ll run up there tomorrow.”
“These missing persons may be linked. If this case escalates, if the media gets wind of it, it could blow up in our face.”
“I noticed Tommy Hartnett has been nosing around.”
“Don’t underestimate Tommy,” Halliday said. “If Genevive is somehow involved with the MPs Tommy’s an asset to us.”
The young detective regarded Halliday like he had just dropped a pass in the big game. “You said the MPs were linked. Does that mean we are now considering it the work of a serial killer?”
“No, not a serial killer. I’m thinking all these missing vagrants have something in common. That’s all I can say for now. As I mentioned, you’re going to need me to back you up on this when it breaks. Keep me posted, okay?”
“Roger, Halliday,” Gladstone said as he dipped his head. “What the hell does all of this mean? Murdered transients? A suicide that makes no sense at all. The U.S. government in the cattle rustling business?”
Halliday understood the young detective’s quandary. “That’s our job, to figure it all out. Let’s get out of here.”
The kid laid rubber as they headed back in the direction of Santa Reina.
Chapter Twenty Nine
At close to 4:00 p.m. Cindy’s diner languished except for the shuffling feet of the waitresses. A bald, well-dressed civilian whom Halliday didn’t recognize sat alone in a booth, reading a newspaper. Halliday walked past him to a nook in the corner where reporter Tommy Hartnett sat scribbling on a yellow legal pad.
Halliday slid into the nook, with his back to the wall. “What’s up, Tommy?”
The reporter dropped his pen and said, “John, I went out to Santa Reina Hot Springs today.”
Transparency: Bio-Tech Cavern Secrets Untold Page 16