Dee dragged the kettle to the sink. “Mom’s awake. Doesn’t look like she slept much. Have you had any word about Sandy?”
Lacey glanced out at the blue shadows in the glade. “The SAR teams will just barely have been organized. I don’t expect an update until noon, unless …”
“Unless they find her body sooner. Poor Dennis. He must be frantic.” With the kettle started, Dee brought out her mother’s medication box to sort the day’s pills. “It’s callous to say this out loud, but I’m glad she had one last good Christmas with her grandkids. I hope they can remember that part, not whatever follows.”
Lacey chewed her lip. “Bull thinks Sandy took a wrong turn in the blizzard, but he doesn’t know yet she was going after someone who owed her money. What if that person couldn’t risk it coming out that they’d defrauded the nursing home with a computer script? That wouldn’t be a simple debt collection, but more like blackmail, whether Sandy meant it that way or not. I have to find out how well Arliss Thompson knew Sandy back at that nursing home. Aidan Anders might know her phone numbers.”
“Why not ask Zoe?”
“After I left in a huff yesterday?”
“Apologize.”
“But she knew stuff about me, about my deepest secrets. She’s been spying on me.”
“Or she’s very observant. Or psychic. You know, the ghost …”
“This ghost stuff is a deliberate distraction from something she knows or suspects about Eric’s death. Although she did seem genuinely surprised about the malware. She’s starting a company investigation today.”
“I thought you two were going to hunt for Eric’s car today.”
“I’d have to apologize to her before that could happen.”
“And what are you waiting for?”
Lacey heaved a sigh. It wasn’t the first time she’d had to apologize for jumping to conclusions. She’d once assumed Dee was too high and mighty to want to be friends again. And there was her hurtful sneer about Jan and her mysterious illness only last summer. Now that Lacey knew more about the condition — myalgic encephalomyelitis, or chronic fatigue syndrome — and the current treatment options, her snap judgment back then was even less excusable. Now it was Zoe’s turn. Whether Zoe was getting guidance from the Great Beyond or not, whether she was peering into Lacey’s soul or not, Eric’s car had to be found so that Lacey could see whether those accounting printouts pointed to Arliss. Apology coming up. Again.
“I’ll call her right after breakfast.” As if on cue, her phone buzzed. Again, not Arliss. “Wayne? Happy New Year’s Eve.”
“And to you, McCrae. Are you planning to go work for CSIS?”
Lacey coughed. “Of course not.”
“Then they don’t need me to confirm your current cellphone number.”
“Oh, shit.”
“Is this anything I need to know about?”
“Is it a guy named Dave? I assume he’s verifying that my number really belongs to me before answering my question. You know how those spooks are.”
“Right. Confirming now.” Clicking sounds came through as he texted. “The other reason I was calling: you requested info about JP Thompson. Still need it?”
“I’m not sure. He seems to be a straight-up guy as far as the oil business goes, but he left the country in a hurry after his company’s intern disappeared.”
“Eric Anders. Found dead in Thompson’s woodshed at Black Rock Bowl.”
“How did you know?”
“Thompson called me two hours ago. He wants me to hire an investigator to clear it up.”
Lacey sat back. That single act pretty much demolished JP Thompson as a suspect in Eric’s death. If the CSIS contact cleared Calvin, that left only Arliss.
As she hung up the phone, a text arrived from a blocked number: Calvin Chan in my eye Fri 4 pm through Tues 10 am. Dave. Another dead end.
“Can you check for a search update now?” Dee asked. “Mom’s sure to ask.”
Bull had nothing to report save that search teams were moving out in a fan from the car. With no evidence to offer him about Sandy’s possible meeting with a possible debtor who was possibly Arliss Thompson, she instead told him that Calvin had an ironclad alibi from the federal government. “As for Sandy, can I tell her best friend in Ontario about my car and the search? She already knows Sandy’s missing.”
“It’ll be on the news soon enough,” said Bull. “I’ll text you the GPS coordinates if you want to join up with a SAR team.” She thanked him and hung up without committing. Traipsing through unfamiliar terrain without proper search-and-rescue gear would make her a liability. She’d be of more use tracing Sandy’s final movements, and that meant tracking down her debtor.
Back in the office with a second coffee, she opened her email again. Nothing lurking there except the email from Dan that she’d been avoiding. Maybe it was obvious to everyone that she was afraid — not of him directly, as letting go of the dangerous denial about his abuse meant she’d never again let down her guard near him — but of the chaotic emotions evoked by any contact with him. The years of small humiliations, the constant undermining of her confidence, the isolation from friends and co-workers — classic abuser behaviours. How had she not seen them sooner?
That was the real source of her shame: how long she’d stayed, rationalizing his behaviour, talking herself out of trusting the same gut instincts that kept her safe on patrol. She’d had all the advantages of education, physical strength, and law enforcement training, not to mention the financial independence to walk away any time, and still, she’d stayed. On almost every shift, she’d attended domestic violence calls and listened to her male co-workers grumble about women who wouldn’t leave their abusers. She’d wondered herself why they stayed. She’d been so judgmental against women with far fewer resources than she’d had. How could a person live that down? She dragged herself back to the present moment and a task she could succeed at: following up with Pat.
When she sat down to scrambled eggs with Dee a few minutes later, she reported. “Pat still hasn’t checked her emails. She told me pointedly that it’s a four-hour round trip to her place from her daughter’s farm, and they can’t tie up the family’s only car at the drop of a hat. After I told her Sandy is presumed dead, she said she’d make every effort to get those emails today. For all the good it will do now.” She poked her eggs with her fork.
“To be fair,” said Dee, “Pat could’ve forwarded those emails the very next morning, and it would already have been too late. Sandy was gone a whole night before we even knew she was missing. Call Zoe.”
“I understand that you don’t believe in ghostly guidance,” Zoe said for what felt like the eighth time. “Not two weeks ago, I didn’t believe in it, either. Stop apologizing and start walking.” She left the upper parking lot for the road, crossing just ahead of a minivan that surged from beneath the lift platform. Lacey followed, skipping nimbly between vehicles.
“You’re sure Arliss is up at Marmot Basin with your family and Clemmie Anders?”
“Yes.” Zoe climbed the plowed ridge of snow and peered down the Bowl. On the last day of the year, a sunny winter morning barely below freezing, the slopes teemed with skiers and snowboarders. “From what Arliss told Nik over breakfast today, Clemmie and Lizi have been in constant contact all week. Since TJ and his mother hadn’t any plans for New Year’s Eve, he suggested they should take Clemmie up north to join the fun. They hit the highway about the same time we were having tea yesterday, and Clemmie’s sharing Lizi’s room until I get there. If I still get to go. That cheque-printer problem” — she hesitated — “it has to be nailed down before the office reopens next week.” Maybe the whole Eric issue would be sorted out by then, and she could enjoy Kai and Ari’s final week hanging around Calgary, eating and sleeping, and playing board games. “I told Nik to remind Arliss to call you when she comes off the slopes today.”
“Arliss can afford to take three people to Marmot for New Year’s?”
“TJ can. He’s got a fat trust fund and apparently a soft spot for Clem. Or he’s bored.” Zoe stepped aside as a VW beetle scooted up the hill. Lacey had been asking about Arliss all through the drive from Cochrane. Not that Zoe knew where Arliss had been on that November weekend nearly two months ago. She hardly remembered where she’d been herself, although she knew life had been a lot more normal back then.
Behind her, Lacey said, “If he’d gone over up here, the car would have landed on the ski hill and been seen immediately. It must be in amongst the trees.”
Zoe shaded her eyes from the bright morning sun. “Once the sun passes that outcrop, this road will be in shadow.” For an instant, the bright sky darkened. Weariness swept over her. Her hands ached as if from clutching a steering wheel that wasn’t there. Sadness and confusion seeped through her. So tired. I don’t remember driving. “Let’s get walking,” she said.
They trudged to the next bend and peered down at the spruces. Nothing. Lacey halted at the next turn. “See anything?”
Zoe shook her head. The trees wavered. Dizziness swept over her.
“Zoe? Are you okay?”
“What?” Zoe pushed a hand at her forehead, jamming her dark glasses askew. “Ouch.”
“You zoned right out there. I thought you’d go over the edge.” Lacey was holding her by the upper arm, peering at her.
“Yeah. I was out of breath and —” She looked around. This was where she’d almost driven off the road. I don’t remember. “Eric doesn’t remember, but I’m almost sure he came this way. He was so sleepy.”
“That sounds like he’d taken one of Calvin’s pills.”
“Are you admitting he might have communicated something to me?”
Lacey put up her gloved hands. “I’m just saying, if he was hypothetically sleepy, he might have taken one of Calvin’s sleeping pills, maybe by accident. They were in the pocket of the jacket he was wearing.”
No no no no. I hate pills. “He hates pills. He wouldn’t knowingly have taken one.” Panic squeezed Zoe’s throat. “Was I — I mean, was he maybe drugged?”
“The police are waiting on the toxicology report. And I shouldn’t be telling you that. Sergeant Drummond already thinks you might be protecting someone.”
“The only person I’m trying to protect is Eric.” A chill breeze shook the branches above the road, sending a flurry of ice crystals down. She strode to the next bend and looked back along that stretch while a shuttle bus rumbled past. Its exhaust hung among the trees, tainting the clear mountain air. Only two more bends in the road and they’d be at JP’s place, with nothing gained but a long walk back up to the parking lot.
As they rounded the corner, the shadow of the cellphone tower tipped across their path. Soon there’d be no sun on this slope. I don’t remember driving here. The feeling of Eric’s misery prickled at Zoe’s eyelids. It’s okay, she thought, giving the spaceship in her pocket a squeeze. We aren’t giving up.
On she went, stopping every few feet to look down the slope below the road. Spiky spruce shadows leaned across the plowed lanes. Cars crawled down the hill, their windshields dazzling in the sunlight. JP’s chalet was now only three driveways away. If the Camry wasn’t between here and there, she didn’t know where else to look.
The next gully was almost a miniature bowl, the road circling deep into the mountainside and back out. The sun didn’t penetrate its farthest recess, and the snow lay deep among the spruces. She removed her sunglasses and stared into the gloom. Behind her came the rumble of another shuttle bus. As it passed them, sunlight danced on its rows of windows and bounced back across the hillside, where it hit the spruce trees below the road. Light glanced back from among the boughs, then it was gone. She squinted.
Lacey leaned on the snow pile beside her. “Did you see something, too, over there, just to the left of that rocky outcrop?”
“Yeah.” Zoe pointed. “Something gleamed, I thought. It vanished so quickly.”
“Maybe quartz in the granite?”
“Nope. This is sedimentary rock.” After twenty years in the oil patch, hearing daily about the geological formations of the Eastern Slopes, Zoe knew the strata of this mountain. “Bare limestone above the treeline, slate and sandstone below. No granite. That’s farther south, along the river valley.”
“There’s something shiny down there, anyway. Fix your eyes on that spot and let’s try to get a closer look.”
Zoe couldn’t have looked away if she’d wanted to. Eric’s excited murmurs accompanied her as she sidled along the tumbled edge of the plow’s path. Where was another shuttle bus when you needed one to light up the hillside? Soon she got her wish, sort of: a minivan. The flash of reflected sunlight sent a dazzling echo back. There really was something near the outcrop of rock.
“Anything?” Lacey called.
Zoe skidded along the narrow shoulder, her eyes fixed on the outcrop. She leaned over to peer into the mass of trees. There! Beneath the branches, where three trunks huddled together.
Lacey arrived at her shoulder, puffing from a fast jog. “I wish I had a flashlight stronger than my phone’s to bounce off whatever that is.”
Zoe yanked a chunk of compacted snow off the plow ridge and heaved it at the spot. Snow cascaded as the chunk fell through the branches.
“You’re burying it!”
Zoe grabbed another chunk. “I’m trying to clear it off.”
After a moment, Lacey picked up a slab and hurled it. More snow slid away between the trees. Beneath the spruce boughs they saw a flash of chrome, and beside it, an arc of black tire and the rim of a bright-red fender.
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
Lacey leaned out over the drop-off, eyeballing the distance to the car. “About four metres down an eighty-degree slope. Bushes above, trees below. I can climb down to check the plate if you want, but how many red cars are missing up here?”
Bull’s voice echoed through her earbuds. “You stay put. I’ll send a crew with ropes and a winch.”
“How long will that take? We’re in the shade and it’s getting a bit chilly.”
“Nearest SAR team is only twenty minutes away, on Richards Road.”
Lacey looked at the chrome bumper below, and at Zoe huddled on the snowbank. Twenty minutes was a long time to stand around on a freezing mountainside with a woman who couldn’t stop crying. “We’re almost at the Thompson chalet. They can meet me there. Nobody’s going to disturb a car that far off the road before then.”
An SUV pulled alongside, drowning out Bull’s reply. The driver’s window came down. “Is she hurt? Do you need a ride?”
“We’re fine, thanks.” Lacey saw them on their way. “Repeat that, please, Bull.”
“I’ve ordered out a constable. If the tow truck arrives first, I’d appreciate you staying with the car until he arrives.”
“Yes, Sergeant. Tell them to look for a stick with a glove on it.” As if she’d leave before getting a good look inside that car. She tucked the phone away, marked the spot, and held out her bare hand to Zoe. “Let’s get you a hot cup of tea.”
Zoe’s weeping eased, but she walked like a zombie. Inside the chalet she trudged to the kitchen with her boots on. Lacey kicked the loose snow off her soles and followed to start the kettle. Once the tea was steeping, she set a mug in front of Zoe, placed the sugar bowl and a spoon beside it, and dropped onto a stool. “You want to tell me why you were crying so hard?”
Zoe sniffed. “Eric. He was so damned happy to see his car.”
The ghost again. “What does he think we’ll find in it?”
“His backpack. An envelope for JP.”
Calvin’s voice replayed in Lacey’s head. Eric made a copy of everything for JP, so they could go over it together. It was in his backpack.
“Will you be okay here alone for a bit? I have to go back to the car.”
“Can’t I come back with you? Eric will want to go.”
“They won’t let you near the car. It’s evidence — the
contents, too. Stay here and get warm.”
Zoe stared into her mug. “I forgot. I kind of forget, sometimes, that he’s … not really here.”
Lacey was standing on the road with her travel mug of tea when the red Camry began its backward crawl up the steep slope. A police SUV, a SAR truck, and a tow truck were the only vehicles now; everything else had been diverted to the north shoulder. The winch on the tow truck whined and stopped. The operator scrambled down the hill a second time while a SAR guy paid out his safety line. The car was snagged on something.
Constable Markov spoke into the quiet. “In the meantime, you want to see the search area around your car? The survey map’s on my dash.”
“Thanks.” She grabbed the creased sheet and spread it on the hood.
He tapped it with one finger. “There’s your car here, beside that slough. There are no recent breaks in the ice, but the sergeant says they’ll put divers in if the ground search fails.”
Lacey suppressed a shudder. At one time she’d aspired to be an RCMP diver, but an hour trapped on a sunken fishing boat, her nigh-empty tanks fouled in the tackle and her vision stolen by silt and darkness, had ended that dream. Placing her finger beside Markov’s, she traced a line along a gravel road down to Highway 1A. If that isolated location had been a meeting place, Sandy’s debtor — that sounded better than “blackmail victim” — had had a reason for choosing it.
“Are there houses near my car?”
“Not many, and they’re widely scattered.” He sketched a line sideways. “That’s the top end of Stoney Nakoda First Nation. Mostly bush and a bit of pastureland.”
“Nobody to witness a possible meeting, then?”
He shrugged. “And no reason for visitors to go there in the middle of winter. Door-to-door turned up two witnesses who saw headlights going north on Boxing Day, sometime after the first snow stopped.”
“It was a blizzard at Bragg Creek until close to midnight that day. Where’s that from the car?”
He pointed. “South-by-southeast. We’re about the same distance north-by-northwest. Snow stopped around eleven-thirty at the Husky station off-ramp, where I spent all night deterring idiots and truckers from heading toward the mountains. Bitch of a wind, too, but then it went still as a grave at midnight. Couldn’t ask for a better night, with the full moon on all that fresh snow. The next squall came through at dawn and half-buried my truck.”
Where the Ice Falls Page 24