Books by Sue Henry

by Henry, Sue

  “Didn’t you ever sit around and listen to family stories? I was always under the table when my relatives talked, whether they knew it or not. Sometimes heard some spicy stuff that way.” She grinned, remembering one particular flapper aunt who seemed to have taken full advantage of the Roaring Twenties.

  Loomis smiled, hesitated, then shook his head. “My parents died in a fire when I was almost seven. I was raised in an orphanage—never got adopted.”

  Things were quiet for a time after that statement as Maxie thought of how different their lives had been—hers so full of family and people constantly moving through her life, his so empty of all blood ties. What a curious mixture Loomis was, confident, competent, and insightful, but under it seemed to run an unexpected shy streak and a hunger for acceptance that betrayed itself in his humor—understandable, given his background.

  “Did you have any brothers or sisters?”

  “One brother, but he was killed in Vietnam.”

  A loner, then. “Married?”

  “Nope—never found anyone to put up with me, or my job.”

  Was there a hint of defensiveness in his voice and grin?

  Remembering that Patrick was also very much by himself, Maxie’s attention turned to his recent and similar lack of family ties. His mother dying so terribly must have been especially hard on him. Where had he gone? With Jessie? With that stepfather he feared so much? Both? It worried her.

  “You’ve worked with—what’s his name—Patrick’s stepfather? What’s he like?”

  “Yeah, I worked with him, but not much. McMurdock’s his name. He’s big—kind of a good ole boy that doesn’t fool around—takes pretty much what’s tossed at him and makes it work—doesn’t waste time putting up with nonsense. It took some time and effort to get used to him when I first came up from Denver almost two years ago. We started out working on…”

  Maxie nodded encouragingly and tried to look as if she was following what he was talking about, but she had stopped hearing what he was saying, as she wondered if there were things he wasn’t saying. He sounded as if he knew this McMurdock quite well, but then he would, wouldn’t he? The Cody police force couldn’t be that large. Was her imagination running away with her common sense?

  “…then they transferred me to homicide, where I’ve been for the last few months.”

  “What do you know about his relationship with Patrick?”

  “Oh—well.” Loomis seemed relieved to get onto something besides his knowledge of McMurdock’s capabilities and personality. He sat up straighter and glanced in her direction, “Not much, really. The kid’s been in and out of trouble, and they didn’t get along. But most kids don’t like stepfathers, do they? I think Mac’s just trying to find Patrick and get this thing with his mother straightened out somehow.” Mac? “It’s hard to imagine him killing his wife—but then it’s hard to figure out why the boy would do it either. We’ve just got to find them—especially McMurdock, before—well, before anything else happens to either one of them.”

  “Why would he try to drown that boy in the pool?”

  “Ah, well, Maxie, we don’t really know that he did, do we? Patrick was there too, remember.”

  She remembered Stringer’s comparable suggestion that Patrick might have run from Wyoming because he killed his mother, and it still seemed unacceptable to her way of thinking. But even Jessie had had trouble trusting the boy to begin with. Was there something she was completely missing in the equation?

  But she knew she had not been wrong about the expression of tension and fear on Jessie’s face as she drove the Winnebago out of the Liard Hot Springs park. And she believed that Patrick was truly terrified when he showed up to hide in her motor home there. The question was why was he afraid—and of what? She was not quite so sure anymore, but Loomis was right, they needed to find both Patrick and McMurdock—and Jessie and the Winnebago—to answer any of her questions.

  “Do you have any idea how far Jessie might drive tonight?” Loomis asked.

  She told him about the Dawson Peaks Resort where they had agreed to meet. “I think she would go there if possible. It’s the only connection we made. I’d like to stop there anyway, to see.”

  “Makes sense. Probably should let Webster know about it too.”

  They had gone almost halfway. It was dark and there was little to see aside from the occasional vehicle that passed them on the road. Maxie was sleepily wishing she were parked somewhere and could crawl into her comfortable bed, when lights ahead on the south side of the road announced the Rancheria Motel coming up, with fuel for sale.

  “We’d better stop for gas,” she reminded Loomis, who pulled into the parking lot and up to the pumps as a teenage girl came out to fill the tank.

  “Good idea,” he commented, opening the driver’s door to get out. “I’d better see if I can use the phone to reach the inspector. Tell him where we’re headed and see if he’s left any messages for us.”

  “Would you see if they’ve got any coffee?” Maxie asked as he slid out and was about to close the door. “I don’t like to drink it this late, but I’m going to be a zombie if I don’t.”

  He trotted off toward the lights in the small store that was part of the service station. Through the window she could see him talking to a woman inside, displaying his identification.

  Unbuckling her seat belt, she got up and went for her credit card to pay for the gas. It felt so good to stand up that she decided to walk around to wake up a little. Handing the card to the girl, who took it into the station, she walked back and forth near the Jayco while she waited for the receipt.

  The air was cool, and a light, pleasant breeze blew the scent of evergreen into her face. Looking up she could just make out the pointed tops of the trees across the road against the slightly lighter night sky with its sprinkling of stars. She wished it were daylight, for the Rancheria Falls were only a few miles up the road, a place she had stopped before. Those who have driven the Alaska Highway more than once often tend to follow roughly the schedule they have maintained in the past, recognizing and stopping at familiar places, renewing their acquaintance and appreciation of favorite scenery and discoveries. The falls usually meant lunch to Maxie on drives between Watson Lake and Teslin. But the events on this trip had redefined her timing completely.

  Rounding one corner of the motor home, she looked toward the station in search of the girl, who seemed to be taking a long time. Inside she saw that Loomis was now talking on the telephone. A cup of coffee, probably hers, sat steaming on the counter. The girl came out, and at the sound of the door closing Loomis turned his head as if to see if Maxie had decided to come in. He glanced at the window, and she lifted a hand to wave, but he seemed to be focused on the conversation he was having.

  It’s Mother’s Day, the telephone suddenly reminded her.

  The girl brought the receipt. Maxie signed it and grinned to herself, knowing how much she did not intend to call her daughter, Carol.

  “Cell phones don’t work out here, do they?” she asked, curious.

  “No, they don’t,” she was told. “There’s a NorthwesTel microwave tower just south of us, but it’s only normal phones or radios until you reach Whitehorse.”

  Carol can’t call me again either, Maxie thought.

  Thanking the girl, she watched her walk back toward the lighted station, where Loomis was now paying the woman for the coffee. Maxie climbed back into the Jayco, locked the coach door, and got into the passenger seat, ready to take the paper cup Loomis handed in.

  “She said it was fresh-made,” he said. “Black okay?”

  “Only way I take it. Anything from Inspector Webster?”

  “Yes. He’s sent word to the dispatcher that he’s already in Teslin and will meet us there. Hasn’t seen any sign of Jessie’s rig.”

  “But he wouldn’t if she stopped at the resort this side of it,” Maxie said.

  “I gave the dispatcher that location and name. She’ll pass it on and he’ll pro
bably check it out,” he said as he took the Jayco back onto the highway.

  In less than ten miles they passed Rancheria Falls and continued into the night toward Teslin.

  Wondering where Jessie was—and how—all Maxie could do was sit, jittery, wide awake, and worried, beginning to wish she had not had that cup of coffee after all.

  “Look,” said Loomis, when he and Maxie reached the campground where she and Jessie had arranged to meet and found it dark and seemingly deserted. “Let’s go on into Teslin—it’s just a few miles. We’ll find Webster. Then we can come back to see if Jessie’s here, if he hasn’t already checked. She might have gone on when she got here and found the access road blocked.”

  It seemed a reasonable assumption. Maxie agreed, tired and yearning for her bed but too concerned about Jessie and Patrick to consider finding it yet. The effect of the coffee was beginning to wear off, leaving her slightly thickheaded, and she was glad Loomis was behind the wheel.

  They drove on a few miles, crossed the Nisutlin Bay Bridge, longest span of any on the highway, and found Webster sitting in his patrol car on the other side where he could watch traffic on the highway. When they pulled in beside him, he immediately climbed into the coach.

  “Was beginning to wonder if you’d gone back to Watson Lake,” he said, leaning between them with a hand on the back of each seat.

  “Have you seen Jessie?” Maxie asked directly, too weary to make small talk.

  “No. I didn’t see her on the way, and she hasn’t been through here.”

  “Did you check at Dawson Peaks yet?”

  “Dawson…? Oh, that RV park outside of town? Why would I check there?”

  “Didn’t you get the message I left with the dispatcher in Dawson Creek?” Loomis broke in. “Maxie and Jessie had agreed to meet there.”

  “No—first I heard of it,” Webster said shaking his head. “But I’ve been watching here for almost two hours and was just considering a call to the Dawson Creek dispatcher.”

  Maxie was beginning to feel as though she were in a stage play with someone else’s script in her hand and lines that made no sense at all. Where was Jessie? People and motor homes didn’t just disappear into thin air, did they? She thought of Patrick’s stepfather and wondered where he was and if he had anything to do with the fact that none of them had seen her. Could she have slipped past without Webster knowing? He seemed too competent to miss the Winnebago, and this was the only road that crossed the bridge and went on through Teslin. Could they have switched vehicles?

  Longing for her bed, she sighed as she slumped a little in her seat.

  “You okay?”

  “Yes, I’m fine—just tired. We’d better do something about checking Dawson Peaks, hadn’t we? It was closed, but she seemed very certain about it.”

  Webster looked at her thoughtfully. “I think we should go and check—meaning Loomis and I,” he said. “You look beat. Why don’t you find a spot in the RV park here and wait while we drive out and take a look? No need for all three of us to be stumbling around in the dark out there.”

  Maxie frowned, considering the suggestion. She had promised to meet Jessie, not send someone else. But what he said made sense. What could she do anyway that they couldn’t do without her—and probably more efficiently? “You’re right—I’m bushed. But you’ll come back and let me know—and tell her where I am if she’s there?”

  “Of course.”

  In five minutes the two law enforcement officers had gone off in the patrol car. In fifteen, Maxie had registered and parked the Jayco in a space on the highway side of the RV park, plugged in her electricity and water, and was considering the restoring properties of a cup of tea.

  I’ll just lie down for a few minutes first, she thought, leaving the galley and dinette lights on, as well as the one outside the coach door, and heading for her bed in the back of the motor home. Then I’ll get up and wait till they come back.

  23

  IN THE LAST, DARKEST HOUR BEFORE DAWN, JESSIE suddenly woke and listened intently for the sound she had heard to repeat itself. There had been something outside—an unnatural sound that was not a part of the faint sigh of Patrick’s breathing, the soft susurration of the breeze in the leaves of a birch, or the faraway murmur of trucks infrequently passing on the highway above the lodge. She could hear passenger cars if she listened very closely when the light wind took a breath, but the trucks made a purring sort of roar that faded slowly as it filtered down through the trees and drifted in through the window beside her bed, which she had opened a scant inch before going to sleep.

  The sound came again, a slight unidentifiable rustle from somewhere up the hill—the sound of something, or someone, in motion. Somewhere near the lodge something had moved. The possibilities were varied and endless. It could be something the wind was tossing against something else. A deer or a moose could be wandering through the dark—even a bear, though she thought that a bear would probably make more noise. Or it could be a person—friend or foe. But if it was, from the lack of normal sounds it was someone carefully trying not to be heard. A soft, dull thump, like the toe of a boot accidentally kicking a root in a trail, a little closer this time, and Jessie was on her stockinged feet, moving swiftly and silently through the dark to lay one strong hand on Patrick’s shoulder, the other over his mouth.

  He woke, groggy and frightened, and tried to twist away from her firm grip, which held him like a vise.

  “Sh-h-h,” she whispered. “It’s Jessie. There’s someone outside—or something. Get up and put on your boots and that raincoat I gave you.” She released his face and shoulder, turning back to don her own shoes and jacket, left ready for just such an emergency.

  “No,” he whispered out of the dark, louder than she liked, and sat up in the bed. “Let’s stay in here—where it’s safe.”

  “I’m not going to be trapped in here like a bug in a tin can,” she told him fiercely. “Get up and get your shoes on—hurry.”

  “Okay,” he said reluctantly and began to follow her instructions.

  Though she had thought it unlikely they could be found, she had slept in her clothes and had Patrick do the same. In one jacket pocket she had put a flashlight and the pepper spray—in the other, a bottle of water and four Power Bars. The keys to the Winnebago were in her jeans pocket.

  “Come on,” she whispered softly next to his ear. “We’ll get out of here until I can find out what’s making that noise.”

  Creeping forward she passed the coach door, which she knew from Dutch Creek experience would scrape against the frame, causing a small squeal of metal against metal. She had parked the motor home headed in the direction that would take them out, so she wouldn’t have to turn around if leaving was necessary. It put the coach door on the uphill side, toward the sound she had heard, so she climbed into the driver’s seat and carefully worked the handle on that door, which opened with only a small click. One after the other, she and Patrick slid cautiously out onto the ground. Then she closed the door and locked it quietly with the key, gripping the two others on the ring tight in her hand to keep them from falling against each other.

  As quietly as possible they became shadows in the dark, slipping away past the cabins, walking on the grass at the edge of a branch of the dirt road that led toward the lake shore, where between them and the water there were trees that would keep them from becoming silhouettes against its pale, breeze-rippled reflection. When they had gone far enough to see around the end of the motor home and up the hill beyond it, Jessie moved them deliberately, one step at a time, into the brush beside the road, timing the rustles of their passage to those the breeze made in the leaves. There they knelt, listening raptly, and waited to see what would happen next.

  They huddled in the brush for a quarter of an hour, listening carefully. There were no more suspicious sounds and nothing visible to indicate that anyone had been moving down the hillside toward them. Still, Jessie was not willing to relax her guard. She badly wished Tank
were with her, knowing he would have been able to sense the presence of another person in the dark. Again she longed to know that Maxie had found and collected him—that he was with her and Stretch.

  Patrick shivered next to her and shifted slightly.

  She laid a hand on his shoulder and leaned close to whisper, “Cold?”

  “A little,” came the soft reply.

  Scared, she thought, and hoped she was not frightening him unnecessarily with this quick trip out into the night because she thought she had heard something. It had been quite a long time since she heard anything and she considered going back to the motor home. Crouching here in the dark might be an overreaction and nothing but paranoia, but something kept her from moving, told her that being overly cautious was better than being caught. There was a tense feeling in her chest and a prickle on the back of her neck that made her unwilling to venture out just yet, kept her motionless and alert.

  She knew what it was to be hunted, from a terrifying experience on an island not so long ago that had produced a kind of terror and claustrophobia she hadn’t easily forgotten. She was not willing to give away the advantage of invisibility easily or negligently.

  If the wind had increased, or if it had been raining, they could have disappeared into the forest that surrounded the resort and made themselves safer. Any attempt in that direction now, however, would result in sounds that could be heard, pinpointing their location if there was someone up there listening. It was not worth the risk.

  “Can’t we go back inside now?” Patrick whispered.

  “Let’s wait just a little longer.”

  He shivered again. Odd how he seemed to feel safer in the motor home, Jessie thought, while she felt imprisoned in it and threatened by the inability to escape. Was the comfort of small confining spaces something you outgrew as you aged? She remembered liking to crawl into cardboard boxes as a child, to fold up her arms and legs inside a container just large enough to hold her curled-up body, and lie there feeling secure and safe.

  All she could hear was the small sound of the lake lapping gently on the shore, and she was almost ready to stand up and take Patrick back to the motor home when a breath of wind rustled the leaves of the bushes and the trees overhead like a million bits of tissue paper. Suddenly, in the midst of it, there was another sound—the metallic click of someone trying the door handle of the coach of the Winnebago.