Hunting Ground
Page 19
“It looked like Evelyn was a person of interest from the beginning,” I said, recalling the notes in the police report.
“She was, and she repeatedly declined requests to take a polygraph. The police put a tail on her after Kilgore disappeared and came up with nothing. They even searched the house. Evelyn’s grandfather gave police permission without a warrant. They combed the house and yard and didn’t find a thing. The case is cold.”
I remembered how she had hesitated when she saw the police emblem on my truck the day I found her car abandoned on the side of the road. “Did you uncover anything about her that raised a red flag?”
“You mean that made me think she could make a man who was terrorizing her disappear?” William asked, voice wry. “No. She was raised by her grandparents. Had a few run-ins with the law when she was a kid, but normal teen antics. Underage drinking, being at parties that were busted for drugs. As an adult, though, she’s been a model citizen.”
“Any clue as to why she left Atlanta?”
“Both grandparents died in the last year. They’d been ill for a while, and Medicare pretty much took everything,” William said. “Raven’s Gap is quite a change from Atlanta, though.”
“It is,” I agreed.
“Why the interest in her?” he asked. “You usually don’t call me just because you’re curious.”
“Jeff Roosevelt is fixated on her.”
The silence on the other end of the line was palpable. William knew my suspicions. He had been the first person I called when I began noticing Jeff’s constant presence in the background of Winona’s last few weeks alive. He had dug up everything he could find on the man, which amounted to nothing that could back up my suspicions.
“She’s the key,” I said.
“Shit,” William muttered on the other end of the line. “Does she know she’s your sacrificial lamb?”
I ignored his question. “Let me know if you find anything else.” I hung up the phone before he could comment further. I glanced at Frank in the passenger’s seat. “I’ll be back.”
My knock on Rachel Vickers’s door went unanswered, but I could hear her little dog barking frantically within. I moved back from the front stoop and studied the exterior of the house. The blinds were closed, the lights were off, and her car was not parked in the drive.
I forded through the snow around to the back of the house and cupped my hands around my eyes to peer through the glass of the door leading onto the deck. I could see the living room, dining room, and kitchen from my vantage point. The interior of the house remained shadowed and still.
“She doesn’t have any family in the area,” Annette Zierdt had said earlier on the phone. “As far as I know, she’s not in a serious relationship. It’s not at all like her to not come into work without giving word that she needs time off. I’m concerned, especially…” She left the sentence hanging.
She did not need to clarify. No woman in Raven’s Gap felt safe at the moment.
I knocked out the pane of glass closest to the handle and reached within to flip the deadbolt. Louie, Rachel’s Bichon Frise, came running through the house at the sound of glass breaking, but when I opened the door and stepped within, he cowered away from me and scampered off to hide.
“Rachel?” I called. Only silence answered me.
Her home was lived in but neat aside from the puddles of piss and piles of shit on the tiles in the kitchen. Louie’s water and food bowl were empty. There were no signs of struggle anywhere, nothing that hinted she had been attacked in her home.
I cued up the radio on my shoulder. “Romeo 3, Dispatch.”
A crackle, and then a woman responded. “Romeo 3, go ahead.”
“I am clearing from the check well-being call. I need an Attempt to Locate put out on this individual. Rachel Vickers, mid-thirties, her birthday and description are on the teletype of her DL you sent me. I want an ATL on the vehicle registered to her as well. It should be a silver Honda Accord.”
“Romeo 3, I copy. I will send out an ATL on both Rachel Vickers and her vehicle.”
“Thank you. I will follow up with the individual who requested the check well-being.”
The house was small, two bedrooms, one bath. I ventured farther down the hallway to the back bedroom the little dog had disappeared into. “Louie,” I called. “Here, Lou.” I whistled for him but received no response.
The back bedroom served as an office space. Louie was hiding under the desk. He began to tremble as I approached. He did not growl when I knelt, though, and when I held my hand out to him, he did not snap at my fingers.
“Everything is going to be okay,” I said. “I bet you’re hungry and thirsty.” I kept my voice low and soft as I spoke to him, and after several minutes he crept from his hiding place to nose at my fingers. Moving slowly so as not to startle him, I stroked a hand down his back. His tail was tucked tightly under him, and he panted heavily, but he remained docile as I lifted him into my arms.
He buried his head against my chest as I carried him to my truck. Frank greeted me as soon as I opened the door. “Don’t frighten him, now,” I said as he sniffed the small bundle in my arms. Louie’s head came up, the whites showing around his dark eyes, but when I placed him in the passenger’s seat next to Frank, he curled against the poodle’s side. Frank glanced at me, expression equal parts appalled and intrigued.
There were only a handful of customers, leftovers from the dinner crowd, at the diner when we arrived. Maggie lifted a hand in greeting when she saw me.
“Why do you have Louie? Where’s Rachel?” she asked as she approached, brow wrinkled in concern.
I dipped my head toward the hallway and followed her as she preceded me down the corridor. She pushed open the swinging doors into the kitchen and called out an order to Chuck, one of her cooks, before opening the door to her office.
Frank trotted within like he owned the place. I knelt to place Louie on the floor. He hunched close to the ground and shook. Maggie crouched beside him, looping an arm around Frank’s neck, and stroked the Bichon, murmuring soothingly.
“I don’t know where Rachel is,” I said. “That’s what I’m trying to find out.”
Maggie looked up at me, eyes wide. “Oh Christ, Hec. Another one?”
I blew out a breath and nodded to the trembling lump of fur on the floor. “We all know how much she loved that dog. She would never go off and leave him. Not voluntarily.”
“The poor darling.” Louie tentatively licked Maggie’s hand. I did not know if she spoke of the dog or the woman. Knowing Maggie, her benediction included both. She cupped the little dog’s face in her hands. “You need some food.”
I followed her into the kitchen, waving a greeting to Chuck, and filled a bowl with water. Back in Maggie’s office, I sat on the worn sofa against the wall and watched Frank stand over Louie as the little dog gulped the water.
When he had his fill, I carried him outside and let him do his business. Maggie was back in her office when we returned, and Louie went directly to the plate she placed on the floor for him. He ate with more gusto than Frank, who polished off his eggs and ham delicately, keeping an eye on the smaller dog the entire time.
“You’re going to take him home, aren’t you?” Maggie asked from where she sat on the floor between the dogs, leaning back against her desk.
Louie finally stopped trembling. His tail wagged as he ate. “He’s frightened and confused. He would be miserable at the shelter.”
When Maggie did not respond, I glanced at her and found her lips quirked in a smile.
My radio toned. Louie started violently and began to bark.
“All units available, we have a report of a kidnapping in progress.”
Maggie scooped Louie into her lap and put a hand on Frank’s shoulder. “Go. I’ll watch them.”
I ran to my truck and let dispatch know I was en route emergent along with the other officer on duty. It took me less than a minut
e to make it to the museum. I threw the truck into park and had the door open before it had fully rocked to a stop.
“Here!” a female voice called, waving frantically. She knelt on the ground next to another woman who lay prone.
I ran to them and knelt beside the pair. Evelyn lay unconscious on the icy pavement.
“What happened?” I tucked my fingers under the collar of Evelyn’s coat. Her pulse was strong and steady against my fingertips. Sirens sounded behind us and another vehicle squealed into the lot and running feet approached.
“Romeo 4, Romeo 3 and I are on scene,” Cooper said into the radio.
“Romeo 4, I copy.”
I tuned out the rest of his exchange with dispatch.
“I don’t know,” Annette Zierdt said, voice shaken. “I was in my office. Evelyn worked late and stopped by my office on her way out. A few minutes after she left, I heard a scream. I was coming to the front of the museum to look out the window when I heard another scream, and I called 9-1-1 as I ran outside. There was a man dragging her across the parking lot, but he let her go as soon as I started yelling at him.”
“Which way did he go?” Cooper asked.
“I’ll show you.”
I did not look to see where Annette directed Cooper. Evelyn looked small and fragile and wounded. For a moment, guilt pierced me. I viewed her as nothing more than a pawn. But seeing her lying on the cold ground, wounded and helpless, I saw her as a woman. As someone who deserved protection from a man I knew was dangerous. I put my hand to her cheek and wondered when my humanity had slipped away.
Evelyn’s eyelashes began to flutter. She came to with a violent start, lashing out at me with fists clenched. She struggled wildly, caught in the grip of terror, unhearing when I called her name until I caught her by the elbows.
“You’re safe,” I said. “It’s Hector.”
She blinked and her gaze finally focused on me. She sagged in my grip, and her clenched fists reached out to grasp the front of my coat. “Hector,” she breathed, voice hoarse. “He’s still here?”
I pulled her into me, stroking her hair back from her face. “You’re safe. He’s gone. You’re safe now.” She trembled in my arms.
Four hours later, she was released from the clinic, and Evelyn sat across from me in the empty diner.
Maggie slid a mug of tea in front of her. “Chamomile, and I added extra honey to sooth your throat.”
Evelyn smiled wanly at her. “Thank you.” Her voice was a near-soundless whisper.
She was more composed now, but her face was pale and I caught the tremor of her fingers as she wrapped her hands around the mug.
I pulled my notebook from my pocket but waited until she had taken a careful sip of the steaming tea before I spoke. “It’s easier to go over the details while they are still fresh in your mind.” She nodded. “Did you see who grabbed you?”
“No.” Her voice was raw, and she touched her throat gingerly. “Someone came up behind me when I was unlocking my car. I never had a chance to see…his face.”
“But you think you know who it was.”
She hesitated, meeting my gaze and then glancing away. “You wouldn’t believe me.” Her gaze dropped to her tea, and she took another sip of the pale liquid.
The guilt that pierced me earlier crept in. Jeff was fixated on her. When she became his next victim, I would be there to finally bring him down. My sacrificial lamb, as William had put it. For Winona and Emma, I reminded myself, pushing aside the nudge of guilt. This woman was the key. “Let’s say that I did.”
Something in my voice brought her eyes up, and they narrowed on my face.
I leaned forward, braced my elbows on the table, and lowered my voice. “Let’s say that I’ve been trying to catch the bastard for a long, long time and have never been able to pin anything on him.”
She stared at me for a long moment. I did not know what she saw in my face. But when she finally spoke, Evelyn told me of the private collection at the museum, how she had linked two items to missing Native American women, how she knew there were more but she could not make the connection. She recounted the incident in the bookstore and the eerie way her music box had been returned to her.
“He told me I reminded him of someone,” she said. “I reminded him of her. I don’t know how many women he has killed, but I know it’s more than two.”
I leaned back, bracing myself against the support of the bench seat behind me. Native American. I closed my eyes and could almost feel the silk of Winona’s long, dark banner of hair. I could almost see the curve of those high, rounded cheekbones when she smiled. I blinked and found Evelyn watching me.
“That meant something to you.”
I cleared my throat. “Winona, my wife, was Hunkpapa Lakota. She and my daughter went missing fifteen years ago.”
Her brow furrowed and then cleared. “Winona and Emma Lewis.”
I nodded. “Ed won’t take that sign down until they come home.” If they could have come home, they would have by now. Not for me, but for Ed and Betty, for Jack, for everyone in this town who loved them and searched for them and missed them.
“And you think Jeff took them?”
“I know he did. I just can’t prove it.”
A tap of a horn outside drew both of our gazes out the window as one of the EMTs pulled Evelyn’s old Honda into the parking lot.
I slid from the booth. “Let me take care of this, and then I’ll follow you home.” I pushed through the front door of the diner and lifted a hand. “Bob. Thanks for bringing her car around.”
He tossed me the keys. “No problem. I found her purse in the parking lot and put it in the passenger’s seat.”
“Need a lift?”
“Nah. Thanks, though.”
As the man strode across the empty lot, I glanced back through the wide windows into the brightly lit interior of the diner. Maggie stood at the table, and Evelyn was turned away from the window to speak to her.
I pulled the tracking device from my pocket, checked to make certain it was secure in its case, and then knelt to attach it to the undercarriage of Evelyn’s vehicle. As I straightened, I made certain Evelyn was still turned away from the window.
She was, but Maggie watched me through narrowed eyes.
I reentered the diner and placed Evelyn’s keys on the table. “Give me a moment, and I’ll follow you to the inn.”
Maggie followed me down the hall to her office. “You’re up to no good.”
I ignored her as I took in Frank sprawled on his side on Maggie’s sofa, with Louie curled up on top of him using the large dog as a bed.
Maggie closed the door behind us and sighed. “William called me. Don’t get that woman hurt in your quest for vengeance, Hector.”
That guilt nipped at me again. I arched an eyebrow at her. “You’ve been watching too many westerns again.”
“Don’t patronize me,” she snapped. “I know you. Others may think you’ve finally let it go, but I know better.” Her voice softened. “Honey, Winona wouldn’t want this for you. She—”
“You know what Winona wanted?” I interjected. “She wanted me to pick up the cake she had ordered from the bakery for Emma’s birthday party. I forgot. It slipped my mind until I was almost home, and by then, I didn’t feel like coming back for it.” Frank’s tail thumped in concern at the tone of my voice. “And when she asked me to go back into town for it, I told her I was too tired, she would have to go instead. That’s all she wanted. For me to pick up a fucking cake.” I let out a breath that felt raw in my throat. “You can’t ask me to let it go, Mags.” I met her gaze and saw her eyes were bright and damp. “This is all I’m able to give my girls.”
Twenty-Eight
I was born with the devil in me.
I could not help the fact that I was a murderer,
no more than the poet can help the inspiration to sing.
-H.H. Holmes
JEFF
Even now, watching her climb the steps to the inn and disappear within, I ached and trembled with the force of it. Only Rose had brought me such painful euphoria before. I considered waiting and slipping into the inn, going to her when she was asleep in her bed, but the last time I had given in to this high, it had cost me Rose.
I moved through the woods and back into town to where my Land Rover was still parked at Book Ends. I drove the winding stretch of road to Gardiner and parked down the street from where I had left Rachel’s car.
Of course I had found that old dog of a police officer’s tracking device. No one knew about the cameras I had hidden within the alley, the stairwell, and my apartment. I left his device untouched. He had been a thorn in my side for fifteen years now. I knew he watched me; I knew what he suspected. He would have been amusing had his harassment not drawn so much attention to me that for fifteen years I had to hunt far from my own familiar territory.
Now it was my turn to make things difficult for him. I owed the bastard that much.
I retrieved Rachel’s car and then turned off the state road onto Jardine Road and followed it up into the craggy canyon. I took the road all the way through the tiny town five miles up into the mountains and turned off onto a narrow tract of trail on the far side of town. The way was rough, and it came to a sudden dead end several miles later when wilderness overtook the trail.
I went the rest of the way on foot. The moon was new tonight, and the darkness suited me. A wolf’s distant howl was a thread of sound in the dense forest, soon followed by a chorus of its brethren, all weaving together to form a haunting tapestry that blanketed the night. I was not afraid. I was tempted to throw back my head and echo their mournful call. Predator knew predator and left the other alone to its hunt.