Once dinner was over and the dishes were cleared from the table, the children took off to do their evening chores. Rachel poured coffee into four mugs and passed three to Clyde, Emma, and Henry.
Emma thought the older children would stay to hear the story of what had happened on the sand dunes. But Katie Ann was worried about the bird and said she’d “get the scoop from Mamm tomorrow.”
Silas apparently had a girl to meet. “As long as you’re okay, that’s what matters. Not the how of it.”
Which was pretty much the same way Emma felt, but Rachel and Clyde wanted details.
So they spent the next hour going over the events that led to Carla Paddock’s arrest.
“I can’t imagine you climbing to the top of a sand dune, Mamm,” Clyde said. “Remember the time Dat hired a driver to take us up into the mountains? You had to sit with your head between your knees because the height made you so dizzy.”
“Gut thing Henry pushed me over the ridge, or I would have stood there, frozen, until that woman shot me.”
“Gotte wouldn’t have allowed that to happen, Emma.” Henry reached over and squeezed her hand. “It wasn’t your day to trade this life for the next.”
“So in the end, your drawings led Emma and Tess to the killer.” When everyone turned to stare at Rachel, she said, “The password for the computer storage device. Emma and Tess saw it on the drawing, on the tattoo on Sophia’s arm. Without that, they never would have accessed the files. If they hadn’t read Sophia’s online journal and Cooper’s notes, they’d never have gone out to the sand dunes. They wouldn’t have known the location for the pickup.”
No one spoke for a moment, and then Henry said, “Perhaps you’re right. If so, then I put your life at risk, Emma, and I’m sorry.”
“Tsk.” Emma grinned at the sound coming out of her mouth. It seemed so normal. Who really cared if it was the same sound her mother used to make? Age afforded one certain privileges, and perhaps tsking was one of them. “It wasn’t my day. Remember? And besides, all’s well that—”
“Ends well. Yeah, yeah.” Clyde nodded in agreement. “The important thing is that the guilty person has been arrested and is no longer a threat to anyone.”
Henry stood and walked to the sink to rinse out his coffee mug.
Rachel leaned over to stare at his feet, and then she said, “You seem to have lost your ankle monitor.”
“Grayson removed it when he came by earlier today.”
“And Tess?” Emma asked. “Where is she now?”
“Staying in town for a few days in case Grayson or Delaney need her. She left me a message at the phone shack. Her plane leaves tomorrow, but she’d like to meet at the diner in the morning. Would you like to join us?”
“I’d love to.”
Rachel sipped her coffee. “If Tess hadn’t come to Monte Vista, if she hadn’t sought us out, Mamm never would have remembered the flash drive Sophia gave her.”
“You probably would have washed it.” Clyde smiled.
Clyde had a habit of leaving bits of paper in his pockets, small scraps he’d write notes on. It had taken Rachel the first ten years of their marriage to remember to check garments for notes before washing them. Emma knew her son had learned the habit from his father. She still had a few of George’s notes—precious memories of a man who had brought joy and happiness to her life for many years.
Make appointment with the farrier.
Bring down more hay from the loft.
Pick up a rosebush for Emma.
Emma treasured each piece of paper, each memory. Even as she looked across the table and admitted to herself how much she cared for Henry, she understood that George had helped her become the woman she was. Henry’s friendship and George’s love had been highlights of her life.
“If either of us had washed it…” Rachel stared down into her mug.
Paddock would still be free, planning the next pickup and willing to kill anyone who got in her way. It was a sobering thought.
“Tess came here because Sophia called her.” Emma tapped her fingers against the table. “After talking to Henry, she called her schweschder. Remember? We all heard the message. Sophia wanted to tell Tess how much she cared about her. Sophia was going to find her husband’s killer, regardless how much it put her own life in danger. But after meeting you”—she reached out and touched Henry’s shoulder—“she took the time to contact her schweschder. She made things right with what was left of her family.”
“Tess is the reason we were able to lead the police to Paddock,” Henry agreed. “At great personal risk, she sought us out and insisted on solving the mystery. She’s a very stubborn, very brave woman.”
After that there wasn’t much to say on the subject.
Henry claimed to be done solving murders.
Emma vowed she was going to begin knitting again. “Silas had a great idea. He suggested I be like other grandmothers and take up a hobby. Preferably something I can do at home, on the porch, at ground level.”
Which caused everyone to laugh. When Rachel stood to take care of the dinner dishes, Emma insisted on helping her, and Henry said something to Clyde she couldn’t hear.
Clyde glanced at Emma, nodded his head once, and they trooped out the back door toward the barn.
“I wonder what that was about,” Emma said.
“I don’t know, but did you see the way Henry was looking at you?”
“Looking at me?”
“During dinner.”
“He looked at me during dinner?”
“Like he couldn’t get enough of the sight of you. I think it frightened him, your life being in danger.”
Emma almost tsked, but she decided once a night was probably enough of that. No need to completely indulge being old and cranky. Besides, she didn’t feel old. After all they’d been through the last week, and after two days of sleeping as much as she could, she felt surprisingly alive and energetic. There might be something to taking an afternoon nap after all.
“How do you feel about him?”
“About who?”
“Henry. Who else?” Rachel rinsed a plate and passed it to Emma.
“Of course I care for him. He’s been a gut freind nearly all of my life and a gut bishop too.” But deep in her heart she knew that wasn’t what Rachel was asking. Emma dried three more plates and added, “I loved Clyde’s dat. I suppose a part of me always will, but I love Henry too. Is that silly? Someone in their sixties thinking about such things?”
“It’s not silly at all. They say sixty is the new forty.”
“Who says that?”
“People.”
“What does it mean?”
Rachel washed the last plate and set it in the rinse water. She dried her hands before turning to place one on each of Emma’s shoulders. “It means you’re as young as you feel.”
“I’m not, though. My knees pop and crackle, I have white eyelashes that poke out in funny directions, and my hands look like an old person’s.”
“Your heart, Mamm. I suppose I was referring to your heart.”
Seventy-Six
Henry and Emma sat across from Tess in the corner booth of Maggie’s Diner.
It was at the height of the breakfast rush, and the place was bustling. Most of the bar stools along the counter were full, their chrome and leather sparkling in the light beginning to shine through the large plate glass windows.
Folks chatted and ate and discussed the weather as the sun rose over the San Luis Valley, and Emma noticed how the waitresses moved back and forth across the checkered floor, waiting on customers, feeding the masses, spreading good cheer in their own special way.
The bell over the door jingled, and Sheriff Grayson stepped inside, looked around, and then walked to their table to join them. They spoke of inconsequential things until they’d placed their order. Then Grayson folded his arms on the table and proceeded to catch them up on the investigation.
“The feds have put a lot of people o
n this, and information is still coming in, so I don’t know everything. But Delaney briefed me last night, and I do know more than the twenty-four-hour news outlets.”
As one they turned their heads to look out the window. The news media people had been camped both at Bread 2 Go and the diner. What had been a dozen television vans had been reduced to two. Henry suspected they’d be gone in another day or so, chasing another story. What had happened in the San Luis Valley was quickly becoming yesterday’s news, and he rather preferred it that way.
“Everything points to this being a multimillion-dollar operation.” Grayson sipped the coffee brought to him by their waitress, grimaced, and grabbed a package of sugar. “Feds are still attempting to trace all of the purchases, which they’re able to do because Paddock kept detailed records. Apparently, she’s a bit OCD.”
“OCD?” Emma glanced at Henry and then back at Grayson. “What is OCD?”
“Obsessive-compulsive disorder. It’s a type of anxiety that causes people to do things in a repetitive or meticulous way.”
“Like this?” Emma touched each of her fingers to her thumb.
“I noticed that too,” Tess said. “I thought it might be a signal or something, but then why bother with signals when you’re the one holding the gun?”
“I guess it could be a symptom of OCD,” Grayson said. “Maybe she was counting in her head. No doubt it was a compulsion of some sort. People with this disorder can be as smart or smarter than anyone else, but they have an overwhelming need to address an irrational fear. In this case, Paddock needed things to be in order even though she was part of a dangerous poaching scheme.”
“She told us to get in line.” Tess turned to Emma. “Remember? When she first confronted us with the rifle. She kept moving you around, like she needed to line us up exactly so.”
“And when we turned toward the dunes, she warned me to stay in a straight line. I couldn’t figure out what difference it made.”
“Sounds like a deeply disturbed person,” Henry said.
“And yet it worked to our benefit,” the sheriff said.
“How so?” Emma asked.
“She kept things she should have destroyed, like Sophia’s camera. Her photos are more proof we can use in the upcoming trials.”
“Her compulsion wouldn’t allow her to throw it away?” Henry shook his head in disbelief.
“Correct. Paddock had to know, on one level, that she shouldn’t be keeping records, but we think she couldn’t help herself. We found them handwritten on an accounting tablet back at her place—names, dates, amounts, animals sold. It’s a treasure trove of information.”
“And that’s gut?” Emma asked.
“Yes. Those records will help the feds specifically locate and charge all persons involved. Her records, those precise dates and amounts, will help us trace the funds. In the end, it will go a long way to ensuring all parties involved are held accountable in federal court for their actions.”
“Millions of dollars…for elk.” Emma shook her head. “It’s still hard to imagine.”
“Oh, they didn’t poach only elk. They took bighorn sheep, cougars, deer, and even a bear. It was quite the operation, and it had been going on for almost three years.”
“Do you know the name of Cooper’s source? BT?” Tess asked.
“I do not. I suspect Delaney does, but he hasn’t shared it with me.” Grayson raised his eyes and waited for Tess to meet his gaze. “There’s something else. The final autopsy reports are in. Your sister was hit with a tranquilizer before she was strangled.”
“Like they used on the animals.” Emma reached out and clasped Tess’s hand. “Paddock told us it could be a lethal dose.”
“It wasn’t, but the thing is, she was unconscious when she was killed. She didn’t feel anything. It’s one of the reasons she didn’t fight back.”
“They shot her with a tranquilizer gun?”
“Yes, like the one Paddock was carrying the night she abducted you two.”
“And then one of her men strangled her?”
Grayson nodded, Emma continued to hold Tess’s hand, and Henry closed his eyes as if in prayer. No one said anything for the space of a few moments. Emma guessed Tess would eventually be relieved to know her sister didn’t suffer, but right now the poor woman was probably in shock. Too much had happened in too short a period of time.
The waitress brought their food—plates piled high with pancakes and eggs and bacon and pan-fried potatoes. Once she’d refilled their coffee mugs and told them to holler if they needed anything, Grayson continued.
“Paddock was second in charge. The real mastermind was a man named Clayton Clarke.”
“The name she mentioned by mistake,” Tess said.
“And the person she was texting.” Grayson picked up the saltshaker, thought better of it, and settled for pepper instead.
“I wondered what she was doing on her phone.”
“At first she was confirming instructions, but in the end she was threatening Mr. Clarke.”
“Who is he?” Emma asked.
“He runs a nonprofit called Wildlife Protection Society. We think that’s where he made his contacts, people he approached about buying genetically superior animals. Delaney suspects he’ll find Clarke was able to funnel the money through that charity.”
“So he wasn’t setting up hunts?” Emma stabbed at a pancake with her fork.
“No. His real business was providing breeding stock to game management places.”
“Have you arrested him?” Tess asked.
“Last night,” Grayson said. “Paddock gave up his name within the first hour of her questioning, angling for a plea bargain.”
“Will she get it?” Henry asked.
Grayson shrugged and scooped up a forkful of potatoes. “Possibly. Not a reduction in sentence, but Delaney said they would consider petitioning the judge for a better facility, one for white-collar crime, if she continued to work with the investigators.”
“But her crime was violent,” Tess said.
“It was, and yet not as violent as many of the offenders in federal prison. She doesn’t deserve to be on the street, not for a very long time, if ever. But the death penalty? I don’t know. It seems to me that life in prison might be punishment enough in this case.”
“These people killed my sister and my brother-in-law. Maybe others.”
“And they will pay for those crimes.”
No one said anything as that sobering thought sank in. Emma felt a profound sadness. What a terrible waste of the gift of life. But perhaps in prison each person involved would have time to consider their deeds and repent for them, to accept the forgiveness of Christ.
Emma thought her appetite should be affected by the topic, but she looked down at her plate dismayed to see that she’d eaten nearly all of her pancakes. She set down her fork and glanced around the table. “So Clayton Clarke ordered the killings, but Paddock carried them out?”
“She did. At least we know she killed Sophia. We have proof of that. Probably Clarke is responsible for the murder of your brother-in-law, though we are still investigating that aspect of the case.”
“Why would she do such a thing?” Emma asked. “How could she justify doing such a thing?”
“I can’t answer that.” Grayson sat back and crossed his arms. “I’m not sure anyone can.”
“I should have known better than to put us in that kind of danger,” Tess said. “These people had committed murder, yet I thought I could record whatever they were doing and reveal their deeds to the world. If it hadn’t been for Jimmy…”
“I try to avoid going down the road of what-ifs,” Grayson said.
But Tess wasn’t listening. “What if Jimmy hadn’t been able to call for help? What if you hadn’t answered Stuart’s call right away? Or Henry’s monitor had malfunctioned? What if no one had called into the police department alerting you to my live streamed video?”
Emma put a hand on Tess’s arm to cal
m her rising panic. “Too bad we don’t still have it to add to the boatload of proof you’re compiling.”
“Actually, we do.” Grayson smiled at the look of surprise on Tess’s face. “The social media site you used maintains copies of everything live streamed for thirty days in case something like this happens. After that it’s erased. I’ve already seen the footage myself. It will be enough to put Paddock away for the rest of her life for poaching alone. Add in the murder charges, and you can be sure she won’t be out on the street again.”
They finished their meal in silence. The waitress came to take away their plates, and then Julie Hobbs stopped by their table to say she was glad to see they were okay.
“You helped a lot, and we’re grateful,” Tess said.
“I don’t know how much I helped. Your sister’s still gone, but I like to think catching those responsible has eased your pain some.”
Emma grabbed her purse off the seat and pawed around in it. “I brought something for you.”
She pulled out a small jar of salve. “For your arthritis. If it helps, I can bring more.”
Julie seemed embarrassed, but she pocketed the jar of salve and promised she’d give it a try.
Emma’s thoughts were pulled back to the investigation when Tess suddenly crossed her arms on the table and leaned forward.
“Tell us about Jimmy.”
Grayson glanced around, as if considering whether he should share the information. Finally he shrugged and said, “Agent Brownfield was undercover in Clarke’s organization, and that team had just tied what was happening with Clarke to this area—to Monte Vista. Jimmy had been here in Monte Vista for the last month.”
“That explains why he was keeping an eye on Sophia.”
“Paddock didn’t realize he was doing that, but Jimmy had figured out Sophia was here to discover who killed her husband. He didn’t want her to get hurt and hoped she’d give up on her search and go home.”
“Obviously, he didn’t know my sister,” Tess said. “She could be quite stubborn.”
“What did Jimmy know at that point?” Emma asked.
“Only that someone was taking animals off national park land, but they needed more proof to build a solid case. Jimmy went undercover, pretending to be a teen hooked on video games who wanted to take the hunting and killing of wildlife to the next level. At that point, he had no idea Clarke’s and Paddock’s crimes involved murder. When he checked into Cooper Brooks’s death, it looked like a mugging to him, just as the San Diego police had determined. He didn’t understand why Sophia was here or what she hoped to find until later.”
When the Bishop Needs an Alibi Page 30