“Obviously, she wasn’t.” Quint scowled at me. “She’s a young woman of honor taking part in a rigorous discipleship program. She wouldn’t break her commitment like that.”
“You’re just broken-hearted at what might have been, then.”
To my surprise, she nodded.
“Adam did have a way with ladies. Made them all feel special.” Bruce shifted uncomfortably in his chair.
“Tell me Brit, what’s it like to be the only woman in the program?”
“She’s not. She has Vivian.”
“Your wife is your disciple?” I flipped my head back to Bruce. After the way he had fumbled the news and she had saved him, I could hardly imagine him leading her.
“No, no. Vivian is Britany’s mentor.”
“In addition,” Quint—who was not to be confused with the strong silent Red—said, “Lauren and Ramona were both in the program until September.”
“And what happened in September?” I smiled at Mr. Talks-A-Lot.
Another sob from Brit.
“They decided to leave. Couldn’t hack it. Lauren met a man she wanted to date, and Ramona got bored and went home.”
“Is that so, Bruce?”
“Yes. This program accepts up to ten people per term, but very few of them have the internal strength to stick out the two years.”
I chewed on my cheek to keep from saying what I really thought. This self-denial, and self-congratulatory thing was something I was very familiar with. Rick was always coming up with new programs he could offer where people paid him hundreds of dollars and he had them abstain from stuff and confess stuff to him. Usually just for a weekend, though. Rick didn’t have the staying power for years long commitments.
“How much does this program cost?” All eyes turned to Bruce. That was unexpected. I turned as well.
“After we accept an application we discuss financial terms. There are scholarships available.”
Gag me. He was making bank off these kids. They were paying him to be his free labor and to feel awesome about themselves. That said, he didn’t look rich. He probably had to send all the money back to his organization. The guy at the top of the pyramid always got richest. But, I slowed down my mind. I couldn’t get angry at these guys. I needed to know what they knew. If this was what they were into, who was I to judge? “How much longer do each of you have here?”
Quint said he’d be done in June. Luke, Red, and Brit would be done in June the year after.
“Let’s get back to Adam. He seemed to be less vocal with you all recently, is that so?”
“Yes,” Quint said, eyeing the others firmly.
“Was he also missing appointments?”
“No, not at all. And I don’t know what Quint means,” Bruce interrupted. “I certainly saw no change, and I would be the one to notice.”
Brit sobbed again. Girl needed to get a grip. I just lost a husband of twelve years and you didn’t see me crying about it.
“It was my fault.” She wiped her eyes with her sleeves. “I’m so sorry. I volunteer to leave. I’ll get myself home somehow. I’m so sorry to all of you for what I did.”
“Honey, it’s okay. Just tell us what happened.” I went motherly again. Odds were this child had been seduced by St. Adam and was killing herself over it. Old men and their interns. Disgusting.
“We…we…we…” She struggled to get sounds out between sobs. “In September,” here she fanned her red face, and tried to pull herself together. “In September we began to meet…on Mondays. For coffee.” She gulped and covered her face. “And he took me out to dinner and I had a glass of wine. And he kissed me.”
Quint was growling.
Even Red looked put off. “Are you okay Brit?”
She shook her head. “I broke every commitment. All of them.”
“I hardly think…” All eyes turned to me, and all of them were angry.
Mr. Radio Voice Luke set me straight. “Our commitment is binding and specific. If she says she broke all of it, she knows it’s true.”
She lowered her eyes to her cup. “I did. Twice I went with him to the Episcopal church. The one in Vancouver with the…the…female priest.”
And there it was.
St. Adam wasn’t merely trying to seduce an intern. He was up to more good deeds. Attempting to show a devout young woman that her role in the church could be more important than what she was seeing. That her service could be bigger, more meaningful. If old, dead, Adam wasn’t careful, I’d fall in love with him myself.
“Brit, I’m so sorry, but you know what this means.” Bruce patted her back softly.
“I’ve known for weeks now. I have…I have been full of doubt and misgivings. This isn’t right for me. I didn’t want to be another female washout, but I am.” She pulled at the fabric of her long skirt, but the color was coming back to her cheeks. From boys to boredom, the ladies in this program were getting out as fast as they could.
“Bruce, why do you think you have a problem keeping women in your program?”
“I didn’t create this program but found it to be good for me when I went through it twenty years ago. Our term had a hard time keeping women involved as well. Honestly, I’d like to say that the world is undermining us, and I’m sure you’d like to hear me say that.” He looked resigned. “But I suspect this program is about forty years behind the times regarding women and it is hard to kick against the goads.”
Red snorted.
“Disrespect is disallowed.” Quint said.
“I’ll deal with him later.” Bruce admonished.
“If you don’t mind, can you pass this paper around and let me know how I can contact you all?”
I cared about none of them accept Red. He had something to say that he couldn’t say in front of Bruce and the others. Something worse than breaking every commitment and kissing a man. And if I wasn’t mistaken, he was dying to tell me what it was.
Chapter Eleven
By Saturday morning I was giddy. You didn’t get to talk to an eyewitness for a murder scene every day of the week. In fact, the last murder I cracked hadn’t had an eyewitness at all. I tucked the memory away and tried not to think about it on my way to the crime scene. That last murder had been a bad one and had put me off murders altogether.
The sun rises late in the fall, so my drive out to the country had the dramatic lighting of the birth of a new day. Like an omen telling me this was going to be good. Momentous, even. Strategically placed to take advantage of the most beautiful scenery below Alaska, the road out to Crown Point was the Sunday drive everyone in Portland ought to take, if they only knew. I let the scenery calm me. My blood was pumping about the interview, but I was learning teens could be tricky, and I didn’t want to scare her off.
I sat in my super fancy rental SUV with my lights and the radio off. I faced away from the cliff and the river below, my eye trained on the parking lot entrance instead. My angsty teenage poet would probably try and make an entrance. Maybe she’d even take the tractor again.
While waiting, I thought about lights. I still haven’t figured out how you could manipulate light to make it kill for you. It was probably impossible. The flashes of light Gina reported must’ve been for the sake of psychological torture. Maybe each flash revealed another severed digit. I’d have to call the young police officer to see what he had to say after the autopsy. Had there been pools of blood at the hands and feet where the body was found? Or had he been killed first, and then mutilated? Perhaps the flashes of light were from the killer checking his handiwork. Maybe he had stopped at chopping off thumbs and toes because he had heard the tractor going by.
I had plenty of time to come up with new and gruesome theories while waiting for Gina, because she stood me up. Two hours after our appointment, I called her step-mom. “This is Maura Garrison. We spoke yesterday,” I said when Jennifer answered the phone. “Is Gina in?”
“I don’t think so. Let me check.”
“We planned to meet this morning, up at Crown Point
.” I filled her in on the details while she checked for her step-daughter.
“No, I’m sorry, she’s not here.”
“Can I have her number to call her?”
“She doesn’t have her own phone right now. She’s grounded for stealing grandpa’s tractor.”
“What about a friend? Or a boyfriend? I’d really like to check in with her, make sure she’s okay.” This step-mom wasn’t the kind who appreciated the sympathetic mother tone, so I kept it business casual.
“I don’t have any of those numbers, sorry.”
“Can you ask her to call me when you see her next?”
“Sure. I can.”
We ended the call, me very dissatisfied with the people in charge of Gina’s life and safety.
I checked the John Deere Facebook account. Perhaps Gina had come up with some more five-seven-five thoughts on being a snitch and had changed her mind. Or maybe she and this boyfriend were more involved in the murder than I had thought possible.
There were no new poems. I sent her a private message and hoped she’d get back to me. But, before I left, I got out of my car for a quick search of the area. It had rained heavily several times since the murder. The weather was a better crime scene cleaner than the ones I’d met in person.
The ground was dark from rain last night, but there were no darker shadows on the ground where blood might have soaked into the pavement. There were no scars in the concrete railing where someone might have thrashed in chains, while being mutilated and killed. It was just another beautiful early-morning with sweeping views of the Columbia River as it cut through the Cascade Mountains. Nothing but evergreen trees, choppy blue water, rocky cliffs, and the fresh, cold, clean, heartless air of a day that was about to start raining.
I left, my earlier excitement and hope washed entirely away like all the clues at the crime scene. Not far from Crown Point, at the intersection of Knierem Road and Old Historic Highway, two police cars were just hanging out. That wasn’t usual.
I pulled over and joined them. “What’s happened?” This was a small country road in the woods, in a small country town. It wasn’t unusual for a neighbor to pull over for a chat.
“Hit and run. Teenage girl on a mountain bike.”
“Oh no!” My heart sunk to my stomach. “Is she okay?”
“She’s at the hospital in Troutdale now.”
“Who was it?”
He looked up from his notes and shook his head. “Not identified yet.” He waved me on.
I took the hint and left, a dark foreboding hanging over me. Teen girl on bike? Hit and run? Eye witness to a murder, headed that direction this morning? The victim had to be Gina.
When I could safely pull over and make a call, I did. I gave Jennifer the news and told her to get to the hospital and see if it was her step-daughter.
“It can’t have been…” Jennifer sounded shocked.
“It might not have been, but you should check.” I gritted my teeth. Why did she hesitate? Had this been a daughter of Rick’s I would have run out of the house and straight to the hospital at even a hint of her being in trouble.
“Okay, I will.” Her lack of enthusiasm turned my dismay into bitter anger. Some people had families handed to them on a silver platter and didn’t have the sense to be thankful for it.
“And…I’m so sorry.” A sick feeling of grief and guilt fought for dominance in my gut. If this was Gina, she had been coming out to meet me, and it was my fault she was in the hospital. If she died, how could I ever live with that?
“You didn’t hit her.” Her blasé answer failed to comfort me.
I let Jennifer go, but knew that if it was Gina at the hospital, her idea of my fault in the matter would change drastically.
I wasn’t family, so when I called the hospital they would not give me any information about the victim of the hit and run. I had never seen Gina in person, so I couldn’t volunteer to identify her. Depending on how she was doing and what Jennifer felt about the matter, she may or may not call me to let me know, or to scream at me for endangering the girl. All I could do right now was wait.
I thought about going straight to the hospital, but that sense of guilt held me back. I couldn’t face up to the worst news, if the worst had happened. But I couldn’t move on either, so I went to the Starbucks nearest the hospital, found a quiet corner, and called that handsome young cop I had met at the crime scene the first day of the investigation. “Officer Chapman? This is Maura Garrison. I’m a private detective and we met the other day up at Crown Point.”
“How can I help you?”
“I have been investigating the murder of Adam Demarcus.”
“Yes?” He sounded bored, which was a bummer. I had pegged him as young and enthusiastic.
“I was meeting an eye witness up at Crown Point this morning, a teenage girl named Gina Stimpson, but she didn’t show. At the same time, she was supposed to be meeting me, a young girl was injured in a hit and run on Old Historic Highway. I think it might be the same girl.”
“I see.”
Did he? I couldn’t tell. “I called her home to see if she was all right and they hadn’t seen her.”
There was no response. I could have smacked him. He needed to wake up. “The thing is, if someone knew she was meeting me, she might have been hit to silence her.”
“Hmmm.”
“Well, anyway, you can check out her pseudonym on Facebook: John Deere. She has an account where she has been talking about what she saw. The victim of the hit and run is at the hospital in Troutdale.”
“Thanks for the info. For the future, you can call the tip line.”
“I hope you don’t think I’m bothering you. There is a teenage girl missing who claims to be a witness to a murder. I’d call that better than just a tip.”
“I’ll let the detective in charge know.”
“All right then.” I ended the call very disappointed in the state of the police. How could he not care as much as I did? Of course, I had no idea what kind of crime he had been in the middle of solving. Or if he had been up all night doing something important. But I didn’t like the idea that my only police contact for this case wasn’t up to scratch.
The idea of my teenage witness half dead at the hospital was driving me mad. It didn’t matter if they wanted me or not, I had to see for myself if the victim was Gina. I pulled up Gina Stimpson’s Facebook page. She hadn’t yet accepted my friend request, so I couldn’t dig deeply into her photos—or even see if she had many. Facebook wasn’t the most popular hangout for girls her age. I studied her profile picture until I was sure I could pick her out in a crowd. Not an easy task with the puppy face Snap Chat filter over the top of it.
At Legacy Mt. Hood Medical Center, I didn’t have to pretend to be worried. “I’m here to see Gina Stimpson. Is she still in Emergency?”
The receptionist looked at me with sympathy. “Let me check.” She typed a little on her computer. “I’m sorry, honey, I don’t have a Gina Stimpson. Can you spell the name for me? Maybe I had it wrong.”
I spelled.
She shook her head. “Nope. Are you sure she is at our hospital?”
Legacy Mt. Hood was the only one that could reasonably be called the Troutdale hospital. “I was sure she was out here.” Was the victim not Gina, or had Jennifer still not bothered to come down and check? “I guess I need to make a phone call.”
“Sure thing. Make yourself comfortable.” She gestured to the coffee cart and bistro tables.
“Thanks.”
I moved to the far side of the room and called Jennifer Stimpson. She didn’t answer. I texted her. Was the accident Gina? I’m very concerned
While I waited for a response, I fixed myself a cup of coffee.
I waited an hour, but no answer.
My foot tapped fast and hard on the tile floor. Gina had to be in the ER. I knew it. She was grounded, so she’d have to use her bike to get to me, rather than a car. What other girl her age would be at that inter
section on a bike at that hour? I pulled up the online white pages and got the number for the “other” Stimpsons, the ones I thought might be her grandparents, Donald and Esther Stimpson.
A gravelly voiced gentleman answered right away. “You’ve got Donald.”
“Donald, my name is Maura Garrison. I was supposed to meet your granddaughter this morning, but she didn’t make it.”
“Gina?” He chuckled. “That girl wouldn’t be on time for an appointment if you paid her.”
“The only thing is, I’m a little concerned.” I laid out what had happened and then added, “I can’t get ahold of Jennifer, and I was hoping she’d come by the hospital and just see if this girl was Gina.”
“I’m not surprised Jenny didn’t come down, but Esther and I will leave right away.” His voice was firm and in control—the tone many men took on when scared to death.
Relief was immediate. Had there ever been a problem a grandfather couldn’t solve? I settled back into my chair to wait for my reinforcements. While waiting, I googled psychological torture and light.
I didn’t have long to read about “sensory bombardment”, a mere fifteen minutes after my call a couple who looked to be in their sixties rushed through the automatic hospital doors. The man was stocky, wearing a blue plaid flannel and a pair of crisp blue jeans. The woman was much younger than I had expected. No older than my mom, tall and slim. They went straight to the reception desk.
The conversation was conducted in low tones that I couldn’t hear, but after a few moments a young lady in scrubs joined the couple and led them away.
Half an hour later my phone rang. “Is this Maura Garrison?”
I recognized the voice immediately as Grandpa Stimpson.
“Yes, any word on Gina?”
“Thank you so much for calling. It was her. Our baby girl is here at the hospital, but she’s going to be okay, I think. She’s got a bad concussion some scrapes and bruises, and a bit of amnesia. They need her dad to come take care of her. The nincompoop didn’t have her wallet on her and was out cold when they found her.”
“I’m just so thankful they saw her.”
The Book of Judges Page 12