Dead Calm

by Annelise Ryan

  The final complication in our decision to cohabitate was the four-legged baggage I brought with me. Hoover, who I found hungry, skinny, and dirty, trying to eat out of a garbage bin behind a local grocery store, wasn’t really an issue. Hurley adores Hoover, and the feeling is mutual. But I also managed to rescue two cats: a gray-and-white kitten I found abandoned in a Dumpster outside of a convenience store and decided to name Rubbish, and a black-and-white cat named Tux that had belonged to a murder victim on a case we investigated two years ago. And Hurley really, really doesn’t like cats. In fact, he’s afraid of them, not that he’d admit to it. If I ever had any doubts about whether or not Hurley really loves me, they were eliminated when he agreed to let me move into his house with my cats. It hasn’t been an easy adjustment for him, but over time we’ve managed to achieve a peaceful state of tolerance. This has been challenged of late, however, because Rubbish has started stalking and pouncing on all kinds of things: dust bunnies, shoes, Matthew and his toys, Hoover, Tux, and yes, Hurley. When Rubbish leapt at Hurley’s feet from beneath Matthew’s bed the other day, I heard my husband scream like a girl one second and swear like a salty sailor the next.

  I’m not sure how I became a pet magnet, because I never had any pets before these. My mother is a germaphobe and hypochondriac of the highest order who considers animals of all kinds to be dirty, vermin-ridden sources of contagion. And David was allergic to pet hair, or so he claimed, though I came to doubt this as time went by.

  While Hurley and I have managed to work through most of our issues over time, the housing arrangement remains uncomfortable. The solution we came up with was to buy a piece of land just outside of town and build a house on it that will be uniquely, and jointly, ours.

  We drive past our new property on our way to the motel, and I gaze out the window longingly at it, imagining how nice the house will be. The property includes a slope of land that runs back from the road for several hundred feet, topping out on a rocky bluff with a forty-foot face. From the top of the bluff, one has a spectacular view of the surrounding countryside, and that’s where we plan to build, taking advantage of that view as much as we can. If all goes according to plan, we hope to have it built and be in it in time for the holidays. But if there is one consistency in my life of late, it’s that almost nothing goes according to plan.

  CHAPTER 2

  It takes us just over half an hour to drive to the Grizzly Motel, an isolated, somewhat seedy joint located on a country highway bearing the ironic name of Morals Road, though it was named after a person rather than a tribute to ethics. The motel is easy to spot thanks to a giant green-and-pink neon bear out front, and a sign boasting of seventy-five cable channels. It’s a long, sprawling structure with two wings branching off either side of a central office area and rooms on both the front and back of each wing. A thick copse of woods borders it in the back behind the rear parking area.

  I’ve been here before, back when I was investigating the death of the woman my ex had his affair with, so I know that the rooms in the left wing are typically used for overnight customers, whereas the right wing tends to do a brisk trade in hourly rentals. It’s hard not to make political jokes about this setup, but I’m too tired to be funny at the moment.

  Even at this hour, there is a maid’s cart parked outside one of the rooms in the right wing. There are lots of people milling about in the front parking lot—most of them huddling in groups of two: gay couples, straight couples, and a couple of couples I’m not sure of.

  We see Izzy and a county cop standing inside the office talking to the woman behind the desk, so we park, get out of the car, and head inside as all the lookie-loos stare after us, whispering and muttering among themselves. A bell jangles over the door to announce our arrival, and the county cop turns around and gives us a relieved look.

  “Thank goodness,” he says, walking over and extending a hand to Hurley. They shake, and since the county guy, whose name tag says J MATHERS, is ignoring me, I head over to the desk and Izzy.

  “The bodies are in a room in this wing around on the back side,” Izzy informs me. “I haven’t been there yet.”

  I nod and look at the woman behind the desk. She is a solid mass of flesh with a thick neck, broad shoulders, heavy arms, and a nearly square-shaped torso. Her hair is cropped short, and she is dressed in a plain white T-shirt with the sleeves rolled up and jeans.

  “You’re Cinder, right?” I say.

  She nods.

  “I met you a couple of years ago when I was investigating another case.”

  She shrugs. I can’t tell if she remembers me or not, or if she even cares. It was a very memorable visit for me, however. I was unfamiliar with the Grizzly Motel back then, and it was an eye-opener for me when I realized they rented rooms by the hour, had VCR players in each unit (modern technology hadn’t yet made it to the Grizzly), and had a special collection of rentable movies that were rated like the spot to dig on a treasure map, movies that sported titles like Assablanca, Womb Raider, and Twin Cheeks—riffs on other, gentler movies.

  “I introduced you to Joey Dewhurst,” I try.

  With that revelation, Cinder’s face lights up. “Oh, yeah. Joey.”

  “I thought the two of you might hit it off.”

  She shrugs again. “We’re good friends,” she says. “He’s a nice guy, but a little slow.” She taps the side of her head. “He’s dating someone else now, someone his own . . . speed.”

  I get what she’s saying. Joey is mentally challenged and has an IQ approximately equivalent to that of a ten-year-old. But he also has an amazing savant ability with computers: hardware, software, and writing code. He considers himself a superhero of sorts—HackerMan—and he often wears a red bodysuit under his regular clothes that has a big, yellow H on the chest and a cape that hangs off the back.

  Mathers is apparently ready to take us to the bodies because Hurley is beckoning to us. I tell Cinder it was nice to see her again, and then Izzy and I follow Hurley and Mathers out of the office and around the right end of the building to the back. Yellow police tape has been strung up from the back corner of the building to a county cop car parked near the bordering woods, and we duck beneath it. I can see similar tape strung up halfway down the building, effectively cordoning off the rear area of this wing.

  “I’ve chatted with all the people who were in rooms back here inside the taped area,” Mathers says. “They’re all out front, and I’ve asked them not to leave.” He shrugs. “Though I didn’t have the manpower to make sure they stayed. I have names, however, assuming they’re legit names.”

  With a place like this, the odds of that are small, I think.

  “Who called it in?” Hurley asks.

  “That behemoth of a woman in the office,” Mathers says with a roll of his eyes. “I sure wouldn’t want to piss her off,” he adds with an arch of a brow. “She said the people in the room to the right of our victim’s heard gunshots and called her at the front desk. She locked the office and came around back to check. Knocked three times, and when no one answered, she unlocked the door and went in. She swears she didn’t go very far into the room or touch anything. She could tell they were both dead from the door, so she shut it, letting it lock, and went back to her office to call 911.”

  Hurley looks up and scans the roofline of the building. “No security cameras?”

  Mathers shakes his head, looking irritated. “Apparently the clientele who frequent this place aren’t too keen on such things.”

  “Did the people in the adjacent rooms see anyone?” Hurley asks next.

  Again, Mathers shakes his head. “The ones who called the office said they heard a man’s and a woman’s voice through the wall earlier, but they were muffled, and they couldn’t tell what they were saying. The voices weren’t raised like they were arguing or anything. Then they heard the shots, two of them, fairly close together. They were, um, otherwise disposed at the time, and it took them a minute or so to get out of bed, put on some clo
thes, and peek through first the peephole and then the window.”

  We have arrived at the door to the room in question, and Mathers uses a key card to unlock it. When he pushes it open, the distinct, acrid smell of blood wafts out into the hot, humid, night air, and my coffee gurgles and lurches in my gut. Hurley, Izzy, and I all don gloves and paper booties from the scene kit I’ve brought along. As Hurley and Izzy head inside, I swallow hard, hoping to keep my peristalsis moving in the right direction, and follow them.

  There are two of our local cops in the room: Patrick Devonshire and Brenda Joiner. Also in the room is Jonas Kriedeman, the police department’s evidence technician. The bodies are on the queen-sized bed: a man and a woman, both lying on their backs. The woman is closest to us, her head to our right, and she has what appears to be a bullet hole in her chest, right where her heart is. Her death was most likely instantaneous. The man beside her has an entry wound on the right side of his head, with a corresponding exit wound on the left side. Judging from the brain matter I can see splattered on the pillow and on the woman’s face, his death was also instantaneous, not to mention messy. His right arm is hanging off the bed, and there is a gun on the floor beneath his hand.

  “It’s a grim one,” Devonshire says with a grimace, staring at the mess on the man’s pillow. He looks a little pale. Devonshire isn’t known for having a strong stomach, and I’m worried he’s going to barf on our crime scene.

  Hurley must be thinking something similar because he says, “Patrick, why don’t you go stand by the door to the room to make sure none of those rubberneckers try to get in here.”

  Patrick obliges, looking relieved.

  We are standing in front of a credenza located at the foot of the bed, and Mathers turns to point to something next to the bolted-down TV. “They left a note,” he says. “Or rather our male vic did.”

  I look at the note. It’s computer-printed on plain paper, the type you can find in most any house, and it’s written in all capital letters.

  I’M SORRY, MEREDITH. THIS ISN’T HOW IT WAS SUPPOSED TO END, BUT NOW WE ARE TOGETHER FOREVER. TO WHOEVER READS THIS NOTE, PLEASE TELL MY WIFE, PAMELA, I DIDN’T MEAN TO CAUSE HER ANY PAIN.

  At the bottom of the page is a big, handwritten letter C, presumably scribbled with the pen lying next to the paper. Given that there is no computer or printer in the room, it seems obvious that the note was brought along to the motel. The pen is a generic ballpoint that could have originated in the room—though Cinder doesn’t strike me as the type to provide perks that can easily be taken—or it might have been left behind by a previous guest or brought along by one of our victims. I try to imagine the man asking the woman for a pen so he could sign the note with a one-letter closing before giving it to her and then killing her. It feels wrong in a hundred different ways. And yet the note is written as if it was intended to be read by the female victim, presuming that the dead woman is the Meredith mentioned in the note.

  I look at Mathers. “I’m assuming you have IDs on them? We heard they’re from Sorenson.”

  Mathers nods. “We found a purse over there,” he says, pointing to a chair. “Wallet inside belongs to a woman named Meredith Lansing, and the driver’s license picture matches that of our female vic. The guy left his wallet on the bedside table. It belongs to a Craig Knowlton. And again, the license picture matches.”

  So the Meredith in the note and the dead woman are likely one and the same, and the name Craig fits with the letter C at the bottom of the suicide note. All neat and tidy . . . too much so for my tastes.

  “This note seems wrong to me,” I say to no one in particular. “It doesn’t make sense to type out a note for the girlfriend and bring it along for her to read before killing her. And then leave it here for . . . for who? For us? A note that says something along the lines of Good-bye, cruel world, I couldn’t live without her would make more sense.”

  “You’re trying to make sense of illogical, crazy thought patterns,” Hurley says. “Anyone crazy enough to kill the woman they love because they can’t have her couldn’t have been firing on all cylinders.”

  “Maybe,” I say, still bothered by the note. I take out my camera and start shooting pictures, beginning with the note. Then I look over at Jonas. “Be sure and bag this pen and dust it for prints.”

  He nods, grabs an evidence bag, and moves in on the pen.

  “Know anything else about our victims?” Hurley asks. He is staring at the bodies, so his question isn’t directed at anyone.

  Brenda Joiner provides the first answers. “A little. Meredith Lansing had an ID card in her purse indicating she works at the hospital in Sorenson. Craig had some business cards in his wallet that state he’s a financial adviser for a company called Carrier Investments, also in Sorenson.”

  Mathers jumps in. “I had our dispatcher run down what she could find on the two of them. They’re both married—to other people,” he adds with a wry arch of his brow. “Meredith’s husband is John Lansing; Craig’s wife is Pamela Knowlton. A Google search revealed that Pamela also works at Carrier Investments. In fact, she and Craig own the company. It’s some type of investment company franchise.”

  “Have you sent anyone to notify the relatives yet?” Hurley asks.

  Mathers shakes his head, giving us an apologetic look. “We’re so short on manpower at the moment that I didn’t have anyone to send. That’s one of the reasons we’re pulling you guys in on the case. In fact, my boss says you can have the whole thing if you want since the victims are both from Sorenson. We’re stretched pretty thin right now, and we’ll assist you with what we can, but . . .” He shrugs.

  “No problem,” Hurley says. “Happy to help.” He looks over at Izzy. “Are you comfortable making IDs based on the license pictures? If you are, I’ll go and notify the families.”

  Izzy frowns at this. “It’s not what I prefer, but under the circumstances . . .” He trails off and moves over to look at the licenses, both of which are at the end of the credenza. Meredith’s license photo shows her smiling, with dark hair framing her face. Craig’s picture is more serious; both his short dark hair and his expression look very businesslike. Izzy picks the licenses up and carries them over to the bed. One at a time, he holds the licenses out and compares the pictures to the faces of the victims.

  When he’s done he looks at Hurley. “I suppose I’m okay with it.”

  Jonas, who has been standing by in his biohazard gear, says, “We’ve got that tablet app for fingerprints. Can’t we scan them in here and see if we get a match?”

  “Great idea,” Izzy says.

  Jonas digs the tablet out of his scene kit and fires it up. A minute later, he has the app launched, and he reaches over Craig Knowlton’s body for his left hand; the right hand, the one that had held the gun, will need to be tested for gunshot residue. It only takes Jonas a few minutes to place each of the fingers on the screen and scan them in. When he’s done, he says, “One hand ought to be enough if they’re in AFIS. And I suspect Craig here will be. A lot of financial advisers have to have their fingerprints on file in order to be licensed.” He taps the screen a couple of times, says, “That one is searching,” and then heads to the other side of the bed and Meredith’s left hand, which is closest. When he’s done scanning her prints in, he tells us so. “It may take an hour or so to get a hit,” he says. And then to prove how wrong he is, a little chime sounds from the tablet. “Or not,” he says with a smile, looking at the tablet. “As I suspected, Craig Knowlton is in the system, and we have a positive ID.”

  Izzy nods and looks at Hurley. “I’m comfortable with the woman’s ID if you want to do the notifications.” Hurley nods, and then Izzy looks at me. “Why don’t you go with him, and I’ll stay here with Jonas and help him process the scene.”

  Brenda pipes up and says, “Patrick and I can stay. We called in some extra help to cover the town while we’re out here, so we’re yours for the duration.”

  “That’s great,” Izzy says.
>
  I’ve been busy with my camera the entire time, and I’ve taken dozens of pictures—general shots of the room and the tiny attached bathroom, followed by close-ups of the bodies, the gun, the blood spatter, the note, the pen, the purse, and the wallet—basically everything in the small room.

  I say to Izzy, “I think I’ve got a picture of everything in here, and I thought I’d get some exterior shots on the way out. Do you need my camera for anything?”

  “No, I’ve got mine in my kit if I need it,” Izzy says. He starts assigning tasks to the others in the room. Jonas is going around the room, dusting various surfaces for fingerprints, while Brenda Joiner does a quick test for gunshot residue on Craig Knowlton’s right hand. To no one’s surprise, the GSR test comes up positive. With that done, she sets about securing the hands of both victims in paper bags to protect any other evidence that might be on them. In the meantime, Hurley picks up the gun with his gloved hand, examines it closely, and then writes down its serial number in his notebook before bagging and tagging it as evidence.

  Hurley turns and stares at the bodies again, his eyes narrowed in thought. Then he looks at Mathers. “What did the woman in the motel office have to say about them?”

  Mathers consults his little notebook, a required piece of equipment in police work. “She said the gentleman checked them in around midnight as John and Jane Smith.” He punctuates this with a roll of his eyes. “Apparently she doesn’t require ID for check-ins. They booked the room for,” he pauses and makes air quotes with his fingers, “the four-hour-or-less rate, and they paid in cash.”

  “Vehicle?” Hurley asks. “They had to get here somehow.”

  Mathers shifts nervously and clears his throat. “Haven’t had a chance to check into that yet,” he says, looking apologetic. “I do know that the four cars parked out back here inside the tape belong to other, um, guests. But I haven’t had time yet to look for the victims’ car or cars.”