Dead of Winter

by Annelise Ryan

  “You like him, don’t you?” I say to her.

  Hildy turns and looks at me with a faint smile, her gaze a smidge starry-eyed. “What’s that?” she asks.

  “Richmond,” I say, nodding my head toward the door. “You like him.”

  She snaps out of whatever reverie held her, her expression sobering. “Oh, he seems quite capable,” she says, trying hard to sound disinterested, or at the least, no more than professionally interested.

  I’m not buying it, and my expression says so.

  “Okay, yeah. I like him,” Hildy says, caving. “He’s very masculine . . . so fit, and tall, and strong. And he has caring eyes. You can tell a lot about a person from their eyes, you know.”

  I nod.

  “How well do you know him?”

  “Pretty well,” I say. “He’s one of the good guys.”

  “Is he married?”

  I smile at her. “No, and never has been. He was dating a local woman for a while, but I think that’s over. So you might be able to catch him on the rebound.”

  Hildy contemplates this information, her expression alternating between worry, hope, and curiosity.

  “I’d go slow, though,” I caution her. “He hasn’t had very many relationships in his life. He used to be quite heavy, and something of a recluse.”

  “Really?” she says, looking thoughtful. “He looks very fit now.”

  “He lost a lot of the weight a couple of years ago after he was shot in the gut,” I tell her, conveniently leaving out the fact that I was the one who shot him. “He visits the gym regularly these days, and he’s a new man as a result.”

  Hildy looks down at herself, running a hand over her slightly rounded belly. “Do you think he’d mind a woman who’s a little, um, unskinny?” she says, biting her lip and looking at me with a hopeful expression.

  “Well, as an unskinny person myself, I’d say you never know until you try.”

  Hildy sighs and turns her attention—reluctantly, it seems—back to our victim. “Do you think we’ll be able to find her sister?”

  I look down at the bruised young face of my victim, pondering the selflessness that made her devote her last, dying breath to an appeal for help for her sibling. “I don’t know,” I say honestly. “But we’re sure as heck going to try.”

  “I want to help in any way I can,” Hildy says. She looks up at me, her eyes pleading. “And not just because of him.” She nods toward the door. “I can be quite resourceful.”

  “Well, for starters, you can work hard at recalling any other details about the man who brought her in. What was the color and length of his hair? What color were his eyes and skin? Did you notice any mannerisms, birthmarks, scars, or tattoos? Did you pick up on any accents, or peculiarities of speech? Were there any unusual smells about him? What was he wearing? Anything you can remember might help. Write it all down and share it with Detective Richmond. Sometimes the most insignificant detail can turn out to be important.”

  Hildy nods eagerly, seemingly buoyed by either the opportunity to help or the opportunity to report her facts to Richmond. Maybe . . . probably both, I realize. “I’ll get right on it while it’s all still fresh in my head,” she says. And then she hurries from the room.

  I turn my attention back to Jane Smith, wondering who she really is. Where was she from? What was her life like before all this happened? And how had she ended up here?

  I continue taking pictures, getting close-ups of her various wounds. It’s the beginning of a long and very intimate process. By the time I get her back to the morgue, and Izzy and I perform her autopsy, I will be familiar with every aspect of this girl’s body, both inside and out.

  CHAPTER 4

  When I’m done with my photographs, I leave Jane Smith’s room and go looking for the ER staffers who cared for her. It’s relatively quiet in the department at the moment, though I know better than to comment on this fact. ER workers are a highly suspicious group and there are three things they believe can trigger a shit storm of patients arriving: any mention of the word “quiet,” a full moon, and ordering food in. There isn’t much that can be done about the lunar cycles other than to gird one’s loins and push through it, and I know from past experience that the temptation of delicious, albeit often unhealthy food delivered from some outside source often wins out over the staffers’ fears. But if anyone mentions that cursed Q word, they are likely to be tarred, feathered, and threatened with a variety of tubes that will fit not so nicely into every one of their orifices.

  I make my way to the nurses’ station, where there are three nurses, a physician, a unit clerk, and a technician on duty, all of them seated at various computers. I glance at an electronic board hanging from the ceiling that displays the room numbers and the names and complaints of any patients currently in the department. There are fifteen rooms, and only four of them are occupied at the moment, with one of those being my Jane Smith. I don’t recognize two of the nurses, but the third one is a good friend of mine and a longtime presence here in the ER: Phyllis, aka Syph, who got her nickname years ago when I worked in the ER and we spent a shift trying to come up with nicknames for ourselves that were also common maladies. We had a habit—and most ER staffers still do—of referring to patients by their complaint or diagnosis and their room number, rather than their name. It happens in part because of attempts to maintain patient privacy, because there are often visitors or other patients within hearing distance when patients are discussed between caregivers. But it’s also the easiest way to identify a patient when you have an ER full of them. Generally speaking, referring to a patient as the “rectal foreign body in bed eight” brings his face and situation to mind much more clearly than his name would.

  I also know the doctor on duty, Mike Leonard, not only from when I used to work here, but also because I used to socialize with him and his wife back when I was married to David. Mike has been working in the Sorenson ER for the past twenty years, and his wife, Dianna Muller, is a local veterinarian. I like them both a lot, but haven’t seen or spoken with either of them in the three years since my split from David—one of the many things I lost in the divorce.

  “Hey, Mike,” I say, walking up to his desk.

  He turns around and gives me a big smile. “Mattie Winston!” He pops up from his seat and gives me a big hug. “It’s good to see you.” He releases me from the hug, but holds me at arm’s length. “You’re looking good,” he says, eyeing me closely. “This death work must suit you.”

  I respond to his comment with something between a grimace and a grin. “I’m not sure how to take that,” I say. “But thanks.”

  “I hear you’ve remarried and have a kid now.”

  I nod. “Technically, I have two kids. My husband has a teenage daughter from a previous marriage, and then there’s our son, Matthew, who’s two and a half.”

  “The terrible twos and a teenager?” Mike says, looking aghast. “That has to be a handful.”

  “It is at times,” I admit. “How are your kids doing? Casey should be graduating from college soon, no?”

  He nods, looking a bit wistful. “He’s in his senior year at U of Dub. Seems like yesterday he was a toddler in diapers. Where does the time go?”

  “What’s his major?”

  “He’s decided to follow in his mother’s footsteps. He’s been accepted into the veterinary medicine program at Washington State University, so he’ll be moving away next summer.”

  “And Christine? What is she up to?”

  Mike frowns. “She graduated from high school this past June, but hasn’t decided yet what she wants to do with her life.” He pauses and sighs. “She wants to travel and take some time to find herself.” He makes air quotes around the last two words. “Anyway, while it’s good to catch up, you’re here on business, grim business no less.”

  I nod. “What can you tell me?”

  “The girl was brought in by some guy who said she fell out of the car while it was moving. He estimated his sp
eed to be around thirty when it happened, but I knew almost instantly that his story was bogus. Knew it because she didn’t have any road rash, her clothes weren’t torn or wet, and her injuries weren’t consistent with the story. Plus, she looked scared out of her mind. At first, I thought her fear was because she was in pain, or afraid she was going to die, but it seemed to be targeted toward the man who brought her in. She kept looking at him all wide-eyed and anxious. I started asking him some rather pointed questions, questions that he dodged, and then our girl started to crump, so my attention shifted to her. Apparently, the guy slipped out during our attempts to resuscitate her, so I wasn’t able to question him any further.”

  “Did she say anything?”

  “She did, once the guy left the room,” Mike says with a sobering look. “My understanding is she said something about her sister, that he had her sister, too. I didn’t hear it, but several other people did.”

  “She didn’t give any names or other information?”

  Mike gives me an apologetic look. “Not that I heard. Phyllis was the primary. You can ask her if she got any more out of her before I got into the room.”

  “I did,” Syph says from behind me. I turn and give her a wan smile. I’m glad to see her, but wish the circumstances were different. “When I was bent over her, trying to listen to her heart and lungs, she whispered something in my ear. It was just two words: ‘lost group.’ ”

  “ ‘Lost group’?” I repeat, frowning. “What does that mean?”

  Everyone shrugs.

  I recall what Hildy had said to me earlier. “Maybe she was referring to others in her situation,” I suggest. “The social worker seemed to think the girl was a victim of human trafficking, so maybe she was trying to tell us something about the others who had been taken.”

  Mike says, “I don’t know how reliable anything she said will be. Not only was she half delirious because of her condition, the tox screen we did on her came back positive for opiates.”

  I nod. “I saw the tracks on her arms. Did you get a level? Any chance she died of an overdose?”

  Mike shakes his head. “There wasn’t enough in her system to kill her. And we gave her two doses of Narcan during the resuscitation attempt. Needless to say, it didn’t do anything.”

  Bob Richmond enters the nurses’ station and walks over to me, notebook in hand. “I have a potential ID on our victim,” he says, consulting the notebook. “There was an eighteen-year-old girl reported missing from Necedah six months ago, and her younger sister went missing a few weeks after that. The older girl’s name was Liesel and the younger one’s name is Lily. Their last name is Paulsen. Their father, Kurt, is the only living parent, and he owned and ran a dairy farm outside of Necedah, which had been in his family for three generations, though he recently sold it. The kids’ mother died a little over a year ago from cancer.”

  “Sad,” Mike says. “How did they disappear?”

  “I haven’t had a chance to review the police files, but I can share what’s known about the case publicly,” Richmond says. “Liesel was a senior in high school at the time of her disappearance. After her mother died, she drove herself and her sister to school every day rather than take the bus. That was so the girls could run errands afterward, like grocery shopping and such, things the mother used to do. Their father was tied up from dawn to dusk with the farm, and it sounds like Liesel took over the role of her mother, cleaning the house, cooking the meals, and taking care of her younger sister. On the day Liesel disappeared, which was a Friday, she took Lily to a friend’s house after school and dropped her off for a sleepover. Liesel was never seen again after that.”

  Richmond pauses for a moment to flip a page in his notebook. “Her father reported her missing later that same night. He said he came back to the house around six and saw no sign of her having returned since that morning. Both girls carried backpacks, and they typically dropped them by the front door as soon as they came home. He waited a while, figuring Liesel was running some errands and would be home soon, but somewhere around eight, he began to worry. He tried calling Liesel’s cell phone, but it went straight to voice mail. So he called Lily and talked to her. Lily told him that Liesel had dropped her off around three-thirty, and that she had mentioned something about having errands to run.”

  Richmond flips another page. “The father called the police around nine, at first just to inquire if there had been any traffic accidents in the area. He talked to a dispatcher, who told him there hadn’t been any accidents, and then suggested that perhaps Liesel was with some of her friends and had simply lost track of time. When he mentioned the fact that she wasn’t answering her phone, the dispatcher suggested that the battery might have died. A uniformed cop went out to the house and talked to Mr. Paulsen, but he gave him the same set of excuses the dispatcher did. He told Mr. Paulsen to call all of his daughter’s friends, and when Paulsen said he already had, the cop told him to wait to see if Liesel came home later that night. If not, he could call again in the morning. The cop did say they’d keep an eye out for her car in the meantime.” Richmond pauses, then shakes his head in dismay before continuing.

  “Mr. Paulsen then went out in his pickup and drove around for a couple of hours, checking all the roads and areas where Liesel would typically drive, and some that weren’t so typical. There was a high school football game that night, so he checked out the school grounds and the surrounding area. The game was over, and most of the people had left. He talked to a few students who were still hanging out, but none of them claimed to have seen Liesel since school let out. So he went back home, hoping she’d be there. She wasn’t, and he called the police again, insisting on talking to a different officer this time.”

  Another flip of a page and Richmond continues. “An officer by the name of Clyde Morrison responded.” Richmond pauses and looks up at us. “He’s the one I spoke to.” He looks back at his notes. “Anyway, Morrison came out to the house and talked to Mr. Paulsen. He admitted to me that he thought Liesel had simply decided to go to a friend’s house and perhaps got caught up in some sort of party and lost track of time, since it was a Friday night. Mr. Paulsen was adamant that Liesel wouldn’t do that, that she was a responsible, mature child for her age. Morrison took the info, and did broadcast a message to the other officers on duty to keep an eye out for Liesel or her car. Someone spotted her car parked in a motel lot about two hours later. It was unlocked, the keys were in the ignition, and her backpack was on the floor in the rear seat. Her phone was nowhere to be found.”

  Richmond looks up at us. “Needless to say, that’s when things got serious. The cops checked the motel registrants, but there was no sign of the girl. They eventually tried to ping her phone, but they got nothing. The car was dusted for prints and searched for evidence, but it appeared to have been wiped clean. There were security cameras in the motel lot, but all the feed showed was someone in a hooded jacket and gloves dropping the car off, getting out, and walking away. The overall build of this person didn’t match Liesel at all. And there has been no trace of her since.”

  “And the sister?” I ask. “What happened with her?”

  “Lily, two years younger than Liesel, disappeared just as mysteriously a little over three weeks later,” Richmond says. “According to her father, she was having a lot of trouble dealing with the disappearance of her sister, on top of her mother’s death. She dropped out of school and was staying at home. Her father thought she was safe there, but when he came back to the house one afternoon to have lunch and check on her, she was gone. Left her phone behind. Not a trace of her anywhere, either.”

  “So, one death and two disappearances, all in the same household in a matter of months,” I say. “I take it the cops looked into the father thoroughly, as well as any farmhands he had working for him?”

  “According to Morrison, they did,” Richmond says. “He told me the father was—and still is—completely devastated. As I mentioned before, he has since sold off his farm and now
lives in a small house in Necedah. He walks and drives the streets and roads in the area for hours—presumably, looking for his girls—and Morrison said he looks sadder and thinner with each passing day.”

  “And now we have to deliver the worst news of his life,” I say, closing my eyes as dread fills me. This is the part of the job I hate.

  “Well, if what Liesel said is true, there is still one daughter out there,” Mike says. “Maybe you can find her?” There is a hint of hope in his voice, but also a modicum of uncertainty. I think we all know the odds of that happening are depressingly long.

  “So far, the only clue we have is a video image of the car the man who came with Liesel was driving, and an even vaguer image of him, although we do have a description based on eyewitness reports from the staff here. I’ve got a sketch artist putting something together as we speak.”

  “We also have Liesel’s comment to Syph,” I add.

  Richmond shoots me a puzzled look, which he quickly shifts in Syph’s direction. “Comment? You mean when she mentioned her sister?”

  “No,” Syph says. She then reiterates what she told us earlier.

  “ ‘Lost group,’ ” Richmond repeats, his face screwing up. “What does that mean?”

  Everyone looks blank-faced.

  “Whatever it means,” I say, “we best figure it out soon, before I have to tell Mr. Paulsen that both of his daughters are dead.”

  CHAPTER 5

  After the chat in the nurses’ station, I call the Johnson Funeral Home, and the CassKit sisters, Cassiopeia and Katerina, arrive to transport the body back to the morgue. The girls, identical twins with long black hair who dress for the job in all black (though I suspect it’s as much a fashion statement as it is any type of uniform), are the daughters of the owners of the funeral home. They have embraced the family business with a vigor that some find frightening, though a number of men seem to find their dark sides intriguing, along with their svelte figures, good looks, and aloof demeanors.