“I know, Blaine. That’s because your mom and dad stomped out of my office before I got a chance to tell them everything you’re up against now. Remember, they’re paying for a lawyer to defend you on drug charges. They might not be up for footing the bill for accessory to murder charges.”
“Pfft.” Blaine tried to maintain his cockiness, but Frank could see him wavering. “No one’s charging me with accessory to murder.”
“We didn’t understand the significance of the stolen ATV until now. We know Caitlin rode that vehicle to the Balsams. We know she couldn’t have driven it herself. You sold it to her killer and have been concealing that information. Hence, accessory to murder.” Blaine didn’t need to know that all of this was unverified speculation so far.
Blaine looked over his shoulder. “Nah, I mean, they can’t...just because...”
Frank kept pushing. He didn’t want to give Blaine too much time to think. The last thing he needed was for Blaine to insist on speaking to his lawyer. “I imagine your folks will be pretty upset once I tell them. You could convince them drug addiction is an illness, but murder—”
“Stop saying that word!”
Frank’s voice dropped nearly to a whisper. “It’s an awful word, isn’t it? How does it feel to know your actions contributed directly to someone placing a pillow over Caitlin Lupton’s face and pressing until—”
Blaine jiggled backward, forgetting his chair was chained to a ring in the floor.
“Tell me who you stole the ATV for, Blaine. Today is your best opportunity. We’re closing in on Catlin’s killer, and if we solve the case without your help, then you’ve lost all bargaining power. You go down with the ship.”
Blaine’s right hand clenched his left as if one was trying to prevent the other from doing something rash. Frank pulled out a tid-bit of information from his interview with Todd, glad that he’d reserved it for this moment. “You made the initial contact at a party, correct?”
Blaine’s mouth opened. The words followed a few seconds later. “I wasn’t invited to their party. I came to make a delivery...to get the party started, understand?”
Frank took a chance. Being right would help him, but if he were wrong, he didn’t think he’d be harmed. “The party was in the Mountain Glades development.”
Blaine reacted as if Frank had supernatural powers. “How—?”
“Okay, so you came to supply the drugs—I don’t care about that. I want to know about the ATV. Who approached you? How did it come about that you stole it?”
Blaine swallowed hard. “After I got paid for my delivery, this other guy came over and said he needed something and maybe I could get it for him. I thought he wanted some specialized product so I said, tell me about it and I’ll see what I can do. And that’s when he said he’d give me a grand to get him an ATV and I had to leave it in a special spot off the Trimont logging road in Verona and deliver it at night.”
“That didn’t strike you as odd? The party was full of rich people. Guy like him could buy a new ATV, no?”
Blaine shrugged. “Why should I ask questions?”
Why indeed? The Hale boys clearly wanted to get an ATV without their father’s knowledge, not go shopping for one at a dealership. “Fine. And the deal was to simply leave it in the woods? The guy at the party didn’t ask you to give a woman a ride on the ATV?”
“No,” Blaine scoffed. “That would be weird.”
As if Blaine had standards.
“So what made you realize this ATV could be related to the Caitlin Lupton murder? Last time we talked, you said you knew how Caitlin got to The Balsams,” Frank continued.
Blaine’s lip twitched in an unpleasant half-smile. “I knew before you did.”
Frank placed his face in front of Blaine’s. “What made you realize the significance?”
“I’ve hunted all over Essex County. I knew that the land where I left the ATV backed up to Mallard Lake. Then I saw on the news that this chick turned up dead in Mallard Lake, and no one knew how she got there. I figured maybe I knew.”
Blaine folded his arms across his chest. “Okay, so I’m cooperating now, right? Can we talk about what I get in return?”
Frank slapped the table. He was sick of being jerked around by this kid. “Here’s what you get. You’re going to tell me everything you know about the man you stole that ATV for. And in return, I won’t take you out of this jail and drop you off in front of Lenny Vicker’s house. “
“You can’t do that.”
“Watch me.”
“I thought you said you’d never do anything to hurt my Aunt Doris.”
“Blaine, right now I know Doris herself would choose finding Caitlin’s murderer over saving your sorry ass.” Frank grabbed the front of Blaine’s orange jail t-shirt and pulled him close. “I’m giving you a chance to do one right thing in your worthless, piece-of-shit life. Now talk.”
“All right, all right,” Blaine squirmed away. “I don’t know his name.”
“Describe him.”
“Early twenties. Tall and thin, but not scrawny. Straight, dirty blond hair.”
That could be Justin or Keith, but lots of other people too. He needed more to get an arrest warrant. “What color eyes?”
“I dunno, man. I don’t look at other dudes’ eyes.”
“C’mon Blaine—I need more. Something distinctive about the guy.”
“Well, he talked funny.”
Talked funny? Keith and Justin both spoke normally. Was Frank wrong about his hunch? “What do you mean—a stutter, a lisp, an accent?”
“No, I mean he talked fancy. Used big words.”
Frank relaxed. That could be either of the Hales. But all the young partiers at that house talked fancy by Blaine’s standards. “I need something specific. Think. What did the others say to him? What did they talk about?”
“I wasn’t there that long. I did my business and left, man.” Blaine slumped back in his chair, seeing his chance at a deal slipping away. Then he straightened up. “One of the guys called him ‘Worm’. Does that help?”
“Worm? What does that mean?”
Blaine lifted his hands to the ceiling. “Other people laughed, but he didn’t like it.”
Chapter 40
Frank was tempted to drive straight from the jail to the party house in Mountain Glade, but a call from Meyerson made him change course. The meeting with the Luptons was scheduled for five at a state police field office halfway between Albany and Trout Run.
Frank met Lew at his office and they made the hour-long drive together, discussing the case. Interviews with all of Caitlin’s friends and an examination of the phone and computer at her parents’ house revealed no connection to any of the Hales or anyone in the Etheridge family.
“Regis Kendall has to be the link between Caitlin and The Balsams,” Meyerson said. “We’ve got the computer forensics team working on the Jacks Are Wild lead—seems the ownership of the site is hidden behind several aliases with foreign domains.”
“Not surprising. You wouldn’t expect Kendall to leave it out in the open when he’s been so careful about covering his tracks everywhere else. Are you sure he actually flew to the west coast, or was that a lie, too?”
“His name shows up on a flight manifest to Seattle last week. No return trip booked; no attempt to leave the country. We’ve got his passport flagged. It’s getting tough to fly without verified ID these days. So either he’s still out there, or he drove back.”
“Have you had a chance to talk to Kendall’s wife and daughter and the colleague who said he exposed women to porn at the office?” Frank asked.
A tendon throbbed in Meyerson’s neck. “The ex-wife was cagey at first. I guess she feels being married to a pervert reflects badly on her and their daughter, even if she did leave him. We had a female trooper interview her. She went for the guilt angle—help us stop him before he hurts anyone else. The former Mrs. Kendall finally admitted she knew about her husband’s, er, proclivities. She sus
pected he had illegal porn on his computers, and she wanted out of that house.”
“Was he selling it?” Frank asked.
Meyerson shrugged. “She claims she didn’t know. Said she was sure he had cash hidden away that she knew nothing about. But he gave her a big divorce settlement, so she left without rocking the boat.”
“Nice.” Frank scowled. “You got a warrant to search his house in Colonie?”
“Tried. Judge said we don’t have enough evidence.”
“So how are we going to bring up this porn angle with the Luptons?” Frank asked. “They think Kendall is their friend.”
Meyerson’s hands tightened on the steering wheel. “I’m hoping something comes to you, Frank.”
FRANK AND MEYERSON spoke to each of the Luptons separately. The father raged. The mother wept. But neither provided any useful information.
By the time they got to Rachel, Frank felt like every nerve in his body had been torched. He paced outside in the cool evening air to settle himself down before he spoke to Caitlin’s sister, the most vulnerable family member.
When Frank and Lew entered the interview room, Rachel lifted her gaze as if they’d interrupted a prayer. Petite and serious, Rachel seemed like an old soul in a child-like body.
Lew had agreed that Frank should take the lead, so he began by telling Rachel a short and sanitized version of what he’d told her parents. He ended with, “We’re concerned that Regis Lupton may have had his own reasons for wanting Caitlin to stay at the Mountain Vista Motel.”
Rachel’s eyes opened wide with dread.
“Did Regis Kendall ever do anything inappropriate around you, Rachel?” Frank asked gently.
“Inappropriate? You mean like...sex?” She looked appalled.
Frank tread carefully. He didn’t want to lead the witness. Clearly, the girl was vulnerable, fragile. “It doesn’t have to be a sex act, per se. Did he ever do anything to make you feel uncomfortable?”
The girl gazed into her lap and picked at her blouse with her long delicate fingers. Frank could imagine them pressing the strings of a violin. “He’s always been interested in my music. He’s very kind to me.”
The sentence seemed to end on an unspoken “but”. This is how older men groomed their young victims—by offering acts of kindness, attention that parents couldn’t supply. Then the victim felt guilty for complaining.
“Did he ever touch you in a way you didn’t like, or pay you compliments that made you feel bad instead of good?”
Rachel’s head snapped up. Her eyes darted back and forth, like those of an animal looking for an escape route.
Frank silently kicked himself for not calling Trudy Massiney, the county social worker, to help him with this interview. He tried to channel Trudy’s reassuring manner. “Rachel, it’s okay to tell me about it. Mr. Kendall is the adult, and he’s responsible for his actions, not you.”
Sobs choked Rachel’s high voice. Frank strained to hear what she was saying. “If I had told my mom...she wouldn’t have let him take Caity there...this wouldn’t have happened.”
“Told her what, Rachel?”
The girl ground the heels of her hands into her eyes. “I was so-o-o selfish,” she wailed. “I wanted Mom and Dad to come with me on the trip.”
“Of course you did, honey. There’s nothing wrong with that.”
Rachel took a deep, juddering breath. “When Mom and Dad were around, Regis always said how much he enjoyed listening to me, how well I played. But if he ever was alone with me, he would tell me how beautiful I was, how pretty I looked on stage, how I had gorgeous hair. At first, I liked it. Then he started saying I looked sexy in my black dress. That I had lovely arms.” Rachel shivered and clutched the buttons of her shirt. “That he enjoyed watching me take a bow because—”
“I get the picture,” Frank said. “Did he ever touch you?”
Rachel shook her head vigorously.
“Did you mention this to your sister?” Frank handed the girl a tissue.
Rachel dabbed at her eyes. “Yes. Caitlin laughed. She told me to get used to it. That all old men are creepers except for Daddy.” She balled the tissue in her fist and looked at Frank as if she half expected him to leap over the table between them and rip off her clothes.
He felt ashamed to be a man.
“So you did warn her,” Frank pointed out.
Rachel scuffed at the carpet with her sneaker. “Caity had a way of making me feel totally clueless. I spend so much time practicing that I kinda zone out on what’s going on around me. My sister always knew the score better than I did, even when we were little. Caity said Regis was just giving her a ride to Trout Run. She said she wouldn’t let him be in the room with her with the door shut. She said she had a plan to protect herself if he tried anything. I figured she knew how to manage him.”
“You didn’t mention any of this the first time the state police talked to you?” Frank tried to keep his voice gentle, but he could see that Rachel felt accused.
Her lip trembled and her eyes grew shiny with tears. “No one asked about Regis. They asked me about Caity’s friends and drugs and if she knew anyone in Trout Run. I couldn’t get my head around the fact that my sister was dead.” Tears slipped down Rachel’s cheeks. “That night, Regis came over to our house and was crying with Mom and Dad. He apologized for having the idea to take her to that motel, and my parents told him none of it was his fault.”
Rachel hung her head and a curtain of blond hair fell across her face. She peered at Frank from under this shield. “Did he kill her?” she whispered.
“I don’t know.” Frank took a deep breath. “Rachel, I have a very hard question to ask you. Do you know, or even suspect, if your sister ever used sex as a way to get drugs?”
Rachel sprang out of her chair and raced to the door. A female trooper caught her hand and held out a wastebasket.
Rachel sank to her knees and retched as the trooper held back the girl’s long, golden hair.
Chapter 41
Frank and Meyerson faced each other across a conference room table.
“What’s our next move?” Frank asked.
“We have to move very carefully, Frank. We have to assemble an absolutely airtight case.” Meyerson’s long, powerful fingers bent a plastic pointer nearly to the breaking point. “Desmond Hale is practically a billionaire. He’ll hire the best lawyers in the business to protect his sons. And Kendall also has cash stockpiled. All the evidence we have so far is circumstantial. We have no forensic evidence proving Caitlin was on the grounds of The Balsams. We have no witnesses who saw her being transported on that ATV. We have no hard proof linking Kendall to the Hales.”
“We do know that Keith Hale logged into an account on Jacks Are Wild, Kendall’s gaming site.” While they’d been interviewing the Luptons, Meyerson had received a message verifying that Kendall owned the site. They were still searching for the account Keith had accessed from the library computer.
Meyerson conceded this point with a slight nod. “But I don’t want to play that hand too soon—pun intended. Once Kendall and the Hales realize we’re on to them, they’ll start covering their digital tracks.” Meyerson leaned across the table. “Augie Enright drove Caitlin to the Finley Notch Trailhead. Someone picked her up there and drove her to the old logging road, then transported her on that ATV. She couldn’t have driven herself through those woods at night. It has to be someone local who knows the area. We need to find that witness.”
“Agreed,” Frank said. “Blaine Timmons would be the obvious choice—he admitted to hunting in that area when he was younger—except he has an ironclad alibi. He’s been in the county jail since before Caitlin disappeared from the Mountain Vista. Unless—” Frank stopped talking and stared at a map of New York state hanging on the conference room wall. “I need a detailed topographical map of Finley’s Notch. And a forest ranger who knows that area.”
Half an hour later, Frank, Meyerson, and the ranger huddled over the map. The r
anger traced a trail with his finger. “Just about everyone who starts at the Finley’s Notch trailhead plans to hike up to the notch for the views. But at the one mile mark, there’s another path that forks off and leads to Half Moon Pond. It’s not so popular in the summer—no breeze and kinda buggy. But the trail is maintained by the High Peaks Hiking Club until it reaches the pond.” The ranger continued to trace a line on the map. “Then the trail goes halfway around the pond and off into the woods here. But at this point, there are no HPHC trail markers—just some old paint blazes and some cairns. You can follow it pretty well over to here.” He tapped a spot on the map. “And that’s where it intersects the old logging road.”
The ranger looked at Frank and Lew’s dejected faces. “Isn’t that what you wanted to know?”
“Yeah, thanks for your help.” Frank sent the ranger on his way. “Good news—we now know that Caitlin went directly to The Balsams and probably got herself to the ATV pick-up spot—”
Lew finished the thought. “Bad news—there’s no driver accomplice who can testify against the Hales.”
Chapter 42
Noon on Friday, and Frank was pleased to see signs of party preparation at the house in Mountain Glade. A young man hauled a case of booze out of the back of a BMW and lugged it toward the house. Frank pulled into the driveway and waited for the kid to return for a second box of tequila and vodka.
The young man emerged from the house and startled when he saw a cop in his driveway. Frank smiled and lifted his right hand in greeting. “Looks like you’re planning to have a good time this weekend.”
“Yeah. Last time I checked, that wasn’t against the law.” He pulled the box from the trunk and slammed it closed.
“Do you know Justin and Keith Hale?”
“No.”
“They were at a party here earlier in the summer.”
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