by Lisa Regan
Fat gray clouds rolled overhead as Josie, Noah, Gretchen, Mettner, and two marked units from Denton, together with Moore and his colleague, Nash, pulled into the driveway of the Sanctuary. As they got out of their vehicles, Charlotte appeared on the front porch in a flowing dress the color of gold. She seemed to float down the steps and across the grass toward them, her signature smile now a thin line. She held up a hand as she reached them. “I’m sorry, officers,” she said. “Now is not a good time.”
Moore stepped up next to Josie and handed Charlotte the warrant. “Mrs. Fadden, this is a time-sensitive issue. We’ve got a missing female, and we believe that her husband is either in residence here, or he used to be. If any of your people have seen him or know where he is, we need to talk with them immediately.”
Charlotte folded her arms across her chest. “Your people were here almost all afternoon and evening yesterday messing about in our cabins. You’ve been traipsing all over our property for days now. One of our own was murdered. People are upset. All of this activity is extremely disruptive. We’re trying to grieve as a family and the police presence is… I’m afraid it’s too much right now. I can’t let this continue.”
Josie said, “We have a warrant, Mrs. Fadden. I understand that with Renee’s murder, people are very upset, but we’re just doing our jobs. Now, if you don’t mind—”
Charlotte cut her off. “You brought a photo of a missing female the other day. No one had seen her. What does her husband have to do with anything?”
Josie said, “We believe he might be with her. We need to locate him. His last known whereabouts are right here on your property.”
Charlotte panned the group of them and said, “Does it need to be all of you?”
Josie said, “It will go a lot faster if we all work together.”
Charlotte looked reluctant. Josie could see her mind working, calculating how hard she could push back. Finally, she gave a tight smile and waved a hand in the direction of the house. “Then please,” she said. “Be quick about it.”
The team dispersed, armed with notebooks and their photos of Jack Gresham. Josie remained in place, hands on her hips. Charlotte’s smile loosened a little into something more genuine. “You want to talk to me.”
Josie reached into her back pocket and pulled out a photo of Jack Gresham. She showed it to Charlotte. “I know he was here.”
Charlotte took it in her hands and studied it. Without looking at Josie, she said, “Yes, he was here for a long time. Jack.”
“You remember him?”
“Yes, he was quite troubled.”
“Do you remember his wife showing up here, demanding to talk to him on several occasions?” Josie asked.
Charlotte handed the photo back. “No, I don’t. But it’s possible I was working elsewhere on the property when she came.”
“His best friend came here and tried to join your people. Tyler Yates. Yet, when I showed you and the rest of your people his photo the other day, no one recognized him.”
“Then there must be some mistake,” Charlotte said. “Or perhaps he wasn’t here long enough for people to remember him.”
“Tyler’s dad said that he was kicked out of the Sanctuary when it became obvious he was just trying to get Jack to come home,” Josie challenged.
Charlotte laughed. “Now I know there’s been a mistake. I don’t remember any such thing. Whoever you’re getting your information from is simply wrong.”
Josie knew Charlotte was lying but pressing her seemed to do no good. She moved on. “Where is Jack now?”
“I don’t know.”
“Is he here?”
“I don’t think so,” Charlotte said. “You would know better than I would. You’ve been speaking to people the last couple of days.”
Josie took out her phone and pulled up a photo of Maya Bestler. She showed it to Charlotte. “How about this young lady?”
Charlotte sighed. “Detective Quinn, I have told you before that we have many, many people pass through here. I simply can’t remember every single face.”
“So she may have been here?”
“What’s her name?”
“Maya.”
Charlotte shook her head. “I don’t think we’ve had a Maya here, no.”
“You said that Jack Gresham was troubled. What do you mean by that?”
Charlotte motioned toward the house. “Would you care to come inside while we talk?”
“I’d like to know what you know about Jack Gresham.”
Charlotte smiled. “Let’s walk,” she said, strolling off toward the area behind the house.
Josie followed her for several yards, growing more annoyed by the minute. But she knew the woman was playing some kind of game, and Josie wasn’t about to let her get the upper hand. She waited until Charlotte spoke again. “Jack had a difficult childhood. Single mother. Not attentive. There were some other issues. He came to me very depressed and confused. I daresay he was suicidal.”
They passed the garden where Josie saw several Sanctuary members gathered around Mettner. Their faces looked drawn. One woman pressed a tissue to her cheeks, dabbing at tears. Clearly, the death of Renee had affected the other Sanctuary members. Josie said, “You nursed Jack back to sound mental health?”
Charlotte laughed. “That’s not what we do here, Detective.”
“Then what did you do for him?”
“I tried to help him align the darkness inside him with the light.”
“What does that mean?”
“Jack had demons. Like all of us. Like you.”
Josie said, “Why are you bringing me into this?”
Charlotte stopped walking. Josie took a few steps before realizing the woman had stopped moving. Charlotte stepped toward Josie, getting so close her face was only inches away. It was a space Josie usually reserved only for Noah. She fought the urge to back away. Charlotte said, “There is a darkness in you, Detective Quinn.”
“There is a darkness in all of us, Mrs. Fadden.”
Her eyes lit up, as if Josie had answered a test question correctly. “You’re right! There is darkness in all of us. Some people come into the world wielding their darkness. Doing terrible things that come easily to them. Their light is buried so deeply, most of them never find it. Others, like me, like Jack, and like you—we are victimized so much, so often, or so badly that our own darkness is buried too deep for us to access. People like us, if we want to fully become, we’ve got to access that piece of ourselves. That’s what Jack needed.”
“What does that mean? To fully become?”
Charlotte stepped back and Josie tried not to show her relief. “It means to align your darkness with your light and vice versa, to become the fullest, truest version of yourself that you can in this one life you get. Embracing yourself completely. All of yourself, not just the pieces of you that society deems acceptable.”
They began walking again, now taking a path that Josie knew led to the cabins. Again, she wondered if Charlotte was somehow psychic; part of Josie’s plan had been to confront Charlotte about the bloody piece of rope found inside one of the cabins.
Josie said, “Did Jack have to make the commitment in order to fully become?”
Josie caught the slight tensing of Charlotte’s shoulders, but when she looked at Josie, her smile was firmly in place. “You’ve done your research, I see. Yes, Jack made the commitment. He was here for some time, if I recall. At a certain point, if I see that a person is here a long time but not making any progress, I’ll ask them to make the commitment.”
“What is the commitment to?” Josie asked.
“To continue personal growth, to not let anything impede it, to commit to protecting the Sanctuary and its members, to commit to living an authentic life. That’s what the commitment is about.”
“Why would you insist on branding?”
Charlotte ducked beneath a low hanging branch. “The branding is symbolic of how painful personal growth can be, but it’s also a
physical reminder of a person’s evolution to a new level of being. Here we don’t believe in an afterlife, so we strive to ascend to new levels of existence and enlightenment in this life.” Her palm circled Josie’s wrist. “You know, I can help you.”
Josie tried to pull her wrist away, but Charlotte’s grip was firm. She said, “Help me what?”
“Evolve. Embrace your darkness.”
Josie snatched her hand back. “Embracing my darkness won’t help me find Jack and Emilia Gresham.”
“Burying yourself in work won’t help you avoid the thing you’re running from.”
“I have work to do,” Josie said and stomped ahead.
The cabins came into view. Josie stopped in front of the one she had been inside the other day. “I found a bloody piece of rope in this cabin,” she told Charlotte.
Charlotte bunched the front of her dress in her hands, revealing a pair of old flip flops, and went up the steps. She took a long moment looking inside, and Josie wondered if she was thinking of something that would explain away the presence of the rope. When she turned back, she said, “Yes, we had a member keeping a dog here. I allowed it until the dog bit him. That was probably the blood you found.”
“Renee Kelly had ligature marks on her wrists. Old ones and new ones. Someone was tying her up. Someone here in your Sanctuary.”
Charlotte descended the steps. “Renee would not have done anything she didn’t consent to, Detective.”
“What does that mean? She agreed to be tied up? She was terrified the last time I saw her. How do you account for that?”
Charlotte stepped toward her again, this time reaching out and touching Josie’s cheek. Fatigue and sleep deprivation slowed Josie’s reflexes. She wasn’t able to stop herself from flinching. Charlotte said, “You’re not the only one scared of the dark.”
Forty-Seven
Josie and her team gathered in the conference room again to compare notes. Outside, rain fell in sheets, pelting the windows in a steady roar. She looked around at Noah, Gretchen, and Mettner, all of them looking exhausted. Boxes of pizza sat in the center of the table, but no one touched them. Mettner took a long sip from his bottle of water and said, “I talked with three people who recognized Jack. They said he had lived there for a very long time; had very little contact with other members; and had left the property a few months ago.”
Gretchen flipped a page in her notebook. “I had two people confirm the same. Same time period. ‘A couple of months.’ When I asked them how he left—by car, on foot—they said they didn’t know.”
“Same from the people I interviewed,” Noah said. “They said they just stopped seeing him around one day. One person said he didn’t speak and didn’t engage with any other members. She said he left three weeks ago.”
“What did Charlotte say?”
Josie filled them in on what Charlotte had told her both about Jack Gresham and about the bloody piece of rope. She left out the parts about Charlotte wanting to help her get in touch with her dark side. “She’s lying,” Josie concluded. “I pressed her on the ridiculous dog story and the fact that someone was tying Renee up and doing something to her, but she wouldn’t budge. All I got out of her were cryptic non-answers. She definitely knows something, though. They all know more than they’re saying.” She thought about what Charlotte had said about the commitment. Renee Kelly hadn’t made the commitment to protect the Sanctuary. In fact, she had left the night that Josie gave her an out. She just never made it to Josie or Gretchen’s car.
But Jack Gresham had made the commitment. He had pledged loyalty to the Sanctuary. So why had he left? Where had he gone?
“Has someone tracked down Jack Gresham’s mother?” Josie asked.
Mettner raised his hand. “I talked with her on the phone last night after you went home. She lives in California. She said she hasn’t seen him since his wedding and that they talk once a year at Christmas.”
“Caring mom,” Noah remarked.
Josie thought about what Charlotte had said. Jack had been troubled. He’d been raised by an inattentive mother. She had referenced other issues. Having spoken with his coworkers at Lantz Snack Factory, and learned about his stalking activity, she could guess what those issues might be. Josie wondered what exactly Charlotte had done to help Jack access his “dark side”.
“I think Jack Gresham is still there, or he is still in the area.”
“On the Sanctuary?” Noah asked. “We’ve searched that place a half dozen times now. Where would they be hiding him?”
“I don’t know,” Josie answered. “But he wouldn’t leave the place for long. He wouldn’t want to.”
“Why would he hide?” Gretchen asked.
Josie suggested, “Maybe he was the one abusing Renee Kelly.”
“You think he killed her?” Mettner asked. “If he killed her, that means he killed his best friends, too, and did something to his wife.”
“Or maybe,” Gretchen said, “his friends get killed and his wife goes missing while on a mission to get him away from the Sanctuary, and he’s afraid he’ll be looked at as a suspect.”
“Could be,” Josie agreed. “Maybe he and Charlotte were thinking that whatever he was doing to Renee Kelly would come up in the police investigation and make things worse for all of them—for the whole Sanctuary. He could have been there the day we found Tyler and Valerie. Charlotte could have sent him away until things died down and told the rest of her people to lie about his presence.”
Gretchen said, “She could have told Renee not to breathe a word about what was happening to her.”
For just a moment, inside her head, Josie heard Lila’s voice from her nightmares. Not one word.
Noah said, “He stalked a coworker. Got depressed, joined a cult. That doesn’t necessarily mean he’s someone who tortures young women or that he’s a murderer. The hermit still looks good for these murders.”
“I think we need surveillance,” Josie said. “We don’t have to go onto the Sanctuary premises. We’ll set a perimeter and see if Jack Gresham comes on or off the property. If we see him leave, we’ll follow him and see where he goes. Then we’ll talk to him and see what he has to say about his missing wife. What if he knows where she is?”
Mettner said, “It’s pretty far out in the middle of nowhere. You can’t exactly sit in your car for a stake-out.”
Josie said, “So we’ll sit out in the woods. We’ve pretty much been out there for the last three days as it is, and now Noah knows which plants not to eat.”
Mettner laughed. “You guys have Ghillie suits?”
Gretchen said, “What’s a Ghillie suit?”
Mettner looked at Josie as if to say, “Is she serious?”
Josie said, “Gretchen’s a city girl, remember? They don’t have much use for Ghillie suits in Philadelphia.”
Gretchen repeated, “What’s a Ghillie suit?”
Noah laughed. “It’s clothing. It’s a kind of camouflage you wear when you go hunting to blend in with your surroundings. Makes you look like walking brush—or like a walking tree covered in vines. Google it. You’ll see.”
Gretchen took out her phone and punched it into her browser. A smile lit her face. “Oh, I need one of these,” she said.
They got Chitwood’s approval for surveillance after he spoke with law enforcement in Lenore County to let them know what was going on. Most of the land surrounding the Sanctuary belonged to the state, so there was no issue of getting warrants or permissions from property owners to set up out in the woods. Mettner and a few of the other officers on Denton’s police force gathered as many of their hunting clothes as they could find to camouflage themselves, as well as some night goggles. The sun set just after eight in the evening. Once darkness descended, they set out in teams.
Unmarked police vehicles were left in strategic places outside their perimeter, and Josie had the uniformed officers don plainclothes and wait in those vehicles in case they needed to pursue any vehicle leaving the Sanctuar
y. The other teams split up, moving on foot. Mettner and two other officers took up the area in the woods between the Yates campsite and the Sanctuary fence, spreading out to cover as much ground as possible and forming a loose circle around the place. Noah, Josie, and Gretchen took up position on the other side of the Sanctuary, in the woods across the road from the farmhouse. Gretchen concealed herself in the trees at the bottom of the hill south of the Sanctuary. Josie positioned herself directly across the road from the Sanctuary driveway. She found a downed tree trunk about roughly ten yards away from the shoulder of the road, well-hidden by brush and trees. Noah traveled farther up the hill, north of the Sanctuary. Josie estimated that there was a quarter mile between them. It wasn’t far, but in the dark, quiet forest, she felt like Gretchen and Noah were worlds away from her. She kept checking the back pocket of her jeans to make sure her radio was still there. The teams had agreed to only contact one another if there was a sighting so that the radios didn’t draw unwanted attention.
Luckily, it had stopped raining. Even though the sun had gone down, the heat and humidity hadn’t let up. Josie had declined a Ghillie suit, instead wearing black jeans and an olive-green raincoat to help her blend into the forest. Still, sweat poured from her skin and pooled at the base of her spine. She ached for a breeze or even for more rain, but none came. Beside her on the tree trunk she set out her thermos of coffee and a pair of binoculars which she used to zoom in on the farmhouse and barn. Dim light glowed from inside both structures. People moved back and forth between the two, some of them abandoning both and walking off into the field behind the house where the tents were set up. An hour passed, then another and another. No vehicles came in or out of the property. Eventually, the lights in both buildings were extinguished. A single exterior light behind the barn illuminated an outhouse.
By midnight, from what Josie could see from her perch across the road, all the members of the Sanctuary had retired to their sleeping quarters. Josie sipped her coffee, waiting. Twice, she saw shadows moving along the outer barn wall, but then the figures emerged in the circle of light around the outhouse. Two female members using the facilities. Josie checked her cell phone and noted the times. The first woman came out at one fifteen a.m. and spent ten minutes using the facilities. The second woman used the outhouse at two forty-three a.m. and emerged only a minute later, hurrying back toward the front of the barn.