Ninth Grave (A Writer's Retreat Mystery Book 9)

by Kathi Daley

  “Okay.” I paused to process this. “So what was going on with this person whose thoughts you were experiencing?”

  “I was at a football game. A high-school football game. I could hear the cheers and feel the energy. There were people all around, but I wasn’t really part of the crowd. I was watching the game from beneath the bleachers.”

  I frowned. “Beneath the bleachers?”

  “Yes. I could see the game through the small openings between the seats where the spectators are supposed to put their feet. And there were people sitting in the bleachers, so there were feet in the way, but I could catch snippets of the game and the other activities going on through the openings. I remember the cheerleaders and the crowd going crazy when someone scored. I remember the conversations going on around me and wishing I could sit on the bleachers with the other spectators, but I also remember knowing that I was trapped beneath the surface of the main event, and no matter how hard I tried, I would never be able to get out.”

  “Okay, so you are under bleachers watching a football game through the small openings between people’s feet. Then what?” I asked.

  “Then the game was over and everyone left. I wanted to leave as well, but I couldn’t. Once the stands cleared out, the lights were turned off and it got dark. Very, very dark. I remember being frightened. I tried to scream, but the darkness was strangling me. It just kept getting darker and darker and I felt the breath being squeezed from my body. I took one final gasp, and then I was dead. I woke up shortly after that.”

  “That sounds horrifying.”

  “It was,” Clara assured me. “I know it was a dream, but it felt real. The fear felt real. When I woke up, my heart was racing and I was drenched in sweat.”

  “And you are sure you don’t know what the dream might mean?”

  “Not at this point. If it was just a dream, maybe that will be the end of it. If the dream was some sort of clue to a past event or a portent of a future event, I suppose it will return and I will try to figure it out then.”

  “For your sake, I hope it was just a dream and that you will sleep better tonight. Maybe you should try some chamomile tea before you go to bed.”

  “Garrett suggested the same thing, only with an added shot of whiskey.”

  I chuckled. “That might not be a bad idea.” I glanced up as Jack and Kizzy walked in. “Jack is back from his walk, so I need to go. I’ll call you tomorrow.”

  “All right, dear. Please be careful. Garrett and I are both worried about you.”

  “I know and we will,” I promised.

  After I hung up, I joined Jack at the little table in front of the window. He had logged onto his computer and opened his email.

  “What exactly should I say to Sam?” he asked, as he sat with his fingers poised over the keyboard.

  “I guess let him know that we are here and have looked into the death, as he requested. I suppose you can just ask him what he wants you to do next.”

  Jack nodded and began typing. When he sent the email off he sat back in his chair.

  “I guess we just wait,” I said.

  “I guess that is all we can do. My sense is that Sam is on a tight timeline, so hopefully, he will be responsive and keep things moving along. Was that Clara you were chatting with when I came in?”

  I nodded and then shared the content of her dream.

  Jack frowned. “That sounds terrifying. Did she think it meant something?”

  “She didn’t know. She’s planning to see if the dream returns, or if the nightmare last night was the end of it.” I glanced at my phone. “I still need to call Vikki. She’ll worry if I don’t check in.”

  “I’ve spoken to Rick twice today, so I suspect she knows we are okay.”

  “I know, but she’ll still be expecting me to call.”

  “Hang on,” Jack said, turning toward his computer. “I have an email from Sam.”

  “That was fast. What does he say?”

  Jack took a minute to read the email and then answered. “He wants us to describe the events leading to Jessica’s disappearance and the suspects we have identified after conducting our interviews. Then he wants us to take a stab at guessing who the killer might have been, based on what we have been able to dig up about the victim and the potential suspects.”

  I paused to consider what Jack had said. “I hope he isn’t expecting us to solve this in only one day’s time. I mean, the cops couldn’t figure out what happened to Jessica in a whole year.”

  “My sense is that he just wants to be sure that we looked into things and he wants us to share what we found. I doubt he is expecting us to be able to identify the killer. By asking us to guess, he is creating a situation that will require us to look objectively at anyone who had the opportunity to kill her.”

  “We don’t know where Jessica was killed or even what happened to her car. The information we have uncovered so far suggests that she was taken from a location other than the diner. But we have zero information about where Jessica went or who she might have come into contact with after leaving the diner. I sort of doubt that the killer will be found from those who spent time in the diner that evening, but if you think about it, that is all we have. Should we just tell him about the people we spoke to and the suspects that came up during those conversations?”

  “I think that is all we can do.”

  “Okay, then, in my mind, I guess the only suspects would be the tall guy with the computer who was loitering and the young man who tried to pick her up. I wonder if we should have looked into Jessica’s social media accounts. There might be additional suspects to be found there who Sam will expect us to mention.”

  “We can take a quick look now. She didn’t seem to have any friends here in Rivervale, and it seemed as if she moved around a lot, but that doesn’t mean there wasn’t anyone in her life she would have wanted to stay in touch with.” Jack logged onto his computer again. He surfed around a bit but eventually decided that Jessica did not have any social media accounts at the time of her death, and if she had accounts before that, she must have deleted them.

  “Okay, so based on the very limited information we have dug up to this point, who do you think killed her?” Jack asked.

  I furrowed my brow. “There are a few potential suspects who come to mind,” I answered, “but if I had to choose one, I would say that the killer was a man in his twenties with an appetite for young, beautiful women and was so socially inept that he was unlikely to get anyone to willingly pay an ounce of attention to him.”

  “That was my first thought as well,” Jack answered. “I suppose we can simply say that we suspect the killer might have been a man in his twenties whose advances were rejected. I would leave out the part about him being ‘socially inept.’ If we are right, I am, after all, describing the person to whom I am sending the email.”

  I nodded. “Yeah, you’re right. Send that and we’ll see what happens next.”

  Jack took his time describing the man he had in mind and the reason he might be moved to kill multiple people. He was diplomatic in painting the killer as a victim of sorts of the cold woman who rejected him. Sam had made it seem as if he wanted Jack to understand why he did what he had, so Jack was very careful about seeming to show compassion in his comments. After a bit, Sam emailed back with a set of coordinates.

  “So he didn’t indicate whether your guess about who the killer might have been was correct?” I asked.

  Jack shook his head. “He just sent the coordinates and a brief description of what we are looking for. I guess the next step is to locate the coordinates and see what we find.” He looked out the window. “It is getting late and we’ll need time to figure out where these coordinates lead. I’m going to call Rick to fill him in. Maybe he can help us come up with a map, and from that, we can extrapolate a set of directions. We’ll plan to head out to look for the remains first thing tomorrow.”

  “What do we do if we actually find Jessica Oswald’s remains?” I wrinkle
d my nose as I said the words. I wanted to find what was left of Jessica to bring closure to her case, but I was having a hard time with the images in my head of what we might find.

  Jack frowned. “I’m not sure what we should do once we find the body. I guess we can turn things over to Rick and let him arrange for the remains to be collected while we head out in search of victim number two.”

  The butterflies I’d experienced earlier in the day were back. Were we really going to follow directions left by a man who professed to be a serial killer to an unknown destination and then dig up the body of a young woman who had been dead less than a year? I glanced at Jack, who was on the phone with Rick. He seemed confidant and assured. I wished I felt half as calm as he appeared to be. I called Kizzy up onto the bed and buried my face in her soft fur. I’d volunteered to come along on this quest, I reminded myself. I needed to pull myself together and face whatever was ahead of us with a courage and confidence I was far from feeling.

  Chapter 6

  Wednesday, May 8

  We’d spent a good part of the previous evening trying to narrow down the exact location of the coordinates Jack had been sent, as well as specific directions to reach the locale where Sam had promised we’d find the remains of the first victim. Jack had emailed Sam again, asking for a map to go along with the coordinates and brief description. Surprisingly, he had complied. It appeared we would need to get back on the highway and travel about twenty miles north. Once we reached the exit Sam had marked as the one that would take us to the dirt road we sought, we would need to travel about ten miles and then look for the turnoff. From the turnoff, we were directed to a trailhead, where it looked as if we needed to continue on foot. Luckily, once we reached the footpath, our destination was close by.

  “It’s really desolate out here, but it is beautiful,” I said. “The green grass, sunny skies, and birds singing seem to offer a sense of peace and serenity.”

  “I will admit that I am enjoying the hike,” Jack said. “Of course, if we weren’t hiking toward human remains, I would enjoy myself a lot more.”

  I looked overhead at the canopy of branches that formed an arch over the trail. The trees grew so densely that they blocked out the sunlight, making it feel as if it was much later in the day than it actually was. “The trees are dense in this area. I hope we don’t get lost. It is hard to have a feel for where we are without landmarks to show us the way.”

  Jack paused. “Sam said to follow the seasonal steam. It is just to our left, so I imagine that we will be fine as long as we don’t veer away from it.” Jack looked at the map. “It also looks as if the dense woods will give way to a clearing up ahead. Once we can get a better overall perspective, we should be able to locate the dig site. At least I hope we will.”

  We continued to hike and consult the map until we arrived at the spot we were pretty sure the directions led to. “What now?” I asked. “Do we just start digging?” I looked around the area. The trees were less dense here, allowing the light to penetrate the woods, but it was still difficult to get an overview of it. “There really is no way to tell if this is even the specific place where we are supposed to find the remains.”

  Jack looked at the map one more time. “I feel like we are close, but you are correct in the fact that this map is fairly general. If the remains are even ten feet away, we won’t find them.”

  I reached for the map and Jack handed it to me. “There is an X on the ground next to this tree.” I pointed to the tree on the map. “I wonder if there is something special about it. Something that will let us know we are in the correct location.”

  Jack looked over my shoulder. “The tree appears to have a single trunk at the base that divides off into three partway up. I guess we can look for that.”

  I looked around the area. Although we now were hugging the edge of the clearing, there were a lot of trees in the area, and the shape of the one on the map was pretty specific. I pointed. “There.” I walked over to the tree. Carved into the trunk were the letters RIP.

  “This looks like the spot,” Jack said. He took a few steps away from the tree and began to dig. After he had spent about twenty minutes digging, he stopped. “I think I found something.” He tossed the shovel aside and got down on his knees. He used his hands to remove the rest of the dirt until the top surface of the skeleton was revealed.

  “Okay, what now?” I asked. “We aren’t going to dig the whole thing up, are we?”

  “No.” He stood up. “We’ll take a photo and send it to Sam as proof that we found the victim. Once we do that, I assume he will return our email with the next set of instructions.”

  Kizzy, whose leash I hung on to tightly, had begun to whine. “I’ll take Kizzy for a walk to distract her from our find,” I offered. “I suppose we should call Rick once we hear back from Sam.”

  After only a few minutes, Sam emailed back and confirmed that Jack had indeed found Jessica. He wanted him to rebury her and move on to victim number two, Kim Houston, who had disappeared from Halviston, West Virginia, in 2017. Jack agreed to Sam’s plan and then called Rick and sent him a photo of the map, the remains, and the coordinates. We asked him to wait until we reached Halviston before he notified local law enforcement that an anonymous source had found human remains here. We knew that someone would put together the fact that we had been in town asking about Jessica and the sudden discovery of her remains, but we were depending on Rick to work things out so that no one came looking for us until we had completed this quest.

  Jack reburied the remains and we made our way back to the car. I had to admit that this girl I’d never met, had never even heard of before yesterday, was very much on my mind as we made the return hike. She was so young. She’d barely had the chance to get started in life. It was just so sad. “How far is Halviston from here?” I asked after we’d walked for a while.

  “It’s close. Only about two hours. When I spoke to Rick, I shared with him where we were heading. He is going to look in to missing persons cases from around the time we are dealing with. He’ll call us back after he is able to track down the file for whatever sort of investigation took place at the time of Kim Houston’s disappearance.”

  Luckily, we found a fairly nice motel that allowed dogs shortly after returning to the highway. It was almost time for dinner and we were tired after our hike, so we checked in before doing anything else. The motel was in a rural area with plenty of space for Kizzy to run around and stretch her legs, so I took Kizzy for a walk while Jack called in a to-go order from a nearby diner. We figured it would be best to eat in the room so we didn’t have to leave Kizzy alone here or in the car.

  I went out to pick up the food while Jack and Rick spoke on the phone again. When I returned to the room, I set out the food on a small table near the window and asked Jack what Rick had been able to find out. Jack indicated that we should eat while we chatted so that the food didn’t get cold.

  “Kim Houston was a nineteen-year-old woman who went missing from Halviston in 2017,” Jack began after he’d eaten a third of his burger. “She was last seen leaving her job as a clerk in the local convenience store. Kim grew up in Halviston, so her disappearance hit the community hard. A lot of people tried to find her, but neither the police nor her family or friends were able to find any clues that would lead to her whereabouts. According to the police report, like Jessica, Kim was working the late shift when she disappeared. The local police determined that the last person known to see her that evening was a fellow employee of the store, Hannah Smith. Hannah told the police that they closed the store as a team and walked out to the parking lot together. They both got into their vehicles at the same time and drove away. Kim lived about ten miles outside of town. Her vehicle was found abandoned on a road about halfway between the store and her home. The police assume that she pulled over to help someone who had broken down.”

  “Okay, that makes no sense,” I said, picking up a photo of another beautiful blonde. “If she pulled over to help som
eone who had broken down, wouldn’t the killer have ended up getting into her car and not the other way around?”

  “It would seem so, unless the disabled car was nothing more than a lure to get her to stop. I suppose she might also have pulled over for some other reason. It was determined that her vehicle was operable, so it didn’t appear that she pulled over because her vehicle had broken down.”

  I pushed my chicken sandwich to the side. I was hating this one already. “Anything else?”

  “I found a newspaper article that talks about her family, and that she was a much-loved member of the community. It ends with a plea for anyone who might have any information to call the local police. While Jessica’s disappearance barely affected the community she lived in, Kim left behind a lot of grieving people who still wonder what might have happened to her. I think that if we decide to talk to folks about her, as we did with Jessica, we are going to run into a lot more emotion.” Jack blew out a breath. “Let’s tackle that tomorrow.” He stood up. “I think I am going to take a quick walk to clear my head.”

  “That sounds good. I’ll clean this up and then I’m going to call Garrett. He’ll worry if I don’t. Vikki too.”

  I decided to start with Vikki because I hadn’t spoken to her at all since we’d left Gull Island.

  “I’m so glad you called,” Vikki said when she answered after one ring. “Rick just filled me in. I can’t believe you actually dug up a dead body. Was it awful?”

  “It wasn’t fun. I suppose it could have been worse. It was a year old, so it wasn’t as if it was fresh.” I felt bile rise in my throat even as I said the last word.

  “That poor girl. One minute she was busy living her life and the next she was six feet under.”

  “It was only about three feet,” I corrected her, “but I know what you mean. I knew this journey was going to be hard, but I think it is going to be even worse than I first imagined. Once we spoke to the people who knew Jessica, she became a real person to me, not just a name in an email. She seemed to have been sort of lost, which makes it even sadder that she never had the chance to find her way in life.”