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

by Kathi Daley

  ******

  I called Clara while Jack emailed Sam. The fact that she had suffered through horrible dreams two nights in a row had me concerned. I was curious to know how last night had gone.

  “It was awful,” Clara said as soon as I got her on the line. “The dream was much the same, only this time I was trapped in a storm drain. I could see out through the opening on the side of the road. Mostly, I could just see feet and cars going by, but I could hear people talking. It was like I was in the world, yet somehow removed from it. As before, after a while it began to get dark, and as the darkness really settled in, I found that I couldn’t breathe. Eventually, the darkness strangled the breath from me and I died.”

  I had to admit that these dreams had me concerned. “Three dreams occurring over a three-night period must mean that the dreams have a purpose and are somehow linked with reality.”

  “Perhaps,” Clara agreed. “It does seem that there is a point to them, I just don’t know if they are metaphors or if they should be taken literally. Even though I am fully having the experience of being trapped and dying in the dreams, as I told you before, I don’t think the things are actually happening to me. I think I am channeling a person or event. I don’t know if it is something that happened in the past or something that will occur in the future.”

  “It seems like it might be important to find out.”

  “I’ll consult my tea leaves,” Clara responded. “I’ll let you know if I come up with anything. I’m not certain that my dreams are linked to the deaths you are investigating, but given the timing, I suspect they may be.”

  I chatted with Clara for a few more minutes and then hung up. By the time I had completed my call, Jack had heard back from Sam.

  “So?” I asked.

  “He asked the same questions and the answers we came up with must have been fine because he emailed me back with a map and GPS coordinates. I forwarded the email to Rick and he is working on coming up with some specific directions. It’s early yet. I say we grab some lunch and then head out to look for the body as soon as he gets back to me. If we find it, we should receive the next destination in this crazy journey.”

  “Okay. Just let me freshen up and I’ll be ready.”

  Chapter 8

  As we had for most of this trip, we decided on takeout that we could eat in the park. We hated to leave Kizzy in the car any more often than we had to, and so far, the weather had been nice, so eating in the park had seemed preferable anyway. Today, we once again went for burgers and fries. Not the healthiest option and somewhat repetitive, but there was a burger joint directly across from the park, so it was convenient, and I knew that Kizzy would enjoy a plain hamburger with no condiments or toppings. I chose a burger with blue cheese and Jack went for a concoction that included jalapeños and bacon.

  “So, do you know what Rick has decided to do about the remains as we find them?” I asked Jack, after we’d settled Kizzy in the shade and dug into our meals.

  “He decided that brining local law enforcement in each town into the loop was a bad idea, so he contacted his FBI buddy, who is going to have the gravesites and remains quietly processed. He agrees with Rick that it is best to keep all this out of the news if we want Sam to continue to work with us until we find all the remains and hopefully save the ninth victim. At this point, they don’t even intend to notify the families. Based on what we know, it appears as if this journey will be over in a couple of weeks one way or another. Once it is, the local police, as well as the families of the victims, will be notified.”

  “Once the press gets hold of it, we are going to have a zoo on our hands.”

  Jack chuckled. “When you say ‘press,’ do you include us in that zoo?”

  “Absolutely. At the very least, you should get to publish first.”

  Jack picked up a French fry and nibbled on the end. “I’m not as concerned about being first with a scoop as I am about saving the ninth victim and identifying Sam and bringing him to justice, but it had occurred to me that I should write our story as we go, so that when we are ready to go public, we are also ready to go to press, hopefully before the word gets out to the public.”

  “I’ve been thinking quite a bit about Sam and the questions he is asking you. Do you think their purpose is simply a means of proving that we actually did investigate the deaths at least to a degree, or do you think they mean more than that?”

  Jack shrugged. “I’m not sure. I know we have fingered a male in his mid-twenties as the likely killer both times that I have been asked to guess, but I don’t think that a male in his mid-twenties is going to turn out to be the killer.”

  “Sam has accepted your answers,” I pointed out.

  “He has, but he is likely going to accept any plausible answer. A twenty-five-year-old male on the prowl is too obvious. Plus, we know that Sam is actually the killer, and my sense of him is as someone who is older and wiser. Someone who has been around. Someone who has a deep emotional reason for killing these women.”

  Jack was probably right. I hadn’t been picturing Sam as a twenty-five-year-old horndog. But if it wasn’t the kid who’d been sitting at the counter and trying to pick up Jessica, or the kid who grabbed Kim’s hair, who was it? As Jack and I had discussed before, it was possible the killer might not even have been inside either the diner or the store on the day the women disappeared. He probably had been watching them for weeks. I supposed that none of the individuals we had identified as being in the vicinity of the women on that day would turn out to be their killer.

  Jack picked up his phone when it buzzed. “It’s Rick.”

  I took a sip of my cola while I waited for Jack to obtain the information we needed. Kizzy would be up for another walk before we set off, so I’d finish my burger and then take her for a short run while Jack and Rick worked out the details of finding Kim’s remains. If the burial site was far away, it was going to be late by the time we returned to the motel. Unless the location from which the next victim disappeared was in close proximity to today’s burial site, we’d probably need to stay another night in Halviston and then start out in the morning.

  I took Kizzy off her leash and tossed a stick for her so she could get the exercise she needed yet still stay nearby. The park was not crowded on a weekday afternoon, so I wasn’t too concerned about her bothering anyone. She was a well-behaved dog most of the time, but when it came to little kids or other dogs, she was prone to say hi first and then obey the command to come when she was good and ready.

  “So what did Rick come up with?” I asked Jack after we returned to the picnic table.

  “The coordinates lead to a location about an hour to an hour and a half away. We should get started. Is Kizzy good to go for a while?”

  I nodded. “She took care of what she needed to.”

  Jack forwarded the map Rick had emailed him so that I could pull it up on my phone.

  “It looks like we head north for about twenty miles and then look for the highway leading west. We’ll need to look for a dirt road after about thirty miles. It should take us to a lake where we should find the gravesite.”

  “I guess it makes sense that Sam would choose out-of-the-way places to bury the bodies, but it seems like this burial site is needlessly far away from where Kim’s car was found. I wonder why he didn’t choose someplace closer.”

  “Maybe the site he chose has meaning to him. Maybe they all do. None so far seem to have been chosen due to proximity or convenience.”

  Jack had a point. The burial sites had seemed specific. Maybe they were clues to who Sam was and why he had done what he had as much as anything else.

  The drive was beautiful, especially once we’d turned onto the highway that led west. The wide-open spaces that could be found in the meadows and along riverbanks and lake shores were lush with green grass and brilliant with the first wildflowers to show their colors. In addition to the natural beauty of the area, it was a day filled with sunshine. If I hadn’t been on my way to d
ig up the remains of some poor girl who had died much too young, I would be thoroughly enjoying the outing.

  “Wow, look at that river,” I gasped as the road paralleled a rushing river with the most gorgeous blue water I had ever seen. “I wonder what give the water that shade. It’s stunning.”

  “That blue really is outstanding. Perhaps there is some sort of mineral that is getting into the water.”

  “I wish we had time to stop to enjoy the scenery. Between the blue water, the green grass, and the purple, pink, and yellow flowers, I feel like we have stepped inside a painting.”

  “I agree,” Jack said. “And I wish we had time to just take a walk too. But we don’t, so let’s be sure not to miss the turnoff.”

  Jack was right. We had a job to do and needed to stay on task. I studied the map for another minute and then looked at our surroundings. “So, we are looking for a dirt road that will veer off to the left?”

  “According to Rick’s map, yes. He made it sound as if the turnoff would show up shortly after we began to parallel the river.”

  I continued to study the geography ahead of us. “It looks like there is a road that winds its way up that mountainside in the distance. Based on my calculations, the turnoff to the road should show up within a mile or two.”

  Jack slowed the car a bit so we wouldn’t miss it.

  I pointed into the distance. “I think I see a dirt road just beyond that little pond.”

  Jack turned onto the road I had pointed out and we continued slowly forward. The road started off flat but then began to climb. I had a feeling things were going to get hairy pretty fast. “Does it make sense that Sam would come all the way out here?” I asked.

  “Not really, but Rick said this is where the coordinates lead. We’ll follow the map and see where we end up.”

  The road narrowed considerably by the time we reached the lake. According to the map Rick sent, we should find Kim’s remains in this general area. We referred to the map Sam sent again and realized that our best bet in narrowing things down was to find a unique rock cropping that had been detailed in Sam’s drawing.

  “There are a lot of trees, which makes getting an overview of the area difficult,” Jack said. “But I think we should head to those rocks along the waterline.”

  “The rocks do look similar to the elevated area on this map, but the water comes right up to the rocks. I imagine the burial site should be on either side of the grouping, or perhaps behind it.”

  “I wonder if the lake floods,” Jack said. “If so, it seems odd that Sam wouldn’t have chosen higher ground to bury his victim.”

  “Maybe there is a trail that leads around to the back. Let’s head in that direction and see what we find.”

  Again, the setting was stunning. I wondered if it meant something that Sam had gone to all the trouble of burying his victim in gravesites with a view. I wondered again if these women were someone important to Sam, other than some random women who caught his eye as he passed through town. And someone who was simply passing through town most likely wouldn’t know about these isolated burial sites. Chances were, Sam lived there, or at least had visited the areas in the past. I wasn’t sure which area I was thinking of exactly. The first burial site we’d found was quite a ways from the one we were looking for today. Maybe Sam liked to hunt, fish, and camp and had spent time in both locations.

  When we reached the rocks we had identified, we began to look around for a trail or an additional clue of some sort. At the last burial site, the tree near the grave had been carved with the letters RIP. I wondered if we should look for a similar marking on a tree here. There were a lot of trees to check out if that was the case.”

  “Any idea where to go from here?” Jack asked.

  I looked around. I was about to suggest that he email Sam to ask for additional directions when I realized that we had left cell service behind quite a while ago. I looked behind myself at the trees, and then turned to look out toward the lake. The rocks had been the most predominant image on the hand-drawn map, so perhaps the clue was there and we had missed it. I put my hand over my eyes to block out the sun and then looked again. “There.” I pointed. “I see something about a hundred feet up. It might be a trick of the light, but it looks like something is carved into that rock.”

  Jack looked in the direction I was pointing. “Okay. Let’s climb up there and see what we find.”

  I looked at Kizzy. “Do you think she can make it?”

  Jack nodded. “The climb isn’t steep. I think she will be fine.”

  And she was. I was the one who had to struggle to stay upright. The climb was tough but worth it. When we arrived at our destination, we found that the rock had RIP carved into it. At first, I wasn’t sure where we should dig, but then Kizzy disappeared behind the rock and I realized that Kim was most likely hidden behind it and not in the ground at all. I called Kizzy back and waited with her while Jack went to explore. After fifteen minutes or so, he returned.

  “Is she there?”

  Jack nodded. “There is a cavern of sorts created by the rocks. A body I am assuming is Kim is tucked inside. There is no cell reception here, so I can’t email Sam right away to verify this, but I took a couple of photos. Let’s head back to the car and drive until we get service. When we do, we’ll pull over and send off the photos. Hopefully, Sam is waiting for my email and will reply right away.”

  As was the plan, we returned to the car, drove down the mountain until we found an area with cell service, emailed the photos to Sam, and then waited for his reply. We didn’t have to wait long for confirmation that we had indeed found Kim Houston. After he confirmed our find, Sam sent an additional email with a name—Patricia Fields—and a location— Forest Springs, Maryland.

  “So, do we head there now?” I asked.

  Jack pulled up the route between where we were and the town we were being sent to on his phone. “Forest Springs is about three hours away after we get back to the main road. It looks like it is perched on the western shore of Chesapeake Bay.”

  “It sounds like a nice place to visit.”

  “From what I can see, it appears to be a cute little town. I say we head to Forest Springs and look for a room.”

  “Maybe we should call ahead about a room. Sometimes cute little towns that live on the tourist trade don’t have a lot of vacancies. I’d hate to drive all the way there and then have to continue on to the next town or, worse yet, have to backtrack.”

  “You make a good point. We’ll need a room that allows dogs, which will be even harder to find. Why don’t you pull up a lodging app on your phone and see what you can find? I’m going to call Rick to give him the information on finding Kim. I’ll tell him to wait until we are out of the area before he sends in the men he is working with. I want Sam fully focused on the victim we are heading toward, not the one we just found. I’m not sure what he’d do if he found out that the burial sites are being processed by the FBI.”

  Chapter 9

  Once Jack had spoken to Rick, we headed toward the highway that would take us northeast. Normally, Thursdays were dedicated to printing the newspaper, which would be distributed on Fridays. Jack had asked his new part-time assistant, Gus Goodman, to see to both the printing and the distribution this week. He had taken a look at the final copy that was emailed to him by Gus earlier in the day. If we were still away next week, I supposed we’d have to stop at some point so that Jack and I could write and format the next edition. The newspaper was a weekly, so once today’s edition was put to bed, we had a little breathing room.

  “It looks like you have a text from your mother,” I said to Jack, nodding at his phone, which was in the holder between us. I hadn’t been trying to snoop, but the lock screen lit up when the text came through and I couldn’t help but notice.

  Jack glanced at the screen. “I should probably call her to find out exactly what is on her mind.” Jack glanced at the map displayed on the dashboard. “It looks like there is a truck stop abo
ut ten miles ahead. We’ll pull in there. We can refuel and walk Kizzy and I can call Mom back.”

  “I could use a break,” I said. “I thought I’d call Gus to make sure he didn’t run into any problems today.”

  So far, Gus had been both efficient and through. He’d worked in the newspaper business for a lot of years and had moved to Gull Island to retire. Jack and I had met him at a community mixer and we’d gotten to talking. One thing led to another, and the next thing we knew, Jack was offering him a job. Not only did we have confidence in Gus to get the paper out when we were both away, but he was an asset even when we were in town. I had a feeling that Jack would eventually turn over production and distribution to Gus so that he and I could focus on writing the articles and lining up the advertising now that we’d finally found someone we could count on.

  At the truck stop, I put Kizzy on the leash and took her for a walk. There was a large, undeveloped area nearby that provided a perfect location for Kizzy to stretch her legs. I called Gus while she was running around, sniffing every bush in sight.

  “Hey, Gus. How did the run go today?”

  “Everything went fine. I have everything bundled and ready for distribution in the morning.”

  “That’s great. I knew we could count on you.”

  “Yes, ma’am. I always follow through with tasks I have agreed to take on.”

  “Jill, please,” I reminded the man, who was thirty years my senior. “Jack and I are going to be gone for at least several more days, so if you run into any issues, you can call us anytime.”

  “I’m sure I’ll be fine. There are a few messages on the answering machine. I didn’t listen to them, but you might want to call in to check them.”