Cry For Help

by Wendy Dranfield

Angie and Wyatt laugh and Mike knows it’s winding Douglas up.

  “Madison Harper’s back in town,” says Angie. “Maybe it was her. Have you asked where she was that night? I mean, she’s a convicted cop-killer and then her ex-girlfriend dies around the time she shows up. She might have got a taste for blood. Maybe she’s the serial killer they’re talking about on the news.”

  Feeling disgusted that she’d implicate her own sister, Mike says, “We’ve already arrested someone for Stephanie Garcia’s murder. It wasn’t Madison.”

  Both Angie and Wyatt look surprised.

  Douglas turns and walks to the car.

  When he’s gone, Wyatt says, “You need to remember who pays your wages, Detective Bowers. You cops work for us, so you don’t want to upset the locals. You should make your friend aware of that. He clearly doesn’t understand how things work around here.”

  Mike feels his face flush with anger. He’s grown to hate this couple. “If you really want to protect Mason, you’ll bring him to me before we drag him in.”

  He walks away with a feeling of dread building in his chest. He just knows something bad is coming.

  47

  Owen Harper is about to do something stupid. He knows it, but he has to do it anyway. He takes a shot of bourbon straight from the bottle and wipes his mouth on his sleeve, just like his father would. He winces as it burns his throat. He doesn’t even like the taste, but he needs all the courage he can get. This last week has been the worst time in his life since his mother’s arrest, and he can see no way out that doesn’t involve some kind of pain.

  He sits in his car near the railroad tracks, watching a train speed by. It’s so fast you wouldn’t even feel it if you happened to get in front of one. You’d be dead before your body hit the ground. It would be a shame for the train driver, but they probably have access to therapy through a company scheme. Not that therapy ever worked for Owen.

  He takes another swig from the bottle and tries to weigh up his options. He truly feels like he has none. He’s barely holding his shit together and he can’t stop thinking about Nikki and the way her life ended so unexpectedly.

  He pulls his cell phone out and looks at the photos he took of her sitting on the hood of his car just hours before she died. She was funny, complicated and beautiful. Which is why it’s hard to understand why she was so unsure of herself, so self-conscious. It was her head playing tricks on her, but she wouldn’t believe him. Nikki was the best thing that ever happened in his shitty life. She was way more beneficial than his therapy sessions. It’s not just because he can’t tell her now that she’s dead, but he knows he was in love with her. They understood each other because they both came from screwed-up families.

  Nikki tried to introduce him to her mom once, when they bumped into her in the grocery store. Not as his boyfriend, though, as she didn’t want her parents knowing she was dating. Her mother cast a critical look over him with cold eyes, judging his appearance, then just walked off. Nikki was mortified. She kept apologizing to him, but he knows she’s not responsible for her mom’s actions. Parents can be the worst. That’s why he never had any plans to introduce Nikki to his dad and Angie.

  He’s always resented them. They talked so poorly of his mother, never waiting until he was out of the room, preferring that he heard. He can’t be the son his dad wants. Mainly because he hates him. Wyatt McCoy is a bully and a criminal and there’s no way Owen would ever work for the real family business.

  His feelings about Angie aren’t so black-and-white. Even though she’s not his mother, she does have a maternal side, more so when he was younger. She took him to see the Thanksgiving and Christmas parades in Prospect Springs every year without fail until he outgrew them. And whenever he was sick, she’d put him under a duvet on the couch while she fed him chicken soup and ice cream and checked his temperature every hour, which always reminded him of his real mom. Probably because he remembers being unwell the night she was arrested, which was the last night he ever lived with her.

  But despite Angie’s attempts at mothering him, he’s also seen a darker side to her. She has a ruthlessness that’s more concerning than anything his dad has ever done.

  Together they’re a dangerous combination, and the closer he gets to turning eighteen, the more he realizes that if he doesn’t give up on his plan of going to college to study law, his dad and Angie will make his life hell.

  Not for the first time, he wishes he could visit his mother in prison. He needs to hear from her what happened to Officer Levy. Angie is adamant she was guilty. She says his mom was ten times worse than her when it came to her temper—a family trait—but he doesn’t remember that about her. He shakes his head. His memories of life before her arrest are so hazy. He wishes he could recall more.

  He probably remembers Stephanie better. He would see her around Lost Creek sometimes, but she would never speak to him. If he was alone, she’d wave, but she wouldn’t come over. He’d asked Angie why and she said the woman probably hated him because he reminded her of his mom and what she’d done. That left him devastated and was one of the reasons why he had to start therapy. He couldn’t understand why he was being blamed for what his mom had done. It made him retreat into himself and avoid ever getting close to people.

  He has few friends, even now. As soon as Nikki died, he deleted his Facebook account because he was getting trolled. People accused him of driving her crazy, of having a stupid suicide pact. He couldn’t handle it.

  When Angie pulled him out of school and changed his name so that people would stop connecting him with his mother, it confused him. Whether or not they were related to him by blood, Wyatt and Angie were strangers to him. The McCoy name meant nothing, so to suddenly be told it was his new identity messed him up. His social worker recommended he attend therapy, but his dad was dead set against it until threatened with a visit from the social worker’s manager.

  Owen shakes his head and sighs at how messed up his life has been.

  The worst part is that his mom has never once tried contacting him over the years. Early on, he found out that inmates were allowed to make phone calls and send letters, so he waited patiently. Angie told him she’d given their address to the prison so his mom would know where he was, and he wrote her plenty of letters for Angie to post, but he never received one response. He has to assume she’s not interested in how his life turned out. He lost his mom and now he’s lost his girlfriend. There’s nothing else left to lose.

  Which makes his decision easier.

  48

  Madison’s feeling defeated. She’s slumped in the passenger seat of Nate’s car while he drives them around town looking for places that would attract a seventeen-year-old boy. The thought that Douglas is eager to charge her son with the murder of Nikki Jackson fills her with dread. What’s more terrifying is the thought that living with Angie and Wyatt might have turned him into someone who is capable of that. Does he enjoy living with his father? Has he discovered that they’re similar?

  She shakes the thought from her head. She has to believe he’s nothing like Wyatt. That’s not how she’s been picturing him all these years. If she finds out he is, she doesn’t know how she’ll cope. “I just need to see him for myself,” she mutters.

  Nate glances at her. “You need to be checking out everyone we pass,” he says. “Stay alert.”

  She’s trying, but it’s hard to concentrate. “What’s the point? I’m not going to recognize him after all this time. I have absolutely no idea what my son looks like now. Do you know how that feels?”

  “Madison, focus,” says Nate. “We need to find him before Douglas gets to him. There’ll be plenty of time for emotion later.”

  She looks at him and can tell he’s as worried as she is that Owen will end up serving time for something he didn’t do. She’s lucky to have met Nate, but he must be getting sick of her problems. “You’re right, I know. But I have no idea where he could be.”

  Nate’s phone rings. When he answers, sh
e hears Rex’s booming voice.

  “We’re a bit busy at the moment, Rex,” says Nate. “Now’s not a good time.”

  She touches his arm and whispers, “It’s fine.”

  “Scrap that. What have you got?” Nate pulls over and puts him on speakerphone.

  “I can’t get any dirt on Davis Levy. No criminal record as far as I can tell. Nothing bad in the press other than his son’s death and a few arguments with disgruntled customers at the shooting range he owns.” He pauses. “About their son’s murder… I read that Officer Levy was shot dead, which means I finally found out who your new friend is. Thanks for the heads-up.”

  Nate looks uncomfortable. “Sorry, I was going to tell you next time I visited. I was planning on bringing Madison with me so you could meet her for yourself.”

  She feels tears building, but not because Rex knows she was convicted of Ryan’s murder. It’s because Nate isn’t planning to ditch her and her problems anytime soon.

  “She was wrongfully convicted, like you and me,” he clarifies. “That’s why we’re here: to find out who framed her.”

  Rex is quiet while he digests the information. “Okay. In that case, I need to step things up a gear. So: the Levys have no financial problems or bad debt. But I’m only going by their names and address. If you get me their dates of birth or social security numbers, I can delve deeper.”

  Nate looks at Madison again. She shakes her head. She doesn’t really suspect Davis of hurting his own son. His reaction to her in the grocery store was that of a devastated father.

  “Hold off on that for now,” says Nate. “How about the cops?”

  “I’ve tracked someone down who might’ve known Don Douglas when he worked in Prospect Springs—heard of it?”

  Madison sits up and leans forward. “Hey, Rex. Prospect Springs is the nearest large town to Lost Creek. It’s about a two-hour drive away.”

  “Right. Well, my contact seems to think he’s heard of your guy. Is he black, mid forties, about six feet tall?”

  Her heart starts racing. “That’s him.”

  “Okay. Well leave it with me and I’ll do some digging while I wait for my guy to get back to me.”

  Nate speaks up. “Thanks, Rex. As always, we owe you one.”

  Rex laughs. “You owe me more than one, my friend. And I’ll want all the gory details about your wrongful conviction when we meet, Madison.”

  She smiles. “You got it.”

  Nate leans back as he ends the call.

  “You know what’s going to happen, don’t you?” she says.

  “What?”

  “I bet Douglas left his previous job due to an internal affairs investigation. He probably did something shady and they told him to move on or risk being exposed by the press. I bet he’s been hiding something all this time. If Rex finds out it involved another cop, it could mean he’s the best suspect for Ryan’s murder.”

  Nate appears to think about it. “Did he and Ryan get along?”

  She shakes her head. “They had no relationship at all as far as I know. Bear in mind we only worked with Douglas for a few months before Ryan was killed.”

  Nate looks reinvigorated. She knows what he’s thinking before he even says it, because his hatred of bent cops is still strong—and rightly so after he discovered the detective who arrested him for his fiancée’s murder was working for Father Connor. The police in Texas effectively helped frame him for murder and she knows he’ll never forgive them for it.

  “If Douglas was responsible, we need to make sure he gets prison time, Madison. We can’t let him get away with what he’s done. And we can’t let him get to Owen before us.”

  He starts the car and pulls away so fast Madison thinks her neck is going to snap.

  49

  Mike and Douglas return to the station after lunch. Before Mike even makes it to his desk, he’s accosted by Alex.

  “Do you have a minute, Detective? It’s urgent.”

  He nods and notices Douglas rushing straight back out the door. Turning to Stella from dispatch he says, “Where’s he going?”

  “We had a call to say Mason McCoy’s been spotted. He’s checking it out. Officer Greenburg’s meeting him there as backup.”

  Mike rubs his face. He’s still worried about the implications of blaming this on Mason. He follows Alex to his office. “Any tox results from Lena yet?”

  “Yes, we just got them. There were no drugs in Nikki’s system other than a daily dose of prescribed antidepressants. No alcohol either.”

  So she didn’t try to overdose or to numb the pain of slitting her wrists.

  Chief Sullivan is already in Alex’s office when they arrive. Alex sits in his expensive-looking ergonomic chair and pulls out a couple of sheets of paper. He pushes his glasses up his nose. Mike can tell he’s excited about something.

  “Okay, so the blood on Nikki Jackson’s face is definitely all hers. The thumbprint on her forehead—which was a partial, remember—is a match for a print found on the knife from the Haunted House.”

  Mike nods. “Good. We’re getting somewhere. Did you run them through the database?”

  “Of course. No match. And before you ask, they’re not Nikki’s either.”

  Not so good. “Are Nikki’s prints on the knife at all?”

  “No.”

  Chief Sullivan sits up straight and looks at him. “So we can rule out suicide.”

  Mike nods. “I take it they don’t match the prints you lifted from Ricky Gregor’s ID badge either?”

  “That’s right, they don’t,” says Alex.

  So they can eliminate Ricky as a suspect. Mike looks at the chief. “We’ll take Mason McCoy’s prints as soon as we bring him in, but in the meantime, I want to check the prints against Mr. Jackson’s.”

  Chief Sullivan raises his eyebrows. “You think our victim’s father could have killed her?”

  “It’s a possibility. I mean, he was supposed to collect her from the park, but he says he blacked out on the couch. Mrs. Jackson was asleep, so there was an opportunity where he could have gone to the park, killed Nikki, and got home all before his wife noticed he was gone. And he wouldn’t let me search his house for the knife.”

  Sullivan’s thinking about it. “But the knife wasn’t found there and I’m guessing no one’s pointing the finger at him, so what’s our reason for bringing him in?”

  “You mean apart from the fact that the guy’s an asshole who treated his daughter like shit?”

  Alex chimes in. “Come on, Detective. We all know you could say that about half the parents out there.”

  Mike stares. “Is that a dig at me?”

  Alex looks confused. “What? No, not at all. Sorry, it was just an observation based on the kind of people we arrest.”

  There’s an awkward silence. Mike thinks of his daughter, and how she’s counting on him not to let her down this weekend. Maybe he’s being too sensitive.

  “Anyway,” Alex continues, “I also found the same prints on the controls of the Ferris wheel and on the safety bar of the car that Nikki was found in. Now, each car’s safety bar snaps down automatically once the ride is in motion. But to get off the ride, you need to lift the bar up yourself. And if you look at the position of these prints…” He picks up an iPad and shows them an enlarged image of the fingerprints illuminated on the metal bar. “You’ll see they’re pointing inwards, not outwards. In other words, whoever left these prints lifted the bar whilst standing outside the car, and therefore they weren’t sitting with Nikki. The safety bar was in the open position when we arrived. I assumed the maintenance guy lifted it when he found her, but we can rule that out now we know his prints don’t match these.”

  Mike nods. “According to the owner, Ricky insisted he didn’t touch a thing when he found her. Looks like he was telling the truth.”

  Alex continues. “That amusement park will get hundreds of visitors every day and you can bet a lot of those people would have a spin on the Ferris wheel, but wi
th only one set of prints found, it looks as if someone wiped the whole car clean, then went back for some reason and forgot to wipe his prints the second time, including from the knife.”

  “Maybe because he was interrupted?” says Sullivan. “Or maybe he had an accomplice, and these are their prints.”

  Mike takes a second to think about it. Finally he says, “And there’s no way of knowing what order the killer did things in?”

  “Oh, there’s a way of knowing,” says Alex. “It’s called CCTV. But obviously there were no surveillance cameras at the park.”

  Mike shakes his head. Damn, this guy’s annoying.

  “The other thing is that I’ve had the results back from the state lab about the fibers and hair samples I took from Nikki’s sweater. The fibers are navy and aren’t from Nikki’s clothes. I took them from the left sleeve of her sweater, so they might belong to whoever was sitting next to her at some point that day, either on the Ferris wheel or at work, or it could belong to one of her parents if they sat together for breakfast. The hair turned out to be animal, maybe a dog, as it was thicker than human hair. Do you know if she had a dog?”

  Mike thinks of her home. There were no signs of a dog there; no water bowl or chew toys. He shakes his head. “Don’t think so.”

  “Well, it could’ve been picked up from any pet owner who rode the wheel that day, or maybe she petted a dog. I wouldn’t call it significant evidence in this case. Not unless it turns out she was killed by an animal, anyway.”

  They ignore his attempt at humor.

  Mike checks his phone out of habit. “Okay, let me know if you find anything else.”

  He heads out of the station for some air and feels raindrops on his face. He loosens his tie, but it’s not just the heat making him sweat. He pops two headache pills and rubs his forehead. It’s going to be another long day.

  50

  Owen checks his watch. He has about two minutes before the next train speeds by. He takes one more slug of bourbon, starts the car’s engine and looks up the tracks, waiting. Rain suddenly splatters on his windshield, so he switches the wipers on and rolls down the passenger window, giving him a clear view of the tracks.