Chapter 5
Brandon picked up a burger and fries at the local drive-in and headed for home. QuickBurger had changed hands a few times since his high school days. Dick Meyer, the original owner, had left it to his daughter, who’d run the business into the ground. The newest owners were immigrants from East Asia, and they’d added spring rolls and Pad Thai to the menu.
He’d planned on stopping by his dad’s house, but he was beat and needed food and sleep. He called his dad and left a message he’d drop by tomorrow.
Brandon pulled into the driveway of the 1940s craftsman he was renting until he could find a place of his own. The rent was cheap, less than a quarter of what a similar house would cost in Seattle. He unlocked the door, felt around for the switch, and flipped the porch light on.
He passed through the living room, where moving boxes were scattered haphazardly, most still taped shut. Pizza boxes littered the floor along with a few beer bottles. His buddies from the Seattle PD had helped him move and they’d made a night of it.
His mattress lay angled on the bedroom floor where they’d left it. He hadn’t had time to set up the frame. Brandon fell onto the bed now, pulled out the hamburger, and ate in silence. As much as he’d coveted alone time when he was married, Brandon still hadn’t gotten used to the ear-ringing quiet of an empty house.
He picked up a book he’d been reading the night before. Anton Chekhov’s Short Stories. Brandon had finished the volume half a dozen times, but never grew tired of it. He’d been introduced to Chekhov while playing lead in a couple of high school plays. The dark realism of Russian literature—stories of everyday people battling for survival in a society that sometimes cared little for them—that resonated with Brandon.
He tossed the hamburger wrapper and bag aside and popped his shoes off, falling asleep with the book propped on his chest.
Brandon’s phone rang a little after nine that evening.
“This is Mattson.”
“Hi chief. Lisa Shipley.” He rubbed his eyes.
“The coroner,” she said.
“I remember,” he said, propping himself up on one elbow. “You got results already?”
“I have a few ideas, but that’s not why I’m calling.”
“Okay. What’s up?”
“You know about the missing person report?” Lisa asked.
“I haven’t heard anything.”
“Apparently someone reported the girl missing. This morning.”
“They informed my department?”
“I’m looking at the report right here. Says it was sent to Forks PD. We usually get a copy too. Came in around noon.”
If the report came in this morning, that was before she was found. Why in the hell didn’t his officers tell him about this?
Brandon pushed himself up off the mattress and went into the kitchen to grab a notepad.
“What’s the girl’s name?”
“Lauren Sandoval. Hispanic, twenty-four. There’s no picture. Just a call from her friends. Why don’t you know about this?”
“Good question. Let me know what you learn about the cause of death.”
“I’ll have something tomorrow morning.”
Brandon hung up and headed to the station.
He found the missing person notice on the fax machine. A man named Adam Cane had called earlier that day, said he and his girlfriend were camping out at Second Beach and when he woke up, she was missing. He’d left his cell phone number.
Second Beach was a popular camp site. In the summer, cars lined the road up to half a mile from the trailhead that led to the beach.
Brandon would deal with his officers in the morning, and they’d better have a damn good explanation why they didn’t connect the dead girl on the beach and this missing woman. It was the part of leadership he hated the most, dealing with staff who didn’t do their jobs.
He dialed the number Adam Cane had left. The young man said he was still camping at the beach with friends, waiting for news about Lauren. Brandon told him he’d be at the trailhead in half an hour.
Brandon contacted dispatch and had them instruct an on-duty officer to meet him at the Second Beach parking lot. On the way down, he called dispatch again, asking for a callback from the officer.
“What’s up, chief?”
It was his oldest officer, Will Spoelman.
“You heard about the body we found on the beach today?”
“Josiah told me all about it,” Will said.
“Someone called in a missing person report this morning—about the deceased girl.”
There was a short pause before Will said, “No one told me.”
“You didn’t know about this?”
“You think I wouldn’t tell you if I did? Listen, Brandon—”
“I had to ask.”
He should know better than to think Will Spoelman would screw up something as simple as a missing person report. Brandon had known the officer most of his life. Will wasn’t one to slough off his responsibilities.
“I was in for twenty minutes for your meeting. That’s it. I started my shift half an hour ago.”
Brandon hadn’t memorized his officers’ schedules yet, but Will probably knew who took the report in the morning. Will wouldn’t rat out a fellow officer, though.
“I contacted the source of the report,” Brandon said. “The girl disappeared at some point last night. He’s still here with two of their friends.”
“You notify family?” Will asked.
“Not yet. I want to check out the story first. The friends don’t know about the girl’s death.”
Will sighed.
“I hate this notification of death crap.”
“You and me both. But as far as I’m concerned, if this is more than a simple drowning, these are potential suspects.”
And if it was an accident, someone has a lot of explaining to do—considering the scratches on her back and the bite marks on her neck.
“Got it. I’m almost there,” Will said.
“See you in five.”
The highway to Second Beach was a two-lane road that dissected a few miles of farmland before nearing the Pacific, where it cut into a swath of coastal evergreens. It was well past sundown, but Brandon knew every curve and corner, even in the dark.
Brandon found Will parked on the side of the road just outside the entrance to the campground’s gravel parking lot.
The young man Brandon had talked to on the phone waited near the registration station. Campers were expected to place a site fee into a little envelope and leave it in the drop box. A bright lamp lit up the trailhead where Adam stood, hands in his pockets and hoodie shielding his eyes.
He stepped forward as Brandon and Will approached.
“Is she safe? You wouldn’t be here—don’t tell me you found her—”
Will pointed a furtive finger at Brandon, as if to say, this one’s yours, chief.
“Lauren’s body was discovered this afternoon,” Brandon said.
Adam’s face contorted in confusion. “Body?”
“I’m sorry, Adam.”
“No.” He took a step back, put his hand over his eyes.
Brandon waited a moment. He’d done this countless times. If he was lucky, and that wasn’t often, a chaplain was present to do the emotional heavy lifting. That wasn’t going to happen out here in the middle of nowhere.
“We need to ask you a few questions,” Brandon said.
Adam leaned back against the registration station and slid to the ground, his head hidden beneath the hoodie. “This isn’t happening.”
Will looked to Brandon, rose an eyebrow. After a few moments, Will approached.
“We know this is tough,” Will said. “but we need your help.” He reached down and put a hand under Adam’s arm. “Come on.”
Adam stood. “Sorry.”
“Go ahead and pull your hoodie off,” Brandon said.
Adam did, revealing a head of curly blonde hair and a clean cut but acne-ridd
en face. His eyes were swollen, as if he’d been crying.
Adam glanced at Will. “How did she die?”
“We’re not sure yet,” Brandon said, before Will could reply. If this was a murder investigation, there was no point in giving away what they did—or didn’t—know.
“Was she…hurt?” Adam asked.
“Right now, we just need to find out what happened last night,” Brandon said.
“We were all hanging out, you know. Partying at our campsite. I fell asleep and she was gone in the morning.”
“Why would Lauren leave?”
“I don’t know.”
“You have an argument?”
“No,” he said. The defensiveness in his tone told Brandon that Adam understood the implication behind the question.
“She ever talk about hurting herself?”
Suicide wasn’t on the table, but Adam didn’t know that. Brandon wondered if the young man would try to use it as an out to cover for anything he might have done.
“Not that I know of.”
“What about your friends? Where are they?”
“Down at the campsite.”
“Alright. Take us there.”
Adam led the way down the winding forest path. Will followed directly behind Adam, holding his flashlight high. The trail rose for about half a mile before descending toward the Pacific. A slight breeze swept through stands of fir, cedar, and spruce, carrying with it the far-off roar of the ocean.
Brandon had hiked the trail a hundred times as a kid. In the winter, local teens used the beach as a favorite party spot. Back then, no cop would make the two-mile trek just to check on a bunch of kids out after curfew.
During the summer, tourists packed the beach. Probably more so now since the Moonbeam Darklove craze.
The path led them up a slight incline, leveling out before a steep descent down a series of switchbacks punctuated by wooden stairs where the path would otherwise had been too difficult for many of the thousands of visitors frequenting the spot each year.
The trail landed in a patch of brush and a forty-foot wide obstacle course of barren and blanched logs, like the mother lode of all driftwood had washed ashore.
Ahead of them a waxing moon cast a silvery light over the sand. One of the area’s popular sea stack rocks rose off to the left. Brandon and Will made their way across the fallen trees and reached the main beach.
Campfires dotted the sand like ancient beacons. You could pitch a tent anywhere, but people tended to spread out in a more or less even distance from each other. In the moonlight, a layer of smoke swelled near the tree line, where most campers settled, far enough away from the shore that they’d be safe from high tide.
“Over here,” Adam said.
They’d set up camp only thirty feet from the trail.
A weak flame flickered in a rock pit. Two tents. They had pulled driftwood near the fire. On one log sat a man and a woman in their early twenties. The man held up a lighter to a small pipe. Despite the ocean breeze and campfire haze, the stink of marijuana wrinkled Brandon’s nose.
“Hey guys. The cops are here,” Adam said.
The young man stood, lowering the pipe. The girl rose too, letting the blanket around her shoulders drop to the sand. She had short black hair, and a Celtic knot tattoo on her right arm. Her arms were tone, almost muscular. She had the look of someone who might run a marathon—pretty much the opposite of the young stoner standing next to her.
“Where’s Lauren?”
Adam saved Brandon the trouble of breaking the bad news.
“She’s dead, Brooke.”
Brooke fell back onto the log. The man with the pipe took the spot next to her.
“No…it’s not…I can’t…” She buried her head in the man’s shoulder. He had the decency to put his arm around her.
Adam ran the back of his hand across his eyes. The other young man, Brandon noticed, wasn’t reacting with grief. His blank stare told Brandon the man was either in shock or stoned out of his mind.
“You were close?” Brandon directed the question to Brooke.
She glanced up, blinking through tears.
“Lauren was my best friend.”
“I know this is difficult,” Brandon said in his most sympathetic voice. “Just a few questions. What are your names?”
The woman answered she was Brooke Whittaker.
“And you?” Will asked.
“Justin Tate.”
Justin’s deep tan was evident even in the firelight. It was barely June, and being Washington State, a tan that early in the year meant the kid must fake and bake. The tan wasn’t what held Brandon’s attention, though. It was Justin’s coiled, knotty hair. Dreadlocks. Another upper-middle-class kid going for the Bob Marley look. Hadn’t that gone out of style ten years ago?
“When was the last time you saw Lauren?” Brandon asked.
“When we all crashed last night,” Justin said.
“What time was that?”
“It wasn’t that late. We’d been partying all afternoon.”
“So, you all went into your tents. Then what?”
“Isn’t that sort of private?” Justin asked.
“We fell asleep,” Brooke answered. Her eyes slid to Adam. “I don’t know what Adam and Lauren did.”
Adam shrugged his shoulders. “Same.”
“What time?” Will asked.
“I don’t know.”
“At some point she got up and left?” Will asked.
“I must have been sleeping,” Adam replied.
They’d been drinking and smoking all day and turned in early, all at the same time. Went straight to sleep and in the morning, Lauren was gone.
It almost sounded rehearsed.
“How did she…” Brooke started.
“We’re working on that,” Brandon said.
“Okay, but was she like, hurt or what? Or did she just drown?” Justin asked.
Brandon considered Justin for a moment. It might mean something that he’d mentioned drowning and the possibility of injury. Sure, they were by the beach, and drowning was a natural assumption. But injury? Not a question most people asked when learning their friend had died.
“Is there anything you want to tell us?” Brandon asked Justin.
Justin swept a hand his direction. “No way man, I’m just asking. Don’t pin this on me.”
Brooke leaned away from Justin. “Do you know something?”
“He’s just trying to mess with our heads.” Justin pointed his pipe at Adam. “You’re the one who was supposed to be with Lauren. She was your girlfriend.”
Fists clenched, Adam cast Justin a murderous gaze.
“Where are Lauren’s belongings?” Brandon asked.
Adam motioned toward one of the tents. “In there.”
“We’ll need them.”
Adam retrieved a duffel bag from the tent. “These are her clothes.”
Brandon borrowed Will’s mini flashlight and searched the tent himself. There was a backpack and two sleeping bags.
He called out to them. “Which sleeping bag was hers?”
“The red one.”
Brandon rolled up Lauren’s sleeping bag and rejoined the others. Because it still wasn’t clear what sort of case they were looking at, everything she’d left behind was evidence.
“I’ll need each of your phone numbers,” Brandon said.
Will pulled out his notebook and the trio passed it around, recording their contact information.
“Did you find her cell phone?” Brandon asked.
“I tried calling it as soon as she was missing,” Adam said. “It went to voicemail right away.”
“Write down her cell number, too.”
When they finished, he said, “Who of you knows her home address?”
“I do,” Adam and Brooke said simultaneously.
Brandon handed the notebook to Adam, and he scribbled a name and address.
“Her mom’s name is Lily.”
He handed the notepad back to Brandon.
Brandon would have to notify Lauren’s parents. They might shed light on Lauren’s relationship with Adam and her two friends.
“How much longer do you plan on being here?”
“Are we suspects or something?” Justin asked, his voice tinged with agitation. It wouldn’t be the first time Brandon had witnessed a potential suspect mask fear with faux anger.
“We may have more questions,” Brandon said.
“We were going to leave tomorrow,” Adam said.
“Don’t you want to find out what happened to Lauren?” Brooke asked, the hint of an accusation in her voice.
“Don’t be stupid,” Adam said. “Of course I do.”
“Dude, chill. She’s upset,” Justin said.
“We’re all upset, moron,” Adam replied.
Justin stood as quickly as his dope-filled mind would let him.
“Alright boys,” Will said, shoving an arm between them. “No reason to fight at a time like this.”
“Just, shut the frick up, Adam” Justin said.
“We’ll be in touch,” Brandon said. “And, Justin. You might want to lay off the weed.”
“It’s legal—”
“Not on federal land,” Brandon said. The beach was part of the Olympic National Forest, meaning federal rules against using pot trumped any state laws. “I can call the ranger down here if you need a better explanation.”
Justin lowered his pipe.
“Whatever.”
Brandon and Will hiked back to the trailhead, Brandon hauling Lauren’s belongings. Will led the way with his flashlight.
“Nice kids,” Will said, the sarcasm hard to miss, even in the dark. “You think they’re involved in her disappearance?”
The two men, Adam and Justin, had been eager to pin the blame on each other.
“Adam, the victim’s boyfriend, seemed genuinely upset,” Brandon said. “But that could be an act. Same goes for Brooke, the victim’s best friend. She may not be as innocent as she seems.”
Brandon had witnessed more than one convicted killer play the part of the grieving spouse or boyfriend.
Dead by Sunrise Page 3
