Dead Point (Maggie Blackthorne Book 1)

by LaVonne Griffin-Valade

  “No, neither would I.”

  “Can you tell me anything yet?” she asked.

  I hesitated. “Can’t really say much about the investigation. But it’s my highest priority right now.”

  “Thank you, Margaret. You were always a good girl, a hard worker.”

  Lynn smiled. It had been years since I’d seen that. “I understand you found that old jeep. Since the title’s in my name, State Police from Bend called about fifteen minutes ago, talked to me about filling out a claim form.”

  “I can get the form for you. Also, some of their belongings were at the same location out off of Logan Valley Highway. I’ll drop by with the claim form for that too.”

  She nodded and sipped her coffee. “Logan Valley? Why out there?”

  “I don’t have an answer for that yet.”

  Cecil Burney had described the Nodine brothers as living on the wind. Maybe Logan Valley was nothing more than the place winter storms had blown them.

  “Can you tell me what led up to the rift between you and your sons?”

  She paused, hands trembling slightly. “All their thieving and lying, still they never disrespected me. Just left me ashamed. Until they stole the two thousand in cash I’d saved up for a trip. Nothing big. Just my sister Beth and me. A few days in Chicago, another couple in New York City. We’d dreamed of it since we were girls. Thing is, if they’d told me they needed money, for anything except bail, I would’ve given them the two thousand and never looked back.”

  “When did the money go missing?”

  Lynn pursed her lips. “A year ago. About the time they quit coming around.”

  “When was the last time you saw them?”

  “Last month. They were coming out of Chester’s Market with a case of beer. They handed it over to some kid. I assumed they bought it for him.”

  “Did you speak with them?”

  She shook her head. “I don’t think they even knew I was there.”

  “Did you recognize the kid?”

  “Afraid not. Maybe eighteen or so. Dark hair. That’s all I remember.”

  “Okay, I’ll let you be. I wanted to check in, make sure you were doing all right.”

  We both stood.

  “Funeral’s tomorrow,” she said.

  “I’ll be there.”

  “You said they had some belongings?”

  “Clothes. A couple of books.”

  “Books?”

  “A Raymond Chandler mystery and a book of poetry.”

  “The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam?”

  “That’s right.”

  “A gift from my grandmother. It’s where I’d stashed the two thousand dollars.”

  “There was also a photo inside. Of you and the twins when they were about six. Cute little boys.”

  “Yes. I remember.”

  “See you tomorrow, Lynn.”

  I arrived early at Erna’s Café, the little hole-in-the-wall place Hollis and I both liked. Eggs, bacon, and ranch fries for $5.99, what was not to like.

  Someone had left a copy of the Blue Mountain Eagle on my table, so I scanned it under the dim ceiling light. Duncan and his store were featured prominently on the business page. The photo of him was a tad blurry, but I liked his smile. I couldn’t remember who had called him crotchety, but he seemed damn normal to me. And he certainly didn’t make love like some ill-tempered men I could name.

  Hollis scooted into the opposite side of our booth, knocking me out of my little daydream. “What’s the gossip?”

  He meant the “Cops and Courts” page, a log of last week’s law enforcement activity and judicial decisions, complete with the names, ages, and towns of residence of those cited, accused, or sentenced.

  “Forgot to check.” I flipped to the log.

  “Did you order breakfast yet?” His voice was deeper, crustier this morning.

  I shook my head and sipped my tepid coffee. “Hope Lil’s getting more sleep than you are. Maybe you should rethink delaying your family leave.”

  “I’ll be okay.”

  Our waitress, a tall, busty woman with muscular arms, stood at our table. “Mornin’. Just the regular today?”

  “Yep. But add a little salsa on the side, please,” said Hollis.

  She poured him a cup of coffee. “Sure thing. And what about you, hon?”

  Calling a cop hon was probably verboten somewhere, but I liked it that she always did. “Can I get my eggs scrambled this time?”

  “Comin’ up,” she said.

  I handed Hollis the Blue Mountain Eagle. “Not much gossip, I’m afraid.”

  He checked the log and inspected the front page. “Any luck finding the Nodines’ jeep or abode yesterday?”

  “Found both. In a campground ten or eleven miles east of Seneca.”

  “So, not too far from the shuttered mill where they were killed?”

  “Yeah, up Logan Valley Highway. Close to where they poached that doe.”

  “A few cattle ranches nearby, if I remember correctly,” he said.

  I nodded. “That reminds me. Met a guy new to the area while I was out there. Calls his place Bear Valley Cattle Company.”

  “Taylor told me about that. Some kind of hormone-free outfit, right?”

  “Yeah. Cecil Burney went on a tirade about all the local ranchers being bought out, taken over by the natural beef industry. Sees something criminal about making cattle into a profitable enterprise, I guess. Still, I take his point if this Asa Larkin guy is any example. Turned the old Harden ranch into a regular Fort Knox of the high desert. Electric fence. Security gate.”

  “A Texan?”

  “A lawyer. Had a practice in Lake Oswego.”

  “And how was your visit with Burney?” Hollis asked.

  “About as delightful as I thought it would be, although he did send me up Logan Valley Highway to look for that jeep.”

  I eyed a couple of customers entering the café. Two men in their mid-to-late forties, tall and rotund. Each wore a bulky jacket, cheap chinos, a straw cowboy hat, and a pair of slick black boots. I was pretty sure they were the two dudes in the green-apple Bronco who worked for Larkin.

  “Don’t turn around, but I think two of Asa Larkin’s hired men just took a table.”

  Hollis stood. “I need to wash up.”

  On his return from the restroom, he tossed the men a glance before sliding back into our booth. “I’ve seen them around town. A couple of times at the hardware store. Once at McKay’s Feed and Tack.”

  “They don’t seem the ranch-hand type to me. Too much meat on their bones.”

  Our waitress placed the plates on the table. “Here you go, hon.”

  I forked up a wad of scrambled eggs and ranch fries and watched her toddle to the table where the two men sat. “Larkin’s not particularly friendly, and he’s apparently the religious type. His place even has a Christian motto, it seems. Jesus Loves Grass-Fed Beef.”

  Hollis ladled a load of salsa onto his breakfast burrito. “Lots of Jesus-loves-this and Jesus-loves-that kind of thing out here.”

  “Tell me about it.”

  After our meal, I spotted the green-apple Bronco in Erna’s parking lot. “That’s the rig those two men were driving yesterday.”

  Hollis surreptitiously snapped photos of the license plate and the bumper sticker with the cattle company motto, and I took a sly gander at the interior.

  “What do you think?” I asked.

  “I’m just following your instincts right now.” He slipped on a latex glove and tried all four doors. “Who in this county locks up their vehicle?”

  “Strangers? People with something to hide? Try the hatch in back.”

  He yanked the handle upward, clicking it open. “Now what?”

  I surveyed the café. Gingham curtains blocked any view of the parking lot out of its few windows. “Go stand next to Erna’s entrance. You’ll think of a way to distract anybody coming outside.”

  “And what’ll you be doing?”

&
nbsp; “That was an order.”

  He smiled and handed me a pair of gloves. “Be careful.”

  I climbed through the open hatch and crawled hastily to the glove compartment. Nothing. Nothing under the front bench seat, nothing under the back. I edged back out through the hatch, eased it shut, and shook my head. Holly, standing nonchalantly by the café’s front door, shrugged, and we walked to our cop Tahoes parked side-by-side in the lot.

  At my desk, I listened to voicemail. Whitey Kern had called late last night to say he’d delivered Dan and Joseph’s jeep and pickup camper to the evidence warehouse in Bend. Earlier this morning, Duncan had confirmed the two Hot Shot DXR cattle prods matched the listings in his inventory.

  “What’s that smell?” Hollis asked.

  “Probably the rotten meat inside the Nodines’ cooler. Should have kept it on ice, I guess.” I unlocked the evidence locker, moved the cooler to the freezer.

  In the meantime, Hollis opened wide the office doors and turned on his computer. “Let’s see what we can find out about the grass-fed beef guy. Asa Larkin, right?”

  I nodded. “Drives a black Prius.”

  “Plate number?”

  Hadn’t occurred to me to check the plates.

  “Maggie?”

  “Didn’t pull him over, Holly. Met him by happenstance.”

  “So you didn’t check his driver’s license either.”

  “Nope.”

  “Well, that’s unfortunate, because there’s no Asa Larkin listed on the Oregon

  State Bar website or at the DMV.”

  I stood behind him, staring at the sites he’d pulled up on his two monitors. “What does that mean?”

  “Name change? Alias? The man’s a liar?”

  That last had already occurred to me. And now that I knew the Nodines had been camped out not far from Bear Valley Cattle Company, he was high on the list of area ranchers we needed to talk to.

  I scanned through close-up photographs of the Nodines’ Ram 3500 and the livestock trailer that had finally been forwarded from the State Police lab in Bend. “Take a look at this.” I turned the monitor toward Hollis.

  “A livestock trailer?”

  “It was parked beside the Nodines’ red truck. See that?” I pointed to the bumper.

  “That same Jesus Loves Grass-Fed Beef bumper sticker?”

  “Think I’ll let Larkin explain it to us. His false identity too,” I said.

  I pulled up the photos I’d taken on the night of the murder. I hadn’t taken shots of the bumper or noticed the sticker. “Shit. I missed seeing it when Olive Kern loaded the damn trailer onto her flatbed tow truck.”

  “A lot going on that night, Maggie.”

  No excuse, I thought. “I keep blundering along, blind to one clue, stumbling across another. I think Bach suspects I’m not up to the task either. He was pretty cold over the phone last night.”

  “That’s not why.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I left a clue for you.”

  “The cryptic sticky note you stuck on my phone, something about J.T.?”

  He nodded. “So we knew J.T. would have a tizzy about Bach supervising our work during the murder investigation, right? Turns out he filed a complaint with Corporal Macintyre at regional. Made some case against you being fit to be a sergeant. Plus he thought it was inappropriate for our office to investigate murder cases.”

  “Fuck me dead. And fuck that son-of-a-bitch ex-husband of mine.”

  “What the hell? You were married to Lake?”

  “Years ago. Lasted only a few months. It was a rebound thing after Morgan left me. Christ, can we talk about it some other time?” The last thing I needed right now was to chitchat with Holly about my love life.

  “That explains a few things, but you don’t have to worry. I’ve got your back, Maggie.”

  “I should’ve told you, though.”

  “It’s none of my business who you’ve been married to.”

  We sat quietly. “How’d you learn J.T. filed a complaint?”

  “I’d like you to think I have a secret source at regional, but I don’t, unfortunately. That medical examiner, Dr. Gattis, left a voicemail on the mainline.”

  “Ray. She was probably trying to warn me.”

  “I think so.”

  “Well, no one’s ordered me to stop investigating. Unless there’s another voicemail you forgot to tell me about.”

  He shook his head.

  “Before I get kicked off the case, let’s go have a conversation with the dude posing as Asa Larkin. And if there’s time, let’s drive out to Guy Trudeau’s place too.”

  Bear Valley Cattle Company’s entry gate was wide open when Hollis and I arrived, which moderated somewhat the fortress vibe present yesterday. The black Prius was parked in the drive. The three identical mobile homes, for his hired men, I guessed, sat at the tree line about twenty yards from the newly painted ranch house.

  Several minutes after I pressed the ranch house doorbell, a lanky teenager—presumably the son who sat in the Prius yesterday—opened the door a crack. Similar to his father, he looked both bemused and hostile, and he was high on a heavy dose of youthful wrath and white privilege. He wore a pair of expensive Ariat jeans, a double-pocketed Gitmon western shirt, some high-end cowboy boots, and a black felt hat, all likely ordered online from Shepler’s or Langston’s.

  “Morning, son,” I said, irking the boy with that diminutive tag. “I’m looking to talk with your father.”

  “Dad! That lady cop’s back!” The kid opened the door wider, walked toward the back of the house and disappeared. “Dad! Did you hear me?”

  “I heard you.” Asa Larkin, or whatever the hell his name turned out to be, appeared in the front room, headed resentfully to the door. “Sergeant. Blackburn, was it?”

  I extended my hand and we shook again. “Blackthorne. And this is Senior Trooper Jones. We’d like to talk to you about a couple of things, sir.”

  He eyed Hollis. The kind of once-over I’d observed locals make the first time they were introduced to the tall Black man who was my police partner and backup.

  “All right,” he said and led us further into the living room.

  The décor was decidedly cold. Black leather wing chairs and matching divan with modern glass tables strewn about. The space had an icy, masculine flair.

  We sat down, the cushioned seats crackling quietly beneath us. “What can I help you with, Sergeant?”

  Hollis broke out his laptop and passed it to me.

  “The Nodine brothers were in possession of this livestock trailer.” I showed him the photo and waited for a reaction. “Here’s a close-up shot of the bumper. Recognize that saying?”

  “Jesus Loves Grass-Fed Beef, you mean?”

  I nodded.

  “Obviously I do. It hangs from my entryway outside. I recognize the trailer too. I reported it missing a couple of weeks ago.”

  “I saw nothing like that come across my desk. Did you, Trooper Jones?”

  Hollis shook his head.

  “I reported it to the sheriff’s office. You’re probably aware it’s not a requirement to register a trailer that size in Oregon. I planned to anyway, but hadn’t gotten around to it. Unfortunately.”

  “It was found at the scene of the Nodine killings and had sustained some shotgun damage.” I paused for a reaction. Nothing. “For the immediate future, it’ll have to remain at the evidence warehouse in Bend. To get it back eventually, you can file a claim with the State Police. With proof of purchase, of course.”

  “I see. So was that all, Sergeant?”

  “I’ll let the sheriff know the livestock trailer’s been located.” I stood, a signal for Hollis to do the same. “And the name you filed the report under?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Trooper Jones did a bit of research. He found no Asa Larkin listed as a member of the Oregon State Bar. Nor is there an Asa Larkin in DMV records. Are you using an alias for some reason?”r />
  His neck and face reddened slightly. “My legal name is Asa Wakefield. After my mother died, her sister and husband—David and Janet Wakefield—adopted me. They were killed in a car accident a while back, and I decided to change my last name to Larkin. It was both my mother and my aunt’s maiden name.”

  Again I sensed his explanation was some distorted version of the truth. “Thanks for clarifying things, Mr. Larkin.”

  “I have petitioned to change my name legally.”

  I put on my hat. “I’ll get back to you with that property claim form.”

  “Okay, what did you think of Larkin?” I asked Hollis on the way to Big T.

  “He didn’t seem particularly surprised the trailer was found at a murder scene.”

  “I thought so too. But he also strikes me as an imperious asshole, and maybe that flat affect is part of the package.”

  “Imperious, huh? Flat affect?”

  I ignored Holly’s teasing. “Let’s figure out what kind of law he practiced, okay?”

  “And did you notice he didn’t name his biological father?”

  “That’s right. Good catch, H.”

  “You know me. Always suspicious of everyone.”

  Hardly accurate, but Hollis did have a knack for registering no surprise when it turned out someone was cagey, or a lawbreaker, or a royal fuck-up.

  I changed the subject. “About Trudeau. He’s not my fan. Called me a Podunk with a gun the other day. Might be good to have you doing the questioning.”

  “Sure, if you want me to. But he’s not my fan either. Last time I stopped him, he was damned belligerent and had a pistol next to him on the seat. Besides, I like to watch you get these folks all riled up. That way I come off looking like Trooper Charming.”

  “I didn’t really rile Larkin-slash-Wakefield, though, did I? He better have filed that theft report with the sheriff under one of those names, or his ass goes up on our murder board as a person of interest.”

  “I’ll check with the sheriff when we get back from Trudeau’s place.”

  9

  Afternoon, February 24

  At the junction with 395 we traveled about eight miles north, turned west on Izee Road, drove along the Silvies River, and finally headed north again toward the west side of the Aldrich range. I pulled off outside the battered gates of Big T.