by Stacy Green
“2006 NBA All-Star game, Houston.”
“I can’t give you an exact date,” Metz said. “But obviously he didn’t die before 2006. The All-Star game is in February, I think.”
Lyric had purchased the land in late 2005. “He was killed before the rest of them?”
“I can’t tell with any scientific certainty until we’ve done a full examination in the lab,” Metz said. “But going by the condition of the bones and the patch, I’d say it’s likely.”
It made no sense. Predators like this man didn’t dabble in preference. Was it possible the boy had been dumped by someone else, years before? One hell of a coincidence, and Cage didn’t believe in them. Not in murder cases.
“What else can you tell me about the boy?” Cage asked as Sheriff Michaels leaned closer to inspect the patch.
“Going by his skull and long bones, he was likely between eleven and eighteen when he died. There’s blunt force trauma in the skull—I’ll need to get it under a microscope to verify if it’s pre-mortem.”
The Sheriff stared at the patch. “It’s Johnny Deitz.”
“Who’s Johnny Dietz?” Cage asked.
“Jasper County’s a small place,” the sheriff said. “Safe. We don’t see too many kids disappear. But Johnny did. His sister was a problem kid, so no one believed her.”
“What happened?” Bonin asked.
“Sheila Dietz was sixteen and wild,” Sheriff Michaels said. “High school dropout and dragging Johnny down with her. He was fourteen and thought she was the coolest thing in the world. They both disappear one afternoon in spring 2006. No damned sign of them until Sheila shows up a couple of months later with a crazy story.”
The gray-haired sheriff appeared suddenly exhausted. “She said Johnny followed her when she was supposed to meet her dealer. They got high. A man attacked them. She wakes up alone and tied up. Said she was assaulted for days and then escaped. Took her a while to come home because she was ashamed. She didn’t think anyone would believe her, and we didn’t.” He turned to look at the barn, shoulders slumped. “She said she was kept in a horse stall and taken out to be raped. I might have believed her, but she talked about a girl helping him. I just couldn’t get my mind ’round it.”
Adrenaline rushed through Cage, wiping out his fatigue. “Did she describe the girl?”
“She couldn’t remember,” Michaels said. “Another reason it sounded made-up. Everyone thought Johnny OD’d, and she’d panicked and buried him, then took off.”
“Were Sheila and Johnny mixed-race?” Bonin asked.
“Yeah. Genetics, man. Johnny looked more white, with reddish hair and a bunch of freckles. But Sheila, she had that pretty caramel skin, like yours.” Michaels’s wrinkled face reddened again as he glanced shyly at Bonin.
“Did you check out her story?” Cage asked.
“As best we could. I think she’d been strung out while she was gone. She was pretty sure she remembered where they were attacked, but she had no recollection of where she escaped from. They were attacked about a mile south of here, near the creek.” The sheriff’s guilt radiated off him.
“Every one of us would have ended up with the same conclusion,” Cage said. “Especially if she took so long to come forward.”
“One of those cases that haunts you,” Michaels said. “I felt sorry for Sheila, really. Her mama never forgave her.”
“Is she still alive?” Bonin asked.
Michaels nodded and half-smiled. “I kept track of her. She got herself right. Owns a Cajun restaurant in Shreveport. Named it after her little brother. Best jambalaya I ever had.”
Cage dropped his overnight bag on the floor and sank into the hotel bed, ignoring the rough sheets and the stale smell in the room. After spending all day and half the night in the Texas heat, he smelled worse.
His eyelids were heavy, but his mind raced as it tried to make sense of the new information. Exhaustion turned his brain into a jumbled mess. His cell vibrated in his pocket; the glowing screen showed one new message from Dani.
Call me.
He didn’t have the energy to argue with her again. But he needed to hear her voice, even if she was still pissed.
She answered on the first ring. “I wasn’t sure I’d hear from you tonight.”
“I just got to the hotel.” Awkwardness swept over him. He loved this woman more than anything, but he didn’t know what to say to make things right.
“Were you at the dig site all day?”
“Yeah.”
She sighed. “I hope you wore sunscreen and drank water.”
“I did.”
“Emma misses you,” Dani said. “She was asking for you all night.”
Cage’s throat tightened. He should have called earlier and talked to his daughter. “I miss her too.”
“Doesn’t this case belong to the FBI now?”
“Not officially. Not yet.” He bit back the frustration and tried to look at things from her perspective. “I know you’re lonely and worn out from getting ready to move and taking care of everything. You’re having second thoughts about moving and I should be there. But I can’t walk away from this now.”
“From her,” Dani said. “You can’t walk away from her.”
He sat up. “Is that what this is about? You don’t seriously think I would—”
“It’s not about trust,” she said. “I’m not worried about you cheating. But you’re swept up in this girl’s well-being. You say you want to solve the case to save additional girls, but that’s not really it. You want to bring her closure. Fix things for her. Because you still blame yourself for what happened to her.”
“Dani—”
“Just listen,” she said. “This is what I wanted to say before, but I was tired and fed up and it all came out wrong. You’re a fixer, and that’s one of the things I love most about you. Helping Annabeth is a good thing, but you can’t trade your whole life and career for this case. Your boss is already pissed you didn’t bring her home right away. He’s going to be especially pissed if you’re causing issues with the FBI.”
“So I’m just supposed to hand everything over to Tims and walk away? She’s too green, Dee. And she’s more concerned with making a name for herself in the Bureau. And Annabeth will take off. I guarantee it.”
“She’s an adult now. You can’t make up for what happened to her by sheltering her now. That doesn’t help her.”
“It’s not just about Annabeth,” Cage said. “Mickie’s parents deserve answers, and so do the families of the other victims we found tonight. Five kids, Dee. How can I walk away without seeing this through and giving them answers?”
“You can’t.” He heard the tears in her voice. “I just don’t want you to get caught up in something you’ll regret. And I miss you. I hate being apart, even if it’s only been a few days. It feels like years. Like you’re just … separate from me now.”
“Dee Dee.” Cage barely managed to get the words out around the knot in his throat. “I’m still here. I’ll always be here. I love you.”
“I love you too.” She sniffled, and he could see her in his head, sitting in her favorite chair in the renovated sun porch, her feet tucked beneath her. “Call me tomorrow when you can?”
“Thanks for putting up with me.”
She laughed. “You are a giant pain in the ass.”
41
Johnny’s Cajun House reminded Cage of the backcountry barbecue joint his father loved. Several miles outside of Shreveport, the building looked like three country shacks sewed together. A hand-painted sign boasted the best jambalaya and crawfish broil in the state.
Inside smelled like heaven. Cage’s mouth watered as they passed a couple happily eating gumbo.
“No time to eat,” he said before Annabeth could ask. “We already had lunch anyway.”
“A shitty sandwich,” she griped. “I need something sweet.”
Cage and Bonin quietly showed their credentials and asked to speak with Sheila. “She’s
expecting us.”
Annabeth eyed the dessert menu. “Can I have an order of bread pudding?”
The waitress nodded and ushered them to a back table. Annabeth had finished half her bread pudding before Sheila Dietz finally joined them.
She was thicker than she’d been in her missing photos, but still a beautiful woman. She wore her black hair short and wavy now, her skin the same creamy, café au lait as the other victims.
“I thought most Cajuns were white,” Annabeth said before anyone else could speak. “You’re at least part-black, like me.”
Sheila’s eyebrows shot up. “You serious?”
“She has a problem with blurting things out,” Bonin said. “Brain injury.”
Sheila folded her arms across her plump chest. “Cajun on my mom’s side. Dad is black. You happy now?”
Annabeth shrugged and inhaled her last bite. “This bread pudding is freaking amazing.”
“Thank you.” Sheila looked at Cage with weary eyes. “You said this had to do with my little brother’s disappearance.”
Sheriff Michaels had agreed to let Cage break the news to Sheila. “We’ve discovered remains in Jasper County that may belong to your brother. We’re waiting on an official ID, but the victim wore the same NBA All-Star jersey as your brother had on when he disappeared.”
Pain flashed over her face. “Where?”
“A few miles northwest of town,” Cage said. “It’s open fields and woods—hunting ground.”
“A mile from where you said your attack happened,” Bonin added.
“Charlotte.” Sheila put her head in her hands. “If I’d never met her, Johnny would still be alive.”
Annabeth jerked. Before Cage could dig the picture out of the file, she’d pulled it up on her phone. She slid it across the table. “Is this her?”
Sheila nodded and blushed. “She was gorgeous. I had a thing for her.”
“Her real name is Lyric.” Annabeth’s hand shook. “Charlotte was her grandmother’s name. You knew her?”
“I knew her as Charlotte—Char. I met her sometime in January that year.”
“How?” Cage asked.
“At a gas station. She asked me for a lighter, then said she had some good stuff to sell.”
“In town?” Bonin asked.
“An old station off 2800. Still had the slow-ass pumps. It’s closed now.”
“Was she alone?”
Sheila shrugged. “I was too interested in the meth she had.”
He would have been nearby, likely watching Sheila’s routine. Lyric showing up at that gas station was no coincidence.
Sheila picked at a scratch in the table, shoulders tense.
“Why did you take so long to go to police after Johnny disappeared?” Cage asked.
Sheila refused to look at them. “I knew no one would believe me. I was right, wasn’t I? And I didn’t even tell them everything.”
Cage leaned forward. “We believe you.”
“I loved Johnny. I didn’t want him to end up like me, so I tried to make him stop following me around. I’d never do what they said I did.”
“But you knew what really happened to him, when you went to the police, didn’t you?” Annabeth said. “Why didn’t you tell them?”
“Annabeth.” Bonin’s voice was sharp. “Please keep quiet.”
Sheila’s hands clenched into fists. “I can’t relive all that.”
“You’re not going to be in trouble,” Cage said. “I promise.”
“You can’t promise her that,” Annabeth said. “If she withheld evidence, don’t you have to charge her?”
Cage shot her a look. “Now I’m telling you to be quiet. And no, that’s not true.”
Sheila swiveled in the booth and started to get up. “I’m sorry, I can’t.”
“He did it to me too, and I don’t remember,” Annabeth said. “Please. Tell me what he did to us.”
Sheila stared at her. “You can’t remember?”
“From the brain injury. Everything before that is pretty much black.”
“You’re blessed,” Sheila said. “You should keep it that way.”
“I don’t want to,” Annabeth snapped. “And if you cared about your brother getting justice, you’d tell us the truth. Or did your brother die for nothing?”
Bonin looked like she wanted to choke Annabeth, but Cage shook his head. Her word vomit was getting to the woman.
Sheila’s jaw worked, but she settled back into the booth. “Johnny died because of me.”
“You didn’t mean for that to happen,” Annabeth said. “But you can help him now.”
Sheila slumped against the booth, her body suddenly liquid. “I was meeting Char for a score. Johnny followed me, and we ended up getting high on Char’s stuff. She went to pee, and then the man showed up. We were too high to fight. I can’t even remember exactly what happened, just his hands around my neck until I passed out.”
She looked at Annabeth. “Are you sure you want to hear the rest?”
“Yes.”
“When I woke up,” Sheila said. “I was locked in a horse stall and bleeding from my private parts. Both of them. He’d put a collar around my neck, and when he wanted to use me, he’d put a chain on the collar and drag me into his camper.” Sheila took a long, shuddering breath. “He’d customized it so the main living area was his play area. That’s what he called it. He had a special table with leather straps, plus a box full of sex toys and things to hurt me with. Bastard liked to talk. I think he got off on that as much as anything else. He’d tell me what he was going to do before he did it. He said that made me tighter.”
Annabeth was silent, but her entire body vibrated against Cage. He wanted to take her hand, but Dani’s words from last night haunted him. Maybe he was getting too close.
“He kept my mouth taped so I couldn’t scream. When I misbehaved, he burned me with a cigarette lighter. Kept me drugged so I couldn’t fight. I lost track of the days.”
“Did Lyric help him?” Bonin asked.
“Char.” Sheila’s voice was bitter. “I don’t know if she was in the camper for the assaults. He had the bedroom and bathroom blocked off. Plus, I was always blindfolded. But when I was locked up in the barn, she brought me food and water. Kept saying she was sorry. That she had to give him someone else so he’d finally stop hurting her so much. I kept asking her where Johnny was, but she wouldn’t tell me. I knew he was dead.”
“How did you get away?” Cage asked.
“Char came to give me drugs—something strong that knocked me out. She was high, and I knew this was my chance. I asked to pee first. She untied me, and I attacked her and then ran into the woods. He came after me. It was night, and my body was wrecked. I found a hiding spot and just stayed put. I was so scared I pissed myself. But morning came, and he was gone.”
“Why didn’t you go to the police?” Bonin said.
“Because the whole time he was searching for me, he kept calling me a slut and telling me everyone knew I sold myself for money. He was an upstanding citizen, and I had drugs in my system. No one would believe me. Then he started threatening my mom and little sister. The baby was only a couple of years old. He knew her name and where we lived. He swore if I every reported it he’d kill her.” She wiped her eyes. “Right before he stopped looking for me, he yelled that our goodbye was only temporary. No one got away from him.”
“But you did,” Bonin said. “And you waited a long time to tell someone.”
“I didn’t know who he was,” Sheila said. “He said no one in town had ever seen Char, and he could make her disappear quickly. I’d sound like a drugged-out lunatic. So, when the sun came up and I got the nerve to come out, I went north through the woods. I jumped into the creek and cleaned off as best I could. Wiped away as much dirt and evidence as possible. I stayed in the woods until that night when I knew old lady Jones would have her laundry hanging out. I stole clean clothes and hitched my way out of town.”
“The person
who picked you up didn’t ask questions?”
“He was a long-haul trucker passing through. I gave him a blow job for a ride. He was satisfied.” She put her head in her hands. “I was young and screwed up, and the drugs he gave me caused the worst withdrawal I’ve ever experienced. By the time I got to my right mind, I’d been gone two months. You know what happened after that.”
“You never saw his face?” Bonin asked her. “Or heard a name?”
“No,” Sheila said. “But Char said it was useless to fight. He always got what he wanted, she said.”
“What about when she sold you drugs?” Cage asked. “Did she mention where she got it from?”
“Just that she had a source with an endless supply.”
“When you met her that day, was it where you always bought drugs?”
“No. We usually met at the gas station. But she wanted a new spot, said it would be more private.” Sheila flushed. “She knew I liked her.”
Four hundred acres of land. A woman no one else knew who’d likely been loaded into the camper as soon as Sheila escaped. All he had to do was drive to a local camping ground and wait until the dust settled.
Sheriff Michaels had checked who owned the land, found no record of Charlotte. He bought the story the townspeople believed, and their killer was quickly back in business.
42
I throw up the bread pudding outside. Dry heave until my throat is on fire and my stomach is one big cramp. My hands won’t stop shaking. I go down to my knees because my legs have turned to jelly.
I don’t remember being strapped to a table and raped. The first few days after my accident, I hurt all over. Gran said I was sexually assaulted, but I would heal. I never asked for more details. But I remember healing. I have little round scars on my thighs.
He did all those things to me.
Cage’s tennis shoes are suddenly in front of me. I can’t look at him.
I never thought of myself as a sexual assault victim. I didn’t remember it, so I didn’t have to deal with the all the psychological agony. Sometimes I even pretended the doctors had made a mistake. My private parts had been hurt in the accident. Easy peasy when I couldn’t remember shit.
