Clint Wolf Boxed Set: Books 16 - 18

by BJ Bourg

“Sure what?”

  “Sure, we’re off the record.” She said it begrudgingly.

  “Yes, these are homicides. The one victim who survived the attack told me the only reason she’s alive today is because she played dead. She said she initially thought an alligator had grabbed her and was pulling her under. She’d heard that the best way to get an alligator to discontinue its attack was to play dead.” I paused to take a breath. “The only reason the killer thought there were three drowning victims was because Camille fooled him into thinking she was dead. No one else would’ve thought to say three.”

  CHAPTER 34

  Laura was silent for a long moment, and I knew she was taking it all in. “But there’s also a chance my source could simply be mistaken, right? After all, you were looking for a third person, so maybe my source assumed a third person had drowned.”

  “Your source said that three people were confirmed dead—not that we were searching for another person or that three people were possibly dead.” I paused and decided to prompt her a little. “Unless you misheard him. Maybe he said two and you reported three. Maybe it was your mistake.”

  “Not a chance,” she said with great confidence. “I record all of my conversations, so there’s never a chance of a mistake.”

  “Are you recording this conversation now?”

  She hesitated, and I knew she was.

  “It’s okay,” I said. “But getting back to your source, I need to know who he is, as he might be my suspect.”

  “First of all, I won’t confirm or deny the gender of my source. Secondly, as a rule, I never give up my sources. I rely heavily on informants—much like law enforcement officers do—and if I started giving them up, people would stop talking to me. I can’t be effective at my job without sources.”

  “What if your source is responsible for multiple murders and at least one attempted murder? You wouldn’t cover up for a murderer, would you?”

  She paused for a long moment and I thought I was getting somewhere. However, when she spoke, it was clear she wouldn’t budge.

  “Unless you show me direct evidence that proves one of my sources is involved in a crime, I won’t give up his or her name. I’m sorry.”

  I placed my laptop on the sofa cushion beside me. “Look, Laura, if I give you a name, will you tell me if he’s your source?”

  “I can’t reveal my source.”

  “Well, if I give you the name of my suspect and it’s not your source will you at least let me know I’ve got the wrong guy?”

  She laughed. “Nice try, but if I don’t say you’ve got the wrong person then you’ll know it’s my source.”

  I sighed and figured I’d just tell her the name and see what would happen. “My suspect’s name is Gabe Burke.”

  “Oh, yeah, you’ve got the wrong guy. That’s not my source.”

  Now I was really worried. “Gabe’s not the guy who called you?”

  “No.”

  I stood and began walking around the living room. “Then someone had to be working with him, because the person who called you had to be involved.”

  “How do you know my source isn’t an officer of the law?”

  “Because all of the officers working the case knew we only had two victims.” I stopped walking and grunted. “Of course, he wouldn’t give his real name. If I killed someone and called a reporter, I would definitely use a fake name.”

  “It is possible,” she acknowledged. “It’s happened on more than one occasion.”

  I walked to my office and dug around for the work notebook I was using for this case. I thumbed through it and stopped when I found Gabe’s phone number. I called it out to Laura. “Is this the number that called you?”

  She was quiet for about a minute and I could hear her fumbling with her phone. When she spoke again, she said, “Nope, that’s not it.”

  I dropped the notebook to the table and leaned forward, resting my elbows on the back of the chair. “What will it take for you to reveal your source?”

  “I won’t.”

  “What if I promise to keep the information to myself and not use it in my investigation?”

  “How will you do that?”

  “I simply won’t use it.”

  “Then what’s the point in telling you?”

  “It’ll let me know if I’m on the right track or not,” I explained. “If I know in what direction to go with my investigation, then I’ll know where to look for evidence.”

  “I’m really sorry, Detective Wolf, but I’d feel like I was betraying my oath.”

  “What if I was able to obtain a court order compelling you to give up his name?”

  “You could put me in jail and I still wouldn’t give it up.”

  “Damn, I respect your commitment to the job,” I said in admiration. “You don’t have to worry about me getting a court order, because I don’t believe you should be compelled to violate your convictions.”

  “I appreciate that, because it has been done to me before. I had to spend two nights in jail before my lawyer got the judge’s order of contempt reversed.”

  “What if it wouldn’t have been overturned?”

  “Then I’d still be in jail, because I would’ve never given up the name.”

  I scowled. While she was possibly hindering me from moving forward in my investigation, I definitely respected her determination and loyalty to her job. It was a rare quality these days. I stared idly at the notepad on my desk, wondering if there was any way we could come to some sort of agreement. I had been in that position for a long moment before it registered.

  “Hey, did your source call from 555-0666?”

  Laura Cavanaugh might’ve been a lot of things—intelligent, shrewd, determined, and loyal—but there was one thing she wasn’t, and that was a liar. After letting out a subtle gasp, she tried to deny that 555-0666 was the number from which her source had called. The more she tried to deny it, the more I knew I’d hit the jackpot.

  She wouldn’t give an inch, so I thanked her and ended the call. I sat on the sofa for a long moment, pondering this new information. If I was right, then Gabe wasn’t our killer. If that was true, then people were definitely still at risk. We had to keep everyone out of the lake.

  CHAPTER 35

  I was about to return to bed when a thought occurred to me. People were usually most vulnerable when they were sleeping. I’d often rousted suspects from their sleep and gotten them to utter incriminating statements with nothing more than a simple question. Maybe I would get lucky once again.

  Knowing I wouldn’t be able to sleep anymore—and wanting to try out my new idea—I quickly dressed for work. I left a note for Susan telling her where I would be. Since my Tahoe was destroyed, I jumped in my personal truck and drove to work.

  Karla McBride was the dispatcher working the night shift. Her face scrunched up when she saw me walk into the office.

  “What are you doing here so early?” she asked. “I didn’t call you out.”

  “I couldn’t sleep,” I admitted. “Too much work to be done.”

  I gave her a wave and headed for the evidence room. Once I’d fished out Gabe’s cell phone, I switched it on, waited for it to light up, and then scrolled through his numbers. I paused when I reached 555-0666. Saying a silent prayer, I hit the number and brought the phone to my ear.

  “Shit!”

  “Shit what?” asked a voice from behind me. It startled me to my boots.

  Resisting the urge to jerk around, I simply took a breath and turned calmly to see Regan Steed standing there in her uniform. She was early for her shift.

  “The number I called is no longer in service,” I explained. I shoved the phone back in the evidence envelope and made a notation on the chain of custody form. As I scribbled the date and time and reason I’d accessed the evidence, I asked, “What’re you doing here so early?”

  “Abel has to drive all the way to Lafayette for work, so he leaves early in the morning.” She shrugged. “On my work days
, I usually just get dressed and come to the station since I’m already awake.”

  I glanced at the fresh scar above her eyebrow. She had worked as a patrol cop for the Tellico Plains Police Department in Tennessee for ten years before coming to Mechant Loup, and I was sure she had many scars to show for her hard work. However, the one displayed prominently above her eye was courtesy of the hard head of one of our Cajuns—and she had been on the delivering end of that head butt.

  “Your scar’s healing nicely,” I said as I returned the evidence envelope to the locker. “Before long, it’ll be invisible.”

  She grinned and instinctively brushed a finger along the line where the stitches had recently been removed. “Yeah, it’s not the first and I’m sure it won’t be the last.”

  We walked together to the dispatcher’s station and she hesitated while I continued to my office. I could tell she wanted to follow me, so I waved for her to do so.

  “How’s the case coming along?” she asked, her hazel eyes sparkling with anticipation.

  I told her what we knew so far.

  “This is some pretty wild stuff. We’ve had similar cases in the mountains where a few people just disappeared without a trace. It really spooked the townsfolk. Their imaginations usually take to running, and they come up with all kinds of wild theories. Same as here, I guess.”

  “Yeah, imaginations have certainly begun to run wild.” I shot a thumb toward the window of my office that faced Washington Avenue. “Have you noticed how different things are today than when you first landed here?”

  She nodded.

  “It’s not normal. This is usually our busiest time of year.” I shook my head. “The sidewalks should be crowded with people—tourists and locals—going about their business. It looks like a ghost town now.”

  “Will things go back to normal after the case is solved?”

  “I’m sure. It’s the unknown that scares people. Once they realize it was nothing more than some deranged individual out there terrorizing people and they find out he’s been locked up, they’ll be back.”

  “That’s good.” She smiled. “I just got to this town. I can’t have you guys shuttering it after one month on the job.”

  I nodded thoughtfully and considered the empty streets. A motive started to formulate inside my mind. It seemed diabolical, but it also seemed possible.

  “What’s going on inside that head of yours?” Regan asked in her Tennessee accent. She was studying me intently while twirling the end of her brown ponytail in her fingers.

  “I think fear is the motive for these killings.”

  “You think fear is the motive for the killings, or the result of the killings?”

  I stood and walked to a map of Mechant Loup that was tacked to my wall. I pointed to Le Diable Lake. “This is public land, but until recently, no one from the public has used it. I think folks have always been afraid to venture into that area because of the giant alligators that live out there.”

  “More giant than the big alligator I saw in Bayou Tail the other day?”

  “Oh, yeah, there are some monsters in Le Diable.” I was still working through the theory in my head. “There are a few hunters with leases out there, but they’ll never harvest enough alligators to thin out the population. For years now these ’gator hunters have had the lake to themselves, but more recently, there’ve been wild college parties out there.”

  “What better place to have a wild party?” Regan surmised. “We get them out in the mountains. College kids will rent a remote chalet far from town where they think they can play their music as loud as they can and make all the noise they want. What they don’t realize is there are other folks living out in those mountains and the sound carries. We were constantly shutting down those parties. And when they were done, they’d leave behind a hell of a mess.”

  “I bet.”

  “Oh, some of them are destructive little beavers.” She grunted. “I’ve seen broken windows, hot tubs filled with whisky bottles and beer cans, drains clogged with condoms, and they even burned down one place. Booze and young brains don’t mix.”

  “That’s what people were complaining about at the town council meeting Monday night.” I turned to face her. “And do you know who was complaining the loudest?”

  There was a blank expression on her face. “Who?”

  “Gabe Burke’s father.” I strode back to my desk and took my seat. “Phillip Burke was complaining the loudest about the parties out there on the lake.”

  Regan’s large eyes widened. “Do you think he put his son up to killing those kids to scare them away from the area?”

  She had vocalized what I had been thinking, and it sounded good on the air.

  “Why else would a troubled kid be doing this, if not for his father?” I asked. “I mean, what on earth would Gabe gain from their deaths? The kid couldn’t possibly benefit from the murders.”

  I began to wonder if it was Phillip who had called Laura Cavanaugh from the 555-0666 phone. Even if it was him, I doubted we’d be able to recover that phone. Phillip knew I’d killed Gabe and he knew we had searched his son’s boat, so he would’ve destroyed every piece of evidence on his end.

  I frowned as I remembered the wild expression on Gabe’s face as he had fired shots at Amy and then at me. I wished it had turned out differently.

  Regan’s voice broke through my thoughts. “How do you plan on proving his dad was involved?”

  “Well, he’s in jail right now, so, as a last resort, I can interrogate him and hope he confesses.”

  “And if he doesn’t confess?”

  “I’ll have to keep digging.” I shook my head. “There’re no surveillance cameras underwater, you know?”

  “Are you down to your last resort already?” Regan asked.

  I mulled over her question. “Since Gabe is dead, he can’t finger his dad. If he was the one doing the killing and they were communicating with burner phones, we’ll never be able to tie the two together. The most we can hope for from the lab is that DNA evidence will link the victims to Gabe’s gear, but that still wouldn’t get us to Phillip. So, yeah, I am down to my last resort.”

  Regan nodded, a smile playing across the corners of her mouth. “So, you really think fear is the motive for these murders and you believe Phillip Burke is the mastermind behind it all?”

  “It’s the best thing I can come up with so far.” I fixed her with curious eyes. “You’re thinking something, aren’t you?”

  She nodded.

  “What is it?” I asked.

  “If you really think it’s him and you think you’re down to your last resort, why don’t you try to set him up first?”

  “Set him up?” I echoed. “How?”

  “If it’s fear he wants, then show him the opposite. Show him that the public isn’t scared to go back out on the lake.”

  “But they are.”

  “I’m not, and no one around here knows who I am—well, except for that one large Cajun man whose nose I broke with my forehead.”

  My brow furrowed and I leaned back in my chair. “Keep talking.”

  “Why don’t you pull some strings to let Phillip out of jail, and then leak it to the media that a young woman is venturing out on the lake alone, daring that creature to come and find her.” She tapped her chest. “I can be that young woman—although I’m not so young anymore.”

  “You’re not even thirty yet.”

  “I’m twenty-nine and I feel every minute of it.”

  I nodded idly, still mulling over her plan. “If it does work and we’re able to lure the killer out into the open to come at you, it’ll be extremely dangerous. We won’t be close enough to save you. If he strikes, he would be able to drown you before we could get to you. We just can’t risk it.”

  Regan shot a thumb toward the window. “You guys have bayous along your roads. In the mountains, we have rivers with steep drop-offs. Many a poor soul has drowned when their vehicle flipped into a river and they were trappe
d underwater. I always like to give myself a fighting chance, so I purchased a rescue air tank that I carry in my Jeep. I keep it mounted to the dash. I figured if I’d ever get trapped underwater, I’d pull that sucker out and keep myself alive until help can arrive. That can be my lifeline in this undercover operation.”

  I leaned forward, my curiosity thoroughly aroused. “How big is the tank?”

  She held her hands apart to indicate about eleven inches. “It looks like a water bottle. I usually strap it to my vest when I’m out kayaking. It looks like a water pack.”

  “How long could you survive underwater with it?”

  “It guarantees thirty breaths and I can hold my breath for two minutes, sometimes longer, so I could survive for an hour.”

  I leaned back again, stunned. “This might be the craziest—yet the most brilliant—plan I’ve ever heard.”

  She smiled and folded her arms in front of her chest. “I’m glad I could help.”

  CHAPTER 36

  Amy arrived at the police department a little after seven and she found me at my desk on the phone. I had called for Laura Cavanaugh again and was waiting for her to answer the phone. Amy plopped in the chair opposite me and threw her boots up on the desk.

  Laura answered the phone sounding a little cautious. “Hello, Detective Wolf, it’s been a while.”

  “Yeah, I’m sorry I called you so early this morning.” I hesitated, giving her a chance to say something, but she didn’t respond. “Does the name Phillip Burke sound familiar to you?”

  She sighed. “Are we doing this again? I already feel like I revealed too much information last night.”

  “You didn’t reveal anything,” I said admiringly. “The info you possess wouldn’t be safer in Fort Knox. You’re a steel trap.”

  She chuckled a little. “No, the name Phillip Burke doesn’t mean anything to me. Since you asked about Gabe Burke earlier, I’m guessing they’re related.”

  “They’re father and son.” I hesitated. “I might need your help later.”