If She Feared (A Kate Wise Mystery—Book 6)

by Blake Pierce

  “And when you look at this Old Park Place as a potential connecting point to these surrounding streets, the latest crime scene really doesn’t seem all that far away from the Leander Drive scene.”

  She was right. When Old Park Place looked to be nothing more than a blank scrap of land and forest, the two properties were a considerable distance away from one another—three miles at least. But if Old Park Place could be used as a shortcut between the two, Kate estimated the trip might be barely over a mile. This line of thinking put all three crime scenes within about two and a half square miles of one another.

  “So what does it mean?” Armstrong asked.

  “Maybe nothing,” DeMarco said.

  “But it could mean that the killer used it as a shortcut and a hiding spot,” Kate said. She figured even if the hunch came to nothing, she wanted DeMarco to realize that the idea had been wholly hers and that it was a credible thought. DeMarco looked back to her with a grin, having understood this. “If he was squatting in these homes, he’d need some way to get between them without being seen…some way to escape quickly, right?”

  “Makes sense to me,” DeMarco said.

  “It’s still early,” Kate said. “Maybe if we can canvass the neighborhoods around Old Park Place and the streets the murders occurred on, someone will know something. Three murders in such a small amount of time makes me think it would be next to impossible for the killer to not have been seen by someone. Especially if he was going in and out of an old overgrown park.”

  “While you two get on that,” Armstrong said, picking up the list of names and contact information DeMarco had brought in, “my team and I will start running through this list.”

  Kate could hear disappointment in the sheriff’s voice. She was apparently very much like Kate; she did not relish the idea of spending her morning on the phone.

  “You know, maybe you can just let your team run with it,” Kate said. “We’ve got a lot of ground and houses to cover. It might do us good to have not only another set of feet, but a set of feet that knows the area well.”

  Armstrong did her best to hide the appreciation and excitement in her expression as she instantly started for the door. “I can do that,” she said. “Let me get my men on task, and I’ll meet you out front.”

  When she was out of the room, DeMarco wasted little time. “Thank you for that,” she said.

  “For what?”

  “Letting me run with it. You’ve been great about making sure you let me know this case is still mine without saying so. I appreciate it.”

  “Not a problem at all. Good thinking with this Old Park Place idea. I think there could potentially be something to it.”

  They left the room, leaving the map behind them. Before exiting completely, Kate looked back at the map, staring down at those three X marks. She could only hope that the next time they entered this room, they would not be placing a fourth one on there.

  ***

  They started at Old Park Place. They had all piled into Armstrong’s police cruiser, a strange but somewhat relaxing experience for Kate. It was nice to not have to drive down unfamiliar streets, to have someone maneuvering the town who knew it well. Armstrong parked the car in the old parking lot. Not much had been done to keep intruders out of the abandoned park. There were a few concrete barriers and orange barrels, and that was it. All of it had been set up several yards into the park’s entrance, making sure the eyesores could not be seen from the street.

  Armstrong had described the place perfectly. The playground had gone to ruin, almost every single swing hanging from rusted chains. The rungs on the sliding board were warped and broken, and wild grass and weeds covered the seesaws and tiled hopscotch field. The pond she had mentioned was visible from the tall grass. It was quite small and almost completely overshadowed by a strip of forest.

  “The little connector road to Jackson Street is right over there,” Armstrong said, pointing in the opposite direction of the pond. “Where it comes out, there’s about half a mile before you come to the road where Dhayna Tsui was killed.”

  “What about the nature trails?” Kate asked.

  “The one around the pond just circles back around and comes out on the other end of the park. But I think there’s one stretch of it that comes pretty close to breaking out of the forest. At one point, you can actually catch glimpses of some of the backyards along Colton Street, which intersects with Hammermill a little further up.”

  “So this truly would be a core of sorts, then,” DeMarco said.

  “Looks that way,” Kate agreed. She then looked to Armstrong and shrugged. “You know the town best. What’s our best play here?”

  “I say we split up. Someone take the little connector road out to Jackson Street, someone head over to Colton, and the other can pound the pavement on Leander Drive.”

  The discussion was brief, and Kate ended up taking the nature trail that skirted along Colton Street. She felt a little silly at first, leaving her partner and the local sheriff behind as she traipsed into the forest. The nature trail had grown thin, overtaken by grass and fallen woodland debris. As she walked along, she looked for any signs of recent passage but saw nothing glaringly obvious—just some litter here and there.

  After walking along it for no more than a quarter of a mile, she came to the section of the trail Armstrong had mentioned. She could indeed see brief glimpses of backyards through what amounted to about thirty feet or so of scraggly forest. When she found what looked to be the easiest section to cross through, she marched off of the trail and through the little stretch of forest. She came out in a backyard that was blocked off from the woods by a wooden gate. She walked alongside it until she came to the edge and then turned, heading up toward the house.

  She knocked at the door of this house. A few knocks and a ringing of the doorbell provided no answer, so she went on to the next, and the next. She didn’t get an answer until the fourth house. It was an old gentleman, the morning news blaring from a TV as he spoke to her in his doorway. He did not invite her in, said he had not seen anyone suspicious, and seemed very grateful when she informed him that he should be on the lookout for unfamiliar people walking the streets of his neighborhood.

  As she left him behind, she couldn’t help but think: Really? Is this why I didn’t go to Chicago with Allen? Is this why Allen is currently pissed at me?

  It was easy to think those things as she went from door to door, hoping for an answer of some kind. But her mind would then bring visions of the three dead real estate agents. She’d see the terrible condition of Dhayna Tsui’s head and face and remind herself that was why she was not with Allen in Chicago.

  And that made it a little easier as she continued to knock on doors, knowing that there was a killer somewhere in this town…and that he could be doing just about anything while she was going door to door.

  ***

  The first helpful person she spoke to that morning was a middle-aged woman who had been sitting on her porch. It was the fifth person Kate had spoken to, and when the woman offered Kate a coffee, she graciously accepted. The coffee was weak, but it did its job in perking her up a bit.

  “You say you’re looking for someone I might think looked out of place or suspicious,” the woman said. She had introduced herself as Shelly Abercrombie before offering the coffee, and she had also looked slightly concerned that the FBI was in her quaint little town. She looked that way again as she watched Kate nod at her question.

  “Yes, that’s right. Preferably in the past week or so.”

  “Well, that’s easy. There was a screaming match right there at the end of the street.” Shelly pointed to the right, toward the end of the block, with the same hand that was holding her large cup of coffee.

  “What was the screaming about?” Kate asked.

  “It was Regina again. Regina Voss. She’s a grumpy old fart that doesn’t really get along with anyone. Lives a few streets over and is always walking her dog. I swear she walks that damned
thing five times a day. She was screaming at some young couple—a couple not from around here, I don’t think. And there are usually a few of those kinds of couples here in Estes during the summer, as you can imagine.”

  “Do you know what she was yelling about?”

  “No, I didn’t catch it all. But I can almost guarantee you it was for something stupid. They were probably looking at her the wrong way or something ridiculous like that.”

  “And that’s common for her?”

  “Pretty common. But no one takes Regina Voss very seriously. She’s just a little crazy, you know? Sort of off the rails, if you ask me. Can’t blame her, I guess. Her first husband died at a young age and her second husband left her for a twenty-two-year-old from out of town.”

  Kate knew better than to believe every word from a bored-looking woman in a small town. But she also knew that most gossip started with a kernel of truth.

  “Has Regina Voss always lived in Estes?”

  “Been here as long as I have, and I’ve been here for twenty-three years.”

  “Do you happen to know where she lives?”

  “Sure do. She’s just two streets over, on Laurel Street. I don’t know the address, but it’s the house with all those godawful wind chimes on the front porch. You can’t miss it.”

  “What are the chances she’s at home right now?” Kate asked. “Any idea?”

  “I’d say pretty good. She doesn’t work…not really. Some online stuff, I think. God only knows what, though. She’s either home or walking that stupid dog.”

  “Thank you for your time, Mrs. Abercrombie.”

  “Oh, sure,” she said. There was a look on her face that made it clear she had plenty more ammunition, should Kate needed it.

  But Kate decided not to waste any more time hearing stories from a woman who clearly loved to dole out the gossip. Instead, she walked two streets over and grinned when, as she stopped at the corner and tried to decide which way to go, heard the sound of wind chimes. She nearly started in that direction, but that’s when her eyes were drawn across the street.

  She was standing at a four-way intersection. Across the road and about a block farther back, there was a property for sale. The bright red and white sign stood out even from where she was standing. Because the street went back at a slight curb, she could see roughly half of the house from its right side. It was a gorgeous home, not quite as big as the ones they had visited so far, but very close. Of course, it might have only appeared that way from the angle she was viewing it from.

  Deciding to take chance, Kate crossed the road and headed for the house. It wasn’t too much of stretch because it was, after all, located in the area they had singled out as the killer’s field of play.

  As she neared the house, she noted that there were fewer cars on the street along this stretch of road. She assumed it was because all of the homes she walked by had two-car garages attached to either the fronts or the sides of the homes. The only cars were a single work truck a few houses farther down from the house she was interested in and a lone black Ford Taurus. The Taurus was parked across the street from the house. From what she could tell, the driver was looking directly at the For Sale sign.

  The Taurus was an older model, easily ten or twelve years old. It had a few dings and scratches, looking rather out of place within the neighborhood. Kate knew this likely meant nothing; as stereotypical as it made her feel, she knew full well that many people who were hired hands of electricians and carpenters drove beater cars and trucks to their worksites. Still, given the details to the case, she figured it was at least looking into.

  Kate slowed her approach as she neared the car. She saw that all of the windows were rolled down to allow some of the cool lake air into the car. The engine was not running, meaning there was no AC.

  “Excuse me,” Kate said as she came up next to the driver’s side door.

  The man sitting behind the wheel jumped a bit. He looked irritated and then, when he saw the woman standing next to his car, he gave her a shaky smile. His cheeks were red with embarrassment. “Jesus, lady,” he said. “I don’t mind telling you, you scared the crap out of me.”

  “I’m sorry about that,” Kate said. “Listen, I was wondering if you were working on something inside of this house.”

  “That one?” the man asked, nodding toward the larger one with the FOR SALE sign in the yard.

  “Yes, that one.”

  “No. Why do you ask?”

  “You were just sort of randomly parked here. And I don’t know if you know, but there has been a string of murders in the area.”

  “I had heard about that,” he said. “And no…I’m not doing any work. I just sort of…well, I like to look at these nicer homes. Makes me think of ways to improve myself…my future. Gets me motivated.”

  “Can you—”

  Before she could answer, she was interrupted by the sounds of a woman screaming. It was not a scream of pain or panic, but one of anger. It was coming from behind her and somewhere to the right. She was rather disappointed in herself to find that it was coming from the direction of the house with all of the wind chimes—the house she had been heading to before becoming distracted by the house for sale and the man in the black Taurus. She looked back to the man in the car with an almost apologetic smile. He looked confused, staring at her as if he wasn’t sure how to respond to her.

  From behind her and just around the corner, she heard the sounds of commotion again. This time there were two voices, and they were escalating in noise and pitch.

  “Ma’am, are you okay?” the man asked.

  “Yes, I’m fine. You just…look, don’t hang around too long.” Apparently, he had not yet heard the sounds of the argument carried on the afternoon air.

  “Sure,” he said.

  Kate gave him a final look, deciding that he was harmless. Sure, she’d scared him out of surprise, but he genuinely did not look as if he was trying to hide anything.

  “Anything else?” the man asked.

  “Nothing,” she said, feeling foolish for the fact that she was about to jump to conclusions about this man, casually parked on the side of the road. “Sorry to have bothered you.”

  “No worries,” the man said. “My heart rate is almost back to normal.”

  Kate gave him a quick smile and then went off running in the other direction, back the way she had come. Step by step, the sounds of people arguing got more heated. She wasn’t sure, but she thought she heard a third voice mixed in now, this one a bit lower.

  When she reached the intersection, she glanced back at the man in the car one more time. He was no longer looking at the house. He seemed to be looking over into the passenger’s seat, like he was looking for something.

  By the time Kate was heading to the right and crossing the street, Kate had put the man in the black Taurus out of her mind. She was instead focused on the three women standing on the sidewalk, grouped tightly together. One of them was screaming, the other looked a little scared, and the third, Kate was shocked to find, was DeMarco.

  ***

  The man in the black Ford Taurus watched the strange woman dash back down the street to the four-way intersection. He didn’t like the look of her, and it wasn’t just because she had scared the hell out of him by sneaking up on him. She made him feel uneasy—like she was there on purpose.

  Like she knew.

  It made him nervous. He looked to the floorboard of the passenger’s side of the car. Even though none of the blood-soaked piece of lumber showed from beneath the seat, he reached over and slid it a little further under anyway.

  Just in case.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  As Kate got closer to the trio of women, it also became clear that it was taking place directly in front of the house she had originally been headed for. The house was a very nice one, with a wraparound porch complete with a porch swing And, as Shelly Abercrombie had indicated, there were quite a few wind chimes on the porch hanging from the rafters. Not cu
te ones, either. These were gaudy relics from swap meets and yard sales, wind chimes that looked almost comical. They chimed together as Kate approached the scene, their noise quiet but somehow spine-chilling.

  As Kate neared the commotion, DeMarco spotted her She gave Kate a look with wide, exaggerated eyes, wordlessly saying: Oh, thank God you’re here.

  The two women were on either side of DeMarco as she tried to keep them apart. The woman doing all of the talking looked to be in her early fifties, maybe a bit younger. The other was probably forty but was wearing the sort of running garb that she probably thought made her look thirty. She also were a relatively tight top with a low U-collar that reminded her of Donald Dewalt’s teenage daughter.

  Using the information Shelly Abercrombie had given her, Kate assumed the fifty-something to be Regina Voss. The fact that she was absolutely railing against the younger woman further solidified Shelly Abercrombie’s claims.

  “…and don’t even try this shit of how much you love this town, honey, because I was here long before you! So the next time you want to stick your nose where it don’t belong—”

  “Whoa,” Kate said, stepping in next to DeMarco and throwing up a hand almost as a shield against Regina Voss. “Let’s just back up and clam down.”

  “And who the fuck are you?” Regina Voss asked.

  “Agent Kate Wise, Agent DeMarco’s partner. And if you keep that tone with either myself, Agent DeMarco, or this other woman, this situation is going to get a lot worse for you.”

  There was venom in Regina’s stare as she glared at Kate. “You going to arrest me because I got pissed about the law showing up at my house for no reason?” she spat. “Gonna arrest me because I told this nosy bitch what’s what when she tried to listen to my conversation between me and your partner?”

  “Ms. Voss, take three steps back,” Kate said. “Do it now, and do it slowly.”