Familiar Lies

by Brian J. Jarrett

  He trained the light back onto the corpse’s face. A man’s brown mustache sprouted from desiccated, leathery skin stretched tightly over his skull. The corpse’s eyes were gone, rotted away long ago. Combed-over tufts of wispy hair barely covered the corpse’s skull.

  “Holy shit…” Liz said.

  Max couldn’t speak. Instead, he shut off the light and took a few steps away from the man hanging from the ceiling. He felt his chest tighten. He couldn’t breathe. His heart raced and he felt as if the world was closing in on him. He stumbled and fell to the dirty floor.

  “Max, what’s wrong?”

  Max panted for air, but it felt like breathing through a straw. Terror coursed through him like a bolt of electricity. He wanted to run, to leave this place as fast as he possibly could, but he couldn’t move. He felt glued to the spot, just waiting for whatever terrible thing that was after him to come and gobble him up.

  Liz stooped and held Max’s head. She pulled him close. “You’re having a panic attack. Breathe.”

  Max heard the words, but they sounded distant and faint. Liz continued to hold him, rocking him slightly for the next few minutes as he focused on his breathing. Eventually, the overwhelming feeling of terror began to pass. His breathing returned to normal and his heart rate slowed.

  Liz helped him to his feet. “Better?”

  Max nodded. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what happened there.”

  “It’s okay. I’m freaked out too.” She glanced toward the silhouette of the hanging corpse in the shadows. “What do you make of this?”

  “Hard to say.”

  “You think he killed himself?”

  “I doubt it with the door locked from the outside.” Max shined the light around the room and found a broken window at the back of the cabin. Shattered glass lay on the inside floor. “Unless he climbed in through there.”

  “We should check the body. I can do it if you shine the light for me.”

  Max wanted to tell her that he would handle it, but he found that he simply couldn’t. Machismo had escaped him altogether, it seemed. He turned on the light and found he still wasn’t prepared to see the corpse’s mummified face again. He looked away while taking deep breaths. It seemed to work.

  Liz searched the dead man’s pockets. She found three items of interest.

  The first, a note.

  The second, a revolver.

  The third, a badge.

  Chapter Thirty

  “He’s a cop,” Liz said.

  “Was a cop. I wonder what he was doing out here.”

  Liz unfolded the note she’d found in the man’s front breast pocket. It had been folded up and tucked inside, the top pulled out enough to make it easy to find. Max shined the cell phone’s light onto the page and they read the note together.

  “I can no longer live with the things that I’ve done,” Liz read aloud from the note. She turned it over. It was blank on the other side.

  “That’s it?” Max said.

  Liz opened the man’s wallet and looked at his driver’s license. “Andrew Paul.” She held the badge up in the light. “Detective Andrew Paul.”

  “A detective. I wonder if he worked with your guy? The detective working Amanda’s case.”

  “Name doesn’t ring a bell.” Liz glanced at the corpse. “Do you think Paul was dirty? Maybe he knew what those men were doing to all those kids.”

  “And his conscience caught up with him?”

  “It would appear.”

  Max thought about it. “Maybe this is all for show. What if this wasn’t a suicide?”

  “A murder?”

  “Maybe they killed him and made it look like a suicide. Maybe he was on to them and followed them here. They caught him and strung him up and then planted a fake suicide note on the body.”

  “It’s possible,” Liz said. “But we’d need more to go on than just a theory. By all appearances, this is a dirty cop who killed himself.”

  “It could be exactly what it looks like. Either way, we need proof. We need to get pictures of everything; the body, the driver’s license, the badge, the note. All of it. If the same people who cleaned up that basement come back here to clean up we’ll have lost everything again.”

  “Pictures are better than nothing. It’ll give us something to turn over to the cops.”

  They spent the next ten minutes photographing as much of the physical evidence as they could. After getting surprised by Gabe earlier that night, Max felt a sense of urgency about their work. If someone did plan on showing up at the cabin, Max did not want to be there when they did.

  When everything had been photographed, Max eyed the cabin door. “We should get moving.”

  “Where’s the closest police station?” Liz asked.

  “Maybe we should wait until morning.”

  “Why wait?”

  “We need to be prepared. We have lots of pictures, which is good, but we need a timeline. We need the names of everyone we know is involved. A statement. What we know so far.”

  “We can give a statement when we get there.”

  “They’ll separate us and try to pit us against each other.”

  “Why would they do that?”

  “Because it’s what cops do. They’re likely to try to implicate us in all this. Our story needs to be straight. A unified front.”

  “I don’t like the idea of sitting on this information, Max.”

  “We’re tired, both of us. They’ll use that against us. They’ll hold us and question us until we tell them anything they want to hear.”

  “You’re paranoid.”

  “I’m not. You don’t know much about cops.”

  “And you do?”

  “I know enough.”

  “If we sit on this it gives these creeps time to cover their tracks.”

  “They can’t cover up everything, not this quickly.”

  “I don’t know…”

  “Let’s just get out of this cabin. We can decide later.” Max thought for a moment. “What about the gun? Maybe we should take it.”

  “Do you want to get caught with a dead policeman’s service pistol? I’m not paranoid like you, but even I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

  “I guess you’re right.”

  “Besides, I already have one.” Liz reached into her purse and retrieved a small caliber revolver. “I got it after Amanda disappeared.” She looked at it with an expression of gratitude and disgust. “It was a scary time.”

  “Is it licensed?”

  Liz put the handgun back into her purse. “I have a conceal and carry.”

  “That would have been good to know earlier.”

  “Let’s just get out of here.” Liz glanced again at the hanging corpse. “This place gives me the creeps.”

  Chapter Thirty-One

  They pulled the cabin door closed as best they could, but it remained open a crack without the hasp to keep it closed. It would have to be good enough. They’d tell the cops about busting the lock. Despite Max’s reluctance when it came to the police, he did feel that the truth was their best option, even if that truth meant that he and Liz had broken a few rules along the way.

  They climbed back into Max’s car where he placed his phone on the car charger. He was glad to see the little battery indicator turn green and start to go up instead of down.

  “When we get back into cell range I want you to text me those pictures,” Liz said. “Both of us should have copies.”

  “Good idea.” Max started the car and flipped on the headlights, again bathing the ominous cabin in bright, halogen light. Knowing exactly what was inside made it all the more frightening.

  He pulled out and took to the dirt road again, heading away from their gruesome find and back to civilization. After another bumpy ride out the dirt road, they eventually merged back onto the two-lane road from which they’d come. Even as he pulled away and glanced in the rearview he could hardly see the entrance to the cabin road. It was tough to find, even i
f you knew where to look.

  After a few minutes, they got their first traces of cell signal back.

  “Two bars,” Liz said. “We’re back on the grid.”

  “I never thought I’d be happy to hear anybody say that.”

  “A Luddite, are you?”

  “Not exactly.”

  “Not much of a tweeter?”

  “I don’t even know what that is.”

  Liz chuckled. “Don’t worry, you’re not missing much.”

  “I didn’t exactly grow up in the social media generation.”

  “Amanda did. She was a net-aholic.”

  Max smiled. “So was Josh. He was online all the time.” His smile faltered. “Now I look back and wonder just who he was talking to.”

  “Yeah.”

  “I wonder how much I didn’t see,” Max continued. “I worked a lot. I guess I missed the signs.”

  “Don’t beat yourself up.”

  “How could something like this have gone on right under my nose? The stuff Josh was involved in…and I was oblivious.”

  “What about your ex-wife? Did she notice anything?”

  “I haven’t talked to her about any of this.”

  “I see.”

  “Things escalated quickly after I found Josh’s letter.” He paused, deciding what he could tell this woman that he’d met only earlier this same day. A stranger, but also a woman who’d suffered the same losses of spouse and child Max had. “I don’t want to bring her into this.”

  “She might already be involved.”

  “You mean you think she could be part of all this?”

  “No, of course not. But you said that somebody stole the video from your house. That means they know who you are, so it stands to reason they could also track down your ex-wife.”

  “I hadn’t thought about that. Everything just went bad so fast.”

  “You should call her.”

  “I will. Tomorrow.”

  “I’m serious. Regardless of what happened between you and her—which is none of my business—she has a right to know what’s going on.”

  “What really is going on? We have more questions than answers right now.”

  “She needs to know to be careful at least.”

  “I guess you’re right.”

  “Of course I’m right.” She picked up Max’s phone.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Give me your passcode.”

  “Why?”

  “I’m sending those pictures you took to my phone.”

  “Oh, right.” Max told Liz his passcode and she began transferring the photos of the flophouse basement and the cabin to her own phone.

  “We can go back to my hotel room for a while,” Max said.

  “Don’t get any ideas.”

  “Wait, what?”

  “I’m joking,” Liz said, with a slight grin.

  “Oh. Sorry.”

  “Don’t apologize. It was a bad joke. I’m just trying to lighten the mood a little.”

  “This is pretty heavy, isn’t it?”

  “You could say that.”

  “We can start putting our statement together there. I have my laptop with me. We can type something up and include the photos. We’ll get it ready for the cops and drop it off in the morning.”

  “I suppose morning works then. It’s only a few hours away now. I’m glad we found that cabin sooner than later.”

  “Yeah.” But a part of Max wished they hadn’t found it at all.

  Max’s phone buzzed in Liz’s hand. She stared at the screen. “Ruby.”

  “What?”

  “A text from Ruby.”

  “Read it.”

  Liz opened the text and read it out loud. “Gabe didn’t show up for work tonight. I overheard some stuff, might be important.”

  “Ask her what she heard.”

  Liz typed the question and pressed send. A few minutes later another text flashed on the screen. “She says she can’t say over text. Too risky. She wants you to meet her after work tonight so she can tell you.”

  “I guess nobody’s found Gabe just yet.”

  “If she’s telling the truth.”

  “Do you think she’s lying?”

  “I don’t know. I guess not. Are you going to meet her?”

  “I feel like I should.”

  “I should tag along.”

  “You might spook her.”

  “No, I mean in my car, from a distance. I’ll keep watch, make sure nothing happens.”

  “That’s a good idea.”

  Liz grinned. “I know it is.”

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  They arrived back at Max’s hotel room twenty minutes later. After letting himself inside he kicked off his shoes and collapsed onto the bed. “I’m exhausted.”

  “Me, too.”

  “If I’d known I was having company I’d have gotten two beds.”

  “No rest for the wicked, Max. When does Ruby’s shift end?”

  “Last call is at one-thirty a.m. They let out by two o’clock or so.”

  “Maybe there’s time for an hour nap. My eyelids are closing as I stand here.”

  Max scooted toward the edge of the bed. He set an alarm for fifty minutes on his phone. He patted the empty space beside him. “Come on.”

  “Don’t get any ideas.”

  “Are you still joking?”

  “No.”

  “Liz, my only idea is to catch a few minutes of much-needed sleep right now. I’m not some horny teenager.”

  “Then we both have the same idea.” Liz kicked off her own shoes and climbed into bed beside Max. She was asleep within a minute. Max followed her there soon after.

  * * *

  By one o’clock a.m., Max found himself back behind the wheel of his car, headed again for The Hustle. Not even in his youth had he visited a strip club so many times. Odd, how things turn out.

  Liz traveled behind him in her car. He felt better about meeting Ruby with someone else at his back this time. If Ruby had some good information it would be that much more he could add to what he and Liz planned to give to the police.

  He’d worked the details out with Liz before they left the hotel; she would park across the street from The Hustle, avoiding detection. Max would meet Ruby in the parking lot. If they stayed there, Liz would watch from afar. If Ruby insisted they go somewhere else, Liz would follow them and watch. Outside of that, Max had no plan. He found himself winging most of this, a thought that didn’t exactly sit well with him.

  Max pulled into the parking lot adjacent to The Hustle and took up residence in the dark spot, as usual. He watched Liz park her car across the street and kill the headlights. He felt antsy, on edge. He couldn’t shake the feeling. He chalked it up to nerves. He had, after all, discovered the body of a dead police detective in a remote cabin only hours earlier. He had a right to be a little shaken.

  The parking lot was packed tonight. Saturday night brought in triple the customers seen on the weekdays and it took a while for them all to clear out. Max watched a middle-aged couple make out beside a station wagon for ten minutes before staggering into the car and peeling out. He chuckled to himself; forty-somethings acting like teenagers. Maybe if he and Katie had done more of that kind of thing they’d still be together. That thought took the smile off his face.

  Ruby emerged from the club’s front door at ten minutes to two and headed across the parking lot toward Max’s car. A few other girls followed after her, eventually splitting off and heading toward their respective cars, or boyfriends, or johns. Max saw the bouncer he’d had the unfortunate chance of meeting a few days back and found he still didn’t like the guy.

  Ruby opened the passenger door and got inside. She closed it and the dome light dimmed before going dark. “Thanks for meeting me. I know it’s unexpected.”

  “That’s okay. You said you had some information?”

  “Yeah. Gabe didn’t come to work today.”

  Max decided not to
mention his involvement in Gabe’s absence. Not yet, at least. “You mentioned that in the text.”

  “Right. Well, I got curious about that, especially after the owner showed up. His name is Caldwell.”

  “You saw him? In the white suit?”

  “Yep. He had the suit on and everything, so no mistaking him. Anyway, I found an excuse to be outside the office door and overheard a phone conversation.”

  “You shouldn’t have done that. It’s too dangerous. You don’t know what you’re dealing with here.”

  Ruby continued, unaffected. “I overheard Caldwell talking to somebody on the phone about Gabe. I only caught one side of the conversation, but Caldwell mentioned something about paperwork that Gabe had taken. Apparently Caldwell thought Gabe was going to put the squeeze on him and either take this information to the cops or use it to blackmail him. Gabe not showing up to work seemed to have spooked him.”

  Max remembered Gabe carrying something out of the flophouse the night he’d tracked him there. A suitcase or a satchel; something that could easily hold paperwork. Was this another piece of the puzzle falling into place?

  “So maybe Gabe isn’t part of this,” Ruby continued. “Or maybe he was, but had a change of heart.”

  “Or maybe he found an opportunity to extort money out of Caldwell. Josh said in his letter that he thought Gabe had lied to Caldwell about him. Sounds like Gabe has been playing his boss for a while now.”

  “Possibly.”

  “You shouldn’t go back to work, not until this thing blows over. We’re going to the cops tomorrow.”

  “We? You mean you and me or you and somebody else?” She paused, giving him a perplexed look. “Did you tell somebody else about this?”

  Shit. He hadn’t meant to bring up Liz. He covered as best as he could. “I meant you and me.”

  Ruby shook her head. “No way. I don’t want to get involved with the cops.”

  “We need to go to the police.”

  “I don’t trust the cops.”

  “But you trust these guys? The creeps from this bar?”