The Drowned Woman: An absolutely unputdownable mystery and suspense thriller (Jericho and Wright Thrillers Book 2)

by CJ Lyons

  She nodded again, her mouth too dry and throat too tight to try to talk as her eyes met Nate’s. They turned, eying the path behind them. The sun was hidden behind clouds, making Emily shiver as the shadows stretched across the trail, trying to swallow her and Nate.

  They took one step, then two… and then they saw him. A big man, dressed in black, with a helmet covering his face.

  Just like the man who’d killed Daddy.

  Thirty-Seven

  Luka had already examined every detail of Trudy’s photos, running every address and license plate through NCIC. After getting the okay from the Smithfield PD and Ahearn, he grabbed a pool car and headed over the mountain.

  Smithfield was a smaller version of Cambria City, mirroring Cambria City’s topography. Surrounded by the Allegheny Mountains on three sides and the Juniata River on the fourth, its history was built on the railroad and coal industries. Large Victorian and Queen Anne mansions anchored the nicer neighborhoods, shoulder to shoulder with white-framed colonials, brick Federal styles, and gabled Cape Cods. Go a few blocks in any direction and the architecture changed dramatically to narrow shotgun-style homes, post-war split-levels, and squat bungalows sporting roofing shingles as siding. Abandoned lots surrounded the railroad tracks alongside the river, while further away from the historic town center was a combination of forest and farmland.

  Luka checked in at the police department—no sense treading on toes—made certain his map and list of names was up to date, then headed over to the nursing home situated in a stately brick Queen Anne Victorian, complete with turret and gables.

  He started retracing Trudy’s movements by speaking with the nursing home staff. Luckily, given the higher volume of visitors on a weekend, the administrative assistant who’d worked with Trudy was there.

  “Mrs. Orly is dead?” he repeated, eyes wide, face aghast. “I just saw her.”

  “I know. That’s why I’m here. Did anything unusual happen during Mrs. Orly’s visit? Did you meet anyone who seemed to know her? See anything out of the ordinary?”

  He shook his head. “Nothing like that. It was mainly paperwork—she’d already toured the facilities. We got her husband on the waiting list, took care of the insurance and financial forms. I don’t think she even spoke to anyone other than me while she was here. She took some pictures to share with her husband—maybe those would help?”

  “Right. Thanks.” Luka headed back out to the street, taking a moment to enjoy the sunshine. He felt as if he were emerging from hibernation, it’d been so long since he’d felt the warmth of the sun on his face. It was still chilly, especially here where the wind was constrained by the mountains, giving it extra bite, but he didn’t mind. He glanced at Trudy’s photos and began to follow her footsteps, knocking on every door he came to.

  He’d made it to the end of the block and halfway up the other side of the street without success. No one remembered seeing Trudy, Dominic Massimo, or any stranger two days ago.

  He reached a nicely kept Cape Cod, white frame, blue shutters and trim, and no one was home. Not surprising given the beautiful day, but… As he was sliding his card and a note into the mailbox beside the front door, he realized that it was almost full. And there were newspapers lying on the porch. Could be nothing, but something felt off.

  Luka checked the homeowner’s name, Patrick Rademacher, against the list he and Leah had compiled last night. People Risa had written about, fact-checked, or proofed their obituary. Rademacher wasn’t on it. Yet, the name felt familiar—a niggly, jangly, electricity under the skin kind of familiar.

  He peered through the front window. No signs of anyone home or any disturbance. Which meant he had no probable cause to enter the house. He went back down the porch steps but stopped before reaching the sidewalk. There was another walkway alongside the driveway that led to the backyard. A white-washed privacy fence surrounded it, but the gate was open. Luka debated the consequences of trespassing, decided they were minor, and went through.

  “Mr. Rademacher?” he called out as he followed the narrow walkway down the side of the house. He looked inside the windows as he went—nothing of note except what appeared to be remnants of a half-eaten sandwich on the kitchen table.

  Approaching the backyard, he could see the framing of a deck and steps down to a flagstone patio. He stopped. Death came with a particular sensation, one that started with a metallic taste high up in the back of the throat, long before any scent alerted a person.

  Luka moved forward slowly, watching where he stepped. Each inhalation heightened his awareness, his instinct that death was near. The crows pecking at the corpse floating face down in the hot tub confirmed it.

  Thirty-Eight

  Leah finished her exam and stepped outside to allow Risa some privacy as she changed back into her clothes. Nothing on Risa’s physical had helped to either confirm or deny her suspicions. Across the hall, Harper and Maggie Chen huddled together at the nursing station.

  “What’s up?” Leah asked. “Did something happen?”

  “McKinley’s on his way for Saliba’s interview,” Harper answered. “I’m just waiting for him and helping Maggie with her math.”

  “I’m telling you, it doesn’t add up.” Maggie turned to Leah. “The water in the car trunk where Cliff was found was forty-nine degrees Fahrenheit.”

  “Not very cold. Probably part of the reason why we couldn’t get him back.”

  “Forty-nine degrees sounds pretty damn cold to me,” Harper said. “I thought cold water was supposed to buy him more time.”

  “Very cold water as in near freezing. Especially when associated with sudden immersion,” Maggie explained.

  “Like a kid falling through the ice on a frozen pond,” Leah added. “In that situation, even with a prolonged down time, sometimes you have a chance. But not with a slow submersion in not-so cold water.”

  “Okay, so the odds were against Cliff from the start. You guys did everything you could. So what’s the problem, Maggie?” Harper tapped the notepad where the death investigator had been scribbling calculations. “You keep saying the math is off. Your algebra—”

  “Algor mortis,” Maggie corrected. “The cooling of the body postmortem.” She tapped her phone where an app was displayed. “I’ve input every variable into the Henssge equation. Water temp, resuscitation efforts at rewarming, his BMI. Nothing adds up.”

  “Those formulas might not be accurate since he died so recently,” Leah said, wondering at Maggie’s level of concern.

  “Right,” Harper said. “In fact, sometimes there’s no obvious cooling of the body for a few hours after death.” Both Leah and Maggie turned to stare at her. “Hey, I’ve read Sutherland’s textbook, too. Besides, we already know the time of death—we were all watching it happen, live. Vogel died at 9:21 a.m.”

  Maggie shook her head, her robin’s egg blue hair sparking in the overhead lights. “No. That’s the problem. Everything in my calculations says that Cliff died in the middle of the night. Hours before that video went live.”

  Now it was Harper and Leah’s turn to frown in confusion.

  “Lies,” Leah muttered. “Somehow the killer must have faked the time stamp, made it appear to be live-streamed.”

  “Sonofabitch set us up—had us on a wild goose chase while he was escaping.” Harper grabbed her phone. “Sanchez? Could the time stamp on the video have been altered? Well, get the camera CSU found inside the trunk and find out. Please. It’s important.” She hung up. “He said he can’t tell until he examines the camera, but it is theoretically possible.” She pushed her chair back and stood up. “Got to go. McKinley’s here and he doesn’t look happy.”

  Leah stood as well and followed Harper’s glance to the ER entrance. McKinley’s rosacea was flaring, and his expression was just as angry. Leah got the distinct impression that the ERT commander was not enjoying his time taking over Luka’s detective squad.

  “Saliba ready for her interview?” he asked when he spotted Harper a
nd Leah.

  “Yes. I’ve got everything set up in the CIC interview room,” Leah told him.

  “Good. Harper, you monitor and record. Dr. Wright, you take lead. I want an exact accounting of everything Risa Saliba knows or suspects about Chaos—every detail, no matter how small. We need to get ahead of this guy.”

  “Sir.” Harper suddenly sounded tentative. Then she took a breath and straightened her shoulders. “Maggie Chen, the death investigator—” She nodded toward the trauma bay where Maggie had gone to prepare Cliff’s body for transport to the morgue. “She thinks maybe Vogel was killed much earlier than we’d assumed. Like hours earlier.”

  “What’s Tierney or the ME say?” McKinley demanded.

  “Nothing yet,” Harper admitted. “But—”

  McKinley silenced her with a scowl. Then he turned back to Leah. “I’ll be waiting in the CIC. Bring Saliba and let’s get this over with.”

  Leah watched him march away. “I’m guessing there’s a reason why McKinley isn’t a big fan of Maggie?” Or vice-versa, given the way Maggie had escaped as soon as she caught sight of McKinley.

  “She once tossed him off a crime scene. He wanted to search the body before she finished documenting the scene.” Harper glanced toward the trauma bay, a gleam of appreciation in her gaze. “Got into a huge shouting match, right there in front of everyone. And Maggie won.”

  “Good for her. Now if we can just make sure this damn interview doesn’t turn into another shouting match.” Not for the first time, Leah wished Luka was here.

  “Good luck with that.” Harper went to get Risa to escort her to the CIC interview room.

  Leah lingered, her gaze caught by the scribbled calculations Maggie left behind. If Cliff really did die hours earlier, then why go through the elaborate video countdown? Like the message to Luka about his fiancée’s engagement ring, it all felt so… contrived. A magician’s patter, designed to distract you with a story while the real sleight of hand was happening right under your nose.

  Chaos lied. But he also did everything for a reason. What was he trying to distract them from? Was something bigger happening elsewhere? If they could find out, maybe they could catch him. Before he killed again.

  Thirty-Nine

  Emily froze. Her breath caught in her throat at the sight of the masked man. The mask had plastic over the eyes, reflecting the storm clouds racing through the sky above him, as if he was part of the sky. Was she dreaming? Then she saw the rifle he carried. A strangled noise slipped past her clenched lips and she clapped her hand to her mouth. Quiet… Daddy said to be quiet so the bad man didn’t find her.

  Nate grabbed her arm and yanked her so hard she spun all the way around, away from the man with the gun.

  “Run!” Nate ordered. They hurled themselves down the trail. Emily barely saw where they were going, everything was a blur, her mind filled with flashes of memory, of the night Daddy was killed.

  The trail ended in a field of broken corn stalks and mud and weeds that brushed against Emily’s knees.

  “Where are we? Where do we go?” Nate asked her, panic filling his voice.

  Emily stood, her breath heaving in through her mouth all the way down to her toes, past her toes even, as if she was a mouse and could burrow her way into the earth, hide.

  But there was no place to hide.

  Be brave, be strong, Daddy whispered. Emily didn’t feel brave and she wasn’t strong. She was scared. But just like Daddy had saved her, she had to save Nate. After all, it was her fault he was there.

  “This way,” she told him, taking his arm and crouching low to hide below the highest weeds along the edge of the field.

  The field ended in a rickety barbed wire fence with some cows behind it. Past the cows was a collection of buildings: a big red barn, a shorter metal building like an airplane hangar open on two ends, a farmhouse, a few smaller buildings behind it, and two double-wide trailers. The Homan farm.

  “We can hide in one of the barns,” Nate whispered. The sound of four-wheelers slipping in the mud, their engines whining, came from behind them.

  They skirted the cow pasture and entered the main compound. Two men came out of one of the trailers and seemed to be arguing about something. They headed toward the metal hanger building where there were several cars and trucks squeezed in. It had no doors, so they crept around the back of the larger barn until they were on the other side of the building where the men were, so at least they were hopefully out of sight. There was a chicken coop with a small yard and beside it was another area behind a short chain link fence with a plastic doghouse that had a broken roof.

  A sad-looking dog circled a pair of empty bowls. From the ruts it had left in the muddy grass, it must have been pacing for hours.

  “Poor thing,” Nate said. “He must be so thirsty. Look at how his tongue is hanging out.”

  Before she could stop him, Nate swung himself up over the fence and emptied his water bottle into the dog’s bowl. The dog didn’t make a sound, didn’t even bare its teeth, as if it was used to people trespassing in its space. In fact, when Nate first raised his hand to open the bottle, the dog had cringed and slunk backwards, head ducked as if it expected to be punished.

  “Nate,” Emily whispered. “Get back here. We need to find a way out.” She’d given up on their mission of retrieving Nate’s great’s medal—getting back home to Nellie’s without being shot was the new mission. Behind her, two men on four-wheelers came roaring into the compound, pulling up in front of the building with all the cars and trucks. They were laughing as they dismounted, slinging their guns off their shoulders.

  “No, we can’t leave him.” Nate picked his way through mud and grass, the dog backing up until it was against the fence near Emily. Up close she could see its eyes were crusty, its hair matted, and there were red stripes crisscrossed across its back. Nate crouched down, keeping some distance. The dog finally met his eyes but bared its teeth and gave a small growl. “It’s okay, boy. I’m not gonna hurt you. Go on, get your drink. I know you’re thirsty.”

  Nate stood to one side and the dog slunk past, edging around to keep Nate in sight. Then it got close to the water bowl and its thirst overcame any fear as it dipped its entire head in and lapped it up.

  “The coast is clear,” Emily whispered to him after the men went inside the main house. The clouds had almost blocked the sun and the first drops of rain were falling. Ruby was going to be so angry. “C’mon, let’s go.”

  Nate was halfway to the kennel’s fence when a noise came from the farmhouse. He froze and glanced over his shoulder.

  Emily followed his gaze. Billy and Jimmy were coming down the porch, headed straight for the dog’s yard. And they both held rifles.

  “Nate, get out of there. Now!”

  Forty

  While Luka waited for the Smithfield PD to respond, he paced the sidewalk in front of the house with the corpse in the hot tub and called Leah, hoping for an unofficial update on both the case and how Nate was doing. Her phone went straight to voicemail, telling him that she must still be in Risa’s interview. He considered calling Ruby but decided he didn’t want Nate to think he was being too intrusive. Then by the return leg of his third lap between the houses on either side of the crime scene, he’d decided that Leah had the right idea and that he needed to get Nate his own phone. Maybe not a smartphone, but at least an old-fashioned “dumb” one.

  Finally, a cruiser appeared, pulling up to Luka, and a uniformed officer emerged. Luka gave an account of how he came to find the body to the Smithfield officer, Jon Mann. Mann called his corporal to the scene, Luka repeated everything, and then the corporal in turn called the coroner and the on-call detective. And then they waited—no one could touch the body until the coroner or one of his deputies examined it.

  “Good thing the hot tub wasn’t actually on,” Mann joked. “Can you imagine the stink?”

  “Would’ve found him faster,” the corporal replied. He was a man in his mid-forties to earl
y fifties with a build that could only be politely described as “stout.”

  “Can’t believe we’ve got a serial killer.” Mann stood straighter and rubbed his thumb over his badge, as if prepping to be featured on the evening news.

  Luka answered their questions, but it felt strange, playing the role of reporting witness rather than detective in charge of the scene and investigation. As polite as Mann and his fellow officers were, they didn’t look at Luka like an equal, a brother in blue. Did he act the same way around witnesses and victims? Luka wondered. Simply because they stood on the wrong side of the thin blue line?

  He took the first opportunity to step away and call McKinley to update him.

  “I’m at the hospital with Dr. Wright; we’re starting Saliba’s interview,” McKinley told him. “What was your victim’s name again?”

  “Patrick Rademacher. I think he’s connected to Saliba, but I can’t place him—”

  “Wait, here she is.” There was a clatter as McKinley handed the phone over and put it on speaker.

  “Risa, does the name Patrick Rademacher mean anything to you?” Luka asked.

  “Patrick? Of course. He’s a photographer, we worked together for years.”

  That’s why the name felt so familiar to Luka. He must have seen it on the bylines of the photos accompanying Risa’s articles. “And where is he now?”

  There was a long pause. “He’s dead. A few years now. Was working on a piece about Syrian refugees. Why?”

  “Did you work on his obituary?”

  “No, this was before I got sick and started taking those assignments. What happened? Why are you asking about Patrick?”

  “How did he die?” Luka asked, edging off the sidewalk to allow the coroner with his gurney to pass.

  “He drowned. His boat was scuttled while he was filming refugees. His boat and two more, filled with families. They were able to retrieve his final shots—won him a Capa and a Pulitzer. Wait.” She paused and hauled in a breath, slow and heavy as if dragging a weight. “Wait. I didn’t write about him, but I did speak about him. At a memorial event for journalists killed while covering conflicts. It was a fundraiser for their families.”