Home Deadly Home

by Janice Kay Johnson

  “Again, I’ll defer to Grant,” he said.

  “At this point, I recommend you not allow yourself to get isolated. Don’t hike or ride alone. Don’t meet up with someone who isn’t family or a good friend. All three men were ambushed. It makes sense to keep an eye on what’s happening around you, but you can be shot without even seeing the man lying in wait for you. If your job demands you be out on lonely stretches of road – say, you’re a utility district lineman, work with the road department or are a first responder like Scott – come and talk to me. Otherwise, indoors with other people is safest.”

  “You saying we can’t even trust each other?” The question came from Eric Sunde, who was trying to look cocky but sounded scared.

  “I’ll stand by what I said. Close friends and family only. We all had something in common damn near twenty years ago. That doesn’t make us a band of brothers who can call on each other for a lifetime.”

  No, it made them a group of people who had the same things in common that Chad, Travis and Curt had had – and they were all dead now. Scott hoped they’d all heard the unspoken: You especially can’t trust each other.

  He watched as the atmosphere in the room shifted. People no longer wanted to look at each other. There was some fidgeting, some glances toward the door.

  Grant spoke up again. “I also need to remind you that Chad was a law enforcement officer, with a level of training you don’t have. He was armed yesterday, but never had a chance to draw. So don’t plan to arm yourself and think that will keep you safe. It won’t.” He nodded and sat down.

  Sunde was the first to rise. “Well, this was fun, but I’m getting the fuck out of here.” Wide-eyed, his wife scrambled to her feet and let him tow her out.

  The rest stood in line to talk briefly to Grant, who appeared to be taking names and phone numbers, but also asking about the whereabouts of other former teammates.

  Eventually, only he and Scott remained.

  Grant looked hard at him. “Did you enjoy scaring the shit out of them all?”

  “No, I didn’t. But I still think we all deserved to know. I had a call-out this morning to a lonely stretch of road. I don’t mind telling you, I felt a little uneasy. That got me thinking about the other guys. If a death can be prevented…”

  “How?”

  “Would Chad be dead if he hadn’t done a dumb-ass thing like riding into the back country by himself?”

  Grant’s jaw tightened. “How is it you know all this?”

  “Cops, firefighters, paramedics, we all talk. You know that. The station house started buzzing by three or four in the morning.”

  He grunted his displeasure, and stood. “This is my investigation. Don’t surprise me again. I don’t like it.”

  Scott didn’t make any promises. Funny, he didn’t remember Grant’s eyes being so icy back then. He was glad when the star of their team walked out without another word.

  The hand he lifted to scrape over his jaw had a tremor. Looking around at all the chairs left askew, he asked himself whether the murderer could have been sitting at this table tonight.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Having set aside the photos of the latest crime scene, FBI Special Agent Noah Taylor looked up finally from one of the autopsy reports and dropped it atop the folder that lay before him. He didn’t bother saying, Might as well not be doing autopsies for all the use these are. Instead, he glanced around the table at the two men and one woman participating in this conference hastily arranged for Monday morning. “I’ve put in a request for a profiler,” he said. “I’ve worked violent crimes for close to a decade now, but this is a strange one. Many, if not most, serial murders have a sexual component that seems to be lacking here. Also, as I’m sure you’re aware, that kind of killer tends to go after a type – only dark-haired Caucasian women who aren’t taller than five foot four, say. The usual theory is that they’re striking out at someone in their past.” He shrugged at that, as if to say, Make up your own mind. “Your perpetrator is clearly focused on a certain group of people but not a physical type.”

  “No,” Grant agreed. “They were all physically fit, but varied in height from Steagall, who was five foot eight, to Burke at six one. Steagall was blonde, Burke dark-haired, Norman halfway between. They were all outdoorsmen, in different ways, Steagall and Burke as ranchers, Norman a hunter who did own a horse and rode regularly.”

  “I imagine riding and hunting both are popular in the area.”

  “They are,” Jed agreed. “But not universal.”

  “This guy is extraordinarily careful,” Karin Engstrom commented. She was here representing the Oregon State Police investigative support unit. “Somehow, he found the bullet that killed Chad Norman and dug it out of the trunk of a cottonwood. I could see where he’d carved it out. As you know, I found a footprint that is likely his.” She believed it to be a size nine – too small to be left by Chad Norman. It had been made by a cowboy boot with a slightly worn heel and smooth sole. “Soil was a little soft there next to the creek. It still wasn’t deep enough for me to get a really good cast.” She looked from face to face. “That is the one and only mistake he’s made to date. And tell me this. How do you lie on frozen ground for who knows how long waiting, and not squirm, scratch yourself, spit or get up to take a leak?” The blind on federal land just beyond the Circle S had especially frustrated her.

  “Long experience.” Jed’s voice lacked the softening effect of his usual Southern drawl. “A sniper in a place like Iraq or Afghanistan has to be able to lie without moving for hours. Even a twitch might catch someone’s eye. He looks through the scope and waits, infinitely patient.”

  The fed glanced at Grant, who answered with the smallest dip of his head. Yes.

  “A military background isn’t the only possibility,” Taylor said.

  “It isn’t,” Grant agreed, “but it’s a logical one. We’ve already started screening the men in our target group with that in mind. Quite a few of them served, if only for one enlistment. Unfortunately, finding out the specifics of how they served isn’t as easy.”

  “I might be able to help with that once you have a list.”

  “Good. Thank you.” One item crossed off on his mental agenda. “Unless you have other suggestions, our current plan is to interview the former members of the football team, then work outward to anybody else who attended high school here at the same time. Oh – a deputy located a woman who is very likely a witness to the killer unloading his horse in a turn-off an easy ride from the latest murder scene, but she didn’t pay much attention. Can’t remember what color the pickup was. Not a bright color, but it could have been gray or dark blue or black.”

  Everyone at the table winced.

  “Hat shaded the man’s face. Horse? Well, it wasn’t white or the pretty speckled gray that’s so pretty, and she doesn’t know the difference between a bay or a sorrel or even a buckskin.” It was almost worse having found a witness who had driven right past the rig at a crucial moment, but was so unobservant. He rubbed a hand over his jaw. “State Patrol is going to try her with an artist in hopes he can spark her recollections. I don’t have a lot of hope. We’re still hunting for other potential witnesses, including anyone who saw someone going into the alley behind the newspaper office.”

  And you never knew, he reminded himself. Criminals made mistakes, thank God. Investigations often turned on the smallest of breaks: an apparently meaningless piece of evidence, snippet of information, casual observation. Grant wasn’t counting on one, but he could hope.

  “Another question,” the fed said. “I expected a representative from Fort Halleck PD to be here.”

  Grant had hoped he wouldn’t ask. Choosing his words carefully, he said, “I considered inviting Chief Seward. However, to this point, there are details from the crime scenes that I haven’t shared even with members of my own department, other than Detective Dawson. I’ve kept Chief Seward up to date in a general way. We worked together to locate all officers from both o
ur agencies the day before yesterday. He was very professional. To some extent, we have to share information because of the reporter’s murder. However, the detective assigned to investigate it is flat-out incompetent. He’s refusing to hand over the bullet that almost certainly killed Chad Norman, or the typed note that accompanied it.”

  The growl he heard had to come from Karin Engstrom, who wanted to get her hands on both pieces of evidence.

  Taylor seemed to weigh what he’d said before nodding. “This is your investigation. I’m not about to question your judgment.” Seeing Grant’s subtle relaxation, he finished, “Tell me what I can do for you.”

  The attitude and offer made Grant more inclined to trust Taylor. He was somewhere around Grant’s age, at a guess, maybe six feet, lean, his sandy hair too shaggy to be regulation, tie knot askew, hazel eyes keenly observant.

  Grant leaned forward. “My gut says this guy has killed before, and not only enemy combatants overseas. I don’t have a lot of experience with ViCAP. I’m hoping you can find significant similarities between these murders and some in other parts of the country.”

  “I’ll do my best, but aren’t you suggesting the murders have been committed by a local boy?”

  “I think we’ll find most, if not all, of these men will have left the area for at least a few years out of the last twenty. College, military service, jobs. I came back a year ago after a seventeen year gap. Scott Mathison, the firefighter, was a medic in the army. Rick Oberg is back in town only because his father died and he has to get the house and business ready to sell.” So Cassie had said, anyway. Grant wouldn’t have recognized Rick, only vaguely recalled the name. “Brian Avery lives in The Dalles, came to the meeting last night because a friend called him. Juan Estrada is an attorney, which means seven years of schooling somewhere.”

  Taylor lifted his hands. “Okay, you’re right.”

  “There may be a few who travel for work, too,” Jed suggested. “Or took vacations to pop a few people for fun instead of snorkeling or mountain climbing.”

  After contemplating that image, the FBI agent grimaced. “Uh…sure. When you have a list of names, include places you know they’ve lived.”

  The meeting broke up, Karin walking out with Noah Taylor. Jed and Grant stayed where they were, his high school senior yearbook on the table.

  Yesterday, he’d come up with the names of teammates and classmates he remembered. Grant had already met with several before Scott called to tell him about the meeting he’d set up. Grant had greeted everyone there as an old friend, even though he’d have been challenged to call up many of their names if he hadn’t been back in town this past year. It had been a little daunting to find out how much he had forgotten.

  Cassie’s mention of consulting a high school yearbook at the library had given Grant the idea of calling his mother last night. With a memory obviously better than his, she directed him right to the shelf on a bookcase in the family room where all four of his yearbooks sat. Good God. When had he last cracked one of these open? He hadn’t even known he still had them.

  Now, with Jed beside him, he flipped to the photograph of the football team, young boys kneeling or standing in tiers. Children. Who’d had sex and fistfights, harbored hero worship, jealousy and maybe even hate. Barely six months later, some of them had joined the military. They’d still been kids when a few of them saw men, even women and children, dying for the first time.

  Shaking his head, Grant jotted down names that he hadn’t come up with yesterday from the caption beneath the photo.

  Then, still staring at the photo, he said, “I know there were a few people who weren’t there the day this picture was taken.”

  “Stands to reason. Who?”

  “Crap, how am I supposed to remember?” He sighed. “I know we didn’t have any freshmen on the team my senior year. There were a few sophomores.”

  “At some point we might want to pick up the guys who graduated the previous year, too,” Jed suggested.

  He went off to make some calls and appointments while Grant began flipping through the yearbook, starting with the sophomore class.

  Halfway through the class pictures, Grant spotted a name he knew. Caleb Manning. Fast guy who played cornerback on the defensive side, wide receiver on the offense. Lousy defender, but he had great hands. Caleb’s name was already on his list, but Grant had forgotten he’d been younger. Good God, he’d only been fifteen that fall.

  He paused on one photo. Anne Denney, his girlfriend for a whole six weeks or so during his junior year. Studying her picture, he couldn’t see why she’d especially caught his eye. She’d been fresh meat, that’s all. Grant was ashamed of the boy he’d been.

  What would he have thought of Cassie if she’d been a freshman his senior year? Would he have noticed her? Or, if he had, disdained her radical opinions and whatever she’d done to her hair at that age? Or maybe she’d have captivated him the way she had now, changed him. No way of knowing.

  A page later, a boy’s face caught his eye. He frowned at it, and the name beneath it. Caden Jones. Scrawny little dude, but Grant thought he’d been moved up to varsity, too, although he’d mostly warmed the bench.

  And so it went.

  Girls he’d had enthusiastic sex with on the bench seat of his rattletrap pickup truck that was fine in the winter, not so good in the summer because the heat kept pouring out whatever he did.

  Memories stirred with each face he recognized. More of the juniors were familiar, faces and names both. Curt Steagall had been one who showed enough promise to jump up from the JV team. Grant added a few more names to his list, hesitating over Sawyer Fossum, who’d gone through elementary school being called Possum. Sawyer had been kicked off the team Grant’s junior year. Coach caught him smoking weed behind the gym, and it turned out he was selling it out of his locker. He’d even done a stint in juvie over that. He’d come back to the high school, but not the team. It would be interesting to find out what became of him, although Grant couldn’t figure why he’d resent his former teammates when they hadn’t had anything to do with his fall from grace.

  Senior year. Grant came up with one more guy who hadn’t made it for picture day. Dave Gabbard. Dave had been a decent defensive tackle, but mentally not the sharpest knife in the drawer. Grant had never been unkind to him, but he knew some people had been. Dave had reason for resentment…but was he capable of these ambushes, the calls to Cassie, the reporter’s quick, brutal death? Grant couldn’t see it. But then, imagining any of those boys he’d known turning into this monster felt like an obstacle he hadn’t yet managed to hoist himself over.

  Sitting back, he read through the list that was now as complete as he could make it.

  Should he start with the bench warmers? The troublemakers? Anyone who hadn’t played as much as he thought he should? Or maybe instead of focusing on the list, he should look for guys who hadn’t made the team at all. And would his questions accomplish anything? Who was going to admit to resenting the three dead guys?

  Damn. Grant massaged his temples and forehead.

  He’d have a hell of a time extracting anything close to honesty from former teammates, but if Cassie asked the questions, she might get different answers. Maybe he should secretly deputize her.

  His mouth pulled into a smile. Deputized or not, he knew what she was doing today. If he was lucky, she might even tell him what she’d learned.

  If she was unlucky, the killer would be one of the people she interviewed today. Best case scenario, he’d be amused by her determination. Worse case, he’d be angry – or get nervous because she might be zeroing in on him.

  Grant squeezed the bridge of his nose until the cartilage creaked. If only Cassie was capable of being cautious.

  *****

  “Ron?” Scott Mathison paused with a bite of waffle halfway to his mouth. “Nah, we were joking. He already played basketball and baseball in high school. The sports overlap, and coaches don’t love sharing their players. Even doing tw
o sports like a lot of us did was pretty intense. My parents would have said no way if I’d wanted to go out for baseball, too.”

  He’d been flatteringly pleased to meet Cassie for breakfast this morning. He was off today, had gotten his sleep, and wanted to help, or so he said. His gaze kept straying to her chest, suggesting helping wasn’t all he had in mind.

  “So it wasn’t like he tried out for football and didn’t make the team.”

  “No.” Scott popped the bite in his mouth, chewed and swallowed. “He was our basketball center, with Travis Burke and me playing forward. Then Ron was shortstop on the baseball team. Holcomb was our catcher.” He grinned. “If only the team had had some pitching, they might have gone somewhere.”

  Cassie laughed. Oh, she could see Grant as catcher. Catchers in the pros, at least, always seemed to have those powerful thighs and big shoulders. She’d have to ask him about it.

  “Did you hear about the meeting we had last night?” Scott asked.

  “No. Who’s ‘we’?”

  “Guys on the football team.” He told her about wondering whether a seemingly empty car that had gone off the road could have been a setup for an ambush. “Then I realized a lot of the guys probably hadn’t heard about Chad’s murder. I did, because cops and firefighters and paramedics talk.”

  She nodded; that made sense.

  “So I decided everyone should know, so they can be more careful.”

  That made sense, too, although a sniper who could kill from two hundred yards out might be just as accurate from five hundred. Did you never step out of your house? And you could be shot through glass, too. What was everyone supposed to do, draw their blinds and huddle inside their homes? Not like home invasions didn’t happen.

  “Did you talk to Grant about this first?” she asked.

  “No.” There was some heat in Scott’s voice, a flash of what might be temper on a face that she’d always seen as amiable. “I invited him.”

  “You don’t like Grant.”