Dead Tease

by Victoria Houston

  Then again, why put himself and Lew through that? Taxidermy is so common in the Northwoods—hundreds of taxidermists must own knives like that. Hell, you can buy them at garage sales.

  Chapter Twenty

  “Did you hear the one about the mushroom that walked into the bar and ordered a vodka tonic?” asked Ray.

  He grinned over at Leigh as they rode back from the shooting range. At the last minute, he had finagled Osborne’s Subaru, figuring Leigh might not appreciate riding in his pickup with the hole in the floor and a strong odor of fish.

  “No, I have not heard that one,” said Leigh with a giggle. She couldn’t remember when a man had made her feel so pretty and fun and interesting. “It’s not off-color, is it?” She giggled again, not caring if it was or wasn’t.

  “‘We don’t serve your kind,’ said the bartender.” Ray deepened his voice in mock seriousness.

  “‘What?’ The mushroom was offended. ‘How can you say that? I’m a ‘fun-guy.’”

  “Oh, you,” said Leigh with a punch to Ray’s upper arm. “That is such a bad joke.”

  Ray gave her a big smile. It had been a good afternoon. Leigh took instruction well and, after an hour spent learning the correct stance and two-hand hold on his Smith & Wesson .22 target pistol, she had asked him to go with her to Ralph’s Trading Post to help her select a gun that fit her hands better.

  After settling on a Model 3913 Ladysmith—and a handsome black holster that she liked because it matched her purse—they had returned to the shooting range for another thirty minutes of practice. Leigh surprised him with her aptitude—she was a natural, able to hit the bull’s-eye almost every time.

  If he hadn’t already planned to meet up with Bruce for fish fry that night, he would have lingered. He liked the girl.

  “How are the webcams working for you?” asked Ray as he turned into the McNeils’ driveway.

  “Perfect,” said Leigh. “I scrolled through the video on the monitor this morning and it was quite clear—our only visitors last night were a doe and two fawns. I could even make out the spots on the little guys.”

  “Let’s hope those are the only visitors you’ll have.”

  “I’m just relieved that Jim doesn’t travel again for a while,” she said, opening the car door to get out. “A couple business dinners. Two this weekend in fact. New recruits for the medical staff,” she said in response to Ray’s raised eyebrows. “You have to talk to those people when they’re not on call. But at least he’s not out of town.

  “Ray, I can’t thank you enough for helping me with this. If you’ll wait here, I’ll get Jim to write a check for your time.”

  “No, no,” said Ray. “You folks are paying me for the webcams and that’s enough. Plus,” he winked, “this was fun for me, too. Not often do I get to spend an entire afternoon with such a lovely lady.”

  Leigh felt herself blush with pleasure at the compliment. As she opened the front door to enter her home, she wished it wasn’t so easy to learn how to shoot a pistol. Too bad she didn’t need another lesson—or a hundred lessons. What a cute guy!

  At three o’clock that afternoon Lew sat back at her desk and rubbed her eyes. It had been a long week, but the stack of reports flowing in from the investigation into Jennifer Williams’s death was growing—by the moment it seemed.

  The desk phone rang: “No, thank you, Doc. I have this paperwork to tackle before I do anything else. I think it best if I’m home alone tonight. Sorry.”

  “You sure about that, Lewellyn?” asked Osborne. “You might feel better if you bounce Chet Tillman’s remarks off me. I might have another perspective or help formulate a rebuttal. Don’t forget I have good connections on that city council. Chet may think he runs the show but he doesn’t….”

  “C’mon, you know I value your input, but right now is not the time. Too much to deal with on the Williams case. Finding that knife has put a whole new spin on things. I’m hoping we can locate our person of interest soon.”

  “Alvin?”

  “Yeah, the sooner the better, y’know. Otherwise Tillman may have enough ammunition to … well, to complain.” Her voice trailed off and Osborne wished he were in the office to give her a reassuring hug.

  “We’ll get through this, Lew. And you will keep your job. I promise.”

  “Thanks, Doc. I appreciate the support. Later, okay?” Lew hung up thinking, Easy for you to say. We’ll see. Chet sure has his ducks lined up.

  “Chief Ferris?” Dani stuck her head through the door. “You got a minute?”

  “Dani, it’s Saturday. What are you doing here?”

  “You asked me to check on that Chester guy.”

  “But not on your weekend. You need a life, girl.”

  “I need a job is what I need,” said Dani with a grin. “Plus I love doing this stuff. Got some news if you got a minute.”

  “Sure. Sit down. I need a break anyway.”

  “This Chester Tillman guy? He goes by Chet—”

  “Just like his old man.”

  “Right. Well, first of all he’s only a corporal—”

  “You’re kidding. He’s not a sergeant or a lieutenant? Just a corporal?”

  “Yep. So I went on Facebook to see if he’s there and found his page.” Dani leaned forward conspiratorially as she said, “Guess what? He friended me!”

  “Why would he do that?” asked Lew. “Isn’t that for close friends or family?”

  “I sent him my profile picture.” At the mystified expression on Lew’s face, Dani said, “You haven’t seen the photo I use on Facebook—”

  “Dani, I never have been nor do I plan to be on Facebook.”

  “It’s my best photo ever—I look great.” Dani gave a sheepish smile.

  “Ah, the light bulb just came on,” said Lew. “He’s a single guy and you are a pretty girl.”

  “He’s a married guy and I’m a pretty girl,” said Dani with an edge. The edge that surfaced often enough to convince Lew that Dani would be a valuable addition to the force when she graduated. Edge is good.

  “I’m doing this on my own time, right?” said Dani. “The only reason I say that is ’cause I plan to lurk on this guy’s page—find out what else he’s up to.”

  “Whatever you do, do not bridge the privacy laws, understand? I’m not hiring you to break and enter.”

  “That’s too bad,” said Dani. “I’m not a bad hacker.”

  “Dani, use your head. You do not want to get us both in trouble.”

  “Promise, I won’t,” said Dani, jumping to her feet. “But cool so far, don’t you think?”

  “Good work.”

  After Dani left the room, Lew pondered what she had learned. Would Chet Tillman really bring in a corporal to fill the position of police chief? An individual that low on the chain of command in a metropolitan police department?

  Corporals achieve the rank of officer or deputy simply by being on the force for five years—no testing, no interviewing, no proving their competence. The most they have to do is stay out of trouble for five years.

  And what kind of guy—married—“friends” pretty girls on the Internet?

  Most important was this question: Did she trust Dani to not invade Chester Tillman’s privacy? Lew didn’t let herself answer that one.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  It was eleven thirty that night when Kerry Schultz arrived at the clinic to work the midnight to six A.M. shift in the ER.

  “Call me Type A,” was her mantra when colleagues expressed amazement at her habit of an early arrival for the late night shift, “but I get here early because I want to hear what’s on the police scanner and review the record of any patients in the waiting area. I don’t like surprises.” She didn’t add: “Because I have no life.”

  “Drats,” said Kerry, muttering to herself as she checked the roster of MDs working her shift. It did not make her evening to see Cynthia Daniels’s name. Just the sight of the woman put her in a foul mood. She made up her mind to so
ldier through—after all, it was only a six-hour shift.

  “Dr. Daniels, any immediate concerns?” asked Kerry, glancing up from the nurses’ station when Cynthia arrived five minutes before their shift began.

  “No. But I have a sinus headache. I’ll go rest my eyes until you need me.”

  Kerry nodded and looked down the charts. A quiet night so far. The action would start around two A.M. after the bars closed. At the moment all they had was a spider bite and an elderly man who had tripped on his door stoop and dislocated his shoulder. Both were resting. No one was waiting.

  Shortly after one, the police scanner crackled with a car rollover on Highway 17: a teenage couple in possible serious condition. Kerry buzzed Cynthia’s pager. No answer. She tried twice then waited five minutes. Ten minutes. Still no answer.

  She ran down to the doctors’ lounge and knocked on each of the three closed doors. When no one answered, she tried the handles to peek into the rooms in case Cynthia had fallen into a sound sleep. No Dr. Daniels.

  When she could wait no longer and the ambulance was less than two miles away, she paged the other surgeon on call. “Sorry to wake you, Tim,” said Kerry, “but Dr. Daniels can’t be reached and the EMTs think we may have a skull fracture on the way—”

  Dr. Tim Donovan lived less than a mile from the clinic. He was there within ten minutes. At two o’clock almost to the second, Cynthia Daniels appeared at the nurses’ station where Kerry was on the phone calling the parents of the boy to let them know he was in critical condition.

  “Why didn’t you page me?” said Cynthia, her voice pitched high and loud as Tim Donovan emerged from the examining room. Cynthia turned around to face the other physician. “This was so unnecessary, Tim. Kerry, you owe Dr. Donovan an apology.”

  Kerry stared at Cynthia. “I checked the doctors’ lounge and every one of the rooms and you were not there.”

  “Silly woman. Of course I was. I was in number three. Come on, I’ll show you.” Forcing Kerry to walk in front of her, Cynthia burst through the lounge to the room where she insisted she had been resting. Kerry peered through the doorway. Yes, the bed was rumpled. Yes, Cynthia’s overnight bag rested on the chair with her street clothes strewn across the foot of the bed.

  “But—”

  “But, hell,” said Cynthia. “Next time do your job. Check all the rooms.”

  OK, bitch, you asked for it, thought Kerry as she found her chair at the nurses’ station, pretended to be looking for a record on the computer, and waited for her heart to stop pounding. Tim Donovan had given her a sympathetic glance but she could tell he believed Cynthia.

  Just you wait, Dr. Daniels. I am making that call.

  The call to Loon Lake Chief of Police Lewellyn Ferris might well cost her her job, but the need to make the call had been nagging at her: it was the call that Jennifer Williams deserved.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  The musical tones of his cell phone woke Osborne from a deep sleep. He needed a few seconds to realize he wasn’t in a dream. Hand fumbling on the lamp table in the dark, he finally found the phone only to see Lew’s home number listed as “Missed Call.” Worried, he pressed the “Return Call” button. The time: 2:02 A.M. was backlit on the phone.

  The last he had heard from Lew was shortly after eleven when she had called to say she was headed home and would catch up with him late Sunday morning. “If I’m lucky, I’ll sleep in—I need it,” she had said.

  “Doc?” the voice on the phone was not sleepy. “I just had a call from the McNeil residence. Leigh saw an intruder on the webcam monitor—”

  “Right now? Someone is there now?” Osborne swung his feet onto the floor. Outside his bedroom window, the night was pitch black. He scrambled for his shoes.

  “They think so but not sure. I’m getting ready to head over to their place. The webcam picked up a figure lurking near the kitchen windows about a half hour ago. Then, minutes later, the same figure appeared down near the boathouse. Leigh’s convinced someone is still on the property, even though Jim said he checked everything out, which he shouldn’t have done.

  “I told him to sit tight even though he’s insisting the images on the monitor are of a bear, not a human.”

  “Lew, you need a good night’s sleep. If you aren’t in the car yet, let me get hold of Ray and we’ll run over to their place. Ray has experience recognizing what those cameras pick up.”

  “Good try, Doc. But I’ll meet you two there.”

  Osborne hung up. If he had learned anything in his three years working with Lew, he recognized the tone that means: don’t argue.

  Ray didn’t answer until Osborne’s second try. When he did it was obvious he, too, had been sound asleep. Osborne explained the situation at the McNeils. “I’ll be right there—pick you up,” said Ray.

  “Give me two minutes to brush my teeth.”

  “You got it.” Ray was through the kitchen door, the engine running in his pickup, before Osborne had his pants buckled.

  Leigh was in a long blue bathrobe, her blonde hair loose around her shoulders and her face tense with worry. Jim had pulled a fleece jacket over gray cotton pajamas. The couple were standing in the front hall foyer, their door locked, until they saw Osborne jump out of Ray’s pickup. Lew’s cruiser pulled in behind them.

  “Okay? Can everyone see?” asked Leigh, once everyone had found a chair to crowd around the kitchen table in front of the video monitor. “Here, Ray, why don’t you run it.” She handed over the remote control.

  “The only reason we happened to see this,” said Jim, “is that I got up to use the bathroom and noticed the motion lights on in the driveway. I turned on the monitor thinking I’d see a deer or some other animal out there. That’s when Leigh woke up and insisted I call you.”

  Sure enough, at one twenty that morning a dark shape could be seen leaning over a hydrangea bush under the kitchen window. Anyone looking in would be visible to someone standing at the kitchen sink. Whether the camera was too far away or the moon cast shadows through the nearby trees, all that was visible was the outline of a tall figure in motion.

  “Not moving like a bear,” said Ray. “My guess is a person. But, I mean, it could be a bear. Just that a bear wouldn’t spend time looking in your windows—it wants your bird feeder.”

  The five of them watched, breath held, as the figure appeared to hover near the window for a long moment. Then it was gone. “Darn the trees,” said Ray, “I thought I had the webcams hung closer to the house for a better view.”

  “We were sound asleep and all the lights were off—not much for anyone to see looking through the kitchen window,” said Leigh. “One thing though—I fell sound asleep early this evening. Most nights, I haven’t been sleeping that well and I’ll come down to the kitchen for a late night glass of milk. If I had seen someone looking in the window, I’d have had a heart attack.”

  “No, hon, I don’t think so,” said Jim, patting her hand. “You might scream but no heart attack.” Leigh smiled a weak smile.

  “I hate to say this, but at least now Jim believes me. Someone really is out there. It isn’t in my head—”

  Jim shot his wife a warning look. “Leigh, I never said that.”

  “You didn’t have to—the look on your face.”

  “Okay, okay, you two,” said Lew. “Ray, can you check out the boathouse?”

  Ray fast-forwarded the video to an image that was so shadowed it was difficult to make out any defining details. From Osborne’s point of view, they could be looking at a lilac bush. “Ah, that’s frustrating,” said Ray. “Can’t tell much from the video.”

  “I think it has the same shape as the person by the window,” said Leigh.

  “Well,” said Ray with a kind note in his voice, “when the images get fuzzy like this it’s a little too easy to see what you want to see. True for all of us.”

  “Look, folks,” said Lew. “Doc and Ray and I will walk your property and check your boathouse before we leave. I’ll als
o call the sheriff’s department and see if they had an officer patrolling the county roads tonight who might swing by and take a look every half hour between now and dawn. Think you can get some rest?”

  Leigh and Jim nodded. “I will,” said Jim.

  “I’ll do my best,” said Leigh. “Thank you, everyone.”

  Outside minutes later, Ray pointed to footprints in the mulch around the hydrangea bush under the kitchen window. “Look awful similar to the ones we found in the mud on the dryer. I’ll run Bruce out when the sun’s up and we’ll get a cast.”

  “Good,” said Lew.

  They checked the exterior of the boathouse, turned on the interior light, and gave the rowboat and the speedboat a good look. Nothing.

  “I’d call this a yacht not a speedboat,” said Ray leaning into the cabin of the speedboat. “You can sleep four in here. Wonder what this sucker cost? Fifty thousand buckaroos if it cost a dime. Wonder if he takes it out much?”

  “Enough boat talk,” said Lew. “Not much else we can do right now.”

  “I agree,” said Osborne. “If there was someone on the property, they are long gone now. Bedtime, Lewellyn.”

  “Gosh, yes, Doc. We’ll talk in the morning.”

  “Not to keep any one a minute longer,” said Ray, “but I am hosting Bruce to dinner tomorrow. That halibut I got from my clients who were up in Alaska. Any takers among the jabones standing here?”

  “You betcha,” said Lew and Osborne in concert.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  A wash of apricot softened the evening sky. Straight out from Ray’s dock the setting sun left a trail of diamonds glittering as if lighting the way for a fairy princess. To judge from the expression on Ray’s face as he passed a plate of sautéed walleye cheeks to his female guests: that fairy princess might be Leigh.