by Jeff Carson
Apparently she didn’t. Because that had been the end of their kiss, and the end of any sort of meaningful communication they’d had with one another until this moment now.
“Tom?” She was looking at him with raised eyebrows.
His face went hot and he stood up. “You want any coffee?”
“Sure. I was just asking, though, have they found anything interesting in Mr. Heeter’s house?”
He walked out from behind his desk. “No I mean, I can’t really talk about it.” He paused at the coffee machine and frowned. “So when is the last time you saw him?”
“Geez, I don’t know. It’s been a couple of weeks, I guess. He usually spends most of his weekends up there during the summer, but I didn’t see him this last weekend, or the one before that, I guess.”
“You want cream and sugar?” Rachette held up a cup of steaming coffee.
“No thanks. Black.”
He walked over and sat it down in front of her.
Patterson’s desk phone rang again.
He jerked his head towards it and then got up. “Just a second. Someone keeps calling her damn phone. Hello?”
There was shuffling on the other end and then a man clearing his throat. “Hello. I was looking for Deputy Patterson?”
“Yeah. Are you the one that keeps calling?”
“I called just before this, but I didn’t leave a message. Then I called your dispatcher and got your fax number. I was just calling back now to let her know that I was going to fax her over some files of interest we have.”
Rachette frowned. “And who is this?”
“Oh sorry. This is Deputy Michelson, Boise Sheriff’s Department.”
“Boise?”
“Idaho.”
“Yeah, I know where Boise, Idaho is. I’m just wondering why you’re calling.”
“I’m calling because Deputy Patterson called last night about a VIN number. And we got to talking about the bodies you’ve been pulling up from that lake down there.”
“Yeah?”
“I just got off the phone with a retiree from our department, a guy who lives up state. He called talking about an unsolved case we have from twenty-four years ago. This retiree worked the case all those years ago. Anyway, he saw the news stories they’re plastering all over the TV about those headless bodies you’re pulling up down there, and he swears there’s a connection to his case way back when. Looks like they had a body that showed up, killed with the same M.O..”
Rachette leaned on the edge of the desk. “Really? Head chopped off?”
Deputy Michelson cleared his throat. “Yeah. I’m looking at the pictures. I don’t envy you guys with eight of these bodies.”
“Seven. One of them was killed with a shot …” Rachette looked at Kimber and stopped talking. She had been staring at him with wide eyes, and now she turned away.
Shit. Rachette was being an insensitive bastard, talking about all this right in front of her. Her father was the one with the gunshot to the head, idiot.
Rachette stood up and turned away. “Sounds like we need to hear about this.”
“Okay, that’s what I figured. I just got your fax number from your dispatcher. I’ll send it right away. Keep an eye out for it.”
Rachette looked absently at Kimber and nodded. “Sounds good. We’ll look forward to it.” The line clicked dead and he hung up.
“Hey, Wilson. We’ve got an important fax coming in from the Boise Sheriff’s Department.
“Idaho?”
Rachette held out his hands. “California. Yes, Idaho.”
“What do you want me to do about it?”
Rachette exhaled. “Just make sure it comes through.”
Wilson shook his head and kept his eyes on his computer screen. “Yeah. Sure.”
Rachette felt his face blossom red.
“Deputy Rachette?” Kimber looked up at him.
“Yeah?”
“Can you do me a favor?” She raised her eyebrows and gave an exasperated smile.
He sat down. “Sure. What?”
“The reason I came in here is because I have to go up to my house, and I heard from Sheriff Wolf that you guys have seen someone up there?”
Rachette leaned back in his chair. “Nobody’s seen anyone. But someone is definitely up there.”
Her eyebrows creased together and she looked at her hands. “I have to go up there. I have to get some things, but I don’t want to go alone. Do you think you could go up with me?”
“Now?”
She exhaled. “I have to go. I left my laptop computer up there and it’s driving me crazy.”
He shook his head. “If you need to you can use one of our computers in here.”
She sagged in her chair. “I also don’t have enough money on me to stay another night in the Edelweiss. I don’t use credit cards, so I have to go get more cash. Listen, I’ll buy you a drink on the way back?”
Without even trying he gave her an awe-shucks smile that lit up her face. “If you need money, I can spot you, Kimber.”
Her face dropped and she scooted her chair back. “No, thank you. I’ll just drive up by myself. I’m sorry for bothering you.” She kept her eyes down as she stood.
“All right. All right.” He raised a hand and stood up. “Geez. I’ll go with you. Don’t worry.”
She smiled and tilted her head, her eyes softened with unending gratitude.
Rachette gave her a cool smile. “But I’m driving. I don’t want to be listening to Madonna all the way up there in that Blazer of yours.” He picked up his jacket and put it on.
She shook her head and rolled her eyes. She liked his ribbing.
“Thank you,” she said. “I feel so much better.”
He smiled and hooked his thumbs on his duty belt. “No problem. Hey Wilson. I’m heading up to the lake for a little bit. I’ll be back.”
Wilson eyed Kimber for a second and then nodded. “All right. I’ll be sitting in this dark room sifting through databases.”
Rachette pursed his lips and thought about Wolf. Where was he? Patterson said after he talked to Jack, he had driven away without a glance or word to anyone. The pity he felt for Jack and Wolf right now made him sick every time he thought about it.
“Could be worse,” he said.
Wilson looked up and nodded with closed eyes. “Yeah. Could be worse.”
Chapter 44
Patterson walked into the Squad Room and took off her jacket, being careful not to flip water all over the papers on her desk.
Easing around to her seat, she looked out the rain-splotched window and read Debate Cancelled Tonight in black capital letters on the Town Hall sign.
“You see all those reporters outside? Now they’re all in the right place at the right time, glomming on to this God-awful mess for something to cover.”
She slung her jacket on the chair and sat down, feeling the ache in her shoulders as she reached for the computer mouse to wake up her computer. The screen for the National Missing Persons Database materialized.
“Any luck?”
Wilson gave her a sour look. “What do you think?”
She opened another Internet browser tab and checked her email.
“So what have we got up there?” Wilson’s tone softened.
She leaned back and rubbed her eyes, trying to vaporize an image of Sarah’s dead, exposed body from the back of her eyelids. “Nothing yet. None of the neighbors saw anything. The two people who heard the gunshots were over a mile away, on the other side of thick forest, over on Bear Hill Road. They didn’t see anything. No brass at the scene. Fingerprints are Carter Willis’s, Sarah’s, and the other two sets aren’t matching in IAFIS.”
Patterson and Wilson turned to the sound of the Reception door slamming closed. Wolf was already halfway through the Squad Room, head leaning forward as he marched.
She swallowed. “Sir.”
Wolf ground to a halt at her desk and dropped a plastic bag that knocked against the wood.
Looking down, she saw it was a brushed nickel doorknob. With raised eyebrows she looked up.
“Where’s the Pollard case packet?”
She snatched it off her desk and held it up.
Without a word he pulled it from her fingers and flipped to a page. “I want you to check the prints on this doorknob against these. And then,” he flipped to another page, “these.”
She took the packet back and pulled her eyebrows together. “You want—”
“Wilson, help her.” And with that, Wolf left the room.
“Yes, sir,” Patterson said to no one. She looked up at Wilson and they exchanged puzzled looks.
“Now!” Wolf’s voice boomed from around the corner.
She jumped in her seat and stood.
“What the hell is going on?” Wilson stood up.
“Follow me.” She grabbed the plastic bag and case file and marched out of the squad room, down the hallway past Wolf’s office and into the tiny box of a room they called a lab.
Wilson was breathing excitedly on her heels. “What’s going on?” He whispered when they got inside.
“We have to check for a print match on this doorknob to these or these.” She got busy.
“But … the first prints are Kimber Grey’s.”
“Yep.” Patterson flicked on an overhead lamp and bent it down.
“And these are the prints on the payphone.”
“Yep.”
“I don’t get it.”
“Me neither. Now stop wasting time and hand me that brush.”
Ten minutes later Patterson stood over the white sheet of paper and pasted the clear tape on top. An array of charcoal-colored prints crowded the small area looking like a cloud of swirling smoke.
With a magnifying lens she bent over and studied the patterns, looking for specific indicators. There were dozens of fingerprints on the knob, smudges on top of smudges, and most were warped because of the shape of the knob.
For a minute she bent over. Her lower back ached and she was on edge, the humming light was hot and making her palms sweat even more than usual under her gloves. Wilson’s exhales through his nose and shuffling feet weren’t helping the overall atmosphere inside the tiny room.
A few seconds later she drew in a breath and looked up.
Wilson stood straight, studying her expression. “What’s the matter?”
Picking up the card covered in fingerprints, she held them next to Kimber Grey’s print sheet. “The fingerprints on this doorknob do not match Kimber Grey’s print sheet.”
“Okay. So, what’s the matter?”
She picked up the fingerprint sheet from the bloody handset of the payphone at Pumapetrol Gas. “The fingerprints on the doorknob match these.”
Chapter 45
“MacLean.” The voice barked in Wolf’s ear.
“I need to know what bullets were used in the Idaho vehicle fire.”
“Sheriff Wolf? Hey, listen. I was so sorry to hear about your ex-wife. My God. I can only—”
“I need to know.”
“Yeah. Yeah. Just a second.” The phone line clicked and there was silence.
Breathing out his mouth, Wolf sat listening to the pulse pounding in his ears. A trickle of clotted blood slid down his throat and he made a face as he swallowed.
“You there?”
“Yes.”
“.308 FMJ.”
Wolf hung up and rubbed the sandpaper stubble on his chin. Sarah and Carter were murdered with a nine-millimeter hollow point. A pistol.
The rifle at Olin Heeter’s had a box of .308 Winchester full metal jackets, half empty, sitting on the bookcase next to it. It was looking like that rifle killed those two burned men.
With growing impatience he stood and walked to the hallway. The door to the lab was closed.
For ten minutes he’d been waiting on Patterson and Wilson, and on Jake Wegener, his friend from his football days who worked for the Carbon County Sheriff’s Department. Wegener had promised to send over all he had on Aspen’s Carter Willis, but the fax machine at the end of the hall sat dormant.
The lab door flew open and Patterson came rushing out. “Sir, the prints on the doorknob you gave us match the ones on the payphone receiver.”
Wolf snapped the sheet out of her hands and walked into his office.
“Where did you get that doorknob?” Patterson was on his heels.
“My house,” Wolf said laying the sheet on his desk.
Patterson shook her head. “What? Your house?”
Wolf nodded. “Kimber Grey was over at my house last night.”
“Sir.” Patterson spoke slowly. “I talked to Lorber today, and he said the watch they found in Nick Pollard’s truck proved Kimber Grey was telling the truth about being at the fireworks show when that payphone call was made.”
Wolf nodded.
“So … I don’t get it.”
The fax machine hummed and Wolf walked past them out into the hall. “I’ve been thinking about those doorknobs at Olin Heeter’s place for a while now. It was so out of place that everything was scrubbed clean, except for those doorknobs. It was like someone was trying to lure us in there.” Wolf paused at the fax machine and turned around to face Wilson and Patterson. “In fact, that’s exactly what it was.”
“I … sir, I’m not getting it.”
He turned to the fax machine and saw the first page spit out from Carbon County Sheriff’s Office.
Letting the machine do its work, he turned back around. “I was out with Kimber Grey last night. I don’t want to talk about it, but she ended up staying at my house. I took that doorknob from my bathroom, which I watched her touch.”
Patterson and Wilson frowned.
Patterson lowered her voice and spoke slow again. “But sir, the doorknob prints at your house did not match Kimber Grey’s.”
The fax machine finished and Wolf turned and picked up the pages from Carbon County. He was surprised to find a hefty stack of paper already in the incoming fax tray.
With mounting curiosity he picked up the entire stack. The heading on one of the pages read Boise County Sheriff’s Department.
As he flipped through the sheets one by one, he held his breath. With a toothless grin he pulled out the third sheet and held it in front of their faces.
Chapter 46
Patterson stared at a picture of two teenaged girls standing side by side, arm in arm on the shore of a lake. The black and white photo was poor quality—a copy of an original that had been faxed—but she could see the two girls were of identical height, with identical haircuts, wearing identical sweatshirts.
With a sinking stomach she looked up. “They’re identical twins.”
Eyes glassing over, Wolf nodded and twisted his lip in a satisfied snarl. “Identical twins who are sadistic killers. That’s who was out murdering Nick Pollard at the same time she was at the lake watching fireworks. That’s why her father left that night. Because it was Kimber’s sister in trouble. She had a dead body to dispose of.”
Wilson frowned. “So she calls her father about it?”
Wolf walked slowly past them toward his office, staring at the fax from the Boise Sheriff’s Department.
Patterson and Wilson followed.
“It’s all here,” Wolf said, flipping to another page. “The family disappeared from Idaho twenty-five years ago, right after a similar killing happened. Near decapitation. Mutilation. It was a murder in McCall, Idaho. A neighbor of the Kiplings. A teenaged boy found murdered in the woods near his boat shed. Stabbed nineteen times, head almost severed clean off, a slice from the pubic bone to the ribs.”
Wolf dropped a page with four photographs of the gruesome killing printed on it and turned to the next sheet. “Here are their real names: Parker Grey was actually named Dustin Kipling. The twins are Hannah and Rachel. The mother is the same name: Katherine.”
“That’s why the Grey’s past never checked out with the Tennessee commune,” Wilson said.
/> Wolf paced in a circle, reading farther down the page. “Dustin Kipling used to own a chain of boat dealerships in Idaho. Kipling Boats was the largest statewide seller and buyer of watercraft and fishing boats, with four dealerships. Says here he sold every dealership in the span of a single day for pennies on the dollar to a casino owner in Wendover, Nevada, named Gabriel Sithro. In the middle of the night of that same day, their house in McCall, Idaho burnt to the ground, and the family went missing. Suspected arson. No bodies were found in the fire, and the family cars were in the garage … and then the family was never heard from again.”
Patterson leaned against the wall with wide eyes. “So they were fleeing … trying to disappear, because of their murdered neighbor?”
Wolf held up another sheet and ran his eyes down the entire length of it.
Patterson’s curiosity boiled over. “What?”
“Looks like a family friend, a psychiatrist, came into the Boise station after the Kiplings disappeared. He had recently prescribed anti-psychotics for Dustin. Knowing that, Idaho law enforcement has assumed all along that Dustin murdered the neighbor, but the Kiplings whereabouts stumped them.”
Patterson frowned. “That was the same story Kimber and her mother told about Parker Grey. He was psychotic and needed meds.”
Wolf perused the next page. “Here’s a statement from a school psychologist taken a few months after the Kiplings disappeared. She reported two incidents involving Hannah Kipling at Duck Mountain Middle School. First, Hannah received minor injuries while fighting a boy. Hannah said she was just sticking up for her sister, Rachel. A few months later …”
“What?” Patterson asked.
Wolf shook the sheets of paper. “Hannah retaliated against that same boy, beating him with a baseball bat until he was unconscious. The kid was hospitalized with a fractured skull, broken ribs, and a broken arm, and she was expelled from school.”
“Wow,” Wilson said. “A middle-schooler taking a bat to someone?”
