“I’ve got something to show you,” he said as Sue emerged from the interior. After showing her the mark in the door and the indentation in the ground, he walked her behind the sauna. “Can you pull any prints off that?”
Sue inspected the rod carefully. “Pitted, rusty surface like this, I don’t think so.”
“Okay, then help me. Let’s see if this fits.”
They carried the heavy rod to the front of the sauna, sliding the shaft under the crosspiece on the door and bracing it against the boulder in the ground. “Perfect fit. Now let’s see if it would have prevented Moarse from pushing his way out.” Ray pulled the brace away from the door. “Go in and see if you can move the door. I’ll tell you when to start pushing.”
“No way,” said Sue, a minute later, emerging from the building. “I couldn’t budge it.”
“This sort of changes things,” observed Ray. He kicked at the rod. “Do you think that little redhead could carry this?”
“What does it weigh?”
“Rough guess, 120, 130 pounds. Could you carry it? I suspect you’re much more fit than….”
Sue squatted, wrapped her hands around the metal, and lifted it a foot. “With difficulty,” she admitted. “It would have been hard for me to move it here and get it in place. Getting it back would have been even harder. We’re looking at a homicide rather than an accidental death, aren’t we? And that 911 call suggests….”
“I’m not ready to even speculate on that yet,” said Ray. He turned around and glanced around at the house, the garage, their own two vehicles. “So now this whole place is a crime scene. Do you want to start in the house or the garage?”
“The house,” answered Sue quickly. “I’ll be able to see what’s changed since the last time I was in there.”
An hour later they emerged, Sue holding the door as Ray gingerly carried a Macintosh computer in gloved hands. Sue, holding the keyboard and mouse in a clear plastic bag, opened the back of her Jeep and made room for the machine and its appliances between the cases containing her investigative equipment.
“That’s an unexpected find,” said Ray.
“He didn’t have the computer more than a few weeks, but it was already starting to disappear in the clutter. Any open space in that dump of a house would be like a vacuum. Looks like he made room on that table to look at the contents of the hard drive, then didn’t use it again. I shudder to think how long a thorough search of that place will take.”
“Let’s look in the garage. Then we’ll go back to the office and develop a plan for the next steps.”
Sue followed him along the gravel drive, weeds encroaching on the uneven surface. Struggling a bit with the heavy garage door on an overhead track, Ray pushed it open.
“Plates are three years out of date,” said Sue, slipping sideways through the debris.
“Why bother keeping up to date if you don’t have an operator’s permit?”
“There’s that. Too bad the people who write the laws are clueless about the folks that break them.” She bent and looked at the right rear tire. “I bet these bald Eagles match my plaster casts.” She paused for a moment. “One more thing to process. We’ve got the computer and the probable vehicle. Too bad we’re a day late and a perp short.”
“Great wit for someone who’s sleep deprived. Now if you could only tell me about the phantom cell?”
“I think we’re just looking at the top of the proverbial iceberg. This case gets more and more complicated.”
“I wonder if you can find any residue of burned skin on that sauna stove?”
“I don’t know how to do that,” Sue said thoughtfully. “I’ll need to make some phone calls and send some emails.”
40
Ray read Sally Rood the boilerplate from a laminated card. Then he identified himself and Rood, and gave the date, time, and location of the interview. He glanced up at one of the two ceiling cameras as he finished, then settled his gaze on Rood.
“Thank you for coming in,” he said.
“Like I had a choice,” she responded. “So there’s this cop at my hotel room at seven in the morning. I’m sure my new boyfriend is sitting there now, wondering what kind of woman he got mixed up with.”
Rood’s face was flushed, her body tense. To Ray, she smelled of soap and shampoo, cigarettes and coffee.
“The SOB wasn’t even going to give me a chance to shower.” She crossed her arms fiercely over her chest. “What’s this all about anyway? Is Jim claiming I stole something on my way out? Your deputy was with me the whole time.” She made a face. “That asshole doesn’t have anything worth taking, and if he did, fat chance you could find it in that dump.”
“Jim Moarse was found dead in his sauna this morning.” Ray let the words sink in.
Rood stared blankly, her defensive stance drooping. She clenched her arms again. “Jim and that damn sauna,” she sneered. “When he was really drunk, he liked to climb in there, said the heat was ‘purifying,’ that he never had a hangover the next day.” She laughed, but her fingers were making white marks on her arms. “He liked to drag me in there with him, but he couldn’t keep his hands off me. I don’t like being pawed. It was one of the things we argued about, one of the many things.” She relaxed slightly and lifted her chin. “So I’m sorry he’s dead, but what does it have to do with me?”
Ray slid his notebook into a more central position. “I need some general information,” he said. “Where were you last night?”
“I sure as hell wasn’t with him, if that’s what you’re asking. You followed me down 22 almost to town yesterday. And that’s where I was. I didn’t come back up here to God’s country.”
“What were you doing?”
“I was hanging out with a friend.”
“Where?”
“In town.”
“Doing what?”
“What people do when they hang out.” She lifted her hair off her neck with one manicured hand and laughed at him.
Ray kept his gaze steady. “Can you be a bit more specific?”
“Like are you trying to establish if I have an alibi? Is that it? Okay, I’ll play the game. I met someone in town. We had lunch, walked around. We got a room at the Park Place, had dinner there, and late in the evening we had drinks in the bar up at the top. Get a copy of my hotel bill; it’s all there. And the city cop that was pounding on the door of our room before dawn will tell you…I guess he figured out that I was there because my car was in the parking lot.”
“The room was registered in your name?”
“Yeah, my name, credit card, my plate number.”
“Does your friend have a name?”
“I don’t want him involved. Like, he’s getting a divorce, and him being with me would just make things worse.”
“That shouldn’t happen. His name is?”
Rood narrowed her eyes, staring him down. “Okay, it’s Dan Ellis. He’s a lawyer from downstate. Wyandotte.”
“After you left Moarse, did you go back there again?”
“No.”
“Did you contact him again by phone, text, e-mail?”
“No.”
“Tell me more about your relationship with Moarse?”
Rood crossed her legs, opened her purse, and closed it again. “God, I wish you could smoke in here. Anyway, there’s not much to tell. I met Jim the summer I was waitressing. He was sort of a fun guy and a big tipper. In the fall I was looking for a new place to stay. I’d been sharing an apartment with three other girls, and that wasn’t going so well. Jim offered me a room, no strings attached.” She uncrossed her legs, re-crossed them. “I know what you’re thinking,” she said, looking directly at Ray. “At first things were okay, fun, but that didn’t last too long. I figured out pretty quick that he had money trouble and was going down fast. Of course, the worse things got, the more he drank.”
“What was his occupation?”
Rood snorted. “Like half the men I’ve met up here, he said he was a
builder.” She shrugged. “And I guess that was true, or at least it had been once. Jim talked about this formula he had. He’d buy lots cheap at tax sales and build inexpensive homes—bi-levels, half story down and a half story up. He told me that he and his crew, a couple of guys, could throw one of those together in a few weeks, and he cleared about 20 grand on each building. Then, boo hoo, the housing market fell apart, and his bank cut off his credit line. By the time I moved in, he was running out of money. And all the so-called friends he’d screwed along the way wanted their money. They were pissed. People were always coming by, calling, sending letters.”
“Did he ever mention Al Capone or buried treasure?”
“Are you kidding?” She laughed. “Pretty funny. He could have used a little buried treasure. He was desperate.”
“Can you give me any names of friends?”
“Who knows? Like I said, what friends he might of had were super pissed. The two of us ended up completely isolated out there. He didn’t have money to take me anyplace, and he refused to drive that stupid old Jeep of his anywhere—except in the middle of the night. That’s a lot of fun. He acted like I was his chauffeur or something.”
“So there were no other friends?”
“Not really. Well, there was one guy that came on the scene about the time I was thinking of leaving, a Ricky something, an old friend from somewhere. Jim was pretty excited to hook up with him again, said the guy was rich and knew all the angles.”
“Can you tell me about this man?”
“Not really. I only saw him, let me think, twice. The first time he arrived with a lot of food and booze. The food came from some good place in TC, not your usual carryout. The two of them got pretty smashed, and then went off to take a sauna. Jim wanted me to join them, but I wasn’t going to have any of that.”
“And the second time?”
“Pretty much like the first, but at some point, Jim told me to get lost for a while. They had to talk business. I did, I went to the movies. The guy was gone when I got back. Jim said they were working on some big deal, that things were going to get better.”
“Did he give you any details?”
“No, and by that time I just couldn’t stand him anymore. I didn’t care. He might have been up that minute, but he’d be down the next. Since I’d moved in, he was more and more depressed. I’ve heard stories, but I’ve never seen someone so determined to drink themselves to death before.”
“So you lived with him from…?”
“Sometime in October till the second or third week of February.”
“Can you describe this Ricky fellow?”
“About your height and size, early 40s. He seemed pretty fit, especially compared to Jim. Wore those nylon running suits like ghetto kids. Used too much perfume. Something sort of foreign about him. But it wasn’t how he talked. You know, just something different. Not from here. He gave me the creeps.” She crossed her arms again over her chest and took a deep breath. “A woman knows a lot about a man by the way he looks at her,” she said. “That’s one of the first things you learn waitressing. Ricky looked me over like a piece of meat, something he’d use and toss away like an empty cigarette pack. I’m sure if we had ever been alone together, he would of hit on me instantly.”
“What kind of vehicle did Ricky drive?”
“Something big, expensive.”
“Color, make, model?”
“I don’t know. I only saw it at night and not even close. I think it was light colored, maybe gray or silver, a Mercedes or Cadillac, an SUV.”
“Do you remember anything about a plate number or state?”
“Are you kidding?”
“And you’re sure you don’t have a last name?”
“I’m pretty sure he never used it.”
Ray took some time scanning the notes he’d made. Rood sat perfectly still for the first time during the interview. “I think that’s it for now,” he said, finally. “But I want your cell number in case I need to talk with you again. And here’s my card. Please call if you remember anything that you think might be helpful. Are you planning to stay in the area?”
“Yeah, I am as a matter of fact. I’ve got a job lined up at the casino. Start next weekend.” Her tone softened, “I’m sorry for Jim,” she said. “Really. As men go, he wasn’t a bad sort. I just caught him crashing and burning. And I needed to get away. I didn’t sign on to be part of the wreckage.”
41
Mackenzie ran her hands back, fingers spread, through her hair. She was Skyping with Ken Lee again, but she’d just woken up and the home video feed was a useful mirror.
“I’ve got your tracks on screen,” Ken Lee was saying, “and I’ve just imposed Sabotny’s over yours.”
“Anything interesting?” she yawned, stretching her arms and slowly rolling her head from side to side.
“You okay? I thought you were up and at it hours ago.”
“I fell back to sleep. Now I feel worse for the wear. What do you have?”
“Lots of stuff. First Sabotny. He was in town earlier in the evening. Looks like he had dinner at Outback, yet again. I’ve noticed that ex-military types think that’s the epitome of….”
“You’re ex-military. You wouldn’t go near any chain restaurant, especially that one,” she chided.
“Got close to dying too many times. Now I make sure every meal is worth eating just in case it’s my last. As I was saying, his vehicle was there for about an hour and a half, and then he stopped at that grocery complex on U.S. 31 for 20 minutes before heading back up 22. He was home for 15 minutes before going out to Moarse’s place. Looking at your track and timeline, you’d been in place quite awhile by then.”
“Yep, I was starting to go crazy. I’m not designed for surveillance work.”
“Your track is more interesting than Sabotny’s. All I can see is his vehicle’s movements. Your movements I can tie to Google Earth and know your exact location, even when you’re walking.”
“What’s so interesting about it?”
“I’m just getting to that. Eventually Sabotny leaves the Moarse place, and you plant the phantom cell. Then you hustle out of there, return to your car, drive around for a bit, then roll by again. Sabotny did sort of the same thing, only he headed south, then came back north. Then he does this really curious thing. He heads west and drives all over hell’s half acre before finally going back down to Traverse and home. You two probably passed in the process.”
“I did see a car or two. Not much moving up here at that time of night. What do you think he was up to?”
“Here’s me speculating. Sabotny does the deed on Moarse, goes off, then comes back to check on something, like to make sure the dude is stone dead. But surprise, the cops are there. Quick switch to panic mode. He’s wondering how the heat got there so fast. So he does a run, paranoid as hell, thinking maybe he’s being followed.”
“Yeah, okay, that’s good,” said Mackenzie. “I’d like the SOB to feel some of the terror he inflicted on my brother.”
“The downside is I don’t have his GPS signal anymore. The unit failed or he found it. My bet is that he found it. He doesn’t just ‘think,’ he ‘knows’ he’s being watched. I’ve told you before, baby, this guy is bad. He’s a killer, a psychopath. And now he’s feeling like a trapped animal. He isn’t going to feel safe until he finds and eliminates whoever’s after him. He’s going to take out anyone that looks like a threat.”
“I hear you Ken Lee. But what can he know? He doesn’t know anything about me,” asked Mackenzie.
“And that’s where we should leave things. It’s time to pull the plug, time to get out, time to find an exit strategy, and get your pretty ass out before things go totally to shit.”
“I don’t agree. He can’t possibly know I’m after him.”
“Do you know that for sure? One hundred percent for sure? No. And the other thing you don’t know is crazy. I mean, really crazy, smart crazy. You don’t know these people. That dud
e is totally wired and he’s going to use all his resources to eliminate the threat. If you found him, he can find you.”
“All right. I’ll think about it. So why did he kill Moarse?” she asked, trying to change the direction.
“Moarse was a liability. Whatever Sabotny needed from him was over. And it would have been a perfect murder. Drunk dies in sauna, someone finds the putrid body days later. Just another dumbshit, accidental death. But things don’t go down like planned. And now he’s on the hunt. Mackenzie, we need to get you out of there. Let’s bring in some pros, see if we can get enough on the dude to take to the police.”
“I want that SOB to rot in jail for the rest of his life, Ken Lee. I want him to be caged up with the other human garbage, wherever they put them in this state, Jackson, Marquette….”
“Good. Go to the cops. Tell them what you know. There might be enough to nail him.”
“Would they believe me? Do they have enough evidence to build a case, or did they screw up the scene? What if the sheriff is an old friend of Sabotny’s—and I’ve blown my cover?”
“Yeah, yeah. Lots of problems” Ken Lee admitted. “And the prosecutor might have gotten his degree online. Sabotny is going to have the best lawyers money can buy. But still….”
“You know what, Ken Lee, I like the fact that he’s crazy. I want to turn up the heat.”
“No, Mackenzie. We need to get you out of there.”
“I’ll say it again: how’s he going to find me?”
“Okay, okay. Give me a minute. I got it. When he looked up his old buddies, he was wondering about you. What happened to that skinny little girl, he says to himself? You’ve made yourself hard to trace, but he’s been trying. And don’t think you haven’t been noticed around there. That’s too small of a place. It’s not like Manhattan or L.A. You’ve got to come home, baby. We’ll come up with another strategy.”
“What’s all this ‘baby’ crap?” asked Mackenzie. “You’ve never used that term before, but it’s been creeping into our conversations lately. I’m not your baby. I’m not anyone’s baby. I’m a woman. And I’m not leaving until this is over.”
Cruelest Month Page 21
