by L. T. Vargus
The message ended abruptly, with no goodbye, and Darger stared at the phone for some time after she’d disconnected. There was something about the woman and the cabin and Dustin Reynolds that felt important. She’d never lost the sense that Dustin Reynolds in particular was the key to finding the missing piece.
Darger had an urge to go up to the cabin while Kathryn was there. Who knew what she might remember visiting the scene in person? More than that, she might be more open, more willing to talk. Not that she’d seemed evasive before, but Kathryn Porter was not what Darger would call a particularly open or accessible personality. Being there at the cabin where she’d spent time with her ex-husband and where he’d ultimately met his demise might put the woman in a more expressive mood. Nostalgia had a way of getting people to talk, to open up. To make connections in their mind they maybe hadn’t realized before.
But Darger’s car was in Sandy, and she felt guilty asking Fowles to drive her all the way back. Maybe she could borrow his car. She was still staring down at the phone in her hand when Fowles walked out of the bedroom.
“You look like you’re scheming.”
“Kathryn Porter just called me. She’s going up to the cabin to look around.”
The space between his eyebrows crinkled up.
“The Reynolds cabin? It’s almost full dark out. That’s kind of odd, isn’t it?”
“Well, she’s kind of odd, so…” Darger waved her hand in the air. “Anyway, I think maybe I should go up there and try to talk to her again. I still think that Dustin Reynolds is important in all of this, somehow. And Kathryn Porter is probably the person who can tell us what we need to know. It’s just a matter of getting her talking again.”
“Let’s go then.”
“Really? You’re not totally beat after today? I feel guilty asking you to get back in the car and drive me back out there.”
“Of course I’m tired,” Fowles said. “And I’ll expect a full body massage when we get back. But this sounds important.”
Darger smirked.
“A full body massage?”
“I expect certain parts will need more attention than others.”
Darger snorted as she grabbed her jacket.
Then Fowles did a double take as he saw her laughing and pursed his lips.
“Oh, it’d be just like you to try to turn that into something dirty,” he said. “I’ll have you know that I was talking about my penis.”
Chapter 53
For the hundredth time, Darger ran through what they knew, trying to line things up in a way that allowed her to see the big picture. Nineteen years ago Christy Whitmore died in a bathtub. Her mother was convinced Dustin Reynolds was the killer, though no evidence was found to that effect.
Now Dustin had joined Christy and five others in death. So he wasn’t the killer, but he was tangled up in all of it somehow.
A dark thought flitted across Darger’s mind. Something Kathryn had said about Dustin feeling guilty after Christy’s death. And responsible. Could Dustin have known who killed Christy all those years ago?
It wasn’t until they turned on the isolated road that led to the cabin that an even darker idea struck her.
“Holy shit,” she said out loud, feeling a chill run over her skin as the full weight of it settled over her.
“What is it?”
“What if Dustin Reynolds knew the killer? Or even if he didn’t know who, maybe he knew something. Something big enough that it scared the killer into thinking he needed to be permanently shut up.”
There was just enough bluish light from the dashboard that Darger could see Fowles’ eyebrows go up.
“That would be a pretty convincing motive.”
“Well,” Darger continued, “Kathryn Porter is his ex-wife. What if Dustin told her something? The killer only has to wonder or worry that she might know something to put her on his radar. To put her in danger.”
“Wouldn’t the same go for Jennifer Strickley, as well?”
Darger’s stomach shrank in on itself at this thought, felt it quiver there in her abdomen like a trembling ball of muscle.
“Yes. Jesus. I need to call Furbush,” she said.
She pulled her phone from her pocket.
“The service is shit out here,” Darger complained.
“I think it gets better near the cabin.”
Shoving the phone back into her pocket, she resisted the urge to nag at Fowles to drive faster. It was dark, and they’d already seen two deer near the shoulder. The last thing they needed was to swerve around an animal and go careening off one of the steep cliff edges.
She just had to hope that her new theory was wrong. Or that they weren’t already too late.
“We might have made a very big mistake,” Darger said.
They arrived at the cabin minutes later. Kathryn Porter’s vehicle was parked next to the rotting fallen tree — one of those smaller model pickups, purple and downright dainty — but Kathryn herself was nowhere to be seen. The cabin lights were dark.
Darger’s hands instinctively grasped for her gun.
“I don’t like this.”
Fowles opened the console between the seats and pulled out the lockbox where he kept his weapon.
“That’s a bad idea,” she said. “You should stay here and see if you can get Sandy PD on the phone.”
“Forget it,” Fowles said, removing the pistol from the case and checking the magazine. “I’m not letting you walk in there without someone watching your back.”
Darger eased herself out of the car and closed the door as quietly as she could. Her pulse whooshed in her ears as she padded toward to the cabin. She could hear Fowles a few feet behind her, legs swooshing through the overgrown grass.
She paused just before stepping onto the porch, remembering how creaky the old boards were.
Her eyes had mostly adjusted to the dark now. The cabin squatted there in the blackness, and Darger squinted at the hedges and the property beyond. No movement inside or out. Aside from the gentle rustle of the trees overhead and the chirping of the night insects, everything was still and quiet.
She wondered if Fowles could identify the bugs based solely on sound, but it was a question for a less tense moment.
Darger lifted her leg and stepped up onto the porch. The sole of her boot had barely touched down when a light inside snapped on. She flinched against the glow and crouched down reflexively, not wanting to be seen.
A rattling sound told her the front door was about to be opened. She snatched Fowles’ sleeve and pulled him roughly to the side and out of the light.
As the door peeled open, Darger held her breath and stared into the cabin. In the backlit door frame, a silhouette took shape.
“Who’s out there?”
Darger recognized the shape and the voice. She stood up, holding her gun to her side and pointed down.
“Kathryn?”
“Oh, thank God, it’s you!” Her hand fluttered about her neck and chest nervously. “Hurry, come inside!”
Darger took a step closer to the door, and Kathryn scrambled backward suddenly.
“Stop! Who is that with you?” Kathryn asked, holding something out in front of her like a shield.
Looking closer, Darger saw it was a cast iron skillet. She put a hand on Fowles’ shoulder, a gesture that said, It’s OK, he’s one of us.
“This is Ted Fowles. He’s working the case with me.”
This eased the woman’s fear enough that she lowered the protective frying pan.
“Kathryn, what’s going on?”
“I wasn’t sure you got my message. I guess I’m lucky you did.”
As soon as they were inside, she hastily shut the door behind them and locked it.
“I thought I was being silly. Seeing things.”
“Seeing what?”
“There were headlights behind me the whole drive up here. And it’s such an isolated road, I started thinking I was being followed or something. Only, I knew that was
crazy. So then I told myself, ‘Kat, you are being a silly goose! There is no one following you. When you turn off into the driveway for the cabin, they are just going to keep on driving.’”
“And?” Darger asked.
“And that’s exactly what happened!”
A funny smile quivered on her lips as she continued her story.
“So I got out of the car, and I started looking around, peeking in the windows, just like I said. I swear, I never planned on coming inside, Miss Darger. I know it’s a crime scene, and that I shouldn’t be messing with anything and all that. But then I saw him.”
Darger felt a prickle spread over her scalp and down her neck.
“Who did you see?”
“A man! He was creeping around out by that old shed in back. He must have driven on down the road a ways and then snuck over here on foot. I panicked when I saw him, and then I remembered there used to be a spare key for the cabin hidden on the window frame to the right of the front door. And would you believe it? It was still there! I’ll tell you, I’ve never unlocked a door so fast in my life. Once I was inside, I got down behind the couch, and I hid. I don’t know for how long, but it felt like hours. When I heard your car pulling into the drive, I thought, I don’t know who that is, but I hope they’ll help me.”
“Do you think he’s still outside?”
Kathryn brought a trembling hand to her mouth and spoke through her fingers.
“I thought I heard something around the back end of the cabin just before you pulled up. A soft crack, like someone stepped on a twig.”
Darger spotted a flashlight lying on a side table near the couch. She reached for it, tested that it worked, and held it in her non-shooting hand.
“I’m going to take a look around,” she said, heading for the door. “Stay here.”
Kathryn hugged her arms around herself.
“You’re leaving me?” Her voice was like an over-tightened violin string, high and tense.
Darger glanced at Fowles, who had followed her to the front of the cabin. He gave a wordless nod.
“Fowles will stay with you until I get back,” Darger said to the woman, then turned to address Fowles. “See if you can get ahold of Sandy PD from in here. If you can’t get a signal, don’t leave the cabin. We’ll figure out what to do next when I get back.”
“Be careful,” he whispered as she slipped through the door and into the darkness beyond.
Chapter 54
Darger waited for her eyes to adjust to the darkness, and then she crept around the side of the cabin, keeping to the shadows. She moved slowly and quietly, eyes scanning the trees for movement.
She wasn’t sure what to make of Kathryn’s story. The woman was so skittish, so twitchy, it was hard not to wonder if maybe she’d gotten out here — in this isolated place, alone in the dark — and freaked herself out. Let her imagination get the better of her.
She didn’t doubt that Kathryn had seen something in the forest. There were deer, cougars, bears, even wolves out here. Plenty of things that could snap a twig underfoot or rustle through some dry leaves. Darger felt a little spooked herself as she navigated the inky landscape, everything black, blacker, blackest. The sky, the ground, the foliage. Her eyes only made the barest distinction between the shades of darkness.
She felt vulnerable as she wove between the trees. Visible, even with the flashlight off. Like someone was watching. Because there was a serial killer out there somewhere. Maybe he was in these woods right now, maybe not. But the thought was a hard one to shake.
Tightening her grip on her gun, she brushed these feelings off and kept moving.
Finally, she reached the shed. It was a rickety-looking wooden structure with an old metal roof streaked with rust, so worn it looked like it would tumble down with one good huff-and-puff by the Big Bad Wolf.
She flattened herself against the wood siding, careful not to put her weight on it, lest she knock the whole thing over.
Air whispered in and out of her lungs as she side-stepped around the perimeter.
Nobody outside.
She sidled back around to the front, felt around for the handle on the door. It felt cold and rough in her hand.
As smoothly and quickly as possible, she wrenched the door open, flicked on the flashlight, and swept the interior, gun drawn. The walls inside were lined with ancient-looking tools and equipment. Everything was covered in a generous layer of dust.
She hesitated to step through the door, not quite able to shake the idea of someone slamming it shut behind her as soon as she passed over the threshold. The beam of the flashlight highlighted a snarl of cobwebs in one corner.
She took one shaky step through the doors. It smelled like cedar and earth with a hint of motor oil.
Crack!
Darger whirled around, expecting to see nothing but the blackness of the closed door, but no. The door still stood open. No one was there.
Crack!
The sound came again.
And then her ears and her mind finally started communicating properly. She realized what she’d heard when the noise repeated itself.
Two gunshots.
And they had come from the cabin.
Chapter 55
Darger closed on the cabin in slow motion, legs numb beneath her but somehow propelling her forward anyway, gun raised at her side.
The skin on her scalp crawled, little pinpricks everywhere beneath her hair. She resisted the urge to scratch it.
Gravity seemed to flee her in this moment, release her from its grip, make her lighter and lighter. Her head fluttered inside, so tingly that she bordered on an out-of-body experience.
She crossed the dirt driveway now, a few loose stones underfoot wobbling her ankles but not slowing her.
And her eyes remained locked on the front door, fastened to the rectangular slab of wood in such a way that it seemed to be bobbing along with her steps, not ever really getting closer. Just a thing that hovered along with her like watching the moon out of a car window. Along for the ride.
It didn’t seem like she’d ever get there, but she did.
She climbed the stairs, took them in two bounds, the wood of the porch sagging a little under her choppy steps.
And she hesitated for just a beat at the doorway, at the threshold. Swallowed hard. Whispering little nonsense syllables to try to psych herself up.
It occurred to her that part of her expected to find the cabin empty. The other half expected something worse. Much worse.
She called out, her voice wavering but somehow still assertive, still confident.
“Fowles?”
It took her a second for her panicked brain to cough up the girl’s name.
“Kathryn?”
No answer to either of these.
Shit.
Her heart hammered so hard she could feel her ribs quaking with each beat, all those muscles stitching up the walls of her chest being stretched like rubber bands.
She adjusted the grip on her gun, wishing more than anything that someone would answer. Anyone. But no.
Still, better to announce herself, avoid the threat of friendly fire. She swallowed again before she spoke, felt a strange sticky feeling in her throat that made her worry a second that she wouldn’t be able to get the words out.
“Alright. I’m coming in.”
Her voice sounded smaller this time, some of that confidence having leaked out in the past few seconds.
And life snapped into slow motion as she peeled open the screen door and prepared to cross through.
Lifting her gun. Holding her breath. The screen door leaning against her right shoulder.
Hand moving to the knob. Throwing aside the storm door and easing through the opening.
The gun pointed the way, its muzzle scanning across the cabin’s interior along with her field of vision. She took in the cabin’s interior slowly, ready to shoot or duck or dive at the slightest movement.
Nothing there. No one.
&nbs
p; At first she thought her panicked premonition had been right. They were gone, somehow. Just an empty cabin. But when she wheeled the full 90 degrees to her left she saw it.
A body lay on the floor — a man — sprawling just where the oak plank flooring of the living space gave way to the kitchen’s linoleum, a faux tile the color of brick. Her eyes snapped to the shiver of movement along the trunk of the body. A wetness.
Bleeding. The abdomen opened up. A red puddle spreading outward from the wounded place. Gushing out like water from a spring.
The words thrust themselves into Darger’s head as if from nowhere: Bleeding out.
Her eyes lingered on that tattered bit of exposed flesh, red sludge and pale belly skin poking out from the blood-stained splotch in the white dress shirt.
And for a second this body looked foreign. Alien. Some stranger who burst in and was now dying on the kitchen floor. Some unlucky fool in the wrong place at the wrong time.
But no. The figure was not foreign.
It was Fowles.
Chapter 56
A breath hiccupped in Darger’s throat, a stuttering click of air stopping and starting and wheezing. The panic swelled, grabbed her by the scruff of the neck and squeezed, froze her every muscle, but just for a second.
Then she went to work.
She stormed down the hall pistol-first, clearing the bathroom and hall closet before moving to the bunks. She needed to make sure the cabin was secure before she tended to Fowles. Needed to be quick about it, too.
Peeking through the final doorway, she spotted something in the corner she’d have to deal with — the tiniest shivering thing. Making sure there were no lingering threats came first, though.
She plunged through the doorway, flicking the gun to the left and then the right. Nothing.
Lowered herself to peer under each set of bunk beds. Kicked at the clothes hanging in the closet. Swiveled her shoulders to check the entirety of the space. Empty, all of them.
