Beech Mountain Breeze

by Ed Robinson

  We soon learned that Angelina was out chasing down leads. I asked the dispatcher to let her know that Breeze and Brody would like to meet with her. I put a little extra emphasis on “and Brody.” Angelina radioed back that she was on Beech Mountain. We said that we’d meet her at the police station up there. Brody reminded me for the fourteenth time how much easier life would be with a cellphone. She was obviously correct, but I hated the things. I had a not so irrational fear of loss of privacy, and I didn’t want to be tracked. I didn’t want law enforcement, the government, or Google, to know where I was and what I was doing every second of the day.

  I grew up and entered the workforce in the ancient times before smartphones. How did we ever survive? We had no internet. We had no home computers. We all lived in caves apparently. We’d tried owning all the devices once. Our troubles with the law were over. Neither of us was wanted by the FBI. Brody fell right back into her old habits, always connected, always showing how awesomely useful these devices could be. It almost cost me my life. Bad actors tracked us, or at least our internet searches. They ambushed us at a place we would never expect to be found.

  A giant of a man broke my body in multiple ways before Brody shot him. As soon as we figured out how we’d been found, we ditched the devices. I didn’t wish to rejoin the modern fascination with being connected. Brody understood that, but she’d be much more immersed in that than I was. I’d never signed up in the first place. It was easier for me to go without.

  Angelina was waiting for us inside the Chief’s office. She stood to greet us both with a pleasant smile.

  “Let’s keep this professional, shall we,” Brody said.

  “Of course,” Angelina replied. “What can I do for you?”

  “We’re rethinking the crime scene,” I said. “Or the lack of one. We think the Chief may have jiggered with our search list to protect himself, or his son.”

  “What was the basis for that list anyway?” Angelina asked.

  “Originally, the hermit was a suspect,” I said. “We ruled out the homes that we knew he’d entered. He never struck the same place twice.”

  “For starters, he’s no longer a suspect based on what you’ve told us,” she said. “Second, there are a thousand houses up here that haven’t been broken into. I’m not sure why or how we’d want to tackle that.”

  “We’ve got three intelligent people here,” Brody said. “Where was the girl killed? How do we find it so we can collect some hard evidence?”

  A silence fell over the room. We all sat in contemplation, rethinking everything we’d previously thought about the case. This went on for ten minutes or more. The silence grew eerie. I spoke more to end it than to add to the investigation.

  “We know she was at the Beech Mountain Ski Resort,” I said. “We know the son was at the house Brody and I found. Maybe it happened somewhere in between, but maybe not. The father was the one seen dumping the body. Let’s try to make some sense of this.”

  “We can’t place the girl with the son at the ski lodge,” Angelina said. “If she left alone, anything could have happened.”

  “Where was the Chief?” Brody asked.

  “Here in this very office,” Angelina answered. “According to him.”

  “Where do they live?” I asked.

  “Here on the mountain,” she said. “We’ve been to their house, but not with a full forensics team.”

  “How hard did you look?” Brody asked.

  “I wasn’t a part of that effort,” Angelina said. “They live on the Watauga County side.”

  “Highway Patrol wasn’t involved either?” I asked.

  “Unfortunately, no,” she said. “None of us have an abundance of resources.”

  “Consider Brody and I as additional resources,” I said. “Get us permission to crawl all over that place.”

  “Do you know how hard it is to reopen a warrant after the fact?” Angelina asked. “The judge will say he already gave us permission once.”

  “He gave the Watauga County Sheriff’s Department permission,” Brody said. “We go somewhere else. Get a warrant for Highway Patrol.”

  “Same judge,” Angelina said. “We could try Avery County, but they’ll question the jurisdiction.”

  “Someone left this investigation to you,” Brody said. “At least the Beech Mountain portion of it. Tell them you’re following the trail and you need to get on that property and into that house.”

  “It’s worth a shot,” she said. “Watauga County won’t like it. It will make them look bad.”

  “That can’t be our concern,” Brody said. “We’re trying to solve a murder.”

  “I’ll bother a judge in the morning,” Angelina said. “What else are we missing?”

  I got up and went to the big map on the wall. I removed all the pins that we’d placed previously. I put one red pin in the center of the ski village. I put another at the park beside Buckeye Lake.

  “What’s the Chief’s address?” I asked.

  Angelina used her phone to pull it up. She came over and stuck a pin on the Chief’s property.

  “Somewhere within this triangle, or damn close to it, the girl was killed,” I said.

  “We can’t walk the whole area looking for blood spatter,” Angelina said.

  “It’s a start,” I said. “A thought process. The ski resort, the Chief’s house, and the lake. What went down?”

  “The kid killed the girl,” Brody said. “He drove the body home to daddy. Dad disposes of it.”

  “That simple?” Angelina asked.

  “Think about it,” Brody said. “Your son shows up at your door with a body in the car. You’re the Chief of Police. No one is in a better position to protect their child. What do you do?”

  “I’d like to think I’d do the right thing by the law,” Angelina said. “But I see your point. That’s a tough call for a parent.”

  “How’s the house the kid was in come into play?” I asked.

  “The father takes him there to clean himself up,” Brody said. “Then sweeps the place clean. Figures we’ll never find it. No one will be the wiser.”

  “So he didn’t alter the list?” Angelina asked.

  “We’re wargaming right now,” Brody said. “Try to keep up. Feel free to jump in at any time.”

  “We did hit that house pretty well,” Angelina said. “We got the fingerprints and the beer can, but no signs of blood or hair.”

  “The body was never in that house,” Brody said. “It was in the car the whole time, at least until dad took it to the lake.”

  “He tells his son to clean up while he disposes of the body,” I suggested. “Comes back and picks him up afterward.”

  “The car was at that house, and also at the Chief’s house,” Angelina said. “We need to take a look at those driveways. Doubtful we could still recover anything lakeside. It’s been too long.”

  “We have to assume that the Chief will have a good understanding of how to best cover his tracks,” Brody said. “But blood is virtually impossible to make disappear completely. Modern techniques can find it, bleached or not.”

  “The car is the answer,” Angelina said. “We’ve got to find it.”

  “What are your leads?” I asked.

  “Slim,” she said. “He didn’t have many friends. No relatives in the area.”

  “Do you think his parents know where he is?” Brody asked.

  “Seems likely,” she said. “But we can’t touch the mother, and the Chief is mute. If he covered up a murder committed by his kid, why would he turn on him now?”

  “Will he go to jail in his place?” I asked. “That’s what it’s going to come down to.”

  “I don’t have an answer for that,” Angelina said. “It would be an interesting thing to research.”

  “We’ll leave that to you,” I said. “Or the prosecutor.”

  “Where’s this all leave us?” Brody asked. “What do we do now?”

  “I’ll try to get another warrant
for the Chief’s house,” Angelina said. “You’re welcome to comb the grounds of the ski resort. Maybe find some blood in the parking lot next to Subaru tracks. Miracles happen.”

  “About as likely as finding clues down at the lake at this point,” I said. “But that girl was killed somewhere. There is a crime scene.”

  “Let me know when you find it,” she said.

  Angelina’s phone rang. She indicated that it was Rominger as she put him on speaker.

  “Is Breeze there with you?” he asked.

  “Yes, both Breeze and Brody,” she answered. “We’re on Beech.”

  “We spoke with Tyler Scott’s daughter,” he said. “She’s desperate to get a message to her father.”

  “Go ahead,” Angelina said. “We can all hear you.”

  “She says for him to come home,” he said. “He’s welcome to take it all back.”

  “Nice family sentiment,” I said. “But I don’t think he cares about that stuff anymore.”

  “She needs him to know,” he said. “She didn’t know he was alive. She didn’t know what else to do.”

  “I’m working on getting some pictures of the Chief for the hermit to identify,” I said. “Once I have those, I’ll go talk to him.”

  “You could have asked me,” he said. “I’m sure we can come up with something. There’s always the internet.”

  “Breeze is internet phobic,” Brody said. “You should know that by now.”

  “A real throwback,” Rominger said. “I don’t know how you two do it.”

  “Like everyone did it for thousands of years,” I said. “It’s not so hard.”

  “We promised we’d get this message delivered,” he said. “Send it in smoke signals if you have to. Just tell him what she said.”

  “I’ll take care of it.”

  We’d run out of things to discuss for the time being, so Brody and I thanked Miss Will for her time and left Beech Mountain. Neither woman had chosen to be catty, which suited me just fine, but Brody was able to subtly insert her superiority over the other woman. I assumed that made her happy, but I’d learned long ago never to think you’ve figured women out. Most importantly, I’d come out of the confrontation unscathed. My hide was intact, and I still had Brody. I couldn’t ask for anything more, considering my behavior.

  Instead of heading down the mountain, I drove to the ski resort. I pulled into the upper parking lot, which was empty this time of year, at least during the day. It was a vast gravel area with no painted lines. Visitors parked every which way during the season. I stopped close to the village and turned off the car.

  “What are we going to do here?” Brody asked.

  “Look around,” I said. “Stumble onto the crime scene.”

  “Really?”

  “You never know,” I said. “Won’t hurt to walk the grounds.”

  “Where do we even start?”

  “The village is on this level,” I said. “There’s the brewery and the lodge. We can rule out the common areas where someone would see the murder. Look at the lights. Find a dark area out of sight from other visitors. I know the cameras didn’t catch them leaving together, but let’s say she was out here on her own. The kid finds her and comes onto her or whatever. It doesn’t go well, and he bonks her on the head. He’s got to get her into the car. It could have happened around here someplace.”

  “Big ass parking lot,” she said.

  “Which is now empty of cars,” I responded. “Dried blood or whatever.”

  “Ridiculous longshot,” she said. “Too much time has passed.”

  “I’m open to other options,” I said.

  “Let’s get looking.”

  Eighteen

  As soon as we got out of the car, I realized how ridiculous this idea was. It would take a week just to cover the parking lots. I tried to picture Zack dragging a body from the resort area out to his car. That didn’t happen. If the murder occurred at the resort, it had to be close to the parking lot, or in it. There were three lots, all equally large and daunting. We were at the highest level.

  “You want to split up?” I asked Brody. “We each take a lot and meet at the lower one.”

  “Okay,” she said. “But don’t waste a lot of time. Just cover ground and keep your eyes open.”

  “I’ll go down one level,” I said. “Meet you at the bottom.”

  As I walked downhill to the middle lot, I noticed a small strip of grass, trees, and shrubs separating the two levels. The open gravel areas had some minimal lighting, but this bit of vegetation did not. There was no need for the resort guests to walk there. I decided to start searching this natural barrier instead of the gravel. Again I tried to picture how the murder may have happened. If Zack’s car was near this strip, he could ambush her from the bushes and get her into the rear hatch without being seen.

  Why would he attack the girl? Was rape the motive? Maybe he hit her too hard. He wanted to assault her sexually but killed her in the process. What was the girl doing here alone? It was a good walk to her parent’s rental cabin, but not too far for a fit teenager. She’d stayed late at the lodge, maybe trying to make friends, sneak some booze, or hookup with a boy. She’d left on her own, only to be clobbered in the parking lot.

  This sort of thing simply didn’t happen on Beech Mountain. The girl and her parents would have thought it a perfectly safe thing to do. I’d never met the Chief’s son, so I had no way to form an opinion of him. I was also jumping to a bunch of conclusions. What I needed was evidence to back up our guesses. I kept looking until Brody came down from the upper lot.

  “I thought we were searching the gravel,” she said.

  “New plan,” I responded, explaining my reasoning to her.

  “Makes sense,” she said. “I’ll go start on the next level.”

  The growth between the lots consisted of waist-high bushes and some scraggly trees. It was not great cover for a full-grown man, but it would be dark at night. The girl had no reason to be wary of attackers. The scenario I’d created in my mind seemed plausible, so I continued to search. I was starting to think that the search was in vain, when Brody yelled from down the hill.

  She stood over a splotch of something. We couldn’t be sure it was blood. There wasn’t a lot of it, but there was a congealed black smear on the ground just at the edge of the lowest parking lot. We had no forensic tools to take a sample. The amount of time that had passed likely made collecting it useless in court, but it was what we were looking for.

  “We’ve got to get the cops to come take a sample of this,” Brody said. “If it matches the girl we’re on to something.”

  “Look here,” I said. “Squint your eyes and imagine her feet dragging towards the gravel.”

  “Could be,” she said. “Check nearby for more blood.”

  We didn’t even know if it was blood. Maybe someone puked up their booze on the way to their car, but we searched anyway. We found a drop here and a spot there of the same stain on the rocks close by. It was beginning to look like we’d found the scene of the crime. The Chief may have done a dandy job of covering up evidence to protect his son, but he hadn’t known about this. The dead girl was delivered to his house. At least that’s what we thought had happened. Sooner or later, all of the little pieces would come together.

  “Go tell Angelina Will to send a tech up here,” Brody said. “I’ll keep looking and keep an eye on the scene.”

  “You sure you want me to go by myself?” I asked. “I can wait while you go.”

  “Drop it, Breeze,” she said. “She gave it her best shot and failed. I told you I’m not worried about her. Should I be?”

  “No, you should not,” I said. “I’m a dumbass sometimes, but I’m not a complete moron.”

  “Don’t be so hard on yourself,” she said. “That girl is damn sexy. She’s younger than me and just as pretty as she can be. I understand, but you did the right thing. You didn’t break our bond. I’ve got to give you credit for that. You should give you
rself a little credit too.”

  “I’ve lost count of the number of reasons why I love you,” I said. “But there’s another one.”

  “This is serious,” she said. “Go get us a tech up here.”

  I left Brody standing guard over our mystery stains. There was no one to intrude, but she seemed determined to stay behind. I drove to the cop shop, half hoping that Angelina had left. She hadn’t. I went inside with no idea how she’d react or what she might have to say. She smiled when she saw me come in.

  “You made the right choice,” she said. “Brody is the woman for you. I’m relieved that she didn’t go off on me.”

  “I’m relieved that she didn’t go off on me,” I said. “I sort of confessed to our little encounter.”

  “What did she say?”

  “She took me to bed and fucked my brains out,” I told her.

  “Smart move,” she said. “She really loves you.”

  “Anyhoo,” I said. “We think we found some blood over at the resort. We need an evidence tech pronto.”

  “No shit?” she asked. “After all this time?”

  “Maybe,” I said. “We won’t know until we get it checked out.”

  “Stand by,” she said. “I’ll make the call.”

  I perused the big map on the wall while she was on the phone. The Beech Triangle stood out prominently, from the resort to the Chief’s house to the lake. The chain of events seemed clear. When Angelina hung up, I went over the possible series of events in order.

  “He whacks her here,” I said, pointing to the resort. “He drives her home to daddy. Daddy drives her to the lake. End of story.”

  “That’s all well and good,” she said. “But we can’t prove a single piece of it.”

  “Not yet,” I said. “It starts with the blood we just found. Get that car, and you’ve got another piece. The hermit ID’s the Chief dumping the body, and all three pins are covered. The Beech Mountain Triangle.”