Cold Lake (15 page)

“I’m telling you, you need to learn how to be more personable with these guys.”

Patterson stared out her window at the passing sagebrush, opting to remain silent through Rachette’s rambling.

“I saw the way you looked at Lancaster. He’s not such a bad guy, you know. Cracked a few good jokes when we were around the back of the house. I think he’s just quiet when he’s around MacLean.”

Patterson looked at Rachette with half-closed eyes. “Really? A good guy, huh?”

Rachette rolled his eyes and shook his head. “And the way you acted with MacLean?” They rode in silence as he swung his gaze between her and the road. “You gonna tell me what’s in that envelope, or what?”

Her pulse quickened again at the prospect of talking to Rachette about the bombshell that lay across her lap. For now, she just turned back to her window and looked outside.

“Seriously. What the hell is that?”

She closed her eyes and shook her head. “All right. Listen—”

Her cellphone trilled. With a silent scream of thanks she looked at the screen. “It’s Wolf. Hello? … Yeah?” She looked over at Rachette with raised eyebrows and then leaned toward the windshield. “Yeah, we just passed the gas station now … what?”

She leaned to look in the side view mirror and turned to Rachette. “Turn around!”

Rachette slammed on the brakes. “What?”

She hung up and pocketed the phone, letting the packet of pictures fall to the floorboard by her feet. “Wolf found Nick Pollard’s pickup truck.”

Wolf watched as Rachette’s SUV slowed and parked behind the other SCSD vehicle that Baine had been driving. Directly behind Rachette and Patterson was another SUV, unmarked and shiny white, looking government-issued. It slowed on the dirt road and stopped, and Lorber stepped out with Dr. Blank.

The four of them convened and scuttled their way down the final incline of the road toward him.

Wolf walked to meet them halfway. “Toyota pickup truck. Has the same dent in the back right panel.”

Lorber looked past him and whistled. “You found it. How the hell did you find it?”

Wolf retold the story about the Pumapetrol Gas station clerk’s mix-up between Highway 734 and County 74.

“So Parker Grey came up and picked up someone, and went up 734.” Lorber put his hands on his hips. “So how did you get here?”

Wolf started walking to the dripping pickup truck. With each step the skin on his thighs screamed in pain as it rubbed against his jeans, because his legs had rammed hard on the tailgate. And the tailgate, resting in this vat of noxious water a few feet below water line for twenty-two years, had rusted out to a dark orange, littered with sharp slits and holes in the metal.

“I checked the local map on my phone, north of the gas station, in the direction Parker Grey took off in his Chevy Blazer that night, presumably along with whomever made that call from the gas station pay phone, the same person who left Nick Pollard’s blood on the payphone.

“I got to thinking, Parker Grey pulled into the gas station, picked someone up, and went up 734. Why? We know he eventually went back up 74 to Cold Lake that night, so why did they go north?”

“The caller had Pollard’s body sitting up here,” Patterson said.

“And she walked her way down to the gas station.” Wolf nodded.

“Yeah, but why not drive Nick’s truck?” Rachette asked.

Wolf shrugged. “Who knows? Maybe the caller was real bloody, didn’t want to risk being pulled over in a truck? Or … she didn’t know how to drive a stick.” Wolf squinted.

“So you,” Lorber tilted his head, “
sensed
the truck was in the water?”

Wolf smiled. “No. I had a hunch it might be, since this is the only place within ten square miles along 734 where one could hide a truck for twenty-two years, so I got in and swam right into it.”

Lorber pointed a long arm at the water. “Jesus Christ, you swam in that?”

Wolf nodded.

“You,” Lorber grabbed his arm and studied it, “do you know the toxic ores found in dark red water like this? The PH level? You’re lucky you didn’t dissolve. It’s like swimming in battery acid. Worse! I mean, my God…”

“There’s fish in the pond. There’s water running into the pond from the north and out the south.” Wolf resisted the urge to itch his skin and turned to the truck. “I want you to scour this truck, inside and out for anything of interest.”

Lorber laughed. “Sure. There’s not going to be any organic material. That’s for sure. Fish in there …” He squinted and bent toward Wolf’s bare arm again.

Wolf turned to Rachette and Patterson. “What happened at Heeter’s place?”

“Heeter wasn’t there,” Rachette said. “And no sign of his car.”

“And how was MacLean?”

Patterson remained silent, looking into the distance.

“He was all right.” Rachette glanced at Patterson.

“Is something wrong?”

Patterson gave Wolf a double take. “What? No.”

Wolf nodded. “Okay. Any word from Yates and Wilson at the lake?”

They shook their heads.

Wolf took a deep breath, hoping the two deputies were all right. He’d definitely encountered someone up there last night. Maybe it had been Heeter. “I’d sure like to know if Heeter’s car is up there. You have a make and model on it?”

“No,” Rachette said, looking at Patterson. Patterson seemed to be avoiding any and all eye contact.

“Rachette,” Wolf said, “why don’t you call Tammy and track down Heeter’s car’s make and model.”

Rachette looked at Wolf and then to Patterson. “Yeah. Sure.”

Patterson watched Rachette walk to the road and she turned to Wolf with wide eyes. “Sir. I have to talk to you.”

Wolf frowned. “All right. Go ahead.”

She froze and stared at Wolf and then sprinted away after Rachette.

Wolf watched her dash up the hill, up the road past Rachette to the SUV, and open the passenger door. A second later she closed it and walked past a confused -looking Rachette back down the hill, to a just as confused-feeling Wolf.

She thrust a manila envelope in his hands. “Here.”

Patterson watched with growing unease as Wolf silently flipped through the pictures. When he’d finished studying the whole stack he looked at Patterson.

“What did Rachette say?”

“I haven’t had a chance to talk to him about it, sir. I didn’t—”

Panic shot through her when he looked up and yelled at the top of his lungs.

“Rachette!”

“Sir,” she whispered, “I didn’t know if I should talk to you first, or … or …” she let the sentence die in her throat, and her heart sank when Wolf offered no condolences to her.

Rachette trotted down, a confused frown on his face. “Yeah?”

Wolf slapped the stack of photos into his chest. “What’s this all about?”

Rachette fumbled for a second and began looking through the stack. He pulled down the corners of his mouth, shaking his head, as if he had no clue what the pages he looked at were. And then when he got to the final pages, and then the Ashland PD police report, his eyes went wide and he looked up at Wolf.

“Sir. This is me and this girl I’ve been kinda seeing. But,” he took out the police report and pointed at it, “that’s not her name. She told me her name was Jessica.”

Wolf blinked.

Rachette turned to Patterson and squinted. “What the hell, Patterson? That’s what was in the envelope and you didn’t tell me?”

Patterson stared at him. “MacLean said we were both in trouble.”

“I … so what? You think I’m what? You think I’m running drugs for this girl?”

“I don’t think,” Patterson said. “I know. The photos are—”

“Listen.” Wolf held up his hands. “ I want to know everything. Who is this girl? When did you meet her? What did she tell you?”

“Sir,” Rachette twirled, arms pleading to the sky, “you gotta believe me. I had no clue. She just said she had to take off to go to Denver, and couldn’t wait around to return this backpack to her girlfriend. Said I was doing her a favor. That was it! She never told me what was in it.”

“And you didn’t think to ask?” Patterson shook her head, her voice hot.

Wolf snapped his fingers.

The two deputies froze and looked at him.

“I want to know who this girl is,” Wolf’s voice was a growl, “I want to know when you met her, exactly. Where? Exactly. What she said? Exactly.”

Rachette swallowed, and began recounting his tale of a night in downtown Rocky Points that seemed too good to be true. A night where all of Rachette’s bad luck with women had miraculously reversed its course and, how he’d become the Casanova of the local zip code.

Patterson watched Wolf as Rachette told his story. Wolf stared motionless toward the mine tailings across the pond. She noticed a blotch of blood spreading on the Sheriff’s thigh, but he was oblivious to it; his mind was elsewhere, and by the look of his flexing jaw, it was an angry elsewhere.

When Rachette was done, Wolf stared in silence for another ten seconds.

“Sir?” Rachette asked. 

Wolf turned and looked over their heads. “What?”

Patterson pulled her eyebrows together and looked behind them, noticing for the first time that radios were exploding with voices.

“What’s going on?” Wolf walked away, leaving Rachette glaring resentfully at Patterson.

Baine raised his radio. “They’ve found something up at Olin Heeter’s house on the lake.”

“Thanks,” Rachette said under his breath as he walked away.

Patterson stood shaking her head, watching the mayhem unfold. Someone’s scratchy voice on her handheld said something about blood. And a door. She was too preoccupied to comprehend everything going on.

Wolf jogged back toward her, still clutching the stack of photos in his hand. “Baine! With me.”

Baine raised his hands. “Sir, I drove up here.”

“Leave it. You’re coming with me.”

Baine shrugged and jogged past Patterson, bouncing his eyebrows on the way by. “See ya’ up there.”

Rachette twirled after Wolf. “Sir, I’ll take Baine’s vehicle!”

“Keys are in the ignition!” Baine said, climbing into Wolf’s SUV.

Wolf got in, and an instant later he was revving the engine and bounding up the steep incline, past the other SCSD vehicles, and then out of sight.

Rachette ran to Baine’s SUV and glared back at Patterson. “Keys are in the ignition.” Without another word he got in, turned the SUV around and drove away in a roar of engine noise.

It took Patterson another few seconds to realize she’d been rooted to the same spot for at least a minute.

“Penny for your thoughts?” Lorber was staring at her over his glasses.

She shook her head. “Maybe some other time.”

“Go get ‘em tiger,” he said with a fist pump.

She smiled despite herself and jogged to join the cavalry.

Wolf stared down at the blood smear on the doorknob of Olin Heeter’s lake house. The mid-afternoon sun shone on the front of the house and the porch was hot, and a prick of purple light glinted off the geode rock still sitting in the grass where he’d last seen it.

The wind breathed through the trees surrounding the property, bringing the scent of pine and scrub oak underbrush, and the faint noise of motorboats tooling around the lake swirled with the air. It was a warm Sunday afternoon, the first real good weather of June yet, and a lot of people would be on the water taking advantage of it.

Another vehicle screamed up the road and scraped to a stop. Patterson got out and walked past Rachette without a glance.

“I’ve got a key here,” Yates was kneeling at the end of the porch, an upturned flowerpot in one rubber-gloved hand and a key in another.

Wolf nodded. “Bring it. Let’s go in.”

“Sir,” Rachette called as he marched over. “Kimber Grey was behind me on the drive up. She’s pulling into her place now.”

Wolf nodded.

Yates gingerly inserted the key into the knob, not disturbing any of the blood that was smeared around the sides of it and twisted.

The door opened a sliver, and Wolf pushed it open.

With a groan it swung wide before hitting a coat rack behind it, sending a crumple of fabric to the wooden floor behind it.

“Put on these,” Patterson said to someone behind him.

“You think?” Rachette answered with as much sarcasm as he could muster.

The interior of the house was cool, almost cold, and dark, the air heavy with the scent of chemical cleaner. As he stepped inside a honeybee dive-bombed past his ear and went down the hallway in front of him, disappearing around the corner.

Yates sniffed behind him. “Smells like some one’s been cleaning recently.”

Wolf flicked the light switch on the wall and a yellow bulb above his head brightened the entryway. At the end of the hall in front of him was a dining table, and the space opened to the right.

Walking after the buzzing insect, Wolf turned into a wood and linoleum kitchen, where brass colored pots and pans hung from ceiling hooks above an antique looking stove.  Black and white checked drapes were drawn across the windows. Wolf squinted when he flipped the light switch on the wall, the overhead lights brightening the space as if they were outside again.

There was a gentle rattle of a humming refrigerator. The creaking and shuffling of footsteps behind him, punctuated by the occasional bark of radio static, were the only other noises.

The linoleum countertops were spotless, the dining table shiny, the area devoid of dust or dirt. The smell of cleaner was overbearing.

“Sir.” Yates was pointing at a door. “More blood.”

Wolf stepped closer and examined another smear of bright red.

“Both these stains, if they are actually blood, look fairly new,” Patterson said. “I’d say twenty four hours.”

“Open it,” Wolf said.

Yates studied the knob and then gingerly put his hand on it and twisted. It opened to a dark stairway that went down.

Wolf reached and flicked on another light switch, and it illuminated a cramped stairway that led down. The walls were painted neutral beige and at the bottom of the corridor was a painting of a vivid moon over the lake.

Wolf walked down, and with each step the wood squealed under the carpet.

The air was dusty, each step colder still as they descended into the walkout basement. Wolf flicked a light switch at the bottom of the stairs and lit the wide-open space to the left.

A hanging lamp and canned lighting in the ceiling blazed bright, showcasing a covered pool table and a bar crafted of logs and lacquered boards. The drapes were all drawn shut, covering the large sliding glass door and two windows that looked out to the back.

The walls were covered in paintings, and it took a few seconds for him to realize they were all of the moon: close-ups of craters as if seen from a telescope lens, the moon waxing, waning, the full moon above the lake, the full moon rising through the trees. There had to have been thirty of them, mounted all over the walls in neat rows. The paintings were life-like, the artistry of a professional.

Wolf pulled aside one of the drapes, bringing in natural light from outside to mix with the harsh yellow ceiling lights. The lake glittered diamonds beyond the wall of stacked rocks. Boats streaked in all directions leaving white wakes. Wolf could see one of the nearest Sheriff’s Department boats down and to the right.

He stood transfixed by the awesome view and then frowned. He fished in the fabric and found the cords, and then pulled open the drapes. They glided smoothly on the rails, the room brightening with each pull.

Unlocking the sliding glass door, he pulled it open and walked outside onto the grass and dirt.

“What’s up?” Patterson asked, following him out.

Wolf pointed. “You can’t see the place we’ve been pulling up the bodies from this vantage point. It’s blocked by that rise in the land, and the trees.” He craned his neck and looked up through the slivers of light in the deck above him.

“Sir,” Yates called from a few paces away. “Look at this.”

On the ground against the wall was a neat pile of red clay bricks. Wolf picked one up and saw the Tracer Building Supplies logo.

“That’s not good for Olin Heeter,” Patterson said over his shoulder.

The brick clanked on the top of the pile and Wolf looked to the lake, still trying to flesh out an idea.

“Sir!” Rachette called from inside. “I’ve got more. More blood.”

Wolf and Patterson went back in through the sliding glass door.

“Open it up,” Wolf said.

Yates was already there, twisting the knob. The door opened wide, revealing a pitch-black void beyond. Yates clicked on his Maglite, illuminating the walls of a ten by ten room.

Yates took a deep breath as if to steel his resolve and stepped inside. “What the?”

Wolf followed in close behind him.