Pushed Too Far: A Thriller (21 page)

A
fter a night of sleep and a morning of sitting around the hospital, Val was feeling rested. Of course, rest and medication weren’t the only reasons for that. More likely, her night with Lund was to thank.

She was grateful they hadn’t had time to talk things over. She wouldn’t have known what to say. When she was diagnosed, she’d vowed never to allow herself to be a burden, not on Grace and not on a man. And of all the men in the world, Lund would be just the one to not only accept that role, but encourage it.

She wasn’t sure she could go there.

So she’d told him she had to get back to her own bed before Grace woke, then she’d returned to her side of the double door and replaced the scent and feel of his skin in reality with that in her dreams. And now she had only the whisker burn on her cheeks and soreness between her thighs to remind her.

She peered at Lund’s pickup in the Nova’s rear view mirror.

If truth be told, she liked seeing him there, knowing he was with her. She was also grateful she and her niece wouldn’t have to confront Harlan alone. While she had trouble thinking of him as dangerous, someone other than Hess had run her off the road last night, and the only one who knew she’d be on the highway was the coroner.

The roads had gotten worse since last night, and a fine drizzle was still falling, promising more to come. Salt trucks trundled along highways non-stop, spraying and spreading in a failing effort to keep up.

They passed the old Badger Ammunitions complex’s miles and miles of half demolished barracks, ammunition factories and testing facilities, ice sparkling on barbed wire. Jack’s Nova struggled up the steep curves flanking Devil’s Lake State Park, and Val decided it was an even better idea Lund had followed, because he’d probably have to push.

They finally crested the hill on their own and passed the turn off to Lund’s house. She’d been to his cozy little cabin back when he’d been a suspect the first time Kelly died. Heavily wooded, the area was beautiful every day of the year, but the addition of ice made it stunning. Each twig of oak and birch or needle of pine appeared polished and etched like sculptures of fine, frosted glass.

She had to wonder what it would be like to wake up to a sunny morning in his little cabin, a cascade of beauty outside, a warm and intimate scene within. A nice dream that could never come true.

Thoughts of Kelly’s baby wound their way into her mind. She probably should have told him, but just because she was suspended didn’t mean she was free of responsibility to the job.

She would check in with Becca, see if she’d learned anything in her canvass of hospitals. And then she would find a moment to break the news to Lund. Right now she had to focus on the icy road and how she was going to get the truth out of Harlan.

Even with the Nova chugging along at the speed of a go cart, they soon reached Baraboo. Harlan’s ridiculous old hearse was parked in the lot, a coat of ice covering every inch. She parked the Nova next to it. They made a nice couple.

As always, Harlan was eating when they entered, though thankfully he was sitting at his computer and not hunkered over a corpse. He looked up. “Hey, sweet cheeks,” he said with a mouth full of either baked beans or bot fly larvae. “You got my message?”

“Message?”

“I got ahold of those medical records you wanted this morning. I left a message on your cell.”

“Phone died last night. Fell in some water.” Val watched his eyes for any flicker that might signal he knew about her late night swim.

“Ahh, I knew it.”

“Knew what?”

“You and me.” He pointed his first two fingers to her eyes then his. “We’re on the same wavelength, probably soul mates. I need to show you something, and here you are.”

“Here I am.” Val coaxed a smile to her lips. Whatever Harlan had found, she needed to see it while he was still in the mood to share. Grilling him about Liz Unger’s death certificate could wait, at least a few minutes.

“It smells funny in here,” Grace said, stepping tentatively into the room. Lund followed.

“Who’s this pretty young thing with you?”

Val shook her head. Of course, Harlan didn’t even see Lund, but stood at attention the minute Grace walked in. “Grace is my niece.”

“I should have known. Pretty and blond must run in the family.”

“She’s sixteen,” she said pointedly. “And this is David Lund. He’s with the fire department.”

Lund rated only a curt nod.

“I don’t feel so well,” Grace mumbled.

“Want something to eat?” Harlan lifted a spoon full of beans.

As if that would help.

“Is there somewhere Grace could sit, Harlan?” Val asked. “Somewhere she can get away from the smell?”

“The smell?” His bushy brows pulled together, as if he was genuinely confused.

“Some of us have squeamish stomachs.”

“Oh, that smell.” Harlan smiled. “I have the best place. Follow me.”

He set down his beans and led them through a short hallway and into an office. The space was so small it could barely fit a desk and copy machine, but dominating an entire corner was a video game straight out of the eighties; Ms. Pac Man.

Harlan gestured to the game with a dramatic wave of one arm. “Wanna play?”

“Can I?”

“A pretty girl like you? You can do anything.”

Val suppressed her urge to glance at Lund and give an eye roll. Once Grace got started on the game, they returned to the autopsy suite. Instead of pulling out the grisly collection of bones Val had feared, Harlan went right to the light box. He switched it on and clipped two x-rays into place. The ghostly outlines of bones showed on the screen.

“Now, these are the ulna and the radius, which would be the forearm bones to you and me.”

Val recognized the images as x-rays of Jane Doe’s scorched bones. She’d spent hours staring at them as well as studying the actual remains.

“I want you to look right here, at the wrist end of the bones.” Harlan turned with a flourish and beamed, as if whatever it was he saw was plain as day to everyone else.

Lund asked the question first. “What is it that we’re seeing?”

Harlan tilted his head slightly, peering at Lund as if a third eye had suddenly popped out in the middle of his forehead like a pimple on a teenager. “The thickening.”

“From a broken wrist.” Val supplied. “Kelly had one. It was an additional reason we thought the bones in the burning barrel were hers.”

Lund stepped closer to the light box. “And what does this tell us?”

“Nothing,” Harlan said.

“Nothing?” Lund repeated.

“How can we get it to tell us something?” Val asked, throwing in a little smile.

Harlan was always motivated by feminine smiles, and this time was no different. “Come over here.”

He led them three steps to the side and pointed at the computer monitor he’d been studying when they’d entered.

Another x-ray glowed on the screen, this one with its hand still attached.

“It looks like the same injury,” Lund said.

Harlan jolted upright. “Very good. I might decide to like you after all.”

Val cut right to it. “Is this Elizabeth Unger that we’re comparing to the Jane Doe x-rays?”

He glanced at Lund, and then focused on Val. “It most certainly is. She was admitted to the hospital when she was in her early twenties. These are the pictures from that visit.”

Val and Lund exchanged glances.

“So what do you think?” Harlan asked.

“It’s a good piece of evidence, but it’s not enough for an ID.” After all, they’d used that same injury as proof the body was Kelly’s.

“I beg to differ.” Harlan puffed out his chest, as if he was highly offended, then shot Val a little wink.

She had to admit, the more time she spent with Harlan this morning, the less she could imagine him running her off the road last night, not that it hadn’t been a stretch in the first place. But now? It just wasn’t possible. “Okay Harlan, spit it out. What are you holding back?”

He nearly danced over to the light box—an odd experience to witness—and clipped up another x-ray, this of a lower leg missing its foot. “Jane Doe again. The site of a similar injury.”

Lund took a step closer. “She broke her leg, too?”

“Since it’s right at the point where the bone shattered in the fire, it’s hard to see unless you’re looking for it. This time, I was.”

He held up an index finger, pranced back to the computer, called up an x-ray of a leg, and pointed out a thickening in the same spot. “Elizabeth Unger and Jane Doe both have two bones with breaks in exactly the same place. I’d say that narrows things down quite a bit.”

“Yeah,” Val said. She felt sick, and still more than a little confused. “Whoever did her autopsy should have recognized those injuries as suspicious, right? He should have noted them.”

His bushy gray brows lowered. “I’m not following, sweetie pie. I’m noting them right now.”

“I found Elizabeth Unger’s death records. Or should I say, Elizabeth Unger Schneider?”

His expression didn’t change.

She continued. “She died here in a car wreck, ten years ago. She was supposed to be buried in Illinois, but her body was never interred there.”

“That seems strange.”

“It’s not the strangest part, Harlan. Do you want to know who signed off on those records and made them official?”

He didn’t hesitate. “Who?”

“You.”

His brows lowered further, and he shook his head.

“You signed them, Harlan.”

“What? No, I didn’t.”

“I saw them. I would have copies, but someone tried to kill me last night, and I ended up in the Wisconsin River.”

“What?”

“Where were you last night?” Lund asked.

Harlan shook his head, paced a few steps, and shook his head again. “I heard Liz Unger was dead. I remember because she was married to Jeff Schneider years ago. But I never performed her autopsy. I may be an old fart, but I still have my memory. I never signed off on her death. And trying to kill you, honey?”

“Where were you?” Val prodded.

“At the supper club. I talked to you. Then I went home. You can ask my neighbor. We were both out salting our driveways about ten. I can’t believe—”

The intercom buzzed.

“I have to see what this is,” Harlan said. “Be right back.”

The moment he left the room, Lund turned to Val. “What do you think?”

She let out a breath, a mix of relief and frustration. “That he’s telling the truth.”

“That’s what I think, too. So how did his signature get on the records you saw?”

“Forged. Or maybe he signed something without really looking at what it was.” She’d seen him hurry through paperwork more than once, scribbling his name without paying much attention to the forms he signed.

“So that leaves Schneider?”

“And my sergeant, Pete Olson. He was in charge of following up on Kelly’s family. I’m having a hard time believing he never thought it necessary to dig a little farther into the inconsistencies surrounding Liz Unger.”

“When it comes to situations like these, some people just don’t want to know,” Lund said.

She stared at the x-rays on the computer. “Do you think he abused her?”

“Schneider?”

She nodded.

“I don’t know. I remember at least one of Kelly’s aunts lived with them for a while. The abuse could have come from Kelly’s father. That family … there were a lot of skeletons in those closets.”

“Maybe. But it would have been tough for anyone to fake death records … except a police chief who knows how to distract the coroner.”

Harlan rounded the corner, his face as gray as his hair. At first Val thought he overheard. Then he opened his mouth. “It’s Monica Forbes. She’s dead.”

V
al wasn’t sure she’d be welcome at the scene, but as soon as she arrived at the casino hotel, an FBI agent escorted Grace, Lund and her into the attached casino’s security office and asked them to take a seat in front of one of the monitors.

The agent was clean cut in that button-down FBI agent sort of way. Hair almost black, he was a few inches shorter than Lund, but looked fit and efficient in his dark suit. He introduced himself as Special Agent Subera and got down to business. “We recovered this about five minutes ago.”

Val was still shaking from the bomb Harlan had dropped in the morgue. She couldn’t believe Monica was dead, couldn’t wrap her mind around it. And as much as she wanted to help the FBI, who shared jurisdiction with the tribe owning the casino, she didn’t know how she would handle seeing her friend’s body.

And she knew she didn’t want Grace witnessing it. “What’s on the video?”

Agent Subera glanced at Grace. “Security footage from inside the casino. I just need you to tell me if you recognize anyone.”