Peak Road - A Short Thriller (Jon Stanton Mysteries Book 10) (8 page)

17

Through a quick call to Mickey’s friend in the FBI, we found out the old woman’s name was Kathleen Harken. We went to the sheriff’s office, where Sheriff Briggs was talking with a man who was noticeably drunk. He was slowly tipping over to one side, and just when I thought he might fall over, he would catch himself and begin tipping the other way.

When she was finished with the man, she walked over and leaned against the front desk. “Got a complaint call on you two.”

“Earl, I’m guessing,” Mickey said.

She nodded. “Says you’re trying to blame the Noels’ killing on him.”

“Only if he did it.”

“He was the first person I looked at. My father told me about him. He’d warned me to stay away from him when I was in high school. Earl would try to pick up high-school girls in his Camaro. When I became a cop, I looked up his old rape file at the DA’s office. He bit off the woman’s cheek.”

Mickey’s watch beeped, and he turned it off. “Can I get a glass of water, please?”

The secretary got him one, and he excused himself to the bathroom.

“What’s wrong with him?” the sheriff asked.

“Small bladder. What do you know about Kathleen Harken?”

“The widow? Nothing. Why?”

“I think she knows more about these killings than she’d like to admit. Does she spend time with anyone else in town? Any male friends or relatives?”

She shook her head. “Since her son and husband died, she pretty much keeps to herself.”

“She has no relatives nearby?”

“None that I know.”

“She’s protecting somebody, and I don’t know who.”

“I don’t think I’ve ever had a problem with her. She keeps to herself. I’d appreciate it if you kept away from her. She suffers from dementia. I don’t want her harassed.”

The secretary answered the phone then said it was for the sheriff. Sheriff Briggs took the call in her office, leaving me alone in the foyer. I stepped outside. Sitting on the front steps, I looked up at the sky, where gray-black clouds spread like pus. They would block the sunshine, release it, then block it again. It was disorienting, and I was glad when Mickey came outside. I rose and followed him to the car.

“I think we should look more into Kathleen Harken,” I said.

“What did you have in mind?”

“I want to pull up a list of relatives. I’m willing to bet Earl Kaiser is on that list, or close to someone on that list.”

Mickey got the list almost immediately. The only one left in the state was a niece in Baxter. Mickey looked exhausted, so I didn’t suggest we drive there. I told him I was feeling tired and wanted to get something to eat. He said he could use a nap, as well, and we went back to the motel room. I dropped him off then began the drive over to the next town. My ribs ached, and I stopped at a convenience store and got a Diet Coke and a packet of ibuprofen. The clerk reeked of marijuana, and his eyes were rimmed with red. He didn’t speak as he rang me up, and when I left, I heard him say, “Damn pigs,” under his breath.

At the tollbooth, Roger waved to me, and I waved back. But he had a stare that said he wasn’t happy to see me. Mickey had been right: no one in the town wanted us there. Maybe they felt embarrassed that something so terrible was going on in their town, or maybe everyone just hoped ignoring the killings would make them go away.

I got to Baxter as the sun was beginning to set. The address listed for Tamila Harken was in an apartment complex—two buildings with a pool in between. I parked on the street and wandered around for a minute before finding her apartment on the second floor. The doors seemed to have been numbered at random.

I knocked then turned to look at the pool, where a life vest floated lazily. I stared at it while I waited for her to answer the door.

I flashed the badge. “I’m Detective Jon Stanton.”

She hesitated and pulled the door closed a little more, revealing only her face. “That badge is from Honolulu.”

“It is. I’m a consultant. I’m helping the sheriff’s office in Peak Road with the deaths of the Noel family.”

She seemed to cower behind her door. “What do you want?”

“I was just hoping we could speak.”

“I don’t know anything. I haven’t been to Peak Road in ten years.”

“Just a few minutes, and then I’ll leave. We can talk out here if you’re more comfortable.”

She nodded and stepped outside, shutting the door behind her. I sat down on a step to give her height over me, hoping to make her feel at ease. She took a package of cigarettes from her back pocket. The package was wrinkled, and the cigarette she pulled out was bent. She lit it, and I let her take a pull before saying anything.

“Did you know the Noels?”

She shook her head. “I ain’t been back in ten years. I told you that. They moved in after I left.”

“Your aunt, Kathleen, did she know them?”

She shrugged. “I don’t know who she knows or doesn’t know.”

“You don’t talk?”

“No.”

I noticed a stain on the left knee of her jeans. Dark, almost black, it looked like blood. “You okay?” I said, pointing to her knee with my chin.

Before she could answer, my phone rang. I looked at the ID: it was my youngest son, Jon Junior. My thumb hovered over the answer button, but I pressed Ignore instead and put it back into my pocket.

“My knee’s fine,” she said.

“What made you leave Peak Road?”

She took a pull from her cigarette again then lowered it before turning away from me. She walked over to the railing and looked down at the parking lot. “It’s an evil place.”

The statement took me back. I sat in silence for a second before I realized she expected me to say something. “Evil how?”

“Stay there long enough, and you’ll find out.” She turned back around. The moment of honesty was over. She was defensive again. “Are we done?”

I stood up, staring down at the concrete littered with cigarette butts. “How did your cousin die?”

“Michael? Why you wanna know about him?”

“Just curious.”

“He killed himself.”

“How?”

“Shotgun. Kathleen was the one that found him.”

“He shot himself? He didn’t drink himself to death?”

She shook her head. “No. He hated booze. When we’d go to bars, he drank wine coolers.”

I nodded.
Why would Kathleen lie to me about something like that?
It couldn’t have been embarrassment or shame. It seemed more difficult for her to tell me he drank himself to death than it would’ve been to say he shot himself.

“I’d like to ask a few more questions about Kathleen if that’s all right.”

“I got things to do, Detective.”

“One more question then: if you were me, who would you be speaking with about the death of the Noels?”

She smirked. “Maybe you should be asking Sheriff Briggs that.”

With that, she shut the door, leaving me staring at it. I put my hands in my pockets and returned to the car, watching the moon coming up over the forests surrounding the city.

18

I drove back to Peak Road. I had forgotten that the tollbooth would be closed. Spikes extended across the road, but I spotted a small clearing off to the side. I drove into the clearing and through a thicket of trees, looping back to the road. Within a minute, I was back on the road and past the tollbooth. Clearly, the booth wasn’t meant to actually keep people from coming and going. It was meant for something else, but I didn’t know what.

I actually was hungry now, so I stopped at the diner. Jennifer was outside, smoking and laughing with a few boys. They hid joints behind their backs when they saw me. As I got out of the car, I heard her tell them that I was cool.

She came over to me. “I went to your motel, but you weren’t there.”

“Why? What’s wrong?”

“Nothing. I just wanted to see you.”

I locked the car and headed into the diner. She followed.

“Let me ask you something,” I said. “They lock the tollbooth up at nine and put spikes on the road, but someone can easily drive around. Why do they bother with it?”

“Oh, it’s just, like, a reminder, I guess. That you shouldn’t be outside after dark. The sheriff told everyone that. But what the hell else we gonna do? There’s no malls or movie theaters here, no gyms, nothing. We gotta do something. Other than dream of escaping from this shithole, I guess.”

We went inside and sat down. Jennifer asked if I was hungry, and I said I was. She said she would have something special made just for me. She went to the back then came out and sat across from me.

She looked and acted older than nineteen. People who had tough lives aged quickly. They were forced to leave childhood behind to deal with the things in their lives that wouldn’t leave them alone, no matter where they ran or how hard they fought.

“I looked at more pictures of Hawaii,” she said, playing with a silver ring on her pinkie. “You know I would go with you right now if you asked me, right? Just pick up my clothes and go with you.”

I nodded. I had known that.
But what would she have with a life built with me? Pain and eventually loneliness.

Still, it was a nice daydream. She was extraordinarily beautiful; that beauty would only grow as she entered her twenties. It would be quite something to wake up every morning and see her lying next to me.

“I know you would,” I said.

“So you gonna ask me?”

“You wouldn’t want to go with me. I have a string of broken relationships behind me.”

“So you gonna be alone your whole life?”

“I don’t know if that’s exactly our choice or not. It doesn’t seem to be.”

She thought for a moment, her teeth pinching her lower lip. “That’d be sad if I believed that. That we don’t get to choose if we’re alone or not.”

We sat in silence for ten or twenty seconds. She played with her ring, her eyes on the table. I knew she was dreaming of a life that could’ve been, one where I swooped in and took her away from this place. That wouldn’t happen. The majority of people died within fifty miles of where they were born.

“Can I ask you something, Jon?”

“Sure.”

“Do you want to have sex with me?”

My mouth opened. Before anything came out, a man approached the table and stood next to us. It was the tollbooth attendant, Roger. He held a cap in his hands and was staring at the floor.

“I think we better talk, Detective.”

I leaned back in my seat. “Why’s that, Roger?”

“Because you gonna find out anyway, so may as well be now.” He paused and then swallowed. “I killed them families.”

19

I stared at Roger, and he stared back. Neither one of us said anything. I took a quick look at Jennifer. She hadn’t moved, though she didn’t look afraid. Slowly, I slipped my hand down to my firearm. I flipped off the safety strap and felt the grip against my palm.

“Roger,” I said calmly, “why don’t you go ahead and get down on the ground really slow.”

“Well, I turned myself in. If I meant you harm, I wouldn’t have done that. You don’t need to be scared. Not right now, anyway.”

“Just please do as I ask. I don’t want to hurt you.”

Roger nodded. He sighed as he got down to his knees then looked up at me as if waiting for further instructions. I got up from the table and realized I didn’t have any handcuffs.

“Get down on your stomach, please.”

“Why? It’s dirty down there.”

“Roger,” I said, my weapon out of the holster now, “do as I say. And do it very slowly.”

Roger swore under his breath then got down on his stomach. I sat on his back and held his hands flush against his body as I searched him for weapons. There was nothing. I texted Mickey, and he texted back that he and the sheriff would get there as quickly as they could.

Roger was calm. I could feel his heart beating against my knee. It wasn’t beating quickly, not as quickly as it should’ve been for someone who had just confessed to the murder of three families.

“What did you mean when you said you killed those families?”

“I meant I did it. I’m the one you’re lookin’ for. I just thought I’d make it easier on both of us. You’d come for me eventually.”

I took out my phone and started the recording app. My instinct told me to read him Miranda, but I wasn’t a cop here. It wouldn’t matter. But I did it anyway.

“Are you saying you killed the Noels?” I said after telling him his rights.

He nodded, though one side of his face was against the floor. “Yup.”

“How did you do it?”

“Just with my teeth. I’m the wolf, Detective.”

Jennifer was still sitting in the booth. Now she looked frightened. I didn’t want her near Roger. I didn’t know exactly what his plan was, but I didn’t think turning himself in was it. The killer wanted to stop, but he wouldn’t stop easily.

We sat there for what seemed like an eternity. Finally Mickey and Sheriff Briggs and her deputy ran into the diner. Briggs froze. “Roger?”

“Yes, ma’am, Sheriff. I’m him. I’m the wolf. I’m who you want.”

The deputy grabbed his wrists and slapped cuffs on him as I moved off. The deputy lifted Roger, and he stared at Mickey as he stood. Mickey’s face was like stone. He didn’t blink as he watched the man.

Without a word, Mickey stepped aside and let the deputy take Roger out to the cruiser.

Hands on her hips, the sheriff watched them leave. “I don’t believe it. He ain’t got no history.”

“The man we’re looking for probably wouldn’t have criminal history other than voyeurism,” I said. “He would get a thrill from watching families and knowing they couldn’t see him. Has he ever had anything like that?”

The sheriff hesitated. “One time, his neighbors that used to live here told me they caught him in the bushes staring into their daughter’s room. She was twelve, I think. He had his pants down. We never filed a report.”

“Why not?”

“Roger apologized, and the neighbors accepted his apology. Wasn’t no need.”

Mickey shook his head. “We would’ve interviewed him a long time ago if he had a voyeurism conviction. It would’ve been voyeurism of a child, which is a registrable offense in this state. He should’ve been on the sex offender registry.”

“Well, how could I know he’d do something like this? He was harmless.”

“The Noels might still be alive if you’d done your job.”

The sheriff’s face flushed pink, and her jaw clenched. But before Sheriff Briggs could respond, Jennifer said, “He didn’t do it.”

The three of us looked at her. She seemed to shrink away, as if our attention hurt her. She looked at me.

“He didn’t do it, Jon. Roger’s my cousin. I know him. I’ve known him my whole life. He couldn’t even go hunting with my uncle ’cause he’d nearly faint at the sight of blood. He’s really slow and had to be in special classes his whole life. He didn’t do this, I promise you.”

The sheriff glared at her, and for a moment, so did Mickey. They’d forgotten they were arguing, and the sheriff just turned and left.

Jennifer grabbed my arm. “Jon, I promise you. Just talk to him. You’ll see he didn’t do this.”