Waking the Dead (24 page)
The man fell silent, his gaze shifting. Cait pressed, “Seems like a lot of trouble involved in moving. You travel light, but there’s still finding the right place. Somewhere you won’t be bothered, either by forestry or people happening by all the time.”
Still he said nothing. She dug in her jeans pocket. Hoped there was a fifty among the bills in there. “You ever see anyone around here at night?”
“Get a lot of fisherman before dawn when I’m near the river. Not in these parts, though.” His eyes flickered when she withdrew some bills and peeled off a fifty to hold it up to show him.
“So you’ve been here a couple days and haven’t seen anyone at night during that time. What about earlier? Where were you camping before you found this spot?”
“Couple miles west of Castle Rock.” He gave a short bitter laugh and flapped his empty sleeve. “I can admit that, can’t I, ’cuz there’s sure no way in hell anyone would suspect me of hauling those bodies up it to dump them.”
Cait smiled easily, but her mind was racing. He might not have hauled the bones to the cave, but that didn’t mean the man couldn’t pose a threat. He managed to set up camp and take it down, pack, and travel around the forest, all one-armed.
Or he could have seen something, someone suspicious in the forest. There was no way the UNSUB could dump remains seven times and not be noticed once, was there?
“How’d you hear about that?”
“I’ve got a radio.” He jerked his shaggy head toward the shelter. “Battery operated. So I can know when bad weather’s on the way. When I heard about the commotion on Castle Rock a couple weeks ago, I knew it was time to go. Too bad, too. Left a real sweet spot.”
“Why’d you leave it?” At his sharp look, she smiled innocently. “Like you said, no one would believe you had anything to do with the deal at Castle Rock. So what was the point?”
“No reason. Just felt like it.” His eyes sharpened when Cait took the bill she was holding and proceeded to shove it back into her pocket. “What’s the deal?”
“The deal is you’re lying. The fifty bucks is for telling the truth.” She drilled him with a gaze. “Why’d you move?”
His faded blue gaze never left her pocket where she’d secreted the bill. “Didn’t feel safe no more. There was a guy came by. Middle of the night. Passed fifteen, twenty yards from my shelter. He had a shotgun. There are all kinds of crazies out here. I didn’t need him coming back. Maybe surprising me sometime when I was sleeping.”
“So you saw someone in the middle of the night who scared you?”
The man’s beard waggled as he shook his head furiously. “Didn’t say I was scared. Just careful. Careful enough to get up and follow him a ways. He was heading east until he just stopped. Never left the forest at all. Then he turned back and headed my way again, so I had to hide so he wouldn’t see me.”
She suspected the stranger he’d seen had been lucky to be carrying a shotgun. Kesey had probably had more in mind than caution when he’d followed the man. “What night was this?”
“Like I said it was a couple weeks ago. I heard on the radio the next day about the cops hauling bodies out of a cave on Castle Rock.”
“You’re sure about that? This occurred the night before the newscast?”
“The night before I first heard about it anyway. So like I said, he goes by me again and I figured he might’ve been out doing some poaching. ’Cuz he’s carrying this bag on his back, right? So I followed him a bit farther from a distance to see where he was going. I lost him for a while, but after fifteen minutes or so he came heading back my way, still carrying the bag. I was behind some rocks and he stopped all of a sudden like he knew I was there. Couldn’t have, of course. But it spooked me all the same.”
Cait pulled her hand out of her pocket again with the bill and he eyed it avariciously.
“The next morning I started thinking I’d best just move out of the area. In case he really did know I’d been spying on him and came back some night.”
“What exactly did he seem to be carrying?” When the man didn’t answer she said, “Was it a backpack?”
“Couldn’t tell for sure. Something dark, that’s all I know.”
“How long had you been at that campsite? The one near Castle Rock?”
He pondered that question for a few moments. “I don’t really know. Months anyway.”
She made a production of smoothing the bill between her fingers. “How many months? Two? Six?”
Kesey just shrugged. “Closer to three, but I can’t say for sure how long.”
“And you never saw anyone else around your site at night in all that time?”
“Kids sometimes. They come out in the forest to screw around. Drink beer and stuff. Otherwise I only saw that guy I told you about, and him just that once.”
She slid her bag off her shoulder and crouched down to unzip it. Pulling out a pad and pen she rose and approached him, extending the fifty. When he snatched it out of her hand, she casually offered the notepad. “Can you sketch the area where you were camping at the time?”
He looked at her like she was crazy. “Can’t even draw a straight line with my left hand. Not that I was ever much better with my right.”
“How long ago did you lose it?” She inclined her head slightly toward his missing arm.
“Two years ago.” Now that Kesey had the money he was plainly in a hurry for them to leave. He was inching closer to his shelter. Away from her. “Got infection in a cut and the doctor amputated the whole damn arm. Fucking butcher.”
Cait could imagine the condition the arm was in before he’d sought treatment. But she couldn’t prevent a surge of pity for the man, nonetheless. “Just do your best with your left hand. I want a general idea of what your campsite looked like. Any focal points that might have been in the area.”
Obviously humoring her, he drew a very rough drawing of fir trees and something that looked like a rock. A squiggly line that could have been a road or the river. Then he handed the pad back to her. “Best I can do unless you have a map.”
“I do, actually.” She sent a look to Zach, who had been standing by silently during the entire exchange. When she unfolded the map of the forest, he approached and squatted down next to Kesey while she studied the drawing.
The stranger was right. He was no artist. And while it was possible he’d deliberately made it appear like he had the ability of a talentless kindergartner, she was more inclined to believe that he lacked the capability of painting minute scenes on human scapulas.
Three hours later Cait’s headache had subsided but for a nagging throb. They’d stopped for lunch and she sat cross-legged, leaning on her pack, which she’d propped against a pine. She had no idea where they were. But when she asked Zach to check off grid-lined sections they’d covered on the map, he never hesitated. Which was oddly fascinating, because if he disappeared at this moment, she’d be screwed. Except for the occasional outcropping of rocks or charred tree, most of the area they’d traveled that day looked pretty much alike.
The granola bars she’d purchased this morning looked neither tasty nor filling, but she needed the fuel, so she chewed unenthusiastically. Sharper was silent as he ate . . . she leaned over for a closer look. “Peanut butter?” The discovery brought a smile to her lips. “What are you, ten?”
His brow rose. “Peanut butter’s a good source of protein. Besides”—he wadded up the plastic bag he’d taken it from in one hand—“I didn’t have any food in the house. Closest decent grocery store is in Eugene, and it’s not like I’ve been to town lately.”
There was no rancor in his words, but she felt a tug of guilt anyway. “I have to get to Eugene tomorrow morning myself for at least a couple hours.” She hadn’t yet gotten those soil samples to Kristy, and she’d promised Barnes she’d get latent samples for the elimination match, as well. “That reminds me, I’ll need to get a fingerprint sample from you sometime today.”
He stilled in the act of shoving the wrapper back into his pack. And the look he sent her was sharp. “What the hell for?”
“We have to . . .” Her cell rang then and she stopped to pull it from her pack. It took a moment to recognize the number. But once she did, the blood pumped a little faster in her veins. Rising to her feet in one smooth motion, she answered, “Detective Drecker.”
“Fleming?” The Seattle detective’s voice sounded in her ear. “Sorry this took so long, but Recinos’s mother was hard to track down. Apparently she was on vacation. I did get some information from her to pass along, though. Recinos didn’t have any arthritis that her family knew about, but she had broken her left wrist six months before her disappearance. Tripped over the cat, or something.”
Her mind racing, she paced a distance away from Zach, although he couldn’t help but hear her end of the conversation. It was possible the signs of osteoarthritis apparent on the remains hadn’t caused the victim any particular problem before death. Also possible that her mother wouldn’t know about every ache and pain her daughter had had. “And she wasn’t adopted? This is her biological mother?”
“Yeah, they’re blood relatives. What are you thinking, DNA match? Can you do that without tissue?”
“I took a sample from the bones. If you can get the mother to a lab, a sample can be taken and the results faxed to us. If that’s not possible, I’d be glad to run the test myself, if she could make her way down here.”
“What have you got, your own private lab facility?” The man’s laugh was liberally laced with cynicism. Cait knew what he was thinking. Too often evidence gathered in police investigations languished in the state labs for months, some not being processed until well after the trial.
“Yes.”
Her short answer had the detective pausing. “Well . . . hell. I almost forgot who you worked for. You might be the first break I catch in this case. I took another look at the case file, after you called last time. I told you I liked the ex for it, right?”
Supremely aware of the man standing only yards away, Cait replied, “You mentioned that.”
“I had one of our forensic accountants take a look at the path the money took when I first caught the case. All I know for sure is someone didn’t want the money trail traced. There were so many transfers and phony fronts that it would take him weeks to unravel it all. Time he wasn’t willing to spend since we didn’t have evidence of a crime, y’know? The ex claims that Recinos frequently talked about wanting to get far away from everybody and everything and start over, but I figure he came up with the story because I was leaning on him pretty hard. Her mother and friends all dispute that. No one else thought she purposely disappeared.”
His words went muffled then, as if he’d partially covered the phone. “Hey, can I get a cup of that coffee over here?”
Cait considered the possibilities. The remains of female C showed signs of a fairly recent fracture of the left lunate. Marissa Recinos broke her left wrist in the last six months of her life. She also matched in the areas of stature and approximate age. It was enough for her to be damn pumped about running the DNA tests. “I don’t suppose you were able to look closer at the finances of the ex. Or even the mother or acquaintances.”
“None of them seem to have changed their lifestyle from a sudden infusion of cash, but like I say, no evidence of a crime. I had jack shit to go on here.”
“Yeah, I get that.” She turned to see Sharper leaning a shoulder against a tree, regarding her enigmatically. “You think the mother will cooperate?”
“There’s no doubt she will. She’s desperate to get information about her daughter.” There was a pause, before he went on. “Guess linking her to bones found in a cave in Oregon won’t be exactly the news she’s hoping for, though. Oh, and I asked her about that list you gave me. Ballet and picture frame and stuff.”
Nerves tightened in a ball in Cait’s stomach. “What’d she say?”
“I wrote it down here somewhere. Just a minute.” There was a rustling noise as if the man were shuffling papers. After a moment he spoke again. “Marissa took dance lessons for about ten years when she was a kid. Liked to ski. She worked from home designing websites for charitable foundations. One of her hobbies was matting and framing pictures she took. The other was speeding along the Pacific Coast Highway in her Dodge Viper.”
Excitement sprinted along her veins. She struggled to rein it in. “Anything about the gum? Or fish?”
“Yes, and no. She was the sole heir of a fortune left to her by her great-grandfather who made his loot in—get this—chewing gum. Recinos couldn’t think of any special meaning for the fish, though.”
“She was last sighted in Pike Place Market,” Cait said slowly. The famous Seattle attraction hosted a fresh fish company where the employees threw fish for the enjoyment of the tourists. “You might want to ask Recinos if that was a favorite spot for her daughter. And if she continued her love of ballet as an adult.”
“What’s this all about, Fleming?” The detective’s tone was curious.
With a flash, Cait’s gaze went to Sharper standing only yards away, his gaze fixed on her. “I can’t go into that right now. But if we get a match with the DNA sample . . . I’ll give you a full accounting on all the details.”
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