White Cloud Retreat (9 page)

Mike’s car wasn’t in the driveway
when Kelly and Lady returned from the Center.
Well, I’ve got a little time.
Think I’ll see what I can find out about Deidre Nelson on the computer.
Lady
followed her and lay down next to her in the office.

She pulled Google up on
the computer and typed in the name “Deidre Nelson.” Within a second, information
regarding Deidre popped up on the screen. Kelly clicked back and forth taking
notes and looking at the screen. There wasn’t much information and it didn’t
take her very long.

She got up from her chair,
went into the kitchen, and opened the refrigerator to see what she could make
for dinner that wouldn’t take much time. She decided on roast chicken, a warm
spinach salad, and fried zucchini squash. She’d just finished smearing the
chicken with soft butter and putting it in the oven when the door opened and
Rebel bounded over to her, followed by Mike.

“Sorry I’m late, but I had
to meet with the coroner on my way home. I would have called, but time got away
from me. Anyway, we’re home and hungry.”

“Well, why don’t you take
off your gun and change out of your uniform. I’ll meet you in the living room
and we can relax. I didn’t get home too long ago and I just put dinner in the
oven. I’ll start a fire in the fireplace.”

“You’ve got it. Back in a
few minutes.” Rebel followed him down the hallway.

Glad you’re watching out
for him, Rebel. Particularly now that it looks like someone’s leaving
threatening notes for him, hanging up on him, and possibly following him.

The fire made the room
inviting and took the chill out of the winter night. “What did the coroner tell
you?” she asked when Mike came back into the room wearing jeans and a flannel
shirt.

“It was interesting. We
knew Scott died from a gunshot wound to his head. The ballistics expert said it
was from a .22 caliber pistol. He also told me something that I thought was
sort of strange. He said Scott had been shot in the head, just behind his ear.
He mentioned in passing that a lot of Mafia victims were killed that way by a
close range shot to the head with the bullet’s point of entry located just above
and behind the victim’s ear. I’ve never heard of the Mafia operating in this
area. Weird, huh?”

“I’m not so sure.” She
told him about her earlier conversation with Luke.

“Well,” Mike said, “the
brothers have been suspects in my mind pretty much from the beginning, but now
I’m beginning to also wonder about Blaine. He certainly would have had a motive
for killing Scott. It looks like he wanted to be the Zen Master in a bad way.
Maybe he has delusions that he’s ready to lead the Center. This means the case has
gone from not having any suspects to having several. Right now I’ve got the
Pellino brothers, Deidre, Blaine, Luke, and that religious guy named Jim. I
haven’t interviewed Jim yet because I can’t think of a valid way for me to
broach the subject other than as a conversation you overheard and then I’d have
to involve you which I don’t want to do.

“I wonder if Luke tried to
feed you a red herring. By that I mean if Blaine was a valid suspect in the
case, it would take the attention away from Luke. Luke has to know that he’s
considered to be a suspect. He probably has no idea how much I know about him,
but he seems to be pretty smart and that would be a good ploy for him to use,
shift attention to Blaine and away from himself. Let’s face it, he certainly had
a lot to gain if Scott died. Scott’s attorney, Lem, called me today and said he
was filing Scott’s will with the court. Half of his estate goes to Luke and the
other half goes to the Center. We know Luke’s had problems with money before.
Greed is always a powerful motive.”

“I know you think he’s a
credible suspect, but I have a problem seeing him do it. Maybe I’m being
stubborn, but I just don’t think he’s the killer. It takes a special kind of
person to kill his own brother.”

“Maybe yes, maybe no. All
I know is that I’m no closer to finding out who the killer is today than I was
yesterday.”

“Let’s change the subject.
Did you have any more poison pen notes or hang-ups today? Or did you sense that
someone was following you?”

Mike rubbed his cheek with
his hand. “I’m baffled by this whole thing. I’d swear someone is following me,
but I sure haven’t been able to spot them. When I’m driving, I keep a very
close eye on my rear view mirror and haven’t seen anything. When I’m walking
somewhere, I’m extra alert and on the lookout. Again, nothing. I say nothing,
but I’ve been taking Rebel with me everywhere I go and twice today he growled
and his hackles went up. Makes me think this whole thing is not just my
imagination. And in answer to your question, yes, there was another note today.
This time it was handwritten and stuck in the window on the driver’s side of my
patrol car.”

“Well, what did it say?”

“It was bizarre. It said
‘Things aren’t always what they seem.’ I can’t even begin to make sense of
that.”

“What about hang-ups? Have
you had any more of those?”

“Yes,” he said tiredly.
“More than I’d care to count. I suppose I could get a search warrant and try
and find out who’s calling, but what am I going to tell the court? That I think
someone is following me and calling me? That isn’t much to go on. Our local
judge is a tough nut and I’m not sure he’d buy it. The only things I have that
are solid are a couple of notes.”

“I don’t know what to tell
you. Maybe all of these things are associated with this case. I’ve kind of
thought it was something from the past, but maybe not. What I can’t figure out
is why anyone involved in this case would do those things. I suppose through a
process of elimination we could try and find the answer. Jim, the religious
guy, doesn’t even know he’s a suspect. The Pellino brothers may be aware that
they’re suspects, but I don’t see either one of them following you. They’ve got
a winery to run. Luke and Blaine are both out at the Center, so neither one of
them would have the time to drive into town just to leave a threatening note on
your car. And Deidre? She’s mourning Scott. No, it just doesn’t make any sense.
Let’s forget about it for now. It’s almost time for dinner.

“Oh, one more thing.
Remember when I told you how strange Deidre’s apartment was yesterday? Well, I
pulled her name up on the Internet today when I got home and there wasn’t much
information on the web about her. She works in a photography shop and she’s
originally from somewhere in Arizona. She majored in photography in college.
That’s about it.”

“Well, the world is full
of nut cases. She’s probably just another one. I’m starving. I’ll set the table
while you finish up.”

“Deal. Does that mean
you’ll do the dishes?”

“Don’t push your luck,
Sweetheart.”

Thursday morning Kelly opened the
front door of her house and walked outside with Lady. It was 5:30 a.m., just
before dawn, and a time when the night sky is at its darkest. Lady growled and
began to bark furiously. Out of the corner of her eye Kelly saw someone running
away from Mike’s patrol car which was parked in the driveway. “Lady, stay.
Stay.” She put her hand on the dog’s shoulder, feeling her raised hackles. She
walked over to his car and saw a note stuck under the windshield with the
words, “Be very careful. I know where you are.” written on it. She lifted the
wiper it was under and put the note in her purse.

Mike has enough problems
without starting his day seeing this. I’ll tell him about it tonight. I saw
someone, but I couldn’t tell whether it was a man or a woman and there’s no
doubt in my mind that Lady saw something.

It was another busy
morning at the coffee shop. The topic of Scott’s death was still the number one
item of discussion. Many of the customers expressed frustration that the killer
hadn’t been caught. When Amber had been murdered the previous June, many of the
residents of Cedar Bay had bought guns to protect themselves and their
families. Once again the people were afraid. A killer was loose in their town
and they felt violated. Cedar Bay had always been a place where there had been
very little crime of any kind. Now they were dealing with the third murder in
seven months. The tension in the air was palpable.

Kelly walked over to the
counter and picked up the ringing phone. “This is Kelly, may I help you?”

“It’s Luke. I’m really
glad you’re the one who answered. I’m sorry to bother you again, but remember
when we talked yesterday and I told you about Blaine?”

“Yes, of course. I told
Mike about Blaine last night and he’s going to check him out today through the
FBI database that lists persons of interest.”

“Well, I don’t think he’ll
be in there for any past crimes. I don’t think he’s ever been arrested for
anything. I think it’s more about his mental condition. Anyway, the reason I called
is to tell you he’s disappeared.”

“What do you mean?”

“Just what I said. The
residential trainees are required to attend early morning meditations with Zeb
as part of their program, but Blaine wasn’t there this morning. After the
meditation ended, Zeb came to me and asked if I’d given Blaine permission to
skip the meditation this morning. I told him absolutely not. We decided to go
to his room and find out why he hadn’t attended the meditation session. When we
got to his room we discovered it had been cleaned out.”

“What do you mean by
cleaned out?” Kelly asked.

“I mean he was gone and so
was everything belonging to him. We went to the parking lot and found that his
car was gone as well. I have no idea what it means, other than it’s quite
suspicious. I thought you might want to tell Mike. I just called his office,
but he was on another call and I didn’t have time to wait. As you know, Scott’s
service is this afternoon and I have a lot of things I have to do to get ready
for it. From the calls I’ve been getting, it looks like a lot of people plan on
attending, even people from quite a distance. I’m glad I decided to have it
from 4:00 to 6:00. That will give people a chance to get to an airport or drive
back to where they came from before it gets too late.”

“Luke, did you talk to any
of the other residents? Did Blaine say anything to them? What did they think of
him?”

“Yes, Zeb and I spoke with
all of them and evidently he hadn’t said a word to any of them about leaving.
Many of them said he’d told them he wanted to be a Zen Master, but none of them
felt particularly close to him. A few even said they thought his commitment to
Zen wasn’t real. They felt he was almost frantic about becoming a Zen Master,
but it wasn’t genuine.” Luke was quiet on the phone for a long moment and then
said, “A thought just occurred to me.”

“Please, tell me whatever
you’re thinking.”

“Well, after you left
yesterday, Blaine came into my office and asked me who you were. I told him you
were the sheriff’s fiancée and we’d been talking about Scott’s murder. Then he
asked me if I was going to become the Zen Master here at the White Cloud
Retreat Center. I told him I’d been thinking about it and yes, I probably would
become the Zen Master for the Center. I told him Scott had given me a transmission,
so theoretically I had the necessary credentials to do it. Now I’m wondering
two things. First of all, he may have been concerned that Mike was getting
close to solving the murder, or that he had become a suspect. Who knows what
goes through a schizophrenic’s mind? On the other hand, maybe he realized he
wasn’t going to become the Zen Master here at the Center and there was no real
point in his staying. I don’t know, but those are about the only explanations I
can come up with for his sudden departure.”

“I think you might be
right with either one or even both. I know you’re in a hurry, but thanks for
telling me. I’ll see you this afternoon.”

Well that’s interesting.
Maybe Blaine was the person I saw this morning by Mike’s car. Maybe Luke’s
right and he was concerned that Mike was getting close to solving the case and
determining he was the killer.

Mike closed the door to his office
and sat down at his computer with Rebel at his side. Last night he’d remembered
that the FBI had a database that identified people who had been designated as
“persons of interest” in criminal cases. He’d decided to see if the database
had any information on Dante and Luca Pellino, Luke Monroe, Blaine Wright, or
Jim Duncan. Even though he and Kelly had talked about Deidre, he didn’t feel
she had risen to the level of being considered a suspect. It had almost been a
week since Scott had been killed and Mike was getting desperate to find the
killer. An hour later he sat back in his chair, thoroughly frustrated. His
search had come up with nothing.

Well, since I’m getting
absolutely nowhere with those four, might as well plug in the names of everyone
we interviewed in connection with his murder. Maybe I’m overlooking something
.

Halfway through his
search, he got a match for Deidre Nelson. He spent a few moments studying the
information and reached for his phone.

*****

Detective Joel Ackerman of the
Tucson, Arizona Police Department picked up the ringing telephone on his desk
and said, “This is Detective Ackerman. May I help you?”

“Hello, Detective. My name
is Mike Reynolds and I’m the county sheriff in Beaver County, Oregon. I’m
working on a homicide case up here that occurred in Cedar Bay, Oregon. A woman
by the name of Deidre Nelson was one of several we interviewed in connection
with this case. I ran her name through the FBI database that identifies all
persons in a criminal case designated by the investigating authorities as a
person of interest. I came up with a hit that listed your department as well as
your name and telephone number as a contact for any follow-up requests for
information. I was wondering if you might have some recollection or information
about a woman named Deidre Nelson that might help me with my investigation.”

“I sure do, Sheriff. Don’t
mind at all sharing the information we have. I was the detective assigned to
the case and I clearly remember the facts and circumstances that were involved
in it. It was a missing person case with a strong suspicion that some type of
foul play was involved. The missing person was a forty-five year old man by the
name of Albert Finley. He lived with his wife and family in a house in a Tucson
suburb. There were no suspicious activities or signs of any type of trouble in
his background. According to all reports, he was a respectable, upstanding and
well-liked member of the community. He was a handsome, rather athletic type of
guy who liked to go jogging every morning. One morning about ten years ago,
according to his wife, he left the house to go for his regular morning jog and
was never seen again. His bloodstained shoes and socks were found on a jogging
trail not far from his house. For reasons we don’t know or understand, after
his shoes and socks were removed he walked away, either voluntarily or under
threat of force, from the location where his shoes were found. We followed a
trail of his bare footprints for a short distance, but then the trail
disappeared. I always thought it was pretty strange he’d wind up being barefoot
on a remote jogging trail in early spring. It was still very cold at that time
of year.

“As part of the work up on
the case, I canvassed the neighborhood and interviewed all the neighbors,
asking them if they’d seen anything suspicious prior to Mr. Finley’s
disappearance. The next door neighbor was a woman by the name of Clara Nelson.
She was the mother of Deidre Nelson, who at the time was nineteen and living at
home with her mother. Mrs. Nelson told me she didn’t know anything that would
help me with the case. She suggested I talk to her daughter who was at
home and in her bedroom.

“Mrs. Nelson, who appeared
to be in poor health and was confined to a wheelchair, told me to just walk
down the hallway and knock on her daughter’s bedroom door if I wanted to talk
to her. I knocked on the door and a young woman’s voice said ‘Come in.’
When I walked into the room I observed Deidre, who was an attractive
looking young nineteen year old woman with bright red hair, sitting at a small
writing desk in the room. I immediately noticed that there were ten or twenty
photographs of the missing man, Albert Finley, tacked up on the walls of her
bedroom. Several of them were life-size blown-up photographs of Mr. Finley.
After I explained to Deidre the purpose of my visit, I asked her why she had
the photographs of Mr. Finley tacked up on the walls of her bedroom.

“She explained that she
wanted to become a professional photographer and was studying photography at a
local community college. One of her class assignments was for each student to
prepare a collection of photos of some person that they knew. It could be a
family member, a neighbor, a fellow student, or whoever. She told me she’d
selected Mr. Finley, but she decided not to tell him about her project and just
take photos of him without his consent. She said she thought using that process
would make her photos of him more natural and lifelike, without a lot of posing
and phony smiles. All of the photos she took of him were taken with a camera
equipped with a telephoto lens. Other than that, Deidre denied knowing anything
about Mr. Finley’s disappearance.

“I thought her explanation
of why she had the photographs of Mr. Finley displayed on the walls in her room
was rather suspicious and for that reason I entered her name in the case file
as a person of interest. A few days later I contacted the professor at the
community college who was teaching the photography class and he verified that
Deidre and his other students had each received an assignment from him along
the lines that Deidre had described to me. I asked him why he required
life-size photographs. He told me that was not part of the assignment and he
had no idea why a student would do that unless they wanted to see if they could
enlarge the photographs they’d taken. According to him, some of the students
hoped to work in a photo lab and that could possibly be the reason.

“We never found Mr. Finley
and there were no active leads for us to follow. About two years after he went
missing, the case was closed and transferred to our cold case files. When the
case was closed and as part of the routine file closing procedure, one of our
administrative staff members entered Deidre’s name as a person of interest in
the FBI database you referred to earlier. By the way, about the time we were
getting ready to close the case, I went back out to the neighborhood to have a
final interview with the neighbors and see if they had any new thoughts about
what might have happened to Mr. Finley. When I was there, I learned that Mrs.
Nelson had died the previous year and that according to the neighbors, her
daughter, Deidre, had moved to the Pacific Northwest, but none of them knew
where. That’s about all I’ve got, Sheriff. Don’t know if any of that can help
you, but if you need anything else, feel free to call me.”

“Thanks, Detective
Ackerman. I really appreciate your input. Not sure if it will help, but it just
might. Again, thanks,” Mike said as he hung up the phone.

Now isn’t that
interesting. Deidre took numerous photos of Mr. Finley in Arizona, just like
she did here in Oregon of Scott Monroe. I wonder if this is a pattern of
behavior on her part. It’s not uncommon
for a young woman to
fantasize
about an older man. I’ve heard of some who start stalking a man and taking
pictures of him
without his knowledge or consent. Stalk, photograph,
fantasize, and then kill, is certainly a possible modus operandi of a deranged
individual. I wonder if she was stalking Finley when he disappeared. For that
matter, I wonder if she was stalking Scott. I’ve got meetings the rest of the
day and then the service for Scott this afternoon, but talking to Deidre has
become a high priority for me. I’ll do it tomorrow.