Chapter 6
The bullet looked dark and deadly in my gloved palm.
Questions ricocheted in my brain.
Had Crawford Joye killed and decapitated his own dog?
Was Joye the person mutilating and displaying animals throughout the region?
Why?
“Some bastard shot this good boy.”
Balodis’s voice brought me back.
“Is Joye capable of doing this?” I gestured at the headless corpse on the table.
Balodis’s shoulders rose, dropped.
“Who knows?”
The Archdale address was in Montclaire, a residential neighborhood behind the Park Road Shopping Center.
The house, like most lining the street, was a flat-roofed, single-story affair.
Its brick exterior, once red, was painted white.
Probably built on the cheap back in the sixties, the place would now be marketed by realtors as midcentury modern.
I pulled to the curb. Balodis and I got out and followed a walkway bisecting a browned-out lawn. On the small porch, two Adirondack chairs flanked a smokeless bonfire pit, the kind you buy at Costco to make s’mores when camping.
Three steps connected the walk to a concrete stoop. The off-center front door was gray and had six small square windows stacked on the right. A sticker affixed to the uppermost said No Soliciting.
We mounted the stairs. Balodis waited as I thumbed the bell.
A single bong sounded deep inside.
No one spoke up. No one appeared.
I rang again.
“Yes, yes, yes. I’m here.” Though muted, the voice was obviously male, its owner obviously annoyed.
Locks clicked, then the door cracked open a few inches. A manicured finger jabbed at the sticker.
“Do you not see that sign? Are you unable to read English?”
“Am I speaking to Crawford Joye?” I asked, flashing what I hoped was an engaging smile.
“No solicitors!”
“I’m not a salesman.”
“Good. Go away.”
“We’ve—”
“Get lost.”
Screw engaging. I cut to the chase.
“Do you own a spaniel named Bear?”
“What?” Sharp with surprise.
“We think we’ve found your dog, sir.”
A beat, then the door swung inward a few more inches.
A man stood in the widened gap, fingers gripping the outer edge of the wood. I guessed his height at six feet, his weight at maybe one-forty.
The man’s eyes were a startling cornflower blue that eclipsed every other feature on his pallid face. Thin lips and nose. Weak jaw ending in a pointy chin. Wispy blond hair in swift retreat from an unnaturally smooth forehead.
“You have Bear?”
“We think so, sir.”
“Thank God!” With a smile so big it split the unimpressive face in two.
Lifting his chin, Joye craned to look past us, cerulean eyes scanning the windows of my car.
As a member of countless death investigation teams, I’d performed that moment’s task far too often, delivering news that would usher in pain, perhaps change a life forever. The job never got easy.
Even if the tidings concerned a pet.
“My name is Dr. Temperance Brennan,” I began, as gently as I could. “I work for the Mecklenburg County Medical Examiner.”
“Where’s Bear? Where’s my dog?”
“I’m afraid I have bad news, sir.”
Joye’s eyes whipped back to mine. For a moment he said nothing. Then, reading the signs, he mumbled,
“Bear is dead.”
“I’m so sorry.”
“You’re sure it’s Bear?”
“We found an implanted chip identifying the dog as yours.”
“Yes. I had that done.”
Joye’s jaw tensed as the significance of my self-introduction wormed through his grief.
“The medical examiner. Like, the coroner?”
“Yes.”
“Why would the coroner care about a dead dog?”
“May we come in, sir?”
“Who’s he?” Joye chin-cocked Balodis.
“Dr. Balodis is a veterinarian,” I said, surprised that Joye didn’t recall the man from their cigar-smoking days. Assumed it was due to the vet’s altered appearance.
A moment of hesitation, then Joye stepped back.
Balodis and I entered a postage stamp foyer. A framed mirror hung on the wall to the right. A bench with a hinged seat occupied the space to the left.
Pegs ran in a row above the bench, three of the four holding canine paraphernalia. A leash. A harness. A cable-knit sweater with the name Bear embroidered across its turtleneck collar.
Joye led us down a narrow hall to a kitchen at the rear of the house. Pointed to a pine table with four matching chairs.
Balodis and I sat. Our host remained standing, arms crossed on his chest.
“I should offer you something.” Delivered with zero enthusiasm.
“We’re good, sir.”
Joye drew one breath.
“Okay,” he said tonelessly. “Give it to me straight.”
“Tuesday, an elderly woman found canine remains near the town of Frog Pond.”
I studied Joye’s reaction as I spoke, alert for any sign suggesting involvement in the atrocity. I knew Balodis was doing the same.
“Big fellow, long wavy brown coat?” he asked for verification.
“Yes, sir. I’m so sorry. I know how hard it is to lose a pet.”
“Bear’s a great dog.” Joye was barely audible now. “He likes long walks. We took one on Tuesday.”
“In Park Road Park?”
“Yes. Bear loves going there.” Joye’s chest gave an involuntary hitch. “Loved going there.”
“You and Bear came to be separated?”
Joye nodded. “It’s my fault. Bear prefers to run off-leash. Occasionally, when few people are around, I allow him to do so. That day, we were alone on the trail.”
Joye’s expression moved through a range emotions. Sorrow? Guilt? Regret?
Balodis and I waited a full thirty seconds for him to continue.
“It was never a problem. Bear would dart off into the woods, chasing a squirrel or a rabbit, the way dogs do. But he always came back when I whistled. For some reason, he didn’t. I searched for hours, whistling and calling his name.”
“Did you report the dog missing?”
“Seriously?” With a derisive snort.
Joye had a point. A lost dog would hardly top a police priority list.
“Then what happened, sir?”
“I finally gave up. Figured I’d either get a call from some Samaritan, or Bear would find his way home.”
“Would you like the ME to handle the disposal of—”
“What happened to him? Was it a car? A coyote? Did he swim too far out and drown in the lake?”
“He was shot.”
Joye flinched as though slapped.
“That dog didn’t have a mean bone in his body. Who would do such a thing?”
“We don’t know.”
Then the question I’d been expecting.
“Who found him?”
I slid a sideways glance toward Balodis. The vet’s gaze met mine, quickly dropped to the hands folded in his lap.
The subtle exchange didn’t go unnoticed.
“What?” Joye’s eyes flicked from me to Balodis and back. “What is it you’re not telling me?”
Sharing the minimum amount of detail, I described the circumstances surrounding the discovery of Bear’s remains. The wrapped and decorated head nailed to the oak outside Frog Pond. The decapitated corpse discarded in the woods near Camp Thunderbird.
Joye listened, face growing harder with each particular.
“Where’s Frog Pond?” he asked when I’d finished.
“Stanly County.”
“How the blazes did Bear get all the way out there?”
“We don’t know, sir.”
“This is so messed up.”
“It is,” I agreed.
“Where’s my dog now?”
“I don’t—”
“Where. Is. My. Dog.” Staring at me hard.
“At the morgue.”
“I want to collect the body for burial. Him. Collect him.”
Sweat dampened Joye’s hairline, and a wide crescent darkened each of his pits. I was suddenly aware of the man’s BO. Of the rage he was struggling to suppress.
“Of course,” I said.
“Do the authorities have any idea who shot him?”
“Not yet. But the situation is under investigation.”
“This was murder, you know. Pure and simple. But the victim’s just an animal, so the police won’t give a crap.”
“That’s not true. I know the detective assigned to Bear’s case.”
“CMPD?”
“Yes.” Sort of.
“Why would the cops care who killed my dog?”
I chose my words carefully.
“Bear’s death is not an isolated incident.”
“What do you mean?”
“Other animal corpses have been treated in a similar manner.”
“Dogs?”
“No. Bear is the first.”
Silent throughout the interview, Balodis spoke up for the first time. “Mr. Joye, do you have any idea who might have harmed your pet?”
“Are you asking do I have enemies?”
“Do you?”
“I’m a divorce attorney. Rarely do both parties walk away happy. Often neither does.”
“Has anyone been exceptionally angry with you of late?”
Joye thought about that. At least appeared to.
“This past year I represented the wife of a man named Jerome Sunday.”
Joye stopped, perhaps considering the ethical implications of disclosing privileged information.
“Go on,” Balodis urged.
“What the hey. Sunday wasn’t my client. And the man was a real piece of work.”
“Explain that, please.”
“I’ll give you one example. At the close of proceedings, Sunday swaggered up and put his face this close to mine.” Joye held a thumb and index finger two inches apart. “Promised to sever my balls with a hacksaw and shove them down my throat. A poet he wasn’t.”
“Do you think Sunday is capable of violence?” I asked.
“Aren’t we all if pushed hard enough?”
“Do any other possibilities come to mind?”
“How about I send over a list.”
“That would be helpful.”
“Keep me looped in?” Joye asked as Balodis and I rose to leave.
“You have my word,” I said. “And, again, I’m sorry about Bear.”
We were at the front door when Joye made a request that seemed out of character.
“Do me a solid?” His eyes were neon lasers on mine.
“I’ll try,” I said.
“Find who did this to Bear.”
“As I said—”
“Kill the fucker.”