Chapter Twenty-Four
Lilith offered to stay with Anders, since it’s her cabin, but in the end, it’ll be Yolanda. Not only does she have training—and her own handgun—but she considers herself bulletproof, at least against exposure threats. For Yolanda, émilie would pull out all the stops.
Yolanda was also Anders’s first choice, and I won’t read too much into it.
I’m still wrapping my head around what I saw this morning, which certainly seems to indicate that Kenny came from my sister’s bed.
Given what she said about not being able to take Rory this morning, it wasn’t a spontaneous event.
Am I hurt that I didn’t know things had changed?
Yes, but I also can’t imagine April telling me.
It would require Kenny’s gently prodding to persuade her to take the relationship public, and she’d want to be sure it was working first. Being someone who wouldn’t read the obvious clues herself, April expects I won’t either.
So for now, I guess I’ll just pretend I can’t put two and two together.
I check on Storm and sit with her awhile, as I make arrangements to talk to émilie about Gretchen and Blake.
Then I feed and change Rory and play with her a bit before passing her off to my sister, who’s done with her appointments for the day.
I’d taken Rory to speak to Gretchen the first time, but only because it was close to town and we’d already made enough noise—screams, gunshots, the ATV—that I was hardly worried about a baby crying. The walk to Lilith’s will be different.
Yolanda and I set out with backpacks of supplies.
Anders took a bag, too, and now we add food and a deck of cards, along with Yolanda’s overnight stuff and things I gathered from the store for Gretchen.
I’ve added a couple of novels and small games, along with treats from the bakery, things I hope might be a comfort to her, as I begin to more strongly consider the possibility she’s actually a traumatized new widow.
It’s a quiet hike out. Now that I don’t need to stay alert, I can sink into my thoughts.
Oh, sure, I should stay alert, so I don’t stumble over Gretchen’s alleged stalker, but I can trust Yolanda to hear him as well as I do.
I can also trust Yolanda to not take offense at my silence.
If anything, she probably prefers it. Better that than awkward small talk.
As we get closer to Lilith’s cabin, I do run a few things past her. Her reading is exactly what I expect—she doesn’t trust Gretchen’s story and sees too many holes in it.
“So someone randomly murdered her husband in the forest and started stalking her. Two hikers minding their own business? Why?”
“Why kill him or why stalk her?”
“Both. Well, no, her theory on why her husband was killed is that Eric is a crazed mountain man.”
“Her husband thought it first—and he only saw me.”
Yolanda shakes her head. “How the hell does someone mistake you for a mail-order bride? No, don’t answer that.
I know how. For the same reason people used to assume I was Gran’s foster granddaughter.
Such a generous family, taking in a disadvantaged Black girl and giving her the chance of a lifetime. ”
“Those billionaires. Always doing good deeds.”
She snorts. “Right? Anyway, if Gretchen’s leaning into the mountain-man bullshit, she’s probably barely stopped to consider why her husband was killed. Clearly, these woods are teeming with unstable killers.”
“As opposed to stable killers?”
“Nah, it actually has those. But unstable ones will be her theory. Theory or excuse, depending on whether she murdered him herself.”
“That also applies if she knows why he was murdered. She’d be redirecting our attention. Of course, we don’t know what she’ll say.”
“Oh, we do. Trust me. Crazed mountain man killed my husband.”
Sadly, Yolanda is right. While those aren’t Gretchen’s exact words, the gist is there.
She has no idea who would murder her husband.
He taught earth sciences at the Yukon University campus in Whitehorse.
No one is going to follow him up here to murder him.
Clearly, he ran across one of those renowned murderous hermits of the north.
I know that’s what people think about Alaska, but it bleeds over the border into the Yukon. Who is out in these woods? Hippies and killers. Well, not necessarily killers, but paranoid men who will murder you if you stumble on their territory.
Of everyone I’ve met up here, no one falls into that category.
Even Brent, who had paranoid schizophrenia, was no danger to anyone.
Sure, there’s Tyrone Cypher, who actually was a hired killer, but he retired to Rockton—becoming sheriff, no less—to get away from killing.
Okay, also probably to avoid being brought to justice for his crimes.
The point is that we keep running into a stereotype that no one actually fits.
Is it impossible? Of course not. I’m sure that somewhere in the Yukon there are people living on their own who might shoot you if they see you, lost in the paranoia of their own muddled minds. But mostly, if someone kills you, they’re going to have a reason.
Otherwise, Gretchen has no idea who killed Blake, and the more I push, the more upset she gets. Why am I ignoring the obvious answer? If she didn’t kill him and we didn’t kill him, then there’s a madman in the forest who murdered her husband and has been stalking her.
I ask a few more questions, but if I keep pushing, I’ll be leaving Anders and Yolanda to deal with the agitation I caused. So I calm Gretchen with meaningless questions that make it seem as if I believe her story. Then Dalton and I head back to town.
Once we’re definitely out of earshot, I start talking, my voice low, filling in the parts that Dalton didn’t hear in my earlier interview.
“There’s a lot to unpack,” I say, “and it all depends on how honest she’s being. I’ve tried to start by taking her word for it, and seeing how that fits.”
Dalton nods and waits for me to continue.
“Gretchen says she wasn’t there when Blake died.
We did find her footprints, but they could be from earlier—when they were getting water—or later, when she heard him shout and came to find him.
Then she sees him being dragged off but can tell nothing about the person dragging him.
She can’t even confirm it was one person. ”
“Likelihood of that?”
I shrug. “I’ve met assault survivors who refuse to pick their assailant out of a lineup because they didn’t get a good enough look.
I’ve met witnesses who saw nothing of the perpetrator, either because they were focused on the victim or they were focused on getting out of there.
Both are better than someone who claims they got a good look and accuses the wrong person.
Things happen fast, and you rarely have time to stop and think. ”
“Then she went back trying to see the killer.”
“Which is plausible. She flees. Realizes she missed an opportunity. Sneaks back.”
“And finds her husband’s backpack gone.”
I nod. “Which fits what we discovered. Blake’s buried backpack. No food in it.”
“She says the food was also removed from hers.”
“Which makes sense if you want to convince her to leave.”
“Except she doesn’t leave.”
“Right. She’s still hoping to ID the killer.
Not the choice I’d make, even as a cop, but if this is all true, then she’s in shock.
Her husband has been murdered. All she can think about is finding out whodunit.
She hears voices. Tracks them to a clearing as two people are leaving it.
Which would explain Storm finding her trail in that clearing. ”
“Where a man had been buried. A man we still can’t identify.”
“Yes,” I say. “Not that she’d know that. We saw no sign that the burial had been disturbed. But it would explain why she overheard two people talking there.”
“They were burying him.”
I rub my temples. “Two people murdered in two very different ways. Two victims who supposedly have no connection. That’s not working for me.”
“Not working for me either.”
“We need to keep Gretchen’s pick-up date in mind. Someone is coming for her, and if we haven’t resolved this—at least enough to convince her to cancel it—we’re in trouble.”
“I know.”
“So the next step is to talk to émilie and hope we discover that Gretchen’s ‘innocent hiker’ story is shit.”
“She’s counting on us not being able to verify her story. Or, at least, that it’ll take us time to verify it, which gives her time to escape.” He pauses to listen to something and then continues, “Now what about the voices we heard this morning?”
“Which Gretchen also claims to have heard? Either that’s the truth … or she’s covering her ass in case we heard them, too.” I shake my head. “I need to talk to émilie. Until then, I’m being pulled in a dozen directions by clues with a dozen explanations.”
Back in Haven’s Rock, we fetch our baby and visit our dog. I’d love to take Storm home, but April doesn’t want her moved. For now, we’ll just keep stopping in so she knows we’re here.
Once we’re home, I message émilie that I’m ready. She’s gets back to me right away, and Dalton takes over feeding while we talk.
I hold off on the complete explanation. I just tell émilie we seem to have information on our dead man and his wife, and I need to verify it. Gretchen provided full names, addresses, dates of birth, and occupations.
Fifteen minutes later, émilie says, “I have them. Or I have people matching that data, which I know is not necessarily the same thing.”
“They could have borrowed identities.”
“Yes, and while this is where I would love to be able to transmit images, we’re going to need to do this the old-fashioned way. Tell me what they look like, in police-sketch detail.”
I do that. When I finish, émilie exhales. “I think this is them.”
“You don’t sound happy about that.”
“I’m not, because it’s much easier to prove a negative than a positive.”
“It is,” I say. “If I told you that our Gretchen has a snub nose, and the real one does not, then we know ours is an imposter. But a police-sketch ID is imperfect.”
“Let me keep digging. I’d like more.”
As I wait, Dalton hands me a bowl of stew. I take it with grateful thanks and eat most of it before émilie calls back.
“All right,” she says. “Either this is a very elaborate hoax or Gretchen is who she says she is. I found her social media, where she said last week that they were going hiking up north. Blake taught in the summer, and he has the fall term off. People on the post are warning them that it’s late in the year—bears, snow, and such. ”
“Which is what Gretchen said.”
“I can also confirm that Blake really does have this term off and did teach this past summer.”
“So they are who they say they are … which doesn’t necessarily prove they’re only a couple of hikers.”
“True,” she murmurs.
“Gretchen says Blake teaches earth sciences. Can you get me something more specific?”
A pause.
I continue, “I’m asking because earth sciences sounds very middle school. He must specialize in something. Now, maybe Gretchen is simplifying it. Or maybe she’s deliberately avoiding mentioning one specific area that is definitely taught in the Yukon.”
She’s quiet, then she curses softly as she understands my meaning. Keys patter under her fingertips. Finally, she exhales a long, low breath.
“Yes?” I say.
“Yes. Blake’s specialization is geology. Specifically geological mapping and field methods.”
Mining.