Chapter 3 - Jordan
THREE
JORDAN
Pray for @carasloveisgold.
—@deathtripdylan
@deathtripdylan I pray for YOU. How damaged do you have to be to be a murderer groupie?
—@TayCamp
Scanner activity indicates search party assembling near China Creek.
—@madera_watchdawg
“Show me again,” Jordan said.
Bill Pfaff, a stocky guide who ran rafting trips on big rivers—Kings, Tuolumne, American—traced a stubby finger over the hydrological map spread out on the hood of Jordan’s vehicle.
“Hard to predict, given the unusual amount of water this year, but I’d say your most likely washout points are here, here, and here.”
Jordan handed him a fine-tipped marker. “Mark them, please?”
Pfaff shrugged, then drew three Xs on the paper. They were lopsided and looked to Jordan like little crosses. A riverine cemetery.
“’Course, this is all guesswork, Sheriff. I mean, she could have gotten snagged anywhere in a strainer. Since she’s not wearing a life vest, she could be rolling at the bottom of a hole.”
“I understand, but we have to start somewhere. Just to confirm, you wouldn’t send a kayak down the creek with this much flow, right?”
Pfaff stared at Jordan like he could see through the hole in his head. “I wouldn’t send a paper boat down there.”
“I appreciate your time.”
They shook hands, and Pfaff made his way back to a dusty Chevy Suburban with Sierra Whitewater Adventures stenciled on the driver’s-side door.
After stealing a few hours of fitful sleep, Jordan had risen before dawn to return to the area where he’d last seen Cara Campbell.
At the crash site on 41, his headlights swept over the scorched earth where the fire had started before climbing into the hills.
In the distance, an eerie orange glow marked the fire’s progress.
It almost seemed as though the fire was chasing her, too.
Circling around the fire and getting ahead of it, he’d taken a back road to the gravel turnout where the search party would assemble, Beto arriving as the first sunlight flared over the trees.
They were soon joined by the RICO-repo RV that served as the department’s mobile command post, or MCP, plus a dozen deputies’ vehicles, and the personal cars and trucks of the Madera County Search and Rescue, seasoned outdoorsmen who usually looked for lost or hurt climbers in summer and avalanche-trapped snowmobilers in winter.
Last to arrive was the K9 van, whose dogs barked eagerly while their handler waited for orders.
Now, three TV news vans parked along the shoulder of the road were shooting B-roll of the whole operation while reporters waited impatiently for a statement from Jordan, who refused to grant any interviews until he had something to say.
All this to find one woman. A woman who had admittedly married for money and then killed her husband, apparently to cash out because his money was about to run out.
Most manhunts were actually quite simple.
Those who escaped custody, broke parole, or fled imminent arrest rarely had the resources to leave the country or even the state.
Jordan usually managed to track them down by sending deputies to knock on doors at known hangouts or simply wait until the offender showed.
He’d never actually had to search the woods before.
Jordan waved Beto over and showed him the map. “See these three Xs? I want a team to start at each one and then work their way upstream. If she somehow got washed past the third one, someone will probably spot her body in Oakhurst.”
Beto squinted at the map, calculating routes with an internal GPS that was better than Google’s, at least when it came to the county’s snarls of unmarked back roads.
“Got it.”
While Beto strode into the center of the lot, barking commands as he assembled teams, Jordan looked again at the map.
He was pretty sure he knew where he’d been standing when he watched Campbell go in, but how far she’d gone was anybody’s guess.
She could have gotten snagged around the first corner in what Pfaff called a “strainer”—a tree or root system crossing the stream—where she would have been pinned in place by water pressure.
She could have died of hypothermia even if she was still able to breathe.
It would be a gruesome way to go, even for a murderer. But nature offered no leniency.
Hearing shouts and revving engines, he looked up.
An orange Ford Bronco with a pointless snorkel was bullying its way into the crowded turnout, refusing to stop for the deputy—Lopez—trying to wave him away.
Parking at center stage, Troy Silverman climbed out, ran his fingers through his hair, and turned in a slow circle, making sure the TV cameras on the road caught his whitened smile.
A handful of men Jordan didn’t recognize climbed out of the Bronco and an extended-cab dually pickup that had followed it in.
Amber had warned him Silverman was putting together his own search party, but he just hadn’t had time to give it any thought—what with leading the official search party and all.
Not wanting to give the man any satisfaction, Jordan pretended to study the map while he waited for Silverman to come to him, only looking up when he heard, “You running a used car lot here or what, Burke?”
“You need to move your vehicles,” he said, feeling his neck getting warm. “You’re interfering with an official operation.”
Silverman raised his hands in what was supposed to look like a conciliatory gesture. “Just tell us where you need us. We’re here to help.”
“I have plenty of bodies already, thanks.”
“So you found her?”
“Not yet.”
“I’ve got some good men with me—hunters and trackers. Unless you want to risk letting Ms. Campbell slip through your fingers.”
“Go home, Silverman,” Jordan growled.
“What are you going to do, arrest me?” Silverman raised his voice, playing to his followers, no doubt hoping his words carried to the TV cameras. “Me and my fellow volunteers?”
Jordan was well within his rights to remove the men from the scene, but any action he took would only be fodder for Silverman’s next campaign ad.
But if he let them help, they would only get in the way, because they weren’t trained like the Search and Rescue volunteers.
And—Jordan hated himself for thinking it—what if Silverman’s team actually found Campbell first?
It was hard to think with the barking dogs disrupting his thoughts. But there was a third option: just ignore the asshole.
Leaving a puzzled Silverman behind, Jordan stalked over to Beto. “You’re in command here. I’m going to take one of the teams.”
Beto hardly reacted, but to Jordan, the veteran deputy may as well have winced. “Are you sure?”
He nodded toward Silverman. “Removing myself before I do something I regret.”
“Understood.”
Without acknowledging Silverman, Jordan returned to his vehicle, calmly folded the map, and got behind the wheel.
Lighting up his flashers, he drove directly toward Silverman’s Bronco, which was now blocking his exit.
He stopped a yard short of the driver’s-side door and gestured impatiently at its owner.
Well?
The TV cameras were definitely rolling.
With a false show of good cheer, Silverman squeezed into his vehicle and pulled forward so Jordan could get out. As soon as Jordan’s tires were on the gravel, he gunned the engine, hoping to kick a few rocks toward the Bronco’s perfect paint job. Not very politic behavior.
Four cars—the deputies and volunteers on Jordan’s team—followed along behind. Jordan watched in his side mirror as the orange Bronco and the big pickup pulled U-turns and followed, too.