Chapter 3
Chapter Three
Cascade Foothills
Chelan County, Washington
The suburbs thinned as they left Tacoma behind, giving way to forested foothills that rose steadily toward the Cascades. After the pass, the landscape opened as they dropped into Chelan County, where orchards and hay fields stretched across the valley floor toward the eastern slopes.
Jason kept the Charger at a steady pace.
Allie watched the scenery blur past as her mind worked through what little they knew about the case.
An AUSA killed in a remote rental cabin with no cell service and no neighbors close enough to hear anything suggested a killer who had done his homework. But that was about all they had.
“You’re coming over the top,” Jason said, making a swooping gesture with his right hand. “That’s why you’re slicing. If you just drop your hands a little at the start of your downswing—”
Allie deadpanned him. “Jason.”
“I’m just saying, if you adjusted your grip a little—”
“Jason,” she repeated.
“—and maybe worked on your stance, you’d see a lot of improvement. It’s really just about the fundamentals.”
Allie sighed. “For the record, that was the last time I’m playing golf.”
Jason raised an eyebrow. “Ever?”
“Ever,” she confirmed. “I’d rather just write a check for a good cause than humiliate myself like that again.”
Jason smiled. “It wasn’t that bad.”
“It was exactly that bad.” Allie shook her head. “I spent two hours retrieving balls from bushes and creeks. It felt more like a scavenger hunt, and I was the only one hunting.”
Jason laughed warmly. “All right. No more golf. Noted.”
Allie settled back in her seat, relieved to have that settled.
The trees thickened around them, their branches forming a canopy that filtered the afternoon light into dappled patterns across the windshield.
The clouds that had been gathering earlier were moving in now.
They darkened the sky and cast the landscape a somber gray.
“How’s Joey doing?” Allie asked, hoping to shift the conversation to safer ground.
Jason’s face softened. “She’s great. Sleeping through the night now, which is huge. Victoria and I are actually getting rest.”
“That’s good.”
“Yeah.” Jason grinned. “I’m always the first to volunteer when she wakes up though. V jokes that I just like having an excuse to hold her.”
“She’s probably right.”
“She is,” Jason admitted. He glanced at Allie.
“Besides, since we’re moving into the new house soon and Victoria’s doing most of the packing, I figure it’s the least I can do.
I wouldn’t mind doing more packing and taking the load off of her, but by the time I get home, she’s done so much and just wants me to relax with her. ”
Allie smiled, genuinely happy for him. Jason and Victoria had been through a lot in the past few years, and seeing them settle into this new chapter of their lives felt right. They deserved it.
The road climbed steadily now as they moved deeper into the foothills.
Jason turned off the main county road onto a narrower route, this one dirt and gravel that wound through dense stands of pine and fir.
The trees here were taller, older, their trunks thick and scarred by weather and time.
The Charger handled the uneven terrain without complaint, though Allie could feel every rut and dip in the road.
After twenty minutes, the trees thinned, and Allie saw the log cabin ahead.
The small structure sat in a clearing surrounded by forest on three sides.
Jason parked behind one of the cruisers and killed the engine.
They climbed out, and Allie took in the scene—over a dozen vehicles, parked haphazardly along the road and the clearing.
She spotted both Chelan County Sheriff’s Office cruisers and state patrol cars.
Yellow crime scene tape stretched across the front porch fluttering in the mountain air.
A man descended the short set of stairs and approached. He was broad-shouldered, with gray hair and a wide, weathered face. He wore the uniform of the Chelan County Sheriff’s Office, the badge on his chest catching the light.
“Agents?” He extended a hand. “Sheriff Fisher.”
Jason made the introductions. “What can you tell us?”
“This one’s a little outside our usual scope. Appreciate you making the drive out here.” Fisher gestured toward the cabin. “Better if I show you. Fair warning though. It’s not pretty.”
They followed him across the clearing. The house looked even smaller up close. A few deputies stood outside near their vehicles, speaking in low voices. Fisher led them through the doorway, stepping aside to let them take in the scene.
Allie stopped just inside and let her eyes adjust to the gloom.
She covered her nose against the overwhelming acrid scent.
The cabin’s main room was small, perhaps fifteen feet by twenty, with a kitchenette in one corner, a small bathroom in another, and a sofa against the far wall.
But what dominated the space was the chaos.
Furniture overturned, papers scattered, a lamp lying broken on the floor.
It looked as though an indiscriminate storm had passed through.
The body was near the sofa.
The victim lay on his back, his shirt open and his skin pale in the dim light. A dark stain of blood had spread beneath him and blackened the wooden floor. A long smear of it led from the center of the room to where he now rested, telling the story of his final moments.
Allie studied the victim’s face. He was middle-aged and lean, with thinning hair and features that might have been sharp once but were now slack.
His eyes were closed, his mouth slightly open.
He looked almost peaceful, as though he had simply fallen asleep.
But the rest of him told a different story.
“The victim’s wife got worried when she didn’t hear from him last night,” Fisher said in a low voice. “He’d called her yesterday morning from the cabin’s landline and told her he’d seen a bear. That was the last she heard from him.”
Jason’s gaze swept the room. “Who found him?”
“The property manager. The wife called the rental company when she couldn’t reach him, and the manager drove out here this morning to check on things.”
Allie’s eyes moved over to the victim’s torso. A single wound was located just below the sternum. The cut was clean and precise, suggesting a sharp blade. But it was what lay above the wound that made her brows draw together.
In the center of the man’s chest, seared into his flesh, was the number 14.
The digits were thick and bold, surrounded by a circle that had been burned just as deeply.
The skin around it was charred black, the edges raised and blistered.
The branding had been done with enough heat to cauterize the tissue and create a sunken, blackened canyon in the shape of the numbers.
The smell Allie had noticed when she entered was the scent of burned flesh and some acrid chemical.
“I’ve never seen anything like this,” Fisher said, his eyes on the victim.
Allie swallowed, forcing herself to remain detached. She’d seen worse. Not often, but enough times to know how to compartmentalize. Still, there was something particularly disturbing about the deliberateness of it. The killer hadn’t just killed. He’d marked his victim. Claimed him, in a way.
“Who owns the cabin?” Jason asked.
“It’s an online rental,” Fisher replied. “One of those short-term places. The owner lives in Seattle and rents it out through a website. According to his wife, Mr. Sterling arrived here Wednesday afternoon and planned to stay through Sunday.”
Allie’s gaze lingered on the body. Thomas Sterling had been a prominent prosecutor. His death would create shockwaves throughout the legal community.
“By the looks of things,” Fisher continued, “he’s been dead for the better part of a day. We’ll know more after the autopsy, but I’d say he died sometime Friday evening.”
Jason crouched near the body. “Any sign of a weapon?”
“None. And the scene has been mostly processed.”
“What about the lock?” Allie asked, nodding toward the front door.
“It was picked,” Fisher explained. “Clean job too. There’s a little damage to the frame where it may have been kicked in. But there’s no damage to the lock mechanism. Whoever did this knew what they were doing.”
Allie considered that. A rental cabin meant a steady stream of guests, each one leaving behind fingerprints, hair, fibers. It would take weeks to sort through all the evidence, and even then, they might not find anything useful. The killer had chosen his location well.
“Robbery?” Jason asked.
Fisher shook his head. “His wallet and watch are still on him. Nothing’s obviously missing, so it doesn't look like it.”
Allie turned, surveying the room again. She stepped carefully around the blood trail, her eyes catching on a loose sheet of paper near the overturned desk. She bent down, pulled on a pair of gloves she slipped from her jacket pocket, and picked it up.
The page was covered in single-spaced text. The letters were uneven, with some darker than others, the hallmark of a manual typewriter. Allie scanned the first few lines. It read like fiction. A protagonist in some kind of trouble, heading downstairs to a basement.
“This looks like a novel,” she said aloud.
Fisher glanced over. “His wife mentioned he was working on a book. Said he’d been talking about it for years.”
Allie’s gaze moved across the room to where a typewriter lay upside down on the floor.
The machine looked old and heavy, more like a relic that belonged in a museum.
Its ribbon cartridge had come loose in the fall, trailing black ink across the floorboards like a thin, dark vein.
She handed the page to a nearby evidence technician, a young woman with a camera slung around her neck.
“Can you photograph all the pages?” Allie asked, pulling out her card and handing it over. “Send them to me when you’re done.”
The technician nodded and slipped the card into her pocket. “Will do.”
“We’ll need the full forensic report as soon as it’s ready.” Jason told the sheriff. “Photos, prints, everything.”
“You’ll have it,” Fisher said, then added, “This is your case now. Anything you need, just ask.”
Allie’s attention returned to the body, to the number burned into the chest. Fourteen. What did it mean? A date? A code? Something personal to the victim?
Whatever it was, it meant something to the killer.