TWENTY-FIVE
Mercy’s feet had started to ache an hour ago.
Truman, Eddie, several evidence technicians, and SSRA Jeff Garrison and Intelligence Analyst Darby Cowan from the Bend FBI office had converged on the hill behind Owlie Lake, and they’d all been standing around for too many hours. Amazingly, Mercy had been able to call the Bend office from the beautiful, remote location. Jeff Garrison’s excitement over the weapons cache had made her day. She wished she could have been present to see him tell Darby. The FBI analyst’s eyes had glowed as she watched the weapons being removed from the narrow tunnel in the mountain.
More data to mine.
Mercy knew Darby had been up to her neck in weapons research as she tried to make progress on the missing weapons from the prepper murders. According to a quick conversation Mercy had with Jeff, Darby had been supremely frustrated. “She’s been consulting with the ATF, and they’re keeping a close eye on these cases, but they haven’t uncovered any new leads either.” Jeff gave Mercy an admiring smile. “This is the biggest lead yet.”
“Truman’s the one who suggested we investigate the area,” Mercy pointed out.
“But he didn’t know where to look, right?”
“You’re lucky I remembered an old make-out spot.”
Jeff’s brows rose. “Is that what it was? You came here often?”
She snorted. “More like I followed my brothers. They were the ones who got in trouble.”
“I can’t believe you crawled in there.”
Mercy would have done it again. Small spaces didn’t bother her, and she didn’t understand why some people reacted so strongly to them. If you can get in, you can get out, right?
The first two evidence technicians on the scene had refused to enter the tunnel. One woman had dissolved in tears after she gave it a halfhearted attempt. Mercy had offered to retrieve the rest of the weapons, but Jeff Garrison had refused. He wanted an experienced team to process the scene and the removal. They’d waited another hour for a tech who claimed he wasn’t claustrophobic. When the tech finally huffed and puffed his way up the path, Mercy had wondered if the large man would fit in the tunnel, but he’d scooted in with ease.
Mercy didn’t know how evidence could be handled correctly in the tunnel. It was full of rock and dust, and even though the weapons were bagged, they were covered with debris. Whoever had chosen this place to hide them wasn’t a weapons lover. The guns would have slowly become useless.
Her father would have been furious at the improper storage.
Even Mercy was annoyed by it.
Truman joined her and Jeff. He’d been talking with Darby and Eddie, and Mercy had overheard Darby recommend hiking trails and a kayaking site. She’d seen Truman make some notes on his phone as Darby talked. Eddie had appeared politely interested, but Mercy didn’t think his interests extended to kayaking. A big yacht on a smooth lake, maybe.
Getting out on the water sounded good to Mercy. She hadn’t kayaked in years. A smooth bit of river. The damp scent of waterlogged moss. Towering pines. The sound of water over the rocks. Nothing between her and nature but a paddle and the kayak.
Yes, I could do that.
Would Truman be interested?
She yanked her meandering thoughts back to the present. Murder. Guns. Focus.
Truman was looking at her with a puzzled gaze. She glanced at Jeff, who was giving her the same look. “What?” she asked.
“Jeff asked you if you’re sure the cave had deepened since you were last here,” Truman said.
“Absolutely. Before, it could barely keep a few people dry from the rain. Now it’s much bigger.”
“Are you sure it’s the same one?” Jeff asked.
“I checked the area,” said Mercy. “I couldn’t find another.”
“She walked right to this one,” added Truman. “I had no doubt she knew where she was going.”
“We need to figure out when it was deepened,” said Jeff. “Was it done deliberately to hide the weapons? Or did someone stumble on it by chance?”
“The tunnel part felt natural to me,” said Mercy. “Someone got lucky finding that as a hidden storage space. Did anyone check with the Forest Service to ask if they were aware of any blasting in the area?” She knew it was a long shot. It could have happened anytime in the last fifteen years.
“I had Darby call. They have no records of anything like that.”
“Could be as simple as a couple of high school kids fooling around with explosives they’d found,” said Truman. “What about reported injuries from explosives?”
“I could ask Levi,” said Mercy. “He would probably remember if something like that had happened. Word travels fast when someone nearly blows their hand off.”
“Ina Smythe too,” Truman said as he pulled out his phone. “I’ll give her a call.” He stepped away and Mercy did the same thing as she dialed Levi.
It felt foreign to call her brother. They’d exchanged numbers yesterday, and at the time she’d wondered if she’d ever use his. She and Levi weren’t at the stage where she could text him a casual “Hey, what’s up?” or a selfie.
How many times over the years have I wished I had his number in my phone?
She’d wanted someone to share her successes with. Her college graduation. Her FBI acceptance. Her posting in Portland. She’d celebrated with friends, but she’d always been painfully aware her family was out of reach. Now her brother was available at the touch of a button. Rose and Pearl too.
Slowly she was making progress.
“Mercy?” her brother answered.
“Yes, it’s me. I have a question for you.” There was no coffee bar noise in the background, and she wondered where he was.
“What’s up?”
“Do you remember the spot up behind Owlie Lake where you guys used to drink and bring girls?”
“The lookout? The one you have to hike up to?”
“Yes. Do you remember the cave that was off the path?”
“Why are you asking?” His voice was cautious.
“Because I’m up here right now and it doesn’t look like I remember. The cave is pretty deep, and there’s a low tunnel that runs even deeper from the back.”
“That’s not right. You must be somewhere else. It wasn’t deep at all.”
“I’m positive I’m in the right spot. I don’t know of any other caves up here, do you?”
“Mercy, what’s going on?” Levi sounded deadly serious.
“I’m trying to figure out when someone made this cave deeper.”
“Why are you poking around up there?”
Frustration rolled over her. Why did her brother care—
She gripped her phone tighter. “What is up here, Levi?”
He was silent.
“Oh God. Are you saying you . . . is this where . . .” She couldn’t breathe. She took several more steps to put more distance between her and the group of investigators.
“Mercy, where exactly are you?”
Her mind spun. Did Levi stash a corpse up here? Is the crime scene team about to find a pile of bones?
“At the lookout. The flat area where you can see forever.”
He exhaled loudly over the phone.
“Levi, we found a bunch of guns stashed in that cave. I know it’s the same cave; someone made it bigger.”
“Are you saying that area is crawling with FBI now?” His voice rose an octave.
“Something like that. But just near the cave for now.”
“Have they gone down the steep slope off the trail at all?”
“No.” Mercy wondered if they would. It had sharp drops in several areas. A wrongly placed foot could send someone sliding through rocks and shrubs for a good fifty feet. “Why would you pick such a popular spot?” she hissed into the phone.
Oh my God.
“I panicked. I didn’t know where to go where no one would see me, and I knew I didn’t have time to dig a hole.” His words tumbled out of his mouth. “And only part of that trail was popular back then. No one goes down the slope; it’s too dangerous. People stay on the trails.”
“What if someone had been here that night? Levi, how were you going to explain a dead body?” Adrenaline pooled in her stomach. How had her brother managed to get a corpse up the hill? He’d been a big, strong twenty-year-old back then . . . but still.
“Nothing happened. It was a pain in the ass, but I got it done.”
“What if they find something now? I’m supposed to pretend I don’t know what happened?”
“Yes.”
“Dammit.” She wiped the sweat off her temples. The sun had long gone behind the ridge, and there was no reason for her to be sweating. She felt as if she had a huge sign on her back for every investigator to read: Murderer.
“Everything’s going to be fine. No one is going to think you have anything to do with an ancient murder victim.”
“Is it buried?”
“Sort of. The rain keeps washing the dirt away because it’s on a slope. The last time I was up there I managed to cover it with rocks pretty well. Someone would have to be paying very close attention to spot it.”
Or have a dog with them.
The sweat started again as she wondered if Jeff would request a dog to search the area.
“Look,” she said. “You don’t know anything about the cave being blasted somehow to make it deeper, right?”
“Right. I haven’t checked the cave since we were kids. I remember it as pretty shallow.”
“Do you remember hearing of anyone who’d been hurt by explosives? A prank gone awry? An idiot playing with fireworks and got hurt? Something like that?”
Levi was silent for a long moment. “No. I can’t remember anything like that.”
Mercy closed her eyes. Her world had tilted the slightest bit. As if it hadn’t been off kilter enough. He’s right. No one can connect a dead body up here with me. Or him.
Unless Levi accidentally left something behind.
“We don’t have any idea who he was, right?” she whispered.
“No. He didn’t have a wallet.” He paused. “I’ve paid attention over the years, and no missing person reports have sounded like him. He wasn’t from around here. Or else no one around here gave a rip about him.”
“I need to go,” she said softly. People were waiting. This wasn’t the phone call she’d expected to have.
“Be careful, Mercy.” Levi told her. “And call me . . . if . . . you know.”
If they find a body.
“I will.” She ended the call, composed her face, and walked back to the others. Truman was already there.
“Ina doesn’t remember hearing of someone hurt in some sort of explosion,” he said.
“Levi doesn’t either. And he remembers the cave being shallow the way I did. He said he hasn’t been back up here or at least checked out the cave since he was twenty.” Her voice sounded normal.
Jeff twisted his lips. “Hopefully we can find some evidence with all those weapons that’ll give us a direction to investigate.” He looked at the scenery around him. “I want to expand the search area. Not just outside the cave. Go at least twenty meters in each direction from the cave. And I want the parking area at the lake searched too.”
“What about the path?” Truman asked. “It’s at least a half mile from the parking area to up here.”
“Five feet off each side of the path.”
Mercy’s knees went fluid. Surely Levi had stashed the body a lot farther off the path than five feet. But someone could still stumble across something to make them look farther.
“You feeling okay, Mercy?” Jeff asked. “You look exhausted.”
“I missed lunch,” she said, wondering how pale she looked. “And I’ve been staying up later than I should.”
Jeff checked the time. “Go eat. This is going to take hours. I’ll keep Eddie here for a while longer. There’s no point in all of us standing around to watch.” He looked from Truman to Mercy. “What’s next on our agenda?”
Mercy tried to remember; her brain felt like mush. “It’s too early for lab results on Anders Beebe. I’d like to talk to the parents of Jennifer Sanders or Gwen Vargas.”
“I’m going to call Ben Cooley,” said Truman. “He was one of the investigators on the Jennifer Sanders case. He still works for me, but he’s out of town.”
“Cooley?” Mercy asked. The name rang a bell, and she searched for where she’d recently heard it.
Pearl. Pearl talked about Teresa Cooley having a problem with Jennifer.
“Does he have a daughter, Teresa?” she asked.
“I think he has a daughter. I don’t remember her name.”
“Pearl told me yesterday that a Teresa Cooley had a problem with Jennifer Sanders in the weeks before she was murdered.”
“What kind of problem?” Truman asked.
“Pearl described it as mean-girl stuff. Boyfriend jealousy or something like that.” Mercy drew a breath, still trying to calm her nerves from Levi’s words. “I don’t believe it’s a woman who’s done all this.”
“Based on what?” Jeff asked. “I don’t want to hear gut feelings; I need facts.”
It was a man who attacked me back then.
“It’s a gut feeling,” she admitted. I can’t tell them what happened back then without turning my life, Levi’s, and Rose’s upside down. Guilt cramped her stomach. Am I slowing down the investigation by not admitting what I know?
Between the shock from Levi and the guilt, she wanted to go crawl in bed.
Telling them a man attacked me offers no insight on the murders of today. He’s dead. His partner might be alive, but I know nothing helpful about him.
Truman’s stare seemed to penetrate her brain and read her thoughts.
She focused on the rock mountain behind him.
“I’ll walk out with you,” he said. “I’d like to come when you talk to Jennifer Sanders’s parents. I checked and they now live in Bend.”
Mercy nodded, wanting desperately to be alone, but her spongy brain couldn’t come up with a reasonable refusal.
“Let’s go.”