Chapter Twenty-Three
It had never been easy saying goodbye to Miah, but the next morning Nicki found it all but impossible. Partly on account of there being zero news from the investigators, but more so because things felt different after last night. Before last night, she’d have said she and Miah were dating—secretly, but dating all the same. But now it felt unmistakably as though they were in a relationship.
Shouldn’t be such a shock, she thought, climbing into her car. They’d been friends for months and months, and their attraction and sexual chemistry were undeniable. All it had needed was a night like last night, uniting them in something larger than themselves, and presto. Even if they weren’t an item, Nicki could admit she had the attachment that went with it.
Can’t act so surprised. She aimed herself downtown. Nobody else will be, likely. You could play it as cool as you wanted, but most of the time you weren’t fooling anybody but yourself.
She pulled into the BCSD’s lot twenty minutes later. She wasn’t on duty today, but she had pestering to do. And, spotting Trace Gregory’s car across the way, she stood a decent chance at accomplishing it.
She greeted Laura on her way through the lobby and marched up to the detectives’ temporary office. “Knock knock,” she called, rapping on the open door.
Gregory turned, seated at the long table. “Deputy.”
“You can call me Nicki—I’m off duty. May I intrude a minute?”
“You may,” he said, attention moving back to his laptop, “but you’re warned, I’m not paying much attention. Got a virtual mountain of shit to dig through.”
“Sounds like a good problem to have. I figured you must be busy, since I haven’t received that update call I repeatedly requested—”
“We’re swamped, Deputy.”
“—so I’ve come to pester you in person. What’s going on with Vreeland? Is he in custody? Did he confess?”
Gregory squinted at the glowing screen, jotted something down. “Yes, he’s in custody, and he’s denying it all, naturally. Or he did when we picked him up. Hasn’t said jack since his lawyer joined the party. Though we do have enough to hold him for the time being, thanks to that phone call.”
“What’d the bank say?”
“TBD. Subpoena’s being drawn up.”
“Figures . . . He didn’t act alone, did he?”
“Couldn’t say, yet. Seems unlikely, if you ask me. Or rather, he doesn’t seem the type.”
“Why?” she asked, leaning on the desk’s edge. “Why’d he want Don Church dead?” Well, technically, Miah. The thought made her shiver, then her blood rose to a roaring boil. “What did he know about the property, do you think? You must have learned something, questioning him.”
Gregory sank back in his chair, seeming to surrender himself to Nicki’s presence. “Unclear. All we really can say is that he’s guilty. He’s involved.”
“He said so?”
“No. But you can tell—he was sweaty as fuck. You ask me, there’s others involved, and he’s more scared of them than he is of prison time. As for what he knew about the land . . . maybe nothing. Maybe he got in because he knew his way around the place, plain and simple. Maybe he was a pawn.”
“That was Bean’s role—he knew the ranch way better than Vreeland could, and he was desperate.”
“Who’s to say Vreeland isn’t?”
“Give me something . . .” She nearly called him Trace, but goddamn if she just couldn’t take that name seriously. “Anything. Jeremiah’s my best friend in this entire town. Gimme some fucking hope, for God’s sake.”
He sighed and rubbed his face. She bet he hadn’t slept all night, and she could sympathize.
“Anything,” she said again. “Public record shit, obviously. Save me the eyestrain.”
“Apart from acting guilty, Vreeland’s clean as a whistle. No debts, no priors. His wife had a DUI six years ago, but apart from that they’re Mr. and Mrs. Upstanding.”
“Have you looked into the construction outfit, whoever hired Vreeland? Whoever he’d have reported his findings to, if he did find anything of interest on the ranch?”
“You do realize I’m a detective, don’t you?”
She rolled her eyes. “I know I’m being a pain in your ass, and you’ve got more of those than you can count just now. But humor me, please?”
“Vreeland’s contact was somebody in the developers’ public relations department. She’s been interviewed and she surrendered her emails and her phone records and her hard drive. Far as I know, there’s nothing suspicious about her, and from what we’ve seen, the reports Vreeland gave her say pretty much exactly what the preliminary ones did. Whole fat load of nothing, Nicki.”
“He could’ve faked the reports.”
“Could’ve, sure. Easily.”
“Maybe . . . maybe he did find something. Maybe the construction was leaking something dangerous into the groundwater. Something illegal. And someone inside the contracting sphere knew it, and they paid him off, conspired to force the Churches to sell, no matter what . . .”
Gregory’s look was withering, at best. “You think they’d want to get themselves into a position to spend millions of dollars to acquire a load of polluted ranchland, just to avoid fines and legal fees?”
She frowned, feeling stupid. “Probably not.”
“Go home, Nicki. Get some sleep. You got a son, right?”
“Yeah.”
“Me too, down in Reno. I would literally cut off my pinky if this case could be closed and I could get home and see him and my wife. So go home, for fuck’s sake. Your heart’s in the right place, but your head’s a mess. I know, because mine’s the same right about now.”
“You slept lately?”
“Nope. Cup of black coffee every hour, on the hour. Even if I could go home now, I’d be afraid to drive.”
“You guys sweep Vreeland’s house?”
“Of course.”
“Anything sketchy?”
“Nicki . . .”
“Anything?”
Gregory nodded to the far end of the desk, where a black plastic evidence bag sat beside a couple cardboard boxes. “In the house, nothing. Not even a pair of fur-lined handcuffs in the bedside drawer. Found a burner in the back of his car, though, wedged into the crack between the seat cushions.” A burner, meaning a throwaway cell phone.
“What would a soil scientist need with one of those?”
He sighed. “Who knows? Maybe he was having an affair. Maybe it was his wife’s. Maybe she was having an affair. Maybe he bought the car used and its previous owner was having an affair.”
“Any juice left in it?”
“A bit.”
“Not the previous owner, then.”
He smirked. “Let it go, Nicki.”
“Can I see it?”
His eye roll was so vast, she swore she felt the room shift. Then he surprised her. He opened a drawer and fished around, finally tossing her a box of latex gloves. “Knock yourself out, Deputy. You won’t find anything we haven’t.”
She pulled on a pair of gloves and rolled a chair over to where the evidence bag sat.
“You gonna plant something on there?” Gregory teased.
“I want justice, Detective. And answers.”
It was a generic sort of phone, the kind you might get for an elderly relative—prepaid minutes, text messages, but no internet, only the most basic apps. Nicki tapped the receiver icon—three times, the latex making the touchscreen fussy—and pulled up the call history.
“Unknown, unknown, unknown,” she read. Every last incoming call, unknown.
“Yup.”
She switched to the outgoing calls. None. “Huh.”
“No voicemails,” Gregory said. “None he saved, anyhow. None in the trash folder.”
“That was my next question.”
“Couple text messages, and they’re sketchy as hell, but as to whether we’re talking criminal conspiracy or a seedy fling, inconclusive. If you can make heads or tails of them, be my guest.”
She clicked back to the home screen and opened the messaging app.
Usual spot. Usual time, read an incoming one from June. Another from July said, Thursday, 11pm. And from last week, Need to talk. Will call on the hour until I reach you.
“Not exactly seductive.”
There was only one other one, dated just yesterday. It was outgoing, reading, simply, Confirming.
“Yesterday,” Nicki said. “Confirming what?”
“You tell me.”
She pondered it. “That would be the day he did the second soil survey. Could be confirming some result or other, or just, like, ‘I’m out confirming whatever the fuck it is we’re so goddamn interested in.’”
“Or he could be confirming his next meeting with his mistress.”
She hit the info icon next to the message. “There’s a number attached to this text.”
“I know. Unlisted. Probably another pay-as-you-go.”
“You run it? Do they register that stuff, like, could it tell you what store sold the phone?”
“Someone’s on it. But stores don’t track that shit, Nicki.”
“Damn. You sure?”
“You have any idea how many burners I come across in my line of work? I’ll bet your little friend was using one when he recorded himself blackmailing Oren Vreeland.”
“I barely know him.”
“Doesn’t matter. Useless as evidence—it can only fuck us if we make too much of it. Though it was pretty goddamn useful, as far as focusing our efforts, so my thanks to your mysterious not-a-friend for that.”
“You’re welcome.”
Gregory rubbed his forehead, eyes squeezed shut. “Only way that phone’s any help is if we could manage to call the contact, keep him on the line, and triangulate the phone’s location. But I’m not holding my breath. I’d put good money on whoever owns that other phone destroying it pretty damn fast once news of Vreeland’s arrest gets out.”
“You tried calling it yet?”
“Of course. No answer, no voicemail.”
“Huh.” She poked around the phone some more, opening up a notepad app. She frowned, finding one entry. Rocky road, lemon, 2 limes, burgers. “Did you—”
“Forgive me, Deputy,” Gregory said, his focus back on his screen, “but I need to get this shit sorted through if I ever want to sleep again.”
“There’s a note on this phone. ‘Rocky road, lemon, two limes, burgers.’ Weird fucking grocery list, don’t you think?”
“Sure. Plus who puts their grocery list on their secret cell phone? But if you can make heads or tails of it, blow my mind, by all means.”
She frowned. Then she took out her own phone and copied the puzzle down, as well as the phone number Vreeland had exchanged texts with.
“I’ll get out of your hair,” she said, dropping the phone back in its bag, sealing it, and snapping off the gloves. “Thanks for indulging me.”
“Give my best to Church. Sorry we don’t have anything definitive for him yet.”
“How likely does a plea deal feel to you?”
He made a face. “Seems like the most obvious strategy, and I’m sure it’s what his lawyer’s gonna push. But having sat with him during questioning, I’m not holding my breath. He’s scared of somebody. That’s what my gut says.”
“Hm.”
“It’ll all come down to his lawyer, what kind of pressure they put on him.”
“Right. Well, good luck with your shit pile.”
“Thanks.”
“Thank you, for allowing the interruption.”
Nicki closed the door behind her, so busy studying the note on her phone, she nearly knocked another deputy down on her way out. “Sorry, Jen.”
This demanded some seriously focused, clearheaded thinking. But with that off the table, it’d take some disjointed obsessing as Nicki sleepwalked through her duties at home.
“Will do,” she muttered, heading outside with the world’s weirdest shopping list scrolling through her head.
* * *
Miah got down to work as soon as he’d kissed Nicki goodbye. He bet he’d slept about three hours, but a nap wasn’t an option. There was too much to do, and his head was too crammed with questions to make sleep likely. He dug into some overdue billing paperwork and let it consume him, blocking everything else out—chiefly, the hope again trying to rise inside him. He had lunch with his mom, neither of them quite willing to start speculating. By then he was nearing delirium so admin work was off the table. He filled his truck bed with gravel and drove out along the service road, filling in the deeper ruts.
He didn’t get back into cell range until the sun was sinking, and his phone buzzed to life in his jacket pocket. One voicemail.
“It’s Nicki. Not sure what you’re up to but I’m coming by. I’ll wait out front if nobody’s around.”
Huh. It was time-stamped a half hour ago, and her voice was tough to read, but he assumed if she had good news, she’d have said so. Bad news . . . ? More likely. He tapped out a quick text. On my way. Home in fifteen.
His mom was out, so when he pulled into the lot he spotted Nicki sitting on the porch swing. He slammed his door. His feet longed to close the distance at a run, but he mustered what composure was left to him, this desperate and under rested.
“Hey,” he called from the lawn. “Sorry I missed your call. I really need to give you the sat phone’s number.”
She stood as he reached the porch and they kissed. When she stepped back, her face was set and serious.
“What’s happening?” he asked, heart dropping into his boots.
“Short answer, nothing at all. Vreeland’s in custody, but he’s got a lawyer so we may not hear anything for a while.”
“Good news, bad news.”
“Exactly. I talked with one of the detectives—Trace Gregory. He’s as frustrated as us. Busy combing through Vreeland’s hard drive and emails and phone records, I think. Don’t go shouting this around, but one thing they did find that’s suspicious is a throwaway cell phone, stashed in Vreeland’s car.”
“Okay. Any numbers on it?”
“One. Unlisted, and no answer, Gregory said. A few texts, real vague about meeting up, but none said where or gave any hints about who with. Plus check this out . . .”
She took a seat on the swing and Miah did the same. She pulled out her phone and brought up a memo app. He frowned, scanning the list typed there. “Rocky road?”
“This was in the phone. It’s not a real grocery list. It can’t be.”
“I wonder if it means a literal rocky road, like directions maybe.”
“I was wondering the same. Like his contact gave him an address for their meet ups, but he didn’t dare write it down.”
“But then what the fuck do the lemons and limes have to do with anything?”
“Limes is an anagram of miles,” she said. “Two miles?”
He frowned. “What if . . . what if lemon meant L, like, take a left? And maybe burgers could be something to do with the ranch?”
“That crossed my mind, too.”
“Rocky road . . . A service road, here on the ranch?”
“Maybe it’s directions to something Vreeland found on one of his visits.”
“Rocky road . . . Well, there’s no left to take on the main service road, the one I used to take him around.”
“Huh . . . Are there any roads in town named after actual rocks?”
Miah considered it. “I don’t think so. I mean, there’s the road to the gravel quarry. Quarry Road.”
“Any lefts to take?”
“Can’t remember . . . I think it’s just a big loop. But you could veer to the left. Then go two miles, right? Two limes, and then . . . burgers.”
A pause, then she blurted, “Do you want to go?”
“Right now?”
Nicki nodded.
“Well . . . sure. Why the fuck not?”
“Do they lock up the quarry at night?”
“Not sure. Lemme call Vince.” He took out his phone and punched in his friend’s number.
“Yeah?”
“Hey, Vince, do they lock up Petroch after business hours?”
“‘Scuse me?”
“Just humor me. Is it fenced in?”
“Not fenced, no. Just a gate they lock across the road to keep people from trying to steal the equipment.”
“Could a bike get around it?”
“Easily,” Vince said. “Why the fuck do you ask?”
“I’ll tell you later. Thanks, man.”
Vince was protesting but Miah hung up on him. He wanted this done quietly and discreetly—not the Grossier way, for a change. He put his phone to sleep and stood. “Let’s find some helmets.”