Blue Heaven Part 18

Carey eyed Jess with cool eyes, as if trying to determine whether he was a supporter or in the 49 percent who had voted against him.

"And you'd be ..."

"Jess Rawlins."

"That's right," the sheriff said, pretending he remembered.

"I've got a ranch north of town, not far from Sand Creek."

"Right. It's not all that far from where the Taylor kids disappeared."

"Over ten miles away," Jess said, feeling defensiveness creep into his voice.

The sheriff heard it as well and looked stricken. "That's not what I meant ...I wasn't implying anything."

Jess shrugged it off. "Your volunteers?"

Carey was grateful to move on. "Yes, they're all ex-cops. LAPD retirees, but not all that long in the tooth."

"How many of them are there?"

"Four are working with me directly. But another couple dozen on search teams."

Jess nodded. Annie had made the drawing he had asked her for on the kitchen table. The sketch was folded in his pocket. The caricatures were rudimentary: a thin man with white hair and blue eyes, another wearing a ball cap, the third bigger, darker, with a black mustache. Three of them, not four. Then Jess remembered Swann.

"Did they all know each other before this?" Jess asked.

"I think so," Carey said. "They seem pretty familiar with each other. They all pretty much agree who the leader is, anyway."

"Who is that?"

"A man named Singer. Used to be a lieutenant, from what I understand."

"This guy Swann," Jess asked, tapping the newspaper with his finger, trying not to convey his trepidation, "the paper says he's the spokesman for Monica Taylor. How'd that come to be?"

Carey's antenna seemed to go up, Jess thought. Maybe he was asking too many questions.

"Do you know him?" Carey asked.

"I've heard his name," Jess said truthfully.

"Well, apparently he's friends with the mother. He volunteered to stay with her in case somebody calls. But with the exposure this thing is getting in the press, he might spend most of his time keeping reporters away from her. I really can't spare a man for that."

Jess nodded. "This is kind of a crazy question, but is this the only big case you're working on right now? I heard a wild rumor about a possible murder in the county."

Carey's eyebrows shot up, and he seemed to examine Jess in a whole new way that said, This old man is a nutcase.

He kept his voice down, as Jess had done. "Where in the h.e.l.l did you hear that?"

"You know how people talk."

"And where was this murder supposed to have occurred?"

"By the river."

Carey shook his head. A vein had enlarged in his temple, and Jess could see the sheriff's heartbeat.

"I wish they'd stick to real life, G.o.ddammit."

"So, no other big crime in the area?"

Carey reached over and tapped the newspaper, as Jess had. His eyes were both angry and pleading. "Isn't this enough right now?"

The waitress emerged from the kitchen with Carey's breakfast and topped off their coffee.

"If you'll excuse me ..." Carey said, turning to his plate and stabbing egg yolks with points of toast.

Jess sat back. He hadn't noticed another man enter the restaurant and walk straight toward the sheriff.

BUT VILLATORO saw him. It was Newkirk. Newkirk approached the sheriff and threw an arm over his back so he could tell him something private.

JESS KEPT his eyes averted but listened carefully. The man had whispered something about a videotape. The man wore a ball cap.

"How'd we get it, Newkirk?" Carey asked, his toast poised in the air between his plate and his mouth.

"Somebody dropped it by this morning. We found it in a grocery sack near the front door of the station. n.o.body saw who left it."

"Have you looked at it?"

Newkirk solemnly nodded his head. "It's something you need to see, Sheriff."

"Do I have time to finish my breakfast?"

"No, I don't think so."

Carey called for the waitress to box up his breakfast.

"Who's on it? Are the kids on it?"

Newkirk looked quickly around the room before answering. He seemed suddenly agitated, and Jess followed his line of sight. Newkirk was looking at the dark man in the booth who was eating his breakfast, the man who had been startled by the bear across the street.

AFTER NEWKIRK ushered the sheriff out, Jess withdrew the sketch. There he was, the one in the ball cap. He stood, threw down two dollars, and slid off his stool. He was clamping his hat on his head and leaving when the man in the booth intercepted him.

"I didn't introduce myself earlier. I'm Eduardo Villatoro."

"Jess Rawlins."

"May I buy you a cup of coffee?" Villatoro asked, gesturing to the empty seat in his booth.

"I'm kind of coffeed out, thanks."

"May I ask you a question?"

"Shoot."

"I overheard you talking with the sheriff. He mentioned the name of a man he's working with, an ex-lieutenant. What was the man's name again?"

"He said it was Singer."

Villatoro's eyes narrowed. Singer. Now there were three.

"You know him?"

"Yes. This name I know for sure."

Jess tried to read Villatoro's face, wondering what he meant by that.

"I guess I will have that cup of coffee," Jess said.

Sunday, 9:55 A.M.

THE FIRST THIRTY seconds of the videotape was of a Seattle Sea-hawks football playoff game from the previous season. As the quarterback pulled back to pa.s.s, the screen faded into snowy static, there was an audible pop, then it was filled with a starkly lighted head-and-shoulders shot of a man in an otherwise dark room.

"My name is Tom Boyd...."

They were in the command center with the door closed. Newkirk stood in the back of the room, watching over the sheriff's shoulder. Newkirk's belly was on fire, and his eyes watered from the taste of acid in his throat that wanted to come up. He had not seen the video before now because he had refused to watch it being filmed the night before. Instead, he had stayed upstairs on the deck drinking Wild Turkey and looking at the reflection of the stars on the faraway lake. All he knew was that it had taken a long time. Nine tries before they got it right, Gonzalez said later. Newkirk had rolled home at 4:30 A.M. His bedroom door was locked, blankets and a pillow on the couch in the entertainment room. Even his dog avoided him.

"I work for United Parcel Service here in Kootenai Bay, and I got to get something off my chest before I split the country for good...."

Boyd looked terrible on the tape, Newkirk thought. His face was white and drawn, his eyes gleamed and looked vacant at the same time. Newkirk noticed that either Singer or Gonzo had b.u.t.toned the man's shirt up to the collar to hide the Taser burns. But when Boyd turned his head slightly while talking, Newkirk thought he could see the top edge of one. Would anyone else see it if they weren't looking for it? He felt a hot surge in his throat and turned away. He needed cold water fast.

"I didn't mean to hurt those kids. I don't even remember how it happened. I mean, what caused it. It was like I was there one minute, and I didn't wake up until after it happened. Like I blacked out, or something. I feel real bad about it...."

The sheriff moaned, "Aw, s.h.i.t." Newkirk looked at Carey. The man had looked bad at breakfast, but nothing like he did now. It was as if the sheriff were collapsing into himself. His shoulders slumped, and his hands fell limply to his sides.

"I ain't saying where the bodies are at, only that you won't likely ever find them. All I can say is they didn't suffer nearly as much as I am now. I'm sorry, of course. They didn't deserve it. Maybe if their mother would'a taught them not to steal, but I ain't completely blaming her, either. She needs help, but I ain't the one to give it."

Boyd paused, swallowed as if it hurt him, then continued.

"Don't bother looking for me, either. By the time you see this, I'll be so far away you'll never find me. All I can say is I wish it never would have happened, and it'll never happen again. I'm through with the drugs and the alcohol."

For the first time, Boyd glanced away from the camera lens, then returned to it. To Newkirk, the reason was obvious: Boyd was looking for approval. But would anyone else see it that way?

"That's it. I'm gone."

You sure are, Newkirk thought.

The tape once again faded into snow before the game returned. The room was filled with the sound of the announcers describing a replay. No one else spoke for several minutes.

Finally, Singer walked to the VCR and monitor and paused it. "Do you want to see it again?" he asked the sheriff.

"Jesus," the sheriff said. "No, I don't want to see it again right now."

"Looks like we've got our guy," Singer said. "Whether we'll be able to find him is another thing."

"Those poor kids. My G.o.d."

"The tape belonged to Boyd, no doubt about it," Singer said. "He kept a library of Seahawk games from last year. Eighteen tapes, all the same brand, lined up in order on his bookshelf. The last one was missing, which is the one we just looked at. So was his video camera, but he left the case for it."

"Maybe we should get some dogs," Gonzalez said. "We could get the scent from clothes at the mother's house and send the dogs out near the river. I'm guessing that's where we'll find the bodies. I don't know the situation around here, but we used to have some dog guys available we could call in."

Carey seemed incapable of moving or speaking. He stared at the frozen screen.

"Sheriff?" Singer asked gently.

"The mother needs to know," Carey said. "I don't look forward to that conversation."

Singer screwed up his face in sympathy. Newkirk felt another violent surge. Again, he fought to keep it down. He looked away, at the empty council chambers, hoping that not seeing Singer, Gonzalez, or Carey would settle his flaming stomach.

"We could call Swann," Singer said. "He could break the news."

The sheriff looked troubled. "No. That's something I should do."

"Swann knows her," Singer said. "It might be better coming from him."

Carey considered it. "You're probably right."

Coward, Newkirk thought.

"Time to issue an Amber Alert and call in the FBI," Carey said. "We've got a suspect now, but this is beyond us. Boyd is probably halfway across Nevada or in Canada by now."

Singer's eyes flared, but so quickly that Newkirk wasn't sure the sheriff even noticed.

"No FBI," Singer said. "Do you know how they come in and completely take over a case? I've been there, believe me. The most dangerous place to be on earth is between an FBI spokesman and a television camera. They make the locals come off as incompetent and lame. There's nothing the Feds can do that we've not already thought of."

Carey shook his head. "We need somebody to a.n.a.lyze the tape. Maybe they can figure out where it was shot, or see something in it we can't see."

Newkirk was surprised by the sheriff's determination and mortified by the sudden turn things had taken. Singer had been sure Carey would defer to him.

"Why does it matter where he took it?" Singer asked. "What matters is what he said. He confessed, Sheriff. We've got our man. Now we've got to concentrate on finding Boyd and locating those bodies. The FBI can't really help with that here. You know this county better than they ever will."

Carey cleared his throat. "It doesn't feel right to me that Boyd here would confess on a tape and, in effect, dare us to come find him. He doesn't seem proud of what he did. He feels like s.h.i.t, and he sure looks like s.h.i.t. Maybe he had to do it to clear his conscience, but why not just turn himself in? He's no hardened criminal. He's just a local boy gone bad."

"Sheriff ..."

Carey looked at Singer. "That's right. Last I looked, I was still the sheriff around here. It makes sense to me to bring in some expertise."

To an outsider, Newkirk thought, it might look like the sheriff had won. But Singer's face was calm, impa.s.sive. As if he were considering what the sheriff said and thinking it over. But Newkirk knew Singer and knew that Singer was at his most dangerous when he appeared serene.