Bed of Bones (A Sloane Monroe Novel, Book Five) (12 page)

“Fine. Fair warning, expect fireworks when everyone finds out I’ve been involved all this time.”

“Where are you?”

“Old Town,” I said. “Across from Sampson Law Office.”

This was true. The museum was across the street. If he wondered what I was doing there, he didn’t ask.

“Give me twenty minutes, then come in.”

“Can it wait? There’s someone I need to talk to first.”

“I need you here.”

“It’s important, Carlo.”

“Fine. Make it fast. I want the address of the place you’re going.”

I gave it to him.

“You’ve got to assume he’s out there,” he warned, “watching your every move.”

For me, it was just another day on the job.

CHAPTER 25

In all the years I’d lived in Park City, I was ashamed to admit that not once had I visited the museum. I’d thought about taking a tour on several occasions. I’d even sent in a generous donation during last year’s fund-raiser for a bigger, better building. I always knew one day I’d make it here. I just didn’t know it would be on a day like today.

The man I was looking for was named Walter Thornton. I found him inside an office, his nose stuck in a book, an Egyptian travel guide from the looks of it. He wore a blue cardigan sweater over a pair of wool slacks that looked like they were thick enough to repel snow. His head was angled down, allowing me to see the ample hair atop his head, proof that not all men had hair loss at his age.

“Planning a trip?” I asked.

He looked up. His wrinkly, crooked smile made me think of my grandfather. “Pardon?”

“The guide you’re reading,” I pointed. “Is it any good?”

He tipped it up, allowing me a visual of a pyramid on the front cover. “Quite good, yes. I’m planning a trip next year. Have you ever been?”

I shook my head.

He removed his reading glasses, pinched the rim while rubbing an eye. He may have been tired in body, but he was robust in spirit. “I expect you’re not here to discuss the marvels of Egypt, although I’d be happy to, if you like.”

Straight to the point—a quality I admired in a man.

He stuck out a hand, displaying the thickest fingernails I’d ever seen. “Name’s Walter. But my friends call me Butch.”

I took his hand in mine. His grip was firm, like a single squeeze could cause permanent damage. “Good to meet you, Walter.”

“Butch.”

“I understand you worked with Melody Sinclair on the movie
Bed of Bones
.”

He placed a cloth bookmark inside the page he was browsing and closed the book, setting it flat on a shelf behind him. “I wouldn’t say we worked together, but she did consult with me on a few things the way one consults with a forensics expert on a television program, I suppose.”

“What did you two talk about?”

“I provided her with information on some of the town’s history, answered a few questions, tried to make sure she had her facts straight.”

“And did she?”

He narrowed his eyes. “I can’t say. I haven’t seen it yet. She emailed me an attachment a few months ago. Couldn’t get the file to open on my computer. A message kept popping up saying something about the file being too large to download.”

If his computer was even a fraction as old as he was, I could see why. Still, I was surprised he hadn’t asked his ever-so-adept grandson for help.

“I wanted to wait and see it on the big screen, and I had tickets too,” he continued. “Miss Sinclair mailed them to me. I planned on taking my wife. Then, well, you know what happened.” He stared at me for a moment. “I’m sorry…I didn’t get your name, young lady.”

I gave it to him.

“What is it you do, Miss Monroe?”

“Find people, mostly.”

“People like Melody Sinclair?”

The man didn’t miss much.

“Are you aware she’s missing?” I asked.

“I watch the news. Shame what happened to the old cinema building, to all the poor souls inside. Glad most of them made it out alive. Hard to believe Miss Sinclair’s a suspect though.”

“Why?”

“I won’t say I’m an excellent judge of character, but she doesn’t strike me as the type who’d harm anyone.”

“Can you tell me what
Bed of Bones
was about?” I asked.

“The old silver mines.” He pressed a thick, yellow fingernail onto the top of the desk. “This place, this town right here, used to be one of the biggest money-makers in America. You familiar with the history at all?”

“Not really.”

“How much do you want to know?”

“Everything,” I said.

“You ever taken a tour of this place? I’d be glad to show you around.”

“I’d love to, but not today. Right now I need to know about the movie. If you help me out, I promise I’ll return when I can and take you up on your offer.”

He angled a crooked finger toward a chair. “You’re after the dark history then. Best sit down. You might be here awhile.”

I sat, wondering how dark such an exuberant place could be.

“Tragic story, really,” he began. “It all started in the fifties when two boys wandered off their grandfather’s farm. The boys’ father, Harvey, had brought the family out as a kind of vacation while he negotiated the sale of his father’s place.”

“Where was Harvey’s father?”

“He’d passed away. Cancer, as I recall. Anyhow, the oldest boy, Willie, was a teenager at the time. Curious, just like any other kid his age, I expect. Just looking for a little adventure. Decided to take his younger brother, Leonard, along for a walk around the place. It was a bad idea, which Willie didn’t realize at the time. The land surrounding the family farm was littered with mines, which was exactly why their mother had warned them not to go beyond the gate surrounding the property.”

“What threat did the mines pose to the children?” I asked. “They were no longer in use, right? Weren’t they abandoned by that time?”

He raised a brow. “So you do know a little history?”

“Some.”

I felt like the star student in class.

“The mines may have been deserted, but giant holes still remained in the ground.”

“Why weren’t they sealed?” I asked.

“It wasn’t a priority. After the stock market crashed in 1929, the mines never fully recovered. Don’t get me wrong, several attempts were made to get things running again. They spent years trying to revitalize what once had been a booming, lucrative industry, but eventually the town’s population dwindled to around a thousand or so, and the mines shut down for good.”

“You spoke of a tragedy. Did something happen to the boys?”

He cleared his throat. Not a good sign.

“Willie and Leonard discovered an open mine shaft, and, from Willie’s account of things, all Willie wanted to do was look at it. A toy Leonard was carrying fell into the opening, and, being as young and innocent as he was, he must have thought he could reach in and get it.”

I clasped a hand over my chest. “What do you mean—
reach in
?”

My stomach churned.

“Some of the mines were deep,” he said, “almost one thousand feet beneath the surface. Poor Leonard fell to his death.”

I clasped a hand over my mouth. The accidental death of an adult was painful enough. The demise of an innocent child stirred an entirely different kind of emotion. “Was his body ever recovered?”

“It was a huge undertaking, but Harvey was adamant. He wasn’t about to leave his boy down there. He wanted Leonard to have a proper burial alongside his own father.”

“It must have been devastating to lose a child in such a way,” I said.

“Willie suffered the most. I saw him once in town about a month after it happened. The two of us were about the same age at the time. He was with his parents. I knew it was him because he was the only one in town I hadn’t seen before, and the rumor about what happened had gone around.”

“I’m sure he blamed himself for what happened.”

“They all did, seemed like. Willie’s parents walked around like a couple of living corpses, like they’d lost the will to live. It was too hard for them to stay here. They took the property off the market and left town.”

“Is there anyone in the family still alive?” I asked.

“I’m not sure. I never saw Willie again. Leonard was their only other child. There’s little chance the parents would still be alive today.”

Was the story of a young boy falling down a mine shaft compelling?

Yes.

A tear-jerker?

Yes.

A full-length movie?

I didn’t see it unless Melody embellished some of the details.

“I can see why Melody Sinclair was intrigued with the story,” I said, “but in my opinion, it would be a stretch to turn it into a full-length feature.”

“Based on the boy alone, you’re right. The death of Leonard is only the beginning.”

“I don’t follow.”

His chair creaked as he leaned forward, staring into my eyes. “
Bed of Bones
isn’t about the death of the young boy, you see. Not really.”

I was more confused than ever. “What is it about?”

“Leonard’s body wasn’t all rescuers found when they reached the bottom of the mine. They found something else, a sight so grisly, so disturbing, even now it’s hard to believe it happened here.”

“What else was down there?” I asked.

“Dead bodies. Lots of them.”

CHAPTER 26

“More dead bodies?” My throat felt scratchy, dry, like it had been raked over with a fork. “How many?”

“Seven,” Butch replied.

“Miners?”

“Women, all buried next to each other in a circular pattern, legs straight, arms crossed in front of their chests.”

“Like a ritual of some kind?”

“Looked like it.”

I thought of the scripture verses, thought maybe this could have been ritualistic in nature. “If the mines were no longer being used, how long had the bodies been down there?”

“That particular shaft hadn’t been active for several years. When the bodies were discovered, all they found was skeletal remains. The ligaments and tendons had decayed, leaving several piles of bones buried in the mine bed. This suggested they’d been down there long enough for the bones to rot.”

“How do you know so much?” I asked.

He winked. “It’s my job to know the history of this town, Miss Monroe. Both the good and the bad. It’s a rarity to come across something I don’t know.”

He said this with pride.

“What can you tell me about the way they died?” I asked.

“It was assumed the women were alive when they entered the mine shaft.”

“How do you know? Were they able to determine cause of death?”

“All of them had a single bullet wound to the head, shot at close range with a Colt SAA .45.”

“Couldn’t they have been shot above ground?”

“Five out of seven shell casings were found in close proximity to the bodies.”

“Are you saying the killer lined them up next to each other and shot them, firing-squad style?” I asked.

“A few of the women were matched through dental records. This enabled investigators to create a timeline on how the murders evolved based on the dates the identified women went missing. Some disappeared months apart from each other. Detective Hurtwick, a man in his early thirties, was the lead investigator at the time. It was his first big case. He believed the killer shot and killed his victims within a few days of their abductions. The forensic examiner concurred with this logic. To suggest otherwise meant the killer would have had to keep them alive for months at a time while he perfected his group of seven.”

“The women…did they have anything in common—age, hair color, profession?” I asked. “Did they know one another?”

“No. They were as different and varied as a group of women could be. That’s what made it so confusing.”

“You said bones were found.”

“Like they were on display, yes. Although, in my opinion the killer didn’t seem to think the remains would ever be unearthed. I believe he returned to the scene of the crime, time and time again, treating the place like his own private cemetery, maybe even thinking he’d created a holy sanctuary of some kind.”

“Why would anyone think it was a holy sanctuary?” I asked.

“Behind each victim was a post, a cross made out of pieces of wood.”

“Grave markers? Was anything written on them?”

“They all had words carved into the wood.”

“Words like the women’s names?”

He shook his head. “Sins.”

Sins.

“Did they happen to be scriptural references?”

I couldn’t imagine anyone, no matter how crazy, taking the time to carve out an entire passage. He shifted in his chair. I had touched on something.

“Most of them were one to three words long: proud, lying tongue, shedder of blood, wicked, mischievous, false witness, soweth discord.”

“Seven sins for seven ladies,” I said. “Why seven? Why stop there?”

I said this knowing once the vast majority of serial killers had the taste of death in their mouths, it was almost impossible to get it out. Most increased their kills, both in number and frequency; they didn’t lessen them. To stop all together took a discipline few possessed.

He turned, extended a hand to a shelf and grabbed a worn, brown, faded copy of the Bible. He opened it to chapter six of Proverbs and handed it to me. “Read verses sixteen through nineteen aloud please.”

My heart raced. With a great deal of reluctance, I accepted the book, reading its contents aloud. “These six things doth the Lord hate: yea, seven
are
an abomination unto to him: A proud look, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood. An heart that deviseth wicked imaginations, feet that be swift in running to mischief, a false witness that speaketh lies, and he that soweth discord among brethren.”

Somewhere in the middle of reading, my hands began to perspire. I thought of the scripture the killer sent to Melody. It fit perfectly with a false witness speaking lies. I thought of Brynn. Hands that shed innocent blood. And as for the actress, Victoria Broderick, she could have easily been any of the rest. What had they done to deserve the sentence they were about to receive? Now I had something far greater than a multitude of abductions to fear. I feared the women’s imminent deaths.