City of the Lost (30 page)

“Suffocating?”

“Exactly. He’s there because it’s the right thing to do, and he knows she’s in pain…”

“But he could use a break?”

He nods. “I could take him something—minor trouble in town—but Beth won’t appreciate me bugging him with the trivial shit. You’re the detective on Abbygail’s case. She can’t argue with that.”

“I’ll see what I can do.”

The moment I set foot in Beth’s house, I know we should have rescued Dalton sooner. It’s not Beth herself. She’s grieving, and as a friend, Dalton wants to help. But there’s an oppressive air in the house that would indeed suffocate him. An air of inactivity, of pressure to stay in one place. Dalton might spend hours on the back deck, but his brain is busy. Here, he’s stagnant in every way, sitting in a chair, gripping the arms, like a boy at an elderly aunt’s, counting down the minutes to his escape.

When I walk in, he’s on his feet so fast I cringe with guilt. Last night, he’d tried to linger at the station. Hinted he’d appreciate a reason to stay. I should have paid more attention.

“You need something, detective?” he says, with such eagerness that it drives the guilt wedge deeper.

“I’m sure it can wait,” Beth says.

“I was just—” I begin.

“It’s late,” she says firmly. “Eric deserves time off, and whatever your question, there’s nothing he can do about it until morning.”

“Right, I … How about a drink? Both of you. Come out to the Lion and we’ll—”

“Thank you, but no.”

“I could use one,” Dalton says. “You could, too, Beth. Casey? Run back and tell Will to join us after his shift.
After.
No cutting out early.”

“Sure thing, boss,” I say, and I’m out the door before Beth can argue.

A week ago, if Dalton had told me to make Anders finish his shift, I’d have thought he was being a jerk. Now I understand it’s simply strategy. If Anders can’t head straight to the Lion with me, then Dalton has an excuse for leaving Beth’s—me drinking by myself at the Lion would be asking for trouble.

By the time I get there, he already has a table.

He’s alone, and when I say, “Beth didn’t come?” the flash of guilt in his eyes makes me regret commenting. I quickly say, “She’s probably in need of a little alone time herself.”

“Yeah. I didn’t want to leave her last night. But another night on the couch? Hell, no.” He stops and pulls a face. “That’s inconsiderate, isn’t it.”

I slide into the seat across from him. “I don’t think you’re ever inconsiderate, Eric.”

“You been drinking already, detective? I’m the designated local asshole, remember?”

“Someone has to do it. You recognize when you’re being an asshole, which means it’s not like you’re too inconsiderate to know better.”

“But if I recognize I’m being an asshole, and I still do it, doesn’t that only make me more of one?” He rubs his face. “Fuck, I’m in a mood. You might
not
want to have a drink with me.”

“Too late.” I set two beers on the table, and open one.

“You got something to ask me? About the case?”

I take a long draft of my beer and then say, “Nope.”

He chuckles. “All right. Yeah, I needed the break, so thanks. I’m just not good at the condolences shit. I want to be, but … you know.”

“I do.”

We share a look. He nods and then says, “I’m going to Dawson City tomorrow. Get away. Clear my head. I’ll be doing research, of course. You want to come with me?”

I arch my brows. “Pretty sure that’s not allowed, boss.”

“Fuck that.”

I laugh.

“No, really, fuck that,” he says, putting down his beer with a clack. “You’re my detective. We have a serial killer. You need access to the Internet to do a proper job. Fuck ’em if they don’t like it.”

“You don’t really mean that,” I say, my voice low.

He shifts in his seat. Like a chained beast, rattling its shackles. “I’ll tell Val.
Tell
her. Not ask. If she argues … we’ll see. But if you want to go … No, fuck that, too, because if I give you the option, you’ll worry that it’ll get me in trouble. You’re coming. It’ll be an overnight trip. Back for the memorial. We’ll leave at noon. We’ll spend the morning at the station, let Will sleep, make sure nothing new comes in before we go.”

“Yes, sir.”

Dalton looks up. I see Anders walking over. When he’s close enough, Dalton says, “Thought I told you not to cut out early on your shift.”

“Fuck that,” Anders says as he sits.

I glance at Dalton, and we laugh, leaving Anders looking from one to the other, saying, “What?”

“Go get another round,” Dalton says.

Dalton tells Val I’m going with him to Dawson City. She doesn’t argue. It’s only when we’re in the plane that I notice there’s something different about Dalton today. He’s shaved. To be honest, the beard scruff suits him better. Without it, he looks younger, softer, not quite himself. Hopefully, it’s a temporary going-to-town change.

When we arrive in Dawson City, the car is waiting. Apparently, there’s a local guy who stores it, and the council calls and says, “Have it at the airport at 2 p.m.” or “Pick it up from the airport at noon.” He does, no questions asked, because the Yukon is not a place where people ask questions.

Dalton doesn’t drive directly into town. He goes down several side roads and stops along one. Then he’s out of the car, grunting, “Wait here.” Ten minutes later he’s back, saying, “I’m going to drop you off at the inn. You get settled. I’ve got things to do.”

“Like call your dad on that cellphone you just picked up?”

“What?”

“I’m a detective, remember? You didn’t drive way out here to take a piss. You were getting something you keep hidden. The only thing you wouldn’t want to keep in Rockton is a secret method of communicating with the outside world. It could be a laptop, but then you wouldn’t have considered buying a tablet for online research. It’s also hard to hide a laptop. So it must be a phone. A cheap one, presumably without Internet access. Something that just lets you place calls. But who would you call? Not a former resident—that would be unsafe for both of you. It must be your parents. And you’d only call from a secret phone if you’re saying more than ‘Hey, Mom and Dad, how are you doing?’ What might you need from someone down south? A partner to help you dig through the stories in your journal. Someone you trust. Someone with detecting skills. Like the former Rockton sheriff who happens to be your father.”

Dalton shakes his head, reaches into his pocket, and tosses a cheap flip phone onto the dashboard.

“
Ding-ding
,” I say with a grin. “What do I win? There is a prize, right?”

He grumbles something about
rewarding
me by not bringing me to Dawson City with him anymore.

“You just need to get better at subterfuge,” I say. “The correct way to do it would have been to drop me off at the inn first. Then I’d have suspected you were going to talk to a local source. It was the random ten-minute walk into the forest that gave it away.”

More grumbling. Then he turns back onto the main road and says, “You got a pen and paper?”

“I’d be a lousy cop if I didn’t.”

“Write a list. Research questions you want answered. Ones we can’t cover with an Internet search.”

I pull out my pad and paper. I’m jotting down questions when he says, “That guy … The one who gave you the necklace and left that message on your phone…”

I tense. “Kurt.”

Dalton adjusts his grip on the wheel. “I couldn’t let you return his text.”

“I understood.”

“I can do it now. Through my father. Pass along a message to let this guy know you’re okay. You want that?”

“I would appreciate it. Yes.”

“Write it down, then. With contact info. Include something so he’ll know it’s really you.”

“Thank you,” I say.

He nods and turns his attention back to the road.

The first thing I do is buy a tablet for Dalton. It’s not easy because, well, let’s just say you aren’t going to find an Apple Store or Best Buy in Dawson City. Instead, I get one at a pawnshop, which is actually just a regular store that sells second-hand goods on the side.

When Dalton takes me to a place to use the tablet, it’s the polar opposite of what I’d expect from him. Or from Dawson City. It’s a coffee house. The type that offers organic, fair-trade coffee and a menu to cover gluten-free, vegetarian, vegan, and so on.

Dalton seems as at home there as he would in a country-and-western bar. The guy who can morph between the rough-mannered lawman and the conservationist outdoorsman and the coffee-shop intellectual in a blink, because he is all those things, bound together in one very complicated package.

He’s already spoken to his father. He doesn’t say much about that. It must be a decent relationship or he’d never trust him to do sensitive research. When I ask if his dad knew about people being smuggled in, Dalton’s answer is a vague mumble and shrug. I suspect he did … and turned a blind eye. Yet obviously he still does this research for Dalton. In other words, the relationship seems complicated, like Dalton himself.

What his father found throws a serious wrench into my investigation. Namely, Hastings’s true identity—one that suggests he’s
not
the guy Dalton suspected he was.

Dalton hasn’t had contact with his father since Hastings disappeared, but he’d already had him investigating—because of the rydex issue—and he’s just found the first hint of who Hastings might really be. He hasn’t had time to dig deeper on his own. So we do now.

I research the name Dalton’s father found.

“Fuck,” Dalton says, leaning back in his seat.

“Agreed.”

There on the tablet screen is a photo of one Jerome—Jerry—MacDonald. A pharmaceutical company chemist. Forty-three. Divorced. No kids. Worked at the same company since he graduated from university. It’s Jerry Hastings. Beyond any doubt.

According to Dalton, Hastings’s entry story was that he’d been selling information on a new drug to a rival company. He’d been on the verge of getting caught when he agreed to pay a half million to hang out in Rockton until he could sneak back down south and enjoy the remainder of his ill-gotten gains. In other words, he’s one of those white-collar guys whose misdeeds keep the town running. And with what I’ve found here, his story is true. He’s a traitorous little weasel. But not a killer.

I spend the next two hours glued to that tablet, going through two cappuccinos, a muffin, and a bowl of homemade granola. At one point, Dalton wanders off. This is too much indoor time for him. When he returns, I’m on the front patio. It’s chilly, but I’ll survive.

I’m researching Irene Prosser now. I’ve compiled a list of clues to her real identity. I’m rather proud of the detective work on this one. After those X-rays suggested that her battered-woman story was bullshit, I started adding questions about her into my interviews. Subtle and casual queries that yielded someone who said Irene had mentioned two stepkids and someone else who commented that Irene’s accent suggested northern Alberta.

With these tidbits, I come up with Irene Peterson. Thirty-six. From Grande Prairie, Alberta. Attended Bow Valley College in Calgary. Formerly married to a man who has two kids. There’s only a stub of a Facebook page, but I dig up a five-year-old photo. Dalton agrees it’s a match.

From what I find, Irene Peterson divorced four years ago and cleared her Facebook page shortly after that. She returned to Grande Prairie, but after a few months she moved to Edmonton. A string of addresses followed. The clues suggest a familiar story. Separate from abusive husband. Try to take refuge back home, and when that fails, flee to the city, hoping for anonymity.

I could be completely wrong. Maybe she committed a crime post-divorce that set her on the run. But I find nothing that refutes her entry story. I must accept the possibility that—like Hastings—she is exactly what she claimed to be.

Dalton says, “Which fucks up the theory that someone is hunting criminals who’ve been smuggled in.”

Yes, that had been the next logical leap. If three murderers smuggled into Rockton wound up dead, there was a strong case for vigilante justice.

“Except Abbygail didn’t fit,” I say. “Which means, while this does throw a wrench in the works, her death already did that.”

At the mention of Abbygail, a shadow passes behind his eyes, but it’s gone in a blink as he refocuses.

“We need to find a new connection,” he says.

“Or accept that there isn’t one. Accept that you’ve got the worst kind of serial killer in Rockton. One who kills for no reason other than that he likes it.”

Before dinner, I buy gifts. Fancy pencils and a sketch pad for Petra, who’d commented that Dalton’s idea of “art pencils and paper” came from a dollar store. Rose’s Lime Juice for Beth, who shares my love of tequila but prefers hers in a margarita, and the dry mix they serve at the Lion doesn’t cut it. Wool socks for Anders, who comes in from evening patrol and sticks his feet on the wood stove. I get hair colour for Diana. I’m not sure if I’ll give it to her, but I feel as if leaving her out of the gift-buying process would be a statement I’m not ready to make. I also buy two pounds of coffee, which Dalton spots when he picks me up after his own errands.

“For the station,” I say.

It’s the kind he was drinking in the café. He looks from it to the bag of presents. “You pay attention.”

“That’s kinda my job, boss. What’s on the agenda now?”

“Dinner. Then a side trip.”

The side trip takes us up a mountain outside Dawson City. When we reach the top …

“Wow,” I say, my nose practically pressed to the window. Dalton puts the window down, and it seems “practically” might be an understatement. My head falls forward as the glass disappears, and he chuckles under his breath.

The view is unbelievable. The sun has just started to drop, and there’s a sliver of pink to the west, over Dawson City, which sits like a toy town nestled along the winding river. To the east … Well, there’s nothing to the east except forest. Endless forest. Somewhere in the middle of it is Rockton, our invisible town, lost among the trees and the hills and the mountains and the lakes and the rivers.