Dead Deceiver (3 page)

“It’s my wife, goddammit,” said Rob, refusing to take direction as he leapt through the snow along the bank. He stumbled and pitched forward off balance—long enough for Lew to grab the back of his jacket and hold on. She pulled him down, hard.

“Please, Rob. I’m a police officer and this may be—” Lew looked up at the ranger watching them from the bridge, “Lorene, you come down here and stay with Mr. Beltner. Rob, you stay right where you are. You can watch from there.”

Satisfied that the two would follow her instructions, Lew yanked off her helmet. After setting it to one side on the snowbank, she stepped into the rushing water and moved forward until, crouching, she could aim her flashlight under the bridge. Edging his way along the bank behind her, Lew could hear Rob’s breath harsh in his chest.

She didn’t like what she saw and paused before asking in a soft voice, “Was your wife wearing a red jacket with a white band across the shoulders?”

“Yes …” Lew heard his boots hit the water behind her.

“Rob, stay where you are, please.”

“Is she unconscious? Did she slip off the bridge?”

Before answering, Lew felt for a pulse on the woman’s wrist—even though what she saw told her everything she needed to know. The beam of her flashlight followed the lines of the woman’s body, which was folded in on itself and wedged into the space above the water line where the wooden bridge met the stream bank.

If it hadn’t been for the slow seepage of blood from the entrance wound, Kathy Beltner might never have been found until summer. By that time the eagles and the ravens would have spirited much of her away, leaving only scraps of clothing and a skeleton for some hapless hiker to find on a lovely summer day.

On rare occasions, Lew hated her job. It is a heartbreak to ask a man to identify the woman he loves after a .357 Magnum has nearly obliterated her face.

Lew turned away from the sight of Kathy’s corpse and spoke in a low tone. Rob was silent, dumbfounded. “I … what do I do?” he asked, raising his gloved hands in a gesture of helplessness.

“Not a thing right now,” said Lew. “I have to get the coroner out here, get photos taken, get the EMTs to move her.” She reached for her cellphone, then paused as Rob turned away, shoulders drooping.

“I just don’t believe this,” he said.

“I am so sorry but it is a crime scene and I have protocols—” Lew paused. She stepped back to let him by as she said in a soft whisper, “Rob, before I make this call … would you like to take her hand and say … ‘goodbye’ or …?”

Dropping to his knees, for a long moment Rob stared at his wife’s body as if hoping, praying to see her breathe. Giving up, he pressed his cheek against the red jacket. He whispered words that Lew couldn’t hear and then he cried, his body heaving with deep, harsh sobs that Lew understood too well.

The night she cradled the dead body of her only son, knifed in a bar fight when he was still a teenager, was etched moment by moment in her memory. No matter how fast she might find the person who had stolen Kathy Beltner from her family, no matter the severity of the punishment—Rob’s pain would never be lessened. He would never forget.

Leaving Rob to softly stroke his wife’s still form, Lew waded a few feet back in the rippling stream and turned away, her cell phone out as she waited for the switchboard to patch her through to the coroner’s home. “Evelyn,” she said in brisk tone when the phone was answered, “Chief Ferris here. Put your husband on, please …
what?
When did that happen? Oh for Chrissake. All right. Will he be released tomorrow? Tell him to call in the minute he’s alert.

“Jeez Louise,” said Lew, hitting buttons on her cellphone again, “Doc? Sorry to call you like this.”

C
HAPTER
5

I
t wasn’t until two minutes after ten that Osborne considered giving up hope that Lew would return. For her to be gone this long meant the situation involving the missing skier must be serious. He certainly hoped no one had died.

Fatality or not, he knew from experience that Lew would be determined to complete her paperwork. She hated leaving it for the next day. “Paperwork just piles up, Doc, and the next thing I know I have to spend a perfectly good afternoon when I could be in my garden or fishing the Prairie with you—doing the goddamn paperwork instead.”

Osborne admired her persistence. He liked to think they shared that trait. Over his years of practicing dentistry, his perfectionism was unyielding: if the fit or feel of a gold filling or a fixed bridge were not flawless, he would work with the patient and the dental lab until it was.

He glanced at his watch for the umpteenth time: ten thirty. Okay, he gave up. But he did expect her to call and let him know she was okay. How many times had they had
that
discussion?

“You are the only woman I know who spends her working hours with a nine-millimeter weapon on her hip,” he would remind Lew even as she grimaced, “so when you are on the job—I worry.” And shortly after they had met, Officer Lewellyn Ferris had been promoted to Chief of the Loon Lake Police Department, so she was “on the job” most of the time.

“But, Doc, you realize that means calling you every day?”

“So? Works for me.” He did not add that the sound of her voice never failed to remind him that no matter his birthday, he was, at heart, a sixteen-year-old with a crush.

“Oh you!” And so they bantered, but she always called. Even if she had to wake him up.

Happy and content in spite of Lew’s absence, Osborne set about getting ready for bed. Given they were both devotees of a good night’s sleep he did not take it personally. Tucking her unfinished dinner, which he had covered with foil, into a Ziploc that would keep it moist, he set it in the refrigerator and glanced around the kitchen to be sure he had everything in order.

The dishes had been placed in the dishwasher and the frying pan washed and set in the rack to dry. The dog had been let out for the last time. Noting the near-zero temps outside and the Weather Channel’s reports of increasing winds during the night, he decided to slip on the warmest of his flannel pajamas. That done, Osborne settled into his easy chair with the hardcover edition of
Trout Madness,
which Lew had given him for his birthday. Mike curled up on the rug next to the chair and with a heavy sigh rested his chin on his front paws.

Reading Robert Travers’ essays on fly fishing the rivers and streams of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula had become his favorite way to end an evening of solitude—almost but not quite as satisfying as a warm summer night of fly fishing with that local police chief who, having stayed on top her paperwork, treasured the hours when she could set her gun aside in favor of waders.

Osborne set the book on his lap and leaned back, eyes closed, to savor the wave of contentment that swept over him so often these days. He and Lew had fallen into a comfortable pattern of three or four nights together each week. He might kid her with the option of marriage—but only as a joke those evenings she hooked three rainbows and he got none. “You can catch and release those beauties,” he would say, “but I refuse the release. I’m hooked and I’ll stay hooked. Let’s set a date.”

Lew would greet his words with a grin but she was adamant. “Now, you know better than that, Doc. You know how much I love my farm—even if it is tiny and on a tiny little lake with tiny little bluegills. Too tiny for two.”

“I know. But a guy can hope, can’t he?” Lew would catch his eye with a smile and a shrug and make no more comment.

But if it was a pattern of togetherness they both found comfortable, it was also a pattern that left him liking
himself
better. Better than he ever had during his thirty-odd years of marriage to the late Mary Lee. He thought about that often. It seemed to have taken him forever to learn that there are people in your life with whom you’re just … comfortable. They can stand next to you and not say anything, but you feel good. Just
comfortable.

He knew three people like that: His youngest daughter, Erin. Ray Pradt, his next-door neighbor who might be thirty years younger but as talented as God when it came to fishing. And Lewellyn Ferris. How lucky can a guy be who—

Before he could finish that thought, the phone shrilled.

“Doc? Sorry to call so late like this,” said Lew. He could hear a crackle through the phone line, which meant that she must be on her cell phone and at a distance from a cell tower. “I’ve got a homicide out here on the Merriman Trail and our trusty coroner is in the hospital.”

“Pecore? In the hospital?” Cordless phone in hand, Osborne jumped up from his chair and headed towards the bedroom.

“Yeah, seems he slipped on ice coming out of the Loon Lake Pub and may have a broken shoulder. Wonder how many martinis that took? How soon can you get here?”

“Give me time to get some clothes on and,” Osborne checked his watch, “I’d say twenty minutes. Do we know the victim? Need an ID?”

“Kathy Beltner, Doc. Rob Beltner’s wife. Cause of death appears to be a gunshot wound. Rob Beltner is here with myself and a ranger—no question the victim is his wife. But I can’t move the body without an official sign-off on cause of death and,” Lew sounded frustrated, “I’m hoping to heck you can rouse Ray to help with photos. I know it’s late but I’m afraid the weather could screw up any evidence if—”

“I’ll call him right now. Kathy Beltner, Lew? Gee, I hate to hear
that.
I know the family. Who on earth—”

“You know the trailhead, right, Doc?” She cut him off so fast, Osborne realized Rob Beltner must be standing nearby.

“Yes, I sure do. Will you be in the parking lot?”

“The forest service is sending someone to meet you in the lot at the trailhead. You’ll likely find the EMTs there, too, but be sure the ranger brings you and Ray in first. Don’t forget a snowmobile helmet—and, Doc, sorry about this.”

“Please, Lew, not to worry. Be there ASAP.” He set the phone down feeling both sad and elated. Sad for the stricken family, elated for himself. Working with Lew was more than just work.

C
HAPTER
6

O
sborne punched in his neighbor’s phone number. “Yeah?” said a drowsy voice followed by a thud.

Osborne waited for the phone to be rescued then said, “Ray? It’s Doc.”

“Jeez, what time is it?”

Osborne spoke fast and did not wait for a response. “So I’ll be over to pick you in about five minutes, okay?”

“Um, hold on a minute,” said Ray. Osborne could hear bedcovers rustling in the background. “Any idea how long this might take? I’m s’posed to audition for that reality show at nine in the morning. Hate to miss that.”

“Then I won’t pick you up. Meet me at the Merriman Trail trailhead with your lights and camera. That way you can shoot what Lew needs and head straight home. She wouldn’t ask you if—”

“I know,” said Ray in a resigned tone. “I can use the dough anyway. See ya out there.”

Osborne backed out of the garage and turned onto the town road. Pellets of snow flew straight into his windshield, stark white against an opaque blackness. To avoid vertigo, he forced his eyes to focus far ahead. His headlights, dimmed by spray from salt on the roads, did a poor job of illuminating the white streaked ribbon that passed for a road. Snow hiding the white lines that marked the shoulder forced him to slow down. This was no night to get stuck in a snow bank.

As he drove, he mused—as he always did when the Loon Lake Police Chief deputized him to fill in for their reliably errant coroner—on the unpredictability of life. Here he was driving to see a dead body in the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night in the middle of a snowstorm—and happy about it! Happy about lots of things.

A second career as a forensic odontologist? Learning to fly fish at his age—this old musky guy? Getting to spend time with a woman who loves the lakes and the rivers and the streams as much as he does? Who would have thought?

After all, just three years ago it was the worst of times.

Career-wise life had hit an all-time low. At his late wife’s insistence he had sold his practice and retired from a profession he loved.

It was Mary Lee who had added it all up: their investment accounts, the escalating (exponentially) value of their lake home, the money he could make from the sale of his practice (exponential again) and the fact that both daughters were grown and self-supporting. As had happened more than once during their married life, Mary Lee had made a unilateral decision: “Paul, we are well off and it is high time we,” (she really meant I), “enjoy the lifestyle I assumed we would have when I married you.”

The next thing he knew she was planning trips to Europe, lobbying for a more luxurious house, scheduling dinner parties to entertain her friends and their husbands—and checking the stock market every few hours. Her fixation on their income got so out of hand that their financial advisor fired her. Or, as she said to her friends, “resigned due to his inability to engage with his clients.”

Well aware that he was risking her ire (though he knew it would be difficult for her to fire him), Osborne had dragged his feet. Rather than read brochures on barge trips through French wine country or go along with their real estate broker to look at lake homes on the pricier Manitowish chain, he would escape in his fishing boat—leaving before breakfast and returning as late in the day as he could.

One evening when he was lingering in his favorite musky hole up on Third Lake—an attempt to hide out from yet another dinner party—he ran out of gas. His trusty Mercury 9.9 outboard just sputtered and died leaving Osborne marooned so far up the chain that it would take hours to row back.

Feeling more than a little frantic, he had waved at a passing fisherman who slowed, assessed the situation and was kind enough to offer him a tow. “Yep, I know your boat—you’re Doc Osborne, aren’t you? We’re neighbors now, did ya know? Nice to meet ya, Doc.” It was as formal an introduction as he would ever get to the man who was not only his new next-door neighbor but a man to whom Mary Lee had taken an instant dislike.