Deep Freeze (4 page)

“No.”

“I can’t be seen in this…wreck,” she said, motioning to the truck’s dented fender.

“Sure you can.”

“But—”

“Keep complaining and I guarantee you, it’ll soon be yours.”

“Oh God!” Cassie’s face was a mask of sheer horror.

“Get in.
Now.”
Jenna was through with complaining teenagers. It was bad enough that Cassie was lobbying hard for her own set of wheels, but that she somehow thought she needed to drive a BMW or sporty Mercedes or the like really bugged Jenna. All those years of privilege in L.A. hadn’t worn off. She climbed behind the wheel, inserted the key, and the truck roared to life on the first try. “Thank you, God,” she said as her girls, subdued, squeezed in beside her and she started down the long lane leading out of her fifty acres.

Finally they were on the road, icy though it was.

Allie played with the radio, and between bouts of static finally found a station that she liked and Jenna could stand while Cassie groused about the weather, noting that she’d seen on the Internet that the temperature in L.A. was supposed to reach eighty-two degrees today.
Perfect
, Jenna thought sarcastically, and attempted to ignore her daughter’s bad mood. She only hoped the last few hours weren’t a precursor of things to come. But that was ridiculous, wasn’t it? she silently asked herself as she glanced in her rearview mirror and saw her own worried green eyes.

What else could go wrong?

Another glance in the mirror and she had her answer.

Red and blue lights were flashing as a cop vehicle roared up behind her truck. She eased off the road, expecting him to fly by.

No such luck.

“What’s going on?” Cassie demanded, and both girls swivelled their heads to look through the dirty back window. “Oh, shi—shoot!”

“Watch it!” Jenna warned, but her eyes were focused on the side-view mirror where she could see what was happening behind her. It wasn’t good.

An SUV from the sheriff’s department followed her onto the shoulder. A tall, broad-shouldered man in county-issued jacket and hat stretched out of his vehicle. Long legs moving swiftly, harsh expression fixed on her truck, a few flakes of snow catching in his thick moustache.

All business.

“It’s that sheriff,” Cassie whispered. “The one on the news.”

“Our lucky day,” Jenna said under her breath. Cassie was spot-on. Sheriff Carter himself was striding up to her pickup. The morning was going to hell in a handbasket at breakneck speed.

“Was I speeding?” the woman asked as she rolled down her window. Carter recognized her in a second. Jenna Hughes. Falls Crossing’s most famous citizen. Fresh out of Hollywood and squeezed into an ancient farm truck with bald tires, a few dents, and brake lights that weren’t working. Sometime back, he’d heard she’d bought the old McReedy place and he’d seen her from a distance a few times, but they’d never met. Until today. Helluva way to introduce himself to a woman whose beauty was legendary, and, from what he could see of her, accurate. Her face was small, knotted now in concern, and she gazed at him with the famous green eyes that he’d seen in half a dozen of her films.

“No, speeding’s not the problem,” he said. “Your brake lights aren’t working.”

She winced. “Great,” she muttered.

“Oh, God.” This from the girl seated on the far side of the truck, a teenager whose features were a near match to Jenna’s. Daughter number one, he guessed, while the kid in the middle of the bench seat was younger, with wild reddish hair poking out of her stocking cap and a mutt of a dog on the floor at her feet. The dog growled and was shushed quickly.

“Can I see your license and registration, please?”

“Of course.” Jenna fumbled in her purse, then the glove compartment that opened with a creak. “I’m sorry about this, Officer. I usually don’t drive this truck, but my Jeep wouldn’t start this morning and I had to get the girls to school and—”

“Mom! He doesn’t want to hear your life story,” the teenager cut in. She slid Carter a dark, surreptitious glance, then stared pointedly out the passenger-side window as if the frozen roadside sludge and snow were fascinating.

“I was just explaining,” Jenna said, and managed a smile that, he supposed, was meant to melt his bad attitude. It didn’t. Not when he had a decomposed, unidentified dead woman dumped in his jurisdiction. “This must be it,” she said, pulling out a dusty envelope.

“I assume you have proof of insurance.”

“It should be in here, too.” She handed him the packet and stole a peek at her watch, reminding him that she was in a hurry.

“Look, I don’t think you want to do this,” she said.

He skewered her with a look.

“I mean, we both have better things to do.”

Pampered princess. Probably never had a ticket in her life. Yeah, I have a lot better things to do than to freeze my butt off here and listen to you try to talk your way out of a ticket you damned well deserve.
“This will just take a few minutes,” he said, and was rewarded with a bored sigh from the far side of the truck.

“Good, because the girls are already late.”

“They won’t be the only ones,” he said.

“Oh.” Again the well-practiced, sexy Hollywood grin. As if she knew she could turn a man’s head and probably change his mind, a subtle attempt to get her way. Her ploy had probably worked more times than not, but this wasn’t Jenna Hughes’s lucky day. Not when Carter was in a foul mood already.

He took the information to his vehicle, checked it, and started to write out a warning, then caught himself up short. The woman deserved a citation. No doubt she was used to privilege, to getting people to do her bidding, including starstruck officers to let her off easy. Well, this wasn’t L.A., and he didn’t give a damn who she was.

Even in the heated Blazer, his fingers were half frozen as he scribbled out the citation and heard the crackle of his radio barely audible over the howl of the wind. Man, it was blowing today. A few vehicles, seeing his lights flashing, braked quickly as they passed. Cowards. More afraid of getting ticketed than of being safe or legal.

Angry at the world, he tore off the citation and climbed out of his rig. As he approached through the blowing snow, he noticed Jenna Hughes’s famous eyes watching him in the truck’s side-view mirror. Lord, she was beautiful. Drop-dead gorgeous. Not that it mattered. This morning, on his watch, she was just Jane Citizen-With-Bad-Taillights.

“Here ya go, Ms. Hughes,” he stated when she rolled down the window again and he handed her the citation. “You can go to court and they’ll most likely reduce the fine. Meanwhile, get those taillights fixed pronto—and I mean while you’re in town today. They’re a hazard.”

“I’ll try,” she said, her voice clipped, her full lips pinched at the corners.

So she was angry. Big deal. “Try real hard,” he advised with a well-practiced, humorless grin. “Drive safely, ma’am.”

She sent him a stare that had probably cut weaker men to the quick. He didn’t give a damn what she thought. Turning, he fought the wind back to his Blazer. As he climbed inside, he watched as Jenna “Hollywood” Hughes eased onto the road, using her turn signal, careful to be the considerate, law-abiding driver.

They all turned into perfect drivers once they’d gotten spanked with a ticket. He figured her new cautiousness would last all of ten minutes.

Hey, she wasn’t speeding. Wasn’t driving erratically. She just had the bad luck to have her taillights out. Give the lady a break.

Carter would. As much of a break as he’d give anyone else. No more, no less. He slid into his vehicle, turned off the overhead lights, and followed her into town.

He sat in the Canyon Café, in a corner booth near the window, and cast a quick look over the top of the half-curtains. Through the ice-glazed panes, he caught a glimpse of the old church, a wreck of a building that had seen better days and several renovations, the most current being a local theater—The Columbia Theater in the Gorge—a pretentious name if he’d ever heard one.

His hot tea came and he poured it over a glass of ice, listening to the cubes crack, noticing how they melted as the amber liquid cooled quickly. There were few patrons this morning, only a few old coots chatting about the weather. Hash browns and bacon sizzled on a grill in the kitchen, country music was barely audible, and the waitress slipped from the tables to the booths and counter. Some of the regulars were huddled over papers or deep in discussion. He waved at a few, smiled up at the waitress, and kept one eye on the theater.

Stirring his tea, he stared through the slit in the lower curtains while pretending to pore over the sports page. He tried to appear calm but his nerve ends were strung tight as piano wire. Energized by the cold front. Enraged by the placard in front of the theater announcing the Christmas play.

It’s a Wonderful Life.

Like hell.

He remembered seeing the movie in black and white. He’d shuddered at the scene where George Bailey’s brother had fallen through the ice and had imagined all too vividly what the boy had felt…cold, cold water swirling, pulling him down, freezing his lungs as he gulped the frigid water, the entire world swimming, his heart pounding…the black terror that struck…

“Are you okay?”

His head snapped up and he looked at the waitress, a girl of about eighteen who held a carafe of coffee in one hand and a pitcher of ice water in the other.

Noticing the cubes floating in the water, chilling it, he managed a smile. “Yes…fine. Just not happy that the Trail Blazers lost again.”

“Nobody is. Aside from the weather, it’s all the talk this morning.” She seemed mollified, managed a wide grin that showed off her braces. “More water or tea?”

“I’m fine.” To prove it, he lifted his glass and took a long swallow.

Satisfied that her customer was content, she slid to the next table.

You idiot!
he silently admonished.
Don’t blow this! Not now. Be patient. Everything’s working fine. Perfectly.

Calming himself, he slowly picked up the paper and turned the page; then, through the slit in the café curtains, caught the image of an old, beat-up truck just outside the window. His heart jolted as he hazarded a closer look and recognized Jenna Hughes at the wheel.

It was fate. He was sure of it. She’d driven up solely to remind him of his purpose.

He trembled.

She was so close.

His breathing became shallow.

Her pickup was paused at a stoplight and she was looking straight ahead…no, she checked the rearview mirror, touched the corner of her perfect mouth as if to brush off a bit of errant lipstick, then focused on the street again.

His insides quivered and he licked the edge of his mouth, silently hoping that she would turn in his direction so he could get a glimpse of her incredible face. Her profile was regal. Classic. But he wanted desperately to stare into her eyes.

It was not to be.

Instead, she turned her head in the opposite direction, giving him a brief view of glossy black hair as she drove through the intersection. Immediately after the turn, she flipped on her blinker and rolled into the theater’s parking lot.

He smiled inwardly, feeling a deep satisfaction.

He knew the remodeled church as well as he did his own home. As well as he knew hers.

His pulse was thrumming in his ears now…he hadn’t expected to see her and usually he planned everything. But this…this sighting was so close it had to be fate. Kismet.

As she stepped out of the cab of the truck, she paused and looked up the street.

He couldn’t resist. He left more than enough money on the counter, hurried outside, and bundled against the wind, walked toward the theater.

In an alley across the street, he stood in the shadow of a huge fir tree and watched her climb the steps to the double doors. She pulled one open. As she did, before she disappeared inside, he blew her a kiss.

“It won’t be long,” he promised, his voice the barest of whispers in the rush of icy wind.

“So what have we got?” Carter asked BJ as she settled into the side chair near his desk. He was just taking off his jacket and hadn’t quite shaken off the encounter with Jenna Hughes, which bothered the hell out of him. It wasn’t as if he didn’t have more important things to think about.

“What have we got?” BJ repeated, shaking her head. “Not enough.” BJ’s hair was short and brown, shot with streaks of red. Her facial features were on the small side, except for her eyes, which were large, dark brown, and didn’t miss much. “The M.E. is still working on Jane Doe. We’re not certain of when Jane Doe died, but the M.E. thinks it’s probably within the year—possibly last spring, because of the decay of the body, the insect larvae found around it, the fact that animals had dragged body parts away. You’ll get a full report as soon as one’s available.”

Carter frowned and tapped the eraser end of his pencil on his cluttered desk. “I talked to Missing Persons in Salem. Nothing yet, but they’re still working on trying to match Jane physically to someone who’s been reported missing in the last couple of years.”

“Just statewide?”

“More. West Coast for starters, and I’ve talked to the local jurisdictions, as well. Just to double-check. So far, nada.” Carter fiddled with his pencil, wiggling it between his fingers, a nervous habit he’d taken up right after he quit smoking. It had worked for him except for that black time surrounding Carolyn’s death. From the corner of his eye, he saw the last remaining picture he’d kept of her in the office, propped in a rosewood frame, a snapshot he’d taken of her on their last trip to the coast. “What about cause of death?”

“Unknown at this time, but the M.E.’s working on it.”

“And the pink stuff on her hair?”

“I asked about that and they’re still analyzing it.” Her lips folded over her teeth as they often did when she was mentally working through some kind of puzzle. “It’s probably some kind of synthetic, sort of like modeling clay made out of some rubbery substance. Kind of like…Silly String or Play-Doh, but not really…”

“Plastic?”

“I don’t even think they can go that far. But the lab’s working on it.”

“And?” he encouraged, seeing her eyebrows knit.

“And?” she repeated.

“And you look like you have something more to say.”

“Nothing concrete, but they found more of that pink stuff in the log. Quite a bit of it. They’re trying to reconstruct the scene.”

“So she had it on her body?”

“Maybe, but more likely
in
her body. The stuff was compacted, solid, in bigger chunks rather than a little bit that would have been smeared on her. They think it was either in her lungs or her stomach.”

“She
ingested
it?”

“Maybe. Possibly drowned in it. That pink gunk, whatever it is, might well be the cause of death.”

“Drowned in it?” His jaw clenched. He rubbed his moustache thoughtfully. “It was liquid?”

“I don’t know. We’ll have to wait for the report.”

“Wait a minute. This is sounding like something that would be aired on the Sci-Fi channel. Why would anyone kill a person with pink crud?”

“We don’t officially know it’s a homicide yet.”

He leveled a gaze at her. “You think suicide? By inhaling pink goo? And ending up at the top of a mountain in a hollowed-out log? What kind of weird ritual is that?”

“I’m just trying to stay rational.”

“Forget rational. Because it’s not. This isn’t an accident, either. It’s a homicide, I’m sure of it. But why all the mess? Why not just shoot the victim, or choke her, or slit her throat?”

“Who knows?” She lifted her shoulder. “If your theory’s on the money, then we’ve got a psycho running loose, or maybe we had one who was just passing through last winter. He did his business, either around here or somewhere else, decided to dump the body, and took off. It’s been a while since this girl was killed. Our guy could have moved on.”

Carter wondered, his eyes narrowing. He looked through his window and saw the ominous gray skies surrounding this small town nestled deep in the foothills of the Cascade Mountains. It was isolated; the only serious connection to the rest of civilization was I-84, the interstate freeway that ran parallel to the Columbia River at this point on the map. He scanned the timber-covered ridges and thought, not for the first time, that the steep cliffs and dark forests surrounding Falls Crossing were the perfect place for a wanted man to hide. But a psychopath? The thought set his teeth on edge.